Sea and Serpent (PJO/HP)

Chapter 9. Platform 9¾

The only problem Amaryllis found with getting their supplies early, was that they had to spend the last month back with their Aunt and Uncle. It had taken all of Amaryllis's persuasion to get Uncle Vernon to allow them to keep Harry's owl and her cat, Carissa, upstairs while only being let out twice a day for some fresh air. Which neither animal seemed happy about, but there wasn't much she could do about that.

After that, it was as if they had never existed. Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon barely spoke a word to either of them as they came down for breakfast, only to quickly eat and leave the confines of the small dining room in which they all frequented. They had gone out more than the twice Amaryllis had said they would, and yet they hadn't not gotten in trouble or spoken to about it once.

Whatever reason it might have been, her and Harry took advantage of it while they could.

The first two weeks had drug by slower than molasses in her opinion, but the last two, as her and Harry read up on many of the books, passed by quicker than they realized as she had woken up on the first of September.

Amaryllis shook her brother. "Harry, get up. Today's the day."

"Lissie," Harry groaned, trying to roll over, but she threw the covers off him, not allowing him to have another moment of peaceful sleep.

"No. Now. We still have to convince Uncle Vernon to give us a ride."

"Can't you do that without me?"

"I could, but I don't trust him to think I'm the only one asking for a ride. You know he'd do anything to sabotage either one of us leaving if he could."

Harry grumbled a reply into his pillow.

"Let's let him get up, Carissa. We'll go out for a little bit before we get stuck on a train for who knows how long."

Carissa meow'd, following behind her as she walked out of their room and shut the door. She'd leave Hedwig to Harry as they still hadn't seemed to get a long, even after spending a month together.

The kitchen was quiet, except for the sound of bacon sizzling in a frying pan she knew her Aunt Petunia was cooking. She'd wait for Harry to come down and eat before she asked their Uncle to drive them to King's Cross. It would be the only thing they asked from him twice a year. A ride to and from the same place every year, at the same time. Wasn't to hard, right?

Wrong.

It had taken longer than she thought it would to convince him. If only she had lead with that bringing them there, they wouldn't have to see them until next summer. It seemed to be Uncle Vernon's selling point as he told them to file into the car and begrudgingly drove them there.

He drove off as soon as they had all their stuff out of the car, without so much as a word. Though it didn't matter as they now had to find the platform that Harry read off the ticket Hagrid had given them.

"Where do you think it is?"

"You're guess is as good as mine."

With a sigh, Amaryllis followed Harry into the station, glancing around at each metal sign that hung out from the red brick walls. The further they went the more confused they had become.

There was no platform nine and three-quarters and when they asked an attendant, he laughed at them, saying the same thing they noticed.

They were going to miss the train and they had no way of knowing who to ask and how to get to the right platform.

"This way. Platform nine and three-quarters up ahead."

Amaryllis turned to the sound of the woman's voice that had spoken and noticed a group of red-heads following a woman with bushy red hair and a little girl at her side.