DISCLAIMER-I own nothing that you recognize from any of the HP books...that
was all the creation of JKR. However, two OC's belong to their owners:
Alaina Stork to Laina and Serenica Boggsworth to Witch Green Eyes.
READERS: The call for characters is over for now, but I promise that I will fit your characters in there sometime, be it sooner or later, so keep reading!!! Also, I have a secondary category to this listed as a romance..patience!!! Romances will develop, and one (namely, Lily and James) is there, but I don't show it much now. I am thinking of changing the category to Tragedy, just so you know...what do you think? Feedback is always appreciated, even ::sniff:: flames.
Here then, without further ado, is chapter 6!!!
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Sit Vis Tecum--Chapter 6
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"Excuse me, Professor, could you tell me how to get to the Arithmancy classroom please?"
Sara was quite lost. She had left Charms in a good mood, what with Paige voluntarily giving her directions to the Arithmancy classroom and turning with the rest of the Ravenclaws and heading into the dungeons for Potions. Of course, her mood dropped considerably after she got lost somewhere on the third floor. It hadn't helped matters any that she knew no one, and so after ten minutes she was glad indeed to have brought her books with her. Sara was greatly relieved when she saw a rather dumpy-looking witch with frizzy grey hair keeping a lookout for misbehaving students in the corridor.
"Of course, dear," she said, squinting at Sara with the monocle screwed onto her right eye. "All you need to do is go up to the fifth floor and find the corridor with the suits of armor. Professor Millstone's classroom is the door to the left of the armor of Sir Galahad. If you get lost along the way, you can just ask a suit of armor or a ghost to help find your way."
"Thank you very much, Professor." Sara made her way through the stream of students trying to get to class, and hurried up the nearest staircase. Once on the fifth floor, she easily found the right corridor, but was dismayed to see that there were at least two dozen doors, each flanked by an animated suit of armor. At least there weren't as many students here, she thought, shifting her bag on her shoulder. Sara traipsed the length of the corridor, searching for the suit of armor that had once belonged to Sir Galahad. She spotted it pacing the stretch of wall between classrooms 411 and 413, bit her lip and approached it.
"Excuse me," the suit of armor jumped at being addressed by a student. The armor inclined its head in query.
"Yes?" It said in strong, slightly rusty, voice that sounded as if it hadn't been used in quite a long time.
"Could you tell me which room is the Arithmancy classroom?"
"Ah, Arithmancy, a noble subject. But wait--you look more wise than a third-year, so why doth thee seek the Arithmancy room? Has thou forgotten where it lies?" He spoke in a gallant manner now.
"Er, yes, could you show me where it is, please?" Sara was beginning to get the impression that Sir Galahad was not quite right in the head.
"Of course, noble maiden! The classroom of Arithmancy is the door numbered 417, just a few paces down the corridor."
"Thank you," Sara told him, turning to walk away.
"May the strength of the kingdom be with you on your noble quest!" the suit of armor said enthusiastically, waving her on. Sara didn't know what to say to this: one of the things that came to mind was to tell him that he was a nutter, but she compromised and settled with not saying anything at all.
Sara approached classroom 417 and, discovering that the door was pen already, walked inside. It was different from the charms classroom in that it was very sunny and bright, and housed a number of potted plants. The seats were arranged into several tables for four students, all arranged in a sort of semicircle around the teacher's desk up front. A large blackboard covered nearly all of the front wall; the words 'Welcome back, Sixth years' were scripted in glittery white on them, while the words 'Mirabilla Millstone, Arithmancy Instructor' shimmered pink in corner.
"Well, hello there," A voice said that made Sara jump. Whirling around she saw a rather young witch in mauve robes and curly black hair grinning broadly at her. "I am Mirabilla Millstone, the Arithmancy professor. You must be the transfer student! It's good to meet you!"
"Sara O'Hanlon, Professor," she replied, shaking her hand.
"Yes, Professor Dumbledore said you would be here. You are only a fifth- year, are you not, though?" Sara felt the smallest bit of heat rising to her cheeks.
"Yes, Professor, I am a fifth year." Millstone nodded.
"Ah, well, I am sure Dumbledore knows what he is doing, putting you in here. Well, If you need it, I will be here to help you. You know that all of the others in here will be sixth-years, right?" Sara nodded. Just then a cluster of sixth-years came through the door. Sara glanced at her watch, and saw that the start of class was just a few minutes away. The sixth- years noticed Sara and stopped in their tracks.
"Hello, who are you?" A girl with a round, friendly face and short brown hair piped up, speaking from the front of the group.
"Sara O'Hanlon."
"Oh, yeah, you're the transfer from the states! But aren't you a fifth year?" Asked a tall Black boy with shorn hair and the hint of mustache.
"Yes--it's a long story--but I've already had five years of Arithmancy at my old school, so Professor Dumbledore saw fit to place me in a higher class than usual so I would feel challenged." Sara looked around at their reactions, which were quite unremarkable, so she continued, "Um, what are your names?" A pink-cheeked witch with violet hair laughed.
"Oh, where are our manners?" She said. "I am Melanie Porter, this [she indicated the black wizard] is Jonas Walker, the girl you spoke with earlier is Lydia Boardman, and this-" she made a motion towards a girl with familiar wavy blonde hair, "-is Fiona Lindstrom." Paige's sister smiled at her, along with the rest of the sixth years. Jonas noticed Sara's Ravenclaw robes and nodded approvingly.
"You're in Ravenclaw then?"
"Duh, Jonas! I thought the whole school saw her Sorting!" Fiona rolled her eyes at him. He looked at his feet.
"Oh yeah, sorry 'bout that." Everybody went to sit down, then, as it was time for class to begin. At once, Professor Millstone spoke up.
