"When we get the chance, we should steal the Sorting Hat out of the Headmaster's office and study it properly," Tyler whispered into Jamie's ear with a faint smile. "A relic like that has to be hiding more than a few secrets."
Jamie's eyes flicked toward the battered hat with renewed interest. At that moment, the Sorting Hat finally finished its song, and the Great Hall burst into applause. Students from all four tables clapped with practised enthusiasm, while the Hat gave a shabby little bow to each table in turn before settling back into stillness.
"So we only have to wear that hat," Ron whispered to Harry, sounding deeply relieved. "No dragons, no giants, and no trolls either. Fred and George told me we had to wrestle a troll, and I've been worrying about it for ages. I swear I'm going to murder them."
Harry let out a long breath. He had been frightened too, even if he had tried not to show it. If Hogwarts had actually expected him to fight a dragon or a giant, he might have chosen the cupboard under the stairs after all, because at least Aunt Petunia's house did not usually involve being burned to ash or flattened into paste.
Professor McGonagall stepped forward beside the stool, holding a roll of parchment in one hand. The Hall quieted at once, the applause fading into a hush as every student turned toward the first years. Even the floating candles seemed to glow a little more steadily above them.
"When I call your name," Professor McGonagall said, "you will put on the Hat, sit on the stool, and be Sorted into your house."
The first years stood rigidly in place. Some looked excited, some looked pale, and some stared at the Hat as though it might still decide to bite them. Tyler and Jamie remained at the back of the line, relaxed enough to make the nervous students nearby look even more anxious by comparison.
"Hannah Abbott!"
A rosy-faced girl with two blonde plaits stumbled out of the line. She walked to the stool, picked up the Hat with both hands, and placed it on her head before sitting down. The brim slipped low over her eyes, nearly covering her entire face.
For a few breaths, nothing happened. Then the rip near the Hat's brim opened wide, and it shouted, "Hufflepuff!"
The table on the right burst into loud applause. It was the largest and warmest-looking table in the Hall, and Hannah looked visibly relieved as she took off the Hat and hurried over to sit among her new housemates. Several older Hufflepuffs immediately made room for her.
"Susan Bones!"
"Hufflepuff!" the Hat called almost as soon as it touched her head.
"That was fast," Harry murmured.
"It seems to be going by surname," Tyler whispered to Jamie. "Abbott starts with A, Bones starts with B, and Bauer starts with B as well. Your turn should come soon."
Jamie nodded, still watching the stool. A few more names were called, and the Hat sent students to different tables with varying levels of speed. Some decisions came at once, while others took longer, the Hat sitting silent as if having a private conversation no one else could hear.
"Jamie Bauer!"
Jamie stepped out of the line calmly. Until now, he and Tyler had been standing with their backs partly turned toward the staff table, and during the chaos at Hogsmeade Station, they had deliberately kept themselves hidden among the crowd. That meant Dumbledore had not truly seen Jamie's face.
Now he did.
Jamie walked toward the stool with unhurried steps, and as he reached the front of the Great Hall, he lifted his head. His gaze met Dumbledore's across the space between them, quiet and direct, as if he had been waiting for this moment.
The fork in Dumbledore's hand slipped from his fingers and struck his plate with a clear, ringing sound.
The noise was small, but in the hush of the Sorting Ceremony, it seemed strangely loud. Professor McGonagall turned at once, her brows lifting in surprise, and several professors at the staff table glanced toward the Headmaster. Even Snape's dark eyes narrowed slightly as he noticed the break in Dumbledore's usual composure.
Dumbledore did not react to them. He stared at Jamie as though the Hall, the students, the storm above the enchanted ceiling, and the entire feast had fallen away. For the first time that evening, the gentle smile on his face had vanished.
The face before him pulled him backward through more than ninety years. In an instant, Dumbledore was no longer an old Headmaster seated at Hogwarts. He was young again in Godric's Hollow, freshly graduated from Gryffindor, brilliant and trapped by family duty, watching the summer world tilt around the arrival of one extraordinary boy.
Gellert Grindelwald had been Bathilda Bagshot's great-nephew, a dazzling guest in the village and a mind sharp enough to match Dumbledore's own. Bathilda had introduced them, and from that meeting came two months that burned brighter in Dumbledore's memory than many whole decades of his life. They had dreamed together, argued together, imagined a world remade by magic and will, and for a brief, dangerous summer, Dumbledore had believed he had found someone who understood him completely.
