Welcome back everyone! We're only one chapter away from Pandora arriving at Hogwarts! I decided to do a bit of a time skip as I couldn't think of anything exciting between the Diagon Alley trip and the first day of school. Thank you so much to the +20 people who have read the story so far and a huge thank you to the one vote from a couple days ago. That one vote made my weekend if I'm being honest. Thank you all and I hope you enjoy!
Okay, that Snape guy was a dick. He wouldn't stop giving snarky jabs towards my father, and pretty much just dropped me at the gateway and left me there, not even helping me through it. Thankfully, a blonde woman walked through with her son and I just followed their example. As I passed the boy, who seemed to be about my age, he openly stared.
"Draco? Are you listening?" Draco? What a weird name. The blonde boy shook himself and looked back at his mother. I snickered and got onto the train. With the help of a platform attendant, my stuff was above the seats and I sat down, reading the latest issue of Witch weekly. I had been correct; my sisters loved that magazine. I even took a second subscription that was addressed to Silena so they could read it while I was at Hogwarts. We recently had a laugh over someone who won an award known as "Witch Weekly's most Charming Smile Award", it was won by someone named Gildroy Lockhart, who we all agreed was ugly and was one of those people who had a major ego problem. Silena, trying to be nice, said that it was probably older witches who found him attractive, but Drew said that it didn't mean they were right. Drew had gotten a bit nicer to me ever since I gave her that magic music box. Silena said that Drew had been shocked that I had thought of her when getting gifts.
"E-excuse me?" I looked up and saw a cute raven-haired boy with glasses at the entrance to the compartment. "Would it be alright if I joined you?"
"Sure thing." I smiled. The boy blushed and sat down. "You look familiar. Have I met you before?" I asked. He gave the aura of someone I haven't seen in a very long time but someone I still knew.
"Um, I don't think so. I'm Harry. Harry Potter."
I did know him. My dad and Harry's dad, James Potter, were best friends when he was in school. Mom once said that during her and dad's dates, he would talk about James and their shared escapades so much that it felt like she knew James too. As Harry was born less than a month after I was, Sirius and James brought us together a lot on play dates before the Potters went into hiding.
"That explains it. My dad was good friends with your dad. We had playdates together when we were little." I said smiling.
"Really?" He sounded surprised.
"Yeah, its good to see you again Harry." He smiled back. "Oh, I'm Pandora Black."
The train gave a mighty whistle and it became moving. I put my magazine away and Harry and I sat in comfortable silence. I think he was just taking everything in.
"Excuse me?" We both turned and saw a red-haired boy with some dirt on his nose standing where Harry had been a little bit ago. His face went pink when he locked eyes with me. "Do you mind? Everywhere else is full."
Harry looked at me and I just shrugged. "Not at all." He said kindly. The boy sat on my right side, across from Harry.
"I'm Ron by the way. Ron Weasley."
"Pandora Black."
"I'm Harry. Harry Potter." Ron gaped at Harry.
"So-so it's true!" He gasped. "I mean, do you really have the...the?" He started pointing at his forehead, but Harry didn't pick up the hint.
"The what?" Harry asked, confused.
"He means your scar, honey." I said, trying not to laugh. Ron nodded. Harry smiled good-naturedly and lifted his bangs, revealing the lightening bolt scar on his forehead. What a bizarre shape. I wonder why a spell gave him that.
"Wicked." Ron said in awe, making me laugh and Harry snorted. Just then, an elderly woman came down the corridor with a cart full of what seemed like candy. I had shared the candy I got at Diagon Alley with not only my siblings, but Clarisse and Annabeth as well. Clarisse didn't like any of it but I didn't take it to heart as Clarisse has never really been a fan of candy or anything overly sweet. Annabeth really liked the chocolate frogs, especially because of the collecting cards that came inside the box. She let me keep the card after she copied down the information that was on the card, after Chiron or one of the campers that didn't suffer from bad dyslexia like we did, translated that it said. The children of the minor gods had an easier time reading English, so I often incorporated their help.
"Anything off the trolley dears?" She asked.
"No thanks." Ron held up a baggie of smushed up sandwiches, looking embarrassed. "I'm all set." I was about to take out my money bag, but Harry spoke up.
