So we were almost late with this. I'm going to blame Magitech for leaving an interesting review and giving me a whole new way to go with a certain Gryffindor bookworm which then caused me to re-write basically a third of this entire chapter. I must admit that it did go really well though. Good catch Magitech!

These chapters don't seem to be getting any shorter, do they? Hey ho, I'm just pleased that we're managing to stick to our update schedule. Even if it is only just by the skin of our teeth. Still a win in my book.

Big love to the mighty Tenzo51 without whom this story wouldn't have even happened, let alone be anywhere near as good as it is. By the way, the whole wolf cuddling thing was all Tenz's idea. The big weirdo.

Enjoying yourselves yet? I know we are.

I'm not JKR and I don't make any money from this. Which is a bit of a shame.

DtR xx.

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The Excellent Adventure of a Wolf, a Loony and a Very Bored Heroine.

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5. First Class.

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Artemis Amarok was drifting on the cusp of wakefulness.

The princess of the true wolves had spent the night in her wolf form trying to relieve the stress of her first full day away from her family and gain the comfort that it brought her. The dreams that this exercise brought were even more welcome than the comfort that it provided. Dreams of the deep forests of her home, of running and hunting with the pack that made her twitch and yip in her sleep.

Unfortunately, this rather adorable behaviour had attracted the attention of her two immediate neighbours in the shared dorm.

Hannah Abbott had been the first one to notice the astonishingly beautiful, white furred wolf and she was entirely unable to resist the temptation to climb up on Artemis' bed and curl up with her. She snuggled up into the warmth of the lightly snoring wolf, feeling right and complete as a paw dropped across her neck, possessively pulling her further in to the embrace.

This was the scene that Shelley came upon as she headed to her own bed, having just finished setting up her equipment and emailing her cousin. She felt strange looking down upon them. Butterflies in the stomach kind of strange. Shelley wanted this. Not necessarily with either of these two, they obviously had their own thing going on what with the wolf bond and all, (it was cute that they didn't think she had noticed) but she wanted something similar. She wanted a somebody to cuddle up with.

Shelley sighed, accepting that this disturbing new development was a part of her now, the need for human (or wolfy) contact. She had undressed and got into her pajamas without taking her eyes from the slumbering Arte' and Hannah. Smiling at them she had crawled up onto the bed and curled behind the white wolf, sandwiching her between herself and Hannah, rested her head on the pillow and then had drifted off into a deep sleep.

Now that full wakefulness was fast approaching, Artemis shifted back into her human form and she noticed a couple of things. Firstly, she was very pleasantly warm and secondly, her shoulder was very unpleasantly wet. The reasons for these conditions lay snoring on either side of her.

Her blonde, witch, who she was becoming more and more convinced was her mate since neither of them seemed capable of leaving the other alone for more than a few minutes, was cuddled tightly into her front. Then there was her other playmate. The small in stature but big in personality 'girl-who-lived'. Artemis was incredibly pleased just to be on speaking terms with Shelley Potter so to have this pack bond forming with her was beyond thrilling for her. Even with her strange habits.

Speaking of which the reason for her being wet now became apparent. The small, powerful, black haired witch was spooned up behind her, head buried in her shoulder with an alarming amount drool leaking from the corner of Shelley's mouth and onto her. Artemis gave a quiet 'eeuw' and rolled her eyes but couldn't quite keep the smile off of her face either.

Carefully extricating herself from the clutches of her bed fellows, she dropped adroitly to the floor before looking up and coming to a surprised stop. There was something different about the dorm room. Other than the fact that it was more than twice it's original size that is.

Artemis made her way over to the back wall and stood goggling at all the amazing, rune inscribed items mounted on the once bare stonework of their dorm and the two gently thrumming towers in the corners radiating a faintly shimmering glow. She could actually feel the magic in the air all but disappear as she walked up to have a closer look.

Although the fifty inch, flat-screen television did certainly catch the attention, the things that actually dominated the walls were the two enormous posters that flanked it. On the left a group of cartoon school girls under the legend 'K-On', were clutching shiny rock band instruments and smiling out at the room with an adorability that could not be denied. Artemis knew the manga well but had not yet seen the anime version and smiled at the fact that they were advocating their first big hit, 'Fuwa Fuwa Time'. To the TV's right it was no less adorable and no less strange.

