A/N: A year after completing this story, I am now slowly going through it to edit the whole thing. This is just a little note to warn you that there may be tiny inconsistencies between parts which I have edited, and parts which still require editing. Nothing major is changing, so please do give this story read- I'm just currently in the process of making it better! (17/04/09- I'll take this note off when editing is complete)

‘My only love sprung from my only hate’- Romeo & Juliet - William Shakespeare

Chapter 1- Bad Beginnings

She stood between platforms 9 and 10, next to a trolley in which she had a large trunk. Her hands hung limply by her sides as she looked around the station, trying to salvage some clues as to what she should do next.

Although she was only a young girl, of 11, she was already showing signs of unusual beauty. She was of average height and had a slender, willowy figure. She had a pale, porcelain-like complexion which radiated against the contrast of her dark, copper-brown, waist-length hair. Her eyes were transitional, but mostly hazel; in between green and brown. It was these hazel eyes which, full of despair, darted around the station, as she silently pleaded for a sign.

‘You know, I’m starting to think that you invented all of this ‘magic’ stuff up as a way of escaping home,’ an amused voice came from beside her.

She threw him a dirty look.

‘I did not. You saw the owl and letter, just as I did,’ she replied tartly. ‘I just don’t know how I’m meant to get to a platform 9 3/4!’

She sighed and looked around the station in a last-bid attempt to find someone who looked as though they might attend a school for witchcraft and wizardry.

And then she saw them.

There were three of them, all donned in the robes similar to those which she had seen in Diagon Alley. The first two- the boy’s parents- walked a few metres ahead and had an air of regality and superiority which sent a shiver up her spine. The boy looked frustrated and kept making faces behind his parent’s backs as he wheeled his trolley.

She watched them for a while longer before turning suddenly to her brother.

‘Okay, I have to go talk to him- he must know how what to do. Bye Mark!’

‘But…’

‘Bye!’

She quickly hugged her perplexed brother and hurried towards the other boy. She blinked when she suddenly saw his parents disappearing and picked up her pace lest the boy disappear and leave her stuck, once again.

‘Excuse me. Hi, sorry, um…’

The boy turned his bored, grey eyes to look at her and rasied his eyebrows at her. She blushed and cleared her throat quickly, realising that she was making no sense at all.

She decided to try again-

‘Hi, my name’s Helen.’

The boy, wearing a confused expression, hesitantly took her hand, not after looking around him cautiously.

‘Sirius,’ he said uncertainly.

She smiled hesitantly.

‘I’m so sorry, it’s just that I don’t know where platform 9 ¾ is and I noticed you had an owl and… do you know? Could you please tell me how to get there?’

Sirius surveyed her for a moment, his lips twitching slightly, and then smiled at her reassuringly.

‘I know! They’ve been really unspecific about how to get there, haven’t they? Why don’t wait here whilst I go find out,’ he said to her, making to leave.

‘Where will you go?’ Helen asked, confused, panicking at the thought of being left alone, once again.

‘Uh… er…the um… the ‘Wizarding Information Bureau.’’ Sirius replied, running a hand through his hair with an amused smile.

‘Oh, okay,’ Helen said, pretending to know what this meant as she wondered why his parents didn’t know where he should go.

But before she could ask, Sirius had already winked at her and disappeared.

---

After waiting for Sirius for ten minutes, and as the clock became dangerously near 11 am, Helen began to wonder if something had gone wrong.

Now she wished that she hadn’t sent Mark off as quickly as she had.

‘Honestly, James. You’re first day of school and you couldn’t brush your hair?’ an exasperated woman scolded her son, from behind Helen.

Helen whipped around, her heart beating hopefully.

‘Mum,’ the boy responded, sounding irritated. ‘Stop fussing over me. It’s not cool. And my hair looks fine.’

‘It looks like you’ve been hit by a lightning bolt!’

‘Enough bickering you two. Emily, if James wants to look like a scruffy ruffian from the streets, that’s his problem.’

The mother, Emily, crossed her arms and pursed her lips, but chose not to argue back.

‘Right, now, who’s through the barrier first?’

‘I’ll go,’ Emily said, sniffing affectedly.

Helen watched in wonder as Emily strode towards the barrier between Platforms 9 and 10. Her eyes widened as she saw her about to hit the barrier with the trolley…

‘She’s going to crash!’ she burst out impulsively to James, her eyes wide with worry.

