No one joined Minerva in her train compartment, and she didn't seek anyone out, being quite content to enjoy the scenery and look over the textbooks she had in anticipation of all she was about to learn. She found the train ride quite agreeable.
The food trolley came by with some very interesting treats, none of which she had money for. The pumpkin pasties smelled especially good. Her stomach gave an undignified rumble that she hoped the trolley witch didn't hear. She reminded herself that she would be eating at Hogwarts very soon.
The plump professor who had greeted them led the way. He seemed pleasant enough but there was something about this Professor Slughorn she didn't like, and it wasn't his slimy-sounding name.
They boarded boats. She was rather glad then that she hadn't eaten anything on the train for the ride across the Black Lake made her seasick though she wouldn't have turned down a biscuit to nibble on just then.
"Who are your parents?" Slughorn asked as if he had been asking all the students that.
She thought it a strange question to ask before even asking for her own name, but she obliged, being that he was a teacher. "Reverend McGonagall and my mother would have been Isobel Ross when she attended school here."
"A reverend is a strange profession for a wizard. I remember your mother. She was here my first year of teaching. Talented witch as I recall. Then she just dropped off the radar."
She didn't correct his mistaken assumption that both her parents had magical abilities, not because she was embarrassed but simply because she thought it was none of his business. "She leads a simple life now, keeping house and raising a family."
"I must have your mother confused for another Isobel Ross. The girl I knew wouldn't have been happy without employing her considerable gifts in a grand way."
Once again, she didn't correct his assumption that he had the wrong Isobel in mind, and he moved onto another student.
The castle was as grand as her mother had told her. Professor Slughorn led them all the way to the Great Hall where they took their seats and where the headmaster greeted them from the front of the room.
Professor Dippet, the headmaster, was a bearded man with a serious countenance that was refreshing. "Welcome to Hogwarts. If you follow our rules, this will be an enjoyable time in your life. A time of great learning and a time to make friendships that will last a lifetime." He proceeded to list those rules of which there were many.
When the speech was finished, it was time to bring out the hat. It didn't look like a remarkable piece of headwear on first glance, being an ordinary brown and worn, but it had a face, and it sang a song.
"I am the cap that will tell your future.
For your future at Hogwarts is dictated by who you are.
Reading your mind, I never make a blooper.
Your thoughts will tell me the house to which you belong.
Will you be a Gryffindor lion, strong and brave,
Fearing none but courteous to others?
Will the student next to you be one you save,
Using the strength and courage of the lion's paw?
Or will you be the Ravenclaw eagle, quick of wit,
Finding value in those that seek their own path?
Very little gets past your eye as the Grey Lady would've had it,
And your mind is as sharp as the eagle's talon.
Or perhaps you are the Hufflepuff badger, hardworking and true,
Deceptively quiet until provoked and then watch out!
But patient and loyal above all, you are true blue.
In your burrow, one can find humility, friendliness, and good cheer.
Or maybe you're the Slytherin snake thus ambitious and crafty,
So willing to reach your goals, you'll use whatever at your disposal.
The parselmouth spoke. 'Accept second-rate or muggle blood?' laughed he,
'No self-respecting serpent would'; you shed the rules like you shed your skin.
Courageous, brilliant, kind, or great,
You wonder what you'll be when Hogwarts you depart.
Even for a most peculiar hat, this is so very easy,
A man becomes the thoughts he thinks in his heart."
She didn't know what house she wanted to be in. Only that she didn't want to be in Slytherin. Shedding rules and using whatever was at your disposal did not sound appealing at all. Her mother had been sorted into Gryffindor, and she was sure it would please her mother if she did as well.
She watched the sorting closely. For some, the hat barely touched their head before it shouted out a house. For otherse, it took a little longer.
When at last her name was called, she made her way to the stool. With great inward excitement and curiosity, she took a seat while a kindly-looking professor placed the hat on her head, she waited for the hat to shout her house.
Only he didn't. He began a long conversation with her, asking her questions that were more prying than Professor Slughorn's had been. What was she looking forward to studying the most? What frightened her the most? And the like. She was looking forward to it all, and she wasn't sure what there was to be frightened about as long as one did the right thing. Didn't her father teach her that God always walked with her?
"It's been over 5 minutes," she heard a student whisper in amazement though it echoed loudly in the quiet hall.
"Though you would do well in Ravenclaw, I put you in Gryffindor!" shouted the hat at last, and there was cheering and clapping as she went to join their table.
"You were in a hatstall," said the girl she sat down beside.
"What's a hatstall?"
"Something that almost never happens. The sorting hat knows his job well, and while he can take some time every once in a while figuring out a house, it very rarely goes over 5 minutes. As in no one can quite recall the last time there was one."
"Hmm."
When the sorting finished, it was time for the feasting. She prayed silently over her meal though it seemed no one else did. The meal was far above the simple meals allowed to a parson. It wasn't called a feast lightly. So much rich food appeared and disappeared in her plate, she feared she was in danger of committing gluttony. She had to exercise great self-control, but she was still left feeling satisfyingly full.
The prefects lead them up to the common room, which didn't seem an altogether trouble-free task with all the moving staircases, but she supposed it was something one got used to, along with the talking portrait of a woman who'd obviously had no qualms about committing gluttony herself.
She walked into a room that was decorated heavily in red and gold with a roaring fire and stuffed chairs. The common room looked and felt like it could be quite a comfortable place to spend time in, a real home away from home.
The poster bed with a thick scarlet blanket looked far better than her own bed at home, but before she climbed into it, she put her knees to the cold, hard floor. Her heart was full and under no roof had the sense of belonging been more complete. "Thank you, God, for allowing me to come to Hogwarts."