The ethereal looking girl with the neon blue twin tails and the short blue dress with it's tie was clearly singing into a headset, caught in mid-dance move was Japanese. That much was obvious from the look of her as well as from the writing above her raised and outstetched arms, 'Sapporo 2011'. Artemis had never really been a comic book or cartoon kind of a girl as she was more of a hardcore manga freak (total otaku) but this amazing young woman on the poster had a presence that was undeniable. Just like Shelley Potter's own aura, it drew you in. Made you feel special.

"That's Hatsune Miku. She's a vocaloid."

Shelley's calm, flat voice would have made her jump if Artemis hadn't been quite so used to the girl being able to sneak up on her by now.

"A what now?"

"A vocaloid, it's a singing voice synthesiser. Its signal processing part was developed through a joint research project led by Kenmochi Hideki at the Pompeu Fabra University in Barcalona, and wasn't actually ... you know what, why don't I just show you."

After fiddling around with her laptop computer and some leads, Shelley took her position on the dance mat and struck a pose. The first strains of 'Kocchi Muite Baby' started and the insane genius in the pink, Hello Kitty pajamas took off into a wild and enthusiastic (if not strictly accurate) mirror of the blue haired vocaloid now gracing the TV screen.

It wasn't really her kind of music but it was a very impressive piece of technology. And wildly hilarious as Shelley started singing along with the infectious J-pop tune while she danced. In Japanese. Which would have been surprising to Artemis yesterday but really wasn't so much now. That girl was crazy brilliant.

Artemis pulled out her phone from her trunk, stepped inside the radius of Shelley's awesome magic suppressors and managed to capture the last few seconds of her friend's dance with it. She was intending to send the video to her grandma to show her that she was following the old Alpha's instructions to make good connections among the wizarding world. She was just powering it down again when Shelley noticed what she was doing.

"Ooh, is that the i-phone 4. Can I see it?"

"Sure. It's not like I can get it to work here. Well, not to make calls anyway."

She gave a pointed look at all of Shelley's electronic gear, hoping for an, at least vaguely understandable explanation, but being disappointed as the other girl didn't seem to notice her silent question.

"Well no but if we link it into my laptop you should be able to email from it ... ooh, and if we can get hold of a web cam I can set you up on Skype. Would you like that?"

"What's it going to cost me?"

Artemis had learned very early on in her life that everything had a price and her new friend was far too smart not to know this as well.

"Just a little dance."

Okay so this particular price was almost not worth paying.

"Oh hell no. I don't dance."

"Please Arte'. I'll even let you choose the music."

The big eyed, pouting and pleading from the 'lunatic-who-lived' had their usual effect on her and the white wolf capitulated to her mad friend, selected a song that she could tolerate and shuffled her way out onto the dance mat.

By this point all of her dorm mates were now wide awake and staring with ill disguised hunger and anticipation at the two girls, especially the one nearest to them. Shelley winked at the giggling Sally-Anne Perks and invited her up to join them with a nod of her head which actually pleased Artemis since there was now somebody else to share in the attention. And the humiliation.

A humiliation that now looked to be in front of a much larger audience as girls from every dorm and year began to push their way into the first year's room attracted by the singing, strange noises and laughter. As the music started some forty, wide eyed witches were crowded in together watching the three small firsties give a reasonably talented, sweet and very funny rendition of the Jackson Five in all of their seventies, Motown glory.

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Oh, A B C

It's easy as, 1 2 3

As simple as, do re mi

A B C, 1 2 3

Baby, you and me girl

A B C it's easy,

It's like counting up to 3

Sing a simple melody

That's how easy love can be

That's how easy love can be

Sing a simple melody

1 2 3 You and me.

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There was a brief moment of silence before whooping, shouting and wild applause broke out and was loud enough that it even managed to wake up the boys in their, far removed, dorms. Shelley, Artemis and Sally-Anne received the applause with small and suddenly shy smiles, shuffling together to take a little bow after their impromptu performance. They were hit with many questions and requests but before any of these could be answered or acted upon the three female Hufflepuff prefects bustled in and chivvied everyone out, telling them to get themselves ready for breakfast and classes.

