Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter nor any of the intellectual property of J.K. Rowling (characters, magical creatures, ect). HOWEVER the concept and actual writing of this story as well as the non-canon characters do belong to me. Thank you.
Inhale. Hold it. Exhale. Inhale. Hold it. Exhale.
Not only was I determined to defile this place before I left I was determined to enjoy it. The smell would be imbedded between the folds of every fabric in this room by the time I was done with it. Cross legged on the rickety mattress with a cigarette between my teeth I slowly filled my lungs with smoke, enjoying the scorching sensation as it seared my pipes, and bringing it up again just as steadily. The stench clung to everything. The tacky curtains, the scarcely washed pillow cases, the molding carpets.
Inhale. Hold it. Exhale. Inhale. Hold it. Exhale.
A glance at the clock left of the door told me that I'd wasted enough time on this small display of rebellion. I flicked the butt onto the center of the carpet, where it singed the threads it touched, before I rose from the bed, pinning my right foot upon the butt and spreading the black spot on the burgundy wool like a parasite. With the next stride my hand clasped the handle that topped my suitcase. One more stride took me to the door. As I made my way down the hall I bid farewell to the empty box of smokes as I discarded it on the floor.
I'd been a smoker for years. When the LCME was in Manhattan a group of us would meet up behind a nearby Starbucks for a smoke and a pint of whatever booze we could loot. Some of the other kids were from LCME as well. But not anymore.
It had been five years since the UK was plagued with another war. Our teachers assured us that everything would be fine. The attempted revolution hadn't reached the States the last time. They insisted that the British MoM could handle everything.
They couldn't be more wrong.
Even in America the papers were alive with the rush of the events across the pond, though they, too, kept pretending we were safe. Two years after his return from the dead, the man behind the purity movement, Voldemort, whose name is forbidden from speech, defeated the only person he was said to have feared, Albus Dumbledore. Britain was practically under his thumb, but the rebels still held hope. The face of that hope was a scrawny, reckless boy named Harry Potter, rumored to be on the run in search of his enemy's weakness. Voldemort became obsessed with the destruction of this one boy. And, in a dramatic final battle, on the grounds of the world renowned Hogwarts School, he did it. He killed the boy and, with him, the hope of the rebels. Both sides had faced immense casualties. Even though the populous of the opposition was hardly smaller than that of their oppressors they were forced into hiding. The death of their hero crushed their spirits, rendering them pathetically useless.
And still it was said the purity movement would never reach us. At this point it wasn't a naïve assumption. It was a desperate hope. Americans aren't only quite openly accepting of muggles, there's more muggle blood loose in the system than any given country in Europe. And the purists knew it.
After they claimed total control over the wizards of the United Kingdom, and even held much of the muggle population at bay with threats they didn't understand, they remembered our poor reputation over here in the States. Death Eaters crossed our borders to recruit local followers and demand the Ministry surrender. Knowing that so few of us were pureblood, and would therefore not be spared, the government tried to refuse. They were quick to change their minds after the Death Eaters burned the old LCME building.
The school had been underground in Manhattan. Lots of muggles around to get lapped up in the flames. I'd skipped that morning's classes to share a paper bag clad bottle of vodka with some homeless drug-addicted muggles and was unharmed. Losing my school books wasn't much a tragedy for me. Neither was losing some monstrous teachers. After the blast, and the MoM's instant surrender, survivors were picked from the rubble and interrogated. The ones they liked went for medical treatment. The ones they didn't were left to die. Their second act was to set up a new government, that hired new staff to replace the charred blobs that used to be called educators and Layton Center for Magical Education was moved to a more 'appropriate' location. Secluded, far from the prying eyes of muggles. As opposed to waking up in our own beds, putting on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, and taking public transit, magic or otherwise, to an underground building in time for classes we were now require to stay in stuffy dorms and wear tacky uniforms that cover every piece of skin from the soles of our feet to the bases of our necks.