"Alright, then! I hope you all have had relaxing summer holidays! Now before I assign your seats [a number of the students groaned], I would like to collect your summer essays." There was a scramble for parchment much like the one earlier in the Charms room as they all fetched their essays from their bags. Once Millstone was satisfied, she took a sheaf of parchment from atop her desk and held it at eye level.
"Now then," she began, "here are your table arrangements for this term: at the first table, I have Walker, Aramaea, Santiago, and Dorr." Sara saw Jonas joined by a pudgy boy with thick hair, a Spanish girl, and an overly lanky girl who greatly resembled a tall weed. "At the second table: Black, Harrah, Wills, and O'Hanlon." Sara took her books and moved to a nearby table with a black-haired girl, a tall boy with green eyes, and a broad- shouldered boy. They sat at the assigned table and waited for Millstone to finish.
"Hello, you're the new girl, right? My name is Hector Wills." the broad shouldered boy said. The other boy introduced himself as Adam Harrah, and the girl as Bellatrix Black. They exchanged casual greetings, smiling at them. Sixth years aren't so bad, she thought to herself. Looking up, she noticed Bellatrix glancing at her robes.
"You're in Ravenclaw,then?" she said casually, mostly for the sake of making conversation.
"Yes," Sara replied, looking down at where the Ravenclaw emblem was displayed on her chest.
"I'm in Slytherin, myself," she informed Sara, smirking with pride at the fact. Glancing at her robes, Sara saw a silver snake, settled on a background of emerald green staring up at her.
"Me too," Adam Harrah put in, smiling at Sara.
"Not me, I'm in Hufflepuff!" Hector said, looking glum. Sara frowned slightly confused.
"What's wrong with Hufflepuff?" she asked him. Hector shrugged.
"I dunno--It's just that I could have been placed into a more distinguished house, that's all."
"Yes, well, I was under the impression that all of the houses were equally distinguished."
"That's what they want you to think, when you first come here. That's what they told us all in the beginning, too. But I don't think it's true." Sara felt rather sorry for Hector, but also something that the marauders had told her on the train the day before: That Gryffindor was the best house, Ravenclaw wasn't too bad, Slytherin was where all the gits were, and that Hufflepuff was the house of duffers who couldn't be placed anywhere else. She also couldn't help but notice that Bellatrix and Adam, while they said nothing harmful, said nothing comforting either.
"Now, then, class--welcome back!!! Woohoo! I know you're all sooo excited to be back, so I won't hold back your thirst for knowledge. First, though, I would like to congratulate you on the completion of your O.W.L exams-" a few students, Sara smiled at this, and others groaned audibly "- and say that for the next two years I will help you as best I can to do well on your N.E.W.T. exams at the close of the year. So, let's begin!" She said this so enthusiastically that her hat seemed to jump off of her head in excitement. Students took out their parchment and quills, as Professor Millstone waved her wand and more sparkling white medium [chalk?] streamed from its tip and began to write itself across a side of the overly large blackboard. "Now today, we will be learning Divisus' approach to evaluating Arithmancical expressions with three or more variables--"
The rest of the class went rather quickly, with Sara and her table-mates not having thetime to talk through their vigorous note-taking. The class was really a lot of fun; everyone talked and laughed a lot, and Professor Millstone seemed to enjoy it as muchas the students did. Sara got the impression that Millstone loved teaching, and most of the time she made jokes and chortled along with the class. At the end of the class, she waved her wand and cleared the chalkboard.
"Now, I think that's enough brain-bending for today," she said cheerfully. "I don't think I want to give you any homework today-- but oh, what the hell!" This statement was met by a number of groans from the class. Professor Millstone grinned. "Alright then, just take five minutes and look over those notes that you took today. That's all, class is dismissed!"
Sara swept her book, parchment, quill and ink bottle back into her bag, slung it over her shoulder, and stood up, stretching. She turned to leave the room.
"O'Hanlon! Wait a moment." Bellatrix Black was approaching her with a small smile on her face. She hurried up on Sara's left side; a few of her Slytherin friends trailed behind them.
"Yes?" Bellatrix looked at her approvingly.
"You know, I like you, Sara," she told her. "I thought I might, you know, take you under my wing: show you the ropes. After all, it must be confusing, being new to the school and all. What do you say?"
Sara started to say that she already had people to do this, but caught herself. Having the opinion of an older student, particularly a Slytherin, could come to be useful. She had been told that Slytherin was, in Sirius' words, a 'house of gits.' One of them being kind to her seemed a bit dodgy; but, she thought, she might as well take advantage of another opinion.
"Alright, yeah, that would be great. Thanks, Bellatrix," she said, smiling at the Slytherin standing next to her, who returned the smile.
"Okay then. Feel free to ask me any questions you might have about any aspect of Hogwarts life, and I will be more than happy to help you out." Sara nodded, smiling at her again. "I guess I'll see you next class then!" Bellatrix doubled back and met her Slytherin friends, who were giggling behind her, and they turned and walked in the opposite direction, still whispering--they rounded a corner and were gone. Sara shifted her bag, and walked down the corridor the opposite way, aiming to get back for lunch. Checking her watch, she saw that it was only 11:30-- she had an hour and a half to eat lunch and get to her next class, Defense Against the Dark Arts.
With help from two portraits and the Hufflepuff House ghost, she found her way slowly back to the Great Hall. When the great, heavy oak doors swung open as she approached, the delighted laughter and chatter of other students rang in her ears, and she couldn't help but smile. As it was midday, sunlight streamed through each of the two dozen high windows in the hall, making any sort of lighting quite unnecessary. It looked as if just over one hundred students were sitting at their House tables, taking a break from classes. Sara quickly found her way over to the area of the Ravenclaw table where she had sat with the others earlier; her face fell when she found the area devoid of familiar faces.
