Year One
Chapter Two - Train Rides and Sortings
Harry sat in an empty compartment on the Hogwarts Express, the scarlet and gold train that carried students to and from Hogwarts, his legs crossed on the seat as he used them to rest his latest book, Magical Drafts and Potions, while he quilled notes into the margins and wherever he could fit them from the accompanying supplementary book, So You Want A Mastery (Potions) Grade Four, writing in whatever he found remotely relevant to furthering his potions knowledge. The book detailed minor improvements to the overall process, when to dice things as opposed to slicing, or how to best extract the juices from a particular ingredient.
His peace and quiet was interrupted by the sliding door slamming open, and a head of bushy hair being shoved into the compartment, courtesy of the head's owner. She looked at him before speaking, her somewhat bossy sounding voice filling the small space.
"Have you seen a toad? Neville's lost his."
Harry blinked slowly at the question, a toad? Most people didn't deviate from the standard cat or owl as a general rule. "No, can't say that I have, sorry Neville." His final words were directed at the shy and chubby looking blonde boy behind the young girl, his eyes dropping in disappointment. "However," at this the boy looked up at him, hope radiating from his eyes, "I do believe that anyone wearing a prefect badge should be able to help you. Prefects are fifth years and up, and the summoning charm is a fourth year spell." The boy practically radiated happiness now, practically running off towards the front of the train.
The bushy haired girl cocked her head at him, eyes focussing on his, her slightly oversized teeth biting gently on her lower lip.
"My name's Hermione. Hermione Granger."
Harry nodded in recognition at the girl's statement before responding.
"Harry Potter, pleasure to meet you"
Her eyes widened in recognition, most likely at his last name if he was to guess.
"Harry Potter?! As in brother of the Boy-Who-Lived Charlus Potter."
"That would be my older brother yes"
"Wow, he's really famous, in both Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts and Greatest Wizards of the Twentieth Century"
Harry simply sighed at his lost peace and quiet and settled in for a long and irritating train ride.
-TDR-
Thankfully, Harry thought, the train trip was not too irritating in retrospect. He had heard from a passing group that his brother had been accosted by the Malfoy heir, and he considered it a small mercy that he didn't have to deal with it. Not only that but after a half hour of droning on, the muggleborn witch had finally stopped talking and started reading, allowing him a modicum of the peace he'd had before she entered.
He left the compartment in order to let Hermione change in peace, simply slipping on his robe as he had already been dressed in his school uniform.
"Well well, if it isn't the reject Potter. Not able to suck up to scarhead enough to get a seat in his compartment?"
Harry sighed as he turned to face the owner of the irritating drawl, one Draco Malfoy. His limited experiences with the arrogant pureblood left much to be desired, his father's son through and through, Draco embodied little of the Black charm that the maternal side of his family exuded, each in their own way. Draco did not have charm, he had arrogance, and it echoed in every little thing that he did.
"Draco, I neither need nor want to sit with my older brother, simply because I do not like him, much like I dislike you, so do me a favour and leave me alone"
"Claws out already Potter? Someone must have done a thorough job on you already, what that mudblood mother of yours not teach you any manners?"
Harry's fist clenched in restrained anger, muscles twitching in barely controlled rage. His emotions burned like a raging fire, washing over everything else in its way, beginner calming exercises doing nothing to quell the inferno that was his anger.
"I suggest, Malfoy, that you shut your mouth, before someone does you the favour of shutting it for you"
The blonde's last name was spat out with an equal measure of venom that Draco did his own. All of a sudden, the inferno vanished, leaving only a small tongue of fire that raged in a nonexistent wind.
Draco pulled his wand out and aimed it directly at the young Potter's face, a scant inch away from his eyes. Narrowing his sharp eyes, Harry tried to return to the bonfire that was his previous anger, feeding all of his rage into the small tongue of flame, but he was unsuccessful, only becoming more calm as a result, but he could feel his focus increasing, vision improving slightly, and he saw Draco beginning to maneuver his wrist in preparation for a spell.
Faster than he thought possible, Harry's arm snapped up, hand slapping Draco's in order to move it anywhere but pointing at his face, and Draco's yell of 'Diffindo' filling the corridor of the train. Harry was slightly too late, he realised, as he felt a trickle of blood running down his cheek, the sting of pain following shortly after.
