After a good few hours of searching (During this time Liz found many different bars and night clubs around London that she had made a quick mental note to return to during weekends) they finally came upon the tiny bar that stood blocking the entrance to Diagon Ally for those who were going to it by foot, and not by floo powder, or apperating. Of course, like everything else, it was completely out of the way, and looked to be in shambles to keep muggles from entering. The crowd on the interior looked even stranger than the muggles on the outside. She wasn't totally accustomed to seeing wizards and witches in their normal attire. Mages and Elementals lived more as muggles themselves. Taking a liking to electricity, and dressing more like them, even when attending mage guilds and councils. As they walked threw, they received many strange glares and bewildered looks. If it wasn't for Loki on her shoulder she felt like she was going to be sent threw a memory charm and shunned out for being a muggle. Luckily enough, that wasn't the case.
They made their way threw the bar, making sure to avoid direct eye contact with anyone and escaped threw the back door to the brick wall that lay before them.
"Liz, you've got that letter from Hogwarts right?" Her grandmother asked.
"Yeah." She then took it, flipped it over, and to Liz's surprise their was more writing on the back which she hadn't noticed in the first place. They were instructions on how to open the barrier. Mumbling to herself for having to use her wand, she plucked out the old beat up wand and began to tap on the wall in the correct order that was instructed on the parchment. It then opened allowing them entrance to the store ridden, alleyway, which of course as usual, held a large variety of wizards and witches all, bustling about buying up everything they needed for their year at Hogwarts.
"Hey, Liz. You ought to buy a new wand as well. That one doesn't look to be in very good condition."
"Well because I normally don't use one, when my magic in my body touches the magic in the wand, it sorta slowly deteriorates the wand." She said with a grin.
"Alright then, why don't you head over to Ollivander's and buy a new wand. Here's some money. We'll go and get some more out at Gringott's. Just wait inside for us, I'm sure by the time we get their you'll still be trying to figure out what wand you need." She said as they then swept down threw the crowd.
"Yeah, bye." She said as they were gone in an instant. "I'll never understand why they act like that when they're around people who use magic." She commented to the bird on her shoulder, which nodded its head in understanding. She then made her way over to the building that held an assortment of different wands in the store window. She received the same strange look from students and adults alike. She actually felt kind of good, knowing she was different. She always enjoyed getting that stange look people gave about her clothes. She walked into the store only to find the store completely deserted.
"Umm… hello?" Nobody answered. "Hey!? Anyone here? I wanna buy a wand." She yelled into the shop, her accent clearly visible.
"I'm here, I'm here, no need to shout." Came a sudden voice from behind a stack of boxes.
"Oh, sorry. Should have answered the first time, round." He then got up and walked over to her and eyed her strangely, just like everyone else did once she arrived.
"You've got a strange aura emanating from you. You have a wand already." He stated glumly.
"Yeah." She pulled out the beaten wand.
"Ugh, what did you do to it?" He asked as he took it away from her and examined it closely.
"Uh, long story. Anyways, got a wand I can have?"
"Yes, yes." He said as he handed back the wand to her. He moved over to a stack far in the back of the room. He took it over to her, blowing off dust on the top, and pulled out a birch wood wand.
"Here, try this." He handed it to her.
"Erm… whatever you say." She took it, and a sudden burst of energy came from her hand upon contact with it, sparks flew from around her grip and she gave it a quick wave. Nothing happened. She looked back up at him. His eyes just starred at her.
"A- Are you sure… you need a wand?" He said quickly, looking at her like she was a bug.
"Yeah, I'm attending Hogwarts, and from my understanding you need a wand to do spells." She stated, trying to pull off as being a witch, which she seemed to be failing at miserably.
"Right." He then whisked away, robes flying behind him, and exited threw the back door. He had left the door open a smidge, and her gaze followed after him threw it. It looked to be a storage room of some sort. Like he needed a storage room. It looked to her like his entire stock of wands was piled up on the floor, on tables and shelves along each and every wall, all of which were in a rather unorganized fashion. He soon came back with yet another box, only this one was all black with a gray trim running around it. He took it out, in a hasty matter, in a way a bit excited but also a little nervous at the same time.
"Here, try this one. Freshly made. And I think it should be just right for you." He handed it to her, his hands shook a bit as she clasped it. This time, no sparks emanated from her hand. She starred surprisingly at it.
"Hey, it didn't—" She quickly stopped realizing that she sounded like sparks shooting from her hand everytime she touched a wand was a normal thing.
