Chapter 5: And So It Begins…
With the first day of school just days away, the anticipation reached an apex. Shal could hardly contain himself. He would read his textbooks (for they were fascinating, and good for making fun of), he would wave his wand around, reciting the incantations within his beginners spellbook (the incantations, he noticed, were wildly different from the ones his mother recited when she used her magic). He asked his mother to teach him the verbal components of some of the spells she knew. He just could not get enough. Magic. It was what he always dreamed about. It was all so invigorating.
The day before September 1st, Versvechverthicha returned from hunting with yet another owl (Shal was sure it was the same one as last time). It held a letter, which it promptly gave to Calohexitharas. She unfolded it and read it to herself:
Dear Calohexitharas,
Enclosed in this letter is a ticket. It is for Shal, and will let him ride the Hogwarts express to the school. The train departs at 10:00, so be early. The drop off point is at Platform 9¾ at King's Cross station in London. Don't be late.
Sincerely,
(Yet another nigh-unintelligible signature)
Albus Dumbledore
Shal looked at the ticket, puzzled. First of all, he hadn't any clue where King's Cross station was. Second, what was with the random platform number? 9¾? Humans must be really screwed up in the head, he thought. But, a number is a number. He gave the ticket back to his mother and headed off to play Command and Conquer: Red Alert. He decided it would be best to stop worrying for now.
Shal slept peacefully that night. His dreams were of wealth and power and glory, like most people with a humongous ego. Suddenly, his mother woke him from his beautiful dreams, shaking him back to reality.
"SHAL! Wake up! We have to go NOW!" she shouted. "It's 10:00! You're going to miss your train!"
Shal sat up with a start. "Oh crap!" was all he had time to say. His mother had (thankfully) packed his school supplies into one of their bags of holding the night before. Calohexitharas knew that they would never make it to the station in time, but she had a plan. She grabbed her son and his supplies, dove out of the house, and flew up high into the sky. She banked sharply to the south and sped off at a pretty serious clip. Shal was worried that he was not going to attend school, and that worry gnawed at him like a mouse at cheese, but he trusted his mother to come up with something.
Up ahead, not a half a mile away, there was a train speeding down the tracks next to one of the farms that Versvechverthicha frequented for food. Thanks to his extremely acute vision, he was able to make out the words "Hogwarts Express" painted in big red letters on the side of one of the cars. As they drew close to the train, Shal realized what his mother's plan was. Calohexitharas flew down low, just above the train, straining to stay aloft. She reached back, grabbed hold of her son, quickly wished him the best of luck, and tossed him down on top of one of the cars. Shal hit the roof hard, with a loud thump. Lucky for him, the car had ridges on top for him to grip onto. Careful not to lose his luggage, he crawled up to one of the openings between cars, jumped down, and knocked on the door.
A man (one of the employees onboard) opened the door, and Shal strode in without the man noticing. The employee looked around outside, puzzled, and closed the door. Turning around, he saw Shal standing in front of him. He gasped, and stared in fear. Shal looked back up at him, smiled, and produced his ticket. The man took it, and sighed in relief.
"Ohhhhh. You must be that new student in the memo. Welcome aboard," he said, and offered to take Shal's luggage. Shal removed his wand and case and handed the rest to the employee. The dragon then began to search for a place to sit. The train was nicely decorated, with varnished wood siding and thin red carpeting. The seats were separated into compartments, and, to Shal's dismay, all the doors were closed.
He continued onward to the next car. By his luck, one door was open. He prayed that the room was empty, and he approached and entered. Unluckily, the compartment was occupied. There were three humans, each about the same age as the other (which he assumed was around eleven), occupying the two bench seats in the small room. The first boy was to the immediate left of the door. He was of obvious Irish descent, with orange-red hair, blue eyes, and loads of freckles. Sitting next to him was another boy, who looked plain, as if he didn't have much to do around the house. He was pale, with really messy black hair, and a pair of perfectly round glasses perched atop his nose. There was a small red mark on his forehead, but it was mostly obscured by the mat of hair on his head. Across from the bespectacled one was a girl. She had long, curly brown hair, and she seemed erudite by the way she carried herself. She wore long, black robes, with the school emblem visible on her chest (Shal assumed that was the uniform). The trio was in the middle of conversation (and the redhead was actively stuffing his face) when Shal entered.
They stared at him, wide-eyed like deer in the headlights. Not a one of them moved a single muscle. Shal looked at the humans, smiled, and spoke. "Hi. I don't mean to pry, but all of the other compartments are occupied." He noticed a vacancy to the left of the girl, near the door, and hopped onto the cushy bench seat. The three humans continued to stare.
Shal sat, noticed their eyes, and said, "Oh, where are my manners. I am Shaloxeroligon, but you can call me Shal." The girl to his right (who was verrrry slowly inching away from him) introduced herself first.
