Draco Malfoy and the Girl from Mahoutokoro (Book 1, Year 4)

5 The Sorting

5

The Sorting

After they got off the train, the students—except the first years, filed off the platform and went toward the grounds where they waited for carriages to take them to Hogwarts. It was still raining hard, so Mizuki pulled out her umbrella as they waited. Mizuki heard Pansy's voice behind her and felt someone shove her from behind. She turned her head slightly and saw that Pansy and her friends were sniggering as they looked at Kuro-chan. Draco wasn't with them.

"Look at that stupid cape," Pansy snorted. "Wouldn't be caught dead with an animal like that." Pansy and her friends began laughing, Mizuki ignored them—she was used to teasing.

The carriage arrived and Mizuki and Kuro-chan climbed on, closing her umbrella since the carriage had its top up to protect them from the heavy rain. As she got comfortable, she saw that Draco was now standing with Pansy and his two friends—who looked more like bodyguards than anything else—and he was watching her with a scowl as more people climbed on.

Why did it have to be that stupid Potter? Why couldn't it have been someone else? She should be sitting with me, not him!

She turned her attention back to the front and realized that Harry, Hermione, and Ron were sitting with her, Hermione was sitting next to her. The carriage started moving.

"Hello, I don't believe we've met," Hermione started with a smile, "I'm Hermione Granger, and this is Ronald Weasley, and that's Harry Potter," she introduced as she gestured to the two boys who nodded at her. Ron gave a little wave and an embarrassed smile. Mizuki had seen them before at the Quidditch World Cup, but she decided not to tell them that.

"It's a pleasure to meet you," Mizuki greeted. "My name is Mizuki Saito."

"What were you doing, speaking to Malfoy like that?" Harry asked suddenly. Hermione's mouth dropped open in horror.

"Harry! You can't just go around asking people things like that. Honestly, it's not proper." Hermione shook her head like a disapproving mother might. Mizuki smiled and shook her head.

"No, it's alright. We were just talking about our summers," she explained, but Harry scoffed, and Ron rolled his eyes.

"You're new here, yeah?" Harry asked, and when Mizuki nodded her head, he continued. "You need to stay away from him. He's a horrible person, thinking he's better than everyone else just because he's got money and comes from a line of purebloods," Harry looked disgusted as he leaned forward.

Ah. It all made sense now. The way Lucius Malfoy looked at her when she introduced herself to Draco, how even Draco had looked at her when he first saw her, the treatment from Pansy; but what about when they talked at the stadium and when he had helped her? Clearly, Harry and his friends knew Draco better than she did.

"What else can you tell me about him?" she asked.

Harry and his friends exchanged looks and for the entire carriage ride, they told her all about Draco Malfoy from Harry's first meeting with him, to thinking he was the heir of Slytherin, to all the things he did and said in between, including calling Hermione a Mudblood. Draco Malfoy sounded like the worst sort of person that Mizuki could imagine—not unlike all the students at her old school who constantly teased her because of her lavender eyes and Kuro-chan.

The carriage pulled up to the castle, and Mizuki gazed at it with amazement. It was much bigger than the castle in Japan, and unlike the castle in Japan, this one was made of stone and looked like something from a fairy tale, the type that princes and princesses lived in and where they might fight dragons and rescue damsels in distress. The thought was ludicrous, but that was what she pictured when she saw the castle towering in front of them.