Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4
It was hard being a potter and a slytherin. Especially for Jame’s twin. You were always slightly different. But nobody noticed or cared then. They care too much now. The minute you were sorted into slytherin, your brother hated you. The rest of your family tried to be accepting at first, but something in their gaze changed. You could see the slight reservation and worry in their gaze every time they looked at you.
The summer of your first and second year they tried, but their smiles towards you weren’t as unreserved and warm. You both desperately tried to get along, but soemthing has shifted that couldn’t be fixed. The summer of your third year you both gave up and it elapsed into slightly awkward silence when it was just you and your parents. You stayed in your room most of the time anyways, so it was alright.
Your brother, on the other hand hated you the minute you were sorted into slytherin. You tried to talk to him several times that year. He never shifted. So you gave up. And pretended to hate him back. You never succeed though. In a small way, you still wanted to be like when you were younger. Carefree and happy with your family and your brother.
Shaking those useless thoughts off, Caterina Potter shook herself fully awake. She’d dreamt of them last night, when they’d been eight and had messed around on brooms together. They’d been so happy...No. Not a useful thought. Thing were the way they were and can’t be changed. He hated her. And she hated him. That was all there was to it.
“Caterina! Hurry up, or there’ll be no food left!” Jane, one of your best friends yelled up the staircase.
“Yeah, or we’ll leave without you!” Your other best friend, Lithia yelled
“Coming!” You yelled as you ran down the staircase whilst adjusting your tie.
“Why am I friends with such loud people?” Complained your other best friend, Emilia
“Oh, stop complaining, you love us really!” Teased Jane
You had all been friends since first year, when you’d been in the same compartment as Jane and Lithia when your bother had abandoned you to go sit with his friends. You became friends with Emilia and Roslinda when they found you crying in the girl’s bathroom after James cold shouldered you for the first time. They were your best friends in the world, and you would do anything for each other. Whoever said slytherins only served their own interests were grievously wrong. It wasn’t very easy to become close with a slytherin, but once you did, they’d be loyal till the end. Griffindors never even try to see past the masks and shields though. Then again, those masks and shield existed because of people like them. It was an endless cycle. At least most Ravenclaws knew not to succumb to ancient prejudices and as a result, they were often friends of slytherins. Your friend Roslinda was a Ravenclaw but the rest of them were slytherins who shared a dorm room with you.
Ten minutes after you got to the great hall with your friends, Dumbledore stood up.
“Good Morning students! I am sorry to be interrupting your meal, however, I have a rather important announcement to make. In liue of house unity, we will be starting a new class for sixth years. If this is successful, it will become a class for first years as well then perhaps eventually for all years. We will be paring pupils from different houses up in groups of four or five and you will have to complet varies assignments and tasks in those groups. You will be getting a mark for this class, and this does affect your class average. Consider this motivation to try hard. Anyway, I’ll let you get back to your meal, breakfast, after all, is the most important meal.”
Your friends glanced at each other warily. “Think there’s any chance we’ll be paired up?” Lithia asked
“Maybe....I mean, I’m guessing it’s equal number of people from each house, so maybe.
“Hey guys! Have you noticed? Our timetables just updated to include this class! And... oh no. We have this with the griffindors.” Roslinda exclaimed, running over to them.
“I hope we don’t get paired with them..” Jane said glancing slightly worriedly at Caterina. The them of course referee to the marauders, who hated them, and who they hated back. It was like a miniature war at school.
Caterina shrugged. “Even if we do, it’s no big deal, we’ll just make a truce for that class and hope they see reason.” At her friends’ skeptical looks she added “Or just hex and threaten them into a truce.”
Her friends looked slightly more satisfied with this alternative solution.
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In their eighth period, they all walked into this new class apprehensively awaiting their fate for the rest of the year. Only minutes after they sat down, the sirius and James sauntered into the room with Remus walking after them and peter trotting pathetically behind them. The two groups glared at each other before Sirius smirked and thye sat down. At that moment, the new professor walked in. She looked like a very cheerful and optimistic person, with honey brown hair swept mostly into a bun and very light brown eyes. She was wearing a formal suit with a tight black skirt and a white shirt with a formal black suit jacket.