"Your not a witch are you?" He questioned bluntly.
"Ahh…" She hesitated on the answer. She knew wizards and witches hated her kind so refused to answer.
"You're a mage. What is your lot doing in a wizarding area?" Liz's eyes grew angry at his tone.
"Hey, you have no right to talk to me like I'm a bug or something. I'm a paying customer, damnit!" She hesitated and calmed her tone. "But, I guess, I can always have one imported and you loose out on a sale." She finished.
"Ahh… nevermind. That's a 10", mahogany, with dragon heartstring. That'll be ten galleons." Liz rummaged into her pockets to pull out the money. Cursing silently under her breath as she took out a pocket full of change which consisted of American currency and money of the magic world. She sorted out the ten galleons payment, and took the rest, but before she could grab the last quarter, Ollivander had snatched it up and examined it.
"Your American." He said as he starred at it.
"Yeah, point being?" She asked as he handed the coin back to her and she dropped it back into her pocket. Then taking her wand she headed for the door only to suddenly have it burst in at her as a group of four boys, who seemed to be students, came in.
"Hey, Olly! What's goin on!?" Came the tallest boy. He then noticed Liz and stopped. "Oh, sorry." He said holding the door for her as she trudged out, rather annoyed already at how Mr. Ollivander had treated her.
"Why, hello, boys. Loose another wand, Sirius?"
"Yeah, actually—Ow! What was that for?" He blurted out as James elbowed him in the side.
"Did you not recognize that girl."
"No, why?"
"Ugh, that was the girl with the black bird. Remember we threw a dung bomb in her room last night. And we thought we'd try and find her here." He stated as a look on Sirius's face came over him as he remembered.
"Oh yeah! Hey, Remus, Peter, we'll be right back." He muttered to his two other friends as he and James ran out the door back into the crowd. "Did you see where she went?" Sirius stated quickly as his gaze ran up and down the ally.
"Come on, it can't be that hard to spot her. She wasn't wearing robes, and she had the black bird on her shoulder, too." James said as he followed Sirius who had quickly started walking down towards Gringott's. Just as they began to approach the stone steps leading into the large building, they came face to face with what looked like three muggles. They were talking rapidly together. And amongst the three stood a rather angry young girl they had just recently run into. The walked down the stone steps and up to them, still chattering away. Her gaze looked away from the two adults and landed on James and Sirius.
"Are you followin me or somethin? I thought I just left you in Ollivander's?" She questioned looking at the two.
James and Sirius looked at each other bewildered. When they had walked in, they thought she had not even looked at them, by the way she had stormed out in such a rage.
"Ahh… no, were not falling you. We were just curious to see—"
"From where I'm standing, that's called following. I just left you two not even five minutes ago."
"Yeah… well… you see…" James stuttered looking for words.
"You're my new neighbor." Sirius butted in. "And then when I saw you…(Sirius ignored the jab in the ribs by James, pointing out that Sirius had not spotted her, he had.)… I realized that you must be my new neighbor, and the only courteous thing to do was to introduce myself, and welcome you to the neighborhood, or Hogwarts, as that's where we're all headed now." He said shakily. James just hit his forehead with his hand and shook his head.
"So, you to were the ones who threw that dung bomb in my room last night!" She stormed. Her grandparents just sort of ignored her as they moved on to go purchase Liz's books.
"Ahh…"
"You know how long it takes to get rid of the smell! And why would you do that!? It's a really childish thing to do." Liz yelled on, now drawing some attention of innocent bystanders.
"Well… we…" James started.
"I should have put a larger hex on that door. Maybe it could have toasted your eyebrows instead!" She said now holding up her fist in front of them, sparks flying from it. Suddenly her grandmother stood between the three, as she quickly shoved her daughter's hand down and out of eyesight.
"Sorry, boys, but you can talk more on the train. We have a lot of things to buy. Come along, dear." She said as she pulled Liz away from them.
"Don't bother coming to look for me. I'll find you." She called back at the two now stunned teenagers.
"Well, that went rather well. I think she likes me. OW!" Sirius's hands flew to his head, as James smacked him across the head with his book.
"Come on. We left Moony, and Wormtail back at Ollivander's. They're probably wondering what happened to us." James stated as he then began to walk down the wizard and witch infested road.
"Liz! You know better than that. You can't just go and start using your magic in front of them. Many of them still have never learned of non-wand using magics before, let alone those who actually can do it." Her grandmother exclaimed.