"I…I'm H-Hermione G-Granger," she stuttered, still frightened. Redhead slowly swallowed his mouthful.
"I'm R-R-Ron. Ron W-Weasley." Of the three, he was the most scared. The other two turned to glasses-face.
"I'm H-Harry Potter," he said. Shal smiled with a smile that seemed to say "pleasure to meet you all." Harry suddenly looked both relieved and confused; as if he was somewhat glad Shal didn't say something. Ron took another bite of whatever chocolate sweet he was eating (Shal didn't care at the time).
"Uh," Harry said, "What…what exactly…are you?" Hermione glared at him, emphasizing the rudeness of his question.
Shal, puzzled, looked down at himself, and then up at Harry. "Isn't it kind of obvious that I'm a dragon?"
Ron coughed and gagged a little on his candy. "What did you say?" he exclaimed.
The other two rapidly shushed Ron. Shal reached for the door to close it, but couldn't reach. To Ron, he said, "Do you mind?" Ron shut the door to the compartment.
"In case you guys didn't already figure it out," Shal said, upset, "I'm trying to keep a low profile until we get to school, so that there wouldn't be people trying to run away or hunt me down."
There was a bit of an awkward silence for a while. Then, Hermione, deciding to break the silence, spoke. "Wait a second. Why would you be going to Hogwarts, of all places?"
"Uh," said Shal, looking at her funny, "to receive an education? Duh."
Ron and Hermione looked shocked. Harry managed to maintain his attitude of perpetual befuddlement. "You're going to Hogwarts?" Ron said, "As a student? That's impossible. Only people have ever gone there. Well, sure there were house elves and ghosts at the school, but none of them were ever students. It's only ever been people, since the school was founded."
"Well," Shal replied, "my mother wanted me to get an education, and this was the best school in England. She spoke to Dumbledore and made a special request for me to attend. He agreed, saying that there were no rules that prohibited dragons from attending. Oddly enough, he had assumed that all dragons were stupid, animalistic creatures that didn't know what school was."
Ron was still upset, but he just sat there. "Now, Harry," Shal said, turning to him, "whenever you introduced yourself, but before you asked me what I was," he rolled his eyes, "you seemed oddly relieved about something. What's up?"
Harry's confused look took on a slightly frustrated tone. "Well, you would be the first person I've met since I found out I was a wizard that wasn't shocked and amazed when the found out who I was."
Shal's puzzled look returned. "I've never seen or heard of you before. Why should I be shocked and amazed?"
Ron and Hermione looked shocked, again. "You mean to tell me that you have never heard of Harry Potter?!" Ron shouted. The other three shushed him again.
Hermione managed to keep her cool. "Harry Potter survived being attacked by You-Know-Who!" she explained, forcefully.
"No, I don't know who," Shal said, just as confused.
"Voldemort," said Harry. The other two cringed at hearing the name.
"I'm sorry, what just happened here?" Shal said, really confused now.
"Lord Voldemort…" more cringing from Ron and Hermione "…killed my parents with some kind of hex. He used that hex on me, but I survived." He lifted the mat of hair in front of his forehead and revealed a red scar, in the shape of a lightning bolt. "It gave me this instead."
Shal nodded, understanding. Suddenly, he realized something, and began to snicker. "Heh. His name is Lord Voldemort?" Harry nodded. The other two cringed again. Shal looked to the others. "Voldemort!" he said, waving his arms, trying to freak them out. "Seriously, that's his name?" Shal asked, to make sure. Harry nodded again. "That is the lamest name for an evil lord I have ever heard!" Shal said, and he laughed to himself. Ron and Hermione looked at him, still nervous. "Voldemort," Shal said. They cringed again. "Voldemort, Voldemort, Voldemort," he continued, mocking them. They just cringed, holding their hand over their ears. Shal began to laugh at them, but he noticed their irritation, and he stopped.
"Okay," began Shal, "because I don't want to say You-Know-Who all the time, and because you can't stand the word…" he looked to them, and they were already cringing. "…I'll just refer to him as Lord Gay from now on. Harry, you said that Lord Gay used a 'hex' on your parents and killed them, yet used the same 'hex' on you and it just scarred you for life." He chuckled at his double meaning. "Is there anything special about that 'hex' that I should know about?" he continued, looking to Hermione, who seemed to be the resident spell expert.
Hermione looked discouraged, as if the spell itself brought fear into her heart. "Well, it is supposedly impossible for a person to survive being hit by it. Everyone, except for Harry, has died when it was used on them."
Shal thought for a moment, and then the realization hit him. "Harry, you were more than lucky to have survived that spell. If my memory serves me correctly, you were targeted by quite possibly the single most powerful kill spell known to this world. Nothing short of divine intervention, or an inherent resistance to magic, such as that which is found in dragons, could have spared you the wrath of that spell."
