Meet and Greet
Harry walked down the road from his house towards the town, his trunk levitating by his side. It was 10:00 which in a mainly farming town was prime work hours so he saw very few people until he started to approach the town proper. Harry hadn’t told anyone about the Hogwarts situation, he didn’t talk to anyone, but it had gotten out and quickly made its way around the town. People saw him passing and shouted out words of encouragement or came out of their houses to pat him on the back and congratulate him.
Harry expected to be bogged down under the attention, but this wasn’t the same kind of attention he got as the boy-who-lived. The town was simply happy for him, excited that someone was getting a change to go beyond their small slice of Scotland. It felt like the focus people had on him after he caught the snitch, yes he was the center, but it was because people admired something he had done, not who they thought he was.
It took him a second to get past the well-wishers, but only a few minutes later he was disappearing into the Floo and emerging onto platform 9 ¾. The platform was almost empty. Because most magical travel was near instantaneous, nobody bothered to show up well in advance to the train and with over half an hour left until its departure the only occupants of the platform were easily distinguishable as muggleborns and their families.
Harry was immediately reminded of his time travel when he saw a few outfits that by modern standards warranted the death penalty. He had worn his new school robes to the train. As much as the sight of the green and silver lapels filled him with trepidation, shame, and a million other emotions, they were far nicer than any of the other clothes he currently owned. Comfort won out over his prejudices nine times out of ten.
He was there so early for a few reasons. The first was he had no desire to get here during the rush and have to join an already occupied compartment. Anyone near his age would already have a well-established group of friends and he wasn’t trying to but in on people catching up over a long summer. It would just be horribly awkward.
The second reason was far less thought out. Ever since his unexpected sorting, he had been sleeping terribly. Tossing and turning in nervousness and anticipation. He had woken up well before sunrise and found it impossible to get back to sleep. So, he had done all of his final packing, puttered around for a couple of hours, and eventually decided in his boredom that he might as well just go.
His trunk floated onto the train behind him and with a flick of his wand he levitated it up into the luggage rack of a compartment near the middle of the car. He tossed himself back onto the cushioned seat next to the window and leaned back, enjoying the comfort. After his sorting he had thought about who he was going to be sharing his new house with. If he was being honest, he had no idea how old most of Voldemort’s death eaters were, but in his consideration, he had had realized there weren’t as many really bad ones as he thought. By his best estimate there were only fifteen or twenty currently at Hogwarts that had tried to kill either him or his friends. There were tons of others who had provided support or just been general blood supremist pieces of shit, but not too many had actively attempted to end his life. He just had to try to stick with the ones he wouldn’t be tempted to put down for the betterment of the future or preferably ones that hadn’t done anything wrong.
He closed his eyes and let out a long sigh. In a few minutes this train was going to be swarmed with hundreds of teenagers. Deep breath in, deep breath out. He needed to stay calm, not get pissed off at something minor, and definitely not injure someone on his first day.
A load bang startled Harry and he shot up, snapping his eyes open and whipping out his wand. He was no longer alone in his compartment, three Slytherin boys roughly his age now occupied it as well. The air was filled with the sound of the train engine rumbling and Harry realized he must have fallen asleep while he was sitting there. One of the boys was standing up, his trunk on the floor by his feet, he had probably dropped it getting it off the rack causing the noise.
The boy next to Harry a short blond guy immediately shouted. “There is no shot that counts you did that on purpose.” The boy with the trunk shook his head vehemently but Harry could see his smirk. “Sorry, I don’t know what to say my hand just slipped.” Harry sat back down, confused, as the boy opened and started rummaging around in its depths.
“I’m not paying up for that, you can go fuck yourself.” The other sitting boys quickly agreed, and the standing boy threw his hands up. “Fine, if you want to be that way. You were the ones who asked me to get the cards anyways.” Harry’s confusion was only growing.
“Sorry, what is going on.” It seemed the three of them had almost forgotten about him in their argument and turned towards him, some looking slightly guilty. There was a moment of silence before the one across from him spoke up. “You’ve been sleeping like the dead for the last two hours so we started betting on when you would wake up.”
