Hermione knew that the hardest thing she'd ever done would be not blaming Harry.
She could, honestly, just picture it. Her parents and she had known quite well how dependent Harry was on her. He'd been hiding his whole life, and was just now coming out of his shell, and that was a very delicate time.
On the other hand, Hermione was a person easily embarrassed, even humiliated. It wasn't a total catastrophe to have this much attention drawn to her, she supposed. Being tied to Harry, who was said to be popular, might be survivable. Her "blood status" would probably be thrown around a hundred-fold over what she would have otherwise endured. She might even be asked if she'd tricked the Sorting Hat. Or worse, the Slytherins, who seemed to be living down to their reputation, would simply assume that and start passing that on.
Yes, as she pictured it, she imagined Harry saying all he wanted was to be with her. Period.
Where the bloody hell was his plan? Or even Plan A? Did it all go out the window? she grumbled internally. Then she realised it might simply have failed, and Harry had been unable to improvise a backup plan. Desperation would set in then, she decided.
Even with all the crazy things she'd read about, never mind encountered, since getting involved with magic, this topped everything.
In addition to not letting this sour her friendship with Harry, she decided, she would show no emotion whatsoever until she could get somewhere private. Showing weakness now could be fatal to her future.
Hermione had succeeded in keeping her emotions off her face, but her musings were interrupted when Professor McGonagall finally breached the shocked silence that had fallen on the entire Great Hall. There were, after all, about a third of the first-year students left un-Sorted, and she probably decided someone should get a move on.
"Whatever do you mean, Hat? How can this be?" McGonagall demanded.
"It means what it means, and it can be because this is part of the fundamental magic of Hogwarts, something decided when the Founders who gave me my personality and powers were still around to catalogue and manipulate it."
This set the professor back for a few seconds. Then she continued, "But we don't understand what you mean? What does this mean for Mr Potter, or for Miss Granger, who's already a Gryffindor?"
"What I mean," said the Hat, though with a less confrontational, less smug tone, "is that while Miss Granger is, indeed, a Gryffindor, she is also the head of her own Hogwarts House. Probably best we call it House Granger."
"Ahem ... my, my ..." Professor McGonagall muttered. "Hat, what are we to do about lodging, about House points, detentions, everything? We've never had a new House in all the history of Hogwarts, and no one was prepared for that to happen, let alone a House with only two members."
"Thank you for cutting to the practical elements, Professor McGonagall. It's no wonder you do all the real work around the administrative offices here," the Hat said.
It cleared its nonexistent throat, then announced, slowly and clearly: "As for lodging, he will lodge with his Head of House. As for House Points, half of the points they each make will go to House Gryffindor, and half will go to House Granger. A fair division, I hope you'll agree."
Lodging? Hermione thought. What does "lodging" with me mean? Will we get our own quarters? We'd better!
She didn't move her head, but motion in her peripheral vision told her the students at the Gryffindor table had turned to stare at her. She could see directly that that was true of the other three tables, and, yes, the staff table as well.
"Also, all detentions assigned must be first approved by Mr Potter's Head of House. If there is a dispute, it will be up to you as Miss Granger's Head of House to resolve it. Mr Potter need not simply accept a detention out of nowhere by a staff member who's not his House Head. His position is equivalent to a Prefect for House Granger, and if any staff or the Headmaster try to insist he serve such an unapproved detention, Mr Potter will gain the ability to assign or remove points, making the process perhaps even more of a farce than it's become in the last several years."
Hermione was prone to stressing about not making friends, about tests, about bullying, and it had made her prone to stomachaches. She'd gone to a yoga studio to learn meditation, and she decided she had nothing to lose trying to use that now. She thought she had kept her face from going red, and if so, she'd be happy with that.
"But our rules don't allow for such things, how are we to ..." McGonagall began. She was interrupted by the Headmaster.
"The Sorting Hat has clearly been Confounded or something," he said, irritably. "Ignore this nonsense, and let's get on with the Sorting so we can all eat and go to our rooms."