Then the dream had curdled. Ariana had died, Grindelwald had fled, and years later, Europe had bled under his war. In the end, Dumbledore had faced him in a duel, defeated him, and left him imprisoned in Nurmengard, where he remained to this day.
Yet the boy standing before him now carried that same face. Younger than the Grindelwald Dumbledore had known, yes, and not exactly identical, but close enough to strike old pain like a bell. The resemblance was cruel in a way only memory could be.
"You…" Dumbledore said softly before he fully realised he had spoken. "What is your name?"
"My name is Jamie Bauer, Mr Headmaster," Jamie replied.
He placed his right hand over his chest and gave Dumbledore a slight, elegant bow. The gesture was courteous, but there was something almost deliberate in it, as if he understood exactly what his face had stirred. The Great Hall remained silent, hundreds of students watching without knowing what they had just witnessed.
"Not him," Dumbledore murmured. "You are not him."
The words were low, nearly lost beneath the faint crackle of the candles overhead. A moment later, Dumbledore's smile returned, gentle and composed, though anyone who knew him well might have seen the shadow still hidden in his eyes. Whatever had moved through him, he folded it away with the skill of a man who had spent a lifetime mastering himself.
"Oh, yes," Dumbledore said, raising one hand with a small smile. "Please continue, Mr Bauer."
Professor McGonagall gave Dumbledore one searching look before turning back to the Sorting. She clearly had questions, but the ceremony was not the place for them. Jamie walked the last few steps to the stool and stopped in front of the Sorting Hat.
"Mr Sorting Hat," Jamie said, studying the battered brim, "has no one cleaned you all these years? That really is pitiful. Perhaps I should help you."
The Sorting Hat twitched. Its rip of a mouth opened again, not to sing this time, but to speak in a dry, offended voice. "Well, here is a little wizard with a rather unique personality. You are the first student in years who has dared speak to me like that."
A ripple of startled laughter moved through the Great Hall. Most students had never heard anyone address the Hat before being Sorted, and even fewer had heard the Hat sound personally wounded by the state of its own fabric.
"I am only a hat," the Sorting Hat continued mournfully. "I am brought out once a year, expected to sort a line of nervous children, and then forgotten in the Headmaster's office until the next September. No one thinks a hat might want to be cleaned."
"That does seem unfair," Jamie said solemnly.
"Quite unfair," the Hat said. "In fact, I am a hat of refined tastes. I appreciate cleanliness, dignity, and proper handling. Yet in all these years, no one has so much as washed me once."
The Hall had grown very quiet again, but this time the silence was filled with suppressed laughter and fascination. Several students were biting their lips, while others stared at the Hat as if they had never considered that it might have opinions beyond house placement. Professor McGonagall's expression had become complicated.
"Oh, that is truly pitiful," Jamie said.
He turned toward Professor McGonagall, then toward Dumbledore at the staff table. His gaze carried an open reproach that would have been outrageous from almost any other first year. Somehow, he delivered it with perfect seriousness.
"Professor McGonagall, Mr Headmaster, do none of you care about the feelings of a hat? Mr Sorting Hat has worked diligently for Hogwarts for so many years, helping generation after generation of students find their houses, and yet it has not even been cleaned once."
Professor McGonagall opened her mouth, then closed it again. This was not a disciplinary problem she had ever prepared for. She could handle tardiness, lost toads, jinxed quills, misbehaving twins, and students sneaking into Hogsmeade before the feast, but a first year accusing the staff of neglecting the emotional well-being of a hat was entirely new territory.
"Is it only because Mr Sorting Hat is a hat," Jamie continued, "that everyone ignores how he feels?"
A few students at the Hufflepuff table looked as though they were beginning to feel guilty. Several Ravenclaws were watching with intense academic interest, clearly wondering whether the Sorting Hat possessed a recognised level of sentience. The Gryffindor table looked delighted by the audacity of it all, while the Slytherins were trying to decide whether this was foolishness or a very strange form of confidence.
"Ah," Professor McGonagall said, visibly struggling for the correct response. "This is… not an issue that has been raised before."
Dumbledore's eyes rested on Jamie for a moment longer than necessary. Then he inclined his head slightly, his familiar smile returning with just enough warmth to ease the tension around the staff table. "Mr Bauer is right. It was indeed our negligence."
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