A/N: Standard disclaimer: All characters and setting belong to J.K. Rowling, except for my original characters Clara Bradley and Renee Sanderson. Nico di Angelo, Hazel Levesque, and Bianca di Angelo (mentioned) belong to Rick Riordan. I am making no profit from this story.
Nico POV
I watched the whole Draco fiasco nervously with some other Gryffindor first years. I didn't want to show emotion about the situation around other Gryffindors, but I didn't like what Professor Moody was doing to my new friend.
Natalie and Colin were talking and laughing like nothing had happened, but Hazel hung back.
"You okay?" she asked cautiously. "You were with him at Diagon Alley, weren't you?"
"He's friends with my cousins, Clara and Renee. But they're also good friends with Harry, Ron, and Hermione. It's a little confusing. They said he had a mean streak, but in the three times I'd met him I never saw it. Not until now."
Hazel studied me for a moment. "It's okay to feel that way about people, Nico. To see two sides of them."
She looked past me and waved. "Your cousins are coming over, Nico. Do you want me to leave so you can talk to them privately?"
"No, it's fine," I said. A moment later I realized I meant it. I didn't really know what "family" felt like, except for Bianca, but if Clara and Renee were "family," Hazel felt the same way as they did to me. Maybe I just wasn't used to being accepted so readily by people, but there was something about her acceptance that really did seem familial.
Hazel seemed to shimmer slightly in and out of focus as she sat down. I blinked.
Clara POV
"So how was your first day?" I asked, sliding into the seat across from Hazel.
Nico and Hazel, it turned out, were probably the first students to enjoy a History of Magic lesson in the entire timeline of the school. For Nico, I guess it made sense, with his affiliation with ghosts, but I wondered about Hazel. She seemed to shimmer, never quite staying in focus unless I was looking directly at her. Did she have something to do with ghosts too?
"The same can't be said for Potions, though," Nico said dejectedly. "He berated me specifically about names of various potions, and the Slytherins laughed and jeered when I couldn't correctly define Drought of Living Death."
A few seats away, Harry turned to us. "Couldn't help overhearing," he said, looking unsure about whether he should be talking to us. "I just wanted you to know, Snape did that to me on my first day of first year as well. It's not personal, he just hates Gryffindors. And you kind of look like how I imagine he did as a kid, you know?"
Next to him, Ron laughed, then caught my eye. "I'm sorry for laughing about Malfoy," he muttered, looking away from us and busying himself in his food.
I nodded absently. "I understand. Up until a year ago, I would have done the same," I said earnestly.
"He did help save my life, though," Ron said thoughtfully. "And yours, Renee. If he hadn't come…"
"I know," she snapped.
"Sorry," Ron muttered again.
"I just don't want to think about it," Renee said firmly
"Noted," Ron nodded.
We ate the rest of our dinner in comfortable silence. As we were getting up to go, an idea struck me. I had glanced over at the Slytherin table a few times during the meal and had noticed Renee doing the same. Draco hadn't reappeared.
"Can I come back to the Slytherin common room with you?"
Renee looked startled. "Are you sure?"
"Just for a few minutes. I want to talk to him."
"Oh, all right," Renee agreed. "Just be careful."
"I'll come too," Nico said. I glanced warily at Renee.
"Come on," Nico said. "He's my friend too."
"Nico, it's just…" Renee faltered. "Well, the Slytherin common room isn't a great place for Muggleborn first year Gryffindors."
Nico stared at us with a glare as piercing as death, and I had to remind myself who his father was.
"Fine." Renee shuddered and looked away.
Draco was sitting alone at the back of the common room, reading. He seemed to be avoiding people.
"Hey," Renee said quietly as we approached.
"What do you want?" he snapped without looking up. "Come to have a laugh at my expense too?"
I sat down next to him. "We wanted to check in on you, Draco."
He raised his head. "Oh," he said, sounding slightly warmer. "It's you."
"Have people been rude?" I asked cautiously as Renee sat down on my other side.
"You know Slytherins," Draco shot back. "And Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs, and Ravenclaws." He turned to glare at us. "Why didn't you do something?"
"What?"
"I bet you loved that, didn't you? Let's all watch Draco Malfoy bounce up and down and make a fool of himself. His father opposed the aurors, so now the auror professor gets to do whatever he wants with him."
"Draco, we didn't-"
"Oh yeah, you didn't do anything. I heard Weasley, the ungrateful git. You're ruining the best day of my life! A life he wouldn't even have, I might add, if I hadn't been there yesterday." He turned to Renee. "And you. I'd expect you'd take more pride in your house, Sanderson. But your little friend didn't even perform the countercurse until he was sure Professor McGonagall was safely there to award him house points. He didn't care."
