Chapter 2 - W2

"Miss Hebert," the man called out.

I stopped, my hand gripping the darkness powder in my pouch tightly. Running would have been a better option, but until I knew how they were tracking me it might be useless. The fact that he knew my real, original name which there was no way he should known was more than a little concerning.

No one should know me by that name; no one in this world. As far as I could tell, the girl whose body I was wearing was named Millie Scribner.

Had Cauldron sent someone for me?

That didn't seem likely. In the last minutes of the battle against Scion I had used up the Doormaker's powers, and Cauldron no longer had the ability to simply open doorways to other worlds. They didn't seem like the kind of people who would care much about me anyway; their leader had shot me twice in the back of the head.

This was a member of the Wizarding community, and he should not know my name.

All sixteen of the wasps and bees I had collected flew out from behind me and circled around. I needed to keep him talking for long enough to get them into position. They wouldn't do a lot of damage, unless I was luck and he had an allergy, but they'd distract him long enough for me to use the darkness powder and the tripping marbles.

It might be enough for me to get away. We were out in the open, but there were a dozen different escape routes I could use. I'd mapped them out in my head when I'd found this place. The last thing I'd wanted to do was to be trapped inside a culvert when the people who were trying to kill me came back.

"I'm not sure I know anybody by that name," I said cautiously. "Why do you want to see her?"

He stood at stared at me. There was something about the look in his eye that I didn't like.

"I am the professor of an exclusive school, one which she has been invited to," he said. "May I have your name?"

"My mother always told me not to talk to strangers," I said.

"And yet here you are," he said.

There was something about the way he spoke; it was very precise.

I'd read a little on the bus back; from what little I knew, wizards used their wands to create any number of powers. They were like mini-Eidolons, able to create and maintain any power at all. Unlike him, they weren't able to do just anything, only abilities that they had been trained to do.

The important thing that I'd gathered from it was that they needed their wands to do just about anything.

The man had a wand in his hand, and I had to treat it like it was a loaded weapon. There were two different options for me... stay as far away as possible so that it was harder for him to aim, or close in and try to get it from him.

I couldn't tell what kind of martial arts training he might have had; it was possible that he might not have had any. People tended to be lazy, and if they had a certain power they tended to rely on it overly much.

It was only people who had sub-par abilities like I'd once had who were forced to work harder. Bug control hadn't even ranked on the scale of super hero and villain abilities, but I'd made it terrifying.

My reputation alone had been enough to get me out of some scrapes. I no longer had that, and I was going to have to work with my wits.

We'd both been silent, staring at each other for a moment.

"You are an annoying child," he said.

"I've been told that," I admitted. "More than once. I'd be happy to give that letter to her."

I stepped forward, my eyes never leaving the wand he had in his hand. If he lifted it I'd dodge to the right and lunge forward, depending on my bugs to distract him long enough for me to get the wand.

"So you do know where she is," he said. He glanced back at the culvert. "It would seem that she has fallen on hard times."

By the time he glanced back I had already closed half the distance between us.

"Her parents had an unfortunate accident," I said. "Met with some dangerous people and didn't come out alive. You wouldn't know anything about that, would you?"

He stared at me.

"It would seem unusual for a child to come out of a situation like that unharmed."

"Some people are lucky, I guess," I said. I was almost there.

I had the darkness powder in one hand, and I was easing the pocket knife open with my other. It wasn't easy; Swiss army knives were hard to open at the best of times, and one handed in the dark was even harder. However I finally felt it slide open just as I got within arms length of him.

A cut to his wrist and he'd drop the wand. I'd step inside his reach, and the knife would slice the femoral artery in his thigh. The shock and blood loss would most likely keep him from being a threat after that, but only if I could catch him by surprise. This new body was small and weak and didn't have the strength or reflexes my old body had.

"I am Severus Snape," he said. He stared me in the eye for a moment, and I felt the beginnings of a headache. "And I am here to offer you admittance to Hogwarts."

"What?" I asked. "So you aren't here to kill me?"

He glanced down, and he must have seen the glint of the knife.

Mister Snape stepped back and slowly put his wand away. "I am here to make an offer. There was some concern when it was found the some of the other prospective students had met with unfortunate accidents."

"Accidents, right," I said. I chuckled sarcastically. "Whatever makes you people feel better."

We were alone; I was sending some of my insects out to the limits of my range, and they weren't detecting anyone else. He might have been arrogant enough to think that he'd be able to take a muggle child by himself, but I'd already survived one attack.

His eyes narrowed. "What do you know about what has been happening?"

"I overheard them planning to kill three more kids and their families," I said. "Before they got their letters."

"And you chose not to go to the police?"

He knew enough to call them police instead of whatever the hell word the others kept using. Despite that, he still chose to walk around in robes.

"They said they had people in the department."

He straightened up. "If this is true, then Hogwarts is the safest place in Great Britain that you can be."

Hogwarts.

"That's the school," I said.

"Yes. You are a witch, and Hogwarts will teach you how to reach your potential."

"Me. You are saying that I'm one of you people?"

He stared at me.

I wasn't sure why I hadn't made the connection before. All of the other dead had been members of this race... wizards or whatever they called themselves. It stood to reason this was why Millie Scrivener had been targeted.

It explained the feeling I'd gotten when I'd handled the wands. I'd been quick to explain that away as sales tactics, or as something inherent to the wand itself, especially since Ollivander had been so insistent that it was the wand that chose the wielder.

"You know who my people are," he said. "And what they can do."

"I've seen some of the things they can do," I said grimly. "So why would your people be trying to kill me if I'm one of you?"

"Some people believe that this sort of power should be reserved for those who have enjoyed it for several generations. They fear that newcomers will prove to be corrupting influences on their way of life."

"So they are racists," I said. "How does that help me?"

"Hogwarts is the one place they will not dare to attack you," he said. "Also, it is better than a hole in the ground."

I stared at him. Did I believe him? I couldn't be sure.

My impression of the wizards was that they were arrogant enough to believe that a normal human child wouldn't be worth trying to fool. Normally, they'd be right too.

In my world, people gained powers when they triggered; it happened when they'd had the worst day of their lives. It wasn't unknown for it to happen to children, and so people were a little more guarded around children.

Here, apparently people my age were considered powerless, even by the Wizarding community.

"How did you find out my name?" I asked, challenging him.

"There is a magical quill," he said. "Whenever a child's magic first manifests itself, the book writes their name in a book. For most children, that happens early, and letters are sent out to them on standardized dates, giving them plentiful time to prepare for their journey."

He hesitated. "Some people are late bloomers. Their magic doesn't manifest until that last month. If it does not happen until September then they have to wait another year."

"I don't have any magic," I said.

"The quill does not make mistakes," he said. "Have you not had unexplained things happen around you? Been able to push your will onto the world?"

My bugs.

I felt a sudden shock go through me. I'd been assuming that I'd been getting my powers back, slowly but surely. But it didn't make sense that the connection in the brain to the alien intelligences that gave us our powers would exist in an entirely new body, not in a world where the shards hadn't been giving people powers.

I wasn't getting my powers back. I was mimicking them with this "magical" power, whatever it was.

According to the book on magical history that I'd skimmed, records of wizards went back five thousand years, long before Scion had ever gotten close to this planet.

"Maybe," I admitted reluctantly. "But I overheard some men saying that all of the children had birthdays in August."

"Children with birthdays in September are not accepted until the next year even if they do have their magic," Snape said. He paused. "You don't seem surprised at the existence of magic. Most muggles have more questions. Have you been exposed to the magical world before?"

It meant that someone had either seem the book or whatever list they'd copied from the book to keep the students organized. While I would have expected the students to have been kept in alphabetical order, it was possible that they'd been kept by birth month. I'd seen stranger organization schemes during my trip to Diagon Alley.

"I followed some strange looking people and found Diagon alley," I said. I pulled out a wand. "Bought a few things."

For once he seemed flabbergasted.

"You've been rather resourceful," he said finally. "But we should get you to safety."

My bugs were hearing distinctive cracking sounds in the distance. Had I been followed back here, or had he? There was a good chance that whoever assigned him to come get me had my name on a list somewhere.

