The first day at school was exhausting, but very exciting. At breakfast Renna received a letter from her best friend Gabrielle. She read it over, smiling. Gabrielle hadn't changed at all so far, judging by the letter. Harry tried to read it over her shoulder, but he took one look and found that he couldn't.
It was, of course, written in French. Renna laughed at his expression and said, "It's from my best friend. Basically she says-" she quickly scanned the letter again "-that the Triwizard Tournament is taking place, which we already knew from last night, and that her sister Fleur is one of the contestants. She also says that she's coming as well. I wonder why."
They were interrupted by Professor McGonagall, who was handing out course schedules. Renna was taking Potions, Defense against the Dark Arts, Arithmancy, History of Magic, Astrology, Transfiguration, Charms, Care of Magical Creatures, Ancient Runes, and Herbology. All of them she had with the threesome except for Arithmancy and Ancient Runes, which she had with Hermione.
After they finished breakfast they left for their first class, Charms. Renna was surprised to learn that each House had its own head, and commented on it as they began to go up a hidden staircase. Hermione asked, "Why is that strange?"
"Well, they just do it differently at Beauxbatons," Renna said, noticing that they all jumped over a step and also jumped over it.
"How do they do it there?" Ron asked. Renna looked up, surprised.
"Oh, there are no houses. The students aren't sorted, just everyone sleeps together sorted by year and, of course, gender. It isn't so much of a castle there as a palace, and it's very large." They passed through a tapestry and entered a hidden passage. "The classes are pretty advanced. We place a lot of emphasis on Charms and Transfiguration. We have many tricksters, probably because in our classes we are punished for talking too much and have to put a lot of effort into our schoolwork. Here, it seems like Peeves does most of your work for you, and I haven't seen any real tricksters like -ahem- I was."
"Dost mine ears deceive me?" someone said behind them. "No tricksters in this school? I pity you, my dear. Clearly we have not been introduced." Two identical redheaded boys with a resemblance to Ron joined them, taking Harry's and Hermione's places next to Renna.
"So, allow me to introduce us," continued the boy on the left. "We are Fred," he indicated his twin "and George Weasley, Trickster Extraordinaires of this school. We rule the roost with very little competition, it is true, but we make up for it in our pranks. Perhaps sometime we can prove our skill in a -ah- little demonstration."
Renna, laughing at this speech, said, "Oh, no. No tricks on the new girl who doesn't know her way around. That's just cruel. Later in the year I might have reason to start watching out for pranks, but not in the first months!"
"These are my brothers, Renna," Ron said dryly. "They're not exaggerating; they really are the biggest pranksters in the school."
"Aided and abetted by our henchman, Lee Jordan," Fred said, indicating the black-haired boy who had come with them.
"A henchman, am I?" Lee said in a would-be horrified voice. "After all my long years of service, I am merely introduced as a henchman? I am deeply wounded."
"Yes, well, casualties are to be expected in such a dangerous business as trickstering," George said with serene callousness. "You'll survive." Lee cuffed his friend. George ducked, laughing.
"Well, I bet I could teach you three a few tricks of the trade," Renna told them, grinning. "Especially about not getting caught; my friend Gabrielle was an escape artist, and she passed on her great wisdom to me. I made up the tricks, and she kept us out of trouble. For the most part."
"I look forward to spending my free time in your illustrious presence," Fred said, bowing elaborately as they arrived at the Charms classroom. "Until then, fair maiden!" The three boys moved off down the corridor to their own class.
"Did you really break rules, Renna?" Hermione asked as they entered the classroom.
"Yeah, I did," Renna said, still smiling over the encounter with the twins. "And the brilliance of it is that because I was at the top of the class and got along really well with the teachers, although we were caught and did have a reputation for troublemakers, the teachers usually didn't punish us too badly. If we did something bad enough to merit a visit to the Headmistress, though- well! We would get in a lot of trouble. Madame Maxime is very strict."
They sat at the front of the class, the boys asking for details of some of the tricks she had performed and Renna answering with relish. Some of her best memories were of playing tricks on teachers and fellow students at Beaubatons with Gabrielle, and even the times they were caught were fun. The rest of the class came in, all smiling at Renna and saying hi before they sat down. When Professor Flitwick entered, everyone stopped talking and settled down to the lesson.