"Well. They're gunna have to just get over the fact that a mage is gunna be in their school, cause I'm not backing down just because I'm different. Besides, they should know how to handle themselves if they ever did come up against mages or elementals. They should be trained everyday as a matter of fact." She began to think as she thumbed threw the books her grandparents had just recently went to pick up for her. "Oh well, hey, did you guys pick up any food for Loki while you went and got me all my stuff?"
"Ahh… no I'll go pick up some treats for him. Why don't you and your grandmother pick out some robes." Her grandfather instructed.
"Yeah sure." Loki then flew over to Liz's grandfather and landed lightly on the old man's shoulder as they retreated into another store decorated with an elaborate array of birdcages and cat posts, along with their respected counterparts.
Walking along the alley the two soon came to yet another store, this one decorated with the years finest wizard and witches robes. Liz let out a moan of distaste at the sudden reminder of having to look identical to those around her during the year, without being able to stand out, as she usually enjoyed. Upon entering, they were givin once more the look of disgust as what seemed to be ordinary muggles entered the building. Her grandmother being the average shop-a-holic had quickly run over to a rack of girls' robes. She quickly grabbed a few off the racks and walked them over to her.
"Here, go try these on."
"Ahh… Ms. Their is no need for that." Came a quick voice from behind a rack of robes.
"What do you mean?"
"We do all the fitting right here. All you have to do is pick out the one you want, and then we do the measurements, right here." The women explained as she walked over to a little circular platform in the middle of the room.
"Oh. Well. I like this one, what do you think?" She turned to Liz.
"Ahh, Gram. You know I would never wear something that bright or…" She glanced it over. "…Frilly." Liz grabbed the robes from her grandma and hung them back up. Scanning over the robes she soon found a plain black one with no extras attached and handed it to the women. "This ones fine I guess." She said, as she tried to ignore the rather disappointed look on the women's face as Liz had taken one of the cheapest robes in the store.
"Very well, very well. Stand up here." She pointed to a platform that was unoccupied by a student, and allowed for Liz to climb up.
'God. Why can't I just try the damn thing on? I hate this.' She thought to herself as tape measures suddenly flew up around her and began taking down her measurements. But sooner than she had thought the tape measures returned to their desk drawer and the women was once again instructing her to get down.
"Very good. And your robes should be finished in a matter of minutes. Is their anything else I can help you with?" She asked as the role of parchment she had been scribbling down the measurements on rolled back up and disappeared into thin air.
"Hmm… well it looks like your going to be needing dress robes."
"Oh wonderful! We have a wide variety of dress robes that just came in this morning as a matter of fact." The women said brightly as the rack of plain school robes suddenly disappeared and was replaced with girls' dress robes. Each one more elaborate in color and design than the other. Liz's eyes widened at the selection as she quickly looked back to her grandmother.
"Ahh… don't worry about the dress robes. I've got a great outfit for any sort of special occasion they plan to hold." She said hurriedly as she waved her hands in front of her.
"Alright if your sure." Her attention was brought back on the women. "No, we don't need any right now. Thanks anyways." The bright smile quickly faded at these words as she then whisked away, robe flying behind her, and around the desk as she rung up the amount into the cash register.
"Alright, that comes to 10 galleons please." She asked, still with a solemn face on, as a bag with the freshly made robes appeared on the desk. Her grandmother paid the lady, only taking up some time to figure out which coins were which, when they finally left. Upon entering the street, it seemed as if total chaos had erupted. It looked like a childish prank had been let loose because they whole alley was filled with different shapes and colours of owls, and the road was crammed with rats, and mice, and plenty of different species of cat.
"What the fuck happened here!?"
"Watch your mouth, hunny." Her grandmother said, rather calmly, as she weaved in and out of the rodents and felines, while batting away the owls that flew in and out of people. Once they had finally reached the heart of the problem, they both sighed after finding their giant black friend swooping in and out threw the owls, causing it's usual ounce of chaos. While her grandfather sat and talked with the shop owner over the mess as his assistants shot bolts of light from their wands immobilizing the creatures.
"Loki!" The giant black raven, upon hearing its name, swooped back down towards its owner and sat proudly on her shoulder. "Great way to put our names in the damned paper so quickly." She scowled as the bird continued to look around menacingly at the other birds.
"We're terrible sorry about this. We'll pay for everything." Her grandfather said coolly to the owner.
"Ugh, don't worry about it. Just get out of my site. I've had enough problems to deal with today, that has been far worse than this." He said as he sent out another jet of light stopping a few more animals in their tracks.
