Chapter Text
As the train pulled out of the station in a cloud of white steam, the small girl with fiery red hair hit her cousin on the arm to get his attention. Frowning, the boy with bright green eyes stepped away from the window that he had been waving goodbye to his parents and sister.
“What?” Albus Potter asked irritably. He was already in an anxious mood about going to Hogwarts and he didn’t need his cousin and her ideas. Rose Granger-Weasley was grinning, unnerving Albus somewhat more than usual and Rose had a habit of unnerving Albus as she was the one who came up with the hare-brained schemes to get them into trouble. Or at least Albus into trouble, as Rose usually managed to worm her way out of it. Uncle Ron always favoured her.
“Come on. We need to scope out the other first years on the train,” she said and pulled him into the busy corridor. Students were finding their way back to their snared compartments after waving off their families. Rose boldly pushed her way through the thinning throng towards the back of the train. An elderly witch pushing a laden trolley full of snacks and refreshments was coming towards them.
“Anything off the trolley, dears? Pumpkin Pasty? Chocolate Frog? Cauldron Cake?”
Albus paused to peruse the selections. His stomach rumbled, he’d been too nervous to eat breakfast and had pretended while his mother tried to coerce him into eating some toast. Just as he was about to ask for a Chocolate Frog he felt an insistent tug on his sleeve.
“Come on, Al!” Rose said bossily, “We need to concentrate. Might as well start from the back and work our way up.” With a sigh, Albus gave the Trolley Witch an apologetic smile, the Chocolate Frogs a wistful glance and followed his cousin.
“Concentrate on what?” Albus asked, not really listening but giving the frogs once last loving look as the Trolley Witch took them out of his sight.
“On who to be friends with of course,” she said. “You do know that my parents and your dad all met on their very first Hogwarts Express trip.”
“Wait,” Albus said, trying to catch her up, “You want us to find life-long friends on the train? That’s quite scary.” Added pressure wasn’t what Albus needed right now. Having endured his brother James’ needling all the way to the station about being sorted into Slytherin, he didn’t need anything else to worry about. His mind was already reeling from the knowledge that his father had almost been sorted into Slytherin. The Gryffindor of all Gryffindors. That information was a little reassuring, but it did not override years and years of prejudice against the serpent house that he had been told had churned out more Dark Wizards than the other houses combined. And in the end, his father was still sorted into Gryffindor. James was in Gryffindor, as were all his older Weasley cousins.
“I’m a Granger-Weasley and you’re a Potter. Everyone will want to be our friends. We’ve got the pick of anyone we want!” Rose insisted excitedly, before peering through the glass of the last compartment. Her brow furrowed a little and then she stepped away. “Maybe we miss this one.”
Albus wanted to know why and looked into the compartment. In there sat a boy about his age, with white-blond hair peering into a paper bag. He looked quite sad and lonely.
“Why?” Albus asked and before Rose could stop him, he had opened the door. The boy looked up to see who had come into his compartment. In an instant his demeanour changed from gloomy to eager. He smiled at Albus who automatically returned it.
“Do you mind if we come in here for a bit?” Albus asked and the boy grinned. Rose hovered at Albus’ shoulder, eyeing the boy suspiciously.
“It’s free. I mean, it’s just me in here. I mean, not at all!” he answered enthusiastically and jumped up out of his seat. “Hi!”
“Albus. Al. Well, my name is Albus.” Albus said awkwardly, introducing himself, unsure of whether to refer himself by his proper name or its contraction.
“Hi Scorpius. I mean, I’m Scorpius. You’re Albus. I’m Scorpius. And you are?” The boy’s pale grey eyes landed on Rose. She arched an eyebrow, looking very much like a red-headed version of her mother.
“Rose,” she answered and crossed her arms over her chest.
“Hi Rose! Would you like some of my Fizzing Whizzbees?”
“No thanks. I’ve just had breakfast,” she said coldly.
“I’ve also got Shock-o-choc, Pepper Imps and Jelly Slugs. Mum’s idea. She says Sweets always help you make friends,” the boy rattled off, nervously tripping over his words almost singing. It was obvious that this wasn’t the way he wanted the first introductions to his fellow school-mates to go as he suddenly became shy and his pale cheeks tinged with pink. “Stupid idea probably.” But he limply he offered the paper bag to Albus and Rose.
Albus couldn’t help being amused by this boy’s over-enthusiastic manner, clearly desperate to be friendly.
“I’ll take some. Mum doesn’t let me have sweets.” At this Albus felt another hit on his arm, he tried to ignore it, though it was starting to hurt. Rose really could punch hard when she wanted to. He peered into the sweets bag. “Which one would you start with?”
