Abby sat on her behind as the compartment door forcibly shut in front of her. When she had woken up that morning, she had not expected to have to be forced out of a compartment against her will. But once she had been around Black for a while, she couldn't keep her thoughts in check anymore.
Abby thought back to when her father had first told her the story of what happened to her grandparents. Four people were responsible for why she would never get to know grandma Alice or grandpa Frank. And one of those people responsible shared the same exact name as the girl who sat in the compartment in front of her.
What gave that girl the right to carry the name of that murderer with pride. What right did she have to parade around the train as if she owned it when it was her family that had almost destroyed their world.
She remembered the stories of Bellatrix Lestrange in the second war. How she gave those scars to Aunt Hermione, how she chased down countless muggleborn for the sole crime of being born, and how she tortured innocents to insanity for fun. The story of her being defeated had always been a positive story. That story had been told in celebration of the evil being defeated, hand in hand with the defeat of Voldemort himself. And now, her descendant was here invoking that evil with her name.
She couldn't hide behind the guise of 'Violet'. Abby knew her real name, no matter how much the girl tried to lull her into a false sense of security.
"Get out of the way!" a boy shouted near her. Abby looked up to see that a boy was trying to pass her in the hallway, something that he couldn't do because she was sprawled across it. With a blush on her face, she quickly got out of the way and started to walk off.
She was still fuming about Violet so she went into the bathroom to get a hold of her emotions. She walked down the train, trying to find where the bathroom was. She passed students loudly reuniting with each other.
Soon, she found a bathroom and closed the door behind and locked it. Her head bonked against the door softly. Seeing Violet today was waking painful memories about her grandparents.
Abby walked into the room holding a bouquet of flowers. It had been a while since her father had brought her and her siblings for a visit. The last time that they had come, her grandfather had had an episode after being exposed to so many people at once. The healers had advised them that they would be limited in the amount of people that would be able to visit at any one point in time.
The room that they lived in had not changed since the last time that she had come in. Two moderately sized beds were on one side of the room surrounded by low profile medical equipment and large windows lit the room with soft and relaxing natural light. There were a few soft chairs on the other side of the room with curious objects strewn about them.
Abby sadly noticed that there were no hard edges someone could hurt themselves on and the floor had cushioning charms.
On the beds lay Alice and Frank Longbottom. People who had once been heroic aurors and had battled Voldemort himself, now lay there after being tortured into insanity. Frank, her grandfather, was laying on his back and staring at the ceiling for long stretches of time without blinking. Alice, her grandmother, had turned her head in the vague direction of the door, but her line of sight didn't quite catch who it was who had walked into the room.
Her father walked over to the soft chairs on the other side of the room and carried one over so he could sit in the space between their two beds. Today was his birthday and he had only brought Abby with him. Every year he would come to visit them on his birthday. Every year he would come to visit him on Christmas. Every year he would come to visit them on the day of the Final Battle. And every year he would visit them on October 31st. He, of course, visited more than that, but the occasions weren't to the point of formal tradition so much as whenever he felt the desire to see them.
Abby watched as he made conversation with them. Watching him talk to them like this always made Abby feel upset. This was the only way that Neville had been able to interact with them for the entirety of his life. He never had the chance to talk to his parents about something or to go to them for any kind of advice. Abby's heart burned painfully.
Alice turned towards the general direction that Neville was sitting and reached out with a wrapper of a hard candy. Neville graciously accepted it as if it was like getting his wand for the first time all over again. Abby had seen the collection of candy wrappers that Neville kept in his room. It was filled with hundreds of wrappers and other pieces of paper that had found its way into Alice's hands over the years that she had thoughtlessly given to him.
Abby walked over to Neville and curled up against his chest as he talked about everything that had been going on in his life since the last time that he had visited. Getting ready for the new school year. Some interesting new plants that he was growing. Some stories about Heather, Nick, and August. Old friends from his Hogwarts days and what they were up to. And after what felt like no time at all, it was time for them to leave again.
Neville stood up and started to take the chair away from them, but Frank started to freak out. He was gasping painfully as his body was going through painful spasms. Abby remembered in the back of her mind about the healers talking about flashbacks to when they had been tortured. Their bodies would flashback to the damage put upon them if any sufficiently unsettling stimulus was given to them.
