Asadal
On the beach of Daebudo Island, Siria Potter-Black stood with one hand in the pocket of her jacket and the other on her phone. Her untidy black hair was stuffed into her baseball cap, which had the same embroidered logo of a wolf howling at the moon. She squinted at her phone, which told her she was right on top of where Baek Eun Jung told them to be.
Siria clicked her tongue and she pocketed her phone in her jacket. She scanned down her outfit: charcoal grey button up, crimson vest, black slacks, Grey Chelsea boots with black trim, and crimson laces. Once she tucked her cap and jacket into her bag, she'd impress. "I hope," Siria took a breath and eyed the beach. Where exactly Hwi-bin's Fortress was, she couldn't say.
"Is there really a school out here?" Ron Weasley, a langley, freckled red haired boy asked as he squinted over the waters. He wore a white button up, with the top two buttons popped and his cerulean tie loosey hanging out of his light cloud grey vest. Maddy Swelyn, a plump, olive skinned young woman rolled her eyes. She wore a plum blazer over her long black dress. Fastened around her left upper arm was a piece of smokey blue cloth. Maddy looked to Siria and the other girl.
"Did you bring the rings EJ sent you?" Maddy asked. Siria reached into her breast pocket. She pulled out three rings, which she handed to the other girl, Hermione Granger, and Ron, as Maddy already wore hers. Hermione, in a smart black and marigold dress with a lace collar, slipped her ring on and stumbled backward, into Siria.
Siria slid the silver band on, stacked with a ring accented with small crystals of green, silver, red, and gold. She paused as color painted over the world before her. It looked like the scene was cast in a rainbow filter. Patches of shifting spots of color danced over the waters and salt and peppered shore.
Ron pointed up, but there wasn't a need. The source of all the color was a massive orb-like prism in the sky. A long, thin, circular platform floated at the water's edge. It sat beneath the prism. Color reflected off and through the orb, which colored the world in fragments of rainbow.
Maddy led them onto the platform. "Don't the Muggles notice?" Ron asked as he eyed around them. Hermione glanced around, but no one seemed to see the four people disappear at the water's edge.
"When have they ever noticed anything?" Maddy asked as the platform rose. Siria reached out and touched a comfortingly cool, invisible wall that kept them in.
All the work Siria did to convince herself she was a "perfectly normal" fifteen year old on her way to Deokjeokdo washed away in the sea of color. Mere weeks ago, she came back to life after being struck with a Killing Curse, for the second time. She ran her hand over her lightning scar, which had not prickled or even tingled since Lord Voldemort's failure at the Ministry of Magic.
Hermione ran her fingers and a comb through Siria's hair. She fought it into a braid while they soared ever higher into the sky. Siria tucked her hat into her bag. Hermione finished with enough time to adjust her own rose gold barretts, which matched with the pattern on the marigold skirt of her dress. She fixed the lacey collar and nodded to Siria, as their platform entered a hole in the floor.
Siria's jaw fell while the room came into focus. The platform turned into a the dark shadow of the new moon, which matched the one they would have seen outside. Stars covered the space, cast in the pale pink and soft blue light of civil dawn. They were more clear than they had been in the Chamber of Secrets.
"Merlin," Ron whispered in a shared awe. Siria followed Maddy off the platform, but continued forward, and into a wall. She startled and placed her hand on it, as though it wasn't there.
"Maddy," Siria said, "why can't we see the walls?" She rubbed her hand along the wall, searching for a doorknob.
"So nosey newbies don't get lost," Maddy said. "Could you imagine what would happen if the first years showed up and decided to explore? You lot were causing havoc at eleven, I don't want to know what you'd do at ten."
"Ten?" Ron repeated.
"Did you read the Fact sheet Baek sent us?" Hermione asked. She shook her head at Ron and took Siria's arm. Hermione rose her foot, and reached for her heel. Siria had Hermione steady on the wall, and knelt down to adjust Hermione's fasteners.
"I told you to wear the slip ons," Siria said, as she rose back up. Hermione blushed and glanced to Ron. Siria pinched the bridge of her nose and squeezed her eyes shut. "They are very nice, and the tall heel certainly compliments your legs," Siria said. "Your height is charming and a shorter heel that you can walk in would have been more sensible, especially given how important today is."
"Are you seriously going to shame me for wanting to be… more adult," Hermione said with a speaking look to Siria. She offered Hermione her arm.
"I'm just saying, maybe ask him for his arm, so we can pretend we're a heteronormative group." Hermione stifled a laugh.
"The Fortress is actually quite progressive," Hermione said. "Baek and her wife are the only two queer teachers, but, apparently, the Headmaster is super pro-LGBTQA."
"That wasn't on the fact sheet," Siria said, as she escorted Hermione toward Ron.