Mind you this never actually affects me or anyone I knew. None of my smoking buddies were spared, anyway. Not only did they break the mould the Death Eaters tried to shove them in, they were too stupid to pretend otherwise. They weren't particularly fond of me either. I wasn't surprised. Not many people are. But once they got beyond being offended by my cold attitude and my blatant honesty about missing classes to get illegally drunk they started feeling sympathy for me. It was a sympathy that I didn't enjoy, but it was one I could use. My tone as I spoke of my parents' murder and how I was force from my home in Britain at a young age to live with a muggle drunkard was passive, but all they could hear was the heart wrenching story of a poor little girl victimized by the barbarism that they aimed to destroy. I let them see me this way. When they told me that they were graciously sending me home I wasn't all that surprised. If I was trying to rule the wizarding world I would want as many kids going to school where I could keep an eye on them too. My British heritage, which I don't even have any connections with (I've never even been able to fake the accent), validates the transfer.
They offered to confiscate my things from the muggle who housed me, but I insisted that the only possession I needed, my wand, was already with me. I decided that omitting the fact that the muggle who housed me was dead, too, would be in my best interest. Still feeling far too much pity for my situation they did provide me with new 'proper' clothes. After seeing what had been packed for me, I snuck back to my apartment snatched back enough of my old 'real' clothes to keep me from going crazy with discomfort.
At first glance even the brightest minds would deny that the new LCME building was actually new. The thing was a mess. Lazily thrown together in after the abolishment of our old building my temporary summer home was already falling down. The thing reminded me of one of the muggle buildings I passed on my way to school in the mornings. A church, it was called. A place where muggles worshipped a man said to have performed miracles. Frankly, I could have walked into any one of those buildings and performed what would pass as a miracle for them, then they'd be worshipping me, but that would have been counterproductive in my mission to intimidate the whole world into leaving me alone.
But I didn't even have to pull such a prank to waver this faith. It did quite well on its own. As people stopped caring they stopped attending church sessions, stopped donating to the cause, and some of the poorer buildings started to fall apart. Rotting wood, chipped paint, a layer of dust no one can be bother to clean… yes, this describes the new LCME quite well. All but the lack of a large wooden "T" on the tilting tower likens the building before me to the one I'd seen in the city.
The location they chose was lame. A woodland in Hamilton County. So unused there's still a layer of dead brown leaves on the ground contrasting the flourishing green ones overhead. They seem so determined to keep us cut off from the muggle world that the man who'd come to collect me didn't even bother kicking the leaves aside to form any sort of structured path.
"How was your summer, Ms. Chisholm?" he said with a smile that was way too kind, indicating he's heard my sob story. Between the prominent brow, chin, and cheekbones, the smile only serves to make him look hideous rather than comforting.
"Uneventful," I answer honestly, without looking at him. I wasn't lying to be rude, either. The only excitement was when I played a makeshift game of Quodpot, which quickly grew boring without competitors. Add that to the fact that their request for me not to use magic kept me from jinxing crab apples into exploding like Quods and the game becomes completely pointless. After this I set to smoking the last of the cigarettes I salvaged from my old apartment, knowing that if I was seen with a muggle object when the Death Eaters arrived I'd be damned. Mind you I didn't care so much if they found the box and butts lying around. I figured they'd be stupid enough to assume it was some punk muggles. Gives them something to be angry about.
Eventually the man introduced himself as Omande Travers, a recently appointed follower of Voldemort (whom he refers to as "The Dark Lord", insisting I do the same) native to Wales who has yet to be promoted to the status of Death Eater. I replied to all of this with a careless "Cool."
My silence up till then combine with my disinterest in his introduction is a code he deciphers as "Shut up and don't talk to me," and obeyed well. We march on in silence until what we both knew to be the end of the protective spells' effective area.
At this point he took my arm in his gloved hand, an action that appealed to me about as much as feasting on dirty earthworms, and we disapparated.
Being of age and having already taken the apparition test I could have gone on my own. I kept myself from dwelling on this as Omande guided me through the grand marble Lobby of the Ministry of Magic towards the elevators. I found myself wondering if government buildings in Britain have elevators, wondering if their presence is the reason why it seems everyone in America is so fat, but restrained from posing the question.
