06 The Hogwarts Express
Occurs during Chapter 6 – The Journey from Platform Nine and Three-Quarters
You slowly begin to walk down the platform and into the crowds of parents and students who have yet to board the train. Your parents follow behind with your trunk and Odin in his cage. As you pass the engine you smell the coal burning and feel the warmth of the steam on your face.
The first carriage has the words Prefects Only by each of the doors. You continue to walk down and look into the windows as you go, they look very busy. Perhaps it’s just easier to go near the back. As you get to the second from last carriage things look much better. Your parents tell you to get a move on as they’ll be setting off any minute.
The realisation that you are not going to see your family for over three month hits you. You start to get tears in your eyes as your parents give you a warm group hug.
Your mum says ‘Remember that you can write to us anytime. Professor McGonagall said Odin will collect and deliver the letters’.
Your dad points out the other children and says ‘Look, at the older kids. They are happy to go to school so it must be a fun. Being in Scotland, away from the city it must be a lovely safe place to study. We are always here for you’.
You grab the handle of your trunk and make your way to carriage G.
Two ginger haired twins are helping the spectacled boy you saw in Diagon Alley lift his trunk onto the train. As the spectacled boy pushes his trunk down the carriage they turn to you and say in unison
‘We are Fred and George. Would you like a hand with your trunk?’.
You happily agree, not knowing which one is Fred and which is George. They pull your trunk up behind them as they get on and you follow behind. They pile into compartment three with the spectacled boy.
You look into compartment four and spot Lavender Brown with two other new students. She smiles at you and beckons you in. You find a place for your trunk and put Odins cage on the top.
Lavender takes one look at him gasps and says ‘wow, what a lovely owl. What’s his name?’.
‘His name is Odin; he is a Brown Fish Owl’.
Lavender turns to the other three in the compartment. She introduces you by name then points to the others ‘this is Lisa Turpin, Wayne Hopkins and Anthony Goldstein’.
You timidly wave to them and look out the window as you hear a loud whistle. The twins jump back on board followed by another younger looking ginger boy. The train starts to move, and you wave goodbye to your parents, your attention it then drawn to a ginger haired girl running after the train, she was half laughing and half crying. You look back to where your parents were, but they are now lost in the distant crowd.
After a while you start to loosen up and talk to your new friends. There is something about all being in it together in this adventure into the unknown. You learn that Lavender is a pure-blood which means everyone has magic in her family. So what are you called?
‘Lavender. If you are a pure-blood, what am I? None of my parents have magic’.
Just then the young ginger haired boy walks past the compartment door. He looks through the window. Then carries on up the train. Lavender turns to you looking a bit red in the face.
‘Sorry, I was distracted. So would be a Muggle-born, or, well… a rather unkind name is, well, mudblood. Sorry’.
Mudblood sounds familiar. You remember that Draco boy and his father back in Diagon Alley. He sounds like a right piece of… The compartment door slides back.
‘Anything off the trolley dears?’
A smiling, dimpled woman is at the door with a trolly full of snacks and the words Honeydukes Express on the side. You take a look, and you see Bertie Bott’s Every Flavour Beans, Cauldron Cakes, Chocolate Frogs, Drooble’s Best Blowing Gum, Jelly Slugs, Liquorice wands, and Pumpkin Pasties.
Between everyone you get at least one of everything. Lavender and Anthony are having fun educating you on what thing are and what they taste like. Most things are great, apart from that grass flavoured Bertie Bott’s Every Flavour Bean.
‘The chocolate frog have famous witches and wizard in them, open yours and see who you get. Oh and don’t forget to catch the frog’. Says Lavender.
You open the chocolate frog box and the frog tries to jump away. You catch it with lightening reflexes.
‘Wow you would make a good keeper’. Says Anthony.
You think of football and think, at least there will be something normal at this school. You look at the card. ‘I got Hengist of Woodcroft’.
‘Hengist of Woodcroft!’ Everyone shouts in a Scottish accent. You look startled.
‘Sorry it’s just something you do when he pops up. No one is sure where it started.’ says Lavender.
After a while you notice the scenery outside the window has become wilder. Gone are the towns and neat fields. Now there are rolling hills and winding rivers. Just then a round faced boy knocks on the door and slides it open. He looks upset.
‘Sorry,’ he said, ‘but have you seen a toad at all?’
You turn to him and say ‘Sorry, we haven’t seen one’
‘Well, if you see him …’ Then he left and you go back to your conversation, though you are starting to run out of things to say.
A few minutes later the compartment door slides open again. The round faces boy was back,
but this time he had a girl with him. She had very bushy brown hair.
‘Has anyone seen a toad? Neville’s lost one,’ she said. She sounded rather bossy. You turn back to her to say you haven’t, but a thought crosses your mind. Should you go with them to help find the toad?
