I feel like I'm always apologizing, but I'm sorry for the long break again. I'm not going to bother to make excuses for the time that I've been gone this time.
Disclaimer I do not own Harry Potter.
Chapter 20
"Ale-... Jem, James, so nice to see you again," greeted Dumbledore. James smiled and Jem continued to glare at the old man.
"I have excused some of your new roommates from their first class so that you can get to know them," Dumbledore said, "They're waiting for you now, so you had best be going."
James trekked up to the Gryffindor common room with his daughter. Once they climbed through the portrait hole they were greeted by three teen girls.
"Hello, my name's Lavender. I heard that you like being called by Jem, that's such a cool name, by the way-" one girl started.
"And I'm Parvati, I love your hair, and your eyes-" interrupted another.
"And I love your outfit-" Lavender interrupted again.
"Girls, perhaps you could show her your room?" James inserted himself into the conversation, sensing that his daughter was about to have two more murders on her hands.
"Oh yes, of course."
"I, like, totally forgot."
The two girls raced off towards the dorms, leaving a bushy-haired girl behind.
"And I'm Hermione Granger, it's nice to meet you," the girl clarified. Jem sighed in relief after she realized that the last girl wasn't going to, well, fangirl at her.
Jem trailed after Hermione up into the dorms. She quickly hid her look of distaste at such a small room and set her backpack down at the end of the bed that was very clearly unused.
"We have twenty minutes before our next class, would you like a tour?" Lavender asked eagerly.
"Did that already," Jem said.
"Oh well... then..." Parvati tried to think of something else.
"Maybe you two could go back to Divination and let her unpack in peace," suggested Hermione.
The girls started to protest before realizing that it would give them a chance to tell everyone about the new girl, making them popular instantly.
Once they left Jem sighed and walked over her bag.
"Sorry about them, they're a little..." Hermione gestured with her hands.
"Yeah," Jem stared at the girl, wondering why she had never heard the last name 'Granger' before. Then it clicked. She was a mudblood. Jem faced an internal crisis. "Befriend" the girl and have some intelligent company, or stick to the purebloods who seemed to not have much upstairs.
"What class do you have first?" Hermione questioned.
"Charms," she replied in a monotone.
"Me too, which electives are you taking?" Hermione asked.
"Well, they want me to have as little time possible to try to escape, so all of them except Divination and Muggle studies. They said they could have foreseen some problems with that one," Jem sneered, hoping to scare the brown-haired girl a little bit.
There was a flash of anger in Hermione's eyes but the Gryffindor hid it well.
"We'll have similar schedules then, as I am doing the same," she responded, "Oh and I should warn you, while most people are excited that you are here, like Lavender and Parvati, there is a small number that are..."
"Not, like the ones who have family that have been hurt or killed by us-"Jem got cut off.
"By Death Eaters," Hermione said. Jem smirked, knowing that the girl was trying to separate Jem from the rest of the Death Eaters.
"Thanks for the warning, but really, I won't be here long," Jem said.
"And why's that?" Hermione asked.
"You're a smart girl; you and I both know that the Dark Lord would do anything to have me back, and if I'm persistent enough, I could get myself kicked out." Jem neglected to mention that she was more than capable of escaping.
"Yes, well, in the meantime, we had better be heading to Charms." Hermione led the way out of the dormitory.
They met James in the common room and headed to the Charms classroom. They were early so Jem grabbed a seat near the back and plastered a bored look on her face.
"So, what house will be joining us in this class?" Jem asked trying to seem uninterested.
"Erm, Ravenclaw, I think," Hermione guessed. Sure enough, a few seconds later, some nerdy teens came through the door. It was comical how their eyes slid from her to her father, sitting in the back corner, to Hermione sitting next to her in the back of the room. While it was comical for a while; after the tenth person, it got a bit old.
Attendance was taken and the small professor told them to practice their Summoning Charms.
James walked over to Jem and gave her her wand.
"Look, I know you don't need it, but could you at least pretend to participate?" James asked pleadingly. Jem nodded, not wanting more attention.
A book went flying by her head and Jem glowered at a guilty looking redhead.
"I-I'm sorry," he muttered. Jem turned away and was amused by the look of distaste on Hermione's face.
"That's Ron. He can be a bit daft, but he is also nice enough... sometimes," Hermione explained. Jem turned back to look at Ron, who was now quite red in the face. She laughed quietly to herself.
"What, you think you're so cool? I bet you couldn't do this stupid charm!" Ron shouted, clearly trying and failing to defend his ego.
Jem flicked her wand and almost decapitated the redhead with a lamp that went soaring across the room.
"You little... uh..." Ron trailed off when he remembered that James was sitting next to Jem. He turned around and stomped back to his seat.
"Like I said, a bit daft," Hermione said and Jem bit back a laugh.
The rest of Charms passed uneventfully. James stopped Jem as she was about to leave the classroom.
"I'm sorry but I need to take your wand." Jem complied with a raised eyebrow as James continued, "You have Potions next, and since your mum will be there, I won't stay."
Jem nodded and headed off to the dungeons.
She walked into the Potions classroom and scanned the room. She realized that they had potions with Slytherins. She tried not to smile as she took the only empty seat near a Gryffindor boy. It seemed she was failing as the boy looked at her frightfully.
Snape swooped into the room and wrote instructions up on the board. Everyone started gathering ingredients while Jem sat in her seat. Draco paused by her desk and dropped off everything she needed. Jem gave him a smile, a nice one this time.
"I-" she started.
"Everyone please take your seats and start your potions." Lily's voice rang through the room. Jem rolled her eyes as Draco walked away.
