Chapter 2: First Year
Her first year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was a bitter disappointment to Lyra. While she had found easy comradery with her fellow Slytherin's, it had been hard to make friends outside of Slytherin House. She had managed to make a few friends in Ravenclaw, widely due to the fact that her sister Arya had sorted into the House of Knowledge. She had also made friends with Susan Bones of Hufflepuff House, but that was sadly the extent of her friendships outside of Slytherin. None of the Gryffindor students had been willing to give her a chance. Either her sorted House or her Surname always stood against her with the proud Lions of Gryffindor. They did not seem to be particularly brave in her opinion.
The majority of the Professor's had proven to be biased in one way or another. Some seemed to favor their own House above all other students. Other's seemed to hover over the Muggle-raised students; coddling them and holding their hand as they walked them along through the steps of learning how to harness their magic. Lyra had taken it upon herself to ensure that Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle were tutored within Slytherin House by some of the upper year Snakes so that they would be able to learn the material. The two boys had never benefitted from tutors before they set foot in Hogwarts and due to that they were in the same boat that the Muggle-raised students were in, not that any of the other Professor's bothered to care. Lyra had swiftly noted how quickly the Professor's had written the two boys off as dunces. She had actually heard Professor Babbling say to a complaining Professor McGonagall that it must be the inbreeding.
Lyra's blood had boiled at that moment. It was common enough to say that the Pure-blood families were inbred, but whether that was true of all of the families was up for debate. She had suffered such insults from Ronald Weasley during the year but she had refused to retaliate against him. She knew that it would be she, and not he, that would have ended up with the detention. He was making himself look bad and giving himself a horrible reputation by singling her out for his abuses. It would be different if she were a male, but she was of the fairer gender and so he looked like a horrible bully who kept on attempting to hurt the girl who would not retaliate against him. Well, she didn't retaliate in the way he could recognize. Both Blaise Zabini and Theodore Nott had become her champions. They took great delight in doing random things to humiliate Ron Weasley, especially after he had been particularly horrible to her.
The Malfoy's had been careful to not allow inbreeding in their line. They had taken the tale of the Ravenscar family quite seriously. In the old legends the Ravenscars were quite powerful but their family fell into great decline due to the inbreeding of their line. With each generation they produced weaker and weaker wizards. Once they had even had Dragonriders in their line, if the legends could be believed, but the Ravenscar's dwindled in power due to their mistakes. Now the Spinks family was the only Wizarding family that could claim any descent to the Ravenscars. Then there was the tale of the Gaunt's, proud descendants of Salazar Slytherin. Their inbreeding resulted in a loss of power and prestige. The Malfoy's were careful to do all they could to keep their own power and prestige so they were very careful in whom they chose to wed and breed with, thank you very much.
The true bane of her first year was Harry Potter. While Ronald Weasley was always the instigator of all altercations between them, Harry Potter was always at Ron's side backing up his friend. He had sneered at her, calling her father a Death Eater. Well how was she to argue with that? She had seen the mark upon her father's arm. Still, he was her father. Hers! These two boys didn't know a thing about him. That they were joined by Hermione Granger, a Muggle-born Witch that Lyra had thought was intelligent just added to the trouble. Since Hermione was a Muggle-born, it was only natural that the bushy haired brunette would automatically dislike any Death Eaters. Lyra could admit to herself now that she had been truly unusually optimistic when she had allowed herself to hope that Granger would not judge her or any of the other children by the fact that their parents were Death Eaters. Granger had proven to be nearly as prejudiced as Weasley and at times more informed. Granger enjoyed learning and so she had immersed herself in reading about some of the Death Eater Trials, what little could be found in the Hogwart's Library anyway. The girl usually stood by Harry and Ron's side staying out of the arguments that Ron started, but she did occasionally come in on his side with facts about this or that battle or attack that a Death Eater had been accused of. She was particularly fond of pointing out to Pansy Parkinson the accusations that the court had put forth against her father. Pansy despised Granger for that and because the other girl was an annoying know it all. Pansy had started the feud between herself and Hermione Granger by calling the Gryffindor girl a "Mud-blood." Lyra thought that if Pansy was going to be that uncouth then she deserved the other girl's ire, but that didn't mean that Granger had to single out the other Slytherin girls as well. Lyra had been on the bad side of the bushy haired Gryffindor ever since the girl had learned of the crimes of which Lucius Malfoy had been accused of. Harry's friendship with Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger hurt her. That he parroted what those two had to say about her wounded her deeply. She was angry that he got to her at all, that her eyes still sought him out in classes, that she enjoyed watching him fly during Quidditch games and the Gryffindor's practices. She hated that she had failed in forgetting all about the green-eyed boy.
