you raise me up || harry potter

chapter 7: yours was the first face that i saw

»»————-　song:　————-««

first day of my life

★ by bright eyes ★

❝  yours was the first face that i saw
i think i was blind before i met you
i don't know where i am,
i don't know where i've been

but i know where i want to go.❞

♢ ♢ ♢

There was not a single sound in the Great Hall after the Hat's voice rang out, and it was left to fade away into the stunned silence. Some turned to each other with disbelief; most simply stared at Harry as McGonagall, after a slight hesitation, gently took the Hat off her head.

Harry looked out into the crowd of her would-be classmates. Had her Sorting been this anticipated? And she certainly didn't think they would be so shocked upon her sorting into Slytherin. She just didn't want to go to Slytherin—she hadn't realized everyone else hadn't wanted her to, either. 

The Slytherin table didn't look very eager to welcome her—in fact, they too looked on in bewilderment. None of them had expected these turn of events.

Harry had half a mind to jam the Hat back onto her head and demand it to reconsider. A very Gryffindor thing to do, she thought scathingly. But that thought was swept away when Draco, looking very small indeed at the Slytherin table, caught her eye.

The Hat had stalled for him too, Harry recalled. And after Draco was so sure he'd be in Slytherin. I know I'll be in Slytherin, he had said at Madam Malkin's. 

Harry got up, keeping her eyes on that familiar face. She couldn't bear to look at Ron, couldn't bear to see how he must be looking at her in disgust, so she didn't. No one applauded. She was finally beginning to see how this might have played out if she were walking toward the Gryffindor table. They would have cheered, and shook her hand, and tripped all over themselves the way the strangers at the Leaky Cauldron had. The twins probably would have stood up and hollered something ridiculous, like "We got Potter!" And she would have liked the feeling of being included, perhaps, but she would have hated it, too. 

I'm famous because my parents died and I didn't, Harry thought, and stumbled a bit as she sat down next to Draco.

The ceremony continued, but the applause was noticeably muted for the rest of the Sorting. Everyone kept standing up, peeking over each other's shoulders, all of them straining to see the Girl-Who-Lived, their hero that had been put into the most hated House. 

And through all of it, a small and slender hand snaked under the table, and grasped Harry's tightly. Draco's hands were cold, but Harry just held on tighter.

♢

Harry tried to hide the amazement, the sheer delight she felt when all that food appeared on the table in front of her.

I'll never go hungry here, she realized. And with that thought she took some mashed potatoes and a drumstick tentatively, wondering if she was allowed to take as much as she wanted. She looked around her. Everyone heaped their plates high, laughing as they did, shoveling food into their mouths (although the Slytherins did it a bit daintier than the Gryffindors), not paying much mind to how much they were taking.

That was enough for Harry. She served herself a steak and poured gravy over her mashed potatoes. She almost felt Aunt Petunia slapping her wrist like she usually did when Harry poured her gravy at the Dursleys, no matter how little she took. But there was no Aunt Petunia here, and no Dudley to steal her dinner as Uncle Vernon looked on with a smirk. 

Harry smiled to herself as she helped herself to more vegetables. Take that, Dudley, she thought with satisfaction. There was more food here to eat than Dudley could ever imagine. Freak, indeed!

"Goodness, Harry," Draco said, after swallowing a small bite of his chicken. "You look like you haven't eaten in days."

Harry felt herself bristle. "And?" she snapped, hyper-aware of the fact that her cheeks probably looked like a chipmunk's moments before.

Draco put up a defensive hand. "Merlin, it was a joke!"

"It wasn't a very funny one," she muttered.

Draco stared at her for a moment, then went back to eating. But not before he said quietly, "Sorry."

Feeling like she had overreacted, Harry tried to bat away her feelings of guilt. 

"So, Helena Potter, right?"

Harry turned to her left. A large, thuggish-looking boy next to Harry regarded her coolly. Harry wasn't sure whether to be relieved or intimidated—none of the other Slytherins around her had talked to her yet, instead sneaking glances at her every so often. She wondered if all Slytherins were this uptight.

"Yes," Harry responded. "Er, call me Harry."

"Flint. Marcus Flint."

Harry nodded, trying not to show her discomfort.

"You're friends with Malfoy?" he nodded at Draco, who had stopped eating to watch their encounter. 

"Yes?"

Flint held her gaze for another moment, and Harry saw something akin to approval in his eyes. He grunted. "I'm captain of the Quidditch team. Hope to see you on it, if you decide to try out. Next year, maybe."

Harry nodded, trying to remember what Draco had explained to her about Quidditch. She couldn't bring herself to like Flint all that much, so she shifted a little closer to Draco and looked around a bit more. Her eyes fell on the faculty table, and thought she made eye contact with a hook-nosed man with greasy black hair and sallow skin before a searing pain cut across her head.

"Ouch!" she said, clapping her hand onto her forehead.

"What?" Draco asked.

"N-nothing," she mumbled, but the man had looked away. Harry had the distinct feeling that he had been looking at her with dislike.

"Flint," she said reluctantly. "Who's that teacher, the one with the black hair?"

"Oh, that's Professor Snape," Flint replied with a touch of admiration. "Severus Snape, Head of House. Genius Potions Master, you know. He's hard on us sometimes, but that's nothing compared to the hard time he gives the Gryffindors." He gave a rather wicked smile at that.

Great. Harry would have preferred even McGonagall over Snape—she seemed no-nonsense and firm. Snape just looked mean, and to top it off, had a stare that made Harry's skin crawl. It would be unwise, Harry decided, to get on that man's bad side. 

Stuffed with treacle tart, apprehensive about the third corridor warning Dumbledore had given, and confused plenty by the school song, Harry stood up with the other Slytherins. Standing on her toes, she tried to see where Ron was in the crowd, wondering if she could say hi. She spotted a redhead somewhere around the Gryffindor table, but couldn't be sure which of the Weasleys it was, and rocked back onto her heels in disappointment. 

Draco stifled a yawn as he pulled Harry over. "Follow the prefect," he said, and they started off for the dungeons. Harry desperately looked back once more before she was swallowed by the dungeons.