Once the start-of-term notices were finished, Dumbledore seemed to slip back into the slightly unhinged grandfather role.
His pointed hat sat crooked on his head as he raised his voice.
“And now, before we all go to bed, let us sing the school song!” Half the professors on the staff table visibly aged ten years.
Several older students looked like they were fighting the urge to bolt.
Dumbledore ignored them completely.
He waved his wand and a long golden ribbon unspooled from the tip, twisting into floating words that formed the lyrics.
The wand became a conductor’s baton.
The entire school launched into the Hogwarts song at once—every house, every year, every possible melody and tempo colliding in the middle of the hall.
“Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hogwarts, teach us something please…” The Weasley twins did their level best to drag the whole performance off a cliff.
Ivan cheerfully joined the mess, belting out whatever notes felt right.
When it was over he was surprised to find the chaotic noise had actually been… enjoyable.
He briefly wondered whether his musical taste had been damaged in the transmigration.
Dumbledore apparently shared the same questionable taste.
The greatest white wizard of the age stood there wiping tears from his eyes, genuinely moved, before finally recovering enough to dismiss the prefects.
Ivan followed the stream of Gryffindor first-years up the spiral staircases to the highest floor.
At the end of the corridor Percy stopped in front of a portrait of a plump woman in a pink silk dress.
Before any of the new students could ask, the portrait stirred, adjusted her pose, and spoke in a solemn voice.
“Password?” “Dragon dung,” Percy answered.
The Fat Lady nodded and swung open, revealing a round hole in the wall.
Beyond it lay the Gryffindor common room.
It was larger than Ivan had expected.
Scarlet banners bearing the golden lion hung from the ceiling.
Several long tables with comfortable armchairs filled the space.
A deep brown fireplace burned steadily against the left wall, throwing both light and warmth into the room.
The boys’ dormitory was a five-bed room.
Four-poster beds stood in a neat circle, trunks stacked at their feet.
Without any useful memories, Ivan could not even tell which bed or trunk was his.
He was about to wait and let the others choose first when a grey-and-white owl dropped from the railing on the west side and landed heavily on his shoulder.
It nuzzled his cheek with surprising familiarity.
“Maka?” The name surfaced from nowhere.
“Hoo.” “Whether that’s your name or not, Maka it is from now on.” Ivan scratched the soft feathers under the owl’s chin.
Maka closed its eyes in contentment.
With the owl’s guidance he found the bed against the western wall.
His belongings were sparse: bedding, a few changes of clothes, basic toiletries, and the required first-year textbooks.
A small wooden nameplate had been fixed to the bedframe: Ivan Hals.
The other beds had matching plates; he had simply failed to notice them earlier.
He had only been alone a short while when the door opened again.
“I can’t believe sorting is just putting on a hat.
George swore we’d have to wrestle a troll.
I knew I shouldn’t have listened to him.” A freckled, red-haired boy walked in still muttering, followed by a thinner boy with glasses and messy black hair.
Harry.
Ron.
Ivan was briefly surprised, then realized it made perfect sense.
Hogwarts first-year numbers were small.
Sharing a dormitory with Harry Potter was almost inevitable.
“Hi.
I’m Ivan Hals.” Ron finally noticed him.
“Oh.
Ron Weasley.” Harry offered his hand.
“Harry Potter.” Ivan shook it, then grinned at Ron.
“Your brothers George and Fred mentioned you at the feast.” “Brilliant.
I bet they didn’t say anything good.” Ron’s expression soured at the memory of every prank the twins had ever pulled on him.
Harry, on the other hand, looked quietly relieved.
For once someone had treated him like a normal person instead of either gaping or trying to get a look at the scar under his fringe.
He found the usual reactions exhausting.
Friendships between first-years could form in a single evening.
Ivan already knew both boys better than they knew themselves, so the conversation moved easily.
Harry talked about life with the Dursleys.
Ron traded stories of twin-inflicted humiliation.
Neville and the fifth roommate drifted in later and joined the talk.
They kept going until well past midnight.
The nonstop upheaval of the day finally caught up with Ivan.
The moment his head touched the pillow his body simply shut down.
The plan to examine the system more carefully evaporated.
The last thing he heard was Ron scolding his rat, Scabbers.
Ivan pulled the blanket over his head and mouthed the words without sound.
Hello, Hogwarts.
He woke with a jolt the next morning, staring at the unfamiliar canopy for several seconds before the reality of classes hit him.
Going from a hospital bed to a school timetable in less than a day was still hard to process.
He had no intention of being late for his first lesson.
The staircases in this castle were legendary for their bad temper, so he decided early was safer.
He dragged Ron and Harry out of bed with him.
Whether it was Harry’s savior aura or simple bad luck, they ran into two vanishing steps on the way down.
Ron, leading the way, walked straight into a wall that had been a door a moment earlier.
His personal demonstration of the castle’s sense of humor at least saved the other two from the same fate.