A/N: This is more normal length for my chapters. I usually don't post so soon, but NO ONE IS REVIEWING!!! (hint, hint). Well…not that many people.
I am already aware of the following:
Molly & Arthur were not at school the same time as Lily and the marauders — I know this, but that would make Molly about sixty when she had Ginny, which is just not right, even in the wizarding world. I crossed that part out in my fourth book.
There are only five people per dormitory — there doesn't have to be. Just because there are in Harry's time, doesn't mean that it's that way for everyone. JKR says that there are about a thousand students in Hogwarts.
That was long.
DISCLAIMER: The ONLY new thing I own is Mindy the Hippogriff. All the rest either I already said, or it belongs to JKR, Warner Bros., Bloomsbury, Scholastic, blah, blah, blah.
Angie: THANK YOU for REVIEWING!!! At first I planned to get one out every week, but I wanted to get it back onto the second of first page so people'd see it.
T H E H O G W A R T S E X P R E S S
T
he next few weeks passed by in a flurry. Her faeries were packed with her books, her wand, and her other school things into a large trunk. Eva lodged in a wicker cat carrier that she had just bought, and Siandra fussed over how much tuna she should give her for the trip. Her cauldron was cleaned, and her bed and covers packed in moving boxes. Mindy, the family hippogriff (an animal that was half horse half eagle), was found a care-taker. Mr. and Mrs. Lorington seemed reluctant to have her go and kept putting extra little packages inside her trunk until her books were forced to be packed inside her cauldron.
When September 1st finally came, her bags were so heavy that they had to be levitated into the car that the Ministry had provided for them for her Dad's undercover project. Her parents were also taking a load of boxes to their new Muggle house that day, so that was the reason that they agreed to drive her to London. Otherwise, she would've just walked to Hogwarts, because she lived in Hogsmeade and the train stopped at Hogsmeade Station to let the students off. Her father packed a bag of books about Muggles to read and a bunch of chocolate frogs. During the ride to King's Cross Station, her father sat in the back seat with Siandra and they flipped at the Muggle book.
"And that is a pen in penholder," said Siandra, reading the description of what looked to her like a lump of iron.
"My cousin gave me one of those," remarked Mr. Lorington, "I believe that I use it as a doorstop."
"Oh, look, Dad! We're nearly there!" said Siandra, pointing out the window at a train station ahead. And they were. King's Cross was coming closer and with each foot of the way, Siandra was getting more and more excited. Finally, as they pulled up into the parking lot (Mr. Lorington had a lot of trouble trying to force sickles into the parking meter) Mrs. Lorington hopped out of the car and went to look for a trolley to use to push Siandra's trunk. Five minutes later, she ran back pushing an overlarge trolley and carrying bags of popcorn.
"We need to eat Muggle food! We can't be seen with chocolate frogs!" she said, out of breath because she had been obviously running the whole way. "It's called popping corn." Siandra took her bag and looked inside. It all seemed completely stationary to her.
"Now come on, Siandra's only got three minutes until the Hogwarts Express leaves, we'd better run!" She then grabbed Siandra's hand and pulled her through the crowded station towards the barrier between platforms nine and ten, still dragging Siandra's trunk and pets behind her. She dragged them right through the barrier and they were suddenly in a station where the scarlet Hogwarts Express was blowing its whistle.
"You've got to run, honey! Good-bye, we'll send you loads of owls!" said her father.
"Oh, good-bye, honey! Oh, and here's a little bag of money to spend on the train and on Christmas presents," said her mother hurriedly, pressing a blue bag of galleons into Siandra's hands. Siandra clutched the bag and ran to the one open door left and hopped on. While still hanging on to the handle of the door, she waved good-bye to her parents as the train sped her out of their sight. When she could no longer see her parents, she slammed the door and levitated her things up on the overhead compartment and walked down the aisle in search of empty seating compartments. It seemed as if there were none left at all and prefects in the first few compartments barred her out. She hoped that she wouldn't have to stand in the aisle the whole way to Hogwarts.
She finally came to the last compartment, opened the door, and said absently, "Is anyone sitting here?" She then looked down at the compartment and blushed because there were obviously people sitting there, two girls, both with red hair.
"Yes, we're here, but you can sit here too. There's quite enough room," said the girl with pretty green eyes, scooting over to make room for Siandra.
"Thanks, what's your name?" asked Siandra, sitting in the space that the girl had made for her.
"I'm Lily and this is — " she gestured to the other girl who was looking out the window at the countryside.
"Molly," she said, turning her face from the window and looking at them. "What's yours?"
"Well, my full name is Millisiandra, but I'm usually called Siandra or something like that," said Siandra. "That's my middle name anyway."
"What about your first name?" asked Molly.
"Well," she blushed and wished she hadn't told Molly and Lily that Siandra wasn't her first name. "Um…er…"
"Well, you don't have to tell us right away if you don't want to. I was wondering, are you both all-magical?"
"I've got a second cousin who's an accountant, I think, but I'm not quite sure. We never talk about him," said Molly.
"I think that I'm all magical," said Siandra, for the first time wondering about this, "but my dad got a job working undercover with muggles so I'm going to have to go live with them."
"No magic at all?" asked Lily, and Siandra nodded grimly, "That's worse than I have now! I was ever so happy when I got the letter, I didn't know anything about magic or Hogwarts, or anything!"