That meant that my best bet to finding the people who'd done this was in Hogwarts itself.

He'd heard the sounds, and while he was trying to look cool and calm, I could see his fingers tightening on his wand, and a sudden stiffness to his posture. Whoever was coming he didn't want to meet, at least not with me in tow.

"All right," I said.

He held out his hand, and a moment later I felt the world contract around me as though I was being squeezed by a tube.

Strider's teleportation ability was a lot more pleasant.

We were suddenly standing on a huge lawn that sloped upward. To my right was a dark forest, and I could feel that it was full of insects, even if I could still only control a few of them.

Up the slope there was a castle.

"There are anti-apparition spells that protect Hogwarts," Snape said. "To prevent wizards from simply apparating inside."

"No moat?" I asked.

Not being able to teleport inside was nice, but if I could walk up to the door and blow it off its hinges, it wasn't that good of a protection. Hopefully there were other things protecting the castle, or I'd have to rethink my decision in coming here.

I knew better than anyone that a school was not necessarily a safe place.

He glanced at me, but didn't deign to reply. We started walking up the slope.

"You know that you have a mole in the castle, right?" I asked. "I overheard the two men who killed my parents saying that they'd gotten the names off a list in Hogwarts."

He stiffened, but didn't say anything.

"How'd they know I was staying in a culvert?" I asked. "No one followed me. Was there a master list that had all the names and the addresses on it?"

From his body language I could tell that there was.

He handed me my letter, and I scanned it. It was addressed to Taylor Hebert, North East Culvert... hmmm... I hadn't known the name of the park. That was really specific.

Apparently I was going to have to buy a whole lot of the crap that I'd turned my nose up at... cauldrons, robes and the whole bit. Luckily I'd already bought the wands and the books.

"I gather you're accepting the invitation even if you believe that the Dark Lord has agents inside the school?" he asked.

I was getting winded on my way up the slope. It had been a long day, and this body was dreadfully out of shape. I was going to have to restart my running and build up my endurance again.

"It would seem prudent, now that I know you can track me wherever I go and someone here is looking at the book that has my location," I said. "I didn't get all of this...just the wands and the books."

"Wands?"

"For breakage," I said. At his look I shrugged. "I'm a child."

"Most children who break things do not plan ahead," he said. "Unless it is deliberately done, and often even then. They also tend to prefer to pretend that they are older than they really are, unless they see some sort of gain."

"I don't trust people," I said. "And if the wands are this important, isn't a spare a good idea?"

Buying a second wand had actually been an impulsive decision. I'd been in denial about the feelings I'd had when I'd finally found the right one, but there had been a kind of strange euphoria when I'd felt that power in my hand.

I was going to have to watch myself; in my old body I'd just barely been an adult. Now that I was in a preteen body, I also had a preteen brain. I'd still have an advantage over other children my age because I'd been through these experiences before.

Having to go through puberty a second time wasn't something I was looking forward to. The only thing that would be worse would be not going through it, because one of these genocidal wizards got to me.

I was going to have to watch my step at this school. In my old school, half the kids had been in gangs, but only a quarter of them had actually been carrying weapons at any particular time. If this really was a school for magic, then every child would have a weapon in his pocket, and all of them could try to kill me.

"I suspect that you will be a headache to whatever head of household who has to deal with you."

"That's not my concern," I said. "I've got people trying to murder me, and so I really don't care what anyone says."

"You won't be allowed the knife in school," he said.

I held up my wand. "No weapons allowed?"

"The Wizarding world frowns on its students being stabbed," he said. "No matter how satisfying that might be. For that matter it's illegal to carry in Muggle Great Britain as well."

"Well, things are a little more lenient where I come from. You defend yourself or you die."

"I wasn't aware that the United States were so violent," he said.

His United states probably wasn't. Mine was a post-apocalyptic hellhole... and that was before the apocalypse had actually started.

We reached the top of the rise, and I finally got my first good look at the castle. My breath caught in my throat. I'd seen other worlds and things no person should have to see but I'd also been raised on Disney just like every other little girl in America.

Because of that, castles had a special place in my heart, and this one did not disappoint. I couldn't help but stare at it.

"Welcome to Hogwarts," Snape said.

1956ShayneTMar 10, 2019View discussion

Threadmarks Eavesdropping

View contentShayneTMar 12, 2019

#1,309

"She fully intended to stab me," Snape's voice said.

I was sitting outside what was apparently the principal's office, although apparently he was called Headmaster here. Hopefully he was better than Blackwell had been, letting the popular kids get away with everything and punishing the other kids.

My bugs were listening in to the conversation; it wasn't that I didn't trust Snape, although of course I didn't. But if this was the place where people got the information to get their killing sprees started, I needed all the information I could get.

"I'm sure it wasn't that bad Severus," an older man's voice said.

"She knew where to stab me to best incapacitate me. That's not normal for an eleven year old child. Her mind didn't even feel like that of a child... it was difficult to read anything other than surface thoughts, and I was only able to get bits and pieces."

There was silence for a moment.

"If she was Tom, you wouldn't have been able to read anything at all. Did you learn anything else?"

"The deaths of her parents didn't bother her in anything other than an abstract way. It was as though she didn't care about them at all."

He'd read my mind.

I felt a chill go down my spine. In my old world, mind reading had been thought to be impossible, and discovering that it wasn't was horrible. I'd been able to beat people in the past because I was smarter and a better planner. If they knew all my plans just by looking at me, then I wouldn't have any chance at all.

"I'm sure that she was just in shock. We saw a lot of that during the war," the other man said. "It will come to her in time."

"Giving people the benefit of the doubt will be the death of you," Snape said. "Not everyone can be redeemed."

"And if I'd felt that way about you?"

Snape was silent for a moment. "It's not normal for a child to be thinking about how to make me bleed to death."

"I'd suspect that some of your students might disagree."

There was a sound of expelled air, almost like Snape was trying to suppress a chuckle.

"More importantly, what if she is right?" Snape said. "It is a serious accusation that muggleborns are being targeted using information from this school."

"It's possible that it could have been a member of the board," the other man said. "If it had been a member of the staff, I would have expected there to be more deaths."

"That would depend on how much access they had," Snape said. "Given that only a few people had access, it should be easy to work out who was involved."

"The fact that there have only been four attacks suggests that someone got a quick look at a list."

"Are we sure that there have not been more attacks than the girl knows about... perhaps some who have already received their letter?"

"That would provoke the kind of response that Tom doesn't want. A few mugglesborns die before they get their letters, well, most wizards think muggles live short brutish lives anyway. But attacking Hogwarts students would risk turning the populace against him."

Snape was silent. "It seems risky to depend on his political acumen given that childrens' lives are at stake."

"Showing concern about the students? How unusual. Especially since none of them will be your direct responsibility."

"They are all of our responsibility."

Snape was silent for a moment. "Then we must find out who this leak is. If it was a member of the board, we can take action, but having a member of the staff be contributing to the deaths of students... that's unacceptable."

"I'm sure it would surprise many of the students to hear that."

"I spend far too much time and effort trying to keep the dunderheads alive to let all my work go to waste," Snape snapped.

"Then finding out who was involved will be part of your task," the older man said. "I will make other inquiries. We will discuss what we have found after the beginning of the school year."

Snape grunted in acknowledgement.

"Well, that leaves us with the problem of young Miss Hebert. What are we to do with her?" The older man sounded cheerful, despite the topic they'd just been discussing. Either he didn't really care, or he was good at hiding his emotions.

"Leaving her out in the muggle world for the next week will probably result in someone being killed," Snape said.

"She seems quite resourceful," the other man said. "Finding Diagon Alley based on the tiny number of clues available to her... astounding."

"I wasn't talking about her," Snape said dryly. "Although it is possible that the Death Eaters will track her down. All they have to do is send her a letter by owl and then follow the owl."

"Regardless, I think you are right. Given the danger the muggleborns are in, and the likelihood that they will go after her, she should not return to the muggle world. I will make inquiries as to a Wizarding house that might be willing to take her."

