Author's Note: I have never been good at author's notes, so from here on out, I'll probably just leave the writing to speak for itself. I hope you like it!

Disclamor: I don't own Harry Potter.

"Firs' years, this way!"

The man swinging the lantern was absolutely massive. He had to be nine or ten feet tall, with a scraggly beard and black eyes that were beady, but not unkind. He seemed used to the stares of young students, because when he saw Ever's eyes fixed on him, his mustache merely twitched around the corners.

"To'rd the boats, miss, jus' that way," he rumbled, and swung the lantern in the direction of the...pond? No, it was too big to be called a pond. Lake, then. The school grounds were massive enough that they had room for a lake, alongside the castle.

"The boats?" she whispered to Fred and George, swallowing hard.

"Yeah, we don't have to row or anything, it's all propelled by magic—"

"I just don't like water."

"Why not?" George whispered, glancing back at her. He was holding hands with his brother—so they wouldn't get separated, she supposed—and when he saw her face, he extended his free hand to her. She swallowed hard, grabbing on tight, and he pulled her level with the two of them.

"It's going to be fine. Just close your eyes and breathe."

"You won't even feel it moving, I've heard," Fred added, leaning forward to look at her across his brother. "And there aren't a lot of people in the boat—"

"I think only four—"

"So it doesn't get overly crowded."

"Okay," Ever whispered, squeezing George's hand. He grinned at her—a crooked grin with really nice teeth, something she wouldn't have imagined before he flashed them at her, and a dimple on the right side of his mouth. Maybe that was something that was different? But then Fred flashed her the same grin, quick, reassuring, and with an identical dimple.

It took them a few minutes to get down to the boat, crowded together like that, clinging to each other's hands so they didn't get torn apart by the swarm of first years, but eventually they managed to find a little boat that had enough space to fit the three of them. A boy was sitting on the second bench, with dreadlocks and a skin tone like dark chocolate. His looked up at them as they clambored in, smiled a bit nervously as Ever sat down beside him, and she noticed his eyes were somehow even darker.

"You alright?" he asked as she folded her arms around her middle. "You look a bit pale."

"I don't like water much," she confided, glancing nervously over the side of the boat; it wasn't very high, and with four healthy eleven-year-olds, who knew if it would hold up.

"I'm glad I'm not the only one."

"You don't like water?"

"Nah, I get sea-sick. Who are they?" Ever looked between the two—they were smirking back at her now, daring her to introduce the, to get it wrong—and she poked the one on the left with her foot.

"I call 'em Twin One and Twin Two in my head when I don't know which is which, but they can tell you their actual names."

"He's Fred."

"That's George."

"They don't seem capable of introducing themselves," Ever stage-whispered to Lee behind her hand. "They only ever say each other's names."

"You've only heard one of our introductions!" Fred protested, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Yeah, how could you know?"

"Well, whichever of you is which, I'm Lee Jordan."

"Nice to mee—"

The boats lurched and started forward, effectively ending any form of conversation for Lee. He took deep breaths through his nose and out of his mouth, keeping his eyes fixed firmly on the end of the boat rather than the water. It was only when the castle came into view that he seemed to feel better—if only because he was distracted by his first time seeing it.

Ever had thought the twins were exaggerating when, as they'd gotten off the train, they'd said Hogwarts was a castle...but it really was a castle! It was huge, it was gorgeous, it was...majestic. Those words didn't fit it, not in her head, but she didn't have the vocabulary to describe the pillars and towers and swoops and stones...there was so much and she must have looked like a cartoon character, the way her head whipped back and forth in an attempt to take in everything. For once, she wasn't alone; nearly all of the first years were looking around in the same way, even the twins. She wanted to say something, but she didn't want to ruin the moment with words she didn't have, and it was impossible to describe what she was feeling at any rate. She put one hand over Lee's on the bench, and reached forward with the other to place it between Fred and George. Their hands covered her's in the next instant.

