Roy

Steam was hissing into the cylinders of the old, but perfectly polished scarlet locomotive, driving the complex steel mechanism that transmitted its power to the wheels. One carriage after another noticeably jerked. For a moment, the engine's rotating wheels kept sliding over the rail surface, then they found their grip. Slowly at first, then increasingly gaining speed, the puffing engine dragged the train out of King's Cross station. The Hogwarts Express was on its way.

When their parents were out of sight, Albus closed the window where he, Rose and her four girlfriends had been waving goodbye, then he left the compartment with an indeterminate murmur. Individually, he thought, girls could be quite nice, and Rose certainly was, but when they came in packs, he found their chattering hard to bear.

Albus peered up the corridor: A boy and a girl, both about sixteen years old, entering the carriage from the other end and recognizable as Prefects by their silver badges, caught his attention. Prefects were highly respected at Hogwarts. Being appointed Prefect was an award only the most intelligent, most mature, most responsible, most trustworthy students received, making their families very proud. Grandma Molly, who was coming to an age when you don't necessarily notice that you are telling the same story for the hundredth time, would never let a family celebration go by without mentioning at least half a dozen times that four out of her six sons had been Prefects and a daughter-in-law and a granddaughter too. Being a Prefect had often been the very first step to a steep career after school, some of them had even become Minister for Magic, most recently Albus' aunt-in-law Hermione, Rose's mother.

Each of the four Hogwarts houses had two of them, usually a boy and a girl. However, the two of them Albus was looking at seemed to belong to different houses, at least they barely noticed each other. While the girl was looking cheerfully into one compartment after another, apparently not to check if everything was alright, but rather to celebrate meeting her friends, stopping at the third compartment door to start a conversation, the other one seemed to take his task a little more seriously: a black-haired boy, sturdy though not too tall, with dark brown eyes in an earnest, not really handsome, but intelligent face that was somehow fascinating. He looked strangely aloof. Wherever he appeared, his schoolmates seemed to jerk and to suddenly take care to behave like students worthy of a thousand-year-old school. They didn't seem to be afraid of him at all, but to rather feel a certain kind of shy respect, probably inexplicable to themselves, but irresistible wherever he passed by, like surrounded by an invisible cloud of authority.

Doesn't seem to have many friends, Albus thought.

"Well, Slytherin?", a familiar voice behind him mocked, and Albus wheeled around. His brother James, two years older, was standing behind him, apparently once again out for teasing the younger. For months, he had been annoying him with his comments, the Sorting Hat, who sent the new students into the different Hogwarts houses, would certainly make him, Albus, a Slytherin. Yet all the Potters and all the Weasleys had been Gryffindors, and there was no reason at all to believe that Albus, of all family members, would end up with the Slytherins, with whom the Gryffindors had been at feud for centuries. Of course, James didn't believe it for a second, and Albus knew he didn't. Nevertheless, he was furious about James' silly jokes – which, of course, just incited him. Albus knew, but could not help getting angry!

"Shut up!", he hissed. "Me – a Slytherin, right? You think the Sorting Hat will send me to those stupid, puffed-up, arrogant pretenders, those" – in his rage he didn't notice that James was giving him a warning glance – "those Dark wizards, those ... Death Eaters?"

"The Sorting Hat," said a calm voice behind him, and again Albus turned around to look into the face of the Prefect, "has sorted Hogwarts students into their houses for a thousand years, and never he sent anyone anywhere they didn't belong. Just trust him. If you belong to Gryffindor, the Hat knows better than you do." He looked from Albus to James, who obviously wished the ground to swallow him up. "Your little brother, Potter?"

"Y-yes," James replied remarkably shyly, "my brother Albus. Al, this is ... Roy MacAllister, Prefect of, err ... Slytherin."

Albus felt he was getting hot: "Oh," he stammered, "what I said wasn't very courteous, was it?"

The older boy looked at him for a moment, as if he was waiting for something, then he said: "You call it not very courteous, but you don't apologize."

"I, uh ..." Albus started without knowing what to say. MacAllister interrupted him, and for the first time a kind of smile curled his lips:

"That's very good, keep it up! Honesty is nothing to apologize for. By the way, it was not discourteous, because it was not for my ears. If you had said it straight to me, yes, that wouldn't have been very nice. But even then, you would have had every right to say it." He paused. "What a pity you have such bad opinions of us even before arriving at Hogwarts and being able to judge for yourself. Where did you get these views?"

Unwillingly, Albus looked at James, who obviously was embarrassed. "No offence to you personally, MacAllister," he said hastily, though with some effort.

"No, of course not, as usual," MacAllister replied with a contemptuous undertone. "I just fundamentally dislike lies, even if they are not against me personally, and you obviously tell your little brother Slytherin is full of Death Eaters."

"Well," James answered somewhat more defiantly, "among you, there are really many from Death Eater families. Many parents and grandparents of Slytherins supported Voldemort then, didn't they?"

"So their children and grandchildren, not even born then, are Death Eaters, too?" Roy's tone had become harsher now.

"My goodness, don't make such a fuss. It's just that, well, at Gryffindor ..." He was searching for appropriate words.

"... EVERYBODY talks like that, right?"

"Well, yes, but not about you and your family, you never had anything to do with them."

"Right, but that's not my merit, none of us choose our relatives. But I'll tell you something, Potter, if I could choose them, I would rather like to be related to three dozen Death Eaters than to people who", – he wrinkled his nose – "parrot what EVERYBODY say! Have a nice trip!"

He abruptly headed off for the door of the next carriage, from which at this very moment a tall boy entered the corridor. He seemed to be about Roy's age, dark blond, with a long slim nose, regular features and incredibly blue eyes. He was exactly the type of guy schoolgirls dreamed of in sleepless nights, and would have fitted in perfectly with any wizards boy band.

Roy was immediately drawn away from his anger: "Julian!"

"Roy!"

Both hugged each other briefly and somewhat awkwardly, then nudged each other in the ribs and patted on their shoulders.

"I've been looking for you all the time", Julian said with a smile, "and was afraid you weren't on the train at all!"

"You know, as a Prefect, you've to do the babysitter first. Where did you think I was? In a cell in Azkaban?"

Both of them laughed.

"Well, you never know with this Ministry," Julian joked. "Let's join the others. We've saved you a seat in the compartment."

"I have yet to finish my tour. Just come with me," Roy replied, wrenched open the door that led to the next carriage, and both disappeared behind it.

Apparently he does have at least one friend, his best buddy for sure, Albus thought. Wonder why he is against the Ministry?