“Wow, this sure looks impressive!” Lily commented, looking up in awe at the huge castle perched on the mountainside. The purple sky lit up as a bolt of lightening cut through the air.
“Ooooooohhhhhh!” the girls said, together.
“Isn’t that the most beautiful thing that you’ve ever seen?” Taryn exclaimed.
“It sure is!” said Gabby, gazing at the little redhead she had met earlier. The drool ran from her mouth and the stars in her eyes prompted the other three girls to snack her upside the head.
“If you ask me the American Institute is much more awe inspiring,” Ophelia said.
“Hey! You four over there,” a booming voice resounded through the night air. The girls looked up to see a huge man with a bushy black beard and beady eyes glaring at them. He pushed his way to them.
“You four are the new exchange students, right?” he said in a softer tone.
Taryn spoke up for the group, “Yes, we are. I assume that you are Hagrid?”
“Yes, I am. Now you girls keep up!” he demanded gruffly. “You are to be sorted with the first years, so don’t get lost!”
Thunder crashed behind them, causing Gabby to jumped, frightened, into Ophelia’s arms. Ophelia rolled her eyes and dropped Gabby to the ground.
“Ow!” Gabby said, but no one listened to her. The three girls pulled her into one of the boats and they glided off to the castle.
“Ew!!” Lily suddenly shrieked. She jumped up to reveal a thoroughly squashed toad on the bench.
“Trevor!” a chubby, stupid-looking boy in the next boat shouted.
“Take him, take him! Ew ew ew ew ew!!!” Lily said as she picked up the toad with two fingers. With a flick of her wand the toad was back to normal. She tossed it to the little boy who gazed at her adoringly.
“Ooooh Oooooh! Grrrr,” Taryn exclaimed elbowing Lily in the side. “I think he likes you!”
“Shut up!” Lily shouted, as she reached out to hit Taryn. Taryn ducked, and the blow hit gabby who promptly shrieked “Ow!” Chaos ensued as all four girls began laughing hysterically as they shoved one another.
“Um… You guys?” Ophelia said, suddenly, “I think we stopped.”
The girls hurried out of the boat and ran to catch up to the rest of the group.
They arrived at the gates and were transferred from Hagrid to Professor McGonagall. She hurried the group into a room and left to get everyone in the great hall ready.
“Oooooh! There’s Ron!” Gabby squealed. She waved to him a blew him a kiss, causing his face to turn as red as his hair.
“Hey, Ophelia! I think that he’s trying to get your attention!” Lily stated as she pointed at Draco Malfoy, who was waving profusely and smoothing his greasy hair
Professor McGonagall returned and said, stiffly, “The great hall awaits you.” As they walked past the rows of tables, Taryn and lily spotted Oliver and Hotex sitting among their Quidditch friends. Oliver winked at Taryn and pointed to an empty seat next to him.
When all had gathered, a magical sorting hat began to sing. The girls weren’t listening as gabby had shouted, “Hi, Percy!” and waved profusely causing the others to clamp her mouth shut.
“What’s the big idea?” Gabby thought angrily.
“Do you want to draw attention to us?” Ophelia thought, angrily back.
“But he’s so cute! His hair! Those freckles!” Gabby thought back as she began to melt with pleasure.
The girls realized suddenly that the hat had begun sorting and was already in the B’s. They shoved Ophelia forward, not paying attention to the ugly girl who was supposed to be next. Ophelia handed her name to Professor McGonagall.
“Ophelia Bennett!”
Ophelia clambered up on the stool and pulled the hat over her head. “Hmmm…” the hat’s small voice said in her ear. “Yesss… intriguing. You have talent and power! My goodness…the Power! You would make a lovely addition to… SLYTHERIN!”
“What the heck kind of crap is this?!” Ophelia thought, indignantly. She turned to Professor McGonagall as cheers erupted from the Slytherin house.
“There must be a mistake! I can’t be in Slytherin!” Ophelia cried.
“Please take your seat!” Professor McGonagall replied firmly.
Ophelia grumbled off toward the Slytherin table. Malfoy waved to her and raised his eyebrows a few times.
The girls were stunned. Ophelia? In Slytherin? She may be evil at times, but… surely there had to be a mistake.
“Ophelia,” Taryn thought to her, “try to make friends with them! We can use connections in Slytherin!”
“Fine,” Ophelia thought back, “but I am not cozying up to Malfoy!”
The girl after Ophelia, Millicent Bulstrode, went to Slytherin and the sorting continued, with Gabby being sorted somewhere in the E’s.
“GRYFFINDOR!” the hat shouted. Gabby sighed, not Hufflepuff, as she had feared.