But Emily didn’t crash. She merely disappeared, just as Sirius and his parents had…

Helen’s eyes widened in comprehension. She suddenly felt very foolish for falling for Sirius’ trick.

The boy, James, turned to her, smiling widely.

‘Are you muggle born?’

Helen raised her eyebrows.

‘I’m sorry?’

‘You’re not from a magical family,’ James’ father translated.

‘Oh…’ Helen said, blushing. ‘No. No, I’m not.’

‘Do you ride in those mini train things that are outside?’ James asked.

Helen raised her eyebrows, feeling very overwhelmed by these two strangers.

‘They’re called cars, James,’ his father explained, patting James on the head.

‘Oh,’ James said, his smile faltering for a second. ‘Those. Do you ride in those?’

‘Um… yes,’ Helen said. ‘Sorry,’ she said, as she saw James open his mouth to ask another question, ‘but I’m going to Hogwarts and the train is meant to leave in five minutes and I don’t know how to get to platform 9 ¾ and Sirius was meant to come back and tell me how to get there but he just disappeared and I have to get on the train because if I don’t, I’ll have to call my parents and they’ll get angry and then I won’t be able t….’

She looked up suddenly as she felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up to see James’ father smiling reassuringly.

‘Don’t worry,’ he smiled. ‘All you need to do is run at that barrier and you’ll appear at Platform 9 ¾. James, why don’t you go with…. Sorry, what’s your name, dear?’

‘Helen,’ she said, her lips trembling in her relief.

‘Richard Potter,’ he said, shaking her hand. ‘And this is James. James, why don’t you go with Helen through the barrier?’

Helen saw Richard giving James a wink and looked to see James glaring at his father.

‘Excuse my son,’ Richard said, looking unimpressed with James. ‘How about we go together?’

---

Finally on the train with her luggage safely loaded, Helen looked for an empty compartment in which she could sit. She had thanked and left Richard Potter as quickly as she could, not wanting to stay with the family any longer when James evidently didn’t like her. As she walked past many full compartments and it was at this point that she felt the first pang of loneliness. She saw groups of girls, chatting animatedly about their summer vacation, boys swapping cards from chocolate frogs. Helen knew no one and, after Sirius and the ‘barrier incident’ felt as though she could trust no one either. Finally, after searching most of the compartments, she found one which only had one boy in it.

‘Sorry, I was wondering if I could sit in here. Everywhere else is full,’ she said, desperate not to have to already resort to sitting alone in the bathroom before she had even arrived at school.

The boy looked up from his book and Helen was instantly struck by the dark circles under his eyes.

He bit his lip and Helen nodded miserably and turned to the door once again, thinking that the cubicle was now looking very friendly compared to the people she had met from her new school.

‘Please….stay…’ the boy called out after her, sounding strained, and also very apologetic.

Helen turned around slowly.

‘It’s okay,’ she sighed. ‘I’ll leave you alone…’

‘No, really,’ the boy said, setting his book aside and standing up. ‘I’m Remus. Sorry, I wasn’t really concentrating when you came in… I didn’t get much sleep last night,’ he said, chewing his lip.

Helen looked at him and then smiled as she saw that he seemed genuinely apologetic.

‘I’m Helen,’ she said guardedly, feeling very overwhelmed with the happenings of her day.

Remus blushed a little and they sat down opposite each other.

‘How are you finding it so far?’ he asked hesitantly, his ears tingeing pink. ‘I’m finding it a bit overwhelming to tell you the truth. You’ll never believe what I did today… I ran into the barrier between platforms 8 and 9 rather than the one between 9 and 10 which was, of course, really embarrassing because my trolley smashed into the barrier sending everything everywhere and all these muggles were telling me off!’

Helen couldn’t help laughing at this.

‘Well at least you knew where platform 9 ¾ was! I didn’t even know,’ she said.

Remus surveyed her.

‘So are you muggle-born, then?’

Helen was beginning to get the impression that this might be an important factor.

‘Yes,’ she said hesitantly.

Remus nodded.

‘How are you finding it? I imagine that a lot of aspects of our world must be very new to you.’

Helen nodded.

‘It’s just… well, yes, it’s that, but I think it’s more the fact that I don’t really know anyone.’

Remus nodded.

‘Do you… do you have friends here?’ Helen asked.

‘At Hogwarts?’

Helen nodded.

Remus smiled, though Helen was sure there was a sad edge to it.

