I do not own Harry Potter or any of its character or settings. I am going to be using Howarts, and the idea of the Triwizard Tournament and everything, but the characters are of my own creation.

The Sorting Hat's Song

The sounds of the Hogwarts Express whistled impatiently, its wheels ready to race down the tracks. "— yes Ma! Of course I'm going to be looking over Leigha. Ma, we really have to go, the train's about to leave," reminded Cassy impatiently. The train whistled again.

"Oh, I don't understand my daughters at all. Why don't you girls want to be like normal kids? Most kids don't leave their parents till they're eighteen. And look at Leigha. She won't be eleven for another month, and I won't even be able to spend it with her," their mother fretted, messing with Leigha's hair.

"Aw Ma. I'll miss you too, but we'll be fine. Look at sis! She's wonderful! Just like what I'll be one day," she assured, kissing her mother on both cheeks.

The train whistled again. "Ma! We really— "

"Okay, dear me. Guess you girls should get going then." She hugged Cassy and kissed her on both cheeks. "Bye!" she shouted, to be heard over the train's howl.

"Bye!" the two girls shouted back, jumping onto the train just in time.

"Tell Christian I said —" their mother started, but her voice was drowned beneath the whistle of the train and its wheels.

Cassy sighed and shoved her sister a little on the back.

"Alright now. Better find yourself a compartment and make friends."

Leigha turned around to look at her. "You're not going to be sitting with me?" she asked, her blue eyes scared and worried.

Cassy shook her head. "I'm a Prefect this year, so I can't. Sorry sis'."

"Than what 'bout Christian? Can't I sit with him?"

"He's Slytherin Head Boy. Now get going. I've got to get to the Prefects Carriage. And with that, Leigha ran off, looking hopefully into compartments for a friendly face.

Meanwhile, Cassy dragged her trunk towards the end of the train. When she got there, the door had slid open. Christian stood at the doorway, looking like he was about to step out.

"I wondered where you were. For a second I thought you had gotten lost." He smiled at her. "Here, let me get that." He grabbed her trunk and pulled it inside.

She thanked him and silently wondered whether or not he had been the boy she saw in the urn down church the other day. She looked inside and saw that all the Prefects and Heads of Houses were already there. There was an empty spot next to Christian, which he must have saved for her. She sat down next to him. The others were already engaged in a heated discussion with one another by the time she sat down. She recognized that Ryan Warren, the Ravenclaw Head Boy, was the one leading the talk.

"Kay, only between us right?" he asked, his long arms moving as he spoke. The others nodded. "Kay than. You heard how the Triwizard Tournament's coming to Hogwarts this year, right?"

"The... what?" asked Cassy. She had never heard about it before.

"The Triwizard Tournament!" repeated Ryan emphatically. Cassy continued to stare at him cluelessly, making his sigh. "Don't you read the Daily Prophet?" he asked, looking at her as if she were stupid.

"No," she answered curtly, not liking his attitude. She lived in a muggle home. Her mother didn't like the Daily Prophet, case anyone visited the house, saw it, and thought she was a lunatic. Because of that, Cassy lost all news of the Wizarding World during her summers.

"Well, anyways," continued Ryan, "the Triwizard Tournament' s a competition between three of Britain's largest schools of Wizardry: Hogwarts, Durmstrang, and Beaubaxton. There's a student that represents each school. They compete against each other to bring their school glory and the prize of a thousand galleons. They used to take turns hosting it every five years, but the death toll got so high that—"

"Death toll?" she repeated.

He raised his eyebrows, wondering whether or not she really was stupid.

"Well yeah, the challenges were so hard. Of course some people were bound to die. But cause so many died they stopped having the tournament. They finally brought it back 'bout four hundred years ago, but then another student ended up croaking. Think his name was Cedric or something. And Harry Potter seemed to be alive during that time too or whatever. Course, the only reason the poor fellow died than was cause of that Voldy, something like that guy. Anywhos, the Ministry's put extra cautions on it this year, so nobody should be dying this time or anything. Anyways, the big thing is, from what Tomas' told me, cause you know how his dad works for Ministry and everything, instead of seventeen, they're letting students of every age compete!"

