Chapter 6

Out in the Entrance Hall, Ursella paced back and forth, stomping her feet against the stone. She didn't want to lose control just about as much as she cared what those stupid Gryffindors thought of her. But getting kicked out of school for property damage was the last thing she needed. Every time she got near one of the torches of the castle, it would flare green and explode into five times the inferno. She was on her second circuit of the hall and contemplating running out onto the grounds when a voice sounded from behind her.

"What is going on here?" Professor Severus Snape had appeared at the top of a set of stairs that must lead down into the dungeons. He was glaring at her like a hawk at a mouse it decided not to kill yet. When she didn't answer, he strode towards her, getting taller as he went. "I asked you what you were doing out here."

"I couldn't…I had…I needed to step out," Ursella finally found her voice but kept her eyes deflected away from the professor's face.

"Why?" He asked as if waiting for the punch line of a joke he had heard a thousand times rather than actually caring about her feelings.

"I'm in Gryffindor." Ursella mumbled miserably to her shoes.

"So?" Professor Snape's monotone was painfully effective at making her feel insignificantly small.

"I can't be in Gryffindor." She stated to the floor, gaining slight courage in the retelling of her plight. "My whole family is in Slytherin. My mother, father, aunt, uncle, and cousin, all of them in Slytherin. Do you have any idea how my mother will react when she finds out I'm in Gryffindor?!" The tears were finally breaking free of her lashes. "I don't belong in Gryffindor. I belong in Slytherin." She tried not to sob as she looked up at the professor. "Why can't I be in Slytherin too?"

Professor Snape's initial reaction was so small and quick that Ursella thought she might have imagined it. When she looked up at him, his face was stern, even bored. But upon seeing her horribly venerable face, he took a tiny step back and caught his breath. His arm even twitched as if he was about to bring it to his mouth in disbelief. Shock and denial flashed across his greasy features for a blink of an eye but he quickly composed himself. "And you think coming out here, unaccompanied by an adult, was going to fix that?"

"Well no," Ella said, rubbing tears off her cheeks. "But not coming out here cost me a set of silverware already."

Snape opened his mouth to reply but was interrupted by Professor McGonagall marching out of the Great Hall.

"Severus! There you are." She hurried to the pair in the Entrance Hall. "Where did you hurry off to?"

"I spied Potter and Weasley peeking through the windows during the Sorting," replied Snape coldly, Ursella momentarily forgotten. "It seems that they crashed a flying car into the Whomping Willow."

"No!" gasped McGonagall. "Where did they find a flying car?"

"It seems they flew it here all the way from London." Snape spat, his true anger finally showing. "It seemed it was the Weasley family vehicle and they were seen." Snape produced a newspaper from behind his back. The front page featured a picture of the sky above Kings' Cross Station. There was a circular insert next to a do tin the sky with a zoomed version of the dot inside the circle. It was severely out of focus, the distance to the object being too great for the lens of the camera, but one would be hard press to argue that it wasn't a powder blue family car of sorts. Ursella tried and failed holding back a snort of laughter which caused both professors to focus back on her.

"Are you still here?" spat Snape.

"Miss Lestrange, please make your way back to the Gryffindor table immediately." McGonagall's lips were practically a line as she tried to hold back at Potter and Weasley.

"Yes ma'am," Ursella bowed her head and hurried across to the Great Hall doors. Before she got out of earshot, she tried to keep listening to what else the two Gryffindor boys may have done. But all she heard was the former Death Eater's mention of her.

"That's Bellatrix Lestrange's daughter?" McGonagall must have nodded because Snape started muttering about detention and expulsions as they walked down to the dungeon steps.

Ella re-entered the Great Hall trying to fight the smile that was creeping onto her face. She was halfway to the Slytherin table before she realized what she was doing. She had automatically gone to tell Draco what Potter had done. Normally, the cousins would have shared a laugh or two and cracked jokes. But after the way he had treated her, Ella thought that he didn't deserve such juicy information. So instead, Ella turned on her heel and strode back toward the Gryffindor table, taking her seat between Ginny and the dough-faced boy.

Her plate was still there, though most everyone else's was nearly empty. Suddenly, Ella felt very hungry and was quickly caught up with Ginny's plate. She was sopping up some gravy with a dinner roll when Granger sat back down in her seat although Ursella hadn't noticed she wasn't there. "I asked everyone, even the Prefects, and no one remembers seeing Harry or Ron on the train or in the carriages on the way up to the castle." She had started to tug nervously on her hair.

