Nella Dursley and the Wondrous World of Magic

Hogwarts, the Grand Tour

Since September first landed on a Friday the next two days were free days and Nella had a lot of time to grow very anxious. Scorpius suggested practicing magic with her wand somewhere with him and Albus but Nella rejected that dangerous idea quickly.

David introduced his small group of friends to the three lonely first years early Saturday morning in the common room.

"This is Ethan Goyle, a second year, Lidia Belby, also a second year, and this is Theodore Flint a third year.” The three didn't look particularly friendly and Nella wasn't sure if this was a good clique to introduce, but there didn't seem to be many options that weren't seemingly unpleasant.

"Are any of you mudblood?” Said Ethan, who was wholly unpleasant and had a very square look to him. Theodore, a rather tall and muscular older Slytherin, whacked his head pretty good, but Ethan hardly flinched. A lot of the Slytherin's looked either big or tall, and sometimes both.

“Must you use that word in front of David? Please don't deduct house points!” Nella made to ask what those were but stopped when she caught Albus's state of complete murderous rage. She had only seen it once before when James tripped and broke his broom.

“I won't if you leave it alone. We can't have a repeat of last year, you two are all that's left in your year. Watch yourselves.” That didn't help Albus's mood and he made to retort but that quickly drew their attention to him.

"And what are you doing here Potter? Hat made a mistake?" As soon as his anger had flared it vanished as he hesitated at the words spoken by the other remaining second-year Lidia.

"I'm glad we got a Potter. Now we don't look like a bunch of gits." A fourth Slytherin slipped into the conversation to the relief of David.

"That's a great point, Zack. Maybe we can redeem ourselves a little here…" Nella suddenly caught David's eye, indicating the set of first years ought to leave during their distracted group discussion. Ethan in particular was beginning to look very sour. Scorpius caught it too and he and Nella pulled Albus away to head off for breakfast.

Nella hoped their discussion would resolve to not doing whatever they did last year.

~ ☪ ~

After the first fiasco at finding a Slytherin clique to join, Nella, Albus, and Scorpius kept to themselves for the rest of that day. This worked out very well because Nella found herself asking many questions that might have embarrassed her in front of the other Slytherins, as well as proved she was exactly what Ethan had called her.

“Don't call yourself that. It's not a word to use in polite company. It's called muggleborn among civilized wizards and witches.” Albus nodded in agreement. A lot of what Nella didn't know wasn't entirely her fault, some of it was explained during the feast she missed. Things like out-of-bounds areas, including the Forbidden Forest were explained in a speech the headmaster, Professor McGonagall, gave after the sorting ceremony.

And then, come to find out, David had to explain how the “house” system worked at Hogwarts since Professor Marazion, the one who had led them to the small room, and then to the Grand Hall, hadn't explained anything but just had the students organize themselves into a line.

Essentially there were four houses, each house had a name, its own sleeping corridors, and points to gain for the end-of-the-year announcement and a reward. Nella didn't entirely get it, she wasn't sure why students would care so much, but both Albus and Scorpius assured her that they all did.

“Maybe we should go see Madam Pomfrey.” Scorpius still felt concerned about Nella's fainting spell.

“Scorpius has a point, you still haven't told her about your symptoms,” agreed Albus. Nella shook her head.

“I'll have to go tonight before bed to give her my journal anyways, I'd rather put it off-”

“To do what? Be anxious for two days?”

“...Maybe.” Nella pouted. There wasn't much to do but worry about what Monday had in store, but she was also anxious to see Madam Pomfrey so soon. That was hardly much of a reason so they stood up to make their way there but David stopped them.

“I heard you three; headed to Madam Pomfrey?” Before anyone could answer David continued,

“I'd like to walk you there, and maybe give you a quick tour. It's a big castle and… Well, I am a prefect.” Nella found him a little fishy. He came off like he was giving excuses to cover something up.

“Sure. Let's go then.” Albus sounded doubting as well but they stepped out of the common room together with Scorpius following along. Outside the common room, David didn't continue, instead, he faced the three after a few glances over the shoulder.

“Okay, listen up for a second, especially you Scorpius. I don't know if you've picked up on what's going on with the Slytherin house-”

“It's a little sad.”

“Kind of pathetic.” Albus and Scorpius shared simultaneously and David merely shrugged. No pride in sight.

“We've grown into a huge target for bullying, Gryffindor's mainly, and there are a lot of them. There's only one of 5 and only a few prefects, and the teachers are swamped. First years typically get hit the hardest because you aren't expected to know much magic-”

“Is that what happened last year? To the Slytherin's?” Nella was frightened, not entirely for herself either. She wasn't sure what would happen if she panicked while a bully had their hands on her. She was, however unintentionally, dangerous.

“That… don't worry yourselves over that too much. Let's go on that tour, getting lost as a Slytherin in your first year can open you up to an attack.” Any questions stopped in their tracks at David's point so they followed him around the castle. Nella realized quickly that she might need to go over the tour several times to understand the layout of the school well enough to just get to classes on time. So they spent the day retracting the tour until at least Scorpius felt he could confidently lead the way if the other two lost confidence.

By the fourth trip, David left them with the hospital wing so they could speak with Madam Pomfrey. Before he left he parted them with,

“Try not to go anywhere without each other, and if you can travel with a few more Slytherins, or even walk with a teacher if there's an opportunity.” On that somber note, the three made their way into the hospital wing and Nella was thankful to her only first-year companions.

┏━━━━ ↜ ⋄ ↝ ━━━━┓
This used to be one chapter… haha
I write a lot. If it's too much, you must tell me! I can edit it down… I think. I rarely worry my writing is too long because it all seems so necessary in my mind, but after omitting several chapters I'm realizing that there is a time and place for everything.

My goal (at this moment) is to try not to go too many chapters over 30 per book.
I'm happy to discuss anything that feels way too expositional, and what's necessary, and what isn't. Just be careful what you ask about, that's down the path to spoiler town.

Word Count: 1107
┗━━━━ ↜ ⋄ ↝ ━━━━┛