As soon as the Sorting ceremony was complete, food appeared on the tables. Rose dug in heartily, as she had not eaten in several hours; the snacks that Scorpius had bought had been devoured pretty quickly, and the trolley had not come back around. All around her, the other Ravenclaw students were also almost-inhaling their food. There was conversation among a few people, but for the most part, many of the students were pretty quiet apart from the noises of chewing and clanking silverware. When the eating of the students had slowed to a near-stop, the woman seated in the middle of the staff table stood up, and all the students that had been talking fell silent.

"I am Professor Clearwater," the woman began. "I'm the Headmistress of this school, as most of you know. Now, all returning students should know the rules, but I'm going to quickly go over the basics for you first years, so that way you can't get in trouble and use 'I didn't know' as an excuse." Rose sneaked a glance at her cousin Roxanne, who had used that line the previous year, along with James. The two of them, seated at the Gryffindor table, high-fived, although Professor Clearwater pretended to ignore them. "Students are not allowed to be out of their common rooms and dormitories after curfew. Any products from Weasleys' Wizarding Wheezes will be confiscated if found. Students are not allowed to go into the Forbidden Forest unless a teacher accompanies them."

She paused a moment for breath before continuing. "Students may not hex, jinx, or curse each other. Spell use is prohibited in the corridors. And obviously, students who are late to class, talk back to a professor, or do not do the work set for them will be punished. Also, prefects must be respected, and treated with the same courtesy that you would a professor, as the prefects report back to us if anything unusual happened. Anyway, I welcome you all to Hogwarts, and if the fifth year prefects would kindly escort the first years up to their common rooms?" She sat down again.

The Ravenclaw first years gathered in a little group as the two fifth year prefects came over to them. One of them was the boy who had told Rose and her friends to change into their Hogwarts robes on the train, and the other was her cousin Dominique. "All right," Dominique said. "I'm Dominique Weasley, and this is Patrick Tomlinson. Follow us, we'll show you to the Ravenclaw common room."

"Welcome to Ravenclaw," Patrick said, gesturing for them to follow as he and Dominique started walking. The first years trotted along behind them, talking amongst themselves. Rose found herself next to the girl who had been Sorted last, Veronica Yeats. Veronica was a small, slender, dainty-looking girl even shorter than petite Rose.

"Hi," Rose said, a little shyly. She hadn't interacted with too many people who weren't related to her. There was Leda and Scorpius, of course, but she wouldn't say that she was an expert at making friends quite yet. She still felt a little awkward and nervous, although she was excited about being at Hogwarts.

"Hello," Veronica said primly. "I'm Veronica Yeats. Although you probably know that because of the Sorting."

Rose nodded. "I'm Rose Weasley."

"Yes, I remember. I'm very curious about one thing, though. You were with your cousin, I know - Albus - but you were also standing next to a Malfoy and a Lestrange, and you seemed...comfortable with them, and you rode the boat with them." She made a disgusted face that involved wrinkling her button nose. "They're bad company to keep; as a Weasley, shouldn't you know that?"

Rose felt a flash of annoyance, but before she could say anything, a tall blonde girl stepped to Rose's other side, glaring at Veronica. "Are you implying that just because they're pureblood Slytherins, they're bad company? My mother was in Slytherin, you know. Not to mention that it's that sort of prejudiced attitude that caused a bloody war, twice!"

"The war was caused by people who were Slytherins," Veronica responded prissily. "So there's proof that they are bad company."

"Leda and Scorpius weren't even born then," Rose protested. "And just because their families were in Slytherin, and took part in the wars, doesn't mean that they would." She felt a little nervous arguing, but she also thought that she should defend her new friends, since they weren't there.

"Exactly!" the blonde girl said, gesturing to Rose. "See, this girl right here should probably hate Slytherins because of who her parents are, but she doesn't, because she knows that they aren't all evil!"

Rose thought the conversation probably would have gone on further, but at that point, they had reached Ravenclaw Tower, and Dominique had pressed her finger to her lips in the universal 'shh' sign. "The Ravenclaw door is not protected by a password, like the other three houses, but rather, by a riddle," the blonde Weasley said. "The door can only be opened by answering the riddle properly; if you cannot answer it, then you'll have to wait for somebody else who can to let you in. Don't worry if you get it wrong once in a while; we all have." She rapped the knocker.

A voice, seemingly coming from the door-knocker, said, "Give me food, and I will live. But give me water; I will die."

Dominique and Patrick both nodded at the same time as they understood the riddle. They did not answer it, however. "This isn't extremely difficult," Patrick said. "Can one of you try to answer it?"

"The answer is fire," a short Asian boy, whose name Rose remembered as Ling, said quietly. The door swung open, and they piled into the Ravenclaw common room. There were bookcases and tables taking up a lot of the spaces; there were several types of chairs, some cushy and comfortable, others - the ones at the tables - wooden. It was a bit cramped, perhaps, with all the furniture, and she couldn't imagine what it would be like when it was full of people, but it was nice and cozy.

"Girls' dormitories on the left, boys' on the right," Dominique said, gesturing up a stairwell, past a bust of Rowena Ravenclaw. "Your trunks should already be up there, so you might want to go up and get settled. It's getting rather late, anyway, and breakfast is at eight, so you should probably get to bed early." She adjusted her hair, which was pulled back in a tight ponytail. "Go on," she said, and the first years hurried upstairs, dividing into boys and girls as they slipped into their dormitories.

