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With the words of the Hogwart's sorting hat still ringing in my ears I followed the other first year students up to the dormitory. I had no idea what it meant byYou will need more courage than most to get through the storm, but do so you will, or whether that was a good or a bad thing. It sounded ominous, and I wasn't sure I liked it at all. I turned the words over in my head, trying to block out the incessant babbling of the girl stood next to me. She'd latched onto me in the boat and not shut up since. Much to my dismay she'd also been sorted into Gryffindor, and I'd never survive seven whole years of her if I didn't manage something!
It was only when the fiery head of the prefect turned and announced that the boys' dormitory was up and down the stairs to the left, and the girls' dormitory was up and down the staircase on the right that my plots of how to rid myself of my self-appointed shadow went out of my head, and my stomach flipped into one giant Gordian knot. I'd never considered that they would separate us into different dormitories, my head had been full of flying and making things explode, not the logistics of where I would sleep. I would never be able to put up with living with girls all day in and all day out, and the feeling would probably be mutual. My mother hadn't even been able to keep me in Brownies for more than a month before the Brown Owl suggested that I might be suited elsewhere.
Of course, I shouldn't be too surprised, boys had never wanted a girl hanging around with them, and girls just wanted to talk about beauty and boys. It would be silly to think that the world would be any different here, even with a sport played by both boys and girls, and a uniform which was the same, even if it did look a little like a dress. My eyes narrowed at the memory of having to wear a dress, and in reassurance I touched the neatly knotted black tie around my neck, imagining tying it in the morning when it was glowing in red and gold like the upper years did. Proudly, I straightened it, and smoothed the wrinkles out of my jumper. I was at Hogwarts, and that was the thing that really mattered.
Someone tugged at my sleeve, and I turned around, disrupted from my thoughts. I shook them off grumpily, noticing that half of my year had vanished and my cheeks flushed red with embarrassment. "What?"
It was the boat-girl again, and I scowled harder, wondering when I would get rid of her. I'd tried ignoring her throughout the boat ride—not that it was difficult to get distracted by the sight of the castle in the lantern-light—throughout the Feast, and up until now, but it hadn't worked thus far. Why couldn't Slytherin have had her instead‽
"Let's go and see our dorm!" She enthused, "I bet it'll be great! Did you hear they have four-poster beds? Just like in a fairy tale..."
"Really? How fascinating." I mumbled, not caring less. With a sign I forced a smile, and gave her the benefit of the doubt. "Why don't we go and explore while everyone else is busy?"
"But that's boring. Come with me, please?" She wheedled, her eyes upturned to mine.
I sighed and resigned myself to following her, for fear that she might start crying. All I could hope that there was no pink in there, it was a hideous colour. I had no idea why everyone thought I had to like it. There was no 'boy' colour in the same way that pink was for girls; they had loads of colours. It wasn't fair, why shouldn't I like green and blue and brown and black just as much? I suppose I'm not supposed to like green much now either, that's the Slytherin colour, and they're supposed to be the enemy.
It was on the sixth step that it happened. The first thing I knew was that my ears were ringing, the noise was deafening. It was ten times worse than the old fire alarms at school, and a hundred times more terrifying. The second thing I noticed was that there was no longer a staircase at all, and I was falling down a very slippery and very steep slide. I hit the slope heavily, landing almost on my face, before ending up in a heap at the bottom. As soon as I touched the flagstones the noise stopped, leaving just a hissing in my ear drums, and I shook my head to try to clear it.
My face blushed with the embarrassment of being caught out by one of the castle's tricks on my very first day. I'd been warned about these, but no one had ever told me anything about the sixth step on the dorm staircase before. Then I blushed more when I realised that something wasn't right, and buried my hands into my trouser pockets, clutching around the wand for protection, even though I could do nothing with it yet.
It was only my fellow first years that were doubled over in innocent mirth. All the older students were staring in shock, or sniggering. It couldn't be just a normal thing for the staircase to do, there was something wrong. There were people whispering. My head swung from side to side, trying to find someone safe to go to, something to explain what had happened, but there was no one. I couldn't pick out the flash of ginger in the sea of strangers. Just all the girls and their horror and whispers, and the boys with their sniggers and louder whispers, and me stuck in the middle with no idea what was wrong.
All too soon I started to realise what the wrong thing was though, and wished that the klaxon was still blaring. The circular room became filled with the same hushed whisper, "Is it a boy?"
It. It. I hate that word. I'm not an it. Fury welled up in me, much worse than it had ever done before, and the rug on the floor burst into flames, roaring just as wildly as the anger and embarrassment inside of me that was suffocating my chest. The flames were quickly quelled with a jet of water from the ginger prefect's wand, and the room fell quiet again. There was no tittering or giggles this time, it was just perfectly silent.
