Joey nods. "So, I'm Joey Reed and this is Thalia, my Faegrecrawe. I'm from California, in the United States. I'm a - newblood? I guess?" He glances over at Aaron, who nods. "I'm a newblood. I don't know what I want to be yet, I used to want to be a writer and maybe I still will but magic changes stuff kind of a lot. And my fun fact - I've got two dads, and eight brothers and one sister and one of the brothers is my twin and I kind of miss him a lot."

Aaron pats him on the head. "Well, that'll get better with time."

     "I didn't know Muggles could make a baby from two men," says an olive-skinned boy sitting next to another, identical olive-skinned boy.

          "Is that one of the innovations we're going to learn about in Muggle Innovations?" his twin asks.

"No, um, Daddy Jordan was born with girl parts and Daddy Michael wasn't so they just made us the normal way," Joey says, blushing a bit. "A lot of people think we must be adopted but they've got pictures from the hospital and everything."

The first twin furrows his brow. "Is that another Muggle thing? Being born with the wrong parts?"

"It is not," says a slight boy, sitting crosslegged on his chair. "You just haven't heard about it because there's potions for it and people don't like talking about it."

"Makes sense," the twins say in unison without seeming to notice. "Sorry about your twin not being a wizard, that sounds awful," one says to Joey.

     Ananda nods. "Leonardo, why don't you introduce yourself next?"

Leo waves. "Leonardo Carlos Santana Vega del Monte de la Cruz, for the love of Morgana just call me Leo. I was born in Barcelona, but my family moved to Birmingham shortly after my birth for various reasons. I'm a pureblood, I have no idea what I want to be when I grow up except that I don't want to be a healer, and I had a pet fairy from the ages of six to eight."

"Don't fairies live for like sixteen years?" Joey asks.

"Not around my sister Marisol they don't."

Joey winces. "I will bear that in mind if I ever meet your sister Marisol."

"If you do, please hex her in the face."

"Okay!" Aaron claps his hands together. "Gavriil and Konstantin, which of you wants to go first?"

     "Alphabetically and by birth order it'd be Gav," says the second twin,

          "so let's introduce Kostas first," says the first seamlessly. "Konstantin Manos, call him Kostas. We're from Greece by way of Coventry, we're purebloods, his life's ambition is to become a famous singer, and when he was six he used to perform concerts for an audience of the family house elves and our pet Puffskeins."

     "Gavriil Manos," continues Kostas, "call him Gav. His life's ambition is to become a famous artist, and when we were seven he stole blackberries from the kitchen and rendered them down into paint, which he used to paint a really lovely mural on the wall that attracted a colony of ants into our room."

The rest of the Hufflepuff first-years introduce themselves, one more boy and three girls. Frederick Conway, a newblood from Cork with an older brother in Gryffindor, wants to be a Crup breeder and has a scar on his butt from a fireworks accident in which his trousers caught fire. Clair Delmonte, a pureblood from Cheddar (Joey's not sure he heard that right), wants to be a professional Quidditch player and her family land is chronically infested with fairies, which she doesn't mind nearly so much as her parents do because they're so pretty. Sally Paloma Martin, a newblood from London, wants to be a Healer and she has a friend in Gryffindor already and his name is Ari (Ananda has to tell her to speak up a couple of times). Katherine O'Malley, a halfblood from Bristol, wants to be a research witch and her mum has a Faegrecrawe like Joey's except he's wicked old and can't travel anymore.

                Ananda nods. "Well, it's grand to meet you all. Now that we all know each other and we've had a few minutes to digest, let's troop down to the dormitory and see the Common Room. Up we all get, come on."

Everybody rises, with a certain amount of groaning, and Ananda leads them out of the Great Hall, through a single hallway and down a flight of stairs. In the basement, Ananda takes a sudden turn into a seemingly disused corridor, and raps her wand on a large barrel in a certain pattern: tap, tap, taptaptap. The barrel's lid swings open, and Ananda climbs through, beckoning the children after her.

"Remember that pattern, and that barrel," Aaron warns. "Get the wrong one, or the wrong rhythm, and it'll douse you with vinegar."

                "Damned stupid of old Helga if you ask me," Ananda mutters. "Why let on that they're in the right place at all? If you want to defend the common room just make it act like there's nothing there. Lock the door if they get it wrong three times, if you must."

"Ananda has opinions," Aaron explains cheerfully. "Strong opinions."

      "She's right," comments Thalia.

"You just have a crush on her," Joey whispers. Thalia pecks him warningly.

After climbing through, they find themselves in a big, round room full of burnished copper furnishings and yellow-and-black upholstery.

