Chapter Text
Harry sighed as he adjusted his book bag for the third time since he boarded. The first time a pair of boys had stopped outside the compartment for a moment. One of them, a brutish, troll-looking boy, had peered through the glass before sliding open the door. They didn't even seem to acknowledge harry as they looked around the room as if checking for something, argued about whether their friend was in this carriage, and then left without shutting the door.
The second time, about thirty minutes later, someone slid the door halfway open and mumbled Harry a name he couldn't make out, but it sounded rather funny. Nd after the person had taken Harrys confusion as answer enough, they had slid the door closed and promptly left.
After that harry had moved his bag to the floor again, deciding that being caught grabbing it made him seem less desperate. then again, a childhood with the Dursleys had taught him that being alone was better than being around people, because people often meant others who shared the Dursleys ' views about 'the freakish Potter boy'.
The carriage clicked and wobbled slightly again as the train rolled over a switch. The houses and walls that had occupied the window since the train left slowly thinned as the train roared onward. Brick walls and houses with little gardens and sheds slowly gave way to vast fields and scattered forests.
Somewhere along the corridor, a loud bang rang out, then laughter so loud Harry could hear it through the walls, and the sound of wheels clacking on the rails.
He wondered how many of them already knew one another. Most had seemed to on the platform, calling across the steam, running between families who greeted them as though this were an ordinary September morning.
Harry looked at Hedwig, the snowy owl Hagrid had bought him, along with a few other birthday gifts from July. She was perched in her cage beside him, her head tucked comfortably beneath one wing as she shielded her eyes from the sun.
"You could try to look interested in me; at least then I'd have something to talk to," he told her.
Hedwig, upon hearing his voice, had given an irritated-sounding hoot and shuffled around so her back faced his.
Harry shook his head lightly and turned back to the window, resting his forehead against it. He'd always wanted to leave Privet Drive so badly that he'd never really understood what that would mean when he did. Obviously, Hogwarts was a school, so there would be lessons. A bed to and of course, people doing magic.
He had imagined the castle every day since Hagrid told him, but he never thought about whether he'd fit in. He had never done any spells, after all. And the M word as Mr Dursley called it, was banned ever since the pig tail incident. How could ordinary, freakish Harry Potter fit into a brilliant magical world?
Harry got dragged out of his thoughts as the compartment's door rattled and rolled open.
Harry straightened so quickly that his glasses slipped down his nose. A girl stood outside, a pale hand holding the door open and the other holding up a black and gold trunk. Her silver-blonde hair was tied tightly back with a dark ribbon, though a few strands had worked their way out and fallen across either side of her face.
The girl looked down the hall, her eyes squinting, then quickly dragged her trunk in and shut the door. It happened so fast that by the time she had dragged her trunk in, Harry hadn't even put his glasses back on properly.
"Is anyone sitting here?"
Harry, slightly shocked that someone was acknowledging him, gave a stiff shake of his head.
"Yes." Harry caught himself looking at the empty seat. "I mean, yes. You can. There's nobody else."
She looked him over, taking in his oversized jumper and the cage beside the window. For a moment he thought she might change her mind.
"Good," she said. "Would you move your bag? I can't get this past it."
Harry, glad he could do something other than awkwardly sit still, pulled the schoolbag out of her way and got up to help with the trunk.
It was heavier than he expected as he dragged it from the doorway, catching a corner on the frame with an unpleasant scrape.
"Oh, don't do that."
"I'm trying not to."
She gave a quick chuckle.
"I was talking to the trunk."
Harry looked up at her.
She was staring down at the scraped corner with such genuine annoyance that a laugh escaped him before he could stop it. Her eyes flicked towards him, and he hurriedly adjusted his grip.
"Sorry."
"Don't worry about it; the damned thing was being difficult."
They managed to push it against the wall. The girl inspected the mark, rubbed it with her thumb, and finally sat down opposite him. Harry returned to his seat, a little out of breath. She was too, although she seemed determined to hide it.
"There are people all over the corridor," she said, smoothing her skirt over her knees. "One boy had his entire trunk open. You'd think he could have waited until we arrived."
Harry glanced at his own bag. He had been considering checking over his books again, mostly to give himself something to do.
"Maybe he'd lost something, or was checking in case he had something?"
"He had everything out. If he hadn't lost something before, he certainly will have now."
She looked at Hedwig.
"Is she yours?"
Harry nodded. "Her name's Hedwig."
"She's lovely."
The compliment came easily, without the briskness of everything else she had said. Harry felt absurdly pleased by it.
"Hagrid bought her for me."
"Who?"
"He works at Hogwarts."
"Oh." She leaned forward to get a better look at the owl. Hedwig lifted her head and regarded her through the bars. "We have eagle owls at home. They're much bigger."
Harry's pleasure faded a little. The girl watched Hedwig turn her head almost completely round.
