Ch 1. New to Hogwarts

Hey! Welcome to my story dear reader. ^.^ It's nice to meet you! This is my first published fanfiction ever. I admit to writing them on my own and then losing the sheets of paper... hehehe... but please let me know what you think of this one! Good, bad, bleagh- tell me how I can improve! Rereading my chapters I do notice that my writing gets stronger as I go along.

I hope you like the intro chapter (there's a prologue one-shot on my account as well), and in case you didn't see the word count that has gotten oh my goodness long, this is going to be a long story. This is the first part of a three part saga, which sets up my OCs, bad guy, and of course shares my version of the wizarding world 23 years after Voldemort's demise.

Added note: I started this before Harry Potter and the Cursed Child came out, so I will NOT be using any of that material in this story.

~E

"There's a new ghost in Hogwarts."

Rose Weasley looked up in surprise; Albus had spawned some crazy theories in their three years at Hogwarts, but this one was certainly new. "A new ghost." She repeated, just to make sure she'd heard him right.

Her cousin and best friend nodded his head vigorously across the Gryffindor table, his messy mop of hair bouncing all over his face.

She sighed. It seemed it was once again time for her to disillusion her cousin- who was the same age as her, but honestly he was worse than Hugo- and receive his sulking silence for a few days. At the end of which, he'd come back with some other idea that she'd have to show him just wasn't possible. "Albus... 'Hogwarts, A History' says the last new ghost in Hogwarts was Moaning Myrtle in 1943, and that was the first new ghost since the 1800s."

"She," Fred Weasley II piped up from his breakfast toast. "She was the first new ghost since the 1800s."

"Come off it, Fred." Rose rolled her eyes. "Mum's not here to get mad at us."

Fred opened his mouth then closed it, tilting his head when he looked at his cousin. "Right, sorry. I guess I'm going overboard since Aunt Hermione made me an official member of S.P.E.W."

Roxanne groaned dramatically and draped herself onto her big brother, making Fred choke on his toast. "Oh, woe is the poor, whiny ghost that likes to sneak into the boys bathrooms. What, does Auntie plan to start a ghost rights movement too?"

"Oh Merlin don't even joke about it." Rose shuddered, remembering all the hours she already spent with her mum knitting hats and scarves for The Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare. She agreed with the ideal her mum had regarding house-elf rights, but thought her dad was right when he claimed mum went over the top.

"Is nobody going to mention how blatantly the two of you eavesdrop?" Albus Potter huffed, annoyed that they weren't talking about his ghost anymore. Seven pairs of eyes looked at him incredulously, and he relented under the combined pressure of the entire Weasley-Potter clan. "All right, all right fine. Would've told you next anyways."

Rose rolled her eyes. If he hadn't, she would have. To tell one Weasley something was to tell all nine of them. Plus a few of the other of the 'Legacy Children', as their classmates called them. They all generally hated the title and much preferred to continue calling themselves a clan as they always had, but it got harder to do after they arrived at Hogwarts and the Daily Prophet gushed about 'the children following in the legacy of their parents'. After that, Legacy Child was a title thrust upon pretty much any kid whose folks had landed on a Chocolate Frog Card after the Battle of Hogwarts. It was a bunch of nonsense that had only made it hard for them to connect with the 'normal' students of Hogwarts and forced them to band together for company, though with such a large group it was hard to ever feel lonely over it.

She looked around and realized their clan was smaller than it should be. She knew Lysander was studying in the Ravenclaw common room with some of his friends, and Dominique was probably off snogging her newest boyfriend, but they were still a few people short. "Where's James?" She asked of habit rather than interest.

Albus beamed again as the topic returned to the one he wanted. "James and Lorcan are going to catch it."

"Catch what?" Rose murmured as she looked through the list of potions ingredients she needed to include in her essay, and missed his crestfallen expression.

"They left to catch Hogwart's new gho-ost!" He whined, and Rose winced as his tone matched that of her little brother Hugo, who would start Hogwarts next year. It was amazing how immature Albus sometimes acted even compared to his own little sister Lily, who was dutifully concentrating on studying for the last tests of her first year at Hogwarts.

"They went on a ghosthunt and they didn't invite me?" Roxanne fumed, slamming her hands down on the table as she stood up. "Godric's sword, something interesting finally comes up and they think they can just..." the rest of her statement trailed off as she stomped away from the Gryffindor table.

