With Raphael 'under orders' from Kat Black to remain seated, Nimue decided to undertake her mission to collect her new owl.

Passing Nathaniel and Sarah talking in the alley, she paused briefly to address them. Nathaniel realised that would make her Nimue, going by Sarah's description.

"It looks like Raphael is a touch confused and has a headache but nothing too serious. You did well Nathaniel. Very quick reflexes."

Nathaniel managed not to blush, but shook his long hair a little further into his face and slouched a little more as if trying to evade the praise.

She didn't linger on the issue.

"I'm just off to collect my new owl and perhaps see if Mahou wants a lift to the station if she's still about. If you two want to travel with us, there will be some Ministry cars out front in a few minutes. The landlord said this morning there would be some taxis arranged for about now as well if you want to grab one and go on ahead."

With that and a smile, she continued on her way.

Sarah thanked her and then turned back to Nathaniel, her eyes bright. "I am really excited about the Hogwarts Express! It's a steam train you know. This will be my first ride on it! So what do you and your kitty want to do?"

Nathaniel looked to Sarah. "Which would you prefer?" he asked courteously. Then he grinned a mischievous grin that looked almost out of place on his face. "Unless you'd rather ditch me in favour of your friends, of course."

"Ditch you?" she said with a smile, "No way."

The kitten dabbed at Nathaniel's ear with a paw, but Nathaniel wasn't sure if the cat was trying to tell him something or just being continuingly obnoxious, so he ignored it and got hissed at for his pains.

Sarah missed the little interchange between young cat and young man by simple dint of looking back towards the pub. "You and Raphael seemed to get on pretty well. Both being new and all. Would you like to travel with him? Those Ministry cars will be really posh.

Else, we can see if anyone else is ready to go and share a taxi? We can get stuff for the journey as well at the station. I know there is a trolley that comes around but it'll be hours and hours until we get a decent meal inside us and provisions are useful."

Actually Sarah would have been happy for the two of them to travel alone but she didn't want to presume on his friendship.

"Raphael?" Nathaniel looked at her, surprised at her comment. "Uh... we only .. yeah... just met. I'd do the same for my worst enemy if he - or she - slipped and fell, just... .the way I am, I guess. No big deal. Food.... no, please!" A briefly dramatic face. ".. don't talk to me about railway provisions. I've travelled British Rail far too many times for comfort. Subway closed up on Tottenham Court Road else I'd suggest I nip up there and pick up some footlongs; but they're bound to have a Pret a Manger or one of those ever-present sandwich-croissant booths at Kings Cross. So ... yeah... that sounds like a good idea."

He straightened up and then laughed a merry laugh. "If you're looking for a third to share a taxi, it'd better be a small third. I was bequeathed an antique trunk from the family storage unit, and once we've added my backpack and the TONS of shopping I had to do here today, plus your luggage, we're going to be pushing the limit on space in a black cab."

"Sounds great" said Sarah. "My stuff is inside and we'll need to go out the front anyway. If anyone else is inclined and want to come with us, they'll let us know when they see we're making a move.

If there is too much luggage for one cab then we can find a fourth person and take two. It'll be cool to get to the train!"

She had a mischievous look on her face. "Ready for the big adventure?"

She headed back inside.

***********

"Now would you like me to get rid of that headache for you? Or do you enjoy the suffering?" Kat had asked Raphael.

Raphael, having sat down at the table after Nimue had somehow made a face that had reminded him, in a weird way, of his earliest nightmares about teachers and schools, shook his head slowly. "I'm fine," he murmured softly, his face turning another shade of red. Desperately wishing that everyone would forget about the incident, he was fine about lying to Kathryn, although he was sure she knew the truth: his head hurt, a lot, like someone had rammed steel needles into both ears and started tapping out the Macarena in the centre.

The table was empty of certain occupants, Raphael noticed. Suddenly his day just got a little worse. Now, the only person around he knew was Kathryn. And was she looking at him and planning how to pin him down and force healing on him? He looked at the expression on her face, and raised an eyebrow, following it with a sigh.

Rolling his eyes closed, he shook his head. When he opened them again he hoped that Kathryn would get the gesture and know to leave him to his burning face and grinning shame. Getting up, rather slowly this time, Raphael moved over to the bar very slowly and asked the barman for a glass of water.

He could feel his face getting redder and redder by the minute. Starting to list the messed he had already made in his head, Raphael wanted to find a corner, suddenly, out of reach and out of sight. Was it that obvious to everyone around him? He should have ordered a butterbeer. His face away from the tables, a sureness that behind him they were looking at him dawned over him, reddening his face, clouding his judgement.