‘No,’ he said. ‘I don’t know anyone here.’

‘Oh, well, we can stick together then!’ Helen said optimistically.

Her smile faltered a little when Remus didn’t reply immediately, but then he smiled back at her.

‘Yeah,’ he said, ‘We’ll stick together.’

---

The train drew to a halt at Hogsmeade Station. By this stage, Helen and Remus had changed into their robes and were awaiting, in trepidation, their first impression of their new school.

A voice shouted: ‘Firs years, over here!’ and Helen gasped to see a gigantic man with a mass of hair around his hair.

She and Remus made their way over to the man.

‘Righ’. ‘Ello to you all. My name’s ‘Agrid and I’m the gamekeeper here at Hogwarts. Now, it’s tradition for all firs’ years to cross the great lake to the school for their sorting ceremony. So, I wan’ you all to sort into groups of four and then get into a boat.’

It was very dark and hard to see who was who, so Helen, holding Remus’ hand so they wouldn’t separate, followed him to a boat in which they both got in.

The two boys in the boat stopped talking and looked at them. Helen wanted to leave the boat immediately but, no sooner than had she thought this did the boat magically start gliding along the lake.

The two boys were James and Sirius. They both shifted uneasily in their chairs under Helen’s glare. Sirius then turned to Remus and held out his hand.

‘Sirius Black, and this is James Potter,’ he said, indicating James.

‘Remus Lupin,’ replied Remus, shaking their hands, ‘and this is-‘

‘Oh don’t bother, Remus. We’ve already met,’ said Helen icily, looking the other way.

‘Wh-?’ Remus started, confused.

‘Er-‘ James started.

‘I see the Wizarding Information Bureau was not too busy this morning,’ Helen said ironically.

‘What? There’s no such thing as the-‘ Remus said, sounding bewildered.

‘Oh I know Remus. Sirius, however, seem to think otherwise.’

Both James and Sirius snorted and Remus frowned.

‘What are you… oh wow,’ Remus breathed, forgetting his previous line of thought as the castle came into view.

Helen and Sirius and James looked up and, for that moment, they all forgot any animosities which they held as the castle which was to change their lives forever came into view.

---

‘Asteria, Helen.’

Helen walked with trepidation to the hat. She was the first student to be sorted and didn’t know what to expect. She was rather scared of what the tattered old talking hat sitting on the stool would do to her.

On the train ride, Remus had told her about the four Houses, but he didn’t seem to know of any factors which might influence what house they would end up in. He said sometimes a family history in a house made it more likely that one would be in that house, however even this was never a guarantee.

Swallowing nervously, she sat on the stool, lifted the ancient hat and dropped it on her head. It was so large that it covered her eyes completely. She gasped when it started speaking in her ear.

‘Hmm… a daughter of Asteria? I’ve seen a few in my time. Yes, this is very interesting. You’re not quite like the others, and yet the same… yes, you’re very interesting. Now, where shall I put you? I could put you in Gryffindor… no, you’re not a Hufflepuff. Now, Slytherin would be interesting. My, my, you shall be a difficult choice... and my first sorting for the year! Yes, you possess certain cunning to be in Slytherin… You most certainly would do very well there. After all, they value the purity of blood above all. You could be greater than all the others before you… you could truly harness it to your advantage…

Helen was confused by the hat’s comment on purity on blood. She wasn’t magically born. Did the hat think she was someone else? And why did it have to make a spectacle of her by taking so long to sort her?

‘But of course, you certainly would excel in Gryffindor. You possess many qualities of the true Gryffindor. Yes, I see true courage and selflessness in your heart. But you’re also very clever! Oh dear… right, let’s decide! Scrap Hufflepuff. Let’s scrap Ravenclaw because I just don’t think you’d do as well there- you’re not that kind of personality. Slytherin? Yes, you could be Slytherin. Dear me, we could flip a coin about this…but seeing as we can’t… ah, I see now. Yes, I see very clearly now…’

Helen blinked, perplexed. She knew that the statement was paradoxical in itself, but she truly thought that the hat was mad.

‘GRYFFINDOR.’

Helen’s felt relief swoop all over her body that her ordeal was finally over. She took the hat off, placed it on the stool, and walked very quickly to the Gryffindor table, which had erupted in cheers. She sat down next to a kind-looking girl.

‘Anika Moss. Well done, and welcome to Gryffindor! That was the longest sorting ever! We were starting to think the hat had died!’ she laughed.

