Venerable Valedictorian

A Harry Potter oneshot

By

EvilFuzzy9

Rating: K+

Genre: Humor/Parody

Characters/Pairings: Hufflepuff, Slytherin, Merlin; [N/A]

Summary: How, exactly, could a semi-mythical wizard from the late fifth century have attended a magic school that wasn't founded until the tenth? [crack]

"Ambrosius, Merlin," came the call of Helga Hufflepuff, reading from a roll of parchment.

A hush fell over the Great Hall at this name, the first to be called in that year's sorting. Murmurs and whispers crept from tongue to ear, students speaking conspiratorially to one another. This name raised wonder and disbelief among all who were present, and scores of eyes scanned the hall for any sign of the student named.

None of the first years stepped forward.

Professors Slytherin, Gryffindor, and Ravenclaw frowned from up at the staff table. Hufflepuff herself looked rather perplexed, and suspiciously shot a sideways glance at the upper year students. Aside from snickers of amusement, none of them looked particularly guilty.

Helga furrowed her brow, huffing and puffing disapprovingly as she looked back down at the list. She eyed the runes critically for a moment, comparing the hand in which they had been scribed to the way the other names had been written. A second's scrutiny convinced her that the shape and proportion of the characters all more-or-less matched the slight but distinct idiosyncracies of her friend and colleague Rowena's handwriting.

Peering quizzically over her shoulder at Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff posed a silent inquiry with no more than a glance. The eagle-eyed woman replied with the slightest knitting of her brow and pursing of her lips. She did something almost like a shrug.

Scowling, Helga looked once more at the scroll in her hands.

"Ahem," she cleared her throat, sounding downright vexed. In her sweetest, most dangerously honeyed voice, she repeated the name: "Ambrosius, Merlin!"

Still, no one came forward.

With a darkening expression, Helga once more looked back up at the staff table, this time at the sweeping mane and ruddy cheeks of gallant Godric Gryffindor. Silently she mouthed some decidedly less than pleasant words at the man, who looked very close to bursting out in laughter.

Godric waved a hand as if to dismiss Helga's burgeoning irritation. Bright eyes twinkled with mirth, and Hufflepuff narrowed her eyes suspiciously. If she hadn't known Gryffindor to be hopeless at magical forgery, she might have whipped out her wand and hexed him on the spot.

Muttering various imprecations under her breath, Helga once more turned her attention back to the scroll. She paused to take a few ineffective calming breaths before continuing.

"Ambrosius, Merlin!" she called out with a good deal more force than was even remotely necessary, her voice carrying across the hall and beyond. These two words echoed throughout the castle, and the recently manifested resident poltergeist flew in through the far wall, scattering several of the floating candles.

(Helga curled her lip. She was very proud of her charm work on those candles, darn it!)

"AMBER-AMBER-ROSEY-US!" cackled the amortal spectre, its young form indistinct and transparent. "MERRY-MERRY-LIONESS!" he continued, loudly gibbering this and other ruder, less sensical things up and down the hall.

This outburst earned the poltergeist a laugh from Godric and a smirk from Salazar.

Rowena was much less amused. With a hissed "Fie, Perversus!", Ravenclaw testily brandished her wand and banished the specter to one of the distant towers.

It was too late, however.

The hall was pretty much in an uproar by this point, students openly gossiping and pondering and debating this apparent prank. Anxious first years looked uncertain whether to sigh in relief or shiver in their boots, and the older students looked borderline mutinous over this delay in the Sorting, particularly in regards to its further postponement of the much anticipated welcoming feast.

Helga looked absolutely livid, and the scroll was threatening to tear in her iron grip. She stamped her feet and spat an exceptionally vile oath at the parchment in her hands, a vulgarity which elicited scandalized gasps from the younger and more innocent students, and amused sniggers from most of the older years.

"MERLIN!" the woman snapped, her eyes distinctly wild as she frustratedly spat the name. "MERLINUS CALEDONENSIS AMBROSIUS!"

Of course, as was only expected by this point, no one stepped forward.

Helga flushed beet red and tore up the parchment in a fit of anger, flinging the shredded remnants of the scroll into the air. She had officially lost her temper.

"BY MY FATHER'S BEARD!" the plump and normally jovial witch bellowed. "I SWEAR, IF I EVER FIND OUT WHO PUT THE NAME OF A CENTURIES DEAD WIZARD ON THIS SCROLL, I WILL JINX THEIR TOENAILS TO GROW BACKWARDS AND THEIR TEETH TO GO SIDEWAYS! MERLIN MY AR—"

A distinctive snicker caught Helga's attention, and she spun around to glare at the source.

"Merlin's beard!" Godric guffawed, slapping his knee, and Rowena also looked rather red in the face. Salazar, however... well, it seemed that HE had finally given up on feigning innocence.

Helga drew her wand with a roar and shot a jet of indigo light at the simian-faced sorcerer, who crowed and deflected it with a hooting laugh.

"SALAZAR SLYTHERIN!" Hufflepuff bellowed. "I'LL SORT YOU RIGHT ALONG WITH MERLIN!"

And so saying this she chased the cackling parselmouth out of the Great Hall, flinging a myriad of nasty hexes and jinxes at him all the way down to Black Lake. The students laughed and cheered, taking much delight in the irreverent jest.

For years to come, the story of the night Merlin was sorted would be passed down among the students of Hogwarts.

A/N: Inspired by a comment by J. K. Rowling in one of her extra info thingies on Pottermore, where she said "Merlin was in Slytherin", or something to that effect. As much as I love the Harry Potter series, and as much as I admire/respect Rowling for everything she's accomplished and what all she's created... even before doing any research, I knew that sounded terribly messed up, as far as timeline.

So, here's my very half-assed interpretation/explanation which doesn't really even explain anything. I actually did a moderate degree of research for this (albeit mostly from Wikipedia and online dictionaries). I even looked up the etymology of peeve (the former of which is only a bit over a century old, a back-formation of peevish which was first recorded in the 1520's), tracing it back to the Latin Perversus just to get a period appropriate name for Peeves.

Admittedly, Ravenclaw's use of the exclamation "Fie!" could possibly be considered anachronistic, but then if I had really wanted to be accurate they would have all been speaking Old English – or possibly some wizarding version of Vulgar Latin. So let's just say "Translation Convention" and leave it at that.

Updated: 1-22-14

TTFN and R&R!

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