Hagrid's Mistake, the Teachers' Bet, and Harry's Benefit

by Healer Pomfrey

All recognizable characters belong to J. K. Rowling, and I am not earning anything by writing this story.
I am not a native speaker of English. Please excuse my mistakes.

'No, I'm not joking,' Harry thought in desperation, feverishly beginning to search King's Cross for platform nine and three quarters, not noticing that several hundreds of other students were running through a wall between platforms nine and ten. He thoroughly searched the crowded station, until he had the impression as if he knew every inch of King's Cross. Glancing at his wrist watch, he noticed that it was already two o'clock in the afternoon. 'Oh no, the Hogwarts Express has already left three hours ago,' he thought, horrified. 'What am I going to do now? I don't know where Hogwarts is located, and with this luggage it's difficult to move around.' He looked at Hedwig. "Do you have an idea, Hedwig?"

The snowy white owl fluffed her feathers as to shade herself from the cold wind as Harry stepped outside the station. 'If I can find the way back to Diagon Alley, I could ask the wand maker or someone at the Leaky Cauldron how to get to Hogwarts,' he thought and slowly dragged himself along the street that he had walked together with Hagrid a month ago. Unfortunately, being together with Hagrid he had not been very careful where he was walking, and the heavy rainfall that began in addition to the stormy wind did not help recalling where exactly Diagon Alley was. By the beginning evening, he still had not found the entrance to the Leaky Cauldron. However, he was hungry, tired, wet and cold and wanted nothing more than a warm meal and a bed. 'If I only found Diagon Alley,' he thought for the umpteenth time. 'I could go to Gringotts and get some money to stay in a hotel overnight. Everything would be better than spending the night in the streets.'

With the trunk in his left hand and Hedwig's cage in his right, Harry dragged himself into a small park at the side of the street, deciding to spend the night in the park, where he would at least be able to sit or lie down on a bench for a while.

~ At Hogwarts ~

At the same time, all teachers and students were gathered in the Great Hall, watching the Sorting ceremony.

"Harry Potter," Professor McGonagall called out for the third time, slightly getting impatient.

Getting no reply from the supposed to be new little lion, she proceeded with the Sorting and finally returned to her seat at the Head table, casting Hagrid and the Headmaster a questioning look.

"He got the ticket and he said he'd come," Hagrid confirmed, causing the Headmaster to sigh.

"If he doesn't show up or contact us by tomorrow, someone will have to visit the Dursleys," he said, popping a lemon drop into his mouth, before he rose from his seat to speak to the students.

~In London~

Harry made himself as comfortable as possible under a large tree that gave him shelter from the rain and the wind but not from the cold air. His teeth were chattering, and he was shivering violently as he sat there, waiting for something to happen and pondering what to do at the same time.

'Maybe they'll miss me at Hogwarts,' he thought, but a small voice at the back of his head told him that no one would miss a good for nothing freak.

"I'm sorry, Hedwig," he said to his owl, although she was fast asleep with her head deeply buried in her fluffy back feathers. "At least you won't get cold." He watched the bird sleep, noticing that he felt calmer due to her presence than he would probably feel if he was completely alone. Only when the town around them had become fairly quiet, the owl woke up, 'probably because she is hungry,' Harry thought. "Shall I let you out so you can get something to eat and drink?" he asked and opened the cage, instructing his familiar to come back as soon as possible.

Hedwig let out a few trills and carefully stepped out of the cage. After a few flaps of her wings, she vanished behind the next row of trees.

'Oh no! I am stupid,' Harry suddenly thought. 'I should have sent her to Hogwarts with a letter. Hopefully, she'll return soon.' Glad that he had tucked a few small parchments and a quill in his robe pocket, he immediately began to write a letter.

'Dear Professor Dumbledore,
I could not find the Hogwarts Express yesterday, because I did not know where the platform was. I am now in a small park near King's Cross. Please advise me how to get to Hogwarts.
Thank you very much for your help in advance.
Yours sincerely
Harry Potter'

Just when Harry finished writing, Hedwig returned. 'Maybe I'm a bit luckier today than I was yesterday,' he hoped as he quickly attached his letter to the owl's leg and instructed her to hand the parchment to Dumbledore as soon as possible. With an understanding trill, Hedwig took off and soon vanished from the sight.

'Oh well, now I can only wait,' Harry thought. He once again made himself comfortable on the bench, where he had already spent the first half of the night and soon drifted back to sleep.

~At Hogwarts~

Albus Dumbledore was gently petting his phoenix familiar's head feathers when he noticed a white owl impatiently tap against his window. "Well, that looks like work, Fawkes," he said and quickly let the owl in to accept the letter she was carrying. He absentmindedly popped a lemon drop into his mouth, while he read the letter with a mixture of relief and surprise. "Twinkle," he called his personal house-elf, who appeared with a small pop.

"Yes, Master Professor Dumbledore?" Twinkle queried, bowing slightly.

"Please fetch the four Heads of the Houses immediately," Dumbledore instructed the elf and leaned back in his seat to further ponder the matter, while he waited for his probably still sleepy and most likely grumpy colleagues. 'Five thirty in the morning,' he mused at a glance at one of the silvery devices on his desk.

Half an hour later, the four Heads of House entered the Headmaster's office, annoyed because of the early wakeup call but interested to hear what the Headmaster wanted so urgently.

