Three Wise Monkeys

Three Wise Monkeys - Chapter Two

Girl Talk

"What happened, Rigs?"

The red-haired girl smoothed down her robes as she re-entered the compartment that she was sharing with two other girls. She sniffed. "They were fighting," she said, shaking her head in disgust. "I´ve never seen such an immature group..."

Yanking the door shut behind her with enough ferocity to make the window pane shake, she paused to wipe a smear of red off her knuckles, before flinging herself down in the forward-facing seat, next to one of her oldest friends.

All three of the girls in the compartment were on their way to their first year at Hogwarts and were desperately excited about it.

"Was it them what was swearing?" Cathlee Jacobs asked eagerly. She was one of Morrigan´s friends from childhood, a dark-skinned, dark-eyed annoyingly pretty girl from a mixed marriage: white muggle mother from Essex and black African wizard father, who had worked for the Zimbabwe Ministry.

She and Morrigan had been introduced through one of Morrigan´s many aunts, who was married to a muggle man, called Michael. Michael had transpired to be the best friend of Cathlee´s mother and they had brought the two girls together.

They had hit it off immediately and had remained firm friends since, despite their very different natures, looks and backgrounds.

Morrigan was confident, clever, resilient, tart-tongued and stubborn, while Cathlee was quieter when around strangers and preferred to follow a set leader, usually Morrigan. The smaller dark girl looked up to the red head with no small measure of awe and almost fan-like adoration.

The red head for her part, had taken the midget of a girl under her wing. They were a painfully cute pair with Cathlee´s exotic dark looks contrasting so dramatically with Morrigan´s pale skin and shocking red hair.

Even in their voices, Cathlee still lived in Essex and had the accent to match, while Morrigan´s parents had moved to live near Oxford when she was seven, unfortunately surrounded by a lot of upper-class people, which did strange things to Morrigan´s accent, since both her parents were from Kent.

"They were swearing and yes, Cath," Morrigan Henshaw sighed. "Boys."

"What did you say to make `em stop?" Cathlee demanded.

Morrigan looked primly at the two girls. "I just made them see things from my point of view," she said.

"We heard ye shouting," Ginger McKinnon said dryly.

No one quite knew why the Scottish Ginger was actually called Ginger. It was a nickname she had had since Morrigan and Cathlee had known her, for the past five years, after running into her in Diagon Alley with their parents.

It was allegedly an abbreviation of her full name combined with her appearance - Virginia - but it didn´t make any sense considering that she had long, blonde hair unlike Morrigan´s shocking orange.

It had gotten to the stage that she claimed that her mother was making dinner when she gave birth and she had asked Ginger´s father if he wanted ginger with his dinner, so when he was given his food, the baby was brought through and he had assumed her name was Ginger, so Ginger she was from there on in.

Either way, it made an interesting topic of conversation.

"I would never dream of shouting!"

Cathlee snickered. "Yeah, right, Rigs," she laughed. "Don´t forget that we know what you´re like."

Morrigan looked a little indignant. "I simply raised my voice, so what I was saying could penetrate their thick skulls."

"Ye yelled at them," Ginger stated, agreeing with Cathlee´s assessment.

"Okay, yes, I yelled at them."

"And?" Cathlee prompted, grinning.

"What?"

"You know we ain´t gonna believe that you just yelled at them..."

Morrigan stuck out her lower lip in a pout. "Why does no one ever believe that I´m a nice, quiet person?" she asked petulantly. "I mean, I´ve got the angelic looks, so why does everyone think I´m always up to mischief?"

"Because ye usually are?" Ginger said, grinning.

"Well, I s´pose that is true..."

"Because they know your brothers?"

That made the red-haired girl grin.

Her family were fairly notorious in some circles, because even though there were only four of them, a small number compared to her aunts and uncles, they drove her poor mother to distraction with their natural aptitude for misbehaving.

William and Charles, her two elder brothers, had been both smart and clowns, a rare and terrifying combination for their baby sister.

And for their teachers.

As far as Morrigan knew, one of the teachers had retired immediately after hearing the news that Charles would be joining William as a pupil as Hogwarts, although she knew it was probably just one of the brothers´ boasts.

At twelve and nine years older than her, most of their tricks that they had developed had been tested on the unfortunate Morrigan, when they were reaching their later years at school.

