**Under Slight Editing**
"Oh, Merlin," I felt like I had just hit a brick wall. My vision blurred, and my mind seemed to fog up. I heard a voice asking if I was alright, but it sounded so far away. There were so many fragrances that were bombarding me, it was completely overwhelming. It's not that I hadn't been around crowds of people before. In fact, I was brought into heavily crowded places the whole summer, to ready myself for the train and school. The steady thrum of the hundreds of hearts beating was enough to make my head spin.
Sometimes, I really hated my abilities. I had been battling with them the entire time that I waited for his arrival at the Hogsmeade station. He had traveled back to London the night before for some reason, and I had stayed behind in safety.
I was about to lose it when a gentle hand was placed on my shoulder.
"It's alright, Deliah, just relax & breathe."
I did as I was advised, then turned to my favorite person, "Remus, why is it affecting me so much?" I glanced around, breathing slowly to calm my senses. "Why are they so different from the crowds I was around before?"
He smiled slightly at me. "I'm not sure, but I do know that you can handle it, Deliah."
We started walking away from the train in mutual silence. I noticed we were going in a different direction than the crowd of students and looked at Remus confused, "Where are we going?"
He motioned to a small carriage pulled by seemingly nothing. "Well, since you're not exactly a first-year, Dumbledore thought you should be sorted separately." Glancing sideways at me, he added, "Wouldn't want to start a commotion, would we?"
Smiling gratefully at him, I stepped into the carriage, ready for this new beginning.
My name is Deliah Lupin. Well, Lupin is my adopted name. Remus found me when I was just three-years-old, and took me in as his own. All he would ever tell me about the night he found me was that it was right after an attack by the Death Eaters. He was honestly surprised that he found me at all.
As soon as he stepped into the carriage, it started off towards the castle. He reached across to the opposite seat and picked up a box I hadn't noticed before. Opening the box, he motioned for me to move to the other seat, and he gently lifted a battered, old hat from inside.
"This, Deliah, is the Sorting Hat," Remus gently laid the hat on my head, "And it will determine which house you will be placed in."
"Ahh, quiet the unique mind you have here. This will be difficult with these traits. Sly, loyal, knowledgeable, brave...You would fit in any house, my dear," The hat murmured, "Perhaps Hufflepuff? No, no... Ah! There is one that would be best... Gryffindor!"
Remus nodded, taking the hat off and placing it back in the box as we came to a slow stop. "Now, Professor McGonagall will be your Head of House," he said as we climbed out of the carriage, him lifting the box to take with him. "And of course, I will be there as soon as you need me. That is if you ever need me," he lightly teased.
I giggled at him, rolling my eyes, "Oh, yes mother, dearest." I looked at him for a moment, feeling severe concern for my father figure, "Will you be alright? I mean...with all the..." I trailed off, watching as his face quickly turned darker.
"I will be perfectly fine, Deliah, don't you worry about me."
As we neared the Great Hall I sighed, resigning myself to what lay past the giant entryway, "Well, I guess I'll see you in class, Professor."
He chuckled, shaking his head "Go make friends." He walked over to a door off to the side that I guessed lead straight to the professor's table. Turning as his hand touched the door's handle, he added "And do try not to blow anything up."
I threw my hands in the air, "Honestly, that only happened one time!" He laughed and vanished down the hall.
'Ok, you can do this. Just lessen the senses...' Concentrating and breathing slowly, I was able to pull back on my heightened senses. The loud, steady heartbeats faded away, and the only thing I could smell was the food - which made my mouth water insanely since I was too nervous to have lunch earlier.
Spotting the Gryffindor table was rather easy. The difficult part would be finding a place to sit. Glancing along the table, I found an empty seat by a slightly plump boy with brown hair and made my way over once they had finished with the first-year's sorting.
"Erm...is this seat taken?" The poor boy just about jumped out of his skin, his fork falling with a clatter to his plate. "Oh, Merlin, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to scare you! Jeeze, what a first impression. I'm Deliah, and I'm not normally a ruddy scatterbrain. Ah, never mind, actually I am pretty scattered..." I rambled for a bit, then finally clamped my mouth shut with a sheepish smile.
The boy stared at me for a moment, and I could tell he was confused, "Umm, yes the seat is open."
Sitting down, I was finally able to see the abundance of food: steaks, ribs, chicken, turkey, ham, every side dish you could think of, different assortments of pasta, salads, several types of bread. My stomach gave a rather loud groan, making me blush.
A girl on the other side of the table burst out laughing, sending me a bright smile, "The food tends to have that effect on people." The girl had an air about her that made me think she had a fiery attitude to match her fiery red hair. "My name's Ginny Weasley, and the poor bloke you're sitting by is Neville Longbottom."
"Oh, your parents are Alice and Frank, right?" I asked turning to him.
He looked at me for a little bit, his mood changing slightly, "Well, yes, but I'm living with my Gran."
I waved my hand around dismissively, "Professor Lupin is my dad...erm...well he adopted me. He took me to visit your parents a few times since they went to school together. I used to bring small flowers for your mom when I was little."
"Oh! That was you?" He asked surprised, "She has a book that has a few little dried flowers here and there between the pages," He smiled a warm smile, "I'm sure they made some sort of impact on her, however much it was."
I smiled happily, "Well, I'm glad!"
We talked for a bit in between bites, and then Ginny joined our chatter. As the dinner vanished and desserts took its place, I glanced up at the professor's table to see that Remus was talking to a rather large man with an equally large beard. He must have felt my stare because he looked over then smiled at me. I think maybe this whole Hogwarts thing won't be so bad after all.
This might not be as good as it should be, but oh well. I do apologize if anyone is OoC
ANYWHO, I don't own anything except the plot/story and my OCs
Her name is pronounced - Deel-ee-ah
Future nicknames – Delly, Dels, and Del are pronounced like the Dell computer name
The title Valkyre is basically - Valk-ear (it's a combination of two words cause why not lol)
"Speech"
'Thought' (might change to 'Thoughts' at some point but who knows)
