Disclaimer for last chapter as well as this one: I own nothing. Absolutely nothing.
Finding Hogwarts
"Hence being muggleborn, really Laura, your superior intellect astounds me," Blaise muttered sarcastically.
"Funny," Laura snapped back. "No, my mother is Hermione Granger."
"Of course," one of the twins, George if Laura was correct, said snapping his fingers. "Why didn't we think of it? Granger, and Granger." They hit each other on the back of the heads, while Laura and Blaise gave them blank looks.
"Ron Weasley's our Uncle," Fred said, with a 'well-duh' sort of voice, "and Harry Potter is our Aunt... I..."
"He's married to our Aunt," George said slapping Fred again. "Forgive him, he's daft." Laura and Blaise snickered. "But yeah Uncle Ron and Uncle Harry are forever talking about Hermione," the twins had started walking to the Great Hall, Laura and Blaise followed. "She was muggleborn see, eighteen when that ridicules law was passed, Uncle Ron was completely smitten with her, but never had the nerve to ask her out –"
"Or anyone for that matter."
"True. And so with this law he wrote in as fast as he could, but not quick enough. Someone else applied first, and she was to marry um... how does Uncle Harry put it Fred?" George asked, they had entered the Great Hall.
"The Amazing Bouncing Ferret."
"Yes, she had to marry the Amazing Bouncing Ferret, Uncle Ron just calls him a slimy git."
"My mother loves ferrets," Laura said, with a smile. "She always bursts into laughter when she spots one. She'd never tell me why, just that she remembered something from school. See ya later." The twins sat at their table, while Laura and Blaise continued to their own.
"Mom's gonna find out eventually," Laura said, "about that marriage law. Especially if she is the same Hermione as the one on the stone. Could you imagine her face if I told her that was getting married. And what if I had to marry some old git? That would be awful!"
"Well they've changed the law," Blaise said. "It's no longer a first come first serve, like a buffet or something. Anyone can apply for a witches hand, but she gets to pick which out of the ones that applied she wants to marry."
"Oh that's lovely," Laura muttered. "But what if that is the same Hermione, I mean if she is... would she remember anything about... about here?"
"She won't Miss Granger," said a voice behind her. She turned to see a teacher standing their with a bunch of papers in her hand. "Professor Uppertip, head of Ravenclaw. Your time tables." She handed one to Blaise, one to Laura, and another to someone sitting on Laura's other side. "And Miss Granger," she handed her another timetable, "these are the nights your dance classes are on. Be at the entrance hall no later than the time given on that sheet. And do know, I expect you to keep your grades up, even with this dance." She stalked off and continued handing out timetables, Laura had the distinct impression that Professor Uppertip did not approve of dancing.
"You're taking dance?" Ramia asked with a shock. "How do you expect to keep up with anything in this school if you do that? I've heard my brothers talk, and the homework load is huge!"
"I've been balancing dance and school for longer than I've been able to balance on one tip toe," Laura said.
"You'll see," Ramia said warningly, "you'll see. You're gonna have to drop dance to keep up with school work. By the end of the year I'll wager."
"I'll drop out of Hogwarts before I drop out of dance," Laura said back calmly spreading some peanut butter onto her toast.
All three girls gasped at that, and Ramia looked ready to yell when Blaise cut in, "I heard Harry Potter's daughter, Lily, does dance."
"Yeah," Laura said, "at my mothers studio!"
"You're mother has a studio?" Blaise asked.
"Well, her and friend of hers Miranda Lambeenee own it. Mom's the secretary," Laura said with a shrug.
"So you, you actually knowHarry Potter?" Kathreen sounded amazed.
"Sort of. Not really. I know his daughter Lily, but that's just because she has ballet before I do, and I said hi. Mr. and Mrs. Potter are nice, but I don't really know them." She refused to answer any other questions, instead looked at her timetable. There was a lot of funny sounding subjects, and some that sounded normal. The timetable also said which textbooks to bring to each class, and other items that were necessary, like dragon hide gloves for herbology. Other classes included potions, charms, defense against the dark arts and array of other subjects. Potions was with Hufflepuff, charms with Gryffindor, so was herbology, transfigurations was with Slytherin.
"I think I'm going to hate transfigurations," Blaise said as they got up to leave. They had potions first, and Laura was thankful for a map on the back of the timetable. One just had to tell it what class they were going to, and it would show a green line from where they were – on the parchment – to where they were going, and as they walked forward the line shrunk to keep pace with them.