"Yours is prettier, though," she added.
Harry smiled again.
For a few moments they listened to the train roll onward. The girl folded her hands in her lap, then unfolded them to straighten one cuff. Harry searched for something else to say. At his old school, conversations had usually been things he overheard rather than joined; it was surprisingly difficult to think of a question once someone was sitting opposite him.
"Is this your first year?" he asked.
"Of course it is." She glanced at him, looking slightly offended. "Why? Do I look older?"
Harry coughed as his throat suddenly dried.
"Uh, no...Sorry, I just wasn't sure."
"Oh." She seemed to consider that. "Well, yes, it's my first year. Yours to I assume?"
"Yeah."
She smiled and held out her hand.
"I'm Draco Malfoy."
Harry looked at it for a second before leaning across the gap between the seats.
"Harry."
Her hand was cool and her grip surprisingly firm. She had begun to sit back when he added his surname.
"Potter. I'm Harry Potter"
She went still.
Harry knew that look now. He had seen it in the pub, in shops, on people who had interrupted what they were doing to shake his hand. He let go of hers and settled back against the seat.
"Really?" she asked.
He nodded.
"But—" Her gaze rose to his forehead. She caught herself, though not before he noticed. "I didn't know you were coming this year."
"Neither did I, until a few weeks ago."
"How could you not know?"
He picked at a loose thread on his sleeve. "I didn't know about any of it. Hogwarts, or magic. Someone had to come and tell me."
"But your parents were—"
She stopped.
Harry looked down at his hands. Outside, the houses were giving way to patches of open ground, but he could feel her looking at him instead of the view.
"Sorry," she said.
"It's all right."
There was a pause.
"I know about them," she admitted. "I, uhm, I wasn't thinking."
Harry looked up. Her face had gone slightly pink, and she seemed irritated by it. That was better than the hushed voices people usually used when they mentioned his parents. He didn't know what to do with those.
"I live with my aunt and uncle." He paused, looking down shamefully. "They're not magic."
"Muggles?" Draco looked slightly disgusted at the idea.
"Yeah."
"What was that like? I mean, do they know about magic?"
Harry hesitated. He couldn't remember anyone asking him that before. Hagrid had seen enough of the Dursleys to make up his own mind, and the Dursleys themselves had never seemed interested in whether Harry liked living with them.
"Lets just say I'm glad I'm coming here," he said.
Draco glanced at his jumper again. He drew his hands into its sleeves.
"Well," she said, sitting a little straighter, "you'll have to learn quite a lot. There are things everyone else will know already."
His stomach tightened. "I sort of figured that already."
"Lucky for you, though, Potter, I can tell you some of them."
Harry looked at her.
"Not everything," she added quickly. "I haven't been to Hogwarts yet either. But my parents have told me about it."
"I'd really appreciate that, actually."
She seemed pleased with his answer. Drawing her feet back beneath the seat, she began to explain the four Houses. Harry listened carefully, interrupting when she mentioned something he didn't understand. He didn't understand much. Draco looked surprised by some of his questions, but she answered them, and once, when she didn't know, she thought for a moment before admitting it.
"My father never said how they choose," she told him. "Only that the teachers don't decide."
"So how do you know which one you'll be in?"
"I'll be in Slytherin, of course."
"Oh. Did they tell you?"
"No, but my family always have been." She shifted against the cushion and gave Harry a small smirk. "I expect they'll be able to tell."
Harry tried to imagine a teacher looking at him and deciding where he belonged. He hoped they were good at it. He wouldn't have known what to tell them himself.
Draco looked away from him and glanced out the window again. A field flashed past, broken by a line of trees and a narrow stream.
"What if you get put into a different one?" he asked.
"I won't."
Her answer was so quick that he wondered whether he had asked something rude.
"Right."
She turned back to him. "Have you got all your books?"
Harry nodded and reached for his bag, grateful for a question he could answer confidently. Within a minute they had their book lists out, comparing the titles. Draco's list was neatly folded; Harry's had been stuffed into his pocket so often that one corner was beginning to tear and the fold lines had small thin creases forming. When she asked whether he had read any of the books, Harry admitted he had started most of them.
Draco raised her eyebrow.
"Most?"
"I kept finding something I wanted to look up in another one."
"You're supposed to finish the first one."
"There was a picture of a man with a bird growing out of his head. I wanted to know why."
She considered it more seriously than he expected.
"Did you find out?"
"Not yet, Uncle Vernon isn't exactly fond of magic."
Draco let out a disappointed sigh.
"Show me the passage then."
Harry dug out the book. By the time they found the picture, Draco had moved to the seat beside him so they could both read the caption. Her sleeve brushed his as she leaned closer, and he kept very still, careful not to knock the book against her.