"Wait!"

"What!"

"No way!"

"Does that mean I can compete?!"

"You're telling me we're going to be having more competition?"

Cassy covered her ears, everybody was starting to talk too loudly. Why was everybody so excited about this Tournament thingy? And why did they all want to compete when so many people have died? She turned to look at Christian, to see what he thought about all of this, but he had already stood up.

"Why don't we make our rounds now?" he asked, speaking louder than normal so that he could be heard above the ruckus.

She nodded and followed behind him out the door. They opened the doors to each of the compartments to check on the students. This was Cassy's first year as Prefect so she followed Christian, mirroring his every movement. He laughed when he finally noticed what she was doing. He gave her a gentle pat on the head, but she brushed his hand away politely.

"I don't particularly like it when you treat me like a child," she informed, patting her own black hair back down. She had decided to wear it in a ponytail today so that it wouldn't get in the way.

He smiled at her, his emerald eyes as gentle as ever. "Whoever said I was trying to treat you like a child? Treating you like that would be the farthest thing I ever intended to do." She stared at him, a bit surprised. Cassy couldn't help it, but her heart fluttered anytime he looked and smiled at her like that. Like she was the only person there.

She tore her cerulean eyes away form his emerald ones, unable to maintain the awkward eye contact.

"M-my mother told me to tell you hello. Or... at least I think that's what she said," she stuttered, changing the subject.

"That's sweet of her. When you write an owl to her, be sure to tell her that I asked about her health."

"Sure thing."

"Your sister's here this year?" he asked, peeking into another compartment.

"Yeah," she answered. "Speak of the devil," she laughed, cause the very compartment she was opening held her sister and two other first year students.

"Christian!" squealed Leigha. She jumped out of her seat and tackled Christian down with a hug.

"Gee. Thanks for the lovin' sis'," joked Cassy, looking down at Leigha and Christian, who had fallen down from the shock. Several compartment doors opened to see what had caused the commotion, only to find Leigha on top of Christian in the hallway.

Cassy gulped, seeing angry stares from some of the girls. Because... Christian... to put it simply... well he was... popular. Especially with the girls.

One girl was angry enough to shout, "Get off of him you filthy mudblood!" Cassy recognized the girl, her name was Delia Richards, a dark-skinned sixth year Slytherin.

Cassy felt her blood boil. Nobody who called her sister a mudblood was going to get away with it. She pulled out her wand and marched up to the compartment with the girl in it and slammed the door all the way open. She could hear her sister behind her, asking Christian what a mudblood was. Cassy looked inside the compartment. There were three other Slytherin girls inside, besides Delia.

She looked straight at Delia and demanded, "Did I just hear you call my sister a mudblood?"

Delia looked a little shocked, like she couldn't believe Cassy had actually barged into her compartment. Finally, after she had seemed to recover from the shock, she replied defiantly. "Well yeah! She is, isn't she? She's a filthy mudblood! And so are you! What gives you the right to hang all over him like that?" she demanded, taking a step closer to Cassy with each word.

"You— You—" Casssy started, pointing her wand angrily at Delia's face.

Delia backed away, afraid that Cassy might jinx her. Out of the corner of her eye, Cassy saw another girl pull out her want. Almost instinctively, Cassy changed the direction of her want and cried. "Stupefy!" but it was too late. The other girl had already cast her spell.

Cassy felt her body fly backwards; her back slammed again the wall of the open compartment, across from the girls. At the same time she heard a voice cry "Expelliarmus!" The people in the compartment she had fell in helped her get up and to the door.

Christian was at the doorway of the girl's compartment, a wand in each hand. Cassy stared at his back.

"There shouldn't be any violence on this train. I trust that you girls will review your actions and repent for it. I hope I will not have to cross paths with you, Ms. Foxworth," referring to the girl who had attacked Cassy," like this again," he reprimanded. He handed her wand back to her and stood there, frozen for a minute.

