There were a hundred and forty -two staircases at Hogwarts: wide, sweeping ones; narrow, rickety ones; some that led somewhere different on a Friday; some with a vanishing step halfway up that you had to remember to jump. Then there were doors that wouldn't open unless you asked politely, or tickled them in exactly the right place, and doors that weren't really doors at all, but solid walls just pretending. It was also very hard to remember where anything was because it all seemed to move around a lot. The people in the portraits kept going to visit each other, and Haru was getting the feeling that the suits of armor could walk.
He stopped walking, completely lost. "Damm, he muttered. "It's easy enough for me to get lost in a normal school. Just how does anyone expect me to find my way around a place like this?"
He reached for a door and tried to pull it open without success. He twisted the handle to the left as far as it could go and pushed. Then he pulled. Then he turned the handle and push and pulled again.
The door simmered, and a gray stone wall appeared. Haru blinked stupidly, and pushed against the wall with his shoulder. It felt solid, but he had seen the door. Obviously that meant that the wall was here to try and make him leave.
He pulled out his wand, trying to think of a good spell, but he really didn't know any. Sighing heavily, he put the wand away. Since he had tried most of the other doors, the only way to get back to an inhabited portion of the school would be to go through the door in front of him.
He was just getting ready to knock the wall down when Professor Sprout rounded the corner.
Sprout was a plump woman with fizzy hair and a good natured smile. "Are you lost, dear?" she asked kindly.
Haru shook his head. "No, I just have to open this door," he said determinedly.
"Door? There's no door there. That's just a wall that pretends to be a door," Sprout said. "It gets rather confusing, but give it a couple of days and you'll be an expert on the location of everything in this school."
"Not likely," Haru said. "And this is a door. I saw it, so you can't tell me otherwise." In spite of his protests, he let Professor Sprout lead him away from the wall-that-was-really-a-door.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Tohru blinked her eyes open sleepily. It was almost time to start breakfast and she had the feeling that she had been up for a long time the night before. Slowly she remembered the sorting ceremony, and a weird dream that she had about being chased by a little ghostly man.
She raised her hand to her eyes, trying to get the sleep out of them. A loud clang sounded as her armored hand hit the helmet.
"Ouch!" she exclaimed, taking a step back and crashing into the wall. The impact jarred her, leaving her a little confused. She pushed herself foreword, but was quickly overbalanced and forced to windmill her arms furiously.
Her flailing arms paid off as she connected with something with enough forced to send her back into the wall with another loud clang.
This time she didn't bother trying to push off the wall. Instead she started to strip out of the armor quickly. "I can't believe I managed to put all of this on in a few seconds," she muttered to no one in particular.
She finished piecing the armor together with no one inside before she noticed what she hit. In a crumpled heap on the floor was a black haired man wearing black robes. He looked like he was unconscious.
Her hands flew to her mouth. "Oh no! I'm so sorry!" she exclaimed, dropping to her knees to check on the unconscious Professor Snape.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Kisa made her way down the stairs to the Gryffindor common room. Hermione, Harry, and Ron were already down there. They had offered to escort her to the Great Hall, taking a round-a-bout course that would show her where all of her classes were.
"It's rather easy to get lost at Hogwarts," Ron had said as they had entered the common room the night before. "Even people with the best sense of direction are sure to get lost if they don't have an idea about where they're going."
"Oh. . . . ." Kisa had murmured. Then she had stayed up trying to find Haru without any luck. There was no doubt where he was now - lost.
"Good morning," Harry said socially. His black hair was sticking up in all directions and his glasses looked a little crooked.
"Good morning," Kisa repeated softly. "How did you sleep?" she inquired conversationally. She didn't want a repeat of the situation she had at her old school. For now, she would try her best to stay active in normal school conversations.
"Horrible," Ron muttered sleepily. He had the beginnings of a black eyes showing around his right eye.
Hermione looked like she always did, but she kept casting disapproving glances at Harry and Ron.
"Who did you get in a fight with?" Kisa asked.