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The entirety of the female population of Hufflepuff House bounced into the great hall in a display of enthusiasm for their first day that grated mightily, and somewhat unreasonably, on the other students. Of course, those other students hadn't had their own personal 'dance off' performed for them this morning by their brilliant and slightly unruly, muggle raised, first years.

The House of the Badgers seating choices reflected just how well thought of their new younger members were. There was no delineation along age lines this morning other than the fact that the firsties were all clumped together in the middle of the table, surrounded by excited witches of all ages. They would have been quite difficult to spot among their taller compatriots had it not been for a certain piece of attire being worn by one of them.

Shelley was sporting her newly decorated, top hat which poked above the crowd, it's bright yellow, sunflower waving enthusiastically on it's charmed compression spring. Below it was her favourite chequerboard pattern in black and yellow with a red number one next to the proudly displayed Hufflepuff crest and a joker card sticking out of the rouched, purple hat band.

It was utterly nuts and Shelley loved it. As did her Housemates it seemed. Indeed, her strange headgear was almost as big a hit among the Badgers as her technologically enhanced dorm room. Once again Shelley Potter was the centre of attention at Hogwarts. Deservedly so in her, not so humble, opinion.

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Albus Dumbledore sat in his throne struggling to keep his habitual, twinkly eyed smile on his face. The reason for his displeasure was sitting almost directly in front of him with the rest of her House, smiling ever so slightly at the boisterous antics of her new friends, who all appeared to be competing for who could manage to please her the most. It was a problem. A very big problem.

Shelley Potter was not supposed to be like this. She was supposed to have come to Hogwarts as a poor, down-trodden, wastrel ready to grab tightly onto the affection and mentorship that he would offer with both hands and never let go. He had been very careful to keep the 'girl-who-lived' away from the wizarding world and in an environment that would stunt her physical, intellectual and emotional growth. It was unfortunate for the girl to have to suffer through these indignities but necessary for the greater good. She had a destiny to fulfill. A destiny that meant she would have to be so unhappy and disenfranchised that she would give away her very life, without hesitation or demur, for those who had taken the time to befriend her.

That she actually seemed to have been raised to be some kind of prodigy in the muggle world with the charisma of a pop star was not going to be conducive to his future plans. This had been painfully obvious to Albus from virtually the first moment that she had stepped into the great hall last night. Intelligence was a far more difficult thing to hide than stupidity and the fact that she didn't even try to conceal her, admittedly, brilliant mind was more than a little concerning.

Clever, arrogant, cold, and already gathering a most devoted little gang of admirers she was reminding him more of Tom Riddle than her sainted parents, a most disturbing line of thought. Along with her managing to somehow circumvent his instructions for the hat to put her in Gryffindor where he could choose and control the friends she made, it was agitating Headmaster no end. He calmed himself with the thought that at least she hadn't gone to Slytherin so he didn't have to worry too much about her going 'dark'.

The old man snorted into his porridge. Yeah right, The Dark Lady of Hufflepuff. That was a good one.

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"What's up with old Gandalf over there? He keeps staring at me like I've shit in his shoe or something."

Professor Sprout had just wandered close enough to be able to hear her most famous student's coarse and irreverent (if funny and true) statement about the Headmaster and the resulting shocked giggles. Not even a day and she was already a terrible influence on her House. Or a good one depending on your point of view. Given that Pomona Sprout was used to being able to see both sides of an argument she decided to let that one slide. There was something about her that she couldn't ignore though.

"Why are you not wearing your uniform Miss Potter?"

"But I am Professor. Everything I am wearing is standard issue Hogwarts uniform, purchased from Madame Malkin's in Diagon Alley."

"The uniform is grey Miss Potter, not pink ... or green ... or blue ... or any of those other unidentifiable colours that seem to have found themselves mixed up in there."

"Yeah, I think there must have been an accident with the laundry."

"An ... accident."

"Well it was probably quite a big accident."

"Did it involve a runaway cement mixer and a trip to the paint factory?"