Renna didn't see it, but Harry kept glancing over at her thoughtfully through the lesson, but always looked away before she noticed.
When I entered the classroom, I remembered that we had this class with the Gryffindors. I glanced around and saw that new girl Rennati talking to Potter while waiting for Professor Moody to arrive. Suppressing an odd surge of jealousy, I walked to the row behind the Gryffindor foursome and sat down. Pansy inserted herself into the chair on my left. I did my best to ignore her, but had only limited success. "Hey, Draco," she said with a sly smile. Ignoring my silence and inching closer to me, lowering her voice, she said, "So what do you think of the new girl in Gryffindor? I bet she's muggleborn. Hanging out with Potter and that stupid Granger, she couldn't be anything else."
"Have you ever talked to her?" I said suddenly, turning to look at her for the first time.
Pansy looked startled. "No, of course not."
"Then how do you know if she's muggleborn unless you ask her?" I said.
Pansy's face began to turn red. "Why would I lower myself to talk to her? She's a Gryffindor, and she hangs out with Potter, Weasley and Granger! And how do you know that she's not muggleborn?"
"Because," I said coldly, "I have actually talked to her. Twice. She was actually considered for Slytherin by the Sorting Hat-" I was stretching the truth there, because I didn't know if she had, but it was a good assumption "- and she's incredibly ambitious. She is, as a matter of fact, pureblood. She told me." I didn't mention that at the time we had spoken I came across as a complete prat and was worth her scorn. Pansy didn't need to know something that was still a sore point for me.
Pansy hissed, "Well, if she's so wonderful, then why don't you go sit with her? Or invite her to take my seat!" and she moved to sit with her gang of friends.
Feeling satisfied, I turned my attention to the front of the class as Professor Moody entered. I was a little disturbed by Pansy's last remark, because my first, and hastily repressed, reaction, was to take her up on that. I didn't, of course. But even wanting to was very odd.
I had a hard time concentrating at first. Rennati was sitting directly in front of me and I found myself idly watching the glint of the sun on her hair. That was before Moody started talking about the Unforgivable Curses. When he asked if anyone knew of any, I raised my hand. I knew about all three from my dad. Rennati also raised her hand, along with, to my surprise, that idiot Longbottom. Granger, of course, also had her hand up, with Weasley. But we were the only ones in the entire class, and I was the only Slytherin.
He called on me after Weasley and Longbottom had identified the Imperius and Cruciatus Curses. Rennati's hand had gone up repeatedly, so she also knew all of them. So, typically, had Granger's. But he called on me.
"Avada Kedavra," I said softly. This spell gave me the creeps. My dad, when he had told me about it, had demonstrated it on a dragonfly. It had freaked me out really badly, and now Moody was going to demonstrate it again on that spider. Whoopee.
When the class was over, I slung my bag over my shoulder and headed for the door quickly. Caught in the press of kids, I knocked into someone. "Sorry," I said automatically, and then saw that it was Rennati. "Oh, um, sorry," I said again.
"It's okay," she said, smiling.
I smiled back. Thinking that I could at least get in some good lines now, I said, "So I hear you're quite the naughty girl, huh?" Damn, damn, not the best thing to say when you're trying to prove to a girl that you're not just a hormonal bastard. Not a good thing at all. I furiously tried to think of something to repair the damage, but I was afraid that something stupid would come out of my mouth again.
But then I saw the other three Gryffindors approaching. I didn't want to deal with them, so I said, "Um, okay, well, I guess I'll see you around. We've got a lot of classes together." I turned away from her just as Potter looked up and saw me. He scowled as I walked away, and when I looked back he was talking to Rennati, probably asking her what I said. He glanced up and saw me watching and scowled again. I grinned cheekily at him and made a rude hand gesture. Renna caught it and glared at me. I winked at her and kept walking along the corridor, feeling rather good about myself. Despite making a fool of myself, I had managed to piss off Potter yet again.
But why had I made such a fool of myself? I had said sorry, then when I saw who it was had apologized again. What had made me do it?
I entered the Great Hall and slung my bag onto the ground, slouching into a chair. Rennati entered right behind me and I noticed sourly that most of the boys followed her progress to the Gryffindor table. She was completely oblivious, talking eagerly to Granger She was ridiculously gorgeous. As she sat down she glanced over at me, and I looked away quickly.
