Chapter 4

Just another sorting ceremony

Draco woke with a sharp pain in his neck. He didn't know if it was caused by sleeping the chair or the squeaking elf voice but frankly he didn't care. He could hear one of the others addressing the elf. They had all fallen asleep in a tangle of limbs right there on the rug. As they each groaned and stretched rising to their feet, Draco smirked. At least their night hadn't been anymore pleasant than his.

"What did the elf want?" Not that he really cared but he didn't like the way none of them seemed to notice he was even there.

"The headmaster wants to meet us in his office after breakfast."

Draco didn't really give a damn what the headmaster wanted and he wasn't going anywhere till he got a shower. Then he noticed his trunk was gone. "Toppy." Nothing happened. "Tissy."

"Her name is Tippy." Granger said and the elf popped up with their breakfast on a large tray. Draco reached over and helped himself to a croissant.

"Whatever. Bring coffee and where is my trunk?"

"The headmaster says to move them to your dorms."

"Well you can move them right back."

"The headmaster says..."

"I don't care what the headmaster says. I am not spending another minute in these striped pajamas. You will bring my trunk back this instant."

"You can move our things back to the dorms during the sorting feast, Tippy." The elf gave her the closest thing he had ever seen to an elf giving someone an exacerbated look, then it popped off. Wow. They hadn't even been here twenty four hours and she had already pissed off the elves. He couldn't wait till she started to mention the SPEW crap.

"Hermione, I don't want to stay in the dorms."

"I know, Harry. But the headmaster said we had to. This Dumbledore doesn't know us. They are still in a war. He has a right to be cautious. If we don't go along with him, he might expel us, then how will we get home."

Draco tuned out their argument and moved to the door where his and Hannah Abbot's trunk had been last night. It opened into a large red and gold bedroom. The wall to the left was covered in a large family tree. Draco only glanced at it, but he could tell it went back even farther than the Malfoy Tapestry. The room only had one window that looked down at the quidditch pitch. Oddly, the only picture in the room showed what he could only assume was the Gryffindor common room. There was an empty portrait frame over the bed.

A connecting door lead to a spectacular bathroom. The tile and tub alone put the prefect's bathroom to shame. Finally. He rushed back out to the common room and routed through his newly delivered trunk till he came up with a clean set of robes. The robes were standard issue and nowhere near as nice as his personaly tailored ones but at least they weren't striped. And bless it all, the elf had brought coffee. He poured himself a cup black and took it with him into the bath.

He was just settling back into the heavenly warm water and the bite of caffeine when Longbottom, Weasley, and Potter entered. "Hello, morons? Can't you see this room is occupied?"

Potter had moved over to one of the two sinks and was actually brushing his teeth the muggle way. Idiot, he should just use a charm like any good wizard. It was Longbottom who answered. "There are only two bathrooms. The Slytherin and Gryffindor bedrooms both connect to this one. One the other side of the common room are the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw bedrooms that share a bath. We figured the boys could use this one and the girls would use the other."

"And you three were so anxious for the sight of me in the bath you couldn't wait till I was done?"

"Don't be such a girl, Malfoy." Weasley said dropping his pajama bottoms on the floor. Draco had to look away quick less he be blinded by freckles. "We've all shared a dorm before." He then stepped into the large shower room.

Potter followed him in in all his naked glory and Draco this time couldn't look away. He had forcibly been denying himself from even thinking about anything from the final battle but Potter's muscular back brought back the feeling of clinging to him on the back of that broom as fire snapped at their heels.

He heard a throat clearing off to his left and looked over to Longbottom who had his eyebrow cocked. Dear Merlin. He had just been caught staring at Harry Bloody Potter. Longbottom moved off to the toilet.

Draco quickly rinsed out the potion cleaning and moisturizing his hair so he could get out without an wrapped one of the fluffy towels around him and picked up the robes he had brought in. Longbottom said the Slytherin Room had opened to this bathroom. Draco crossed the room to the door across where he entered the bath and sure enough, it opened into a silver and green bedroom fit for a prince.

