They got out of the boat and made their way up to the castle. The giant knocked on the door, well more like banged. For while nothing happened, but then those doors swung open.
"The first years, Professor McGonagall."
"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here." Hagrid bowed a little and made his way to the castle. They followed Professor through the entrance hall. Swati was taking in every detail, so he can describe it in his letter. She stopped before another huge door and turned to them.
"Welcome to Hogwarts," said Professor McGonagall, "the start of term feast will begin in a moment, but before that you will be sorted into four houses. The Sorting is very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like a family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with your house, sleep in house dormitory, and spend free time in your house common room.
"The four houses are called Gryfindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff and Slytherin. Each house has its own noble history and each produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your house points, while any rule breaking will lose house points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the house cup, a great honour. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house becomes yours.
"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. I suggest you all smarten yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting," with that she looked at Swati and his blue hair. They managed the eye contact for while, until it was broken by McGonagall.
"I shall return for you when we are ready for you," and before she left for the Great Hall, she added, "please wait quietly."
"This is going to be interesting," he said to Neville and Teri.
"Definitely, I hope I get to the house I want," agreed Teri.
"How do they even sort us?" asked Neville.
"Some sort of test, I think. My brother said it hurts a lot, but I think he was joking," answered someone. They looked at him. He had red hair, just as the prefect and lot of freckles.
"Oh, where are my manners," said the boy, "Ron, Ron Weasley," added the boy.
"Swati Stenran."
"Teri Noeter."
"Neville Longbotom," they introduced them self.
"Nice hair, what are you going to do, if you end up in other houses, but Ravenclaw? Will you change it? Oh, and I think my mom once talked about you, I think they know your parents, but can't be sure," Ron told them.
"Nah, I am not changing my colour, blue is too good," answered Swati. Ron grinned at him.
"You know my parents?" asked Neville, his voice was filled with fear.
"I don't, actually, but it appears, that my father used to know yours, from work, I think," Ron scratch himself at his chin.
"Oh, okey," he relaxed.
Suddenly someone screamed. Swati shot his head up and saw ghost pouring in from walls. The ghost clearly wanted to scare them. Swati just watched them with no emotion in his face at all. Ghosts were saying some stuffs, but he ignored them. He already saw a ghost. They were nothing impressive. He stood there, thinking about houses. It appears every house has its set of colours. So far he only knew that Ravenclaw has a blue. He liked blue, it was his favourite, second was red.
"YOU!" somebody screeched. Swati lifted his head and his eyes met someone else eyes.
"What?"
"Why aren't you scared? Those people are ghost! They are scary!" Swati just now noticed, that it was another ghost, that was yelling at him.
"Are they? I mean, yeah ghost are scary, but that much? I mean, you can tell it is just an act," Swati said, to astonishment of others.
"This guy is no fun, I hate him already," said ghost and left the room.
"Don't mind Peeves, he is like that since forever, but you...why you have to destroy our fun?" another ghost asked.
"He asked, I answered," with that he started to think once again. But before he could get back to his original thoughts a McGonagall has returned.
"Move along, the Sorting ceremony is about to begin," she said and students followed her. They entered through big doors, they passed sooner. The hall was big. There were four tables along the way, and fifth on the end of the hall, where professor sits. Swati noticed, that people are staring at him, probably because of his hair.
"I bet they never saw someone with hairs like you," Neville claimed.
"Probably," he shrugged it off. He glanced at the roof and he saw a night sky. He smiled again.
"It´s bewitched to look like the sky outside. I read about it in Hogwarts, A History," said girl voice. They stopped in front of teacher table and McGonagall placed a four-legged stool in front of them, together with a hat.
Suddenly, the hat twitched and suddenly it began to sang. Swatis eyes widened. He never saw something like that.
"Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,
But don't judge on what you see,
I'll eat myself if you can find
A smarter hat than me.
You can keep your bowlers black,
Your top hats sleek and tall,
For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat
And I can cap them all.
There's nothing hidden in your head
The Sorting Hat can't see,
So try me on and I will tell you
Where you ought to be.
You might belong in Gryffindor,
Where dwell the brave at heart,
Their daring, nerve, and chivalry
Set Gryffindors apart;
You might belong in Hufflepuff,
Where they are just and loyal,
Those patient Hufflepuffis are true
And unafraid of toil;
Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,
if you've a ready mind,
Where those of wit and learning,
Will always find their kind;
Or perhaps in Slytherin
You'll make your real friends,
Those cunning folk use any means
To achieve their ends.
So put me on! Don't be afraid!
And don't get in a flap!
You're in safe hands (though I have none)
For I'm a Thinking Cap!"
