"Huffy Puff! Huffy Puff! Helga is a Huffy Puff!"
The little girl squared her shoulders against the village boy's taunts. The familiarity of them did not lessen the tears threatening to burn her eyes.
Her mother had never needed to warn her against unleashing her magic upon her tormentors – Helga had never been the kind of girl who'd retaliate in anger. She wished simply to reach out to them, to take them by the hand and befriend them.
"HuffyPuff!"
The taunt stayed with her the rest of the way home.
Helga was not a woman easily upset, but at the downcast looks and teary eyes on the remaining student's faces she shot her fellow founders a stern look, and they thanked their lucky stars it had not been worse. Even Godric, renowned for his bravery, buckled beneath the might of Helga's legendary glare, made powerful in her infrequent use of it.
"Not clever enough," Rowena stated.
"Not brave enough," Godric declared.
"Not ambitious enough" Salazar sneered.
Unspoken were the words, "Not enough like me."
Though she supposed she could not judge them too harshly for that last one. In the assembly before her, Helga could not help but see the reflection of a little girl, taunted and rejected by her peers. A girl who never had gained acceptance there amongst them.
Instead, she'd found it elsewhere.
"Come along, dry those eyes," she said, clapping her hands as she gave them all a matronly smile. "You lot is with me now!"
"I'll teach the lot and treat them just the same." ~ The Sorting Hat