Hogwarts Express

"Sure, do you need help with your trunk?" Robert asked, eyeing the big rectangular iten sitting next to the girl's leg.

To the boy's answer, the girl only nodded with a small shy smile.

A quick feather-light and levitation charm combination later, they both were now sitting across from one another.

"I'm Robert Rosier, nice to meet you." the boy spoke as he offered his hand for a handshake.

The girls took his hand and said, "Rose Potter, nice to meet you too."

Rob had a surprised look on his face, this was the famous Girl-Who-Lived, the only thing that could give her away was the red hair and the green eyes. Where was the supposed grandeur of being a national hero?

The boy noticed that his change of expression was noticed by the girl, who now showed a slightly angry look.

"I'm sorry, it's just that I thought you'd look different." he quickly said.

Rose let a small sigh lose and said, "It's fine, it's not just you, ever since I got my letter everyone looks at me like that. I know that I'm supposed to be famous, but it feels weird with everyone wanting to hold my hand or wanting to see my scar."

Robert then decided to put his book away and look directly at the girl, he said, "If it is like that, then do you want to talk about something?"

Rose felt happy, maybe she would learn more about this world, so caught up in her excitement, she didn't realise, until it was too late, that she had said, "Yes, I want to know about magic!"

The boy was taken aback with the eagerness of the girl but with a smile he continued by saying, "There is a lot to know about magic, you'll have to choose something more specific."

"Fine, how about the magic that you did with my trunk?" she said after thinking for a bit.

Robert, to that, took out his wand and held out the book in his other hand. He said, "I used two spells, one made the trunk lighter, and the other levitated it."

After that he made a swish and a flick and said "Wingardium Leviosa", this made the book that was in his hands float towards the girl sitting across from him.

She caught the book and noticed that it didn't weigh as much as she thought it would.

"We'll learn the levitation charm during our first year, I reckon we should learn the feather-light as well, it'll make carrying the books around much easier." Robert said to the impressed girl.

Before they could continue their conversation, the compartment's door slid open and a young redhead boy went in.

"Anyone sitting there?", he said pointing at the seat next to Robert. "Everywhere else is full." he complemented.

Both occupants shook their head and the boy sat down.

"I'm Ron Weasley, my mom helped you with the barrier right?" he said as he pointed to the girl.

He received a nod in return alongside a greeting, "I'm Rose Potter, nice to meet you."

The boy's eyes opened so much that the other two kids thought they'd pop out of their sockets, with an unbelieving expression he said, "Are you really the-girl-who-lived?" to which he received a confused look.

"Yes, she really is." came the voice of the boy that was sitting next to him.

Ron looked happy, but then suddenly he pointed at the girl's forehead and said, "And have you really got… you know.."

The girl quickly covered her bangs with her hands, the only answer to the boy's inquiry was a small nod of her head.

"Can I see… " Ron started but was interrupted by the other boy again, "I'm Robert Rosier, nice to meet you Ron." he said.

Weasley didn't have a very pleasant look on his face, but in seeing the relieved expression on Rose's face, he ignored the interruption.

"What were you talking about anyways, before I got here?" he continued looking at Rose.

The girl held up the book and said, "Robert was showing me some magic spells, he made this book be really light and he made it fly."

"Cool, mum never let us do magic inside, she didn't want me to do magic at all before I got my letter. But I managed to get my brother to teach me a bit." Ron commented.

With an understanding nod, Robert said, "My mom, also didn't let me do magic before I got my wand, she even said that she'd hex anyone who tried to teach me."

"But you already know some spells, you even said that we would learn them later this year." Rose interjected.

To that Rob could only say, "Well, I got my letter in January, so she didn't have a reason to not let me try anymore. These last few months all I've been doing is trying out spells, that's why I already know some that we'll learn."

"So you read ahead? Are you mental? Why would you do that?" said a shocked Ron.

Robert gave the boy an angry look and answered him, "I like to read, that's what I do for fun, don't you have something that you like to do when you're bored?"

