Legal Disclaimer: I own my stuff, but not the original source material. That belongs to whoever. Also, the opinions and interpretations I use here may not reflect the same in said whoever that owns the source material. Look, I'm just a poor college librarian. Suing me isn't going to get you anything but tears.

Warning: This work may be offensive to some readers. Feel free to back out if need be.

Author's Note: Okay, first off, I want to remind everyone that eleven-year-olds are typically, well, kind of stupid assholes, and in canon, Ron was a bit thicker about things with his first assumptions of things (though he would always get better). Don't judge Ron by the same standards as you would an adult. Secondly, I have two kinds of genderbending going on: always a girl! Harry Potter and trans MtF! Neville Longbottom. Additionally, I am using the Desi Potters headcanon. Before any of you ask "why", let me answer "why not?"

Submitting Info:
Stacked with: Hogwarts (Term 12); MC4A
Individual Challenges: Rainbow Focus; Sapphic Bribery; Feast; Hufflepuff MC (Y); Sett to Destroy; Unaccompanied Minors; Seeds; Shipmas; Ways to the Heart; Golden Times; Interesting Times; Old Shoes (Y); The 3rd Rule; Advice from the Mug; Ethnic & Present; Neurodivergent; Quiet Time; Letter of the Day; Rian-Russo Inversion; Flags & Ribbons; Gender Bender (x2); Setting Sail; Rowl in Her Grave; Hold the Mayo (Y); Short Jog; Yellow Ribbon (Y); Yellow Ribbon Redux; Two Cakes!
House: Hufflepuff
Assignment No.: Term 12 – Assignment 2
Subject (Task No.): Amulets & Talismans (Task#8: Write about protecting someone from harm.)
Other Hogwarts Challenges: Insane Prompt Challenge [75] (Quarrel); 365 [05] (Ache)
Other MC4A Challenges: Wi Bingo [4D] (Glitter); Su Medium 2 (Gender Swap)
Representation(s): Trans Neville Longbottom; Autistic Harry Potter; Pre-Neville/Harry
Bonus Challenges: Easy Zephyr; Second Verse (Bechdel Test; Ladylike; Not a Lamp; Persistence Still; Found Family; Nontraditional; Unwanted Advice; Car in a Tutu; Clio's Conclusion; Deadliest Catch; Lovely Coconuts; Lyre Liar; Muck & Slime; Hot Apple; Bad Beans; Under the Bridge); Chorus (Pear-Shaped; Wabi Sabi; Peddling Pots; Delicious Lie; Mouth of Babes; Tomorrow's Shade; Larger than Life; Unicorn; Abandoned Ship; Head of Perseus; Turtle-Duck; Getting On; Hot Stuff); Demo (Misshapen Pods)
Tertiary Bonus Challenges: T3 (Thimble); SN (Rail; Intercept); FR (Satisfaction; Evolution); O3 (Orator; Olivine); TY (Enfant); SS (Schooner; Sanctuary); RoIL (Satisfaction; Volition); SHoE (n/a)
Word Count: 1860

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Relative
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Neville knew that she made most people uncomfortable. Everything about her was a contradiction to the stuffy wixen around her. No matter how much her grandmother loved her and supported her decisions in most things, Neville knew that the world did not. She was the embodiment of people's fears and worries. Just by existing, she disproved a lot of their beliefs about how the world worked.

She had been a powerful toddler with ample accidental magic to prove it. Then the attack that sent her parents to the long-term care unit of St. Mungo's had happened. While she hadn't been locked inside her own body like her parents (especially her father), the damage to her magical core had been extensive. Squib didn't adequately describe a wix who had lost their ability to use magic, but that was the word the other children called her when politeness demanded that they attend the same functions and the adults had turned their backs. It was rather telling that the magical world did not have a word for the phenomenon.