Both Draco's and Harry's eyes widened in surprise, the blonde boy paling as he realised what he had done, an apology quick to his lips.
"Potter, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to-"
Harry's venom stained cypress wood wand was flicked out in an instant, interrupting the Malfoy's apology as the black and silver and wand appeared in front of his eyes. The fear in Draco's eyes was easily visible to Harry, and still within the clarity brought on by the void he found himself in, he knew he could not truly hurt the boy, not that he knew any overly harmful spells, but improvisation, now that he was good at.
'LUMOS!'
The shouted spell caught Draco by surprise, as did the thunderous blow to the cheek that followed near instantaneously after. Harry only saved himself temporary blindness by squinting his eyes as he shouted the incantation, and even still he had spots of light burned into his retina for a few seconds afterwards.
A quick wave of his wand and the light went out from the tip, and it was quickly deposited into the improvised wand holster sewn into his robes. He then knocked on the cabin door, and entered at the come in that followed his unspoken request, leaving a stunned blonde behind wondering just what the hell had happened.
-TDR-
Having just gotten off the boats carrying them over the lake, Harry still stared in amazement at the magical castle. It was breathtaking, tall spires silhouetting against a star filled sky, the torch lit entrance doors an ancient wooden creation, a splendor of untouchable wood, affected, but not ravaged by, the passage of time. It was a similar story with the stone walls, the extremely old masonry coarse to the touch, but not in a harmful way. Harry was fascinated with the castle, his senses being enveloped by it.
His exploration of the nearby features was interrupted by a familiar, stern faced old woman, her scottish accent cutting through the awed silence of the students.
"If you're done Mr Potter? Yes? Good, we shall continue in now"
For a brief second, Charlus wore a confused expression, before realising the potter in question was in fact, not him, and then the look on his face transformed into a sneer of amusement, the redhead at his side, Ron, if Harry's memory was to be believed, looked between the two with an unsure expression.
The group was quick to follow after the aged witch, her emerald robes an interesting contrast to her status of Gryffindor head of house, at that thought he pictured his mother's old friend, who he knew to hold that status of Slytherin head of house, Severus Snape, dressed in crimson and gold clothing and could barely restrain the giggle that threatened to break out of his throat and mouth. Hermione, who had been walking next to him, looked over in concern for him as he started spluttering in an attempt to confine his amusement at the thought inside himself.
They walked through a large room that had corridors branching off on both left and right walls, along with another pair of ancient doors opposite where they now stood. McGonagall turned to face them, her voice ringing out in the eerie silence of the room.
"Behind these doors lays the great hall, it is where you shall have breakfast, lunch and dinner and often serves as a place of celebration and socialising. For tonight it serves as the place where you will be sorted and then partake in the welcoming feast. As many of you no doubt know, you will be sorted into one of four houses. Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw or Slytherin. You will be sorted based on the traits that you possess that each founder thought to be most important, and it will be accomplished by a painless and effortless process. I will call you in momentarily, please be patient until then"
She slipped out into the 'Great Hall', leaving a group of young children alone to do what they pleased, and to the Malfoy heir that meant terrorising the Potter that had rejected his offer of friendship.
"So Scarhead, looking forward to being a 'puff reject? Merlin knows it's all you'll ever accomplish now that you've had your fifteen minutes of fame."
Harry sighed in fear of what was to come, his brother had always had an issue with anger management, and to him the insult of being suspected as anything but a Gryffindor was an insult of the highest order. In the corner of his eye, the youngest Potter could see his older brother reddining with anger, hands working themselves in and out of the form of clenched fists. Knowing his brother was about to reach breaking point and only from a single insult, Harry started towards the two, but his progress, like his brothers reply, was interrupted.
"LISTEN HERE YOU-"
Four pale figures floated out of the wall in front of them, their silvery translucent forms emerging from the stone that formed the castle. Ghosts, Harry realised, as his eyes were drawn to a particular ghost, a wide eyed gaunt figure that wore heavy chains that rattled with every movement of the ghost's body, his chain covered robes sullied by a large amount of silver stains. The young potter's eyes met the strange ghosts wide, unblinking eyes, zoning out what the other ghosts were saying as his attention was focused entirely on the blood stained remnant of a man long since dead.