"Yeah, I play quidditch, do you play? I reckon we could try and get to the house teams. It'd be great, play quidditch at hogwarts." the boy answered, clearly showing his excitement for the sport.

"What's quid itch?" Rose's question quenched all of the boy's excitement at the moment's notice. Now he was looking at her as if she had just insulted his whole family.

"You don't know what quidditch is?" he asked, still not believing his ears. "It's just the best thing there is." he continued with a confident look in his face.

Rose still looked confused, so Robert decided to help, "It is called quidditch, it has nothing to do with an itch or a quid. It's the most popular sport for the wizarding population, you basically fly on brooms and try to score by throwing balls at the goals, that is until one of the players grabs a golden ball, then the game ends."

That cleared the girl's confusion, the only thing that she showed was eagerness.

"Wait, so it is true that you were raised by muggles? Since you didn't know about quidditch." Ron said after he had gotten over his surprise.

The girl had a sad smile when she said, "Yeah, they weren't very nice, they didn't even tell me about magic, not even when some weird stuff happened. They just said that it was my freakness."

"Well, I don't think it was any sort of freakness, else you wouldn't be here. And like I said before, you can ask me anything that you want and I'll try to answer you. I'll even try and make him not mention your scar or anything related to that." Robert said, the last part while he pointed at Ron, how was supporting a sheepish look.

Rose lit right up and with a bright smile gave the boy a thanks. That gesture made both bright red, and looking at anything other than her.

Ron was the one to break the silence that ensured in the compartment, he removed a rat from his pocket and said, "This is Scabbers, I got him this year from my older brother Percy, he's been in the family for ten years already, that's why he looks so old."

All three pairs of eyes were on the fat grey rat that seemed to be sleeping on Ron's hand.

"He does look really old", Rose said, getting closer to take a better look at the animal.

This prompted them to introduce their pets, Robert showed them Gizmo, who was eyeing the rat, and Rose introduced her snowy white owl, who she named Hedwig.

The conversation died down after that, Robert focused instead on the outside scenery, Rose didn't want to bother him with questions and Ron was afraid of embarrassing himself by asking questions abou You-Know-Who to the Girl-Who-Lived.

A few minutes later there was a great catering outside in the corridor, and the kids turned to see a smiling, dimpled woman who had opened their door and said, "Anything of the trolley, dears?"

Rose was the first one to get up and go towards the lady, she asked for a candy called 'Mars Bars', but the woman didn't have those.

Robert, who was still sitting and looking at the interaction, couldn't help but hear the mutter that Ron made, "I've sandwiches."

He could see the saddened expression of the boy so he made him a proposition, "Hey Ron, do you want to trade your sandwiches with some of the things from the trolley?"

The boy brightened up immediately after and, somehow, in one motion threw his sandwiches to Robert and dashed to the elderly lady in order to choose something for him.

He ended up getting some Cauldron Cakes and some pumpkin pasties, while Rose bought a few of each, since she had never heard or seen any of those foods before.

With all that food being paid, Ron's part by Robert, the three compartment residents started to dig in.

"You can take a cake or a pasty, those are all dry." Ron said while handing the boy one of the pumpkin pasties.

"You can take from mine too. I just wanted to try them, we can share." Rose added.

Robert gave both of them a smile but still ate the sandwich, between bites he said, "I don't know what you were talking about, these are really good."

The other two were dumbfounded, they didn't think that he would eat after they offered to share. They were even more confused when Robert handed them a sandwich a piece and said, "Since we are sharing it's only right I give you two some of mine."

They took the food but decided to eat the things they bought first.

After they finished their first choice of meal they went for some snacks, the ones which got Rose's attention were the Chocolate Frogs, she asked the other two, "These are not real frogs, right?"

Ron answered her by saying, "No, but see which card is in it. I'm missing only a few of them."

Rose was once again confused, so Robert explained, "Those candies come with a card of a famous wizard or witch, some people like to collect them. I think that's the case with Ron."

"Yeah, I need Agrippa and Ptolemy." added the other boy.