Neither of them understood all the words in the explanation. Draco insisted one must be the name of a spell; Harry thought it sounded more like a disease. They were still arguing about it when a trolley appeared outside the door.
Harry looked up at the rows of brightly wrapped sweets. He had seen some in Diagon Alley without getting a proper chance to examine them, and there were more here: little paper bags, twisted sticks of sugar, cakes with glittering tops. His stomach gave an audible growl.
Draco looked at him.
"I haven't had lunch," he said.
"Well, that's obvious." She stood to let him pass. "Have you got money?"
He nodded and pulled a little bag of coins from his pocket.
Choosing from the vast collection proved rather time-consuming. Harry had never been able to choose anything to eat. Harry thought he'd never be allowed to buy anything for himself until Diagon Alley.
Draco, though, clearly knew most of the sweets, and she had opinions about all of them, so Harry ended up buying several things she said she didn't like just to find out for himself. She accepted a bag of jelly slugs when he offered it, but only after warning him that the purple ones were unpleasant.
"You don't have to eat them," Harry said.
"I know, I'm finding you a good one."
She selected a green slug and handed it over, then took another for herself. Harry brought it to his nose and gave a quick sniff, then quickly bit into it. It wriggled slightly between his teeth as he bit down. The sudden movement from the supposed candy startled Harry, and he immediately pulled it out of his mouth.
Draco stared at him for half a second, then started giggling. It was a startled, unguarded sound, quite different from the careful way she had spoken when she first arrived.
"You could have told me it did that," he said, examining the bitten sweet with a sharp look of disgust.
"I thought you knew!"
"I told you I don't know anything."
"You didn't say anything about the sweets."
He looked at her, then at the slug, and began to lightly laugh too.
After two, Draco fetched a small parcel of sandwiches from her trunk. They were neatly packed into thin brown parchment with a perfect diagonal line cut through the middle. Without looking, she took one of the sandwiches and handed it to Harry.
"Mother says too many lollies without proper food is bad; best you have some so you aren't keeling over at the welcome feast."
They ate with the book still open between them and the paper bags spread over the opposite seat.
The corridor grew quieter as the afternoon wore on. Someone passed the compartment carrying a sleeping cat, and further away a door slammed, followed by an indignant shout. Draco looked up at the noise, then returned to the book. Harry watched her turn a page, holding her place with one finger while she tried to pronounce a name beneath a photograph.
"Are you staying here?" he asked.
She looked round. "What?"
"For the journey." He glanced towards the door. "I thought you might be meeting someone."
"Oh." She glanced at the sandwiches, the open book, her trunk against the wall. "No. no I sorta ditched the ones I was meant to meet. Do you want me to stay?"
"Of course! I mean, uh, yes, yes, I would like you to stay."
Draco gave a genuine smile as her cheeks turned light pink, and she nudged the book toward him.
"You try and pronounce this one. I don't think I'm saying it properly."
Harry smiled and leaned over the page.
As the sky began to darken and the train began to slow, Draco instructed Harry to get into his robes. His first attempt left his head caught in a sleeve.
"That isn't the right bit," Draco told him.
"I've noticed."
He pulled the robes off and tried again while she turned towards the window. Outside, the last of the daylight had faded from the fields. Harry could see the compartment reflected in the glass: their abandoned sweet wrappers, the book they had finally put away, Draco trying to fasten a button beneath her chin. His stomach had begun to feel strange. All summer Hogwarts had been somewhere he was going; a dreamlike idea of freedom. Now they would have to get off the train and enter it.
"Do I look all right?" he asked.
Draco turned back. She had managed the button, though her ribbon hung crookedly behind one ear.
"You've got the collar folded under."
He quickly felt around his neck until she pointed out which side. Draco gave a curt nod, then turned away, deciding it was time for the next task. She swiftly gathered their wrappers into an empty paper bag, pushed it into the corner, and checked beneath the seats for anything they might have dropped.
Harry tucked his glasses more securely onto his nose and brushed his hand through his hair, praying it would do something to tame it. He wanted to ask what would happen when they arrived, but Draco was looking out the window again, so he stood beside her instead.
The train finally stopped with a long shudder. Bright amber lamplight appeared along a small platform, catching drifting wisps of steam. Doors began opening unevenly further down the carriage. Suddenly, the corridor filled with voices and feet as a loud voice told everyone to leave their luggage on the train.
Harry checked Hedwig's cage twice, his eyes staying on it as Draco guided them out and onto the station.
The air on the platform was much colder than it had been in London. He drew his robes around himself and looked over the heads of the other children, searching for somewhere to go. Draco stayed close enough that her sleeve kept brushing his when someone pushed past them.
"First-years! Over here!"
Harry recognized the voice before he found its owner. Hagrid stood beneath a lamp, holding another high above the crowd. The sight of him eased something in Harry's chest.
