Chapter Three
Severus accompanies her to the entrance of the great hall.
"From now on you should call me Professor Snape, among the students," he tells her, before leaving her at the entrance. Many students watch her curiously as she walks to the table where she sees students wearing the same colours she is. She sits down, and looks up to the teacher's table. Severus comes in, his robes flowing dramatically, and takes his seat. He looks at her and nods once, before focusing on his plate.
"New student, are you?" an obnoxious voice comes from her left side. She looks at the girl. She has a round face and medium-length brown hair. Sasha simply nods, hoping the girl won't say anything more, as she has an annoyingly loud and piercing voice. Sadly, she continues, "Why are you so late? Classes started weeks ago."
"That's none of your business."
The girl watches her through suspicious eyes, "Hm."
"And why is that?" asks a boy who's seated in front of her. He has white blonde, short hair and high cheekbones. He reminds her of someone.
She doesn't answer him, but asks a question instead, "Are you Lucius' son?"
When Severus explained everything, earlier, he told her who the most prominent Death Eaters were, describing a few characteristic traits of each so she would know which name belonged to which face.
His eyes widen, he appears smug when he answers, "Yes. I'm Draco Malfoy. You know my father?"
She watches him pensively, "Sort of." Meanwhile she thinks, 'Well, I saw him at a Death Eater meeting, does that count? Hmm.'
"You didn't answer my question," he then states.
"Indeed." She enjoys tormenting the boy, he looks far too happy with himself.
"Well?" He's obviously waiting for an answer.
"Well nothing."
The boy doesn't look happy at not getting his way. He seems like a typical spoiled little brat who's used to always getting what he wants.
She finishes eating – in silence, thankfully; the rest of them noticed she wouldn't let them know anything, for now. She leaves the table and its suspicious occupants, and continues to the hall's entrance. She's going through when a girl crashes into her. The girl instantly starts apologizing, "Oh dear, I'm so sorry, I didn't look where I was going—"
Sasha was about to interrupt her, to tell her it was okay, but a deep, familiar voice is quicker, "Obviously, Ms Granger. Ten points from Gryffindor."
The Granger girl doesn't look up and silently heads to her table. Sasha raises her eyebrows to Severus, "That was a bit harsh."
He doesn't answer, "Follow me," he states, "I'll show you the Slytherin dormitories."
She shrugs and simply follows him. Several students go out of their way to avoid the professor. "I met Lucius' son," she tells him when they arrive in a deserted corridor.
"Draco."
"Yes."
"No, you should say Draco. The students will wonder how you know Lucius' first name, otherwise."
"Oh, okay."
"It's here, the password is 'Pureblood'." He taps the stone once with his wand, the stones move aside and a doorway appears.
She nods, "There's just one problem; I don't have a wand."
"Right. Let's go to my office. There we'll be sure not to be overheard."
In his office he explains the way a wand chooses its wizard or witch, and how despite the fact that a wand that isn't one's actual wand won't work as well, it will often work for, at least, simple spells.
"Considering you don't actually need one, only to integrate and be unnoticed, it won't matter which wand you have. As soon as I've procured one, I'll call for you."
"Okay, but in the meanwhile I have to go to class, don't I?"
"I'll talk to the headmaster about that. Since it is but a week until the end of the semester, you don't have to follow those classes; or not actively, if you do decide to go. Before the start of the next semester, you'll have your wand."
She nods, "Thank you, Severus."
"Professor, or sir."
"Yes, in public areas."
"Hm."
She smiles, "Good afternoon."
He nods curtly. With a movement of his hand, the door opens and she leaves.
The rest of the day Sasha spends exploring the castle. It's quite interesting, especially the magical qualities about it, such as the living portraits and the moving staircases. On her walk she nearly bumps into a woman who's just coming from around the corner. She's clad entirely in pink. Sasha absolutely abhors that colour. The woman is small, chubby and kind of looks like a toad.
"Well, well, well. What have we got here?"
Ugh, not another one with an annoying voice.
"Why aren't you in class?"
"I'm just a new student, looking around," Sasha answers, "Not causing trouble of any kind, don't worry," she smiles.
"Do not talk to me like that! Don't you have any respect? Come with me."
"What? Why?" She doesn't get an answer, but, in order to not cause a scene and stay – somewhat, at least – unnoticed, she follows.
They arrive at the woman's office – an atrocious pink room filled with bows, lace napkins and cats painted on plates covering the walls. Once they sit down, the professor asks, "So you are the new student?"
