Familiarity was a strange antidote and one Aslan Evans did not often steep herself in, but today as she walked into Hogwarts' Great Hall she allowed the feeling to settle in the very belly of her being. It was warm as a crackling fireplace and hot cider, but the tang on her tongue was sour, not sweet.

Those she had come to lean on within these halls had come and gone, leaving only memories which the brunette cared not to look upon, and those that remained? She wasn't so certain where she stood with them.

Change was heavy in the air. The sixth year remained in the entrance, caught metaphorically and physically in the middle.

Loosely Aslan crossed her arms under her chest. There was so much happening, but that wasn't a surprise, nothing was a surprise- it was all eventual, and expected at this point. The hall seemed almost to be bursting at the seams with energy, excitement and cheers, the loudest of all came after each sorting and then it was in waves.

Blue. Red. Yellow. Green. Each table had it's turn. It brought her back. To her own sorting. To her brother's. To Bastien's, Vincent's, Minnie's and Daxton and even Cox. She had watched them all as they'd sat beneath and let the sorting hat decide who they were and where they would spend their lives here in this castle.

It had all seemed so inconsequential back then, and now? Now as she glanced to the very different staff table (the headmistress she had first known, the one with the blood orange hair and fierce eyes was long gone) it all felt..... fated, and very real.

Realer than she felt.