A lot of the features were like Gryffindor's room only better as they were much more tastefully decorated. There was a family tree, a framed picture of the Syltherin Common room and a window. Only this window didn't look out over the quidditch pitch. It was like an observation bubble right under the lake the same as his dorm room down in the dungeon.

He changed into the clean robes before looking around once more, pocking in drawers and the wardrobe before existing back to the common room. Hannah was just coming out of the door opposite of him.

"This place is so neat. That door leads down to a court yard and greenhouse. One, I've never seen before. The one right next to it leads to Hufflepuff's bedroom and there is a window that looks out over the whomping willow. I don't even know how all these rooms lead to different places around the castle."

"It's called magic Abbott. Perhaps you've heard of it."

"Don't talk to me like that, Draco. I'm not a Gryffindor."

"I thought you were placed in Gryffindor with me."

"I am. But you know what I mean. Anyway, this place is amazing. That door there leads to a potions lab."

"Really." He was about to open the indicated door when the annoying elf popped up.

"Sirs and Ma'ams. Headmaster would like to be seeing you."

"Unn Huhn." Draco turned back to Hannah. "Did any of these doors lead anywhere near the headmaster's office? I don't really care to traipse down seven flights of stairs."

"I don't know. I haven't tried any over by the fireplace. Tippy will you alert the others that Headmaster Dumbledore is waiting for us?"

Draco surveyed the room. Across from the fireplace was the door they had come into from the room of requirement. Counter clockwise, the first door is the one Hannah indicated was a potions lab. Then Slytherin's bedroom. There was a large space of wall and he assumed that's where the bathroom was as the next door was Gryffindor's. Draco opened the door next to Gryffindor's and found a large armory and sparing area.

"Wow, wish the DA had a room like that to train in." Hannah turned around to where the others were starting to gather. "Guys, come check this out."

Draco had no wish to gawk like little first years so moved down the wall to the next door. It opened to a very small space filled with mops and broom. He was about to close the door when the light glimmered off a golden doorknob on the far wall. Draco looked back and loony was the closest one to him. "Lovegood, hold this door open for me."

"Planning to apply for a house elf position?"

"Clever weasel. Think of that one all by yourself? It's no wonder you need to borrow Granger's brain." He managed to make his way across the small closet thankfully without stepping in a bucket. He turned the knob and the far wall opened up to the entrance way right outside the great hall. "Excellent. Tippy."

"Yes sir?"

"While we are meeting with the headmaster, clean out this closet."

"Mister Filch needs those supplies."

"We need to be able to walk through this room."

"I think I found the closet the Headmaster was talking about." Hannah called from the other side of the room. The door she had opened was to a closet much the size of the one Draco had found only instead of cleaning supplies, it held a multitude of extremely gaudy robes.

"We can walk straight into the headmaster's office."

"Why are you waiting." Longbottom asked, " He said he wanted to see us."

"We just can't barge our way into his office. It's rude." Granger said.

"Well I am not going to walk when there is a perfectly good shortcut."

"I think we should use the door Malfoy found by the great hall. It's not that long a walk to the gargoyle from there."

Draco felt like pulling his hair out. Except that would be a sin against perfectly good hair. Maybe he should rip out her bushy hair. It would only be an improvement. How on earth did these people actually win the war when every little thing had to be decided on by committee?

"I hate you people. If the headmaster asks, I was tired from the journey." Draco then turned and stalked to the door to the potions lab.

He spent the entire afternoon in Slytherin's lab. There were ingredients in the cupboard that he knew had not existed for hundreds of years. The snidgit feathers alone would fetch him a thousand galleons each. And the demiguise eyes were the main ingredient in a potion to see through invisibility cloaks. So there, Potter.

Draco hummed to himself as he began to organize the cabinet just as Professor Snape had taught him when he was seven. The previous system seemed to be by class. Draco preferred his potion parts to be in alphabetical order. He only got to the H ingredients when Granger interrupted him.

"Wow, This room is great. Did you poke around any of the other rooms."

"No."

