New School, New Life

Sorting Ceremony

Hello again! Here's another chapter and I hope you enjoy it!

Disclaimer: Much to my dismay, I do not own the fabulous works of Harry Potter. That belongs to J.K. Rowling.

I could hear voices. But they were muffled and echoed and I couldn't make out what was being said. I opened my eyes to see what was going on but my vision was blurry. I could barely make out what looked to be three people in the room. From the way things looked, I was on the floor and one of the people were kneeling over me. Perhaps even trying to talk to me, but I still couldn't hear what was being said.

I don't remember anything and my mind is racing, spinning with questions. What happened, why am I on the floor? Where am I? ...who am I?

Then - in a single second - I could hear, my vision cleared...I could remember. I could remember it all and, Merlin, did I want to forget. But I had to focus on here and now.

I had just come back from changing when the train stopped, the lights went out, and that dementor appeared. Now, I could feel the train moving, the lights were on, and the dementor was gone.

I turned my attention to the people in the compartment with me to find the three people were the two boys from before and an older gentleman. The stranger was wearing an extremely shabby set of wizard's robes and he looked ill and exhausted. Though quite young, his light brown hair was flecked with grey.

"Are you alright?" the gentleman asked, " according to them you caught the back of your head on the table as you fell," he gestured to the other two in the room. As he said this I noticed a small throbbing in the back of my head. I slowly sat up and winced as the throbbing became more pronounced and the room began to spin.

I brought my knees closer to my chest and bowed my head between my knees, placing my hands on the back of my head, in hopes of getting the room to stay put.

"Here, you take this." I looked up slowly to see him handing me a large piece of chocolate. I hesitantly grabbed it and took a bite. To my surprise, all the coldness that still lingered from the dementor vanished, and warmth began to flood in. "We should be at the school in another ten minutes." With that he got up and walked out of the compartment.

I decided to move from the floor back to my seat. As I got up, I looked at the table and noticed a crack. I must have hit my head hard.

When I sat down, the boys said something about going to look for their friends. I nodded dismissively and went back to looking out the window and into the cold rainy night, waiting for the train to arrive at its destination, and lost myself in thoughts of a woman and a lullaby

~-~-~-~

The rest of the train ride was quiet, and when we arrived at the school I was glad to have something to distract me from my thoughts and the confusion it brought on.

As I got off the train, I heard someone calling for first years and turned to find a very large and tall man that could be nothing less than a giant. He was about twice as tall as an average man, standing at eleven feet, six inches tall and three times as wide, with a long mane of shaggy black hair and a beard that covered most of his face. He had light skin and dark eyes. ""Firs' years! Firs' years follow me! Julia Wright out here? Julia!" Surprised he was looking for me, I made my way over to him. "Ah, there ya are. C'mon, follow me - anymore firs' years? Mind yer step, now! Firs' years follow me!"

I walked along side the man, the first years slipping and stumbling behind us, down a steep, narrow path. "Yeh'll get yer firs' sight o' Hogwarts in a sec," the tall man called over his shoulder, "Jus' round this bend here." As he said this, we turned a corner and there, on the other side of a vast lake, sat the grand castle. There was a chorus of "oohs" and "aahs".