Frank was flailing uncaringly against the bed as he let out a pained moan that sounded like a dying animal. Soon after, Alice started to feel the effects of the flashback as well, seemingly caused by her husband's flashback.
Abby watched in horror as they flailed against the bed, unable to do anything to help.
She blinked her eyes heavily to distract her from the unpleasant memory.
That was the last time that she had been able to visit them. Neville's visits had to stop lessening in frequency after that. They began to react negatively whenever he would start to leave them. Apparently losing the pleasant sound of their son talking to them about his life was enough to classify as an unpleasant stimulus for the flashbacks to be triggered.
Tears were beginning to come to her eyes unbidden and she couldn't stop them from falling down her cheeks. The thoughts of missed experiences with her grandparents was clouding her from making rational choices. And then she would remember the face of Violet Black. Looking almost identical to the face of Belatrix Lestrange that they could be mistaken for each other. The anger coursed through her again.
She slammed her fist down onto the sink in front of her in rage.
She hurt her family in a way that they could never recover from. In a way that they hadn't recovered from in over 30 years. 30 years of them suffering from flashbacks that caused unimaginable pain in them. Tortured into insanity. The fire of rage inside her lit into an inferno.
As she stared into the mirror she saw her irises change from amber to a bright red. She saw the wisps of flames start to swirl around her. She felt her rage fuelling the flames and caused them to grow. She watched in horror as the flames lashed out at the stall behind her, leaving large scorch marks all over it.
All of the rage that had been growing inside of her immediately died out as she watched in horror of the damage she had caused. She tried to clamp down on the magic that was fuelling the flames as much as she could. She turned around and started to pat down the flames that were still lit on the toilet stall. The heat of the flames did no damage to her.
She got the flames to go out after a minute of patting them down, but black spots marred the divider that she couldn't just brush off with her hand. With a huff she turned away and looked back at the mirror. With a large pang of shame, she realized that her irises were still a vivid shade of red.
She knew the flames were not natural for a witch.
The flames had always tormented her. For years she had tried to keep the flames from everyone that she knew. The flames were made to hurt and she tried desperately as hard as she could so that she was not someone who hurt others. She hated people who hurt others with a passion. People like the people who hurt her grandparents. Parents like the people who hurt her dad.
Abby sighed sadly as she thought back to the day when she had seen her father after the burning. Her father had served as a part-time auror during the summer months when he wasn't teaching. That had only stopped about 5 or so years ago, when he ran into one of the last Death Eaters who had escaped arrest. There were only about three notable enough to be remembered, and even then they were all low ranking grunts in the organisation, but they were still wizards that were dangerous.
Her father had known that, but he didn't expect that the Death Eater would have rather died than be taken into custody. He had summoned a magical inferno, Fiendfyre, in a small and enclosed room with only himself and her father.
The Death Eater had not made it out, and her father made it out only barely with life threatening burns all over his body. The healers had healed him as much as possible, but there were still scars there if you knew to look for them. As well as some of the pain of fiendfyre that could almost never be healed.
Another form of permanent harm done against her family by people championing blood supremacy. And the day after he had come home, the flames had started.
It was small and inconsequential things at first, a small wisp appearing whenever August had done something to annoy her, coils framing her arms when she was eating something that was exceptionally delicious, the heat of shame when she did something she wasn't supposed to do becoming actual heat around her.
And the fire that burnt inside of her. That fire that she always felt thrumming away, begging to be let out. It was desperate and it was dangerous. It wanted to be let out, and she knew that it wanted to destroy.
That is what fire did. It destroyed. Like it almost destroyed her father. She knew that she could never let the fire out. She knew it would destroy and she couldn't let herself hurt others. Like Bellatrix hurt her grandparents. Like her father was hurt.
She hated it. She hated herself for having the fire inside of her, and she hated herself everytime that she wanted nothing more than to just let the fire burn away all of her issues. She sighed in shame as the color of her eyes returned to their normal amber.
Her arms rested heavily on the sink as she stared deep at herself for a long moment, thinking about the harm that her flames could do if she ever let herself let go control of them. Flashes of her father's scars passed her by.
After a long moment in the bathroom collecting herself, she left and started to walk up the hallway. There were less people walking up and down the train now, most of them having found the people that they were looking for and having settled down in their respective compartments, so she could walk through without any difficulty.
