A/N: Explicit Undertale spoilers in this chapter. Be careful, OK?

Some shops that Frisk glanced into as they searched for the recommended "Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions" looked nothing like anything she'd ever seen out in the non-magical world. Broomstix, which had an openly levitating broom in its window was a prime example. Amanuensis Quills, was almost as surprising. "I'm not sure why people don't just use normal pens," Toriel said. "They're a lot less messy."

On the other hand, Madam Malkin's almost looked like a non-magical (if high-end) clothing store. If it weren't for nearly the entire stock consisting of fancy robes and pointed hats, Frisk would not have known the difference.

Frisk entered the store first, with the proprietor giving her a friendly nod from where she was straightening a rack. The woman, presumably Ms. Malkin, had turned toward her when Toriel entered behind Frisk. Ms. Malkin froze momentarily, giving Toriel a look that Frisk recognized as fear. It was gone two heartbeats later, though, as she adopted a professional mask. "How can I help you two?" she asked.

"My child is attending Hogwarts this fall," Toriel said, smiling at the woman. "I understand you are the best place to be fitted for a school uniform."

"Thank you," Ms. Malkin said, turning to Frisk. "What's your name?" she asked.

"Frisk Dreemurr," Frisk told her. Behind her, Frisk could simply feel Mom beaming. It would be a long time before she got over hearing Frisk identify herself with her surname.

"Alright Frisk, let me fetch my measuring tape," If the truth were to be told, it didn't actually take long for Madam Malkin to fit Frisk for a robe. Frisk had been obedient when getting prodded in various places. Actually, the child had been too interested in watching Ms. Malkin's face, as she had been very carefully avoiding looking at Toriel.

"There you go," Ms. Malkin told Frisk. "Plenty of room for a growing witch."

"I suppose I'll have to get used to hearing that term," Toriel said, smiling. Ms. Malkin gave Toriel a quick, nervous look. Frisk noticed, even if Mom did not. A few minutes later, after Toriel had paid for the robe, the monster turned to leave the shop, then stopped, as Frisk hadn't joined her.

Frisk had gone to look up to the shopkeeper with her half-lidded eyes. "I know you're scared, Madam Malkin," Frisk said in her quiet voice, "but Mom couldn't have hurt anyone. I know the stories too."

Toriel looked horrified, and moved to grab her child, but Frisk stood her ground. "I know what it is liked to be scared; scared like that."

The tailor had flushed properly scarlet. "Frisk," Toriel began to say, but Ms. Malkin interrupted her. "No, your daughter is right." Ms. Malkin looked up, meeting Toriel's gaze for what the monster realized was the first time, "I want to apologize..." she flustered around the fact she'd never asked for a name.

"Toriel," Frisk supplied.

"Ms. Toriel," she stuttered, and caught herself, "Toriel," she continued finally, "We all got, well, reminders from certain parts of the wizarding community, parts I don't like to associate with," she gave a rueful smile, "After all, I've been called 'Mudblood'. A horrible term for a witch or wizard with two muggle parents. It was un..." she searched for the word, "It was unreasonable, and I apologize. You are clearly a mother who cares deeply for her daughter."

This caught Toriel completely off guard. "Thank you," she said after a moment of review. "I understand you are unused to seeing monsters, so it can be difficult to acclimate. Thank you for your honesty, and for your kind words," Toriel held out a furry paw, and Madam Malkin shook it. With their new robe carefully stored in Toriel's bag, the two left the store.

Frisk thought Toriel was going to admonish her about speaking up, but she didn't say anything about it. "Let's find Mr. Ollivander,"

Ollivanders (which Frisk was convinced was missing an apostrophe), was another store that could have, under cursory observation, been mistaken for a nonwizard shop. In this case, she thought it resembled a shoe shop, if the boxes were about half the size, both ways, of a shoe box.

"Come in, come in," said an elderly voice near the back, "Another new Hogwarts student?" asked the voice.

"She is," Toriel said, smiling again.

Mr. Ollivander turned around, walking toward them. "And a former prisoner, if you'll excuse the term, of the Mt. Ebott barrier. But that was a nasty business, and I hope you won't hold it against the wizarding world," Ollivander said, giving a bow to them both.

