Dear readers. Thank you again for reading. I really appreciate watches/favorites/reviews. I am open to any comments/critiques.
Also, yay for more OC's!
Faith arose early the next morning. She grabbed her belongings, which were much easier to carry now that she had the majority of her things tucked away in her large trunk, and headed down the stairs and into the pub. The Leaky Cauldron was bustling with families eating breakfast and getting ready to head to King's Cross Station. She took notice of the red haired family having breakfast at yet another long table, as well as another large group of red-heads who were making their way down the stairs, two of the girls with loaded trunks. This red-haired family consisted of an older couple, two younger sets of parents, along with the two students and four younger children.
Faith was so interested in what everyone else around her was up to, she almost forgot that she had somewhere to be. The young girl had planned on getting breakfast, but with the swarm of people dining at the pub, she decided to skip the most important meal of the day and make her way over to King's Cross Station.
Outside of the pub, Faith walked down the sidewalk, out of the alleyway and toward the main street. She looked around the, trying to find a taxi. Behind her emerged the red-haired family with the children, talking loudly and happily amongst each other. Faith tried to ignore them, focusing on the cars passing by on the road. She had never hailed a taxi before; perhaps if she waved her arms one would stop.
Hesitantly, as a cab made its way toward her, she held out an arm. The driver didn't even notice the poor child standing there innocently, a large trunk with a rat cage on it by her feet.
"Going to Hogwarts, lass?" said a thick Irish accent from behind the girl.
Faith turned around the see the oldest man on the red haired family, the rest of his pack coming up behind him. Now that they were closer to her, she could tell they all had relatively thick accents. Faith nodded.
"First year, eh?" the man said. She nodded again. "Well, good idear takin' da taxi. Dat's how we plan on gettin' ta King's Cross as well. Need 'elp hailin' one?" Faith didn't want the man's help, but she also realized she was much too small to get a driver's attention or even be taken seriously by a cab driver.
"I think so," she said.
"No problem, as long as you don't mind a bit o' comp'ny. No use takin' up a whole taxi to yerself, right?" the man said.
"Sure," said Faith. The last thing she wanted was to share a ride with this obnoxious Irish family, but she would need help finding the train to Hogwarts once at King's Cross so she might as well take a helping hand while it was being offered to her. "Thank you."
"Great!" said the man. As a taxi approached, he whistled and waved his arms big and strong. The cab pulled over to the curb. "Top o' da mornin'!" the man greeted the cab driver. The trunk of the taxi opened and the man helped Faith put her trunk inside. "We'll take this one with ya, lass. It'll take more than one cab for this whole family. Go ahead and take the front."
Without question, Faith happily took her place in the front seat of the taxi. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see that the cab driver was not at all pleased to have a rodent sitting in his front seat, even if it was in a cage and resting on Faith's lap. The girl watched as the older woman, presumably the man's wife, slid into the back seat. The oldest girl of the two students handed her trunk to the man and he loaded it into the trunk as well. She sat in between the man and the woman in the back seat, a barn owl caged and sitting in her own lap.
"We'll be off to King's Cross Station, if you please," the man said from the back seat. As the cab pulled away, the three in the back seat waved goodbye to the rest of their family, who were busy hailing other cabs.
"How're you doin' this mornin' sweetie?" the woman in the back seat addressed Faith politely, breaking the silence. Her accent wasn't quite as thick as the man's.
"Excited," Faith said. Her tone may have suggested that she wasn't feeling much of anything, but she truly was excited.
"As all first years should be!" said the student between the two.
"Rowan'll be a third year, dis year," the man sitting next to her explained proudly. "Where're our manners? My name's Cian O'Shea. Dis is my wife, Ana," he pointed to the woman, "and our youngest daughter, Rowan." The girl smiled and waved, trying to peer around her large owl cage.
"Our two older children and our grandchildren should be right behind us," explained Ana. "Our granddaughter, Riley, will also be a first year too!"
"Oh okay," Faith said, smiling slightly. "I'm Faith." It would be great for her to start meeting people her age already. Maybe these people weren't so bad after all.
"I hate seein' first years trying to make their way to... school... without their parents," Ana said, noticing that the muggle cab driver was listening curiously. "Have you got parents meeting you at King's Cross?" Faith shook her head 'no'. "Well, alright, we'll have to take you to the platform then. We won't leave you stranded!"
"Thanks!" Faith said, her spirits lifting, getting more and more excited the more this family spoke. The three in the back seat talked excitedly and as discreetly as they possibly could. It only took the cab driver about twenty five minutes to get to the train station from The Leaky Cauldron.
The O'Shea's took no time at all getting out of the cab and grabbing their luggage from the trunk of the car. They placed the two trunks as well as the rat and owl cage on a moving dolly and started making their way through King's Cross Station.
"I never like takin' muggle transportation," Cian muttered to Faith as the cab pulled away and they headed inside. "Luckily we only hafta use it ta get ta King's Cross ta drop the kids off n' ta pick 'em back up."
"Otherwise we'd just use floo powder to get around, but you'd know all about that," Rowan chimed in, skipping happily at her mother's side.
"Not really," Faith said.
"Oh?" Rowan replied. "Muggle born, then?"
"Rowan Canagan O'Shea!" Ana said sternly, giving the thirteen year old a threatening look. Cian put his hand over his face with embarrassment.
"Not that there's anything wrong with that! I'm just curious!" she defended herself. "If she is, then she'll not know what's goin' on at Hogwarts. It'll be a bit of a shock."
"I'm not," Faith answered, before Ana could say anything else. "I've just been at a muggle orphanage since I was four- haven't seen either of my parents since."
"What happened?" asked Rowan. Her mother responded by slapping her across the back of the head. "Sorry," she said, fixing her long, red hair. Faith wasn't bothered by the question, though. She simply shrugged in response.
"Dunno," she answered casually. "But I remember the magic." She thought back to sitting in the grass with her father as he made things hover. Her favorite thing for him to do was transform dandelions into frogs.
"Well that's good," Rowan said. "But you won't know much about Hogwarts, will you?"
"Not a thing," Faith replied.
"We'll fill you in on the train then!"
Faith followed the family until they stopped between platforms 9 and 10.
"I don't see a platform 9 and 3/4," Faith said innocently, looking at her ticket. Rowan laughed, and Faith was confused as to what was so funny.
"Just watch us," Rowan said. She hooked arms with her father at the elbow, and together they pushed the trolley carrying she and Faith's trunk toward the wall. Just when Faith thought they were going to crash, they vanished. Had they just run straight through the wall? The girl looked up at Ana O'Shea with wide eyes.
"You saw that right," she said. "You just run straight at the wall. Don't draw to much attention to yourself. You'll go right through." Faith looked from Ana, to the wall, then back to Ana. "I'll go with you, darlin'," she said to Faith's relief. Ana placed her arm around Faith's back and they both set off at a jog. The young girl wanted to flinch when they reached the barrier, but she kept running- holding her breath and closing her eyes nervously.
When her eyes opened back up, her mouth came agape. They were in a whole different train station, and a beautiful red and black train stood before her, puffing clouds of thick, gray smoke. There were already a handful of students saying goodbye to their parents, hopping aboard the train. Older students were walking up and down the platform, already dressed in their school robes, helping younger students load up their luggage and get on the train. Faith's smile grew and her eyes lit up. She wished her father could be with her at this very moment, seeing her off like the other children. Regardless, Faith was happy to finally be heading to Hogwarts and away from the orphanage for most of the year ahead. It was a good feeling.