During the start of term feast for Harry Potter's fourth year of Hogwarts, the young wizard was feeling particularly good about his life. Not only did he now have a godfather to write to, he had also enjoyed going to the Quidditch World Cup with Ron's family during the summer... even if the whole event had ended in disaster.

Also contributing to his levity was the fact that this was the first time in two years that he'd actually been able to attend the Sorting Ceremony. Harry thought that it would be almost interesting to see what it was like when he wasn't the one wearing the Hat in front of the entire school, and that this feeling was a great improvement over the nervous terror he'd felt the first time around.

The students, seated at the four House Tables, had been making casual conversation among themselves as the First Years filed in and lined up along the wall, waiting to be Sorted. Rather than the usual Sorting Hat song, however, Dumbledore appeared to be standing up to make an announcement. The students turned their attention to the Headmaster respectfully, as the ancient wizard cleared his throat.

"Welcome to another year at Hogwarts!" he greeted them, smiling benevolently. "This year," he began, "we'll be handling the Sorting a bit differently. If everyone could stand along the wall with the First Years for a moment, I would very much appreciate it."

Well, there was some grumbling from the Slytherins at this request, and some confused whispering from the rest of them, but they soon did as their Headmaster had asked. The Professors were eyeing Dumbledore with varying proportions of uncertainty and wariness. Obviously, they had no more idea what the Headmaster was doing than the students did.

Dumbledore beamed at them in satisfaction. "Now, then," he continued, "that's better. So... to business. It has come to my attention that inter-house rivalries have been going a bit strong these past few years, and I find myself forced to confront the fact that, perhaps, our Four Great Founders may have been misguided in dividing our students into four separate houses. Differences are what give us our identity, yes, but unity among those differences is what makes us strong."

People were murmuring to their neighbors in a decidedly discontented tone. They didn't like where Dumbledore was going with this.

"Therefore," he said. "I have decided to abolish the four houses."

"What!?" Ron called out.

"You can't be serious!" cried Padma Patil.

Dumbledore held up his hand. "I realize," he continued, "that this may be a hard transition for many of you to make. Taking these considerations into account, I have decided to first phase into this new state of doing things." He waved his wand and the two middle House Tables moved towards the outer tables, creating two distinct factions of the room.

"For the next year," he said, "we shall have two houses: Ravendor and Slytherpuff."

The Staff were now staring at their Headmaster in horror. The students had given up on trying to be polite and shouts of protest rang throughout the Great Hall.

With another wave of his wand, Dumbledore silenced them.

"While I anticipate this change in arrangements may be unwelcome by many of you," he said, "there is absolutely nothing you can do to change my mind on this. Now, then, older students may return to their Slytherpuff or Ravendor Tables while the First Years are sorted."

Harry, for one, was in complete and total shock. As he listened to the Sorting Hat sing about the virtues of the now two houses of Hogwarts, each call of "Ravendor!" or "Slytherpuff!" from the Hat had made him a bit more convinced that this had to be some sort of cruel joke.

This couldn't work. The Gryffindors and Ravenclaws (Harry refused to use the new name) had no respect for each other. And the Slytherins despised the Hufflepuffs, while the Badgers were all but terrified of the Snakes.

Once the Sorting was done with. Dumbledore got up to speak with a less than enthusiastic crowd. "Ah, yes," he said. "I should probably also mention that Hogwarts will be hosting the Triwizard Tournament this year."

Well, the first few weeks of life in 'Ravendor' and 'Slytherpuff' were nothing but Hell. Dumbledore had gotten rid of the old Common Rooms and made new ones, which no one was happy with. The Ravendors were stuck rooming in the Chamber of Secrets (the passwords were still in Parseltongue and were always a pain to memorize.) The Slytherpuffs were rooming in the middle of nowhere by the Divination tower, which had all of them constantly complaining. Snakes and Badgers don't have much in common, but they do both like to be grounded.

In fact, when the students from Durmstrang and Beauxbatons showed up, the hype took a backseat to everyone still being cheesed-off at Dumbledore. Not even the fact that the Beauxbatons girls were gorgeous or that one of the Durmstrang students was famous Quidditch player Victor Krum could lift the scent of rebellion from the air.

Though, the advent of the fresh meat had reminded half the Ravendors of something important: the attention of the entire Wizarding World would be on Hogwarts this year... and the Hogwarts Champion for the Tournament could throw a major monkey-wrench into Dumbledore's agenda. He wanted to take away their houses? Fine, they'd take away Hogwarts' dignity.

