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CHAPTER 7: A BRAVE NEW BEGINNING
The morning of September the first had been a typical, seasonably warm and sunny day. Harry, Neville and Luna had opted to travel directly to the station by themselves with liberal use of glamour charms. They arrived at ten to the dot into a completely empty station and climbed aboard and found a compartment to ward and lock themselves in. The trio had been assigned to take an elf with them for personal security and Moira had chosen to follow them to school.
Harry had asked Kosher to remain behind and act as a liaison between Arcturus and various business dealings. Kosher wasn't as easily recognized unlike Maudlin, who was getting on in years himself, nor the other Black Elves with their distinctive engraved pillowcases or cultured, clipped speech. Dobby opted to trail after the headmaster, unseen. Neville's companion elf Ivy and Luna's little Skipper were not the regular house elves but fae elves, less than half a foot standing; their fae magicks were a lot more harder to detect too. They would stay with the luggage and protect their assets.
Half an hour later, Luna and Harry saw Daphne come through with her father, and a dark haired girl and her parents. Luna went out to greet Daphne and invite them to join in the secured compartment; she came back with Daphne, Tracy Davis and Blaise Zabini. With the six of them, the compartment felt fairly full to bursting. Harry and Neville offered to help the other kids set their trunks overhead. Introductions were made by Daphne, resulting in gasps from the two new faces that were quickly reigned in.
It was a strange coincidence in retrospect that the cabin was a mixture of all ranges of wizards and witches. There was a celebrity half-blood, a pseudo orphan pureblood, another witch with a reputation of being oddball , a pureblood ice princess, a half-blood beauty and a foreigner wizard of dubious parentage. None of them knew it at the moment but this group would become the face of revolution that changed the way of life in Wizarding England.
Harry, Neville and Luna had discussed revealing Harry's past in great detail over the past month. They needed to create a believable story of how their friendship started. For all anyone outside of their circle knew, Harry Potter would be officially entering the wizarding world only today. Even elders in the family concurred that the fewer people who knew the real truth of how long and how much Harry had studied magic, the greater his advantage.
So, in the end, they had decided to continue with the same charade they were using to trick Dumbledore: the fiction that Harry had always lived only with the Dursleys and his only exposure to magic so far had been Hagrid and that brief trip to Diagon Alley. Harry carried his mother's special Apartment Box shrunken in his concealed pockets; it was where all his real supplies, books and clothes and life-space was. The trunk he carried was a placebo; he was sure that it would be searched and objects within inset with tracking and control hexes.
If anyone questioned his clearly expensive and magical things, he could always say that Aunt Petunia had preferred that he owl order rather than drag them all to a magical street; she pretended he and magic didn't really exist in her house and her world, and he had always played along. Other than his trip with Hagrid, he had gone there just once with his Aunt's permission and had been allowed to withdraw money but she had always insisted he shop owl orders only.
It would not be a far stretch for anyone to assume that neither Harry nor his muggle Aunt would know what was cheap or expensive or necessary or frivolous. She would obviously have had only vague memories of growing up watching Lily as a Hogwarts Student. She would, by the virtue of her nature, have only permitted what she remembered of what Lily did and it was the extend of what she would be expected to tolerate. Aunt Cassie had planted the necessary memories in Petunia's mind to co-relate with the story and kept Vernon and Dudley completely out of the picture.
As far as they were concerned, Harry Potter was a freak, there were other freaks and they all went to school together for a school of freaks; there was absolutely no need to involve perfectly normal folks with that sort of nonsense lives.
The platform was beginning to get more and more crowded while the kids had settled into the compartment. Harry was beginning to get restless and agitated. When his fidgeting finally got to Daphne and she asked him why, he explained that far too many people were interested in gawking at him and his wretched scar. He didn't want or appreciate all that attention.
