As Eudora left the fireplace she gazed out upon the glittering platform.  Young witches and wizards were everywhere, bustling about before the shining image of the cherry red locomotive that would be bearing them to Hogwarts.  Most were in clothes that were distinctly wizard-like, and entered through the fires.  There were a few more coming through the wall out to the outer platforms, but they were fewer, and some looked shocked as they viewed the platform.
 
A host of animals hooted, hissed, and croaked in outrage as the mass of youths moved about.  The youngest were looking nervously about as they were led by their parents to the train, while the older students happily joined with friends who they'd been separated from the whole of the summer holidays.  Eudora could easily tell that she was amongst the later arrivals by the much larger number of adults as compared to children amongst the crowd.
 
It was truly a shame that the girl didn't really get to much socializing, so knew almost nobody.  Even those she did know were not friends as such.  However there was one boy who seemed to have taken an interest in talking to her, and he approached now, a woman who could only be his mother trailing closely behind.
 
"Why hello again," he said as he approached.
 
"Gawain right?"  Eudora asked.
 
"Yep," the young Ollivander said, brushing a bit of dark brown hair from his eyes.  "And if I'm remembering correctly, your name was Eudora?"
 
"Right you are.  Want to sit together?"  It would be nice to have someone she knew with her for the trip.
 
"My my making friends already?"  Gawain's mother interjected, smiling at them.
 
"We met in the shop, this is the girl who made her own wand," he pointed out, and a few nearby heads turned subtly to look in their direction.
 
"Oh?  Not trying to steal secrets are you dear?"  She raised an eyebrow at Eudora.
 
"No ma'am, grandfather made us learn the basics, but I'm not planning to do much with them."
 
Before they could continue a piercing whistle blew and the staff started calling for everyone to board.  With a hurried wave both turned and hustled onto the train.  The doors were quickly shut behind them and Gawain had hardly gotten his trunk into the hall before the train began to move.
 
The first compartment they checked had a rather curt girl who informed them in no uncertain terms that they were in the prefect's car, and were to move down the train.  From there it was slow going, most places were full up, and a few had students who were either clearly lost in their own devices or wanted nothing to do with a pair of first years.
 
Finally though they did find a room with a pair of open seats.  A girl with bright blonde hair, and a boy with dark curls sat there, the boy clearly a bit overwhelmed with everything.  Both of them looked to be new students as well, which was a plus.
 
"Mind if we sit here?"  Eudora asked, they were nearly at the end of the train, and quickly running out of options.
 
"Not at all, Regina Quint, pleasure to meet you," the girl declared.
 
"Thomas Davies," the boy nodded quietly.
 
"Eudora Pyrites,"
 
"Gawain,"
 
Once their trunks were safely stowed and seats had been found they all turned back to one another.
 
"We were just discussing what house we hoped to be in.  Personally I'm hoping for Gryffindor what do you think?"  Regina asked.
 
"Dunno, all of them have merits.  Doubt I'll be in red and gold by the end of the night though, nothing wrong with bravery, but I just never meshed with most of them."  Gawain shrugged.
 
"Regina was just telling me about them, so long as they don't put me in Slytherin I reckon I'll be fine.  Not that they would anyway with my parents," the other boy said, scratching his neck.
 
"Yes, mother said that's where all the dark wizards come from, hate to go there," Regina answered, nodding her head.
 
"That's just flagrantly untrue," Eudora answered.  "Sure, most dark wizards do end up coming from Slytherin, but certainly not all, and there are plenty of heroes from the house as well.  Merlin himself was a Slytherin.  The fact of the matter is that most who end up going down the road of dark magic are ambitious, which is one of the key traits of Slytherin."
 
"Pfft, old Salazar was the one who came up with the blood purity nonsense, and I think we all know where that went," Regina said.
 
"He didn't like muggles for a reason," came Eudora's reply.  "And if you're curious as to what that was, look in the paper.  They just found out about us again and already there are people calling for us to be hunted.  Now, yes, it went way too far, but try to think about why he did what he did."
 
"Yeah, some of the stuff on the news has been... I mean, a lot of muggles don't think that way, but there are some crazies out there," Thomas said.
 
"Not a reason to try and kill them wholesale like Voldemort did though."  Regina patted the Thomas on the shoulder as she spoke.  "And he was decidedly a Slytherin.  Bet you can't even name a dark wizard that ever came from Hufflepuff."
 
"Eunon Blackwood.  As for the other houses, there are examples of Voldemort's supporters from those that can be named, if you really want."  Granted, not many, but they existed.  "I'll probably be in Slytherin, and I for one have no intention of going on any maniac killing sprees," Eudora finally admitted.
 
"Way to say, 'Look at me, I'm a bad person' isn't it?"  Regina scoffed.
 
Both girls were on their feet at once, hands reaching for wands.  The two boys, realizing that something bad was about to happen jumped up too.  Gawain grabbed Eudora, trying to pull her back from the other girl, eyes wide as the tip of her wand started to emit angry looking purple light.  Thomas, acted so fast he hardly even seemed to think about it, and jumped physically between the two.
 
Before anything could actually happen there was a knock and the door to the compartment opened.  There stood an ancient looking witch with a small cart.  "Anything from the trolley dears?"  She asked before her eyes took in the situation fully.  Then her expression became significantly more stern.  "There's no fighting, and definitely no dueling on the train."
 
