"Why not apparate directly beside the train?" I asked. "Why risk being seen in muggle London?"

"It is risky to have multiple wizards trying to apparate to the same place at the same time," Snape said. "Given that the platform itself is of limited size, the choice was either to create hundreds of portkeys keyed to different times, which was deemed overly complicated and expensive, or to simply have everyone show up in muggle London."

That actually made sense.

What didn't make sense to me was requiring all wizards to show up in muggle London at all. Why not have Wizarding families teleport directly to the town near Hogwarts and just leave muggleborns on the train?

We were walking into King's Cross station. It was incredibly crowded, and very large.

I didn't see any Platform Nine and three quarters, but Snape had already told me the trick that was involved. I was unsure whether he was toying with me; forcing me to run into a wall at full speed seemed like a cruel joke, but if it was I'd find a way to make him pay.

In any event, I saw enough children dressed inappropriately carrying large trunks that I had to wonder how the normal population didn't notice anything year after year. Even if it only happened twice a year, that would be enough for conspiracy theories to arise.

How the Wizards were going to deal with secrecy once cell phones were invented I had no idea. Memory charms (and wasn't that a terrifying idea) weren't going to be enough once pictures were uploaded to the web.

Snape stayed with me as I grimaced and shoved my cart with the trunk on it through the wall. He stayed behind, because if he'd gone first that would have left me alone in muggle London, and would have been a good opportunity for me to be snatched.

Strangely enough, I would be safer alone on the other side of the tracks. Wizards wouldn't ignore magic the way that muggles did, and with so many parents around watching their children, attackers were unlikely to be able to get away with anything.

That was the explanation Snape had given me, and it seemed sound enough.

He didn't follow me; presumably he didn't want to highlight the fact that I was special to any of the Death Eaters on the other side.

I kept my hood up, and I stared at the steam engine on the other side. If I'd thought that people were dressed outlandishly on the muggle side, this side was even worse. The steam engine looked like something from the old west, and it was painted red.

There were cats and owls everywhere, the cats moving around the hundreds of feet. I was suddenly glad I hadn't got one; it would have been easy to lose in a crowd this size, and Snape would have accused me of deliberately killing it.

I managed to slip through the crowd and get my school trunk loaded onto the train. It helped that I actually didn't have anything in it; everything important was in my fanny pack. That way it would be easier to maneuver around, and once I got to school I could pull the extraneous things out like clothes and school books; things that people were unlikely to bother with destroying and that would make more space for whatever else I might want to stuff in there.

Even so, it was a struggle to get the trunk on board given my body's weakness, and no one seemed interested in helping me, including most of the adults. It didn't help that I didn't see many muggle parents on this side; apparently most of them stayed on the other side.

Snape had insisted that we arrive an hour early, but even so the first few compartments were already full by the time I'd managed to get my trunk on board. I found an empty compartment in the middle of the train, and I took it. Somehow I doubted that it was going to remain empty.

The door to my compartment slammed open as I was struggling to get my empty box up. I dropped it and turned to see a miniature version of Malfoy flanked by two other students.

He looked at me and then sniffed as though he smelled something bad. He started to turn away.

"Malfoy, I presume," I said.

He stopped, and then turned back. "You've heard of me?"

"I've heard of your father," I said.

"I wouldn't have expected a... one of you to know about my father."

"Taylor Hebert," I said. "Mudblood."

He froze and stared at me.

"What?"

"I'm a mudblood. Have you ever met one before?"

He hadn't; I could tell from the expression on his face. It didn't bode well for the intelligence of his underlings that they seemed confused about the whole exchange.

"I'm not sure..."

"Oh, I know what it means," I said. "And if anyone else calls me that, they'll likely regret it. But it doesn't bother me all that much. I know what I am, and I'm comfortable with it."

He stared at me.

"It's never a good idea to judge people before you meet them," I said. "A mudblood can kill you just as easily as a pureblood, and maybe even easier, because they'd think of things that no pureblood ever would."

"Are you threatening me?" he asked incredulously?

I shook my head. "Absolutely not. If I was threatening you, I'd pull out my wand like this, and I'd mention that I knew the cutting charm."

Casting the spell, I used it to slice the ropes holding my trunk together.

"It's not recommended to use the cutting charm on human flesh, but it works just fine," I said, looking up at him.

His face drained of color.

Even his subordinates seemed to pick up what was happening, although he fat one still looked a little confused.

