✧ONWARD TO HOGWARTS✧

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From there, Ms.Roswell graduated with full academic achievements and a roaring start to her career in the wizarding world, the only issue is...Mr. Cawford did not want to send her back to that wretched place known as Foutain of Angels.

But there were a few times where she would legally have to.

Aria begged and begged to go to Ilvernomory with her friends, but she was highly pushed to the Hogwarts school as she was destined to follow in pursuit with her roots.

But Eli was weary of her parents finding her, Aria was impressionable but she wasn't naive. Either she figured it out before or played the unknown card.

The days following her departure to Hogwarts was she meant to stay at the orphanage, she hid away her wand and anything to do with the magical world.

If anything was stolen the secrecy would be broken, and if anyone needed an escape from this muggle world, it would be her.

The taxi brought her to the train station, and she already had an idea of how to get to platform 9 3/4, but the sense of anxiety and aloneness was starting to sink into her gut.

Meow!

"Thanks Omie, remember what Mr.Crawford said, if I don't like it here I can go to Ilvermonry...Right?"

Mew.

It sounded like a confirmation, and the young girl dragged her trunk further into the muggle infested building and to the in-between of platform nine and ten.

Times like this she rightly missed America, but as the headmaster and her professors she talked with, they said this was where her roots were. Where she was born, not giving an attempt would make her scared of returning to Britain in general. If she could manage America, then she could get through a year of Hogwarts. She was giving the explanation of the dangers, those called themselves Death Eaters and followed a 'Dark Lord', but she had little to no worries.

Although she believed and went with the identification of being a half-blood, others suspected differently.

The bustle was different between the barrier, muggles were distracted by their need to get to one destination to the next. While here, here there was a full range of emotions.

She struggled to siphon through them all like Ms.Silva had taught her too. The young witch was an uncontrolled empath, it was why they gifted her a kitten her first year at school.

And now her little cat was perched like an owl on her shoulder, Omen was indeed scowering the crowd just the same.

"Anything?"

Rrrr!

That rightly didn't sound anywhere in the sense of being good, so she hurried along and settled the like of her luggage before standing by the train awaiting for proper boarding.

However, as she caught the sudden plop and darted her attention to it. Someone had dropped a book!

Walking the few steps did she bend down and retrieve it before clutching it close to return it. Aria hadn't caught who it was, but it was a family of three.

Brrep...

Omen had caught the sight, and it earned her a promise of treats once she gets settled into her proper dorm and house.

"Excuse me, I believe you dropped this." She politely offered, and the boy looked startled.

"T-thank you." He hurried, his hands reaching unsteadily towards his book.

"Where are your parents darling, let me walk you back to—" Aria shook her head, it was a question she's had to deal with for a while now. "Are you sure, I don't want them to be looking for you."

"I don't have parents Miss...I'll see you later." She bowed her head and hurried along up to the likes of the train to board.

It was an odd introduction, and Remus was internally screaming at the sight of a person his own age. Looking back up to his parents for support had they ushered him to train to take the opportunity while it still lasted.

A girl without parents was sure to make good friends with a boy with no friends.

Remus hugged them both one last time before taking a chance with the girl who just wandered onto the train. He had lost her quite easily, and by then he was destined to find a seat on this vehicle compacted with students of all ages.

The warning whistle was a gentle nudge that he needed to find a seat and sit down, and as he was about to dart back down and take whatever compartment with an empty seat available he had found the girl.

All the surrounding ones had filled to the brim while she was alone in the company of her cat. So he settled it with a knock before opening the sliding door.

"E-everywhere is...Is full. Can I j-jo—join you?" He reeked of nerves and she gave him a smile and offered the seat across from her. Omen eyed the newcomer and called out her own sort of greeting.

"My name's Aria Roswell, this is Omen...It's nice to meet you." She offered her hand and he flinched at his rudeness, he was taught better than this.

But his handshake said a lot about his character.

"R-remus L-lupin...Thank you, f-fo—for finding my book." Her beautiful grey eyes sparked with interest as she nodded and looked to the book still in his hand.

"I wouldn't want someone to be bookless on a train ride like this, I hear it's only two hours or so." He nodded, his father had warned him about all the likes of Hogwarts, so what did she know? If she doesn't have parents then how did she come to know everything?

