Chapter Thirty-Six
Slytherin's Newest Member

Once everyone was safe and sound back in good old Hogwarts, Dumbledore stood up in the Great Hall to make an important announcement to all the students gathered there. "Now, Severus, think before you make those accusations!" he said in front of everyone. "I'm not the one who borrowed your black silk panties! If you ask me, I suspect Hagrid."

Snape's pale face went several shades darker. Hagrid buried his face in his beard.

Dumbledore smacked himself in the forehead. "Wait, wrong announcement!"

The students all sighed with relief.

"The real announcement is this: the Sorting Hat has confessed to a dreadful secret. Six years ago it cheated when sorting one of our students!"

A series of gasps filled the Great Hall.

"That's right, boys and girls," said Dumbledore, nodding his elderly head. "An error was made when Harry Potter got sorted six years ago! We'll have to re-sort him."

"Re-sort me?" Harry cried. "But that's ridiculous!"

"It's justice, my dear Harry," Dumbledore replied calmly. "The Sorting Hat has been under suspicion ever since it got caught taking a bribe from a student trying to avoid Hufflepuff. After some further investigations, the hat was put on trial and finally confessed to a series of terrible crimes, including an unfair bias when you were sorted! So naturally, Harry, we'll have to redo the whole process." Dumbledore's eyes twinkled behind his glasses. "Care for a lemon drop before you get sorted?"

"No, I don't want a lemon drop!" said Harry. "I want to stay right where I am!"

"Relax, Harry," said Ron. "You'll probably get sorted back into Gryffindor!"

Harry sighed. "I hope you're right."

He got up from the Gryffindor table and trudged to the center of the Great Hall, where the Sorting Hat sat waiting on its stool. He was ready to meet his fate and place the hat upon his head, but an interruption suddenly broke out. Seamus, who was dressed all in green and enjoying a nice meal of corned beef, cabbage, and the finest Irish whiskey, suddenly leaped up and started doing a Riverdance jig on top of the Gryffindor table.

McGonagall grabbed her purple megaphone and shouted, "Seamus Finnigan, go be stereotypically Irish someplace else!"

"Top o' the mornin' to ya!" Seamus announced drunkenly as he toppled off the table.

Dumbledore coughed. "Well, now that our minor interruption has passed, let's get this boy sorted! Harry, if you would put on the hat, please?"

Harry reluctantly placed the hat on his head. He found himself wondering if anybody ever washed the hat, or if it carried lice from all the thousands of students that wore it.

Definitely, the Sorting Hat agreed. I'm absolutely crawling with lice! Nobody's bothered to wash me since Godric Gryffindor was alive!

"Speaking of Gryffindor…" Harry murmured. "Do you think you might consider—"

Not so fast, young man! That's what got me into trouble. Now, let me take a peek inside your soul and… Merlin's ice cream sandwich! Is that a Twinkie I see?

"Y-yes," Harry confessed, hanging his head in shame. "I've never tasted one, you know. Dudley always kept them from me!"

Well this is enough to send you straight to Hufflepuff!

"No! Have mercy!"

Not this time, buddy. Remember why you're here! Now give yourself a nice round of applause because your new home is going to be… SLYTHERIN!

"Wait, what?" cried Harry, completely stunned. "I don't see the logic behind this!"

I'm a talking and singing hat, the Sorting Hat reminded him. I don't see it either.

"Well you heard the hat, my boy!" said Dumbledore. He rushed forward and draped a green and silver scarf around Harry's neck. He sighed happily. "It really brings out the color of your eyes!"

"I agree!" Blaise said from the Slytherin table. She was currently a girl and cast longing looks in Harry's direction.

"This is an outrage!" Draco protested. "That foolish old hat must have made a mistake!"

"I agree!" said Pansy. "Potter doesn't belong in our house."

"No, Pansy," said Draco sadly. "You misunderstand me. This is an outrage because… if Harry was really a Slytherin the whole time, then why didn't he want to become best friends with me?" His eyes filled up with tears.

Pansy stared at him in disgust. "You should have been the one named Pansy."

