SA & RoF - Chapter Two, "Sorting It Out"
Special thanks go to my own personal Sorting Hat, melinda_goodin. Seriously, I can't sort people to save my life, so without you this project would have been dead on the ground.
Chapter Two
Sorting it Out
On the morning of September 1st, Solana gathered her things, dressed in her new uniform, and accepted a rather frosty goodbye from her grandfather before being driven by one of the family chauffeurs to London. There were a lot of people in King’s Cross station. They were non-magic, Muggle, as Jowan had called them. It amazed her to think that she was now part of a world that these people had no idea even existed.
Crossing into Platform 9 & ¾ was strange, but Solana finally managed to walk through with her eyes closed, emerging on the other side of an invisible gateway. The crowd of people here were clearly witches and wizards-she saw floating trunks, and cages holding cats in several colours, every breed of owl, and even a few very impolite ferrets. People in cloaks and robes milled about the platform, hugging and kissing their children goodbye.
Solana told herself that she wasn’t envious as she boarded the old-fashioned scarlet steam engine, stowing her trunk in one of the overhead luggage racks. Before long, everyone had boarded and the train began to leave while parents and siblings waved goodbye from the platform.
After a few minutes of travel, Jowan appeared at the door to her compartment. “Oh, it’s you. I was wondering if I’d see you on the train.” He looked around, as if checking for anything that Solana could accidentally drop on his head. “Can I sit here?”
“Of course,” said Solana.
They chatted about their schoolbooks (Solana had already read hers from cover-to-cover, while Jowan’s parents had threatened to burn all of his supplies if they ever caught him using them in the house). Solana bought plenty of snacks from the trolley-lady, using the money Professor Irving had helped convert for her at the magical bank, Gringotts. She and Jowan sampled wizarding candy for the first time. They even tried casting some spells with their new wands, though without training they could only really shoot sparks around the compartment.
All the while, the landscape outside slowly changed from wide open fields to a forest that grew thicker and wilder with each mile traveled. It was completely dark when the Hogwarts Express eventually pulled to a stop. Everyone left the train, emerging on a small platform at the edge of a village surrounded by a thick, black forest.
“That’s Hogsmeade,” Jowan said. “It’s the only all-magic village in Britain.”
Solana and Jowan followed the other first years down a path through the forest. Hogwarts castle was beautiful in the distance, like something out of a fairy tale with its hundreds of windows glittering like stars in the darkness. At the edge of the lake, they found a fleet of enchanted rowboats that slowly took them across the water to a cave at the base of the castle.
A stern-looking older man with silvery-grey hair and a neatly trimmed beard met them there and introduced himself as Professor Greagoir. Solana recognized his name-it was signed at the bottom of her Hogwarts letter, which meant that he was the Deputy Headmaster.
“Follow me,” Professor Greagoir ordered. He led the first years out of the cave and up several steps to the castle’s huge oak front doors. In the grand entrance hall, he brought them to a halt. “Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin: these are the four houses of Hogwarts,” Professor Greagoir began. “The welcome feast is about to begin, but before you can take your seats in the Great Hall, each of you must be sorted into a house. Prepare yourselves. I shall return in a moment to take you to the ceremony.”
Professor Greagoir left without another word. Jowan, already quite pale, went completely white. “Ceremony? You don’t think they’ll want us to do something difficult to prove ourselves, do you? Not in front of the whole school?”
“Do not be foolish,” said a skinny, pale girl with jet black hair worn in a messy black bun. Her eyes were striking yellow. “They would not expect untrained children to do anything outside of their surely miniscule ability. How very lucky for you all.”
“My uncle told me that it’s more like a test of character than ability,” said a gangly boy with strawberry-blond hair. “He might just be having me, on, though.”
Jowan didn’t seem very comforted by their words.
Professor Greagoir returned. “Alright, all of you line up,” he ordered. “Now follow me.”
He led them through a pair of large double doors into the Great Hall, a huge room lit by thousands of candles. All of the older students were seated at four long tables (one for each house, Solana guessed), while the professors sat at the High Table beneath a row of stained-glass windows at the far end of the room. Solana was not a person easily intimidated by large crowds, but even she was made slightly nervous at the sight of so many staring people. Thankfully she caught the eye of Professor Irving, now dressed in slate grey robes and seated in a golden chair at the middle of the High Table. He gave her a reassuring smile.
Between the line of first years and the seated professors, Greagoir set up a four-legged stool, on top of which he placed a pointed wizard’s hat. The old hat was patched and practically threadbare in places. Everyone stared in fascination as a rip on the hat’s brim opened like a mouth and began to sing.
“Oh you may not think I'm pretty,
But don't judge on what you see,
I'll eat myself if you can find
A smarter hat than me.