The rest of the sorting went in order. “Lily French!” was heard through the hall. After considerable muttering, the hat shouted, “Gryffindor!” Lily squealed with delight as she ran off to find Hotex. She passed Gabby, who was sitting with her feet being rubbed by Percy and her shoulders being massaged by Fred. George looked upset that he wasn’t getting a piece of the action.
“Taryn Greenburr!”
Taryn jumped onto the stool, and was soon proclaimed a, “Gryffindor!” She happily ran to the Gryffindor table. She looked for a seat and found one across from Oliver. His face fell for a moment as Hermione Granger skipped into the seat next to Taryn, who was too busy to notice, as she was conversing with Lily.
After all had been sorted and the food was being eaten, Gabby snorted with laughter. She pointed to Ophelia, who was trying to edge away from Malfoy. Their laughter stopped with a swift, cold glance from Ophelia.
The night passed by quickly. Gabby was in heaven, she was surrounded by Weasley’s.
“Oh, Ron!” she gushed, “How do you get your hair to be so lustrious?” She ran her fingers through his flame-red hair, ignoring his slightly bewildered look. Meanwhile, Oliver had succeeded with prying Taryn away from Lily and continued their conversation on Quidditch.
“Well, you know,” Oliver said, importantly as he puffed his chest out, “I am known for successfully pulling off the Wronski Feint several times.”
“Wow!” Taryn exclaimed. “But, I thought you were a keeper?”
“Oh, well, you know…er…ahem,” Oliver blundered through his explanation.
“You know when you pull your name apart, it sounds like Hot-extra-at-end,” Lily said, bashing her long eyelashes at Hotex. “What is your name? Russian?”
“Actually it’s French,” Hotex replied, matter-of-factly.
“Really?” Lily sighed.
Ophelia wasn’t having as much luck in the men department.
“You know, I’m a great Quidditch player myself,” Malfoy said, inching towards Ophelia.
“That’s … wonderful,” Ophelia said, flatly. She jumped up to find the ladies water closet when her eyes landed on an incredibly handsome professor sitting at the head table. He was conversing with Professor Flitwick, and a broad, handsome smile was stretched across his face. He glanced up and caught Ophelia gazing at him. He gave her an extremely charming smile and winked at her, returning her gaze for a few minutes. Once the gaze was broken, Ophelia made a beeline for the Gryffindor table.
“Oh, my, gosh you guys!” she exclaimed.
The girls were surprised at her tone and immediately looked at her. They had never seen her so flustered.
“What?” Gabby asked, looking at her blushing friend. “Did you hit it off with Malfoy or something?” Ophelia looked at the rest of the people at the Gryffindor table and switched over to telepathic thoughts.
“No!” she thought, to the group disgustedly. “Who is the professor talking to professor Flitwick?”
“I dunno,” Taryn replied. “Let me check with Oliver.”
“Oliver? Who is the professor talking to Professor Flitwick?”
“Him?” Oliver replied. “He’s Professor Hugh Leopold. He teaches International Wizarding Studies.”
“He’s Professor Leopold. Why do you ask?” Taryn said.
"Only because he is the best looking guy I have ever seen!” Ophelia thought, excitedly. “Isn’t he so cute? Wow! I’ll bet he’s really smart too!”
“Whoa, now!” Lily thought, to Ophelia. “He’s a teacher! That’s gotta be illegal or something.”
“Actually I think we’re of age, or something like that,” Gabby said in one of her more intellectual moments.
“Ok, guys?” Taryn thought. “I think that we need to get going.” T
he four girls looked around the empty room and scrambled to get to the Gryffindor common room.
“Wait!” Lily cried, suddenly. “I left my wand in the great hall!”
She hurried off to retrieve it getting side-tracked a few times by some extremely hot students,
“Actually, we should probably check with Dumbledore about getting Ophelia out of Slytherin House,” Taryn said.
The girls ran to the tower where Dumbledore’s office was located. They heard the beats of “Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?” resounding behind a stone gargoyle. The three girls looked at each other and shrugged.
“This must be Dumbledore’s office,” Ophelia said, “but how are we going to get in?”
“I could try one of my charms,” Taryn suggested.
Still ever guarding
Give us the password
Or upon you we shall be charging”
A blue light gushed from her wand and the gargoyle croaked out, “Lemon Drops!”
“Wow, I didn’t think that it would work,” Taryn said.
“Yeah, that was a pretty crappy spell,” Ophelia said.
“Hey! I’m rusty okay?” Taryn replied, defensively.
“Lemon Drops!” they shouted.
