Pale Ghosts Ascend

Before the Entrance, at the Very Threshold

As we got off the train, Harry and his friends led us to a bunch of carriages.

"What are those... horses? Are they horses?" Harry said, pointing at a pair of jet black horses that the carriages were each hitched to.

Hermione frowned, looking at him with a concerned look on her face. "Thestrals. They say you can only see them if... if you've seen someone die."

I tilted my head in slight confusion. I'd seen a lot of things, but someone dying was fortunately not among them. But I could still see the thestrals. Did the underworld count? I'd seen a lot of dead people there. Or was whatever hid them just a weird form of mist I could see through because of my mother? I glanced at Andromeda, and she nodded, as if to indicate she saw them too, which discounted my latter theory. Hermione glanced towards us. "Can you two..."

"Yeah." I replied simply, not wanting to lie to her too blatantly.

"Who was it?" Ron asked, prompting Hermione to slap him on the shoulder.

"Ron! You can't just..."

"It's alright, Hermione. One of the professors at Ilvermony. He had a heart attack in class. He was really old." I said, trying to save Ron from any further lectures.

Hermione simply sighed and glared at Ron again as he shimmied uncomfortably in his seat. The rest of the ride to the castle was uncomfortably quiet. We went in, and were stopped by a tall woman in a dark black dress.

"Mr. L/N and Miss Fitzgerald, I presume?"

I nodded.

"Good. I am Professor McGonagall, deputy headmistress. Follow me, Professor Dumbledore asked that you be sorted the same way as the first years."

Me and Andromeda followed her through the halls before eventually coming to a side room. We could hear cheering and clapping from the great hall through the door as McGonagall explained the sorting process. The whole thing seemed rather silly to me, but I'd done crazier things before and seen stranger, so I didn't exactly question it. If it had worked for so long, they must have been doing something right. As she finished explaining and we prepared to go in, I raised my hand.

"Professor, if you don't mind, has Albus, sorry, Professor Dumbledore, told you anything about us? Anything... different, I mean."

She nodded. "I am aware of your... heritage, yes. And the reason you are here. I must say, I find it rather dangerous. Would you allow me to ask a question regarding it all?"

I nodded, a bit surprised she was asking in the first place.

"Is it... hard? Growing up with all this danger, I mean. How does it affect you mentally? I worry about Harry, going through all he has at such a young age, and I was hoping you two would be able to give me some insight."

I glanced over at Andromeda, giving her the signal to talk. She had been appointed as a sort of therapist by her fellow children of Apollo, so I thought she ought to take that question.

"It's not easy, no. But for a lot of us it's all we know. That makes it easier to cope with in a way, I think. More than anything I'd say just be available for him to talk to. That's what we do at camp. Y/N? You've probably been through more than me personally, so..."

I nodded. "Last winter my brother cut his hand off in front of me to try and bring Kronos back. That definitely stuck with me for a while, but... well we don't have any option but to move on. With what we're facing, if we spend too long thinking about the past we won't have a future. Harry I honestly don't know about yet. He hasn't had that same moment of realization yet, I don't think. About what he's really facing, what he has ahead of him. Everyone takes it differently anyhow. But what 'Meda said is right. Just be there for him. Thats all you can do."

McGonagall nodded. "I see. Thank you two. I believe they are ready for you now."

With that, she opened the door, and we walked out onto a slightly raised platform. The staff table was to our right, and in the middle of the platform was a small stool with a ragged hat sitting on it.

"You want to go first?" I whispered to Andromeda, as the rest of the hall mumbled amongst themselves, no doubt talking about us.

"Sure."

I squeezed her hand quickly as she somewhat nervously walked over and put the hat on. After a moment, the brim opened and a voice boomed out.

"GRYFFINDOR!"

Andromeda took the hat off and made her way over to the cheering table on the far left side of the hall, which meant it was now my turn. I took a deep breath and went over, taking a seat on the far too small stool and putting the hat on.

"Hmm... Another demigod, then? One of hers, no less..."

I jolted upright a bit.

"Nobody else can hear this, right?"

"No. Your secret is safe, I assure you. My former owner, Godric Gryffindor, was your half brother, by the way. It is good to meet a relation of his."

"I uh... thanks, I guess. So how do we do this then?"

"Open your mind up. You are keeping it well and truly shut. I need to see within it to decide."

I nodded internally at the voice and released the hold on my mind I had placed as soon as I detected the weird mental magic of the hat.

"Hmm... interesting. Very interesting. You would do well in Ravenclaw, very well. Impressively well read for someone with dyslexia, mild as it may be. But no, I sense that you desire to be in the house of your... sunny friend."

"I... yeah. Thats a bit of a strange way to describe her, but yeah. I also need to be close to Harry, so if you could..."

"Very well. I would normally place you in Ravenclaw, but I can hardly interfere in a quest given by your mother. Would not be particularly smart as an item animated by her magic."

I felt the presence retreat from my mind, and opened my eyes as it spoke.

"GRYFFINDOR!"

Even more cheers arose from the Gryffindor table, as the other houses grumbled slightly at their rivals getting both me and Andromeda. I could hardly blame them, given our cover story and what McGonagall had said about how seriously the students took the House Cup. Still, I smiled and went to join Andromeda, Harry, and the others over at the Gryffindor table. The quest was going really well so far, much smother than my previous quests. I hoped it would stay that way.

A/N: Hey folks! If you aren't in my discord and you realized the titles for this book are a bit weird, it's because they are all taken from the Aeneid. I read it again recently and felt like doing something different with the chapter titles for this book.