"I guess it's just as well." she said under her breath as she sat down, setting her bag at her feet. Deciding that she could wisely use this time to look over her Arithmancy notes, she poured a glass of pumpkin juice and propped her notebook against the jug. No sooner had she gotten through the first page than James Potter popped up in the seat across from her.
"Hey James," she said, a bit surprised at seeing him at the Ravenclaw table.
"Hey, what's up?"
"Nothing much. Where's the rest of the posse?" Just then, Lily, Remus, and Rena sat down around James and Sara. James was looking a bit confused.
"Posse?" he asked. Lily laughed out loud.
"It's a muggle thing, you dolt!" Sara grinned at the expression on James' face at this remark, as did the others sitting around her. A question suddenly came to Sara's mind.
"So how come you're all sitting over here?" James shrugged.
"I dunno.....you did look kinda lonely, and I have been wanting to talk to you." Sara raised her eyebrows.
"About?" James shrugged again, and Lily got an interested look on her face.
"Yes, about what did you want to talk to her that absolutely couldn't wait until next period."
"I dunno, just wanted to know how your first day is going, Sara."
"Well, you saw what happened in Charms earlier---" she began, but was interrupted by Rena.
"What'dyou mean, 'you saw what happened?'" She sounded mildly scandalized. "It sounds like you think it is a disaster that you're, you know, intelligent!"
"Well, I didn't exactly want to start the term with the rep of a know-it- all." Sirius joined them at the table.
"Well," he said, "that rep is sort of implied, with you being in Ravenclaw and all." Lily smacked the back of his head, then turned back to Sara.
"Okay, so Charms went well. What about Arithmancy?"
Sara told them about how she had found the room, met Paige's sister and Christian's brother, about how kind Professor Millstone was. She told them about being assigned to sit at a table with Bellatrix Black, and how she had offered to take Sara 'under her wing.' When she had finished, the others were throwing each other apprehensive looks; Sirius was scowling visibly.
"What? What did I do?" Sara asked tentatively. James, Lily, Remus, and Rena all shot looks at Sirius, who, still scowling, shrugged.
"You didn't do anything.....just, don't mingle too much with Bellatrix Black." Sara frowned. She was about to ask why, but restrained herself in time. If Sirius and the others weren't telling her something, she rationalized, they must have their reasons. Still staying silent, she nodded understandingly.
"Actually," James said quite suddenly, making them all jump. "Why don't you take advantage of her offer, Sara? Ask her any questions that you might have, and tell us everything she says; everything that she tells you. Just don't tell her too much, and *don't* do anything to upset her." Once again, James shot Lily and Sirius meaningful looks, and both returned looks of understanding that Sara thought best not to question. Maybe they would tell her once she got to know them better. Sara agreed to the conditions.
After that, lunch went quite smoothly, the six of them chattering away unconcernedly. Sara got to know everyone much better. They began to talk to each other about, mostly for her benefit, their own families, which for Sara herself was a touchy subject. Lily told them about how she was a muggle-born witch like Sara; how her parents were proud of her, but her older sister, Petunia, hated her for it and called her a freak.
".....But I just threaten to hex her if she says anything about it.....she doesn't know that we aren't allowed to do magic outside of school!" They all laughed.
"What about you, Rena?"
"Well Remus and I are half-bloods," she said. "Our mum is a witch; dad's a muggle."
"You mean 'was,'" Remus cut in, a dark look suddenly coming over his face. "He left when Mum told him she was a witch, right after she got pregnant with us. Haven't heard from him since."
"'Course, Mum still makes him pay child support. She really doesn't need the money, but she said it was funny to watch him writhe and scream that she was a witch in a court full of muggles who don't know any better," Rena added, a smirk on her face. James and Sirius sniggered, and Remus and Rena slapped palms. Sara smiled.
"Yeah, I'm a pureblood," James told them before Sara could ask. "Mum and Dad are really nice about it, though. They still respect muggles and muggle-borns though. I am an only child, which is alright, a bit lonely though," he added as an afterthought.
"Well, I didn't get so lucky," Sirius said darkly. "I am a pureblood, too, but my whole family is obsessed with this pure-blood mania--they really want someone to purge the wizarding world of everyone with muggle blood. They hate me for not flinching at the sight of a muggle-born--and they shun anyone in the family who is halfway decent, including me. I have a younger brother, Regulus, he's in his second year here, and he is my parents' favorite child."
"I haven't seen him hanging around you," Sara said. Sirius got an uncharacteristically disgusting look on his face.
"You wouldn't, he's in Slytherin. The whole lot of them have been, with the exception of my uncle Alphard and my cousin Andromeda, and me, of course." He spat. Something suddenly clicked in Sara's mind.
"Wait a moment," she said slowly. "Bellatrix Black---"
"She's my cousin, yeah," Sirius spat again, his face scrunched up in distaste. "You're pretty quick, O'Hanlon-I gotta give you that." Sara smiled.
"Well, I am in Ravenclaw, after all." Lily and Rena smiled at her. Sara suddenly noticed that two were missing from their number. "Where are Arabella and Peter?"
"Remedial Potions lessons," said Lily, worry evitable in her green eyes. "Poor Bella..."
"Remedial potions?"
"Yeah, like, potions lessons for those wizarding folk who don't quite grasp the concepts so easily," said James rather lazily, grabbing a chicken-and- ham sandwich from a large platter on the table and taking a large bite. "Ffeeferraveemeasem," he said through a mouth full of sandwich. Sara hadn't understood a word he had said. Neither, apparently, did any of the others.
"Care to clarify that for us, James?" Remus asked him, amusement in his voice. James swallowed.
