Sorted Out
Albus too did not want to think about it now. The critical sorting procedure now on the agenda made him forget the bad omen almost immediately.
McGonagall unrolled an impressively long sheet of parchment containing the alphabetical list of the new students and called the first name: "Anderson, William." The addressed, a slender blond boy with a narrow, slightly freckled face, went to the chair with an expression as if this were his last walk, sat down and put on the hat. One moment there was silence, then the hat shouted:
"Gryffindor!"
Under thunderous applause of the Gryffindors, Anderson was welcomed into his new Hogwarts family by the Prefects Victoire and Ethelbert with a friendly smile and handshake before sitting down at the Gryffindor table. Those within his reach patted on his shoulders, then silence returned.
"Avery, Malcolm."
"Slytherin!"
And so it went on. By now Albus knew where to look for his brother and found him. Of course, when their eyes met, James had no better thing to do than to slide the tip of his tongue between his teeth as if he wanted to hiss like a snake. The snake was Slytherin's coat of arms.
Albus, annoyed, turned his gaze away from him and looked at his cousin Victoire, who gave him and Rose an comforting smile. He tried to smile back, but his excitement made it hard for him.
While one student after another was called, he felt his entire body tremble. He would have liked to take Rose's hand just to hold on to anything, but this was out of question, what would it have looked like?
So he stood, pale and resigned, and let his gaze wander through the hall while the first-years were sent to their houses one by one. Suddenly he jerked:
"Potter, Albus."
The time had come.
While Albus felt his heart beating, the atmosphere in the hall was rather relaxed. Some Slytherins, ostentatiously bored, lolled on their chairs, Roy MacAllister and Patricia Higrave, having just welcomed "Ogilvy, Lancelot" for Slytherin, took their seats, while Victoire and Ethelbert at the Gryffindor table stood up in anticipation. The Gryffindors beamed expectantly at Albus, even James could no longer hide his joy. Albus took a quick look at MacAllister. If you belong to Gryffindor, the Hat knows better than you do, he had said, and this was what Albus held on to when he walked over to McGonagall who smiled at him imperceptibly, just with her eyes, as if to say: Don't be afraid, you'll soon be over it!
With a beating heart and trembling fingers, Albus grabbed the hat, which was way too large for a child's head and fell over his face like it had done with all the others. Sitting in the dark, he heard the hat murmuring:
"A clear case, an abnormally clear case ..."
He breathed a sigh of relief. A clear case, this could only mean one thing ...
"Slytherin!" shouted the hat.
Albus froze.
When he took off the hat, there was dead silence in the hall, and the longest ten seconds of Albus' life started. He looked up to McGonagall, who raised her eyebrows in bewilderment, to Rose, who was staring at him like petrified, to Victoire, who was groping for her chair as if she feared she would faint at any moment, to the other Gryffindors, who had blank horror written all over their faces. His glance moved over the puzzled faces of the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws to his future Hogwarts family – the Slytherins.
Pale as chalk, he rose from his chair, took a last look at the damned hat, and slunk towards the Slytherin table.
When James had made his jokes on him, Albus, laying in his bed at night, had often imagined what it would be like to come to Slytherin. They would treat him there like a cockroach on a soup plate, avoiding and mobbing him. He would be the loneliest person at Hogwarts, cut off from Gryffindor, his family's home, but a foreigner among the Slytherins, for whom he would always be the Gryffindor, and he had felt sorry for himself in advance – sometimes it did so good to feel a little sorry for oneself. Maybe they would even try to convince him of their intolerable views about Muggles and Muggle-born wizards. He would be an outsider because never, he was sure, would the word "Mudblood" pass his lips. They would hate him and make him feel their animosity always and everywhere.
However, what was on the faces of the Slytherins was not animosity, least of all hatred, just utter perplexity. As anyone else, they could not believe what they had just heard.
But when Albus had made it halfway to the Slytherin table, their freeze loosened, and suddenly a cheer out of all the Slytherin throats at once exploded, making the hall quake. They leapt to their feet, clapping and cheering, and even a little chant of "We got Potter, we got Potter!" was heard.
Roy MacAllister and Patricia Higrave had leapt with the others. Roy grinned broadly at him, shook his hand, leaned down to him and whispered: "Don't worry, you'll see: We are the nicest Death Eaters ever!"
