Morning… I open my eyes, Mini curled up under my chin as she baps me on the nose, her huge eyes glinting with dawnlight. Sitting up, I run a hand over my tiny familiar, her enormous ears flicking as she yawns widely. I rub my face, and dig in my bedside table’s drawer for Mini’s food, setting a small bowl down for her and adding a couple of grasshoppers. The tiny fox leaps off the bed and buries her face in the bowl, her tail flicking back and forth as she feasts on her breakfast.

Ron and Harry are stirring, and a couple of boys are already dressed and heading for the Great Hall, mumbling blearily about something. I quickly dress under the covers before anyone notices, uncomfortable with being out in the open. I have no idea how anyone would react if they found out about me…

As I descend the stairs to the common room, I bump into Hermione, who still seems a bit huffy with me about the glasses thing yesterday. I shrink back a little as she brushes past me, her nose in the air. Breakfast is a quiet affair, with drowsy students half-asleep in their porridge or groggily tipping goblets of orange juice into their mouths. According to my timetable, I have Charms first, then Potions.

“Ooh, Potions, huh? Bad luck newbie, that means you’ve got Snape!” I whip around, and the pair of identical red-headed twins are at my shoulders, wincing in sympathy. I gulp, “why’s that bad luck?” One of the twins smiles. “Because he’s a horrible old bat who’s never happy unless he’s inflicting his miasma of constantly-offended superiority on as many kids as possible! I’m Fred, and this is George. We’re Ron’s older brothers, in case the hair didn’t give it away.”

I smile at their infectious cheerfulness as Ron bumbles into the Great Hall, Harry in tow, and the twins grin impishly. “Well, good luck at Hogwarts, mate. We’ll see you ‘round, try not to let Professor Snape get to you!” the pair of them vanish into the crowded hall as I head towards the third floor, my bag under my arm. The stairs shift and rotate, allowing me access to the Charms corridor, gaggles of students ascending and descending as they make their way towards their first classes of the day.

Pushing open the door to the Charms classroom, I take a seat on the higher level of tiered seating, placing my book in front of me, and producing my quill and a bottle of black ink, setting them down on the timeworn wooden desk. The room fills steadily, and I wait nervously for the teacher to arrive.  Approximately five minutes later, the door swings open by itself, and a tiny, middle-aged man with slicked-down black hair, glasses, and a bushy moustache, enters, clambering onto a stool at the front of the room. “Good morning, class! I am Professor Flitwick, and I will be your Charms instructor this year!”

We all stare, before greeting the miniature teacher, as he begins to explain the spell he’s coaching us in this semester, the levitation charm, “Wingardium Leviosa”, a basic yet effective charm for moving objects around without touching them. He demonstrates a couple of times, and then uses his wand to direct a large feather to land before each of us. “This is what you’ll use to practice on. A good swish and a decisive flick, careful pronunciation, and, with any luck, you’ll lift that feather into the air! Good luck!”

I bite my lip, then focus, my attention on the large plume in front of me, Mini’s tail brushing against my leg as she noses around. A few students have managed to levitate their feather a few inches, while one of the unluckiest has made his explode.

As Hermione coaches Ron, slightly condescendingly, I gesture at my feather. Swish, flick, and… “Wingardium Leviosa!” The feather rises, wobbling slightly, before floating up and up, a good few feet, as Professor Flitwick applauds. “See here, that’s the way! Well done, Mr. Darcy! Ten points to Gryffindor!”

Hermione huffs again, but I’m too busy cringing internally at being called ‘mr’. At least the points will help ingratiate me to my new Housemates. And, thankfully, the lesson will be over soon…

Time passes, and, after a rush down the stairs to the dungeons, helter-skelter, heading for the Potion classroom. Finding a spot near the back, I set out my notebook, ink, and quill again, as a tall, greasy-looking man with pale, waxy skin and a hooked nose that resembles a beak belonging to some horribly-mangy, depressed bird of prey. His long, black hair frames his face, his flat, unimpressed expression panning over the class. His face twists into a sneer as he spots Harry, and a dissonant, monotonous drawl emerging from his mouth, his words dripping with barely-restrained contempt.

"You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potion-making. As there is little foolish wand-waving here, many of you will hardly believe this is magic. I don't expect you will really understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses… I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, and even put a stopper in death…… if you aren't as big a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach."

He turns towards the front of the room, and raises an eyebrow in resigned disapproval.

“Ah, Mr Potter…. Tell me, what would I get if I added powdered root of Asphodel to an infusion of Wormwood?” Harry shakes his head. “I don’t know, sir.”

“Where would I find a bezoar?” Snape asks again, his eyes narrowing. Harry responds, “I don’t know, sir.”

“What is the difference between Monkshood and Wolfsbane?”

“I don’t know, sir.”

Throughout the whole interrogation, Hermione has had her hand up, almost bouncing out of her seat. Snape ignores her, announcing, “Tut tut. Clearly, fame isn’t everything. One point from Gryffindor, Mr Potter. Now…”

He stalks around the room, slowly circling like some kind of swamp-dwelling predator. As I shrink down in my seat, he almost lunges. “Darcy. Do YOU know what I would get if I added powdered Asphodel to an infusion of Wormwood?”