"Hagrid!"
"There yeh are, Harry. Good journey? Met a friend, I see."
"Yeah. This is Draco."
Hagrid glanced down at her. "Evening. Come along, both of yeh. Don't want anyone left behind now."
They joined a knot of children beside him. A round-faced boy was crouching near the platform edge, peering beneath a bench. When Hagrid called for everyone to follow, he stood up so abruptly that he nearly knocked Harry onto the tracks.
"Have you seen a toad?" he asked sheepishly.
Harry shook his head. "No, sorry. Did you lose him on the train?"
"I thought he was in my pocket." The boy felt his robes again, looking increasingly miserable. "He was when we stopped."
"They'll find him," Hagrid said. "Now, mind yer feet down here. It's a bit steep."
The path led away from the platform's mystical warmth and down between the trees. Harry could hear water trickling somewhere below them. Roots rose beneath the earth in uneven ridges with strange plants growing out of them. Harry kept one eye on the back of Draco's head so he wouldn't lose her. Behind him, the boy with the missing toad stumbled and apologized to someone.
The trees slowly thinned into an opening and small dock, revealing a wide black lake that Hogwarts towered over on the far shore.
Harry stopped walking and felt his jaw hang as he took in the sight. Large, oddly shaped Towers climbed into the night, with lights burning in so many windows that he couldn't begin to count them. Bright dotted reflections stretched across the water, breaking whenever a small wave passed through. He had imagined a castle, but never one like this. Whole buildings seemed tucked behind others, walls climbing the hillside, windows higher than any house he had ever been inside.
"That's it?" he asked, although there could hardly have been another explanation.
Draco stood beside him, her mouth slightly open.
"Yeah," she said, after a moment.
Hagrid ushered them towards a row of little boats. Harry climbed into one with Draco and the boy who was still checking his pockets. A girl joined them just as Hagrid called for everyone to sit down. She asked how the boats were steered, but they began moving before anyone answered her.
Draco caught the edge of the seat.
Harry looked away before she could notice him looking. His fingers had hooked themselves beneath the bench. The boat rocked gently as it carried them away from shore, and harry found himself leaning towards the middle, unwilling to look too closely at the water passing beside his knees.
"It's deeper than I thought," the round-faced boy whispered.
"Don't lean over, then," Draco said.
He immediately sat back. She watched him for a moment, then loosened her grip on the seat.
"You don't have to sit that far back. Just...keep still."
The castle grew larger with every passing minute. Harry could hear the other boats nearby, children calling to one another in voices that sounded oddly small beneath the cliffs. By the time they passed under a curtain of ivy, nobody in their boat was speaking. He ducked when Hagrid told them to, and the open lake disappeared behind a low roof of rock.
They stepped out at a landing beneath the castle. While the others gathered, Hagrid bent to retrieve something from an empty boat.
"This yer toad?"
The boy beside Harry shouted in relief.
Draco looked at the damp creature in his hands. "Perhaps don't put him straight back in the same pocket."
The boy glanced down, considered the advice and nodded, clutching the toad against his chest instead.
The large group formed a line behind Hagrid once again, trailed up a flight of stone steps, and reached a great wooden door. A tall woman in green robes was waiting on the other side. Her eyes moved over the children, taking in their crooked hats and damp shoes, and the group quietened without being asked twice.
"Thank you, Hagrid. I'll take them from here."
Harry gave Hagrid a small smile as the man left, leaving a pit to start forming in Harry's stomach. The group followed her into an entrance hall so large that Harry had to tilt his head back to see the ceiling. Light spilled from an open doorway to their right, along with the sound of hundreds of people talking. Somewhere beyond it, the smell of something warm and savory made him realize how hungry he was again.
The woman led them into a smaller room and introduced herself as Professor McGonagall. Harry listened while she explained the Houses and the points they could earn or lose. Draco stood straight beside him, hands clasped behind his back. She looked more like the girl who had first opened his compartment door than the one who he had gotten to know over the last hours.
"The Sorting will begin shortly," Professor McGonagall finished. "While you wait, I suggest you make yourselves presentable."
She gave a red-haired boy a funny look as she left them to sort out their robes.
Harry looked at Draco. "Do you think we're meant to know how to do something?"
"No, she would have said so, Harry."
"I suppose."
"She definitely would have." Draco glanced towards the door through which the professor had disappeared. "They can't expect us to know spells before we've had lessons."
The girl from their boat was talking nearby, listing spells she had already tried. Harry decided it was best to try and block this out.
The red-haired boy behind them leaned towards another child.
"My brother said it hurts. I reckon he was making it up, though."
Harry turned. "What hurts?"
"The Sorting." The boy looked at him properly, and his eyes widened. Before he could say anything else, Draco spoke.
"It doesn't hurt. My mother would have told me."
