The next morning, Lucy woke up at 5:30am. A leftover habit from her time at the Dursleys that only got stronger when she'd gotten to Hogwarts. There was something so soothing about the hour or so a person can get alone when they wake up early. By 6am, she was ready for the day.
Akia slithered up her sleeve before she left the dorm room, "What are we doing today?"
"I'll get my class schedule today. I can't remember when Hufflepuffs have classes so it'lll be interesting to see how different the schedule will be," she replied.
"What is the point of these lessons? I can teach you everything you need to know about biting and hunting mice," Akia said.
Lucy rolled her eyes, "Not all of life-"
She stopped abruptly when she noticed a person sitting in an armchair by the fireplace. Cedric looked up and smiled at her.
"Hey, you're that little First Year who got in a fight with Alex, aren't you?" when she just stared at him, he laughed. "Don't worry, I'm not mad about it. Alex gets in fights with literally everyone."
Lucy scowled at him, "I don't think it was a fight. He accused me of lying, but I didn't even do anything. And I'm not little!" She turned on her heel and started walking towards the entrance.
Cedric jumped up and followed her. He laughed again when he spotted her at the end of the dirt hallway staring at the wall.
"Hey, hey, I didn't mean anything by it. That's just who Alex is. And I'm sorry I called you little. Do you think you can ever forgive me?"
She frowned at him, "Maybe if you tell me how to leave this infernal common room. Or are we stuck here until a certain time?"
He smiled a lopsided smile at her, "That's a very Slytherin tactic. They normally don't tell the Firsties how to leave the common room, so they wait until one of the prefects is awake to lead them. Luckily for you, I happen to be awake even if I'm not a prefect."
Lucy watched as he leaned over and tapped on a stone in the middle. The entire wall folded back like it had the night before to reveal the exit.
Lucy walked out into the corridor with Cedric beside her. She started walking confidently towards the Great Hall.
He gave her a sideways glance, "You must be good at directions to remember your way so well from just last night."
She blushed and slowed down, "Well I guess I'm pretty observant."
After that, she allowed him to seem like he was leading the way, but a glance his way revealed his smile which seemed to suggest he didn't believe her act. Lucy scolded herself for not being more careful. Remembering her way from the common room to the Great Hall wasn't a big deal, but she needed to be careful so she didn't reveal how well she knew the castle. People might get suspicious.
Entering the Great Hall, she made a beeline for the Hufflepuff table. She filled up her plate with food before she paused to look around the room. There were very few people in the Great Hall at the early hour. She knew that most students would arrive around 7am, so they'd have plenty of time before the end of breakfast at 8.
She glanced around the Hall as they sat down. There were a handful of students sitting at the Ravenclaw table and one student sitting at the Slytherin table. Unsurprisingly, there were no students sitting at the Gryffindor table. After all, they weren't exactly known for being super studious.
Up at the High Table, the muggle-studies professor and Professor Sprout were sitting there.
Cedric motioned towards Professor Sprout, "That's our Head of House. She'll be around in a bit with the schedules."
Lucy nodded at him as she filled up her plate.
They ate in silence as the Hall started to fill up. She noticed when Hermione sat at the Gryffindor table because of the loud thud as she put her giant stack of books on the table. Lucy shook her head while Cedric gave a low whistle of shock.
"What's she planning on doing with all of those books? It's only the first day!" Cedric said in an outraged whisper.
At that point, she noticed Cedric's friend, Alex, walking towards them. She scowled at him. To her utter outrage, he ruffled her hair.
She scowled even more when they laughed at her.
"Its like making a kitten angry," Alex said in a laugh to Cedric.
She turned in a huff back to her food. It's not like she really minded messy hair after a lifetime as Harry, but it was the principle of things.
Soon the Hall was filled with students all talking and eating. Lucy had forgotten the conundrum that occurred when the Great Hall was filled.