"Not if they're all as polite as you are, Mr. Ollivander," Toriel said, still smiling, and Frisk nodded in agreement. They introduced themselves.

"Please," he told Frisk, "Have a seat," and he pointed to the only chair in the shop, "and I promise to find you the wand that matches your personality. It is, after all, the wand that chooses a wizard! Now, you're the one who came out through the barrier with the monsters, right?" Ollivander asked.

Frisk nodded again.

"Such an act of justice. We should start with chestnut and... yes." He turned to a shelf on side of the shop, eyed it up and down for a moment, and deftly pulled a box from the stack without causing an avalanche. "Chestnut, with a core of unicorn hair," he told her, opening the box, and holding the wand it contained out.

Frisk hesitantly took the wand in her hand. It felt smooth and cool. But it didn't actually do anything.

Ollivander waited expectantly, "Give it a wave, please?" he asked politely. Frisk gave it a wave, grinning at the memory of Madjick. The tip of the wand glowed for a second, but then faded, and Ollivander looked disappointed. "Not Chestnut then, let's see. You emerged through a great trial. Maybe a Fir?"

He put the lid back on the chestnut wand, discarding it into a corner, and dashing to another stack. This pull was less deft, and the stacks of boxes on top of the one he selected wobbled dangerously before settling. He produced another wand for Frisk to pick up and try.

This one was much more dramatic, it grew hot in her hand before she'd even had the chance to handle it for a second, and with a cry, she dropped it back in the box.

"Are you all right, my child?" Toriel asked, alarmed.

"It... it didn't like me," Frisk said, waving her not quite burned hand.

"Fir and dragon heartstring..." Ollivander began.

"Does that hurt the dragon?" Frisk asked, anxiously. "Are they intelligent creatures?"

Ollivander shook his head, "They're not sentient, if that's what you're asking. They're giant lizards."

"Oh," Frisk said, slightly mollified, "but I don't know if I could bring myself to use one."

"Not Fir, and no dragon heartstring." He gave Frisk an appraising eye, apparently going over what she'd said, "Pine then. Do I have a Pine with a Phoenix feather?" He went to one shelf, then a second, then a third, before taking a box off the top of its particular shelf, pulling it down and rushing back to Frisk, enthralled with the challenge that had been presented to him. He presented the box to Frisk with a flourish.

This one didn't mind so much that it was being handled, but even when waved multiple times, it remained aloof, simply unresponsive.

"I, I was so sure," Ollivander said, fascinated. "Hm. Ms. Frisk, do you have an idea for what you want to do when you grow up?"

"I want to help people," Frisk said, unsure of what she was being asked.

"Ah, an auror? That is, a guard against Dark Magic," he explained, seeing Frisk's confused look, "Or maybe a healer?"

"A healer," Frisk said quickly.

Ollivander nodded. "I still think phoenix feather, but perhaps willow." This one led to Ollivander balancing precariously on a stepladder before pulling a box down and presenting the wand from within. Frisk tried it, and though it did respond, it still didn't feel right.

"We're on the right track at last," Ollivander said happily. "But, hm. It's odd. None of the wands are acting like they're the first wand you've picked up. Still, let me find a pear wand with..."

"I'm sorry," Toriel interrupted, "Did you say pear? Like the fruit tree?" Ollivander nodded to her. Toriel searched through her bag, pulling out a familiar stick. "This is the stick that my child carried with her throughout the entire underground. It is pear, is it not?"

Ollivander took the stick gently in his own wizened hands, turning it over several times. He then pulled a wand from the front pocket of his robe, tapping the stick with it. A shower of golden sparks came out from it.

"I'll be. This is magic grade wood, Ms. Toriel," he handed to Frisk. Frisk grasped it, and though it felt familiar, it was not any piece of magical equipment. But Ollivander's eyes were wide, and excited. "Yes, yes! It just needs a proper core, and some filing and polishing! Phoenix feather, do you think?"

Toriel's voice had grown thoughtful. "Can you use other magical creatures to be a core of a wizard's wand?"