"Indeed, Professor."
"Now tell me, why didn't you come to Hogwarts when you were eleven?"
"I was home schooled." The woman is suspicious, Sasha notices. But why does she ask such questions? Her position in this school is lower than the headmaster's, so shouldn't she simply trust him? "Why do you ask, professor? I'm sure the headmaster will explain all of this, if he hasn't already."
"Do you know who I am and why I'm here, child?"
Ha, 'child', if only she knew… "To teach?"
"That too. My name is Dolores Umbridge – that's professor Umbridge to you – and I'm a ministry official. I'm here to keep an eye on this school, for the ministry. Therefore I can ask you whatever I want to. Not that I should justify myself to you, but you are new, which is why you apparently don't know everything yet." She seemed to be talking to herself, in that last sentence. "Now, tell me," she continues, "why aren't you being home-schooled anymore?"
"My parents died."
"You say that very calmly, almost emotionless." Yep, she's still suspicious.
"I am not an overly emotional girl and I don't like to talk about it, professor, does it matter?"
"No… Not at all… And in which year are you?"
"Fifth year."
"You appear to be older."
"Yes, well, I'm seventeen but Professor Dumbledore decided to put me in fifth year anyway. You should talk to him about that."
"Oh, don't worry, I certainly will."
"Will that be all?"
"Mm, yes, for now. Be sure to follow the rules. Breaking them will, most certainly, result in a detention."
"Yes, that's normal, is it not?"
"Indeed, child. Have a nice day …?"
"Sasha, Sasha Louhi."
"Have a nice day, Ms Louhi."
"You too, professor."
She is happy to finally be out of that room. Truly annoying, that woman. She's startled by a girl's voice, next to her, "So you had to talk to her, did you?"
Sasha looks up; it's the same girl she bumped into before, the Granger-girl who got points taken by Severus. She's got voluminous brown curls and brown eyes. When she sees it's Sasha, she looks surprised, "Oh, I'm sorry. Never mind."
"Wait, it's okay," she calls her back, "I know your last name's Granger, what about your first name?"
"Oh, um, I'm Hermione. I'm from Gryffindor," she then adds. Hermione seems to be surprised she's talking to her, and a bit suspicious as well.
'So this is one of Harry's friends, if I'm not mistaken; that's convenient,' Sasha thinks as she recognises the name as one Severus mentioned when talking about Harry Potter and his friends.
"Yes, I noticed when professor Snape took points, earlier," Sasha smiles, "I'm Sasha, by the way, Sasha Louhi."
"Okay... Nice to meet you, Sasha. Don't take this the wrong way, but I'm simply surprised you're talking to me; I'm a Gryffindor, you're a Slytherin. Our two houses don't usually interact. Not civilly, anyway. But you're new, aren't you?"
"Yes, I am, I guess that's why I don't really care about this thing between Gryffindor and Slytherin."
"That must be it. And your parents must not have told you about all of the rivalry then?"
"Well, they never went here."
Hermione nods understandingly, not asking anymore questions about the subject, to Sasha's surprise,
"Anyhow, I'm going to the library, do you want to come along?"
"Yes, sure, I love books."
"Great, finally someone who does, my other two friends hate the library."
"Well, shame on them," Sasha laughs.
The library is huge. It smells of old paper and dust. She immediately loves the place. Together they look through the collection. After a while she asks, "Hey, Hermione, are you looking for something specific?"
Hermione pops her head around the corner of the rack Sasha's browsing, "Not really, I'm just trying to find something interesting, to read as a pastime. Why?"
"I thought I could help you, if you were looking for something, that's all."
"Okay," Hermione smiles at her and returns to her rack. She seems surprised Sasha would want to help her.
A short while later the library doors open. A boy's voice calls out, "'mione? You here? Oh, there you are."
Somewhere someone hushes him.
"Not so loud, Ron, what's the matter," Hermione's voice answers.
"Nothing, really, we were just wondering if you could look over our potions' essays," another boy's voice explains.
Sasha goes towards where they are standing, rounding the corner of a rack to look if those two voices indeed belong to Ronald Weasley and Harry Potter, as she suspects.
Hermione is standing with her back to the racks, the boys are facing the direction Sasha comes from. They are a redhead, who looks rather joyful despite it being a Monday, and a boy with messy black hair and round glasses who, in contrast to his friend, seems tired. The redhead whispers – quite loudly for a whisper –, "Uh oh, snake spotted…"
"Ronald!" Hermione chastises. She turns around, "Don't mind him, Sasha, he often speaks without thinking."