She stopped a few times to say hi to people that she recognized. Having been raised in the bar that most people used as the floo entrance to Diagon Alley meant that she got to know many people throughout the years. Added to that the network of people who had been a part of Dumbledore's Army, she would never be in desperate need of acquaintances.
She waved to Louis and Fred Weasley who were entertaining a room of their friends by working on some kind of contraption. After seeing them, she got the idea that she should go looking for Albus and Rose because she knew that they were going to be on here somewhere as well. And Albus's cousin as well. Hadn't she been introduced to her when they all came to the Alley?
Abby continued on her way through the compartments, greeting those she recognized with a nod or a friendly wave, until she saw Rose sitting in a compartment with only another boy.
That was very weird.
Abby didn't recognize who the boy was. She couldn't remember ever seeing him in the Alley, and she definitely had never seen him interacting with Rose. Rose's family tended to keep to themselves most of the time. Her parents were both immediately recognizable for their roles as the right hand man and woman to Harry Potter. That, in addition to everything that they had accomplished in the time after the war, tended to give them a very large reputation that they didn't always enjoy welling in. Although Ron was never opposed to being recognized for his efforts if they weren't too annoying about it.
So to say that seeing the boy was strange was an understatement. To Abby's knowledge, Rose didn't even know anyone in their year except for her and Albus.
Abby pulled the compartment door open to talk to Rose, and the two looked up at her exactly the same time. Abby took a step back in shock. They had the exact same expression on their face. Recognition, surprise, a little joy, and welcoming. They both had the same twist to their lips. Their expressions looked like mirror reflections of each other.
The two of them opened their mouths at the same time and said "Abby," in unison. That seemed to surprise them, as they looked at each other having done it and started to laugh at each other. They didn't say anything but they seemed to be communicating something with their eyes.
Abby was incredibly unnerved. How did Rose know this boy that well to communicate with him without saying anything? How did that boy know her name? It was with great unease that Abby closed the door and sat down across from them.
"H-hey Rose," Abby said carefully. "Are you going to tell me who your friend is?"
"This is Scorpius Malfoy," Rose said.
The name was recognizable to Abby after a second of thought. The Malfoys who had supported Voldemort in both wars, and they had only switched their allegiances at the eleventh hour. Apparently that was enough to absolve them of any and all of the blame of the uncountable crimes that they certainly had committed throughout years of serving directly under Voldemort. And only a few years ago, they had been killed by an unknown party. Rightfully so, Abby thought, that's what they deserve for trying to not atone for their actions.
"Malfoy?!" Abby said angrily. "Oh are you going to kill us if we even look at a muggleborn, huh?"
The humor that was on Rose's face immediately fell off. "What did you say?" She said dangerously.
"Rose! He's a Malfoy! What are you doing talking to him! The whole lot of them are bad!"
"The whole lot?" The Malfoy boy said. "We're all bad huh?"
"Yeah and they deserved what happened to them!" Abby said, the anger that had awoken in her earlier with Black stirring up again in earnest.
"Oh, yes," Malfoy said. "My baby brother was really out there being evil, I guess too huh? My little three year old brother deserved to die because of how he was born."
Abby took back a step, but the fire inside of her was still broiling. "Well, I bet if he stayed around the rest of you for long enough, he would turn!" Her attention turned to Rose. "And you! You should stay away from that ilk, or else you might catch his evil!"
"I can figure out the right sort of people for myself, thank you very much," Rose said darkly. Abby looked at her angrily, before storming out of the compartment. A wisp of flame came out of her and slammed the door shut heavily and left some scorch marks on the handle.
She fumed as she stormed up the hallway for the second time that day. This time, she decided to forego going to the bathroom to let out some steam and instead to one of the connecting areas of the trains so she could get some air.
She slammed the door to the train hardly behind her in anger. The wind was blowing hair into her face uncomfortably. Not knowing what to do, she leaned up against the train car and stood there to collect her thoughts for a while.
She knew that she couldn't be letting her emotions get the best of her like this. Seeing Black earlier had lit the fire of rage inside of her, and she was having difficulty getting it to calm down. Lashing out at Rose had been a mistake, she could see that now. But she didn't understand why Rose was tolerating being around Malfoy for so long.