"You know what the smartest thing to do with dangerous people?" I asked.

"What's that?' he asked faintly.

"Make friends with them," I said. "That way you don't wake up one night with them standing over your bed ready to do terrible things to you."

"I'll keep that in mind," he said carefully. He was backing out of the compartment.

"It was nice meeting you," I said. I smiled but it didn't reach my eyes.

He was gone rather quickly, and apparently word spread, because it was a long while before anyone else slipped into my carriage. I'd resorted to using my trunk as a footstool since I couldn't get it into its space above me.

I closed my eyes and reached out to the insects around me. I always kept a few on my person that I kept on at all times, but I shifted the bugs around me otherwise on a rotating basis. It was easier than actually moving the bugs, since there were always bugs everywhere, and even controlling a hundred my abilities weren't as strong as I would have wished.

My wand was on my lap, and I kept a few bugs in my compartment alert, just in case someone should try something. I then began to listen in on conversations in the other cars.

Most of it was the usual inanities; people trying to catch up, people introducing themselves. I checked compartment after compartment and I didn't hear anyone plotting to murder their classmates. I wasn't sure whether I was pleased or disappointed. If I'd heard them plotting it would have made things easier, but maybe noone was actually plotting anything evil.

I could hear Malfoy warning people about the crazy mudblood in the fifth car. I could also hear a rather annoying girl asking people if she knew the location of her friend's toad.

The door to my compartment opened.

"The toad is in the boy's bathroom in the third car," I said without opening my eyes.

I could see her gaping at me, and a moment later the compartment door slammed closed.

Five minutes later the door opened again, and the girl stepped into the compartment, followed by a rather portly boy. He was one of the few overweight Wizarding children I'd seen, other than Malfoy, and I wondered whether it was because Wizarding culture didn't include visits to Wizard McDonalds, or whether it was simply because I was an American, and from twenty years in the future when everyone was fatter.

"How did you know?" the girl asked. "I know you haven't been out of your compartment in the past twenty minutes, but the toad was exactly where you said it would be."

"Magic?" I said.

Technically, it was even true. I was able to see better with insect sight than I'd ever been able to with my old powers, when I'd mostly had to make do with hearing and touch. Insects have crap for sight.

She stepped into the room. "My name is Hermione Granger. This is Neville Longbottom."

"Thank you miss," Neville said.

I'd heard her annoying people up and down the train, and for a moment I considered dismissing her. However, I was going to have to spend possibly the next seven years with her, and alienating her wouldn't get me any closer to my goals.

Considering that she seemed to be socially maladjusted, it probably wouldn't get me much closer to my goals either, but even having another set of eyes might be useful.

"Taylor Hebert."

"Are you an American? I thought only British children went to Hogwarts... it says so In Hogwarts a History."

"You can't always believe what you read," I said. I opened my eyes and looked at her.

The girl had a rather unfortunate set of front teeth, and a large mane of frizzy hair. I suspected she might grow up to be good looking in a few years, with the help of an orthodontist, but I'd been wrong about things like that before.

Getting through the next few years was going to be a challenge if she kept acting the way she was. I'd had enough experience in pushing people away to know that she was likely to find the next few years to be rather stressful.

"I've never met an American before. Did your parents come here for work?"

That wasn't the kind of question I wanted to answer. If I told bits and pieces to enough people, it was possible that someone might collect them all together and work out that I wasn't who I was claiming to be.

"You're a muggleborn, aren't you?" I said.

"How could you tell?" she asked. "I'm so excited about magic. I've read all the books, and I've tried some of the spells at home."

It suddenly struck me. I'd been struggling with my trunk, and I hadn't had to.

I grimaced, pulled my feet off the trunk, and then pointed my wand at it.

"Wingardium Leviosa," I said.

The trunk obediently rose into the air, and I slid it into the overhead bin. I was going to have to be careful about being so focused on doing things the mundane way, or through my bugs that I forgot that I had other resources at my disposal.

Hermione was staring at me, and I shrugged. "I forgot that I could do that."

"Are you a second year then?" she asked. "You look like you're our age."

"No, this is going to be my first year at magic school," I said. "The same as for both of you."

"Then how did you already learn... that, and make it look so easy?" she asked. There was a hint of jealousy in her voice. Apparently she'd thought that was going to be the smartest girl in her class and discovering that she wasn't was going to be a huge letdown for her.