"Preferably one that does not have other children," Snape said. He hesitated. "There is something seriously wrong with her."

"There are children who have natural affinities for occlumency; you were one of those if I recall. Given the trauma she has been through, we should give her the benefit of the doubt."

"It's not the occlumency that bothers me. It's the sociopathy."

"Weren't you telling me just last week that children are natural sociopaths?" The other voice chuckled. "It takes time for their moral development to... er.. mature. I'm sure she will be fine."

I was panicking by this point. If they knew what I was thinking, then they'd know that I didn't belong here. I'd hijacked the body of one of their children. While it was true that she wasn't using it at the time, would they consider that a crime? Would they try to exorcise me?

"Perhaps it is best if you stay out of her mind for the time being, Severus," the other voice said. "It's not polite to look where you aren't invited."

"Is that something you are planning to abide by yourself?" Snape asked. "Because you are a better legilmens than I, and you might be able to find out just what is wrong with her."

"I see no reason to violate the privacy of a young girl's mind, not when we have bigger issues to deal with. We have three dead muggleborns with their families, and one missing. Justin Finch-Fletchley, Hannah Haywood, and Sarah Hamilton all need justice. Millie Scrivener is still missing."

"We should have Miss Hebert speak to the aurors."

"Tom always had sympathizers in the office; I have reason to believe that he has more now."

"So we are to follow this investigation entirely on our own?" Snape sounded doubtful. "Surely there are members of the Order who can be trusted."

"They are being watched," Dumbledore said. "We must be discreet. Do you have any idea who Tom has spying here?"

"Half the children in my house I am sure," Snape said. "Possibly some of the staff members."

"Perhaps you can get information from Tom himself?"

"He has only spoken to some members of the inner circle," Snape said. "I do not happen to be one of them. There are rumors about what he had to do to reconstitute himself."

"Yet reconstitute himself he has," Dumbledore said. "And his forces are gathering even as we speak. I need you to speak to as many of your old contacts as possible to find out about who is perpetrating these murders."

"They may not be willing to talk," Snape said.

"Do your best." The other man's voice was firm and didn't seem like he expected an argument. I didn't hear one from Snape.

Snape was a double agent in Tom's organization?

If wizards could read minds, how did that even work? From what the other man had said, Snape was able to resist mind reading somehow, by what sounded like natural skill and training. Yet if I was a criminal mastermind, I wouldn't trust anyone who wouldn't let me read their mind. I'd insist on it, even if I had to force them at weapon point.

Or I'd just kill them.

Having someone you couldn't trust at your back was a recipe for disaster. Whoever Tom was, he was an idiot to trust someone who could hide what he was.

Still, if Snape and the other man weren't going to invade my privacy, that still left the matter of the other wizards. Could all of them do it?

If Wizards had to learn spells, then maybe only some of them could. It would have to be something I would learn as quickly as possible. It made sense that not all wizards could do all spells, or otherwise there wouldn't be such a thriving trade in places like Diagon Alley.

Certainly, almost everyone can cook, or at least make a sandwich, and yet restaurants still exist. But convenience wouldn't be much of a factor if everyone could simply make anything they wanted. Some wizards had to be better at some things than others, or there wouldn't even be an economy.

Every wizard would be able to provide everything they needed for themselves.

I heard the door beside me open, and Snape looked out at me. I was sitting on the floor, leaned up against a wall.

"So you haven't chosen to set fire to the entire building," Snape said. "I am pleasantly surprised."

Looking up at him, I said, "I'm just sitting here doing what you asked. You can ask any of those guys."

I pointed at the moving pictures. Truthfully, they creeped me out. If I understood Snape's explanations, they were simple mental clones of people who had actually lived. How did that work exactly? Did the wizards make a copy of the mind and place it in the paint?

Wouldn't that make Wizarding paintings the perfect interrogation technique? As long as you could paint a picture without someone knowing, you could theoretically torture their painting for whatever information you wanted, and depending on how sentient they actually were, maybe even be somewhat more moral than ordinary torture?

Regardless, all they would have seen was me sitting on the floor, my back against the wall with my eyes closed. Unless they could see magic of course; there were a lot of things I didn't know, which meant that I was going to need a crash course in magic before any of this went any further.

"The Headmaster is ready to see you."

I stood up and I stepped past the gargoyle. Was the gargoyle like the paintings, or was it somehow more sapient because it was three dimensional? It had stared at me suspiciously the whole time I was sitting there.

Stepping onto the moving stone staircase, I grimaced.

If this school was the safest place in the Wizarding world, then the other places had to be deathtraps. I'd already seen moving staircases, and if OSHA had any sway in Britain, or the Wizarding world, the whole place would have been shut down before it even started.

My father worked with the Dockworkers, and while they'd had their arguments with the Occupational and Safety administration, he had to admit that a lot of their rules made sense.

Stairs should have rails, and small children shouldn't be sent plummeting to their deaths. While having paintings watch over the children was creepy, it wasn't like they could do anything to save anyone.

As we reached the actual office, I stepped inside, and then looked around. It was a large circular room, with knick knacks and odd items everywhere. Dumbledore was apparently like a lot of old people I'd known; an avid collector of strange things and unwilling to let any of it go.

There were portraits of old men and women on the walls, most of the people in them were asleep.

There was a bird in the corner. It snapped at the air and ate one of my bugs. It turned to look at me, and then it coughed violently. It made a choking sound and then it suddenly caught on fire.

What...the...hell?

It fell over, and the fire was burning merrily. I stared at the corpse, which collapsed into ashes faster than should have been possible.

The sad thing was that I knew exactly how long it took a body to go from living to dead and then to ashes because of fire.

"Fawkes is a phoenix," an old man said. He was sitting on a high backed chair. "His life cycle includes burning to death and then rising again. His species is essentially immortal."

"I know how he feels," I muttered.

The man looked like Gandalf. Was that deliberate? Did Lord of the Rings even exist in this universe?

"I understand that you have had quite the experience," Dumbledore said. "And that you have been very clever at surviving things that most grown wizards would not without their wands."

"What else could I do?" I asked. "Lay down and die?"

"And yet you continued trying to look for your parents' murderers, despite the clear danger that would be involved."

"They were after me," I said. "I had to find them first."

Even a wizard would die from a knife in the back, and they had to sleep sometimes.

He didn't flinch, which meant that either he wasn't reading my mind, or he was a better actor than I'd thought.

"Still, that was an amazing act of bravery from a girl who had no power but her own wits and her own determination."

"What happens to me now?" I asked.

"You will stay at Hogwarts until the end of the week. You will then be taken to London, where you will board the train with the rest of your classmates."

"Why would I do that if I am already here?"

"The train ride is an important opportunity to bond with your classmates. It helps to create friendships that may last for your entire lives."

"I'm not that interested in making friends," I said. "I'm here to find out who is targeting me, and I'm going to make them pay."

"Revenge is never the way to achieve happiness," Dumbledore said. "It only causes more pain."

I stared at him. It was like he wasn't even listening to what I was saying.

Was stopping a mad dog revenge, or was it simply prudent? What made him think that these people were going to stop killing muggles and muggleborns? Unless someone stopped them, it was only going to get worse.

Snape got it; unless I was mistaken, he'd been a double agent in the other organization, which meant that he'd seen and probably done horrible things.

I knew what that was like. There were things that I'd done that I still had the occasional nightmare about. I'd done them for the best of reasons, for the greater good, but I'd never liked them.

"Fine. I'll give up on the whole thing and leave it to the adults, who I am sure know much better than I do."

Dumbledore smiled at me, but I could see that Snape wasn't buying it.

"Excellent," he said. "While you are here, you will have access to the approved sections of the library, and the dining hall. You will be staying in one of the Gryffindor rooms; perhaps those are rooms you will be spending a lot of time in over the next seven years.

I could hear Snape snorting next to me. What did that even mean?

"The paintings will keep watch over you. I would ask that you stay out of the Forbidden forest. Despite your... unusual survival skills, there are a number of creatures in the forest who are known Wizard killers."

The library would be useful. It would give me a greater sense of this world that I'd stepped into, even more than the school books that I'd bought.