Eventually the pleasant and plump professor walked over to the Hufflepuff table, "Hello, I am Professor Sprout and I am the Head of the Hufflepuff house. If you have any issues, do not be afraid to come talk to me. Now, I have some schedules for you all."
She called out the students names and handed them their schedules. She paused when she got to Lucy's name, "Ahh Ms Lucy. I heard from you did on the train. That was a very brave thing to do. Standing up for something else can be hard."
Lucy blushed and looked down at her schedule. Professor Sprout moved on and the First Years started discussing their schedules.
"Charms with the Gryffindors this morning. Double Transfigurations tomorrow," Hannah said.
"Look, we don't have potions until Thursday!" many of the First Years breathed a sigh of relief.
"How bad can Professor Snape really be? He can't be that bad if Dumbledore hired him," Justin questioned.
Lucy felt pretty pumped for her classes. After all, she had the mind of a 32 year old auror, how hard could some first year classes really be? She walked down the halls with the rest of her classmates. After the incident with Cedric this morning, she made sure to stay in the middle of the pack.
As they filed into the classroom, she noticed that they had gotten there before the Gryffindors. She watched the red and yellow group as they filed into the classroom.
She'd never realized before how loud the group could be. She didn't agree with stereotypes, but it seemed like the houses were set up to support stereotyping the students.
Flitwick started the class the same way he had last time. When he got to Harry's name, he squeaked and fell off the stack of books. Lucy laughed with the rest of the students this time around, but she noticed that Harry didn't laugh. He smiled, but the smile somehow didn't seem to reach his eyes.
The professor quickly got the class back under control, "Hello, today we will be working on a simple levitation spell, WIngardium Leviosa. We will begin without out wands by simply practicing wand movements and pronunciation."
Lucy waved her hand with the rest of the class, feeling incredibly foolish. She couldn't hear the Gryffindors from across the room, but she could see from their actions that Ron and Hermione were starting to get into a fight.
"Ok everyone, I believe you are ready to try on the actual feathers," Professor Flitwick announced.
With a flick of his wand, feathers flew from a box behind him. One feather went to each student.
Lucy smiled as she waved her fake wand over the feather.
"Wingardium leviosa," she pronounced clearly.
Absolutely nothing happened.
"Wingardium leviosa!" she said again with more force.
Again the feather stayed motionless.
She had to try it five times before the feather rose. Professor Flitwick gave her five house points for being the first to succeed. She smiled at him, but frowned at the feather. What was wrong with her, she should have been able to do the charm on the first try.
She looked at the bracelet on her arm. Could switching from the Holly wand to a new focus have somehow affected her magic? What if she was never able to use the bracelet properly, and her magic was crippled for the rest of her life?
Lucy was very quiet for the rest of the class. As the students filed out of the classroom, she watched Hermione and Ron yell at each other. She could see the tears in Hermione's eyes, but she wasn't sure what she could do to help her. Plus she was distracted by the worry over her focus.
Instead of heading with the rest of her classmates to the common room to hang out before their next class, she turned down a side corridor by herself.
Akia noticed the silence and stuck her head up from Lucy's shirt pocket and through the neck of her robes, "Where are we going?"
Lucy replied, "To the Room of Requirement."
Once she had arrived at the correct floor, she paced in the corridor three times. A door appeared that she walked through. Inside was a small round room that seemed like a mixture of the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff common rooms.
After shutting the door, she stood in the middle of the room.
"Carver," she said. She'd learned that she didn't need to yell for the angel to hear her.
Right on cue, he appeared in front of her in his typical suit and tie, "Yes?"
"Something's wrong with my magic! I couldn't even do a basic first year charm! Does it have something to do with this focus?" she held the pretty piece of jewelry out to him.
He sighed, "It is your first day of class, why would you be able to do the charm on the first try?"
Lucy stared at him like he was crazy, "Because I've been doing magic for 2o some years?"