"Odd question, but is Lyall Lupin your father?" He nodded with a growing smile on his father. Perhaps making friends wasn't that hard.

"Anything from the trolly?" The woman selling sweets offered, but Aria shook her head. Of course she had money, but she was saving up her allowance for a new broom. Next year was she going to try out for her house's team and she couldn't wait.

"Do you want a chocolate frog?" Her eyes popped up from behind the book she was currently invested in and narrowed her eyes. "Is that a joke?"

"N-no...It's a...It's really a chocolate frog." He held up the package and offered it to her.

"They're really good, just got to be quick because they're enchanted to act like a frog." Her interest grew tenfold as she took a look at the little thing that jumped at her.

"Whoa, that's brilliant. I should've brought some chocolate, I only thought to bring sour quills." She reached into her bag and offered one of the candies.

"Are they like sugar quills?" Aria shrugged, completely unknowing of the named candy either. It was gummy and chewy, sort of sour.

"That's really good." He nodded in appreciation and she smiled, it was her first managed friend in Britain. Had she really done it?

"Um, back at the platform...You-you said that your—"

"I don't have parents?" He nodded unsteadily as he darted his eyes elsewhere and away from her.

"I dunno, I only learned about magic two years ago."

"Two? How?" She offered up the book that she was reading from, it was simply one of the potion manuals from Salem school of witchcraft.

"Salem?"

"It's a school for witches, they only pick about twenty a year...Otherwise Hogwarts would've had to send someone to come and talk to me." His eyes widened immensely, so she was entirely an orphan with no sort of family?
Merlin, that must be difficult.

"You're a—" "A muggle-born? I must seem like one, but I'm a half-blood. I've been staying in America for that long, I've only been back for a week." She smiled as her attention turned to the outlands of empty fields, complete appreciation sparked her expression as though she was memorized by the scene before her.

"Did you like America?"

"Yeah, I made a lot of friends at Salem...They're going to love the candy." She smiled at the wrapping but then realized the cards had faces, reading the description of the new headmaster was becoming, but she offered it up.

"Do you have Dumbledore yet?"

"Yeah, he and Merlin are usually what I use up getting." He refused to take it, claiming she could start her own collection her own.

Maaorrao!

"Goddess, you aren't getting anymore treats until we're settled. No." He chuckled as the cat was wildly entertaining throughout their time, and he had to admit...The girl in front of him was as vastly curious and knowledgable about the strangest of things.

"What house are you hoping for?" She peeked up from behind the book again, an hour and a half into the ride Remus rightly didn't ask many of the questions to start the conversation and so she smiled.

"I dunno, Gryffindor, Slytherin, Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff. I don't think I'm a Hufflepuff, yellow isn't a flattering color on me." He chuckled, granted she was wearing her school uniform already and the grey seeming brought out the crystal orbs of her eyes.

"What about you?"

"Dad's a Ravenclaw, and if my mom were a witch we joke that she'd be a Hufflepuff." Aria smiled as she tapped her chin and brainstormed for a moment.

"I think you're going to be a Gryffindor."

"Why do you say that?" The girl shrugged, and the knowing smile had tugged at the corner of her mouth. "Just an honest prediction." She looked completely devious, but in truth it was just a bit hilarious on the whims of anothers house.

"Is it true...About Slytherin?" Remus' face paled, the girl before him didn't act like what his father had warned him about nor did she look rightly prejudice against muggle-borns or half-blooded considering she herself was a half. And she lived in a muggle community without any knowledge of magic until Salem, though that didn't help her opinion on them either.

"Y-yeah, I suppose. With everything happening with he who must not be named...I guess the Slytherins are quite...Evil?" She blinked without so much of a reaction, he simply confirmed of what Mr.Crawford had warned her.

However the universe was playing a sick trick as Aria's true brother yanked the door open and brought in two other wizards in his wake.

It had Omen hop into her mother's arms and cuddle away from the strangers, while Remus' shoulders hitched up at the event of new people as well.

"Mind if we join you?" Sirius turned to the gal beside him, and she narrowed her eyes in a telling motion. "By all means...Names are the price of admission." A grin plastered on his face as he ushered his name, while James and Peter followed in pursuit.

"Aria Roswell, this is Remus Lupin." The boy across the ways simply waved to the group around him.

"You two know what house you're settling for?" James attempted to make small talk with the two newcomers, granted he and his new mates were in their territory but it was beside the point in his mind.