They'd all have those broomstick things, Raphael was sure. And an owl or a rat or something, like he'd seen people carrying around. And a full set of books. Maybe they'd have a proper set of robes for the proper occasions, not the tatty dress thing he had been forced to buy. And they'd be there, doing stuff left right and centre, probably being amazing in lessons, and he wouldn't be able to do anything. He'd be a failure.

It was already starting: Sarah and Nathaniel had already made themselves absent, probably off goofing off about what a klutz he was. Well, stuff it. If he was alone when he got to the station, well, if there weren't any other students at least, he'd give up. Maybe he could go back to his uncle... hitch-hike, maybe? Or maybe he could find somewhere else to live. He could hunt. He'd be okay. In fact, he'd be great.

Why wait until the station?

Spinning around as the barman slipped a drink into his hand, Raphael couldn't help but shout when he nearly threw the glass of water over...

Sarah....

*Again! * she thought and stepped to one side quickly.

"Hey, this is becoming a habit!" she said with a smile. "I was going to wash out the butterbeer you almost saved me the trouble."

Sarah had entered the Leaky Cauldron to retrieve her trunk and shopping. Seeing that Raphael had crossed over to the bar, she decided to see how he was.

"Nathaniel and I are going to grab a taxi and head for the station before the general stampede. Are you sticking with Kat and Nimue or can we tempt you to come with us?"

**********

"No." Nathaniel replied vaguely, following Sarah into the Leaky Cauldron and moving towards his baggage. "But that's never stopped life happening to me before."

And so saying, he was struck in the face by the contents of a glass of water.

"I...." He wiped at his dribbling-water face with a voluminous sleeve of his indigo robe. ".... rest my case."

"Thank you, Sarah." Nathaniel said morosely as he wiped the water out of his eyes and discovered that she had side-stepped it neatly, only for it to hit him full in the face.

"Hey, that was meant for me!" she said to him through the giggles handing him a napkin from the bar.

Raphael spun around and immediately turned a bright shade of purple. He'd just thrown a glass of water over Nathaniel. What was wrong with him?

"Er..." mumbled Raphael as he slipped into cringe mode for almost the third time that day: it was becoming a habit. "Er..." he said again, looking at Sarah. "Er... don't you want... er... to... er... um... should... er, look, um, okay. Er."

"Yeah," mumbled Raphael, suddenly feeling confused. "Er, yeah."

"Good!" said Sarah, interpreting Raphael's string of 'ers' as his agreement to join she and Nathaniel in a taxi to the station.

"I'm going to change these jeans, get my trunk and will be out front in two flaps of a Hungarian Horntail's wings."

Nathaniel wiped his face with the napkin and noted absently that the kitten on his shoulder had managed to avoid even getting mildly damp. Typical.

"Come on then." he said cheerfully to Raphael. "Time to start shifting luggage into taxis, my friend."

Nodding at the immediate responses, somehow thinking that there was something he'd missed, Raphael instantly went over and grabbed his backpack, shouldered it on easily. Raphael immediately leapt in with a "Well, I'm ready."

Nathaniel looked at him for a moment, vaguely nonplussed by the other boy's absence of luggage.

"Well, you can help me with the monstrosity gift from my parents, then." Nathaniel proposed brightly. It was only after a second had passed that Raphael noticed the pile of luggage that constituted Nathaniel's life.

"It's going to be a long journey," sighed Raphael.

************

Sarah didn't bother changing but did a 'quick clean-up' spell on the quiet in the ladies room on her jeans and crop top. Then in typical teenage girl fashion - especially when faced with the delightful prospect of escorting two black-haired, green-eyed wizards to the Hogwarts Express - Sarah decided that she wanted to change her top anyway. So did to a black and white silk T-shirt in a snakeskin pattern with a blue flower near the shoulder that set off her eyes.

She then grabbed hold of her trunk and manoeuvred it through the parlour door and back into the main bar and towards the front door to meet up with Raphael and Nathaniel.

Raphael was pulling several bits of luggage outside officiously, and trying to make sure Nathaniel didn't notice just how heavy he was finding it. Raphael stopped for a breather outside the pub, waiting on the street, and watching with some interest, just how the people around him seemed to glance past the pub. He wished they'd glance past him. They kept giving him odd looks. Maybe he had a bit of a bruise on his head?

