Chapter 16: The Sorting Ceremony
The giant oak doors groaned as they swung open, revealing the cavernous entrance hall. Professor McGonagall stood waiting, her emerald-green robes crisp and her dark hair pulled into an impossibly tight bun. Her sharp gaze swept over the huddled group of first-years.
"Welcome to Hogwarts," McGonagall's voice rang out, crisp and authoritative. "The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats, you must first be sorted into your houses."
She delivered a brief, practiced speech about the four houses—Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin—before instructing them to straighten their robes and wait.
Beside Tamara, a red-haired boy leaned in toward a bespectacled boy. 'Ron Weasley and Harry Potter,' Tamara noted dryly.
"I heard Slytherin produces nothing but Dark Wizards," Ron muttered loudly enough for half the group to hear.
Harry's jaw tightened, his brow furrowing deeply as a look of clear repulsion crossed his face.
Tamara let out a soft, cold breath that might have been a laugh. 'What an ignorant, narrow-minded little fool,'she thought, her dark eyes flashing with disdain.'It seems the so-called savior has absolutely no taste.'
McGonagall turned and led them through a set of massive double doors. The muffled buzzing of hundreds of voices instantly swelled into a roar.
The moment they stepped inside, the noise in the Great Hall faltered, dropping into a hushed murmur as older students craned their necks to inspect the fresh meat. Thousands of candles floated mid-air, casting a warm, golden glow over four impossibly long tables laden with gleaming golden plates and crystal goblets.
At the far end of the room sat the High Table, occupied by the school's professors.
Tamara's gaze bypassed them all, locking instantly onto the ornate golden chair in the very center.
Albus Dumbledore.
The old madman sat there, his long silver beard spilling over his robes, hands steepled beneath his chin. His bright blue eyes twinkled behind half-moon spectacles as he observed the incoming first-years with entirely too much interest.
Tamara snapped her gaze downward, staring intently at the stone floor. 'Don't look at him,' she warned herself. Without her former mastery of Occlumency, meeting the Headmaster's eyes was practically begging for a Legilimency probe.
Instead, she tilted her chin up, feigning awe as she examined the ceiling. It was bewitched to mirror the night sky, glittering with distant stars.
McGonagall stepped up to the High Table and placed a four-legged wooden stool on the stone floor. Atop it, she set a pointed wizard's hat.
It was frayed, heavily patched, and coated in centuries of accumulated grime.
Tamara's nose wrinkled in sheer disgust. Her aristocratic sensibilities violently rejected the sight. 'This,'she thought venomously,'is the most barbaric tradition in this entire school. Forcing students to place a filthy, unwashed rag upon their heads.'
Suddenly, the hat twitched. A wide tear near the brim opened wide like a toothless mouth, and it began to belt out a grating, off-key song about the four founders.
Tamara tuned out the tedious lyrics, her mind working rapidly. The Sorting Hat was a sentient magical artifact. It possessed the ability to peer directly into a student's mind and heart.
That meant, aside from Dumbledore himself, this wretched piece of leather was the greatest threat to her identity in the entire castle.
'I must shut that thing's mouth before it has the chance to scream,' she calculated, her fingers twitching at her sides.
The song finally ended to a wave of thunderous applause. McGonagall stepped forward, unrolling a long piece of parchment.
"Hannah Abbott!"
A pink-faced girl with blonde pigtails stumbled nervously out of the line, practically dropping onto the stool as the hat was dropped over her eyes.
A brief pause.
"Hufflepuff!" the hat shouted.
Names were called one by one. Tamara watched the mundane procession with cold, detached apathy.
"Harry Potter!"
The moment the name left McGonagall's lips, a sudden hiss of whispers ignited across the hall like dry brush catching fire.
"Potter? Did she say Potter?"
"The Harry Potter?"
Tamara watched the scrawny, black-haired boy step up to the stool. He looked entirely overwhelmed. The hat slipped over his eyes, and then... nothing.
Seconds ticked by. The hall held its collective breath.
Tamara narrowed her eyes, observing the delay. A full minute passed. 'Interesting,'she mused, a cruel smirk playing on her lips.'It seems the savior—the boy carrying a fragment of my soul—isn't quite the pure, golden Gryffindor they all expect. The hat is hesitating.'
Finally, the tear opened wide. "Gryffindor!"
The table on the far left erupted into deafening cheers. Two red-haired twins stood on their benches, hollering, "We got Potter! We got Potter!"
Harry let out a massive breath of relief, his shoulders slumping as he hurried to join his new housemates.
A few more insignificant names followed. Then, the moment arrived.
"Tamara Riddle."
McGonagall's voice caught slightly. She paused, her sharp eyes flickering rapidly between the parchment and the girl stepping out of the line. For a fraction of a second, the stern professor looked deeply unsettled, as if a ghost from fifty years ago had just walked into her hall.
The Great Hall fell dead silent.
It wasn't merely the unfamiliar, sharp-sounding surname that silenced the crowd. It was Tamara herself.