"Believe the sorting hat decides that, so how would we know?" She challenged, and James frowned, she shrugged at his stubbornness but he caught her rolling his eyes.

"Oi, it was just a question."

"Yes, but preemptively settling for a house and not gaining entry would simply lead to unhappiness." James knew this far too easily as he pulled a backhand near the other newbie and whispered: Ravenclaw.

The others stuck around, and although Remus attempted to talk to them. Aria stayed silent in comparison to whatever else could happen in their presence.

She indeed shared a boat ride with them, and after being introduced to Professor McGonagal, Aria clutched her charm and whispered her blessings.

Her anxiety was surly spiking.

"As above, so below. As within, so without. As the universe, so the soul." Sirius stared at her in utter disgust, she was one of those witches. Surely his mother would have a heart attack in hearing that over Christmas dinner, though he was still hopeful in gaining a house OTHER than Slytherin.

But suddenly the girl was pushed, his first instinct was to react in catching her. He knew far too easily who was standing behind her, Black simply narrowed his eyes to the bastard behind her.

Rabastan Lestrange.

"Watch it mate," Sirius growled, and Rabastan chuckled, eyeing the girl with a scrutinizing gaze. Although Black knew what the issue was already, Aria hadn't.

Nor did she know the name Lestrange.

"It's alright, he's a brute. It's in his nature." Sirius Orion Black had grinned, the girl was indeed a spitfire as she glared in Lestrange's direction.

"Making friends with the lower class already, I'm sure Bella will be ecstatic." Ah so they were the pureblood of her generation, figures she'd meet a few just short of arriving.

"Lower class, and who do you think you are to—" Sirius squeezed her wrist in warning, merlin could she be quiet for just two seconds?!

"This is going to be a fun year little one." He winked, and though she was meant to cower down in fear. Aria had enough torture in the orphanage and has met more than enough strange encounters for a boy her own age to cause any fear.

Especially when he called her little.

He soon turned back to his own mates and so she ripped her hand out of Sirius' grasp. "Do you have a death wish?"
"That's morbid, honestly no one wishes for death but—" He sighed in pure aggravation.

"Besides, I can practice my poisons on someone now." She grinned deviously, and now he shot down his own confusion in gazing to the young gal.

"Who were you going to use before?" It was something familiar about her smile that he couldn't place, nor was he one to help others like this.

Sirius found himself standing beside Aria while Remus stood on her other side. Figures she would make all males friends in the honest two hours of being alone.

It was like that at the Orphanage as well.

The grand hall was gorgeous, a very pristine upgrade from the likes of Salem. Not that she would say that in front of Mr.Crawford, but this was for upper years the magic running through this school was ancient. And Aria couldn't wait to visit the library.

"Sirius, Black." The professor had called, and Aria gave him a supportive smile. Instantly giving him a rather boost in pride as he hurried on up the stairs and sitting at the stool.

It hadn't taken all that long for the sorting hat to shout GRYFFINDOR out to the awaiting crowd. The clear happiness in his face rallied true as he practically skipped to the den of the lions.

"Arya, Roswell" The young witch offered a smile to her Transfigurations professor as she settled down just after Sirius. The stiff sorting hat soon topped the brim of her head. "Ah, it's been a while since we've had a Salem graduate in our mists...But your name...Is wrong." She hummed along, course the sorting hat would know who she is.

"I don't want to know." She issued, and the hat chuckled. "You seek knowledge, yet pride yourself to stay away from them." The girl shrugged, knowing that she did not want to be a hat staller.

"Very well, RAVENCLAW!" Remus continued to smile off towards his new friend as she found an empty seat and greeted those around her.

Though the boys she met on the train were all sorted into Gryffindor, it came too little to no shock to see that the boy that bothered her had been placed into Slytherin.

Suppose Crawford was right, there were bad apples and rotten...

It was up to her to really figure out the difference.

*

Aria hadn't seen the boys from the train for a few days, she was far too consumed by the library and those in her house that there was little time to socialize. Not that she would want to really gossip, however the surprise of seeing them in charms class surely settled the mood for today.

Remus was always easy to talk to, the others reminded her of her friend's brothers back in America.

Speaking of America, she surely missed them. Eli promised that they would make up the time lost during Christmas, but it was so far away to think about during the first full week of school.