Helen paled and, upon seeing her worried expression, Anika added:

‘Well, if the hat had died, it would have been perfectly normal. It is, after all, ancient.’

Helen smiled tightly and was thankful that she didn’t need to respond as the hall had hushed as Professor McGonagall barked the next name.

‘Black, Bellatrix.’

Helen looked up as the Hall went deathly silent to see a girl who… well, she looked remarkably like that Sirius boy.

The hat merely touched Bellatrix’s head before it shouted out ‘Slytherin.’

There was a raucous yelling from the Slytherin table and that was the first time that Helen had actually noticed them- they seemed to emanate an auror which made her rather afraid of them.

Perhaps that’s what Remus had meant by calling them the ‘Dark’ house.

‘Black, Sirius.’

Helen glared at him as he walked to the hat. She hoped that he would end up in Slytherin just like Bellatrix so she wouldn’t have to associate much with him. She was still hurt and just could not understand why he had played such a cruel joke on her.

He dropped the hat on his head and Helen was relieved that it seemed to take even longer to sort him than it had her. At one point, she saw him shaking his head vigorously under the hat, his fists clenched. Finally, Seconds later, it shouted: ‘Gryffindor!’

Helen groaned and looked the other way as he sat down next to her.

‘Oh look. We’re stuck in the same house together,’ he drawled, in a falsely cheerful tone.

‘More fun for me!’

And with a final grimace at Helen, he turned to watch the rest of the sorting without saying another word to her.

A few more people were sorted and then:

‘Davis, Marina’

Helen’s head snapped up and she felt her blood chilling as she saw Marina, her blonde hair bouncing as she walked to the stool.

She held her breath, hoping that Marina wouldn’t be sorted in her house…

‘GRYFFINDOR!’

The table all around her erupted into cheers and applause. Sirius, from next to her, wolf-whistled and Helen turned, incredulously, to see him winking at Marina who blushed as she sat next to him at the table. Marina’s blue eyes flickered to Helen but they both looked away quickly as Professor McGonagall called the next person to be sorted.

If Helen’s start to the day was shaky, it ended much more smoothly. Sirius and James, who seemed to already be close friends, ignored her. Remus, to her pleasant surprise, was also sorted into Gryffindor (along with another boy- Peter Pettigrew). Marina ignored her, as did Mary McDonald (another girl who was sorted into Gryffindor) and she got along pleasantly with Lily Evans, a red-haired girl who struck Helen as being very anxious and slightly bossy.

---

When Helen woke up the next morning, it took her a moment to register where she was and why. It all seemed so surreal- that she should be at Hogwarts, a school for Witchcraft and Wizardry… that she was no longer living at home…

‘Girls, time to wake up,’ Lily called, pulling back all of their hangings.

Helen sat up to see that Lily was already dressed and was combing her long red hair methodically.

‘We don’t want to have a tardy start to the year, now, do we?’ Lily continued, shaking Marina who simply rolled over and kept sleeping.

Lily gave an exasperated sigh and turned to Helen who hurriedly got out of bed.

‘I’m up,’ Helen smiled, going to her trunk and taking out her clothes.

‘You always were a goody goody,’ Marina mumbled from under her pillow.

Helen halted in her tracks on her way to the bathroom and clenched her fists. She turned to see that Lily was watching them both curiously.

‘Do you know Marina?’ Lily asked Helen, coming into the bathroom after her.

Helen glanced at Lily’s reflection in the mirror as she pulled on her stockings.

‘No,’ she muttered. ‘I just think she’s a nasty girl.’

She looked up to see that Lily was pursing her lips, her green eyes narrowed.

‘What?’

Lily shrugged.

‘She does seem a little… cold,’ Lily said, hesitant to speak ill of one of her peers. ‘But maybe she’s just homesick?’ she suggested optimistically.

Helen looked up and envied that Lily was such a good person to see the good in everyone. She knew that, even though she didn’t know Lily very well, she would probably grow to envy Lily as being the type of girl she would always aspire to be, but would never actually become.

‘Yeah, that’s true,’ Helen sighed, not about to tell Lily the truth. ‘So can we go to breakfast yet? I’m starving!’

Lily smiled and, picking a stray thread off Helen’s robe nodded.

