Anticipation
For the next few days, Sakhmet continued her lessons with Professors Snape and McGonagall and cleaned the back of the house with the others. She noticed that everyone was nervous the day of Harry's trial, but the goddess had forbidden her from telling anyone the outcome of the trial ahead of time. As such she didn't join in the odd dance with Ginny and the twins when they found out.
Until the day when the children would return to (or in Sakhmet's case arrive at) Hogwarts, Sirius seemed to have a melancholy aura. It would have depressed Sakhmet if she weren't already grouchy from her dream-filled sleep. Not only was the goddess visiting every night to warn her of the dangers of saying too much of what she thought, she also had strange dreams of looking through a strange fog, thin yet tangible. Yet even her bad mood didn't stop her from laughing when she found out that the foolish Ron was a prefect. She couldn't help but agree with Fred and George on the subject of prefects. She didn't mind the party though. It was rather fun to talk to all the assorted strange people in the Order of the Phoenix, even though halfway through she had to charm some duct-tape to stick to Ron's mouth to silence his ravings about his new broom.
The next morning she almost had a heart attack when she realized that she'd be going to a place like absolutely nothing she had ever seen in just a few hours. She rushed about as she finished the packing she should have done the previous night. After throwing on the fifth outfit she had picked out, she ran downstairs just in time to grab a bite of breakfast before they left with Sirius the dog in tow.
Sirius had to bite Sakhmet's ankle four times on the walk to Kings Cross station to keep her from leaving them all behind. She was so anxious to arrive that she kept speeding up every few minutes. When they arrived at the station Sakhmet hugged Sirius and told him to bark at her grandmother for her before running onto the train, barely held back by her heavy trunk. When she found an odd girl sitting in an otherwise empty compartment, she immediately sat down next to the girl and stuck out her hand. "I'm Sakhmet Black, who are you?"
The girl stared at her as though she had just noticed Sakhmet there. "Luna Lovegood. You're too young to be a first year."
"I'm a fourth year, but I'm just now going to Hogwarts. They couldn't find me. What are you reading?"
"The Quibbler. My father's the editor."
"Never heard of it. Would you mind too terribly if I read over your shoulder?"
"Not really." Luna raised the upside-down magazine back to her face. It was opened to an article on Cornelius Fudge's apparent vendetta against goblins. They were both totally absorbed until Ginny, Harry, and a boy Sakhmet had never met entered.
Ginny greeted them and asked if they could sit in the compartment. Sakhmet and Luna both nodded before returning to the magazine. They were now in the middle of an article on how Sirius Black was really Stubby Portman. Sakhmet had to bite her tongue not to laugh. It was rather interesting finding out why Sirius had been in Azkaban however. At least some of the story was true.
Ginny began a dull amount of small talk that barely registered in Sakhmet's brain as speech. Neville's reluctant introduction tore her away from another slightly insane article that she wasn't very able to concentrate on in the first place.
After the introductions everyone tried not to laugh at Luna's reading habits. Sakhmet ignored them and tried to focus on an article about how the Quidditch League was corrupt. A few moments passed before her reading was interrupted again by Neville.
"Guess what I got for my birthday?"
"Another Remembrall?" asked Harry.
"No, I could do with one though, I lost the old one ages ago. . No, look at this. ." He took out what appeared to be a squishy gray cactus with a bad case of acne; instead of the usual prickly things it had boils. Sakhmet tried not to look disgusted. "Mimbulus mimbletonia," Neville said proudly, as though it were something terribly interesting rather than a sad little. . thing. "It's really, really rare," continued the boy, still acting like the whatever-it-was was the most incredible thing in the world. "I don't know if there's one in the greenhouse at Hogwarts, even. I can't wait to show it to Professor Sprout. My great-uncle Algie got it for me in Assyria. I'm going to see if I can breed from it." Sakhmet wondered if Neville hadn't been dropped on his head when he was a baby.
"Does it - er - do anything?" asked Harry with as much tact as a rock to the head.
Neville appeared to be very thick-skulled when it came to rocks to the head. He demonstrated by taking a quill from his bag and poking the plant-thing.
Apparently the plant could be much more disgusting than it had been before. Sakhmet's hand immediately went to her hair where it met a sticky, smelly mass that covered the rest of the compartment as well. Wiping her face, she glared hotly at Neville.
"S-sorry," he stuttered. "I haven't tried that before. . Didn't realize it would be quite so. . Don't worry though, Stinksap's not poisonous," he added as Harry spat a disgusting mouthful onto the floor.
With timing that only happens in stories (and in the lives of the unlucky), the compartment door opened to reveal a pretty girl with really long black hair. Sakhmet began to wonder if it was a witch thing to have long hair. Tonks had been the only girl she had seen with short hair since she met Sirius. She decided to think more on this later as the girl began to speak. "Oh. . hello, Harry. Um. . bad time?" Apparently the girl was a Barbie prototype; pretty and states the obvious, all at the same time!
"Oh. . hi," said Harry stupidly. Sakhmet rolled her eyes.
"Um. ." said the Barbie prototype. "Well. . just thought I'd say hello. . bye then." She left quickly with a pink face. Harry sank into his seat as Sakhmet laughed uncontrollably. Harry glared at her to shut up, but Sakhmet just kept laughing.
"Don't tell me you actually like her? She's a total Barbie clone!" she managed to say in between laughing and breathing.
"A what?" asked Luna curiously. Apparently the girl had a fixation to anything odd.
"Barbie's a Muggle doll. She's basically really pretty and really stupid. Or at least really uncreative. She never seems to come up with anything original other than a good outfit every now and then."
Ginny's mouth twitched as she spelled the compartment clean. Nearly an hour went by before Ron and Hermione showed up with the news that Lucius Malfoy's son was a Slytherin prefect. Of course, this was met with moans, groans, and complaints. Ron and Hermione somehow managed to get into a single argument instead of their usual three to seven.
Finally they arrived at Hogwarts where Sakhmet became the tallest person in the first year crowd other than some teacher that she assumed must be replacing the Hagrid person Ginny and the others were asking each other about. The others went to carriages drawn by what appeared to be semi-transparent skeletal horses with leathery wings. Confused for the moment, she stood still in the moving crowd and closed her left eye. The horse-creatures were no longer transparent in the slightest but fully solid. She switched eyes. The horses were no longer there. She retested this several times before she rejoined the first year crowd.