I didn't even get to thank him, she thought as she went to retrieve her old duffle bag and hat, which had fallen in all the chaos. Each step sent shards of increased pain through her hip. She just set her jaw and concentrated on walking normally.

The platform was now filling with people. Paise made it as far as the train and paused. These few steep steps presented a challenge. She managed by slinging the duffel over her back and half pushing with her arms on the handrail, half jumping with her good leg. The feat did get her some odd looks, but she made it up the steps.

"Are you hurt?" Paise turned. Two boys about her own age and an older girl were coming up the steps behind her.

"I'm fine." The blond boy raised an eyebrow at her, and she reacted defensively, "Just sore; what business is it of yours?"

The blond boy looked as though he were about to speak, but the girl broke in first, "He was just being kind, you'd no call to be so rude about it!"

"Miriam," the boy spoke, "It's fine."

"He's in the wrong."

"I can take care of myself. I don't need you to defend me." The girl sortof humphed and turned away, and Blondie readdressed Paise. "I wasn't trying to pry in your business. Sorry. My name's Jesse Fletcher, what's yours?"

"Paise Weissli." She wanted to apologize, but didn't. She'd learnt that people were less likely to bother you if they thought you had a temper.

"Don't worry about her," he nodded his head in the direction the girl had gone. "Miriam's my sister. She gets kindof defensive sometimes."

"I'm Dantes Cortiza," offered the second boy, "You a first year?" Paise nodded yes. "So's Jesse here. I'm a second year." Eliciting no response, he went on, "Weissli. Are you from Germany?"

"Österreich. I mean, uh—Austria," despite the pain and her uncertainty, Paise was beginning to thaw towards these boys. Together, the two lifted the trunk they'd been carrying onto the train when the conversation started, and maneuvered it down the narrow hallway. You want to come in with us?" asked Jesse as they stopped to open a compartment door. Paise hesitated, and he went on, "Oh, come on. You're welcome here." She followed them in.

Another large trunk to match the one they'd just brought in was already in the compartment, but for that it was empty. Feeling self conscious about her duct taped bag, Paise stuffed it under a seat and glanced out the window.

Gathered just outside on the platform was a mass of people, most of whom had bright red hair. There were far too many to be just one family, and yet their expressions and interaction seemed to name them as just that. Paise turned back to the two boys, hoping for a distraction, but they had moved up to peer out of the window as well. Now the kids were hugging their parents goodbye and moving towards the train.

"There, do you see him?" asked Jesse excitedly.

"No, where?" The two were now right on either side of her, their attention turned outwards. Paise's heart began to thump at their proximity, but she let no outward sign of her fear show through. She knew they meant her no harm, and besides, she could probably take these softies if she needed to. But try as she might, she could only hide her emotions, not conquer them.

"On the left of the group, with his son just leaving—"

"Oh, yeah."

"Who are you guys talking about?" Paise interrupted. She didn't see anyone of note out there.

"Harry Potter!" they said together. "He was practically raised by the Weasleys," said Dantes, indicating the familial crowd without.

"But I thought he went to live with muggle relatives until he came here," she put in skeptically.

"He was, but—oh, just look! Over on the left, there. His son Dallin has red hair, he's a fifth year, and—his daughter's there, too." Paise thought she caught a glimpse of the famous wizard through the crush of people now filling the platform.

Justin laughed slyly, "Dantes fancies Rose Potter!"

"Oh, shut up, you!" Dantes pulled his wand from his pocket and waved it haphazardly at his friend. A blast sent Jesse flying backwards into the floor. Dantes stood frozen where he was, looking stricken, until Jesse let out a moan. Paise and Dantes moved in concernedly.

"Are you okay?" Dantes asked, leaning in over him on the floor. Paise wondered distractedly whether there might be another mediwizard in the press outside, and leaned in as well to see if he was alright.

"Rah!" Jesse yelled and lurched up at them. The two leapt back instinctively, and Paise stumbled and fell. Jesse lay back on the floor again, laughing uncontrollably. "You—should—have—seen—your—faces!" he gasped. Dantes broke into a grin, and his shoulders started to shake with his own laughter. A smile crept across Paise's face, and soon she was chuckling along with the others, fuelled more by Jesse's enjoyment than by the joke itself. All three suddenly ceased as the compartment door slid open. Six older students stood there, four boys and two girls.

