The boy rested his head against the velvet-lined back of the chair, causing his blond hair to ruffle. He looked the very picture of placid, calm, contained; he lounged on the chair as if he was without a care in the world. There was only one tell-tale sign of the knot of dread in his stomach: his fists clenched the arms of the chair so tightly that his knuckles shone white. He also kept stealing quick, nervous glances at the mahogany-paneled door next to the chair.

A sharp, cold voice spoke from behind the thick mahogany door.

"Draco. Come in."

The boy slid off the chair and, pushing open the door, entered the room.

The room was grand, though it wasn't very large. There was a plush, green rug on the planks of the dark wooden floor, bearing an intricately woven pattern of coiled snakes. Tall pillars supported the domed ceiling. A large desk across the room took up most of the opposite wall. It was laden with objects, some of which looked interesting and others creepy. A live-sized jade skull was poised on the desk, facing across the room. Next to the skull was a potion of a sickly yellow color that was slowly emitting steam.

Behind the desk was a man. He was slowly running his fingers down a wand of black wood, while staring with narrowed eyes off into nothingness. He focused his grey eyes on the boy that was swinging the door to the room closed.

The man pushed his chair back and stood up. "Draco, there you are. Sit down."

"Yes, Father," the boy murmured. He pulled up a chair by the desk.

"Your letter to Hogwarts arrived today," the man began. He pulled open a drawer on the desk and withdrew a thick, creamy-colored envelope addressed to 'Draco Malfoy'. "I expected no less of you, but I am proud that you are carrying on the Malfoy tradition." He offered the boy a chilly smile.

Draco bowed his head. "Thank you, Father."

"Now, as you know, young Harry Potter is in your year at Hogwarts," Lucius Malfoy continued. "I am… interested in the boy." Lucius glanced at the door to the room before continuing. "No one knows how he managed to escape the Dark Lord that night as a child. Little Potter could, perhaps, have strong Dark powers - enough to protect him from from the killing curse. He could be a predecessor to the Dark Lord."

"Yes, Father?" Draco said again, hesitantly. It was obvious that he did not know where this conversation was heading.

Lucius stared at little Draco with such intensity it seemed he was shooting daggers from his eyes, pinning Draco to the chair. "I wish for you to keep tabs on Potter at school. To see if he has the makings of a new Dark Lord."

"What?" Draco blurted out, before clapping a hand over his mouth and ducking his head to the carpet.

"Yes, Draco, you heard me. Inform me of what Potter is doing at school. Is that so hard to understand, or are you to be sorted into Hufflepuff?"

"No, Father." Draco whispered.

"Good boy."

Lucius walked around the desk, and faced Draco. The boy looked up at him. In that moment, it was apparent how similar the father and son looked. They both had silvery-blond hair, steely grey eyes, and a sharply angled face, although Draco's sharp features still clung to the round boyishness of youth. Their icy, pale beauty made many a wizard wonder if the blood of the veela ran in their veins.

"I'm proud of you, Draco," Lucius murmured. "Don't let me down."

Lucius strode past his son and toward the door, his green cloak billowing behind him. As he put his hand on the doorknob, he added:

"And be sure to be Sorted into Slytherin."

And with that, he was gone.

. . . . . . . . . .

"Granger, Hermione."

When Hermione learned about the Hogwarts Sorting, she'd consulted every book she could find about the Hogwarts houses. It was easy to see, just by the way the children sitting at their respective tables behaved, how the Houses differed.

The children at the Ravenclaw table weren't all watching the Sorting. Many were reading books, or sketching in notepads. One boy had whipped out a harmonica and was attempting to play it, but was chastised by an older student. The Hufflepuffs, next to them, were laughing loudly, their arms wrapped around their friend's shoulders. Some were animatedly describing their summer vacations, their hands waving wildly in the air as they spoke. Beside them were the Gryffindors. They were boisterous and noisy, laughing louder than the Hufflepuffs. One boy lobbed a mashed potato at another boy on the other end of the table. Two redheaded Gryffindors were jeering and booing everytime a young Slytherin got sorted.

The Slytherins were at the far end of the Hall. Two girls were playing chess at the Slytherin table, as a group of boys huddled together. When Hermione strained her ears, she could hear them discussing Quidditch strategies.

