Chapter One
“All ready?” Harry’s father asked, reaching down to grab Harry’s trunk.
It was half past 9 on the day that Harry officially began his Wizarding education at Hogwarts, and he couldn’t have been more excited.
“Yes, yes, yes,” he said impatiently, dodging a kiss from his mother. “You don’t have to walk me to the platform once we’re there. I know where it is.”
“And how do you know that?” his mother asked amusedly, taking a step back. “I don’t ever remember bringing you there.”
Yeah, it would be weird if she did, seeing as the only time Harry had gone to the platform was when Bill had secretly taken him and his best friend Ron that one time. Harry was sure it wasn’t the best time to mention that.
“Fred and George told me,” he informed his parents. “And Malfoy. They couldn’t all be lying together.”
His father let out a laugh. “Well, if that’s your reasoning,” he said, somehow linking arms with Lily and Harry despite the luggage and owl he was holding.
“Here, I’ll hold the owl,” his mother offered, taking Hedwig’s cage in her arms. “All ready to go?”
“All ready,” Harry and James assured her.
They apparated to the station. Harry immediately spotted Ron and ran off towards him, but not before getting his luggage and a tight hug from his parents.
“Have fun, Harry,” his mother said.
“We won’t be too mad if you’re not a Gryffindor,” his father added.
His mother swatted his father on the arm.
“Don’t talk like that. We’ll be happy no matter what happens.”
“Bye, mum, bye, dad,” Harry repeated, and then he was off, eager to meet up with Ron for the first time in weeks.
They hadn’t had a chance to see each other since before Hogwarts letters had been delivered, and there was much to discuss.
“Ron!” Harry yelled. “Over here!”
“Oi, mate, good to see you,” Ron said as he turned, shoulders slumping in relief. “You wouldn’t believe what happened to me the other night. Fred and George made a new potion—at least that’s what they said—and decided to test it on me. It was just horrible.”
“Oh, that?”
Harry remembered what Fred and George had been up to the last time he had visited the Burrow. It took a while to make potions, right? So Harry wasn’t at all surprised that he was hearing the results of it now.
“Are you sure it wasn’t just something from Zonko’s?”
Ron matched Harry’s quick walking pace. He was sure. The ooze that had appeared on his bed had matched the color of the muddy-looking potion in the twins’ room.
“I know it wasn’t,” he confirmed.
“Excuse me,” a stiff voice said behind them.
Harry and Ron turned, coming face to face with a pale brunette boy wearing unsorted Hogwarts robes. Well, almost face to face—the boy in question was rather short. Ron estimated that he couldn’t have been a fingernail taller than Ginny; maybe he was even shorter.
When he got no response, the boy frowned and put out his hand.
“I’m Tom Riddle. Do you possibly know how to get to Platform 9 and ¾?”
Looking surprised, Harry shook his hand in return.
“I’m Harry, Harry Potter. And this is Ronald Weasley. Ron, say hello, don’t just stand there—” Ron yelped as Harry elbowed him in the stomach.
He waved, and then felt a bit stupid, seeing as the boy was right there in front of them and didn’t look like he appreciated being waved at.
Riddle let go of Harry’s hand in favor of picking up his muggle trunk.
“Well?”
“Are….you sure?” Ron asked slowly, looking down at the skinny brunette—Riddle—and his baggage.
There was no way he was actually a first year student. Sure, he was wearing unmarked Hogwarts robes and was gripping his wand entirely the wrong way just like the rest of them, but he was just… so… short.
At this point, Riddle started to look annoyed.
“Am I sure of what? We don’t have all day. The train leaves at 10, and I’d like to board before that happens.”
“Well, you’re… a bit…”
“Spit it out. Come on,” the boy said shortly, eyeing them.
Unconsciously, he had begun to fiddle with his wand, and failed to notice black sparks flying out the tip. Ron watched with a mix of horror and fascination; Mum said that only dark wizards could purposely create accidental magic. Was this….a future Dark Lord?
“...short for a first year,” Harry finished cautiously.
It was true: Riddle was even shorter than Ginny, Ron’s sister, and Ginny was tiny.
The boy scowled at that.
That….wasn’t the intended effect. It was one thing when Ginny complained of Ron calling her short—she was just a big crybaby—but they were just stating the obvious, at least in this instance.
“It’s just hard to believe you’re a first year too. We’re first years,” Ron tried again, with no success.
Riddle looked up at them again, real hatred gleaming in his eyes. Ron backed away, holding up his hands.
“Sorry—”
“If you want to get to the Platform, just run through the barrier,” Harry rushed, cutting in before Ron’s words could deal any more damage. “Look, I’ll show you, Ron's brother showed me the other morning. Like this—”
Harry pushed his trolley towards the sign, disregarding the crowd.
“Watch me,” he called out, and was through to the Platform in under a few seconds.
Meanwhile, Ron was frozen to the spot. He really, really did not like Harry right now for leaving him alone with this new boy.