"We'll take the lot." He said to the woman, pulling out a handful of galleons. Great minds think alike, I guess.
"Whoa." Ron stared at the gold.
We got a bit of everything, forgetting about the nasty looking sandwiches, and I immediately went to the cauldron cakes. Maybe it's an Aphrodite girl thing but I had a weakness for chocolate.
"Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans?" Harry picked up a box of them. I had gotten quite a few of those and that was the one sweet I was able to share with the entire camp. Even Mr. D had one, having picked up a purple one that turned out to be grape jelly. He had been in a surprisingly good mood after that. Clarisse ended up with Bacon (which she enjoyed) and Annabeth got grass. Conner Stoll was one of the very unlucky ones as he had eaten a vomit flavored bean. His brother Travis couldn't stop laughing.
"They mean every flavor." Ron warned as he took a bite out of a pumpkin pasty. "There's chocolate and peppermint but there's also spinach, liver and trout. George swears he got a bogie flavored one once."
"I gave these to a couple of my friends when I went back to camp from Diagon Alley. My camp director got grape jelly, my friend Clarisse got bacon, and my other friend Annabeth got grass. Conner got vomit, and his brother Travis wasn't even able to eat his bean, he was laughing too much."
"Camp?" Harry asked.
"Yeah, my Grandfather owns a camp in New York, along Long Island Sound. My many cousins and I are all magic and we stay there a lot. All of us come during the summer, and some of us stay there year-round, since a lot of our parents are really busy."
"You must have a huge family." Ron said. I nodded.
"There's about 80 of us, give or take. Some of my aunts or Uncles have a lot of kids. I have about 9 siblings, though some of them are only half."
"Blimey." The boys stared at me. Eventually Harry picked up a chocolate frog box.
"These aren't real frogs, are they?" He asked.
"It's just a spell." Ron said. "Besides, it's the card you want. Each pack's got a famous witch or wizard. I got about 500 meself." Harry opened the box and the frog leapt out of its box.
"Watch it!" Ron said. I quickly moved and grabbed the frog before it jumped out the window. "Wow." Ron said, probably surprised I moved so fast. That's what years of weapon training does to you.
"You want it Harry?" I asked, holding out the frog. He just smiled and shook his head.
"You can have it. You caught it." I smiled and I bit into the frog's head. He looked down at the card. "I've got Dumbledore." He exclaimed.
"I got 'bout six of him." Ron said.
"I haven't gotten him yet. I only have Lady Carmilla Sanguina, Bowman Wright, Carlotta Pinkstone, Circe, and Cliodne." I said.
"You remember the exact names?"
"Surprisingly. I have a hard time reading so I'm shocked I remembered all of them."
"What do you mean you have a hard time reading?" Ron asked.
"I have something called dyslexia. I see letters in different places and it just makes it harder to read especially with joined writing or people with messy handwriting. A lot of my family has it. It just takes a little extra effort to read, but usually I just ask someone to help me if I can't figure out a word."
"Isn't there a spell or potion to fix that?" Ron asked.
"I have no idea, but I wouldn't take it anyways."
Harry looked back down at his card. "Hey, he's gone." He said. I looked at his card and the figure of Dumbledore that had been there moments before was now gone.
"Well you can't expect him to hang around all day, can you?" Well I guess it's hard to argue with that logic. I looked down at Ron's lap, just now noticing the huge gray rat on his lap. I screeched and scrambled over to Harry's side.
"Oh, sorry Pandora." Ron said. "Don't worry, Scabbers won't hurt ya. He's too lazy to do anything but sleep." I looked at the creature in disgust. I hated rats. They were filthy and ugly little pests, but I didn't want to hurt Ron's feelings. "Pathetic, isn't he?" Ron looked down at Scabbers with a similar expression.
"Just a little bit." Harry said politely.
"My brother Fred gave me a spell to turn him yellow." Ron said. "Wanna see?"
"yeah!" Harry looked excited, probably at the idea of magic. I was also curious about what magic looked like here. Ron pulled out an old and worn-down looking wand and cleared his throat.
"Sun-" A girl walked into our compartment. Her hair was really bushy, like a cliché perm from the 80s kind of bushy, and gray eyes. She was already in the uniform, reminding me of how much I wasn't looking forward to changing into that.