The ultimate insult had come from Albus Dumbledore though. Slytherin had won the House Cup. They were celebrating their victory at the Leaving Feast when the Headmaster chose to award points to Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Ronald Weasley, and Neville Longbottom for reasons that were not properly revealed to the rest of the student body. The end result was that Gryffindor was now in the lead and the winners. Lyra had felt betrayed by the Headmaster and had watched him dispassionately as he clapped happily and smiled at Harry Potter.
The Slytherins took to calling Potter "Dumbledore's Golden Boy" and "Golden Boy Potter." She secretly thought of him as Dumbledore's Pet but she did not say it aloud to the other Slytherin's.
Now she sat on the Hogwart's Express, heading back to London. She sat in a dining car compartment that most of the Slytherins had long ago claimed as their territory so they could protect themselves from the other students, particularly Gryffindor's.
"I think we are in agreement once and for all that Dumbledore is a lost cause for us." Theodore spoke softly to the group at large.
There were several nods of agreement to that statement. "I didn't have much faith in the Old Coot in the first place," Pansy Parkinson said then she frowned. "But it still hurts to know that he won't at the least try to be fair."
"I think the scary thing is that Dumbledore did seem to think he was being perfectly fair," Lyra said. "He really did think giving those points last minute was the right thing to do."
"We all know that Potter ended up in the Hospital Wing and there were rumors of some Death Eater attack in the school," Gregory Goyle mentioned.
Blaise Zabini snorted. "Yes, wasn't that just lovely. Gryffindor's were right prats before that. They were completely impossible after they thought their little Hero was attacked by one of us."
"Right, but I am saying whatever happened to Potter was weeks ago so why did the Headmaster wait so long to give out those points?" Goyle asked.
Lyra saw where he was headed and nodded to him. "Because he knew that waiting until the feast would ensure that we could do absolutely nothing to catch up the points."
"You know, my father was never a Death Eater, no one in my family was. We have a long history of neutrality in Wizarding Wars," Daphne Greengrass stated. "Yet, my father has told me stories of Dumbledore from his school days. He has often theorized that a great many of his fellow classmates went on to become Death Eaters due to Dumbledore's refusal to believe that goodness could be found in the House of Snakes."
There was silence for a long time after that. It was Tracey Davis who broke it. "Does this mean that will be our fate too? Destined for Slytherin, destined to be mistreated by our peers and our elders, destined to become Death Eaters?"
Everyone remained silent for a few minutes mulling over her words. Lyra mulled over the bitterness in Tracey's tone. It matched the bitterness that had been growing inside of Lyra. She was a Malfoy and she was a Slytherin, even if someone would look past the first, and she had yet to meet that miraculous person, they would never look past the other. Dumbledore was the Headmaster. He should not be playing favorites. He should not be playing half of the games that he was playing.
"No," she said softly. "We will just have to change our stars." Lyra liked that phrase, enjoyed the way it sounded. Andromeda had told her that was what she had done when she had defied the family and married her beloved Ted Tonks.
"Change our stars?" Theodore asked, but his tone sounded as though he too enjoyed the phrase.
"Our parents' generation were caught between two great powers. Dumbledore and the Dark Lord," Lyra explained. She paused a moment to collect her thoughts and then looked at Blaise and then to Theo. "Both men were using the Wizards and Witches around them, maneuvering them like pieces on a game board. Dumbledore knew that the Dark Lord had an advantage in Slytherin, but instead of attempting to help save any of those children, he wrote them off as expendable. Instead he focused on the Gryffindor's. Being a Gryffindor himself he knew just what to do to guide them and maneuver them into fighting against the Dark Lord. He neglected Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw in favor of Gryffindor."