The compartment door opened to her left and Albus stepped out into the open air. He was looking around lost, and looked concerned about something. Abby smiled as she saw him.
"Hey, Albus," she said, spooking him slightly.
"Abby!" he said. "I've been looking for you everywhere. Where were you?"
"I've...been around," she said. "Weren't you with James or something?"
"No," Albus scowled. "James left me behind as soon as he could to go hang out with his friends. I've just been wandering the halls looking for someone I know. Did you see that Rose was sitting with Malfoy?"
A spark burned within her. "Yeah," Abby said darkly. "What's up with that? Why is she giving him the time of day?"
"I don't know," Albus said. "Maybe he put a curse on her?"
Abby laughed darkly. "His evil magic is going to take over her brain!" she joked.
Albus laughed at that. "Come on, let's go find the general first year compartment." Albus led the way back into the train and they made their way to the general compartments.
There were general compartments for all of the houses on the train as well as a general compartment for unsorted first years. In between those general sections were smaller rooms for small groups like the ones she had sat in with Rose and Emily.
Rose slid open the door to the general first years, with Albus just a step behind her. Inside the compartment there were about 30 or so first years sitting around in small groups. There benches and chairs and tables lined up on the two sides of the compartment, with a space for people to walk through going down the middle. When they entered there was an older year going past them, with a scowl around at the snotty nosed firsties.
Albus and Abby sat down at a table next to some of the other occupied ones. There, there was a group of boys talking animatedly about Quidditch.
"All I'm saying," One of the boys who was wearing dark sunglasses said. "Is that if you think that the Cannons are going to be in any place but last this year, you are absolutely off your rocker."
That, Abby thought, was not an original thought. The cannons had been in last place every single year for the last 30 years, much to the chagrin of Ron Weasley.
Abby saw one of the boys in the group she recognized. "Hi, Edward!" She greeted warmly.
His name was Edward Ollivander, and was the son of the Ollivander that currently worked at Ollivanders. Him and his older brother, Geoffrey were going to be the next generation of wandmakers. The Ollivander family had been making wands for as long as anyone could remember, if Abby could remember correctly. She was fairly close with them, as they lived just down the Alley from her home and The Leaky.
"Oh, hi Abby!" he greeted. "Excited for school?"
"You betcha!" she said. "Have you met Albus?"
Edward's eyes grew a little bit. "Albus Potter?" he asked.
Albus shifted uncomfortably at the attention. "Yeah, that's me."
"C-can I have your dad's autograph?" asked one of the pudgy boys with Edward. Albus looked at him in shock, astounded that someone would actually ask for that.
"Uhh, I can ask him?" Albus answered confusedly.
The boys laughed at the boy.
"Come on, Thomas," the boy that wore the sunglasses said. "Who cares about some old geezer's autograph." He extended his hand towards Abby. "I'm more curious about this charming lady we've got here. The name's Nick Irst. Pleasure to make your acquaintance."
Abby took his hand with a smile. She liked the boy's charm. He gave her a small smile even though she couldn't see his eyes behind his glasses.
"So Harry Potter's your dad?" asked an asian boy. "You know, my mom dated him in Hogwarts."
"Really?" Albus asked, slightly weirded out.
"Yeah, does he remember anyone by the name Cho Chang, my name is Michael by the way."
"Oh," Albus said. "I remember a story about her. She betrayed my mom and dad and made them write with a blood quill for hours."
That caused the atmosphere to freeze up as people looked between Albus and Michael. In Michael's favor, he looked embarrassed that his mother would have done something like that. "Yeah, uh, that sounds like her," he said sheepishly.
"Anyways," the last boy in the group said. "What house do y'all think you're going to be put in? Oh, and my name's William."
"I don't know," Edward said thoughtfully. "Either Slytherin or Gryffindor probably. My family used to all go to Ravenclaw, but you know…"
"Yeah," Abby said. "My dad went to Gryffindor and my mom's a Hufflepuff so I bet I'm in the air still. Albus though, has been all Gryffindor for forever. He's a Weasley for merlin's sake."
That caused Edward, Abby, William, and Michael to chuckle. "Sorry I don't quite get that," Nick said. "Was that a joke I was supposed to get. Kind of went over my head."
"Has none of your family ever gone to Hogwarts?" Edward asked, which Nick shook his head to. "Well every Weasley has gone to Gryffindor without exception for generations. For as long as anyone can remember, really."
