For the sake of this story,Hermione, Fred and Bellatrix will be younger than Lucius. The years might not match up canonly, but do ignore that. They'll be kind of close to the canon year, but the major events will still happen canonically with the years they happen.
The night had been long for Hermione and she hadn't fallen asleep until the very early hours of the morning.
Sleeping in a foreign dorm, the woman who had tortured her almost to death was sleeping in the neighboring bed, the kind Andromeda Black in the bed on her other side.
Hermione and the two Black sisters shared a dorm with the second years girls whom didn't talk to them, but it certainly made up for the mostly empty room.
The class of 1966 had been one of the smallest due to being the generation born of those from Grindelwald's war. The generations to come would surely be bigger as it was then that the families decided to jump in numbers.
For Hermione and Fred, the halls were quite familiar and they remembered quite well all the secret passages that Fred had explored through the Marauders map, the map not even in existence yet.
Though in the Slytherin dorms, Hermione had encountered quite an interesting situation.
Bellatrix, whom she thought would have been extremely difficult to get along with, did not speak to her. She preferred to speak with Anita Urquhart, a tanned witch coming from Scotland. The girl had a strong Glasgow accent that made one of the other girls, Andromeda, giggle just a bit.
While Bellatrix was very vocal about her views in the Old Present, currently she rarely spoke of Blood Purity or Supremacy in Slytherin house. Here, she knew when to stop talking and when she should. Hermione rapidly found a few uncanny resemblances in character to herself, which made her a bit nervous. The night before, while the second year girls were having loud gossip sessions in the early hours of the morning, as Hermione was about to snap and tell them to sleep, Bellatrix had said exactly what Hermione wanted to say.
Hermione had mumbled a thank you and she had just hummed in response. Quite cold, Hermione deduced rather quickly.
The next morning, she had sat beside her brother at the Slytherin table for breakfast, his friends Rodolphus Lestrange and Cantankerus Nott around him as usual.
It hadn't taken long for Fred to get out of bed and come down to breakfast, Antonin Dolohov not too far behind him.
"Hermione, sleep well?" Fred had taken a seat next to Hermione that morning, an interested look in Lucius and Cantankerus's eyes as they watched the Heir and Lucius's little sister interact.
"Yea. It's different though. A good kind." She had casually said. "What about you? Who're your roommates?"
"Well, we first years sleep with the second years." Antonin waved as Fred pointed to him and Cantankerus. "We've got Nott, Dolohov, Rodolphus Lestrange, Malfoy and another guy but he doesn't talk much." He pointed down the table to where a second year had his head in a sketch pad.
"Doesn't seem to do much, that one." Nott added. "Always seen 'im sketching, but we don't know what."
"My roommates are Bellatrix, Andromeda and Anita Urquhart. We've got the second year girls too but they won't tell us their names."
"It's best you stay away from them then." Lucius advised. "If a Slytherin doesn't share their name with their own roommates, it's a sign of distrust and disloyalty."
"Disloyalty? Really?" Antonin laughed as he questioned the third year. "How?"
"Well, we in Slytherin are seen as the bad guys so as a fellow Snake, we watch each other's backs." Explained Lucius. "When someone refuses to tell you their name, they're not letting you in. We pride ourselves on camaraderie in our house. They're rejecting the idea and, in term, rejecting the members who want it as well."
"So, they don't show loyalty to Slytherin house then." deduced Fred. "Makes sense."
"Hey Cant, we've got a group of intelligent Firsties. Let's see how long it takes until one of them get on a Lion's bad side." One of the older students said.
"Pavel, leave them be." Nott talked back to the older one. Turning to the First years, he introduced them. "This is Pavel Parkinson. Fifth year and bane of our existence." The dark haired wizard whacked Cantankerus across the head with a piece of bacon. "Not the bacon man! I just washed my hair this morning!"
"Oh poor Cantankerus Nott with his greasy mess of hair." Pavel ruffled his hair teasingly, while Cantankerus did not seem to enjoy it very much. "It'd be nice if you put in the effort."
The older student left and Cantankerus passed his fingers through his hair, trying to flatten his brown-black hair against his head, but the thick strands stuck up in almost every direction, no matter how much he tried. "I get it from Grandmum side of the family Not my fault." He kept mumbling to himself, even using the knife as a mirror for his thick locks.
"His grandmother's family has hair that won't cooperate. Quite a show to watch every morning." Lucius told the first years. "He's like this every morning, cursing his mum's mum."
Seeing the confusion on multiple of the Heirs faces, Lucius sighed. "His grandmother was a Potter. Unruly hair, that lot. No matter what he or his mother do, their hair is all over the place." He pointed to the curled mess sitting on top of the second year's head. "He's got a little cousin or second cousin with the same problem. Not old enough for Hogwarts yet though."
Hermione sent a look to Fred, who nodded just enough for her to notice, but not anyone else. 'Maybe that's why Theo never did anything to Harry' Hermione wondered as she watched Cantankerus give up and pick up a muffin and chew it frustratingly.
"No more bacon in my hair? "Nott lowered his head for Rodolphus to stand and look over quickly.
"You're good." He sighed and returned to his breakfast.
"You firsties should head to class soon. Get a good look around the school so you won't get lost." Cantankerus tried to cover his mouth as he attempted to swallow a large piece of bread as he spoke. "There's always lost firsties in every House."