Her posture was flawless, her movements possessing a fluid, predatory elegance that made the other eleven-year-olds look like bumbling trolls. Her dark green robes swayed gently with her measured strides. In the flickering candlelight, her breathtakingly exquisite face appeared exceptionally pale, framing dark, fathomless eyes that held an ancient, mysterious weight.
She sat upon the stool with the grace of a queen ascending a throne.
McGonagall lowered the Sorting Hat onto her head. The oversized brim slipped down, plunging Tamara's vision into total darkness. The overwhelming stench of old leather and ancient dust filled her nostrils.
She waited for the tiny, whispering voice to speak.
Instead, a psychic scream of absolute, unadulterated terror exploded inside her skull.
'AAAAAAHHHHH—!!!'If the Sorting Hat possessed legs, it would have leaped off her head and sprinted out the oak doors.'Merlin's beard! What on earth is this?!'The hat's voice violently trembled, vibrating with panic.'This soul... this familiar, sickening stench of darkness... It's... it's you?!'The ancient artifact had instantly recognized Tom Riddle's soul signature. How could it not? It was the very same hat that had sorted him into Slytherin half a century ago.'Shut up,'Tamara commanded, her mental voice dripping with absolute, freezing malice.'If you dare shout that out to the hall, I will tear your fabric to shreds and throw your remains into the Black Lake to feed the giant squid.''You... you're still alive? How did you end up like this?!' The hat shrieked incoherently, completely ignoring her threat.'No! I must tell Dumbledore! This is too dangerous! Hogwarts cannot tolerate a Dark Lord—'
Just as the terrified hat prepared to rip its brim open and announce the return of Voldemort to the entire school...
A secondary force violently intervened.
[Ding! Host identity exposure crisis detected.]
[Virtue System forced intervention: Soul Aura fully activated.]
[Activating Special Effect: Holy Light Illumination.]
Boom—!
Within the Sorting Hat's psychic perception, right beside that ink-black, rotting soul filled with tyranny and evil, a blinding, pure, and dazzlingly golden light suddenly erupted.
It was the Virtue Aura, forcefully shoved into her spiritual form by the system.
'My eyes! Oh, I don't have eyes, but my consciousness is going blind!' the Sorting Hat wailed in agony.
What was it looking at?
On the left, a bottomless, suffocating abyss of dark magic and murder. On the right, the radiant, holy light of the heavens. Half of the soul possessed the ruthless cruelty of Voldemort, while the other half radiated a sickeningly sweet compassion rivaling that of a martyred saint.
This extreme, violent fragmentation left the thousand-year-old artifact completely paralyzed with bewilderment.
'This... this is impossible!'The hat muttered to itself, its mental voice shaking.'Extreme evil and extreme goodness... how can they coexist in a single vessel?''What kind of monster are you? A saint? Or a demon?''I am the student you are supposed to sort,'Tamara ground out, suppressing a massive headache as the system's holy light clashed with her dark nature.'Hurry up and put me in Slytherin.''Slytherin? No, no, no...' The hat hesitated, sounding entirely dazed, practically intoxicated by the blinding holy light.'While you certainly possess the ambition and cunning of a Slytherin, this light... this overwhelming desire to save the world and protect the innocent...''Hufflepuff! You should go to Hufflepuff! Only there can such a pure spirit of self-sacrifice be properly accommodated!''What did you just say?'
Tamara's hands gripped the edges of the stool so hard her knuckles turned white. She nearly launched herself off the seat.
Hufflepuff?
That was the ultimate, unforgivable insult to a Dark Lord!
'If you dare shout Hufflepuff,'Tamara threatened, her mental tone dropping into a terrifying, venomous hiss,'I will conjure Fiendfyre and burn you to ash. I swear on my magic, even with Dumbledore sitting right there, I can destroy you in three seconds flat.'The hat whimpered.'And...'Tamara smoothly shifted her tactics, forcefully drawing upon the power of hypocrisy granted by the system to sweeten her logic.'Think about it, Mr. Hat. Only in Slytherin can I better guide and reform those potential Dark Wizards, can't I? Leading the lost sheep back to the light... surely that is the greatest good of all.'
The hat fell dead silent.
It trembled violently against her scalp, locked in a brutal, agonizing internal struggle.
Down in the Great Hall, the students and staff watched the spectacle with mounting curiosity. Tamara had been sitting on the stool for nearly three minutes—the longest sorting of the evening, far surpassing even Harry Potter.
Worse, the hat kept twitching and writhing on her head, its fabric face twisted into an expression of extreme, constipated agony.
Finally, the Sorting Hat broke.
It simply couldn't endure this schizophrenic psychological torture a second longer. It just wanted to get off this terrifying, contradictory head as quickly as possible.
'Fine... fine...'the hat gasped weakly, its spirit utterly broken.'Since you insist... and you do indeed possess Salazar's bloodline... and some sort of terrifying talent...''Then go and plague them...'
Summoning the very last dregs of its strength, the Sorting Hat opened its wide mouth toward the silent hall and screamed in a hoarse, exhausted voice:
"Slytherin!!!"
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