I am despairing. If you read this please review. Even if you just say 'I
read it'. I don't know if anyone's reading this, and it is making me sad.
Ok, if this chapter goes how I plan it should be super-long (in comparison with the last few). There will probably be quite a few notes I make throughout since I've got a lot to explain in this chapter.
Disclaimer--- Enter Stranger If You'd Like, But Remember That I Only Write! I Do Not Own A Single Mite, That Is J. K. Rowlings By Copyright!
All right, that was weird. I've also realized I am very short in physical description of characters, but I refuse to overload the stories with them, though I'll try to add some here and there.
Mr. Potter leaned against the wall of the Platform, while waiting for his son and his friends to exit the train. Ever since he had received that letter from Albus he had decided that it would be better to pick the children up himself rather than send anyone.
And there they were, finally. Lily was still scolding James, and Remus was following them. James smiled when he saw him, and was about to take off running when he seemed to check himself and walked over.
"Hey Dad!" he said, beaming. He wondered at his son's odd behavior for a moment, till he heard a small sigh, and looked down to see a very undersized Sirius sticking out a James' pocket and looking vaguely motion sick.
Mr. Potter tried to control the swelling laughter that was threatening to over take him, and ushered the children out of the train station and to his car.
He then looked around at them all, taking in how much they had grown.
James hadn't changed much since that Christmas, except he'd grown a bit more, same mop of hair so characteristic of his family.
Lily looked about the same as ever, the curls in her red hair starting to straighten out, beautiful, though she wouldn't admit it herself. She had been a ward in his home since her muggle parents had been killed when she was nine*. Her elder sister attended a boarding school, and would not be coming home for a while this summer as she was visiting a Muggle friend's house. She sat down in the front seat next to him, eager to be away from the 'immature prats, except you, Remus'.
He searched again to find Sirius, who was struggling up onto an armrest. Sirius hadn't changed at all that he could see, with the exception of Lily's jinx.
He almost laughed again, and then glancing back at his son, who was still wrestling with trunks and brooms, and leaned over to Lily.
"Do I even wish to know what trouble he got himself into on the train?" He asked, smiling at her, he had always considered her to be nearly as close as a daughter would be, if he had had one.
She gave a long-suffering sigh, and replied. "Oh, he was just charming the robes of a Slytherin student to glow pink and flash in gold 'I AM A UGLY GREASY GIT' across the front." She sighed again, and then stared out the window.
He chuckled, and shook his head, glancing back at his son in the mirror.
"We'll be at Domleoanim* Manor in a while kids." He said.
"Are you dropping me off first, sir?" asked Remus. He lived in a small village not but a mile from the Manor, and had spent his childhood roaming the surrounding hills and land, when old Mr. Potter and James' uncle lived there*. He had met James when they had been quite young, though they hadn't been really good friends till they had entered Hogwarts.
"Actually your family is coming to dinner as well, so we are just going straight home." Mr. Potter said, and smiled back.
Sirius had been scowling unhappily through all of the preceding conversations. He was seated precariously on the armrest of a chair, holding on for dear life as the air conditioning blasted on him, and praying that someone would notice, though he was too prideful to ask himself. Finally someone did, though Sirius unhappily noted that his black hair, which prior to the car had been stubbornly and immaculately washed and combed, etc. as always was now standing on end in every direction.
Someone was out to destroy him before he turned sixteen. Sirius just knew it. He suddenly felt that everyone in the world was out to get him. Heck, even the car had tried to do him in! This deepened Sirius' scowl.
"Where am I going to sleep?" He asked, interrupting everyone else. "I refuse to sleep in a box for the next two months."
"Actually, I have thought about that, though we'll have to convince little Marie that you wont do any harm...." He trailed off, and then looked at the window.
"Oh, here we are." He said.
Down the road, which was slowly turning into a dirt one, for it was a rarity that Muggle anything came down this way, was a tower appearing through and soaring over the trees. Off to the right lay a small sleepy looking village that surely could not have changed much for centuries. The rest of the manor, besides the tower, was appearing now.
A great rambling place, filled with corridors that seemed to have gone untouched for years, and locked doors no one could recall how to get into, and legends of the Potters of years gone by who had mad their home here. The tower was some 12 stories tall, which in itself was very unusual, though it did have an unmatched view of the English countryside on the top. There were gardens surrounding the Manor, with statues and doors to other gardens hidden all throughout.
It brightened Sirius up quite a bit, to be returning to a place that felt so much like home, though he had only been here once for a few days. Also, the thought of the adventures that might be found here helped, he hated nothing more than a dull summer.
Well, he did hate being shrunk down to less than a foot more, and immediately resolved to completely ignore Evans for the rest of the summer.