Now that she knew what they were talking about, she unwrapped his Chocolate Frogs and picked up the card.

The card showed an older man, with silver hair and beard, he also had blue eyes which were behind a pair of half-moon glasses. Underneath the picture was written the name Albus Dumbledore.

"So this is Dumbledore." Rose said out loud.

Ron was again hit with realisation that the Girl-Who-Lived didn't know about the magical world. "Can I have one?" he asked.

His response was the girl handing him a handful of the candies.

While the two boys were dividing the Chocolate Frogs between themselves, Rose turned the card and read its description.

-

'Albus Dumbledore, currently Headmaster of Hogwarts.

Considered by many to be the greatest wizard of modern times, Dumbledore is particularly famous for his defeat of the Dark wizard Grindelwald in 1945, for the discovery of the twelve uses of Dragon's blood, and his work on alchemy with his partner, Nicolas Flamel. Professor Dumbledore enjoys chamber music and tenpin bowling.'

-

After turning it again, she was surprised that the picture was empty. Thus she exclaimed, "He's gone!"

To which Ron answered, "Well he can't hang out all day."

The way that he said it made Rose realise that this was another normal thing for magical people, it was confirmed when Robert, once again, helped her out, "We use magical pictures, it's normal for them to move. I heard that muggle ones don't, I guess that's why you reacted like that."

At her confirmation, Ron blurted aot a "Weird!", which prompted the three to go in a fit of giggles. When they finished the Chocolate Frogs, and the redhead realised that he didn't get any new cards for his collection, he offered the other two, and, since Robert wasn't interested, Rose took them.

The next candy that they decided to try was Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans, they had their fun going from amazing tasting ones to the most disgusting things that they could imagine.

Their fun was interrupted by the sound of the door sliding open. On the other side stood a girl, one that had really bushy hair and rather large front teeth.

She pointed at Robert and said, "It's you, from the bookstore."

Robert looked at the girl and remembered the incident on his birthday where he crashed into the girl when he was running inside Flourish and Blotts.

"Hermione right? Great to see you again." he said with a smile.

The girl entered the compartment, closed the door and sat besides Rose. She also said, "You remember me?" a smile could be seen forming on her face.

"You know her?" came Ron's voice before Rob could say anything.

Robert looked at each member and introduced them, "Yeah, this is Hermione Granger, we met when I was buying my school books. Hermione, these two are Ron Weasly and Rose Potter, I met them here at the train."

Hermione's head did a very quick turn towards Rose as she said, "Are you really Rose Potter?"

"I know all about you, of course... I got a few extra books, for background reading, and you're in Modern Magical History and The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts and Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century." she continued before anyone could've said anything.

Rose showed a surprised look and commented, "Am I?"

"Goodness, didn't you know? If I was in a book I'd find out everything I could." Hermione said while staring at the confused girl.

Robert once again stepped in to try and help the situation, "Rose grew up with muggles, so she doesn't know about the wizarding world."

That statement seemed to only make it worse as this time real excitement was shown in Hermione's face as she said, "Really? Me too, it was such a surprise. When I received my Hogwarts letter, my parents didn't believe it to be true, but then a professor went to our home and showed us some magic. I remember that some weird things happened when I was younger, I neve thought it'd be magic. Did the same happen to you?"

"Woah, calm down Hermione, she won't be able to answer you if you don't give her time." Robert said when the girl finished talking.

With a sheepish look, and looking to the ground, she muttered a small "Sorry."

"It's fine. Weird things did happen to me, and Hagrid went into my house to tell me that I'm a witch." Rose answered her.

Ron, who seemed to be getting red, took a breath and asked, "Who's Hagrid?"

"He is the gamekeeper of Hogwarts, he's also really tall, but he's sweet." she continued after hearing the boy's question.

Silence downed on the compartment after her answer, it was broken a few moments later when Hermione said, "Do you know what house you'll be in? I hope I get in Gryffindor, it sounds by far the best, I heard that Dumbledore was one."

Rose didn't know what she was talking about, instead she was looking at Robert waiting for him to explain what was said.

