Ultimatums

Chapter 1

Hermione Potter was an elegant witch. She went to all the etiquette lessons her mother took her to. She spoke and held herself like a proper lady. And the girl was only eleven. Though if you asked her, she was eleven and a half. But with all this, she still didn't feel she was as much of a Potter as her father Fleamont or her older brother Jamey. See, Hermione Potter was adopted into the family at a month old, and even though she avidly tried to be a proper Potter, it never truly worked. Her puzzle piece was always a bit askew. Which is why she related to her mother, Euphemia, who was a Slytherin in a legacy of Gyffindors, even if she was only a Potter by marriage.

"Hermione darling, our Jamey will be home soon. Come downstairs!" her mother called up to her daughter's bedroom, and instead of the boisterous run her brother displayed when called, Hermione gracefully sauntered into the living room.

"Here, hold these cookies for him while I go and send an owl quickly. Your father will be home with the boys soon, love" Euphemia patted her daughter affectionately and left the room, leaving her daughter to question her last statement.

The boys? Last time she checked, Hermione didn't have a second sibling. She was the second one! But after weighing up the various meanings, the girl decided to just wait by the door with the house elves for her beloved brother's return. The pair were quite a duo, always together, thick as thieves. People always used to say that if Hermione being adopted wasn't common knowledge, they would have thought that her and James were twins, the bond they shared was so deep.

But that year James had been at Hogwarts, and Hermione was most envious to go. At home, being a pureblood daughter, Hermione never really got a chance to research everything she wanted to research because it wasn't something ladies should know. And while Euphemia and Fleamont were flexible with their restrictions, they still believed in the foundations of how a pureblood child should be raised, minus the supremacist beliefs. But Hermione still wanted more. The undivided freedoms of a boarding school.

Soon Hermione was pulled from her thoughts as the front door opened. Her father appeared first, with his salt and pepper unruly hair and amber eyes, grinning at her. Then he stepped aside, and revealed her brother, not more different from when she last saw him at Easter, and another boy. This boy was ebony haired too, but his locks fell shaggily to his shoulders, rather than sticking up at the back like the Potter men.

"Hello Jamey! Would you like.." but Hermione was cut off.

"Thanks Miones, gotta go!" James and the boy snatched a cookie off the plate, before bolting up the stairs and past a chuckling Euphemia clucking her tongue.

Hermione was positively shocked. Firstly, there was an intruder in her house, or by the familiarity from everyone else, a guest she hadn't known of. Secondly, her Jamey ignored her and her mother and father condoned his rudeness by not even addressing the house elves. She looked between the Lord and Lady Potter, her coffee coloured eyes demanding an explanation.

Her father laughed at his furious daughter's expression. "That was Sirius Black. He's staying with us for the summer, Mia. Treat him like family, although he technically is."

Thinking about it, the girl decided at Hogwarts she would need as many allies as she could. It would be useful, and if the situation called, she might need help. From bullies or understanding concepts. So Hermione nodded firmly and set off up the stairs, determined.

She knocked on the guest bedroom door, and Sirius answered it with a raised brow. "You're Hermione Potter?"

"Yes. Why wouldn't I be?"

"You look nothing like the Potters. More like the Longbottoms, or the Carrows..."

James stood from helping his friend settle in, and walked to door frame. His sister thought he was going to defend her right to the family, but instead he just said "Nah she's a Potter. Adopted though. What did you want, Miones?"