"I would like for Madam Pomprey, our Medi-witch to examine you, to see that your adventure in the muggle world didn't leave any continuing problems."

Just what would a witch healer be able to determine about me? Was I really some kind of zombie, reanimated, but not really alive? Or was something else going on.

Maybe I really was Millie Scribner, and Taylor Hebert's memories had overwritten hers. Or maybe Taylor Hebert's soul had possessed her, although I wasn't sure if I really believed in the existence of a soul.

My stomach clenched. If they discovered that I really wasn't who they thought I was, what would they do with me?

Dumbledore must have seen my sudden look of anxiety.

"Many muggleborn students worry about visits to the healer. I can assure you that you will not be subjected to any injections or other intrusive tests such as the muggles tend to do. It will be entirely painless."

Somehow I found that hard to believe.

1829ShayneTMar 12, 2019View discussion

Threadmarks Pomfrey

View contentShayneTMar 14, 2019

#1,636

"She shows evidence of repeated exposure to the Cruciatis curse," Madam Pomfrey said. "Enough that I am surprised that she is still sane. I have seen aurors who were never the same again after similar levels of exposure."

"I'm not entirely sure she is sane," Snape muttered.

Madam Pomfrey ignored him. "There are signs of dark magic exposure that I haven't seen before. It is similar to what we see in people killed with the Killing Curse, except that of course it must be a less efficient variant since she is clearly alive."

"Is there any indication that she was abused otherwise, especially over the last few days?" Snape asked.

"None. She's a little dehydrated, and a little sun burned, which is surprising given our climate. Where did you find her?"

"Living in a hole in the ground in central London," Snape said. "I would have expected her to be covered in insect bites at the very least."

"I saw none," Pomfrey said. "And nothing wrong with her that a little nutrition and sleep in a good bed won't fix. Her mind, however...I can't imagine what that kind of torture would do to an impressionable young girl."

"Warped her," Snape said darkly.

I was lying on a hospital bed. I would have liked to say that there weren't insects here for me to use to eavesdrop with, but there were. Apparently magical healing didn't require the same level of cleanliness that muggle healing did.

They were using something to muffle their conversation. It was creating a strange sensation; half my bugs were outside the circle and could hear nothing, while the other half were inside, and they could hear just fine.

I felt a sense of relief.

Madam Pomfrey's inspection really hadn't been invasive. It had mostly involved her running a wand up and down over my body, like a piece of equipment from Star Trek. The fact that I wasn't actually a zombie was a relief; for all I'd known, it was possible that I could have started rotting sooner or later, and then what would I have done?

This meant that I was clear to move on to the next part of my plan, which involved doing as much research as I could over the next week.

I needed to find out what the limits to legilimency were, and what an occlumens was. I needed to get a general idea of what the capabilities of most of the wizards I was likely to meet were. I'd fortunately bought the first through seventh year books, claiming that I was buying for a rather large family.

Even when I hadn't thought I had magical power, I'd bought the books just in case; learning what spells the wizards were studying would be an indicator of which spells they were likely to use. I'd been wrong to dismiss the books as useless outright, and I'd bought them for fear of missing something and because they were cheap.

"Just from speaking to her, I don't see any signs of mental trauma, but it's likely that some will crop up over the next few days. Seeing your parents murdered in front of you has to be terrifying for a young girl. The fact that she was able to survive and even thrive is remarkable."

"Indeed," Snape said.

"She doesn't have any other friends or family that she can turn to?" Pomfrey asked.

Snape shook his head. "She gives me the impression that her parents have only moved here recently, and that she had no close family back in the States. Otherwise we'd been dealing with the MACUSA about taking her to be educated in Ilvermorny."

"I can't recall ever having an American at Hogwarts."

"That won't be the problem," Snape said. "I have a feeling that letting her attend here will be like setting a piranha on goldfish."

"You must be exaggerating! She's just a little girl!"

"She looks innocent," Snape said. "But don't be fooled."

"She'll be a Gryffindor for sure, as brave as she was. Wandering around London on her own, surviving for several days. Without their wands I'd imagine a lot of fifth years would do worse."

"Not all of the brave are in Gryffindor," Snape said stiffly. He gestured and the strange silencing field he was using disappeared.

Snape strode over to my bed.

"I will take you to your room," he said. "We will return to Diagon Alley tomorrow to complete your purchases."

"What if I don't have any more money?" I asked.

"There is a fund provided for those without means. However, I suspect that you are not the type to have spent all of your money, despite being a child."

I shrugged. "Maybe I don't want to spend my money on fancy pots and weird robes."

Antagonizing him wasn't the best idea, but he was so stuffy that I couldn't help myself. Besides, when was the next time I actually got to be a child? Once school started I was going to have to get serious and work on finding out who wanted us all dead.

Tom seemed like a prime candidate, but I couldn't ask him about it without revealing that I had been listening in. I suspected that was an ability not shared by most wizards, and would be best kept under my hat, at least as well as I could in a school filled with mind readers.

"You will do as directed," he said. He gritted his teeth.

I slipped out of bed, and back into my sneakers. I took a final look around, and we made our way out of the Hospital wing. It said something about the safety of this school that there were so many beds. The place looked like they were ready for a war, which suggested that having a school where one hundred percent of the students were armed might not be as safe as Snape and Dumbledore were trying to make it out to be.

The Hospital Wing was on the first floor, and we went through a long hall that led to stairs going up.

"Is there really a rule about having knives at school?" I asked.

I was interested in what he had to say. I'd turned the knife over in the interest of not causing problems, but I'd suspected he'd been lying the whole time.

He was silent for a moment, then admitted "No."

"You just didn't want me to stab you."

"You will learn far worse ways to hurt people than stabbing," he said. "But it would be preferable if you did not start with that."

"Will there likely be a lot of classmates that I will want to stab?"

His face turned dark. "Wizarding children are no better than muggle children; in some way they are worse, because they have more ways to express their natural tendencies."

"Tendencies to bully?"

He glanced at me and didn't say anything.

"I won't stand for that," I said. "I don't like bullies, whether they are students or teachers."

"It's likely that you won't have much of a choice. Older students have skills that make them much more dangerous than a muggle of equivalent age."

"There are ways to stop that...

"Even the Wizarding world frowns on killing or maiming other children.," Snape said quickly.

"If teachers would do their jobs it wouldn't be necessary for more extreme measures to be taken," I said sweetly. "Besides, Madam Pomfrey said that she could completely regrow bones."

"Should I be concerned that this is the first thing you asked her?"

"I was just curious," I said. "What with all the moving staircases and all, I was a little worried about falling."

"Given that many of the children at this school will have parents who were sympathizers of the last Dark Lord, I would suggest that you try to blend in and not cause too many problems," Snape said. "The first response of many of the more privileged students would be to make complaints to their parents about the dangerous mudblood."

"Mudblood?" I asked.

"It's an offensive term for the muggleborn," Snape said. "Its use marks the user as someone who does not care for them."

"If they don't come after me, I won't come after them," I said. "I can tolerate words, but I won't let anyone bully me."

I'd made that mistake in my first life. Three girls had made my life hell for more than a year; they'd been the cause of my getting powers. In my world, powers came from having the worst day of your life.

Letting them get away with bullying hadn't worked. Ignoring it hadn't worked. They'd just escalated until they had put me in the hospital.

Our conversation drifted off as we walked up floor after floor. By the fourth floor my energy was flagging. By the sixth I felt like I was going to drop dead. Had this girl whose body I was wearing never done any exercise in her life?

He led me to the Gryffindor dormitories, which were at the top of a tower on the seventh floor. There was a common room with a roaring fire, reached by climbing a mahogany staircase decorated in crimson and gold. There was a lion over the mantle of the fireplace, and it seemed very cozy.

It was one of the tallest towers in the castle, and I wondered if all of the students had to climb this much just to get to bed. If they did, physical education might not be as important.

"Will I be allowed to spend time on the grounds?" I asked.

"Why?" Snape asked.

"I want to start running; I'm terribly out of shape and I need to get stronger."

"Wizards don't run," he said.