Georgiana, her elder sister, wasn´t as bad with the tricks and, much to Morrigan´s glee, she regularly pummelled their brothers for laying booby traps in her bed.

Unlike Morrigan, who was fairly short and looked like she was going to remain so even when she started to actually grow, Georgie was tall, skinny and the walking, talking definition of a tom boy.

She was in between William and Charles, age wise, but still always had time for her little sister, especially when teaching Morrigan how to know if there was a trick coming and how to avoid or reverse it on the tricksters.

Charles had never realised that she knew, even when he had been turned into various critters after his spells and traps backfired on him.

All of them had attended Hogwarts before Morrigan, but that didn´t worry her, because she knew that she was taking all that she had learned from every one of her infamous siblings with her.

If anyone even dared to mess with her, or her friends, they wouldn´t know what had hit them.

"Okay, okay, I taught them all that fighting was bad," Morrigan admitted wryly. Her two friends exchanged knowing grins. "Stop that! You know that annoys me and I´m already all wound up!"

"Sorry, Rigs," Ginger smirked.

"No you´re not."

Cathlee giggled. "You know us too well."

"That´s what worries me," Morrigan replied.

***

"Good afternoon, dears."

"Oh! Hello!"

The plump witch who brought the food trolley around the carriages smiled in on the three pretty little first years. "Is there anything I can get for you, ladies?" she asked, glad to see that at least one set of first years were behaving.

After seeing the boys in the next compartment...

She sighed mentally.

There always had to be a group that didn´t behave.

"Ooh! What do you got?" The dark-skinned little girl bound over to look at everything on the trolley. She was an adorable little creature, small for her age, with a mass of curly black hair.

"Everything you could possibly want," she replied with a smile.

"Cigarettes?" the red haired girl asked, grinning. The trolley-witch´s lips pursed and she frowned at the girl, who grinned a little wider. "Well, you did say that you had everything we could want and I had to ask..."

The trolley-witch studied the girl.

She looked like she would be a very proper student, with her ironed robes and tidy uniform already on and very respectable-looking. However, there was a twinkle in her eyes that suggested otherwise...

There was something familiar about the mischievous look in those brown eyes, but she hadn´t seen anything like them for the last two years, since young Charles Henshaw had finished school.

Unless...

"You wouldn´t happen to be a Henshaw, would you, dear?"

The girl´s wide grin looked like it was about to break free of the constraints of her face. "Yes, last of the Henshaw kids," she replied cheerfully. "I´m Morrigan and yes, I know its an utterly bizarre name."

"Your mum liked to give you odd names, didn´t she?" the blonde girl noted.

"The girlie names anyway. I could have been Guineviera or Morrigan. I don´t know which is worse," Both of them approached the trolley, where the dark girl was eagerly grabbing little packets of sweets.

"Want some Bertie Bott´s Beans, Rigs?"

"You´ve got Bertie Bott´s Beans? Crikey! I haven´t had those for an absolute age! I´ll have to have some!"

Immediately, each of them started rooting through their pockets, digging out enough money to buy a small box of beans each, as well as some cauldron cakes, a couple of chocolate frogs and pumpkin juice.

"Don´t forget that you still have the big feast to come, when you arrive at the school this evening," the witch reminded them. "I wouldn´t recommend that you eat too much just now."

Morrigan Henshaw smiled up at her. "Thank you!"

The plump witch couldn´t help returning the smile, as the girls paid for their treats, then returned to their seats, comparing what they had and she closed the door to move further down the corridor.

They were certainly an adorable little trio and so well-behaved...

Now, if only those wretched boys...

She sighed again.

Fortunately, she didn´t have to deal with them until they were returning home, but she certainly felt sorry for their teachers.

***

"D´you think I´m all right?"

"Cath, you look fab."

Cathlee looked down at her robes. They were enormous on her tiny form and they were the smallest size that Madam Malkins´ shop had in stock. "I look like a ruddy great walking tent!"

"Don´t be daft, Cath," Ginger laughed. The smallest of their number actually smiled, a little comforted. "If anything, ye look like a ruddy small walking tent!" She ducked a bean that Cathlee hurled at her.

Into the final ten minutes of the train journey to Hogsmeade, they had all been changing and getting ready for their arrival at the station and the excitement in the air was palpable, surging through the whole train.

