Spells in Silence

Chapter 32: The Badgers

The Sorting Hat was lifted off Hazel's head, and for all that the students massed in front of her had fallen silent during her conversation with the Hat, their shock and surprise still slammed into her with enough psychic force that it physically pushed her backwards nearly off the stool. Applause started immediately afterwards, and she glanced up at McGonagall.

"Head over to your table, Miss Potter," she said with a strained, plastic smile. "A Hufflepuff? James and Lily's child, a Hufflepuff?! Merlin, he is no doubt rolling in his grave right now."

Hazel gave the woman a side-eyed glance before turning away so McGonagall would not see her frown. She was not sure just what McGonagall's connection to her parents was, but the witch had made no secret during their first meeting that she knew them well, or at least thought she did. Would her parents really have been that disappointed with her because of which House, which dormitory, she was put into of all things?

She could not help but think of just the previous day, when she sat in front of their graves and pondered how they would have felt were they alive to see her now. She assumed they would be proud of her because they were her parents, so they should be proud of her even if she was different. Not to mention that because they could not tell her their opinions and she had to assume, there was little reason to assume they would be disapproving. Was she wrong in making that assumption? Were her parents just as closed-minded as it seemed like so many people in this society were?

Morgan chirped reassuringly at her, and she reached up to brush her fingertips against his feathers as she stood up from the stool and started the short walk over to the table just to her right, the same one where the applause for her sorting had been loudest and Sally-Anne clapping even harder than the rest of her new housemates. You're right, she told him. Who cares whether she thinks they would be disappointed? This is the same woman who left me with Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon. She clearly is not a good judge of character, so why would she be any more correct about my parents' opinions?

Sally-Anne slid over to make room for her on the bench, and Hazel could not help but smile at the way the other girl was almost quivering with strained restraint. "This is wonderful! Just what I hoped would happen. I made a friend, and she's in my house, and everyone has been friendly so far. I-I'm glad we're both in Hufflepuff," the blonde told her with a wide smile of her own.

Shiny silvery movement flickered in the corner of her eye, and she turned her head to get a better look at the source. Another spirit was moving along the table, this one in the form of a man. It was hearty in build with the top of its head either balding or shaved clean to leave a ring of curly grey hair behind. It gave her a wide smile and moved closer, but a moment later its expression shifted to one that was almost disappointed. The spirit turned away and drifted back in the opposite direction.

Letting out a tiny sigh, Hazel forced herself to relax, and she was surprised when that also meant releasing her death-grip on the bench beneath her. When had she grabbed it in the first place? Her eyes swept over the room as a whole, seeking similar silver glows, and they widened when she finally looked up. In addition to the four ghosts that confined themselves to the tables on the floor, she would guess that there were at least another dozen spirits floating in the air. Was this all of them, or were there even more waiting elsewhere in this enormous castle?

And if they were that common, was she going to be startled and frightened every time she crossed one?

She had not always been so cautious around spirits. If she had, she never would have obtained the fairy lens she still wore over her right eye. Yet for all that she knew there were friendly spirits – the one in Shervage Wood as well as the nature spirit in Compiègne Forest being fantastic examples – she had also run into several that were not. The hungry ghosts in de Rais's tower, the vengeful spirit in the scoured clearing, not to mention a particularly insistent rusalka she made sure she stayed very far away from in Yugoslavia.