The magical world also did not have a word to describe a child who declared from a young age that they were not the gender assigned to them. Fortunately, Gran had supported her declaration. Unfortunately, Uncle Algie still called Neville his nephew, even if he refrained from commenting on her wardrobe choices after Gran had taken to using Stinging Hexes every time he asked about Neville's dresses and feminine-cut robes.

Neville had been worried about Hogwarts. For years, it had seemed impossible that she would be able to even go. Once she had gotten her acceptance letter, a new fear began eating at her. Depending on the House, the dormitories were warded to keep out unauthorized genders. Would she be enough of a girl for the magic to allow her to pass? Or would she be forced to room with the boys? How would her yearmates take it either way?

She had been so wrapped in worrying about her own future at Hogwarts that she had forgotten that she was going to be in the same year as the Girl-Who-Lived.

So it had been a shock to find herself meeting the girl while looking for an open compartment for herself and the cat that Uncle Algie had gotten her as a present for getting into Hogwarts. Harini Potter was nothing like how the books had described. Or rather she was, because she certainly had a fluffy mane of ink-black curls that refused to be tamed and eyes that matched the leaves of the oaks in summer, but she also looked like a cat's sneeze would blow her away, nearly small enough to disappear into a shadow like one of the Kind Ones of old.

"Do you have the scar?" asked the redhead boy who was sharing the compartment after Harini had introduced herself. Harini stared at him with wide eyes that were suddenly glittering like they were full of tears that she refused to allow to fall. The boy—who had still not introduced himself, but Neville thought he might be one of the Weasley children—just continued barreling onward without noting Harini's increasing discomfort, making something flare like dragon breath in Neville's chest. "Do you remember anything about that night?"

"You're being rude," Neville snapped. She knew that she sounded a lot like her Gran about to fire yet another Stinging Hex at Uncle Algie and found that she couldn't care less. The dragon in her chest was roaring too loudly to care. "You shouldn't ask about such personal information from a complete stranger! Not only that, but you do realize what else happened that night, don't you? Maybe she doesn't want to remember losing her parents."

Neville winced at her own words. She knew if the roles were reversed, she would be aching at the blunt reminder of her parents' torture. Suddenly nervous, she glanced at Harini, hoping that her face expressed how sorry she was for mentioning the other girl's parents. Despite how hesitant she was normally she knew her temper tended to make her rash. Gran was always despairing about that during their etiquette lessons.

Harini had turned those wide eyes towards her now, but she did not appear to be about to cry anymore. The thick black frames of her glasses made the green of her eyes seem to glow. Neville had heard stories of changeling children and how the magic of fairy mound that they had been born in would linger in a bloodline, giving descendants visible traits of their fairy heritage. Only now, with Harini looking at her like she was doing something impossible to believe, did Neville think those stories might be more than bedtime stories.

"What's wrong?" Neville asked. Her nerves were returning as Harini continued just looking at her. She swallowed the apologies that wanted to spill out like water from a kicked bucket. The staring was beginning to be too intense for Neville's peace of mind. "Do I have something on my face?"

"You defended me," Harini said. Her nose wrinkled slightly as she finally looked away, back towards the boy. "You do have something on your face, though." She tapped the bridge of her own nose. "A smudge of soot, just there. It's probably what your mother was trying to clean off before you boarded."

"How'd you know that?" the boy complained as he scrubbed at his face absently with his sleeve. Harini rolled her eyes.

"You were outside my window," she answered flatly. Then she turned back towards Neville and just like that, she seemed to dismiss the boy from her attention. The dragon in Neville's chest purred at being the focus of Harini's attention. "You defended me," she repeated. She sounded as confused as she was shocked. "Why?"

"Because it was right," Neville replied honestly. It felt like a blanket was being wrapped around her, like the very air was growing thick enough to cut. Any worry about that felt distant, however, as if it was just a whisper in the middle of a gala. "Because you are worth defending, even from the small harm of a stranger's questions."

"It's nothing that I can't handle," Harini whispered as she dropped her gaze to her lap. "I've handled worse than a few dumb questions."