"What's so funny, Cortiza?" asked one in scornful tones. Paise looked around at Dantes and was surprised to see fear on his face. Jesse seemed nervous, as well.

"What do you want, Skank?" Dantes addressed the leader. He was probably in sixth or seventh year, fairly tall and thinnish, with hair so dark it was almost black.

"You want to be a bit more respectful of you elders, Cortiza," taking a threatening step into the room, "And what's this? First years—and a Weasley! You ought to know better, consorting with red weasels. You're a disgrace to your House." The ringleader, Skank, gave Dantes a solid kick in the ribs, and turned round to face Paise. One boy stood over Dantes and a girl twisted Jesse's arm behind his back. He let out a little gasp of pain, but Paise didn't allow herself to show concern, not in front of these types.

Backed by three cronies, Skank gave a malicious grin he must have found very effective at intimidation in the past. He spoke, "I'd have thought your clan would be keeping a better watch out for you, little weasel. But then, now those five from last year are finally gone, perhaps we won't have to deal with any more interference from you rodents."

Still sitting on the floor, Paise was all too aware of her disadvantage if it came to blows, but to rise was to reveal her bad leg.

She immediately rejected arguing the point of her family; he had obviously already decided she was a 'Weasley', and it was her experience that no bully really cared whether his excuse was legitimate. Casting about her mind for a course of action, Paise suddenly realized that, for the first time in a very long while, she felt almost like a normal kid again. She began to laugh, for suddenly the figure before her was reduced to a schoolyard bully. And the more she laughed, the harder it became to stop. After facing starvation, loneliness, cold, and some truly frightening people since Vati died two years ago, this boy was supposed to scare her? The still-sharp memory of her loss gave Paise the self-control to stop laughing. The bullies, who at first had appeared so daunting, were reduced, but they were still a threat. Their initial reaction of bewilderment had now been replaced by anger, and Skank pulled out his wand. Paise drew back as though in fear. Her hand touched something just under the seat behind her: her bag. If only she could get her wand out—but no, they wouldn't allow her that.

He raised his wand, and Paise reacted without stopping to think. Even as he swished his wand down she shifted all her weight to her injured leg and hands, reaching out with her left leg. He shifted to take the kick, but it never landed. Instead she turned her foot around his ankle and pulled hard, and he hit the floor. Here she ought to have leapt to her feet and retrieved his wand, but the curse she had hoped would go astray in the attack had indeed found its mark, and she was wriggling on the floor. He had a fast wand, this one. Her muscles spasmed, jerking without her consent. Despite the affects of the curse, she did manage to plant a kick just below the ringleader's knee as he rose. Favoring her with a choice vocabulary, Skank returned the kick several fold. Despite the increased pain in her hip from the jerking and her maneuver to bring him down, she never made a sound until a kick happened to land on her right hip. She screamed.

Startled, the bullies fell back for a moment, and three people appeared at the compartment door. Between the fact that she was still jerking on the floor, and that her vision was graying out, Paise couldn't really tell who they were at first. Turned to face her, the bullies didn't see them there. Skank stepped forward and raised his wand again, but it never descended.

"Expelliarmus!" the spell was followed directly by a small, red headed whirlwind. Skank fought back, tooth and nail. The tiny first year was armed with a wand, but she seemed barely to know how to use it. And Skank was quick. He really wasn't bad at hand fighting, the thought drifted through distractedly as Paise fought to maintain consciousness. Too shocked at first to react, it took a moment before his friends waded in to aid him. At last they had restrained her, for it was a her; the red haired girl who'd come racing through the barrier with Virgil and the twins no so very long ago.

And the other two figures she'd seen—probably the twins—where were they? Skank was positively spitting with rage, though his accomplices were looking nervous.

"Sceptus, we should go," a girl, his last crony not detaining a victim, was tugging his arm, "It wasn't meant to go this far. We should go, before someone else comes."

He turned to her, the unreasoning anger fading from his eyes, and he nodded. "Conjure ropes. Tie them up, so they'll be stuck here calling for help until someone finds them." His gang complied, but before turning to go he set one last spell on the Weasley girl. It was a simple cheering charm, but purposely overdone to the point where she was laughing so hard she could hardly get a breath in edgewise. Last of all, he leant over and slapped the girl full across the face, gave Paise one last vindictive kick to her injured hip, and left the compartment.

Just as she was fading off into oblivion, Paise heard some sort of commotion erupt out in the hallway even as the door was closing behind them.