"Hat," he continued, "I order you to Sort Harry Potter into one of the real Houses forthwith and drop all this stuff and nonsense!"
"I was answering the Deputy Headmistress, who, as I said, does all the real work around here. If the drone who wanted me to throw the Boy Who Lived to the wolves by having his pet Death Eater torture him until he broke, in the House he's allowed to degenerate into a Death Eater warren feels the need to interrupt me again, I will refuse to speak, except to have House Granger put me back on so I can instruct them, and the rest of you can go hang."
The fury on Dumbledore's face had never been seen openly in Hogwarts before, and it was unsettling to the staff, and to the Ravenclaws, who were nearest to him. After the Hat had refused his command to put Harry Potter in Slytherin, but had acceded to his demand that the Hat encourage him to go there, he'd been upset, but not irate. But now, it had, out of the blue, decided to baulk at his every command, and attack his reputation, to boot. While it was a tradition going back to the early years of Hogwarts that Sorting be done by the Sorting Hat, as he'd told the Hat warningly, it wasn't mandated by the Hogwarts Board, and could be dispensed with.
Those thoughts were interrupted as he looked around. There was not a sympathetic face to be found. Everyone wanted to know what was going on, and the Hat had made him the sole obstacle to finding that out. It was a new experience for him, but he would have to actually acquiesce to another being's will. Worse, he couldn't keep his pique from showing on his face. It was so great it was leaking through his Occlumency.
After a long silence, the Hat continued, clearly addressing Professor McGonagall.
"Harry Potter will lodge with Hermione Granger in her sleeping area in the Gryffindor girls' dormitory. The stairs won't hinder him from travelling there. It will facilitate the transition from simply being a Hogwarts House to additionally becoming a Magical dynasty House. This is, as I said, fundamental Hogwarts Magic, and fundamental Magic, and it's not to be negotiated."
Professor McGonagall gasped. "But what about the other girls in the first-year dormitory?"
"Miss Granger can testify that Mr Potter is a very shy and gentlemanly boy. She has the wit to work out accommodations to the situation Magic has dictated. As for the other girls, they are Gryffindors. They can endure, they are resilient and brave, not a bunch of shrinking violets."
Professor McGonagall wished for a second that Harry had been sorted into Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw, so she could have another Head of House carry on this absurd conversation.
"But why?" she said, desperation and exasperation mingling in her voice. "Why all this, why on Earth do you wish him to lodge with Miss Granger, in her very bed, if I am not misunderstanding you, in the first place?"
"As I told you, Deputy Headmistress, among the many reasons I have, one is to facilitate the growth of House Granger from a Hogwarts House to a Magical House, that their children may carry on both the Potter and Granger names, family magic, and so on."
Our children? Hermione thought. She would have to put her head down towards her thighs soon or she'd pass out. She was sure of it. She had only imagined things had gotten as humiliating as possible. Never jinx yourself again like that, Hermione Granger, she scolded in her thoughts.
"Their ... their children?" McGonagall mirrored Hermione's reflections. "Surely, you cannot mean ..."
"They are both well-suited to the founding of a House, a future part of the Wizengamot, which sorely needs new blood not overly obsessed with old blood," the Hat said, serenely.
"So," McGonagall asked, still trying to make sense of the absurd situation, "you wish - no, Magic wishes, according to you - that they marry after Hogwarts?"
"Neither Magic nor I care about legalities like marriage," came the reply. "Yes, the tradition has arisen for Houses' rises and falls, alliances, inheritances and so on to follow such laws, but in the creation of an actual Magical House, they're completely irrelevant, though not as stupid and pernicious as the pure-blood nonsense." It was a sign of how fascinated the students were that no one in Slytherin House objected to that last.
Since McGonagall didn't say anything to that, the Hat went on: "When new Granger Harry Potter and his Head of House have made a sufficient commitment, and when they've consummated that commitment, that will be the beginning of New Magical House Granger. They are free to do so whenever they wish. At that point, the House Points that were going half to House Granger and Half to House Gryffindor from Mr Potter will go entirely to House Granger."