Once the girls had all claimed their respective beds, they got down to the process of introducing one another. Rose had already introduced herself to Veronica Yeats, who was still glaring daggers at the tall blonde girl, whose name was Allison Dagworth. Isabella Aberdeen, a Muggle-born who had read her textbooks almost obsessively before arriving, they learned, was a plain-looking brunette who wasn't surprised at all at her Sorting. Lastly, Nina Goldstein seemed loud, almost more of a Gryffindor than a Ravenclaw, although she promptly proved why she was Sorted into Ravenclaw when she pulled the History of Magic textbook from her trunk and began reading it.

Overall, Rose thought, the other girls seemed nice enough. Veronica seemed stuck-up and a little irritating, but not horrible, and she didn't have a problem with the others, at least not yet. It was a good feeling to have all these people that she liked who weren't related to her, and so far, she thought, she really liked Hogwarts. It was with those thoughts that she fell asleep that night, pleased at the good things that had happened already.

Getting up at seven o'clock wasn't particularly fun, she thought as she got dressed for breakfast the following morning. With five girls sharing one bathroom, it was a necessity to get up a full hour before they had to go downstairs. That didn't mean she really enjoyed it, however. She wasn't much of a morning person - nobody in their family apart from Dominique and Molly actually was - and she trudged downstairs a little grumpily with the rest of the girls. They almost got lost finding the Great Hall, but thankfully they were able to follow a third year (who, for the record, had no idea that five first year Ravenclaw girls were tailing him) all the way down.

She waved to Leda and Scorpius at the Slytherin table, and Al at the Hufflepuff table, as she sat down with the other girls. The prefects passed out schedules as the students ate, and Rose promptly looked at hers, curious to see what classes she had that day. At nine o'clock they had Herbology, then Defense Against the Dark Arts, then History of Magic, then lunch. After lunch was Charms, Transfiguration, and Potions. Every Wednesday there was an Astronomy class at midnight.

She'd share most of her classes with Al, she noted, as Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs shared all classes except for Herbology, which was Gryffindor/Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw/Slytherin. Which meant that was the one class she'd share with Leda and Scorpius. She wished it was a bit more evenly divided; it would have been nice to spend a little more time with her new friends, but at least they had one class together. Al didn't have any classes with Leda and Scorpius. That would change, of course, when third year came; since the students had to choose electives, all four houses shared the same elective times because there was less students per class.

"I don't like the idea of Herbology," Veronica said disdainfully to nobody in particular. "It sounds very dirty, and I don't enjoy getting dirt all over myself." She made the same disgusted face that she had when talking about Slytherins the previous night.

"I think History of Magic sounds interesting," Nina said. "I heard it sucks, though, because the professor - Binns - is a ghost and has this really boring voice that makes everybody drowsy."

"At least in History of Magic we don't have to work with our hands," Veronica said.

"Herbology sounds better than History of Magic," Allison jumped in. "What about you, Rose? Herbology or History?"

"Herbology," Rose replied. "I know the professor, actually. Neville Longbottom is one of my parents' friends. Besides, my mum was the only student in her year who could actually pay attention during Binns' classes." Rose had read a little of her History of Magic textbook, and while some of the information could actually be classified as interesting, the way that the professor presented it was sure to be boring. Rose's mum had said that even some of the Ravenclaws had trouble staying awake during History of Magic classes. Isabella, who was engrossed in a book, didn't look up at all, at least until an owl landed in front of her bearing the Daily Prophet. She slipped a Knut into its pouch, but kept the newspaper on the table, not reading it. "Hey, mind if I look at this?" Rose asked her.

"Go ahead."

"Thanks." Rose picked it up. She was a little curious about if they had printed anything about her and Al going to Hogwarts; they had done that when it was James' first year, and she couldn't resist checking. To her surprise, though, there was a much darker story on the first page.

DANGEROUS RUMORS SPREADING AS MUGGLE-BORN ATTACKS CONTINUE

Over the past month, there have been two separate occurrences of Muggle-borns being killed. The first victim, Lola Cruz, was killed on August 10th in her own home, while she was alone preparing supper. The second murder, which was that of Jon Bernhardt, happened on August 24th, and he was also killed while he was alone at home. Both of the victims appeared to have put up a struggle, as there was evidence of a duel in both places. The murders are thought to be connected, due to the similar circumstances, although it cannot be definite without proof.

The problem in this situation lies not only with the murder of innocent people, but the possibility of hysteria. Many years ago, the man calling himself 'Lord Voldemort' and his followers the Death Eaters got their start in much the same way. With two killings in approximately two weeks, which, according to the Auror Office, is not a very long time, then the chances of people thinking that new Dark forces are rising increases, and the rumors will continue increasing as long as the attacks continue.

We advise people to keep calm, as well as always having their wand nearby, and, especially for those who are Muggle-born, not to go places by themselves or stay home alone for long periods of time. More on this story will be printed as new details are released from the Auror Office.

Rose set the newspaper down. "Merlin," she said, spreading it across so that her roommates could see this. "I really do hope that it's just one person, and not a whole gang of people like the Death Eaters."

"Agreed," Nina said, stuffing half a piece of toast in her mouth. "I couldn't imagine if there really was some gang of lunatics like the Death Eaters. I mean, look at what our parents had to deal with while they were in school. I'd hate to have to deal with all that."

"Yeah," Rose said, nodding. "Hopefully it's just one person, and the Aurors catch him soon." She stood up. "We really should head to class." The other Ravenclaws agreed, and the ten first years, all in one group, headed off to Herbology together for their first class at Hogwarts

All right, so I thought it was necessary to introduce Rose's roommates, as they'll be mentioned several times throughout the course of this series. And, well, that turned out to be longer than I originally intended, so I decided to start adding the Dark forces plot thread now as well. Of course, that won't come into play for a little while...but you'll just have to keep reading to find out, won't you?

Thanks for reading, and please continue to review!