DISCLAIMER : HEY… I DO NOT OWN HARRY POTTER. I AM USING THIS J.K.R WORLD SHAMELESSLY. : P
This story is AU.
I am planning to make this as a series for all 7 years but the chapters will not be big later as I will have to go slowly and build up the AU.
Enough talk…. On with the story…
Chapter 3 : Hogwarts Express
September 1st arrived in no time. Harry Potter got out his bed early and decided to meditate. He had found a book in the manor's library about a branch of magic called Occlumency. He found the idea of blocking the mind from intruders intriguing as well as necessary. Andrea Zabini, Blaise's mother had agreed to teach him too when he found out that all the Zabinis learn it before they go to Hogwarts.
Harry ordered the house elf to bring his breakfast in his room itself because he knew there would only be sappy useless family reunions with the marauders and lily dotting on Godric and Godric whining about things. At 10:30, lily came up and told him to get ready to go to platform 9 ¾ for Hogwarts express. Half an hour later, the Potters, Sirius, and Remus were standing on the platform staring the scarlet Hogwarts express.
Harry turned to his family who looked questioningly at him. He muttered goodbyes to everybody and went inside the train.
Harry searched the train for an empty compartment and entered it. He was sitting on his own when the door opened and a girl who should be first year came in.
"Anyone sitting there?" she asked, pointing at the seat opposite Harry. "Everywhere else is full."
Vibrant green eyes met intelligent blue eyes.
"Sure, I am Harry Potter"
"Daphne Greengrass,"
"Nice to meet you. Don't you stay in Godric's Hollow?"
"Yeah, I have not seen you out enough though…" came her reply.
"Yea… he just likes to sit at home and shine his arse." Came a voice from the door.
"Hello to you too Blaise. Did you eat chocolate pancakes for breakfast?"
"How did you know?"
"Well… you are your hyper cheerful today so I just knew. I am your best friend you know."
"Whatever…" said Blaise sticking her tongue out childishly. "Hello Daphne"
"You know her?"
"Unlike you, I am not a social outcast."
"I am not an outcast. Just unique, one in many"
"God… please give me his ego in breakfast so he will get rid of it." Said Blaise ginning.
"Alright you win. Damn I never win…"
"He he he, so care for a game of exploding snap. "
"Sure" replied the other two.
While they had been talking and playing, the train had carried them out of London. Now they were speeding past fields full of cows and sheep. They were quiet for a time, watching the fields and lanes flick past.
Around half past twelve there was a great clattering outside in the corridor and a smiling, dimpled woman slid back their door and said, "Anything off the cart, dears?"
Harry, who had not had any breakfast, leapt to his feet and checked out her stash. She had Bettie Bott's Every Flavor Beans, Drooble's Best Blowing Gum, Chocolate Frogs. Pumpkin Pasties, Cauldron Cakes, Licorice Wands, and a number of other things
He got some of everything and paid the woman eleven silver Sickles and seven bronze Knuts.
The girls stared as Harry brought it all back in to the compartment and tipped it onto an empty seat.
"Hungry, are you?"
"Starving," said Harry, taking a large bite out of a pumpkin pasty. Daphne stared at him as if he had grown a second head and Blaise was looking at the goodies with a drool on her face.
"Just take them Blaise…"
Blaise literally jumped on the sweets.
They were all quiet for a while when a person Harry was least interested in opened the door flanked by a red haired boy who had dirt on his nose.
"Well brother, ready to tell the world that I am better than you."
Harry looked at him as if he was a eight year old.
"Godric, even this is petty for you. You as well as I know that the only thing you are good at is whining. So why don't you both dumb and dumber go back to the filth you were lying in."
He said this quietly but the disgust and loathing was evident. "don't mess with me, you don't have mom and dad to protect you.", saying this, he banged the door shut on his face.
Blaise was looking apologetically and Daphne was looking curiously at him.
"You two don't get along."
"Understatement of the century. Nope, never have, never will"
"Hmm"
"So what house do you thing you will be in?"
"Slytherin…", shouted both Blaise and Harry.
"Me too…", came amused reply from Daphne.
A voice echoed through the train: "We will be reaching Hogwarts in five minutes time. Please leave your luggage on the train, it will be taken
to the school separately."
Harry went to the bathroom to change while the girls changed in the compartment.
The train slowed right down and finally stopped. People pushed their way toward the door and out on to a tiny, dark platform. Harry shivered in the cold night air. Then a lamp came bobbing over the heads of the students, and Harry heard voice: "Firs' years! Firs' years over here! c'mon, follow me -- any more firs' years? Mind yer step, now! Firs' years follow me!"
They followed the huge man who introduced himself as Rubeus Hagrid. He led them to a boat.
"No more'n four to a boat!" Hagrid called, pointing to a fleet of little boats sitting in the water by the shore. The boy who Harry had met in Madam Malkin followed Harry, Blaise, and Daphne into the boat. "Everyone in?" shouted Hagrid, who had a boat to himself. "Right then -- FORWARD!"
"Heads down!" yelled Hagrid as the first boats reached the cliff; they all bent their heads and the little boats carried them through a curtain of ivy that hid a wide opening in the cliff face. They were carried along a dark tunnel, which seemed to be taking them right underneath the castle, until they reached a kind of underground harbor, where they clambered out onto rocks and pebbles.
"Everyone here?"
Hagrid raised a gigantic fist and knocked three times on the castle door.
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There you have it… chapter 3. The next chapter will be the sorting ceremony. Please read and review.
