When James, Triss, Dray and Hermione finally got off of the train they followed a voice loud voice yelling, "First year this way please!" The owner of the voice was a burly man that James could tell was a half giant.
Once all of the first years had been gathered the man led them to a bunch of boats. "No more than 4 to a boat," the man yelled. James, Triss, Dray and Hermione piled into a boat.
"Hermione, do you have a nickname?" James asked once the boats started to move.
"No, why?" Hermione asked him.
"Hermione is hard to pronounce. You said your middle name was Katharine didn't you?" asked James.
"Yes," said Hermione.
"How would you feel about your nickname being Kat?" James asked.
"That would be fine," said Kat nodding here approval. The rest of the boat ride was quiet. The view of the castle from the lake however, caused everyone to gasp. The castle was lit up like a beautiful candle against the star filled night sky.
The boats soon docked in a cove under the castle. The man led them to a set of double doors where another man with black hair, hazel eyes and glasses. "Here are the firs' years, Professor Potter," said the half giant.
"Thank you, Hagrid," said Potter. Potter led them into a circular room with a pair of double doors opposite of where they entered. "Now," said Potter. "The start-of-term feast will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is important because, while you are here your house will be like your family.
"The houses are Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin," he said all but sneering the name Slytherin. "Each house has it's own history and has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn you house points, while any rule breaking will lose house points. At the end of the year the house cup will be awarded to the house with the most house points. The Sorting will begin in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school," he said before walking out of the room.
The minute Professor Potter was out of year shot the famous Hogwarts rumor mill started at full speed. The most ridiculous Sorting rumor came from a red haired boy who said, "My brothers said that you had to wrestle a troll to find out what house we are in."
James, however, was not listening to the ridiculous rumors but talking to Draco. "Professor Potter doesn't normally do the Sorting speech but Professor Evans, his wife, is 4 months pregnant and no one wants her to move around much for the fear that she will lose another baby," Draco said to him.
"Another baby?" asked James.
"Yeah, her first son was stillborn and she miscarried all of the others. Dad said it was Potter's fault, not hers because Potter has faulty genetics," explained Draco.
James thought about this for a minute knowing full well who Lily Evans was. 'It must be the Potter genetics because I was fine when I was born,' James thought feeling a slight pang of fury remembering that Evans had abandoned him.
Professor Potter came back a few minutes later and the room went silent. "Follow me," he said before leading them through the double doors he came in from and into a massive hall.
The hall had five long tables. Four of the tables had different colored banners hanging over them and were full of students. The other table was at the front of the hall over looking over the other four tables and had several teachers sitting on it.
Professor Potter led them to the front of the hall and had them stand side by side in front of what looked like and old hat. The hall was quiet as if waiting for something when suddenly the hat started to sing.
"A long time ago when the Wizarding world was new,
Four people deiced to build a school to teach what they knew.
Old and cunning Slytherin taught the students pure and sly,
While good man Gryffindor taught those with more than met the eye.
Lady Ravenclaw taught those with extra amounts of talent,
And sweet Lady Hufflepuff taught those who were combined," it sang.
The hall burst into applause when the hat had finished and Professor Potter pulled out a list and started calling names. James was called up quickly and he sat down on the stool and placed the Sorting hat on his head.
'My, my, don't you have a load of secrets locked away in your head. Slytherin is the place for you but lets see what else you have locked up in here. Ah, you're the one who defeated Voldemort, Dumbledore would love this piece of information,' the hat thought to him.
'If you tell any one about that I will fry your ass,' James thought back to the hat building up some of his elemental energy.
'Okay, no need to get pushy. You know I live in the headmasters office and I hear all of his meetings, I would like to tell you that you shouldn't be mad at your mother. Not everything is what it seems,' said the hat before yelling, "Slytherin".
James walked over to the Slytherin table and sat down wondering what the hat meant by 'Not everything is what it seems.' He was drawn out of his thoughts when Professor Potter yelled, "Granger, Hermione". For some reason James felt very protective of the girl, like a brother would be over his little sister.
Kat walked up to the stool and sat down. After a minute and a few fearful expressions flashing across Kat's face later the hat yelled, "Gryffindor". Kat got up from the stool and looked over at James as if asking permission to sit down. James nodded and flashed her a lopsided grin making her laugh.
A few minutes later Draco sat down next to James followed by Triss. "I can't believe Granger got thrown into Gryffindor. I thought she would be in Ravenclaw," said Draco shaking his head.
"Granger?" asked James wanting to know why Draco was calling Kat by her last name.
