A/N: Garrr, that first chapter so did not come out the way I wanted it to.I had to change the file type and it messed everything up. I'll go back and fix it later so it's more understandable, but at the moment I'm too lazy. :)

Chapter Two:

The sorting hat. It was by far the oddest thing young Numair had ever come across. Then again, he was also scared half out of his mind. A talking hat didn't help any.

He sat that there, listening to the hat whisper in his ear,
debating on were to put him. Mere moments before his sister had been placed in Gryffindor, and he hoped with all his heart he'd end up there too, but it wasn't looking that way.

"Hmmmmm. I think you'd do mighty fine in Ravenclaw. Brilliant mind. Quite the book worm I see..... but no, I don't think that would quite work. You're far to ambitous for that." the hat almost sounded..... pitying. "You're going to really be something kid,
but Ravenclaw isn't it. No Gryffindor, no matter what you may wish.
Pity. You'd have done well."

"SLYTHERIN!"

Numair nearly jumped out of his skin when the hat shouted out. The feeling was even worse when he realised the choice the hat had made.
Slytherin. Slytherin. Were all the evil wizards came from. He numbly removed the hat and walked to the table on the far side of the great hall were the Slytherin table was still clapping enthusiasticaly for their newest edition.

"Hey, welcome to Hogwarts kid." he didn't know who said it, nor did he care. The only thing on his mind was that he'd been sorted into Sytherin Ani had not.

He took a seat between a dark haired boy mayby a few years older than him and an empty seat. The older boy completely ignored him, for which he was greatful. He watched the others get sorted one by one. Emerson ended up in Slytherin too. He took the empty seat beside Numair, grinning as though being put in Slytherin was exactly what he'd wanted. Like it was a good thing. Numair wished he could share his new friend's enthusiasm.

Dumbladore, a tall silver haired wizard, rose and gave a start of term speech that Numair didn't listen too. He was too buisy looking acroos the room to the table were his sister was, already chatting with a red haired second year girl, looking quite happy. She didn't even seem to care he'd ended up in another house. He turned back to face his own table, which had just been covered in food, but he wasn't hungry. He was scared. And suddenly he felt very lonely. Ani was in Gryffindor,
making friends, and he was over here, feeling miserable. It wasn't fair.

"Hey, what's wrong?" he looked up to see Emerson looking at him with concern.

"Oh, nothing. Nothing at all."

The first few days at Hogwarts weren't all that bad, but they weren't all that good either. Numair and Emerson went to all their classes together, talked alot. He even talked with some of the other first years. He still felt miserable in side, though he tried his best not to show it.

Ani spoke to him rarely, looked at him even less. He got the impression she was enjoying this new found freedom. He'd always followed her around,
as attached to her as another limb. He was with out a doubt the most emotionaly immature of the pair. He couldn't do anything without Ani.
She'd gotten frustrated with him more than once, often telling him it was more like having a baby brother than one that was the same age as her, but she'd allways forgive him and seek him out were ever he'd gotten off to.

Here, it wasn't like that. It was almost as if she avoided him on purpouse. Like she didn't want to be with him. He supposed it would ware off as she got over the newness of him not being able to follow her all day, but at the moment it was very depressing.

And they'd been sorted in to two houses with extreme rivalry. It'd be impossible to spend time with her even if she wanted him to. Heh. Couldn't get much worse.

Atleast Numair did well in all his classes. It was all far to easy. He even found himself enjoying flying class, and he had a severe fear of hights. Atleast it kept him buisy. Nothing like flying all the way around the grounds, upside down, Madame Hooch desperately chasing after you, trying to instruct you on how to stop or run into something that would knock you out of the air without killing you........

The days flew by quite uneventfuly. He went to classes. He did homework.
He studied. Read. Got chased by Peeves. Nothing out of the ordinary.

Halloween came and went. The feast was truely amazing, so Numair heard.
He hadn't gone. Instead, he and Emerson had been sneaking around the castle. The next day Professor McGonagle found a lovely little green snake in her desk drawer.

Finally, at long last, it was Christmas. To Numair's relief, both twins desided to go home for the holidays. It was actually kind of nice. Their parents at least pretended they weren't on the verge of removing one another,
and Ani talked to him more than she had in months. Everything seemed normal again. She told him all about how her year had been so far, how she'd made a ton of friends. He listened, just happy to share her company.
It was nice to not be ignore for once.

When he asked her why she had, he wished he hadn't.

"I haven't been ignoring you Numie, I've been distancing myself from you, and with good reason! I'm not always going to be around, and you need to learn to function on your own. I love you, but I'm sick and tired of being treated like we're one person, 'cause we're not. Everybodies always shoving us together, when really we should be spending more time apart. I thought that by being away from you as much as possible you might,
well, I thought you just might grow up a little bit! You're such a baby sometimes!"

After that he'd gone out back to their hill and didn't come back in till the next day. No one seemed to care. It made him want to cry.
And the worst part was, she was right. She was right. And it wasn't fair.

Numair spent the rest of his holiday locked in his room, reading the new books he'd gotten for Christmas. Once or twice his mother came to ask him what was wrong, but he just shrugged it off,
telling her nothing was wrong and he didn't want to be bothered.

He was glad when school started again. He and Emerson spent all their time causing as much trouble as possible. And Numair began to notice that he and his friend were avoided by most everyone, mostly because of Emerson. For reasons Numair couldn't even begin to comprehind,
Emerson Linwood was extremely different. He knew things other kids said he shouldn't. Their troublemaking didn't help his reputation any.

It helped to pass the time. Which flew by at great speed. Easter came and then was gone. School exams. The boys scraped by on those. Ani did excellent. They went home for what was with out a doubt the worst summmer of their lives.

Numair was mad at Ani, for reasons he couldn't explain. When she asked him why he'd no longer speak to her the way he used to, he said simply, "Well,
don't you see sister? I've grown up. I thought you'd be proud of me."