"Albus," Rose once more felt obligated to remind her cousin of the facts. "You can't catch a ghost. And besides, there can't be one because-"

"Actually that rumor's been going around for a while now," Fred interrupted her before she truly upset Albus, who was notably dejected at being dismissed. "Bunch of students have said they're noticing one they've never seen before."

"Really?" Her interest peaked and she looked at her friend, finally noticing that he was honestly getting cross with her. "Did you see it yourself?"

Albus nodded, poking at his food. "It looked familiar, but he was walking around in muggle clothes."

"He?" Fred looked surprised. "I've been hearing the ghost was a girl."

Rose frowned at the discrepancy, but Albus cut her off to exclaim "Well James will bloody well catch him and then he will bloody well tell us all if he's a bloody girl or not!" His voice rose and cracked each time he declared the word 'bloody' and his face grew red with the famous Weasley temper. Then he folded his arms and sulked, kicking Rose underneath the table.

She, in turn, chose to display more of her mum's cleverness and decided not to point out the many things wrong with the grammar of his sentence. "Then we'll wait till they get back. In the meantime, don't we all have finals to be studying for?"

The clan groaned the reminder but dutifully pulled out their books as they continued their Saturday luncheon, a family tradition that usually got all of them together, if certain troublemaking family members weren't off on a wild goose chase. Rose took full advantage of the quiet moment to finish her Potions essay.

Her blissful concentration was once again shattered when Fred knocked an inkwell over as he finally processed something his sister had said, looking positively horrified. "Myrtle does what in boys bathrooms?"

"They're hunting a ghost?" Malfoy sneered, looking at Melissa.

Melissa and Priscilla nodded, giggling at the stupidity of Gryffindors. "All brawns and no brains; it's not possible to catch a ghost-"

"-they'd just walk out of any room you lock them in." Priscilla finished in a self-satisfied tone.

Malfoy bit his tongue to keep himself from replying that ghosts, as incorporeal entities of thoughts and notions held together by a sense of self, would phase through any spell as well. And no ghost actually 'walked' anywhere. Instead he looked up at Nott and Zambini, an eager grin on his face. "Are you blokes thinking what I am?"

"Wow Scorpius." Melissa breathed, adoration shining in her eyes. "You've already learned Legilimency?"

Malfoy shot her his winning smile even as his stomach churned at her idiocy. If he had learned how read minds, he wouldn't need to ask what someone was thinking, would he? Thankfully Nott spared him the need to verbally respond when he spoke up instead. "I'm thinking that with everyone panicking about finals, this could be a perfect chance to catch those two alone in the hallways."

Zambini grinned as he caught on as well. "To get back at them for last week."

"Oh, and the week before that!" Priscilla piped up, earning a sullen glare from the three boys.

For three years, three long and spite-filled years the five of them had opposed the Legacy Children with all they had. Each group, naturally, claimed that the other had started it. And it wasn't even a fair fight, in number or- Scorpius would never admit this aloud- magical skills. Though they tended to get a one-up on the Legacies in their own classes, James and Lorcan were two years ahead of them in studies and didn't hesitate to use that to their advantage.

Two weeks ago the Legacies had spiked their pumpkin juice with a cheer potion, forcing them to go to class with ridiculous expressions on their face and costing them house points when Zambini giggled, giggled like a girl at Professor Slughorn. To which they responded by magically gluing the youngest Potters into their chairs during class, costing Gryffindor the same house points when Ablus refused to join a demonstration in Defense Against the Dark Arts rather than tear his pants (they were all surprised he hadn't ratted them out). Most recently, the Legacies had retaliated by managing to detonate a dungbomb in the privies of the Slytherin dorm, and it was high time to get back at them for it.

He strode out of their common room, Marcellous Zambini and Thomas Nott following him instantly as they always did.

It took a while to finally find Potter and Lorcan, their trip punctuated with their hushed planning.

"-need to do something original, the Legacies stole our idea to turn their robes purple."

"Yeah, needs to be something we haven't done yet."

"How about a dung bomb?"

"That would make it look like we're the ones who copy them, idiot."

"And using something from the Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes is hardly new," Scorpius grumbled, even as his mind kept trying to churn out new ideas. "What it- what if we get them in trouble with one of the Caretaker?"

They grew silent as the notion sunk in. It was a good plan, and would be a very simple one. When Mr. Filch's notorious cat Ms. Norris had died, the old squib had finally retired and left the post to a house-elf from the kitchen. The elf, Snottgrout, was just as mean and arguably even nastier than her predecessor. Both Caretakers rarely took the time to fully investigate incidents in favor of quickly finding and dolling out punishments with far too much glee. It would be easy to pin something on the Legacies.