They passed through the large iron gate, and then drove up to the huge doors and climbed out of the car. Before Mr. Potter could even reach for the key, the butler answered the door and they were escorted in.
Walter Swift, preferring in his strange sense of humor to be called simply 'Walter' by all the children but 'Sir Swift' by any adults, was not an ordinary butler by any account. He was a ghost, and had come to live in this house in 1611, and had never seen a reason to leave since. As he said, he had 'guarded the door of the house of the lion since they're great, great, great great, great, grandparents had not even existed, and he had no intention of leaving the post that he had promised Randolph Potter, his first master, that he would keep'. So he stayed.
He answered the door with his customary 'Enter', and stepped back as the door finished opening of its own accord, casting a blue glow in the shadows of the to the side of the great door. A great hall of wood and stone stretched into view, lined with doors and stairways leading up into the next floor.
As the children entered, he smiled slightly, and they all beamed back at him, even Sirius scowled slightly less, Walter loved and had always taken care of the children in the house, no matter whether they were the children of servants or wizarding village children or what. Lily was a favorite of his, since she had come to the house so scared and lonely years ago.
"Would Miss Evans like an escort to her room now?" He asked. She nodded, and they took a stairway headed to the sixth floor in the tower.
They heard someone give a small shout, and Remus' sister Isabella came running out of an adjoining room, long white dress and brown hair flying, and immediately threw her arms around her brother. They both laughed and she looked him up and down, seeing how much her brother had grown.
She was born a squib, but had never allowed it to let her down, and since the village had no secondary school (they were all wizards and were sent to Hogwarts) Mrs. Potter, James' mother, had offered to take her in and teach her regular schooling and as much about wizarding as was possible, so that she could live in either world. Though it had never been requested of her, when she was sixteen she offered to help with the housecleaning and such, since the Potters had never kept house elves, and earned a steady wage from it since. She had been working here since Remus had been very small, and was happy where she was. She was marrying a stable hand next July, and had no intention of leaving her home and her second family.
Sirius looked grumpily around now, and then grabbed hold of the strap on the trunk as James lifted it. Remus grabbed Sirius' trunk and followed, after placing his own in a closet near the door. Isabella ran off to wait for their parents to arrive. They began to slowly climb the steps toward James' room on the eighth floor, on the left side of the tower.
"Be back down for dinner at eight boys!" Mr. Potter called after them. "Sirius, I'll show you where you are probably going to be sleeping later."
They trooped up the stairs, and when the two trunk-bearing boys finally reached James' room, they dumped the trunks on the floor (after taking Sirius off James'). James threw himself down panting onto his oversized canopied bed, and Remus plunked down in a chair.
Sirius stared rather modestly at both of them, finally seeing a good side to being so small. Eventually he began to grow bored.
"When do you all think we'll get our OWL results in?" He asked.
Remus looked rather upset. "I hope we get them in soon." He said. "I'm still rather worried about my Charms test..." He trailed off.
"Really." Sirius said, in his teasing voice. "I'd have figured that you'd be more worried about Potions..."
James glared at him. Remus sighed. "Oh, I already know I failed that one."
Sirius sighed. Remus really wasn't that much fun to tease. He stretched out slightly and rumpled his hair.
And then he suddenly let out a shout and threw himself behind the mirror. The Potter's cat, Ignoramus, (named so by a very irate Mr. Potter, but mostly referred to as Ignor, or 'that dumb cat'), had spotted him, and had decided he might be fun to play with. James lunged for him, and pulled him off the dresser where Sirius was, and wrestled him out of the door.
Sirius scowled. He'd have to fix his hair. Again. He wasn't looking forward to the rest of this summer, not in the least.
*Stories all to be told, later. Not in this story. I'm already going off the plot I intended to stay on. James' uncle and the rest of his family are in vacationing in Italy over the summer, except for the youngest of James' cousins. She is about six years old, an will come into the story later.
"Domleoanim" means roughly 'House of the Lion's Spirit'. If you hate it, tell me. Yes, I do know some Latin, but I was trying to make it sound like the name of a Manor, so I squished it together as best I could. If you have another suggestion, tell me, I'd love to hear it.
Also, it's NOT that I don't WANT to write Peter. It's just that I've already got more characters than I know what to do with. I'm going to try to add him in later, but I won't do it if it is at the expense of cutting down on Remus' time. Sorry, I just think Remus is more of a challenge to write, besides, I just like him a lot better.
Next up, dinner and Sirius finds out where he'll be sleeping. It's just his size!
Reviews:
Sarah aka Hobbit in Guard: Oh thank you, thank you, thank you! You have the honor of being my very first reviewer! I'm so happy you liked it. I also like your suggestion, and will probably be using it since I ran out of ideas myself.