‘Yes, why don’t you go down and wait in the common room? I’ll see if I can wake up these other two before I meet you. Honestly, to be late on their first day…’

---

Helen was once again shocked at the sheer size of the Great Hall when they entered it for breakfast. Now that it was light, it looked even bigger than it did before. As she and Lily were helping themselves to porridge, Remus, Sirius, James and Peter entered the hall and sat down at the table.

Lily eyed the boys warily as they sat down.

‘You haven’t brushed your hair,’ she commented stiffly to James, who was sitting opposite her.

James’ head snapped up from where he was shovelling scrambled eggs on his plate and he gaped at her. Helen couldn’t help laughing, remembering his mother’s comments on his hair.

‘Why should he brush his hair?’ Sirius interrupted snidely, looking at Lily with distaste.

Lily looked at Sirius, blushing a little.

‘I’m sorry, I don’t remember your name,’ she said.

Sirius rolled his eyes.

‘Sirius Black.’

‘Lily Evans.’

‘I can’t say I’m pleased to make your acquaintance,’ he drawled.

Lily blinked, shocked by his rudeness.

‘Don’t worry,’ Helen said, glaring at Sirius. ‘He’s like that to everyone. He’s just an insufferable git who thinks he’s above everyone else.’

The table fell silent and Helen felt her cheeks colouring as she realised that everyone else had heard what she said.

‘I mean…’ she faltered, looking up at Sirius hesitantly.

But to her surprise, he let out a bark of a laugh.

‘Sweetie, I am better than most of the people you’ll meet here.’

Helen blinked- she couldn’t believe his nerve!

‘Well…’

‘Tell me,’ James interrupted, sensing an argument between Helen and Sirius brewing, ‘Why is it that girls eat rabbit food all the time?’

‘What?’ Helen breathed, thinking that the boys at her new school were the strangest boys she had ever met.

Lily, who was next to her, rolled her eyes, sighed heavily, and left the table. Helen’s lips twitched as she watched James’ eyes following Lily.

James then looked back to Helen expectantly.

‘So what’s with you girls and food?’

Helen looked at James coldly.

‘I thought you didn’t want to associate with me?’ she asked, raising her eyebrows.

James surveyed her.

‘At first you seemed like you were too much of a rule-follower… but then I saw you sneaking out of the common room last night and changed my mind.’

Helen paled.

‘What?’ she whispered.

James grinned.

‘So yeah, I changed my mind. I think you’re okay… for a girl, that is.’

Helen calmed down and rolled her eyes and sipped some of her pumpkin juice. She had only snuck out of the common room because she had lost her necklace and was trying to find it.

She cleared her throat.

‘This is what is called a healthy breakfast as opposed to the artery-clogging, recipe for a heart attack of a breakfast which you are eating,’ she said.

Sirius rolled his eyes and piled more bacon on his plate and offered it to James who appeared undecided for a moment, but then took it and put two extra rashers on his plate.

‘What class do we have first?’ Helen asked, turning to Remus.

‘Charms,’ Remus replied, looking up from his charms textbook.

Helen watched him, her eyes widening.

‘Have you studied much?’ she asked, feeling worried.

Remus chewed his lip.

‘I’ve read through all our text books. Do you think that’ll be enough?’

Helen’s eyes widened. She hadn’t even opened her books yet.

She turned to James.

‘Have you studied?’

James rolled his eyes at Helen.

‘In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m not a goody-two-shoes.’

Helen relaxed a little and glanced at Sirius who was making a point of ignoring her.

‘What about you, Sirius?’ James asked, nudging Sirius.

‘What?’ Sirius asked, looking up.

James rolled his eyes.

‘Have you done any study yet?’

‘Nope,’ Sirius said coolly.

‘Peter?’

‘Me? No, of course not!’ Peter stammered, his cheeks flushing.

‘You know, Remus, you probably don’t want to be telling everyone that you’ve been studying a lot already. Trust me, it’s not a good look,’ Sirius said, tapping his nose before rising from the table and striding out of the Hall.

James hovered uncertainly but then shrugged and hoisted up his bag.

‘We better get going,’ he said, hurrying to catch up to Sirius.

Peter scrambled to follow suit, tripping over his oversized robes as he did.

Helen turned to Remus.

‘There’s nothing wrong with studying. Don’t listen to Black- Lily said that she had been practising with her wand and has also read a few of our books. Even I tried to read two of them… I just didn’t get what they were talking about half the time. Potions seemed interesting enough, though,’ she admitted. ‘A bit like this thing called chemistry which we studied at my muggle school.’