I'd been in the MoM once before, for legal issues. This time we were on our way to the department of transportation. The elevator shifted and rose and turned until at last the doors were opened. A bored looking young woman behind a desk immediately outside the elevator doors asked to be allowed to examine our wands. As she identified them I listened to the hum behind me. I'd never been in this department before but I was still able to confirm a prominent difference that I'd noticed the whole trip up here: each word was said in a British accent. Did they just go and have the whole country arrested? From what I heard nearly no one that had gone to LCME, student or staff, was being permitted to return. And each official in this room sounded like they were from the UK. Could they really have wiped out so many of us in just a few weeks?
The woman returned our wands to Omande, who returned mine to me. I started to walk down the row of offices when Omande stopped me. Perplexing. I remembered only having to present me wand as identification before entering the justice department. Is protocol different in transit? Or is this an 'improvement' by the Death Eaters? It turned out to be the latter. Once I'd returned to the desk its occupant was stamping a booklet of paper. This Omande passed onto me as well.
"Identification," he said. "You can't just trust a person by the wand they wave anymore."
As I followed Omande's footsteps through the maze of offices I examined the booklet. The front page bore the photograph my initial escort to the LCME building had insisted on taking. Just my shoulders up, unmoving, staring at myself. Accompanying the photo was all the information anyone would ever need to identify me:
Name: Chisholm, Audrey Victoria
Name of birth father: Chisholm, Cliff Henry
Name of birth mother: Allsopp, Margaret Merie
Blood status: Pureblood
Sex: Female
Date of birth: January 3, 1982
Place of birth: Bawtry, England
Current residence: New York City, United States of America
… and so on. I was slightly confused. I thought you and your family had to go through a series of severe testing and interrogation before pureblood status was granted. I was pretty sure why I was exempt from the process, though.
"We didn't want to stir up any bad memories about your family," Omande confirmed when I posed the inquiry. I nodded and returned my attention to the next page.
It included a condensed form of my identification, this time with 'pureblood' in bold red letters directly below my name. The lower half of the sheet describes my intentions.
Place of departure: New York City, United States of America
Destination: London, England
Method of transport: Portkey
Time of Departure: 11:33 pm
Time of arrival: 11:34 pm
Intention: Educational transfer from Layton Center for Magical Education to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
Reason for travel: Improved quality of education
The last remark made me snicker a bit. I wasn't seeking to improve my quality of education. They wanted to keep me close and loyal to Voldemort. Oh, well. England would probably have a better education, anyway. That's a bonus.
Most of the text thereafter was obscured by, but still legible under, a large red stamp that read APPROVED. It was hard not to question whether or not you had to have such personal information approved of to travel, having never travelled outside New York State before. Well, not since I'd developed a memory span of over five minutes.
Omande directed me into a series of offices labelled Intercontinental and continued along to a cubicle labelled Portkeys. I began wondering whether or not anything was this organized before the Death Eaters arrive, then proceed to think that I ought to have paid better attention to my surrounds because I seem to be questioning what the Death Eaters have and haven't changed far too often for someone whose supposedly lived here nearly her whole life.
"Ever travelled by Portkey before?" Omande asked expectantly, holding out the lovely goblet with a silver foot and stand and crystal top. He'd just received this from an older looking person in charge of moderating Portkey usage.
"Not that I can remember."
Omande looks solemn. "Sorry, I forgot you'd been so young."
I shrugged, not really caring.
