Beside the Black Lake.
Thin mist was an eternal visitor to these waters.
It came uninvited, blurring the distant Forbidden Forest and the Castle's spires into silhouettes in an ink painting.
The air smelled of damp earth, mingled with the faintly bitter, crisp scent of rotting water plants.
The first-year students assembled here on time.
They took off their wizarding robes.
They had been ordered to change into matching, unfamiliar gray training uniforms.
It was the most common style in the Muggle world, made of coarse but sturdy, hard-wearing fabric.
On their feet were standard-issue black athletic shoes.
These clothes had not been on their school supply lists; Hogwarts provided them all.
Gone were Gryffindor's scarlet and gold.
Gone were Slytherin's silver and green.
Gone were Ravenclaw's bronze and blue.
Gone, too, were Hufflepuff's bright yellow and black.
The lion, snake, eagle, and badger crests-those emblems they had spent just one night taking pride in-were now locked away in their dormitory wardrobes.
They looked no different from one another now.
A blurred, moving mass of gray.
Remus Lupin stood at the front of the group.
He wore the same gray training uniform, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, exposing sturdy forearms.
The simple outfit made him look a little younger than his actual age.
His gaze swept over the young faces before him.
A sea of gray, yet it had not truly become one.
The boundaries within the group were sharply defined.
The Gryffindors still instinctively clustered together, their voices the loudest as they discussed all the new wonders of the wizarding world they had seen in the Common Room.
The Slytherin students occupied the far-right area. Most had their arms folded and their chins slightly raised, keeping a safe distance of more than half a meter from students