Hermione pretended she'd dropped something, but stayed down under the table until she was sure she'd remain conscious. She finally gave a thought to Harry, who had scurried back to her side while McGonagall questioned the hat, when she came back up. She turned to look at him. He was utterly miserable. She didn't wipe his tears, but she did take his hand and squeeze it. On an impulse, she leaned towards his right ear and whispered, "We'll get through this."
She wasn't so sure, inside. What the Hat was saying implied that, should she and Harry do something she wasn't even thinking about, everyone in the entire school would know, as the House points would immediately announce that. She really missed her old primary school, bullies and all, and was seriously reconsidering her enthusiasm for Hogwarts, and for Magic in general.
Lavender Brown spoke up, then. She and Parvati, as the only girls who knew Harry and Hermione, had had a few whispered words with Fay Dunbar and Sally-Anne Perks.
"It's alright, Harry and Hermione, we'll all manage somehow. Parvati and I have told the other girls you're both responsible and respectful. And, to boot, we're going to be right there making Hogwarts history. We'll all be in the next edition of the book Hermione keeps lugging around, you know."
I will be in Hogwarts: A History because my body is considered a Hogwarts House, Hermione thought. I don't have to work hard to guess what someone like Cormac McLaggen would say about that.
The Hat spoke up, then. "To finish off, I would like to point out that neither the Headmaster, nor anyone he appoints, has any control over Harry Potter as of this Sorting. Interfering with the creation of a House will disqualify him from being the Headmaster, and from remaining within these walls. He is warned. And with that, I finally agree with his demand, earlier this evening: let us get on with it."
"Oh, thank Goodness," Professor McGonagall couldn't help but blurt out.
"Indeed, said the Hat. "I believe next up was Abraxas Runcorn? Three guesses on which House he'll want." Since the Hat had a mouth, it was fully capable of smirking.
By the time Blaise Zabini went into Slytherin, the entire Hall breathed a sigh of relief. Neither Harry nor Hermione felt like saying anything. The other first-year Gryffindors kept the bulk of students from harassing them (Ron Weasley looked stunned, and paused in his eating periodically to look stunned again, then went back to it, giving up understanding what was going on as a bad deal). The two members of New House Granger ate quickly (and not very much, though Harry needed to eat more than Hermione did), then went up to bed the instant the Headmaster finished his end-of-feast remarks (which he did with very poor grace). The other Gryffindor girls let them go on ahead to make whatever preparations Hermione decided upon.
The most interesting reaction, in the end, turned out to be on the part of Minerva McGonagall. She had thought her heart would fail during the sorting, but sitting down with a little food and listening to the staff discuss the event had calmed her down and cleared her mind. She noticed with some satisfaction that being called Dumbledore's pet Death Eater by the official Sorting Hat had silenced Snape, since she didn't think she could tolerate his remarks about Harry Potter, and she was seeking to avoid a confrontation with Dumbledore over the wretched man.
And that was the focus of her reaction: this, all of this, was heaven-sent. She had been wanting to do right by Harry Potter, to start to turn the school back to its original purpose. Dumbledore and the Hat were now at daggers drawn. That suggested Hogwarts and the Founders might have a few tricks up their sleeve to thwart him if he sought to do things that the School didn't approve of. She should have been surprised the Headmaster was ordering the Sortings around, but she couldn't bring herself to be. She just felt a sort of apathetic "well, of course he is," about that. But the whole House Granger thing was going to set him on his heels, perhaps for the entire year. Even better, the announcement of a new Magical House would probably distract Malfoy long enough for her and Augusta Longbottom to work out a strategy to sideline him, and remove him from the Hogwarts Board.
She had been proud of the way Hermione had visibly steeled her expression not to reveal anything of her inner feelings. She owed it to her to do the same as she listened and plotted.
She had always admired Augusta in a rough way, but she had a feeling they were going to be the best of friends before too long.