The elderly man with a wispy white beard and receding hair line stood up and explained the basics of Portkey travel in, no surprise, a British accent. Hold tight, don't let go until reach your destination, and focus your eyes on the Portkey so you don't become nauseous with the spinning, let your escort hold your suitcase since he has experience and is less likely to drop it. I wanted to laugh at this last point, but I nod anyway, letting them wonder why the edges of my lips were curling. After an extensive description of the grip he recommended for holding the goblet key I got direly bored with his rambling. I was quite thankful when he pulled out his brass pocket watch and looked shocked at how he'd let the time slide. "11:32! Goodness, I must have been ranting!" You just noticed? "Alright, then, Mr. Travers, Ms. Chisholm, if you'd position yourselves in the hall and take hold of the Portkey. Oh, Ms. Chisholm, please hand your suitcase to Mr. Tra—"
Whoosh. With my hand still on my own suitcase we were off. A minute later I was falling through streaks of black and gold. I landed hard on my back and my suitcase flew open on impact, but I was on my knees balling up my clothes and returning them to the case before anyone could offer assistance. Quodpot players always know how to get back up after a fall. Omande insisted on taking my luggage after that, but I turned him down with a threatening glare. After snapping the bag back to my side I stood up straight and took in my surroundings. The black and gold streaks were caused by the decorative gold borders to the fireplaces and doors fusing with the polished black wall. Directly in front of me was a huge statue depicting muggles suffering to hold up the stone wizards that stood on their shoulders. Fitting. Very fitting for such a movement.
I didn't have much time to observe, as Omande and I were swept away with the tide of people marching to work. We were herded into the elevator (called a 'lift' here) and Omande asked if someone could hit the button for the Department for Magical Education floor once he realized he'd been pinned out of range of the controls. I had to hold my breath in the lift, not because there was any sort of stench, but because the crowdedness was off-putting. NYC may be huge, population wise, but you can always count on finding a space to yourself. Being in such a congested space made me feel trapped. I took a huge breath of relief at being freed from the confines.
When we reached another office on this floor they sent our transportation paper down to the proper department to be screened while we filled out forms and signed names for my transfer of schools. I made a mental note not to skip classes again. Not burning was a huge mistake in the avoiding-painfully-slow-and-annoyingly-legal-school-transfers department. Our travel papers came back approved. I figured they'd approve anyone with the big red P-word on their identification form. And finally my transfer was complete and I was going to get to see my new home, or prison, whatever the case may be.
After telling them I was a fair flyer I was granted a broom to amuse myself at the new LCME building while I waited to be transferred. As you already know, this was ineffective, but I was allowed to keep the broom, which allowed me to fly with Omande to Hogwarts, as opposed to taking the Floo Powder network. I'd never taken the Floo network, but the idea of catching yourself on fire sounded precarious. Though the flight ended up being precarious, too. Being in New York meant you only flew on the Quodpot field. Flying from London's Ministry of Magic to Hogwarts required covering a lot more ground. It was at least eight thirty in the evening by the time we landed outside the gate.
The castle was huge and grand, like something a king would live. But it was ominous. Cloaked dementors glided round the perimeter of the grounds. When they sensed our presence they began gravitating in our direction. Then they all of a sudden backed off as we landed.
Coming down the path was man draped in black cloaks carrying a lantern. He was not fat, but he was still quite large and had tiny eyes set deep into his pig-like face. The gate before us released its numerous physical and magical seals as he approach and swung open before him. He nodded curtly to Omande. "Travers," he greeted.
"Carrow." Omande returned the nod.
"Thank you. You may return to head quarters to await a new assignment." Omande nodded obediently. He extended his hand to me as a gesture of farewell. Still repulsed by our contact during apparition I squeezed the tips of his fingers without breaking eye contact with the new man before me. Obviously this discouraged Omande from prolonging his farewell, which didn't bother me in the least. My attention had permanently left him and wasn't going back. Not with the man in front of me, Carrow, he was called, was staring so intently at me.
We continued staring one another down for moments after we heard Omande depart. Then a smile curled on Carrow's lips, and I kept my face unchangingly cold. "Audrey Chisholm," the way he said it was strangely disturbing, "my name is Professor Amycus Carrow. I'll be teaching you Dark Arts here at Hogwarts. Now follow me, the Headmaster has been anticipating your arrival."
The Headmaster looked incapable of anticipating anything. We'd climbed an ornate series of stair and entered by a final hidden set behind the statue of an eagle to get to the Headmaster's office. Everything about this school was fancier than LCME. I concluded Brits just have higher standards for these sorts of things.