He shook his head, "Your last body had been doing magic for years. Lucy just started trained magic today."
Lucy tried to understand what he was saying, "…what?"
He sighed before sitting in one of the armchairs the room had provided. He motioned for her to sit down as well.
"There is nothing wrong with your focus. Do you remember how hard magic was to learn at first? That is because your magical core has to get used to being manipulated in a set manner. With accidental magic, the magic just explodes out of the children. Using wands and incantations requires the magic to be used in an organized manner. Instead of bursting out, a strand of magic is pulled from the user and through the wand. It is used in a specific and understandable way. It takes a lot of practice for the magic to get used to being pulled out in a delicate strand like that. That is why spells can explode. The magic accidentally comes out in a burst instead of the needed amount."
Lucy nodded, "Ok that makes sense, but why can I suddenly not do magic?"
Carver snorted, "You can do magic. You made the feather rise didn't you?"
"Yeah, but it took a lot of work. It was like I was learning it for the first time again," she whined.
"That's because your body is learning it for the first time," he replied. "The magical core of Lucy has not done magic before, so it has to be trained like every other first year."
"What about the magical core with my soul? Didn't it come along," she asked.
Carver nodded, "Your case is quite special. Your core started being special clear back the first time around when Voldemort tried to curse you and accidentally embed a Horcrux in your forehead. This infused some of his magical essence into your core. And since you were so young and your core still developing, your body easily absorbed that magic and turned it into your own. That is how you got your own ability to speak to snakes. It literally became a part of you. In addition, your body fought during those first few months constantly with the magic of the soul fragment. Because your core was connected to your body and soul so deeply, it won, but the fighting stretched the core. This with the combined magic resulted in a very enlarged core."
She interrupted him, "What does that mean, that I was like a superhero among wizards?"
He rolled his eyes, "Hardly. It just meant you had more magical reserves than some. Think of muscles. A weightlifter has more muscles than a stay at home mom who watches soap operas. Your levels were higher than average, but they weren't superhuman. All of your professors had larger cores than yours during your first years, because you still had to use your core and grow it more."
She nodded, "Ok that makes sense. But what happened when my soul was put into this body?"
"Your ability to talk to Akia shows that you didn't just loose your core. Instead, your core was mixed with the core of the body," he said.
"Is this the same thing that happened with the Horcrux?" she asked.
He frowned and shook his head, "No, the Horcrux is never meant to mix with someone else. It is meant to reside in an object until someone activates it. At that point, it is meant to take over the person and turn them into a copy of the original creator. There is no mixing, just beating into submission. In your instance, you took on the role of the holder of the Horcrux. It merely resided in you. Because of its dormant status, your body was able to make it submit."
He took a breath before continuing, "Your soul inhabited the body of Lucy. Because it was done with angel magic and not Dark magic, your core merged with Lucy's core to create a whole new core. At this point, your magical core is impressively large. That is one of the reasons you couldn't use a wand. Your core is about the size of an adult wizards. Normally by the point it reaches that size, it is well trained and used to being used with a wand. In your case, it is still wild. If you had tried to use a wand, it would have burnt out the wand because of how much extra magic it would send through it."
Lucy still felt confused, "So because the cores combined and created a new core, it needs trained on how to work just like any other core?"
He nodded.
"So it really is like I'm a first year student?" Lucy felt outraged when he nodded. "It's not enough to turn me into a little girl? Now I'm not even super powered or anything?"
Carver shrugged, "You have more power than most first years, but you lack a lot in knowledge. Despite having the mind of a thirty year old, you don't know that much about magic."
Lucy scowled at him, "What do you mean?"
Carver looked away, "How much time did you spend studying? Did you learn all you could and as many spells as you could?"
Lucy thought through her last life, "Well Hermione did a lot of the spell research. I just asked her whenever I needed help."
"Your OWL scores weren't exactly that impressive and you never even finished your years at Hogwarts. I bet there are seventh years that know more spells than you do, let alone Voldemort," he told her.