Swati gasped at the line, there´s nothing hidden in your head the Sorting hat can't see. This is going to be hard.
The whole hall burst into applause as hat finished its song. The hat bowed to each table and sat there in silent again.
"So we got to try on the hat? That is all? I am going to kill Fred for this!" he heard Ron swear and couldn't help himself to smile a bit.
"When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted," she said.
"Abbott, Hannah!" A pink-faced girl with blonde pigtails stumbled out of line, put on the hat, which fell right down over her eyes, and sat down.
"HUFFLEPUFF!" shouted the hat. The table on the right cheered and clapped as Hannah went to sit down at the Hufflepuff table. Swati saw the ghost waving merrily at her.
"Bones, Susan!"
"HUFFLEPUFF!" shouted the hat again, and Susan scuttled off to sit next to Hannah.
"Boot, Terry!"
"RAVENCLAW!" The table second from the left clapped this time; several Ravenclaws stood up to shake hands with Terry as he joined them.
Lavender Brown became the first new Gryffindor, and the table on the far left exploded with cheers.
"Bulstrode, Millicent" then became a Slytherin. Perhaps it was Swati´s imagination, but they seemed as unpleasant lot.
"Finch-Fletchley, Justin!"
"HUFFLEPUFF!" Swati noticed, thatsometimes the hat shouted out the house at once, but at others it took a little while to decide.
"Finnigan, Seamus," the sandy-haired boy next to Swati in the line, sat on the stool for almost a whole minute before the hat declared him a Gryffindor.
"Granger, Hermione!" Hermione almost ran to the stool and jammed the hat eagerly on her head.
"GRYFFINDOR!" shouted the hat. Ron groaned.
When Neville was called, he fell over on his way to the stool. The hat took a long time to decide with Neville. When it finally shouted, "GRYFFINDOR," Neville ran off still wearing it, and had to jog back amid gales of laughter to give it to someone called Morag MacDougal.
There weren't many people left now. Moon, Nott, Parkinson then a pair of twin girls, Patil and Patil then Perks, Sally-Anne and then, finally, "Stenran, Swati!"
He swallowed hard and made his way up to the stool. He sat and last thing he saw was a Neville encouraging grin.
Nothing. He couldn't hear nothing. He didn't know how long has it been, but that hat still didn't say a thing.
"Hmm," said a small voice, "Difficult, very difficult. I can't decide where to put you. You are smart and wise, so normaly Ravenclaw would be the best, but you are also cunning and you want true friends, so Slytherin, not to forget you are loyal, Hufflepuff would be correct choice, but you are also brave. You, young boy, may be the bravest person I ever met. Coming here like that, and not caring, that you may fail at hiding it."
Please, don't tell anyone, I don't want to be known, Swati thought to himself, knowing that hat will hear him.
"I see, so be it. There is only choice now," said the hat before yelling, "GRYFFINDOR!"
Swati smiled and put down the hat, and joined Neville at the table. He shook the hands with some old members of the house and looked at Neville who was smiling.
"Now, we only need Teri," Neville proclaimed and looked at the stool. Teri was just about to sit on it. She sat the in silence.
"RAVENCLAW!" the hat yelled. Teri stood up and jog to her table. But before sitting she shoot both her friends apologetic smile. Neville sighed.
"Well, we can still see her during breaks," Swati tried to raise his mood.
"Yeah I know, but we were together almost every time since we were kids," Neville answered. By that time everyone was sorted.
"Well done, Ron, excellent," said prefect. McGonagall took the hat away and when she returned, someone stood up.
"Welcome," he said. "Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! Thank you!" With that hall everybody clapped and cheered. Swati joined in and was clapping like his life depended on it.
Suddenly there was a food. Swati smiled and started to choose from huge variety of meals.
As the night progressed Swati encountered many new people. His meeting with Gryffindor ghost was funny one. He showed them, why he was named Nearly Headless Nick. Swati also got into conversation with both Neville and Ron, who was eating really a lot, but Swati didn't mind. The first years were now talking about their families. Some guy named Seamus had witch mother and Muggle father. Neville also added his particular story, about how his uncle nearly killed him. Swati laughed a lot at this, alongside with both Ron and Neville.
He glanced at teachers table and took a good look at them. Professor McGonagall was talking to headmaster named Albus Dumbledore, as he found out. He also noticed a man with pink turban was talking to a professor, dressed whole in black. But his attention was focused on the man with turban. He felt like someone was poking him with needle in the back of his head. He didn't like it at all, and neither he liked the person with turban. But he smiled. His first year is going to be interesting. He couldn't wait for lessons to start.
Here I am, with another chapter.
I hope you enjoyed it, and I will see you at next chapter!
Yours truly
Nariem