It was never a good idea to base your self esteem around a single thing; when that thing was knocked down, it was hard to get back up.

"Practice," I said.

Although I had no way of knowing whether this girl was going to be a talented witch or not, I had an eighteen year old mind, which had to be some sort of an advantage. It wasn't fair, but fortunately playing fair was never something I had bothered with.

When you only have insects against people like Alexandria and Hookwolf the only way to survive was to cheat.

"We aren't supposed to be learning that for a little while," Hermione said.

"It'll be one of the first spells they teach us, I think," I said. "At least that's what I gathered from what I've read."

"There's nothing about it in the books they assigned,' she said.

"You have to learn to read between the lines," I said. "And know how teachers generally do things. They tend to start with the easiest subjects first, and then move on to the harder ones. Wingardium is one of the easier spells, so..."

"You made it look so easy," she said. "And a whole trunk too."

I didn't mention that the trunk was empty. Looking impressive was a lot easier if you didn't reveal all of your secrets.

"Are you a pureblood?" I asked the boy behind her.

The Longbottom boy was dressed in the slightly strange, off putting way I was coming to associate with the purebloods. I'd read about halfbloods, but I suspected that they found it easier to blend in with both sides.

The purebloods made a point to not blend in.

The boy nodded, but he kept his eyes down. Was he trying to avoid my reading his mind? To my great relief, what I'd read about legilemency seemed to indicate that it was a relatively rare skill. It was probably practiced more by the purebloods, though. I'd have to watch for any tells from body language.

"You're a muggleborn, aren't you?" Hermione interrupted.

The jacket and hoodie pretty much gave it away, so I couldn't give her a lot of credit for observational skills, but she seemed to be bright enough. She might even be useful, so I decided to be civil.

I nodded.

Both of them sat down, and I fought not to groan out loud. I'd hoped to be able to spend the rest of the train ride spying on the other children. Children were stupid, and if there was a plot, it was likely that at least some of them would be blabbing about it somewhere along the ride.

I knew children were stupid, because I'd once been one. I'd trusted Emma, and that had been the biggest mistake of my life. I'd made worse mistakes, but all of my other bad decisions came from that one.

Without Emma, I never would have been shoved in a locker. I wouldn't have had the worst day of my life, gained powers, and become a super villain.

I also wouldn't have become a super hero and saved all the Earths that ever were, but she had no way of knowing that when she betrayed me.

"Do you think people don't like us?" Hermione asked, lowering her voice.

"You?" I asked.

"No," she said, flushing. "Muggleborns."

I frowned, considering how much to tell her. Finally I decided that I couldn't leave her in the dark; people were trying to kill muggleborns, and letting her go in ignorant was as good as putting a knife to her throat.

"Some parts of the Wizarding world are prejudiced against muggleborns," I said. "Mostly purebloods. There are factions who think that muggleborns don't deserve to learn magic at all."

"What?"

"There is also a faction of wizard terrorists who have been targeting muggleborns and their families," I said. "There have been four families killed already."

The color drained from Hermione's face. "My parents..."

"I don't think they're in a lot of danger," I said. "The terrorists were targeting muggleborns. As long as you are at Hogwarts, they are most likely safe."

I had no way of knowing that, of course, but that was my suspicion. These people couldn't go after every mundane person in the country, and killing a muggleborn's family while they were at school would only ensure that they were better guarded next time.

If I were trying to kill the muggleborns off, I'd simply follow them home from Winter break, since they all ended up back in King's cross station. I might even introduce myself to some of the obvious parents waiting for their children to come back.

Once I had their names, it would be easy to use an owl to find out where they lived.

It would be relatively easy to slaughter many of the muggleborn families before Wizard law enforcement ever got wind of it. The impression I got of Wizard law enforcement was that it was a lot like the law back in Brockton Bay.

People in the rich areas got quick responses to police calls. People in poor areas... not so much.

"If you are worried about it you can send them an owl when you get to school," I said. I closed my eyes again. Maybe Hermione would get the message and would give me a little time to spy.

"How do you know all of this?" she asked.

"I listen," I said. "Talking is great, but you learn a lot more by being quiet and paying attention to the people around you."

Hermione was silent for a moment.

"Which house do you think you are going to be in?" she asked. "I'm thinking about Gryffindor, because that's the house that Dumbledore was in, and he's the most powerful wizard of the age."

I barely kept myself from grimacing. She hadn't gotten the hint. I had a feeling that it was going to be a long several hours.