On the whole Laura found the whole day quiet boring. They had performed no magic, and the only homework was to read such and such chapters from various different books and answer the various questions set out by the teacher. The only interesting thing that had happened was that on the way to Charms they were held up by a poltergeist, Peeves, who refused to let anyone past unless they burnt their pants. Laura had looked down at her uniform before marching towards the door that was blocked.
"Now hold up there Missy," Peeves said in an annoying crackle, "your pants ain't on fire, now ain't they?"
"In case you haven't noticed," Laura said in a stern tone, "I am not wearing pants." The poltergeist gasped and made a show of looking down. "I am wearing a skirt."
Peeves glared at her, "Smarty pants!" and he flew away, pulling some of her hair as she passed.
She was a little nervous as five o'clock approached. Her first class was at five thirty, and she didn't know how she was going to get their. After a very quick dinner, she had her bag that was usually full of dance clothes, instead she had her outfit on under her clothes – plain muggle clothes, the timetable had warned her – and her her hair already done up. The bag was to bring them back in later.
Professor Uppertip was the one meeting her. "Are you taking me to my lessons professor?" Laura asked. The Professor was still in robes, and Laura knew she would stand out if she took her to a muggle studio. Did witches and wizards dance?
"Goodness no, us Professors cannot afford to leave the school. No, a ministry appointed guide will take you to and from your classes." Professor Uppertip said sharply. "He will be pretending to be your father," Laura opened her mouth to protest, the Professor cut her off, "don't worry, he looks enough like you no magic needed. I'm not saying he isyour father, but they need to think you are being taken care of now don't they?" Laura nodded. "Ah, here he is now. This way." Professor Uppertip led her outside and down a courtyard that ended with a well worn path. Sitting on the path was an open carriage, with two black horses pulling it. Sitting in the carriage and holding the reigns was –
"Mr. Malfoy!" Laura said with a huge smile. Sure enough, the man who she was convinced was perfect for her mother was sitting there with a dark cap over his bleach blond hair. He returned the smile.
"Miss Granger," he said with a nod. "Professor." Another nod. "We must get going, otherwise we are going to be late."
"Of course," She quickly climbed in the other side. "Goodbye Professor!" She waved until the cranky professor was out of sight. Then Mr. Malfoy took out a wand and tapped the reigns, they glowed green for a moment, and so did the horses harnesses, and suddenly the carriage was going and three times its normal speed, however Laura did not feel like she was going to fall out.
"I've really missed you Mr. Malfoy," Laura said.
"I missed you too Miss Granger," Mr. Malfoy replied.
Laura scoffed at him, "Miss Granger? Yuck, that's what people call my mother. Or Ms. Granger. I'm Laura!"
"Sorry."
"It's alright," they were silent. "Mr. Malfoy?"
"Hmm?"
"Won't the... the muggles notice if we show up in a carriage. Especially a carriage going this fast?"
"Nope, we are walking some of the way. The studio is at the edge of the town, and our story is we live close enough to walk, and that I don't like to pollute the air with car, car, car... the stuff that comes out of cars!"
"Exhaust?"
"Yes, that."
"Mr. Malfoy," Laura said after another pause, "how come you didn't tell me or my mother you were a wizard?"
"It's against the law," Mr. Malfoy said, "unless I was going to be married to her, or she absolutely needed to know."
"So you didn't have any plans of marrying her?"
"I barely knew her Laura," Mr. Malfoy said. "Perhaps if we did get to know each other better we might have." If Laura had been paying attention she would have picked up on the sour tone in his voice, but she was oblivious.
"You would have been cute together." They lapsed into silence again. She turned to look behind her, but could no longer see the castle.
"What house are you in Laura?" Mr. Malfoy finally asked, breaking the silence. The carriage had stopped, he climbed out before helping her down.
"Ravenclaw," she said proudly.
"Interesting."
"The hat didn't know where to put me, at first," she said as they started down the path to town. "It was going to put me in Gryffindor," a small smile twitched on Mr. Malfoy's face, "but it decided I had too much of my father in me. I don't even know my father! It said I was too sneaky for Gryffindor. So then it was going to put me into Slytherin, but it decided I was too noble. Blaise Zabini got into Ravenclaw too, I met him on the train. He says his father won't be to happy about that."