“Uhh, yeah.”
Riddle rolled his eyes. “Well, thank you for the help,” he said snidely before pushing Ron out of the way.
He ran straight at the barrier, robe billowing after him. A few squawks and exclamations from the nearby crowd of muggles later, Ron was the only one that remained.
“Well, what are you waiting for?”
It was Ginny. Ron jumped a little. She certainly hadn’t been standing next to him a moment ago.
His younger sister craned her neck upwards to look at him, blinking her eyes slowly.
Ron turned to her and leaned down a bit.
“Ginny, want to hear something?”
Ginny nodded.
“Can you believe…that I met someone more miniature than you?”
This time, Ginny was the one who let out a squawk of indignation.
“Ron!” she shrieked. “That’s not—nice! Mum! Ron called me miniature again!”
Unwilling to endure another lecture about ‘kindness’ and ‘not teasing your sister’ from his mother, Ron hurried after Harry and that Riddle boy onto Platform 9 ¾.
A few minutes later, Ron and Harry found themselves an empty compartment, with Riddle nowhere in sight. Ron found Riddle equally intriguing and horrifying, and continued to talk about him as they both made themselves comfortable in the new space.
“Mate, he was about to hiss at me,” Ron insisted as Harry plopped down on his seat and procured a chocolate frog seemingly out of nowhere. “He had, like, these humongous eyes. And I swear they got real red before he pushed me and ran through the barrier. He’ll be a Slytherin, I bet.”
“Sure,” Harry responded, not really listening to his best friend.
He flipped over the card from his chocolate frog. It was Falco Aesalon, the first recorded Animagus. Aesalon winked and smiled at Harry, disappeared from the card, and then quickly reappeared as Aesalon’s own animagus: a falcon.
Ron scooted over and observed the card.
“Oh, I still haven’t got that one.”
“I have four of them,” Harry responded, and then rummaged through his trunk for more. “Do you want it for one of your Dumbledores?”
And so they spent the remainder of the train ride like this; trading cards, eating vast quantities of chocolate and candies, but mainly discussing the anticipation of coming upon Hogwarts for the first time.
— — — — — — — —
The first years were crowded just outside the Great Hall, anxiously waiting for the Sorting to begin.
On impulse, Harry stuck his tongue out at Draco Malfoy; they had both had the misfortune of seeing each other weeks earlier at a society event and had snuck out of the ballroom to race on Malfoy’s new brooms. Harry had won, fair and square, but Malfoy obviously didn’t think the same and was clearly plotting to usurp Harry’s obvious dominance on the quidditch field.
But that would happen next year. This was first year, and in the meantime, Harry could sense that Malfoy was plotting something different, which was also big. And evil. Because—
”You’re a slimy Slytherin,” Harry whispered loudly at the Malfoy heir. Ron nodded furiously in agreement.
Malfoy paused and turned to look at Harry with loathing.
“Shut up, Potter, I’m not even sorted yet.”
“As if you’ll be a Hufflepuff.”
Malfoy rolled his eyes. “Merlin forbid.”
Harry and Ron snickered.
Malfoy, a Hufflepuff. That was funny. There’d sooner be another Dark Lord than a Malfoy sorted into Hufflepuff.
“Boys,” Professor McGonnagall admonished.
Harry looked around. Whoops. A couple older students standing nearby were staring at them. One Slytherin prefect rolled her eyes and motioned towards them with her wand, which made the others next to her laugh.
“Sorry, Professor McGonnagall,” Harry and Malfoy said in unison, and then made faces of disgust when they realized it.
The professor let out a disappointed sigh, and then began to speak, addressing all of the first years.
“Welcome to Hogwarts. The start-of-term banquet shall begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your Houses.”
Excited would be an understatement; Harry was elated to see where he’d end up. Not that he expected to go anywhere but Gryffindor.
“The Sorting is a very important ceremony. While you are here, your House will be something like your family at Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your House, sleep in your House dormitory, and spend free time in your House common room.”
Professor McGonnagall continued to talk about the Houses, providing a bit more detail, probably so the Muggleborns didn’t feel completely out of place.
Harry zoned out a bit. He had heard all of this before. He stared aimlessly at a nearby stone wall until Ron jabbed him in the side, hissing, “It’s in front of the entire school, Harry. Fix your hair.”
“I can’t,” Harry argued. “You try to fix it. It won’t flatten.”
“Need some help, Potter?” Malfoy offered. “I can try a new spell my mother taught me.”
Harry’s nose wrinkled. “Eugh. No. You’ll curse me.”
Malfoy shrugged. “Just trying to help.”
“As if you ever help.”
“I help. ”
“When?”
“Always!”
“No you don’t,” Ron interjected. “You hit Ginny upside the head when she asked you for a scarf last winter.”
Malfoy made a face. “She shouldn’t have lost hers, then.”
“That was your fault! You hid it from her!”
