The Adler family arrived at King's Cross Station with few minutes to spare, which was exactly in the middle early but not that early.
"Platform nine," said Mr. Adler, squinting at the departure board. His mustache twitched, which it always did when he was trying not to look worried. "Platform ten. No platform nine and three-quarters, Nicholas. Are you certain you've got the right station?"
Nicholas Adler checked his ticket for the fourteenth time. The heavy parchment felt important in his hands ,far more important than the train tickets his parents used for their accounting conferences in Birmingham.
"Professor McGonagall said nine and three-quarters, Dad. Between the platforms."
Mrs. Adler adjusted her glasses, the ones she wore for reading annual financial reports. "Between," she repeated, as if the word might make more sense if she said it slowly enough.
A family with flaming red hair rushed past, pushing a trolley piled so high with trunks that Nicholas couldn't see who was steering it.
"Follow them," Nicholas said.
They walked faster, weaving through Muggles who couldn't see what was about to happen. Nicholas watched the red-haired mother approach the solid brick wall between platforms nine and ten, glance around once, and then —
She walked straight through it.
"Good Lord," said Mr. Adler.
"Accounting never prepared me for this," said Mrs. Adler.
But Nicholas was already moving. He fixed his eyes on the brick, gripped his trolley handle until his knuckles whitened, and ran.
For one terrible moment, he thought he would smash face-first into solid wall. Then the bricks dissolved like wet paper, and he stumbled into brilliant sunlight and noise and steam.
Hogwarts Express, Platform nine and three-quarters.
Nicholas turned. His parents stood in the archway, frozen halfway through, their faces comical with shock. Behind them, the Muggle world bustled on, oblivious.
"Come through!" Nicholas called. "It's safe!"
They emerged slowly, Mrs. Adler brushing dust from her coat.
"Still alive I guess," said Mr. Adler as he scratched his head.
They found a relatively quiet spot beside a pillar. Parents and children hugged and cried all around them. An enormous woman in emerald green robes was telling a boy with a round face that he'd better behave or she'd hear about it.
"You'll write," said Mrs. Adler and wasn't a question it's an order.
"Every week," Nicholas promised.
"And you'll eat properly. None of those weird and suspicious food."
"Pumpkin cake are supposed to be quite good," said Nicholas, who had read Hogwarts: A History cover to cover three times.
Mr. Adler cleared his throat. "Your mother and I... we're very proud. Very proud indeed. Send us letter when you can. Even if it's just to say you're alive."
They hugged him, brief, efficient hugs, the kind that came from a family that expressed affection through packed lunches and remembered birthdays rather than words. Nicholas didn't mind. He knew what they meant.
He was turning toward the train when a commotion erupted near the engine.
A boy with black hair that wouldn't lie flat was arguing with a round-faced woman who kept trying to smooth it down. A tall man with spectacles was laughing. A lot of people were staring amd whispering.
"That's him," said a girl with pigtails to her friend. "Harry Potter, The Boy Who Lived."
Nicholas looked. The boy seemed ordinary enough — too thin, clothes too big, and it's kind of old?. He was fending off the woman's hands with embarrassed patience.
"Nicholas?" Mrs. Adler touched his shoulder. "Are you ready?"
"Yes," he decided. "I will learn magic as I can dad."
Mrs. Adler smiled ,the small, private smile she reserved for when Nicholas said something that reminded her of herself. "Go on then. Find a compartment. We'll wait until you leave."
---
The Hogwarts Express was everything Nicholas had imagined and nothing like it. He passed compartments full of students in robes already, arguing about spellbooks and summer holidays. He passed a boy who was turning his rat yellow. He passed three girls sharing a packet of Chocolate Frogs and shrieking when the cards moved.
He found an empty compartment near the end and wrestled his trunk onto the rack with difficulty. His owl, Archimedes, a birthday gift from his uncle, hooted softly in his cage.
Nicholas pressed his face to the window as the train pulled away. His parents grew smaller, then disappeared around a bend. London became suburbs became fields became sky.
He watched a cloud shaped like a broomstick. Then one like a Snitch. Then one like nothing at all, which was somehow better.
The compartment door slid open.
"Anyone sitting here?" asked a girl with dark skin and short hair, before Nicholas can answer, she already sitting down, which suggested the question was rhetorical. "Everywhere else is full of second-years talking about how much homework they have. As if I care about homework before I've even had my first lesson."
"Nicholas Adler," he said, because his mother had taught him that introductions were important.
"Linn Tylor." She stuck out her hand. He shook it. "Ravenclaw, probably. My sister's in Gryffindor and she says Ravenclaw's for people who think too much, but I told her thinking too much is better than not thinking at all, which is what she does. Are you first year?"
"Yes."
"Me too. What do you want to do at Hogwarts?"
Nicholas considered lying. He considered saying something impressive about Transfiguration or Ancient Runes, well who doesn't want to act cool right?. But looking at Linn's face, Nicholas chose to spike the truth.
"I want to play Quidditch," he said.
Linn eyebrows rose. "Do you fly?"
"Never have."
"Do you know anything about Quidditch?"
"I've read Quidditch Through the Ages. Twice."
"Reading isn't playing."
"No," Nicholas agreed. "But it's where you start."