The Headmaster himself didn't seem to fit in with his decorative surroundings. Professor Severus Snape wore very plain black robes that billowed behind him at the slightest motion and two sheets of greasy black hair framing his face, particularly his big hooked nose. When he handed me a tattered old hat I was tempted to tell him I wasn't touching anything he'd touched until he took a well deserved bath. Maybe even three.
"You will be sorted before the start of term, Ms. Chisholm, and take time to adjust to the new school before the start of term. You will take a preliminary lesson from each of your future teachers to decide—"
"And what's the hat got to do with this crap?" I interrupted. This was the first time I'd spoken in a while and I was starting to notice how prominently American I sounded.
Snape looked and spoke in a tone that suggested he was unaffected by interruption, but his choice in words suggested otherwise. "If you plan on attending a new school, miss, it might be useful to understand some of their more basic customs—"
"So, hat fits in because…?" I persisted. Snape still didn't look angry. I decided that it was now my mission in the coming school year to see him display emotions.
"That is the Sorting Hat," he said plainly, as though that explained everything. After a moment of waiting for my bewilderment to fade he continued. "Each student is placed in a house base on their personality. Each house was installed by one of each of the four founders; Slytherin, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, and Gryffindor. That magical hat will decide where you belong. Usually first years are sorted in a ceremony but we've decided to spare you the embarrassment. Now, if you will take a seat." He motioned towards a stool that sat in the middle of the room.
I paced over and sat down facing my audience; Snape, Amycus Carrow, a woman I later learned to be his sister and a scarred fox faced man. I stared each of them down for a moment with the hat in my lap. Then, with my eyes locked on Snape, I flipped it up onto my head.
My vision became unfocused, though the hat didn't cause this directly. The sudden presence of its voice demanded my attention, and I stared into the distance at something I couldn't see so that I didn't miss a word.
"You have secrets, girl," the hat began, "dangerous secrets indeed."
The lack of reaction from the onlookers gave me the feeling this conversation might have been private. Either that or the teachers were just used to seeing talking hats. Still, I tried focussing my thoughts rather than speaking aloud at first. It worked. "Only dangerous for the one who tries to spill them on me," I threatened.
"Fierce." I think what happened next was a chuckle from the hat. It's unnerving to hear someone else laughing in your head. "I suppose I ought to explain a bit about the houses before a sort you?"
"Whatever."
"Alright then. Gryffindor is the house of the lion, founded by Godric Gry—"
"Wanna keep it quick?" I interrupted.
"Fine," said the hat, with a hint of irritation. He decided to just tell me the kinds of people who end up in each house. Gryffindors are brave and chivalrous. Hufflepuffs are loyal and just. Ravenclaws are witty and creative. Slytherins are resourceful and ambitious.
"Hey, Hat," I thought. I guess he's not used to being addressed in such a manner because his response resembled "Hmm?" more than actual words. "When Snape spoke of the houses he seemed to like Slytherin, and hate for Gryffindor. You speak of them the other way around. Are you two…?"
"Prejudice?" It's the hat's turn to interrupt. "Yes. We all are."
"That's pretty honest."
"I've no need to lie. It was at the hands of Slytherins that our old world fell. Many people hold see them with contempt."
"And why would they dislike the other houses?"
"I have my suspicions. But they are my own. You will have to decide for yourself about what happens here. Now, back to you. I see you are deceptive. You are hard and determined, and have all the makings of a leader…"
"Damn, I hate people."
"… and you go after the things you want. Therefore," the hat ignores my comment, "my initial thought is Slytherin, but…"
"But what?"
"You'll be in danger in Slytherin. Your ferocity and… All things considered, you'd be safest in Ravenclaw. You're smart enough and they're still held in high regard with the staff…"
I considered all this for a moment. I considered all the houses. I thought about who I've been in my life, where I'm going, my past.
"Put me where I belong."
Once again, the hat chuckles, but this time I chuckle with him. Not in my head, but aloud.
"This'll be fun to see," said the hat. "Very well, girl, and may I never be damned with being your enemy, Audrey Chisholm of—"
"—SLYTHERIN!"