The door of the underground classroom opened and closed again, leaving only Professor McGonagall and her two useless students inside.
Her chest was heaving violently, and she stared at them like an angry eagle.
In the end, it was Ron who broke the silence.
"Professor, was that just now... a phoenix?"
"That's right, it was a phoenix!" Professor McGonagall didn't seem to want to say much more, just nodded and moved on.
"You'd better go to the Hospital Wing, Weasley, your eye is swollen."
"It's nothing." Ron quickly covered his eye. "Professor, did Headmaster Dumbledore just say the house sorting is over?"
"Yes, just now…"
"Then where's my sister?" Ron asked, a little nervously.
"Also in Gryffindor."
Hearing Professor McGonagall's answer, Ron said happily, "Oh, that's great."
Although he hadn't seen it with his own eyes, the result was still pretty good.
But as soon as Gryffindor was mentioned, Harry seemed to suddenly think of something and hurriedly said, "Professor, when we got in the car, term hadn't started yet, so we shouldn't have points taken from Gryffindor, right?"
Professor McGonagall gave him a stern look, but Harry noticed her lips weren't so tightly pressed anymore.
...
...It turned out Harry's words were actually useful.
Professor McGonagall didn't take any points from Gryffindor.
Although they were put in detention and could only eat in the underground classroom, that was much better than Harry had expected.
Because she had to go back to the feast, Professor McGonagall quickly left.
After the door was shut again, Ron let out a long, soft whistle.
"That was lucky…" He grabbed a sandwich Professor McGonagall had brought. "Just detention—that's way better than getting expelled, and we didn't even lose any points."
"I think so too." Harry grabbed one as well.
"By the way, how's your wand?"
"That's not my wand." With his mouth full of chicken and ham, Ron mumbled indistinctly.
He pulled a black rubber cod out of his pocket and said, "This is a trick wand Fred and George made. They must've wanted to prank me, so they swapped my wand."
"Good thing they did!" Harry said, laughing.
"Yeah… When we crashed into that tree, it was about to snap in half." Ron put the black cod back in his pocket, a little relieved.
"But we'd better be more careful in the future."
Harry took a sip of pumpkin juice. "I really wish we could go to the feast…"
"Professor McGonagall doesn't want us showing off," Ron said wisely, "she doesn't want people to think flying a car to school is something to be proud of."
"But Kael gets to go to the feast…"
"That's different. He got brought to school by a Phoenix; of course that's worth bragging about." Ron shrugged. "If it were me, I'd brag about it for a year—anyone would."
"Phoenixes are rare?" Harry asked.
"You could say extremely rare—a lot rarer than Fire Dragons." Ron picked up a second sandwich. "Many people never see one their whole lives. I only saw one once at the Quidditch Pitch, remember? That game that got called off."
Harry nodded...
Of course he remembered, and it left a deep impression.
While the two of them were discussing Phoenixes, Kael was also brought to the Auditorium by Dumbledore.
As soon as he walked in, he hurried to the Hufflepuff table.
Snape's face along the way was darker than one of Hagrid's rags, making Kael feel all kinds of uncomfortable under his stare.
By the time Kael arrived, the feast had already started, but when everyone saw him, they all stopped what they were doing, and then suddenly it got noisy again.
Only now there was a mix of buzzing whispers.
But Kael didn't care about any of that, heading straight for the Hufflepuff table.
Cedric had saved him a seat.
As soon as Kael sat down, Cedric couldn't wait to ask, "Hey, did you come here like Potter, in that flying car?"
"Flying car?" Kael replied absentmindedly, "If I could, I wish I had."
"That's nothing to joke about," Conna frowned. "That car crashed into the Whomping Willow outside the castle; they say they almost got flattened."
At Hogwarts, there were never any secrets. In the time it took to sort the houses, Harry and Ron's exploits were already common knowledge.
"Same difference…" Kael muttered, "Whether it's the Whomping Willow or being treated like a Bludger… doesn't make a difference."
"Bludger?" Cedric scratched his head, not quite getting what Kael meant.
"So if you didn't come by car… how did you get here? Fred and George said you weren't home on the first day of term."
"It was Fawkes," Kael explained. "Dumbledore's Phoenix. It brought me from Dorset back to Hogwarts."
Then Kael briefly described what happened with Newt, leaving the others around him stunned.
Wow, an unexpected Phoenix, a Nundu giving birth, and Apparating back to school with a Phoenix… Kael's last couple days were more exciting than their whole past two years.
"A Phoenix, huh…" Cedric sighed. "That must have been amazing…"
Mikel and Ryan nodded along in agreement; they both wanted the chance to get close to one of those legendary magical creatures.
"Trust me, you definitely wouldn't like how it feels." Kael waved his hand, saying seriously.
He was still feeling queasy; staring at a table full of wonderful food, he had no appetite, just nibbled some pie and ordered a double-lemon lemonade.
But the lemonades from the little elves were only sour, not bitter… The effect was just a bit lacking.
Cedric, seeing him like that, didn't ask more about the Phoenix and instead pulled out a sheet of parchment, saying:
"We got the letter you sent over the holidays. Here's the new map we made according to your instructions on the train."
His voice was tinged with excitement. "It's way more trouble than just copying like last year, but it's real popular… already fifty first-years have signed up to buy from us."
But those more expensive customized maps for special orders will need you to do them—we just don't have the experience."
"How many do you need?" Kael asked.
"Twenty-five," Cedric said with a grin. "A lot more people are buying these maps this year, and they're all picking us."
Another batch of Galleons in the bag—Kael finally felt a little better.
He looked up at the staff table and saw Professor McGonagall had returned, talking to the flamboyantly dressed Gilderoy Lockhart.
Except she looked very stern, lips tightly pressed together, and didn't seem happy at all.
...