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Hermione Adaeze Granger, scion of the once defunct house of Dagworth-Granger, heiress to the Eze tribe of central Nigeria was nervous. English born; her first sign of accidental magic had changed her fate in ways she could not entirely put into words. Her mother, Chika, was the great-great-great-great granddaughter of the current ruling Matriarch. A squib, not exiled from the tribe, but her great-great-great grandmother had wanted to travel and fallen for a ‘colonial’ man.
Her lips quirk at the thought. Colonial indeed. At four, Hermione had been quite independent already, reading voraciously. A magical gift, so she later found, from the all but extinct Dagworth line. Her understanding of the world was limited, but she knew English Princesses and English princes and that her mother and she were far from milk skinned royalty.
Now as she stands in elf-woven silk wrapper and bandeau top, with goblin wrought gold at her waist, in her hair, Hermione can’t help but find that little girl helplessly lost. Grasping for strings, bonds, she could feel and not understand. Her back straightens the slightest amount as her Matriarch approaches her. It’s sunset, almost time to go.
It’s the first time she will leave Nigeria since being swept up from the Hospital after her magic had saved herself, her mother and father. Grandmother had come in a blaze of gold and wild perfume, and now she comes again, her silver hair coiled high on her head, peeking from her headscarf as the flames flare high and white behind her.
“Grandaughter,” the endearment, the title, “Oshun smiles on us this day.” Weathered hands cup Hermione’s cheeks, tilting her face up just slightly. Eyes as tourmaline brown as her own stare, and she can see the slope of her mother’s nose in her Matriachs. “Ogun has blessed the tribe with a strong heir, Oshun guides your magic now, back to the land where you were born. The Castle will be cold, and the people within it colder, more rigid than our people could ever imagine. Not even petrified wood could be as rigid as the English wizards. But you are going to claim our honor in this tournament we were often left out of, lest we were enslaved to serve.”
It’s a speech, not just for her, but for the collected tribe who has come to see her off. They are all in finery, not traditional, as hers is, but finery all the same.
“I won’t fail the tribe, Matriarch.” Her words are sure, honey-smooth and her aura responds in kind, skin glowing. She knows the steps to this dance, but not the ones she’ll have to dance when she arrives in Britain once more. “I will let the wizarding world see just how powerful our magic is, I’ll show them how primitive they’ve become.”
“So, it shall be,” the crone crows in delight, as she has every time Hermione has embraced her future role in the world. “Little witch, you wear war on your waist, your mind demands progress, your magic sings retribution. Go with the blessings of all the Matriarchs who came before. Walk as Oshun walked from Africa into the wilds of the world and brought her light. Bend lesser spirits to your whims and no other.”
The great pyre behind her Matriarch soars to its highest possible height and turns verdant. “Be careful little Adaeze. You will be alone. But I have every faith in you. Keep your wits, and your portkeys at hand.”
“Always, Nne nne m.” Her hands cup the weathered ones a moment before stepping out of the embrace. Stepping just to the side, she looks up at the green flames and takes a breath, steeling herself for the travel ahead.
“Ojanomare,” she whispers and her familiar slinks into view, falling into step as she heads for the flames. Together they would face this ‘homeland’ of hers. Her wrapper rustles, a pocket, of sorts, stuffed full of the things she would need in the coming months away from home, including several ways to communicate with her parents and Matriarch. The heat of the flames still radiates as she draws to the mage fire, before she steps into it, her hand finds Mare’s scruff and she calls out clearly – “Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry!”
There was a pleasant feeling of anticipation in the air that day. Nobody was very attentive in lessons, being much more interested in the arrival that evening of the people from Beauxbatons, Durmstrang, and far off Uagadou; even Potions was more bearable than usual as it was half an hour shorter. When the bell rang early, Harry, Ron, and Neville hurried up Gryffindor Tower, deposited their bags and books as they had been instructed, pulled on their cloaks and rushed back downstairs into the entrance hall.
The Heads of Houses were ordering their students into lines.
“Weasley, straighten your hat,” Professor McGonagall snapped at Ron. “Miss Patil, take that ridiculous thing out of your hair.”
Parvati scowled and removed a large ornamental butterfly from the end of her plait.
“Follow me, please,” said Professor McGonagall. “First years in front… no pushing…”
They filed down the steps and lined up in front of the castle. It was a cold, clear evening; dusk was falling and a pale, transparent looking moon was already shining over the Forbidden Forest. Harry, standing between Ron and Nevil in the fourth row from the front, saw Dennis Creevey positively shivering with anticipation among the other first years.
“Nearly six,” said Ron, checking his watch and then staring down the drive that led to the front gates. “How d’you reckon they’re coming? The Train?”
