A/N: "Wow, she finally updated", is that what you're thinking? That's what I'm thinking:P. I've had this chapter written for like two months, so now I'm kinda sick of waiting for my beta… Who won't return my emails. This chapter is therefore unbeta'd. Just so you know. Some sentences might be a little strange because of it.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything, blah blah blah, everything belongs to J.K. Rowling and so on...
Italics : Thought
Bold : Writing
Behind the Veil?
-Classes:-
Annie was following Hermione along a familiar route to Gryffindor common room. She constantly had to remind herself that she was supposed to be new here, and didn't know her way around, and to avoid looking too familiar with the castle, she asked a couple of questions about Hogwarts as they were walking.
When they arrived at the portrait of the Fat Lady, Annie noted that it hadn't been repaired before; there were no patches. Sirius must never have broken out of Azkaban; this reality's Sirius must still be there… No wait, if Sirius is here without a disguise, then… Where is the 'real' Sirius…? Hermione said the password ("Snidgets") and they crawled through the portrait hole.
"Our dormitories are on the left, the boys' on the right, come on; let's go upstairs, I left my bag up there." Hermione said and hurried up the staircase.
Annie followed, and walked into the familiar room she'd slept in the last five years, it was almost exactly the same; Lavender had even put up the same poster of that quidditch player she never remembered the name of. When she'd put it up, she declared that she wasn't really into sports, but when she'd seen that poster in Witch Weekly, she just had to put it on her wall. Annie chuckled at the memory of seeing the same poster in the boys' dormitory, only smaller, beside Dean Thomas' bed. When she told him about Lavender's poster, he had turned red and ripped it down at once, muttering something she couldn't hear. Suddenly, she saw something unexpected; there wasn't just one extra bed, but two. One of the extra beds had someone sleeping in it, a blonde someone who strongly reminded her of Fred or George Weasley; only she didn't have as many freckles as them, just a little over the bridge of her nose.
"Oh, honestly Aurora!" Hermione said in an exasperated voice. "You haven't even gotten up yet? I woke you up when I went down to breakfast!"
The person in the bed, Aurora, opened her eyes, they were green. "I thought I'd just skip it and sleep some more. And no obviously I haven't gotten up yet, now leave me alone!" She said and drew her blanket over her head. Then, as an afterthought, she took it off again and glared at Hermione. "And don't call me Aurora, you know I hate it!"
"Why? It's a pretty name I think." Annie said.
Aurora looked at her, puzzled. "Hermione, who's that? Did you bring someone from another house in here? Honestly, I thought you had more house pride than to let a Slytherin in here!"
"Now listen, I'm not-"
"Oh, right, this is-"
Annie and Hermione started at the same time. They looked at each other, "Sorry, you go first." Annie said, as what she was going to say would've seemed a little strange, after all, she wasn't supposed to know much about the school yet.
"This is Annie Green; she's a transfer student from a small school called Secrét in Indonesia. Yes I know it's weird that they got to transfer after the school has started, but you said something about an exception…?" She trailed off and turned to Hermione.
"Wait, you said 'they'. She's not the only transfer?" Aurora asked.
"No, I'm not. There's another one, John Pear is his name," Annie answered her," he was sorted into Ravenclaw, I'm so glad I'm not in the same house as him… Why did you think I was a Slytherin?"
"Oh, well, I know just about everyone at this school, the only ones I don't mingle with are the Slytherins, and since I didn't know you…." She smiled
"So, now that we got that straight, Annie, this is Aurora-" Aurora shot an angry glance at her, "fine, this is Aurora Prewett, who prefers to be called Rory, don't you agree that that's silly, I mean, it's the same name as in that idiotic TV-show, Gilmore Girls! Honestly! Anyway, Aurora, oh all right, Rory this is Annie Green. Annie do you have any annoying nicknames you would like me to call you by?"
Annie laughed and told her that she didn't. We're exactly alike! She even hates "Gilmore Girls"!
"Now that we've got that straightened out, let's go to our classes, okay?" Hermione started towards the door, "What classes are you taking, Annie? I don't think you mentioned it during breakfast… And Rory, you should try to get up, you'll be late for divination again." Aurora, or, Rory, got out of her bed, glaring at Hermione like it was her fault she had to get up this early.
"Oh, umm, I take Old Runes, and…. Well, basically all of the elective classes except divination and muggle-studies, because I'm muggle-born and divination is stupid, dropped them after third year, it was too exhausting." Annie answered. "
"Are you joking? Divination is great! It's like, the best subject ever!" Aurora, or, Rory jumped off the bed grabbed her bag and started walking beside Annie and Hermione.
Hermione frowned at her "you only say that because you can just make stuff up, she'll take anything if it involves catastrophes and or death, honestly, if half of that woman's predictions were true…" She snorted. "You should have dropped like I did it and taken a real subject like Aritmancy, don't you agree Annie?"
"Whatever, what's our first class of the day, 'Mione?" Rory said.
Hermione rolled her eyes, "You have your own schedule, why don't you check it? And, we're two weeks into the school year, why haven't you memorised it yet? And don't call me that, or I'll start calling you Aurora again"
Rory looked at her, "Well, not all of us can memorise absolutely everything like you do, and I lost my own!"
"Fine. We have transfiguration."
John entered the Ravenclaw common room, the entrance was hidden behind a large painting of ravens that stood perfectly still, when Sal had said the password they had started moving and a doorknob had appeared. The common room was cosy, nothing like the Slytherin one. There was a large fireplace, and above it was a raven holding a quill, carved out in stone. Along every inch of wall in the rest of the room there were bookshelves; the room looked like an extra library.