Harry, in his role as a poor orphan raised in his unwilling Aunt's household in the muggle world, and in reality, actually disliked attention; in his world, attention always meant trouble. His comment stating the same, in an irritated huff, turned the conversation away from Harry himself and towards what exactly makes the muggle world. Harry's clothes, bag, even the ziplock bag for snacks and goodies, had made the newcomers in the group rather curious about the muggle world. Harry set to explaining what he knew. It was all pure fantasy fiction to them. Unreal!
It was hard enough for them to grasp that their national hero was sitting beside them, and he knew nothing of their world. Harry Potter did not know much magic. All those books that talked of his adventures were nothing but lies. Harry Potter was as good as practically muggleborn; and it was a travesty, they all declared and hastened to explain small and significant aspects of the cultural differences they wished everyone knew. Harry, Neville and Luna in turn explained about the muggle version of magic - electricity.
While they sat explaining the unique little things that differentiated muggle world from the magical one, many people had begun to peep in through their compartment windows, until, in an irritated huff, Daphne had gotten up and snapped the curtains closed. For good measure, Blaise had set a darker variant of the colloportus spell to lock the door.
Tracy, Blaise and Daphne were curious about his life with Muggles. Although Tracy's mum was a muggle born, they had had little contact with that side of her family for decade and more now. Even though Blaise's mother did a lot of business with Muggles, in her role as a fashion designer there, Blaise himself knew far too little about that world. Daphne practically knew nothing at all. Harry, Luna and Neville had had more experience personally.
They continued to ignore the knocks at the door and discuss many things.
Around lunch time, Neville and Luna took out bottomless picnic baskets and Harry took out his stash of muggle candies and sweets. Everyone had a blast and was glad that they didn't have to wait for the sweets trolley. Hershey bars, Reece's Peanut butter cups, sour warheads, gummy bears, melody pops and sherbet straws were a big hit and Harry was glad he had stocked up a bigger stash in the storage box in the apartment cube. He in turn, relished the fresh strawberries and cream swirls that Neville and Luna had brought from their personal greenhouses. Daphne, Tracy and Blaise promised to spring for the sweets from the trolley as they munched on the picnic goodies.
The kids had abandoned the seats, spread out a tartan sheet on the floor and had settled down to chat and eat and drink. Harry commented that all they needed was the open blue sky and some green grass all round, and it really would be a marvelous picnic with friends; even the water tasted exceptionally sweet and so different from the metallic twang of the water from muggle taps and bottles.
With that comment, the talk once again shifted from gadgets and facilities to foods and goodies and from there to toys and games. There were persistent knocks a few more times at their door before they heard the Sweets Trolley Lady calling out and went to investigate. And that's where Harry met his second cousin twice removed, for the very first time.
Draco Malfoy turned out to be a disappointment and far too much like Dudley for Harry's liking. It was distasteful that the boy was brash, arrogant and a tasteless bully. And Harry grew up tackling three relentless bullies.
He noticed that Draco Malfoy began smartly enough, offering friendship but then completely ruined the good work when he went on to call Neville a Squib, Luna a nutcase and Tracy a dirty half blood. It was enough to piss the occlumency shields inside Harry's mind, although his expression never even faltered. He politely shook the boy's hand and threw a few sharp barbs right back, reminding him that Harry himself was a half blood. Harry was shrewd enough to quip that Draco reminded him of his muggle cousin; the poor boy wasn't very smart and had poor manners and graces too.
He then stood back and watched the blonde spluttering with outrage of being compared to Harry Potter's brutish bully cousin who was a muggle to boot! - It wasn't to be borne and he stomped off, making dire threats and promising to tattle off to his powerful and influential father. They were glad that he took his entourage of Pansy Parkinson, Gregory Goyle and Vincent Crabbe with him too. Harry promised himself that he wouldn't make an enemy out of the boy. Malfoys had been de-fanged but not entirely rendered harmless.