"I don't think so." The finger was up and a cute, thoughtful expression adorned Shelley's face. "But the laundry is Aunt 'Tunie's domain and ... well ... I'm not allowed to even help with it any more after the incident with Gerald."

"I know that I'm going to regret this, Miss Potter, but who is Gerald?"

"Gerald is ... was ... my cousin's hamster."

"Oh?" Realisation dawned. "Aah."

"Yeah, so no more laundry duty for Shelley."

She sighed dramatically and gave her patented 'sad face number twelve', making all of the girls who were listening in with rapt attention sigh along with her. I mean they all knew and had seen for themselves what a clever, powerful and scary little witch she really was but they seemed powerless before her onslaught of cuteness. Even Professor Sprout blinked back a tear or two before she remembered who she was talking to and that devious little smirk of Minerva's at the sorting ceremony the previous night.

"Well we can't do anything about it today I suppose but you will at least get rid of the hat."

"You don't like my hat?"

"It's ... "

Pomona Sprout was suddenly surrounded by her small Badgers all pouting at her and giving disappointed cries 'not the hat' and 'we love the hat', gaining the attention of the other teachers and making her look very bad.

"It's very lovely Miss Potter but, once again, it's not really regulation is it?"

"I know it's not really pointy but is black. Well mostly black anyway."

Her whole House was staring at her now with those huge wet puppy eyes that there was simply no defense for.

"Fine. Keep the bloody hat then."

"You're the best teacher ever professor Sprout."

She shook her head ruefully as she continued down the table to distribute the rest of the time-tables, receiving other such tributes from her students and thinking what a manipulative little cow one Shelley Potter was. Clever and very entertaining to be sure but still a manipulative little cow of course.

She smiled again as she heard the groan from those of her first years who had older relatives already at Hogwarts as they spied the subject that occupied very first slot on their timetables. Serves the little monsters right she thought.

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The first lesson of the first day for the new intake of Hufflepuff House was the one lesson that most students dreaded. Potions. The reason for their dread was currently seated behind his desk glowering at all the eleven year old imbeciles and dunderheads who were piling into his dungeon domain and making altogether far too much noise for his liking.

Severus Snape was already in a bad mood due to having been kept up half the night by the Headmaster, being forced to listen to the old fool's ranting and raving about the damned Potter brat. He, of course, wasn't surprised that the clearly evil and insane spawn of that ignorant, up himself tosser James bloody Potter had managed to muck up a decade of carefully laid plans but it didn't make him any more willing to listen to Albus whining about it. What with the bearded wonder's ranting and his own, less than calming thoughts about the re-emergence into their lives of the 'girl-who-lived', sleep had been very hard to come by.

This made the Hogwart's Potions Master very grouchy this morning. Even more so than he normally was. Catching sight of the ridiculously attired Hufflepuff sweeping into his lair surrounded by her tiny toadies and hangers on, with a supercilious look on her smirking face didn't exactly improve his mood.

"Sit down and shut up."

He bad temperedly ground his way through the roll call in his most gravely and intimidating voice until he reached ...

"Ahhh, Potter. Our new celebrity."

The sneer was something that he had practised, honed and perfected through ten years of attempting to teach morons how not to blow themselves (or him) up in his class and he now put all of his considerable venom into it as he locked eyes with ... her. He almost immediately wished that he hadn't.

Leglimancy was an art form that relied, primarily, on order and the 'girl-who-lived's mind was anything but ordered. Looking into her thoughts was like being inside of a particularly vigorous pinball machine being played by an expert. A really self centred, pinball machine, that is, as she didn't appear to have much in the way of feelings about anything or anyone but herself. And her massive intelligence was just awe inspiring in both it's scale and it's complexity. The gears in her brain didn't stop moving for even a fraction of a second.

Whatever. It didn't matter how intelligent she was, or how pretty, or how she had inherited her mother's eyes, Severus just couldn't get past the fact that she was James Potter's daughter and not his. Her crazy, wild, black hair and that air of total arrogance that she sported as proudly as she did her insane hat made this more than clear and he would have his revenge on the hated Potter by humiliating his daughter in front of her peers at every opportunity.

He set to this task with a will.