“Good morning everyone! My name is professor Anderson and I’ll be teaching this class. The only three rules I will enforce are that :
1) There will be no prejudice of any kind in this classroom and you will be civil at all times
2) There is to be no cheating of any kind
3) You are expected to be on time and to hand in work on time. You are not to skip classes without a legitimate reason.
Please understand that a breach of these rules will result in punishment.”
She has walked over to the desk whilst she said this and now seeemd to cheer up immensely.
“Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, I’ll be telling you your groups !”
She either didn’t notice the nervous tension in the air, or she ignored it and carried on.
“ Louise Johansson, Penelope Dawin from griffindor with Lawrence Sohrin and Ambrosius Cadwin from Slytherin. Please sit over there.” She pointed to a row of desks in front of her and motioned for the students sitting there to get up and when they had sat down she continued.
“ Leopald Tasin and Samual Damien from slytherin with Heather Clarence, Ashley Beaumont and Laura Greenwood of Griffindor. Please sit over there.”
She gesture to a cluster of desks again and they sat down. Caterina and her friends were practically at the edge of there seats, though they were careful not to look worried and only looked vaguely interested.
“Do you see how she’s picking two or three of each gender form each house? Maybe we’ll end up together!”Lithia whispered to Caterina.
“I hope we will” She whispered back.
“Our next group, Caterina Potter and Emilia Cathwright from slytherin with”
They two friends high fived, exuberant, then waited with bated breath for the grififndirs to be called.
“—with James Potter and Remus Lupin.”
“What?!” Exclaimed both Caterina and James
The teacher looked a little taken aback but replied “Well, I thought, since you’re obviously siblings, it might be easier for you two to be together and bring your friends together.” It was true, even without their last names, they looked quite alike. They both had the same jet balk hair, but where James wore it short and ruffled, she wore it straight down and long or half up in a bun with curls on her shoulder when she was being formal. She also sometimes put it up in a pony tail when she didn’t want the hair bothering her. They had the same coloring and good looks, but where her brother had brown eyes, she had a stricking light turquoise mixed with a little grey. Overall, she was quite as attractive as her brother, although he failed to see or acknowledg it.
Caterina and James were now glaring at each other, each with their friends glaring at the others friends.
Lawrence raised his hand. “With all due respect Professor Anderson, those two have hated each other since they were sorted into separate houses.”
Professor Anderson seemed somewhat surprised but said “ Well in that case, you can use this class to reunite with your sibling and get to know each other better. Please sit over there.”
Caterina and James sat with Remus and Emilia in between them and ignored the other.
Professor Anderson said next “Sirius Black and Lily Evans from griffindor with Jane Audrey and Lithia Walters.”
There want as violent a reaction this time, but they still glared at each other with distrust and hatred as they sat down.
She continued assigning the other groups and then told them of their first task.
“Now, your first task will be to learn about the people in your group and next week you will have a test on various things about them, such as their favorite color, childhood memorie, game Ect. Please use the rest of this lesson to get to know each other better.”
A tense silence fell over their little group, until Emilia kicked Caterina under the table and shot her a glance. She got the hint and schooled her face into neural disinterest. Remus was the one who broke the silence.
“How about we each find out what we already know about each other? Caterina, whould you like to go first?”