"And so the Slytherin's were doomed," Arya muttered from her place beside Theodore. "And how is that any different than the future we might be headed toward. You heard the rumors. A Death Eater attacked Potter."
"Is it a Death Eater wanting to rise up and become a new Dark Lord, a successor to Lord Voldemort?" Millicent Bulstrode asked with a frown.
"We don't have enough data to prove anything. Look if a real Death Eater had attacked Potter it would be all over the Papers. Instead we have these facts, Potter was attacked when he was in a part of the Castle that all of us had been warned to stay away from and our Defense Professor went missing," Aleksei Spinks argued.
Theo leaned back in his seat and a small crease was at his brow, a sign that Lyra had learned meant that he was busy thinking over the puzzle before them.
"Lord Voldemort was defeated by Harry Potter in 1981," Theo murmured in that tone that said he was still deep in his ponderings. "Defeated, not killed."
"Not killed?" Vincent Crabbe squeaked.
"Not killed," Lyra agreed with Theo's assessment. It made sense to her. "Potter didn't kill him, if he had there would have been a body but there was never a body. Theo you are brilliant!"
A flush came to Theo's cheeks due to the praise but he showed no other sign that she had affected him. "So Potter was somehow accosted by the Dark Lord and the Dark Lord escaped and Potter was briefly hospitalized in the infirmary."
"He's trying to regain power then," Arya whispered in horror. Her hand flew up to her mouth and she leaned closer to Theodore unconsciously for comfort.
"And Dumbledore knows. He has probably always suspected that the Dark Lord was not dead," Blaise said.
"So we should what? Begin training to become the Dark Lord's next generation of acolytes?" Pansy asked bitterly.
Lyra smacked her palm down hard on the table jarring everyone out of thoughts of self-pity and forcing them to pay attention to her. "Never! We are not going to serve that monster," she declared. "We are going to need to train though. We have an advantage right now. Dumbledore does not know that we know of the Dark Lord's return and he will continue to cultivate his Gryffindor's for war and ignore the Slytherin's. He'll no doubt neglect us for a few more years at least. At best he'll look to the seventh year Slytherin's and not to us lower years. Most of the Professor's ignore us. As annoying as that is, it is now to our benefit."
"We cannot trust the Professor's," Daphne murmured. "Not even our Head of House."
Lyra and Arya opened their mouths to protest but Daphne held up a hand and with pleading eyes began to speak, "I mean no disrespect to Professor Snape. I only mean that we cannot trust him with this because it could put him in a terrible position with Dumbledore."
Arya nodded her understanding and Lyra huffed but acknowledged that Daphne had a good point. Lyra never wanted to put her beloved god-father in a bad position. Dumbledore was dangerous. If Severus was not so talented, and therefore so useful, she was sure that Dumbledore would have abandoned Severus long ago.
"I concede," Lyra agreed. "We cannot let Professor Snape know our intentions. To this end, every one of you must begin learning Occlumency this summer. If you already have some training in this art, then I want you to continue your studies. Our dear Head of House has some talent with Legilimency."
"No kidding?" Crabbe groaned. "No wonder I could not seem to convince him that Weasley was the one who put the sage into Lavender Brown's cauldron."
There were a few chuckles then. It had turned Lavender's potion to a horrible sludge that was similar to tar, but it had not blown up the cauldron. As far as pranks went, it was a fairly light one.
Tracey Davis, their resident Half-blood, took out a Muggle Notebook from her book bag. She then took out a self-inking quill. "Right, so let's write this down and we can keep each other up to date on our successes over the hols."
Tracey then jotted down notes as each of them came up with a suggestion of how to improve themselves.
Train in the mental arts, particularly Occlumency.
Go over all that they had learned in their First Year and study and practice it until they were sure they had full mastery over everything taught in the First Year curriculum. Also avail themselves of books in their parent's libraries, but be careful not to push too hard too fast.
Physical Training. Jogging, running, stretches, acrobatics and other various exercises to help train their bodies for combat.
The Mental Arts involved many fields but the children had chosen for now to focus on Occlumency since it would not only protect their minds, helping them to keep each other's secrets, but it would also give them a stronger mental discipline. It was the hope of all that they would be able to learn Legilimency after they mastered Occlumency.