"Oi!"
"Aren't you the new girl?" the other boy – Harry, most likely – asks, frowning at her.
"Yes, I'm Sasha," she replies as she walks closer and joins the group.
"She's okay, boys, she's not like the other Slytherins. She's actually nice," Hermione tells them.
The black-haired boy smiles, though his smile seems strained and his eyes have a flicker of suspicion, "Hi, I'm Harry, this is Ron."
"Nice to meet you," she nods.
It was rather easy to find the three friends, luckily. She doesn't want to make any more 'friends' than is needed for her plans. "What is the odd look on your face for, Ron?"
"I'm just surprised a Slytherin can be nice, is all."
"Um, thank you?" She smiles at them. "So you two are the ones who hate books, right?" She looks at Hermione for confirmation.
"Yes, that's them. See," she turns to the boys, "I found someone who does like books. Told you I wasn't the only one."
"Well, then you're both unique," Ron decides.
"I needed to look over your potions essays?" Hermione then asks.
"Oh, may I read along? That way I can see what you're learning currently, as I haven't attended a class as of yet."
"Of course. Come on, we'll sit at that table over there."
The four of them talk until dinner time, hardly getting any work done. As it turns out, getting close to them while being a Slytherin isn't so hard after all. They are walking to the great hall for dinner, still talking, when they come across Severus in one of the corridors.
"Potter. Not causing trouble again, are we?"
"No sir," his eyes are narrowed and Sasha feels the hostility flowing off him in waves.
"Well, run along. I need to talk to Ms Louhi, here."
"Yes sir." The three of them quickly continue their way. They look over their shoulders, though, to give Sasha a pitying look. She simply smiles, shaking her head when they are out of sight.
"Come," the professor orders.
"You say that quite often, have you noticed?"
"Hm. Hasn't their mindless blubbering bored you yet?"
She chuckles, "No, not yet. They're not so bad, really."
"Good thing you think so, you'll be spending a lot of time with them."
"Where are we going?"
"The Headmaster's office."
As soon as they enter the eccentric room, Headmaster Dumbledore greets them, "Ms Louhi, Severus… I hope you like the castle, Sasha?"
"I do, Headmaster. It's…," she looks for a fitting word, "intriguing."
"Good, very good. Now, first of all, Severus talked to me, earlier, and we have decided to give you a place in the Order. Severus appears to believe you are on our side, and so do I."
She nods. They are right in trusting her. She realises they don't have a lot of proof, so she's happy they believe her nonetheless. Severus must've told him about the legilimency; that was probably the main, if not only, reason for believing her.
"And," he continues, "we have acquired a wand for you." He opens the top left drawer of his desk and takes out a long, thin, black box. He carefully takes out a darkly coloured wand. It's a dark brown, nearly black. Its surface is somewhat rough. The handle is well-defined with purposefully carved lines.
"Here, try it."
"Thank you, Headmaster."
It's a foreign feeling, holding a wand, sort of unwieldy to her, but she supposes she'll get used to it.
She focuses on a book that is laying on his desk and moves her wrist upwards, the wand following the movement, the same way she does usually with her hand. One half of it raises up into the air, but she can't levitate the rest of it. "Hm." She frowns.
"Try this movement," Severus takes out his wand and, focusing on the book, first whips it to the right and then down. The books completely rises.
She imitates him, once it's back on the desk. Indeed, the book levitates. "Thank you, Severus."
He nods.
"You will still need to learn the names of incantations. It will be noticed if you always use wordless magic. And also the wand movements, apparently, as they seem to affect your magic. Perhaps Severus will assist you?"
The professor simply nods again.
"I will, headmaster," Sasha answers.
"Well then, one more thing. You will be spending the Christmas holidays with the Order, or, more specifically, with Harry and the Weasleys, since all of the Order won't be at headquarters during the entire holiday."
"Will I?"
"Yes, it's the perfect opportunity to be introduced."
"That's a good idea, indeed," she agrees, "but I will need to leave for about two or three days, during the holidays, for personal matters. Is that acceptable?"
"Yes, though I would advise you to go after you've been introduced and not during the festivities."
"That won't be a problem, I don't have a fixed date yet, anyway."
"Also, it might be best if you leave Hogwarts by train, like the other students. Perhaps even along with Harry, Mr Weasley and Ms Granger. I will let Mrs Weasley know she has to take you with them, as she's the one who'll come to get the three of them, along with the other Weasleys, from the railway station."
[To be continued]