"What, Tomasz?" Renee gasped, taken aback. "He was messing with his wand, trying to figure out the spell. You just didn't see it writhing around on the floor and being tossed in the air."
"And yet," Draco said annoyedly, "he still didn't do anything until the Transfiguration professor showed up. He was just showing off for her."
"Draco, please. Wren tried to charmspeak Moody but it didn't work!" Renee, Nico, and Draco glanced around the common room, and I realized I had raised my voice. "Sorry," I whispered hastily.
"Look," Draco muttered. "I don't know if that's true, and you'll just charmspeak me to tell me that it is. If you're serious, tell me something Potter and the Weasel and Granger don't know."
I stared at him, then glanced at Renee. I didn't need a sunbeam connection to tell now wasn't a good time to reveal our summer. Nico, however, straightened up.
"I… I can tell you who my father is."
Draco's eyes widened, and he nodded.
"Nico, are you sure-" Renee started, but Nico cut her off.
"I trust him." He turned to Draco. "My father is Hades, Lord of the Dead," he said, his voice barely a whisper. "Back at camp, I was an outcast because the other gods shun him, and so their children shunned me. And Clara and Renee said we get to keep our private lives private here, that I could be whoever I wanted. And one person I want to be is your friend, Draco. I didn't like what you said to Harry and Ron, but I also didn't like what Professor Moody did to you."
He said it in such an intense way that the hustle and bustle of the common room faded away, and he was the only thing the three of us could focus on.
Draco smiled, one of his rare real ones. "Thank you," he whispered. "I'd like to be your friend too, Nico."
I could have sworn Nico looked embarrassed, but I blinked and he was fine. He simply yawned. "It's getting late, we should head back."
Renee nodded and told Draco she'd talk to him later, then walked us to the door.
As I stepped out of the portrait hole, I turned to Nico. "So, what did you think of the Slytherin common room?"
He didn't answer, and I turned around. I didn't see him, and I figured he must be blending into the shadows. I didn't blame him. His confession was likely very emotionally draining, and I respected him for it.
Draco POV
I turned back to my book, a story of the first Giant War told from a Durmstrang student's perspective. It was significantly more interesting than the way we learned about the Giant Wars in History of Magic. Reading historical fiction was the only way I got through that class.
"Hey, Draco, I wanted to ask you-"
I dropped my book with a loud thud as Nico materialized out of a dark corner. "I thought you left with Clara."
Nico gave me a small, embarrassed smile. "Sorry."
"No, it's okay, you just startled me is all. What do you want?" I didn't mean to sound rude, but I was still getting over the shock of a first year materializing next to me. "Please, sit down."
Nico glanced around the room, noticed Renee playing Wizard's chess with Astoria, and lowered his voice.
"I'm looking for an entrance to the underworld," he whispered. "Hades's kingdom. I have unfinished… stuff from over the summer." He mumbled this last part.
"Nico, with all due respect, don't you think Clara and Renee would be better at helping you with demigod stuff?"
The younger boy shifted uncomfortably. "I don't really want them to know," he confided in a whisper.
I followed his gaze back over to Renee, checking to make sure she was still immersed in her game. "What's going on?" I whispered.
Nico opened his mouth and then closed it. "I don't know if I can tell you," he said finally. "I think Clara needs to be the one…"
"She and Renee were going to tell me at the World Cup. You were there. They said something about a He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named god or something, right?"
"A… a titan." Nico looked around, unsure. "Look, Draco, it's not my place. I don't even know the full story. All I know is that I allowed the Labyrinth to be destroyed, so I can't find an easy entrance from here to there that goes through."
I glanced around. "I'm not sure if I understood anything you just said, Nico. But I do admire you for keeping your friends' secrets. That seems like a very Slytherin quality."
I scanned the room to make sure nobody was listening, then lowered my voice to less than a whisper to match Nico's. "Meet me tomorrow at lunch break at the staircase in the next to the History of Magic classroom. I can't guarantee it will work, but there's a secret room on the seventh floor that can turn into any kind of space you want. I found it by mistake my first year, and I'm pretty sure most students don't know about it. I met Clara and Renee in there once, but I doubt they realized what the room fully does."
"So you think it could give me a… a secret passageway or something?"
I nodded. "Again, I don't know. But it's worth a shot."
I waited until Renee was safely out of the room to show Nico out, knowing he might not know the way back to the Gryffindor tower yet.