A few more children joined their rather cramped compartment; three muggleborn kids, Sally Anne Perks, Dean Thomas, Justin Finch Fletchley and Hermione Granger escorted by their rescuers Susan Bones, the new Minister's niece and Hannah Abbot, her best friend. It had become very embarrassing for the pure-bloods and traditionally raised witches and wizards that the newcomers had to see the dark side of their society so soon. Harry comforted them all, saying that this group only meant friends; here blood did not matter, only manners and personal achievements did. That seemed to inspire them all.
Daphne and Susan, determined to offer any and all support to the newbies, took Hermione and Sally-Anne under their wing and soon explained how witches and especially muggleborn witches could ensure that they wouldn't be targeted. Safety came above all else. The boys all swore to band together and keep their group safe from brutal bullies and evil homework; Dean's sly remark about homework took the edge off and they resumed conversation, laughing and more cheerful now.
This led to a discussion of what to do if they ended up in different houses; Harry and Neville were quick to point out that houses were only labels and only important if everyone let it become important; surely, there was no rule against having friends across all houses. Hermoine began to vociferously advocate Gryfindor much to everyone else's annoyance; and Harry quickly put down the tendrils of discord, firmly reminding everyone that each of them were very much entitled to independent opinions; no one was allowed to judge in their groups. Then, Hermione's smug grin withered when he pointed out he never thought that there was ever anything commendable about headstrong, blind courage of uniformed, unwise and fools.
He vehemently argued that courage isn't absence of fear; its a very popular quote he read once in a muggle book, and spoken by a muggle leader he had really admired - Nelson Mandela. To Harry, the courage that came without fears, came without understanding, respect or wisdom. It came from a place that made us reckless, Harry argued.
If Hogwarts didn't appreciate hardwork, wisdom and cunning ambition, then it wouldn't have had four houses. Courage without guile, or hard work or at least the foundations of wisdom was called foolishness of the naive, the stupid and the very very young. So far, he had only seen that extreme of this ideal being touted and celebrated. He upheld his own deceased parents as prime examply, to the now rapt audience.
He had two Gryfindors for parents who were dead and left him to fend for himself. All the house system achieved was easily divide and conquer them all through their need for conforming to some pointless idea. It angered him how easily they were willing to be divided. He declared he found such divisive classification rather polarizing for such a young age. He was sure he would not be the exact same person he was now, in seven years. He always believed that people grow and evolve; if not, education was a waste of time and resources; we all might as well go back to cave dwelling.
Everyone in the group only knew from word of mouth or written testaments, but only Hannah had an older brother now a fifth year prefect. Her brother, she admitted, hadn't taken long to get into the spirit of house rivalry and had regaled her with tales of rivalry between Slytherin and Gryfindor. He had also scared her with tales about Professor Snape's punishments and Professors Dumbledore and McGonagall's blind prejudices against anyone not Gryfindor and how the whole school thought Hufflepuffs were nerds. Harry pointed out that apparently the only place they could all safely go to, then would be Ravenclaw. It would not be a bad idea.
Harry wanted the kids who would be his friends not to be swept in the sea of mediocrity. He needed them to think for themselves and not fall into stereotypes set for them by the others. He firmly stated that he wasn't going to predict where he would end up, but wherever it would be, he would want to remain friends with each of them. Being sorted, he was determined, would not be the only way to define him.
He wasn't entirely aware, but he emitted a faintly pulsing aura of power and conviction shone bright in his face, like any evangelical worth their salt. And, albeit eleven, he was already creating a ripple by forcing his peers to look at the world around them with more maturity than they would have otherwise done. His promise of unconditional friendship soothed the uncertainties of the would be slytherins and inspired the others to offer the same.
Hermione shyly declared that this group was her very first friends ever and she would rather be expelled than forgo their friendship. With that, they all welcomed her, brash snootiness and all. They didn't get all mushy or go for group hugs, but they certainly gained new understanding and respect for each other.