"Eudora and I were just about to change compartments, right?"  Gawain asked quickly.
 
"Yes, seems like someone spilled something foul in this one," she answered.
 
The trolley witch was kind enough to sell them some chocolate frogs and direct them to an empty compartment at the very back of the train.  Though she did keep an eye on them the  whole way to make sure they actually went.  Nobody seemed to pay her that much mind, but she was an adult witch and could probably calmly put all of the first years in their places.
 
"Did you mean what you said back there?"  Gawain finally asked when they arrived.  After opening his candy.
 
"About what?"
 
"Going to Slytherin," he clarified.
 
"Yes, I probably will.  I know that I want more, and I'm willing to go and get it.  Also, most of my family that went to Hogwarts ended up in Slytherin."  There were other reasons as well, but she felt no need to clarify.
 
"It's not like it's bad or anything," he said after seeing her look.  "I don't think you're on the path of becoming a dark witch or anything, you know.  You're not here screaming about 'filthy muggles' or whatever at least."
 
Eudora sighed and gave him a long look.  "My parents might have, as they were that kind of person, but they're gone now, so who cares?  As for me, I don't like muggles, but it's not like I want to kill them or anything.  I mostly just want them to leave us alone."
 
"Not likely that'll happen after the dragon attack.  Even The Prophet thinks they'll have to tell them something in the end."  He sat back and pulled the card from his chocolate frog.  "Huh, Paracelsus.  Don't think I've got one of him before."
 
She let that hang in the air a bit as she looked out onto the countryside.  There were a few clouds here and there, but otherwise the sky was bright as the afternoon wore slowly on.
 
"He was a medieval alchemist and healer."  After that she waited, continuing to look through the glass.  "I was there you know."
 
"What?"
 
"I was in The Leaky Cauldron when it happened, ended up running out onto the muggle road."  She could barely hear her own voice, so soft as she spoke the truth of that day.
 
"That's... I don't know," Gawain said, looking up at her.
 
"I felt so weak.  I couldn't do anything as it killed those people.  I never want to feel that way again."
 
"Then let's get strong."  At his companion's look Gawain continued.  "Look, I know we're not supposed to know any magic before school, but I spend a lot of time in a wand shop.  If you think I've not picked up a few things here and there you're wrong."  Now he had her attention, and he leaned in.  "Betting you have too.  From the looks of it you'd have hexed that little idiot back there till not even her mum could've recognized her."
 
Eudora snorted laughter.  "Alright, I might know one or two spells.  Doubt I could do that though."
 
"How about this, I'll show you one of the spells I know, and then you show me one of yours.  Goodness knows that it'll take awhile before we learn anything really cool from the professors."
 
"Alright, let's see what you've got."  With her agreement Gawain went off.
 
The first spell he knew was a little charm to make red sparks fly from the tip of his wand.  They bounced around a bit in the compartment causing a bit of chaos until they hit the two occupants, stinging causing both to yelp.
 
"Okay, next time, no dueling spells," Eudora said, rubbing her side.
 
"Yeah... maybe should have saved that for later."
 
"Alright, my turn then I guess."  She took her wand and laid it flat in her hand.  "Point me"  It was probably the easiest spell she knew, and quite harmless.  The wand spun around until the tip went due north.
 
"Um... neat I guess," Gawain said.
 
"Don't underestimate the value of knowing what way is north.  I spend a lot of time in the local woods and I hear there's a forest at Hogwarts."
 
"And you're planning to go into it?"  The boy asked.
 
"Not immediately, but the real question is if you're going to be up for joining me when I do," she responded.
 
He smiled, and they continued on with their sharing.  Neither could really master much of what they could show in the time they had, but they could give ideas and try some of it out.  Gawain showed the general counter-spell, which was covered in the first year, but good to know, as he had to remove a few minor effects from the shop now and then.  This went up against Eudora's levitation charm, something she did every morning, and had down to practically second nature.  The only hitch came when she repeated that charm without a wand.
 
"You okay?"  Eudora asked after Gawain sat there staring for a solid five seconds.
 
"You're not using a wand," He said.
 
"No, brother showed me this one.  Got it out of some books."
 
"That's supposed to be, like really hard," Gawain muttered.
 
"It's not.  Not as easy as using a wand, but not that hard either."  She began to think that perhaps she shouldn't have shown him this trick.
 
"Yeah... okay, I've got to learn that one."
 
From that point they stopped sharing and began the process of practice.  Both had a few new things to go over and while every now and then someone would pop by the door, nobody cared much that they were playing with really weak spells on the train.  Eventually the sky began to darken and the lights slowly began to glow from their little sconces.  Around that point both slipped their school robes on over their normal clothes.
 
Sadly all good things had to come to an end, and after one more pass by the trolley witch, when everyone loaded down with sweets it was time to go.  The train slowed, finally grinding to a stop at a small station.  Not too far off one could see the gentle lights of a village on a nearby hill, otherwise there seemed to e little more than woodland nearby.
 
"First years, come over here you lot.  All first years here!"  Shouted a massive man with a slightly grey beard and mop of hair, holding a lantern high.