"Thanks," he whispered once we were back in the entrance hall and he assured me he knew his way from there. "There's so much I don't know. I had to figure everything out for myself after Bianca died. It's nice to have someone older to show me the ropes."
Even as I lay in bed that night, I couldn't get those words out of my head. Hadn't I been alone and angry for most of my life as well? Until Renee came along, my story matched Nico's word for word.
It was only as I was close to sleep that I realized I didn't know who Bianca was, or why she died. I filed that away in my list of questions to ask Renee and Clara when we finally got a chance to talk about this.
Renee POV
Not surprisingly, Clara and I were the only students in our Defense Against the Dark Arts class who weren't overly thrilled or excited as we made our way to Professor Moody's classroom on Thursday Morning. None of them thought that what had happened to Draco was necessarily negative, although Hermione did understand why we were upset and nervous.
Clara reached for my hand as we walked into the room. I squeezed back, hard. "It's okay," I whispered.
She nodded but didn't say anything as we filed into the last open seats, a three-seater next to Neville and across from Harry, Ron, and Hermione.
A moment later we heard Moody's distinctive clunking as he made his way into the room, looking as strange as ever.
"You can put those away," Moody growled, observing our open copies of The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self Protection.
We returned our books to our bags. Most of the class looked excited, but Clara looked around warily. I knew what she was thinking. A practical lesson on her first day of the advanced class last year had landed her unconscious in the hospital wing for the better part of a day.
Moody called roll and went over what Remus had told him about our education last year. He confirmed that we had a good deal of experience with dark creatures, but then he paused, and I could have sworn his magical eye was moving between me and Harry as he said his next words.
"But you're behind - very behind - on dealing with curses. I'm here to bring you up to scratch on what wizards can do to each other. I've got one year to teach you how to deal with Dark-"
"What, you aren't staying?" Ron blurted out.
Moody's magical eye moved toward him, and Ron looked nervous, but then Moody smiled, making his face look even more grisly and twisted than usual.
Moody identified Ron as Arthur Weasley's son and thanked his father for helping him out of a tight spot a few days ago. I assumed that was what Mr. Diggory had called about on our first day of school.
He went on to explain why he would only be staying a single year, and then got back to his point. He explained that while the Ministry only wanted to teach students countercurses, he didn't think we could be prepared without knowing about the real thing. It sounded a lot like our training from Camp Half Blood, knowing about the worst so we could do our best to fight it. Clara relaxed a bit as she seemed to realize this as well.
Moody talked a little more about curses, and then posed a question to the class. "Do any of you know which curses are most heavily punished by wizarding law?"
Several hands rose tentatively into the air, and I thought about what Kaylee's crowd had tried to do to me. I was sure that was one of them, but I didn't offer an answer.
Professor Moody called on Ron, although his magical eye was focused on Lavender Brown, who had been showing Parvati Patil her completed star chart under her desk. Apparently Moody's eye could see through solid wood.
"Er," Ron said tentatively, "my dad told me about one… it's called the Imperius Curse, or something?"
"Ah yes," said Moody appreciatively. "Yes, your dad would know about that one. Gave the Ministry a lot of trouble a few years back. Mr. Weasley, will you be kind enough to open that drawer and hand me the jar of spiders?"
Ron shuddered, and Clara stood up quickly. "I'll do it, Professor. Ron has had some bad experiences with spiders."
Ron nodded at her appreciatively as Clara walked over to the cabinet, took the jar out, and deposited it on Moody's desk.
"Thank you. Take a point for Gryffindor."
"It's Huffelpuff, actually. I'm one of the two third years in this class, I'm sure Professor Dumbledore mentioned…"
She stopped when she noticed her classmates glaring at her.
"Thank you, Miss. Bradley," Moody said evenly. "In that case, take two points for Hufflepuff, one for your help and one for your honesty. And your classmates can keep their point as well."
Clara smiled before hurrying back to her seat. Moody took out one of the spiders. "Engorgio," he muttered, and the spider swelled to three times its size. Ron let out a distinct whimper.
Moody pointed his wand at the spider. "Imperio!"
The spider swung back and forth from the desk as if on a trapeze. It stretched out its legs and did a backflip, then began to do what was unmistakably a tap dance. Most of the class was laughing, but I frowned. This curse was Charmspeak gone wrong. I felt sick and stared out the window, missing Moody's explanation of the curse. I could always copy Clara's notes later, but at that point I was contemplating my talents.