Lucy felt herself pale. She'd thought this second chance would be pretty easy, especially since she'd already beaten Voldemort once. Now she could see how many of her adventures had simply worked out because of luck instead of any skill on her part.
Carver nodded, "I can see that you are starting to realize your issues. You knew that there was a Dark Lord going after you personally. Why wouldn't you have learned all you could in a chance to stop him?"
Lucy shrugged, "Plus the fact that I'm literally at a magical school doing homework on magic. Doesn't make much sense not to have studied all I could."
"Don't beat yourself up too much, Dumbledore had several charms on you to affect your motivation and intelligence. Plus you were friends with Ron-the-eternal-slacker Weasley. Dumbledore wanted you to be easy to manipulate. A super smart, talented savior would've been much harder to control," he said.
Lucy felt a lot better, "Plus I can do things differently this time. It'll just take a lot more work."
Carver rolled his eyes again, "Honestly, I can't believe you. You just assumed you were gonna be this super talented witch without doing any work."
Blushing, she looked down at her toes. When she heard him start laughing, she couldn't help but laugh herself.
"Well, I am the chosen one," she mumbled. This just made them laugh harder.
"Alright kid, better head back. I'm sure someone will start looking for you soon," he said. She nodded and headed back into the hallway.
As she walked, she tried to think through a good plan. She blaimed her deep thought processes for the reason she screamed like a little girl when someone tapped on her shoulder. Turning around, she spotted an unfamiliar black haired Slytherin behind her. Based on his height, she guessed that he was at least a fourth year student.
"What's a little Hufflepuff first year doing walking around alone on the fifth floor?" he sneered at her.
She frowned at him, "What's a little Slytherin doing wandering around the hallways alone?"
He smiled, "Maybe looking for a student to tease." He pulled out his wand and started to cast a spell at her. Reacting on reflux, she swung her fist at his face at the same time a spell hit him from behind.
"Ouch!" she yelled shaking her fist. She was surprised to watch the Slytherin turn firetruck red as his feet swelled up. Behind her, a familiar redhead walked towards the two.
"Are you ok?" the Weasley twin asked. Lucy thought it was Fred, but she wasn't sure. She didn't have a chance to reply when she saw the robes of a professor walk around the corner of the hall.
"Cry," the twin whispered out of the corner of his mouth.
Lucy focused on the pain in her hand to start crying, but she wasn't sure how much good it would do when she realized the professor was of course Snape.
"What is going on?" he demanded as he noticed the crying first year, angry Gryffindor, and unconscious and obviously cursed Slytherin.
Lucy decided in a split second to try Hermione's method from the troll
"He was trying to attack me!" she blurted out.
"Excuse me?" Snape asked. The twin was looking at her like she was crazy too.
"I got lost and then he came up behind me and threatened to do stuff, so I tried to punch him but it didn't work very well," she held out her hand that was rapidly bruising. It looked like one of her fingers might be broken. "Then this guy came along and he cursed the other student first!"
She could feel Snape reaching to read her mind as he stared into her eyes, so she noticed the surprise in his eyes as he met her shields. Recovering quickly, he turned to the twin.
"Even so, I believe you may have gone overboard," he snarled. The twin smiled back at him innocently.
"Ten points from Gryffindor for cursing another student. Come with me, little brat so we can get your hand fixed up," he waved his wand at the Slytherin who started to wake up with a groan. Lucy and the twin shared a delighted grin that he hadn't even assigned detention.
Snape called from half way down the hallway, "Now you chit."
Lucy held her hand as she ran down the hallway.
"No running in the halls, two points from Hufflepuff," he said.
She frowned at the ground. Her hand was starting to throb. She was almost certain one of the fingers was broken.
Snape led her to the Hospital Wing. Lucy couldn't see Madame Pomfrey anywhere, but Snape walked to the medicine cupboard confidently.