The prefect stepped forward from the circle of those gathered around. "I think you'd better follow me." He spoke with no emotion that I could label in this voice.
I nodded meekly, following with no comprehension of where we were going or why. I followed him out of the common room, back through the portrait hole, and down five or six flights of stairs, and finally came to a halt outside a large oak door. The door looked the same as any other, and I wondered whether I'd ever get the hang of finding my way around the castle, if they let me stay. Heck, they'd probably not let me stay. Was this where you went to get expelled? Accidental magic was dangerous, and I'd almost blown up the whole common room, not to mention whatever it was that had happened before. My knees quivered like the trifle had on my spoon at the Feast with the thought of being sent home already.
The prefect rapped smartly on the door in what seemed to be a certain pattern and stepped inside the doorway as it opened, before turning to me and commanding brusquely to wait where I was.
Some magic charm must have been on the door, as I couldn't hear a word through it, not even the faintest muffled sound. There was no keyhole to peek through either, not that I thought I would have dared if there had been. Part of me contemplated running away, surely they could never find me again in this maze of a school? The other part of me was fixed firmly to the spot in terror, not wanting to do anything else to cause trouble. And then there was another part, which I tried not to let exist, the part that wondered why I was stood there, what it was that had gone wrong when I had stepped on the sixth step of that staircase, what it was that made everyone whisper behind their hands. Could it have been that I wasn't really...
No. I ordered myself to stop. That wasn't a sentence that I was supposed to finish, that I would let myself finish. It was silly. Not something that first year students at Hogwarts should be thinking. Something for a tomboy in primary school perhaps, no someone who went to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. I wasn't childish enough for that anymore, I couldn't be.
A wrinkled face appeared that the door, it was the witch who had explained the process of the Sorting. Not harsh, but not kindly either. Somewhere in the middle, but definitely stern and methodical. I felt like I'd shrunk. "Please, step inside."
Involuntarily, I swallowed and followed her into the room on legs I was amazed held me up. I quickly wiped my palms on my robes to try and remove the sweat in case she held out her hand for a handshake, but she didn't. It was only a small room, with a desk in front of the window, and not much else except for several bookcases lining the walls. She motioned for me to take a seat on a spindly wooden chair, and I perched on the edge nervously, making sure not to touch the green tartan blanket draped over the back. Glancing over my shoulder I noticed that the prefect was still there, stood against the wall by the door.
"Mr Weasley here tells me that you set off the caterwauling charm as you tried to enter the girls' dormitory." She said bluntly as my stomach plummeted right through to the basement dungeons. She didn't say it harshly, and she didn't seem angry or disappointed, but the terror still gripped me. Somehow I'd been hoping that it wouldn't be about this, it would be about the accidental magic. And it had a name, there was a deliberate charm on there, and there would only be one purpose that I could see it having, and if it was that purpose then... I didn't know what it could mean.
She quirked an eyebrow at me when I didn't answer. "Do you have any idea why this may have happened?"
I shook my head, not daring myself to speak in case that little childish part of my brain took control and piped up that reason that I knew couldn't be true. If I stayed silent then they'd think that there was something wrong with the charm. They wouldn't have to think I was some sort of childish fool. They wouldn't have to think I was a freak. Maybe, maybe, they'd let me stay. If they kept me perhaps they'd have to put me in the boys' dormitory if I couldn't get to the other beds.
But maybe they wouldn't let me stay, and I'd be thrown out with my wand snapped by the end of the night. That had to be some sort of record, surely? Not even getting to spend a night in the castle.
Tentatively I shook my head.
Professor McGonagall lent around me to talk to the prefect, and asked him to fetch Professor Dumbledore. My heart started pounding harder in my ribcage, and I felt faint. I clenched my fists around the edge of the chair to try and keep upright as the room threatened to spin before my eyes. I was going to be expelled and that was that. Where else would I be able to learn how to control the magic which had made me feel different and other my whole life? Where else was I going to learn how to be myself? There isn't another school here.
What must have been moments later, but was long enough for me to work myself into a complete panic, Professor Dumbledore silently entered the room. Neither I nor the Scottish teacher spoke, and the room was heavy with an awkward silence by the time he drew his wand and conjured a plush pink stool out of thin air. He sat down calmly, and fixed me with a twinkling kind gaze.
"Anyone care for a sherbet lemon?" He asked, flicking his wand again and summoning a paper tube of sweets which hovered in front of me. The corners of my lips twitched, and I felt some of the fear leave me.
"Uh... No thanks. Sir." I managed to spit out of my dry mouth.
The sweets glided through the air and twitched at Professor McGonagall who dismissed them with a wave of her hand, a wrinkled nose and pursed lips. "No. Thank you, Albus." Once Professor Dumbledore had popped a sweet into his mouth and smiled gleefully as he'd teased some of the ticklish sherbet from the boiled sweet, she continued as I watched the exchange with a slight hint of fascination cutting through the fear. "I assume Mr Weasley informed you of the situation?"
