When Harry awoke, he was lying in the Hogwarts Hospital Wing, with several concerned pairs of eyes hovering all around. He moaned, and rolled off the bed onto the floor. "Harry!" Hermione cried, rushing over to him. "Are you alright??" He stood up slowly. "Yeah…I think so," he said, still not quite sure what was happening. "How'd I…get here? I had a horrible nightmare…" Ron frowned. "You must've had some real trouble, Harry," he said. "We found you passed out in a potions cauldron in one of the dungeons. Snape was furious, tried to get you expelled again. Harry couldn't help rolling his eyes, and Ron grinned. Hermione looked stern.
"Really Harry, you must be more careful! Imagine what would've happened if you hadn't teleported to Hogwarts, but had ended up somewhere else instead! It would have been disastrous!" Harry had a vague feeling at the back of his mind that Hermione's words had triggered. Where had he been? All he remembered was the green light…he shook his head to clear it. "Really, Hermione, I'm fine. I must have just been exhausted from staying up late doing summer homework, and was a little careless with the spell. It's really fine, don't nag." Hermione didn't look convinced.
At that moment, the doors to the hospital wing burst open, and Fred, George, and Ginny ran in, followed, more sedately, by Professor Dumbledore. "Harry!" "Where've you been??" "What happened?" "Where did you end up? Anywhere you aren't supposed to be? Tell us about it?" "Quiet, quiet, please," said Dumbledore, approaching Harry. "Mr. Potter, please come to my office." Hermione looked worried, and Ron bit his lip and gave Harry a thumbs-up. Then Harry, still confused, followed Dumbledore to his office.
When they reached it, passing the living stone gargoyle, Dumbledore sat Harry down and frowned at him. "Harry, I'm not sure what happened, and I know," he said, before Harry could protest, "That you didn't do it on purpose. But please, Harry, tell me why you ended up in Professor Snape's new gold cauldron." He waited. Harry blinked. "I…don't know, sir." He thought hard. "All I remember…is a lot of green light…I don't know where I was…I think maybe I just messed up the spell and teleported to the wrong part of Hogwarts. Really Sir, I can't remember." Dumbledore watched him for a long time. "Alright Harry," he said resignedly after a while, "You may go now."
* * * * * * * * * * * *
The next day, while Harry, Ron and Hermione were walking to "Care of Magical Creatures" class, they heard a commotion and loud voices around the corner. "Sounds like Malfoy," Ron said, recognizing the sleazy drawl that was easily distinguishable as the voice of their archenemy. "Oh no, Ron, please, not now! We can't be late, not on the first day of school!" Hermione was distraught, but Harry and Ron had already rushed around the bend to see what was going on, and she followed resignedly, unwilling to allow them to get into all sorts of trouble on their own.
What they saw was skinny, blond Draco Malfoy, laughing raucously at a dark haired girl in 5th year robes like their own, who seemed to have dropped her books, and was collecting them up again, her face bright red. Malfoy swooped down and grabbed a book, waving it in her face and saying something menacingly that Harry couldn't hear. He could see that it was her "History of evil," textbook, for the Defense Against the Dark Arts class, but that didn't really matter to him. All that he really cared about was that Draco had made a new enemy, and any enemy of Malfoy's was a friend to Harry. He stepped forward to where Malfoy could see him, and cleared his throat.
Malfoy looked up, and grinned at Harry. "Oh, it's Potter the blunderer. Hear you messed up that simple little teleportation spell, eh Potter?" He said, grinning. Harry stepped menacingly forward. "Could've happened to anyone, Malfoy," said Ron. "Give her back her book!" said Hermione; clearly slightly shocked that Malfoy should try to steal a textbook. "She'll need that for class!" "Give it here, Malfoy," Harry reinforced. "Like to try and make me?" He said, still smiling. Harry and his friends would have been quite willing, if Professor McGonagall hadn't appeared just then.