"No, but it was in the notebook," Hermione said like that solved it.
"Excuse me for being too busy trying to learn enough Korean to learn at our voluntary summer school."
"EJ's on her way," Maddy said, as she slipped her phone back into her purse. Ron's eyes followed Maddy's phone. She eyed him back. "What?"
"I thought phones and stuff didn't work at Hogwarts," Ron said. Maddy widened her eyes and looked around.
"I didn't know we were still at Hogwarts," Maddy rolled her eyes. "Technology is a part of most Muggle's everyday life. Only archaic places, like Hogwarts, haven't adapted for it. You won't catch a single student here without at least a smartphone."
Muted, sepia light cracked through a wall. It outlined a door, which slid, to the left, open. A woman in her late twenties smiled at them. She wore a white blazer with a white blouse and navy slacks. Her heels were dark navy slip ons with white polka dots. She had dark brown hair and tan skin. Her skillful hands applied the natural look with a light blush, and made her eyes appear sharper than they really were. A single gold watch and gold wedding band accented her look.
"Welcome. I'm Eun Jung Baek," she introduced herself with a smile. Baek looked to Maddy, then Siria, Hermione, and finally Ron. "But, I suppose you know that. It's nice to see you all in person." She turned and eyed them over her shoulder, "if you'd follow me, our Head is waiting for you," and she led the way. Baek and Maddy broke into Korean too quick for Siria to keep up.
"So much for all that studying," Hermione teased and stuck out her tongue.
"Don't the Body Snatchers know they're supposed to replace you with someone like you?" Siria hissed as they followed Baek and Maddy through what appeared to be open space.
People walked on… Siria looked up and watched people walk on the ceiling, completely unphased by it. Someone rolled along in a wheelchair. Birds flew by, upside down. Dogs and small, reddish things dashed here or there. Siria caught the occasional person, bird, or little red thing stare back at her. They disappeared through odd bits of space with the same muted glow of when the wall cracked open. It wasn't just the spots where people disappeared that had odd lighting, the entire place had the same, civil dawn gradation of light. Stars still spotted everything, in their constellations, some with more stars in them than Siria knew the names of. Her hand reached for one of the silver chains around her neck, but stopped and patted her collar.
They reached a slope in the wall, which eased into the ceiling. Siria inhaled slowly. After years of magic, she would have thought it would stop leaving her wondering how things worked, but it only made her more curious. Her hair shifted like it always did when she walked, like gravity was the same.
Baek knocked on a spot of wall without the sepia glow. "Come in," a cool voice replied. The wall slid open like a pocket door, and Baek led the way in. While the room had the same pale pink and light blue gradations of light that the rest of the school did, it was somehow clearer. Siria could make out that the floors were wood and that halfway through the room there was a single step of low shoe cubbies, where the floor transitioned to a cushioned material.
A large, round table took up much of the raised area. At least twenty people sat, but there was still room. Baek pointed the cubbies with what looked like slippers. She slid her heels off, traded them for the slippers, and stepped onto the cushioned floor. Siria eyed Hermione's strappy heels then her own Chelsea Boots.
"[Pardon us]," Siria said, and unlaced her boots while Hermione, Maddy, and Ron also took off their shoes for the slippers. Maddy finished first, and sat beside Baek at the table. Siria pressed her hands to her eyes, as she put her boots into the cubby. She pulled on a smile while she sat down.
Before Hermione, Ron, and Siria, sat a cup of what looked like water, but smelt like burning wood and bubbled the way thick chowders sometimes do. Maddy nodded to them with a look that read "drink it." Siria nodded back and downed it. The potion tasted rusty and kind of like mud, if she were completely honest. She pulled her smile back on, as she placed her cup back down. Hermione and Ron did the same.
"Speak," the cool voice that told them to enter said. It belonged to the person at the seat furthest from the door. Their hair glowed with health, and their skin did the same. They wore a deep magenta Jeogori with a nearly midnight purple Chima. The accessories of their Hanbok were crimson or else scarlet. If a round table had a head, that was where they sat.
"Thank you for having us," Siria said. "So," she glanced to Baek, who kept her eyes on the person at the far end, so Siria did the same. "I am Siria Potter-Black and I come with Hermione Granger, Ronald Weasley, and Madison Swelyn. We're here to persuade you to help us…" Siria took a breath. She felt like her speech sounded better when she rehearsed it, but also felt like her Korean was better than usual.
"As you may know, 'A Tale of Two Brothers' may be based on a real life story, so I am here with the hope that the story involving a 'change of power' is as well," Siria said. "Lord Voldemort has returned to power and is in the public eye, to an extent," they didn't flinch in the way she was used to people doing, like Ron still did.