"So… the girls' dormitories are to the left and the boys' are to the right, don't try to get up there, it's not a good idea." Sal told him, "I expect you've gotten your schedule, but the classes can be a little hard to find if you don't know your way around, do you want me to show you?"
John thought for a moment, but then decided to say no, it wasn't like he didn't know his way around. He walked up to his dormitory to get the bag Dumbledore had promised him would be there, and looked at the schedule, Crap, had to be potions first, didn't it? The class that's four floors away… Well, Snape's always liked me, but that was in my reality…
He hurried down the stairs from the boys' dormitory, class started in three minutes; he would have to take a shortcut if he was going to get there in time. Outside the Ravenclaw common room, he pushed a tapestry aside; he'd been in this corridor before, in first- or maybe second year, Crabbe, Goyle and he had gotten lost, and then, when Goyle tripped over his own feet, they had discovered the secret passage behind it. It let directly to the dungeons, not far from the Potions classroom. At least in his reality it did, but the thought that it might be different here, never crossed his mind…
Harry and Ron were hurrying down a stair, when suddenly; it started moving, "Oh, great, we'll never reach transfiguration on time now."
"Oh, yeah, that's terrible, 'cause your dad is surely going to take points from his own house, and then he's going to give detention to his son, right…" Ron said sarcastically and gave Harry a look.
"It's not that I'm afraid he'll give me detention or take points, I like that class, you know! Even if it is my father t-" He broke off when the exchange student who got into Ravenclaw came running out from behind a tapestry down at the end of the staircase. Harry looked at him; puzzled I didn't know anyone else knew of that passage! It's not even on the Map!
John finally got to the end of the secret passage, it was a bit longer than he remembered it, but he had thought nothing of it, when he got out, he saw why. He was in a corridor not far from the Charms classroom, but a long way from the dungeons. When he looked up at the staircase, his mood darkened; there came this reality's Potty and Weasel.
"Hey, you're one of the exchange students, right?" Weasley asked him.
John nodded.
"That's what I thought. I'm Ron Weasley. And I wanted to ask you a question."
"Ask away…" John answered; there was something in Weasley's voice he didn't quite like.
"What's with the hair? Is it, fashion in Indonesia to have ugly hair colours? And how did you know about that secret passage anyway?"
"May I point out, that that is several questions, not just one?" A voice behind him drawled, "Professor Snape asked me to look for you when you didn't arrive to class on time, he was worried you might have gotten lost… And I see that you had, come on, I'll show you the way to the dungeons."
John turned around; and looked straight at an exact copy of himself in Hogwarts robes, only with a Ravenclaw tie. My God, that's weird...
He turned his head to Potter and Weasley and said:"Right, nice to meet you guys, I'm sure." No I'm not…
Annie sat with Hermione and Aurora in transfiguration, Professor Potter was telling them about self-transfiguration; they were going to start learning how to do it next week.
Suddenly, Harry and Ron burst in. "Hi, sorry we're late, da-err-professor." Harry said.
"Sit down please, Mr. Potter, Mr. Weasley. As I was saying, self-transfiguration is very difficult branch of magic, but as this it the N.E.W.T.-level class, I'm sure you can handle it. The more advanced form of self-transfiguring is becoming an Animagus, however…" He droned on, a little like professor Binns.
Annie wondered how someone who was actually an illegal animagus could talk about it so boringly. I hope all his lessons aren't like this…
Harry sat at his usual spot in the back of the transfiguration-classroom with Ron, listening to his dad drone on about animagi. Ever since that law that forbade animagi came, and the previous professor got killed by ministry wizards because she was one, his dad had become very nervous when it came to talking about animagi, or any kind of animal, actually. Not that he didn't know why…
My God, this is so boring! Are you guys related to Binns? Ron wrote in his book. He knew he hated it when anyone drew in his transfigurations' book, and yet Ron couldn't keep his quill away from it. He glared at Ron, and then bent over to write in his book.
Do not write in my book! I've told you like a hundred times, and yet you still do it! And no we're definitely not.
Ron chuckled when he read the note in his book. He bent over to write back, but Harry snatched away the book, so he sighed and wrote on a piece of parchment from his bag Ha-ha, why do you think I do it?
Harry didn't' answer, he was scribbling notes from what his dad was saying, moments later Ron had bent over and written something else in his book. Aww… don't be mad, why don't we go steal my sister's Map and set off a dungbomb in the dungeons tonight? That ought to cheer you upJ
Oh yeah, lets! And then we can walk around smelling eau de dungbomb all morning because we have potions first thing tomorrow! Ron looked thoughtful for a moment, but didn't have time to reply because just then, the bell signalled end of class.
Rory grabbed her bag and left the classroom, she had asked Hermione what they had next: History of Magic. With Binns. Oh that would be so much fun. Or not. She looked at the girl walking in front of her, Annie, The red hair was very hard to miss, she'd been too tired earlier to notice properly, and in class she'd been busy sleeping. She wondered how she'd gotten away with it; after all, she had been sitting at the front…
Should I ask about it? What if it's very fashionable to have hair like that in Indonesia, and she is insulted? What if it it's a touchy subject? She snorted to herself, Aurora Prewett, the daughter of Petunia Evans Prewett, nosiest woman on Earth, is setting someone's feelings over asking them about something that might be personal… the world is coming to an end…
Suddenly, Hermione asked instead, and Rory looked at her, surprised. "Why did you colour your hair that red? I mean, it's a nice colour, a lot like the Gryffindor house-colour, but it's kind of…err…." She looked like she was trying hard to find a way to describe it without being rude.
Annie looked down "Oh, right, I- I lost a bet… don't ask, you really don't want to know…."
A/N: That's six pages and 2344 words. Now go Review.