"PE - TER RA-THER NEEDS THEM," he said loudly in the tone one would use speaking to an elderly person who was hard-of hearing. He lowered his voice to its normal tone. "Pity Bella needs them too, though...she always did well in potions..." Sara glanced quickly back over at Sirius, who looked quite relieved that the topic was no longer about their families. She stowed her Arithmancy notes back into her bag, grabbed an apple and a turkey sandwich and shoved them both into her bag (after first wrapping the sandwich in a napkin), and stood up.
"Umm...would one of you mind showing me where the owlery is quickly? I just need to find my owl and mail a letter..."
"Of course," Lily said. "I'll show you how to get there-I keep forgetting that you don't know where it is." Sara smiled at her gratefully, and the two left the Great Hall. They rounded a corner and started up a staircase as Lily asked Sara about her own family.
"We told you about ours," she said as they climbed the staircase. Sara did some very fast thinking, and decided to stick with the story that she had told Paige earlier if need be. She took a breath.
"Well," she said slowly, "I am a muggle-born, and an only child, which is pretty boring. My best friend back home, Ariana, was like my sister. She still is...it's just that I don't get to see her all the time anymore. We used to live right across the street from one another, and we were in the same dorm back at Beaumore." Good, Sara thought, no parent talk.
"What is Beaumore like? I mean, I've heard of the Salem Institute, but I never knew that the States had more than one wizarding school."
"Well, most do go to Salem, but a lot of witches and wizards, like me, live much too far away. Beaumore used to be an old Muggle boarding school, so it has different buildings unlike Hogwarts."
"Do you have houses like we do?"
"Yes, but it isn't really the same thing. We have Andromeda, Calliope, Orion, and Zubeida dormitories. Instead of being sorted like you, with the hat, we wrote our own names on a slip of parchment given to us and threw them into a goblet of fire, and then the goblet spit them back out with the name of the dorm best suiting us printed on the reverse side. Andromeda is like Gryffindor, Calliope is like Ravenclaw, Orion is like Hufflepuff, and Zubeida is like Slytherin."
"And you were in Calliope, then?"
"No, actually," small lines of confusion appeared on Sara's forehead. "I was in Andromeda. That's odd...unless-" her mind went back to what the Sorting hat had told her the day before. It had said that her courage had been hampered by an event-her parents' deaths.
"What?"
"Oh, it's nothing," Sara said a little too quickly. They rounded another corner and made their way up a long, spiral staircase. Somehow, Lily sensed that this subject made Sara uncomfortable, and she was grateful for it. They climbed the staircase in silence. At the top, a small corridor opened into a very high-ceilinged round room, with several open windows and a straw-covered floor. The room, the Owlery, was inhabited by dozens upon dozens of owls; some belonging to students, and others school owls.
Sara was craning her neck, searching for Athena, when she heard her familiar dulcet hooting, turned, and saw her fluttering down from a high perch. She landed on Sara's arm and nuzzled her affectionately; Sara couldn't help but smile.
"This your owl, then? Yes, I remember her from yesterday," Lily smiled, stroking Athena's cream-colored plumage. Sara dug her letter to Ariana out of her bag, rereading it one last time:
Dear Ariana,
How is it back home? I am currently sitting on a train on the way to my new school. It is called Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry-what a name! I miss you and everyone back home. Everything here is strange, including the people. They aren't mean or anything, just foreign. I am not used to the accent, the new money, anything. I want to come home, to go back to Beaumore with you like always...but things change, I guess...though not always for the better. I am adjusting to the change well-but guess what? Here, school starts when you are 11 instead of 10, so I have to repeat my fifth grade year here! It's cool, cuz I know the stuff already, but it does feel like the waste of a year's time. Send my love to everyone back home, and write back soon! Love 'n' stuff, Sara
Nodding with satisfaction, Sara rolled up the parchment and tied it to Athena's leg.
"Now, this is for Ariana, Athena," Sara told her owl. "It is a very long journey, so you take as long as you need, okay? I don't want you to get hurt. If you aren't up to it, I can send a different owl, alright?" Athena nipped her finger in an affectionate manner, hooted, and flew off into the clear blue sky. Sara watched her until she disappeared, then turned back to Lily, who was mailing off a letter of her own with a black- feathered owl not much taller than hers.
"I'm almost finished," she said, tying the parchment to the owl's leg securely. The owl turned its head and Sara caught a glimpse of startlingly green eyes much like Lily's own. "There," she said with satisfaction. "Sara, this is my owl, Jasmine," Lily told her proudly. Jasmine the owl, sensing that Lily had finished with her, went soaring gracefully out of the window into the dying summer breeze.
Sara watched the owl for a moment, then looked at her watch: it was seven after noon: she needed to get back to the dormitory soon for her books. She turned to Lily.
"Shall we go then?" she asked. Lily nodded, and they turned and left. Winding their way back, they finally reached the fourth floor and they parted ways, promising to meet again in Defense Against the Dark Arts.
Sara made her way down the corridor and, upon coming to the statue, gave the password and went inside, making her way up to her dormitory. She quickly emptied her bag of Arithmancy and Charms books, and shoved her Defense book into it. Finding the sandwich from earlier, she sat on the foot of her bed cross-legged and ate in silence, looking over the previously disregarded Arithmancy notes. At 12:30, she crammed a box of potion ingredients into her bag and set off again, this time for the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom.
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Yeah, I know, weird place to stop-but I didn't want to keep you guys waiting any more for chapter 6!
Unfortunately, as you are all unpleasantly aware, school starts in less than a month, and I have a bit of summer reading to get on with, so my writing will have to take the back burner for a while-but have no fear! I will still try to update as much as I can, and the next chapter should be up in the next 20 days (before school starts). Plus, soccer (football for all you Brits out there) conditioning is starting up as well...so, yeah.
PLEASE KEEP UP THE REVIEWING!!!
And, as always, thank you to Gryffindor Gal and VampireBat for helping to bring my total of reviews up to 18-even though a whole one person reviewed for chapter 5...that is some sort of all-time low, even for me ( Oh well
Best wishes for the end of the summer!