"Y-yes," Delia stuttered, having been the one to reply. She sounded scared. As soon as Christian turned away, Delia shut the door.

"Merlin! What'd you do? She sounded like she just saw the devil, "laughed Cassy, her hand gripping onto her side, because it hurt so bad.

Christian turned around to look at her and shook his head.

"You shouldn't have done that," he said. He took one of her arms and swung it over his shoulder so that he could help her walk. Around them they could hear the sounds of shutting doors. The show was over.

"Well what'd you want me to do? I wasn't going to stand there and let her insult my sister," she defended.

"You're too hot-blooded sometimes," he noted, helping her down the hall.

"Teasing my sister's reserved only for us," she laughed. "Ow! Can't you be more gentle?" she asked. His hand on her hip had pressed too hard.

"Sorry, I'm not too good with healing spells. I think we're going to have to ask Sara for that one. But let's go see your sister first. She looked worried sick," he informed. She nodded as he opened the door to Leigha's compartment and led her in.

Leigha was sitting across from a small, mousy looking boy with blonde, blonde hair, who looked like he was trying to comfort her, along with another girl with bushy brown locks and big brown eyes, who sat next to her.

Leigha heard the sound of the door sliding open and turned to look at Cassy and Christian, her face pasty and pale looking. She jumped up from her seat and tackled Cassy this time.

Cassy groaned. "Get off me Leigha. My hip hurts!"

Leigha quickly leapt off, afraid that sh ehad hurt her.

"Are you okay?" she asked, issuing commands to the boy with her hands so that he would scoot over for Cassy.

"No, I'm fine," Cassy told the boy before he moved.

"Leigha, listen, be careful kay? And tell me if anybody messed with you. If they do, I'm ready to beat them down to a bloody pulp. And if I can't... well this big guy can do it for you. He's got to be good for something," she joked, patting his muscular chest.

Leigha laughed, feeling a bit relieved.

"Well I'm going to go, kay little sis'?" said Cassy, more than ready to find Sara so that she could heal her hip. It was throbbing like crazy.

"Bye," said Leigha, watching as Christian helped Cassy back to the Prefects Carnage.

"In the name of Merlin's beard did you two cause a commotion! I thought you guys were just going to check on the other compartments. Never said anything 'bout fighting!" exclaimed Ryan, who had opened the door for them before they even got close to the carriage.

"Sara," called Christian, "can you fix Cassy's hip? From what if feels like, it seems like she fractured her hip bone," he informed, handing Cassy off to Sara.

Sara was sixth year Hufflepuff prefect with a mess of brown hair, which she had pulled back and braided, and a kind face with freckles dotted across her nose. She examined Cassy's hip, and, with a thoughtful look said, "Definitely fractured." She pulled her wand out of her black dress robes, which she had already put on, and pressed the wand onto Cassy's hip, muttering a spell. Instantly, Cassy felt a warm, golden sensation envelop her, but when she opened her eyes, the feeling had already left her. A little sad, she grabbed her side. Sure enough, the pain was gone.

"Thanks," she muttered before getting up to sit back down next to Christian.

"You're welcome," she heard Sara say, smiling pleasantly.

"God! Heard you guys from a mile away! 'Course, by the time we opened the door, all we saw was Christian helping you into another compartment. So what happened?" asked Ryan, words falling out of his mouth faster than Cassy could think.

For the next half hour or so, Cassy told them what had actually happened, and, still, after that, they continued to discuss the event. Cassy stopped participating after a while and turned to look at Christian, who had already fallen asleep long ago. She sighed, sometimes she wondered what he dreamt about.

From what she heard Ryan say, Delia was Simon Richard's daughter, a head honcho guy in the ministry, second to the minister himself or something like that, so she'd better watch her back, cause she had just made herself an enemy of a big spoiled brat. She pulled her dress robes over her head, they were getting close to the school. She groaned. As if she didn't have enough to worry about already, much less self proclaimed pima donnas.

She got into a black carriage with Christian, Ryan, and Sara. The carriage soared up into the sky and headed for Hogwarts, steered and lifted by nothing that Cassy knew about.