Seeing as everyone was waiting for him to talk, he said, "Hogwarts is divided in four houses, there is Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin. Each one represents some characteristic of a person, so when she says she wants to be a gryffindor it means that she prefers those characteristics over the others."

"Gryffindors values courage, chivalry, and determination; Huffepuffs values hard work, dedication, patience, loyalty, and fair play; Ravenclaws value wit, learning, and wisdom and Slytherins value cunning, resourcefulness, leadership, and ambition. I don't know how they choose, whomever I asked only said it was tradition to not tell new students." he finished receiving a nod of gratitude from Rose.

After that she looked at Ron, wanting to know his opinion.

Seeing that now he was the center of attention he said, "My brothers were Gryffindors, Mum and Dad too. I don't know what they'll say if I'm not in it too, I just don't want to go to Slytherin, that's where all the evil people go."

Rose took his words in consideration, but before she could say anything Rob started talking, "You shouldn't classify a house for the people that went to them, almost everyone of my family members went to Slytherin, and they're not evil. My mom's even a healer. So I don't think it's right to choose a house just because of where people like Dumbledore or Voldemort went."

At the mention of the name, Ron flinched, but he continued to glare at Robert.

"So what? Do you want to be a snake?" he said, raising his voice.

Robert kept calm and said, "I don't know. I just want to go to a house where I'll be able to make friends and learn magic."

"If it is like that then I suppose I'd be better in Ravenclaw, after all I do want to learn magic." Rose said quickly, trying to interrupt any conflict that might happen.

They stayed quiet after that, and once again what broke the silence was the opening of the door.

This time it was three boys who were on the other side. The blonde boy that was in the middle looked at Rose and said, "Is it true what they are saying all down the train? That Rose Potter is in this compartment?"

"Yes" was Rose's answer, she looked at the boys, the middle one was the shorter of all the boys in the compartment, and the other two were the bigger, and they looked mean.

Seeing that the redhead girl was looking at his companions the blonde boy introduced themselves, "Oh, these are Crabbe and Goyle. And I'm Malfoy, Draco Malfoy."

They all heard a snicker coming from Ron's direction.

"Think my name's funny, do you? No need to ask who you are. My father told me all the Weasleys have red hair, freckles and more children than they can afford" Draco said while snoring at the redhead boy.

He then turned to Rose and said, "You'll soon find out some wizarding families are much better than others, Potter. You don't..."

Before he could continue he heard a voice coming from the side of the compartment that he wasn't facing, "There are indeed Draco. Hello Gregory, Vincent, long time no see."

Draco turned to see who'd dare to interrupt him only to be shocked to see who was sharing the compartment with the Girl-Who-Lived.

"Robert Rosier, I didn't expect to see you here, not with a Weasley and a mudblood." he said to the boy.

Many emotions were thrown into the mix with those words, Rose and Hermione were confused, Crabe and Goyle were happy to see a friend, Robert was angry at the choice of words from the boy however, the most expressive one was Ron, he was starting to get purple when he lashed out, "So you're a snake, what is this? Some sort of plan to make fun of us? What'll be next? Will you join your Death Eaters friends and attack us?"

No one saw that coming, those that understood what he said grew angry, but before any of the three new members of the compartment could say or do anything Robert said, "No Ron, I'm not here to make fun or attack any of you. I was the first in this compartment, you choose to sit here with me and Rose. As for you Malfoy, you shouldn't be using those kinds of words now that your father isn't here to protect you."

It was a new experience for the three kids who were sharing the compartment with Rob, he had been so friendly and happy, and now he was starting to become a little frightening, it looked like he was leaking some sort of cold wind. Draco palled immediately, he knew that Robert wasn't too fond of him and he never could use his father's name against the boy.

"That girl, Draco, is my friend. If I hear you call her that again you'll have to worry about me. We both know that your father can't save you if you mess with me." Robert said, now with his hair starting to move, semmeling from an inexistent breeze, since the windows were closed.

