Prologue
"What have you done, Dumbledore?"
"What I had to do."
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"Hufflepuff!" The Hat shouted as soon as it got onto Raven's head. She frozen upon hearing that word, that house. She wasn't supposed to be in that house. No, she was a Rosier. She was supposed to be with the Slytherins!
This was wrong.
Very wrong.
She could hear everyone whisper around her at the hat's choice. She locked eyes with her cousins as she walked down the steps and towards the Hufflepuff house. Her house.
No one had made a sound as this happened. No cheers. No claps. Nothing. Not like how they did for Harry Potter.
Just whispers as she walked.
"Rotten Rosier." She heard someone whisper under there breathe as she passed them by, and soon, it spread. She knew that her first year at Hogwarts was going to be hell.
How could someone like her be a Hufflepuff? Hufflepuffs are kind, loyal. She wasn't kind. She wasn't loyal. She was selfish, wasn't she? Like the rest of her family. Her uncle was selfish, angry. Her aunt was cunning, manipulative. And her cousins...
They weren't selfish.
Just kids stuck in a bad situation. Like her.
She finally sat down beside some boy as soon as the hat called for the next person. She couldn't turn back to look. She couldn't look at the guy next to her to talk. She just looked straight ahead.
She didn't even have to turn to see that the rest of the table scooted away as soon as she sat. Almost as if she were a parasite.
She felt her lip wobble.
"Hey."
"Huh?" She turned to the boy next to her. He had a kind smile on his face unlike his peers, who looked at her with a scowl. She almost wanted to call them out on it. Weren't Hufflepuff's supposed to be kind? "Are— Are you talking to me?"
"Yeah, silly." He said, his grey eyes shinned in the light. "Who else would I be talking to?"
"A— A ghost?" She stuttered, turning her head back not liking how much she felt exposed. "Don't they have them here?"
"We have a smart one guys!" He exclaimed for the rest of his table to hear. He turned back to her, placing his hand on her head, ruffling it. "'You'll fit right in."
"I don't think so." Raven sighed. She pursed her lips before nodding her head towards the rest of the distant table. "They don't seem to like me."
"Who cares about them?" He scoffed before turning his head to glare at them. "I don't like them either."
"Really?" She asked.
"No." He chuckled. And Raven felt her chest lighten as soon as she heard it. "But don't worry, they'll warm up to you."
"I hope so." She mumbles.
"But hey," He bumped his shoulders on hers. "At least you got one friend."
"Is this some sort of tactic where you take me under your wing and mentor me or something?" She questioned, furrowing her eyebrows as she looked up at him. He smiled, scratching the back of his head nervously.
"You could say that." He joked. "Or you could just be my friend. What do you say?"
"I'm Raven Rosier." Raven stuck her right hand out for him to shake. He smiled, a gentle smile before shaking her as well.
"I'm Cedric Diggory."