Hermione had decided that Gryffindor was the House she wanted, as soon as she first read about Hogwarts. Any House that churned out the likes of Albus Dumbledore was the House for her. Ravenclaw was her next option. Hermione loved books and learning, and Ravenclaw's values were her right up her alley. Hufflepuff valued hard work, so Hermione figured that the House couldn't be too bad, but Slytherin… Hermione didn't like a single thing she'd read about it. Values cunning and ambition? Hermione wasn't an idiot, she knew that that was a code for a House full of cheaters and slackers. And Slytherin's obsession with blood purity? Hermione herself was a Muggleborn. She wouldn't be able to fit into that House. And Voldemort himself was from Slytherin, too? Well, put it all together and you get a House that is a very bad match with Hermione.

Hermione heard her name get called. As if on her own accord, her legs stumbled down the passage between the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw tables to the stool with the Sorting Hat. She could feel heat burning her cheeks as she jammed the hat on her head. The last thing she saw before the overlarge hat fell over her eyes was Professor McGonagall's encouraging smile.

"Well, well, well," a little voice in her head whispered. Hermione tensed. "This is interesting."

"How so?" Hermione challenged under her breath.

"Very rarely do I see Muggleborns with an aptitude for Slytherin. Last Muggleborn Slytherin I Sorted was, oh, thirty five years ago. Nobby Leach. Wonderful boy, he became the Minister of Magic, did you know?"

"Yes, actually," Hermione said eagerly. "He was the first Muggleborn Minister of Magic."

"I see you've done your research," the hat said, sounding amused. "You could certainly be in Ravenclaw. Alas, that is simply to boring. I've been doing this job for hundreds of years, and if there is anything I hate it's a predictable Sorting."

"Mm," Hermione agreed nervously.

"I see you could be in Gryffindor as well, plenty of nerve and daring here if you prod deep enough. But still, there is so much untapped potential in putting you in Slytherin. What with all of the pureblood mania these days, it'll do some of the kids good to have a Muggleborn in their House."

"Wait," Hermione muttered to the hat, nervousness bubbling up in her stomach. "What are you doing?"

"SLYTHERIN!"

Hermione's eyes widened with horror. As she lifted the hat off of her head, she saw a few Slytherins whooping and clapping for their new Housemate. But a chorus of jeers and hisses broke through. The two ginger-haired boys from Gryffindor stood on their seats and booed her through cupped hands.

The knot of fear was pulled taut.

"Professor, wait!" Hermione cried. But Professor McGonagall just shook her head sympathetically, and went on to call the next first year up to the hat. As if in a daze of dread, Hermione fumbled towards the sea of green-adorned students. Her new House.

. . . . . . . . . . . .

"Potter, Harry."

"Potter? Potter, did she say?"

"Harry Potter?"'

"The Harry Potter?

The students around him craned their necks to stare at Harry, whispering to their peers and casting sideways glances at Harry's forehead. Harry's stomach turned and lurched. He felt nauseous, like he was about to throw up.

Harry pushed through the cluster of first years, muttering 'excuse me's as he went. Ron patted Harry on his back before they broke away. Harry felt a tingle of pleasure - his first real friend! - but the happy feeling was quickly swamped by the consuming dread that clung to him.

As he walked down the aisle between the tables, he fastened his eyes on the stone floor. Even though he couldn't see the people around him, he could feel their stares searing into him.

Snippets of their whispered conversations burned in Harry's ears as he passed them.

"He looks just like how the books describe him-"

"Where's his scar, I can't see it, his head is down-"

"Hey, Harry!"

Harry glanced up, to see Fred and George Weasley waving to him. They looked elated that they could show off how they helped Harry Potter board the train. He offered them a half-hearted smile.

Harry approached the wooden stool nervously, lifting the hat up and settling it on his head. It immediatly slipped over his face, causing his glasses to tumble to his lap.

"Hmm…" a little voice murmured. "Difficult. Very difficult. Plenty of courage, I see. Not a bad mind either. There's talent, oh my goodness, yes - and a nice thirst to prove yourself, now that's interesting… so where shall I put you?"

Harry squeezed his eyes closed so tightly that patterns blossomed behind his eyelids. He thought suddenly back to the smirking, pale face of Draco Malfoy.

Not Slytherin, Harry begged. Anything but Slytherin.