"They should," I said. "They'd live longer."

Whether he caught the double meaning in what I'd said or not, he seemed to simply ignore the questions.

"You will required to stay away from the edge of the forest and out of the lake. There are creatures in the lake and some of them are not... entirely tame."

If the people trying to kill me knew I was here, they'd be able to get me while I was out on the grounds. There were probably more protective spells than I knew about, but I couldn't depend on that. Yet trying to run around inside the castle, with its shifting stairs would be a recipe for disaster.

I'd need to stay close to the castle.

"It's probably best if you do not stray too far," Snape said.

It was possible that working on my strength and endurance might not be helpful at all. Yet I suspected that being able to dodge would be important no matter what magic was like, and without physical endurance, slowing down would happen sooner than later.

Were spells like heat seeking missiles, or was it like guns, where the person who aimed better and missed less often was the winner? I didn't know, and not knowing was likely to get me killed.

"The stairs leading up to the girl's dorms are enchanted so that should boys attempt to climb them, they will turn into a slide. Male prefects may bypass this in emergencies."

"Is it the same with the boy's stairs?"

Snape looked at me assessingly. It looked like he wanted to lie, but he knew that I'd test it out the moment he left, and so he simply shook his head.

"That'll be useful," I said.

He showed me the bathrooms. Shockingly, there were no showers, but only baths. That seemed dangerous to me; it would be relatively easy to drown someone and make it look like an accident. Although actually showers had the risk of slipping on soap and breaking necks, so it might be a wash.

With four beds to a room, it looked like I was going to have roommates. I hadn't slept in the same room with anyone, outside of wartime since Emma. The fact that I'd be sharing a room with three other eleven year olds wasn't promising.

"Any other child, and I'd ask if you needed someone to check in on you. It can be frightening for some of the younger ones to be home for the first time."

"So you don't think you need to check in on me?"

"I know I do," he said. "But not because you are afraid. Compared to the hole I found you in, this must seem like a castle."

"It is a castle."

"Precisely."

I stared at him, giving him a flat, unamused look. One should not encourage bad jokes; I'd learned my lesson with Clockblocker.

"Lights out is at 10 P.M.," he said. "And you should not leave the dorms before 6 A.M. I am sure that you are planning to ignore these rules, but once the term starts, the halls will be patrolled."

"And they aren't now? So anyone could break in and attack me? So how is this place any safer than where I was?"

"The professor has taken steps so that you can't be tracked here."

I hadn't noticed him doing anything. Snape must have noticed my expression.

"As Headmaster, Professor Dumbledore has options that are not available to the rest of us. He can, for example lift the anti-apparition spells that cover the castle in the event of an emergency.

"So as long as nobody is in the castle who can call their buddies and let them know I'm here, I'll be fine."

"At least here you aren't in a hole," Snape said.

"I'll be the judge of that," I said.

He was silent for a moment. "It's unusual for an American to be selected for Hogwarts. It means that you first found your magic in Britain. Your parents were visiting?"

I shrugged, keeping my eyes down. "You know how it is. I don't really know a lot about why they came here; they didn't exactly explain it to me."

"I have a hard time believing you didn't eavesdrop," he said.

I looked at him sharply. Did he know I'd been listening in on his conversation with Dumbledore? Had I given myself away, or had he peeked in my mind like he'd promised not to.

"My father and mother were some of the best people I ever knew," I said. For once I could speak with sincerity. "She was a professor, and he worked as the head of hiring and spokesperson for a labor union."

I didn't want to get too specific, because if he investigated my background he'd find out that the people I was talking about didn't exist. Or even worse, they actually did, but were still four years away from having their first and only child.

I'd seen Earths before where there were supposedly copies of people I'd known. The idea that Mom and Dad were just an ocean away was painful, because they wouldn't really be my Mom or Dad. It would be a constant reminder of what I'd lost, what I'd never have again.

"Get some sleep," he said. "Breakfast is normally from 6:30 to 8:30 in the morning, but with just staff attending, it will not begin until eight. Lunch is at noon, and dinner normally ranges from six to eight. With only staff available it will be held at six."

Ah, food. The one thing that an eleven year old would be concerned about.

"Do you need something now?" he asked.

I shook my head. I'd eaten at Diagon Alley.

After he left, I chose a bed, and began pulling the things I'd need out. I loved my fanny pack; it would hold an entire wardrobe and all the books, and once I got a chest, I'd be able to fill it with other things.

The first year spell books were written in an easy to read fashion. Some of it was because it was written for eleven year olds, but I remembered having read harder books when I was that age. Of course, you always wanted to make your instruction manuals easier to read than you had to. The military did it because no one wanted to be struggling over wording while bombs were flying around.

The spells they were planning to teach first years were useful as weapons.

Making fire was always going to be a favorite. Levitating things was a good way to drop things on enemies. You could sever a neck with a spell meant to sever clothes. The ability to give someone a cold didn't seem that useful, but I was going to reserve judgment.

It would make torture easier for one thing. Hold their mouth closed and then use the spell to fill their nose and lungs with mucus. There would be a certain degree of panic involved.

The locking and unlocking spells would be useful back in the real world, but if every first year student knew how to do them, then locks were either entirely useless or protected by stronger magics.

There was a spell to make an emergency flare, which might be useful in coordinating troops or for... actual emergencies. There was a spell to turn your wand into a flashlight. A smokescreen spell looked really useful.

I tried a few spells and wasn't able to get anything to work, but it was possibly because I was tired.

This body didn't have the endurance I was used to, and it was frustrating. I needed to get it into shape, and going to bed at 9 P.M. didn't figure into any of my plans.

It happened though.

My sleep was disturbed though, by dreams of strange alien creatures with spindly arms and legs and oversized heads and eyes. They had bat-like ears and all night they cleaned and cleaned and cleaned.

Last edited: Mar 14, 2019

1801ShayneTMar 14, 2019View discussion

Threadmarks Bait

View contentShayneTMar 17, 2019

#2,028

Getting fitted for robes wasn't any more fun than it had been in my last life. It wasn't even all that different. The proprietor used a magical measuring tape, but Parian had all of her clothing move by themselves.

Still I stood and pretended that it wasn't terribly boring.

Despite what Snape had said, I hadn't gone down to the great room for breakfast. Instead I'd found a simple meal waiting beside my bed when I'd woke up. There had been more than I could eat, but a letter from Madam Pomprey told me to eat everything, because I was a little malnourished.

Apparently pizza and Sikh temple food hadn't been enough for me.

I closed my eyes and focused my senses on the bugs around me. I found Snape on the other side of the shop. He apparently had one of those silencing fields up, and he was talking to a white haired man. They had deliberately turned themselves so that no one would see their faces or lips. Was lip reading a skill known by wizards, or was Snape just being paranoid?

"He is back," the other man was saying. He had a narrow, pointed face and hair so blonde that it looked white. He carried a walking stick with a snakes head.

I found myself wondering if I would be allowed a walking stick like that at Hogwarts. I'd carried a collapsible baton in my life as a super villain and super hero and using a stick was something I was skilled with.

"You've seen him yourself?" Snape asked.

"The Yaxleys and the Carrows have. They have been reaching out to the others and have been going out on hand picked missions for the Dark Lord."

"Like eliminating mudbloods before they can get to Hogwarts?" Snape asked. "That seems foolish; it's likely to attract scrutiny before the people who need to be in place are back in power."

"I don't know anything about that," the other man said. "Although who cares if a few mudbloods go missing? The important thing is that it's only a matter of time before he calls us all back to service."

"It doesn't sound like the Dark Lord's plan," Snape said. "It's too petty for him, and he usually had his eye on the bigger picture."

"There have been some rumors that he... isn't the same man he was before he vanished," the other man looked troubled. "If his sanity is worse than it was before, it won't bode well for any of us. Bellatrix is bad enough, but she can't match him for power."

"I wouldn't mention those fears to anyone else," Snape said. "You know how he reacted to unpleasant news when he was himself."

The white haired man shuddered. "Well, there's nothing that can be done about it now," he said.

"It's best to take no action until you see which way the wind is blowing," Snape agreed. "Lest you face the displeasure of the Dark Lord himself."