"There will be no foolish wand-waving or silly incantations in this class. As such, I don't expect many of you to appreciate the subtle science and exact art that is potion-making. However, for those select few … who possess, the predisposition … I can teach you how to bewitch the mind and ensnare the senses. I can tell you how to bottle fame, brew glory, and even put a stopper in death. Then again, maybe some of you have come to Hogwarts in possession of abilities so formidable that you feel confident enough to not pay attention!"

His eyes flicked back to his target.

"Potter!" Snape suddenly barked out. "What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

"Hmm, let me see." The dour professor had a brief and unwelcome moment of deja vu as the dratted girl put a finger to her chin ... just like Lily used to. "Powdered root of asphodel and infusion of wormwood, if combined correctly would be two of the major components in the Draught of Living Death, Master Snape."

"What did you just call me?"

"Master Snape. Am I incorrect in thinking that you are a certified Potions Master then professor?"

"You are not incorrect."

"Well then it would be the height of bad manners to call you anything other than that would it not Master Snape?"

His eye twitched at both her good manners and her reasoning. He really wanted to hate her. Hate her and take a hundred points from Hufflepuff. Unfortunately, her knowledge of his subject and Merlin damned respectful attitude was making that impossible. For now. He decided to give it up as a bad job, employ some well practised needling techniques and try again later.

"The instructions for today's potion are on the board. Get on with your work."

Artemis decided that being paired with Shelley for this class was a really good idea as her friend conjured up some floating, inert, bluebell flames for extra light and carefully copied the instructions into a notebook. Then she saw her looking at the knives that were provided by the school and frowning deeply at the dull, barely sharp, implements. She knew that it wouldn't be long before Shelley figured out what to do about it.

And sure enough, with a quick 'ooh I know' she reached underneath her robes and pulled out her prized possession. The hatchet glittered menacingly in the extra light of her conjured lamps as Shelley caressed it gently, cooing at the hand axe and asking it if it was alright for her to use it today. Apparently, it was as she then started to douse both it and their workstation with disinfectant before perusing the instructions for their brew again.

While she did this Artemis gathered the ingredients for the potion from store room and laid them out for her partner to chop in the prescribed manner. Which task she, of course, accomplished with a great amount of skill, flair and panache.

"Cool."

It was pretty much the only word that Artemis could think of to describe what she was seeing. Almost as much fun as this was watching the teacher that Shelley had been so courteous and polite to getting more and more red every time he glanced at their work station with it's perfectly simmering cauldron.

She concluded that he was probably a former Death Eater or something and simply followed Shelley's example, ignoring his attempts to make them bite at him with his barbed comments. The horrible man's spectacularly purple face when they handed in a perfect potion, complete with a spare vial in case of accidents, at the end of their time made up for having to bite her tongue at his behaviour.

Professor Sprout was right. Smiling serenely and thanking him for such a brilliant and constructive lesson had left the sour faced dungeon bat spluttering in apoplectic rage. It was brilliant. Apparently Shelley had thought so too.

"Well that was fun, what's next?"

"Seriously? You thought that lesson was fun?"

Susan Bones couldn't believe that anyone but a drooling lunatic would think that that piss poor excuse for a Potions class was ... oh, hang on. Drooling lunatic, Shelley Potter. She got it now.

"Oh yes."

"There's something really wrong with you Potter."

The 'girl-who-lived' nodded happily at her class-mate's assertion, causing the sunflower on her top hat bob around madly and the other 'Puffs to giggle.

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The next class was Herbology with their Head of House and the Gryffindors. One of whom was turning out to be very, very annoying. Shelley had hoped to find, well not an intellectual equal (she was a genius after all), but at least someone who she could hold a reasonable conversation with about the finer points of the nature of magic. After ten minutes she realised that this wasn't going to happen and her hopes were cruelly dashed as the Granger girl displayed a reliance on the infallibility of the written word that every true scientist knew was very silly indeed.

"Ooh. ooh, I know professor. Pick me, pick me."

The bushy haired girl with the buck teeth that Shelley had met briefly in Flourish and Blotts on her shopping trip over the summer looked to be well on her way to straining something in her eagerness to answer the question about the Devil's Snare that they were working with today. As she had suspected would be the case, the answer was straight out of the year one text book, far too simplistic and left a lot to be desired. Shelley, being the kind of person that she was, couldn't just let such a half-arsed explanation go and decided to step in to correct it.