When none of the others knew how they would be sorted, Harry let slip that all they had to do was wear a hat, and that Hagrid had mentioned that the hat was an enchanted relic owned by Hogwarts Founders. Besides, Harry explained that he was sure to find himself in Ravenclaw; he preferred knowledge over fights or pride or blind loyalty. He admired the courageous, the ambitious, the hardworking and loyal but he himself never saw any point it working thanklessly, or fighting pointless battles for those who won't fight for themselves, or pointless pride and scheming.
He frankly admitted that he did not trust many, and so it was harder for him to stay loyal to folks once they betrayed him. As an orphan, he had to look out for himself. He would only stay loyal to his friends, and the ideals of his parents. The rest was all window dressing of the presumptuous and the self righteous, as far as he was concerned. Besides, loyalty was a trait to be earned; the onus of maintaining it lay on the person or ideals we would give our loyalties to. It set everyone thinking.
Far too soon, they heard the announcement that station was nearing; there was a flurry of activity and everyone raced back to where they had left their trunks to get changed into the uniforms. Harry, Neville and Blaise stepped out into the corridor to pull on their school robes while the girls stayed inside. The train was slowing down and at Hogwarts Station already, as the speakers in the corridor announced in loop. The halting was loud, grating and clanky, but the announcement played above the noise in a loop.
It made Harry curious where else the train travelled to. He put that thought away for latter introspection and moved out of the train. The kids gathered into a tight group and disembarked, falling into a line behind Hagrid, who had already picked out Harry in the crowd and hailed far too loudly for his comfort. They followed him on to the rocky path into the docks and kept their group in three boats. Harry and Daphne sat with Hermione and Justin, Neville and Luna sat with Dean and Sally-Anne, while Susan, Hannah, Blaise and Tracy huddled into a boat.
There were no visible oars and the boats appeared to be held together with elbow grease and magic, but barely. On an impulse Harry sent out a small pulse of magic to reinforce and strengthen each boat and felt shocked to feel a warm nudge in return. The sensation grew in intensity as he crossed the ward lines and the magic of the castle washed over him, turbulent and choppy like ocean waves in a storm.
Oddly though, it didn't taste of fear or anger or threats or darkness. It simply felt chaotic. He remembered the lessons of Wards and Protection lines and understood immediately why it felt so chaotic; the ward stone was severely weakened and the building had a sentience and was using its own energies to shore up the leaks and plug in its own essence to stopper darkness outside its doors. He wondered who controlled the ward stones and why they hadn't done anything about it yet. Such choppiness wouldn't have developed overnight, no matter how clear it was an indication of weakness.
He ignored the gasps of wonder of his classmates when they turned the bend and took in the majesty of the castle for the very first time. He reserved the wonder for the achingly heavy feel of ancient magick that the sentient building emanated; a powerful aura of a powerful, restrained, sleeping goddess, he mused. Even in her soporific state, Hogwarts reached out to his magical core, seeking respite from the chaos she barely reigned in.
He made a mental promise to check in and see what he could do to help. Grandfather would know what to do. Meanwhile, they had already docked in, and he joined the others, queuing behind Hagrid as he led them past hefty doors into a dark, stony corridor into an antechamber of sorts. A sweeping staircase lead to even larger double doors and a tall, stately witch in severe attire peered at them through her spectacles, her lips pursed into a moue of barely suppressed mirth.
As the first years all gathered around the foot of the staircase, she introduced herself as Professor Sinistra, teacher for Astronomy, and gave them a brief overview of how the House system worked here. She spoke in warm, soothing tones even as she warned them to fall into line, as she would be leading them into the great hall.
It was where they would be led out to be sorted before they could join other senior students for Supper in their respective house tables. She did warn them that it didn't matter who stood first in the line, as they would be called to sort, in alphabetical order of their surnames. From somewhere in the back, Hannah Abbott and Euan Abercrombie gave loud groans and pushed forwards; soon enough, other kids were following their lead.
Beyond the doors was a new chapter of their lives. The next five or seven years. A place that set in stone, the foundations that would steer them all, for the rest of their extraordinary long lives. It was strangely sobering and scary thought.