With a blink of his eyes, the ghost was gone, vanishing from the hall, leaving the other ghosts in a state of shock, except for the lady, who seemed bored by the whole process and the afterlife in general.
"Dear Friar, I do believe that was the first time that's ever happened"
"It was indeed Nick, it was indeed"
Then, with a large creak of effort, the doors to the great hall opened up and the silence that had been filling the room evaporated without warning as the sounds of conversation and the barely contained excitement flooded into their ears, and as the group stepped forward, Harry grinned in excitement.
-TDR-
He was disappointed. Extremely disappointed. He had expected something grand, worthy of stories, but what he got was not what he expected. He got a hat, granted, it was a singing, talking hat, but an old worn hat nonetheless. He sighed in a display of his disappointment, and the girl next to him raised an eyebrow at him, her bright blue eyes staring at him, questioning evident in her eyes.
"It's a hat"
"Well, yes, what were you expecting?"
"Something more exciting I suppose, not a hat"
She giggled in amusement before catching herself and restraining herself to a small smile instead.
"Are you a muggleborn?"
"Perhaps. May I know your name?"
"Daphne Greengrass!"
"Ooh, that's me"
Harry smiled at her, watching as she sat upon the stool, hat covering her head and past her eyes. It was on her head for nearly half a minute, before shouting out her house.
"SLYTHERIN!"
He gave the girl a grin and nod of recognition while clapping gently as she quite calmly walked towards the table that seated members of her new house. After her sorting Harry tuned out again, not paying any attention to what happened, or who was sorted where. And then, it was his brother's turn, the heir of the Potter family striding up to the stool with a cockiness that was visible to everyone, and Harry could see his mother's old friend, Snape, glaring daggers at his brother, and gave a small smile at the scene. Ten minutes after the hat had gone on his brother's head with no result, the teachers had started getting nervous, and the students started whispering to themselves about what it could possibly mean, while Harry had started a mental chant to somewhat pass the time.
'Please be Hufflepuff. Please be Hufflepuff. Please be Hufflepuff. Please be Hufflepuff. Please be Hufflepuff.'
On and on his mental prayer went, and yet the hat, after fifteen minutes of deliberation, yelled out for his brother to be a lion. And with a sigh, Harry started moving forward to the stool before his name was called. Sitting on the stool, he lowered the hat onto his head himself, almost jumping at the voice that filled every space of his mind, rough sounds that made up a raspy voice rebounding off of his skull.
'An old, worn hat am I?'
'Ahhh, sorry about that?'
'Not to worry child, I have heard much worse from others that disagreed with my sortings before'
At that, Harry couldn't help but think of the disappointment he'd had when Charlus was decided as a Gryffindor.
'At odds with your brother aye? You aren't the first and I'm certain you won't be the last in that regard. Now let's see here, where to put you, ambition, yes, you have lots of that, the drive to shake the heavens if need be. Pride, so much pride, but not like that of your brother, pride in your family, not in the name, unlike many purebloods.'
'The blood purists and their beliefs hold no place in my heart hat, you should know this.'
'Indeed I do, cunning little thing aren't you, I guess your wand has done my job for me. With your talent there's only one place to put you isn't there? Better be'
"SLYTHERIN!"
And everyone in the great hall couldn't believe their ears, and there was silence.
-TDR-
Harry entered his private room, neighboured to Draco and some other first year named Blaise. Shutting the door with one hand, he fingered the green trim of his robe with the other. This was certainly an unexpected occurrence, a Potter in Slytherin. Potter's had always been a 'light' family and not a single one, save any individuals who had married into the Potter name, like his grandmother Dorea Black, had ever been in Slytherin.
As he approached his bed he noticed a small figure of a coiled snake made of a strange green stone that sat next to a small rectangular piece of parchment upon his pillow. Picking up the snake and resting it in his palm, he gazed at the parchment and the words written in an elegant penmanship, silver ink shimmering in the green light cast by the emerald flames that lit up the room.
Follow his voice and he shall guide you.
You shall be his voice in this world.
AN: Another chapter down! This sorting may have been pretty obvious after the wand selection last chapter, but it was originally planned to be the one chapter but got split because I felt that it worked better as it is. So the first two years will be a lot more light hearted than later years, and with the third being a sort of changing phase that lies in between the two. But with that said, lemme know what you guys think and I'll catch you next time.