Insomnia is seriously the work of the devil, or a devil, or several devils working together. Ugh, whatever, story time!
So here's more of Dany mulling over her past and burning through Diagon Alley since I really have no desire to explore it. Hermione's introduction was kind of rushed but it really isn't getting to know her, but rather to nip the whole 'Boy-Who-Lived' thing from her thought processes at the beginning. Dancia want's Hermione to think of Harry as just a regular kid from the get go, so that's what she did.
Not a super long chapter but I'm also exhausted so meh, I'm gonna try and get some sleep, please enjoy!
When she really broke it down Dancia's upcoming trip to Diagon Alley meant next to nothing to her, and really who could blame the twice born witch? Technically speaking it was her eighth trip for school supplies and not counting her memories of Draco she had been there dozens of times alongside a disguised Harry and their families.
So in turn what to many would amount to a life changing event barely registered to the young heiress as being little more than an afternoons jaunt. The only major differences from the norm was her asking Dobby to spy on the Grangers to make sure they were going to the Magical District that weekend, something Dany would admit was kind of creepy yet necessary, along with having Nymphadora escorting them on her own.
Oddly enough none of the adults in her life actually held any particular significance to the trip other than it being their children's first chance to gain a matched wand. Draco's Harry had actually been a bit surprised to find out that most families didn't really make all that much of a fuss about the first trip at all. The Weasleys simply treated it as an important event because they were dead broke and going out to spend a large sum of money at once was something of noted significance.
Not being facetious, when you had no money the yearly trip to buy school supplies must have seemed like a big deal, yet for Dancia Malfoy, it was a Tuesday, and a boring one at that.
She tried not to wince at how pretentious that thought sounded, she succeeded for the most part but as always Harry noticed her discomfort.
"Dany is everything ok?" Sighing she turned to her best friend and took in his appearance; unlike last life he had actually managed to somewhat harness his metamorphmagus ability before his twenty's, completely thanks to his close relationship with Dora.
He would never under any circumstances have his sister's level of control or flexibility but he was still able to change his hair length and color along with his eyes. Add a bit of muggle makeup for his scar and viola, you had a sandy blonde blue eyed young child before you.
That little change alone was going to make their Hogwarts years interesting, especially when combined with Dora's coaching him in the realm of sowing chaos for personal amusement, his father's invisibility cloak, and the Marauder's Map. The perfect recipe for insanity and-
"Dany?"
Shit, right.
"Sorry Harry I'm ok shall we get going?"
Harry grinned at her while taking her hand in his, he glanced at the parasol resting over her opposite shoulder a moment before shrugging lightly, he knew not to ask questions when it came to that and the fan.
"Gotta wait on sis, apparently she wanted to dress all official like for this trip since she's going to be Head Girl and all."
"Didn't she call the position 'Alpha Hall Monitor?' Why does she even care that much?"
"Because," a voice began behind them causing both children to turn and take in their older cousin's visage in slight surprise, "I fully intend on becoming an auror. I am the only Hufflepuff who made it into Snape's NEWT class, and I need to prove that I earned my position in the ministry through my own abilities rather than the fact that I am aunt Amy and Uncle Sirius's favorite niece."
Dancia snorted at that, "What about me?"
Dora, previously looking stately and stuck up glanced at her little cousin a moment before grinning, her hair lengthened to fall down her back and turned snow white while her eyebrows danced up and down.
"Anything you can do I can do better little cousin."
Harry rolled his eyes and made for the fireplace, "Can we just get this over with already? You can have your weird girl moment after we get home and I get Neville over here to play Nintendo."
"Right-o grasshopper, we're going to the Leaky so lets get this done and over with," and moments later the trio flooed to Diagon Alley.
Dancia hadn't been surprised at all with their day upon arrival, no one recognizing Harry and everyone being far too nervous to approach Dora or herself they easily made their way to the bank without interference. After entering the building Dora was escorted down to the carts by a pair of goblins while Dancia and Harry waited, ten very boring minutes later she was back and they began shopping in earnest.
Their robes, trunks, and potion supplies were bought without fuss and sent home easily enough via the Dobby express, their wands though were...weird.
Harry still got Riddle's sibling wand, which was just, ugh, no, but it didn't actually react all that well to him. It was just the least worse of the lot, something told Dany she was going to have to drag him off to France to have a proper one made during the holidays and thus made a mental note of that.
Her wand though...
Staring at the length of sakura blossom engraved wood in her hands Dancia Alya Malfoy couldn't help grinning and blushing slightly as phoenix song filled the room.
"Ah, one of my grandfather's masterpieces, cherry wood, eleven and half inches, supple with quite a bit of give along with a phoenix feather core. Both were acquired by him during a trip to Japan in his youth, a very unique wand that will only respond to those that have a reverence for elegance, and an intimate understanding of how to wield power."