It felt like a lifetime, the four of them sitting there and staring in awe as the castle slowly grew closer, but it couldn't have been more than ten minutes before the boats were docking on the banks on the opposite side of the lake. Ever had forgotten her fear of water; she wanted to sit and look at the castle for the rest of the night, and on into the day so she could see it as the sun rose.

"C'mon, we can't miss the sorting." One of the twins—she'd lost track of which was which again—grabbed her hand, pulling her easily out of the boat. Nervous conversation flowed around them about everything from the giant of a man leading them into the castle to what the sorting would be like. Maybe even the children of witches and wizards weren't told everything about how Hogwarts worked...

"What's the sorting?"

"It decides what house you'll be in," Lee murmured, fighting to keep close to Ever and the Weasleys. "Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, or Slytherin."

"And...which are the ones in green?"

"That's Slytherin," Fred mumbled as they made their way through the high wooden doors and into the...

"This must be the Entrance Hall," Lee whispered. It felt wrong, somehow, to speak out loud just then, like it would have been defiling some sacred rite of passage.

Dear Mum, she composed in her head, picking at her bottom lip with her teeth. This castle is huge and it doesn't feel like home without you. I don't know what I'm doing here yet but it's glorius, I don't even have the words to describe it, and I wish you could be here to see it.

Her letter was cut off abruptly when the door in front of them swung open and a tall, stern-looking woman—stern, but not unkind, she thought, there was something about her eyes that didn't seem unkind at all—entered the room in a sweep of green robes.

"First years," she said, and the way her voice rang made all conversation that hadn't petered out when she entered cut off abruptly. "I am Professor McGonagall. Follow me."

They did, silently, in a single-file line. The next room was five times the size of the last, with four long tables running down it and one running across at the opposite end. The professor led the way, and they followed wordlessly, staring at the ceiling—how did they make it look like the sky? Would she be learning that kind of magic? Ever wondered how difficult it was, how many people it had taken to do that—and the floor, the students around them and the teachers in front of them. Professor McGonagall cut a straight line between the two tables, to the head of the hall, and there she placed a stool. On that stool, she placed a hat. The first years stared at it for a moment, perplexed, until a rip in its brim opened up and it began to sing. Ever didn't hear the words of the song; she was too busy staring at the hat. This was like something straight out of a Disney movie, except...well, the hat sounded like a fifty-year-old man who had smoked his whole life.

"How does it do that?" she hissed, leaning forward so Lee—in front of her in line—could hear. He shrugged.

"Not sure. You'd have to ask Professor McGonagall, or maybe even Professor Dumbledore." Ever opened her mouth to ask exactly who Professor Dumbledore was, but the hat had fallen silent, and now Professor McGonagall was unrolling a scroll of parchment.

"When I call your name," she began, watching the first years with steely eyes that seemed to dare them to make a sound while she was speaking, "you will come sit on the stool and place the Sorting Hat upon your head. You will then go to your assigned table. Andrews, Janet." A girl, small for her age, blonde, and looking extremely scared scampered up to the stool and put the hat on.

"RAVENCLAW!" The middle-left table roared with approval, and the girl, looking relieved, placed the hat back on the school and ran to it. Ever breathed a sigh of relief; was it really that simple? All you had to do was put the hat on your head and then your table cheered? She watched as the professor read through the B's and C's, chewing on her bottom lip. She wished she'd been able to really listen to the Sorting Hat's song. Maybe he had sang about the houses, and which was which, what made them different.

"Jordan, Lee." Ever jumped when her new friend's name was called, watching him make his way up to the stool. He didn't look nervous, like nearly everyone else had. He didn't look much of anything. The hat was on his head for less than ten seconds.

"GRYFFINDOR!"

Professor McGonagall smiled—just a quirk of the lips, really—and Lee ran to the screaming table on the far left. Now K and L were the only letters separating Ever from her turn on the chair, and she found herself torn between wishing there were quite a lot of people with last names that began with those two letters and just getting this sorting over with.

There were exactly two. Laurel, Krickett became a Hufflepuff and Laurance, Theodore became a Ravenclaw.

"Moore, Ever."