She began her potion. It was easy, something she had learned years ago. Snape patrolled the room like a greasy bat, making sure nobody was going to do something stupid.
"LONGBOTTOM!" he barked at the boy next to her.
"Sir?" he asked, shaking.
"Did you intend to kill everyone in this room by adding those worms?"
Neville's hand shook above the cauldron as he slowly put it down.
"Sorry sir, I thought-" he tried to explain but Snape cut him off.
"Those are plain earthworms, not the glow worms that I had instructed." Snape sneered.
"Sorry sir," Neville said meekly.
"10 points from Gryffindor," Snape said as he continued walking past the cauldrons. He looked down at Jem's potion and gave her a nod that anybody else would miss. Jem understood that he had to be careful about how much loyalty he had to hide from the students of Hogwarts, but he also had to respect her, lest he gets the wrath of her father.
He moved on, and Jem almost groaned when she saw Lily making her way down the rows towards her
"How's it going?" Lily asked. Jem just looked up at her and continued with her potion.
"It looks like you're doing very well." Lily sighed and walked away.
Halfway through class, a Gryffindor's potion one table over started to sizzle dangerously. Jem threw a shield up as it exploded. When the smoke cleared there were two Gryffindors covered in nasty burn marks. Luckily Jem's shield had protected the rest. She quickly took it down, hoping no one would notice, but it was clear that Lily and Snape had.
"FINNIGAN!" Snape yelled at the burnt boy.
"Severus, I'll take them to the infirmary," Lily said, waving her wand to clean up the mess. Snape nodded and the two students were escorted out of the room.
The rest of the class passed uneventfully, but by the end of it, Jem was really uncomfortable with the mixed looks she was getting from everyone in the classroom. For the first time, she was hit by a wave of homesickness. Her whole life she had been in a little bubble and now the bubble had popped.
When class was over she took her time to pack up her stuff. Draco walked over to her, followed by the rest of her friends.
"When's your next free period?" he asked.
"Wednesday, last hour," she answered.
"Library then?"
"Yeah." They parted ways as they exited the classroom. She started up the stairs to go to the entrance hall and was met by James. They headed to the Great Hall and Oliver bounded up to them.
Jem was startled by the comfort she felt at his presence. She put it down to predictability. She knew Oliver, but she didn't know the students; Oliver was predictable, they were not. Predictability was comfortable.
Yes, she thought, that's definitely why.
Oliver dragged her over to the Gryffindor table. He started piling her plate with food, talking about what to eat and what to stay away from. Jem cast a discreet inspection spell to make sure no one had poisoned her food.
While Oliver chattered on, Jem looked around at everybody staring at her. This was the first time that most of them had seen her, and it was clear that they were bursting with questions. Lavender and Parvati were surrounded by admirers, those two being the only ones who had had any interaction with Jem.
Hermione walked into the hall a minute later and was immediately swamped with questions. She brushed them off and sat down across from Jem. The whole Gryffindor house waited to see if Jem would allow it, and when she did nothing, they figured it was safe to approach Jem.
Suddenly she had people on all sides of her, introducing themselves and asking questions. She could only catch snippets of what they were saying.
"Hi, I'm-"
"-Potions together-"
"Tomorrow?"
"-Colin Creev-"
Jem turned to Oliver, "Are all of the students here so rude?"
"Umm..." Oliver looked around, giving a hint that they should leave.
Red and shame-faced, the Gryffindors made their way back to their seats.
"What a bunch of nutters," Jem muttered, and she looked up to see the daft redhead from Charms slide into the seat next to Hermione, shaking his head. What was his name… Reginald, Ryan… oh yeah, Ron, Jem remembered.
He grabbed a chicken leg and ripped off a piece, chewing loudly. "I swear we weren't that annoying when we were little tykes."
"You almost got me expelled in our first year," Hermione said, shocked.
"Saved your life, too," Ron reminded her. "Er, sorry about that Fanged Frisbee, though."
"It's fine." Hermione turned back to her plate, and Jem was shocked to see that her cheeks were touched with pink. No way, Jem thought. Could she actually like this dim bulb?
Hermione cleared her throat and said, "Oh, Ron, this is Jem."
Ron nodded. "I remember. You're the one who almost killed me during Charms."
Jem smirked. Of all of the Gryffindors besides maybe Hermione and the two fangirls she had met, Ron was the only one who didn't seem to be afraid of her. She admired that, in a way. Sure, he might be an idiot, but he was an idiot with courage. On second thought, Jem considered, that might be worse. Jem decided to fix his attitude.
"If I had been trying to kill you, your parents would be planning a funeral," Jem said.
Ron paled a little, then continued to be blunt. "So, what's he like? Y'know, You-Know-Who?"
"Ron!" Hermione slapped his arm.
"What?" Ron said indignantly. "It's what everyone wants to know, isn't it?"
Hermione sighed, turned to Jem, and said, "I'm sorry about him, he just says things without thinking some- no, all of the time." Ron didn't notice or at least pretended not to, as he shoveled mashed potatoes into his face. Nevertheless, Jem thought she saw the tips of his ears turn red.
"So..." Ron gestured that Jem should explain.
Jem leaned in secretively and had to try not to laugh as everyone around did the same.
"I think that it's important that you know," she paused, smiling evilly on the inside as everyone held their breath, "that I'd never share anything about anything in my life with mudbloods and blood traitors like you."
Everyone recoiled, shocked.
"And you're supposed to be the brave house." Jem snorted, picked up her bag, and left the Great Hall.
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