"Ladies!" Morrigan yelled, dodging the low flying beans. "I just got my hair to lie evenly on both sides! Don´t make a mess of it now!"

Ebony eyes met green, grins exchanged, then the tall blonde and small dark girl both turned to the red head with a matching wicked smirk on their faces, as Morrigan immediately groaned.

"Fine! Make a mess of it!" she sighed in resignation, spreading her arms by her sides, as both her friends jumped at her and started fluffing her already-immense mass of vivid red hair. "For the record, I hate you both."

"We love you too, Rigs," Cathlee laughed, flinging her arms around Morrigan. "We are gonna have a ball this year!"

Adding her arms to the hug, towering over both of her petite friends, Ginger sighed dramatically, "If we´re put in the same house..."

"We better be..."

Morrigan nodded. "I´d rather stay with my two best friends than with a bunch of strangers. If I end up in the same house as those...ruffians in the compartment next door, I think I would rather go home."

"Liar," Ginger said with a chuckle. "Ye´d just bug the pants off them."

"I´m awfully good at that too, you know..."

Cathlee rolled her eyes. "Obviously, Rigs," she said dryly. "We´re only your best mates. We only have to put up with you."

"And even if we do get put in different houses, we´ll still be best friends," Ginger said, kissing Morrigan firmly on the forehead. "Ye´re not gonnae get away from us that easily."

"Where´d´you think we´ll get put?" Cathlee demanded excitedly.

"My bet´ll have Rigs in Slytherin," Ginger smirked, avoiding a swat from her flame-haired friend. "What? Ye expected me to be nice to ye? Ye´re annoying, loud, rude and stubborn. Where else could ye go?"

"I´m a Gryff," the red head said huffily. "My mum and dad were both Gryffs. So were all my aunts and uncles. So were Will, Charles and Georgie. Something tells me that I´m going to follow the pattern."

"You hope," Cathlee snickered. "Ooh! Imagine the looks on their faces if you do end up as a Slyth! I dunno where I´ll be, seeing as mum and dad didn´t go to Hogwarts. I wanna be a Gryff as well..."

"Doesn´t everyone?" Ginger laughed. "I mean, Hufflepuff...the name of the house is such a mouthful...Slytherin...yuck. Snakes. I s´pose Ravenclaw wouldn´t be too bad, if all else fails..."

"What about the prats in the next compartment?"

The three girls paused for a moment and listened.

They could hear various colourful words from the boys next door.

As one, all three looked at each other and said, "Slytherins."

***

"Firs´ years this way! Firs´ years!"

Keeping her arms securely looped through Cathlee and Ginger´s, Morrigan looked around for the owner of the deep, booming voice, her teeth chattering together with the cold already, her nose numb.

"C-c-c-cold," Cathlee mumbled, gripping onto Morrigan for dear life. Both girls knew she would probably be carried off in the wave of bigger people, if she lost her grip on the red head.

"Firs´ years!"

"That way!" Ginger pointed further down the platform.

She was the only one who didn´t seem to be bother by the biting winds that were tearing through the small station. Morrigan supposed that was because the girl was from this far North, so she was used to the cold weather.

They started moving, but something yanked around Morrigan´s cold ankle and she tripped, caught by both her friends. She heard someone laughing behind her and straightened up, turning around with a glare.

The brown-haired, green-eyed boy from the compartment next to theirs was standing right behind her, a rather shocked look on his face, both his companions several paces behind him, laughing loudly.

One of Morrigan´s hands lashed out and slapped him hard.

The boy staggered, his hand coming to his cheek. "What the hell was that for?" he demanded, looking startled.

"You tripped me, you idiot!"

"I bloody well did not!" he spluttered. He did look genuinely shocked by the accusation, shaking his head. "I-I-I was walking and I-I-I must have caught your ankle by mistake..."

"Rigs, leave him be," Ginger suggested, glaring at the boy, who was rubbing his reddened cheek. The Scottish girl´s green eyes flicked over his face and the faces of the other two boys and she smirked. "So those three were our neighbours, eh?"

"They were," Morrigan glared at the one in front of her, but he still looked utterly mortified by having tripped her. Sniffing, she swung around, taking Ginger and Cathlee´s arms again. "C´mon."

Cathlee glanced back at the three boys, the red- and the sandy-haired ones crowding in on the brown-haired one, apparently no longer fighting amongst themselves. A snicker escaped her and she turned back to her friends.