"Potter, Weasley, Malfoy! What is this nonsense going on here?" Hermione spoke up. "Professor, Malfoy's got that girl's book!" Malfoy dropped it behind him and slunk off. Professor McGonagall shook her head in exasperation. "Potter, Miss. Granger, Weasley, and you…ah…Miss. Polaris, get off to class now, no more dawdling in the halls, or I'll have to take points from Gryffindor! Go on, go!" They went. The girl whose book they'd rescued went with them, smiling with relief. "Thanks," she whispered, looking over her shoulder to see if McGonagall was gone. "That Malfoy's a real creep."
"Yeah," agreed Ron. "He does stuff like that all the time. It's not real hard to make him stop, though. He likes to pick on weaker kids. You gotta stand up to him. By the way, what's your name and house? I haven't seen you around before." The girl looked at her feet, for a reason none of them could understand. "Ariel Polaris, 5th year Gryffindor," she said. They blinked. "5th year Gryffindor? But, we're 5th year Gryffindors, and you certainly weren't in our house last year," said Hermione, puzzled. Ariel nodded. "I'm a transfer from Beauxbatons School this year. My parents used to go here, but then we went to France for a while, so I had to go to a different school. I got sorted yesterday morning…so I'm in Gryffindor with you guys." She sounded so upset about it that Ron couldn't help taking a bit of umbrage. "What's wrong with Gryffindor?" He asked loudly. Ariel looked up. "Oh, nothing, nothing of course!" she said quickly. "Really! It's just…all my family…for generations…has been in, well, Slytherin."
There was a long pause. A whole family full of Slytherin, and she ends up in Gryffindor, he thought blankly. It was quite odd. Slytherin was famous for turning out dark wizards and followers of Voldemort. Of course, they weren't all like that, but…Gryffindor didn't really seem the place for snake spawn. Of course, the sorting hat knew what it was doing. Hermione spoke up at that point. "Really, is that all? That's nothing to worry about! You were sorted into Gryffindor because that's where you belong, and that's all there is to it. It's really nothing to get upset about." Ariel gave Hermione such a grateful smile that Hermione had to smile warmly back. "Really. And I'm sure you'll be great and help us win the house cup again!" Harry and Ron nodded. "It's true," Harry said, squeezing her hand.
They went to Care of Magical Creatures together, taught by the gamekeeper, Hagrid, who winked cheerily at them. "Alright, Harry? Ron? Hermione? Who's your new friend?" When they introduced her, Hagrid raised an eyebrow. "Polaris, eh? Knew your father and mother." Ariel's face fell, but Hagrid grinned. "Wos wrong? Yer carrying on the tradition of Hogwarts, nothing wrong with that!" He didn't say anything about Slytherin and Gryffindor, and Ariel began to feel a bit better. By the end of the class, she looked much happier than she had when they'd found her with Draco, and was amusing them all with tales of Beauxbatons on the way back to the common room. Ginny Weasley was sitting with her nose in a Transfiguration textbook, and looked up as they came in. "Oh Hermione, I can't figure out how to turn Fred and George into twin armchairs, and I need to turn them into something before they get into any more trouble!" She lowered her voice.
"They've found some sort of book from the restricted section that some teacher left lying around and they're trying all sorts of things in it. I'm afraid they'll blow themselves up, or worse, experiment on me with it; please go see if they're still all right. I can't really figure out if I want something horrible to happen to them or not." Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Ariel agreeably went over to where George and Fred were sitting hunched over a book. Looking over their shoulder, they saw the title "Potions of Possession" imprinted in flashing green and silver writing on the front.
Ron tapped Fred on the shoulder. "Oi, George, what've you got there?" He whirled around towards Ron, and Ron shrieked in terror. Fred's face was all bloated and contorted, and had turned a very putrid shade of green. In fact, Harry realized it looked nothing at all like Fred's face at all, anymore. Laughing, Fred removed the horribly ugly mask and grinned impishly at Ron. "Why I'm sorry, did I scare you?" Ron stared. "Ah, no, no, of course not, knew it was you all along, just playing along, right Harry?" Harry laughed nervously. "You certainly scared me," he said, and turned to look for Hermione, but she wasn't behind him anymore.