He laughed heartily and, with a pat on Albus' shoulder, passed him on to Patricia, who hugged him, held him tightly, and – something she hadn't done with anyone else – even planted a kiss on his forehead. Albus felt his heart beat fast when she let go of him, and he even was a little dizzy. But already he was standing in a crowd of Slytherins shaking his hands and patting his shoulder so hard that it hurt. Malfoy beamed at him, shouting into the thunderous noise "My father always said the Potters actually belong to Slytherin. Now it has finally come true!", and invited him to sit next to him.
The chair Malfoy offered him had his back to the Gryffindors, and before he sat down, Albus caught a glimpse of their faces. Their expressions had darkened considerably when they impotently had to endure the triumph of the loathed Slytherins, and they were glaring at Albus as if he himself, and not the Sorting Hat, had made the decision. He turned away from them and sat down.
"Why are all the Slytherins so excited?" he wondered. Yes, it did good. It did good to be welcomed with open arms, especially now that he felt the piercing glances of the Gryffindors on his back. He was now a Slytherin – it suddenly hit him like a punch: He was a Slytherin! The uncertainty was gone, the decision had been made, he was now breathing more freely, and in view of the smiling faces all around him, he even managed to get shyly happy about it: He was a Slytherin. He wasn't yet entirely comfortable with the exuberance with which they had welcomed him, but he didn't want to think about it any more, didn't want to let it spoil the moment.
"Silence, please!"
McGonagall had magically magnified her voice to calm the tumult at the Slytherin table. "Ladies and gentlemen, with all due sympathy for your pleasure, I must ask you to take your seats again. We have not yet finished!"
She had emphasised the last sentence with particular sternness, and as always when McGonagall became stern – Albus knew it from his parents – silence returned abruptly.
The ceremony was resumed, the remaining ten students were still to be sorted into their houses. "Weasley, Rose" was the second to last. Albus silently begged for a glance from her, but he hoped in vain. Rose seemed firmly determined to look anywhere but to the Slytherin table. Who knows, Albus hoped, maybe ...
When Rose put the hat on, Albus muttered silently to himself: "Slytherin, please say Slytherin. Slytherin, Slytherin, Slytherin …"
"Gryffindor!" the hat shouted, and as cheers roared around the Gryffindor table, Albus slumped a little. Now he really felt a bit lonely.
However, anyone who assumed the Sorting Hat had caused enough surprise for the evening was proved wrong when the last student was called. It was Wildfellow.
When the hat was on his shoulders, anyone in the hall waited for the decision, but nothing happened. Ten seconds passed, thirty, one minute, two minutes ... Murmur began to arise: "It happens sometimes" – "Yes, but for so long?"
After a total of five minutes, when the noise level already equalled that of a well-attended pub on a Friday evening, the hat shouted its verdict into the hall:
"Muggle world!"
Again, dead silence. Then all people talked in confusion: "Never happened before!" – "Is the hat drunk?" – "Since when are Muggle-borns rejected?" – "Incredible!"
Albus, however, remembered what Wildfellow had told him: that without the Ministry wizards he would not have managed to pass through the barrier to Platform nine and three-quarters. Now he realised what this meant: that Bernie simply was no wizard. But this was something the others could not know.
McGonagall had the presence of mind to take Bernie by the hand and lead him into a niche of the hall that couldn't be looked into. The others should not see him cry. After a few minutes, she came back with him, who had given his tears a brave and victorious fight, magnified her voice again and said:
"Ladies and gentlemen, I apologize for the incident, which has never happened in this form before and the reasons for which are unclear to me. By virtue of my position as a Headmistress, I sort Bernard Wildfellow into ... Hufflepuff."
The Hufflepuffs applauded politely, though not excitedly. Bernie was received by the Prefects of his new house and sat down at the last available seat at the Hufflepuff table. At that moment, he probably wished to have been sent to Eton.
Professor McGonagall now took the lectern: "Welcome to Hogwarts, and for the old hands: Welcome back!" Students and teachers gave friendly applause. "I am going to be short in my welcome address: Enjoy your meal!"
While once again applause, mixed with some laughter, was heard, golden plates, cups, and cutlery, then sumptuously filled platters of all kinds of exquisite food, appeared the tables. Many of students had deliberately not eaten during the day to really fill their belly at the start-of-term feast, and this was what they were starting to do now.