Daughter of the Dark

Chapter 3

Harry drearily picked up his spoon full of porridge. Hermione had been busy with her Head Girl Duties, and Ron had been busy...entertaining, for lack of better word, so he had basically been left alone last night. And he hadn't really felt like talking to anyone else when they seemed so happy without him. He could have talked to Neville, but he was with Amy, a cute sixth year Hufflepuff, and he hadn't wanted to interrupt him when they were getting so close to finally going out. And Ginny and Dean were out of the question, since he always felt a weird prickling of anger whenever he was around them together.

So instead he had spent the night in the library. It was almost sad. Instead of enjoying his first night back at Hogwarts, which was basically his real home, he had spent it curled up with a book. Hell, it felt like he had switched personalities with Hermione. Then again, she still spent about half her life in the library. Harry didn't know why, but he was very interested in Zarah Hawkins. Something about her pulled him towards her. It wasn't attraction; although he had to admit that she was beautiful...it was something else. Something he couldn't really pinpoint.

Harry had decided to find out about her family. Sure, it was a little creepy, he had to admit that, but it was either that, or go crazy wondering who she was. It turned out that the Hawkins were one of the most elite American families. Most of them were Pureblood, although he had found that some married Half-bloods, or even Muggleborns. They weren't openly for Voldemort, although it was rumoured that a certain branch of the family was very close to the Dark Arts. Likewise, they weren't openly against Voldemort, but once again, it was rumoured that another branch of the family was very anti- Voldemort.

The Hawkins were well known business owners, famous for their restaurants and clothing lines. Most of them were filthy rich and owned many properties across the continents. They had held some of the most elaborate balls, and formal outings of the century. They kept connections with all the right people, although they were also known to hold very strong grudges against those who double-crossed them. They were also very powerful. Other than a slight strain of insanity that tended to appear every third generation or so, they were known to be one of the most prominent wizarding families in the world. Hell, they probably even topped the Malfoy's.

So he wondered why Zarah had chosen to come to England. Because according to the book, she had relatives popping up all over the United States. It was true, her maternal grandfather did reside in London, but still...why go across a continent when you can just move two blocks down the street?

"Potter? Will you please pay attention Potter! I can't have you keeping me all day. I've still got to hand out schedules to half the House. I'll ask you again then. You have requested to take Arithmancy, Study of Ancienct Runes, Herbology, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Potions, Care of Magical Creatures Charms and Transfiguration, yes?"

Harry looked up and spotted Professor McGonagall frowning down at him severely. Her mouth was getting thinner and thinner by the second.

"Sorry Professor. Um, yah, that sounds good."

She tapped a piece of blank parchment, and suddenly it was full of details about his courses.

"Here you are then. I have to say, I was very pleased that you managed to achieve such excellent Arithmancy, and Study of Ancient Runes marks, very pleased indeed Potter. You'll be having a busy year with this lot though. NEWT year is always the hardest. Each teacher only expects the best from their pupils. An of course, there is always the NEWT project that must be completed. You best be careful to manage your time carefully Potter. I've grown quite fond of seeing the Quidditch Trophy in my office."

Harry frowned, looking at his schedule. It was full to the brim with courses, leaving him very few spare periods. There seemed to be more classes this year for every subject than last year. It would be extremely hard to manage the Quidditch team. Still, last year he had picked up two subjects last year, and managed to conduct the Gryffindor Quidditch team to win the Quidditch Cup, so he supposed he'd manage.

"Harry! I'm so sorry about last night. There was just so much to do! I never knew that being Head Girl was such a huge responsibility."

Harry grinned down at the petite Gryffindor. "It's fine Hermione. Say, who's Head Boy? Not Malfoy, is it?"

"No, thank goodness. It's Terry Boot, from Ravenclaw, you know. Well, I'm very glad it's him. He's and excellent worker, and doesn't treat me like scum. Anyways, we've got to run, Harry. It's double Potions first thing, and Snape would probably like nothing better than to put you in detention on your first day."

Harry groaned loudly. He had almost forgotten about Snape. Snape had definitively not gotten better in the last few years. In fact, he had only seemed to redouble his efforts to make Harry feel like an extremely stupid child every class. What a way to start a year.

................................................

Draco opened his book, trying to ignore Pansy's incessant whining. How she had ever managed to get an O on her Potions OWL was beyond him. She never seemed to do any work...except when it came to finding out about gossip, and trying to fix her appearance. Trying being the key word. She had been waiting for him this morning at the foot of the boys' staircase, and had immediately latched on to him from there. It had been like a Daymare, if there were such thing. And at breakfast, when Snape had been handing out schedules, she had insisted on taking every course that 'Darling Draky' was taking. Thank god she was only smart enough to get into three of them.

He had taken all the courses that a Malfoy heir was expected to take. There had been the usual ones: Potions, Charms, Transfiguration, Study of Ancient Runes, Arithmancy, and Herbology. Defense against the Dark Arts too, to keep up appearances. Father had warned him that the Dark Lord did not want the Ministry suspecting them any more than they had too. So Defense Against the Dark Arts was mandatory, even though it was being taught by a Werewolf who just happened to practically worship Saint Potter. Draco rolled his eyes. Him and the rest of the bloody Gryffindors.