The headmaster focussed on me over the top of his half-moon glasses as if seeing me for the first time. I suddenly felt very exposed and open. "Ah, yes. So you set off the caterwauling charm... well it has been a fair few years since we've had that happen in Gryffindor, has it not Minerva? Was about time I suppose."
My brain went into over drive, and my fingertips released from where I realised they'd been gripping my robes. It happened before? The charm could have been malfunctioning then, it didn't necessarily mean that there was anything wrong...
"Four years if I remember rightly. Pomona has had a couple more recently though."
"I assume you realise the what the purpose of the charm is?" Professor Dumbledore addressed me.
Did I know what it did? Not really. Something to do with keeping boys out I assumed, but I wasn't sure. "No Professor, not really. They said something about boys in the common room."
The wizard nodded towards Professor McGonagall, who seemed to settle in her seat, and clasped her hands in front of her. "The school was built by the four founders of Hogwarts, Godric Gryffindor, Salazar Slytherin, Helga Hufflepuff and Rowena Ravenclaw—which as I'm sure you've gathered, the houses are named after. The two women, being suspicious of the nature of the male members of the community—and quite rightly so in those times I may add—decided that it would be prudent to give some form of protection to the young women residing in their walls. They convinced the other two founders, and Gryffindor performed similar enchantments as the women had to safeguard those in his own tower, which you encountered today.
"It is the caterwaulling and glisseo charms which protect those in the girls' dormitories from any boy who seeks to enter them. Of course, it's now apparent that boys are no more likely to be untrustworthy than girls, but it would be rather a shame to lose part of the original founders' work. In my opinion it would be much wiser to extend the charm to prevent girls' from accessing the boys' dormitories, but the headmaster protests against it." She shot the older man an admonishing glance.
My hands dug their way into my pockets uncomfortably. Slowly and hesitantly I spoke. "You're saying that the charm thinks I'm a... boy?" The last word came as nothing more than a whisper.
Professor Dumbledore leaned towards me, looking and speaking to me gently. "It sees what is deep inside you, deeper than your skin. I think you already know the truth of this situation, there's no shame to admit it to the world; rather the only shame should be from keeping it inside and being content to live a lie. A lie not only to the people around you, but also to yourself. The world isn't always the kindest to those like you, but it you must remember that you're not alone, the steps you're walking have been taken by so many before."
His words sunk deep and hit hard. They hit me hard in my chest, grabbed my heart and wrenched it around. No matter how hard it was to admit, I knew he knew the thoughts I'd hidden deep and dark in the back of my head. He knew the thoughts that I'd kept so far out of mind that I hadn't come to terms with them; I'd never voiced them, or even strung them into a sentence in my head. But they'd been there, and he'd uncovered them. It was more than a little scary, but relieving to hear them voiced aloud.
My head nodded entirely of its own accord even though my mind was still screaming at me to run, run far away and not ever let anyone know that I was a freak. Even in this weird place it couldn't be that normal... or could it? They hadn't seemed particularly shocked, and they'd said that someone with a funny name had a couple recently. Actually, they'd never said what Pomona had a couple of.
"What's wrong... what am I then?"
There was a faint smile, and his eyes glistened, giving away the depths of wisdom of them. "It's quite simple, you're a boy.
A boy. My stomach lurched, but the ecstasy hadn't seemed to reach my mouth. "No. You're wrong. I know I'm a g—" The final word caught in my throat and I couldn't force it out.
"A girl?" He said mildly, raising his eyebrows in silent questioning.
Something had happened when that word had got stuck in my throat, and I knew I'd finally been able to voice the truth, or rather, not voice the lies. The lies that had been plaguing me since my birth were finally gone, and finally the truth was out, exposed and naked. And certainly that summed up my emotions, raw and naked. There was no protection from what their reactions were going to be. More had been said in my failure to utter that word than anything I'd ever said before.
Much to my surprise, neither of them flinched when my silence answered. My head shook from side to side almost imperceptibly.
"Minerva, I think it best to take him to the hospital wing, I'm sure he will appreciate a break from the pandemonium of the first night. I shall instruct Severus to bring a batch of the necessary potions up as soon as possible. Oh, and perhaps it would be best to dig out that book of baby names again, I think our young man here will be requesting a new one in the near future."
With those final words and what could have almost been classed as a wink, the mysterious headmaster was gone as quickly and silently as he had arrived. He left the lingering sound of two words behind him. Two words so short and seemingly insignificant that to anyone else they wouldn't matter, but to me they meant everything, I'd just never known it before.
Him. He.
Me.