"Mine didn't tell me much either," the boy replied. "That doesn't mean—"
The door opened, and Professor McGonagall returned.
The students wordlessly hurried into a line, their unfinished questions giving way to nervous silence. Draco moved in front of Harry, then glanced over her shoulder to check that he was still there.
The Great Hall was even bigger than the room outside. Four long tables stretched towards a raised platform where the teachers sat. Hundreds of candles floated above the students, their flames flickering in the draught from the doors. Harry looked up and forgot, for a moment, about the people watching them. Stars shone overhead in a deep blue sky. He could see no beams, no roof, nothing to explain why it wasn't cold inside.
Someone nearby whispered that the ceiling was enchanted. Harry barely heard them. He tried to take in the candles, the plates, and the ghosts drifting among the tables, while also keeping up with Draco. His shoes seemed very loud against the stone floor.
A stool stood at the front of the hall with a battered hat resting on it.
Harry stared at it.
"Is that—"
Draco nudged him before he could finish. A tear opened in the hat, and the hall fell quiet as it began to sing.
Harry listened, relieved to discover that nobody seemed about to ask him to perform a spell. The hat explained how it would find a House for each of them, praising qualities Harry wasn't sure he possessed. Courage sounded useful. Cleverness did too. He wondered whether being accustomed to hard work counted if most of it had involved cleaning up after Dudley.
When the song ended, applause rolled through the room with a few loud claps over staying their welcome. Professor McGonagall gave a small cough that quickly demanded peace and unrolled a large, yellowed parchment.
One by one, children were called forward. Some barely touched the stool before the hat shouted a House. Others sat for long enough that Harry began to worry on their behalf. Each announcement brought cheers from one table, and each newly sorted student hurried towards them with an expression of relief.
The girl from the boat was Hermione Granger. The hat sent her to Gryffindor, where she sat down and immediately began talking to an older student. The boy with the toad was Neville Longbottom. His Sorting took longer. When Gryffindor was called for him too, he started towards the table with the hat still on his head and had to come back.
A few students laughed. Harry felt his face grow warm for him.
Draco had stopped moving beside him. Earlier she had shifted from foot to foot whenever the line advanced; now she seemed determined to stand perfectly still.
"Malfoy, Draco."
She drew a breath.
"See you in a minute," Harry whispered.
Draco gave him a quick look, then walked towards the stool.
Murmurs rose from one of the tables. Harry recognized its green decorations and guessed it must be Slytherin. A dark-haired girl there leaned forward, looking pleased. Draco saw her and lifted her chin slightly before sitting down.
Professor McGonagall lowered the hat over her hair. Harry waited for another quick ]shout.
It didn't come.
Draco's shoes were neatly together beneath the stool. Her hands lay flat on her knees. After a few seconds, one of them tightened around the fabric of her robes.
Harry looked towards the Slytherin table. The dark-haired girl was still watching, but she had stopped smiling.
The hat dropped almost over her head, but to Harry it almost looked like her lips were moving.
The hat shifted on Draco's head.
Harry was too far away to hear what she said, and for the first time he wondered whether she could hear something the rest of them couldn't. The hall had grown restless around her. Somewhere a goblet scraped against a table, the noise startlingly clear between the whispers.
Draco shook her head once as the hat broke the silence.
"GRYFFINDOR!"
Harry looked towards the red-and-gold table as applause broke out. For a moment he thought he had misheard. He turned back to Draco, expecting her to get up, but she remained on the stool.
Professor McGonagall lifted the hat away.
Draco looked up at her, her face even paler than before.
"I think there's been a mistake."
She spoke quietly, but Harry was close enough to hear her. So did several of the children beside him.
Professor McGonagall bent a little closer.
"Your House is Gryffindor, Miss Malfoy. They're waiting for you."
Draco glanced at the table. Students were still clapping, although some had begun to look uncertain. Two red-haired boys further along were cheering loudly enough to make up for several of them.
"But my family—"
"We can speak afterward." The professor's voice remained low. "Go and sit down. You needn't ruin tonight for yourself."
Draco stood. For a second she seemed to have forgotten where to go. Harry wanted to say something, but the next name had already been called, and another child brushed past her toward the stool.
Draco walked to Gryffindor without looking at the Slytherin table again.
An older girl moved to make room. Draco sat beside her, keeping her eyes on the empty plate in front of her. The girl said something that Harry assumed was some kind of congratulation or comfort. Either way, Draco nodded, but she didn't seem to answer.
Harry tried to watch the next Sorting but couldn't stop looking back at her.
He had asked her, on the train, what would happen if she got a different House. She had been so sure it couldn't happen that he hadn't thought about it again. Now she sat among people cheering for someone else, her hands hidden beneath the table.
There was a space beside her.