Cassy watched, along with everybody else in the Great Hall, as the first year students walked through the great oak doors. Some of them looked shaken and scared, probably from the boat ride that htey had just take to get to the school, while others looked perfectly amazed and mesmerized. Like Leigha, who was now staring at the enchanted ceiling filled with stars.

The kids followed along behind the gamekeeper, Malcolm, a big, dark-skinned man, with a shaved head. He had rags on for clothes and muscles bulging out of his Python like arms and calves. He led them up to the three legged stool with a tattered hat on top, that looked like it had been beaten and burned. He told the students to back up a little and stay there till there names were called. The first years stood there, nervous and fidgety as they watched Malcolm take a seat at the Staff's table.

Suddenly, a long tear near the brim opened, wide like a mouth, and the hat broke into a song. Cassy distinctly heard a first year student scream.

In times of old when I was new

And Hogwarts barely started

The founders of our noble school

Thought never to be parted:

United by a common goal,

They had the self same yearning,

To make the world's best magic school

And pass along their learning.

"Together we will build and teach!"

The four good friends decided

And never did they dream that they

Might someday be divided,

For were there such friends anywhere

As Slytherin and Gryffindor?

Unless it was the second pair

Of Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw?

So how could it have gone so wrong?

How could such friendships fail?

Why, I was there and so can tell

The whole sad, sorry tale.

Said Slytherin, "We'll teach those

Whose ancestry is purest."

Said Ravenclaw, "We'll teach those whose

Intelligence is surest."

Said Gryffindor, "We'll teach all those

With brave deeds to their name."

Said Hufflepuff, "I'll teach the lot

And treat them just the same."

These differences caused little strife

When first they came to light,

For each of the four founders had

A House in which they might

Take only those they wanted, so,

For instance, Slytherin

Took only pure-blood wizards

Of great cunning, just like him,

And only those of sharpest mind

Were taught by Ravenclaw

While the bravest and the boldest

Went to daring Gryffindor.

Good Hufflepuff, she took the rest,

And taught them all she knew,

Thus the Houses and their founders

Retained friendships firm and true.

So Hogwarts worked in harmony

For several happy years,

But then discord crept among us

Feeding on our faults and fears.

The Houses that, like pillars four,

Had once held up our school,

Now turned upon each other and,

Divided, sought to rule.

And for a while it seemed the school

Must meet an early end,

What with dueling and with fighting

And the class of friend on friend

And at last there came a morning

When old Slytherin departed

And though the fighting then died out

He left us quite downhearted.

And never since the founders four

Were whittled down to three

Have the Houses been united

As they once were meant to be.

And now the Sorting Hat is here

And you all know the score:

I sort you into Houses

Because that is what I'm for,

But this year I'll go further,

Listen closely to my song:

Though condemned I am to split you

Still I worry that it's wrong,

Though I must fulfill my duty

And must quarter every year

Still wonder whether sorting

May not bring the end I fear.

Oh, know the perils, read the signs,

The warning history shows,

For our Hogwarts is in danger

From internal, deadly foes

And we must unite inside her

Or we'll crumble from within

I have told you, I have warned you...

Let the sorting now begin.

The clapping that usually ensued the hat's song did not commence immediately. Not 'fore another a minute or two did somebody start to clap.

"Well, that was interesting wasn't it?" muttered Cassy to a fellow fifth year friend named Lisa as they clapped.

"Sure enough. The song seems different from the other years," noted Lisa, flipping her long blonde hair out.

"Hope my sister gets put in Gryffindor with us," said Cassy. She watched the Defense Against the Dark Arts Teacher, Professor Livingston, a man with short gray hair, and square spectacles call out the first year's names.

"Abrams, Patricia!"

A short skinny girl stepped forward nervously and placed the hat on her head.

"RAVENCLAW!" the hat called. The Ravenclaw table clapped and cheered loudly.

A second later Henry Adams joined the Slytherin table. He was a tall with short black hair.

"Wait! What!" hissed Lisa. "Since when did you tell me you had a sister?" she demanded, clapping as David Boxworth now joined the Gryffindor table.