The party sat there, as Shal's words sank in. Harry was utterly awestruck by the revelation. He looked at himself, puzzling over how an ordinary boy could have survived such an attack. The mood in that compartment shifted to that of somber realization.
This mood was broken when, through the door to the group's compartment, talk was heard that the train was to reach the station in less than ten minutes.
"I'm so nervous," said Shal, feeling jittery. "I just don't know what to expect."
"Well," said Hermione, "First, they will sort us into our houses."
"Houses?" Shal asked.
"The student body is divided up into four houses. The house represents the students one sees most often, where one will be sleeping, and which team one roots for during the Quidditch games." Ron's face lit up at the mention of Quidditch. Shal puzzled at the word, but dismissed it for later study, to allow Hermione to continue.
"The four houses are Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin."
"My whole family has been in Gryffindor," said Ron, "so I'm probably gonna end up in it, too. That's not for sure, though. I wouldn't really mind Ravenclaw, but imagine if I got stuck in Slytherin."
"What's so bad about Slytherin?" asked Shal.
"That's where all the rotten people go," said Ron, "including You-Know-Who."
Shal noticed Harry grow slightly paler at the thought that he might be stuck in the house where Lord Gay had gone. But before anyone said anything else, a voice could be heard throughout the train: "We will be reaching Hogwarts in five minutes' time. Please leave your luggage on the train; it will be taken to the school separately."
Hermione looked to the two boys in the room. "You two haven't gotten into your uniforms yet. You'd better get moving." She turned to Shal and stopped, as if she didn't know what to say. "Um…" she began, "do you even have a uniform, Shal?"
"No," he replied. "Dumbledore made an exception in my case."
"If you don't mind," said Ron, "we would like a little privacy."
Hermione swiftly left. The two boys looked at Shal. "I'd go," he said, "but I'm trying to keep a low profile. I'll just turn away and close my eyes. Besides, it's not like I've never seen a human torso before." Shal swiftly pointed his head in the corner of the compartment.
When they had finished putting on their robes, the pair stuffed the last of the candy they had been munching on into their pockets. They were noticeably paler and more nervous now that they were drawing near to the school. The train slowed and lurched to a halt. All the students in the compartments made a mad rush to the exits. Shal made a point to stay close to his friends, and to avoid being seen by (or touching) anyone. The vicious stampede made its way out of the train and onto the station. A gust of cold air chilled Shal as he stepped out into the night. There were few lamps alongside the tracks, but a hooded lantern caught his attention. This lantern was special, as it was held in the hand of a man unlike any Shal had ever seen before. The man was at least eight feet tall, and had a bushy, shaggy mane of black hair coming down over his shoulders. The man's face was obscured by an equally shaggy black beard. His massive arms waved about, directing the sea of first years.
"Firs' years! Firs' years over here!" he shouted over the crowd.
Harry, who was standing right next to Shal at the time, recognized the man.
"Hello, Hagrid," he said to the giant traffic cop.
"All right there, Harry?" Hagrid replied, smiling. He motioned for the throng of newbs to follow him down a dark path, away from the station. There was sharp-looking brush on either side of the path. Shal was not paying much attention to what was said, he was so caught up in the moment. I'm actually doing it, he thought. I'm actually going to learn magic. This is amazing.
The path led down to an absolutely massive lake. On the far shore, atop a high rise, was the magnificent Hogwarts, in all its glory. It looked even better than last time Shal saw it, with glowing bright windows and an ominous air about it. The near shore boasted a large fleet of what appeared to be rowboats, but there were no oars. Shal quickly jumped into a boat with Ron, Hermione, and Harry. He ducked down low, next to the bottom, so as not to be seen. A strange boy, whom Shal did not recognize, came up to their boat and grabbed a seat next to Hermione. He was whimpering, as if he had lost something. Thankfully, the boy did not see him lying there, and must have thought that there was room for one more.
Hagrid grabbed a boat for himself, made sure that everyone was seated, and shouted, "FORWARD!" Immediately, the little boats began to move, as if pulled along by invisible ropes, toward the castle.
Dead silence pervaded the micro-armada. Not a single soul spoke. All were too busy gaping up at the school, in its majesty. The boats drew up close to the cliff face at the base of the school. Just before they collided with it, Hagrid ordered for everyone to duck down (which Shal was already doing), and the fleet passed under a wall of hanging ivy, which had concealed a passage under the school. There, the boats found an indoor harbor, and the first years and their giant caretaker disembarked. Shal stayed close to his three friends, still paranoid about being seen. The strange boy walked slowly after them, downtrodden, but Hagrid approached him, presented him with a toad, and patted him on the head. The boy became ecstatic at the sight of his lost toad.
The giant led the group up a set of stone stairs and out onto the front lawn (Shal didn't remember there being a staircase last time he visited). He approached the front door and knocked thrice, hard.