Her soft tone of voice threw Ron off for a moment. "The Womping Willow while we were going to visit Siru-" he began before Harry elbowed him sharply.
Kisa could see that he was trying to come up with a way of hiding whatever Ron had been saying, but he was having trouble. She smiled. "I don't need to know. I just wanted to make sure that no one was picking on you. . . ." she said. "Could you still show me around even though I pryed into your life?"
"Of course," Hermione said quickly, still shooting death lasers at Harry and Ron. "Come on, let's leave these two behind."
Kisa followed Hermione out of the common room, noting that they had all seemed relieved when she had stopped prying into their late night escapade
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Shigure pranced down the hall behind a group of sixth year girls. As the eleven year old boy he appeared to be, none of them seemed to suspect anything perverted about him following the girls.
No one except Kyou. "You're really perverted, you know," the orange haired cat stated flatly.
"A little look never hurt no one," Shigure pointed out. "And since I'm only -"
Kyou punched him in the mouth, dropping him to the floor. "Listen you pervert," he hissed. "Just cuz' you look like you're eleven, it doesn't change the facts. A man you're age has to look for women your own age - "
"Ewww!' Shigure exclaimed, popping back to his feet. Before anything else could be said, both the cat and the dog heard the familiar sound of Tohru's voice, and it sounded like she was in trouble.
They quickly hurried in the direction her voice was coming from.
When they found her, she was on the ground beside the crumpled heap of the potions teacher.
"Oh dear. . . ." Shigure muttered, noting the large bruise forming on Snape's left cheek. "I think that it's best to get out of here before he wakes up."
"Uhhhh. . . . yeah," Kyou agreed. He went to pick Tohru up and move her out of the hall without much success. All that he achieved was turning himself into a cat.
"Oh, that was a good move on your part," Shigure muttered sarcastically.
"Meow," they both heard behind them and froze. Standing with her blood red eyes trained on them, Ms. Norris stalked foreword.
"Isn't she . . . " Shigure muttered.
"HEY!" Kyou shouted as she started sniffing him. "Get away from my ass, you filthy bitch!"
"You do realize that you're talking to a cat, don't you?" Shigure asked. He had pulled Tohru to her feet.
"Take Kyou away from here quickly," he ordered her. "Before he changes back."
Tohru cast a quick glance at the unconscious man and picked up Kyou. Ms. Norris got a furious expression on her face and attacked her ankles. "AHhhhhhh1" Tohru screamed and took off running.
Ms. Norris was fully prepared to give pursuit, but Shigure grabbed her tail and growled at her. Her tail puffed up in fear like most normal cats' tails do when they are confronted with a dog.
Shigure let go of her and quickly hurried away from Professor Snape as he regained consciousness.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Yuki woke up, noting that the dark green and silver decor of the room seemed to have changed. "Nani?" he questioned, swinging his legs out of the bed and parting the curtain.
"Good morning," Hana said eerily. She had an ebony brush in her hand and was combing her long black hair. She was already dressed in a long black dress complete with black cloak. She painted an eerie picture to say the least.
It wasn't what Yuki expected to see first thing in the morning. "What are you doing here?" he asked.
"This is the girls dorm," Hana pointed out. "You might want to put on a shirt before the other girls wake up. . . . . . . that is, if you plan on staying in here like I suspect you will."
"What!" Yuki exclaimed, pulling a shirt over his head. "Why would I stay in the girls dorm?! I'm a - "
Kagura poked her head out of her bed. "Morning, Yuki!" she exclaimed brightly. She slid out of the bed all the way and Yuki had to close his eyes.
"You sleep naked?" he asked tightly.
"No, you didn't look. I'm wearing a small nightie with pretty little cat heads on it," Kagura said.
Yuki stayed quiet. "Why would I want to stay in here?" he repeated.
"Because, Aya, Akito, and sometimes Haru are your other choices for roommates," Hana said.
Yuki froze. He really didn't want to be mistaken for a girl, but if it kept him from having to sleep in the same room with Haru, who unnerved him, Aya, who irritated him, and Akito, who scared him. . . . . . just what was worse.