"HARRY POTTER"
He jumped slightly as he looked towards the front. It was his turn now. The whispers began before he reached the stool. His surname seemed to travel ahead of him, repeated along the tables by people leaning over one another's shoulders. He tried to keep his eyes on Professor McGonagall. Sitting down ought to have been easy, but he almost missed the stool.
The hat dropped over his eyes.
For a moment there was only darkness and the warm, dusty smell of old cloth. Then a voice spoke inside his head.
You've had a long day, Harry Potter.
Harry gripped the edge of the seat.
Can you hear me?
Quite clearly. No need to speak aloud.
He tried to stop thinking about the hundreds of people watching him. This only made him think about them more.
The hat considered him for a while. Harry could feel its presence, though he couldn't explain how. It seemed to linger over things he would rather have kept to himself: the cupboard, his aunt's voice, the little rush of pleasure he had felt when Draco asked to see his book.
There's a good deal you want to prove, it said. Slytherin could give you opportunities to do that.
Harry thought of the green table, the waiting faces Draco had looked towards before sitting down. He wondered whether she would have liked it there better than where she was now.
Would I have to be in Slytherin?
No. There's more than one place you could grow.
What about Gryffindor?
The hat seemed amused.
Ahh Your new friend is there.
Harry felt himself blush beneath it.
I I know.
And if she weren't?
He thought about the song. Courage had sounded like something other people had, people who knew what to do when someone threatened them. But he had got onto the train. He had left London without knowing anyone, and now he sat here asking a talking hat where he might belong.
I...I think I'd still like it, he answered. I'd like to be brave.
The hat settled a little more firmly against his forehead.
Then you'll have plenty of chances to find out how.
"GRYFFINDOR!"
The sound seemed much louder from inside the hat. Harry blinked as Professor McGonagall lifted it away, then stood to find the red-and-gold table cheering for him. One red-haired boy had climbed halfway onto the bench before an older boy pulled him down.
Harry hurried towards them. People reached out to shake his hand as he passed, and someone thumped his shoulder hard enough to make him stumble. He smiled because they seemed to expect it, searching past them for Draco.
She had turned towards him.
He pointed at the space beside her. "Can I?"
"Yes." She moved her goblet out of his way. "Obviously."
He sat down, and she looked at him for a moment before turning back to the front. Her shoulders had lowered slightly.
The older girl beside her introduced herself as a prefect and told them they could ask her if they needed anything. Further down, Neville gave Harry a hesitant smile. Harry returned it. There were so many faces around him that he couldn't remember who had already said hello.
Draco found a fork half-hidden beneath the napkin between them and pushed it towards him.
Harry looked at her and smiled. "Thank you."
"You were ages up there."
"So were you."
Her fingers stopped against the table. Harry wished he hadn't said it. Before he could think of something to add, another House was shouted and the hall filled with applause again.
The red-haired boy from the waiting room was called Ronald Weasley. His Sorting was brief, and he came towards Gryffindor looking delighted. When he spotted Harry, he quickened his pace and squeezed into a space beside him.
"I thought that was you earlier," he said. "I'm Ron."
"Harry, but uh, you know that."
"Yeah." Ron grinned, then seemed to realize what he had said. "I mean, everyone does. My brothers were hoping you'd come here."
He pointed out the twins and the older boy who had pulled one of them down. Harry listened, grateful that Ron had begun talking without expecting him to think of anything interesting first.
"Have you got any brothers or sisters?" Ron asked.
Harry shook his head.
"Lucky. Percy's already told me about six things I'm not allowed to do."
"The prefect?" Draco asked.
Ron leaned forward to see past Harry. His smile faded a little.
"Yeah."
"He looks like he enjoys it to much."
Harry glanced at Percy, who was explaining something to another first-year with considerable seriousness. He could see what she meant.
Ron looked at Draco again.
"You're Malfoy, aren't you?"
"You heard the professor."
"I thought your family was all in Slytherin."
Harry felt Draco straighten beside him.
"Apparently the hat didn't know that."
"I was only asking."
"Well, now you know." Harry wasn't sure if Draco meant to retort so harshly but her glossy eyes kept him from asking.
Ron sat back, clearly caught off-guard. Harry looked between them, unsure how a conversation that had seemed quite easy a moment ago had become this uncomfortable.
"I met Draco on the train," he said.
"Oh." Ron's gaze moved from Harry to Draco. "Are you friends, then?"
Harry hadn't heard anyone say it like that yet. He glanced at her. She was looking at him now, waiting with an expression he couldn't quite read.
"Yeah," he said. "She's my first friend."
Draco turned back towards the teachers. Beneath the table, her shoe touched his for a moment as she shifted closer.
Ron picked up his goblet. He seemed about to say something else, but the final Sorting ended and the headmaster stood.
