September arrived with its usual storm of trunks, owls, and chaos of returning and new students, but Hogwarts did not feel like a market street anymore. The students moved in lines that made sense. Prefects kept their voices low. House elves did not have to dodge stampedes. Even the portraits, who used to cheer on chaos like it was a hobby, watched with something close to approval.
The castle itself seemed to enjoy being taken seriously. Fresh parchment crackled under arms. New rules were given to new students before they left their homes.
It was not a barracks, of course; this was a place of learning after all. The grounds proved that as soon as the first years were marched past the courtyard.
A new duelling circle sat where a patch of dead grass had once been. Two rings of white stone, etched with runes so fine Neville had to squint to see them, waited in the morning sun. Past it, behind a hedge of dark yew, a set of training dummies floated in a row, their shields sparking as an older student sent a neat stream of hexes into them while passing. The dummies answered with blunt bolts of light, and the student deflected them with a silver shield charm that snapped into place like a door on a hinge. He and his friends chuckled. Deflection was a skill they learned the hard way and were proud of using every possible opportunity to show off. Not even their parents were as efficient as them and this was only one of the small changes the curriculum and the faculty made within the lives of Magical Britain.
If the former generation had these skills, a fledgling dark lord with a handful of masked morons could and would not have bent the knee of the country. At least the idiocy was getting corrected, student by student. Year by year and eventually generation by generation.
Next to the floating dummies, there were obstacle courses. Not mud and rope like their counterparts in the Muggle world. The idea was from the Muggle side. Professor Baier, also known as Rival, personally advised and arranged every obstacle in the courses. Vinda took the idea to Corvus, and after getting briefed on the potential effects, she wondered why they were not being implemented before.
Back to the courses, this was magic shaped into a problem and timed with a stern whistle. Four spells chosen at the start. Four spells only. Students ran, climbed, slid, and then had to think when the course changed on them, while dummies were sending harmless spells towards them. The castle did not care if the students were brave. It cared if they were competent. The stone slates next to each activity show the houses and names of the top ten who completed the challenges with their completion time.
Neville would never have admitted it out loud, but he liked the idea. He was not the same timid, chubby boy who entered the castle last year. He imagined his and Harry's names on those slates standing at the top. Though he was not sure if his or Harry's name would be above the rest.
The mandatory physical classes had been the strangest change. Wizards were suddenly expected to know what their bodies could do without a wand in hand. The older students complained in the first week. The complaints stopped when Headmistress Rosier decided to observe one lesson and asked, politely and with a smile, whether any of them wanted to demonstrate their incompetence in front of her.
Now, on the first of August, the discipline sat on the older students like a new robe. A bit stiff. But better than the old rags. New ones were looking with curious and eager eyes.
The first years formed a line outside the Great Hall, quiet enough that the clink of a prefect's boots could be heard. No pushing, no shouting for friends. The children stared at the doors as if the doors might judge them before the Hat did.
Harry sat next to Neville on the Gryffindor table like all the other older students and was waiting to see what he looked like last year. The doors of the great hall opened, and the first years entered. They were short, their gazes reserved and trying to file every detail of the hall. Michael stood with them; it was easy to notice him as he was the tallest and largest among them. Harry's mind still refused to accept that the boy was starting Hogwarts.
Michael had the height of a second or third year and the calm of someone who had been raised with rules instead of excuses. He had talked with them about his family on the train, plain and without pride. He was a Half blood. German Pure blood mother and a Muggle father, a soldier. The details had sat in Harry's mind like an unsolved puzzle. Harry had not pushed. Michael did not look like someone who enjoyed being pushed. He turned his gaze to the hall.
The Great Hall looked the way it always looked, if Hogwarts had always been run by adults who remembered what power meant. The ceiling showed a late fall sky, calm and indifferent. Candles floated in perfect rows, all at the same height. The tables were crowded, but the crowd was different. Fewer empty spaces than last year, which meant fewer silences, and those silences had made the castle feel like it was missing teeth.
Now there were voices again. Laughter, too, though it stayed controlled. Even the Baboon Weasley looked more careful. Harry chuckled softly at the black eye.
The teachers' dais held more bodies than last year. Some wore Durmstrang black. Some wore robes cut in styles that looked continental, sharper than British tailoring. One of them, pale and elegant, sat with the stillness of a predator that did not need to move to be noticed. Her gaze and the tips of her fangs were a wet dream of half the upper years, while they were nightmares for the other half. Harry nudged Neville and motioned towards Countess Seraphine Lasombra. As his body was developing, he was seeing what the upper years saw in her perfect form. His gaze went to the stool in front of the dais.
The hat sat on its stool, patient.
The first years filed in. Names started.
Professor Septima Vector stood beside it with a list that looked longer than last year's. Her voice carried without strain.
"Adams, Coraline."
A girl stepped forward, sat, and the Hat barely touched her head before it called out, "Hufflepuff."
The table cheered. The sound stopped cleanly when the prefects lifted their hands.
More names. More sorting.
