Tainted

Chapter 1 - Surprises & Suspicions

Disclaimer: I do not own anything from the Harry Potter world that JK Rowling created and that includes characters, spells and locations.But I have copyright for everything and everyone else.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

I wandered through the numerous carriages of the Hogwarts train, passing through the students without even a second glance. A smile found its way across my face. This was it. I’m finally going to teach at Hogwarts. As I passed through, some of the boys turned their heads and I had to fight to hold my laughter in. There wasn’t a dress code for Professors so I had chosen to just wear anything black.

Today I’d pick a black, fitted long sleeve dress that reached the floor. It had a lace bodice that went in at my waist, showing off my curves. The sleeves were lace as well and to finish it off it had an A-line skirt. I’d paired this with black converse shoes that were hiding underneath and a small gold pendant in the shape of a diamond, with an emerald in the middle to compliment my brown eyes. The pendant settled over the gap between my clavicles that stuck out underneath my lightly tanned skin.

I’ll have to find someone and ask where the Professors’ compartments were but everyone was either stunned or glaring at me. My black hair had tumbled out of the braid I had it in earlier so now waves cascaded down to my mid-back. Eventually I found a carriage with people who seemed nice and well, a lot more down to Earth than everyone else. Okay, I can do this. I’ve looked Death in the eyes more times than I can count so asking a bunch of students for directions is nothing.

Bringing my hand up to knock I took in a deep breath. I knocked twice and poked my head through the door.

“Are you an apprentice?” asked a girl with bushy, brown curls who I assumed was the infamous Hermione Granger as I recognised Harry Potter in the corner with Ronald Weasley. They were all wearing muggle clothes seeing as the train ride had only just begun.

I blushed at her comment. She can’t be serious.

“No, actually I’m not. I’m the new Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor.”

I walked in and closed the door behind me.

“Oh!” exclaimed a surprised Hermione, the embarrassment was starting to show. Harry must have overheard our brief exchange as he stopped his conversation with Ronald and came over to introduce himself.

“It’s nice to meet you Professor. “ He held out his hand to shake which I gladly took.

“Likewise. Save the introductions, I know who you are and you’ll find out about me soon enough. Could you three by any chance tell me where the Professors’ carriages are at? Hagrid’s directions got me a little confused.”

“Right. Well as far as I know, they’re the end compartments closest to the front of the train.” Harry moved out of the door and pointed at another compartment ahead.

“The one over there is where we’ve seen Professor Snape and a couple of other Professors go into but we haven’t seen any of them this morning.”

At this point Ronald decided to speak up.

“But you might not want to be in the same carriage as him.”

“Ron!” scolded Hermione as she gave him a good whack with her Potions book.

“Hermione!”

“I was just warning her.” Ronald muttered whilst rubbing his arm.

“What’s there to warn me about?” I inquired. Sure, I’ve heard a few things about him already but to be honest I was excited to meet him. He’s a master in both spell and potion making. It’d be an honour to work alongside him regardless of the many insults he was known to give. Especially since our paths never crossed back when we were students, he was four years ahead of me and mostly kept to himself so I never had the chance