"No, I don't think he will be," Mr. Malfoy said softly before brightening up again. "You know, I was a Slytherin."
"Really?"
"Yeah. It's also why a lot of people don't like me."
"Well I like you," Laura said with smile. "I think the hat knew my mother too."
"Why would you say that?"
"It said I had my mothers skill, and her love of dance, and some other thing, and that I liked books. I don't like reading much, and but my mother can't stop reading."
"Maybe the hat just picked that up from your mind, it does that sometimes." Laura saw the town getting closer, and could already pick out the dance studio. She looked at her watch, five twenty, she was shocked, she didn't think they would get there in time.
"Maybe," Laura said. They were almost at the building when she remembered something else. "It called me Miss Malfoy."
"I'm sorry?" Mr. Malfoy said, stopping in front of the studio door.
"The hat, I called me Miss Malfoy. And when I corrected it, it said 'I forgot, you go by your mothers name.' What did the hat mean by it Mr. Malfoy?" Laura asked.
Mr. Malfoy opened the door and indicated for Laura to go in. She didn't move. "I'll explain later, alright. But not here, the," he leaned in, "muggles might hear." She nodded and entered the building. Mr. Malfoy followed, and stayed long enough to find out when Laura's classes would be over, said goodbye and left.
According to her timetable, Laura had an hour of Ballet, and an hour of Jazz tech. She quickly pulled off her outer clothes, so she was just in her body suit and tights, and pulled on her ballet slippers. Aunt Mandy said that she might have put Laura en Pointe next year, and Laura really hoped this studio would do the same. With her shoe's firmly done up, she started stretching, looking at the other girls. None of them were paying any attention to her, she was the new girl untried and unproven. She was expecting this, although she did wish her mom was here. Hermione always introduced new girls, or guys, or their class, and make everyone act nice and get along.
Her teacher was nice though, Miss Ronda. Nice, but strict, a good ballet teacher. Inwardly Laura was thankful that Miss Ronda taught the class like they were trying to get into an arts school or something and taking it seriously, not just some recreational class. She had already found at least one, if not more, things each girl had to work on and forced them to work on it while she had them in her clutches, but she never failed to encourage something who improved or did an exercise – or in their case part of an exercise – well. By the end of the class Laura was sweating. There was a one hour break between her two classes, and decided to continue her letter to her mother. She was going to do her homework before realizing that the textbook cover pictures moved, and that the titles gave her away.
She was hampered slightly when she went to continue the letter, she only had a quill and ink with her. So instead she asked the secretary to borrow a pen, saying she forgot one and needed to do her homework. In the rest of the letter, she talked about the studio, and how Mr. Malfoy was going to be the one taking her to and from all her dance lessons. She added how this morning she had found these two stones, and skipping over the one for the dead, said how one was to commemorate bravery, and she had seen the name Harry Potter on there, and just wanted to check if a Harry Potter did have a daughter in dance. She was sure that Lily Potter did go to their studio. However she was careful not to mention her mother's name being on the stone. She ended off by asking what school her mother had gone to for high school, she couldn't remember, and that a lot of people were wondering what type of schools muggles went to for their later years. She re-signed it just in time to go to jazz.
By the time Mr. Malfoy had picked her up, she was exhausted. This studio definitely worked her harder then Bee-File did, and in some ways she was thankful for it. She had changed back into her normal clothes and silently followed Mr. Malfoy as they walked to the carriage. All she could think about was a nice cool shower and getting ride of the sticky sweat. She must have fallen asleep on the carriage ride back because Mr. Malfoy had to shake her awake when they arrived.
"Thank you Mr. Malfoy," she said, looking at her timetable. Today was Monday, "I'll see you Wednesday."
"Bye Laura," he said and turned the carriage around and left. No one was in the entrance hall to meet her, and she was thankful. She returned to the common room, not paying attention to Lady Ravenclaw's question. She gathered up her pajama's, and a towel and headed for the shower that was in another room connected to the common room.
"I hope you're not going to the owlery in those," Blaise said once she was done her shower, and settled in to do her homework.
"Oh, right! I'm sorry Blaise, I totally forgot," she looked down. "I should go change then shouldn't I?"
"No," Blaise said, holding out his hand, "just give me your letter, I'll mail it off for you."