It seemed strange to me that everyone was so afraid of someone named Tom. Tom the Dark Lord didn't seem to have much of a ring to it. Hopefully he had another name.

"I understand that your son will be attending this year," Snape continued.

"Yes," the other man said. "He will do the Malfoy family proud."

Ah... Malfoy. Learning which of my classmates were the children of death eaters wasn't going to be easy, but I was going to have to make a list. I doubted I'd ever be able to fully trust any of them; anyone could be subverted, but the children had most likely been taught racial hatred from the time they were born.

It was difficult, but not impossible to overcome that kind of upbringing. Theo had been the son of Kaiser, and he'd heard white supremacist rhetoric his entire life. Of course, Theo admitted that his father had only given lip service to the ideology, which may have made it easier for him to escape the ideas. Still, in the end, Theo had been a hero.

It meant that I couldn't automatically count any of the children out, even if their families were members of the group that was trying to kill muggle-borns.

I had little doubt that those who bought into the ideology would make themselves known to me, especially since I was capable of listening in on them without them knowing about it.

Both men were silent for a moment.

"This is the year that Potter is supposed to attend," Malfoy said.

"I do not want to talk about that," Snape said. He sounded irritated.

"The Dark Lord will undoubtedly have plans for him, once he's gotten enough pieces in place. I understand that you have strong feelings about the boy..."

"I have no feelings about him," Snape said. "But contempt."

"The Dark Lord will be pleased. Are you here to get new robes?"

"I have a wayward student I have been required to sheppard... an orphan. Dumbledore has commanded it."

"A mudblood?" Malfoy asked.

"Does it matter?" Snape asked. "As long as she is supposed to be under my protection, I will be held responsible. I will have to be seen to defend her, lest I be seen as incompetent, or worse."

"Ah," Malfoy said. He seemed to lose interest as the proprietress approached.

The silencing field around them vanished.

Snape headed back toward me while Malfoy completed his transaction with the woman. It surprised me that Malfoy would get robes from the same shop as a poor orphan like me. In the regular world, the rich hated rubbing elbows with those who were their lessers.

Maybe the Wizarding population was so small that there simply weren't that many shops to be had. I'd asked Snape on the way to Diagon Alley how many Wizards there were in Great Britain, and he'd told me that there were approximately ten thousand.

That would give a worldwide estimate of perhaps a million wizards, assuming the demographics were the same everywhere. In my world, there had been one parahuman per eight thousand people in urban areas, and one in twenty six thousand in rural areas.

There had been approximately seven hundred thousand parahumans in the entire world, and so wizards were somewhat more populous. The fact that they had been able to keep themselves secret was mind-boggling, and had to involve some sort of Stranger effect.

Parahumans had changed the entire history of our world, and because we knew of another world, Earth Aleph where there had been fewer of them, we had been able to see just how much of a difference they had made.

"Is she done?" Snape asked.

"She is."

I'd been forced to buy three pair of plain work robes, a pointed hat, a pair of protective gloves, and a winter cloak. On Snape's advice, I'd paid a little more for the gloves to have them in dragonhide. He said that potions class often involved caustic chemicals and cheaper gloves often led to grief.

He'd also dragged me off to get Cauldrons, another item he insisted I pay more for than the basic set. According to him, some potions were caustic enough to burn through the bottom of them, and cheap cauldrons were likely to result in injury.

If that was true, then why did they even sell the cheap ones? Was that something that pureblood families told their children about, increasing the chances the muggleborns would get hurt?

As we left the shop, I slipped back into my hooded sweatshirt, and pulled the hoodie up. Snape looked down at me approvingly. While the hoodie would identify me as a muggleborn, it would also hide my face, which would be useful.

Whoever had killed my host body had apparently spent some time doing so, and they'd be likely to recognize my face. Personally I thought Snape and Dumbledore were foolish to bring me here. I'd already been here before and I could have just as easily given Snape my money.

All my being here did was tell prospective muggle murderers that a child was being ferried around by Snape. He was a double agent, so all they had to do was ask him about it, and he had to tell the truth, because there was at least one other agent in the school.

Was Dumbledore using me as bait? He hadn't seemed like the type when I met him, but the best schemers rarely seemed like schemers.

I didn't believe Dumbledore about it being a member of the board of governors. People like that wouldn't risk their position to kill two or three schoolchildren. They'd only do it for a large gain. Most likely it was a teacher, or someone no one would expect, like the janitor.

I'd gotten a bog standard school trunk; this was one item that Snape didn't seem to care whether I spent a lot of money or not. As I didn't have the money for any of the really fancy charms that I wanted, one trunk was basically like another.

He wouldn't let me step near the joke shop.

Although he made an effort to look confident, I could see that he was watching the crowds closely as we made our way toward the next store.

"I presume you won't be wanting an owl."

"An owl?"

"A Wizarding owl can find anyone in the world; they are used to send messages. The school has it's own selection of owls; I assume that you don't have anyone you would want to contact."

I shook my head. There was no one in the world that I needed to talk to. Besides, I suspected that it wouldn't be that hard to intercept a bird if I did.

In any case, I didn't have the time or the inclination to take care of an animal.

"Cats and toads are also on the allowed list of pets," he said. "But I suppose you have no interest in them because you can't weaponize them."

I glanced up at him. "You don't think? I can think of three different ways."

I was lying, of course. I could only think of two.

He stared at me for a long moment.

"But I'm looking forward to a stress free next several years," I said. "Since Dumbledore assured me that the adults were going to take care of all of the problems."

"I can't take points until I discover which house you are in, but lying is not appreciated at Hogwarts," he said.

"Good thing we're not there," I said.

"The Headmaster thought that owning a pet might have a...calming influence on you, given the deaths of your parents."

"So a cat is supposed to replace my parents?" I asked. "What kind of advice is that? You should probably offer me therapy.

"Wizards don't have therapists," he said.

"Color me surprised," I said. "Your culture would probably be a lot healthier if you did."

He ignored what I'd just said. "I think we are done here."

"Is there anything in Knockturn Alley that might be of interest to me?" I asked. "I still have money left."

"Knockturn Alley isn't for the likes of you. The people who are after you are likely to be there."

"That didn't exactly answer my question," I said.

"I'm sure there would be a number of things there that you would be interested in. My duty as a professor at the school is to protect all of my students, and so I have to keep you from possessing them."

"All right, then," I said. "Lead on."

We returned to Hogwarts, and I proceeded to spend the next few days in my rooms or at the library. Food mysteriously appeared in my room, and so I spent the time studying everything I could. I found a few references to legilemency and occlumency, enough to know that I should avoid people's eyes. The really interesting stuff was apparently in the restricted section, which neither Snape nor Dumbledore had reason to lend me access to.

I took up running early every morning, but I didn't see anyone else. I typically ran around the castle, although I stayed close enough that I could dart to the nearest door should someone come to try to abduct me.

The rest of the time I spent exploring the castle.

Given my ability to sense and control bugs, this was easier for me than it would have been for the average student. When you could sense the bugs in a secret passage behind the wall, you could use its senses to determine whether it was actually a secret passage, or just a walled off space.

Figuring out how to open those passages was a lot harder, especially since the portraits were always watching. I couldn't just go knocking on the walls. For one thing, if the staff knew where the secret passages were, they'd want to know how I knew about them.

So I had bugs looking for trigger mechanisms and the like, but unfortunately, the wizards tended to use magic for that as much as they did everything else. As often as not there wasn't much in the way of a trigger. I'd simply have to keep an eye on those locations and see if I could see how people got through those locations.

I made a simple map of the castle, noting all the secret passages that I could find, and I hid it in my fanny pack.

My control over bugs continued to increase, doubling one, then again, and then yet again. By the end of the week I could control over one hundred bugs at once. It was easier to control them as a group; the kind of multitasking I'd once been capable of gave me headaches, but even that was growing easier with time.

The rest of the time was spent trying out magic. A lot of it was trial and error; apparently wand movements were just as important as saying the words, and pronunciation was important too. I managed to get the cutting spell to work, and the levitation spell to work, and I practiced those as much as I could.