"Doesn't mean that you should," Neville objected, reaching out to lay a hand on Harini's arm. Something warmth flowed between them through the touch. It felt like sunlight in her greenhouses back at the manor, all warmth and comfort. She wanted to wrap the feeling around herself like a blanket and never come out again. "I'm Neville, by the way. Neville Longbottom."

"That's stupid," the boy interjected. Neville closed her eyes, certain that she knew his reasoning already and resigned to accepting whatever came next. Conversations like this could have been avoided if she had agreed to Gran's offer to change her name, but she had so little from her parents already. "That's a boy's name."

"And it's hers, too." Harini's hand covered the one Neville had on her arm. Gone was the hesitancy of just a moment before. In her anger, the tiny girl seemed impossibly bigger, as if the emotion made her take up more space than she could have otherwise. Or maybe it was just the way that her magic was leaking out enough to make her dark curls move. Her green eyes glittered and sparked with it, too. "Making fun of people's names is stupid."

"It's still stupid," the boy complained mulishly.

"You're stupid," Harini countered, "and you're being very mean. People can't help what name their parents give them."

"Yeah, well, then they shouldn't have given her a boy's name."

"Quit saying that," Harini ordered, losing any semblance of patience at the boy's continued obstinance. "It's mean, and it doesn't matter. It's her name, regardless of what you think. Is your name any better?"

"My name's Ron," he answered. "It's a boy's name because I'm a boy."

"Leave off," Harini growled. Under Neville's hand, her arm was tense. "You need to stop right now."

"Oh, yeah, or what?" Ron challenged in a way that reminded Neville of how crups would growl at their littermates before starting to wrestle. A part of Neville felt sorry for Ron at that moment, because if he was a crup expecting to play-fight with its sibling, then Harini was a fully-grown wolf who was defending its territory. There just was no way for Ron to win this.

"Or I'll make you," Harini declared, raising her chin defiantly. Ron got the look like someone had smacked his nose. At least he was now actually looking at Harini. Finally, he shook his head and held up his hands in surrender.

"Sorry," he muttered. "Blimey, I didn't know it was so important to you."

Before Neville could think of something to say, there was a knock on the compartment door. There was a bit of awkward shuffling as she and Harini bought a selection of the trolley wix's wares. Harini wasn't familiar with any of the purely wixen sweets and pastries. Neville caught her sneaking a glance at their subdued companion who had said that he was fine with the roast beef sandwiches his mother had packed but it was clear that he probably didn't have any money for the trolley. Neville brushed her hand against Harini's to gain her attention before she started tripling her order of things in order to have enough to share with the others. Beaming now, Harini followed suit with her own order.

And just like that, their previous quarrel was forgotten. The three of them bonded over enough sweets to make their stomachs ache if they had tried to eat it all by themselves. Both Neville and Ron didn't mention anything when Harini snuck a selection of pumpkin pasties and cauldron cakes into her bag for later. They did exchange a glance to make sure that the other one had seen.

It felt like coming home after a long trip. It felt like receiving yet another gum wrapper from his mother.

Neville hadn't been surprised when mere hours later, the Sorting Hat had argued between Hufflepuff for her undeniable loyalty to a girl she had just met and Gryffindor for the protective dragon still roaring in her chest. She could practically feel the whispers starting as the minutes continued to tick away without a verdict from the Hat. Hatstalls were rare enough that people tended to note them, after all, and flaming the spark of interest was how this Sorting had already had one.

In the end, the Sorting Hat had pulled forth the memory of Harini silencing Ron's unintentional bullying with a defiant tilt of her tiny chin. With that image in her mind and affection bursting in her heart, she heard the Hat send her to her mother's House. As she walked to the Hufflepuff table, she looked at the friends she had made on the train and knew that she would do anything to hold onto them. She knew it would work, too.

After all, badgers were known for their tenacity.