The abrupt return to a magical environment forced me to wear my sunglasses. In the Muggle world everything looked like it had before I could see magic. No colored auras hovering over buildings, or veins flowing over people's skin. Muggles didn't have magical veins like wizards and witches did. It made me realize how used to the colors I'd become. They helped me gauge a person's mood. Now, being back in a magical environment, I was surrounded by so many different colors they hurt my eyes. It happened on the platform as well, but I could handle it with only three others in one compartment.

Besides new classroom material I figured getting used to the return of my magical sight would be the only hurdle I had to get over this year. Apparently I ended up having to deal with a new ferocity from the Slytherins.

I learned this when three fifth-year Slytherins caught me alone one morning. I expected them to ignore me, or maybe just sneer and call me a derisive name like usual. That was why they caught me by surprise. All three of them whipped out their wands. Ropes jumped out of one wand to tie me up. Another pointed his wand at my face, and I had no idea what effect it had. The third hit me with a spell that cause me to slide across the stone floor and slam against the wall.

I grimaced at the pain, barely noticing the Slytherin closest to me spit in my direction. "It's time you learned your place. Mudblood filth."

The three of them continued down the corridor; not once looking back at me. I stayed still, trying to absorb the encounter that lasted less than ten seconds. I don't know how long I laid on the cold floor until the shock wore off. It was at least three minutes before I finally shifted to look at my restrained body.

No amount of struggling loosened the bindings. With my arms pinned I couldn't reach for my wand. Groaning tiredly I let my head fall back against the hard stone. It hurt, but I ignored the dull pain.

With nothing much to do I thought through my options. I could stay on the floor for somebody to find, but that left me open for more humiliation, and I didn't know what happened to my face. Another option would be to get up off the floor and walk to the infirmary. That would still involve someone seeing me like this, and Madam Pomfrey would ask questions I had no desire to answer. Getting those three in trouble would only bring a short lived satisfaction, before they retaliated with something worse.

Unfortunately I couldn't get out of this alone. The only person I trusted to get me out of this was Remus. He couldn't help me because, while I was in my free period, he was in Herbology. I didn't trust anybody else in the castle except for one.

"Taffy?"

The resulting pop echoed down the corridor. The house-elf looked happy to be called, but once she saw me the happiness bled into shock. "What happen to Miss?!"

At any other time I would have smiled at the level of concern in her voice. "Just some trouble with other Slytherins. Could you help?"

Taffy reminded me of a bobble head with how hard she nodded. A simple snap of her fingers and the ropes were gone. I could finally sit up, but the look on her face told me there was another problem. "What's wrong?"

She wordlessly summoned a mirror and handed it to me. I took it cautiously and looked into its surface to see what made her so uneasy. Scrawled across my forehead in elegant script was the word "mudblood". I sighed sadly, and closed my eyes so I wouldn't have to see it. "Can you remove it?"

"Yes, Miss." A sensation of pins and needles washed over my forehead. When it went away I looked in the mirror to see the word had vanished.

With another sigh I handed back the mirror. I smiled, but it was obviously forced. "Thank you, Taffy. Don't know what I'd do without you."

My statement cause Taffy to tear up a little. It made my smile more genuine. "Go on back to the Kitchens."

The eager to please elf became as stern as Professor McGonagall. "Miss will call Taffy if she ever needs help."

"Of course," I bowed my head with a serious expression. House-elves were invaluable help.

That encounter turned out to be the first of many. A few were pretty tame, charming insults to show up on my skin or clothes. One incident had my entire body covered with their favorite insults of mudblood, filth, halfbreed. All things I heard so many times they no longer bothered me. Especially when Taffy could quickly remove their spells.

One instance went farther than necessary. It could have been worse, but since these ambushes started I became more aware of my surroundings. I saw the spell from the corner of my eye and I ducked. The cutting spell still managed to glance over my upper back.

A sharp sting went over my shoulder blades while the strap of my bag broke. Despite the sting I caught the bag so it wouldn't spill across the stone floor.

Anger shot down my spine. Whipping out my wand I pointed it at the Slytherin who attacked me. "Expelliarmus!"