"So you think they missed the train?" Ginny asked. "What happened to them?"

"I actually know that one," Ella interjected brightly, not bothering to hide her smile. Ginny and Granger looked apprehensive, like she was going to yell at them again. "Snape found them outside. They apparently missed the train and flew the whole way here."

Both girls gasped appropriately. Granger was the first to speak. "Flew on brooms the whole way here? That must have been miserable."

"Not brooms." Ella made eye contact with Ginny. "A flying car." Ginny and Granger glanced at each other in shock and exasperation. "They crashed it into something called the Whomping Willow."

"What's that?" asked Ginny.

"It's this big tree beyond the greenhouses that strikes at anything that gets too close." Granger rattled off before turning back to Ella. "Do you know if they're alright?"

"Well," started Ella, feeling slightly better about herself. "I didn't see them but I suspect they are in the dungeons. That's where Snape was coming and going from."

"Who's in the dungeons?" Seamus had perked his ears up, ready to jump in on the conversation.

"Harry and Ron flew a flying car here all the way from the station in London!" Granger squeaked to her classmate. Seamus barked a short laugh.

"Brilliant!" He nudged the boy next to him. "Did you hear that Dean? Potter and Weasley flew a car to school!" Pretty soon nearly all of the Gryffindor table was talking about the dynamic duo's adventure with great enthusiasm. But the dough face bot to Ursella's right wasn't buying it.

"You're going to believe her?" He said, addressing Granger across the table. He was gritting as the food magically cleared itself from the table and was replaced with so many different kinds of desserts that Ursella momentarily forgot that the doughy faced boy was insulting her. "She is more than likely lying. Her parents were Death Eaters and she doesn't even want to be in Gryffindor."

"Neville, that's not a very good attitude to have," Granger scolded. "You can't hold her accountable for her parents' actions. I mean, my parents are dentists but you don't see me searching people's mouths for cavities."

"You don't know what they did!" Neville growled back, slamming the table with his fist.

"What's your problem, Doughy?" Ursella rounded on him. No one spoke about her like this, at least not when she was sitting right there. "You don't even know me and I don't know you."

"I'm Neville Longbottom." Neville stated like it was the answer to the meaning of life. But Ursella knew why he said it that way. You don't forget a name like "Longbottom", even if our parent's didn't torture a couple by that name into madness and then were sent to a life sentence in Azkaban for it. Ursella never had to directly face the consequences of her parents' actions. But here was one of them, sitting red faced and even a little teary eyed right next to her and she didn't think, if the situations were reversed, that she would trust her either.

"Fine," she said, keeping up her tough bravado just to save face. "You don't have to trust me if you are really that incapable of doing so. But let's not assume that everything I do has malicious intent. What I said about the car is true." Over Longbottom's shoulder, she saw McGonagall re-enter the Great Hall and whisper sternly in Dumbledore's ear. Ursella pointed to the professors' table. "See. Professor McGonagall is telling the Headmaster of the situation right now."

They all looked up at the Head table as Dumbledore nodded to McGonagall and stood to address the students. Ella thought he was going to announce what Potter and Weasley did but she was again disappointed.

"Alright everyone," the old man didn't shout but the Hall immediately quieted down. "I expect you are all starting to get quite ready to turn in for the night. So I will let you all retire to your dormitories for a well-deserved night of rest. Sleep well, for classes start first thing tomorrow."

He clapped his hands and the desserts were cleared from the tables, leaving them as immaculate as if hundreds of children hadn't just been eating there. There was a sudden explosion of the sound of benches scraping away from tables as the student body all got to their feet at once. Over the hum of general chatter, some older members of each house were shouting to be followed in some organized manner. A tall boy with red hair and horn-rimmed glasses was taking the lead for the Gryffindors.

"First years! Gryffindor first years!" He was shouting as other Gryffindors pushed past. Before Longbottom could get away, Ursella grabbed his sleeve and pointed at Dumbledore, making sure that the angry boy saw his Headmaster leave with McGonagall. He watched but then jerked his sleeve back without looking at her and hurried to catch up with Seamus and the boy named Dean.

"Come on," Ginny was beside her and pointed to the red head calling for first years. "We better go. Percy hates it when people ignore him." Ursella followed Ginny to gather with Colin and the other Gryffindor first years. She noticed that Hermione hovered close to Ginny, probably because both of her actual friends were absent. She also saw that the Weasley twins were standing nearby, just outside Percy's circle of first years.

