The Scamander ✧ Harry Potter Year 1

Chapter 6

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"We're ready for you now."

You don't need to remember the first time you enter The Great Hall. At least, that is what I would come to know. And perhaps you would never need to enter it again if you had done it once. It is a message; beyond that, it is little else. It is the feeling given by the message, maybe you could liken it to coming home, but with that, I would contest. It was knowing that; if I couldn't be home, I would be here. The power of Aslyum, of seeking it, of having it ached like a tiny dot of light on a black map. I perhaps understand this better now, but then I think I would've described it at the time as a second home.

The grand room was illuminated by uncountable candles dancing gently in the waves of the night sky, the soft glow brightening the already amazed eyes of the young onlookers. As I walked down the middle lane, taking the path directly to the front of the hall with my peers, I felt the eyes of the older students with every step.

"It's not real, the ceiling." Hermione was the first to speak from beside me, seemingly less self-conscious about the plethora of intently staring older students. "It's just bewitched to look like the night sky. I read about it in Hogwarts: A History." Of course, this was quite evident to those who grew up around magic, but I was willing to indulge as the oblivious companion to Hermione's like-minded excitement about Hogwarts.

"Wow, that's amazing," I spoke just as we reached the front of the Great Hall. In front of us stood a long bench on which all the professors sat taut, and in front of them stood a lonesome stool in the middle of the stage, which was occupied by a lonesome tattered hat.

"All right, will you wait along here, please? Now, before we begin, Professor Dumbledore would like to say a few words." McGonagall announced, gesturing to the enigmatic man, with the silver beard and kind eyes that stood in his ripe age to greet us.

"I have a few start-of-term notices I wish to announce. The first years, please note that the dark forest is strictly forbidden to all students. Also, our caretaker, Mr Filch," Dumbledore signalled to a ragged old man in the possession of a Maine Coon cat with striking red eyes, "has asked me to remind you that the 3rd-floor corridor on the right-hand side is out of bounds to everyone who does not wish to die a most painful death. Thank you." The message did not frighten me as it seemed to do my peers. Grandpa Newt had on multiple occasions been called into the Forbidden Forest for Beast business, and often I had gone along with him. The horrors of Hogwarts did not come worse than the Forbidden Forest.

"When I call your name," McGonagall once again took over, "you will come forth, I shall place the sorting hat on your head, and you will be sorted into your houses... Hermione Granger." I squeezed the girl's arm in encouragement as she sent a quick, nervous smile before heading forth towards the hat. I felt Hermione's nervousness along with her as the sorting hat was placed on her head. The house in which you are placed would greatly influence one's school life for the next seven years. The sorting hat was placed lightly on her head by the experienced hand of McGonagall. And then there was silence through the grand hall, waiting for the decisive disruption from the tattered hat that told her future.

"Okay...Gryffindor!!" The table sporting flashes of red and gold erupted with thunderous applause, welcoming the beaming Hermione towards them.

"Draco Malfoy." The name was called to move on the queue of eagerly waiting children before I had had the chance to prepare myself for the possibility of a sullen future without the friend I had made on the search for Trevor if I was to be placed out with the courageous house.

Lucius Malfoy's descendent could have bypassed the sorting hat if he so wished, for the sorting hat seemed to be waiting for the moment it touched a single strand of his perfectly combed hair before he would announce.

"SLYTHERIN!" Any hopes one may have had for this boy's character under the upbringing of Lucius was vanquished with his display of blood puritanism in the Entrance Hall. It was thus with a heart of empathy that I watched the boy saunter over to his correlating house.

"Susan Bones." An unknown, preppy girl moved her way out of the crowd and onto the stage as the others had.

"Let's see..." The hat began once again, "I know...Hufflepuff!" I turned to look at the house, which had been my grandpa's, the house sported fruitful, happy smiles as they welcomed the Bones girl, and I found myself smiling along with their success.

"Ronald Weasley." My eyes trailed the mob of fiery hair, my fingers created a knot in the secrecy of my sleeve. I was suddenly envious of those who already sat with a house to their character. To have your badge, to know your place within this great hall, and to know the friends from the foes.

"Ah! Another Weasley." The hat drawled. "I know just where to put you...Gryffindor!!" The room did not lose vitality with every announcement, and the corresponding house was in eruptions once again. Despite my growing anxiousness, I could only meet Ron's bright-faced smile with one of my own.

"Harry Potter." The silence from The Great Hall was the only thing to be suspected at the mention of such a name. A name that had been whispered, celebrated, and cried over for the past decade. Beyond the fame, the silence was produced from a name attached to death, sacrifice, and just enough hope to stop outbursts of tears. Suddenly, it wasn't just myself holding my breath to see the answer from the sorting hat. The Great Hall's breath stopped with me.

Harry sat on the lonesome stool.

"Hmm...difficult, very difficult..." The sorting hat whispers were too quiet for the hall to hear, but we still hung onto every isolated mumble and quirk of Harry's eyebrow. "No? Well, if you're sure...better be...GRYFFINDOR!!"

The lion's house roared.

"We got Potter! we got Potter!" Two tall, overbearingly loud ginger boys with grins reaching each ear yelled in mocking to the other tables.

There was a gleeful laugh that escaped me then, much different than the doom I expected to feel. There was a refugee in seeing the jubilation of The Great Hall that evening, in seeing my temporary friends find their welcome house.

"Mathilda Scamander", McGonagall calls, I turned to the stern woman, the smile lasting only a second more. I felt only in control one step at a time, bringing me closer to that tauntingly lonely stool. A breath was taken upon arrival, and then I rested on the hard stool, uncomfortable enough to bring me a little closer to being ready to be settled with my friends at my house out with the room's prying eyes.

I wasn't aware of the interested eyes of Dumbledore and the supportive looks of my temporary train ride friends that tried to comfort the anxious quiver of my lip without much more power than a smile. The shadow of the sorting hat shielded the room's eyes from mine.

And then it whispered to me quietly,

Ahh, you want to be with your friends. Gryffindor could suit you, but no, you belong in Hufflepuff, most certainly. 

like most Hufflepuffs, your drive to be true leads you to your house, not your quest for glory.

It won't be a bother; true friendship concurs all. 

"It will have to be - HuFfLePuFf"