Departing Northwards Open

Novalie was so late.
She would have been on time - because for once, she hadn't been the reason something had gotten in the way. She, Malic and Liam, her brothers, had been all ready to leave in her eldest brother's old, red Toyota, a car that already made the strangest noises whenever Malic tried to take it anywhere. This time, however, when he turned the key, there was nothing.
Not even a little sputter or a reluctant shudder. Just complete, devastating silence.
"The fuck?", Malic cursed, flicking on the car's lights as if that would somehow help him figure out what was wrong.
Miraculously, they worked, which only made him click his tongue in irritation, "Car's fucking dead."

It took nearly an hour of discussing the problem with a few neighbours, poking around under the hood and Malic making increasingly creative threats against his car before they finally found a solution. One of his friends was willing to lend him a run-down, dirty moped that had held more bumps and scratches than any reasonable person would feel comfortable riding on.
Not Novalie, obviously - she was delighted!
With an excited grin, the redhead let her eldest brother place the oversized helmet on her head before climbing onto the back of the moped, squeezing in behind her him. Liam meanwhile looked offended by the fact that there was no room for him on that tiny vehicle.
"Unfair.", he pouted, wrapping his arms around Novalie in a tight hug, "Bring me back one of those Chocolate Frogs again when you're back."
"I'll bring you one hundred!", she promised with her usual grin.
How she was going to afford that many was a question for another time.

And so, they set off at the astonishing speed of fifteen miles per hour.
At some point, Novalie even heard Malic questioning whether walking wouldn't have been a faster way of getting to London King's Cross, but in the end, they stubbornly stayed on the little moped all the way to the station.
"Now hurry off.", he instructed once they finally arrived and as the Ravenclaw slung her bag over her shoulder, wobbling slightly beneath its weight, "And no eating glass this time. I mean it, Nova."
"Yeah, yeah.", she laughed, throwing her arms around Malic for a quick hug before rushing into the station.

She barely made it onto the Hogwarts Express.
The moment Novalie had stepped inside, the doors closed behind her and the train began to move. She didn't even have time to catch her breath before she was already completely focused on finding one of her friends among the compartments.
"Oliiiiiver! Where are youuu?", she called, walking along the corridor and pressing her nose against the little windows in each compartment door to inspect whoever was inside.
Sadly though, she only spotted faces she barely knew.

And so, as the train gathered speed and her legs began to grow tired, the Metamorph finally decided to give up on her search for the moment. She grabbed the handle of a random compartment door and slid it open, fully prepared to invite herself into whatever social gathering she happened to find - except that there was no gathering.

There was only one girl inside.
"Oh, how odd!", Novalie exclaimed with a bright smile.
She tossed her bag carelessly into the luggage rack, closed the compartment door behind her with a loud thud and threw herself into the seat opposite the lone person.
"Almost all the compartments are stuffed and you somehow managed to get one all to yourself. That's, like, super crazy.", she tilted her head, studying the girl with dark hair with open curiosity, "Don't you have, like, friends?"

Her eyes travelled up and down the other one, trying to determine whether she was in the same year as her or perhaps a new student altogether. Of course, she didn't even bother to introduce herself first.

Novalie was just about to surrender herself completely to the rather wide compartment seat, intending to stretch out flat on her back and perhaps start singing that song - Chicken Chicken by Burger King - that had been stuck in her head since earlier, when the girl's words stopped her.
She didn't have any friends and - more importantly, it was her first time here! That was more than enough to make Novalie instantly sit straight up again.
"I knew it!", she exclaimed with a wide smile.
Outside the compartment windows, the outside landscape was already beginning to blur into streaks of green and grey as the Express picked up speed, the clatter of the wheels beneath them filled the space, occasionally accompanied by the dangerous sounding rattle of the luggage racks overhead.
Novalie didn't pay it any mind though.
She leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees as she looked at the girl,
"Bet you'll make hella friends, since you already look, like, really cool! Or is that not your thing because you're, like, one of these uh..."
Her gaze drifted upwards towards the ceiling, thinking for a moment before remembering, "Ah! Introverts! Yes. Are you, like, one of those?"
The Metamorph asked it with such complete ease that it sounded no different from asking someone whether they preferred cats or dogs, or what their zodiac sign was. Of course, there was no judgement behind the question, either. If anything, the redhead seemed genuinely fascinated by the possibility.

While the other girl asked why Novalie had chosen this compartment, the Ravenclaw made absolutely no attempt to hide the fact that she was staring at her.
Novalie studied the person in front of her openly, her gaze travelling over her specific features before settling on her hair - brown, and her eyes - a dull green.
Novalie leaned even a little bit closer and reached up to absently run her fingers through one of her own long curls.
The red color gradually drained from its original shade and transformed into the same deep, dark brown she had been studying just now, the change creeping through until not a single strand remained untouched.
After blinking several times, concentrating on the sensation, the color of her eyes also changed into the same green hue the other girl had.
There was no grand reason behind any of it, obviously. Novalie simply felt like it.

"To be honest, this was the first one I opened.", the Ravenclaw then explained, "The others, when I looked inside through the window, didn't contain any of my friends and I literally got tired of searching."
She shrugged, "So, since I'm, like, friendless now, too, you're stuck with me, I guess."
Then, without so much as a warning, Novalie reached across the space between them, making an attempt to grab the girl's hand,
"Also! You're, like, really pretty."
Her eyes immediately flicked down towards it, "A bit pale, right? Like a Dhampir, in a way. Are you one by chance?"

If the girl allowed her to take her hand, Novalie would immediately turn it over between her fingers, holding it up beside her own for comparison, her eyes narrowing in intense concentration as she'd try to match their skin tones.