"Hmmm. That can't be right though can it."

"What do you mean 'can't be right'? Of course it's right, I read it in A Beginner's Guide to Magical Plants. It's in the book and I've read it from cover to cover so I actually know what I'm talking about."

Shelley hadn't originally gone into her lessons today with the intention to upset people or make any enemies but there was something about that smug smile on Granger's face that was just making her itch to slap it off. Verbally that is. Well, at least verbally for now. She would hold off on physically till later.

"What I mean is that they can't be completely subdued by just being exposed to light."

"They are. I read it in the book so it must be ... "

"You may have read it in your beginner's guide, Miss Granger but what you are failing to take into account is the evidence that is being presented to you now that you are having actual, physical, interaction with these plants."

"What evidence, I don't see any evid ... "

"Do you agree that we are in an outdoor greenhouse?"

"Yes."

"And the plants are in the same outdoor greenhouse."

"Yes."

"And it is ... " She made rather an ostentatious show of consulting her Minnie Mouse watch strapped to her left wrist. " ... a quarter to twelve in the morning."

"If you say so."

"And the sun is shining quite strongly today."

Hermione Granger opened her mouth to reply before following the actions of all of the other first years to look up into the bright, Scottish afternoon. Her finger came up to point at the girl with the blank, slightly quizzical look on her expressionless face and the open mouth worked a couple of times before slamming shut.

"So given the evidence presented of the sunlight, refracted through glass to give an impressive amount of light and the fact that these plants are still managing to move around quite freely ... " The merest trace of a smirk caught at her lips a she continued. "... we can hypothesize that, in fact, not all types of light are effective in combatting Devil's snare."

"You ... I ... you ... "

"Perhaps you should do some further reading to see if this 'discovery' had been made previously, Miss Granger. You know, before you go around preaching your half truths from your flawed and semi-competent research, that is."

"Ooh someone call the nurse, 'cos she just got burned."

The giggling duo of Sally-Anne and Artemis high fived each other at the little wolf's comment and their amusement soon spread to everyone who was not robed in red. Hermione Granger meanwhile was being dragged away by a very anxious looking red haired boy who was desperately whispering in her ear to 'please stop annoying the mad witch and her scary wolf'.

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Lunch was once more presided over by the still genial seeming (but only just) presence of the Headmaster who had to drag his attention from the Hufflepuff table more than once. It would not do for him to lose his twinkly eyed, benevolent aspect that he had tried so hard to cultivate over the years and observing the interactions of the young Badgers too closely was the quickest way for that to happen.

After which it was off to another class, Charms this time, and another different pairing brought Hannah Abbott into the now highly prized position of being Shelley's partner of the moment.

It didn't stop her sneaking glances at Artemis every couple of minutes though.

When their half-goblin professor, Flitwick, fell off of his book pile upon simply reading out the name of Shelley Potter it took all of her pureblood training not to laugh at him.

Their first class with the Slytherins was going very well, despite all the horror stories that they had heard from their older siblings and Housemates. This may have had something to do with the three boys who managed to position themselves as far away from her and Shelley as possible and kept whispering 'shut up you fool' at anyone who tried to wind her up. Although the magical prowess of the gaudily hatted girl with the big brain was probably just as effective at keeping them silent and watchful.

Filius Flitwick was another one that was pleasantly surprised by the, almost cordial, atmosphere as he had expected this class to be something of a battleground. Anywhere you got the children of Death Eaters and the girl who had defeated their dark master together was bound to be fraught with simmering tension and possibly violence. But no. There was nothing other than a little understandable nervousness.

That this was mainly on the part of who he had thought would be the aggressors though which confused him somewhat. Well up until the point that he saw her actually perform some magic that is. The girl was, quite simply, brilliant.

Shelley Potter had already progressed from the 'lumos' charm and was currently occupied in giving her giggling study partner a bit of a make-over. Third year colouring and fixing charms were pouring from her wand in a steady stream, painting Miss Abbott's nails and putting hot pink streaks in her hair. The wand itself, intrigued him as well once he caught sight of that miniature basilisk eye focus.