"Of course I already talked with Kagura about it and we're both okay with you staying in here so long as you don't try anything funny," Hana said.
"Yeah, so just let us know by tonight what you want to do," Kagura said.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Akito was sleeping fitfully in his four poster bed. He was probably having an okay dream by his standards, but Aya didn't really mind if he disturbed the head of the families sleep.
"Akito-san!" he exclaimed loudly next to his ear. "Wake up!"
Akito blinked his eyes open, staring directly at Aya's face, which was only a few inches from his. "Nani?" he muttered softly before shouting, "Get the f*** away from my face! And don't presume to tell me what to do!"
Aya backed away, a glimmer of startled fear on his face. "Gomen ne," he said quickly. "It's just. . . . well we have classes, and I thought- "
"Well, stop thinking!" Akito snapped. "You're irritating me, get out!" Then he flopped back in his bed and fell back asleep as the snake let himself out the door.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Hatori was standing outside the Slytherian common room. The emerging Slytherian students were starting to get upset with him, but he had a feeling that he was going to be needed shortly.
The door opened once again and Yuki, Kagura, and Hana stepped through. "Good morning, Hatori-san," Hana said as they passed him by.
"Wait! Do you know if - " he began to ask them, but Aya hit him around his waist and was clinging on tightly.
"Oh, Tori-san, it was awful! I thought that I'd just wake Akito-sama up and he yelled at me and . . . . . " the snake shuddered.
Hatori glanced over at the paused group. "You can go. I'll use Aya," he said. He rubbed his eyes tiredly.
Aya had already popped to his feet. "But you know, Yuki never came to bed last night. . . . I was looking for him, you know. I think I'll just go and - "
"Aya open the door, I have to wake Akito," Hatori said.
He could practically see all of Aya's thoughts dance out of his head as he flung open the door and pranced in. After showing Hatori where Akito was sleeping, he quickly departed.
Several minutes and thrown objects later, Hatori and Akito headed down the stairs and set off towards the Great Hall for breakfast.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Author's notes,
I still need a Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. I'm thinking that I'm going to use Bill Weasely. He is after all a curse breaker for Gringots, and I need a familiar character.
My other idea was maybe Snape could finally get the position and use a Time Tuner to be in two places at once.
I'm still open to all suggestions.
Thanks for reading,
Kissa-chan
He stopped walking, completely lost. "Damm, he muttered. "It's easy enough for me to get lost in a normal school. Just how does anyone expect me to find my way around a place like this?"
He reached for a door and tried to pull it open without success. He twisted the handle to the left as far as it could go and pushed. Then he pulled. Then he turned the handle and push and pulled again.
The door simmered, and a gray stone wall appeared. Haru blinked stupidly, and pushed against the wall with his shoulder. It felt solid, but he had seen the door. Obviously that meant that the wall was here to try and make him leave.
He pulled out his wand, trying to think of a good spell, but he really didn't know any. Sighing heavily, he put the wand away. Since he had tried most of the other doors, the only way to get back to an inhabited portion of the school would be to go through the door in front of him.
He was just getting ready to knock the wall down when Professor Sprout rounded the corner.
Sprout was a plump woman with fizzy hair and a good natured smile. "Are you lost, dear?" she asked kindly.
Haru shook his head. "No, I just have to open this door," he said determinedly.
"Door? There's no door there. That's just a wall that pretends to be a door," Sprout said. "It gets rather confusing, but give it a couple of days and you'll be an expert on the location of everything in this school."
"Not likely," Haru said. "And this is a door. I saw it, so you can't tell me otherwise." In spite of his protests, he let Professor Sprout lead him away from the wall-that-was-really-a-door.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Tohru blinked her eyes open sleepily. It was almost time to start breakfast and she had the feeling that she had been up for a long time the night before. Slowly she remembered the sorting ceremony, and a weird dream that she had about being chased by a little ghostly man.
She raised her hand to her eyes, trying to get the sleep out of them. A loud clang sounded as her armored hand hit the helmet.
