Chapter 21: The journey begins

June 24, 1976, Boston, Massachusetts, United States.

Severus was taken by the portkey to a port in Boston which is the capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and one of the oldest cities in the United States.

He had heard that Boston is considered the economic and cultural center of both the Muggle and magical regions and is sometimes unofficially referred to as the "Capital of New England".

Now he was at a major seaport located in Boston Harbor and adjacent to the city of Boston.

It is the largest Muggle and magical port in Massachusetts, as well as being one of the major ports on the east coast of the United States.

Boston Harbor was historically a point of entry for many magical immigrants and was also one of the reasons for the significant growth that the city of Boston had.

Severus looked around and saw a group of no more than 50 wizards and witches that seemed to be from all over the world, suddenly he felt very much at ease with his decision to come to the summer program, it was a unique opportunity as Hermione had told him.

Also in the harbor was the rest of the SWI student body who were mostly witches in their final years or graduates.

The witches were mostly wearing the SWI uniform, which consisted of a green skirt and black shoes, with a green Long Sleeve T-shirt.

Severus felt someone bump into his back just as he was about to approach the group of students who were not in SWI uniform and he guessed that just like him they were for the SCoP program

"Ouch, Oh, my head" a young girl was heard to say.

Severus turned and saw on the floor a young witch with emerald green eyes and blonde hair, which is sporadically arranged, with a large portion trailing the upper part of the nape of her neck.

"Are you all right?" asked Severus as he offered her a hand to lift her off the ground.

"This... Yes thank you, I didn't see you, sorry for bumping into you... I'm not used to such crowded places" said the young witch taking the hand offered by Severus to get up and making an extremely cute and innocent face that Severus believed could make anyone who saw her fall in love.

"Don't worry, I don't like crowds either, I'm Severus, by the way, Severus Prince, nice to meet you-"

"Freyja, my name is Jinlǜ Freyja, nice to meet you," she said quickly and excitedly taking Severus' hand by way of greeting.

"Oh, me too," Severus said with a smile as he looked at her a bit surprised by the young girl's sudden exalted greeting.

Freyja seemed to notice the awkward situation and quickly let go of Severus' hand blushing.

Freyja's expression became a little tense and she stammered, "Yes ... like this, I'm a little nervous about meeting new people, sorry about that."

Severus realized instantly that the young witch in front of him was worse than him socializing with other people.

"Don't worry Freyja, you just took me by surprise, are you by any chance for the SCoP summer program?" asked Severus seeing that the young Witch was not wearing the SWI uniform.

"Me? Oh yes, of course! I mean, yes, I'm coming from China to go through the SCoP program and then integrate into the institute as a student!"

"Then it looks like we'll be partners from now on, what do you say we join the rest of the students in the program?" said Severus pointing to where the group of witches and wizards he assumed were for the SCoP program just like them.

"This... yeah sure, I'd love to, I don't really understand how things are around here, it's all so new to me, if you could explain a little bit I'd be grateful," Freyja said shyly.

"Sure, whatever you need, from now on we are partners so don't hesitate to ask me anything."

"Really, thank you very much, Severus Prince."

"Just Severus is fine."

"This... thank you then Severus," Freyja said happily.

They both continued walking together through the harbor to where the group was that they assumed were students of the SCoP program, as they walked Freyja asked Severus all sorts of questions about the institute and other common-sense things that Severus couldn't understand how the young witch didn't know, he began to think that the young woman had never left her house or something, because all the knowledge she had was from books and she didn't seem to have experienced anything on her own, it was very strange.

As they caught up with the group, they could both see from there a large ship that had the shiny SWI school crest on it.

On the dock there were families saying goodbye to witches, people talking, walking, dragging cargo, some witches were even with their pets.

As Severus and Freyja were about to join the group, the student body present began to walk up the ramp and onto the deck.

Noticing this, they both decided to walk up the ramp along with the others.

After a while, Severus noticed that they were moving slowly because they appeared to be making a line that led to one of the tables at the end of the ramp where students were checking in and signing their names in large books.

Behind the tables sat several young women who couldn't have been more than thirty years old.

In the row, Severus and Freyja were standing in sat a young witch with straight blonde hair and light blue eyes that made her look quite beautiful, and Severus wondered if she might be a teacher.

Next to the tables were other rather beautiful young women as well who were smiling exaggeratedly as she quickly and enthusiastically indicated to the students who finished checking in at the tables which section of the ship they should go to.

The line moved, though not as fast as Severus would have liked, as the people around him were already talking to other people and didn't seem too interested in making small talk with him.

But luckily Freyja's curiosity and constant questions kept him quite busy and entertained.

When Severus and Freyja arrived at the table, the young woman quickly caught his attention.

Severus let Freyja pass first.

"What letter does your last name begin with, miss?" the woman behind the table was heard to ask Freyja.

