"Chapter 1: The Sorting"
Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to Harry Potter. This is me toying around with innocent works of fiction for my amusement purposes. Also, I hope to create a semi-enjoyable story.
Author's Note: After posting the prologue to this awhile back, I have finally come up with the first Chapter. I don't expect this fic to be as long as my other, but I think that I have it planned out pretty nicely. I'd like to thank my lovely friend Jen for encouraging me in this, as well as Zmedlebum who has lovely writing that you should check out. That's all from me for now. Please give me feedback, I live for it. Merci beaucoup mes Amis!
~*~
Anita Kent sat alone in her compartment on the scarlet steam engine which would take her to her knew school. A whistle outside announced that the Hogwarts' Express would be pulling out of the station any minute now. She stared out the window as parents waved goodbye and latecomers rushed through toting heavy school trunks. She watched an owl drop a letter on someone's head and saw a mother shrink one of her son's school trunks with a wave of a magic wand. People came and went through a brick wall. Her own parents were on the other side of the brick barrier. It was funny how a month ago she never would have believed any of this. She still found herself squinting from time to time, sure it would all disappear.
~*~
"Anita, come downstairs," Mrs. Kent shouted.
"Mmm c'ming, mum," groaned the girl as she wrapped herself tighter in her comforter, ready to fall back asleep. Another call eliminated the chance of having a good long lie-in.
"Anita, Get your arse out of bed this instant," her father yelled up the stairs. "We need to talk to you.
Anita groaned and sat up. She pulled back the comforter and swung her legs over the side of the full sized bed. She walked across the blue carpet which covered her floor and opened her bedroom door slightly to yell back down.
"Is this about the laundry?" she yelled, incredibly grumpy, especially considering it was seven o'clock on a Saturday, "because you can tell Brian he can sort his own socks from now on."
"Just get down here!" shouted her father, sounding very impatient
Finally she opened the door the rest of the way and walked down the hall to the staircase. When she finally walked into the kitchen her mother looked slightly pale.
"Honey, we got a letter the other day..." she said.
"And what?" asked Anita impatiently. If they had gotten her out of bed early just to tell her about winning some lawn gnome competition or something she was not going to be happy.
"Well," said her father, "You are not going to be attending Panbourne this year after all."
"Ha ha," she said, "Very funny, but I'm already out of bed. Can't you let me get some breakfast in peace now?"
"Anita, this isn't a joke," said her father, rubbing his temple as if he had a headache already.
"What?" she shrieked. She stood up bumping against the table and knocking her chair to the kitchen floor with a clatter. "But I got in! You know that! I was in the top ten tested at our school. Is it the money? Don't they have scholarships?"
"Calm down," commanded her mother who didn't look so calm herself. "It's none of that."
"What is it then?" exclaimed Anita. Maybe her parents were joking. She was going to Panbourne. Her best friends, Julie and Andrea, were going to Panbourne. She'd already been shopping for supplies and her uniform was due to arrive any day now.
"We received an offer from another school," said her father.
"And you said yes?? Why would you do that without even telling me??!" Anita thought she would start bawling any minute. This had to be a joke. An awful bloody joke, but an attempt at humor nonetheless.
"Well, we didn't really have a choice..." put forth her mother. "But I think you might come to like it?"
"Never," said Anita stubbornly, now feeling an enormous rush of malice. "How could you just- "
Then the doorbell rang. For some reason this infused silence through the whole kitchen.
"Is somebody going to get that?" inquired Anita's older brother, Brian.
"Yes, of course," said her father who seemed rather twitchy. He glanced at her Mum.
Anita wondered what could be going on that her parents were jumpy over a doorbell and they wanted to send her to a new school. At last her mother opened the door with a gracious hello.
A man with a crooked nose and a long white beard stood before him, wearing something like she'd seen in all those fantasy movies and picture book stories about magic.
"Hello," he said to Anita, "Allow me to introduce myself; Professor Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."
~*~
So there she sat, alone, as the train pulled out of the station. It was so strange to be in what was truly another world; it was even stranger to consider herself a part of it. If someone had asked her to introduce herself not too long ago it would have been easy. "My name's Anita Kent. I'm eleven years old and a future student of Panbourne. I have brown hair and green eyes. My favorite color is blue and my favorite subject is science." What was it now? "I'm Anita, a witch. My favorite hobby is turning toads into teacups..." She could barely get past the witch part. How much different did that make her? Was she still the same or a whole new person? There were so many terms given to her now: witch, muggleborn, Hogwartian? (What odd names this world had...) She thought she still looked the same on the outside, but somehow she felt like a different person. It was as if even she didn't know herself.
She was also unsure of how she'd fit in. Well, rather, whether she'd fit in at all. Thankfully she'd managed to grasp some of the concepts of this wizarding world with the aid of many books she'd bought in Diagon Alley's book store, Flourish and Blotts. There had also been a few letters from another girl-witch who had been born into a non-magic family. She'd started a school program after being selected as a prefect or something. What had her name been? Harmony maybe? No, that couldn't be right.