Ok, if this chapter goes how I plan it should be super-long (in comparison with the last few). There will probably be quite a few notes I make throughout since I've got a lot to explain in this chapter.
Disclaimer--- Enter Stranger If You'd Like, But Remember That I Only Write! I Do Not Own A Single Mite, That Is J. K. Rowlings By Copyright!
All right, that was weird. I've also realized I am very short in physical description of characters, but I refuse to overload the stories with them, though I'll try to add some here and there.
Mr. Potter leaned against the wall of the Platform, while waiting for his son and his friends to exit the train. Ever since he had received that letter from Albus he had decided that it would be better to pick the children up himself rather than send anyone.
And there they were, finally. Lily was still scolding James, and Remus was following them. James smiled when he saw him, and was about to take off running when he seemed to check himself and walked over.
"Hey Dad!" he said, beaming. He wondered at his son's odd behavior for a moment, till he heard a small sigh, and looked down to see a very undersized Sirius sticking out a James' pocket and looking vaguely motion sick.
Mr. Potter tried to control the swelling laughter that was threatening to over take him, and ushered the children out of the train station and to his car.
He then looked around at them all, taking in how much they had grown.
James hadn't changed much since that Christmas, except he'd grown a bit more, same mop of hair so characteristic of his family.
Lily looked about the same as ever, the curls in her red hair starting to straighten out, beautiful, though she wouldn't admit it herself. She had been a ward in his home since her muggle parents had been killed when she was nine*. Her elder sister attended a boarding school, and would not be coming home for a while this summer as she was visiting a Muggle friend's house. She sat down in the front seat next to him, eager to be away from the 'immature prats, except you, Remus'.
He searched again to find Sirius, who was struggling up onto an armrest. Sirius hadn't changed at all that he could see, with the exception of Lily's jinx.
He almost laughed again, and then glancing back at his son, who was still wrestling with trunks and brooms, and leaned over to Lily.
"Do I even wish to know what trouble he got himself into on the train?" He asked, smiling at her, he had always considered her to be nearly as close as a daughter would be, if he had had one.
She gave a long-suffering sigh, and replied. "Oh, he was just charming the robes of a Slytherin student to glow pink and flash in gold 'I AM A UGLY GREASY GIT' across the front." She sighed again, and then stared out the window.
He chuckled, and shook his head, glancing back at his son in the mirror.
"We'll be at Domleoanim* Manor in a while kids." He said.
"Are you dropping me off first, sir?" asked Remus. He lived in a small village not but a mile from the Manor, and had spent his childhood roaming the surrounding hills and land, when old Mr. Potter and James' uncle lived there*. He had met James when they had been quite young, though they hadn't been really good friends till they had entered Hogwarts.
"Actually your family is coming to dinner as well, so we are just going straight home." Mr. Potter said, and smiled back.
Sirius had been scowling unhappily through all of the preceding conversations. He was seated precariously on the armrest of a chair, holding on for dear life as the air conditioning blasted on him, and praying that someone would notice, though he was too prideful to ask himself. Finally someone did, though Sirius unhappily noted that his black hair, which prior to the car had been stubbornly and immaculately washed and combed, etc. as always was now standing on end in every direction.
Someone was out to destroy him before he turned sixteen. Sirius just knew it. He suddenly felt that everyone in the world was out to get him. Heck, even the car had tried to do him in! This deepened Sirius' scowl.
"Where am I going to sleep?" He asked, interrupting everyone else. "I refuse to sleep in a box for the next two months."
"Actually, I have thought about that, though we'll have to convince little Marie that you wont do any harm...." He trailed off, and then looked at the window.
"Oh, here we are." He said.
Down the road, which was slowly turning into a dirt one, for it was a rarity that Muggle anything came down this way, was a tower appearing through and soaring over the trees. Off to the right lay a small sleepy looking village that surely could not have changed much for centuries. The rest of the manor, besides the tower, was appearing now.
A great rambling place, filled with corridors that seemed to have gone untouched for years, and locked doors no one could recall how to get into, and legends of the Potters of years gone by who had mad their home here. The tower was some 12 stories tall, which in itself was very unusual, though it did have an unmatched view of the English countryside on the top. There were gardens surrounding the Manor, with statues and doors to other gardens hidden all throughout.
It brightened Sirius up quite a bit, to be returning to a place that felt so much like home, though he had only been here once for a few days. Also, the thought of the adventures that might be found here helped, he hated nothing more than a dull summer.
Well, he did hate being shrunk down to less than a foot more, and immediately resolved to completely ignore Evans for the rest of the summer.
