Chapter Two
Starting as they Mean to Go On
Charles Weasley, or Charlie as he was known to most was head boy this year, following in the footsteps of Bill, the eldest brother. He and his younger brother Percy would be joined by Weasley twin brothers this year. The two eldest Weasleys were very much head boy material, and were a pleasure to teach. Slatero was three years older than Charlie, having left and returned after a year away studying with the likes of aurors. Davina was the same age as him, joining the staff the same year. Both of them had only expected a temporary placing, but had been asked back for another year.
Slatero and Davina were put on station duty
with Hagrid. The night air was oddly bitter as the three of them walked down.
Slatero wore a Cossack style fur hat in an effort to hide his hair.
"You'll just get hat hair!" Davina laughed as he came out to the gates
to meet them.
The train was on time as per usual. The station master stood with them, a pocket
watch in one hand, staring down the track. Behind him were a team of house elves
and the horseless carriages.
"Seventeen, sixteen..." Slatero noticed his friend staring at the
moon.
"Clear night, despite the wind." He commented.
"Thirteen, twelve..." The steam of the Hogwarts Express appeared over
the trees and the scarlet engine came into view, slowing for the station.
"Seven, six..."
"Goin' t' be on time, I don't know why 'e counts." Hagrid sighed,
holding the lantern up higher, well over their heads.
"Three, two, one..." The train halted and the carriages bumped gently,
sending a wave of clanks up and down the train. Doors were flung open into the
darkness along the platform, students piling out.
"First years this way!" Hagrid called over the milling mass of heads.
Davina and Slatero got on the train at the front and worked their way through
the compartments with the elves following them, taking bags and trunks off the
train. Something black flew out of the third compartment down. Slatero quickly
identified it as a bat, and was off in pursuit.
"Honestly!" Davina sighed in mock indignation. There was a crash from
further down the train. Davina pulled her head out of a compartment and looked
down the corridor. She guessed Slatero had run into a student while capturing
the bat. By his triumphant grin on finding his feet, she took her guess to be
correct. He held a huge bat in his hands.
"Fruit bat, not Vampire, but puzzling why it's inside and here."
"I just hope it didn't enter too suddenly." Davina commented. Both of
them knew a sudden entry into a dwelling, or perhaps even a train, signified the
death of an occupant.
"Either that or it signifies good weather." Slatero inspected the bat
and held out one of the wings.
"What are you going to do with it?" Davina asked, eyeing the bat
sceptically before checking the next compartment.
"Keep if of course." Slatero replied, deep in concentration inspecting
the wing.
"I thought it was a fruit bat."
"I'm hardly going to keep a live vampire bat am I, so this will be a
worthwhile teaching aid." Slatero said, tapping the bat with his wand. It
vanished. Davina didn't ask. They finished checking the train and station then
apparated to the gates with the statues of winged boars and hopped up on the
back of the last horseless carriage.
Davina and Slatero found their seats (Slatero
once again beside Severus) at the staff table. Dumbledore smoothed his robes
down as he gazed across the decorated great hall. Each house table was nearly
full, students sat before golden plates and goblets lit by the floating candles.
Slatero took his hat off and Severus stared at his hair. Davina started
laughing. The Defence against the Dark Arts teacher stared from one professor to
the other.
"What?" He demanded. Davina stood up and started to untangle the
shrunken bat from his hair. As she worked at it, the doors of the Great Hall
opened, and silence fell. Rather than leave Slatero with the bat, Davina kept
going. Minerva lead a long line of first-years to the front before the staff
table.
"Weasleys..." Severus muttered, seeing the two identical twins walk
jauntily up the hall. McGonagall placed the hat on the three-legged stool and
soon it broke into song. Davina finally freed the bat from Slatero's hair and it
escaped from her hands, the spell wearing off. It shot up towards the enchanted
sky. Attention was turned from the hat, to the bat....
"For Merlin's sake you two." Severus muttered, drawing his wand, but
before he could do anything the bat exploded, sending a shower of coloured
lights out.
"Bravo Severus." Albus said, the sorting hat finished its song and the
hall clapped. Slatero noticed, as Severus protested his innocence that Charlie
was glaring at his twin brothers.
Minerva seemed unaffected by the bat and proceeded with the large scroll of
parchment in her hands.
"Oh bloody hell, put the hat back on." Davina hissed. Slatero shoved
the hat back on, wishing silently that he didn't have hair at all to worry
about.
The sorting proceeded in much the same fashion
as before following that mishap.
"It must have been the." Davina whispered to Severus and Slatero as
McGonagall called:
"Weasley, Fred," and the first of the twins sat down on the stool. All
previous Weasleys has been Gryffindors. The sorting hat pronounced Weasley
"GRYFFINDOR!" Almost immediately; Fred hurried to his table to sit
with Lee Jordan, their dreadlocked friend, to watch his twin's sorting.
"Weasley, George," The second of the twins sat down on the stool and
once again the hat shouted "GRYFFINDOR!"
The two Weasley twins were reunited and also with their families. Dumbledore
stood.
"A most lively and entertaining sorting, I must say, now, time for the
feast." Dumbledore clapped his hands and the plates filled. The happy
chattering returned.
"There isn't anyone else who has pulled a stunt like it." Slatero
agreed. Severus frowned at them, and then sneered.
"One lesson with me and they'll regret that bat."
"Who would that be Severus?" McGonagall asked, sitting down the other
side of him. The head of Slytherin declined to reply.
"What was it doing in here anyway?" Minerva asked, serving some pork
onto her plate.
"We brought it off the train." Davina replied. Slatero looked at her
oddly.
"It was me who brought it in here Minerva, it was a fruit bat." He
admitted. Minerva just nodded, smiled slightly and said:
"Like the hat." Slatero blushed and stared at his plate. He knew the
underlying message.
"It's not that bad, honestly." Davina sympathised. Her friend gave a
slight smile and busied himself with the food.