"Apparently, Hagrid forgot to show Harry the entrance to platform nine and three quarters," Dumbledore stated and read Harry's letter to his colleagues. "I am sorry, but I need someone to go and fetch the boy. Severus, would you...?"

"No Albus, I'm sorry, but Potter is most likely to be sorted into Gryffindor. Therefore, I believe that Minerva would be the most adequate to go and fetch the dunderhead," Professor Snape interrupted him before he could even finish his quest.

"The fact that his parents were in Gryffindor does not necessarily have anything to say," Professor Flitwick threw in thoughtfully. "Especially since he did not grow up with his parents. Maybe his relatives raised him to become a Ravenclaw student."

"If he had the potential for a Ravenclaw, he'd have been intelligent enough to come to Hogwarts on his own or at least write his letter yesterday morning," Snape contradicted, only to continue, "and if he was a Slytherin, he somehow would have found a way to get onto the train."

"Let's make a bet," Pomona Sprout voiced, smiling at her colleagues. "I think he'll get sorted into Gryffindor, but if the Hat puts him into Hufflepuff, I'll assign him one of the coconuts spitting palm trees and teach him how to care for it so it won't destroy the greenhouse."

Flitwick chuckled. "Very well then, I bet it'll be Gryffindor, too, but if he becomes a Ravenclaw, I'm going to teach him the juggling charm next weekend.

McGonagall cast her colleagues an annoyed look and said in her strong Scottish accent, which always came out when she was tired, "If you don't have other problems than making bets as to where the students are going to become sorted... Of course I hope that he will be sorted into Gryffindor. If I'm wrong, I'll personally teach him how to become an Animagus every weekend."

"Well, Severus?" Sprout asked, looking expectantly at the Potions Master, who rolled his eyes in annoyance.

"Gryffindor of course," he finally said, sounding very bored. "If the Sorting Hat was drunk and would sort him into Slytherin, I'd intensely teach him Potions and make him my student assistant."

The Headmaster thoughtfully stroked his long, white beard. "It will be Gryffindor," he said reassuringly.

"If not?" Sprout queried, looking at him with apparent amusement.

Dumbledore sighed. "If not, I'm going to take him away from the Dursleys and make the one, in whose House he ended up, his guardian. Now Minerva, would you please?" he asked, glancing at his Deputy Headmistress.

"Very well then, I'll go and fetch the boy," Professor McGonagall spoke up in determination and rose from her seat.

"Minerva, let Fawkes take you to him," Dumbledore suggested gently. "That way you'll be back soon, so that we can get him sorted before breakfast."

~In London~

Releasing Fawkes' back feathers, Minerva glanced around the small park, trying to make out a small boy in the still lingering darkness. However, she could not see any living being, before she heard a series of harsh coughs coming from under one of the trees. 'Ah, there he is,' she realised. 'He must have caught a cold from staying out in the rain the whole night. How could we not make sure that he knows how to get to Hogwarts?' She strode to the bench under the tree, making out a small figure that was curled up on the bench, and carefully shook the boy's shoulders.

"Mr. Potter?" Seeing that the child slowly cracked his eyes open, she continued, "I am Professor McGonagall, and I came to take you to Hogwarts."

"Good morning," Harry replied, sitting up as quickly as he could. "I'm sorry to be such a burden."

"You don't have to be sorry, and you're not a burden," Minerva replied, horrified, not only because his voice sounded very hoarse, but also because of his words. 'Why would he think he was a burden?' she wondered. "Well, let's get you out of this rain. This is Fawkes, our Headmaster's phoenix. Please grab his tail feathers."

An instant later, Fawkes flashed them into the Headmaster's office.

~At Hogwarts~

Harry hesitantly glanced around as he took the offered seat, feeling very self conscious upon realising that the adults, who were gathered in the interesting looking office, were all staring at him. "I am sorry," he repeated, but it only came out as a whisper. Harry flinched back, startled, when he suddenly faced the business ends of three wands as the teachers began to cast spells at him.

"Don't worry, Harry, no one is going to do anything to you," McGonagall said soothingly. "That was only a drying spell."

"And a warming spell," the oldest man Harry could recall to have ever seen added.

Another, very grumpy looking, tall man was still pointing his wand at him, but Harry felt too miserable to care. "Mr. Potter needs to be taken to the hospital wing immediately," the man spoke up in a surprisingly soft, baritone voice. "He caught a bad cold that is on the verge of turning into something much more serious."

"It's all right. I'm fine," Harry whispered.

"Thank you, Severus," the old wizard with the long, white beard replied gently. "Let's just sort Mr. Potter first, and then his Head of House will take care of him."

The older witch, who had brought him to Hogwarts, fetched an antiquate looking hat from the shelf and coaxed it onto Harry's head, explaining that he was now going to be sorted into one of the Hogwarts Houses.

'Hmmm, this is difficult,' a high, pitchy voice suddenly penetrated Harry's mind. 'You'd fit everywhere, but seeing that you're trying to hide how unwell you are to just get over with this, let's say...' The Hat quietened, before it spoke into the room, "Slytherin."

The End

Snape's reaction and everything further is up to your own imagination – unless I continue this in a few years' time after finishing all my other stories ;-)