Fyi I accidentally messed up the timeline and made Charlie a year younger
Susan Bones was downright giddy. She was going to Hogwarts today. It was the first day of the rest of her life!
She barely took a bite between breathes as she rambled on about Hogwarts to Harry. He'd spent the night since Lord Sirius had to go to Hogwarts early to start his new position as Professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts. Susan was glad she'd have a professor she could go to to ask questions without being nervous.
"Everyone in my family goes to Hufflepuff. I probs will too. Or maybe Gryffindor. Just as long as I don't get sorted into Slytherin. Your mom and dad were—" Susan cut herself off. "Lord Sirius was in Gryffindor so you'll probs be sorted there. Though I guess you did spend most of your life without him. Did you go to school before? Were there different houses there?"
"Susan, breathe." Aunt Amelia nudged her under the table.
Susan took in a big gulp of air, not having realized she was getting light headed.
Harry was staring at her with big, weird eyes. He wasn't looking down at his plate as he cut up sausage. "We didn't have a school. But we were tutored together outside. We were all different ages. There wasn't any houses."
"Aren't you excited?" she asked, trying not to vibrate in her seat.
"I don't know."
Susan's nose scrunched up. "How do you not know if you're excited?"
Harry moved the eggs on his plate around with his fork. "Sirius said that a lot of the professors aren't going to be happy with me not having a wand."
"But you're the Boy-Who-Lived. They're not going to kick you out or something."
"Yeah, but they might take house points from me and make my housemates mad at me."
Susan bit her lips. She hadn't thought of that. "Why don't you just get a wand then?" It was the obvious solution.
"In Ant Hill we're taught how to do magic without wands. Wands are just a crutch."
"Don't go around saying that, Harry," Aunt Amelia spoke up. "That goes against much of the Ministry Doctrine. You'll be learning about the goblin wars this year and how hard they fought for the right to wield a wand. You're disparaging a whole race when you say their beliefs are wrong." Susan didn't know what the word disparaging meant, but Harry nodded so he must have. She'd look it up later—if she remembered to.
Glenn pitter-pattered into the room. Susan cooed at her new cat. It was ¼ kneazle and was a gift from Ms. Figgs. She'd offered one to each of them when they were done shopping. Harry and Neville turned her down, but Susan and Ann didn't.
After parting ways with the Blacks and Longbottoms they floo-ed to Ms. Figgs' house. Amelia had marveled at all the muggle things, but her attention had been quickly pulled away by adorable kittens. She and Ann chose from the same litter.
Glenn hopped into her lap and began purring. Susan tried to secret him a piece of sausage, but Aunt Amelia gave her a warning look.
Susan pretended not to understand.
Later on, after checking then double checking her things they were floo-ing to the train. She gave her aunt a kiss and a hasty goodbye before tugging at Harry's sleeve to hurry up so that they could get on the train. He good-naturedly didn't resist.
By rare luck, the first compartment they opened had Neville in it.
Neville had his toad, Trevor, in his hand. He gave them a wide smile. "It's good to see you guys." Susan could see past his smile though. He was nervous.
Susan plopped down beside him. "Hogwarts is going to be great. We're going to make a ton of friends." She patted him on the shoulder. Harry sat across from them, looking out the window. He perked up. Susan barely noticed it. He stood and opened the window. "Ann, we're in compartment seven," he called out.
Susan heard Ann say something, but from her position and the din of other people she couldn't really make it out.
Before she could ask, the compartment door opened. "There you are, Harry," a blond boy said, stepping into the compartment. He glanced around and sneered before smoothing his face out.
"Draco." Harry nodded at him, neither pleasantly or with malice. Just simply polite. Susan thought it made him look a great deal older.
"Father tells me that we are to be friends."
Susan was pretty sure that's not how you make friends, but Harry gestured for Draco to sit next to him, so maybe she was wrong.
"This is Susan Bones and Neville Longbottom, heir presumptive of House Longbottom."