"Okay, well, come on, we should best be getting you to the train now."
"Hold on just a second!" The group stopped and turned only to be quickly blinded by the light of a flashbulb going off in their unprepared eyes, leaving them all with momentary blindness. A quick thank you was all they heard before their vision cleared and they continued on, not thinking twice on what had just happened.
~*~*~*~
It wasn't long before they finally arrived at the train station. Of course their ticket said Platform 9¾, meaning in muggle terms, "What the fuck!". So of course they wandered aimlessly around Platforms 9 and 10. Looking utterly ridiculous what with the large amount of items and the uncommon black raven accompanying their party.
"Ya know what. Why don't we just skip the 9¾ bullshit, and head on home." Liz stated as she began to turn the cart around, only to be stopped by her grandfather's strong grip on her arm.
"I don't think so. You're finishing your schooling, even if it is in a wizarding school." He said as he turned her back around.
"Well, and look at this. Looks like we may have some luck after all." Her grandmother quickly blurted in as she saw two familiar boys, and two others accompanying them, with a large variety of items and animals as well.
"Excuse me boys." She said walking up to them.
"No, Gram, please don't." Liz scowled as she smacked her forehead.
"It's our grand-daughters first time to Hogwarts, and we don't really know how to get her onto the platform." She asked as kindly as possible, as her patience was already wavering from walking the stretch of the train station over and over again.
"Ahh… yeah, just walk threw that wall." The brown haired kid said. "James, why don't you go first and show her."
"Why me?"
"Cause Moony said so. Now go." Came his companions urged reply. Rolling his eyes, he then quickly glanced at the muggles, noticing known were paying much attention, walked aimlessly towards the wall, and in an instant disappeared threw it.
"Nice, I get to walk threw a wall." She said enthusiastically, as she then started for the wall. "See ya guys." She waved back to her grandparents, and in a split second collided with now a solid wall, allowing for the wind to get knocked out of her from ramming the handle bar into her ribs.
"Ugh… what the… fuck!" She said threw gasps of breath. The brown haired boy, called Moony, walked up to the wall and placing his hand on it looking like he was leaning, went clear threw.
"Hmm… that's weird. How come you can't get threw? You're a witch, aren't you?"
"Well, obviously. You normally don't see any normal person carrying around this much shit, now do you?" She motioned to the cart of bags and the bird.
"Yeah well…"
"Oh I know! It's the shielding spell. It's on to keep outsiders out." She said as she then stuck her hands in her pockets, and with a few hidden hand movements, and a small silent incantation, she grabbed her cart and walked on in, without removing her eyes from the wall. Allowing for a smooth entrance in.
"What?" Moony just stood their, confused as his black haired friend walked up to him and with a shrug walked threw followed by the blonde, and last himself.
"Well, it looks like she'll have a great year." Her grandfather instructed.
"Yeah. I think she will." Replied her grandmother as they then both walked back down the platform.
~*~*~*~
One on the other side, she was greeted by the other boy who had gone threw before her. He most likely had been waiting for his other companions to come threw the barrier.
"So you look like you made it threw alright." He said with a cocky smile.
"Yeah, it's always great fun to walk threw a wall." She said sarcastically. As she moved past him and moved into the river of students as they brought their carts of luggage to the end of the train to be loaded on. Once she left her cart there, she made a quick hasty grab for her guitar and its bag, along with her own bag. Snapping open the cage door of Loki's cage, she allowed him to fly up and onto her shoulder. The wizard who stood putting the trunks and cages into the train, looked at her strangely.
"He doesn't like closed in areas." She motioned to the cramped compartment along side the train. "Oh, and please be careful with my amp. Thanks." She said quickly looking at the large black speaker with its assortment of plugs and knobs. She then headed back down to the opposite end of the train and climbed on.
The train was already jam packed with students of all ages. Each compartment was filled. That's all she needed was to be sitting in a compartment with some noisy little children. Finally after a while of searching she found a compartment that was completely empty. Of course on the way of heading for it, she noticed the four boys she had left a while ago, had taken a different compartment just a little ways from hers.
The compartments were small. Each could fit four comfortable, and if need be, six. A nice sliding glass door could be closed for privacy, which she made note of, and along the wall, above the large window, was some storage space for small belongings that a passenger had brought with them on board.