     "This is the Hufflepuff common room," Ananda says grandly. "No outsider has been in this sacred space in over a thousand years." She pauses. "I'm just messing with you, obviously we have guests in here all the time, we're Hufflepuffs. Keeping your common room a secret is for belligerent weirdos, that is to say Gryffindor and Slytherin. But make sure any guests you bring don't see you tapping on the barrel so they can't get in themselves, we don't want uncontrolled traffic through here. And you can't take them into the bedrooms, that's not on."

          "There's a couple of things you should know before we let you go to bed," Aaron says. "You're going to run into a lot of people saying we're a House of dullards - ignore them. We've got our fair share of great alumni, and fewer dark wizards than any other House, which in my book is pretty good. Moreover, it doesn't matter. Your House doesn't determine your future - you can be a Gryffindor researcher, or a Ravenclaw Quidditch captain, or a Hufflepuff duelist, or a Slytherin healer. Your House is just the people who make you feel at home. And that's what we Badgers do better than anyone."

                "Very nicely said," says a slightly mousey woman who looks a bit young to be a teacher but rather too old to be a student, suddenly fading into visibility in a plush armchair by the fire. "First-years, I am your Head of House, Sophie Milliner. I will also be teaching you Enchantment and, if any of you take Artifice at the NEWT level, that too. And I do hope at least some of you will take Artifice at the NEWT level, because teaching a class of all Ravenclaws gets insufferable very fast. More importantly, as your Head of House I am here to instill in you all the virtues of Hufflepuff, and ensure-"

                She shakes her head irritably. "I sound like Liz Suliman. Listen, you're Hufflepuffs, right? That means you support each other. But it also means you support anybody else who won't knife you in the back for it. And sometimes, if you think you can take it, it means supporting the ones who will. There's this Greek word, agape, means 'the kind of love you have for everybody in the whole world'. That includes the bastards. Because everybody deserves to be loved, and maybe we're the only ones who'll do it for them. You've got to be braver than the Gryffindors to do it, but sometimes it's what you have to do." She stands up. "That's my speech. Now, you've all got classes tomorrow, but tomorrow being Friday, we've got the whole weekend ahead of us after that, and I'm sure your prefects have some lovely plans made up for your first weekend at Hogwarts. So why don't you go off to your bedrooms and get some sleep? Tomorrow's another day."

Joey likes this lady. Idly, he wonders if she planned out the part where she complained that she was sounding like Professor Suliman and started talking more earnestly. Probably, right? Probably.

Alongside the other first-year boys, he follows Aaron through the door with a big copper "1" over it. The room beyond is much like the previous, except that it contains five four-poster beds with black-and-yellow patchwork quilts, and a pile of luggage. Aaron points out the door to the communal shower and toilets, lets them know that as in all Hogwarts dormitories the beds have been the subject of so many Silencing Charms that there's a permanent muffling effect on them so don't worry if you snore, and then leaves them to choose their beds.

Beds are divvied up according to no particular system. Luggage is unpacked. Joey sets Thalia's cage on his desk next to the typewriter, and she flutters in and takes her perch with a happy sigh. Then he sits down on the little stool and starts typing.

Hey everybody,

Just got to Hogwarts. Well, I got here a couple of hours ago, but we had a big feast first thing...

...castle is huge, like ENORMOUS, but there's really not that many kids...

...Hufflepuff, which is one of the Houses. Basically they sort us into nerds, jocks, politicians, and huggers. I'm a hugger. As well you konw know. There was an older boy showing us around who called himself a Prefect, his name's Aaron but and I met him on the train when he lost his cat...

...still getting used to the e typewriter. As you can probably tell. It's wie not quite like using a computer keyboard. You have to think more, I think...

...and Leo, who has like seven names most of which I don't ream remember, but he prefers to be called l Leo anyway, so it's no skin off my back...

...give Finn a kiss from me. Ben, make sure to wear your favorite underwear at least once a week or you'll never wear them. I'm going to ask around tomorrow about sweets you'd like, like I said I would. Dylan, look after your little brothers. There's a class called Enchanting and I plan on seeing if I can enchant you a wooden sword to defend them with. Jake, you're adorable and I'm finally far enough away fom from you that you can't bite me for saying that, so I'm saying it, ha. Also they have enchanted combs that detangle your hair for you and I'm definitely gonna see if I can get you one. Fi Gil, sorry for almost misspelling your name, I'm ruffling your hair in spirit from the other side of the world. Can you feel it? That's me. Ezra, please ruffle F Gil's hair for me. (Why do I keep misspelling Gil's name?) I'm getting you a Slythi Slytherin scarf, I don't know yet where to get them but I will find out. Nathan, I know you're devastated not to be sharing a room with Arthur anymore; stay strong. I will send you my finest macaroni portrait to hang on your wall. As a talisman. Send Arthur and Clarice my love at college, tell Arthur he's a dork and tell Clarice I expect her to have cured cancer by te the time I'm home for Christmas. I don't care that she's not pre-med. Chop chop, Clarice.