Harry looked out the window, the countryside signaling that they were already well on their way. He turned back to them, “Makes sense, what are your names?” They blinked as if expecting him to be more put out about it. Honestly it sounded exactly like something he and Ron would have done so he didn’t hold it against them. They went around introducing themselves. The short blond who had been protesting the result was George Sitwell, the one who had been standing was Elliot Scrimgeour, the tall black-haired guy across from him was Finlay Selwyn. “Oh, we are all sixth years.”
“I’m Harry I’m a new sixth year.” Although he recognized the last names, he didn’t recognize any of their first names. So, by his best guess they were probably from irrelevant branches of the family, dead, or not involved by his time, perfect.
Elliot pulled out the deck of cards and a small box that he had been searching for. “Do you want to join us. We learned this muggle game this summer and its good fun.” They launched into explaining the rules of what Harry clearly recognized as Texas Holdem. “So, Harry you in? We are saying buy in is just two sickles.” Harry thought it was funny that the two things that translated seamlessly from the muggle side to the magical were alcohol and gambling. Beer was beer and cards were cards regardless of whether you had magic.
Now, he wouldn’t say he was a card shark, but he had been playing in the weekly auror poker games for years now, so he certainly had a lot more experience than any of these guys. Normally he would feel a little bit bad preying on them, but he was light on money currently and wanted some pocket cash. “Sure, I’ll play.” He pulled out the money pouch that the Macmillans had given him and fished out a couple sickles from it. Well, he had to hope for the cards as well because if he lost these he’d be down to only six or seven more sickles.
Chips were quickly pulled out of the box and handed, cards were delt, and the game began. It was great fun. Just playing and chatting, admitting it felt odd as he was a grown man but acting like a kid again felt good. After thirty minutes or so of play he wound up at an all-in with Finlay who to his eyes was trying to talk himself out of a hole. “We just met, but I’m telling you because I like you, fold, I guarantee you are not walking away with this hand.” He had played a pretty good bluff but he was talking so much now it was giving him away.
“Like you guaranteed you would make the Quidditch team last year!” Chirped Elliot and Finlay sighed in resignation, clearly, he thought this was an overdone joke. “As I’ve said over and over, Rodolphus only kept his friends on the team, there is a reason they got their asses kicked.”
“Yeah, and you would have totally been the difference maker.” Harry pushed his chips into the middle making the call and Finlay tossed his cards to the side, waving off Elliot when he asked if he wanted to re-buy. “You know you’re pretty good at this for it being your first time.”
Harry deflected slightly, “Thanks, we have a kind of similar game where I’m from.”
George started dealing the next hand. “We’ve got a plan for this year. We are going to get some people with worse poker faces and start a weekly game. It should be just free money if we play right.” Harry was certainly down for that, and if their money-making scheme didn’t work out, he was always keen to just play casually.
There was a knock on the door to their compartment and before they could respond the door swung open revealing a familiar mop of greasy black hair. “Fuck off Snape.” That was from George, it appeared he wasn’t alone in his feelings. Even after knowing everything the man did for him he couldn’t help but still despise him for his childish behavior towards him. “Has the trolley passed here yet.”
“No, now move before we make you.” The door swung closed, and George turned back to the game. “Snape, he’s this fourth year. Damn good at potions but completely insufferable and full of himself.” Harry nodded happy to hear someone say it.
“Has no friends in his year so he follows after Rabastan and Dolohov, they’re seventh years, like a lost puppy.” Added Elliot “They use him as an errand boy.”
Hours later the train began to slow. Their game had wrapped up ages ago, Harry had won four sickles on top of his buy in, so he was happy. Now he was going to face Hogwarts and the whole of his new house.
He followed his compartment mates out into the packed corridors, pushing through the masses of younger students. The carriages were just as he remembered, the thestrals standing somberly ahead of them. Harry used to think that the invisible winged horses were creepy. But a year after the war was over, he had come to the end of year feast. Professor McGonagall, then Headmistress McGonagall was awarding him an honorary diploma in light of his achievements. The entire ceremony had been dull and overly long, but after when the students loaded into the carriages to head to the train he saw almost all the upper years able to see the death horses. Now he was sure that they were more tragic than creepy.