"My word Miss Potter that is some really very good work. I wonder if I might see that rather remarkable wand of yours?"

The short professor's eyes widened as the famous young Badger handed her wand to him for inspection. He was skilled enough in wand-lore to recognise a wand-staff when he saw one and knew that the people who used them were, generally, not those that you wanted to upset or get angry. It also took a serious amount of power to be able to use one of these things to any great effect.

The fact that Shelley Potter could do so was pretty impressive. And also pretty disturbing. Perhaps it was time for him to reach out to his relatives at Gringotts and find out what else she could do before he accepted the Headmaster's mission of trying to stunt the girl's rate of learning and separating her fro her friends. He was quite new to all of this 'Order of the Phoenix' business' so he would be taking things very slowly and very carefully.

"Very nice. I'm sure that you will do great things together."

Whatever was going on between the 'girl-who-lived' and Albus, Filius decided that he would need a lot more information before he stuck his neck on the line. Plus he rather liked her no nonsense attitude and exuberant clothing choices, despite his more staid and scholarly Ravenclaw ways.

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In Shelley's considered opinion it had been a good day. Certainly there were things that could be improved upon here and there, the teaching standard in Potions for instance, but generally speaking she felt that the educational standards of Hogwarts were ... adequate. Well adequate for most people, she was sure that she would have learned everything availlable here by the end of her third year. Fourth at the latest.

This gave her an interesting dilemma.

How would she fill her time in order to not become insanely bored?

There were a few options that she was considering but her favoured one involved the thing that she had never really had the time or inclination for previously. Friends. It was in this spirit that she had decided to educate her new dorm-mates and potential friends in the art of subversion and, what she liked to call, marauding.

She set up the girls in a circle around the TV and handed out popcorn and a strange, fizzy, orange coloured, muggle drink before addressing them, using her carefully selected DVD as a baton.

"Tonight I'm going to show you all an extremely motivational film that I believe we should use as a blueprint for our time here at school. It certainly inspired me and I just know that it will do the same for you."

"What's it called?"

"Saint Trinians."

The mouthful of Irn Bru that Sally-Anne had been in the middle of drinking was violently expelled as the muggleborn witch failed to keep her shock bottled up and sprayed the orange liquid all over the unlucky Susan Bones.

"Really?"

"Sorry Sue, went down the wrong way."

One hour and forty one minutes later six shocked looking witches and a grinning Sally-Anne Perks and Artemis Amarok looked over at their unofficial dorm leader. Her message with this movie selection had been clear. No more were the House of the Badgers going to be the poor relations of Hogwarts. It was time for the yellow robed House to stand proud just like those wild and entertaining girls on the screen. They were going to rule this school.

"We are Hufflepuff."

Susan turned to her best and oldest friend who had spoken and nodded back at her with a determined look on her face to echo the sentiment.

"We are Hufflepuff."

Artemis leaned forward and gripped Hannah's hand tightly, growling out her own.

"We are Hufflepuff."

A thumping started as the young witches, gaining in confidence began to pound their feet on the floor, setting up a beat that Shelley couldn't resist taking advantage of.

"We are the best, so screw the rest

We do as we damn well please

We are the toughs

The Hufflepuffs

Defenders of anarchy.

HUFFLEPUFFS!"

The pink haired young woman, hidden at the back of the room under a disillusionment charm, had her fist jammed into her mouth to prevent the escape of the laughter that had been bubbling up all night. Her punishment from her Head of House for her latest ... er ... indiscretion had turned out to be rather a fun one. Okay so sitting quietly and observing wasn't precisely her idea of a good time but it still beat scrubbing floors or polishing trophies for Filch.

And honestly she was a slightly curious herself as to what the new first years were up to.

It was a lot as it turned out. These girls were scary. Once they had decided on the fact that they were going to go all St. Trinian's on the school then they had set to their planning with a will. While some of their suggestions were fairly innocuous, others had that touch of devious devilry that would certainly not be out of place at the fictional English girl's school itself. And it would give those uppity, pureblood wankers a good, old fashioned, poke in the eye at the same time.