Linn studied him for a moment, really studied him, the way his mother studied balance sheets, and then she smiled. "I want to invent spells," she said. "New ones. Not just learn what everyone already knows. Maybe a spell that reminded me what time it is every day."
They shook hands again, properly this time.
The train rattled on toward Scotland.
---
Night had fallen when they finally stopped. Nicholas stepped onto the platform and immediately shivered , the air here was no joke with cold that can freeze you in a matter of minutes.
"Firs' years!" bellowed a voice. "Firs' years over here!"
A giant, maybe half giant? Looking at a tall man who held a lantern high, his beard just faced a storm. Nicholas doesn't know who it is, but that man doesn't look dangerous.
"Is it true?" a boy whispered as they shuffled forward. "That's Hagrid right? About him being expelled?" Okay he take back his word, look like his intuition can't be trust at all. Thought him as Nicholas shake his head.
"Four to a boat, now. No more'n four!" Said the man.
Nicholas climbed into a boat with Linn and two boys who didn't speak. They pushed off from the shore, and Nicholas looked back at the train, small now, ordinary, the last connection to the world he'd left.
Then he looked forward.
Hogwarts rose from the cliff across the lake, its towers and turrets blazing with light, its windows like hundreds of watching eyes. Nicholas almost forgot to breathe as he admired the castle.
"Amazing," said one of the silent boys.
Nicholas said nothing. He was making a promise to himself,
I will play here. On that pitch. I will fly over this castle, and people will remember my name.
The boats scraped stone. Hagrid helped them out, one enormous hand steadying Nicholas's elbow.
They climbed steps, so many steps, and then double doors swung open, and warmth and candlelight spilled over them.
The Great Hall.
Nicholas had read descriptions. He had seen drawings in books. Nothing prepared him for the ceiling, black velvet sky, moving stars, real clouds drifting past painted constellations, or the four long tables, or the thousands of candles floating overhead.
"Line up here," said a sharp voice. Professor McGonagall, stern in emerald robes. "When I call your name, you will step forward, place the Sorting Hat on your head, and be sorted into your houses."
Nicholas found himself between Linn, vibrating in nervousness, and a tall blond boy who looked like he'd already decided he belonged in Slytherin.
"Abbott, Hannah!"
A pink-faced girl stumbled forward. The hat took a long moment, then shouted: "HUFFLEPUFF!"
"Bones, Susan!"
"HUFFLEPUFF!"
"Boot, Terry!"
"RAVENCLAW!"
Table by table, the lines grew shorter. Nicholas watched Harry Potter ,the Boy Who live, walk to the stool, sit, wait. The hat took nearly a minute with him, then: "GRYFFINDOR!"
The table in red and gold erupted. Nicholas clapped politely.
"Macmillan, Ernie!"
"HUFFLEPUFF!"
"Malfoy, Draco!"
"SLYTHERIN!"
"Taylor, Linn!"
She squeezed Nicholas's arm , hard, and marched forward. The hat had barely touched her curls.
"RAVENCLAW!"
She bounced to the blue-and-bronze table, looking relieved and triumphant.
More names. More houses. Nicholas stopped listening to the announcements, started listening to his own heartbeat.
Ravenclaw. Please. Ravenclaw.
Maybe because Linn there, maybe because he like reading book, he like learning, he want to learn how to fly, learn how to play quidditch. But time waits for no one.
"Adler, Nicholas!"
His legs moved without permission. The stool was hard. The hall was silent, hundreds of eyes, all watching him, waiting which house will he go to.
The hat dropped over his eyes, and the world went dark.
Ah, said a voice in his ear. Read, learn what you want, but deeper in your heart, you want something else.
Nicholas stiffened.
I can hear everything, young Adler. You want to fly. You want to win. You want to be remembered. But tell me , why Ravenclaw? Gryffindor has courage. Slytherin has ambition. What does wisdom have to do with sports?
Nicholas thought of his books. Quidditch Through the Ages. The chapter on strategy. The diagrams of plays. The history of teams that won not because they had the fastest Seeker, but because they understood the game better than anyone else.
Because flying fast isn't enough, he thought back. You have to think faster.
The hat laughed , a sound like dry leaves. Well answered. Well answered indeed.
"RAVENCLAW!"
Nicholas pulled the hat off, grinning. The Ravenclaw table applauded , polite, measured, the way Ravenclaws did everything. Linn was waving frantically.
He ran to join them.
---
The common room was at the top of a tower, behind a door that demanded answers to riddles. ("What walks on four legs in the morning?" "A human. Can I come in now?")
It was the senior student who answered it. Then everyone entered.
Nicholas climbed into a four-poster bed with blue hangings and a ceiling painted with stars. Archimedes settled onto his perch, already asleep.
He is looking at other 3 person in this room, they already asleep.
He should be tired. He should sleep.
Instead, Nicholas thought about broomsticks.
About wind in his hair. About the Snitch, golden and elusive. About the roar of a crowd, his name on their lips, the cup in his hands.
Champion, he whispered to the dark.
Somewhere, an owl hooted. The castle settled around him, ancient and patient, waiting to see what Nicholas Adler would become.
He closed his eyes.
Tomorrow, everything would begin.