Remus smiled and Helen smiled as she saw his cheeks flushing a little.

---

‘Now, class,’ chimed Professor Flitwick, the tiny charms Professor, after having given them a briefing on levitating charms, ‘to work! Two per feather.’

Helen paired with Lily. Lily was first to attempt to levitate the feather and, after three attempts, was successful, earning Gryffindor 10 points.

Helen swallowed nervously as Lily stepped aside. It didn’t seem very hard to do…

As she raised her wand, she smelt smoke from behind her.

‘Look at what you’ve done, Sirius!’ James shouted, trying to pat the flame out of the burning feather, only to withdraw his hands and suck on them in pain.

‘Silly boy,’ Lily muttered disapprovingly. ‘Professor!’ she called desperately, trying to find Professor Flitwick, as the fire spread to Sirius’ charms book.

Helen suddenly remembered about the charm she had read about in her charms book a few nights ago and made her decision in a split second.

‘Aguamenti,’ she said, pointing her wand at the desk, a stream of water pouring out of her wand, extinguishing the fire immediately.

Helen blinked, surprised at herself and also, quietly, very proud for having performed her first successful charm.

‘Wow,’ James said, looking at Helen both thankfully and in awe.

Sirius, on the other hand, looked at her coldly.

‘I didn’t ask for you to show off,’ he snapped.

Helen felt a sudden urge to slap him. She couldn’t understand why he was so determined to be nasty to her.

‘Fine,’ she said, coolly, muttering the opposite incantation and lighting his desk back on fire again. ‘Deal with it yourself then,’ she added, turning around her attention to her feather which she caused to soar to the ceiling immediately.

---

The rest of Helen’s day turned out to be much better than she had anticipated. Marina had burnt her eyebrows off in potions, Sirius had already received a detention, and she had won 30 points for Gryffindor in total for her contributions in the classroom. For some reason, things that involved wand magic came very naturally to Helen. She quickly realised after her History of Magic class, however, that a lot of study was involved if she was to be a good student as there were many subjects where natural talent just did not cut it.

If Helen thought she might never get along with Sirius during charms, she was absolutely certain by the end of the day that if there was one person in the world whom she hated, it was him.

Almost more than Marina.

During lunch, Sirius had talked very loudly to the older boys in their house about a very annoying and nosy girl who they should ignore. He became very annoyed, however, when one of the boys remarked that she was one of the best looking girl he had ever seen- a comment which had caused Helen to blush quietly.

Then, during transfiguration, he threw a dung bomb under Helen’s chair. Helen had never seen dung bombs and thus couldn’t understand from where the awful stench was coming. Remus, however, was very quick to respond. He quickly kicked the bomb out from under his and Helen’s shared desk so that it under Professor McGonagall’s desk instead.

‘Oh no,’ Remus whispered, his face looking pained.

Helen looked up at him, confused.

‘What’s going to happen?’ she frowned.

She got her reply a few seconds later, when it exploded and filled the room with its putrid smell. Professor McGonagall became livid, looking at the shell which, on it, had carved the inscription: ‘with love, SB.’

‘SIRIUS BLACK!’ she barked, giving him a very length lecture which ended with her docking off twenty house points and handing him yet another detention.

Helen couldn’t help smiling as he scowled at her from behind Professor McGonagall.

---

‘So, you think you’re so clever?’ Sirius drawled, leaning against the corridor wall, causing Helen to jump out of shock as she walked passed him and hadn’t noticed him.

Helen glared at him, arms crossed and lips pursed.

‘You don’t want to get on my black list,’ Sirius continued, a malicious glint in his eye.

‘Really? What can I say? I’m just trembling from fear,’ Helen said sarcastically, turning to walk away.

Sirius grabbed her arm. Helen felt her breath quicken; despite her words, she actually was frightened, even though she didn’t show it. Sirius knew so much more about this world and surely knew tricks which she could never work her way out of.

But she tried not to show it as she looked him defiantly in the eye.

‘Can I help you, Black?’ she asked coldly.

Sirius stared into her hazel eyes and felt shocked as he realised that she actually was very pretty… prettier than any other girl he had ever seen.

‘Er…’ he faltered.

Helen wrenched her arm from his now slack grip and stormed off.

So this is my first chapter! I'd love to hear your thoughts so reviews are much appreciated :)

Love Anya