Draco ignored her in favor of Neville. "Heir Longbottom." He bowed in his seat. "I'm Draco Malfoy, heir presumptive of House Malfoy."
"Err, well met, Heir Malfoy." Neville's face became blotchy with blush as he bowed. Malfoy didn't even give her a glance.
Susan didn't get all this title nonsense. She knew her aunt was proud of her title as head of the DMLE, but she'd earned that. Neville and Draco had been born with those titles and Harry got his through adoption. Susan would rather earn a title herself than just being given one.
Draco was showing off his wand to Harry, going on about its properties. All Susan could hear was a lot of bragging for another thing that had been given to him, rather than earned. Not that Susan had done anything to earn hers either, but she was going to do great things.
The compartment door opened once again. It was Ann. There was another girl following her spouting off facts to the point that Ann looked overwhelmed.
"Ann!" Susan said loudly while getting up to give her a hug. The other girl gave pause.
Ann whispered thank you to Susan in her French accent that Susan loved.
"Hi," the bushy haired girl said, suddenly looking shy. "I'm Hermione Granger." She shifted on her feet. "I'm sorry, I never got your name."
"Ann Figgs."
"I've never heard of noble families with the last name Figgs or Granger," Malfoy announced, putting a sour taste in everyone's mouth.
"Considering you haven't given your name, you shouldn't talk," Hermione looked him up and down and didn't seem satisfied with what she saw.
Malfoy began to bluster indignantly, but Harry was quick to step in. "I know Ann from Diagon Alley, we all went shopping together. I trust her judge of character." That shut up Malfoy. Children jostled through the small hallway, many pausing to look at Harry. "You two might as well come in."
Ann sat next to Malfoy (sacrificing herself), while Hermione closed the compartment door and sat by Susan.
"I'm Susan Bones," she introduced herself, taking charge. "This is Neville Longbottom and Harry Black." She contemplated not introducing Malfoy since he was being a prat, but she'd feel bad if she excluded him. "And this is Draco Malfoy. We're all first years."
"Wonderful! I'm looking forward to Potions class. It's too bad Professor Slughorn retired. I heard—" Hermione was off, boggling Susan's mind.
"Say, Harry," Malfoy interrupted. Hermione went on, focused on Ann while glancing at Susan every few seconds. Susan tried listening to her, but Malfoy was more interesting. "Do you think Uncle Sirius will give us extra house points?"
"He wouldn't," Susan said. "My Aunt Amelia wouldn't date someone who wasn't fair."
"Uncle Sirius—Professor Black," Neville corrected himself, "will be great. He's been teaching me since I was a sprog."
"You all seem to know each other," Hermione said, her eyes flicking around.
"Harry's blood mother is also a professor, though of a dubious new course." The look on Malfoy's face made it clear what he thought of that.
Hermione didn't pick up on his tone. "What new course? Is it open to first years?"
Malfoy went to say something, but Harry cut him off, "Leave it, Draco."
Malfoy puffed up. "Will you enjoy seeing the woman who abandoned you everyday?" His words were cutting.
Susan held her breath.
Harry didn't even flinch. "She's a stranger to me."
Susan was starting to feel very uncomfortable and she wasn't the only one. Ann was staring down at her lap and Hermione had fallen silent.
"I want to get into Gryffindor," Neville said, thankfully kicking off a new conversation. Susan let out a breath of relief. Hermione started listing of the founders of Hogwarts and factoids about them.
HP
Ron was agitated. His mum and da had kept him on the platform too long. They'd insisted on embarrassing him with kisses and tear filled hugs, as if they were never going to see him again. By the time they were done nearly all the compartments were full. He ended up sitting by his older brothers, Percy and Charlie.
He felt like a loser as Charlie talked to his friends and Percy lectured him about the rules. He was also nervous about wrestling the troll to see which house he'd get into. The Weasleys were always Gryffindors, but he'd never hear the end of it from Fred and George if he ended up somewhere else. He shuddered. They would be merciless if he ended up in Slytherin.