As Renna sat down at the Gryffindor table for lunch, she looked over at the Slytherin table and caught Malfoy watching her. He turned back to his own table, but she had a harder time of concentrating on what Hermione was saying about the Unforgivable Curses after that and instead replayed her encounter with Malfoy in the hallway. She had been putting her book back in her bag when she felt someone bump into her. She looked up and saw Malfoy.
Just seeing him that close to her had made her heart thump painfully in her chest, but she had managed to keep calm and act normal throughout their brief encounter. When Harry had asked her what he had said, she just said that he'd run into her and had apologized. When Harry had seen him watching and Malfoy had made a rude hand gesture, Renna had frowned and hoped that he remembered their conversation on the train. He winked at her and then was lost in the crowd.
After dinner, when everybody else was in bed, I went for a walk through the corridors to think a little. Avoiding Filch, Mrs. Norris, and Professor Snape easily, I traveled the moonlit corridors without really paying attention to where I was going.
Eventually I arrived at a window that overlooked the lake, and I sat down in the deep windowsill. Staring over the lake, I was struck by how very quiet it was. I couldn't hear anything. The lake was like glass, and the moon was reflected perfectly on the surface. Nothing moved at all.
I relaxed against the window and let all of my surface thoughts drift away, thinking of nothing in particular, just savoring the quietness. But someone kept on intruding into my thoughts, and finally I just gave in and thought about her. As beautiful as all this was, I would rather be doing something else with someone else.
Renna couldn't sleep. Finally she crept out of bed and pulled on her jeans and favorite T-shirt and tugged her black robe on over them, but left it unfastened in the front, liking the effect it had when she walked and it belled out behind her.
She left the girl's dormitories and stepped silently down the stairs into the Common Room. It was empty and dark, the fire mostly coals by now. She pushed open the portrait hole and stepped out into the hallway.
"A little late for a stroll, isn't it, dear?" The Fat Lady asked as she swung closed behind Renna.
"Oh, hush," Renna said absently. "I couldn't sleep." She walked down the hall, not thinking of anything in particular. She didn't pay attention to where she was going, which was probably a bad idea; she didn't know her way around the castle yet.
She was also extremely lucky to not meet any of the Hogwarts rule keepers in the halls, but she didn't know that.
She turned a corner into a moonlit corridor and stopped. Someone was sitting in a windowsill about halfway along the hallway. She approached silently, and when she realized that it was Draco Malfoy, her heart gave a little jump.
He was staring out into the grounds, the moonlight turning him into an ice prince. Softly, not wanting to startle him, Renna said, "Draco?"
He turned his head and saw her standing in the shadows behind him. He smiled. "Couldn't sleep either?" he said, pulling his legs up and giving her room to sit down.
"Not really," she said, taking the proffered seat. "You?"
"Yeah," he said, looking out at the lake. "Every once in a while I go for a walk in the corridors, just to clear my mind." He sighed. "Everything's so peaceful after dark." She watched him for a little while, and then he turned his head and smiled wryly. "What?"
Renna blushed, but said, "Why do you and Harry hate each other?"
He was startled, she could see that quite clearly. He began to answer automatically, but she cut him off. "Do me a favor. Just think about it for a while. Why do you hate Harry?"
He sat for a moment, his changing emotions flickering over his face and discomfort in his eyes.
I couldn't believe it. The most beautiful girl I had ever met was sitting across from me, our knees practically touching, and a philosophical question hanging in the air between us. My automatic reaction was, "Because he's a Gryffindor and an idiot, and is full of himself because of a stupid scar," but when I started to say that, she cut me off and asked me to think about it for a while.
So I did. And the more I sat there, the more I realized that I had never asked myself that question before. Why did I hate Harry?
Well, because I had always been told that I should hate him by my father, because he brought down the Dark Lord and restored Muggle lovers like Dumbledore to power. Plus he was a Gryffindor, and Gryffindors were naturally the enemies of Slytherin.
But had I ever given him a chance? Maybe because it was night and I was thinking differently, but the only reasons I could think of for why I hated him was because that was what I had been told to do. And out of my own experience, he always grabbed every chance he got to be in the spotlight.