Bloody hell she was actually sad that it was her last year. Hufflepuff House, despite their extreme Badger pride, had never had much to cheer about but this year she sensed that something was about to change. At least she was going to get to the opportunity to see her tiny Housemates sow the seeds of chaos and mayhem that they would surely build upon later. The devious little minxes.

It was at this point that the chief devious minx and ringleader of the Hufflepuff Hooligans displayed her rumoured prodigious magical talent by staring right exactly at where she was sitting.

"Excuse me. Are you going to sit there all night or are you going to come and join us?"

Oh bollocks.

Nymphadora (don't call me Nymphadora) Tonks was starting to think that a week of detentions with Filch might have been the better option.

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In the small village of Ottery St. Catchpole in a house that looked like the chess piece after which it was named, a petite, willowy girl with dirty blonde hair suddenly stopped talking.

Her father and the owner of 'The Rook' was rather taken aback since he couldn't remember another time when she had willingly stopped her meandering monologues about all of the invisible and possibly imaginary creatures that she saw. That she had done so now was, therefore, something of a shock. Although a much larger shock was had when her eyes snapped open again and she punched the air shouting.

"HUFFLEPUFFS!"

"Are you alright there, Moonbeam?"

"Oh yes thank-you daddy, I was just having a vision about ... ummm ... "

Okay now she was stuck. Luna couldn't exactly say what her vision was about without alerting her father, who was surprisingly perceptive sometimes, to the fact of her future coven mates. Luckily, however, her father was experiencing one his less perceptive moods tonight and helped her out himself.

"Hufflepuffs?"

"Exactly daddy, Hufflepuffs." She used the well worn tactic of smiling brightly at her father before following up with. "You're so clever."

"Why thank-you darling."

While flashing him another of her most distracting smiles, Luna Lovegood started to feel quite downcast as, although it was lovely to connect with Shelley and Artemis in this way it always got her to thinking. Thinking how it was going to be such a long, boring year stuck here at home while they were so far away, enjoying themselves and bonding at Hogwarts.

Unless.

Ooh now that was a good idea. And daddy seemed to be in a nice and receptive mood tonight so she was sure that she could sell it to him if she employed just the right tactics. Mentally squaring her shoulders, Luna prepared for battle by cocking her head smiling at the old man like her mum had done whenever she wanted something.

"Daddy?"

"Yes Moonbeam?"

"I've been thinking."

"Have you dear, well do try not to strain yourself too badly."

Luna had to work hard to keep her happy-go-lucky smile active after that little barb.

"What would you think of including some Quidditch match reports in 'The Quibbler'? It might increase our circulation so that we can appraise more people of the real issues in our society like the disappearance of Stubby Boardman and the declining Snorcack population."

"But aren't match reports dreadfully dull Moonbeam?"

"School match reports aren't, they're always exciting games. We could go to Ilvermorny and Beaubaxtons, not Durmstrang obviously ... "

"Obviously."

" ... and ... er ... Hogwarts, of course."

Xenophilius Lovegood looked at his daughter closely. He knew full well that she was employing his late wife's 'cute and adorable' terror tactics to get her own way but had decided to wait until she got to the point first before his inevitable caving in to her wishes occurred. And now it was clear. Something or some-one at Hogwarts had piqued her interest and she wanted to visit.

"Alright darling girl, we can give it a try if you really think it's a good idea."

"Yay! ... I mean ... absolutely Mister Editor, I truly believe that this will turn out to be a great move for 'The Quibbler' ... and for us."

He watched his daughter bounce happily off up the stairs singing a little song, something about Hufflepuffs defending a harpy? He didn't really mind that she had attempted to manipulate him into doing what she wanted. It reminded him of his darling, late wife, Pandora. And quite honestly it was a pretty good idea. If it paid off it would certainly ease their financial worries. Plus, he could never say 'no' to his little girl. Never had been able to, never would be able to.

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I do try not to use too many song lyrics in my fics but this chapter was just begging for them.

Reviews are our cookies and you wouldn't want us starve now would you. Seriously though the feedback would be very helpful on this one guys so do let us know how we're doing with it, and I promise that I will try and answer all of your questions. Of which I am sure there will be many.

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DtR xx.