Chapter Text
"May as well put me in the green already." Melusine's face broke into a self-satisfied smile. "I know where I will be ending up." It was intended as a show of pride and pedigree from a long line of Slytherin.
But the seamstress that was not Madam Malkin just replied, "Oh yes, I'm sure you do, dear," without even looking up from the pinned fabric. Melusine hadn't learned her name and now she didn't much care to.
There was precious little to focus on here. The squat Madam Malkin was fussing about near the entrance, organizing bolts of black cloth, surely for the inundation of Hogwarts students. Those that could afford new robes, that was.
She tried tempting the witch with talk, but it seemed she wasn't interested in racing brooms, or the sweets shops she'd asked her father to stop at, as all her responses were monosyllabic.
The tugging at her arms had begun to get irritating when a distraction finally showed its face, and a face it was, half obscured by messy hair and much too large spectacles. It was novel, coming across a wizard her own age that wasn't thrust in front of her by her father. He reminded her then of a stray cat. Rather mangy.
Or perhaps he was a little duckling that had lost its mother, the way he looked every which way with a slacked jaw.
"Hogwarts, dear?" Madam Malkin said by the door, standing up to her own meager height. "Got the lot here - another First Year being fitted up just now, in fact."
Even standing on the stool, Melusine could tell she was taller than the boy. It satisfied the deep part of her that thrived on her father's tales of the Sacred 28 and her own, natural superiority. He seemed gangly even at his age, which was at least one accomplishment he could merit.
Madam Malkin took the boy by the hand and stood him on a stool across from Melusine. With a wave of her wand, a folding screen popped up between them for modesty, but it did nothing to obscure the boy’s head.
"Hello." Melusine said, quite satisfied with the face he made when she spoke to him. "Hogwarts too?" It was an unnecessary question, but it looked like the poor boy needed guardrails just to walk.
"Yes," the boy replied simply.
She tilted her head at him and the seamstress automatically adjusted it back to neutral. She continued. "My father's next door buying books and Mother's up the street looking at wands." The droll atmosphere and sub-par chatting partners were beginning to get to her and she almost yawned. "Then I'm going to drag them off to look at racing brooms. I don't see why first years can't have their own." A toothy smirk formed on her face. "I think I'll bully Father into getting me one and I'll smuggle it in somehow."
The boy still looked out of place, but the cloth covering his body seemed to make him seem a touch more presentable. Though, his face puckered like he'd drank sour milk. Odd fellow.
"Have you got your own broom?" She continued. Perhaps the boy didn't like being suffocated in robes. That was one thing they had in common.
"No," the boy replied. He was as good a conversation partner as the witch.
"Play Quidditch at all?" She asked next. Her eyes narrowed at the way his brows furrowed.
“I do,” Melusine cocked her chin up and this time the witch didn’t correct her posture. “Father was against it at first, but after seeing me on a broom he says it would be a crime if I’m not picked for my House. Any idea what House you’ll be in?”
“No,” the boy said again, but his rose in pitch like he too was tired of giving the same answer.
“Well,” she pulled her eyes from him to look out the window as her interest waned. “No one really knows until they get there, do they, but I know I’ll be in Slytherin, all our family have been –“ A ridiculous thought crossed her mind. “Imagine being in Hufflepuff, I think I’d leave, wouldn’t you?”
The boy didn’t match her grin. He mumbled more than anything else.
It was then that something through the window finally proved interesting. “I say, look at that man!” She exclaimed, nodding to the window. The boy had to turn in his seat to see what she was looking at and earned a groan from Madam Malkin.
The man was large. As large as a giant, if not a giant himself, and twice as unkempt as the boy across from her. In one giant hand he had two ice cream cones that looked like toys between his large fingers and with the other he waved at the boy and pointed meaningfully to the ice cream.
So, he didn’t intend to eat them himself.
“That’s Hagrid,” the boy chimed in, finally knowing something. That rang a bell. She remembered her father talking about some incident at Hogwarts long ago. “He works at Hogwarts.” He continued.
That clicked. “Oh, I’ve heard of him. He’s sort of a servant, isn’t he?”
That earned a wrinkled nose from the boy. What had she said?
“He’s the gamekeeper,’ the boy said, as if correcting her.
“Yes, exactly.” She replied, furrowing her own brows. What was the difference? “I heard he’s a sort of savage. Father says he lives in a hut on the school grounds and every now and then he gets drunk, tries to do magic, and ends up setting fire to his bed.”
“I think he’s brilliant,” the boy was frowning now and his voice was cold. Melusine felt a flash of something clenching in her chest. She didn’t like the feeling. Her lips curled up in disgust.
“Do you?” she asked, voice as condescending as his had been cold. “Why is he with you? Where are your parents?”
“They’re dead,” the boy said. Oh. Lost little duckling after all. That odd feeling in her chest returned and Melusine drew her eyes away from him.
“Oh,” she said simply. That was odd. She couldn’t imagine her parents being gone. The thought of leaving this shop without her parents there to pick her up suddenly entered her mind and she didn’t like that at all. Mother always brought sweets with her.
“Sorry,” she apologized after a moment. There were an awful lot of people that died in the Wizarding War. “But they were our kind, weren’t they?” Melusine already had her doubts with the boy’s clothes and lack of knowledge. The thought of this boy she’d been sharing a room with secretly being a mudblood unnerved her. She’d heard the stories from father.
“They were a witch and a wizard, if that’s what you mean,” he replied. Ah, that was a relief.
“I really don’t think they should let the other sort in, do you?” Muggleborns. They got a free invitation to Hogwarts even though their families could never have contributed anything to wizarding kind. “They’re just not the same, they’ve never been brought up to know our ways. Some of them have never even heard of Hogwarts until they get the letter. Imagine. I think they should keep it in the old wizarding families. What’s your surname, anyway?”
Before she could get an answer, Madam Malkin jumped in, “That’s you done, my dear,” and the boy seemed eager to be away from her and the endless measurements. Melusine couldn’t blame him. They seemed to be taking quite a long time with her.
“Well, I’ll see you at Hogwarts,” she said as the boy left. A small smile formed on her face.
She thought she’d made an excellent friend that day.