You can keep your bowlers black,
Your top hats sleek and tall,
For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat
And I can cap them all.
There's nothing hidden in your head
The Sorting Hat can't see,
So try me on and I will tell you
Where you ought to be.
You might belong in Gryffindor,
Where dwell the brave at heart,
Their daring, nerve, and chivalry
Set Gryffindors apart;
You might belong in Hufflepuff,
Where they are just and loyal,
Those patient Hufflepuffs are true
And unafraid of toil;
Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,
If you've a ready mind,
Where those of wit and learning,
Will always find their kind;
Or perhaps in Slytherin
You'll make your real friends,
Those cunning folks use any means
To achieve their ends.
So put me on! Don't be afraid!
And don't get in a flap!
You're in safe hands (though I have none)
For I'm a Thinking Cap!”
Everyone applauded at the end of the song and the Sorting Hat, as it called itself, bowed to each of the four tables. Professor Greagoir unfurled a long roll of parchment. “When I call your name, put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted. Amell, Solana!”
“That didn’t take long,” Jowan whispered anxiously. “Good luck.”
That was the thing about having a surname that began with “A”-you often went first whether you liked it or not. Wishing that she’d been allowed to watch someone else go before her, Solana stepped forward and sat down on the stool. Everything went black as the Sorting Hat covered her eyes.
“Hmm…” a small voice hummed directly into her ear. Solana only barely managed not to jump. It sounded like someone was in the hat with her, or maybe even inside her own head. “Ah, there’s obviously great courage here. Shrewdness, oh my, yes. A fair enough mind, though it will need some polish before you reach your full potential. Considerably loyalty-with a fierce protective streak. So what shall decide it, eh?”
Solana said nothing, but the hat seemed to hear her anyway.
“Very well, then… better make you GRYFFINDOR!” The last word was shouted out loud so that everyone could hear. The Gryffindors cheered as Solana removed the Sorting Hat and joined them at their table. Glancing down at her uniform, Solana saw that they had become accented with scarlet and gold. She gave Jowan a hopefully reassuring thumbs-up.
Professor Greagoir continued to read names off of his list, and the students were sorted one-by-one. Alistair Guerrin, the gangly blond boy, actually let out a startled squeak after he put on the hat, prompting bursts of laughter throughout the Great Hall. He was still blushing and grinning embarrassedly when he took his seat at the Hufflepuff table, the trim on his uniform turning yellow and black.
It seemed to take longer to sort some students, and practically no time at all to sort others. The girl with yellow eyes, Morrigan Hemlock, had barely put on the hat before it screamed “SLYTHERIN!” Her uniform turned green and silver. Many of her new housemates attempted to shake her hand when she sat down at the Slytherin table, but Morrigan simply sneered at them until they decided they were better off keeping their hands to themselves.
When it was finally Jowan’s turn, he swallowed nervously and put on the hat. He needn’t have worried, because after only a moment, the hat shouted “RAVENCLAW!” The trim on Jowan’s uniform turned blue and bronze. He flashed Solana a relieved smile.
Once the last person was Sorted, Professor Greagoir rolled up the scroll and took away the hat and stool. That seemed to be the signal for the feast to start, as all of the plates and platters were suddenly full of food. Everything was delicious. Solana chatted eagerly with her new housemates between bites.
When everyone had finished, the headmaster stood from his throne-like chair. Everyone fell quiet. Though Professor Irving didn’t raise his voice, his words carried over the Great Hall with ease. “Now that we have eaten our fill, I have a few start-of-term notices. As always, the forest on the grounds is forbidden to all students. Magic is not to be used in the corridors between classes. And finally, anyone found attempting to enter the basement repository will be promptly expelled and have their wand snapped. You have been warned.”
Solana’s eyes widened. What on earth could they be keeping in the repository to merit such a serious reaction?
“But do not worry about such things now,” said Professor Irving. “It is time for us all to go to bed and have a good night’s sleep, so that we may wake up tomorrow morning, well rested and ready to learn.”
Everyone got up and made their way to the door. Solana followed her new housemates to Gryffindor tower, which was accessed through a hole behind a portrait of a lady in a pink dress. She made a note to remember the password. The common room was round and full of squashy armchairs and sofas, all in the Gryffindor house colours. Hanging on the walls were old medieval tapestries depicting knights and noble beasts, including a lion, Gryffindor’s mascot, in a position of prominence over the large crackling fireplace. Solana continued upstairs and fell gratefully into her four-poster bed, ignoring the chatter of the other girls in her dorm. She hadn’t realized how tired she was.
She had an odd dream of a twisted, nonsensical landscape full of strange creatures. Something that at first appeared to be nothing more than a humble rat approached and spoke to her like a person.