The headmaster was an old man with a long silver beard and spectacles that caught the candlelight. He introduced himself as Albus Dumbledore and looked pleased to see them all, even the children still sitting stiffly in their new places. His welcome was brief enough that Harry was caught off guard when food appeared on the dishes in front of him.
He stared at the roast potatoes. A second ago, only empty platters had been scattered across the tables, but now they were all filled to the brim.
"You can take some, you know," Draco said, her sarcasm slowly returning.
"I know. I'm just looking."
She picked up the serving spoon and put several onto his plate before passing it to him. Harry added chicken and carrots, then paused to see whether anyone would object. Nobody did. Around him, students reached across one another for dishes and complained that someone had taken the last piece of something, only to discover another platter further along.
Ron began describing Quidditch to him over dinner. Harry listened with growing interest, particularly when he discovered they would get to watch matches between the Houses. Then Ron asked which team he supported, and Harry had to admit he didn't know any of them.
"You can borrow any of my books," Ron said. "I brought a couple."
"Thanks. I'd like that."
Beside him, Draco moved a potato around her plate without eating it.
"Do you play?" Harry asked her.
"I fly at home."
"Are you good?"
"Yes." A little of her earlier confidence returned. "We have plenty of room. I've been practicing for years."
"First-years can't bring their own brooms," Ron said.
"I know."
"I didn't say I did."
Harry took a mouthful of chicken and waited for them to stop looking at each other. Then he asked what sort of brooms the school had. They both knew something about that, and for a while the conversation went more smoothly.
By dessert, Draco had eaten most of her dinner. Harry was trying a second helping of treacle tart when a ghost drifted through the table near his elbow. He almost dropped his spoon. Draco laughed, then jumped when the ghost turned to address her.
Harry was still smiling when Ron nudged him and began pointing out the teachers. One man sat in the shadows near the headmaster, his dark hair hanging around a thin face. Beside him, a professor in a turban had turned away from the students to speak to someone further along the table. Harry was trying to see who it was when the dark-haired man looked up. Their eyes met, and a sharp pain struck Harry's scar.
He pressed a hand to his forehead.
"What's wrong?" Draco asked.
"Nothing. Just hurt for a second."
He lowered his hand. The pain had already gone. At the staff table, the dark-haired man turned towards the professor in a turban beside him.
"That's Snape," Draco said, following his gaze. "He teaches Potions. Father knows him."
Ron glanced past Harry again, but this time he said nothing.
After the feast, Harry struggled to stay awake through the rest of the announcements. Dumbledore warned them about the forest and a corridor on the third floor, neither of which Harry intended to visit. His legs felt heavy as he finally stood and followed the prefects out of the hall.
Professor McGonagall caught up with them near the doors. Draco stopped at once.
"If you still wish to discuss your Sorting, come and see me after breakfast," she told her. "One of the prefects can show you to my office."
"Can it be changed?" Draco asked.
"We'll talk tomorrow. For tonight, get some sleep."
Draco nodded without looking satisfied. Harry waited until the professor had moved on before following the others.
Draco walked beside him. In the crush at the doors, he lost sight of Ron, then Neville. A staircase changed direction ahead of them, and Harry forgot his tiredness long enough to watch it move. Draco caught his sleeve when the line began leaving him behind.
"Come on. We can look tomorrow."
They climbed until Harry thought they must be somewhere among the towers he had seen from the lake. At last Percy stopped before a portrait, gave a password, and revealed an opening behind it.
The room beyond was warm and crowded, with armchairs drawn around a fire and rugs spread over the floor. Older students had arrived ahead of them. Several called to friends, waving them over, and Harry stood just inside the entrance, uncertain where to put himself.
Draco was still holding his sleeve as they both looked around.
She let go when Percy began explaining where they would sleep. The girls went one way, the boys the other. They had already brought up their trunks.
Harry looked at the two staircases.
"I suppose I'll see you tomorrow," he said.
Draco nodded. "Before breakfast."
"Where do we—"
"The hall, Harry."
"Right."
She almost smiled. Then a girl called to her from the stairs, and Draco followed her up.
Harry found a bed with his trunk at its foot and Hedwig's empty cage nearby. A notice explained where the owls had been taken. Ron was delighted to discover that they were sharing a room; two other boys introduced themselves as Dean and Seamus, while Neville carefully settled his toad into a box.
For the first time Harry could remember, everyone around him was getting ready for bed in the same room. Someone was there to ask where things went, someone else complaining about a missing sock. He liked it. He also found himself sitting on the edge of his mattress for several minutes, waiting for a moment when nobody was looking before changing into his pajamas.
Eventually the candles went out.
Harry lay beneath the blankets and listened to unfamiliar breathing. The bed was comfortable enough that he ought to have fallen asleep immediately. Instead, he kept remembering Draco looking up at Professor McGonagall, certain there had been a mistake.
