Arabella Wolf and the Founder's Room (Harry Potter fanfic)

The Sorting

It was pitch black and raining heavily by the time the train drew into the notorious Hogsmeade village station. With a great deal of pushing and shoving, all of the students disembarked and weaved around on the platform with the hoods of their robes pulled tightly across their heads and faces. As Arabella was buffeted by students rushing about and the lashing rain, she lost sight of the others. Unsure of what to do she tried to get out of the swirling mass of people. Suddenly, a booming voice echoed over the crowd,

"Firs' years over here, c'mon now."

The voice proceeding to say things of a similar nature so Arabella fought against the crowd to follow the general direction the noise was coming from. This was where her height helped her. Even though she was a first year, she seemed to be almost as tall as the average third year. Since most of the older years had gotten of the platform first, only younger years remained, and she could see over quite a few heads. As she continued through the crowd she caught sight of Logan and quickly waved to him, but he didn't see. Finally, she broke through the people and found the source of the voice.

A large and rather elderly looking man stood smiling with a large lamp in one hand. In fact, the more Arabella looked, she was sure she had never seen anyone so tall in her life. Lost in her thoughts, she didn't immediately notice that Violet and Beetle had sidled up beside her. When she did see them she gave them a grin, which they both returned. Happily, she turned back towards the front.

"Albus! How're you?" The tall man cried out after catching sight of a young boy, presumably a Potter in the throng of first years, "Seems like jus' yesterday I was guidin' yer dad across the lake." After engaging the boy in what looked like a rib-cracking hug, he let go and turned quickly to the rest of them.

"Gather roun' everybody, I don' want to be out here too long in weather like this." Looking rather scared, the first years shuffled closer together.

"Righ', I'm Hagrid, Gameskeeper an' professor at Hogwarts. It's my job to get yer across the lake, so get into fours an' hop into a boat." Hurriedly they followed his orders and soon Arabella was sat in a boat with Violet and Beetle. The twins were nowhere to be seen and they couldn't find anyone to go with until quickly Albus slipped in beside them.

"Please could I sit here? If you're saving the seat for someone else I can move," He said above the roaring wind.

"It's fine, that seat wasn't taken, don't worry." Arabella said.

It was then she had noticed that Violet was looking quite green. As the boats began to make their way forwards, she shut her eyes completely. In a triangle formation they travelled onwards across the black glass lake towards the castle, which was magnificently silhouetted against the dismal night sky. For a couple of seconds, the thick dark clouds parted and the groups gazing entranced gasped as they saw millions of tiny stars, pinpricks of light, scattered high above them. Suddenly, just infront of them, the tip of what looked suspiciously like a tentacle flipped out of the water before being submerged again. Albus gasped,

"That must have been the Giant Squid! My dad told me all about that, it's lived here for ages."

Arabella was about to ask a few questions, when Violet, who had clearly had enough of being on water leant over the side of the boat and was promptly sick.

After poor Violet's incident, they sat in silence. Arabella could tell that Albus was very nervous about something, so she asked, "Is there something wrong Albus?"

He shook his head but said, "I'm just being silly. It's just... I really don't want to be in a certain house is all." Arabella nodded sypathetically and tried to comfort Violet too. As the wind battered them, the boats made slow progress and once again they lapsed into silence, although this time it was because of nerves. They were all worried at least a little by the upcoming sorting ceremony, and Arabella had no clue what it would entail.