ONE

Lush emerald green cliffsides adorned the window view from the train compartment. They were close now. And usually, in this realization, with painted Scottish landscapes marking the imminent arrival of the students to their new school year, feelings of excitement and eager anticipation would wash over the students. At least, it always had for Eve. But not this time.

Eve de Santos glanced from the blooming green mountains to the sparkling deep blue lake below them. The lake's bridge had always been her favorite of the ride to Hogwarts. But the nostalgia she so long had for this view, and the anticipation she had felt for it at this moment, was not there.

She absentmindedly twirled one of her long dark curls between two fingers. She did this often when she was feeling uncomfortable. The remembrance of this made her drop her hands to her side again.

She looked away from the window, glancing at the two other passengers in her compartment. Douglas Dempsie and Lucie Fontaine, her two best friends who had taken this ride with her for so many school years now, both looked forgotten in their thoughts. Douglas sat across from the two girls, but instead of spending the entirety on the train ride detailing every moment he had consumed during the summer away from his two friends, he sat quietly playing with a loose hem on his jacket cuff.

Eve noticed his neatly combed and side-parted hair, a refined style that was so different from his usual brown messy locks. He looked older, mature, even handsome.

She looked to Lucie, her usual blond bob was paired with stern concentration, that at this time was directed at the compartment door where she idly watched the passing of students through the train corridor.

For a moment, Eve tried to imagine what they must have looked like together years ago, at 11 and 12 years old. Their childlike faces of animation and curiosity, passing sweets to one another and taking turns sitting in the window seats. Life seemed painless back then, almost dreamlike to Eve, who had come to the wizarding world as an outsider.

For years, she spent every single day learning new things, every moment more astonishing than the next. But just like all growing spells, eventually, she settled in Hogwarts life as a natural. She didn't bat an eye when howlers went off during breakfast or when she found herself fighting off a new plant Professor Sprout brought to her. She thought about how she let out the most piercing girlish scream the first time she saw Professor McGonagall change into her cat form.

She looked to her friends again and considered sharing these memories but decided against it. Instead, she just turned her attention back to the window and wondered if she looked older too.

"Weird, isn't it?" Douglas asked, finally snapping out of his thoughts. Or perhaps he had been searching for the right thing to say the entire time as well.

"Yeah, it is," Eve answered, her gaze not leaving the outside view. The sun was setting now, and the hillsides were transforming into flatlands adorned with specks of cottages, many already disposing little gusts of chimney smoke.

The trio sat in silence after this, only to have it broken once again by the sound of their compartment door opening, revealing Marcus Fitzgerald. Already adorned with his yellow house robes, he took a seat next to Douglas.

"Sixth year, wild isn't it?" he asked, looking to the three of them with the gleaming enthusiasm he usually displayed for even the most mundane activities.

Eve couldn't help but grin at the fellow Hufflepuff. Despite the now sprouting chin hairs, Marcus never seemed to have changed much in the last five years. Even after everything that happened last school year, he had still written multiple letters to her over the summer holiday, all of which were filled words of hopefulness and dreamy plans for the future ahead.

"You know, I've always liked the sound of sixth year," Eve said. She casually glanced at her friends, testing to see if they would join in the pep.

"Yeah, even numbers… sounds good, doesn't it?" Douglas offered, his tone mild, but Eve could see the hint of humor in his eyes.

"Sixth year Potions doesn't sound very good," Lucie muttered, but even her complaint, her friends knew she must be feeling okay if she was responding.

"Maybe they'll do some sort of toast to Cedric at the feast? You know, a small commemoration or something. It would have been his last year…" Marcus said, his voice trailing in his last sentence. He glanced apprehensively at the three.

Eve had been waiting for this moment for the entirety of the trip. The moment when Cedric Diggory's name would finally be uttered between them. When he would eventually be recognized, but in the past tense. As in used to exist, at one point in time lived, and in this very moment, in another universe, would have been on that train with them.