"Rigs," she said accusingly. "I thought you said that you only yelled at them."

"I didn´t say that," Morrigan replied, glowering, as she stormed onwards, dragging both of the girls with her. Her cheeks were scarlet from the embarrassment of almost falling on her face on the crowded platform.

"I..."

"Cath, you said that you thought I had probably done more than yell," the red head growled, clearly more than a little irritated with their annoying neighbours. "I just didn´t bother to tell you yes or no..."

Ginger kept a grip on her red-haired friend. "Don´t let them know that they´re annoying you, Rigs," she advised in a low voice. "It´ll just make them worse and more determined to get back at you."

Morrigan made a growling sound. She had decided, it was clear to her friends, that she really didn´t like any of the three boys who had had the nerve to made a noise in the compartment next to hers.

Pushing ahead, she crashed into the back of the rest of the first years, almost knocking a blond-haired boy off his feet.

"Rigs!" Cathlee and Ginger both cried out, the taller of the two grabbing the boy´s arms before he could fall.

"Get off!" Startled, Ginger released the boy´s arms and he straightened up, turning to stare at her. "What on earth did you do that for?" he demanded, but - to her friends surprise - Ginger didn´t say anything.

The blonde girl was staring at the boy, open-mouthed.

Morrigan groaned and Cathlee slapped her forehead.

The boy certainly had a look going for him and unfortunately, it happened to be the look that Ginger appreciated. His silver-blond hair was around shoulder-length, well-groomed, around his shoulders that were draped with expensive robes that did nothing but make him look good.

However, Morrigan didn´t like the cold arrogant look on his pale, pointed face, his mouth twisted into what it apparently thought was a smile, but it looked more like a smirk. His grey eyes skimmed over Ginger´s face.

"She was stopping you from falling on your arse, mate," Cathlee answered the boy´s question, giving Ginger a sharp nudge in the ribs.

The boy raised an eyebrow. "And who might you be?"

"Cathlee Jacobs," A skinny brown hand was held out to him. he stared at it coldly until it was pulled back. "Um..."

"Ginger," Raising her hand, Morrigan pushed her friend´s mouth closed, still unable to shake the bad feeling she got when she looked at the blond boy. "You´re going to catch a fly if you keep standing like that."

Ginger blinked, still staring at the boy, who was - for once - the same height as her, a blush rising up her cheeks. "I-I-I...ye were going to fall...I-I didn´t want ye to...ye know... look daft..."

"How very considerate."

"It was no bother."

The boy´s lips lifted in a little more of that cool smirk.

"I see," he extended a black-gloved hand to her, which she shook with her trembling one. "If you are in Slytherin, I would be pleased to make your closer acquaintance... what did you say your name was?"

"She didn´t," Morrigan interrupted, not liking the look on Ginger´s face. Couldn´t she see the blond boy was an utter slimeball?

"Gin-Ginger...I-I-I mean Virginia McKinnon."

"Virginia..." he murmured, blatantly ignoring Morrigan and Cathlee. He gave her that slight smirk and Morrigan groaned when Ginger released a sigh. "I´m Malfoy, Lucius Malfoy."

"And that wasn´t at ALL rehearsed," Morrigan rolled her eyes.

Grey eyes flashed at her dangerously. "And you are?"

"No one you want to mess with the friends of," she replied sweetly.

"Is that so?"

"It is, and for your information, I would be Morrigan Henshaw and Ginger is my very good friend, so keep your mitts off."

Malfoy studied her. "Is that a warning?"

"Mmm. Or you could say a threat," Yanking Ginger´s hand out of Malfoy´s, she smiled at him, ignoring her blonde friend´s whimper of protest. "Now, if you don´t mind, we have to go and get our transport over to Hogwarts."

Lucius Malfoy´s eyes locked with the red-haired girl´s. "You don´t want to make enemies this early, Henshaw," he said softly.

"Oh, I don´t make enemies," Morrigan said, smiling coldly at him, as she steered Ginger away from him. "They just seem to appear..." Her eyes flicked to the trio of boys, who were getting closer and she mentally groaned. "Apparently en masse."

Any reply that Malfoy would have made was cut off by the booming voice sounding above them.

"Ri´, firs´ years! Follow me!"