Leo's POV

"SILLEEEENCE!" this old guy with a super long beard yelled. Wow, this old dude had a good set of lungs.

The old dude—Dumbledore I think, Annabeth mentioned him—told us a bunch of welcome stuff blah blah blah, I was looking through big doors, waiting for the Sorting thing.

As we were waiting for our cue, I checked the effects the Stolls and I had placed. All was good. I returned to my position at the doors.

"It better be safe and legal, Valdez," Annabeth whispered to me.

"It's safe don't worry," I said back.

"You left something out."

"Well, you know Bri-ish people, there are different laws here. Maybe it's actually legal here, innit! Wouldn't that be wicked bloody brilliant, mate!"

"That's a horrific accent. And I've read Hogwarts: A History, and blah blah blah blah blah." I didn't listen to her after that.

She must have realized I wasn't interested so she went to talk with her Seaweed Brain.

I peeked through the doors and heard Dumbledore say, "Please welcome them!"

Then the doors opened and I fell flat on my face.

Everyone burst out laughing. I could tell even the teachers were trying not to laugh.

I brushed nonexistent dust off myself, "I meant to do that."

"Smooth Leo," Percy said.

"Shut up," I told him.

Once everyone was in, the doors closed.

I concentrated, and the fire all around the "Great Hall" got bigger and turned into balls of fire, they started whizzing around wildly in the air. People shrieked and hid under the table. The teachers just stared. Then the doors burst open and a hundred firecrackers flew inside and exploded everywhere. They bounced on ceilings, tables, and the candles. Thankfully the candles didn't fall.

Eventually the firecrackers finished popping and exploding. Now it was just a bunch of red papers falling down like red rain. I returned the fireballs back to their places.

I finally burst out laughing and so did the Stolls.

"You guys—" Travis said.

"—should have—" Connor said.

"—SEEN YOUR FACES!" we yelled.

I turned around and saw Annabeth breathing heavily, trying to calm herself down, her face was turning kind of pink.

"Annabeth?" Percy said nervously.

"VALDEZ!! Frankly this was not as bad as I thought it would be but I would be remiss if I didn't yell at you!"

I pretended to be annoyed, "Yeah yeah, only yell at me."

"STOLLS!! How could you do something like that? Scaring innocent eleven-year-olds?"

"It was his idea!" Travis and Connor protested, pointing at each other.

"No, it was my idea! It was great huh?" they both said at the same time. It's so cool when they do that.

Annabeth was about to say more, but Dumbledore cut in. "Please, let's keep it peaceful. Students, if you could not tell from the excellent Fourth of July entrance, these are the fifteen American transfer students!" Everyone clapped out of fear.

Dumbledore smiled. "Please, come up here and introduce yourselves."

"I'm Leo Valdez, the awesomest person you'll ever meet."

I noticed a lot of girls sign at Percy, Jason, Will, and even Nico. And some guys at Piper and Annabeth. Hehe. It went on to the Stolls.

"I'm Travis Stoll!" Travis said.

"And I'm Connor Stoll!" Connor said. They both flashed this identical grin.

"It's the other way around," Annabeth said.

I stared at her, "No it isn't."

She blinked, "What?" She turned to them. They grinned at her. "You...you...you actually said the right names? Oh forget it!"

"I'm Thalia, I don't like using my surname."

"Her surname's Grace!!" Nico shouted before Thalia could stop him.
"HEY!" she tackled him and smashed his face against the floor.
"Oww," he groaned.
"This idiot here is Nico di Angelo," she said cheerfully, "also known as Rainbow Unicorn."
His eyes widened, "What?!" he rolled and smashed Thalia's cheek into the floor, "Her nickname's also Barbie!!"

Thalia grabbed his shoulders and flipped him over her. Making him fall onto his back.

"Ouch," he got up.

"Wimp," Thalia spat.

"Show-off."

"Stop it!" Annabeth snapped. "If you two don't stop this fighting right now, I won't let you eat." They both shut up instantly.

"Dumbledore, can you please continue?" Annabeth forced a smile.
Dumbledore smiled. He said that we're in Gryffindor and he continued about teachers and rules and blah blah blah.
We sat down at the Gryffindor table.
The Stolls and I sat with two twins who are brothers of Ron.

Normally we wouldn't all fit on the table, but none of the tables were even close to being crowded. The war against Voldebolt must have taken a big toll on the community.

I was pretty happy that Dumbledore let us be in the same House, since it was all rigged anyway and maybe our entire personality should not revolve around —

The food appeared!!! No thoughts, head empty. I dug in.

Then a girl with curly white-blonde hair came to our table, "Hi guys!"

I didn't recognize her, but Annabeth got up to throw her arms around her. "Luna! Oh gods, I was ecstatic when Chiron told me you'd be here! So when you said 'European school', you really meant Hogwarts?"

"Yes," she nodded, strange radish earrings jangling. "He said it was vital that I not tell you what the school was really teaching. Top secret, he told me."

Percy waved with his sauce-covered fingers. "Hey, Luna! Annabeth told me a lot about you."

"You guys know each other?" Ron asked, having apparently been listening in along with his friends.