Then, Sarah stepped into the doorway, and with a burning red-cheeked thudder into his stomach, Raphael worked out just why he was getting odd looks. With a quick flourish, or rather with a quick flourish and a bit of a struggle with the arms, he removed the black, slashed robes and stuffed them into his bag. Underneath was a long-sleeved T-shirt, in faded blue, with a black (ripped) short-sleeved T-shirt on top, and a pair of excessively baggy combats, with about three patches on them, and a rip almost totally removing the right shin bit. He hadn't torn it off yet: he didn't want one-legged shorts.

On no account would he let Sarah know, especially considering just what she was wearing, the fact that he was wearing his best clothes. "You shout taxi or do I?" he asked with a half smile.

"Permit me..." Nathaniel, having shrugged easily out of the indigo overrobe to reveal black jeans, black shirt and (unsurprisingly) black boots, leaned past Raphael, stuck his fingers in his mouth and whistled. A second later a black cab made a rather illegal looking U-turn dangerously close to the front of an off-duty 15 bus and skidded to a neat halt in front of the pile of luggage.

"Kings Cross St Pancreas - the Kings Cross side..?" Nathaniel asked.

"Yer'll ne'er git all tha' in 'ere, mate." the cabby - who in typical London style was a Hindu Sihk with an red turban and a Scottish (of sorts) accent leant out the window and eyed the trunk, the backpacks, the carryalls, the book parcels and the cauldrons that made up the pile. Curiously enough the man didn't seem to actually see the cauldrons. Nathaniel's kitten was sitting atop the heap like a conqueror of Mount Everest.

"But we'll gi' it a shot, eh..." he finished and got out to help.

Amazingly enough, they did manage to get everything in, and still have room for three people to sit on the back seat. Sarah sat between them, and the kitten sat on Nathaniel. The indigo overrobe was stowed in his backpack, so at least that wasn't jabbing into his ribs. Raphael closed the cab door and the vehicle pulled out into the steady stream of traffic down Charing Cross Road.

Nathaniel looked at the battered trunk and odd packages that contained everything he had left in the world, and suddenly felt a great sense of loss as he looked out at the familiar cityscape sliding past the taxi.

Sarah had said a quick goodbye to her classmates in the pub and assured Kat Black that she's keep her eye on Raphael and secure as large a compartment as she could find if they managed to get to the train before all the good ones were occupied.

She'd sat between the two boys as the black cab moved off into the heavy traffic of the Saturday morning. She didn't like the city that much. For all her air of urban savvy - she much preferred the wilderness regions of Canada and the Highlands of Scotland - where they would be heading soon enough.

It would be interesting to see how Nathaniel and Raphael coped with the legendary magical barrier that shielded Platform 9 3/4 from muggle eyes. She was looking forward to it herself. It was a marker between this world and the magical one.

She settled down and gave the kitten a little wink as she caught its gaze.

**********

A great black car pulled up outside the Leaky Cauldron and a witch stepped out and into the pub where she immediately walked to Morticia and Nathan. Inside the car, first-year Nimue Lagrand sat chewing on her nails. "Mr. Lagrand, Miss Lagrand," the witch said inside the pub, "I'm Rachel Newtcutter, the Ministry of Magic has sent me to drive you to the station."

The two uttered polite responses, then Morticia added, "Our friend Niki here will come with us, and I think Hagrain as well...?" She eyed him questioningly.

Nathan ignored her and yelled across the room, "OY! DRAKE! Come on, we're leaving!" He left the pub with Drake and sat down in the car, leaving Morticia behind with Niki and Hagrain.

"Shall we, then?" Niki said to her friend. "It looks like your brother isn't keen on waiting for us."

Niki and Tish moved on and climbed into the magically-widened car. "Coming?" Niki asked the little First Year.

**********

Breana had sat back when the entire incident of the boy falling to the floor, and hadn't reappeared when the boy was helped up. She had wanted to make her presence known again, but then Tyris decided that they should go on a little journey around Diagon Alley. Giving Breana rough nip, the squirrel danced out of her hands and then ran out the door, which was being held open by two people talking to each other, halfway in.

Chasing after her squirrel, Breana snapped something at the two people before running out into the street. The squirrel was easily hidden by the swarming masses of the people in Diagon Alley, and Breana swore under her breath a long list of unheard of words. Ones that would have definitely started her stepfather to fight. Glaring around, Breana felt like she had to punch something, but then hissed a sigh before heading back into the pub.

Glancing at the people inside, Breana slowly moved towards her old table, which luckily hadn't been taken by anyone else, and pulled her trunk out, along with her two other bags. With great effort, she managed to get them out of the pub, and into the street, where she rested. Breana glanced around, in the hope that someone would help her out here. She had never gone by the train-route before, and was quite lost, due to Mr. White's inability to help her.