~*~*Callista Rose*~*~
READERS: The call for characters is over for now, but I promise that I will fit your characters in there sometime, be it sooner or later, so keep reading!!! Also, I have a secondary category to this listed as a romance..patience!!! Romances will develop, and one (namely, Lily and James) is there, but I don't show it much now. I am thinking of changing the category to Tragedy, just so you know...what do you think? Feedback is always appreciated, even ::sniff:: flames.
Here then, without further ado, is chapter 6!!!
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Sit Vis Tecum--Chapter 6
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"Excuse me, Professor, could you tell me how to get to the Arithmancy classroom please?"
Sara was quite lost. She had left Charms in a good mood, what with Paige voluntarily giving her directions to the Arithmancy classroom and turning with the rest of the Ravenclaws and heading into the dungeons for Potions. Of course, her mood dropped considerably after she got lost somewhere on the third floor. It hadn't helped matters any that she knew no one, and so after ten minutes she was glad indeed to have brought her books with her. Sara was greatly relieved when she saw a rather dumpy-looking witch with frizzy grey hair keeping a lookout for misbehaving students in the corridor.
"Of course, dear," she said, squinting at Sara with the monocle screwed onto her right eye. "All you need to do is go up to the fifth floor and find the corridor with the suits of armor. Professor Millstone's classroom is the door to the left of the armor of Sir Galahad. If you get lost along the way, you can just ask a suit of armor or a ghost to help find your way."
"Thank you very much, Professor." Sara made her way through the stream of students trying to get to class, and hurried up the nearest staircase. Once on the fifth floor, she easily found the right corridor, but was dismayed to see that there were at least two dozen doors, each flanked by an animated suit of armor. At least there weren't as many students here, she thought, shifting her bag on her shoulder. Sara traipsed the length of the corridor, searching for the suit of armor that had once belonged to Sir Galahad. She spotted it pacing the stretch of wall between classrooms 411 and 413, bit her lip and approached it.
"Excuse me," the suit of armor jumped at being addressed by a student. The armor inclined its head in query.
"Yes?" It said in strong, slightly rusty, voice that sounded as if it hadn't been used in quite a long time.
"Could you tell me which room is the Arithmancy classroom?"
"Ah, Arithmancy, a noble subject. But wait--you look more wise than a third-year, so why doth thee seek the Arithmancy room? Has thou forgotten where it lies?" He spoke in a gallant manner now.
"Er, yes, could you show me where it is, please?" Sara was beginning to get the impression that Sir Galahad was not quite right in the head.
"Of course, noble maiden! The classroom of Arithmancy is the door numbered 417, just a few paces down the corridor."
"Thank you," Sara told him, turning to walk away.
"May the strength of the kingdom be with you on your noble quest!" the suit of armor said enthusiastically, waving her on. Sara didn't know what to say to this: one of the things that came to mind was to tell him that he was a nutter, but she compromised and settled with not saying anything at all.
Sara approached classroom 417 and, discovering that the door was pen already, walked inside. It was different from the charms classroom in that it was very sunny and bright, and housed a number of potted plants. The seats were arranged into several tables for four students, all arranged in a sort of semicircle around the teacher's desk up front. A large blackboard covered nearly all of the front wall; the words 'Welcome back, Sixth years' were scripted in glittery white on them, while the words 'Mirabilla Millstone, Arithmancy Instructor' shimmered pink in corner.
"Well, hello there," A voice said that made Sara jump. Whirling around she saw a rather young witch in mauve robes and curly black hair grinning broadly at her. "I am Mirabilla Millstone, the Arithmancy professor. You must be the transfer student! It's good to meet you!"
"Sara O'Hanlon, Professor," she replied, shaking her hand.
"Yes, Professor Dumbledore said you would be here. You are only a fifth- year, are you not, though?" Sara felt the smallest bit of heat rising to her cheeks.
"Yes, Professor, I am a fifth year." Millstone nodded.
"Ah, well, I am sure Dumbledore knows what he is doing, putting you in here. Well, If you need it, I will be here to help you. You know that all of the others in here will be sixth-years, right?" Sara nodded. Just then a cluster of sixth-years came through the door. Sara glanced at her watch, and saw that the start of class was just a few minutes away. The sixth- years noticed Sara and stopped in their tracks.
"Hello, who are you?" A girl with a round, friendly face and short brown hair piped up, speaking from the front of the group.
"Sara O'Hanlon."
"Oh, yeah, you're the transfer from the states! But aren't you a fifth year?" Asked a tall Black boy with shorn hair and the hint of mustache.
"Yes--it's a long story--but I've already had five years of Arithmancy at my old school, so Professor Dumbledore saw fit to place me in a higher class than usual so I would feel challenged." Sara looked around at their reactions, which were quite unremarkable, so she continued, "Um, what are your names?" A pink-cheeked witch with violet hair laughed.
"Oh, where are our manners?" She said. "I am Melanie Porter, this [she indicated the black wizard] is Jonas Walker, the girl you spoke with earlier is Lydia Boardman, and this-" she made a motion towards a girl with familiar wavy blonde hair, "-is Fiona Lindstrom." Paige's sister smiled at her, along with the rest of the sixth years. Jonas noticed Sara's Ravenclaw robes and nodded approvingly.
"You're in Ravenclaw then?"
"Duh, Jonas! I thought the whole school saw her Sorting!" Fiona rolled her eyes at him. He looked at his feet.
"Oh yeah, sorry 'bout that." Everybody went to sit down, then, as it was time for class to begin. At once, Professor Millstone spoke up.
"Alright, then! I hope you all have had relaxing summer holidays! Now before I assign your seats [a number of the students groaned], I would like to collect your summer essays." There was a scramble for parchment much like the one earlier in the Charms room as they all fetched their essays from their bags. Once Millstone was satisfied, she took a sheaf of parchment from atop her desk and held it at eye level.