They spread the word throughout the school, and the plan took off like wildfire, for this was a way to fight back. Naturally, there were a few holdouts (who either wanted the thousand-galleon prize or who retained even the slightest bit of school pride), but the vast majority of students were all for it. Almost every eligible student put their name into the Goblet of Fire, and then also put in the names of all the younger students as well. Finally, Hermionie's brains, Draco Malfoy's knowledge of the Dark Arts, and Luna Lovegood's sheer insanity had been combined to mess with the magic of the Goblet itself. What would come of their tampering, not even they were sure, but it would certainly be most glorious to watch.

On the night of the choosing of the Champions, Victor Krum was designated as the Durmstrang Champion, Fleur Delacour as the Beauxbatons Champion, and when the time came to choose the Hogwarts Champion, the Goblet of Fire burned crimson, saffron, and blinding white in rapid succession, before vomiting forth six pieces of parchment which read: "Cedric Diggory," "Harry Potter," "Luna Lovegood," "Fred and George Weasley," "Gregory Goyle," and "Terry Boot."

Well, needless to say, the other schools were outraged at the injustice of one school having seven Champions, and insisted on having six of the Hogwarts Champions disqualified. Unfortunately, it seemed that being chosen by the Goblet was the seal on a 'binding magical contract' which required the selected Champion to see the contest through to the end. In the end, both Durmstrang and Beauxbatons were allowed to select six other 'Champions' to participate in the Tournament, and the

whole thing would be turned into a team sport.

And, most expectedly, things went nowhere but downhill from there. Seeing as their goal for the Tournament was humiliation of the establishment, the seven Hogwarts Champions didn't even try during the First Task, and were eventually removed from the arena after students in the audience kept very obviously cheating by helping the Hogwarts Champions, some even going so far as to jump out onto the field to give them aid.

In the Second Task, they'd brought along a beach-ball and played volleyball in the shallows of the lake for the entire hour allotted to them. Ten minutes before the hour was up, however, their hostages surfaced, having somehow hoodwinked their way out of their enchanted sleep on the bottom of the lake.

During the Third Task, they'd holed up by the entrance of the maze and refused to go any further. They stayed there until Durmstrang had claimed the Triwizard Cup. Unfortunately, during the following celebration, Harry was kidnapped by 'Mad-Eye Moody' and his blood used to resurrect Voldemort. Harry had managed to escape and make his way back to Hogwarts, using some of the charms and protection spells the Champions had devised for use during the Tournament. Harry did tell Dumbledore about his experiences, but he no longer trusted the old man.

The next year, there was only one house in Hogwarts: Slythinpuffclaw.

With Dolores Umbridge sent in from the Ministry, the year was as mutinous and annoying as the last had been. The only good thing about the whole mess was that Harry had been able to pick up the basics of Occlumency and Legilimency from Blaise Zabini, a former Slytherin, because he really had been getting sick of dreaming about Voldemort killing people.

And, apart from Arthur Weasley nearly dying from a snake bite, the year ended on a good note, when Dumbledore finally relented and gave them back their four houses.

Their sixth year, Voldemort finally got around to attacking Hogwarts. He'd stormed into the castle with little-to-no resistance from those within, taken over the school in short order, and then called all the students forth to have someone listen while he gloated over his victory.

Voldemort was standing where Dumbledore usually stood, at the center of the Head Table. The Headmaster and Staff were trapped in full body-bind curses, forced to watch helplessly as their students faced Voldemort.

"Bow before your new master!" commanded the Dark Lord, a cruel smirk on his face.

The students did so.

"Tell me that I'm the greatest person ever and you're all scum!"

"You're the greatest person ever, Lord Voldemort, and we're all scum," they obediently recited.

"Excellent," he said. "Now, there will have to be some changes here, starting with this ridiculous house system," Voldemort said, waving his wand so that all of the wall-hangings changed to green and silver. "From now on," he told them, "there will be no more Sorting at Hogwarts. The colors and emblem of my ancestor, Salazar Slytherin, will suffice for all."

The room went deathly quiet. Even the Slytherins looked upset at this turn of events.

The next thing he knew, Voldemort was being hexed from a hundred different directions at once, with a multitude of unforgivable curses coming from the Slytherin Table.

Thus ended the reign of the Dark Lord Voldemort.

And that, my children, is why there will always be four houses at Hogwarts.