Hermione and Ariel had taken the book while Fred and George were preoccupied, and were now leafing through it, riveted. "Why, these are some of the most dangerous potions there are!" Hermione proclaimed, astonished. "You just found this book lying around?" George shrugged, making a grab for the book. "Possessions, Permanent Paralysis, Evil diseases," Ariel read. She looked up. "This is really awful stuff. You aren't gonna try any of this, are you?" Fred shrugged. "No, 'course not." "Though," George said thoughtfully, "It might be fun to see what it would do to "perfect Percy." Even Ron had to smile at that.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
The next morning, Harry had to get up bright and early for some quidditch practice. He got dressed and washed, grabbed his Firebolt, and headed down, only to bump into Ariel on his way to the common room. "Oh, sorry Harry," she said, yawning. "Just got up early to finish some homework I'd fallen asleep in the middle of last night. Oh, are you going to play quidditch? Can I watch?" Harry didn't mind, so she accompanied him down to the playing field, where George and Fred Weasley, Katie Bell, Angelina Johnson, and Alicia Spinnet were already waiting. The new captain of the team and Keeper was a 6th year named Dalton who was no nonsense, down to business, and to the point. "We're going to win this year," he said simply. "Get on your brooms and get warmed up."
As Harry zoomed around doing loop de loops and zigzags, he looked over into the stands, and saw Ariel watching him, with a tint of envy on her face. He was used to that, most people wished they could be on a quidditch team and be star seeker, like Harry. But there was something else in her face, something about her eyes, as she looked right at him, something he knew he recognized. It had to do with the green light in his dreams, he knew…but for the life of him he couldn't figure out what it was.
When quidditch practice was over, he beckoned Ariel out onto the playing field. He'd seen how she'd been looking at his broom, and asked, "Do you want to try it out?" He wasn't sure what prompted him to offer so quickly and easily, but he really wanted her to go for a ride on it. "Really?" She was amazed, running her hand over the smooth handle of the Firebolt in amazement. "You'd really let me do that?" He shrugged. "Sure."
Before he knew what was happening, Ariel was high in the air on the Firebolt, laughing with delight, and diving down towards him. He ducked out of the way, thinking she was going to crash, but she swerved back up again just in time, still laughing. Scared for a moment, he grinned, and called her back down. "That was really good," he said as she landed and clambered off, breathless and rosy cheeked. "Thanks," she said, smiling.
"It's a great broom. I don't know much about brooms, but that's the fastest I've ever been on. It was lots of fun."
"You should play quidditch," he commented, as they walked to the common room. "There'll be plenty of spots available on the team next year, when George and Fred and everyone are gone." She sighed. "I'd love to, but I don't have a broom…I've used my cousin's broom often enough, that's how I know how to fly. But still, there's no way I could get one of my own to play with." Harry looked confused. "Surely, if you got onto the team, you could convince your parents to get you one? They're wizards, right? So they'd understand."
"No…that's just it…they are wizards, but…they'd never let me play quidditch for Gryffindor." She dropped her eyes to the ground. "They were so disappointed in me when they found out. They sent me a cursed letter that made it so I'm not able to fall asleep, ever. I suppose that's a good thing, in a way…I can't doze off in class now…" She looked very unhappy. Harry cringed, and put an arm around her awkwardly. "Don't worry. My family wouldn't get me a broom either; I got one from the school so that Gryffindor could have a seeker. If you're good enough, I'm sure they'd do the same for you."
Ariel looked startled. "Your family wouldn't get you a broom? But…you're the best player Hogwarts has had, in a long time! Weren't they proud of you?" Harry snorted. "The Dursleys would only be proud of me if I'd managed to get myself lost somewhere and expelled at the same time. They hate me." "But surely they don't!" "Oh yes they do." He grinned, so that she wouldn't look so distraught. "Don't worry about it. I don't mind all that much."
When they reached the common room, Shamus Finnegan clomped Harry on the back. "How's quidditch going, Harry? Gonna win again this year?" "Of course we are," said Ron, descending the stairs. "How could we lose with Harry Potter on our team? Morning Harry, Ariel." Hermione and Ginny, yawning, came down behind him. "Come on," said Hermione peremptorily, "We're going to be late for breakfast!" "Hermione," said Ron, frustrated, "breakfast isn't for another 15 minutes! We aren't going to be late!" Harry shook his head at his friends. "C'mon, Ron, I'm hungry too. Let's go."