The Clan

Chapter 2 - A Different Type of Sorting

    "Now, Rosebud, I don't know what to expect for your Sorting, so you'll just have to go and make the best of things."

    "I know, Mum," Rose sighed. "I'll be good and try not to have and owl home the first day."

    "Child, your father and his friends did that almost every year. They liked to go in with a bang, as well as out. At least you haven't all ready made friends with another troublemaker."

    "Somehow I @*&%#$ well doubt there will be another girl with personality there."

    "Now, Rosebud, we already know that some things are different from Hogwarts, but I'm sure you'll be able to make friends with some of the girls."

    "I'll say some things are different." They didn't wear robes at Spellfire, they wore the classic school girl outfit in their house colors: a short pleated shirt, a short sleeved collared white shirt, and a gray pull-over vest with their house crest on the left breast. In the winter they added berets in their house color and matching scarves, white muffs, and short black capes with neat slits to put one's arms through, as well as switching their vests for sweaters, their white stockings for tights, and their neat black dress shoes for boots. For the sorting they wore green, the school color. The three houses were Veela (blue, quiet, nightingale), Siren (yellow, proper, Siamese cat), and Loreli (red, strong-willed, dragon).

    "Rose Black, it's not that bad," Maralin sighed. "Come on, we have to get you on the train by one. Which platform is it again?"

    "Seven and One Third," Rose told her mother sourly. Fifteen days and two hours earlier she should have been leaving for Hogwarts a little more than two platforms over.

    "Ah, yes. Let's get to it." Rose followed her mother and her trunk over to the barrier between platforms seven and eight, where they walked easily through the apparently solid wall to the platform. It was almost one. Maralin hurriedly helped her daughter put her trunk on the train and gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. "Good luck, love." Then she was gone.

    Rose sighed and boarded the train, sitting in an empty compartment near the back. In a few minutes the train started up and the little Black girl soon lost herself in the rythym of the train and the shifting sea of sound from down the corridor that washed through her barely opened door. She couldn't say how long had passed, though it was no more than an hour and a half, before some of that sound started drawing nearer. Rose straightened slightly from her position, curled in her chair, as several giggling girls grew nearer.

    The door to the compartment opened suddenly, if slowly, revealing three girls. One, a blonde, had on yellow skirts with a Siamese cat laying in front of the bottom of a delicate yellow script "S" on the left breast of her vest. A brunette wore a blue skirt and a nightingale perched on a curling tendrel at the top of the blue script "V" on her left breast. The third was a red-head who wore a red skirt with a red script "L" behind a Chinese Fireball in flight on her vest.

    "-And then he said that I looked like an angel, isn't that just amazing? I mean, he was so sweet, and he promised he'd write me while we're at school. I don't have to worry about him finding someone else, since he goes to Kirin's," the blonde chattered excitedly.

    "That's wonderful, Lindi, but this compartment seems to be occupied," the red-head said, looking directly at Rose with piercing ice-blue eyes that were somehow warm, like frozen fire.

    The brunette glanced at her. "It's just a greenie, Lauralynn."

    "Will you second years never learn? You were a greenie last year, Mirim." Then she smiled at Rose. "Hello, I'm Lauralynn Weasley, though you can call me Laura, or Lynn, or even Laur. You?"

    "Rose Black, First Daughter of the Clan," Rose said smoothly, glaring at the blonde. She knew her. Her name was Yolindi Hampton, and her family had claimed to be part of the Clan on some obscure basis after her father was... unavailable... to judge their claim. Then she smiled at Lauralynn, who looked to be about thirteen. "I've met several Weasleys, and never one that I didn't like."

    "Thank you, though I do like to think that we're not all alike. These are Mirim Randara Sylvana Colleena Katrina Marina Quintina Green (I've always thought it funny that such a small, quiet girl, had such a long name) and-"

    "Yolindi Hampton, a fifth year, I know. I just didn't know she went here. We've met on several occasions." She gave Yolindi a sickly-sweet smile. "I hope you're #$%@^$ well actually working on getting ready to take the $%^# Test, because Uncle Betelgeuse is nice enough to allow you one #$^% attempt at True Entry. If anyone else ends up as $%&^#% Keeper after all this #$&% &$%^ is over, than you're family's $%&# well out of luck. &)$*%# %^&#, the position of Keeper could $%^# come open any day."

    "Yes, your father could finally have spent enough time rotting in Azkaban to keel over," Yolindi sniffed.

    "Don't you #$^%& well dare, #$^% you," Rose said dangerously. "My %^*&$^ father went %^&$^% mad. At least he had the $%#^ since not to be $%^#%$ best friends with a $%^# Death Eater."

    "Neither my father nor his friends are Death Eaters, you little-"

    "Girls!" Laur interupted. "None of that, now, you wouldn't want an owl home the first day."

    "I think my mother will be surprised if I don't," Rose muttered. "Anyhow, she's right, Yolindi. Clan business is $%*^&# well not to be discussed around #$&% outsiders."

    "Of course, you have to keep all the rules. They'd throw your father out if they could, and-"

    "Shut up, Yolindi, %^&$ it. Lauralynn, Mirim, if you would please leave?" The twelve- and thirteen-year-old girls quickly retreated from the angry eleven-year-old. "You know what will happen if I #$&^%* complain to Uncle Betlegeuse about you disrespecting the $%#^$% Clan, Yolindi."

    "Nothing, until you're sixteen. By then my parents will have stopped their attempts at official entry and I'll have married high in the Clan. Do you think that my family really cares about your stupid Clan and your insignificant Trust? Don't you know how powerful the Clan you're practically the princess of is? It has been said that nations will fall to the Clan, and I intend to become the head of whatever empire you raise."

    "I don't know where you *&(#%$ get that, but we don't

#$@%^& well rule. We leave that to the ^&*$(% Ministry of Magic and *($%#^ the Order of Phoenix and take care of our own $%^#%$ matters. $%#%, if I told Mum and Uncle Betleguese what you just said, than your %^$# family would never be allowed near the #$^&%# Clan again."

    Yolindi smiled evilly. "They wouldn't believe you."

    Unfortunately, Rose knew all too well that she was right. "$%#*."

                    *

    "Black, Rose!"

    That was the problem with having your name at the beginning of the alphabet, wasn't it? Rose walked out of the line of green-skirted girls and up to the front, taking the golden wand she was handed and holding it up above her head, as per instructions. She held it there for a moment, feeling as stupid as she'd always thought she would holding up a wand or sword that then started glowing blindingly at the end of some plays. Then, quite suddenly, there was a shower of red sparks and the sound of a dragon's cry, and she was in a Loreli uniform. She put down the wand, feeling rather foolish, and joined the politely clapping girls with neat red skirts and watched the rest of the Sorting with little interest. She would much rather the Sorting Hat.