.Rating: Teen
Chapter One:
The train to hogwarts ambled along as dusk settled, lowering a hazy glow in the compartment that the four friends shared. The storage compartments above their heads, a offwhite color to match the yellow clad walls gave evidence of full baggage. The tense atmosphere in the room, not uncharacteristic of late, gave way to humor as a couple unexpected guest barged in.
"Oy! Harry!" exclaimed the gangly, quite clumsy boy. Harry looked up with an annoyed look on his face, probably due to the argument he had just been having with Ron.
"If I've told you once I've told you twice Harry! The bloody plan will work!"
Neville, the boy who had barged in, asked curiously, completely forgetting the reason of his brash entrance, "what plan?"
"Nothing" said Harry, a hint of exasperation in his tone, "Ron was just going over some quidditch strategies with me.
" And right good you came in when you did" piped up Hermoine from the seat next to Ron, I was ready to kill these two if they didn't drop it!"
"Thats right" continued Ginny, Ron's little sister, and the latest flower to bloom at Hogwarts, sitting next to Harry. "Your our hero Neville!" she exclaimed playfully.
Hermoine laughed roucously and Ron gave her a reproving look. "I was just saying..." but Hermoine cut him off,
" what did you need Neville, please save us from another lecture on field format, and wind velocity"
Ron, completly sullen at the teasing at this point retired to a pouting position drawing in on himself, and drawing quite amused expressions from the rest of the people in the the compartment. Neville, being reminded of his reason for being tere by Hermoine said, "I just heard who our new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor will be this year, you'll never believe it!"
"who?" asked Harry, effectively baited by his curiosity, brushing aside a stray strand of hair, momentarily revealing the famous scar that graced his forehead.
"SNAPE!" Neville practically shouted, no longer able to contain the secret that half of Hogwarts no doubt knew by now.
"Snape?" asked Ron quesily, shocked out of his sullen state, "but who will be potions master?"
"I don't know," said Neville. "All I know is he finally got Defense against the Dark Arts. Can you imagine what it's going to be like this year?"
"Either he will be very gracious because he has finally gotten the position he's been lobbying for since we first started Hogwarts," began Hermoine reasonably.
"Or he will be completely horrible because, well because he's Snape" finished Ginny.
"Boy, I'm happy this is our last year" said Neville before leaving the bunch to pass the news on to anyone else who hadn't heard.