"I'm sorry," Siria said. "I'm still only fifteen, not very good at Korean, and in way over my head. We came here hoping to meet with the Headmaster, so we could ask permission to study under Baek for a few weeks, as part of one of the summer programs offered at Hwi-bin's Fortress. I wasn't prepared to ask a room full of people, in a language I don't really know, to help when they have no reason other than this: Voldemort won't stop with the U.K. It might take him years to decide the world is his grand plan, but, if he isn't stopped, he'll expose the Magical Community in the worst light possible."
The head of the table smirked at Siria as the silence sunk in. Whatever they decided, their mind wouldn't be changed. They sat in the same, still position as when Siria first noticed them, whereas Siria had to shift her weight on her legs. Baek kept her eyes on the person at the head, so Siria did her best to do the same. It was easier to focus on one face than all of them.
"You're less charismatic than I expected," they told Siria. "People kept saying that Voldemort was charismatic and charming, like they did with Grindelwald, but I am underwhelmed." Siria forced a polite smile. "Baek may have oversold you," they said. Siria clenched her fists in her lap. "I was told you're clever, imaginative, and resourceful." She struggled to keep her head up and her eyes on the person at the head. "Let us hope your schoolwork will reflect these things better than you have."
"We're in," Hermione breathed. She squeezed Siria's hand, which remained clenched.
"We are in, aren't we?" Siria asked. The figure at the head of the table sighed.
"You would not have been allowed entry to the school if we were not going to accept you," they said. "I would have not invited the Heads of our sister schools or our Ministers, to send you away. There are just a few things you need to be clear on, all of you.
"You have been allowed into our school under very special circumstances and on several conditions," they explained. "Few at this table were alive when the Magical community lived with the non-magical people and things were easier that way. Siria Potter-Black, your ideals on reintroducing our community, your initiative in independent studies, and the unique circumstances that have allowed you to continue to live have been taken into consideration.
"Hermione Granger, while your academic history makes you promising candidate for our summer program, anyone could have decent test results. Your leaps in information distribution and magical creature equality are why we accepted you.
"Ronald Weasley, you academic record is… impressively average. Somehow, you manage 'Acceptable', but your school doesn't test for everything. It would take a lot of courage or else stupidity to sacrifice yourself at eleven to delay the return of a Dark Wizard you have only heard stories of. Compassion and strategy are, for some reason or another, not taught at Hogwarts, but you managed to get some of both, or so I am told. Please be more compassionate and tactical than Voldemort is rumored to be charismatic or charming.
"Madison, as I understand it, you did not come for the summer courses, this year, but as a guide to the school" they said. Maddy nodded. "Very well… though it is a shame.
"You shall be sorted before we continue, but I must tell you, our school is not 'Hwi-bin's Fortress', or whatever you Europeans are calling it these days. It is, as it has always been, 'Asadal'. I am not so full of myself as to name my school after me."
"Ron hardly knows any Korean," Siria hissed to Hermione, "how is he supposed to take an actual test?"
"Siria," Hermione snapped back, "you've been speaking Korean this entire time— what do you think the drink was?" Siria smacked her palm to her forehead.
"How am I so oblivious, but also sometimes observant?" Siria asked. "I'm a walking contradiction."
"To be fair," Ron said, "I had no idea anyone was speaking Korean, and thought they were just speaking English, until Siria said her Korean was bad." They eyed the corridor of pitch black doorways before them. Ron put a hand on Siria's shoulder and the other on Hermione's. "If their first years can get through this, so can we," he said. "Who knows, it could be like the Sorting Hat."
"Or we could have to fight a troll," Siria joked.
Each of them lined up before a door and looked to Hwi-bin and the others. "When you're ready," Hwi-bin told them. Siria took a breath and pulled on a smile.
"See you soon," she told them.
"We've got this," Hermione said with a nod.
"You certainly do," Ron smiled and stepped through his door first. Hermione and Siria walked through theirs in pace with the other. The darkness swallowed everything.
Siria continued forward. She hoped her eyes would adjust or that she would walk into a wall she could follow. A wall didn't come and her eyes didn't adjust. There was no light and no sound. Even her slippers, which should have tapped against the floor as she walked, were silent. It was like being dead again. There was no smell, other than her. She ran her hand over her hair and missed her hat, which was tucked in her bag and back with Baek. That would smell, not good, but a smell of needing to be washed would be something in this void of forward. Twice, Siria thought she saw small pieces of light, but they were never there when she looked at them.
Eventually or quickly, Siria couldn't tell, she stepped back into the corridor, opposite her door. Baek approached them with a tablet. She typed in: Siria Potter-Black, 15. A brown and green box that read "Earth" at the top of the page pulled up five boxes, one of which Baek selected. The tablet generated a grass green arm band, which Baek took and fastened around Siria's left bicep.