Now Diagon Alley itself had been an "interesting" place if you wanted to put it as such. When she and her family had entered the Alley none of them had been able to prevent gasping. They'd gone to the most imposing building first, the Gringott's Bank. After changing money she had gone through the shops to purchase supplies. There had been many magnificent sights and Anita was surprised repeatedly by what she saw. Window displays belched loudly and the people around her had talked about the oddest things. By the end of the day she had been exhausted though and they had stopped in Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlor. Looking back now she could remember what they'd over heard almost word for word.
"Really," said one older witch who was holding a sherbert Ice Cream cone, "I don't think they should be admitting students like that to Hogwart's at all. It just isn't the way things are meant to be."
Anita had listened further to this conversation only to discover that she was one of the students "like that." She was one of "the other kind." She was a muggle. And by some accounts a mudblood. The discovery of the prejudice that many witches and wizards seemed to hold had frightened Anita, though she'd never admit it. She certainly didn't think that she had dirty blood...
Anita was jolted out of her reverie as the door to her compartment slid open. A girl and a boy who looked to be around her age or perhaps a bit older entered the compartment. The girl had long blond hair and her eyes were almond both in color and shape. She was the first to speak.
"Is there room for more in this compartment?" inquired the girl.
Anita simply nodded, giving a small smile. She glanced at the boy and noticed that both he and the girl the same eyes. He looked very like the girl though his face was more angular and he had brown hair.
"Hello," he said, extending his hand, "I'm Matthew."
"And I'm Caera," added the girl as she dragged a large brown trunk in from the corridor, using her foot to shove it as close to the wall as she could.
"It's nice to meet you," said Anita as they both sat down on the bench facing her.
"You too," replied Caera. "So what year are you in?"
"It's my first year," replied Anita, "How about you two?"
"It's my second, but Caera's first," said Matthew.
"What house do you want to be in?" inquired Caera.
"I'm not really sure yet," replied Anita, twirling a strand of hair around her finger. "We don't get to choose anyway, do we?"
"Of course not," said Matthew, "The sorting hat will do that."
"Sorting hat?" said Anita curiously.
"You'll see when we get there," said Matthew, "besides I don't want you to miss out on the element of surprise."
"Maybe we'll be in the same house," said Caera cheerfully. "I do hope I'm in Gryffindor."
"That's where I am," replied Matthew, "courage, valor, all of the good stuff."
Anita nodded trying to remember everything they'd said. The information pamphlets she'd received had explained the house system somewhat. She knew there were four, and that they were made up of students who shared certain characteristics. The process used to divide students, she didn't know about. All she had to go on was Matthew's mention of a hat. The thought of a magical hat deciding where she would spend seven years of schooling unnerved her a bit- not that she'd admit that to these two, who obviously found it quite normal.
"What are the other three houses, again?" Anita asked him.
"Well you've got Ravenclaw for the witty, Slytherin for the ambitious and cunning, and Hufflepuff for the loyal and hardworking."
Anita nodded.
"What's your bloodline, by the way?" he inquired. Anita noticed Caera giving him a look that would've made her shut up instantly.
"Oh," she replied. She decided to start using one of the newly introduced words now. "They're both er muggles."
"Well then," said Matthew, "You won't have to worry about getting into Slytherin."
"Why?" said Anita, thrown once more.
"They can be a nasty lot from what I've heard," said Caera. "They're very pureblood."
"Oh, right, yeah," stated Anita. That didn't sound very appealing. "So is it against the rules for someone without magic parents to get in it then?"
"Technically, no," replied Matthew, "It isn't written down anywhere. I can't think of a single muggleborn to get in though. Slytherin himself wasn't fond of them."
Before Anita could pursue the matter further a snack cart was rolled to their compartment. Matthew and Caera forked over a few coins immediately, purchasing a few pumpkin pasties and some chocolate frogs. Anita fumbled with her money, trying to remember how many sickles there were to a Knut. She counted them out awkwardly and bought herself about five chocolate frogs.
The scenery of Scotland could be seen rolling along as the train drew closer and closer to its destination. Hills and trees had all begun to look the same by this point, though still quite lovely. The three occupants in Anita's compartment ate their sweets happily in companionable silence for awhile. Caera even dozed off for a few minutes or so, but woke abruptly when one of Anita's chocolate frogs leapt straight from the packaging to her forehead.
Eventually the children began to grow restless and quite a bit bored. It was then that Matthew rifled through his trunk to pull out a deck of exploding snap cards. The card game provided laughter and amusement for about an hour. Caera had the most success of them all and had built a palace of a card castle for herself. Anita was in the middle with Matthew being the worst. His singed eyebrows showed his lack of skill and luck in this game. When everyone had tired of that they'd proceeded to play a game or two of gob stones, but that too lost its novelty.
Everyone settled into silence once more. Anita had taken out her copy of Standard Book of Spells: Grade 1 when the compartment door slid open. Two boys about her age stood outside the door. Both of them were a pale sort, but one had dark black hair and the other sandy brown.