"Uhm. Jinlǜ. J." Freyja smiled shyly, feeling a little nervous at how she stuttered in her answer.

Severus could only smile at the innocent, shy witch he had come across.

"It's alright Miss Jinlǜ, you can sign this book here," the woman pointed to the book in the middle of the table, and Freyja quickly signed her name under a signature that looked so much like a chicken scratch.

Severus wondered if anyone could read it or even understand that signature and name.

"Thank you, now they will direct you where to go!" the woman said pointing to the helpers around the tables.

"I... this..." Freyja stammered as she looked behind her at Severus as if asking for his help in the situation.

Severus could only deny and smile at the young witch's awkwardness as he approached the table where Freyja was.

"Excuse me miss, she and I are coming together, if it's not too much trouble could you quickly sign in and go next to her?" said Severus to the woman behind the table.

Freyja nodded her head quickly as if affirming what Severus was saying.

"Very well, there should be no problem sir-"

"Prince, Severus Prince."

"Right, well, here Mr. Prince, sign and you may continue."

Severus quickly signed and thanked her, "Here you go, thank you, Miss-"

The woman looked at him for a few seconds and then replied with a smile, "Professor Ava Hale and I hope you have a good trip Mr. Prince, and you too Miss Jinlǜ"

"Oh I see, thank you very much then, Professor Hale, likewise to you," Severus said with a smile.

"Yes, thank you for everything professor," said Freyja tenderly.

After saying goodbye, Freyja and Severus were taken together to their assigned cabin on the ship along with the other students in the SCoP program.

Each student had his or her own cabin with a window and a thin door.

Some of the cabins had red knobs, and Severus could only assume that those were the ones that were occupied since no one else was trying to get into them.

Severus moved along with Freyja quickly down the corridor, peeking inside the windows of each booth.

When he was halfway down, he found two seemingly unoccupied cabins and decided to enter one while telling Freyja to take the other next to him.

Apparently, each cabin had room for three people, so it was likely that he would have to share a cabin with two other students and he guessed that Freyja's situation would be the same.

After a while of Severus arranging some of his things inside the cabin, the door to the room opened.

It was then that a young man walked in, Severus looked up and saw that it was a boy with short straight black hair, pale white skin, and dark brown eyes.

At first glance, Severus could tell that the young wizard in front of him practiced dark arts, as he was not even making an effort to hide the intimidating aura his body gave off and Severus was too well versed in the dark arts to know that this was due to some sort of dark magic.

Severus only uttered the word 'hello' as he waved his hand slightly, not really moving it from his lap.

'Does he practice dark arts? Interesting' Severus thought, no one knew what Severus was thinking at the moment...

The young man's expression was unchanging and he replied without giving it much thought, "The other booths are mostly full or have a problem or two, annoying?"

"Uh..." Severus looked at the young wizard, wanting to say something regarding why he thought he hadn't gotten a cabin, but he seemed to reconcile it and not touch that subject "Of course not, there's no one else here, there's plenty of room, you can choose the bed you like," Severus said kindly without caring much about the aura the young man in front of him was giving off.

"Well, I'll trouble you then." said the young man nodding as he positioned himself on one of the beds in the cabin...

"I'm Severus Prince by the way, what's your name?"

The young man looked at him and replied without much trouble, "Hayato Sasaki".

"Nice to meet you Sasaki, are you from Japan?" asked Severus.

"Yes and likewise" answered Sasaki without much enthusiasm.

Severus did not insist anymore on conversing with the young man who clearly did not seem to be in the mood to talk, so he decided to finish settling in and leave the booth.

When he exited the cabin he again encountered Freyja who was apparently waiting for him in the hallway.

"This... I didn't know what to do and I didn't want to interrupt you so I decided to wait for you to finish" said Freyja embarrassed.

Severus just smiled.

"I was just about to give you a tour of the ship, do you want to join me Freyja?"

"Oh! Yes, great idea, what a thrill, I've never been on a ship before, have you ever been on a ship before Severus?"

"Well, no, I've never been outside the magical world of Britain before. I have no idea what the rest of the magical world will be like let alone a boat trip; In fact, I was just about to find out some things about how the boat works, it's said to have some very interesting ancient magical runes"

"Me too!, I've only been to a few parts of China, my father wouldn't let me go out much so it's a whole new experience," Freyja said excitedly and smiling.

"Mmmm I understand, then let's not waste time and see as much as we can!"

The two toured the ship together while talking comfortably with each other and asking questions to the staff inside.

After a good while, all the student body and staff seemed to have boarded so the ship finally set sail on its way to the island where the Salem Witch Institute was located.

Severus knew that the SWI has located on an island 300 km from the city of Salem, this was an island that Muggles considered uninhabited, but in fact, several witches had settled here many years ago and they had covered a whole part of the island with a magical barrier that prevented the entry of Muggles, eventually, these same witches created an organization and then formed the Salem Witches Institute, which is the first magical institute in North America.