Oh, true. It hadn’t been a pretty sight. Harry stifled an unorthodox giggle at the memory of it. Ginny had thrown a tantrum at the Malfoy family’s annual Yule ball, all because Draco Malfoy himself had thought it a wise idea to steal her scarf, illegally charm it into looking like a quaffle, and hide it behind a frozen garden gnome. What a night that had been.
“Boys,” Professor McGonnagall admonished a second time, tutting.
“Sorry, Professor McGonnagall,” Harry and Malfoy said in unison, again, and then made matching faces of disgust, again.
She shook her head, muttered something under her breath, let out a deep sigh, and then scanned the room of first years.
“Sort yourselves into a proper line,” she called, raising her voice to be heard over the first year’s nervous murmurs.
Merlin. Harry had been so focused on his and Malfoy’s argument that he hadn’t even realized there were ghosts floating around, appearing and disappearing through walls.
Not that he was scared, of course. His parents had prepared him for anything.
“We’re going,” Ron called to Harry over his shoulder.
Harry raced a little to catch up to him. He did not want to be alone walking into the Great Hall.
Oh, and how the Hall was beautiful. Harry looked in wonder at the thousands of floating candles, the teacher’s old mahogany chairs, the glittering golden silverware, and the strange old hat in the front and center of the room. Wow. The moving pictures in Hogwarts: A History couldn’t compare to this.
All this looking, and Harry didn’t even really listen to what was apparently the Sorting Hat’s yearly song. He clapped on instinct with everybody else at the very end of it, not yet pulled out of his thoughts.
And then the Sorting started.
First: “Abbott, Hannah”.
Hannah walked up to the Hat, put it on, sat in the front seat for just a moment, and was almost immediately sorted into Hufflepuff.
Some Sortings took longer than that.
“Granger, Hermione,” and “Longbottom, Neville,” took what felt like quite a while—only building the nervous anticipatory feeling in Harry’s gut.
Then it was his turn.
Hearing “Potter, Harry,” almost scared the soul out of him; he jumped. And then took a deep breath.
It was going to be Gryffindor, it was going to be Gryffindor.
The Hat wasn’t that sure.
“Given any thought to Slytherin, my boy? You would do well there.”
No, no, no, it couldn’t be Slytherin.
“Very well, then. GRYFFINDOR!”
Heaving a deep sigh of relief, Harry slid off the chair and walked to the Gryffindor table, blood roaring in his ears. He hardly heard the applause from all the other students. Thank. Merlin. Harry didn’t know what he would have done if he had been forced to be in Slytherin.
The applause for him died down, and it was quickly onto the next person.
Harry sat, dazed, all of it hitting him for the first time.
He was here. In Hogwarts. It was real. He was a Gryffindor. This was the same table he’d be sitting at for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for the next 7 years.
He snapped out of it when Ron slid onto the pew next to him.
“Hey, good we’ll be in it together.”
“Yeah, of course.”
Ron’s congratulations were brief; he offered Harry a quick nod in favor of discussing the Riddle boy’s sorting, which had coincidentally taken place right after Harry’s own. There hadn’t been anything there to watch with such fervor, in Harry’s opinion. It had been a perfectly normal sorting: Riddle had walked up to the podium after Harry’s sorting had gotten a round of applause and sat down with the hat on his head. After maybe a second, the hat had announced Riddle’s acceptance into “SLYTHERIN!”
“And would you look at that,” Ron said darkly. “Riddle’s a Slytherin.”
Next to him, Harry let out a laugh.
“You keep talking about him. I don’t see why. The bloke's a snake, so what? He's not that interesting.”
Ron whipped his head around.
“You, out of all people, should care. Pay close attention to the one whose name doubles as a puzzle.”
Ron looked older than time as he said this. He stared directly into Harry’s eyes.
Harry shivered a little.
“Don’t…don’t talk like that,” he said slowly, scooting away from his friend. “You’re freaking me out.” He stopped scooting away when he realized he was about to bump into another student.
Ron rubbed his eyes for a whole of ten seconds. “Talk like what?”
“You were just being all creepy. Telling me about how I need to pay attention to Riddle and all.”
“Mate, shut up. We have enough on our hands with Malfoy.”
Harry made a face and pretended to gag.
“Thank Merlin he’s in another house. It’s bad enough that we have to go to school with him.”
“Oh, come on. Everyone knew he was going to go to Slytherin and that you would be in Gryffindor. You don’t still owe him ten galleons, do you?”
Harry’s face reddened.
“Maybe I do,” he muttered, turning to see headmaster Dumbledore’s speech more clearly—and by extension, not Ron.
The two friends continued to talk throughout the ceremony, and throughout dinner, and throughout their very first trudge to the Gryffindor dormitory. Among other things, they discussed what Fred and George could be up to, what nefarious plans Malfoy was sure to be hatching, and the fact that Ron actually hadn't had to slay a dragon to discover his House.
“Lies,” Ron complained. “They’re all lies.”
A certain pale brown-eyed boy was left forgotten at the Slytherin table.