Now, although most people would have reacted violently to your enemy’s friend, Caterina was not this kind of person. She was always polite and had a graceful and elegance about her that could be seen in whatever she did. She was also usally quite warm and charming, however, her brother and his friends had never seen this side of her as she always put up her politely reserved mask whenever they were around and tended to look at either the floor, or hyper focus on soemthing, liek her friends’ face or her books. It also happened that she never quite disliked Remus, as he seemed quite nice and didn’t really discriminate. If he hadn’t been one of his brothers best friends, she would probably have been his friend. And so, she smiled, nodded and replied
“Alright, I already know everything about Emilia, so I won’t go into that, I know James’s favorite color is bright griffindor red, he is a chaser for the griffindor quidditch team, his best subject is transfiguration, he hates and bullies snape, his best friend is Sirius, he hates slytherins, he hexes people in the corridors ,he likes stalking and chasing lily evens who has rejected him numerous times, he likes running a hand in his hair to look ‘cool’, he is arrogant, he gets drunk at hogs mead very often and his friendship group which consists of you two, Sirius and peter is called the marauders. As for Remus, he likes reading, is often unwell, is friends with lily evens and is a prefect with almost perfect scores in every subject.”
And with this, she calmly said, “Would you like to go next Remus?”
Remus and James were staring at her as though she just said she wanted to be a purple jaguar when she got older.
“H-How do you know that much about me?!” James chocked out, seeming to forget off a moment that he hated her.
She shrugged, “I’m observant. And anyways, you’re still my brother whether you like it or not.”
James seems to remember his hatred again. Shock must have attributed to his loss of it seconds before. “I bet you just wanted blackmail material, you filthy snake.” He spat.
She merely raised an eyebrow “I thought siblings were supposed to know each other at least a little.”
“Why would I bother learning anything about you?” James replied in a disgusted and cold tone.
Seeing Caterina about to say something, Remus hastily cut in. “Alright! James, how about you got next?”
“Sure. Emily is friends with Caterina, she—”
There was a very long and awkward pause as James tried to think of one fact about her. Emilia broke the silience yet again.
“It’s actually Emilia, Potter.” She said, politely, yet with a cold edge. After all, this was Caterina’s brother who made her life hell and who made upset her countless times.
James flushed red with embarrassment, but managed to still sound cold. “Wouldn’t matter to me. You’re just another worthless snake.”
Emilia sighed almost inaudibly, but Remus’s keen ears picked it up, and guessed that her patience was starting to wear thin.
“How about we make a deal? No one is to insult anyone else. We are all to be civil.” At this hw glared at James. “We all want a good grade, so let’s all try our best, okay?”
Everyone nodded including James, although his nod was barely perceptible and tight.
“Class over everyone! Now, just before you go, to help you get along, you will now share quarters and your new quarters will include a common room and living room. To help prevent any mishaps, magic is not allowed in these rooms, so you will essentially be living like a muggle. You will also be eating meals in your rooms together. You have already each been given keys to your rooms they are on your desks and the rooms are located on the newly built ninth floor. Class dismissed!” She waved goodbye at the class with a cheerful smile.
“So, we’ll be living together.” Stated Emilia as they walked to their new quarters. “Since we’ll be living together, I see no reason why we should still be hostil. Let’s start over shall we? Blank slate. And Caterina? Let’s stop holding back!” She finished.
“Why? They’ll just use it against us later on.” Responded Caterina whilst the other two listened curiously.
“Even if they do, who’ll believe them?” Asked Emilia
“I suppose.....Alright. Clean slate. We don’t know each other.” And with that the mask dropped mostly. What remained was a girl with a warm smile, bright, slightly wicked eyes and her entire body language shifted from elegant, charming and reserved to a slightly wicked cheerfulness and warmth. The charm was still there, however it just seemed a little bit more strong and wickedly alluring. She seems almost completely different. She smirked at how Remus and James were staring at her. She may have used a little magic to direct the light so that it fell on her in the best possible way, she also may have enhanced her looks a little with magic. She didn’t regret it when she saw them now. It was like they were in a trance.
“ I—Wow.” That was all Remus managed to day before he blinked and rubbed his eyes and snapped out of the trance he was in.
“Stop staring like that, brother. That’s incest.”
James hadn’t snapped out of his trance but at that comment he did.
“I wasn’t — I don’t —That’s gross!”
Emilia was smirking with her. And she raised an eyebrow but said nothing as they arrived at their rooms. They opened the door.