"Sit on a bed there," he ordered her as he grabbed several potions. "Madame Pomfrey is out for the day, so I have been left as the temporary healer."
Just the thought of it seemed to make him even madder and his scowl deepened. He placed several potions on the end stand and held out his hand. Gingerly, she held her hand out to the professor. She was surprised when he grabbed her wrist in a firm, but gentle manner. She had to remind herself that she was no longer Harry Potter, the potions professor's most hated pupil.
He waved his wand at her hand and she felt the bone healed. She gasped involuntarily at the sharp pain of the bone moving back in place, but it then felt better. He immediately released her wrist before handing her the potions that she swallowed. She grimaced at the nasty taste of them.
Lucy hadn't been completely sure how she was going to handle Snape, but she'd had a vague idea that perhaps could work for the best and might even be fun. She decided that this was the best time to start that plan.
Jumping off the bed, she attempted to wrap her arms around the surly potions professor, "Thanks so much professor!"
He pushed her off with a few muttered curses. She smiled up at the angry professor.
"Ten points from Hufflepuff for accosting a professor," he snarled. She continued to smile at him.
"It is not wise for such a small first year to be wandering the hallways alone. Make sure that you stay with your classmates from now on," he said.
She nodded at him though she felt annoyed at the small comment. She wasn't that small!
"Alright, away with you!" he snapped as he turned dramatically and went into Madame Pomfrey's office. Lucy hopped off the hospital bed and headed back towards the Great Hall. At least the Hospital Wing was close enough to the Great Hall that she probably wouldn't be asked too many questions.
As she walked out of the Hospital Wing, she noticed Professor McGonagall standing by the doorway with a smile. She wondered how much the stern professor had seen, but shrugged it off.
Cedric felt a headache starting. One of those blasted Weasley twins had just come over to the Hufflepuff table to talk to the older years. Cedric had overheard him telling the fifth year prefect that he had just saved the smallest first year he'd ever seen from a Slytherin on the fifth floor. As the twin was describing the way the girl had acted, Cedric knew immediately who it had to be.
"Personally, I think she got sorted to the wrong house. You should've seen the way she punched him. Definitely a Gryffindor to me," the twin said.
Cedric knew what it was like to feel like you were sorted into the wrong house. The Sorting Hat often took personal preferences into account. He was a perfect example, his father had been a Ravenclaw and his mother had been a Hufflepuff. Because of Cedric's outgoingness and adventuresome spirit, the hat had wanted to place him in Gryffindor. Cedric's parents had often told him that only the foolish went to the red house, so Cedric had begged not to go there.
Cedric was also loyal, though that characteristic wasn't as strong as his bravery. Despite that, he had enough loyalty that the Hat willingly sorted him into Hufflepuff even though he fit Gryffindor better.
It occasionally happened to other students too. They didn't always fit with the expectations of their houses.
Cedric had no doubt that that's what must have happened with Lucy. Everyone had heard of her saving Neville on the train. Plus the incident today.
Normally, Cedric tried to mind his own business, but he'd made it his business to try to help the other students who weren't placed into quite the right house. Plus, Lucy was so tiny that her bravery was just going to get her in trouble.
Cedric leaned his head on the table. There was also the matter of last night at the banquet when Lucy had talked about the ghosts. No one else had noticed, but Cedric had seen the way her eyes had glazed over as she talked. He wasn't sure if it meant anything special, but he had this vague itching at the back of his mind that he knew more than he could remember.
And when she'd walked down this morning, he could have sworn she was hissing to herself.
Cedric wasn't sure what exactly was up with the First Year, but he felt like he should probably help her.
Alex frowned at him, "Dude, stop trying to think so much. You look like your brains going to explode. When's the last time you even turned your brain on?"
Cedric threw a piece of toast at his friend and smiled. Eh, things weren't too bad yet. How much damage could one wild First Year cause anyway?