"Well, hello," stated the boy with darker hair. He seemed to be the more imposing of the two.
"Hi," said Anita, trying to sound friendly. These two were a bit strange, and almost menacing.
"Hey," echoed Matthew and Caera.
"You two are new," the visitor commented, indicating with his glance that he meant Caera and Anita. The other boy next to him remained silent, barely nodding along.
"I'm Andrew Blair, and you're Caera Donovan?" he questioned and Caera nodded.
"Oh, a waste then, you'll be a Gryffindor just like your brother."
Caera frowned at this but he'd already turned to Anita.
"Any chance you'll be a Slytherin?" he inquired. "I'm already set there. What's your name?"
"Anita Kent," she answered the second question.
"Oh, not a familiar wizarding surname. Muggleborn then?"
"Yes," she answered, not liking where this was going at all.
"Oh, pity. I'll be going then," said Andrew. He left swiftly; the sandy haired boy remained nameless and followed him out.
"About time," interjected Caera as the door slid shut behind him.
Matthew snorted and Anita was still frowning.
"Well that was pleasant," Anita asserted sarcastically.
"Don't worry," replied Caera. "Hopefully you won't see that much of him. After all he's bound to be in Slytherin."
"So it would seem," said Anita. "It's too bad so many of this lot are bloody prejudiced. Well except you two so far."
Matthew and Caera nodded sympathetically. This soothed Anita's temper slightly, but she doubted they could understand or feel it to the full extent that she did. The wizarding world was proving to be much like the normal one. It was full of prejudices, and now she was being caught on the victim's side of them. It grated at her nerves and she knew that she'd have to watch her temper already. She'd show them all though. If Hogwarts had accepted her, then she'd make as damned a good witch as any of them. And that, she told herself, was a fact.
~*~
Three hours later Anita Kent found herself in the Great Hall. She was still shocked by how magnificent the castle had turned out to be. And then there had been the boat ride as well, along with the Giant Squid. She noticed that she wasn't the only first year who stood wide-eyed in the center of the hall. All of the first years waited in line as the strict Professor McGonagall brought forth a stool, upon which stood a tattered hat. Anita wondered whether this was the actual "sorting hat", but her doubts vanished when the brim of the hat split open. It had begun to sing. Several jaws dropped.
Though I am just a tattered hat
Listen well to me
Pay very close attention
And we'll see where you shall be
Perhaps you'll be in Ravenclaw
With those of stunning smarts
They suck up facts from books
From history to art
Or perhaps in Hufflepuff
Is the place for you?
Where you will meet loyal friends
Who are all hard-working too
Then of course there's Gryffindor
If you think you've got the nerve
If you possess the bravery
This placement you deserve
Or perhaps there's room in Slytherin
For a cunning child like you
To achieve your goals
You know, you'll do what you must do
So try on this old tattered hat
Into your mind I'll see
Then my child I'll tell you
Where you ought to be!
Anita waited patiently as students from the beginning of the alphabet were called one by one. Some of them took longer than others, but the hats decision always came out sounding just as firm. She paid vague attention as Andrew Blair was sorted into Slytherin, just as he'd predicted. Donovan, Caera was next and Anita watched her approach the hat. She waited for it to bellow Gryffindor, but instead the hat gave a shout of RAVENCLAW. Caera glanced at her brother, gave a little shrug, and walked over to the applauding Ravenclaw table, smiling anyway. More followed, a blonde girl with pigtails was the first new Ravenclaw. Others followed. Griffin, Tracy- Higgins, Clark – Destine, Mary. Eventually Professor McGonagall made her way down the list to Kent. Anita walked to the stool, trying to step with a confident stride. She was lucky, she thought, many of these other first years had to worry about family loyalties when being sorted. Her parents could care less as long as she was in the right one for her.
"Oh my, oh my, where to put you?" said the tattered hat. "So many qualities within, I daresay we've got every house in here. Now which of the three to choose from... You are very..."
"But there are four houses," she thought fiercely, frowning. "What have you cancelled out?"
"Slytherin of course!" said the hat. Then as if it had realized something, "Unless..."
Anita cut off the voice in her head, remembering the nasty blond boy from the train, and mentally spoke back to it, "This practically drives me insane!" She fumed, "What is all this no muggleborn rubbish, I bet I could do twice as well as any of those people who think they're so noble blooded. The whole lot of them!"
"Well you have the ambition..." said the hat, "and I do think it's about time... Very well, welcome to
"SLYTHERIN!"
And then the great hall was surrounded by a hush. When Anita removed the hat and placed it back on the stool she realized they were all staring at her. Now would be the time to make a witty comment, to let them know that she wasn't anything to examine under a microscope, to make them leave her alone. A lump formed in her throat though and she couldn't think of anything even half-clever to say. She gulped, and then began to walk to the Slytherin table at what felt to her an agonizingly slow pace.
What had she gotten herself into?