Taking her guitar, she rested it on the opposite seat, as she settled down on the other, relaxing and putting her feet up. Loki flew from her shoulder and landed on the seat beside her, resting his head under his wing and drifting off to sleep. Rummaging in her bag she soon found her CD player and assortment of CD's she had brought along with her. Her friend back in America had a way with electronics and magic, and he had been able to magic her electronics so they would be able to work past the barriers that kept electronics from working. Allowing for her to keep some of her sanity stable. Figuring she would need it, her friends had given her a goodbye present of 12 new CDs to add to her ever-growing collection. Tossing on her headphones she quietly head bobbed to Placebo.
~*~*~*~
"Ha! Look at this! So those weirdo's were the ones who began all the commotion in Diagon Ally." The blonde laughed to his companions as they all examined the new issue of the Daily Profit.
The article read:
Major Upset in Diagon Ally
And under the heading contained the confused picture of Liz and her grandparents, and of course the bird that caused it all.
As back to school shoppers travel along happily buying their assortments of books and wands, a few new faces to the crowd decide to make themselves known. The three (pictured above) decided to pull a prank and send the hundreds of animals into the crowds causing mass chaos, and some looting as the animals were slowly recaptured. Many had suspicious outlooks on the group upon their arrival.
"They looked like a group of muggles stepping into the alley this morning. Of course I didn't think of saying anything considering the large black bird the young girl had on her shoulder." Parcy Hengsing pointed out while she took her 1st year daughter around the now cleaned out Diagon Ally.
With the damage done, the three had left without a word, and without an ounce of care for all the damage they had committed.
The group broke out in hysteric laughter, breaking all of those in the surrounding compartments to stop mid-sentence to allow the laughter to pass before continuing. But were suddenly halted as a scream came from their door.
"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" Came the female voice as the sliding glass door swung open revealing the same girl who was pictured in the moving picture upon the newspaper.
"Well, look who it is."
"Do you realize how fucking loud you guys ARE! I had my damn volume up to 100 db to try and drown you three out, and yet I could still HEAR YOU!" She continued to yell as she waved her CD player around in front of their faces, with the headphones dangling from it dangerously. The three looked at each other in utter confusion at her last words, but shrugged it off as the ring leader suddenly stood up, scaling her a good 5 inches.
"Well, boys. Looks like we've got ourselves the trouble maker." He said. The rest giggled.
"What are you talkin about?" She questioned, still enraged, not even noticing that all the other students in the current part of the train had walked out of their compartments to find out what all the commotion was about.
"Haven't you read the Daily Profit? Your face is printed right on the front cover. Along with your muggle parents, I see." He had brought the paper back up to his face examining the paper. He smirked and turned it around to face her. She simply smiled.
"Damn, I hate seeing myself in pictures." She simply stated as she, unnoticing brought her hand up to the edge of the paper and snapping her fingers next to it, the paper was then quickly engulfed in flames and had disintegrated into the air as if it were never there. The blonde jumped back at the sudden fire in his hands and starred at her.
"Why, you little freak! That was my paper!" He said as he moved in closer to her, but before he could get much closer a large black bird had suddenly jumped to Liz's shoulder and screeched evilly towards the blonde, allowing for him to step back once more.
"Now then, if your finished with being a pain in the ass. I'm returning to my music." She said as she turned away to head back to her compartment.
"Why don't you go back to where you came from?! Mud blood!" He said back to her. Putting plenty of emphasize on the last work. But before he could turn and laugh along with his classmates, Liz had spun around in her place and with one clean swipe, punched the blonde square in the nose, knocking him on the floor with a bloody mess to deal with. Many of the other students cheered at the upset. Liz took no notice and returned to her compartment without another word.
"Damn, did you see that? That girl just punched Malfoy in the face. That was the best action I've seen all day!"
"And the animals all over Diagon Ally didn't interest you."
"Well, that was good too. But this just out beats that 100 to 1. It's always great to see Lucious get his ass whipped. Specially by a girl."
"Yeah, that was something. Bet he never saw that muggle move commin at him, right Sirius."
"Yeah. We should say something to her when we get to school. I hope she gets into Griffindore." Sirius thought hopefully.
"You would." James laughed at his friend as the four fell into their own conversations.
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Author's Note: Well would you get a look at this. I've actually written something. Of course my HP fic isn't as popular as my Spirited Away fic is right now, but my friend Slytherin1987 got me wanting to work on it. A note about the Spirited Away Fic: Chapter 6 is on it's way. I started it just recently; I've just been rather busy working on my online comic.
Speaking of my online comic, please check it out. All the drawings are by me, and it's updated 3x a week. If you do visit please sign the guestbook and tell us what you think. ^_^