"Yeah, from Camp Wizardry," Annabeth replied. She and Luna had been close. Then when Luna was 10 she left Camp Half-Blood to go to a school in England. She visits Camp from time to time. Luna had arrived at Camp at 9 years old. Apparently once when she was late for class, the rest of the class had gone to an assembly, and she was alone in a classroom with a telkhine. She'd killed it with a math textbook and some pens. So badass huh? It had told her she was a demigod. Then a satyr named Bush found her and brought her to camp.

"Oh," Ron said.

Luna kept chatting with Annabeth for a bit then she went back to her table. I approved of her bottlecap necklace.

We were still the centre of attention. Everyone nearby wanted to know about America and "Camp Wizardry". We answered their questions the best we could without sounding like we were hiding something like A GODDESS OF SORCERY WHO GAVE YOU MAGIC SAID SHE FORESAW THAT SOMETHING TERRIBLE WOULD HAPPEN HERE.

Remembering that I was here on a mission kind of bummed me out. Then I remembered something. I got five drachmas out of my tool belt under my robes and tossed them across the table to Lou Ellen.

Annabeth saw it and sighed. "Lou, you helped them with the firecrackers?"

"Just trying to pay my bills."

"What bills?"

"Uh, anyway, I charmed those firecrackers so they wouldn't go near anyone." She switched to Ancient Greek: "Iτ ωαs α gooδ bαrgαιn. I hαrdly hαve τo usε αny εnεrgy τo δo mαgιc hεrε."

"What language is that?" Hermione asked. Her bat ears seemed to pick up any opportunity for knowledge.

"Ancient Greek," Annabeth explained. "We learned it at Camp Wizardry along with Latin, since so many spell incantations are based on them. We used it so much it's almost like our native language."

Hermione looked scandalized. "Why doesn't Hogwarts teach them? I need to..." She got out some paper and started writing things down with a fury that scared me.

Dinner was delicious, but I was also excited to see our dormitory. Dumbledore had given us our own so we could train, use our powers, and talk about gods inside without worrying about being caught.

That was especially great because I wanted to practice breathing fire. Then I can upgrade to shooting fire from a different area.

We followed Hermione and Ron (Head Girl and Head Boy, which sounded wrong to me) to what must be the Gryffindor common room entrance.

It was a massive painting with a lady trying to sing. And you know what they say about door-sized paintings — there's always something behind them.

"Flabbergasted," Hermione said.

The portrait swung open, and we all filed in after the first years.

"The girls dormitory is that way and the boys are that way," Hermione said kindly to the first years.

Instead of going to the ones she pointed out, we went up another set of stairs off to the side. Annabeth had mentioned that the other stairs could flatten themselves to ward off intruders, which was a really good idea. I should build one for Bunker 9.

Harry Potter followed us to the stairs and looked up at us, confused. "This wasn't here before."

"We know Harry, Dumbledore gave us another dorm just for us..." Katie said.

"But why?" asked Hermione, coming over with Ron.

"Deal with it punk," Clarisse went up the stairs.

"That was rude," Hermione called up to her.

"She's always like that," Thalia said, "that's actually her being nice."

"Whoa, then I do not want to see her mad," Ron said.

Thalia shrugged. We got to the top and entered our room.

Ron's POV

How could Dumbledore trust these people? Three of them (Nico, Thalia, and Clarisse) look like Death Eaters! They're from the other side of Earth! Dumbledore barely knows them! How could he let them in like that?

"They have to be Death Eaters!" I said.

"I don't know Ron, they are a bit different, but I don't really think they're Death Eaters," Harry said.

"We shouldn't jump to conclusions so fast about people," Hermione said, "remember Sirius?"

"Yeah, thanks for bringing that up," Harry grumbled.

"Sorry Harry, we'll talk about this tomorrow okay? I'm tired," she went to the girls' dormitory.

I have to know what they're doing! Maybe Dumbledore doesn't even know about the 3rd dorm! What are they doing in there that they have to have their own dorm to keep it secret?

I sneaked up their stairs.

"What are you doing?" Harry whispered.

"Spying," I replied.

He sneaked up too. We listened at the door.

"—just have to gain their trust!" a girl's voice said, I think it was Piper.

"And then reveal who we really are, like I'm actually the son of—?" a boy, I think Nico, stopped talking, "there's someone outside!"

Me and Harry looked at each other in horror. We scrambled down the stairs and Harry sat on the armchair facing the fireplace. I sat under him on the floor The dorm's door opened. I hoped that they wouldn't be able to see us.

There was a pause, then Thalia said, "There's no one there, I think your senses are getting dull Skull Man." Skull Man? They have weird nicknames.

"I'm sure! There was!" Nico protested.

"Well they're not there now, I'm going to sleep." The door closed.

Okay, I'm sure of it now! They're Death Eaters! And son of? Nico must be the son of You-Know-Who!

Harry seemed to be thinking the same thing.

"Do you think Nico's You-Know-Who's son?" I asked him.

"He's got to be!" Harry said.

We went inside the boys' dorm, we have to tell Hermione about this tomorrow!

Claire from May 2021 here: I am editing this!!! If you see inconsistencies in the plot, that's probably why. But leave a comment if you see any so I can fix them!