Harry's gaze kept drifting to the first years line. The number of children was larger than he had expected. Large enough that he wondered if the tables would be enough.
The surnames did not help.
Greengrass. Selwyn. Rosier.
Harry watched a small boy with a Selwyn name walk to the stool with the careful pride of someone who had been coached to never slouch. He did not look like a Muggleborn. He did not look like someone who had ever been uncertain that he belonged.
Whispers ran along the tables.
"Did you hear that?"
"Selwyn, that's…"
"Maybe it's a cousin."
"Britain never had this many."
Those who knew smiled and kept their mouths shut. Those who did not frowned and tried to count. Some Ravenclaws began to debate quietly whether the 'cousins' were local or not. A Slytherin prefect muttered something about people finally doing what was necessary.
Neville leaned slightly toward Harry, not enough to be obvious.
"I think they're Muggleborn," Neville murmured.
Harry's mouth twitched.
"I do not think so, look at their posture."
The names reached the letter M and finished.
Harry's attention snapped back to Michael.
"Didn't he say his family name was Mounts?" Harry asked.
Neville's shrug was small. "He did. It seems he has another one."
Michael stared ahead with an expression that did not reveal anything. If he was nervous, he hid it well.
Professor Vector's finger ran down the parchment.
"Michael Nacht."
Harry blinked hard. Neville's gaze jumped to the dais.
Professor Isolde Nacht did not move much. The light caught her profile, sharp as a blade, and her eyes held the sort of focus Harry had seen only in people who meant to win.
Rituals Master. Head of the subject. One of the old names that carried weight now that the castle had stopped pretending titles were just decoration.
Michael took a breath, walked to the stool, and sat.
The Hat slid onto his head.
For a moment, the Hall seemed to lean closer.
Harry heard the Hat's brim rustle, as if it was whispering into the boy's mind. Michael stayed still, spine straight, hands resting on his knees.
Then the Hat shouted, "Ravenclaw."
Ravenclaw cheered, sharp and pleased with itself. Nacht was not a common family name, and they were sure he was a relative of their Rituals Professor.
Michael stood, stepped off the stool, and his robes shifted, the trim turning blue and bronze. He walked to the Ravenclaw table without looking around like a lost child.
He sat beside Luna Lovegood.
Luna's face lit up as if the world had finally remembered to be kind. She leaned in, her voice soft enough that only the boy beside her could hear.
"Do you think there will be pudding?"
Michael's mouth curled. He nodded once, solemn as a judge.
Luna's smile widened, serene and simple, as if pudding was a truth worth believing in.
On the dais, Professor Nacht smiled. It was not warmth. It was satisfaction.
She turned slightly toward Headmistress Rosier.
"You will see that my grandson will devastate your heir's records, Vinda," she murmured, the words wrapped in polite tone like a dagger wrapped in silk.
Vinda sat with her tea untouched. Her expression did not change, but the corner of her mouth lifted in a way that might have been amusement if anyone else wore it.
She gave Isolde a sideways glance, then returned her gaze to the Hall.
The sorting continued. Names rolled on. The Hall filled with new bodies, new voices, new life. She felt it in her heart. Mother Magic was happy and satisfied with the return of the Rituals and souls of her new children.
Vinda listened to the cheers and the whispers and the careful control layered over it all. The castle was changing again, and it was changing in a direction she approved of.
Yet Isolde's confidence lingered like smoke.
Vinda had known her before the mantle of Headmistress sat on her shoulders. She had known her when Grindelwald's war still cast a long shadow, when Isolde Nacht had stood on the same side with her. Ritualists did not gamble unless they had already seen the shape of the board.
Vinda's eyes narrowed by a fraction as she watched Michael Nacht settle at the Ravenclaw table, calm as if he had always belonged there.
What, exactly, had Isolde seen that made her speak so confidently?
On the other side of the dais, Michael Mounts, because this was what he called himself in his mind, smiled as the dinner was served. He leaned to his left and called for a Hogwarts elf. A soft pop, and the creature appeared at his side. He asked for a large serving of Pudding politely and thanked the Elf before it vanished.
His gaze turned to his Grandmother. He was sure she would want him in the Slytherin, but he liked this angelic girl who had the eyes of someone hurt and broken inside. He wondered what his father would have thought. A soldier through and through, he raised Michael with the integrity and teaching of being a good person.
"Protect what can not defend itself, be it a human, an animal or an object. Stay true to your training, son." He was still heartbroken by the new law of segregation implemented by Minister Krafft. His father agreed with tears in his eyes. He understood the need for secrecy. Humanity was greedy in its nature. He hugged Michael and held his cheeks between his hands. "I will always love you." This was the last words of his father for him.
Michael was determined. His grandmother held him in her arms after his father left with the wizards.
"Only if we were stronger, my boy... We would not have to hide from Muggles. Your father, even though I never approved of him, was a good man. A brave man."
Michael decided to work hard so the Magicals were strong enough not hide. Strong enough to rule. Strong enough so he can hug his father again.