Scorpius perked up again. “I’ve always regarded the Pepper Imp as king of the confectionary bag. They’re peppermint sweets that make you smoke at the ears.” He shook the bag to see if he could make one rise to the top.
“Brilliant, that’s what I’ll have –“ Albus went to pick up the little black sweet on offer when Rose hit him on the arm again. “Ouch, Rose! Will you please stop hitting me?”
Her cheeks becoming red, Rose bit her lip, angling for the picture of innocence. “I’m not hitting you.”
“You are!”
“She hitting you because of me.” It was Scorpius who answered. His joy at sharing his sweets had turned to gloom once again and he sat down, looking at the floor. “I know you’re Albus Potter and she’s Rose Granger-Weasley. Well, I’m Scorpius Malfoy. You know, son of Draco and Astoria Malfoy? Our parents, they didn’t get on.” He hesitantly glanced up to see their reaction.
Albus had heard the Malfoy name mentioned by his parents, usually in collaboration with what was happening at the Ministry and it wasn’t usually spoken about in a friendly manner.
“That’s putting it mildly. Your parents are Death Eaters,” Rose retorted and hit Albus on the arm once more to try and get him to leave.
“Dad was. Mum wasn’t!” argued Scorpius, clearly affronted by the accusation, his gloom turning quickly into anger. “Dad and Grandfather helped put all the Death Eaters in Azkaban.” He clocked Rose’s expression of shame at accusing someone of being a Death Eater, yet she still didn’t want to stay in this compartment with him. “And I know the rumour.”
Clueless, Albus looked between Rose and Scorpius. They seemed to know a secret that he didn’t. Not unsurprising as Rose’s mother, Hermione, was Minister for Magic. Even though his own father also worked at the Ministry, he never told Albus or his brother or sister anything about his work. Always citing it either too boring, too dangerous or too secret.
“What is the rumour?” Albus asked.
“It’s not true,” Scorpius said. He looked back at the floor, somehow finding courage in the carpet’s pattern. “The rumour is my parents couldn’t have children; that Dad and Grandfather were so desperate for a powerful heir to preserve the end of the Malfoy line that they used a Time Turner to send Mum back.”
Albus was still confused. He shook his head and looked at Rose.
“The rumour is he’s Voldemort’s son,” she explained exasperatedly. A heavy silence descended around the three of them. Scorpius looked helpless, Rose still wanted to leave and Albus’ mouth dropped open, giving him the impression of a dog trying to understand human language.
“You’re probably not though,” Rose added to quell the awkwardness. “I mean, you’ve got a nose.”
“And it’s just like my Dad’s!” Scorpius added quickly, grabbing onto this life-line away from humiliation. “I have his nose, his hair, his name. Not that that’s a great thing either. I mean, father-son issues, I have them. But on the whole I’d rather be a Malfoy than son of the Dark Lord.” His nerves had taken over again and he was rattling away, talking too much. Albus smiled, he knew what it was like to have father-son issues. He wasn’t like his brother, nothing ever seemed to bother him. James was confident and sometimes a little arrogant, even though he hadn’t done anything special to warrant the egotism. Trying to live up to his brother, let alone his famous father, and now coming to Hogwarts where he will be compared with the great Harry Potter, he felt a kinship with Scorpius, that this was someone who could understand what he was going through.
“We should probably go, now. Come on Al,” Rose said, giving Albus another whack on his arm. That had done it. He truly was getting annoyed with the way Rose could boss him around. Because they were the same age, they had always hung around together. Their other cousins, and they had many, were either too old to want to associate with the younger ones, or too young being the babies of the family. Rose and Albus had been stuck in the middle together and she had always been bossy. They would always do what she wanted to do, play the games she wanted to play.
Albus turned to her with a frown and said self-assuredly, “No. I’m okay. You go.”
“I won’t wait,” she said.
“I wouldn’t expect you too,” Albus said firmly. “I’m staying here.”
With a noise of exasperation, Rose turned her nose up in the air. “Fine.” And she stormed off out of the compartment and down the train corridor.
Shyly Scorpius smiled. “Thank you.”
“Oh, I only stayed for your sweets,” Albus grinned and took the seat opposite Scorpius, eyeing off the bag.
“She’s quite fierce,” Scorpius said, angling his head towards the compartment door to indicate Rose.
“Yeah. Sorry about that.”
Scorpius grinned. “No, I like it. Do prefer Albus or Al?” Plucking the black sweet on off the top of the bag, Scorpius popped it into his mouth. Albus pursed his lips as he thought. His whole family called him Al and he never really liked it. This was a chance to change that.
“Albus,” he replied.
Scorpius nodded, then all of a sudden his eyes went wide and smoke poured out of his ears causing Albus to break out into gales of laughter.