"Other wand makers do. I know other wand makers use Veela Hair, Troll Whisker, Basilisk Horn. But I only use..." Ollivander cut himself off, and his eyes narrowed. "Are you suggesting?" he asked.

Toriel nodded.

Ollivander positively raced to his back room. "A brush! Or a comb! Let me find a comb!"

They returned later that day to pick it up. By Frisk's request, it hadn't been polished. This had confused Ollivander. But the stick didn't really look that bad. It didn't have any side twigs or anything that'd have really made it a branch, it didn't have any leaves. And it had felt right just the way it was in Frisk's hand. She had, after all, carried that stick a long time, and it felt wrong to change it now.

When she first picked the wand the wand up, it gave off such a warm, inviting light when Frisk picked it up that everyone knew it was not just a right choice to have this wand made, but the perfect choice. Thus, Frisk had Ollivander's first wand made with monster fur, and Ollivander was in for several weeks of happy experimentation as payment.

Frisk woke up, and for the briefest second, wondered where she was. Realization came quickly though, and she changed into her robes, gathered her school things and headed down through the common room to breakfast. After the feast last night, breakfast was reasonably simple, and with much more familiar foods.

Ginny was there, and while Ginny gave her a friendly nod, she was busy, talking with friends in her own year. A prefect – Percy, if she remembered the name correctly - handed out the first year schedules. And after breakfast, it was time to locate her class.

Transfiguration was Frisk's second class of her Hogwarts career. So she was only somewhat startled at the lack of an obvious teacher. And it wasn't much more surprising that a cat that was apparently counting students and matching them to a list on the desk.

After all, if a ghost could teach history of magic, and if the Dog Patrol could guard the area outside of Snowdin, why couldn't a cat teach transfiguration? The cat suddenly changing into Professor McGonagall, on the other hand, that caught Frisk by surprise. She was... moderately successful in class, she did better than Laura Johnson, at least. She wryly admitted her older cousin, apparently a Ravenclaw, was going to be hard to live up to.

"McGonagall is our head of house, Laura," Kevin Duncan whispered, annoyed. "Like she is going to compare us like that." They ceased arguing when McGonagall's eyes focused on them, and they went back to practicing.

When the bell rang, and the first year Gryffindors prepared to file down for lunch, but Frisk was interrupted. "Ah, Ms. Dreemurr?" McGonagall said, "A word please." Frisk's mind raced of all the things she could have done, or possibly been accused of doing in her first day at Hogwarts, while the rest of the class filed out the door, murmuring to each other.

"Now, I had my fifth year Gryffindors in my first period, and I overheard an interesting rumor," McGonagall said. "That you were going to tell the story of how you fell into, and escaped, the underground this evening."

Frisk blinked at her. "It's going to hang over me anyway," Frisk said quietly. "I think I should just get it over with."

"I think that's actually a very good idea," McGonagall told her. "Would you mind if I sat in and listened as well?"

Frisk shook her head. "No, not at all, professor." Though she was bemused at the attention she was getting.

"Mr. Potter, I suspect, will be relieved that the attention will not be on him for a change," Frisk's expression was confused, even more so by the momentary grin McGonagall allowed herself. "Ah well, go down to lunch, Ms. Dreemurr. I shall see you this evening."

There was to be double potions that afternoon, with the Slytherins. She'd already heard the rumors, that Professor Snape, the potions master, was the hardest teacher of Hogwarts to please, and it went double for Gryffindors. So, she buried her nose in her potions book over lunch, determined to impress the unimpressible.

It hadn't worked. Snape had already been irritated by something that afternoon, and he had found something to complain about with each and every Gryffindor's cauldron. The Slytherins, apparently, were either all better potion makers, or immune to his criticisms. It was almost with relief that Frisk headed back up to the great hall for dinner, though her stomach was already churning with the thought of what she had promised to do that evening.

But she was determined to see it through.

Thus, after dinner, she climbed back through the Fat Lady's portrait hole into Gryffindor tower, and wasn't completely surprised to find the common room already filling up with students of all years. It was Mettaton's TV show all over again. McGonagall sat, alone, in one corner of the room, the students all giving her a fairly wide berth. A high backed comfortable chair had been pulled near the fire, facing outward, to give her a place to sit.