“I doubt it,” said Neville.
“How, then? Broomsticks?” Harry suggested, looking up at the starry sky.
“I don’t think so… not from that far away…”
“A Portkey?” Ron suggested. “Or they could Apparate – maybe you’re allowed to do it under seventeen wherever they come from?”
“You can’t Apparate inside the Hogwarts grounds, Ron,” Neville reminds gently, tugging at his robes.
They scanned the darkening grounds excitedly, but nothing was moving, everything was still, silent, and quite as usual. Harry was starting to feel cold. He wished they’d hurry up….Maybe the foreign students were preparing a dramatic entrance….He remembered what Mr. Weasley had said back at the campsite before the Quidditch World Cup: “always the same – we can’t resist showing off when we get together…”
And then Dumbledore called out from the back row where he stood with the other teachers –
“Aha! Unless I am very much mistaken, the delegation from Beauxbatons approaches!”
“Where?” said many students eagerly, all looking in different directions.
“There!” yelled a sixth year, pointing over the forest.
Something large, much larger than a broomstick – or, indeed, a hundred broomsticks – was hurtling across the deep blue sky toward the castle, growing larger all the time.
“It’s a dragon!” shrieked one of the first years, losing her head completely.
“Don’t be stupid…it’s a flying house!” said Dennis Creevey.
Dennis’s guess was closer… As the gigantic black shape skimmed over the treetops of the Forbidden Forest and the lights shining from the castle windows hit it, they saw a gigantic, powder blue, horse-drawn carriage, the size of a large house, soaring toward them, pulled through the air by a dozen winged horses, all palominos, and each the size of an elephant.
The front three rows of students drew backward as the carriage hurtled ever lower, coming in to land at a tremendous speed – then, with an almighty crash that made Neville jump backward onto a Slytherin fifth year’s foot, the horses’ hooves, larger than dinner plates, hit the ground. A second later, the carriage landed too, bouncing upon its vast wheels, while the golden horses tossed their enormous heads and rolled large fiery red eyes.
Harry just had time to see that the door of the carriage bore a coat of arms, (two crossed, golden wands, each emitting three stars) before it opened.
A boy in pale blue robes jumped down from the carriage, bent forward, fumbled for a moment with something on the carriage floor, and unfolded a set of golden steps. He sprang back respectfully. Then Harry saw a shining, high-heeled black shoe emerging from inside of the carriage – a shoe the size of a child’s sled – followed, almost immediately, by the largest woman he had ever seen in his life. The size of the carriage, and of the horses, was immediately explained. A few people gasped.
Harry had only ever seen one person as large as this woman in his life, and that was Hagrid; he doubted whether there was an inch difference in their heights. Yet somehow – maybe simply because he was used to Hagrid – this woman (now at the foot of the steps, and looking around at the waiting, wide-eyed crowd) seemed even more unnaturally large. As she stepped into the light flooding from th entrance hall, she was revealed to have a handsome, olive-skinned face; large, black, liquid looking eyes; and a rather beaky nose. Her hair was drawn back into a shining knob at the base of her neck. She was dressed from head to foot in black satin, and many magnificent opals gleamed at her throat and on her thick fingers.
Dumbledore started to clap; the students, following his lead, broke into applause too, many of them standing on tiptoe, the better to look at this woman.
Her face relaxed into a gracious smile and she walked forward toward Dumbledore, extending a glittering hand. Dumbledore, though tall himself, had barely to bend to kiss it.
“My dear Madame Maxime,” he said. “Welcome to Hogwarts.”
“Dumbly-dorr,” said Madame Maxime in a deep voice. “I ‘ope I find you well?”
“In excellent form, I thank you,” said Dumbledore.
“My pupils,” said Madame Maxime, waving one of her enormous hands carelessly behind her.
Harry, whose attention had been focused completely upon Madame Maxime, now noticed that about a dozen boys and girls, all, by the look of them, in their late teens, had emerged from the carriage and were now standing behind Madame Maxime. They were shivering, which was unsurprising, given that their robes seemed to be made of fine silk, and none of them were wearing cloaks. A few had wrapped scarves and shawls around their heads. From what Harry could see of them ( they were standing in Madame Maxime’s enormous shadow), they were staring up at Hogwarts with apprehensive looks on their faces.
“’As Karkaroff or the High Witch arrived yet?” Madame Maxime asked.
“He should be here* –“Dumbledore started, before being caught off guard by what he could only assume was the next school’s arrival. Where the Beauxbaton arrival had been somewhat demure, this school was very flash. Literally.
The flames reminded him of the color of floo travel, but they reached to the tops of the trees within the forbidden forest. The color threw the world into a bit of a tilt, with some students shrieking, and others murmuring in awe. Such a wild show of power was at odds with those who appeared.