But still... despite being the one who suggested it Scorpius, at least, hesitated. This would be crossing a line that neither group had even toed before. While the ultimate goal was always to beat and yes, humiliate the other, nothing yet had been done with the direct intention of causing harm to the students' careers.

Not that he cared about what happened to the Legacies- all of them could get jobs at the Ministry of Magic based on name alone. However the Malfoy family had their own history to live down and at this point his battles could be disregarded by teachers as childish rivalry, though there was nothing childish about anything Scorpius Malfoy set his mind to. Doing this would definitely cause the situation to escalate and he could potentially lose his plausible deniability. Something that did not sit well with his self-preservation drive as a Slytherin.

Before he could voice his concerns Nott grabbed his arm and pointed over a banister to the landing below. There, James Potter and Lorcan Scamander were lazily leaning back on a window seat, basking in the sunlight.

And probably their own over-inflated egos, Scorpius added to himself. Their conversation carried well through the empty hall, and he focused on hearing it while he absentmindedly watched Zambini scurry off somewhere.

"He seriously believed us?"

"Yeah," James grinned at the pleasure of pulling another one over his little brother. "He thinks we're hunting for that ghost of his."

"What'll we tell him?" Lorcan chuckled, but without quite his usual enthusiasm. He was supportive of the troublemaking nature of his friend and loved initiating some good pranks of his own, but it never felt quite as fun when they pulled one on their own clan. Particularly naïve little Albus, who hung on James's every word only to be jerked around time and time again.

"Oh, we'll tell him... lets see. Why don't we say it was a bloody, dismembered woman that made even the Bloody Baron flee as she chased us within an inch of our life?" His casual tone didn't match the careful scheming that flickered behind his eyes. "It'll probably give him nightmares for a week and make him wet the bed for sure."

Not for the first time, Scorpius wondered how the arrogant, manipulative prat had made it into Gryffindor and not Slytherin, but felt grateful the Sorting Hat had sorted the way it did. He could barely stand Potter when he was in the same room, let alone the same living quarters.

Zambini came back, floating a large and notably fragile bust of Headmistress McGonagall behind him. "Snottgrass will charge in here any second now looking for this."

Well, Scorpius thought of his reservations as he looked at the pilfered mantle, too late now. Either he or they were going to get in trouble for this, and it wasn't going to be him. He silently motioned for Nott to give him a hand balancing the bust on the banister, not bothering to explain the best way to do this would be to knock it over with a spell from a distance. He wouldn't risk Potter overhearing him as easily as he could them.

The three of them froze guiltily at the sound of Roxanne Weasley's voice echoing down the hall. "Oi! Whadya think you're doing?"

Scorpius breathed a sigh of relief when she appeared not before them, but beneath them and approached her cousin on the floor below.

Roxanne gave James a not-so-playful punch on the shoulder. "Who said you could go on a ghost hunt without me? You know I'm ruddy well dying for something to happen at this boring school."

Lorcan smiled at her. "Oh we know Roxy. But we're not really going after a ghost, we just said that to get Albus to pipe down about it."

The girl deflated visibly at the news. "Then, please tell me we're gonna do something better than study with Rose all day long?"

James snapped his head up, "Oh yeah, we still haven't gotten the Sneakers back for gluing Albus to his chair."

Scorpius was caught between a mix of pride and confusion. The statement made no sense but it was obvious the title referred to him and his friends, and personally he thought it better than 'Legacies' though not by much. He was more proud that their efforts had warranted acknowledgement from their rivals, enough to necessitate a shorter and quicker means of discussing him since it happened so often.

Nott and Zambini hesitated on pushing the statue. Each moment they delayed risked them being caught with the bust, but the chance to hear their enemies plot against them was rare and was certainly worth chancing a few more seconds, at least?

"Didn't you two do that with the dung bomb last week?"

James and Lorcan looked at eachother and burst out laughing. "Really, Rox? If we could make it into the Slytherin common room we'd put it somewhere way better than their privies."

"Honestly," James added. "You'd be the first to know if we could, and then we'd have you help us get it into their dorm. What bloody idiot would set off a dungbomb in the bathroom? May as well get one of them sick and let them stink the place up themselves."

"Matter of fact," Lorcan added thoughtfully, "That's probably what happened. Wonder how we ended up getting credit for it."