I imagined all the horrible things one could do with the Imperius Curse or Charmspeak, and all the reasons why they would do these things. History had already shown that people would do what leaders say, just look at Hitler and the Holocaust. If they had either of these tools available to them…"
Clara nudged me, and I realized Moody was moving on to the next curse. He asked if anyone knew it, and Hermione's hand shot up, but to everyone's surprise, so did Neville's.
He noticed people staring and started to lower his hand, but Clara touched his shoulder. "You've got this, Neville," she whispered.
Moody nodded encouragingly at him.
"There's one…" he said in a small voice. "The Cruciatus Curse." He looked at the ground.
Moody nodded. "Your name's Longbottom, is it?"
Neville nodded nervously, but Moody made no further comments. He enlarged the spider again, and this time Ron wasn't the only one who looked nervous. Neville was practically shaking. Clara moved her seat closer to him, alarmed.
Moody raised his wand and pointed it at the spider again. "Crucio!"
The spider began to writhe in pain, and Neville was full on shaking now. I glanced across at Harry's table, where Ron had moved his chair so far back he was practically in Seamus's arms behind him.
Moody did not remove his wand; on the contrary, the spider started to shake more violently. Clara stood up.
"Stop it!" she screamed. "Can't you see it's bothering him?"
Moody nodded, and with a quick twitch of his wand, he made the spider stop twitching.
"Pain," said Moody softly. "You don't need thumbscrews or knives to torture someone if you can perform the Cruciatius Curse… that one was popular once too."
Neville shuddered again, and Clara moved closer to him. His bravery inspired me to speak up, and when Moody asked for the final curse, I beat Hermione to the punch. Both of our hands shook as they went into the air, I noticed.
Moody nodded at me.
"I'm not sure of the exact curse," I said in a small voice. "It starts with Avada, and it's… it's the killing curse."
Several people looked around uneasily, and I shrunk back into my seat. Beside me, Clara looked uncomfortable, and she squeezed my hand under the desk.
"Ah," Moody said, another slight smile twisting his lopsided mouth. "Yes, the last and worst. Avada Kedavra. The Killing Curse."
There was a collective shudder as Moody said those words so ominously. I was also wondering why he had smiled slightly. Hadn't Tomasz said that in his career as an auror, Moody never killed if he could help it?
Moody raised his wand to the spider, and I shot up as if I had just been shocked by Zeus's worst lightning bolt. Before I could comprehend what I was doing, I had one foot out the door. It didn't matter, though. I wondered if students in the transfiguration classes down the hall heard him, because he said it with so much force that it could have even been heard from the Greenhouses.
"Avada Kedavra!"
Clara POV
Renee came back into the classroom only reluctantly. Moody tried to send Lavender Brown to the door to fetch her, but Renee had screamed at her. I knew she and Lavender had some unresolved issues, and so I excused myself as Lavender walked back into the classroom, close to tears.
"Wren," I said. "I promise you can vent later. But if McGonagall hears about this, she might decide you can't handle the class a year ahead of yours, and place you back with the third year Slytherins."
We both knew it wasn't true; McGonagall knew what happened on the train, and Sprout would vouch for her is anything like that were to happen. However, it seemed to do the trick, and Renee hesitantly took my hand and pulled herself up.
We spent the rest of the class taking notes, and I was acutely aware of Renee on my right and Neville on my left. If I hadn't seen enough of Moody's darker side when he turned Draco into a ferret, I was definitely seeing enough now.
It was a relief when the class was over. Many of the other Gryffindors were chatting excitedly as they made their way toward dinner, but Harry and Hermione were not among the jubilant either.
We were walking directly behind the trio, and Ron was chattering away excitedly to an unamused Harry and Hermione.
Hermione cut him off. "Hurry up," she said sternly.
"Not the bloody library again!" Ron protested.
"No," Hermione said curtly, pointing up a side passage. "Look. Neville."
I followed her gaze. I had been watching Neville closely in class, since I was sitting right next to him, but now he looked even worse. Renee was muttering under her breath, and Harry looked a little green as well as we turned toward Neville.
"Neville?" I said gently.
Neville looked around. "Oh, hello," he said, his voice much higher than usual. "Interesting lesson, wasn't it? I wonder what's for dinner. I'm… I'm starving, aren't you?"
Renee, Harry, and Ron exchanged a glance.
"Neville, are you all right?" Hermione asked.
"Oh yes, I'm fine," Neville gabbled in the same unnaturally high voice. "Very interesting dinner - I mean lesson - what's for eating."
"Neville," I said in a soft voice, "you can talk to us."
