Both families met up in a Costa Coffee near Kings Cross, suitcases in hand and Hedwig hooded and perched on Harry's hand. They managed to have a conversation around people walking up and admiring her and asking about Falconry.
Emma started, "OK, so one of the things we decided while you were upstairs yesterday, is that you'll be coming back to ours for Christmas if that's OK." Harry nodded vigorously and he couldn't keep the grin off of his face with that news.
"You'll both need to keep up your meditation practice, and no more testing whether you've mastered it or not. No Hermione, that doesn't mean you can ask a teacher to help you either, no more trying it until we are all comfortable we at least at the same level you were when you had your accident." She indicated the three adults, and Hermione face dropped as her mother pre-empted the wiggle room that she was going to use.
"We also remember the outburst that you had about The Dream, and what you said about it. So we don't want either of you to talk about it with the other students or teachers."
"But Mum…"
"Don't but Mum me young lady. This is important, as far as we can tell they think that wherever we went is a fairy tale, so we don't want you to find out what their version of a Mad Scientists lab is."
"OK mum", Harry of course had been trained not to argue, so he didn't even consider complaining.
With that they finished up their drinks and headed into the station. Finding the platform turned out to be easy as the Magicals appeared to have used a glowing portal. The Grangers all looked around carefully trying to work out why everyone was ignoring it. It was Petunia that put them out of their misery.
"Don't worry about it, they can't see it, it's like the brick to open the way into Diagon Alley. No one else could see it even though Harry and I could."
Understanding dawned on them, as they walked through. The portal led them out onto a platform with a steam engine on it, as they were early they all went to find a compartment to sit in. Once they found one they put their suit cases up and went back to say goodbye on the platform.
The only fly in the ointment came from Hedwig.
"What do you mean you want to go with Auntie?... What no, we're going to on the train for around 9 hours… What do you mean that's too long… No I'm not going to blindfold you again… But I want you to come with me… No I can't open the window so you can fly out… OK, but only if Aunt Petunia agrees."
"Aunt Petunia, Hedwig doesn't want to go on the train, is it OK if she goes with you and flies up later?"
Smiling at Dan and Emma. "I'm sure that will be fine, just as long as she leaves before I have to go home."
Hedwig just nods and hops over to Petunia's shoulder.
"Come on, let's go and get gawked at." Harry turns away and starts to head to the train again as the platform is starting to fill up. Hermione pulls a dark green beech hat out of her book bag and runs up behind Harry before pushing it down on his head. Harry freezes and starts shaking, so Hermione moves round in front of him.
"No, no, I didn't mean that, I just wanted to surprise you, please be ok, please be ok."
A moment later he comes back and sees Hermione in tears with the adults standing around, he enfolds her in a hug.
"I'm alright, I'm back now."
Emma offers a comforting hand on his shoulder. "OK, well I think you can handle it from here, don't forget to do your meditation and do try to make friends. Also try to keep Hermione out of her books for long enough to make friends."
With that, and one last round of hugs, which Harry tries not to stiffen for, they leave and head to Diagon Alley to do a bit of their own shopping.
Harry and Hermione head back to the compartment they found only to find a Pudgy blond boy holding a toad.
"Oh, I'm sorry, I thought this compartment was free, I'll just go and find another one."
"No! don't worry, we don't mind company. Is that a toad?" Hermione quickly moves to put the boy at rest.
"Uh huh. He's name's Trevor and my uncle Algie got him for me."
"Cool, this is Chirpy, he's an Antixuilaxr."
"Erm, there's nothing there."
"That's because he's invisible, look touch him." Hermione shoved Chirpy into the boys hands and handed Trevor to Harry.
"Er, Hermione, I know that you like to make friends by bludgeoning people to death with words, but we've not even introduced ourselves yet."
Hermione immediately flushes bright red and promptly sits down. "Yes, well, erm. I'm Hermione Granger, first of house Granger. Pleased to meet you."
"Greetings Miss Granger, I'm Neville Longbottom, heir of house Longbottom."
"And I am Harry Potter, heir presumptive of house Potter."
The formality of the introductions seems to ground Neville and he visibly relaxes while his fingers explore Chirpy, who chirps happily when he gets a good spot. Suddenly Chirpy lifts his nose as if scenting something and darts up Neville's clothes and pulls on something before settling down to chew on his shoulder.
"Hey, where did you go?"
"He's on your shoulder, looks like he found something yummy. Did you have any charms on your clothes?"
"What!? What do you mean he's found something yummy?"