"Earth, 6-Saturn?" Siria read aloud, as Baek did the same with Hermione and Ron, though their bands were silver, copper, and gold. Baek smiled at them, and led the way back to Hwi-bin, who was now only accompanied by Maddy and three other woman. Siria looked at Maddy's armband, which now had letters or, more likely, had always had writing and Siria could just see it now. It said "Water" over "9-North".
"You will want to keep your bands on as you go about the school," Hwi-bin told them. "Baek, I leave the rest in your care."
"Of course, Headmistress," Baek said and bowed her head at Hwi-bin. As Hwi-bin walked away, Siria could have sworn she saw a tail beneath the Hanbok, but figured she imagined it.
Maddy exchanged a short goodbye with Hermione, Ron, and Siria. Then she left with two of the other women, who wore billowing robes with rainbow trim. Baek led the trio through the school, pointing out the library, dining hall, the classrooms, and the kitchen.
"You'll join your sorted class for their meal preparation times," Baek said and pointed to her band, which was stripped and read "Staff" with "Directional" under it. "Even in summer school, students are responsible for preparing meals twice a week. There are five meals a day, and their duties broken down by element. You'll join some other students to prepare lunch."
"Who prepares the rest of the meals?" Hermione asked as they walked through the mostly empty kitchen. "House elves?"
"Our kitchen staff is mostly Dokkaebi," Baek said. "Yes, and they are paid for their work, as they have been since our school's founding." Hermione smiled and eyed Siria, as though Siria had proposed not paying the Dokkaebi. Baek continued to lead them through the school, and to the dorms.
"The other students are finishing term this week, so you'll be sharing dorms, as they do," Baek explained. "Yours is here," Baek told Ron. She knocked on the door, then opened it. It was a communal room with twenty some odd copper bunk beds with desks beneath them and built in drawers. The room's floor had a brown, muddy look with spots of red, orange, and yellow leaves. There was a small, round table in the middle of the room. Ron placed his things down at a bed that had his name and followed the others.
Baek led them to the next dorm, which was full of odd things. There was the same civil dawn light, but it felt different, more like a sunset. A soft mist seemed to the fill the room. Childish drawings spotted the walls. Unlike in Ron's room, the beds were a pale metal. The table in the middle was a dark, deep metal. Hermione pulled her bag out of Siria's, and placed it on her desk.
"Which one is mine?" Siria asked as she scanned over the names carved into the beds again.
"You aren't in this class," Baek said. "You were each sorted into different classes." She tilted her head, which caused her hair to drift off her shoulders, as she smiled apologetically.
"But we're all Gryffindors," Ron said. "How could we be in different Houses here?"
"We don't have Houses," Baek said. "We have classes and our students are not sorted based on what they are taught to value most, but by how they learn best. Gryffindors can grow into their mantel of bravery, but someone who learns with a hands on approach will struggle in a class that focuses on reading."
Siria reached out and grabbed onto Hermione's arm band. She and Ron had bands of silver, copper, and gold. Under "Metal" Hermione's band read "7-West" and Ron's said "7-Autumn". As she had always been with Hermione and Ron, Siria had not even considered the chance they would be sorted apart. She remembered that Asadal's school year ran from March to February, so Ron and Hermione were a year above her. All she could manage was an "Oh," and she remained in a daze through seeing her room and taking up at her desk.
The room for 6-Saturn was full of starlight. It reminded Siria of the room with planets and stars from the Ministry, which made her a little uncomfortable. Saturn was painted on the far wall, and its rings spread out onto the floor of the bedroom. The table in the middle looked like Titan with its yellow hue and shading. Her bed, like the others in the room, was black with fragments of constellations.
Baek provided each of them with a handbook, which Siria pulled out with the notebook Hermione mentioned, and she flipped through them at her desk. Asadal offered two two-week summer class sessions, which started the second week of July and the first week of August. They had "General Studies", which rotated the subjects of maths, science, Korean, physical education, Muggle history, and home economics.
Children started at ten, took their O.W.L. equivalent at the end of their sixth year, and their N.E.W.T. equivalent at the end of their eighth year. Students could then enter their work field or remain at school for additional studies, which included Alchemy, Genealogy, Spellcraft, and Law. Siria stared at the subject list for awhile, before the other students returned from their classes.
Dinner was served in the dining hall, which was free seating at narrow rectangular tables for twenty that focused around a circular staff table. The rectangular tables fanned out in a stretcher bond pattern. Food varied by table, so there was some passing around of dishes.
Hermione and Ron already hit it off with their dorm mates, some of whom joined them. An odd feeling of unease twisted in Siria's stomach as she returned to her dorm, which was co-ed and included a professor. Every class did everything together, and hardly had more than kitchen duty with others. It made her wonder. Who would she have been at this school? Was there another Siria or a Harry that went to Asadal?