The four of them piled into a carriage but before it could start moving a shout reached them. “Hold the door.” Harry stopped the door from swinging closed although he couldn’t see who it was. A tall acne ridden boy spilled in after them. “Thanks.”
Finlay clapped the boy on the back “Amy, how have you been!” The boy winced at what Harry assumed was a nickname. “Nothing, finally escaped my sister though.” The other boys laughed, and Harry realized who was now sitting across from him, Amycus Carrow. He looked completely different now than he did as the future sadistic defense teacher of Hogwarts. Their feet knocked together, and Harry pulled his away.
“This is Harry he’s new in our year.” Carrow nodded and stuck out his hand, “Amycus Carrow, nice to meet you.” Harry had never thought shaking a hand could be so hard. He had met and greeted people he didn’t like and people he hated, but he had never had to make nice with someone who had repeatedly tortured Neville, one of his best friends. He forced a smile with all his will power and shook the hand, the other boy’s skin too warm. “Good to meet you.” Harry just hoped the low light level in the carriage was enough to hide any facial slips.
“Where are the two you are usually attached to?” Carrow waved his arm as if gesturing behind him. “A couple carriages ahead, we were going to ride up with our sisters but Ella joined us, and I wasn’t trying to be in that carriage.” Everyone snickered.
“Not trying to see your one true love?” Elliot chatted and even in the dim light of the carriage Harry could see Carrow turn completely red. “You can’t ask out a girl in your house and then try to avoid her forever when she says no.”
Carrow shook his head. “Well, I’m going to fucking try.” That was unfortunately similar to his own approach after his however brief relationship with Cho. Merlin, was he finding this piece of shit relatable?
The carriage ride wasn’t particularly long, and it wasn’t hard to get excited for people chirping a guy he already hated. But it was incredibly odd seeing Carrow in such a normal position. Yes, he had seen Lestrange in Diagon a few days earlier, but that had been a brief interaction, it hadn’t done anything to break the image of a psychotic chaos obsessed witch. This was different though. It was almost impossible for him to reconcile a normal teenager who was embarrassed from being rejected with the man who tortured students for sport.
Luckily as soon as it slowed to a stop, they all hopped out and Carrow darted off towards the doors ahead of them. Harry followed the rest of his group up towards the castle, passing under the large doorway once again, taking in the large entrance hall. Everything the same as he remembered it before the war. The area had been mostly destroyed in the battle of Hogwarts and while they had done their best to repair it as it was before it had never felt quite the same. Now, it felt like coming home.
He took the route he had walked a thousand times before into the great hall and had to consciously turn himself away from the sea of red and gold on the right side of the hall, pivoting towards the hubbub of green and silver piling into the table.
The hall seemed larger than he remembered and more crowded. He guessed that made sense, a civil war usually did cause population loss. He glanced up at the head table to find it equally much larger than he remembered. Dumbledore sitting imperiously in the center. McGonagall sat to one side speaking with a man Harry didn’t recognize. Flitwick and Slughorn were speaking, both looking far younger than Harry had ever seen them. Actually, Harry was relatively certain that Flitwick was new, he remembered seeing that he was European dueling champion in 69’ and 70’ so he likely joined the faculty in the last couple of years.
He followed his new friends. Friends? They weren’t friends yet, he had only known them for a couple of hours, but it certainly looked like it was heading that way. Altogether they seemed like good guys. Regardless of what they were he followed them towards were Carrow was sitting with two boys Harry actually did recognize, Avery and Mulciber, two sadistic bastards. He sat next to Finlay on the side away from the future death eater club.
Finlay pointed up the table towards the seventh years. “People you should care about.” He indicated a group of three guys, “Rabastan Lestrange, Thorfinn Rowle, Antonin Dolohov.” Harry certainly knew those three. “Rabastan and Finn are dense as shit, but Dolohov is the #2 ranked junior duelist in Britain. Would not mess with him.” He nodded towards a bit further down the table. “The blond and the guy build like a troll are Cyrus Greengrass and Lewis May, Cyrus is the seventh-year prefect and May is the Quidditch captain this year.”