"Ouch!" she exclaimed, taking a step back and crashing into the wall. The impact jarred her, leaving her a little confused. She pushed herself foreword, but was quickly overbalanced and forced to windmill her arms furiously.
Her flailing arms paid off as she connected with something with enough forced to send her back into the wall with another loud clang.
This time she didn't bother trying to push off the wall. Instead she started to strip out of the armor quickly. "I can't believe I managed to put all of this on in a few seconds," she muttered to no one in particular.
She finished piecing the armor together with no one inside before she noticed what she hit. In a crumpled heap on the floor was a black haired man wearing black robes. He looked like he was unconscious.
Her hands flew to her mouth. "Oh no! I'm so sorry!" she exclaimed, dropping to her knees to check on the unconscious Professor Snape.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Kisa made her way down the stairs to the Gryffindor common room. Hermione, Harry, and Ron were already down there. They had offered to escort her to the Great Hall, taking a round-a-bout course that would show her where all of her classes were.
"It's rather easy to get lost at Hogwarts," Ron had said as they had entered the common room the night before. "Even people with the best sense of direction are sure to get lost if they don't have an idea about where they're going."
"Oh. . . . ." Kisa had murmured. Then she had stayed up trying to find Haru without any luck. There was no doubt where he was now - lost.
"Good morning," Harry said socially. His black hair was sticking up in all directions and his glasses looked a little crooked.
"Good morning," Kisa repeated softly. "How did you sleep?" she inquired conversationally. She didn't want a repeat of the situation she had at her old school. For now, she would try her best to stay active in normal school conversations.
"Horrible," Ron muttered sleepily. He had the beginnings of a black eyes showing around his right eye.
Hermione looked like she always did, but she kept casting disapproving glances at Harry and Ron.
"Who did you get in a fight with?" Kisa asked.
Her soft tone of voice threw Ron off for a moment. "The Womping Willow while we were going to visit Siru-" he began before Harry elbowed him sharply.
Kisa could see that he was trying to come up with a way of hiding whatever Ron had been saying, but he was having trouble. She smiled. "I don't need to know. I just wanted to make sure that no one was picking on you. . . ." she said. "Could you still show me around even though I pryed into your life?"
"Of course," Hermione said quickly, still shooting death lasers at Harry and Ron. "Come on, let's leave these two behind."
Kisa followed Hermione out of the common room, noting that they had all seemed relieved when she had stopped prying into their late night escapade
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Shigure pranced down the hall behind a group of sixth year girls. As the eleven year old boy he appeared to be, none of them seemed to suspect anything perverted about him following the girls.
No one except Kyou. "You're really perverted, you know," the orange haired cat stated flatly.
"A little look never hurt no one," Shigure pointed out. "And since I'm only -"
Kyou punched him in the mouth, dropping him to the floor. "Listen you pervert," he hissed. "Just cuz' you look like you're eleven, it doesn't change the facts. A man you're age has to look for women your own age - "
"Ewww!' Shigure exclaimed, popping back to his feet. Before anything else could be said, both the cat and the dog heard the familiar sound of Tohru's voice, and it sounded like she was in trouble.
They quickly hurried in the direction her voice was coming from.
When they found her, she was on the ground beside the crumpled heap of the potions teacher.
"Oh dear. . . ." Shigure muttered, noting the large bruise forming on Snape's left cheek. "I think that it's best to get out of here before he wakes up."
"Uhhhh. . . . yeah," Kyou agreed. He went to pick Tohru up and move her out of the hall without much success. All that he achieved was turning himself into a cat.
"Oh, that was a good move on your part," Shigure muttered sarcastically.
"Meow," they both heard behind them and froze. Standing with her blood red eyes trained on them, Ms. Norris stalked foreword.
"Isn't she . . . " Shigure muttered.
"HEY!" Kyou shouted as she started sniffing him. "Get away from my ass, you filthy bitch!"
"You do realize that you're talking to a cat, don't you?" Shigure asked. He had pulled Tohru to her feet.
"Take Kyou away from here quickly," he ordered her. "Before he changes back."