"Yeah, those Gryffindors will corrupt her and shill be calling us slimy snakes by the end of the week, you'll see," said Draco with a sneer on his face.
"I seriously doubt that," said James looking at Hermione. Hermione was sitting all alone at the end of the table waiting for the Sorting ceremony to be over.
When the ceremony was over a man that James guessed was Dumbledore stood up. "I would just like to say a few words, they are: Newt, Nitwit, Oddment, and Tweak," he said before sitting back down. Suddenly the tables were laden with food.
You know that old man is crazy, right? asked Jewel from under his robes.
Yeah, said James looking around. He spotted Kat doing the same and their eyes locked. James motioned for her to come sit in the empty seat next to him.
Kat didn't need to be told twice and was across the hall and in the seat next to him in less than a second. When she sat down her house mates as well as his started whispering among themselves.
One well placed glare shut them all up. Once everyone had gone back to their conversations James stared his own. "What's up with you looking so squeamish with the Gryff's?" he asked.
Hermione motioned her hand to toward Randal Black who was glaring at her with a malice glint in his eyes.
James glared right back at him causing him to look at his plate. "If he or anyone else bothers you let me know, I'll take care of it," said James. The two of them spent the rest of the meal talking about Hogwarts and anything else that came up.
When the meal was over the Headmaster stood up again. "I have a few start of term notices I would like to announce. First, the third floor corridor on the right hand-side is out of bounds this year. Second is that Quidditch try outs will be held in two weeks, if you would like to try out please see Madam Hooch. Also last but not least the Forbidden forest is just that, forbidden. Prefects, please lead the students to your house dormitories," Dumbledore said.
James and Kat stood up and parted ways. Kat looked uneasily at her house mates who were glaring at her but one glare from James made them avert they're eyes. "Kat, promise, if they bother you let me know and I'll deal with it," said James squeezing her shoulder.
Kat left the hall with her house mates and James went to catch up with Dray and Triss. He found them trailing behind a fifth year boy named Marcus Flint, the 5th year Prefect and Quidditch captain. Marcus led them into the dungeons and to a portrait of two snakes arguing, to James ears at least.
"This is the entrance to the common room, the password is Legacy," said Marcus, the portrait opened to reveal a door that led into a big stone room decorated in green and silver. "This is the common room. Up the stairs on the right are the boys dorms, girls are on the left. Two students to each room and bathroom, the doors have the names of the occupants written on them, I suggest you get to bed as we do have classes tomorrow " Marcus continued.
James said goodnight to Triss and headed up to his dorm. He found his name on a door with Dray's name right under it. He changed from his school robes in to a pair of plain black shorts and crawled into bed immediately fell a sleep.
The next morning James woke to 'Bounce, Bounce, Bounce.' "What do you want Triss?" James asked burying his head deep into his pillow.
"James, get up! We have training to do," Said Triss pulling his covers off. James crawled out of bed and straight into the bathroom. He splashed cold water on his face and pulled a lose workout shirt on. Triss was in the Armory in his trunk when he returned.
A few minutes later she came out with the two swords they had last dueled with last and two cups of a potion that protected the two of them from fatal wounds and in Triss's case, healed any inflicted wounds. In James case, however it blocked some of his power and only allowed him to partially heal his own wounds, it had to heal the rest of the way naturally.
Triss handed him his sword and dragged him down stairs, threw the castle, out the front doors, and across the grounds to what he recognized as a Quidditch pitch. "No one should be able to see us practicing here," said Triss downing her potion, James did the same when she handed him his.
"I hate that stuff," said James gagging at the horrible taste. Triss just rolled her eyes and got in dueling position. As good as Triss was at dueling she rarely ever beat James because she didn't have enough patience to let the other person to take the first blow and was therefore very predictable. Also unlike James she stuck with using the same technique which made her even more predictable.
James, on the other hand, never used the same series of attacks twice if he could help it and preferred to make up his own techniques. That is what made him a hard to beat.
As predicted Triss made the first strike but James parried easily and launched his own series of attacks. James could tell Triss was having a hard time parrying his strikes but she was keeping up. James purposely left him self open in one of is attacks to see if Triss caught it.
Sure enough she saw the opening and left James with a two foot wound wrapping around his side but her making that attack allowed him to drop and kick her legs out from under her causing her to drop her sword.
Before Triss could make a move to grab her sword James had his sword pressed against her throat. "Do you yield?" James asked. Triss nodded and James removed his sword and pulled her up.