Percy broke off his tangent, catching Ron's attention. "It shows a disregard for family values. The Potters may have messed up, but The-Boy-Who-Lived is still their son."
"You're only saying that because you haven't met Harry. He's the weirdest eleven-year-old I ever met," Charlie said. "He talks like a grown up and isn't awkward—"
"Unlike our ickle Ron." Ron hadn't noticed the terrible twosome come into the compartment.
"Go away you two," Tonks, Charlie's friend said. She was frowning, but her eyes were fierce. "Or I'll hang you out of the train by your ears."
The pair skittered away with guaffs and smiles.
Penny, Charlie's other friend, tittered.
"We talked about dragons for an hour. He really knows his stuff."
Ron saw Percy nearly roll his eyes. He wished he had, then he wouldn't look like such a prat.
"It always comes back to dragons with you," Penny teased him.
"Mother and father did the right thing by voting to keep Harry Potter with his real parents. Think about the repercussions and precedence of the ruling. It's only one step away from muggle-borns being taken away from their parents and given to a wizarding family."
"Oh shove off, Perce. That will never happen."
"Not with the moderates in control, but they won't always be." Percy let out a huff.
"You always see the worst in every situation." Penny shifted in her seat to get a better view of Percy. She waggled her finger at him. "The Wizengmont ruled that parents who abandoned their child had no right to them. That's a positive step towards getting children out of situations where their parents might be hurting them."
Ron was seriously getting sick of all their politics talks. He was with his parents on this. The Potters had made a mistake. They'd lost their son, but got a second chance only for some dark wizard to take him.
The whole situation also made Ron uncomfortable. His family was dangerously close to being dirt poor. His da had a well paying job, but there was seven kids to feed and kit. If they got too poor would someone try to take them away, split them up?
His family was all he had, and he was already off to a poor start here. He'd been hoping to at least make one friend on the ride to Hogwarts.
Ron tried not to let his worries show. It was easy since the older kids were ignoring him.
He felt downtrodden as the train came to a stop. Charlie gave him a pat on the back and told him everything would be alright before they parted ways.
Half the crowd of first years were nervous, making Ron feel a bit better about how he was feeling. The other half was excited, whispering to friends they'd already made.
They moved to the docks. He bit his lip as boats were filled by small groups of friends. He shuffled towards an empty boat and was joined a minute later by a chubby kid, a blond, and a lump of a boy.
"Hand me down clothes and red hair, must be a Weasley," the blond said. Ron's face grew hot with blush. "And another wizard with tattered clothes." He sneered in disgust and stood. "Come on, Crabbe. There has to be better company than this."
As the blond went to leave Ron rocked the boat, nearly causing the blond to fall out. The lump, Crabbe, grabbed Ron by the collar of his shirt.
"None 'er that, boys," Hagrid, their guide, called out.
"Really, Malfoy?" a girl said while passing him. If he responded, Ron didn't hear it. She got in Ron's boat along with a bushy haired girl who wouldn't. shut. up. He didn't give a lick about the height of the Astronomy Tower.
Ron seemed to have the worst luck. The girls ignored him and the pudgy boy had a sour look on his face. Ron didn't know what to do in this situation. He'd grown up in the Burrow where everyone already knew him. He'd only had two real neighbors. Cedric Diggory pretty much ignored him in favor of playing Quidditch with Ron's older brothers. There was also Luna Lovegrove, but she was weird and the few times they spoke Ron had gotten lost in the first few minutes.
In an unhappy haze the boats landed and he followed a severe looking witch. He hoped he didn't have any classes with her this year. He was relived when he found out he didn't actually have to wrestle a troll. He should have known the twins were messing with him. His mind got stuck in a loop worrying about getting into Gryffindor as other students were sorted.
"Harry Potter," Professor McGonagall called out pulling Ron out of his thoughts. The boy looked—before Ron could finish that thought there was a squealing noise and the chubby boy from earlier tackled Harry.
Sorry for the slow update! I'm totally obsessed with writing my Soul Stone!Tony Stark fic.