"Now then," she began, "here are your table arrangements for this term: at the first table, I have Walker, Aramaea, Santiago, and Dorr." Sara saw Jonas joined by a pudgy boy with thick hair, a Spanish girl, and an overly lanky girl who greatly resembled a tall weed. "At the second table: Black, Harrah, Wills, and O'Hanlon." Sara took her books and moved to a nearby table with a black-haired girl, a tall boy with green eyes, and a broad- shouldered boy. They sat at the assigned table and waited for Millstone to finish.
"Hello, you're the new girl, right? My name is Hector Wills." the broad shouldered boy said. The other boy introduced himself as Adam Harrah, and the girl as Bellatrix Black. They exchanged casual greetings, smiling at them. Sixth years aren't so bad, she thought to herself. Looking up, she noticed Bellatrix glancing at her robes.
"You're in Ravenclaw,then?" she said casually, mostly for the sake of making conversation.
"Yes," Sara replied, looking down at where the Ravenclaw emblem was displayed on her chest.
"I'm in Slytherin, myself," she informed Sara, smirking with pride at the fact. Glancing at her robes, Sara saw a silver snake, settled on a background of emerald green staring up at her.
"Me too," Adam Harrah put in, smiling at Sara.
"Not me, I'm in Hufflepuff!" Hector said, looking glum. Sara frowned slightly confused.
"What's wrong with Hufflepuff?" she asked him. Hector shrugged.
"I dunno--It's just that I could have been placed into a more distinguished house, that's all."
"Yes, well, I was under the impression that all of the houses were equally distinguished."
"That's what they want you to think, when you first come here. That's what they told us all in the beginning, too. But I don't think it's true." Sara felt rather sorry for Hector, but also something that the marauders had told her on the train the day before: That Gryffindor was the best house, Ravenclaw wasn't too bad, Slytherin was where all the gits were, and that Hufflepuff was the house of duffers who couldn't be placed anywhere else. She also couldn't help but notice that Bellatrix and Adam, while they said nothing harmful, said nothing comforting either.
"Now, then, class--welcome back!!! Woohoo! I know you're all sooo excited to be back, so I won't hold back your thirst for knowledge. First, though, I would like to congratulate you on the completion of your O.W.L exams-" a few students, Sara smiled at this, and others groaned audibly "- and say that for the next two years I will help you as best I can to do well on your N.E.W.T. exams at the close of the year. So, let's begin!" She said this so enthusiastically that her hat seemed to jump off of her head in excitement. Students took out their parchment and quills, as Professor Millstone waved her wand and more sparkling white medium [chalk?] streamed from its tip and began to write itself across a side of the overly large blackboard. "Now today, we will be learning Divisus' approach to evaluating Arithmancical expressions with three or more variables--"
The rest of the class went rather quickly, with Sara and her table-mates not having thetime to talk through their vigorous note-taking. The class was really a lot of fun; everyone talked and laughed a lot, and Professor Millstone seemed to enjoy it as muchas the students did. Sara got the impression that Millstone loved teaching, and most of the time she made jokes and chortled along with the class. At the end of the class, she waved her wand and cleared the chalkboard.
"Now, I think that's enough brain-bending for today," she said cheerfully. "I don't think I want to give you any homework today-- but oh, what the hell!" This statement was met by a number of groans from the class. Professor Millstone grinned. "Alright then, just take five minutes and look over those notes that you took today. That's all, class is dismissed!"
Sara swept her book, parchment, quill and ink bottle back into her bag, slung it over her shoulder, and stood up, stretching. She turned to leave the room.
"O'Hanlon! Wait a moment." Bellatrix Black was approaching her with a small smile on her face. She hurried up on Sara's left side; a few of her Slytherin friends trailed behind them.
"Yes?" Bellatrix looked at her approvingly.
"You know, I like you, Sara," she told her. "I thought I might, you know, take you under my wing: show you the ropes. After all, it must be confusing, being new to the school and all. What do you say?"
Sara started to say that she already had people to do this, but caught herself. Having the opinion of an older student, particularly a Slytherin, could come to be useful. She had been told that Slytherin was, in Sirius' words, a 'house of gits.' One of them being kind to her seemed a bit dodgy; but, she thought, she might as well take advantage of another opinion.
"Alright, yeah, that would be great. Thanks, Bellatrix," she said, smiling at the Slytherin standing next to her, who returned the smile.
"Okay then. Feel free to ask me any questions you might have about any aspect of Hogwarts life, and I will be more than happy to help you out." Sara nodded, smiling at her again. "I guess I'll see you next class then!" Bellatrix doubled back and met her Slytherin friends, who were giggling behind her, and they turned and walked in the opposite direction, still whispering--they rounded a corner and were gone. Sara shifted her bag, and walked down the corridor the opposite way, aiming to get back for lunch. Checking her watch, she saw that it was only 11:30-- she had an hour and a half to eat lunch and get to her next class, Defense Against the Dark Arts.
With help from two portraits and the Hufflepuff House ghost, she found her way slowly back to the Great Hall. When the great, heavy oak doors swung open as she approached, the delighted laughter and chatter of other students rang in her ears, and she couldn't help but smile. As it was midday, sunlight streamed through each of the two dozen high windows in the hall, making any sort of lighting quite unnecessary. It looked as if just over one hundred students were sitting at their House tables, taking a break from classes. Sara quickly found her way over to the area of the Ravenclaw table where she had sat with the others earlier; her face fell when she found the area devoid of familiar faces.
"I guess it's just as well." she said under her breath as she sat down, setting her bag at her feet. Deciding that she could wisely use this time to look over her Arithmancy notes, she poured a glass of pumpkin juice and propped her notebook against the jug. No sooner had she gotten through the first page than James Potter popped up in the seat across from her.