“Preconceptions. Careless trust. Pride,” it said. “Keep your wits about you, friend. True tests never end.”
Chapter Two
Sorting it Out
On the morning of September 1st, Solana gathered her things, dressed in her new uniform, and accepted a rather frosty goodbye from her grandfather before being driven by one of the family chauffeurs to London. There were a lot of people in King’s Cross station. They were non-magic, Muggle, as Jowan had called them. It amazed her to think that she was now part of a world that these people had no idea even existed.
Crossing into Platform 9 & ¾ was strange, but Solana finally managed to walk through with her eyes closed, emerging on the other side of an invisible gateway. The crowd of people here were clearly witches and wizards-she saw floating trunks, and cages holding cats in several colours, every breed of owl, and even a few very impolite ferrets. People in cloaks and robes milled about the platform, hugging and kissing their children goodbye.
Solana told herself that she wasn’t envious as she boarded the old-fashioned scarlet steam engine, stowing her trunk in one of the overhead luggage racks. Before long, everyone had boarded and the train began to leave while parents and siblings waved goodbye from the platform.
After a few minutes of travel, Jowan appeared at the door to her compartment. “Oh, it’s you. I was wondering if I’d see you on the train.” He looked around, as if checking for anything that Solana could accidentally drop on his head. “Can I sit here?”
“Of course,” said Solana.
They chatted about their schoolbooks (Solana had already read hers from cover-to-cover, while Jowan’s parents had threatened to burn all of his supplies if they ever caught him using them in the house). Solana bought plenty of snacks from the trolley-lady, using the money Professor Irving had helped convert for her at the magical bank, Gringotts. She and Jowan sampled wizarding candy for the first time. They even tried casting some spells with their new wands, though without training they could only really shoot sparks around the compartment.
All the while, the landscape outside slowly changed from wide open fields to a forest that grew thicker and wilder with each mile traveled. It was completely dark when the Hogwarts Express eventually pulled to a stop. Everyone left the train, emerging on a small platform at the edge of a village surrounded by a thick, black forest.
“That’s Hogsmeade,” Jowan said. “It’s the only all-magic village in Britain.”
Solana and Jowan followed the other first years down a path through the forest. Hogwarts castle was beautiful in the distance, like something out of a fairy tale with its hundreds of windows glittering like stars in the darkness. At the edge of the lake, they found a fleet of enchanted rowboats that slowly took them across the water to a cave at the base of the castle.
A stern-looking older man with silvery-grey hair and a neatly trimmed beard met them there and introduced himself as Professor Greagoir. Solana recognized his name-it was signed at the bottom of her Hogwarts letter, which meant that he was the Deputy Headmaster.
“Follow me,” Professor Greagoir ordered. He led the first years out of the cave and up several steps to the castle’s huge oak front doors. In the grand entrance hall, he brought them to a halt. “Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin: these are the four houses of Hogwarts,” Professor Greagoir began. “The welcome feast is about to begin, but before you can take your seats in the Great Hall, each of you must be sorted into a house. Prepare yourselves. I shall return in a moment to take you to the ceremony.”
Professor Greagoir left without another word. Jowan, already quite pale, went completely white. “Ceremony? You don’t think they’ll want us to do something difficult to prove ourselves, do you? Not in front of the whole school?”
“Do not be foolish,” said a skinny, pale girl with jet black hair worn in a messy black bun. Her eyes were striking yellow. “They would not expect untrained children to do anything outside of their surely miniscule ability. How very lucky for you all.”
“My uncle told me that it’s more like a test of character than ability,” said a gangly boy with strawberry-blond hair. “He might just be having me, on, though.”
Jowan didn’t seem very comforted by their words.
Professor Greagoir returned. “Alright, all of you line up,” he ordered. “Now follow me.”
He led them through a pair of large double doors into the Great Hall, a huge room lit by thousands of candles. All of the older students were seated at four long tables (one for each house, Solana guessed), while the professors sat at the High Table beneath a row of stained-glass windows at the far end of the room. Solana was not a person easily intimidated by large crowds, but even she was made slightly nervous at the sight of so many staring people. Thankfully she caught the eye of Professor Irving, now dressed in slate grey robes and seated in a golden chair at the middle of the High Table. He gave her a reassuring smile.
Between the line of first years and the seated professors, Greagoir set up a four-legged stool, on top of which he placed a pointed wizard’s hat. The old hat was patched and practically threadbare in places. Everyone stared in fascination as a rip on the hat’s brim opened like a mouth and began to sing.
“Oh you may not think I'm pretty,
But don't judge on what you see,
I'll eat myself if you can find
A smarter hat than me.
You can keep your bowlers black,
Your top hats sleek and tall,
For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat
And I can cap them all.