"Are you alright?" asked Triss pointing to his side where a two foot long 2 inch deep wound was visible.
"Yeah, I'll have to stitch it up though," said James inspecting the wound.
"Sorry about that," said Triss also inspecting the wound.
"Don't worry about it, it was my fault anyway," said James.
Triss walked towards the Quidditch locker rooms to shower and change while James had to go back to his dorm because he forgot to bring his stuff. On the way to the dungeons James seriously hoped that no one was up yet but looking at his watch he wasn't worried as it was only 6:30 in the morning.
When James got back to his room Dray was just getting up and that left him a few minutes to grab a change of clothes, robes, put the swords away and get his first-aid kit without Dray seeing to cut in his side.
After taking a shower and thoroughly cleaning his wound James threw on a pair of boxers and black jeans before starting to stitch up the cut that went from his back to the middle of his stomach. It didn't take him more than 10 minutes having done it on multiple occasions. After cleaning up the bathroom James threw on a dark blue shirt and his robes and walked out to the common room.
It was now 7:15 in the morning and everyone was up and moving around. James walked out threw the portrait hole not wanting to be in the steadily filling common room. James walked up towards the towers hoping to run in to Kat but not in the way he did.
As James walked up another flight of stairs he heard sniffs and sobs with his sensitive Elven hearing. He followed the sound and was very surprised to find Kat as the source. James kneeled down and touched her shoulder and was even more surprised when Kat started swinging furiously trying to get away from him as if he would hurt her.
James eyes widened when he remembered Triss doing the same when he first met her and his suspicions were confirmed when he saw a black eye decorating her face. James backed off for a second and started calling to Kat. After a few minute of calling her name Kat looked up at him with fear in her eyes.
"What happened Kat?" James asked tilting her head up to make her look him directly in the eye and giving her some mental persuasion.
Kat's eyes started to water and she started to speak. "When I was 8 I had an accident that ended up having to have the Accidental magic reversal squad come and fix it. They explained to my mom, dad, and brother that I was a Witch. My father was very unhappy about it, as my other brother is a wizard, and started trying to 'beat the magic' out of me. When I got my letter he was even angrier and started to beat me more. My mom got me out and taught me how to cover up my bruises with make-up," Kat said before bowing her head back down.
James knew there was more but had decided to drop it for now. "Kat look at me," said James. Kat looked up and with a small touch of his fingers all of the bruises and cuts on her body disappeared.
Kat obviously felt the difference and stared at James amazement. See her surprise James answered her unasked question. "I am a healer, only you, Triss, and my Guardian know so you can't tell anyone," James said pulling Kat off the floor. Kat nodded.
"Why were you out in the halls, anyway?" James asked as Kat led him back to the Gryffindor common room.
"Randal Black started taunting me last night and I couldn't take it, so I left," Kat said simply as the reached a portrait of a fat lady in a pink dress. "Password?" the lady asked. "Electron," said Kat and the door opened.
"Go and get cleaned up, I'll wait here," said James flopping down in one of the over stuffed chairs in the Gryffindor common room. Luckily breakfast had just started and everyone was gathered in the Great Hall, so James didn't have to worry about any Gryffindor's wandering around.
Kat finally came down from her rooms at about 8:10 and was dressed in her school robes with her hair pulled back. She looked much better now that her robes were no longer wrinkled and her hair was tamed.
"Ready to go?" asked James from his seat.
"Yeah," said Kat as James hopped up from his chair and followed her out of the common room. It took them about 10 minutes to get to the Great Hall from the towers, about twice as long as the dungeons. A sudden thought struck James, he had left Jewel alone in the dorm.
"Kat, I have to run back to my dorms really quick. You can come with me or meet me in the hall," said James. Kat said she would go to the hall and wait for James. James took off like a bat out of hell and when he was out of sight of everyone he started porting for short distances. He reached the entrance to the dorms in about a minute and a half and he yelled the password to the portrait.
The portrait opened and James ran inside and up the stairs to where his and Dray's rooms were. Jewel was curled up on his pillow when James arrived and James picked her up. Hey, what was that for? she hissed as he threw her around his neck and started running back towards the Great Hall.
Sorry Jewel, but I don't want to leave Kat alone with her house mates for to long. I have a feeling something bad will happen to her and I want to try and prevent it, James hissed back.
About two minutes later he reached the Great Hall. He saw that all of the teachers were either sitting at the head table or passing out time tables. James spotted Triss, Dray, and Kat all sitting together looking over their time tables and James joined them.