"Hey James," she said, a bit surprised at seeing him at the Ravenclaw table.
"Hey, what's up?"
"Nothing much. Where's the rest of the posse?" Just then, Lily, Remus, and Rena sat down around James and Sara. James was looking a bit confused.
"Posse?" he asked. Lily laughed out loud.
"It's a muggle thing, you dolt!" Sara grinned at the expression on James' face at this remark, as did the others sitting around her. A question suddenly came to Sara's mind.
"So how come you're all sitting over here?" James shrugged.
"I dunno.....you did look kinda lonely, and I have been wanting to talk to you." Sara raised her eyebrows.
"About?" James shrugged again, and Lily got an interested look on her face.
"Yes, about what did you want to talk to her that absolutely couldn't wait until next period."
"I dunno, just wanted to know how your first day is going, Sara."
"Well, you saw what happened in Charms earlier---" she began, but was interrupted by Rena.
"What'dyou mean, 'you saw what happened?'" She sounded mildly scandalized. "It sounds like you think it is a disaster that you're, you know, intelligent!"
"Well, I didn't exactly want to start the term with the rep of a know-it- all." Sirius joined them at the table.
"Well," he said, "that rep is sort of implied, with you being in Ravenclaw and all." Lily smacked the back of his head, then turned back to Sara.
"Okay, so Charms went well. What about Arithmancy?"
Sara told them about how she had found the room, met Paige's sister and Christian's brother, about how kind Professor Millstone was. She told them about being assigned to sit at a table with Bellatrix Black, and how she had offered to take Sara 'under her wing.' When she had finished, the others were throwing each other apprehensive looks; Sirius was scowling visibly.
"What? What did I do?" Sara asked tentatively. James, Lily, Remus, and Rena all shot looks at Sirius, who, still scowling, shrugged.
"You didn't do anything.....just, don't mingle too much with Bellatrix Black." Sara frowned. She was about to ask why, but restrained herself in time. If Sirius and the others weren't telling her something, she rationalized, they must have their reasons. Still staying silent, she nodded understandingly.
"Actually," James said quite suddenly, making them all jump. "Why don't you take advantage of her offer, Sara? Ask her any questions that you might have, and tell us everything she says; everything that she tells you. Just don't tell her too much, and *don't* do anything to upset her." Once again, James shot Lily and Sirius meaningful looks, and both returned looks of understanding that Sara thought best not to question. Maybe they would tell her once she got to know them better. Sara agreed to the conditions.
After that, lunch went quite smoothly, the six of them chattering away unconcernedly. Sara got to know everyone much better. They began to talk to each other about, mostly for her benefit, their own families, which for Sara herself was a touchy subject. Lily told them about how she was a muggle-born witch like Sara; how her parents were proud of her, but her older sister, Petunia, hated her for it and called her a freak.
".....But I just threaten to hex her if she says anything about it.....she doesn't know that we aren't allowed to do magic outside of school!" They all laughed.
"What about you, Rena?"
"Well Remus and I are half-bloods," she said. "Our mum is a witch; dad's a muggle."
"You mean 'was,'" Remus cut in, a dark look suddenly coming over his face. "He left when Mum told him she was a witch, right after she got pregnant with us. Haven't heard from him since."
"'Course, Mum still makes him pay child support. She really doesn't need the money, but she said it was funny to watch him writhe and scream that she was a witch in a court full of muggles who don't know any better," Rena added, a smirk on her face. James and Sirius sniggered, and Remus and Rena slapped palms. Sara smiled.
"Yeah, I'm a pureblood," James told them before Sara could ask. "Mum and Dad are really nice about it, though. They still respect muggles and muggle-borns though. I am an only child, which is alright, a bit lonely though," he added as an afterthought.
"Well, I didn't get so lucky," Sirius said darkly. "I am a pureblood, too, but my whole family is obsessed with this pure-blood mania--they really want someone to purge the wizarding world of everyone with muggle blood. They hate me for not flinching at the sight of a muggle-born--and they shun anyone in the family who is halfway decent, including me. I have a younger brother, Regulus, he's in his second year here, and he is my parents' favorite child."
"I haven't seen him hanging around you," Sara said. Sirius got an uncharacteristically disgusting look on his face.
"You wouldn't, he's in Slytherin. The whole lot of them have been, with the exception of my uncle Alphard and my cousin Andromeda, and me, of course." He spat. Something suddenly clicked in Sara's mind.
"Wait a moment," she said slowly. "Bellatrix Black---"
"She's my cousin, yeah," Sirius spat again, his face scrunched up in distaste. "You're pretty quick, O'Hanlon-I gotta give you that." Sara smiled.
"Well, I am in Ravenclaw, after all." Lily and Rena smiled at her. Sara suddenly noticed that two were missing from their number. "Where are Arabella and Peter?"
"Remedial Potions lessons," said Lily, worry evitable in her green eyes. "Poor Bella..."
"Remedial potions?"
"Yeah, like, potions lessons for those wizarding folk who don't quite grasp the concepts so easily," said James rather lazily, grabbing a chicken-and- ham sandwich from a large platter on the table and taking a large bite. "Ffeeferraveemeasem," he said through a mouth full of sandwich. Sara hadn't understood a word he had said. Neither, apparently, did any of the others.
"Care to clarify that for us, James?" Remus asked him, amusement in his voice. James swallowed.
"PE - TER RA-THER NEEDS THEM," he said loudly in the tone one would use speaking to an elderly person who was hard-of hearing. He lowered his voice to its normal tone. "Pity Bella needs them too, though...she always did well in potions..." Sara glanced quickly back over at Sirius, who looked quite relieved that the topic was no longer about their families. She stowed her Arithmancy notes back into her bag, grabbed an apple and a turkey sandwich and shoved them both into her bag (after first wrapping the sandwich in a napkin), and stood up.