Neville tried to heroically climb on top of the Gryffindor table to announce himself as the Official Gryffindor Stud, but he tripped and fell flat on his face. He tried to get up and resume his seat, but only succeeded in knocking over a jug of pumpkin juice and spilling it on the floor.

"Forty billion points from Gryffindor, Longbottom!" barked McGonagall.

Neville put his face in his hands as various students snickered at him. "Oh, drat. It seems my buff, outgoing, fearless personality is slipping away from me with Harry's departure!"

"And take a look at what Hermione's doing!" Dean remarked.

"I could see if her chest wasn't—" Neville blinked and rubbed his eyes. "Hey, Hermione's chest isn't in the way for once!"

"And she's actually reading!" whispered Dean. "She hasn't touched a book in months!"

It seemed the entire castle had gone topsy-turvy since Harry's re-sorting. Even the Hogwarts staff was affected by these uncanny changes. Dumbledore stood up with yet another announcement. "In order to help Snape cope with the dreadful fact that Harry Potter is now in his house, I have promoted him to Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher! Sirius Black will take his place as potions master."

"Are you sure putting Sirius in charge of potions is a good idea?" Harry wanted to know.

"Of course, Harry," Dumbledore said wisely. "It will be quite all right."

A loud BOOM! suddenly came from the direction of the dungeons.

"But what about me?" demanded Remus. "Defense Against the Dark Arts was my job! You can't just give it away to a greaseball like Snape in the middle of the school year!"

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled with great wisdom. Or maybe just a trick of the light. Nobody knows for sure. "Never fear, my dear Remus. I haven't forgotten you. In fact, I've already got a little job lined up for you that I think you'll enjoy very much."

Remus eagerly sat up. "Oh, goody. What is it?"

"I have appointed you as the official person who operates my cheese grater for me!"

"WHAT?"

"My cheese grater, Remus! Somebody has to operate it." Dumbledore got a dreamy look in his eyes. "Ahh, the power of grated cheese!"

Remus slumped down in his seat. "I should have known."

Dumbledore clapped his hands. "Well, children, off to class with you! Have fun in your new house, Harry." Just as the Slytherin students were trickling out of the Great Hall, Dumbledore crept over to Blaise and tapped her on the shoulder. "Before you go, Mr—I mean, Miss Zabini, I'd like a word with you please."

Blaise looked up at the professor with sparkling eyes. "Yes, professor? Is this… what I think it is?"

Dumbledore nodded his wise old head, then dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "I believe so. It is time, for me to tell you what I should have told—"

"Yes, yes, I know that part already! Get to the good stuff!"

"Very well, Blaise," said Dumbledore. "I've guarded this deep, dark secret throughout your entire life, but now the time has come for me to confess. I was there on the day you were born!"

Blaise gasped. "Then surely you must know—"

"Oh, yes. I do indeed, my dear child. I was there that day, working as a janitor in the hospital to earn some extra cash to buy myself a giant squid. You've met Squiddly-Diddly-Doo, haven't you? Anyway, I was mopping the floors when you came into existence! I even caught a glimpse of your birth certificate before the boss yelled at me to clean the toilets."

Blaise was quivering all over with excitement. Her eyes glowed and her heart pounded with anticipation. "Oh, professor. I thought I'd never learn the truth! Please, please tell me what I am!"

Dumbledore wiped his half-moon glasses on a corner of his robes, placed them back on his nose, and looked Blaise solumnly in the eye. "Aardvark."

"Wh-what?"

"Aardvark," Dumbledore repeated.

"But that's not a gender!"

"Potato," Dumbledore said wisely. "Sweet potato pie."

"Professor, please, I just want to know—"

"Perhaps," Dumbledore whispered, leaning closer to Blaise, "if you'd like to learn the truth, you should follow the spiders."

Indeed, there was a trail of spiders crawling across the Great Hall and out onto the Hogwarts grounds. Blaise eyed the spiders doubtfully. "Well, if it's the only chance I've got, I guess I'll take it. But first I'd better become a boy. My girl self is terrified of spiders!"

And a distinctly male Blaise took off after the trail of spiders while Dumbledore faded mysteriously into the shadows. Meanwhile, Remus was in Dumbledore's office, looking sulky while he grated a giant block of gouda cheese.

"I deserve a raise for this," he muttered.