****
That morning, Scorpius had been up early, just as the sun had peeked over the horizon. He had woken in the golden light filtering in behind heavy curtains and grinned to himself. The sun was shining brightly, the air smelled fresher, the bird song was beautiful and today, today was the first of September. He had already been packed for a week, but once up and dressed, Scorpius repacked his truck again to make sure he hadn’t forgotten anything. He had robes, school supplies and most importantly, his wand. Blackthorn, eleven inches with unicorn hair core. He’d had his wand since he had turned eleven earlier in the year from a special one-off trip to Diagon Alley with his dad. And from that moment he had been counting the days until he could go to Hogwarts. Much to his dad’s annoyance, Scorpius had occasionally marked the passage of time on his wand, carving little numerals on the handle. It was a lonely existence at Malfoy Manor, and Hogwarts was a chance to get away from the isolation, to finally have friends.
Almost skipping down to breakfast, Scorpius sang to himself and in his haste, tripped on the bottom stair into the dining room. His father, Draco was already sitting at the head on the long table. He glanced at the clumsiness of his son and shook his head.
“Graceful, Scorpius,” he commented and went back to reading his newspaper. Sometimes Scorpius wasn’t sure whether his dad was being funny or scolding him.
“Sorry, Dad. I’m just excited,” he said and squirmed onto his seat beside his father. Almost instantly a breakfast of bacon, eggs and toast appeared on the plate in front of him. Starving, he tucked in.
“About what?” Draco asked playfully, still hidden behind the Daily Prophet.
“Daaaaad!” Scorpius whined through the mouthful of bacon. He quickly chewed and swallowed. “You know why.”
“Is someone going to Hogwarts today?” His mother, Astoria had walked into the room. Still in her dressing gown, she leaned down she kissed Scorpius on the top of his head. “Good morning. All packed?”
“Yes, I’ve been packed for a week,” Scorpius said grinning.
Draco put his paper down to look at his wife. She was extremely pale, her dark hair accentuating how little colour she held in her face. “How are you feeling today?” he asked with concern.
“I’m fine. I can’t miss seeing my boy off today,” she said, sitting down opposite Scorpius.
“Mum, if you don’t feel well enough, I understand,” Scorpius said hesitantly. He disliked seeing his mother so ill. She had been ill for most of his life, a blood malediction passed down from a cursed ancestor. She had good days and bad, but the lately the bad days were starting to outnumber the good.
“I’ll feel better after I’ve eaten and had my potion,” she replied with a smile. Draco reached over the table and gently squeezed Astoria’s hand.
It had only been the three of them, if you didn’t count the house-elf, rattling around in the large house and estate. His Grandfather and Grandmother Malfoy had moved to the south of France to live in the family’s winter retreat a few years ago and so Scorpius had grown up alone, with only Malfoy Manor’s large library to keep him company. He had read every book, apart from the Darker tomes his father had forbidden. He had yearned to go to Hogwarts for so long, if it was just to get away from the dark grey walls of his home. Excursions out were very few and far between, even trips to his Greengrass relatives didn’t last long as they didn’t like his father. Just as Grandfather Malfoy didn’t like his mother very much. It had been a tense childhood, yet the library was always there for him, to hide away, pretend he had friends to go on great adventures with.
*****
“So, you have no cousins or anything?” Albus asked, once his own ears had stopped smoking after devouring the last of the Pepper Imps. He’d been enjoying sitting and talking with Scorpius, though he wasn’t sure they could come from more different homes.
“No. Mum has a sister but she doesn’t have any kids. Grandfather didn’t have any siblings, Grandmother had two sisters, but one married a Muggle-born so she was cut off from the family, and the other was killed at Battle of Hogwarts,” Scorpius replied, looking anxiously at his new friend, hoping this information wasn’t going to make him run away.
Albus thought for a moment, he didn’t really know who was related to who in the Wizarding World, what with having too many cousins of his own to take stock of.
“I have some seriously Dark relatives,” Scorpius said, trying to make light of the situation. “Even though Mum’s family are pure-bloods, she didn’t really go in for that ‘all Muggles are scum’ thing that Grandfather Malfoy did.”
Albus was intrigued. He’d never heard anyone talk about the Dark side like that before. Actually, no one did talk about it. Voldemort was defeated and that was it, Darkness gone. But it wasn’t. Scorpius had to live with that fall out.
“So, if your dad was a Death Eater, he must have some pretty bad things,” asked Albus. “Sorry, I don’t mean to accuse, I’m just interested.” He added quickly when he saw Scorpius’ momentary expression of despair.
“You’ve never read your dad’s biography?” Scorpius asked.
Albus shook his head. He had enough of Harry Potter talk when Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione came to dinner, he didn’t want to read about it as well. Also it was seven volumes long, and Albus didn’t much like reading.