"Well," I said slowly, "He's always seemed very full of himself and always grabs every chance to be in the spotlight."
"But think about it," Rennati said softly. "Has he ever, as you say, grabbed the spotlight, or has it been forced on him because of something he did when he was so young he can't even remember it? When has he done that, out of your own experience of him? I'm genuinely curious; you've known him for much longer than I have. I want your opinion."
Once again, I thought about it. Once again, maybe it was the moonlight making me think differently or something. There was that time in our second year when he walked into Flourish and Blotts and ended up on the front page with that dumb Lockhart, I remembered. But he didn't make his own way to the front and ask for them to take his picture. From what I remember, Lockhart jumped on him and pulled him up. And wasn't he blushing?
"There's also the fact that he's a Gryffindor," I said, sidestepping her earlier question about my experiences of him. Only after I said it did I realize that she was also a Gryffindor, and I had just insulted her.
I winced. She just said, "I would think that you'd know that Godric Gryffindor and Salazar Slytherin were best friends before they fought over that stupid prejudice about pure blood. Best friends. I don't expect you and Harry to buddy up all of a sudden, but think about that. And think about the fact that the Founders broke their friendship over pure blood. And tell me if you think that's a stupid reason."
I was silent again. There was that time when he set a snake on that Hufflepuff, I thought. But I didn't speak Parseltongue; how could I, or any of the school really, know what he said? The snake hadn't bitten the boy; it had curled up and watched Harry, but it hadn't hurt anyone. Had we all just reacted because we heard Parseltongue? And why would he do that, in front of the entire school? What was the gain for him? He had to put up with people thinking that he was the Heir of Slytherin for the rest of the year; that seemed rather counterproductive, to me.
"Well, he brought down the Dark Lord," I said, then winced yet again, realizing that that made me sound like a Death Eater.
"Did he really?" Renna said, sounding a little surprised. "I thought that he sat on his cot while the Dark Lord killed his mother and then tried to kill him, but for some unknown reason the killing curse backfired onto the caster. Doesn't sound like he did very much at all."
Dammit, I hate it when she's right, I thought, annoyed. And unfortunately she's right quite often. She had just shot down all of my arguments, and left me feeling rather stupid. I dunno why I hate him, but I just do!
"Will you do me favor?" Rennati said suddenly, and I drew myself out of my thoughts and looked at her. "It's getting late. Will you think about that stuff, and then ask yourself if you have justification to hate Harry? And one more thing. Have you ever tried to get to know Harry, himself, instead of the person everyone else says he is? Have you ever tried to learn who the boy is behind the Boy Who Lived?"
She stood up, unfolding herself from the windowsill. I followed her. She was a few inches shorter than me. She smiled up at me happily, with the light of the moon falling on only half of her face and turning her into something magical. "Well, I suppose I should start back to Gryffindor Tower now," she said, turning away. Then she stopped and muttered something under her breath. "Shit."
"What is it?" I asked. She was frowning, a little embarrassed.
"I don't know how to get back to the Gryffindor common room," she confessed, running her hands through her hair distractedly. "Of all the times for my status as New Kid to kick in, it had to be now."
I grinned. "Well, that can be solved easily," I said. "Just nock over that suit of armor over there, and that will bring Filch at a run, and he'll take you back to the Tower. Maybe not right away, but you'll get there eventually." I laughed at the horrified look on her face. "I was just joking. Come on, I can take you back."
"Why am I not surprised that you know the way to Gryffindor Tower?" Rennati said rhetorically, following me as I began to walk down the hallway.
We didn't talk much on the way back, keeping an eye out for any of the authority figures who prowl the corridors after hours.
"Good night, Rennati," I said when we had reached the portrait of the Fat Lady that marked the entrance to Gryffindor Tower. She had already opened it, after I had covered my ears so that I wouldn't hear the password.
"Call me Renna," she said, turning to me. "Good night, Draco." She smiled. "Think about our conversation, will you?"
"I will," I promised. I paused, then bent and gave her a soft kiss on the forehead. "Good night." I watched her enter the tower, then turned and headed down to the dungeons and the Slytherin common room, thinking about many things.
R/R, please! Even if you don't like it, say something!