Love, your beloved son and brother,

Joey

He's filled a few pages by the time he's done. He folds them into one of the envelopes he brought with him, and scrawls the address of the intercontinental wizarding mail center Daddy Michael found on the front, with their box number - there's some kind of complicated system where it goes into the box in France and comes out in Kansas and an owl flies it to California. Then he starts on another letter.

Ezra,

I miss you already. It's only been 24 hours and I miss you so much it hurts. I want to swim with you and play games with you and hug you and hear you breathing. I can't wait for Christmas...

...doing okay? I know this letter isn't going to reach you until after the worst is over. I know this isn't going to get there in time for the worst of it. I'm sorry. I'd say I couldn't sleep last night, but Professor Suliman very considerately drugged me...

...love you. I don't know what I'm going to do without you here. I know I've said it but I'm saying it again.

Love, your favorite twin,

Joey

This one's shorter. He puts it in a second envelope, wipes his eyes, and cracks his neck.

"Merlin, that sound is unholy," Leo comments, his quill scritching away as he sits at his own desk. "Do you need a healer?"

"I guess that's not a wizard thing after all," Joey says. "Wanna go drop off our letters together when we do? As the First Night Letter Writers Brigade?"

"Sounds good. You took my fun fact, you know, I was going to tell everyone 'and I've got six older sisters!' but then you came along with 'and I'm one of ten siblings' and I was very neatly upstaged. Had to go with the fairy story."

"Six older sisters! I've only got one, but I think I like having more brothers. It's a fun atmosphere. And Clarice is a lot to handle even just on her own, I don't know if I could handle six of her."

"You probably wouldn't get six Clarices. I've got five sisters who are perfectly nice in various distinct ways, plus Marisol who was sent to us from Hell and is a demon."

"Wanna tell me about them? I can tell you about all of mine. Like trading Pokémon cards."

"What in the world is a Poké- no, nevermind, we'd be here all night, I'll wait for Muggle Innovations. Um, my oldest sister is Delilah, she's twenty-four, really sweet and loyal, she'd be a Hufflepuff if she went here. Second is Salome, she's kind of shy but she sings really beautifully, she's actually got a record out even though she's only twenty-two, and people bought it and stuff, which seems crazy until you hear her voice. Third is Jael, twenty, she's really fierce and protective, definite Gryffindor, she's on the duelling track at la Torre Azbache where all my sisters went to school. Fourth is Tamar, seventeen, she wants to marry a nice girl and brew potions for the rest of her life and probably she will because she's lovely. Fifth is Zuleikha, fifteen, can you tell my parents were running out of Bible names, she loves acting and telling stories but she's got no face for cards, it's hilarious watching her try to lie. Plus she's nice - they're all nice except Marisol and me. Marisol's a sociopath and I'm kind of a dick. And Marisol's thirteen, so you've got all the numbers. And we've all got six names apiece but I won't subject you to that."

"That's very thoughtful of you. They do sound cool - um, so, my family - the eldest are Clarice and Arthur at eighteen. Clarice is really sweet and considerate, she kind of took care of the rest of us when we were growing up. She loves kids. Arthur's kind of - stiff and awkward with family, because he loves us but he can't really express it right, but he's really cool and charming with other people. Nathan is sixteen, he likes to take things easy, he's the best babysitter because he'll let you get away with anything. Ezra and I are eleven but our birthday's on the tenth, Ezra's - sweet and reliable and kind of the opposite of me in every way. Well, we're both fun, I guess. And smart. But other than that we just - fit together." He wipes his eyes surreptitiously. "Um. Gil's nine as of August, he's so cute and he knows it, the little bastard. He's also super manipulative, which nobody would put up with if he weren't so adorable. Jake's eight, he's cute too but don't tell him that or he'll bite you. He acts like he doesn't like anybody, but really he loves everybody, he's just acting out and nobody's letting him get away with it. Dylan's seven, he loves fantasy stuff and he's got a collection of plastic swords and he wants to take care of everybody even if they're bigger than him. Ben's six, he's the sweetest thing, he can't stand raising his voice or making decisions even if he knows what he wants. Dylan's really good with him, Dylan can make decisions for him and he's loud enough for two kids. And Finn's the youngest, he's almost two, he's really quiet and happy and he likes when people hold him even though he can walk pretty well now."

"They sound lovely."

With that, Leo turns back to his own letter-writing.

Joey unearths his toiletries from his bag and decides to get them arranged in the bathroom, however that's supposed to work. In the process he manages to take a shower and brush his teeth.

Then he goes to bed. It helps, having people around. It doesn't help as much as having Ezra around would help. But it's almost okay.