“Well, Dad doesn’t come off so well. He said it was all very biased, but he did do some things he regretted – “ Scorpius bit his lip before saying very quickly “- like trying to murder Albus Dumbledore.”
“Your dad tried to kill Dumbledore?” Albus exclaimed a little too loudly. In that moment it was like the train engine had stopped and all the world had heard his exclamation.
“And he kind of accidentally poisoned your Uncle Ron too,” Scorpius screwed up his face, waiting for Albus to run out of the compartment. Why would he want to stay here with the son of a former Dark Wizard?
Albus blinked, but didn’t move from his seat.
“But he didn’t want to. Voldemort made him. He never wanted to be a Death Eater, not really, but he had to because of my Grandfather. But can you see why, even if Dad did have a Time Turner, he wouldn’t send Mum back to have anything to do with him. Dad turned on all the Death Eaters after the War. He gave them all up and on his information, like I said they all went to Azkaban. I think that was part of the reason we kind of hid away from the world. Dad didn’t want his reputation to tarnish mine. You can go now, if you want to. I’ll understand if you don’t want to be anywhere near me,” Scorpius looked thoroughly depressed now. He picked through his sweet bag to see if there was anything left. A lone jelly slug was sitting at the bottom. He put it into his mouth and slurped it up.
“It’s not like we can choose our parents,” Albus said, “but we can choose our friends.”
Scorpius smiled, “I’ve never had a friend before. Well, I had an imaginary one. But he didn’t like me much either.”
Albus laughed. “You are weird.”
“Sorry.”
“No, I like it.”
Stretched out on the bench seats with the compartment to themselves, Albus and Scorpius spent the rest of the train journey comparing family stories.
“You got to go to the World Cup in Patagonia? Wow, I am so jealous,” Scorpius exclaimed, sitting up when Albus had casually dropped into conversation their family trip to South America.
“Mum was correspondent for the Daily Prophet so we all went. It was pretty fun,” Albus grinned. He loved Quidditch and it was a highlight of his life to able to see his favourite player Brazilian Chaser Gonçalo Flores play.
“Wow,” Scorpius said again and slumped dramatically back in his seat. He remembered following Ginny Potter’s coverage in the paper. Every day his father would read the match reports to him over breakfast and then they would go out into the grounds and re-enact some of the plays. His dad was a great flyer and Scorpius had always wanted to be as good as him. He hoped that once he hit second year, he would be able to try out for Seeker for his house team.
“I’m not very good on a broom,” Albus confessed. “James got all the talent there. I’m going to be so rubbish.”
“I love flying,” Scorpius enthused and then he waved his hand, “You won’t be rubbish. Flying’s easy once you get the hang of it. Mum and Dad got me Firebolt for my tenth birthday.” From an extremely wealthy family, Scorpius’ parents hadn’t given into many of his pleadings, determined he would not to grow up like his father, a self-entitled brat but the racing broomstick was the one indulgence they had allowed.
All the worries Albus had been trying to ignore resurfaced, he sighed heavily and leaned his head against the window. It was growing darker more quickly the further north they went. The sun had almost disappeared behind a large mountain range, turning the shadows to a deep purple.
“Everything okay?” Scorpius asked, noticing the sudden dejection that had descended on Albus’s face.
“James reckons I’m going to be sorted into Slytherin,” he confessed. “Dad said it doesn’t matter, but everyone and I mean everyone in my family was or is in Gryffindor.”
“I’ll be in Slytherin,” Scorpius replied with a nonchalant shrug. “I’m a Malfoy and there has never not ever not been a Malfoy in Slytherin.” He frowned at the inelegance of his sentence. “You know what I mean.” He looked over towards Albus’ reflection in the train window and found his eyes. “It wouldn’t be so bad to be in Slytherin, would it?”
“I don’t want to disappoint my family,” Albus said quietly.
“If you go into Gryffindor and me into Slytherin, would you still talk to me?” Scorpius asked hopefully, “This has been nice. You know, just talking.”
“Of course I’ll talk to you. We’re friends now, aren’t we?” Albus perked up a little. Scorpius was right, this had been nice. He couldn’t be this honest with his family, for one, James would never let him live it down. Albus had always been the quiet one, reserved and thoughtful and with such a big family, no-one had ever noticed how quiet he really was.
“I hope so,” Scorpius replied and then excitedly pointed out of the window. “Hogsmeade!”
“You get distracted easily,” Albus commented and pressed his nose to the window. He saw the flickering lamps of the station and a large silhouette standing on the platform. As expected Rubeus Hagrid, the Hogwarts gamekeeper and Care of Magical Creatures professor was there to meet the train
“Yeah,” Scorpius replied, jumping up to drag his trunk down from the overhead rack. “I have a short attention span. It drives Dad nuts. Hogwarts ahoy!”