Draco now could be mistaken for a ghost, he couldn't take his eyes off Robert, afraid that he might do something, thus he decided to do the only thing that he knew wouldn't bring him trouble, he fled.

Gregory and Vincent didn't follow him, they were too shocked at seeing the most friendly person they knew being that scary, they only noticed the situation when the pressure eased up due to Draco leaving.

"We'll talk at Hogwarts, I brought the pictures that I took during the World Cup, I know that I said I'd share with you two, but we haven't met since then." Robert said to the two boys, after which they left.

Rob then turned to the other passengers and said with an apologetic tone, "Sorry about that, I know them, we used to go to each other's house to play when we were younger. Never really liked Draco, he made fun of me one time and I couldn't get past it."

"Wa...wa...was that magic that made your hair move and the cabin get colder?" Hermione asked, trembling slightly.

Robert realised that he lost control, and with an embarrassed face said, "Yeah, I have a strong connection with magic, so if I'm not careful that can happen, but you don't have to worry, that only happens when I get really angry. It's sort of like accidental magic, only stronger."

After a few seconds in silence Hermione said, "You three should change into your robes, me and Rose can leave if you want to change first."

That brought everyone back. Robert simply stood up, grabbed Ron's arm and left through the opened compartment door, closing it when they were outside.

Out of the compartment, Ron shook off his hand and was about to berate the boy when he saw him raise his hand making a sign for him to stop.

"I don't want to hear it Ron, I'm mad at you as well. Did the last few hours we spent talking with each other meant nothing? Just because I like some people that got into a house that you don't like, you just go ahead and call me a Death Eater. I thought we would be friends, but it seems that I was wrong" Rob said, the look of disappointment clear in his face.

Ron didn't know what to say, so he just stood there frozen, trying to think about something to tell the boy. When he finally thought of something he heard the compartment door open and the two girls were standing there waiting for them to get in.

They did so, but only for a moment, Robert simply went in, took his owl and his trunk and got out.

"Where are you going?" asked Rose upon seeing the boy leave carrying his belongings.

Robert looked at her, then at Hermione and said, "I have other people I know on the train, I'll go say hello to them. We can talk later when we get to Hogwarts." and then he left.

Ron simply closed the door and changed his clothes. Outside, Hermione said her farewells for Rose and left while saying that her trunk was in another compartment.

When Ron opened the door again he came face to face with the only remaining person. Rose just went in and sat where she was before, she was now looking out of the window while softly stroking Hedwig's chest. The boy who was sharing the compartment only sat down and started to mess with his pet rat.

After he left, Robert went to the loo so he could change uniforms. With that out of the way he went to look for Daphne. It had been a while since they saw each other, and he hoped that she'd help lift up his mood.

It wasn't hard to find her, she was in a compartment at the end of the cart. She wasn't alone, together with her was another girl, this one had long dark brown straight hair held in a ponytail.

"Hey Daph, how have you been?" he asked while he opened the door.

The two girls stopped talking to each other and looked to see who had opened the door without knocking.

When Daphne saw Robert she quickly got up and gave him a hug, she also said, "Rob, I missed you. How could you not talk to me for so long? I was so bored, and don't get me started on Astoria."

Remembering the younger girl that likes to annoy him and Daphne whenever she was bored brightened his mood, thus he chose to just hug her back.

After they separated, Daphne pulled him inside the compartment and closed the door, when she saw the expression on the other girl's face she said, "Tracey, this is my friend Robert Rosier. Rob, this is my friend Tracey Davis."

They gave each other smiles and exchanged greetings. After that the three talked about what had happened with them, with Robert using his increase in classes as an excuse for not seeing Daphne and her family for as long as it had been.

They stopped when they heard a voice echo through the train, "We will be reaching Hogwarts in five minutes' time. Please leave your luggage on the train, it'll be taken to the school separately."

They did as the voice said and left to join the other students that were now filling the corridor.

The train came to a stop and the students left it to a tiny, dark platform. It was quite a cold night.

In the dark night, the students could see a lamp bobbing over their heads, they could see that the person who was carrying it was really tall.