Title: Sorting Situation

Author: SCWLC

Disclaimer: I own nothing but my theories about the hows and whys of Sorting.

Rating: K

Summary: The Sorting Hat thinks about why it sorts like it does.

Notes: So, this is sort of a companion to my fic, "House Pride". You don't have to read that to understand this one, but they sort of link up. This kind of relates to one of my pet peeves, the misunderstanding that Harry picked Gryffindor, which he did not, he picked, "Any house that's not Slytherin," which is not the same thing. It also relates to my noting that the Hat didn't actually say that Harry would do best in Slytherin. It just said he would do well in it, and makes me wonder how the hat would have responded if Harry had said, "Not Ravenclaw," or, "Not Hufflepuff," or even, "Not Gryffindor." "Not Gryffindor, eh? You could be a hero, you know. It's all here in your head, and Gryffindor will help you on the way greatness,no doubt about that." Think about it.

Notes2: Sorry, to everyone waiting on updates for my WIPs, but this has been bugging me for a while, so I'm putting it out there.

Nothing had changed in the past thousand years, but then again, everything had changed.

"Patterson, Thomas!"

The eleven-year-old boy sat on the chair and I was placed on his head. This one had no particular preferences . . . hmm . . . he doesn't want to upset his parent by getting too close to the 'mad' Potter boy . . .

Well, that did spark a response in the child. "So, he is mad!"

One of the problems with being fundamentally created to be a legilimens is that sometimes my thoughts get broadcast aloud when I don't wish them to. I only do this once a year after all. It's a long lag between Sortings that usually gets me a little out of practice.

"He's about as mad as you are," I snapped back. "He is angry, but he's earned that right." I didn't have eyes, but I could hear and see after a fashion, and everything I'd heard in Alby's office seemed set to drive the Potter boy quite to distraction with fury.

But the back and forth gave me a hook to hang my Sorting on with this one. Loyalty to his parents and a desire to make them proud by working hard. "Definitely a HUFFLEPUFF!"

The previous Hufflepuff head of House had been Hadrian McKinnon. He'd died in the last war, and I would never have Sorted that boy into his House. Back then it would have been Slytherin, given the other predilections in the boy's head. Hadrian would have put up with none of that, "I don't want to be in the same House as the mad boy," garbage. He'd been one of the fiery 'Puffs. Those were ones that took loyalty and hard work seriously. They were the ones who outperformed everyone else because they were going to work for it, and once their loyalty was given it could only be shaken by the most egregious betrayals.

"Singh, Aparajita!"

This one was fearless. Brash and determined. If the House of Lions were still under the headship of Godric Gryffindor, I would have placed her there, no trouble. But she wasn't. I made a mistake with that Hermione girl, letting her have her way to be Gryffindor. It was sheer luck that Harry Potter was the sort that pulled her out of the obscurity she would have sunk to, this one, might not have similar luck. I was created a thousand years ago to Sort the children by personality, into the House with the best Head to act in loco parentis for them. Minnie McGonagall would be proud of this one, but she'd miss the bullying.

But this girl was like Hermione. She loved books and knowledge and wanted to know everything just because it made her happy to know. As much as I usually factor in the preferences of the children, I don't want to rely on luck to keep them from being bullied. "There's only one place I can put you miss, RAVENCLAW!"

Filius would direct her enthusiasm, and she'd find others who wanted to know.

Rowena would have had no patience for her. Rowena's preferred students had been those with directed interests, or just quiet readers. This one would have made the founder mad with incessant questioning and querying and her desire to know everything without any sort of direction.

It was something only a hat that had been around a thousand years and had read the minds of nearly every British witch and wizard since then would know, but the composition of the Houses had changed over the centuries, again and again, back and forth.

It was a fundamental misconception -

"Travers, Quentin!"

No question this one, "SLYTHERIN!"

- that each of the Houses stood for nothing more than the ridiculous overblown characteristics the Founders had invented back in the day. No, I wasn't created to simply Sort the Chivalrous from the Intellectual, the Loyal from the Sly.

I was created to match student to House head.

When Godric was replaced with his protege, Aonghus Mhac Domhnall, I'd had to make a shift. The students that Godric would have easily directed into participating in the school's activities and brought to join in and enjoy the boisterous nature of Gryffindor Tower had to be sent elsewhere, because Aonghus didn't have the finish that Godric did. That was the year that the Potters went from being Slytherin to Gryffindors, and the Bulstrodes went from Gryffindor to Slytherin.

"Zuckerman, Helena!"

"Gryffindor, Gryffindor, Gryffindor," this one was thinking.

She was determined, and even though she'd have some trouble pushing herself to settle in, this one I couldn't fight against. She'd be miserable anywhere else, so certain she was that she was a Gryffindor at heart. If I had my druthers, she'd be in Slytherin, but sometimes you can't fight them.

"GRYFFINDOR!"

The Sorting was a source of such misunderstanding among everyone, but like the computers I'd heard about from the heads of muggleborns, there were simply things I was not programmed to do, no matter how much the magic of Hogwarts had brought me to life and sentience. Explaining this all to the severely prejudiced was not something I was equipped to do.

Poor Harry Potter hadn't understood a word I'd said to him. I still remembered his horrified belief that I was actually recommending he go into Slytherin. He would have done well there, but I never once said he should go there. I do that sometimes, when someone is so balanced between the Houses that I need something to . . . well . . . hang my hat on.

Harry was brave, no doubt, but behind that was a mind I'd wished to send to Ravenclaw so that he'd truly be encouraged to excel scholastically. He never would now, not the way he could have. Years of being told by his aunt and uncle he was to do no better than his cousin had taken their toll, and his years as being best friends with Ron Weasley and intimidated by Hermione Granger had taken their own toll.

He could have been brilliant, it was all there in his head, you know. Ravenclaw would have helped him on his way.

If there's anyone more loyal than Harry, you'd be hard pressed to find them, and he knew what hard work was for years. He could have been popular, it was all there in his head, you know. Hufflepuff would have helped him make more friends than he knew what to do with.

It was a test, to sort out which of the other three Houses I should have Sorted him into. The wordless horror and the half-formed arguments in his head were what made the choice for me. When he asked me a year later, I tried to put it into words, but he took me off before I could finish explaining. By now the boy is a Gryffindor of Minnie's stripe, through and through.

A thousand years ago, his fierceness and faith would have made him one of Helga's. A thousand years ago, Draco Malfoy would have been one of Godric's. A thousand years ago those Weasley twins would have caught Rowena's eye and she would have mentored them into greatness and Ron Weasley's strategic mind would have been Salazar's to mould into a general of armies. Zachariah Smith would have been sent to Godric to have some sense beaten into him, and Neville Longbottom would have been best in Rowena's House, where his interest in herbology would have made him one of her high achieving darlings.

Then again, with how the students beg and plead for the House they think best, perhaps not.

Everything changes, and yet nothing does. I settle back onto my shelf, to wait and listen for another year.