Fred, Hermione and Antonin all agreed and left the now empty plates on the table and dashed out down to the dungeons, Fred and Hermione almost going the wrong way by force of habit.
"Today, we shall be learning the Levitation charm, Wingardium Leviosa!" Professor Flitwick ecstatically announced. Fred and Hermione were seated beside each other, Antonin on Hermione's right, and Fred on her left. Bellatrix was seated on Fred s left and Andromeda was seated across the room. Due to her late arrival and the lack of available seats, she had to take a spot beside the Hufflepuffs.
"Now, just swish and flick your wand as you say, Wingardium Leviosa. Like this." The Charms professor demonstrated slowly with his own feather, careful not to fall off his stack of books, and levitated his feather. "Now try it."
Hermione leaned over to Fred and whispered silently. "Should we fake it or do it for real?" Fred answered the latter.
"Wingardium Leviosa" They both said together, levitating their feathers with surprising ease.
"Mr. Black and Miss Malfoy have done it! 10 points each to Slytherin!" the Slytherins high fived each other quickly before they continued to attempt the spell.
"Mini, can you help me out?" Hermione raised a brow and tried to keep herself from smiling when she looked at Antonin in surprise.
"Did... Did you just call me Mini?" She asked him, trying not to grimace
Uh... Yea... Like a nickna- I can take it back if you want!"
"No, no, it's alright. It's different." She smiled, beginning to show her friend the wand motion and how to pronounce it properly. It was only when there was an explosion that everyone turned to Fred and Bellatrix.
"Quite explosive, she is." Antonin whispered to Hermione, who had to bite her tongue to avoid letting slip a laugh.
"Oh, we ll be great friends." Hermione mumbled, trying not to laugh as Bellatrix coughed, the smoke from the singed feather blowing in her face. Her hair seemed fine though, her thick curls not moving an inch. One by one, the students went back to their work, attempting to ignore the glares of death Bellatrix sent them.
Potions class had been surprisingly pleasant with Horace Slughorn. He was quite cheery and enjoyed talking or giving tips to his students, an opposite in many ways to Severus Snape.
Instead of throwing NEWT level questions on his students first thing in class, he actually gave proper safety precautions and kindly answered any questions his students had, whether it was about him or the class.
The block had been spent with the Teacher pulling out the most common potion ingredients and the tools they would use for brewing, such as the cauldrons, the grinder, and where the knives were. It had been more informative than Professor Snape s class had been, where he would simply give you the instruction and see if the student either sunk or swam.
Professor Slughorn kindly aided his students who had difficulty with either cutting or grinding some ingredients and showed them easier ways to do it, the same result if they had done it either way.
Hermione had been paired with Anita Urquhart, one of her roommates, and they showed each other different ways to use the ingredients and even wrote a few inches of parchment on the different forms and ways to use Asphodel. They'd quickly gotten started on the essay and had even arranged to study together later that night.
Though Potions had been amusing, lunch finally rolled by and Hermione sat by her brother again, Cantankerus still seated across and Pavel Parkinson a few seats down. Nott's hair had finally subdued itself a bit that morning, but the curls still stood up all over.
It reminded her of Harry's hair. The Potter hair had to have been an extremely dominant gene and it was most likely the reason Theodore Nott had always kept it cut short. No one needed to know he had unruly hair like the Chosen One. It was less work that way to cut it.
Hermione was quite thankful for her new hair she had gotten when she appeared in this time. Her locks were flowing and void of any untameable curls. It was straight, with a bit of wave near the bottom, longer than Lucius and she was quite proud of it. No more issues being called a literal lion or big ball of frizz. She had beautiful, platinum Malfoy hair. While she would never admit it out loud, she had always been jealous of Draco for having such nice hair.
"How was your first classes?" asked Lucius as his sister took a seat and a wedge of a sandwich.
"They were good." She took a bite of her lunch and chewed it for a few seconds. "Black and I got 10 points each in Charms."
"Now don't you go telling that to Prefect Yaxley." Cantankerus pointed down the table to a dark haired wizard who was a few inches shorter than his comrades. "Seventh year. Was pretty mad when he didn't get Headboy." Lucius and Cantankerus let out small laughs.
"Poor bloke. Still hoping to grow a few inches." Rodolphus let out a snort at his friend's words. "Too bad he got it from his mother. He's almost as tall as his sister in Ravenclaw. I think her name is Isabelle."
Standing beside a first year, Slytherin Prefect Corban Yaxley was barely 6 inches taller than the 11 year old. It seemed to be quite the running joke that it had been the primary reason he played seeker for Quidditch. Smaller meant more Aerodynamic, so they picked the smallest seventh year.
Hermione had heard the sixth and seventh years joking and leaning onto the Prefect as if he was a leaning post. She had expected the Prefect to deduct points, but he simply laughed along with them.
Slytherin House really did have each other's backs, from walking to classes, to even mocking the Prefect s height without fear of being deducted points. It felt much more welcoming than Gryffindor had at the time. It had taken Hermione a few months before she really felt like she fit in, and here she felt natural from day one.
The was the only element that frightened Hermione more than she needed at the moment was the fact that Bellatrix was still observing her with the mix of death and intrigue in her eyes.