My sudden retaliation surprised the fellow third-year enough to allow the spell to hit her right in the chest. She yelled in surprise, and I watched with satisfaction as my old dorm mate flew down the corridor. I laughed under my breath, and gingerly picked up my bag so I could get to Potions.

I slipped through the door just as the bell rang. The only open seat was in the back next to a Gryffindor girl. She looked none-too-happy when I took my seat. It only got worse when it turned out we would be working with our table partner to make a potion. When she told me she'd get the ingredients her tone was clipped.

The two of us worked quietly but efficiently. I ignored the stinging sensation on my shoulders. The cutting curse must have made it through my clothes to the skin. I couldn't do anything about it then, so I waited until class ended. Lunch was next, so I could go to the Kitchens and have Taffy fix me up.

The Gryffindor took our potion to the front because she didn't trust me enough not to ruin it. Why she thought I would sabotage my own grade, I didn't know.

Letting her bring up the potion meant I didn't have to go up front. While sitting in the back nobody could see my ripped clothes and maybe bleeding back. Casually reaching back as if to massage my shoulder, I felt around until my finger caught the edge of torn cloth. Grimacing at the ruined uniform I pressed into my skin, making me bite back a hiss of pain, and brought my hand forward to look at.

My fingertips had a hint of blood on them. Enough to let me know it was bleeding, but not a lot. However the amount didn't matter to a werewolf's senses. When they smell blood they search it out until they found the source.

It's why I found myself on the receiving end of Remus' stern glare. His eyes roamed my body for injuries, but he couldn't see my back from his seat at the table diagonal from ours.

I shook my head slightly; silently trying to tell him he didn't need to worry. Remus only narrowed his eyes, and I could see his nostrils flaring. He could somehow smell my blood over the potion fumes.

When the bell rang, signaling the end of class, I bolted from the room as casually as possible. The strap to my bag was still broken but I could use it to cover my back.

The kitchen was too far away for me to run without someone seeing me. As I've recently been doing in times of need I called Taffy. She popped next to me a second after I said her name.

"Quick, Taffy, the Kitchens."

I reached out for her to take my hand. It took her a second to figure out my short demand, but once she did she clapped our hands together and popped us away.

Once we arrived in the Kitchen I fell to the ground. Her way of travel was what I imagined the feeling of getting flushed down a toilet would feel like. A weird swirling, sucking sensation that didn't agree with my balance or stomach.

I swallowed a few times to keep myself from throwing up on the stone floor. Taffy looked worried, so I smiled to try and reassure her. "I'm okay, Taffy, but could you look at something for me?"

"Of course, Miss."

Unbuttoning my robe and shirt I pulled them both off then undid my tie. "Please see if you can heal my back." I turned around so she could see the wound. With my clothes in my lap I used Reparo to fix the holes.

She 'tsk'ed when she caught sight of the cut. "Miss needs to defend herself."

I felt her thin fingers carefully prod at the edges. "I did this time. Unfortunately this happened before I retaliated."

Taffy said nothing in response, and I felt a tingle go across my right shoulder blade to my spine. When it stopped I put on my shirt and started buttoning it up. "Thank you, again, for helping me."

"Taffy be more than happy to help Miss King. Me thinks Miss should get other help."

I sighed. "I could. I don't know what good a teacher would do, though. Involving a student would put them in danger of being hurt, too."

"Miss could ask her wolf friend." Taffy suggested. "Sir could eat them for you."

Her comment made me laugh. My smile stretched widely across my face. "That's one idea. Remus might not like it though."

She seemed sad her idea wouldn't work. Even then the thought of Remus' face if he heard the suggestion glued my smile to my lips.

Shrugging on my robe I gave one last thanks to Taffy before leaving the Kitchens. There were no more attacks on me for the rest of the day. It put me on edge for what the Slytherins might do in retaliation for fighting back.

I should have realized the Slytherins wouldn't be my only problem that day. Remus had become fairly protective of me after the day he caught me with the cut on my arm. I asked him why once, and he told me his wolf considered me pack. That admission made me feel like I was part of his family. Somewhere I truly belonged.

I remembered that feeling when Remus sat at my table in the library. He had a stern expression on his face. "Why were you bleeding?"

