"Daddy, I'm scared."

Poppy was holding tightly to her father's hands as she watched Cousin Harry and Ginny go through what appeared to be a solid brick wall at King's Cross Station.

Dudley happened to agree with his youngest, but parents were supposed to be invincible in their children's eyes, right? So, he would tuck that fear right down between his kidneys and put on a brave face for her.

"Nothing to be frightened of, dearest," he said, ruffling her blonde pigtails. "If your cousins can do it, we can too."

And so they did. Dudley, Anita, Daisy, and Poppy all walked through together, surrounding Daisy's trolley loaded down with a large trunk and Aurelius' brass cage. The other side of the platform appeared out of nowhere, much like that alley. A crimson engine, billowing steam, proudly awaited the students to board and Poppy's eyes were wide at the sight.

"Daddy, I want to go to Hogwarts, too." She said, in an awed voice.

"And leave us, too?" he said to her, clutching his heart. "What would I do with both of my girls gone for nearly all of the year?"

"You'd have Mummy!" she giggled.

"We'll have to see, dearest."

That little lick of uncertainty flickered in his belly, remembering the animosity between his mother and Harry's, but he tamped it down once more to focus on Daisy searching for the family.

"I want to go with Jamie and Al." Lily whinged to her father, his hair looking even more wild than usual, likely due to wrangling his children around the station. Dudley felt exactly the same.

The fiery red headed girl had been arguing with her father to go since they got out of the cars. Tenacious, that one. Got it from her mother, if Dudley had to guess.

Albus was looking around anxiously, trying to find the rest of the extended Weasley clan, who were lost in the fog of the engine's vapor. No matter though, Ron and Hermione Weasley appeared from the fog, the wife's hair more frizzy than usual thanks to the steamy weather.

While Anita fussed over Daisy's trunk, checking to make sure everything was latched properly, the Potters and Weasleys discussed driving exams and Dudley heard something about Ron confounding someone, which didn't sound pleasant to Dudley's ears. He'd have to ask Harry about it late and hope that Harry didn't do it to him as way of explanation.

"If you're not in Gryffindor, we'll disinherit you," Ron was saying to his little girl, "But no pressure."

"Ron!" his wife scolded, and whapped him on the arm.

Gryffindor was one of the houses, Dudley knew that much. He'd heard of that one and Slithering, but new that there were others. To his knowledge, Harry and his friends had all been in the Gryffindor house together, and his son James was there as well. Hermione had explained all about some hat that put students into the houses, though Dudley had only been able to imagine the wealth of lice that must reside in such a thing. Dudley didn't like lice, not one bit. He'd considered moving when Poppy had brought them home from a slumber party once, but Anita had talked him down from it. He'd been so focused on the possible lice that he'd quite missed the rest of her explanation and hadn't the heart to tell her he hadn't been paying attention.

From what little he did remember, the houses seemed to be based on characteristics of the students as opposed to an even divide of boys and girls into each. Little Albus was terrified of ending up in Slithering, which his brother used to tease him mercilessly. He was standing with Rose and Daisy, glowering at his brother.

The other adults were looking down the platform and Dudley followed their gaze to a tall, pointy faced man with white blonde hair and his perfect miniature with him. His wife was a frail looking woman with a tight clutch on her son's hand.

From Ron's encouragement to Rose to beat the boy in exams, Dudley deduced there was a history there, and not a pleasant one.

The grousing over the pointy man was abruptly drowned out by James' return to the fray telling anyone who would listen that he'd seen his godbrother kissing his cousin. As any good parent knows, showing shock at at that type of proclamation only encourages gossip and spying, so they all remained stoic. James obviously thought this was the news of the century, and Dudley found himself amused at the thought of the ever-changing lad with the lovely blonde girl, but kept his face schooled with the rest of them.

With a whistle of the engine, all of the parents leaned down to give hugs, kisses, and reminders before shooing the children into the train cars. There was much hustle and bustle and then suddenly they were all on board and the train was making its way north.

"Two down," Ginny said, leaning her head on Harry's shoulder.

"Could've been three if you just let me join," said Lily, crossly.

"Two years, darling," Harry said, smoothing her hair.

"Well, are we doing our dinner again this year?" Asked Ron, his stomach rumbling at the thought.

Ginny laughed while Hermione rolled her eyes.

"Yeah," said Harry, "Thanks for the reminder. We did a dinner last year so we'd all be together when James sent his owl with his house on it. You're welcome to join us this year, you three."

He looked at Poppy especially.

"You can bring Pygmalion and send your sister a letter so it's waiting for her in the morning if you'd like."

"I'm calling him Pyg," Poppy said.

"Excellent," said Ginny.