With a slight jump, Breana felt a lump jump up on her shoulder and she knew without a glance that it was Tyris. She snapped a few angry words at the squirrel, but the animal didn't seem to hear and instead curled on her shoulder. Pulling at her hair, the squirrel forced Breana's long amber hair out of the bun she had put it in earlier, and made a nest from it. Breana half thought of pushing the squirrel off, but then her exhaustion set in, and Breana realised that she just didn't have the strength. The affects of the flu that knew was starting, was making her extremely tired and her joints hurt. There was no way she was going to move her bags or trunk any further without help....

**********

Oriana glanced over to where Kat was. "I hope he's okay...".

As they watched Raphael had gotten up, crossed to the bar and then been joined by Sarah and Nathaniel. Soon the three had left the Leaky Cauldron. She looked back at Marvo.

"Well, I think I'd better get to the Hogwarts Express. I guess I'll call a cab... How are you getting there?"

"Well.... erm..." Marvo not quite sure what to say. "I'll be going by Car. I'm sure there would be space if you don't have anything sorted?"

This girl may be a Slytherin, but she was obviously distressed, and anyway, if Arcadia had her eye on her, then she may be useful.

On the other side of the room Kat smiled at Andy. Her mind was on Raphael. She knew his head had not cleared, and would have liked to help, but well, boys will be boys!

"Oh Hiya Andy. Nothing really. Raphael, a new student. He hit his head and I tried to help, but he seems to have run off with Sarah!"

She Sighed, "So, Andy. Have you got all you need?"

The she whispered, "Do you want me to try and have a word with Marvo? I know what he can be like, and.. well. He told me, you know, about you and why he has this... problem, and......"

"Yes," Andy whispered. "Please talk to him for me. He's so stubborn..."

She stops as she realised the time. "Gosh! we must get started for the station! MARVO!" She shouted "Come on will you!"

"That would be great! Thanks so much." Oriana heard Kat scream for Marvo to join her. "Shall we go then?"

Marvo blushed slightly. "Erm, yes, yes we should"

He led Oriana towards Kat who was already on her way to the door. He ignored Andy.

Andy saw Marvo walk over.

"Okay. I'll just gather my stuff and we'll be off!" he exclaimed.

He gathered his luggage. He ignored Marvo.

Kat gave Andy a wink as Marvo came over.

"Oh hello Oriana, yes we have met. Have you got a Car sorted Marvo? Or did you forget?" She smiled

"NO, I remembered this time, It should be waiting outside" He blushed slightly, embarrassed that he forget to arrange a car last year.

"Okay then" Said Kat with a smile, lets get going.

"Hogwarts Fourth Years? Anyone of you want a lift to Kings Cross, Marvo here has offered a ride in a car" She shouted.

Winifred looked up from her conversation and heard Kat offering a ride. She quickly gathered her things and rushed up to Kat, Marvo, and the others. "A lift to the station would be great! Are you sure it's not a problem?"

Marvo, of course went red, "No problem. I've got a car outside waiting, it will take us to Kings Cross. Room for six people I think."

Marvo then followed Kat outside to the street, where they see Breana waiting.

*********

"I arranged a cab" Alpha said "and it's arriving any minute now" She stood there, rucksack and a large trunk and a small basket where she had put her cat in.

"Oh, there it is... "She announced "If anyone wants to go with me, you'll have to hurry, otherwise I see you at the station, ok?" There she went, with a very loud basket... Miss Eezy obviously complaining.

Piotr had remained in the shadows watching the unfolding events in the pub including Raphael's fall and recovery as well as his departure with Sarah Taverner and Nathaniel followed by the departure of Morticia and Nathan Lagrand with their friends and an apparent first year in tow.

Now this rather authoritative dark-haired boy and his prefect girlfriend appeared to be organising 'lifts' for their classmates, which in theory included him. He had no interest in travelling even for a short period of time in such crowded conditions.

Therefore, Piotr gathered his belongings and slipped outside. A number of taxis were waiting in front of the pub as well as some large luxurious cars with uniformed drivers. Piotr wouldn't mind travelling in one of those - alone. That wasn't possible as these were undoubtedly the cars mentioned intended to convey a number of students.

He passed them by and entered the first black cab in the queue, gave the driver the instruction to take him to 'Kings Cross' and settled back.

Breana noticed the other students showing up, as she hadn't seen any that she had recognised since Sarah had left with the two new students. In a desperate attempt to get some help, she strode over to the nearest group and asked, 'Are you going to King's Cross?'

Marvo, smiled and offered Breana a lift in their car.