"Has anyone seen a toad?" Oh gods, she had that bossy I'm smart so I'm better than you voice. "A boy named Neville's lost one."
Ron scrunched up his nose and said no. The girl looked at the wand in his hand.
"Oh, are you doing magic?"
"No, he's clearly baking a pie. What do you think he's doing?" I said before I could stop myself. Harry snorted and Ron looked like he was biting back a laugh. The girl glared at me. "Well don't ask a stupid question if you don't want a sarcastic answer."
She turned, ignoring me. "Well, let's see then." She said to Ron. His ears went pink and he cleared his throat.
"Sunshine, daisies, bottom mellow, turn this stupid fat rat yellow." He pointed his wand at the rat, but nothing happened. Scabbers stayed fast asleep.
"Are you sure that's a real spell?" The girl asked in a condescending voice. Ugh, it's as she was an Athena kid version of Drew. "well, it's not very good is it? Of course, I've only tried a few simple ones myself, and they've all worked for me." She pulled out her wand and sat next to Ron, across from Harry. "For example." She pointed her wand at Harry, who went crossed eyed looking at the tip of her wand. I just now noticed that the middle part of his glasses were taped together. "Oculus Reparo." The tape came off Harry's glasses and disappeared. His glasses were fixed. Harry took off his glasses looking amazed. "That's better isn't it?"
Okay, I know she was annoying, but that was a nice thing she did for Harry.
She suddenly gasped. "Holy cricket, you're Harry Potter!" Harry put his glasses back on. "I'm Hermione Granger." She looked at me with a bit of dislike.
"Pandora Black." I said, giving her the same look back.
"And, you are?" She asked Ron, who was stuffing his face with candy.
"I'm Ron Weasley." He said around the candy. Hermione looked at him in slight disgust.
"Pleasure." She looked away from him. "You three better change into your robes. I expect we'll be arriving soon." She got up and was about to leave but she doubled back and looked at Ron. "You've got dirt on your nose by the way. Did you know? Just there." She said, pointing at the same spot on her nose. Ron glared at her as she left.
I sighed and pulled out a makeup remover wipe from my pocket. "Here Ron. This will get that dirt off no problem." He took it and wiped the side of his nose. "So am I the only one that thought she was annoying? Ugh, I so want to curse her clothes."
"Curse her clothes?" Harry asked.
"So, my siblings and I have always been gifted in fashion related magic. One thing we do when we really don't like someone is curse them so that all of their clothes become two sizes too small for about 2 days. It may not sound that bad but it's enough to make the cursed person really uncomfortable."
"I know how that feels. I have six older brothers and almost everything I have are hand me downs from them. My robes are too short because of that."
"Oh, I can fix that super quick. As soon as we get changed, I'll fix them before we get to the school."
Ron looked relieved. "Thanks Pandora."
"It's my pleasure. Now, I am going to go find a bathroom and change. You boys are cool, but I do not want to give you a peep show." I said casually and both boys went pink as I got my uniform out of my suitcase. "Don't miss me too much." I said, winking as I left. As I walked down the corridor, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a lot of heads turn as I passed by different compartments. I found a girls bathroom and changed. Ugh, I looked hideous, but I had to wear it. I left the bathroom, placing my wand in the special pocket inside my robes and started heading back to the boys. However, I bumped into someone who was coming out of their compartment. He was a cute red-haired boy, who looked very similar to Ron.
"Merlin's beard." He said, looking down at me.
"Oi, Fred, your blocking the door." A carbon copy of the first boy poked his head out and he also stared at me.
"I'm sorry but can I please move past you?" I asked, putting a small bit of Charmspeak in my voice. "Fred" nodded and went back into the compartment and I squeezed past them. I'd have to find them again. They were cute. I got back to the compartment and saw that Ron and Harry were dressed in their robes. Ron was right, his robes were almost three inches too short and his parts were almost 2 inches. I just stared at it, willing the clothes to change and the robes and legs got longer until it looked the same as Harry's brand-new robes. The rest of the uniform even changed to fit him specifically, any rips or frays were instantly fixed. Ron breathed a sigh of relief.
"You're the best Pandora." He said.
"I aim to please, Ronald." I said with a smile. The train soon pulled into a station and we started to get off the train.