She looked out to the group, swallowing down the butterflies. Some of the faces she recognized, like the four Weasleys... and that was probably a fifth, others were her year-mates, who she'd spent the day with. Others she didn't, including the dark-haired boy with the scar in the shape of the lightning bolt.

She took the seat, and a hush fell over the group. McGonagall had pulled out a quill, already making some series of notes on parchment.

"Hi," she said nervously, "I'm Frisk Dreemurr, and about seven weeks ago, I climbed Mt. Ebott. We've all heard the stories, right? The legends?"

A brown-haired girl, sitting next to the lightning scarred boy, put up her hand. Frisk blinked and paused. "It's said that people who climb Mt. Ebott do not return," the girl said.

"Let her speak, Hermione," the red-haired and probable fifth Weasley said, giving her a playful light shove.

"It's... it's okay," Frisk said, "She's right, after all. There's a reason for it. There's a hole, a hole to the underground." She stared down at the throw rug in front of her. "I didn't have a very happy childhood. I never met my parents, and I don't know what happened to them." There was a brief mutter through the common room, and multiple sets of eyes glanced toward the boy with the lightning scar.

"I had no relatives that I know of, and so I bounced between different orphanages and foster homes." The next words were difficult, but she had to say them. "When I climbed Mount Ebott, I hadn't wanted to return. What I found down there was a hole to the underground..." and she launched into her story. She told of her first encounter with Flowey, how she was saved by Toriel. There was laughter at Papyrus's and Sans's introductions, especially from the twins. She wasn't truly interrupted until she began to describe having to directly confront Undyne.

"How could you not fight back against her!" a large boy asked incredulously. "She was trying to kill you and start a war!"

"Stuff it, Cormac!" an older girl told him. "You're always trying to pick a fight."

"It's probably a good question," Frisk said, looking directly at him, and giving Cormac her most determined glare. "But I knew how much Papyrus looked up to her, how much he said she had taught him. All I could think was, 'How could I hurt Papyrus's best friend?'."

Out of the corner of her eye, she could see McGonagall giving an approving smile.

"I couldn't." She continued, describing her encounters with Mettaton, and how the robot's goal contrasted with Undyne's, that it wanted to prevent a war, instead of start one. Then she got to the Undertale itself. Of how Asriel, the son of King Asgore, had taken the body of Chara, his human best friend, through the barrier to fulfill his final wish, to see the flowers of his home village, one last time.

More than a few eyes in the common room were damp when she told them that Asriel hadn't survived the night either. Frisk had to stop at that point, to dry her own eyes. A few minutes later, she continued with Sans's judgement of her actions. "But I couldn't continue on," Frisk said, and then told her first direct lie. "I knew, somehow, that if I confronted Asgore at that moment, one of us would die. And neither of us wanted to kill the other. In fact, I think both of us would have wanted to sacrifice themselves for the other. For the other to be free." There was a good reason she knew that. She'd lived through it. She'd seen Flowey... his own son... break the last hope keeping Asgore together, and then strike Dad's soul directly. Even if it, technically, never happened.

"But I got a reprieve," she said, back on honest ground. "Undyne wanted me to do her a favor," and gave the comical account of her... 'date' with the Head Scientist of the Underground. But then she skipped the laboratory itself, not talking about either the experiments with determination, or the amalgamations it created.

"When I confronted Asgore, finally," Frisk concluded, "Toriel arrived, all the way from the ruins, to break up the conflict," she explained how, in her moment of need, when Flowey attacked, everyone came. Then she told the last lie. "All I remember is blacking out. When I awoke, I was surrounded by the friends I made, and the barrier was broken. Something must have happened," she swallowed her guilt. "but I don't know what it was. We made our way out to a ridge on the side of Mt. Ebott, with the monsters enjoying a sunrise for the first time in their lives. Which is when the Ministry of Magic found us, and you probably can guess the rest. Monsters are finally free." Frisk said, finally allowing herself to smile. "I hope I'm still welcome at Hogwarts... in Gryffindor."

There was silence for a few moments, then applause. She wasn't sure where it started, but it echoed throughout the common room.