Neville opened his mouth, but then Moody came clunking down the hall. We fell silent, apprehensive, as he approached, but when he spoke it was in a much lower and gentler growl than we had previously heard from him.
"It's all right, sonny," he said to Neville. "Why don't you come up to my office… come on, we can have a cup of tea…"
Neville looked around at us, signaling that a cup of tea with Moody was the last thing he wanted to do right now. I glanced around at my friends. Renee was slowly shaking her head, but none of the others seemed to know how to react to Neville being like this.
"Go on," I encouraged him. "We'll save you a seat at dinner."
Neville looked at the ground, but reluctantly allowed himself to be led away by Moody.
Most people were still gossipping about the lesson at dinner, where we once again sat at the Gryffindor table, but Hermione wolfed down her food and hurried away to the library.
I looked around at the people who seemed to think Moody had put on a spectacular show. "He had no right to teach us that on the first day!" I hissed so only my friends would hear me. "It's good and well that he needed to teach us the curses this year, but couldn't it have waited a week or two?"
Ron shrugged, but Harry and Renee nodded vehemently.
Five minutes later, Hermione's vacant seat was taken by Neville.
"What did Moody want?" I asked kindly. Neville looked in slightly better spirits.
"Well, he gave me these books," Neville said slowly. "Apparently, Professor Sprout told him I'm very good at Herbology, and he thought I'd like these."
I smiled. That sounded just like something Professor Sprout would do, knowing that it would cheer him up when he needed it. But something was off about the way Neville was looking at the books.
"Is there a problem about the book?" I asked.
"Well, I know it's about aquatic plants, but the letters keep swimming off the page and rearranging themselves. See, look."
Ron took the book from him and stared at it for a second. "Looks fine to me."
I stared at the book as well. "Hey, Neville, I'm sorry if this is a kind of personal question, but -"
Neville flinched, startling me somewhat.
"Sorry," I said quickly, guessing he thought I was going to ask him about his reaction class. "I was just wondering if this happens with a lot of text, Neville."
Renee's eyes went wide as she realized what I was implying.
"I mean, yeah, sometimes, I guess," Neville mumbled. "But-"
"Neville, listen closely," Renee said, leaning in across the table to talk to him. "There's a condition called dyslexia, okay. It's a learning disability that twists written words in your brain. And a lot of, well, people like Clara and I have it, but it isn't just us. It makes the lines and letters look funky. Clara and I both have it because of you-know-what; it helps us read Ancient Greek. Nico has it one of the worst cases I've ever seen."
"Does…" He looked around, making sure nobody but us could hear him. "Does Professor Sprout have it? I've noticed when doing extra tasks in the Greenhouses that she sometimes has trouble reading labels on plants, and sometimes she stumbles over words."
"When are you doing extra work in the Greenhouses?" I asked without thinking.
"On the weekends, usually. I started doing it when I was banned from Hogsmeade visits last year. It relaxes me in there, and Sprout welcomes the help. She has her seeds filed alphabetically, and sometimes she'll mix up bitterroot and berryroot, or things like that."
"She might," Renee said, glancing at me. "You'd have to ask her."
Neville looked up at the Staff table, where Sprout seemed to be smiling about something Flitwick had just said.
"You know," I said thoughtfully, "maybe we could help you out with your dyslexia, Neville. At our summer camp back in New York, we get a lot of techniques for working past our limitations. We can get together to read, talk, and work on strategies once every couple of weeks, if you want. It can be like some sort of dyslexia book club."
"Don't let Hermione hear you saying those words," Ron warned. "She'd adopt it as her new pet project. Although maybe it's better than her new fixation with House Elves."
"I'd like that," Neville said, ignoring Ron. "Do you guys want to start next week?"
"Sure. We can meet in the Hufflepuff hidden room. I'll see if Nico wants to work on it as well."
Renee and Neville agreed it was a great idea. Seeing Neville's renewed enthusiasm, I felt my cheeks getting the tiniest bit hot. The Gryffindor was kind of cute.
A/N: So I've been procrastinating this author note for a really long time and I honestly have no idea why. I'm not sure why I included all of the mains' POVs in this chapter but it seemed like it fit.
I'd love to know what you thought, especially about Nico and Draco, as I'm just working them into the story.
Next chapter will probably be Durmstrang and Beauxbatons, although I might end up including the Goblet of Fire scene as well.
Thank you to Ana (emeryses on ffn) for being the one I can vent to about my frustrations with this story and everything going on in the world.
I hope you all are safe and healthy.
~Celia