Eve sighed heavily and shrugged to no one in particular.

"Who knows what the professors have in store for us. It's anyone's guess. Wells is bringing a bottle of fire whisky for the first quidditch team meeting and making a toast," Eve replied, thinking back to the letter she got during the summer from Fernando Wells, the keeper for the Hufflepuff team.

At some point during the holiday, Wells seemingly decided to take on Cedric's role as captain, which Eve didn't mind in the slightest. She didn't want it; she couldn't imagine anyone wanting it. She did know, though, that she wanted a drink.

"Wells is going to need more than just one bottle, I think," Douglas replied, having gotten his own letter from him during the summer.

Eve and Douglas were chasers for the team, but it was unlikely that either of them had even thought about quidditch during the summer.

"We should probably put on our robes," Lucie said, shooting up from her quiet spot next to the three, grabbing her bag, and escaping out of the compartment.

The three remaining inside watched her go, undoubtably knowing what she was feeling in their separate ways. Eve gave Lucie a few minutes before she followed her to the changing rooms, leaving Douglas and Marcus alone with their individual miserable countenances.


There was no commemoration for Cedric Diggory's death at the dinner feast. No memorial words, not even a banner of some sort with his initials. It seemed as though the mourning of his death was left behind with last year's parting words and replaced with something much more uncomfortable, sinister even, in Eve's thoughts.

There was no way she would ever be able to look at the color pink the same way again after the introduction given to them of Dolores Umbridge. A new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher was assumed for this year, but the position was certainly not expected to be given to a woman in pink kitten heels.

When Lucie muttered how the woman didn't even look like she could even form a Patronus spell, with such an obscenely vacant pursed smile, Douglas mentioned that she worked in the Ministry of Magic with his father.

When the two girls pressed for more details, he silently shook his head and went back to his mashed peas. There was nothing more to say about her. This response was not comforting to Eve in the slightest.

And even when the speeches were over, there was a strange feeling looming in the Great Hall that night as students dug into the first feast of the school year.

Eve made glances around the other houses, wondering if the feeling was just reserved for the Hufflepuff side, the table that was so prominently missing one of their own. A vast majority of the other students were in their usual lively discussions, telling animated holiday stories and giving friendly introductions to newly placed first years.

Eve couldn't help but find herself scanning the Gryffindor table, her eyes landing on her choice of curiosity.

Harry Potter was sitting with his usual group of friends, seemingly tensed and distracted. He exchanged unheard words between his housemates, but there were no high spirits in his face as he did so.

For a moment looking at him brought Eve an unwanted memory from last year. One of collective screaming and sobbing and Harry's body hunched over that of another's.

No, not right now.

She turned and met the eyes of Douglas, who sat directly in front of her. He had been watching her, and when their faces met, he leaned in to whisper.

"He was on trial with the ministry, you know, this summer," he muttered, glancing in the direction Eve was just turned.

Eve had no idea Potter was on trial but, how could she? She spent summers in her childhood home, in her muggle neighborhood, with muggle parents who only read The London Times. She could never keep up with the wizarding world when she was outside these walls.

When she shook her head, Douglas began to recount the previous week, in which Potter was charged with using magic as a minor outside of school. When Eve offered that the offense happens all the time to students during breaks, Douglas stated that Potter had done the magic in front of muggles, a serious crime, even if a wizard was of age.

"He's here, though," Eve replied, looking at Douglas for a sign of explanation. Surely, it couldn't have been that serious.

"My father said Dumbledore himself came to testify for him, saved his sorry arse completely. But I must say, he's certainly already made an enemy of someone this year," Douglas replied, pointing his fork that held a half-bitten slice of ham in the direction of the staff table. Eve already knew who he was pointing to but still took a second to glance at the pink bubblegum lady of terror.

Even with all her muggle-born ignorance of the inner workings of the ministry, Eve still knew nothing good could come out of being on Dolores Umbridge's unpleasant side.