There were plenty of Dark Arts books that were in the libraries of most of the children and it was swiftly agreed that those books should not be touched just yet. Bellatrix Lestrange had once been a witch brimming with potential, only to become interested in the Dark Arts and immersed herself too soon, too fast without someone to act as a tether to help bring her back. It was no wonder the woman was deemed insane by most before she was even put away for life in Azkaban Prison. None of them wanted to end up like Bellatrix Lestrange.
There were many great theorists out there who believed that a stronger and healthier body would assist with the growth of power in one's magical core. Regardless of whether or not this was true, the group was going to need to be fit in order to fight. They would have a two front battle on their hands. The Dark Lord Voldemort was their enemy, but so too was the Light Side who would forsake them. They had to learn how to save themselves, they were on their own.
By the time that the scarlet train came to a stop in London, Lyra and her Slytherin friends had figured out how they would go about their individual training and had worked out how they would be able to get together for visits in which they would hopefully be able to learn how to work together in teams.
It was when Lyra got her school trunk and began moving down the hall, deep in thought that she realized that she should talk to Dora about her plans. Nymphadora had just graduated from Hogwarts and was accepted to the Auror Training Program. Surely cousin Dora would have some good ideas that could help them, and even if she did not now, the older girl would once she was in training. Lyra smiled as she moved down the hall glad that she had thought of talking things over with Dora. Too bad she didn't yet know when she would see Dora again. She would have to write to her.
She felt the spell coming at her and immediately raised her shield just in time to stop the stinging hex from hitting her. She whirled around to find Ronald Weasley glaring at her with Hermione Granger and Harry Potter right behind him. She sighed in sadness then. Why was the red-haired boy so mean to her?
"Malfoy," he spat her name out like it was the vilest thing to call a person. In his mind it probably was.
'Oh right, this is why he's so mean to me.' She thought as she stared at him. "Mr. Weasley, please leave me alone. I have told you more than once during this past year that I am singularly uninterested in the Feud of our ancestors. I am not saying we have to be friends, to be perfectly frank your behavior toward me has been so despicable that I could not imagine being your friend, but this does not mean that we need to be enemies. We are students who attend the same school, nothing more."
Ron sputtered at her, "You, you are not just any student," he managed to snarl at her. "You are a Malfoy," again he sneered her name.
"Yes, and you are a Weasley," she responded as calmly as she could. "I fail to see what that has to do with much of anything," she said simply.
She felt Potter's green eyes upon her, watching her curiously but she refused to turn her own gray eyed gaze upon him. She didn't trust Weasley enough to take her eyes off of him.
"I know that you're just a Death Eater waiting to happen," Ron said, his voice full of self-righteous anger.
She took a single step toward him and said softly. "So it is true then, you did fight against Voldemort." It was a statement of fact and she found her suspicions confirmed when she saw Granger flinch and Potter pale slightly.
"That's none of your business," Weasley hissed at her, his hand tightening around his wand.
Lyra silently disagreed. It was very much her business; it was everyone's business if the Dark Lord was back. Never-the-less she had no intention of sticking around to argue that point with Dumbledore's Pet and his merry side-kicks. "I suggest physical training this summer and plenty of review. Review all of your studies from this past year. You have survived him twice Potter by ancient magic alone, but the Dark Lord will likely look for ways around that now. You cannot rely on it forever."
They were silent for a few moments, clearly shocked by her suggestions and Lyra smiled sadly before turning her back on the trio to continue on her way. It was Harry's voice that called out to her and made her pause.
"Malfoy," he stared at her for a few moments after she had turned back to stare at him. "Do you know what happened? Do you know how I defeated him the first time?"
She frowned then. She didn't know, not for certain anyway, but she had a very good guess. "I was not there, and even if I had been I was an infant too Potter," she reminded him and she thought that would be the end of it. It would have been if the questions were coming from Weasley, but she had underestimated Harry Potter.
"But you have a guess," Harry said and it was not a question. There was conviction in his voice.
"Who cares if she does?" Weasley complained trying to steer Harry away from pursuing the conversation further.