"Oh. You didn't miss much with the Headmaster. He wanted us to go with the James and Lily on the Express to pick up the kids. We were able to talk him out of it."

"Huh." Draco wondered what the hell she thought she was doing.

"We had a long talk over lunch about what we needed to accomplish here to change things. Everyone agreed to make a timeline of the known death eater activity."

"Huh." Draco not quite said again. She was still nattering on and finally he couldn't take it. "Did you come in for a reason?"

"Time to go to the Great Hall."

Draco made a notation of the ingredient he was handling and placed the small glass bottle on the shelf. "Don't talk to me like we are friends."

"We are all in this together. And if..."

"Whatever. I'll see you in the entrance hall."

The entrance hall was full of very short people. When did first years get so small? And there were so many of them. All looking nervous and scared. It was only a few minutes before McGonagall showed up to escort the little dwarfs inside to be sorted.

Draco had spent the entire time waiting on the other side of the hall from his fellow time travelers. Their incessant prattling and obnoxious voices carried easily through the empty hall but Draco didn't even care to listen. He had started to feel nervous about facing a room full of people, most of which were dead. Some of which were people he loved but they wouldn't love him here. They didn't know him. He ran through his Occlumency exercises. It was a good twenty minutes before McGonagall came back into the hall to escort them inside.

"Now that our first years are settled, I have the great honor of introducing you to seven new transfer students. They went through a very traumatic experience at their last school and I ask everyone here to make them welcome by not asking about it. Being a good friend means knowing when to push and more importantly, when to sit back and allow them their secrets. Now, they were previously sorted so at least we don't have too much longer till we can get on with the feast. Ron Weasley and Luna Lovegood will be joining the Hufflepuff House. Draco Malfoy and Hannah Abbott will be joining Gryffindor. Neville Longbottom and Hermione Granger are now Ravenclaws and Harry Potter was chosen for Slytherin. Welcome."

The students in the great hall gave polite applause and the seven of them went to their allotted tables. Draco moved over to where the seventh year Gryffindors were seated and saw that there was only one open seat, between Lupin and Pettigrew. A rat or a dirty filthy animal.
Yuck. He looked around to see if there was any other seat when he caught Potter's eye. He had a worried look on his face and for a second Draco wondered if Potter actually cared for his unhappiness. Didn't matter. Draco moved further down the line and asked a red headed girl to make room for him on the bench.

Dinner was great like always. That alone was enough to remind Draco of home. He listened to the gossip around him cataloguing any interesting facts he could. He was going to be living with these people; he needed to know who to defer to and who was beneath his notice. He also found his gaze repeatedly go up and down the Slytherin table. It was amazing how many people he could pick out. His mother. Severus. Blaise's Mother. Several of his father's associates.

Potter looked utterly miserable sitting at the Slytherin table. The Slytherins looked on with bored detachment but they weren't fooling Draco. Seven years, most of which he was the undeniable prince, had taught him how to read his people. The seventh years were practically humming with excitement to get back to the common room and start the initiations.

The houses started to file out of the great hall and Slytherin house collided with the Gryffindors. Draco grabbed at Potter's sleeve has they passed and pulled him into a little alcove. Then his brain caught up with his body's actions. He couldn't believe he was actually going to warn the little berk about what to expect. Potter cut him off though.

"Look Malfoy, you do anything to hurt or out Remus and I will make you wish you had never been born."

"Excuse me?"

"I know how you feel about him and what he is. I saw the way you looked at him before you sat down. If you tell anyone about him, you will regret it."

Potter walked off in righteous indignation and Draco didn't stop him. Let him face the initiations, the prat.

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Just as a warning, so far Chapter 5 is leaning into the adult material. Okay, not leaning so much as jumped right in with both feet. I figure I'll try and write both five and six at the same time and I'll post a little summary of five at the top of six. So, if you don't want to read the sex and violence stuff, skip straight to six. If I'm late posting next week, it's because I'm doing two chapters at once.

Also, not to beg for reviews or anything. But Please Please Please, this is me down on my knees. Please review. I want to know if I'm wasting my time on this story.