"Ah, I see," Nick said, smiling. "Well maybe I'll start something like that. Think of it 'Every Irst Ever Goes to Ravenclaw',"
That sobered the others at the table. "Come on, you know that won't happen," Abby said.
"Well maybe I'll be the one to break the curse?" Nick said. Thomas looked confused but before he could ask about it, they were interrupted by a commotion on the other side of the compartment.
"Well what's this then?" A snide voice exclaimed loudly, drawing almost everyone in the compartment's attention.
Abby looked over to where the voice was coming from. She saw black haired boy wearing fine robes, standing over a boy who was sitting alone while reading a book. The sitting boy was dark skinned and wore muggle robes that were visibly second hand, even across the compartment. Abby noticed a necklace that he wore around his necklace that looked to be in stark contrast to everything else he wore. With a flash of memory, Abby remembered that it was one of the muggleborn that had been shopping with their group, Paul. And, with another flash of memory, he was deaf.
She remembered her father talking about the inbound muggleborn that was completely deaf, and the necklace that he was working on acquiring that would allow him to easier communicate with wizards. He had described it in depth and how it was used. Words that were spoken around him would appear as readable words around him as long as he held onto the necklace and imbued it with some magic.
Evidently, he was not currently holding onto the necklace, so he couldn't hear the boy who was making a fuss.
"Hey! Idiot!" The boy taunted. "Stop ignoring me!" He put his hand on the book Paul was reading, and he reacted to him. Paul's hand found his necklace.
"What?" he asked, with only a slightly strange lilt to his voice. "I'm busy right now, please just let me read."
"'Please just let me read' he says," the boy let out a taunting laugh. "And I suppose that I'm bothering you right now, am I?"
Paul narrowed his eyes. "Yes."
"You know, my parents told me a funny story," the boy said. "About some boy that was making the school pay for a necklace that would allow him to hear. You see, this boy was completely deaf, and could you believe it? What kind of wizard is completely deaf? A useless one, that is. OH! And do you know what else is funny about that? It was a mudblood that needed it! Little deaf mudblood needs help hearing, does he?"
Paul made no move while the boy was ranting, he looked completely immune to the insults that the boy was slinging at him. "And what's your name?"
"Parkinson," the boy said. "Peter Parkinson at your service, although that probably doesn't mean much to a little mudblood like you."
"That's it!" Another voice called out. To Abby's shock it was Albus who was standing up and making his way over to Parkinson. Abby cupped her face with her hands.
If Albus was involved, there was no way this was going to end well.
Parkinson looked amused as Albus moved his way over, looking over his features. "Oh, and who might this be? Oh, I think I know. Horribly messy black hair, green eyes. You must be Harry Potter's son."
"Yeah, and what of it."
"Oh, nothing! It's just nice that you've finally decided to stop hiding between your father's legs. Too scared to be out in public without him protecting you, were you?"
"Was not!" Abby winced at the whining tone that Albus' voice took. "And shut up! What you say doesn't matter, you - you little Death Eater!"
The compartment was silent as they listened to Albus and Parkinson throw insults around. Paul had somehow taken the book that Parkinson had taken from him out of his arms and had started reading again, completely ignoring the bickering boys in front of him. A particular pointed barb from Parkinson got Albus angry enough to throw a fist at him. Others moved into action in order to separate the two of them.
"Oh, the little Potter Prince can't take the heat?" Abby stiffened at the phrasing. "Well you better get out of the fire pretty soon or else you're going to get burned!"
Albus freed himself of the people holding him back and stormed out of the compartment. Abby chased after him to catch up with him.
"Albus, wait!" she said as she grabbed a hold of his shoulder. She turned him around to see that he was glowering at her.
"I don't want to be near you right now!" He yelled. "Why'd you just stand there like an idiot, as if you were agreeing with him! What kind of Gryffindor just sits there while people get made fun of!" He yanked out from under her and stormed off.
Abby stood there shocked for a long moment before slowly going back to the first year compartment. When she returned, she saw that the boys she had been sitting with had closed the circle around them, so she couldn't rejoin them. They had looked uncomfortable with the argument but had made no move to help.
Abby found another place to sit, and stewed there until the message that they were approaching Hogsmeade sounded out through the train.