Harry's green eyes narrowed at Ronald Weasley and he said in clipped tones "I care."
Granger nodded her head in encouragement. "It cannot hurt to hear what she thinks. She might have some good insight."
"Please, tell me your guess," Harry Potter asked her and she found herself unable to resist the plea in his voice.
"It was blood sacrifice. A life for a life. Ancient magic that mothers and fathers use to be willing to perform back in the days when Muggles were trying to burn us at the stake and when Light Witches were turning on Dark Witches. Your parents were in hiding in order to protect you, they knew that Voldemort might come for them someday. They loved you so they would want to protect you, their baby. My guess is it was a last resort to ensure that you would be protected and live. That Voldemort murdered your father and then your mother personally before killing you might very well have made the protection magic even more powerful," she explained. "Of course, this is my pure speculation. I don't really think that you'll ever truly know what happened that night."
He stared at her for several moments, his green eyes locked with her gray eyes as though searching her for the truth. What he found, she had no idea but he slowly nodded his head in acceptance of what she said. "Thank you. What you told me about a protection, that is similar to what the Headmaster said, though he was vaguer about it."
She nodded her head in acceptance of his thanks. It was odd to not be at odds with him at the moment. It was only a moment though, she reminded herself. Harry Potter was an enemy. He was Dumbledore's Pet that Dumbledore intended to be groomed into Dumbledore's Weapon. That weapon would be used against Voldemort and his Death Eaters. Then Dumbledore would aim that weapon at Lyra and her Slytherin friends and any allies they gained.
"This doesn't make us friends," Potter said after a moment, seeming to come back to himself and realize that he was talking to Lyra Malfoy, oldest daughter of Death Eater Lucius Malfoy.
She nodded at that. "No, it doesn't make us friends. We aren't friends, Potter," she assured him in a tone that was emphatic on that point. She noticed that Granger was looking back and forth between them with suspicion in her eyes. Granger was beginning to realize that there was something between Lyra and Potter that she had not known about before. She wished Potter well of Granger's nagging. She had heard enough of the girl over the year to realize that she was like Pansy when she wanted to know a secret. She would be merciless in finding ways to pry the information from Potter.
Potter took a step toward her even as she turned away from him. There was nothing more to say. The conversation was one that should not have delayed her in the first place. She added a mental note to her summer agenda to try to come up with ways to become immune to Harry Potter. She did not want to spend the next school year with her eyes seeking him out in the Great Hall and in Classes.
She heard her name called out excitedly by her younger sister, Satyra, when she exited the Hogwart's Express. Her lips curved up into a genuine smile as the younger girl rushed forward to give her a hug. Andromeda and Narcissa stood talking together with Nymphadora and Arya. It seemed that Lucius must be too busy to come retrieve his daughters from their first year at school. She was not unhappy with his absence since it allowed Satyra the freedom to rush to her and throw her arms around Lyra in a fierce hug.
"I missed you!" Satyra exclaimed.
Lyra released her hold on her school trunk in order to wrap her arms around her baby sister. "I missed you too," she told the younger girl.
Satyra grabbed up the handle on the trunk and Lyra grabbed the other handle as they made their way toward their mother, sister, cousin, and aunt. "Tell me all about Hogwarts and don't leave a single thing out," Satyra ordered.
Lyra laughed and promised her sister that they would talk all about Hogwart's as soon as they were settled in back at home. A few moments after they joined their family, Narcissa guided her daughters toward the barrier into the Muggle World. Narcissa informed her daughters that Andromeda and Narcissa were taking Nymphadora, Lyra, Arya, and Satyra out for dinner in Muggle London.
Lyra smiled Narcissa shrunk the school trunks and then the girls were led along outside to the sleek black car that Narcissa preferred for when they made shopping trips into Muggle areas. She climbed into the back of the car and nestled in beside Nymphadora.
So ends Lyra's first year at Hogwart's. Since very little happened in her first year that was different to the original timeline of "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" or "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" (Whichever title one prefers), I did not think I should waste too much time on her first year of education at Hogwart's. We shall see some Canon Divergence in the other years though. I do apologize for how long it has taken me to get this written, edited, and posted. Thank you for your patience!