Either spell would be useful, and I suspected that older students would tend to take advantage of powerless firsties.

I'd tried turning the other cheek in my last like, and all it had gotten me was burned. That wasn't going to happen again.

Minor bullying probably wouldn't bother me that much; none of these children would have the emotional leverage to really hurt me, not the way Emma had. She'd known all my hopes and fears and she'd used it against me.

But I wouldn't put up with being physically attacked. These were people who had attacked and killed children. Most likely it hadn't been the kids at school, but that wasn't guaranteed. There had been kids at Winslow that I was almost certain had murdered someone, possibly as an initiation into one of the gangs.

Some of them were almost certainly the children of Death Eaters. I'd found that term in some of the histories, and I found it particularly uninspiring.

If I'd been creating a name for my minions, it would have been something more like Death Bringers, or Deadites or something. What did Death Eater even mean?

Also, nobody mentioned the Dark Lord Tom in any of the books. In fact they refused to use his name at all. Apparently there had been a Taboo on his name, a spell that informed his people whenever his name was said, and he'd sent his merry band of terrorists to make people pay.

Given the kind of power he'd had, I was surprised that he hadn't been more successful. He should have worked on getting more support from the populace before he attempted an uprising. The Wizarding world wasn't like the non-magical world.

My world was a lot more dangerous than this one, and even there not everyone had guns. Most people had been unarmed, and they'd be reasonably easy to round up and force to do what you wanted.

Wizards were all armed, almost by definition. If you didn't have popular support from them, you'd never be able to take them over. Tom should have worked to take over the press, and to have infiltrated the government.

He should have been like Coil, and worked from within the government, even as he controlled the terrorist organization outside of it. A couple of false flag operations, and he could have pushed himself into a position of power without anyone realizing that he was a dark lord at all.

A real Dark Lord would be like Palpatine in the later Star Wars movies, not that these people would have seen those yet. The man had become leader first, and then used his evil plans to consolidate total power afterwards.

Working as a terrorist the way Tom had... that was just being an amateur.

The week passed before I was ready, and on the last day I was forced to go all the way across the country just so I could ride on a train on the way back. While I'd never actually ridden on a train before, I doubted that it would impress me much. After all, I'd ridden in Dragon's Dragon-craft, and I'd been in assorted other vehicles.

Yet I felt my stomach tighten into a knot. I was about to be surrounded by children, some of them children of the people who wanted to kill me. At the very least they might be spying for their parents, and at the worst they might try to kill me.

Strangely enough, that wasn't the part that made me nervous.

It was the fact that they were children. How was I supposed to interact with them? I wouldn't have any interests in common with even the oldest of them, other than magic, and they'd expect me to act like a child of my apparent age.

I hadn't been all that great as an eleven year old the first time around. I'd been gawky and awkward and overly affectionate. Now that I'd seen a war for the survival of all the worlds, fought Scion and the Slaughterhouse 9 and the Slaughterhouse 9000...

Children were going to be as alien to me I was to them.

1889ShayneTMar 17, 2019View discussion

Threadmarks Hogwarts Express

View contentShayneTMar 19, 2019

#2,414

"Why not apparate directly beside the train?" I asked. "Why risk being seen in muggle London?"

"It is risky to have multiple wizards trying to apparate to the same place at the same time," Snape said. "Given that the platform itself is of limited size, the choice was either to create hundreds of portkeys keyed to different times, which was deemed overly complicated and expensive, or to simply have everyone show up in muggle London."

That actually made sense.

What didn't make sense to me was requiring all wizards to show up in muggle London at all. Why not have Wizarding families teleport directly to the town near Hogwarts and just leave muggleborns on the train?

We were walking into King's Cross station. It was incredibly crowded, and very large.

I didn't see any Platform Nine and three quarters, but Snape had already told me the trick that was involved. I was unsure whether he was toying with me; forcing me to run into a wall at full speed seemed like a cruel joke, but if it was I'd find a way to make him pay.

In any event, I saw enough children dressed inappropriately carrying large trunks that I had to wonder how the normal population didn't notice anything year after year. Even if it only happened twice a year, that would be enough for conspiracy theories to arise.

How the Wizards were going to deal with secrecy once cell phones were invented I had no idea. Memory charms (and wasn't that a terrifying idea) weren't going to be enough once pictures were uploaded to the web.

Snape stayed with me as I grimaced and shoved my cart with the trunk on it through the wall. He stayed behind, because if he'd gone first that would have left me alone in muggle London, and would have been a good opportunity for me to be snatched.

Strangely enough, I would be safer alone on the other side of the tracks. Wizards wouldn't ignore magic the way that muggles did, and with so many parents around watching their children, attackers were unlikely to be able to get away with anything.

That was the explanation Snape had given me, and it seemed sound enough.

He didn't follow me; presumably he didn't want to highlight the fact that I was special to any of the Death Eaters on the other side.

I kept my hood up, and I stared at the steam engine on the other side. If I'd thought that people were dressed outlandishly on the muggle side, this side was even worse. The steam engine looked like something from the old west, and it was painted red.

There were cats and owls everywhere, the cats moving around the hundreds of feet. I was suddenly glad I hadn't got one; it would have been easy to lose in a crowd this size, and Snape would have accused me of deliberately killing it.

I managed to slip through the crowd and get my school trunk loaded onto the train. It helped that I actually didn't have anything in it; everything important was in my fanny pack. That way it would be easier to maneuver around, and once I got to school I could pull the extraneous things out like clothes and school books; things that people were unlikely to bother with destroying and that would make more space for whatever else I might want to stuff in there.

Even so, it was a struggle to get the trunk on board given my body's weakness, and no one seemed interested in helping me, including most of the adults. It didn't help that I didn't see many muggle parents on this side; apparently most of them stayed on the other side.

Snape had insisted that we arrive an hour early, but even so the first few compartments were already full by the time I'd managed to get my trunk on board. I found an empty compartment in the middle of the train, and I took it. Somehow I doubted that it was going to remain empty.

The door to my compartment slammed open as I was struggling to get my empty box up. I dropped it and turned to see a miniature version of Malfoy flanked by two other students.

He looked at me and then sniffed as though he smelled something bad. He started to turn away.

"Malfoy, I presume," I said.

He stopped, and then turned back. "You've heard of me?"

"I've heard of your father," I said.

"I wouldn't have expected a... one of you to know about my father."

"Taylor Hebert," I said. "Mudblood."

He froze and stared at me.

"What?"

"I'm a mudblood. Have you ever met one before?"

He hadn't; I could tell from the expression on his face. It didn't bode well for the intelligence of his underlings that they seemed confused about the whole exchange.

"I'm not sure..."

"Oh, I know what it means," I said. "And if anyone else calls me that, they'll likely regret it. But it doesn't bother me all that much. I know what I am, and I'm comfortable with it."

He stared at me.

"It's never a good idea to judge people before you meet them," I said. "A mudblood can kill you just as easily as a pureblood, and maybe even easier, because they'd think of things that no pureblood ever would."

"Are you threatening me?" he asked incredulously?

I shook my head. "Absolutely not. If I was threatening you, I'd pull out my wand like this, and I'd mention that I knew the cutting charm."

Casting the spell, I used it to slice the ropes holding my trunk together.

"It's not recommended to use the cutting charm on human flesh, but it works just fine," I said, looking up at him.

His face drained of color.

Even his subordinates seemed to pick up what was happening, although he fat one still looked a little confused.

"You know what the smartest thing to do with dangerous people?" I asked.

"What's that?' he asked faintly.

"Make friends with them," I said. "That way you don't wake up one night with them standing over your bed ready to do terrible things to you."

"I'll keep that in mind," he said carefully. He was backing out of the compartment.

"It was nice meeting you," I said. I smiled but it didn't reach my eyes.

He was gone rather quickly, and apparently word spread, because it was a long while before anyone else slipped into my carriage. I'd resorted to using my trunk as a footstool since I couldn't get it into its space above me.