He worked his way down the table pointing out a couple more seventh years that Harry didn’t think were anywhere near as important then got to the other sixth years. “Those are Amy’s friends, Tom Avery and August Mulciber but everyone just calls him Dirt.”
“Dirt?”
“We have open showers, first year he was afraid of people seeing him naked and would go for weeks without washing. Also, his name kind of sounds like mulch.”
Harry had to stop himself from laughing out loud. This was a man that was well known for dismembering muggles and Slytherin house referred to him as Dirt. It was hilarious and very odd for Harry to see.
“It caught on quickly and is pretty engrained now. It fits pretty well, he’s kind of a scummy guy.”
Finlay lowered his voice. “Now on the other side of you.” Harry started to turn but Finlay stopped him. “Don’t look, you don’t want them know we are talking about them.”
“We just stared at Avery and Mulciber for five minutes.”
“Yeah, but they’re assholes. I’m trying to shoot my shot with Tori this year.”
Harry smiled at that, quite possibly the most teenaged thing he had ever heard. Coming back to Hogwarts was turning out to be very funny. “Just look in a second I’m only going to tell you about our year.” Harry gave him a nod.
“The two guys on the other side of the girls are Everitt and Lucas, real anti-social you’re barely going to see them outside of classes. Then the girls, Ella, the girl who rejected Amy is the blond at the end she’s talking with Alecto, his twin.”
The arrangement was getting on his nerves. “This is taking forever I’m not doing this.” He turned his head only to find himself locking eyes with a very familiar set of lilac eyes. He tensed up but managed to avoid drawing his wand this time.
She narrowed her eyes slightly, “We’ve met.”
Finlay leaned forward over the table to join their conversation. “I see you two are familiar.”
Like sharks smelling blood in the water all the people within hearing range turned towards the new conversation. Elliot and George from the other side of the table looked on keenly and two blond girls across from Lestrange focused in curiously. “Not really, we saw each other buying our books.”
There was a moment of awkward silence. Harry had no desire to even try conversation with the woman who had carved a slur into his friend’s arm. Unfortunately, he didn’t seem to have a choice in the matter, the girl sitting across from Lestrange speaking up. “So, I assume you are new?”
He gave her a nod and a smile, “Yes, Harry Allen good to meet you.”
“Victoria Rosier” Harry recognized the name Rosier but didn’t think this one had ever been a death eater. “This is Ava Rosberg, and you’ve already met Bellatrix Black.” Both of those were death eaters. “Where did you transfer from?”
Harry was rescued from the conversation by Dumbledore standing up. He had thought the sorting was long every year, it was so much worse now. His year had something like 40 people. There were at least 60 first years sorted this time; it was painfully long. The first few kids got large rounds of applause, but once 10 or so had gone it became just a short polite clap, no one wanted to make it take longer than necessary.
Finaly it was over, and Dumbledore made a brief remark than the food finally appeared. Harry expected the conversation to start back up, but everyone was so desperate for the food that not a word was spoken for at least five minutes. Hunger making even the most polite students look like Ron at a buffet.
Eventually the blessed respite was chased away, the Rosier girl seeming very interested talking to him. She was probably just trying to be friendly to the new boy but damn every moment he Lestrange focused on him felt like he was trying to keep up a conversation while a Horntail cleaned its claws. He was going to try his best not to be rude to any of the future terrorists, he wanted to stay away from any difficult politics or civil wars. This was his time to experience what being a teenager was supposed to be like and he wasn’t going to throw it away. But, while he was committed to not getting involved in anything, it was still hard not to see what Lestrange -or he guessed Black at this point- would become.
He explained that he was a farmer before coming to Hogwarts, he had already told the guys on the train, they had mostly thought it was cool that he had made it to Hogwarts from that. The girls were clearly trying their best to not show that they looked down on it. At least Victoria, although she insisted to call her Tori was, the other two didn’t seem to care very much about hiding their thoughts. Harry smiled at the frown plastered over Rosberg’s face. This was going to make being better than them in everything so much more satisfying.