Licking my lips thoughtfully, I wondered how I could possibly explain without making him angry. I hadn't told him yet because I didn't want him worrying about me. Those familial feelings decided to rear up, and I couldn't continue hiding it. "You can't get angry."

His eyebrows rose. "If you have to say that there's a good chance I will be."

I huffed. "Well, do your best to refrain." Tilting my head, I contemplated the best way to tell Remus what's been happening over the last few weeks. "The other Slytherins have been… targeting me, whenever I'm alone."

Remus' eyes darkened with the beginnings of anger. "Targeting you how?"

Sighing heavily I set aside my Arithmancy homework. Now my favorite subject since it reminded me of Muggle math. "They might tie me up or stick me to walls while spelling degrading comments onto my clothes or skin." My stare sharpened. "Similar to the Marauders idea of 'pranks'."

He flinched at the last comment but ignored it to focus on the current issue at hand. "But something was different."

"On my way to potions an old dorm-mate used a cutting curse. I saw it coming so I ducked, but it still managed to graze my shoulder." I could tell my explanation was making him angry by how fast the magic was traveling throughout his body. "I couldn't fix it myself, so I asked Taffy to heal me."

To anybody else Remus' eyes would look a little more gold, but to me his chocolate colored magic brightened to make his entire body glow. "How long has this been going on?"

I answered cautiously. "Since the beginning of the school year."

Immediately his lips pulled back in a vicious snarl and the yellow splotch on his magic started roiling. His wolf wasn't happy finding out people were hurting a member of his pack.

"Remus," I hissed, "calm down before you start growing fur."

My reference to his werewolf side helped him calm down, but only a little. "Rosabell, why don't you tell someone about this?"

I looked at him innocently. "I just told you, didn't I?"

He gave me a tired look. "You know that's not what I meant."

"Remus," I sighed and looked him in the eye, "telling a teacher wouldn't help. Today I actually retaliated, and who knows what effect that will have."

The anger melted away to be replaced with sadness. "Why did the Hat put you in Slytherin? It only causes you pain."

"Because in Slytherin I can expect it. Accept it, even. You know I never talked before first year, and even now I still don't talk during class. In first year, no matter where I went, I would have been treated differently for my preferred silence. It's preparing me for what I'll have to deal with in the real world."

"I accepted your silence."

I smiled widely. "You did, and I thank you for that. You're my only friend in this life Remus."

My statement only made him even more sad. "Couldn't you make more friends?"

"With who? Nobody trusts a Slytherin. You only stayed friends with me because you met me before we were sorted. Even now it's dangerous for you to be near me because your Marauder friends are the epitome of Slytherin haters."

Remus groaned at that. "Don't remind me."

I chuckled and started putting away my homework. Curfew was soon, and we both had to get to the seventh floor. "You better hurry. If they find us together who knows what will happen."

He grabbed his bag and walked out of the library with me. "I wouldn't let them hurt you."

"Maybe not, but they could humiliate me. At least the Slytherins attack me when nobody will see it."

"If nobody sees you then how do you undo everything?" Remus looked at me curiously.

"Taffy," I replied simply.

The rest of our walk was made in companionable silence. A few students passed, giving us odd looks when they noticed Remus, an infamous Marauder, with me, a Slytherin. No comments were made so we ignored them.

On our walk we came across the wall hiding the door to the Room of Requirement. When I stopped walking Remus kept going, until he noticed I was no longer next to him. He turned around and stared at me confusedly. "Rosabell?"

I smiled at him. "I'll see you tomorrow, Remus."

Remus nodded, figuring I would head back down to the Slytherin dorms. "Okay. Be careful down there, would you? I don't know how much more can take before the wolf decides to attack every Slytherin it finds."

"Would that really be a bad thing?"

We both grinned at each other, imagining the carnage that would take place in Slytherin's dorms.

Remus eventually nodded, saying a quick goodnight before moving on down the hall towards Gryffindor tower. I waited, using my newly enhanced hearing to listen to his footsteps. When I could no longer hear him, and I was sure he could no longer hear me, I paced in front of the blank wall and waited for the door to appear. I trusted Remus with a lot, but this was one secret I needed to keep for myself.

Edited: 1/22/2019