I closed my eyes and reached out to the insects around me. I always kept a few on my person that I kept on at all times, but I shifted the bugs around me otherwise on a rotating basis. It was easier than actually moving the bugs, since there were always bugs everywhere, and even controlling a hundred my abilities weren't as strong as I would have wished.

My wand was on my lap, and I kept a few bugs in my compartment alert, just in case someone should try something. I then began to listen in on conversations in the other cars.

Most of it was the usual inanities; people trying to catch up, people introducing themselves. I checked compartment after compartment and I didn't hear anyone plotting to murder their classmates. I wasn't sure whether I was pleased or disappointed. If I'd heard them plotting it would have made things easier, but maybe no one was actually plotting anything evil.

I could hear Malfoy warning people about the crazy mudblood in the fifth car. I could also hear a rather annoying girl asking people if she knew the location of her friend's toad.

The door to my compartment opened.

"The toad is in the boy's bathroom in the third car," I said without opening my eyes.

I could see her gaping at me, and a moment later the compartment door slammed closed.

Five minutes later the door opened again, and the girl stepped into the compartment, followed by a rather portly boy. He was one of the few overweight Wizarding children I'd seen, other than Malfoy, and I wondered whether it was because Wizarding culture didn't include visits to Wizard McDonalds, or whether it was simply because I was an American, and from twenty years in the future when everyone was fatter.

"How did you know?" the girl asked. "I know you haven't been out of your compartment in the past twenty minutes, but the toad was exactly where you said it would be."

"Magic?" I said.

Technically, it was even true. I was able to see better with insect sight than I'd ever been able to with my old powers, when I'd mostly had to make do with hearing and touch. Insects have crap for sight.

She stepped into the room. "My name is Hermione Granger. This is Neville Longbottom."

"Thank you miss," Neville said.

I'd heard her annoying people up and down the train, and for a moment I considered dismissing her. However, I was going to have to spend possibly the next seven years with her, and alienating her wouldn't get me any closer to my goals.

Considering that she seemed to be socially maladjusted, it probably wouldn't get me much closer to my goals either, but even having another set of eyes might be useful.

"Taylor Hebert."

"Are you an American? I thought only British children went to Hogwarts... it says so In Hogwarts a History."

"You can't always believe what you read," I said. I opened my eyes and looked at her.

The girl had a rather unfortunate set of front teeth, and a large mane of frizzy hair. I suspected she might grow up to be good looking in a few years, with the help of an orthodontist, but I'd been wrong about things like that before.

Getting through the next few years was going to be a challenge if she kept acting the way she was. I'd had enough experience in pushing people away to know that she was likely to find the next few years to be rather stressful.

"I've never met an American before. Did your parents come here for work?"

That wasn't the kind of question I wanted to answer. If I told bits and pieces to enough people, it was possible that someone might collect them all together and work out that I wasn't who I was claiming to be.

"You're a muggleborn, aren't you?" I said.

"How could you tell?" she asked. "I'm so excited about magic. I've read all the books, and I've tried some of the spells at home."

It suddenly struck me. I'd been struggling with my trunk, and I hadn't had to.

I grimaced, pulled my feet off the trunk, and then pointed my wand at it.

"Wingardium Leviosa," I said.

The trunk obediently rose into the air, and I slid it into the overhead bin. I was going to have to be careful about being so focused on doing things the mundane way, or through my bugs that I forgot that I had other resources at my disposal.

Hermione was staring at me, and I shrugged. "I forgot that I could do that."

"Are you a second year then?" she asked. "You look like you're our age."

"No, this is going to be my first year at magic school," I said. "The same as for both of you."

"Then how did you already learn... that, and make it look so easy?" she asked. There was a hint of jealousy in her voice. Apparently she'd thought that was going to be the smartest girl in her class and discovering that she wasn't was going to be a huge letdown for her.

It was never a good idea to base your self esteem around a single thing; when that thing was knocked down, it was hard to get back up.

"Practice," I said.

Although I had no way of knowing whether this girl was going to be a talented witch or not, I had an eighteen year old mind, which had to be some sort of an advantage. It wasn't fair, but fortunately playing fair was never something I had bothered with.

When you only have insects against people like Alexandria and Hookwolf the only way to survive was to cheat.

"We aren't supposed to be learning that for a little while," Hermione said.

"It'll be one of the first spells they teach us, I think," I said. "At least that's what I gathered from what I've read."

"There's nothing about it in the books they assigned,' she said.

"You have to learn to read between the lines," I said. "And know how teachers generally do things. They tend to start with the easiest subjects first, and then move on to the harder ones. Wingardium is one of the easier spells, so..."

"You made it look so easy," she said. "And a whole trunk too."

I didn't mention that the trunk was empty. Looking impressive was a lot easier if you didn't reveal all of your secrets.

"Are you a pureblood?" I asked the boy behind her.

The Longbottom boy was dressed in the slightly strange, off putting way I was coming to associate with the purebloods. I'd read about halfbloods, but I suspected that they found it easier to blend in with both sides.

The purebloods made a point to not blend in.

The boy nodded, but he kept his eyes down. Was he trying to avoid my reading his mind? To my great relief, what I'd read about legilemency seemed to indicate that it was a relatively rare skill. It was probably practiced more by the purebloods, though. I'd have to watch for any tells from body language.

"You're a muggleborn, aren't you?" Hermione interrupted.

The jacket and hoodie pretty much gave it away, so I couldn't give her a lot of credit for observational skills, but she seemed to be bright enough. She might even be useful, so I decided to be civil.

I nodded.

Both of them sat down, and I fought not to groan out loud. I'd hoped to be able to spend the rest of the train ride spying on the other children. Children were stupid, and if there was a plot, it was likely that at least some of them would be blabbing about it somewhere along the ride.

I knew children were stupid, because I'd once been one. I'd trusted Emma, and that had been the biggest mistake of my life. I'd made worse mistakes, but all of my other bad decisions came from that one.

Without Emma, I never would have been shoved in a locker. I wouldn't have had the worst day of my life, gained powers, and become a super villain.

I also wouldn't have become a super hero and saved all the Earths that ever were, but she had no way of knowing that when she betrayed me.

"Do you think people don't like us?" Hermione asked, lowering her voice.

"You?" I asked.

"No," she said, flushing. "Muggleborns."

I frowned, considering how much to tell her. Finally I decided that I couldn't leave her in the dark; people were trying to kill muggleborns, and letting her go in ignorant was as good as putting a knife to her throat.

"Some parts of the Wizarding world are prejudiced against muggleborns," I said. "Mostly purebloods. There are factions who think that muggleborns don't deserve to learn magic at all."

"What?"

"There is also a faction of wizard terrorists who have been targeting muggleborns and their families," I said. "There have been four families killed already."

The color drained from Hermione's face. "My parents..."

"I don't think they're in a lot of danger," I said. "The terrorists were targeting muggleborns. As long as you are at Hogwarts, they are most likely safe."

I had no way of knowing that, of course, but that was my suspicion. These people couldn't go after every mundane person in the country, and killing a muggleborn's family while they were at school would only ensure that they were better guarded next time.

If I were trying to kill the muggleborns off, I'd simply follow them home from Winter break, since they all ended up back in King's cross station. I might even introduce myself to some of the obvious parents waiting for their children to come back.

Once I had their names, it would be easy to use an owl to find out where they lived.

It would be relatively easy to slaughter many of the muggleborn families before Wizard law enforcement ever got wind of it. The impression I got of Wizard law enforcement was that it was a lot like the law back in Brockton Bay.

People in the rich areas got quick responses to police calls. People in poor areas... not so much.

"If you are worried about it you can send them an owl when you get to school," I said. I closed my eyes again. Maybe Hermione would get the message and would give me a little time to spy.

"How do you know all of this?" she asked.

"I listen," I said. "Talking is great, but you learn a lot more by being quiet and paying attention to the people around you."

Hermione was silent for a moment.

"Which house do you think you are going to be in?" she asked. "I'm thinking about Gryffindor, because that's the house that Dumbledore was in, and he's the most powerful wizard of the age."

I barely kept myself from grimacing. She hadn't gotten the hint. I had a feeling that it was going to be a long several hours.