After a few more minutes the conversation reached a natural pause which Harry quickly used to turn back to Finlay and restarted the conversation they had been having on the train about Quidditch. Harry was seriously considering trying out for the team now. He didn’t have a broom, but he could figure that out and he had a lurking desire to play against his own father in Quidditch. Everyone had always talked up how good he was, Harry wanted to see for himself.
Before long Harry was part of the crowd of Slytherins making their way through the hallways down into the bowels of the castle. The Slytherin common room was as he remembered it from their break in during his second year. A massive room of black stone with pillars holding up the ceiling. The room was softened from its completely stone construction by the rugs covering the floor and the tapestries hanging on the walls. Some depressions in the floor forming comfortable cushion lined pits and a few hearths scattered around the room with circles of chairs and couches around them. There didn’t seem to be any light sources, but the room was still plenty bright even with the dark walls and floor.
He and the rest of the boys he rode the train with were the first 6th years to get to the common room and Harry followed while they tracked straight towards a large circle of couches on one side of the room, next to a large hearth. There were a couple of what looked like 4th years already there that were promptly kicked out of their seats by George. “I waited five years to get these seats, they can sure as hell wait a couple more.”
Slowly the rest of the 6th years trickled in and Harry had to go through the introductions all over again with the girls that had been sitting further down the table as well as the last two boys who like Finlay had said barely spoke a word. But soon the common room was packed and Slughorn bounded into the dungeon with the constant energy he had.
Harry loved the older man. Yes, he was egotistical, vain, and only focused on those he thought had talent. But he was also one of the most cheerful men Harry had ever met, he didn’t discriminate by any factor other than talent, and he used his connections to help his students. He may only help them in order to expand his network of friends in high places, but one only needed to look at the walls of his office to see the amount of people who he had helped achieve their dreams.
“Quiet please, the faster you all stop talking the faster we get to sleep.” The common room quickly descended into silence. “Thank you, now we can go over little details in the coming days but there are some things we should get through tonight.”
He looked over towards where the seventh years were sitting. “Can I get the committee up here?” Greengrass, May, Dolohov, and a girl that Harry was pretty sure Finlay had called Sarah stood up and walked over to him. “I expect the best out of all of you this year. New faces and old ones. I ask nothing more than your all. Now I will let your fellow students explain everything to you. I am sure everyone has heard me speak enough before.” There was a small wave of laughter and Slughorn moved towards the wall, out of the way.
Greengrass stepped forward. “Welcome back everyone. For all the new students Sasha” he gestured at one of the girls, eh his guess had been close enough. “and I are the seventh year prefects, don’t bother us with trivial things but real problems we are here for you.”
It seemed like now it was May’s turn to step forward “I will be the Quidditch captain this year. I think we can all admit that last year was an embarrassing showing. I don’t intend to fall into the same traps as our previous captain.” Harry could clearly see Rabastan Lestrange scowling across the room at the clear shot at his brother. “I want anyone who thinks they have a shot to come try out. We might not be working with much but we are going to give it our best shot this year.”
Dolohov was the last to come forward striding confidently. Between now and when Harry had first met him he had aged 20 years and done a long stint in Azkaban. He had been a shrunken husk. But he had always had an unnerving cocky grin. It stretched his face when skin hung off his bones, it looked more natural on his teenaged face, but it was equally irritating.
“As this year’s social officer, I’ve got a lot of great things planned.” He gave that smile and Harry wanted to punch the man in the face. “This year is the 150th anniversary of the end of the Treaty of Hawick.” Harry was a bit confused. Harwick had was the treaty that brought about the union of Scotland and England on the wizarding side. It had taken quite a bit longer and a couple more wars than on the muggle side. He had no idea how that would make a good social event.
“I’m not going to spoil anything, but I’ve been working with the other houses and doing research to design some competitions for us.” Now that was even odder, from what he had heard of the man he didn’t cooperate well with others, and he certainly didn’t do research. His self-satisfied smirk grew. “We will have fun competitions throughout the year with the goal of finding out who would have been the best soldier in the wars of the border.” Well, that wasn’t suspicious at all.