"First years!" He assessed the group quickly before continuing. "Alright, stay together and follow me. Don't want to get lost on your first day."

"Yeah or the night patrol will get you!" One of the twins had stepped closer, saying his warning and waiting for someone to take the bait. Of course Colin would be the most gullible.

"There's a night patrol?"

"Argus Filch, the caretaker," Percy interjected quickly before his brothers could interfere and further. "And his cat but that's—"

"But that's not all folks?" The other twin had stepped up and started to circle the group with his brother like a pair of vultures. "You can't forget about the herd of trolls that are set loose through the corridors at night."

"Trolls?!" Colin squeaked and clutched his camera tighter, like it would protect him. Ursella rolled her eyes but the rest of her classmates seemed genuinely worried, except for Ginny who seemed to find the whole display amusing.

"Pay them no mind." Percy was trying to maintain control over a situation that was already far out of his reach. "Hogwarts does not set herds of trolls loose in the castle." But the twins wouldn't be stopped.

"Don't believe him!" One shouted as the darted away from Percy's blows.

"He works for them!"

"They made him their king!"

"He fed them the first years last year!"

"HE'S KILLED AND HE'LL KILL AGAIN!" The pair was shouting back and forth getting Percy more and more irate.

"Oh really now." Hermione had had enough. "If he fed last year's first years to a bunch of trolls, why am I still here?"

The twins just laughed harder as they ran off to be lost in the sluggish mass of students. Percy smoothed his hair as he turned back to Ursella and the rest of the first years. "And that, boys and girls," he said quite condescendingly, "is two prime examples of how not to behave during your time here at Hogwarts. This way, follow me!"

The Gryffindors made their way out into the Entrance Hall and added themselves to the jam of students trying to get up the staircase into the rest of the castle. The Slytherins, of course, didn't have this problem and Ursella saw Draco and his ogre spawn henchmen follow the rest of the Slytherins down into the Dungeons. Ursella knew Draco well enough to know that he was purposefully avoiding eye contact. But Pansy wasn't. She not only made eye contact but sneered at her and gave a little malicious wave before turning and laughing with Milicent and her other friends.

"Ignore them," Ginny had seen Parkinson and was glaring at her from across the Entrance Hall. "They're just jealous."

Ursella scoffed at that. "Pansy is many things, but jealous is no longer one of them." They were in the back of the group and, because Percy had let a Ravenclaw prefect with long, curly hair lead her first years up the stairs ahead of them, their group was last to make its way up to the common room. Finally, Ella and Ginny started up the marble steps.

"What do you mean 'no longer'?" Ginny asked after they passed the second floor landing.

"About the jealousy thing?" When Ginny nodded, Ella rolled her eyes but continued anyway. "Pansy's in love with Draco. Well…actually," Ursella paused, thinking about how to explain Pansy and Draco's relationship and their families' promises to a blood traitor who would never understand. "It's not so much love as ownership. She thinks she deserves him or something."

"So why was she jealous?" Ginny said, stepping over the trick stair Hermione pointed out to them.

"Because I am closer to Draco than she is," Ursella stated. "At least, I was. He liked me, where he simply tolerated her because he didn't feel the necessity to be mean." Ursella could feel herself deflating as she remembered just how sorry of a situation she was in. "But that was before. Now, I may as well not exist."

"Oh, Ursella," Hermione scolded as they passed through a tapestry. "You shouldn't think that way. I doubt the house you're in is going to change how much they love you."

"Love has nothing to do with it." Ursella laughed coldly. "You wouldn't understand. You're not a Pureblood."

"I am," said Ginny in defiance. "My parents wouldn't stop loving me if I hadn't gotten into the House they wanted me to."

Ursella just rolled her eyes. "But they wanted you to be in Gryffindor and you are. So, I guess we'll never know how they would have acted had you been in any of the others."

"They wouldn't have loved me any different." Ginny insisted.

"So you've said," Ursella didn't say anything more and just kept her head down as they made their way deeper into the castle. She was fighting between feeling sorry for herself and angry at the world, particularly her cousin. She didn't know how long it would take her mother to find out and when Ursella thought about what would happen when she did, it just made the would-be Slytherin just a little bit glad that her parents couldn't leave their cells. To top off the frustration of her plight, she was tired of walking up all these steps. Slytherin had to be in bed by now because there was no way Gryffindor tower and the Slytherin dormitory were equidistant from the first floor. Godric Gryffindor just had to have his precious students in one of the tallest towers in the whole castle. So far, Ursella could see no benefits in being in Gryffindor.