"I'm not complaining. Let them think it, just another thing we'll get away with that Uncle George didn't."

That was probably exactly what happened, Scorpius felt like kicking himself for not seeing it sooner. He realized that he was the one that had probably started the bloody rumor. He'd been taking a shower and was so determined to find how the Legacies would respond in the next round that when the gods-awful smell emanated from the restroom and sent everybody scuttling he'd immediately muttered "Potter."

The real culprit must have heard him, spread the rumor to cover their own embarrassment, and when it circled around to him again he'd no way of knowing it was actually based of his own actions.

Roxanne looked between her two boys and sighed. "Fine, I forgive you. Now, what shall we do next?"

"Is that supposed to go there?" a loud, curious voice came from just beside Scorpius's ear.

The three Slytherin's jumped in surprise, Zambini knocking into the bust with his shoulder and sending it toppling toward the ground below. Scorpius had to pull Nott back over the railing when he tried to jump after it, cringing for a crash that never came.

The three people below and the three people above stared breathlessly at the bust Roxanne Weasley had saved at the last second, even as Lorcan had moved between her and what he thought was going to shatter. After she released the spell to set the carving gently on the ground the six stared at eachother, half of them confused half of them relieved and all of them wondering just what exactly had happened.

"Oh I guess is doesn't. Well, can that bust of the Headmaster talk?"

Six pairs of eyes whirled on the girl that casually sat on the railing right next to Scorpius, swinging her legs over the edge. She had electric blue hair that reached her shoulders and emerald green eyes that twinkled with mirth, but what put her even more out of place was her clothing. She had no robe or house emblem, nothing wizardly about her at all. Just a plain shirt and pair of shorts, running shoes... and tall black-and-blue stripped stockings. Okay, Scorpius amended, completely out of place. The abundance of blue seemed to tinge her skin and as short as she was- sitting on the banister she was still below his eye level- Scorpius couldn't help but compare her to a Cornish Pixie.

"Oi, you three," the girl shouted down to the still-confused Legacies, "could one of you ask Miss McGonagall the way to her office? I got lost again."

After longer moments of silence Malfoy sighed and decided to try and scrap what he could from this situation. Starting with, who was this strange kid and why had she interrupted him, Scorpius Malfoy, instead of minding her own business. "What do you want?"

She looked at him for the first time and he was startled by the zap of energy she had in her eyes. It sent tingles down to his toes. "I want to ask Miss McGonagall the way to her office."

Was this girl being purposefully dense? "Why would a statue be able to talk?"

"Well the paintings do, but they all said they're not supposed to tell anyone where her office is-"

"The portraits are soaked with an expensive potion that takes days to take effect. Do you have any idea how much they would need to make for it to work on a statue?" The potion was only common because it was reusable, and it didn't take much of it to soak a flat picture. Scorpius knew it would theoretically work on statues as well, but that would require a huge vat of the potion that would likely remain underused. Such luxury wasn't worth funding even in Malfoy Manor.

She looked down and he thought he'd successfully cowed the girl until he noticed her fingers twitching along with the math she was trying to do in her head. Then her eyes snapped back to him and asked "Sixteen liters?"

He looked into her serious face and had to wonder how stupid this girl could be. He was about to put aside his father's teaching of Malfoy manners to ask what this girl was up to in a blunt and deservedly rude manner- this girl had ruined what was sure to be a good prank, after all- when James called out from the landing below "Peeves!"

Nott cursed and followed his gaze to find the infamous poltergeist himself barreling towards them, knocking against tapestries and suits of armor while cackling a new song. "He's coming, he's coooming, he's coming HERE! Hold your head and hide your rear, the one that curses all draws near!"

"Dammit he's bringing the Caretakers!" Malfoy shouted over the loud and off-tune singing, covering his ears to drown the racket out. Zambini turned tail and ran, Nott following but at least summoning the courage to cast a spell before he did. Scorpius found himself without allies as Peeves came closer, the portraits cursing the unstoppable force of destruction that wandered their halls.

The poltergeist froze before the blue pixie girl, quickly and solidly enough that it seemed Nott's spell had petrified him. Then the pixie smiled and stood casually on the banister, and Scorpius wondered what spell she was planning to cast from such a precarious perch as she brushed off imaginary dust.

Then his jaw dropped as she extended an empty palm, beamed at the Poltergeist of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and brightly spoke words that had never once been said in a thousand years of school history. "Hi Peeves, it's nice to meet you!"