But then a week turned into a month, and a month turned into their last few weeks before Christmas Holiday.

Aria hadn't really spoken to the likes of the Gryffindors, nor found herself in the mists of the Slytherins. She kept to herself or the likes of the Ravenclaws...But that was undoubtedly going to change.

Rabastan made it his personal mission to make a certain Ravenclaw life miserable, all the account of what happened the first day. Within the first five minutes of arriving into the castle, his motives altered every other day, especially when it was in the classroom setting.

Transfiguration and Herbology did Aria have to watch her back, or rather her back is faced away from his front as she kept him all too easily in the line of sight.

Aria explained to her roommates what happened, but their own morals and what they had been taught about blood had rallied. No matter how much they favored Arya, she was still a halfie.

Clementine was considered to be the closest with her, she was just barely was considered a pureblood herself. Together they considered themselves fully pureblooded, though they still reigned in the beauty of knowing both muggle and magical lifestyles.

Clem was just the luckily one for being the final generation of a  third generation half-blood, but she still knew the struggle in seeing her mother try and rally the demand of a pureblooded society. And she learned quick enough on Aria's story that she didn't question anything that the girl favored or looked to.

She was indeed on the side of nonviolent, and Aria had enough of the torment between the struggles in America to the trials of what she dealt with in the orphanage.

Or the idea that her parents gave her up in the result of being an almost squib.

Crawford made it painfully aware to Aria's headmaster and headmistress of her situation, and unbeknownst to her. They were on the hunt to see who her true parenthood lies, just in the event that word started to come out.

Thought the young Ms.Roswell was all the less likely to search them out, no part of her wanted to meet the parents that gave her up. Especially if they could've waited on the Salem letter.

But it didn't bother her...Or most of the time it didn't bother her.

Seeing all the mail that her roommates would receive was difficult to watch, Remus would spot her from a distance at the Gryffindor table. Frowning every other chance he could after seeing her abruptly get from the table without a word for her friends.

They weren't friends, or Clem is...But the rest were too posh for her liking. Harper would barely give her a glance after the first week, unless it was help for assignments. The same would come from Isabella.

They were using her.

Remus had taken the tin of homemade cookies his mum made this weekend and hurried after his first friend. He neglected the idea after his mates started to rally in the idea of causing mischief, and perhaps after having no friends to a multitude of friends cut his time in half.

He found her out in the courtyard, Omen in her grasp and what truly made his heart clench was a sniffle. A painful sob admitting into the air.

"Aria?...Is everything alright?" He questioned, a good distance still between them, but he crept closer. Knowing that letting anything fester alone was worse for wear.

"Yeah. Everything's fine." She muttered, he couldn't rightly take it to heart when she was breaking down in front of him.

"I didn't know fine looked like this...Mum baked this weekend, did you want one?" Of course Remus John Lupin's first instinct was to solve a problem with chocolate.

There was nothing that couldn't be solved with Mrs.Lupin's baked goods. But she shook her head and stood to her feet. "I don't want bloody cookies Remus!" She shrieked, and off she had stomped. Omen darting after her mum as the young girl was still acclimating to her kind.

In Salem she barely fit in, everyone having known about their legacy.

Yet Aria had none.

Everyone having had known about magic.

But Aria had to be introduced.

It pushed her to try harder, to grasp anything and everything she could before waking up from this awful nightmare. The brutal reality that came with being a child at the Fountain of Angels.

Here she was labeled as a half-blood to secure her protection away from the people who didn't want her. Why would they now? It disgusted her that the amount of pureblood in her dictated so much, and so she took the opportunity to hide away in her dormitory...Though the outburst had not gone unnoticed by Remus' dormmates.

"Good grief mate, did you break her heart or something?" James nudged, but Remus was still stuck in his retracted position after being shouted at.

"N-no...I offered her a cookie." Sirius chuckled, staring off to where the gal had run to, something fluttered in his heart once again. Much like the first day of school that he had the strongest urge to protect Roswell. But then he huffed and shrugged his shoulders. "Can't get a gal with cookies."

"I was just trying to be nice, doesn't make it better that Lestrange is after her." Sirius gritted his teeth, the girl had made a negative impression the first day, but that wasn't his fault.

So why did he feel guilty?
Why were the butterflies bouncing around in his stomach?

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Date Posted: 01-11-20

Time: 4:32

Words: 3737