The gargoyle slid aside as the beats of “I’m too Sexy,” streamed into the hall. Ophelia and Taryn grabbed Gabby, who was dancing rather unrhythmically and doing the “lawn-mower,” and dragged her inside. The scene that confronted them was horrifying. The room was warm, cozy, and circular with empty picture frames around the perimeter. A gorgeous phoenix was perched in a cage. However, the charm of the room was destroyed by the shriveled man in front of them.
Professor Dumbledore was dancing on his desk, swinging his robe over his head Chippendale style, revealing a pair of white boxers adorned with pink kisses and red hearts. His long silver beard swayed, and his wrinkly skin jiggled as he sang, “Taking my turn on the catwalk!!”
At the sight of this tremendous atrocity, Gabby let out an ear-splitting, mirror-shattering scream. The music stopped with a scratch.
“Ewwwwwww!! That is nasty!!” Gabby cried. “I mean, put your robes back on! No one needs to see that!! That is so gross!” she continued to yell. “I’m going to need massive therapy now!! Ewwwww!! Mrglerphaph.”
The two other girls clamped their hands over Gabby’s mouth. “You know what I’m thinking?” Taryn asked, in her mind.
“Yeah!” Ophelia exclaimed back.
“THE SORCERER’S STONED!!!” they all thought together.
By now one extremely embarrassed Professor Dumbledore had pulled his robes back on.
“Oh…you…you…startled me,” said the aged wizard as he tried to hide his acid-laced lemon drops in his desk.
Suddenly, Lily came bursting through the door.
“I found my wand!” she shouted, waving her pink wand in the air. “Oooh! Lemon drops!” she cried. Before Professor Dumbledore had pulled the bag away, Lily grabbed four drops, and popped one into her mouth.
“Yummy!’ she cried, chewing the gummy sweet. Her friends looked at each other with trepidation. Lily saw flashes before her eyes and suddenly, a hundred naked Legolas’s appeared around the room, gyrating to “Ice, ice baby.”
“Oooooohhh!!!” she said, drool dripping down her chin.
“Wonderful,” Ophelia said. “Now I have to make a potion to reverse the effects, and wizard acid is worse than Absinthe!”
“Which isn’t that bad…” Gabby was shut up by a glare from Ophelia.
“I’ll explain our predicament to Dumbledore while you whip up the potion,” Taryn said. “Gabby, you…uh…never mind.” Gabby was off in Never Never Land, dreaming of a certain hobbit.
By now Professor Dumbledore had sobered up and listened attentively to Taryn’s speech.
“You see, Ophelia just can’t be in Slytherin! She needs to be in Gryffindor with us.”
“Yes, I thought it most peculiar that she be sorted into a different house thatn the rest of you, For, ah… safety reasons, I shall have her transferred immediately,” the professor replied. “Now, I believe that you have a busy day tomorrow.”
“Yes, sir,” Taryn said. She turned to find an “normal” Lily, an indignant Ophelia, and a star-struck Gabby.
As they left, Gabby noticed Professor Dumbledore pulling out his lemon drops. Taryn and Ophelia, however, noticed the gargoyle.
“Lily!” Ophelia exclaimed.
Gabby looked at the statue and snorted with laughter. Instead of the ugly stone sculpture, there stood a tall stone Legolas, checking his braids.
“Change him back now!” Taryn commanded.
“Fine, fine,” Lily grumbled, flicking her wand. “I was only having some fun.”
They traipsed off to the Gryffindor common room and made their way to their own private dormitory. On the way up the stairs, they bumped into a dorky-looking kid with a horrible coiffure and bad glasses.
“Hi, Harry!” Lily said, extending her hand. “Remember me? Lily? From the train?”
Harry turned pale and began to shake, “Mommy!” he sobbed, and ran off to the boys’ dormitory.
“What’s with him?” Lily asked.
“Must have gotten into Dumbledore’s lemon drops,” Gabby said seriously.
They went to their dormitory and got ready for bed. As they climbed into their sheets, the girls noticed a letter written in purple ink on the desk. A spider scuttled away from it as Taryn reached to grab the letter. Disgusted but curious, the girls looked over Taryn’s shoulder as she unfolded the letter:
With great love, V.L.
“Wow,” Lily said.
“Who is V.L.?” Gabby yelled.
“Shhhhhh!” the other three exclaimed.
They climbed back into bed. As each one fell asleep, their heads filled with the excitement of the day. At one point during the night, Lily was dreaming about her beloved Legolas, and as a result of her gorging on pork rinds earlier that day, the girls awoke the next morning to find their former easy chair rubbing Lily’s feet and a harem of no fewer that ten other Legolas’s wandering about the room, flexing their muscles and attending to Lily’s every whim.