"Umm...would one of you mind showing me where the owlery is quickly? I just need to find my owl and mail a letter..."
"Of course," Lily said. "I'll show you how to get there-I keep forgetting that you don't know where it is." Sara smiled at her gratefully, and the two left the Great Hall. They rounded a corner and started up a staircase as Lily asked Sara about her own family.
"We told you about ours," she said as they climbed the staircase. Sara did some very fast thinking, and decided to stick with the story that she had told Paige earlier if need be. She took a breath.
"Well," she said slowly, "I am a muggle-born, and an only child, which is pretty boring. My best friend back home, Ariana, was like my sister. She still is...it's just that I don't get to see her all the time anymore. We used to live right across the street from one another, and we were in the same dorm back at Beaumore." Good, Sara thought, no parent talk.
"What is Beaumore like? I mean, I've heard of the Salem Institute, but I never knew that the States had more than one wizarding school."
"Well, most do go to Salem, but a lot of witches and wizards, like me, live much too far away. Beaumore used to be an old Muggle boarding school, so it has different buildings unlike Hogwarts."
"Do you have houses like we do?"
"Yes, but it isn't really the same thing. We have Andromeda, Calliope, Orion, and Zubeida dormitories. Instead of being sorted like you, with the hat, we wrote our own names on a slip of parchment given to us and threw them into a goblet of fire, and then the goblet spit them back out with the name of the dorm best suiting us printed on the reverse side. Andromeda is like Gryffindor, Calliope is like Ravenclaw, Orion is like Hufflepuff, and Zubeida is like Slytherin."
"And you were in Calliope, then?"
"No, actually," small lines of confusion appeared on Sara's forehead. "I was in Andromeda. That's odd...unless-" her mind went back to what the Sorting hat had told her the day before. It had said that her courage had been hampered by an event-her parents' deaths.
"What?"
"Oh, it's nothing," Sara said a little too quickly. They rounded another corner and made their way up a long, spiral staircase. Somehow, Lily sensed that this subject made Sara uncomfortable, and she was grateful for it. They climbed the staircase in silence. At the top, a small corridor opened into a very high-ceilinged round room, with several open windows and a straw-covered floor. The room, the Owlery, was inhabited by dozens upon dozens of owls; some belonging to students, and others school owls.
Sara was craning her neck, searching for Athena, when she heard her familiar dulcet hooting, turned, and saw her fluttering down from a high perch. She landed on Sara's arm and nuzzled her affectionately; Sara couldn't help but smile.
"This your owl, then? Yes, I remember her from yesterday," Lily smiled, stroking Athena's cream-colored plumage. Sara dug her letter to Ariana out of her bag, rereading it one last time:
Dear Ariana,
How is it back home? I am currently sitting on a train on the way to my new school. It is called Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry-what a name! I miss you and everyone back home. Everything here is strange, including the people. They aren't mean or anything, just foreign. I am not used to the accent, the new money, anything. I want to come home, to go back to Beaumore with you like always...but things change, I guess...though not always for the better. I am adjusting to the change well-but guess what? Here, school starts when you are 11 instead of 10, so I have to repeat my fifth grade year here! It's cool, cuz I know the stuff already, but it does feel like the waste of a year's time. Send my love to everyone back home, and write back soon! Love 'n' stuff, Sara
Nodding with satisfaction, Sara rolled up the parchment and tied it to Athena's leg.
"Now, this is for Ariana, Athena," Sara told her owl. "It is a very long journey, so you take as long as you need, okay? I don't want you to get hurt. If you aren't up to it, I can send a different owl, alright?" Athena nipped her finger in an affectionate manner, hooted, and flew off into the clear blue sky. Sara watched her until she disappeared, then turned back to Lily, who was mailing off a letter of her own with a black- feathered owl not much taller than hers.
"I'm almost finished," she said, tying the parchment to the owl's leg securely. The owl turned its head and Sara caught a glimpse of startlingly green eyes much like Lily's own. "There," she said with satisfaction. "Sara, this is my owl, Jasmine," Lily told her proudly. Jasmine the owl, sensing that Lily had finished with her, went soaring gracefully out of the window into the dying summer breeze.
Sara watched the owl for a moment, then looked at her watch: it was seven after noon: she needed to get back to the dormitory soon for her books. She turned to Lily.
"Shall we go then?" she asked. Lily nodded, and they turned and left. Winding their way back, they finally reached the fourth floor and they parted ways, promising to meet again in Defense Against the Dark Arts.
Sara made her way down the corridor and, upon coming to the statue, gave the password and went inside, making her way up to her dormitory. She quickly emptied her bag of Arithmancy and Charms books, and shoved her Defense book into it. Finding the sandwich from earlier, she sat on the foot of her bed cross-legged and ate in silence, looking over the previously disregarded Arithmancy notes. At 12:30, she crammed a box of potion ingredients into her bag and set off again, this time for the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom.
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Yeah, I know, weird place to stop-but I didn't want to keep you guys waiting any more for chapter 6!
Unfortunately, as you are all unpleasantly aware, school starts in less than a month, and I have a bit of summer reading to get on with, so my writing will have to take the back burner for a while-but have no fear! I will still try to update as much as I can, and the next chapter should be up in the next 20 days (before school starts). Plus, soccer (football for all you Brits out there) conditioning is starting up as well...so, yeah.
PLEASE KEEP UP THE REVIEWING!!!
And, as always, thank you to Gryffindor Gal and VampireBat for helping to bring my total of reviews up to 18-even though a whole one person reviewed for chapter 5...that is some sort of all-time low, even for me ( Oh well
Best wishes for the end of the summer!
~*~*Callista Rose*~*~