A single figure stepped from the flames. A girl, who didn’t look much older than Parvati or Lavender came into view. Head held high; she was the prettiest girl Harry had seen – anywhere. Her hair was hidden, wrapped in cloth that sparkled in the flames, her shoulders and midsection were bare, showing off her strong shoulders, delicate collarbone and frankly gorgeous skin.
She wasn’t dark like Dean Thomas, with a reddish undertone that let him nearly hide in the right lights. Nor was she somewhere in between like Blaise Zabini, who was not red, not pink, not yellow like most of the Hogwarts population tended to run. She was warmth embodied. Even from so many meters away, Harry could tell that. He wasn’t near enough yet to see much of her, but she didn’t stop moving toward the contingent of Beauxbaton and the assembly of Hogwarts. When she was halfway between her fire and the students, the fire blinked out of existence.
And with it bled into reality she was not alone. A dog, or wolf, walked beside her, coat mottled, head reaching her waist, with mouse-like round ears on top of its head. There was so much to the girl. She didn’t walk – she simply seemed to glide along. Her feet were adorned with slippers that matched out outfit, and now without the fire, he could see they were gold, as her head wrapping. Her …shirt, was deep purple, skirt the same, edged in a pattern he wasn’t familiar with. Her waist was ensconced with beads that winked in the low light, just like a gem in her naval.
When she was close, passing by him, really, he could see that her face, a nose with the slightest upturn, eyes like amber, and a generous mouth, were painted with what looked to be scars. Or an imitation of them. Her companion was silent, yet menacing as she drew up to the teachers, the whole of the school watching her.
“Ndewo onye ọ bụla,” her words carry, and then Harry notices the way she is in fact glowing. Glowing with her magic. “Thank you for such a welcome, Headmaster, Headmistress, Professors. My Matriarch and High Witch sends her greetings, her thanks, for your attempt to foster friendship between European wizards and those beyond the Sahara.”
Several students murmur, her greeting had been African, so she must be from Uagadou. But… she was alone. That seemed to startle Dumbledore for he took a moment before smiling, twinkling at the young woman.
“It is our pleasure, Miss -?”
“Heir Hermione Adaeze of House Eze and Chi gọziri agọzi Tribe, representative of the African Council of Nations, first of my name. You may call me Miss Granger – my father’s name.”
There is a snort in the crowd, the mutter of mudblood, that Harry doesn’t miss, and it seems Granger’s familiar doesn’t either. The dog – wolf – goes off like a shot, and there is a shriek, that Harry knows well. The young woman, turns calmly, though Snape has started toward the creature, a foul look upon his face.
“Mare!” Her voice cracks like an Exploding snap card. “Leave him. We do not eat the uncivilized.”
“I’m in bloody love,” Harry blurts, blushing when Neville and Ron turn to goggle at him. “What!?” He squeaks out. “She just called Malfoy uncivilized. Her dog wants to eat him. How can I not?”
“Point, mate.” Ron chuckles and Neville nods while turning to look at the girl some more.
“Ah. Welcome, Miss Granger. I – We were all expecting a larger contingent from Uagadou. Will they be arriving?” The Headmaster flails verbally, trying to make sense of the situation. Trying to take hold of the situation. This girl, no older than the 4th years, held power like those ready to graduate, held herself as if she were royalty, and spoke as if facts were the only things that dropped from her lips. She was an anomaly, and Dumbledore wasn’t truly fond of anomalies.
“No, Headmaster. Uagadou may be the only school your Ministry acknowledges as up to standard, but it cuts out 99% of the rest of the Sub-Saharan community. The African Council of Nations took it upon themselves to hold a contest of our own, to determine who would represent the continent since that is what your Ministry reduced us to. I will be the African champion.”
“Preposterous,” Snape is the one who speaks, and no one misses how the French contingent regards him as he trails behind ‘Mare’. “You are not of age.”
Whiskey-amber eyes settle on the tall, sallow man. He is clearly a professor, but his demeanor makes her magic itch. There is something…wrong with him. She adopts a look that she has seen all too often on the Matriarch’s face when dealing with underlings.
“Do all Europeans put so much stock in age? How, quaint. We do not do so in my home country, we let experience and knowledge determine a person’s standing. I am to be the next High Witch of the Council. I am more than enough to send for a spectacle of games.” She looks over the castle, Madame Maxime, Dumbledore the lot.
“I expect this will be a trying visit. May I warm myself inside? The climate here is not what I remembered it to be.”
“I’m going to marry that girl,” Harry says, watching as she slides past a gobsmacked set of Slytherins, approving Puffs and the French students following her.