After a while he got up for a drink of water. He couldn't find a jug in the dark without waking someone, so he put on his dressing gown and went downstairs.
The common room had emptied. A few lamps were still burning, and the fire had settled into a low glow.
Draco sat at a table near it, dressed for bed, with a piece of parchment in front of her.
She looked up when he reached the bottom step.
"What are you doing?"
"Just getting some water."
She pointed to a jug on a side table. Harry poured a glass, drank half of it, then looked at the parchment. Only two words sat at the top.
Dear Father,
"Are you writing home?" he asked.
"I'm trying."
He pulled out a chair but stopped before sitting. "Do you want me to go?"
Draco looked down at the letter.
"No not really."
Harry sat. For a little while she turned her quill between her fingers, and he watched a thread of smoke rise from a darkening log in the grate.
"He won't like it," she said eventually.
"Gryffindor?"
She nodded.
"But you didn't choose it."
"He'll still want to know why."
Harry looked at the two words again. He understood not knowing how to explain something to an adult who had already decided what the answer should be.
"Did the hat tell you?"
Draco pressed the quill against the parchment without writing.
"It said I'd argue with it even if arguing made things harder." She gave a small, unhappy shrug. "I told it I wanted Slytherin. It kept asking why."
"What did you say?"
"That it was where I was supposed to go."
The fire shifted in the grate. Draco watched it for a moment.
"Apparently that wasn't a good enough answer."
Harry hesitated, turning his glass between his hands.
"I asked for Gryffindor," he said.
Draco looked at him. "You asked?"
"Yeah. The hat mentioned Slytherin, but I asked if I could come here instead."
Her quill stopped moving.
"Why?"
"Because you were here."
For a moment she only stared at him. Harry began to feel embarrassed. It had seemed perfectly sensible beneath the hat; saying it aloud made it sound like something he should have kept to himself.
"I didn't know anyone when I got on the train," he explained. "Then you stayed with me. I thought if I went somewhere else, I'd have to start all over again."
"But you could have been in Slytherin."
"I know." He gave a small shrug. "I wanted to be with you."
Draco lowered her eyes to the parchment. The quill left a little spot of ink beneath her unfinished greeting, but she didn't seem to notice.
"You should have told me at dinner."
"There were too many people."
She nodded slowly. Harry watched her turn the quill over in her fingers, waiting for her to say whether he had been stupid.
"You still want to meet before breakfast?" she asked instead.
"Of course."
"Good." She rubbed at the ink spot with her thumb, making it worse. "I don't know where anything is either, you know. We'll have to work it out together."
Harry smiled. Draco hadn't stopped looking worried, but she had pulled her chair a little closer to his.
He still didn't know how to help with the letter. Gryffindor had given him dinner, a bed, and people who knew his name, but he could see none of that answered her problem.
"My aunt and uncle don't really like any of this," he said.
Draco glanced at him. "Magic, you mean?"
"Hogwarts. Hagrid. The owl. My parents. All of it."
"That's ridiculous."
"Yeah." He turned his glass between his hands. "They were angry before I even knew I was a wizard."
She looked at him for longer this time. Harry wondered whether he had said too much.
"What do you tell them?" she asked.
"Mostly I try not to say anything to them."
Draco let out a breath that might almost have been a laugh.
"I don't think that'll work with Father."
"Probably not."
They sat quietly for another minute. Then Harry glanced towards the boys' staircase.
"I think Ron was just trying to talk to you earlier."
Draco frowned. "He was asking why I wasn't in Slytherin."
"He might not have known it upset you, he doesn't exactly seem the sharpest."
"It doesn't upset me."
Harry looked at the letter. She followed his gaze, and her face tightened.
"Well, he doesn't need to keep asking."
"You could tell him that."
"I did."
Harry's brow furrowed as he thought. She had, in a way.
"Maybe say it a bit differently."
Draco sat back, studying him. "Do you like him?"
"I don't know; he seems all right. He offered to lend me a book; I've just never really had friends till you."
She picked up her quill again. Harry watched her sketch a small square in the bottom corner of the parchment. When she spoke, she was looking at the page.
"You can borrow mine too."
"I know."
She glanced up.
"I'll give it back," he added.
"You'd better. I've written my name in it."
This time she did smile, briefly. Harry settled further into his chair while she dipped the quill into her ink. She managed a sentence about arriving safely, hesitated, then began another about the journey.
"Is Potter spelled with one T or two?" she asked.
"Two."
He leaned forward without meaning to. Beneath the line about the train, she had written that she had met him.
Draco noticed him looking and shifted the parchment a little.
"You don't have to read all of it."
"Sorry I wasn't trying to intrude."
"I'll tell you when I'm finished."
Harry nodded and sat back. His water was gone, and upstairs he had a bed waiting, but Draco had begun writing again. He stayed beside the fire until she put down her quill.