"Really?" Laura asked.
"Sure," Blaise said.
"Thanks," Laura handed over her letter, neatly rolled up, and sealed with a pink ribbon. She found most of the homework to be quiet easy, only potions stumped her for a bit, and she was still working on the questions when Blaise returned, although she did have it finished before he had finished his homework. She bade him goodnight and went upstairs. Instantly the girls wanted to know everything that happened at dance, but she wove them off with a yawn, and fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.
The rest of the week passed by in much of the same fashion. Her and Blaise would talk with Fred and George on the way to breakfast, and during the break between morning classes they four of them would hang out again. During lunch Blaise would usually complain about one class or another, particularly History of Magic, which Laura had to admit was a bit dull with the way the ghost teacher taught it, but she found it a fascination subject altogether, and couldn't help but pay attention. He was right too, he did end up hating transfiguration's, the Slytherins were horrible always calling her names, and making fun of Blaise. She would get a bit of homework done waiting for Mr. Malfoy, and before they left the carriage he bewitched her textbooks to look like muggle textbooks, before sending her off. The dance studio continued to work her hard, but she enjoyed it. She was taking, all told, ballet, lyrical, jazz tech, musical theatre, tap, a jazz competition class, and a musical theatre competition class, as well she was asked to do a solo for jazz as well, which would take up more time, but she had received permission to do so from Hogwarts and Mr. Malfoy.
Friday morning, the pattern was slightly cracked. Two owls came to their table, one in front of Blaise, and one in front of Laura. Blaise took his in his fingertips as he looked at the writing on the front.
"It's from Father," he whispered, holding it at arms length as he opened it, eyes screwed shut. Laura thought he looked rather comical as she unhooked her own letter from the owl, both owls took off at once.
"Do you want me to screen it for you?" Laura asked, "and tell you how bad it is before you read it yourself?" Blaise nodded and handed her the letter as if it had dung on it or something.
Blaise,it said in a bold handwriting.
What were you thinking, entering Ravenclaw? Your mother and I are very disappointed! Ravenclaw! You know, I had half a mind to Floo right over and get that Headmaster of yours to re-sort you! Do you realize what you've done? Centuries upon centuries of Zabini's all in Slytherin, but Blaise Zabini my son? No, he has to be different – defiled! I hope your sister doesn't follow the same disgusting path as you! As for this Granger girl, I don't like it. She's a halfblood! Not even a halfblood, practically a mudblood! If her mother wasn't such a tramp I might have allowed you to continue this ridiculous friendship that I am sure will have formed by now. But I must forbid you from having too much contact with Miss Granger, I am sure she is just like her mother.
We will talk about this over Christmas
Father.
P.S. Blaise sweetie, don't you worry too much. Just enjoy your school year, and have fun. Lots of love, Mother.
"Well?" Blaise asked when she put the letter down.
"He put flew in the wrong tense and spelled it wrong," Laura said tossing the letter down?
"Huh?"
"He said he 'had half a mind to flew right over' he spelled flew wrong, and used it in the wrong tense, it should be fly right over," Laura explained.
"No," Blaise laughed, "Floo is travel by fireplace." Laura looked at him with large eyes. "I'll explain later. Is that all he said?"
"No," she flicked the letter over to him. "You're forbidden from having contact with me, he called my mother a tramp, and me a halfblood and a mudblood. Whatever that is."
"He didn't," Blaise gasped picking up the letter, he scanned it over, turning very red and then very pale. "Well you know what, he's at home, and I'm at school, and I can hang out with whoever I like to!" Laura smiled at him, he's voice was faint as he said it, and she wondered how long that resolve would hold. "Mother will be able to talk sense to him. I'll send two letters next time, one to Father and one to Mother. She'll calm him down."
"Why would he call me a halfblood though?" Laura asked opening her own letter. "I mean my parents are muggles."
"Well obviously not if your mother was part of the Golden Trio," Blaise said. Laura nodded and shrugged at the same time. She bit into her toast and read the letter while she chewed. What she read caused her to chock.
"You're joking right?" She said out loud to no one, more the letter or her mother that wasn't there.
I also don't take credit for Peeve's idea of a joke. I read it in the sixth Harry Potter and thought it would be funny if Peeve's tried it every year. So I repeat, I didn't not come up with Peeve's idea of a joke.
Rebellion Author.