A plump woman opening the compartment door one hand on a large cart that she seemed to have pushed up to them suddenly interrupted Lily.
"Anything off the trolley? It'll be a long time before the feast!" she said. Lily's eyes widened as she looked at the large wooden cart overflowing with licorice wands, Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans, chocolate frogs, cauldron cakes, and pumpkin pasties and all three of them pooled their money and bought some of everything.
When the witch with the cart had cleared the hallway, Lily picked up the first package of chocolate frogs and read the back.
"Collect trading cards of famous witches and wizards while eating our delicious chocolate frogs," reeled off Lily, "So, there's a card with each chocolate frog? Wow!" She unwrapped the box and popped the dark frog into her mouth. "Mm…and they're good too!" She unearthed the wizard card from underneath the chocolate crumbs and remarked, "Oh, look, I've got Galdrakona…" she paused as she read about her, "What? She found out about Apparating…don't they mean apparitions?" asked Lily
"No, they're right. Apparating is a way that wizards and witches travel. Just disappear one place and re-appear another place with a little pop! My parents do it all the time. But you have to take a test and you have to be of age," said Molly like she thought that the age restriction was too strict. Soon Lily was obsessed with the chocolate frogs and the cards and she had Merlin, Circe, Morgaine, and Agrippa.
"Wow, I didn't know that Muggles knew about Nicholas Flamel!" said Lily, examining her newest wizard card, "I sure never knew about him until now!"
"Hey," Molly said, while opening her chocolate frog box, which contained Albus Dumbledore as the wizard card, "Do you know what house you'll be in yet?"
Lily had a confused look on her face as Molly told them that she wanted to be in Gryffindor and Siandra came to her rescue, "When you get into Hogwarts, you get sorted into different houses depending on your different qualities. They each have separate common rooms, and you can earn points to get the house cup. The Muggle book my dad got says it's a little bit like cottage."
"College," Lily corrected her. Siandra didn't know what college was anyway. She thought that she had read something about samurais in it, but she thought that she'd better not mention that to Lily because she didn't want to embarrass herself more.
"What I don't get is how they sort people. Do you just stand in front of the headmaster and tell him about yourself? I hope it's not some sort of test with magic! And in front of the whole school!" said Siandra quickly, turning to Molly.
"Oh, don't talk about that, Siandra! You're making me nervous already. No, I don't know and I wish it didn't have to be in front of the school." Molly did look very nervous and they all looked a little jittery.
Just then, a voice blared through the train, "In five minutes we will be unloading all students onto the platform and you then will be directed to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry. Please leave your baggage on the train and it will be taken to the school shortly."
"B-But I don't know any magic! How am I supposed to be sorted?" stammered Lily.
"It's fine, I'm sure that Dumbledore has thought of that, b — but I'm really nervous too!" reassured Molly.
"We'd better change into our school robes, don't you think?" said Siandra. She wanted to keep her mind on anything but the sorting. Lily pulled down the shades on the windows and they silently changed into their inky black Hogwarts robes.
A sudden lurch knocked Siandra onto the red seat of the train as it stopped on the dimly lit platform.
"It — it's time to go, right?" asked Molly, hearing the muffled footsteps sounding in the aisle outside their closed compartment door.
"I think so," replied Lily in a determined sort of voice and set out for the sliding door and opened it quickly. All three of them quickly joined the stream of people flooding past the door and stepped outside the train into the cold night air. Lily, Molly and Siandra joined a huddle of confused first years waiting outside the door pulling fur-lined robes around their heads.
Suddenly, a figure wearing a robe made completely of rabbit fur parted the crowd of older students and shouted above the hassle, "Any first years? Come over here, I'll lead you to Hogwarts," he yelled, as a few scared-looking first years advanced nervously to him, "Come on, my name's Ogg, by the way." A throng of anxious first-years followed Ogg as he led them by a glowing lantern through the path that looked like it was going through a thick forest. Most of them were looking at their shuffling feet and not talking at all. Siandra thought that it was a good thing that they didn't have to take their bags with them, because her legs already felt like lead. After a long time, when they were all about to collapse from exhaustion, there came a sudden corner.
"And there's Hogwarts," said Ogg as he rounded the corner. A bundle of excited first-years followed him and as they turned the corner, let out rather strangled 'ooh's and 'ah's, forgetting their fears for a few seconds. And as Siandra turned the corner, she really did see a breathtaking sight. A towering castle adorned with turrets and towers and gleaming windows stood across the swirling black lake. Ogg lead the crowd to the edge of the lake where quite a lot of little boats were perched unmoving on the edge.
"Hop in these, four per boat is all they can hold, they're quite small," directed Ogg, as he jumped into the front one. They all picked a boat; Siandra's boat was also occupied by Lily and two black-haired boys she didn't know. As soon as everyone was in a boat, they started sailing smoothly across the pitch-black lake. Soft rain poured down on them and wind whistled across the lake. Everyone was silent, looking at the castle of Hogwarts looming ever closer.
There was a slight jerk and the boats bumped against the underground harbor of Hogwarts. Shakily, the first-years climbed out of the boats, and Siandra, feeling very nervous, stepped behind Ogg as he knocked on the towering wooden door.
A/N: I know that there's no real plot yet…it will appear soon though. There WILL be a plot; it's just coming.
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