There's nothing hidden in your head
The Sorting Hat can't see,
So try me on and I will tell you
Where you ought to be.
You might belong in Gryffindor,
Where dwell the brave at heart,
Their daring, nerve, and chivalry
Set Gryffindors apart;
You might belong in Hufflepuff,
Where they are just and loyal,
Those patient Hufflepuffs are true
And unafraid of toil;
Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,
If you've a ready mind,
Where those of wit and learning,
Will always find their kind;
Or perhaps in Slytherin
You'll make your real friends,
Those cunning folks use any means
To achieve their ends.
So put me on! Don't be afraid!
And don't get in a flap!
You're in safe hands (though I have none)
For I'm a Thinking Cap!”
Everyone applauded at the end of the song and the Sorting Hat, as it called itself, bowed to each of the four tables. Professor Greagoir unfurled a long roll of parchment. “When I call your name, put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted. Amell, Solana!”
“That didn’t take long,” Jowan whispered anxiously. “Good luck.”
That was the thing about having a surname that began with “A”-you often went first whether you liked it or not. Wishing that she’d been allowed to watch someone else go before her, Solana stepped forward and sat down on the stool. Everything went black as the Sorting Hat covered her eyes.
“Hmm…” a small voice hummed directly into her ear. Solana only barely managed not to jump. It sounded like someone was in the hat with her, or maybe even inside her own head. “Ah, there’s obviously great courage here. Shrewdness, oh my, yes. A fair enough mind, though it will need some polish before you reach your full potential. Considerably loyalty-with a fierce protective streak. So what shall decide it, eh?”
Solana said nothing, but the hat seemed to hear her anyway.
“Very well, then… better make you GRYFFINDOR!” The last word was shouted out loud so that everyone could hear. The Gryffindors cheered as Solana removed the Sorting Hat and joined them at their table. Glancing down at her uniform, Solana saw that they had become accented with scarlet and gold. She gave Jowan a hopefully reassuring thumbs-up.
Professor Greagoir continued to read names off of his list, and the students were sorted one-by-one. Alistair Guerrin, the gangly blond boy, actually let out a startled squeak after he put on the hat, prompting bursts of laughter throughout the Great Hall. He was still blushing and grinning embarrassedly when he took his seat at the Hufflepuff table, the trim on his uniform turning yellow and black.
It seemed to take longer to sort some students, and practically no time at all to sort others. The girl with yellow eyes, Morrigan Hemlock, had barely put on the hat before it screamed “SLYTHERIN!” Her uniform turned green and silver. Many of her new housemates attempted to shake her hand when she sat down at the Slytherin table, but Morrigan simply sneered at them until they decided they were better off keeping their hands to themselves.
When it was finally Jowan’s turn, he swallowed nervously and put on the hat. He needn’t have worried, because after only a moment, the hat shouted “RAVENCLAW!” The trim on Jowan’s uniform turned blue and bronze. He flashed Solana a relieved smile.
Once the last person was Sorted, Professor Greagoir rolled up the scroll and took away the hat and stool. That seemed to be the signal for the feast to start, as all of the plates and platters were suddenly full of food. Everything was delicious. Solana chatted eagerly with her new housemates between bites.
When everyone had finished, the headmaster stood from his throne-like chair. Everyone fell quiet. Though Professor Irving didn’t raise his voice, his words carried over the Great Hall with ease. “Now that we have eaten our fill, I have a few start-of-term notices. As always, the forest on the grounds is forbidden to all students. Magic is not to be used in the corridors between classes. And finally, anyone found attempting to enter the basement repository will be promptly expelled and have their wand snapped. You have been warned.”
Solana’s eyes widened. What on earth could they be keeping in the repository to merit such a serious reaction?
“But do not worry about such things now,” said Professor Irving. “It is time for us all to go to bed and have a good night’s sleep, so that we may wake up tomorrow morning, well rested and ready to learn.”
Everyone got up and made their way to the door. Solana followed her new housemates to Gryffindor tower, which was accessed through a hole behind a portrait of a lady in a pink dress. She made a note to remember the password. The common room was round and full of squashy armchairs and sofas, all in the Gryffindor house colours. Hanging on the walls were old medieval tapestries depicting knights and noble beasts, including a lion, Gryffindor’s mascot, in a position of prominence over the large crackling fireplace. Solana continued upstairs and fell gratefully into her four-poster bed, ignoring the chatter of the other girls in her dorm. She hadn’t realized how tired she was.
She had an odd dream of a twisted, nonsensical landscape full of strange creatures. Something that at first appeared to be nothing more than a humble rat approached and spoke to her like a person.
“Preconceptions. Careless trust. Pride,” it said. “Keep your wits about you, friend. True tests never end.”