I gulp, and then respond, quietly, “You would create an extremely potent sleeping potion, sir. The Draught of Living Death.”

He seems a little put out, before asking me about the bezoar. I know this one, too, but Hermione butts in, “the stomach of a goat, professor! It protects from most poisons-”

“Silence, Miss Granger. When I want you to answer, I will ask you to. Five points from Gryffindor.” Professor Snape doesn’t even turn back, still staring dead at me like I’m a very appetizing sandwich.

“Now, Darcy… what is the difference between Monkshood and Wolfsbane?”

I clear my throat, and respond, “There’s no difference, sir. They’re both names for the same plant, Aconite, a poisonous plant from the Northern hemisphere, frequently used in medicine.”

Silence falls over the classroom, as Snape’s mouth twists in irritation. “…. Correct. Two points to Gryffindor, for answering basic questions about potion making.” I sag in my seat as he turns to harass someone else, Hermione looking quite aggrieved about the teacher’s attitude. I can’t understand why this man teaches, if he seems to despise his students as a whole.

The lesson continues to its end, with Snape’s lecture being less ‘pleasant and educational’ and more… ‘Educational, but only because I don’t want you morons to end up actually dead’. I manage to avoid getting targeted by the malevolent entity posing as a teacher. I understand what the Weasley twins meant now. They were right!

After lunch, everyone heads out to the quad, where two lines of brooms are waiting. A woman with short, spiky silver hair stands waiting, her arms folded. “I am Madam Hooch, the Flying Instructor and Quidditch coach! Now, have any of you used a broom before?” A few students raise their hands, and she nods approvingly.  “Right, then! Take up a position on the left of a broom, hold your hand out, and say, ‘up!’. It should respond by leaping into your hand!”

Nervously, I take up my position, stretching my hand out and commanding, rather feebly, “U-up!” the broom rises up about a foot, then thinks better of it and drops back onto the grass. Madam Hooch tuts, her eyes roaming over the assembled students. A couple have managed to call their brooms to their hands, including that pale ponce Malfoy, because of course he has. The student who exploded his feather in Charms ends up getting whacked in the face, and, once everyone has their broom in hand, Madam Hooch instructs, “Right, mount up, kick off, rise a few feet into the air, and then tilt your broom handle forwards to come down.”

 A chubby boy ends up lifting several metres into the air, before rocketing off, bouncing off walls and statues, as the instructor shouts, “MR LONGBOTTOM, GET DOWN HERE!” I stare in horror as he screams, apparently unable to obey, before getting hooked on a statue’s spear, about twenty metres off the ground, his broom disappearing into the distance. His robes rip, tear, and then sunder, and he plummets, landing with a meaty thud. Madam Hooch runs over, her face taut, as she helps the boy up, tutting. “Oh dear, your arm’s broken. Class, stay on the ground while I take Longbottom to the Hospital wing.”  

As the teacher escorts the injured boy away across the grass, Malfoy bends down and snatches something from the grass. A ball, about the size of a bludger, made of clear glass or crystal, a band of gold around the middle. “Look, Longbottom’s dropped his Remembrall, let’s put it somewhere safe for him to find!”

Harry steps up, holding his hand out. “Give it here, Malfoy!”

The scrawny blonde weasel sneers dismissively. “Nah. I think not, Potter.” With a cocky smirk, like an insouciant member of Stomp, he swings himself onto his broom and glides into the air. Harry mounts up and takes off after him, glasses flashing with determination.

We all watch as Malfoy and Harry go at it, each with their own goal in mind. Harry, trying to retrieve Neville’s Remembrall, Draco trying to keep it away. Higher and higher, the pair circling each other, diving and making aggressive lunges. Finally, Draco grows bored of the whole stupid affair and tosses the ball up, spinning in mid-air to bat it away with the tail of his broom.

Harry barrels right past the grinning blonde, buffeting him as the bespectacled boy soars after the sparkling ball. I lose sight of it in the early-afternoon sunlight, as do most of the class, but it looks like Harry has it in his sights. Just when it looks like he’s about to careen right into a window, he whirls, his hand shooting up, and something… glints in his palm, shimmering, as he descends back to earth.

Draco’s face twists in disappointment, as his ‘prank’ fails. As we cheer and crowd around Harry, Professor McGonagall storms across the grass, her bottle-green robes billowing. “Mr Potter, come with me, this instant!” Draco’s face lights up as he pictures the trouble he’s just got Harry into now.

The elderly woman carts Harry off, Ron and a few others glaring daggers at Malfoy. Luckily, Madam Hooch turns up to dismiss us, my next lesson taking the form of quiet free-study in the Library. However, as I work through my homework assignments, I can’t help but get distracted. Not only is my dysphoria kicking me in the back of the head, the fact that Malfoy’s got such a hate-on for Harry in particular, and everyone else in general, makes me worried. He might come after me sooner rather than later, and I’m not confident in my ability to deter him…