He shut his book closed as Snape swept into the room, closing the door softly behind him.

"Before we start today's class, I think I must remind you that you will be sitting one of your most challenging exams of your life at the end of June. Incapable though some of you are, I expect all my NEWT students to pass with the high standard that I have come to expect from them. After those exams, you and I may never have to meet again. However, there is still a year until that happy moment comes, and until then, you will all be expected to put your best effort for every one of my classes. There are not to be any excuses. Also, as you know, there is a project that must be completed in order to pass this course. In the past, I have always made this a group project, and I do not plan on changing my course of action."

Snape's cold black eyes swept the room. Draco grinned as his glittering eyes seemed to bore into Potter's.

"I have selected groups in order to make this process fair. Be warned, there will be no changing of these groups. This project will account for a major percent of your mark. You will be required to brew a certain potion over the course of several months, and write a full report on it. I suggest you take extra care in making them, as you will be the testers of them at the end of the time. Therefore, I require that you start with four of five samples, as you will probably complete most of them incorrectly. I will spare very little class time for your project, so you will be working mostly outside of class. Fail this task, and I will not allow you to take this exam. In essence, you will automatically fail this course. You have been warned."

Draco grinned slightly as Snape did that smirking-without-moving-any-other-part-of-his-face-thing that he was so good at. Always the theatrics, Snape was. He loved scaring the Gryffindors.

"Macmillan, Bones"

"Nott, Parkinson" Draco nearly laughed. It was comment knowledge that Nott and Pansy were the two stupidest people in the class. He would be very surprised if they passed the course.

"Granger, Boot" Lucky Mudblood, getting pared with Boot. Boot was a decent guy, for all that he was a Half-Blood, and was usually more than willing to do Draco's share of the project for a few extra galleons.

"Zabini, Potter" Not that was a paring that was sure to end in disaster. Probably why Snape had put them together. He had never really like Blaise, most likely because of what Blaise's father had done to him in school. He smirked. Potter looked like he was going to be sick.

"Abott, Patil"

"Hawkins, Malfoy"

Draco looked up sharply, meeting Zarah's green eyes. She smirked slightly at him, raising one of her dark eyebrows. He smirked back, nodding.

"I will be passing around the potions that you are to complete. I will be giving you this class to work with your partner, so that you can figure ingredients, and such not. If I find that you are wasting your time, then you will be given detention. Remember, I will not always be so generous with my class time."

Draco grinned as Zarah walked over.

"Ravenclaw, huh? I had thought that you'd be a Slytherin for sure."

She grinned back. "I was just as surprised as you were. That does give me some advantages though."

"So there are some advantages to being in the Eagle's house?"

"Sure. For one thing, I can now try out for Seeker. I heard that the last one, Chang or whatever her name was, left. Couldn't do that in Slytherin, now could I? I've heard that there's another one. And Ravenclaw has way nicer dorms."

Draco was unwilling impressed. He had no idea how she had found out that he was Slytherin Seeker, or that Ravenclaw need a new one, but he had to admit that finding that out was impressive.

"You've never even seen the Slytherin dorms."

"Actually, I have. It's in the dungeons. Dark, green. Password Salazar, Great and Cunning Pureblood."

Now Draco was really impressed. It was one thing to know some useful information. It was another thing to know what the where the Slytherin Room was, what it looked like, and what its password was after only being in the castle for one night. That was almost scary.

"Mr. Malfoy, and Mrs. Hawkins. I have decided to give you two the potion Veritaserum. It is one of the more difficult potions, and will take much more care and attention than any usual ones. However, you two are two of the stop students in this school, and I trust that you can handle something slightly more...challenging. You will have seven months to complete this potion, as it takes six moons to develop. I suggest that you start as soon as possible."

Draco watched as Snape walked away to pick on Potter and Zabini. It was common knowledge that Veritaserum was incredibly hard to make. Only a select few highly skilled Potions Masters could manage it. He sighed and opened his Advanced Potions book. There is was, taking up six pages of instructions. There really were some odd ingredients. He, for one, had no clue where he was going to get Meteorite Powder, or what Apothecary would sell him Hungarian Horntail venom. Damn Snape for giving him such a hard, finicky potion. Between him and Pansy, his best year of his life scheme was just about ruined.

Draco groaned as the bell rung. He was basically doomed to fail potions.

"Well, I suppose we should get started on this just about now. I have some contacts who could probably get me some of the er, more special products. How about meeting me after classes today in the library so that we can make a list of who gets what, where we're going to make this, and how much of each thing we're going to need? You know that sort of thing. It's not a really hard potion; it just takes one hell of a lot of time to stew. Hate to break it to you, but you and I will be spending a lot of time stirring it. Anyway, got to go, Charms is in fifteen, and I hate being late. But see you after class, right?"

Draco stared at her as she flew out the room. That girl was either smoking something really strong, or she was just plan crazy. There was no way you could be that optimistic after receiving an assignment like that. He signed, and packed up his things quickly. He grabbed his bag, and sprinted out the room, hoping not to be late to his first Transfiguration class, not noticing that he had, in fact, passed Zarah on his way out, and that she was heading back into the class.