"Not Slytherin, eh?" the Sorting Hat muttered, sounding amused. "Are you sure? You could be great, you know, it's all here in your head, and Slytherin will help you on your way to greatness, no doubt about that."

Not Slytherin. Not -

"Don't try to argue with me, I've made up my mind. SLYTHERIN!"

Harry's eyes shot open as McGonagall lifted the hat off his head.

A chorus of gasps and muttering echoed around the Hall. The hundreds of eyes trained on Harry turned cold and glaring. Suddenly, Harry wanted nothing more than for the stone floor to swallow him up. He jammed his glasses on, slid off the stool and scrambled over to Slytherin. He plopped down next to Hermione Granger from the train. Hermione's eyes looked strangely glassy. Harry sighed and glanced at Ron, still huddled in the crowd of unSorted first years. Ron was staring at Harry with shock, his head tipped to one side, vague pain written on his face.

Ron is Gryffindor-bound, Harry reflected, and even I know Gryffindors and Slytherins don't get along.

. . . . . . . . . . . .

"Weasley, Ron."

Ron had waited for this day for years. Fred and George used to tease him, telling him that the Sorting involved wrestling a troll, or correctly producing a complicated bit of magic. At night in bed he'd fantasized it, the way he'd swagger up to whatever he had to face, the way he'd be Sorted so quickly and decisively that the teachers would be talking about it for decades to come.

Still, Ron was pleased that he only had to try on a hat. It looked a lot simpler than having to put a mountain troll in a headlock.

When Harry had been Sorted into Slytherin, however, Ron's elated mood took a blow. His first friend at Hogwarts, doomed to be his enemy.

Everyone knows, Ron thought morosely, that Slytherins and Gryffindors hate each other. He wondered if Harry knew. If Harry didn't know, Ron wondered if Harry would still be his friend.

Ron heard his name called. He tried not to think about the uncomfortably loud beating of his heart in his chest. He surged down the aisle between the tables, plastering a confident grin on his face. He highfived Fred's hand as he passed his twin brothers, and waved a little at Percy all the way in the corner.

He settled onto the stool, and yanked the hat over his head, his view of the crowd before him obscured by the mothball-scented darkness.

"Another Weasley, I see," a small voice whispered into Ron's head. Great Merlin, the hat spoke! Ron nearly fell off the stool with surprise. "Plenty of bravery and daring, yes, you would do wonderfully in Gryffindor - but what's this?"

"What's what?" Ron hissed to the hat.

"There's a strong, no, overpowering desire to stand out, to step out of your sibling's shadows," the hat mused. Ron's hands tensed on the edges of the stool. "You think all of your siblings have something you don't. They are Prefects, Quidditch captains and Head Boys. Even Fred and George made a name for themselves as pranksters, and little Ginny is special by default because she's the only girl. You want to be something that sets you apart from the rest of your family, that will make people see you as an individual, not as the unremarkable Weasley brother."

Ron's insides were doing somersaults.

"Gryffindor. Please, just Gryffindor," he pleaded the hat in head.

"Nonsense, boy. You want to stand out? There is no better place than in SLYTHERIN!"

The Hall, or so it seemed to Ron, froze. The Slytherins looked up at their newest member, the blood traitor Weasley, in all his shabby-robed, orange-haired glory, and seemed to be unable to move. Ron's head spun around to the Gryffindor table, hoping, praying, begging -

Fred and George seemed like statues, their hands were frozen in front of themselves like they were about to clap but stopped abruptly. George (who was closer to Ron) had flickering expressions cross his face. Shock. Anger. Confusion. Behind them, Percy's eyebrows were furrowed.

A few Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs applauded politely, breaking the confused silence between the Slytherin and Gryffindor Houses.

A whoop came from the Slytherin table. Harry grinned up at Ron, cheering, sounding remarkably out of place in the quiet Hall. All the same, a bubble of utter terror rose up in Ron's stomach.

"I suggest you move to your new House, Mr. Weasley," Professor McGonagall said, perhaps a little tersely. Ron was frozen to the stool. He tried to demand a re-Sorting, but all that came out was a whimper.

"Mr. Weasley, move along now."

Ron, chest clenched, shuffled over to where the Slytherins sat.

Everything his brothers had ever said about Slytherin echoed in his ears. Slytherins are prejudiced against muggleborns. Slytherins are Dark. Slytherins are evil. Slytherins should be banned from the school.

What would his family think of him?