~D~D~D~D~D~D~

Dinner that night was simple but delicious: a roast with yorkshire puddings. Anita stared longingly at the dishes that washed themselves while the adults made themselves comfortable with glasses of wine, Butterbeer, and whisky. The children too young to attend were upstairs in Lily's room, suspiciously quiet.

"That was a proper meal, Gin," Ron said, patting his belly. "Might steal a little more in a bit."

"Ron, you ate the last of it during your fifth helping. Move your feet, will you?"

"Oy, Hermione, would you grab me another pudding?"

"No can do, Ronald. I'm eating it."

"What?!"

"Should've gotten it yourself."

Anita giggled at the banter between Ron, his wife and his sister. She had grown up an only child, complete alone unlike Dudley, though Dudley couldn't say his life had varied greatly from hers as Harry was never considered Dudley's equal, like a sibling would have been. They both were enjoying the chance to have a larger family. Dudley enjoyed it significantly more than he thought he would. The only sibling encounters he'd seen were those of his father and his late Aunt Marge. Dudley was quite happy to see that family wasn't simply….that.

"Oh look!" Anita cried, looking at the open window. There, lit by the light of the moon, was the beautiful form of Aurelius flying silently towards them. He had a scroll of parchment clasped in his talons and dropped it neatly in Ginny's hand as he flew through the wide window. Dudley wondered if the window was that wide purely for the convenience of owl post.

Probably.

"Quite early this year. Guess ol' Minnie's speeches aren't as wordy as Dumbledore's were," Ron commented, taking another swig of his whisky.

"Well, not like she has to warn them about three headed dogs guarding weapons that could bring back a dark lord, now does she? Speeches are all, 'Don't go in the forest, beware of moving staircases, don't make Filch hate you.'" Harry said, off-handedly.

Anita's eyes grew wide and Dudley raised his eyebrows.

"Long story," Harry said, waving their concerns off. "Basically, going to school with me meant you rarely had a normal year, and almost never had finals."

Ron guffawed whilst Hermione frowned.

"Some of us had actually prepared for those exams, you know." She said primly.

"Well, do you want to know the results or not?" Ginny asked, tapping her foot.

A chorus of "yes!" answered her.

"Right then.

Mum,

Cousin Daisy let me use her owl since she wanted to give him a try. We're all well and all of us made it to the feast and none of us ended up in the Whomping Willow, so it's already going better than dad's second year, eh?

Turns out we might have the Sight in the family because Al ended up in Sly-"

There was a loud choking noise from Ron. Hermione patted him on the back until the hacking stopped.

"Honestly, Ron." Harry said. "That hat tried to put me in Slytherin, too. My grandmum was Slytherin, and so was yours if I'm not mistaken. It's not an Azkaban sentence."

Dudley wasn't certain what was so wrong with this Slytherin house, but he was more anxious than ever to find out where Daisy had ended up. Ron had told him that the houses were basically divided into Courageous, Evil, Smart, and Chill. Dudley and Anita had discussed quietly and decided that meant that some crazed founder had decided to put all of the wild, danger seekers together, the conniving get-aheads in their own house, the book worms and study-focused in another, and the laid-back students who weren't into ADHD, ambition, or research obsessive in their own. Ron had mentioned that their house was also right by the kitchens. Dudley personally thought that last house had the right idea, though the Gryffindors sounded like a fun bunch at a party.

"May I please continue, if you're done dying. My son is a Slytherin. We'll get over it. Continuing on…

Al ended up in Slytherin. He's there with Malfoy but seemed happy enough by the end of dinner. Guess I can't tease the snakes anymore. Oh well.

Rosie is with me up in Gryffindor tower, no big surprise there.

Daisy had a longer sorting but ended up in Ravenclaw. Dominique has already taken her under her wing so she'll be well taken care of there."

Dudley and Anita looked anxiously around until Dudley finally said, "So is it the smart house, or the kitchen house?"

Harry laughed.

"Smart house."

"Wonderful!" Dudley cried, feeling a glow of pride in his chest. So what if Daisy hadn't known magic existed before now. So what if he had been terrified of magic up until a few months ago. Some magic hat saw that his little girl was brilliant and put her in the Smart House.

"Shame she already has an owl," Anita was saying to Ginny. "Guess we should have gotten her a raven!"

Ginny laughed.

"Oh, no. The symbol for Ravenclaw isn't a Raven. It's an Eagle."

And this was supposedly the Smart House?! Now Dudley wasn't so sure.

A/N: Sorry for the long delay! A rotten bug got me down, then I had to play catch up at work. Thank you to all of my new followers, please leave some reviews and let me know what you think so far!~Pooka