"Just now," laughed Cassy, sticking her tongue out playfully.

Cassy and Lisa watched as the other first years were housed. Cassy cheered extra hard when Mamie Morgan and Scott Norton, the two first years who had sat with her sister were housed for Gryffindor.

Finally, she heard Proffesor Livingston call her sister's name.

"Rivers, Leigha!"

Cassy saw her sister down on the stool, her face pale as ghost. She placed the hat on top of her head. After what seemed like forever, the hat finally shouted,

"GRYFFINDOR!"

Cassy jumped up from her seat and cheered wildly, embracing her sister when she got to the table. And from the corner of their eyes, when they had glanced over to the Slytherin table, they could see Christian clapping.

"Jesse!" hissed Perry. "Stop playing with the freaking dang snitch, Professor Wilkins'," the Durmstrang Headmaster, "looking at you."

"W-what?" asked Jesse, breaking free from his daydream in which he was back at the field of flowers again. He followed Perry's gaze towards Professor Wilkins, a tall man with short graying black hair, who was staring at him disapprovingly.

"Now that Mr. Riveria has decided to rejoin us, shall I continue? This year, as you all may already know, we are going to be traveling to Hogwarts to participate in the Triwizard Tournament. The Triwizard Tournament was founded about eleven hundred years ago as a friendly competition between three of Europe's largest schools of wizardry: Hogwarts, Beaubaxton, and Durmstrang. A champion was selected to represent each school, and the three champions competed in three magical tasks. The schools took turns to host the tournament ever five years, and it was generally agreed to be a most excellent way of establishing ties between young witches and wizards of different nationalities. But the death toll was mounted so high that the tournament was discontinued. It was, as many of you probably have learned in Wizard's history class, the Tournament was reinstated four hundred years ago, but unfortunately, a Hogwarts student had perished then, in the hand of a Dark Lord named Voldemort. But do not worry, for this year the Ministry has ensured, with extra precautions, that another death will not occur, so feel free to enter if you want to. We will—" (Oh dear lord did the majority of that paragraph come out of HPGOF).

"— be bringing along the students who choose to participate," announced Madam Finn, the Beaubaxton Head Mistress, a rather tall and skinny woman with a flowery taste for clothes, "but of course we will have to eliminate some students before leaving. You all, are welcome however, to come to Final Task. The students whoa re selected to enter will come with me to Hogwarts in a month's time. There you will have classes with the Hogwarts students for the year, and will adhere to their rules and regulaation. There are, however, some changes in the rules. Students of all ages," she started, her voice so loud that it was booming, which seemed rather impossible coming from her fragile looking body, "are now permitted to enter." Caterina turned immediately to her cousin, Bella, not missing the sharp gasp or the glint in her eyes. Caterina gulped and turned her attention back to Madam Finn. "However—"

The small, dwarf-like Headmaster of Hogwarts voice spread throughout the Great Hall. He was so short, he had to stand on a tall stool to be seen by his students, and had a voice so high when he spoke, he would have made a soprano singer jealous. "— just to be clear, students below fifth year are unlikely to be chosen. And an addition to the rules," his voice squeaked on the last word making the crowd of students burst into a raucous laughter. One dark look from Malcolm, the gamekeeper, however, shut them up immediately. The Headmaster, Professor Dawns cleared his throat and stuck his nose up into the air as he continued, "As I was saying, there will also be an—"

"— assistant chosen from each school to assist their school's champion. For teamwork is just as important, or even more so important, than personal triumph," Professor Wilkins declared. "For all of those who are interested, you have all week to submit your names to Professor Winn. Now! Bedtime! Please file out!"

"Assistants?!" everybody exclaimed, all of them discussing heatedly with their neighbors about the new, unexpected development.

Jesse merely smiled at the news.

Six people, two legs for each team. It was interesting. It really was.

Wow! So finally finished writing the dang thing! Yeah! Must say that I stole so much of the Triwizard Tournament speech thingy from HPGOF. And the whole freaking Sorting Hat song from HPOTP. Thanks for reading you guys!