"They eat magic, I usually let him suck on my thumb when he's hungry, but he seems to like charms a lot. Nixie's like that too."
"Who's Nixie."
Harry interjects before Hermione can overshare. "We found her in Wales, and she took a shine to my Aunt, so we brought her home. Turns out she was pregnant, so we gave one to Hermione and Hagrid, and the Goblins bought the others."
"Oh, well if Hagrid has one it must be ok. My gran says he's the games keeper at Hogwarts. Still, you should warn people before you hand him over, as a lot of witches and a few wizards use cosmetic charms."
The door to the compartment opened with a bang, and Trevor tried to make a break from Harry's hands at the shock.
"Hi Neville, oh sorry!" a red headed girl started and then apologised with a squeak.
"Come in, we've still got plenty of room and it looks like you know Neville."
"Thank you, we've known Neville for what seems like forever. If we weren't around he'd be stuck in his greenhouse all the time being a wallflower."
A round of formal introductions later and Susan Bones, the redhead, and Hannah Abbot sat down in the compartment.
"You know, I don't think I've ever heard someone introduce them as being the first of their house before." Susan muses.
"Well, that's the way that the etiquette book said I was supposed to introduce myself. One mo." Hermione reached into her bag and pulled out a wizarding book on etiquette.
"Right here we are, 'Properly, witches and wizards that are new to the magical world should introduce themselves as the first of their house and take their surname as the name of their house. Failing to introduce yourself as a member of a house in a formal greeting is considered to be an insult, and should be avoided in any formal context. This rule can be relaxed in more casual environments, such as while shopping or meeting at a tea shop, but proprietary should be maintained wherever possible as politeness is the grease that keeps society moving'."
"Fascinating." Susan says with a dry voice. At that Harry nudges Hermione with an elbow.
"Ok, you've used up your book privilege for the conversation, put it away now and you're not allowed another one until we stop for a break."
Hermione pouts at him but does put the book away.
The conversation moves on from there and covers their various childhoods, expectations, why they were studying a book on etiquette in the first place. Interspersed with children looking in for Harry Potter, and then popping out before they received an answer. At which all three of the children that grew up in the magical world promise to help them practice and learn everything Harry needed to know. They're introduced to Chirpy, Harry and Hermione promise to get their guardians to buy runic versions of any charms he eats off their clothes. Finally, they move onto Meditation. Harry gently takes the book that Hermione was about to open away from them with the explanation that it's too complicated and they've been reading it for a month and still don't understand it all. He then needs to reassure the others that actually it's not that complicated to do, just some of the things that the book talks about are complicated, which leads to guiding them through the process of meditation until the sweet lady arrives.
A soft knock on the door followed by the door sliding open brings everyone out of the efforts at mediating.
"Anything from the trolly dears?"
"What would you guys recommend?" Harry says.
"The chocolate frogs are good, as are the sugar quills and cauldron cakes. The beans are an experience, so I wouldn't buy too many of those." Hannah responds.
"I like the liquorice wands." Susan says.
Harry jumps in before anyone else can "Ok, I'm paying, can we get 1 pack of Beans and 5 of everything else?"
"Certainly." The trolly lady starts handing out the sweets, and Hermione watches Chirpy jump onto one of the chocolate frogs and start nibbling on the charm.
"Can we have another 3 frogs each please, I've got this one Harry."
Harry looks surprised, but hands over his money and lets Hermione hand over hers.
Once the trolly witch moved on, Hermione hands out the chocolate frogs. "At least this way we might all get a couple before Chirpy finishes with them."
Hannah looks at Hermione curiously "How exactly are you allowed Chirpy by the way?"
"Oh, that's easy, we found a copy of the Hogwarts charter in the second-hand bookshop for 50G, I eventually persuaded Dad to buy it because we needed to know the rules for where we were going. Especially as we were learning the Etiquette anyway." She then pulled an unmarked scroll out of her bag, the seal of Hogwarts stamped on a ribbon hanging off the bottom.
"Right, here we are, 'No magical child shall be denied entry due to the nature of their bonded familiar, neither will a bonded familiar be barred from the grounds, for all know that the forceful separation of a wizard and their familiar causes great distress and can lead to the death of weaker in the bond'".
"It's weird opening a Chocolate frog and it not jumping away." Neville's irrelevant comment breaks the mood and all the children sit back laughing.
Apart from an interruption by a blond-haired boy called Malfoy who was looking for Harry and decided that Harry couldn't be harry because he looked like a muggleborn. The rest of the journey passed with jokes and laughter.