The Abominations | Ilvermorny

Chapter 7

If you didn't already know how the sorting ceremony works at Ilvermorny, let me explain. So basically, all the new students go into the circular room located just past the great front doors. They're told to line up around the perimeter and wait to be called. The floors are made of the most beautiful marble I have ever seen, and there is a Gordian Knot engraved in the center. On the upper level is a balcony where older students watch quietly as newbies get called into the middle. Four wooden statues, each representing a different house, will react if a student belongs with them. Any amount of statues can react, and on the rare occasion that more than one does, it's up to the newbie to decide.

Horned Serpent, the house for smart-ass know-it-alls, has a gem in the middle of the statue that will glow. Thunderbird, the house for loud and extra people, has a bird statue that flaps its wings. Pukwudgie, the house for kind pushovers, has a little arrow it will rise into the air. And finally, my house, Wampus. We have a little wooden lion that roars. 

Wampus was always the house for me. I remember riding the bus for the first time, sitting in-between Mother and Mama, talking to them about each house. 

"I don't think I belong in Horned Serpent." I told them while the bus went over a bump.

"Why would you say that, child?" Asked Mama, giving me a concerned look. 

I thought that because Kate had told me I wasn't good enough. 

I shrugged. "It's just not for me." 

"When I went to Ilvermorny, my house was Thunderbird." Mother said proudly. "It's the best house by far."

Emil reached thru the seats behind us to give Mother a high-five. Then, I heard Kate tut at their house pride. 

"What's that house about?" I asked. 

Mother gave me a smirk. "Adventure." 

I remember thinking it over in my head; Adventure does kind of sound fun. But honestly, at that point in my life, and now, I feel adventured out. My non-conventional childhood put a bad taste in my mouth for any sort of wild adventure. 

"I don't think I like that." I said. 

"Like what?" Asked Mother, raising an eyebrow at me like 'how could anyone not want to be in Thunderbird'? 

I changed the subject "What about the nice house?"

"Pukwudgie? I don't know." Mama said. 

I was shocked, my parents have never been unsupportive before. "What's wrong with Pukwudgie?"

"Nothing, child, it is an honorable house," Mama explained. "But maybe, Wampus would be more fitting." 

Kate cleared her throat from behind us. "Because it's the healing house Pasty, and sucking the happiness out of people isn't healing." 

She was right. 

Luckily enough, Wampus chose me. Well, I wouldn't have gone to any other house. Wampus favors warriors, and I sure am a warrior.

I push the cupboard door open to see the vanishing cabinet room in Wampus house. There are a ton of cabinets from all over the country, even some from Canada and Mexico. I climb out and lug my trunk out from the bottom, I noticed some of the pink paint rubbed off inside the trunk compartment. Great. I bend down to scratch it off, unknowingly leaving my trunk in the way of others. 

"Every year that trunk looks worse and worse." said an all too familiar voice. 

I jump, hitting my head. 

"Did I just scare you? That's actually really funny." 

Standing on the other side of my trunk is my lovely roommate Jaylee Hagedorn. We've been friends since first year, I tell her everything. Well, almost everything. 

She's from the states, somewhere in Montana, and she's part of the Northern Cheyenne tribe. She has gorgeous straight dark brown hair, and dark eyes to match. She's a bigger girl but I would not call her fat. She comes from a long line of Cheyenne wizards and she always wears her family's necklace because it has a generations-old protection spell. It's cute, made of something that looks like twine and had some wooden beads painted red, blue, green, and yellow. 

"Ya you did." I said as I pushed myself out of the cabinet. 

She smiled. "Good to see you."

Together we walked out of the vanishing cabinet room, trunks behind us, and down a long, well lit, corridor made of old blueish grey stone. 

"Liv, I need to tell you something, but like, don't get mad at me." 

Oh great. 

"I won't."

She hesitated for a second. "You know those no-maj show dogs."

I knew it. I knew I looked like a damn dog. This sucks.

"Do I really look like that?" 

We were nearing the end of the corridor, where the Wampus common room is. I could hear voices and people laughing. 

Oh god, I should take my hair out. 

"It's not that bad." She told me, probably lying. 

I stopped walking. "Then why did you bring it up?"

"Okay, maybe it does, but here let me fix it."

She takes the pink bow out of my hair, then yanks the hair elastic out. 

OW! 

I probably lost half the hair that was in that elastic. 

She runs her fingers thru my hair a couple of times then parts my hair closer to the left side, clipping the hair that fell into my face back with the bow. 

"Less like a dog, more like a girly girl." 

Sometimes, I really hate her. 

"Thanks."

The common room is almost full, every student in Wampus house was either arriving or had just arrived. Everyone was hugging and talking about their summers. The common room was fairly large, had really tall ceilings and old dark wood floors. The stone fireplace that was built by Webster Boot himself was across from us, it's made of rocks the size of footballs held together by cement. Infront of it are the red leather sofas that look like they're from the early 1900s. Next to the fireplace are some black wood bookcases that almost reached the ceiling. Behind the fireplace setup are some tables and chairs for students to study at.  The walls are covered in various paintings and nicknacks. 

Jaylee and I agreed that putting our trunks away now was probably our best bet. 

"Olive!" I hear from the other side of the room. 

I got an elbow in my side from Jaylee. I don't know if she thought I didn't hear him, or if I was just ignoring him out of sheer awkwardness.

Running over to me is my goofy close friend Lazarus Spinder. Laz is great, he's really tall and skinny, has shaggy strawberry-blonde hair and lots of pale freckles. 

Jaylee smirks at me, I just roll my eyes in response. 

See, last year, I may have developed a little bit of a crush on Laz. I'm embarrassed to admit that because he and I have been close since our first spells class. My first mistake was telling Jaylee because she has never let me forget it. 

"I always know it's you from behind, nobody else has old lady hair." He says jokingly. 

That's not even funny.

I force myself to laugh a bit and give him a hug. "You're obnoxious."

We break from the hug and he smiles at me, then he's gone, attacking somebody else with his bad jokes. 

"I still don't know what you see in him." Jaylee says as we walk towards our room. 

"I see a friend." 

She scoffs "You are the biggest liar on the mountain."