They passed through the large iron gate, and then drove up to the huge doors and climbed out of the car. Before Mr. Potter could even reach for the key, the butler answered the door and they were escorted in.
Walter Swift, preferring in his strange sense of humor to be called simply 'Walter' by all the children but 'Sir Swift' by any adults, was not an ordinary butler by any account. He was a ghost, and had come to live in this house in 1611, and had never seen a reason to leave since. As he said, he had 'guarded the door of the house of the lion since they're great, great, great great, great, grandparents had not even existed, and he had no intention of leaving the post that he had promised Randolph Potter, his first master, that he would keep'. So he stayed.
He answered the door with his customary 'Enter', and stepped back as the door finished opening of its own accord, casting a blue glow in the shadows of the to the side of the great door. A great hall of wood and stone stretched into view, lined with doors and stairways leading up into the next floor.
As the children entered, he smiled slightly, and they all beamed back at him, even Sirius scowled slightly less, Walter loved and had always taken care of the children in the house, no matter whether they were the children of servants or wizarding village children or what. Lily was a favorite of his, since she had come to the house so scared and lonely years ago.
"Would Miss Evans like an escort to her room now?" He asked. She nodded, and they took a stairway headed to the sixth floor in the tower.
They heard someone give a small shout, and Remus' sister Isabella came running out of an adjoining room, long white dress and brown hair flying, and immediately threw her arms around her brother. They both laughed and she looked him up and down, seeing how much her brother had grown.
She was born a squib, but had never allowed it to let her down, and since the village had no secondary school (they were all wizards and were sent to Hogwarts) Mrs. Potter, James' mother, had offered to take her in and teach her regular schooling and as much about wizarding as was possible, so that she could live in either world. Though it had never been requested of her, when she was sixteen she offered to help with the housecleaning and such, since the Potters had never kept house elves, and earned a steady wage from it since. She had been working here since Remus had been very small, and was happy where she was. She was marrying a stable hand next July, and had no intention of leaving her home and her second family.
Sirius looked grumpily around now, and then grabbed hold of the strap on the trunk as James lifted it. Remus grabbed Sirius' trunk and followed, after placing his own in a closet near the door. Isabella ran off to wait for their parents to arrive. They began to slowly climb the steps toward James' room on the eighth floor, on the left side of the tower.
"Be back down for dinner at eight boys!" Mr. Potter called after them. "Sirius, I'll show you where you are probably going to be sleeping later."
They trooped up the stairs, and when the two trunk-bearing boys finally reached James' room, they dumped the trunks on the floor (after taking Sirius off James'). James threw himself down panting onto his oversized canopied bed, and Remus plunked down in a chair.
Sirius stared rather modestly at both of them, finally seeing a good side to being so small. Eventually he began to grow bored.
"When do you all think we'll get our OWL results in?" He asked.
Remus looked rather upset. "I hope we get them in soon." He said. "I'm still rather worried about my Charms test..." He trailed off.
"Really." Sirius said, in his teasing voice. "I'd have figured that you'd be more worried about Potions..."
James glared at him. Remus sighed. "Oh, I already know I failed that one."
Sirius sighed. Remus really wasn't that much fun to tease. He stretched out slightly and rumpled his hair.
And then he suddenly let out a shout and threw himself behind the mirror. The Potter's cat, Ignoramus, (named so by a very irate Mr. Potter, but mostly referred to as Ignor, or 'that dumb cat'), had spotted him, and had decided he might be fun to play with. James lunged for him, and pulled him off the dresser where Sirius was, and wrestled him out of the door.
Sirius scowled. He'd have to fix his hair. Again. He wasn't looking forward to the rest of this summer, not in the least.
*Stories all to be told, later. Not in this story. I'm already going off the plot I intended to stay on. James' uncle and the rest of his family are in vacationing in Italy over the summer, except for the youngest of James' cousins. She is about six years old, an will come into the story later.
"Domleoanim" means roughly 'House of the Lion's Spirit'. If you hate it, tell me. Yes, I do know some Latin, but I was trying to make it sound like the name of a Manor, so I squished it together as best I could. If you have another suggestion, tell me, I'd love to hear it.
Also, it's NOT that I don't WANT to write Peter. It's just that I've already got more characters than I know what to do with. I'm going to try to add him in later, but I won't do it if it is at the expense of cutting down on Remus' time. Sorry, I just think Remus is more of a challenge to write, besides, I just like him a lot better.
Next up, dinner and Sirius finds out where he'll be sleeping. It's just his size!
Reviews:
Sarah aka Hobbit in Guard: Oh thank you, thank you, thank you! You have the honor of being my very first reviewer! I'm so happy you liked it. I also like your suggestion, and will probably be using it since I ran out of ideas myself.