Tohru cast a quick glance at the unconscious man and picked up Kyou. Ms. Norris got a furious expression on her face and attacked her ankles. "AHhhhhhh1" Tohru screamed and took off running.
Ms. Norris was fully prepared to give pursuit, but Shigure grabbed her tail and growled at her. Her tail puffed up in fear like most normal cats' tails do when they are confronted with a dog.
Shigure let go of her and quickly hurried away from Professor Snape as he regained consciousness.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Yuki woke up, noting that the dark green and silver decor of the room seemed to have changed. "Nani?" he questioned, swinging his legs out of the bed and parting the curtain.
"Good morning," Hana said eerily. She had an ebony brush in her hand and was combing her long black hair. She was already dressed in a long black dress complete with black cloak. She painted an eerie picture to say the least.
It wasn't what Yuki expected to see first thing in the morning. "What are you doing here?" he asked.
"This is the girls dorm," Hana pointed out. "You might want to put on a shirt before the other girls wake up. . . . . . . that is, if you plan on staying in here like I suspect you will."
"What!" Yuki exclaimed, pulling a shirt over his head. "Why would I stay in the girls dorm?! I'm a - "
Kagura poked her head out of her bed. "Morning, Yuki!" she exclaimed brightly. She slid out of the bed all the way and Yuki had to close his eyes.
"You sleep naked?" he asked tightly.
"No, you didn't look. I'm wearing a small nightie with pretty little cat heads on it," Kagura said.
Yuki stayed quiet. "Why would I want to stay in here?" he repeated.
"Because, Aya, Akito, and sometimes Haru are your other choices for roommates," Hana said.
Yuki froze. He really didn't want to be mistaken for a girl, but if it kept him from having to sleep in the same room with Haru, who unnerved him, Aya, who irritated him, and Akito, who scared him. . . . . . just what was worse.
"Of course I already talked with Kagura about it and we're both okay with you staying in here so long as you don't try anything funny," Hana said.
"Yeah, so just let us know by tonight what you want to do," Kagura said.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Akito was sleeping fitfully in his four poster bed. He was probably having an okay dream by his standards, but Aya didn't really mind if he disturbed the head of the families sleep.
"Akito-san!" he exclaimed loudly next to his ear. "Wake up!"
Akito blinked his eyes open, staring directly at Aya's face, which was only a few inches from his. "Nani?" he muttered softly before shouting, "Get the f*** away from my face! And don't presume to tell me what to do!"
Aya backed away, a glimmer of startled fear on his face. "Gomen ne," he said quickly. "It's just. . . . well we have classes, and I thought- "
"Well, stop thinking!" Akito snapped. "You're irritating me, get out!" Then he flopped back in his bed and fell back asleep as the snake let himself out the door.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Hatori was standing outside the Slytherian common room. The emerging Slytherian students were starting to get upset with him, but he had a feeling that he was going to be needed shortly.
The door opened once again and Yuki, Kagura, and Hana stepped through. "Good morning, Hatori-san," Hana said as they passed him by.
"Wait! Do you know if - " he began to ask them, but Aya hit him around his waist and was clinging on tightly.
"Oh, Tori-san, it was awful! I thought that I'd just wake Akito-sama up and he yelled at me and . . . . . " the snake shuddered.
Hatori glanced over at the paused group. "You can go. I'll use Aya," he said. He rubbed his eyes tiredly.
Aya had already popped to his feet. "But you know, Yuki never came to bed last night. . . . I was looking for him, you know. I think I'll just go and - "
"Aya open the door, I have to wake Akito," Hatori said.
He could practically see all of Aya's thoughts dance out of his head as he flung open the door and pranced in. After showing Hatori where Akito was sleeping, he quickly departed.
Several minutes and thrown objects later, Hatori and Akito headed down the stairs and set off towards the Great Hall for breakfast.
** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
Author's notes,
I still need a Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. I'm thinking that I'm going to use Bill Weasely. He is after all a curse breaker for Gringots, and I need a familiar character.
My other idea was maybe Snape could finally get the position and use a Time Tuner to be in two places at once.
I'm still open to all suggestions.
Thanks for reading,
Kissa-chan