Ollivander stared at her a few moments before smiling slightly, "I'm expecting great things from you, young Miss Malfoy."
Dancia didn't really know what to say to that, considering everything about this interaction, from the actual wand to the conversation, hadn't happened to Draco. So she just simply nodded and paid for the wand leaving it at that.
Thoughts for another day and all that.
Approaching the bookstore Dancia grit her teeth and prepared for the worst, because she knew exactly what she was walking into and was dreading it with all her being.
"Oh mummy look at this! A history of magic! Do you think it means world wide magic or just the isles?"
God. Damn. It.
Ok it needed to be said, Draco in the end respected the hell out of Hermione Granger-Weasley, especially after she got the divorce and moved in with Harry and Ginny. That aside, the unyielding woman she grew into was nothing like the little girl she started out as, and unfortunetly Dany kinda wanted to punch her in the face from the get go.
Hermione suffered from emotional neglect and bullying, so in turn she looked up to authority figures since they were the only ones who showed her any care as well as making an attempt to stop kids from picking on her. This created one of the most annoying personalities Draco ever had to deal with and frankly Dancia just didn't have the patience to let it grow on its own.
It was time to perform a bit of...triage...
"I wouldn't bother with that book, it's all lies and conjecture," she stated flatly as Hermione reached for the history tome. Freezing mid motion she turned to face the snow haired witch in confusion.
"What do you mean?"
Harry, bless him, responded for her, "Well for starters that book talks about the end of Riddle yet has no real facts in it. Er, right, people call him You-Know-Who but he called himself Lord Voldemort."
"What?" Hermione looked truly perplexed, as did her parents, Harry glanced to Dora who just sighed while shaking her head.
"There was a taboo cast on his name, that means if anyone said it witches and wizards aligned with Voldemort would appear right before you and snatch you before you could blink. So everyone took to calling him 'You-Know-Who', and yes, it is a bit ridiculous but if you say his name around anyone these days they'll still wince.
"According to mum and dad, his birth name was Riddle, so yeah, that's a thing."
"Right," Harry said with a nod, "So that book talks about his end, about how the Boy-Who-Lived defeated him and all that but seriously it isn't what happened. How could they know? Really?"
The Grangers looked truly lost at this point.
Dancia smiled thinly as she gave them a slight nod, "Go ahead and read about Voldemort's end, but ask yourself this, if there was only a fifteen month old child and the Dark Lord in the room, how does anyone know what happened? You know, considering one of them was dead and the other was a baby? Just something to think over."
This was a bit of a gamble, but Dany thought it was worth it all things considered so she shopped with her cousins and kept to herself when eventually Hermione made her way over to Harry.
Excellent, looking haughty and pretentious drove her to the more humble looking boy, just as planned.
"Excuse me...you...you said no one knows what really happened that night correct?"
Harry met Hermione's gaze before nodding slowly, "Correct, why do you ask?"
Hermione worried her lip a moment before replying, "Then why did they publish it?"
Harry just snorted at that, "To make money of course, there's no libel laws in the magical world, you can publish anything and the general public will accept it as fact no matter how ridiculous it may sound."
Hermione reeled back at that, "Th-that's deplorable!"
"That's life," he said with a shrug, "trust me I get it, there is an entire series of books depicting Harry Potter growing up in a flying castle and apparently I fight dragons and save princesses on a daily basis. Oh and I have a pet unicorn despite the fact that unicorns don't like boys, so yeah, I get it and accept it. Doesn't mean I like it though."
Hermione stared at him a few moments before letting out a quiet squeak, "You're Harry Potter!?"
Harry grinned at her a moment while placing a finger to his lips, a moment later his hair shifted to raven black and his eyes changed to emerald green. He winked at her once and then his features reverted back to a blue eyed blonde.
"Hmm... I only re-entered the magical world a few years ago and my aunts gave me a bunch of books to introduce me to Pure-Blood culture, would you like me to help you find them so you can get a hold of this entire thing? I don't mean to be rude but it's kind of obvious you're muggle-born and if my mum's diaries are anything to go off of you're going to need a bit of leg up."
Dancia smirked as Hermione began shooting off rapid fire questions at Harry who seemed to be handling them well enough considering he was smiling rather than running away screaming.
Threading her fingers together she cracked her knuckles while turning to find Dora, "I love it when a plan comes together."
Plans, Dany has them and she is very happy when they go off without a hitch. Filler more than anything I know but I wanted to get over the hurdle of one of my favorite HP characters growing up a bit before we actually get to Hogwarts. Also Dany still has no idea what to do about Quirrell but I am considering her addressing him as The Squirrel for her own personal amusement