Discovering life...
By Suzannah black
Chapter 1: the birthday.
Far away in an inaccessible part of the world, away from the prying eyes of curious humans stood a huge, stone fort. The tall stone walls were lightly lined with moss, showing very subtle signs of age. Through the main gate was the large expanse of land devoted to a beautiful garden, decorated with small fountains and flowers of every kind; across the lawn stood a beautiful stone castle. Somewhere inside the castle in a luxurious suite's sitting area, a girl was sitting on a sofa in front of the fire, reading a book. The girl had long raven black wavy hair that almost reached her waist. She had a very pale complexion, unnaturally so.
The girl's name was Suzannah black.
She lived in the corvinous isle with her uncle and aunt and Cousin. Lord Marcus corvinous was the headmaster of the academy well known throughout the magical world as the best institute for advanced researches and studies of obscure branches of magic. His wife, lady Claudia corvinous was a well-known scholar of the mind arts. She specialized on the art of ambient magicks. Suzannah was eagerly waiting for her 11th birthday which was less than 24 hours away. It was on that day the she would finally get her Hogwarts letter. In spite of the excitement of going to her father's old school, she was very nervous about leaving home for 10 months straight. It was an unsaid fact the she would not be able to return home during the Christmas vacations.
Claudia had been trying to cheer her niece since past week. It was seven days ago on the breakfast table that Suzannah had suddenly realized that she would be away from home for 10 months straight.
Don't misunderstand her, she was not dreading homesickness. She had attended a boarding school in India since she was 5 years old. She was dreading the unfamiliarity of the country. She had never been to Britain; the idea of spending the majority of her time in a previously unexplored territory was thoroughly unnerving to her. Marcus' absence was another negative factor. If there is one person on the planet that could convince Suzannah of anything, it was Marcus. He knew his niece inside out like the back of his hand.
Sitting on the sofa in her suite's sitting area, blankly staring at the herbology book she had taken from the library the previous day, Suzannah was planning emergency exits for every situation since the past one hour. She was pulled out of her musing by her private house elf Nancy, who had just apparated in front of her.
"Mistress Corvinous is calling young mistress for dinner." Nancy chirped in her light pitched voice. "She is telling young mistress to quickly come; Nancy is to take mistress to mistress."
Closing her book and glancing at the large grandfather's clock on her side, Suzannah yawned lightly. Turning to her elf, she said, "I'll be there shortly."
Then she stood up and stretched her muscles, put on her slippers and left her quarters for having dinner with her aunt. On reaching the dining hall, she spotted her aunt arranging presents in one side of the huge dining table. Claudia was a beautiful woman who looked to be in her early thirties. She married Marcus around five years ago. She had long chocolate brown straight hair that went well past her shoulders. Her light brown eyes were currently focusing on the huge pile of gifts, her hands moving accordingly in order to make sure that the packets do not fall off the pile.
She turned around to see her niece had already taken her seat. She was still wearing that very serious expression on her face. Sighing, she took her seat across the table, directly facing Suzannah.
"Still having second thoughts? You know you don't have to go if you don't want to go." Claudia said, picking up her goblet to drink some water.
"It's just that it is an entirely new territory. I want to go to Hogwarts. I want to connect with my parents' past. It's just that I'll be all alone there. Miera is going to gurukul tomorrow. And I cont even mail her for the next 2 years. She told me that younger students were not allowed to interact with outside world. And then it'll be 10 months before I get to see you and Marcus again." Suzannah replied. After her mini speech, she was feeling much lighter.
She looked at Claudia, who was still holding her goblet near her lips, and said," Dia, when would marc return?"
By then, the elves had served dinner to both the ladies.
"He should be back by next week. But I am not sure. This year's conference might take longer than usual to wrap up." Claudia replied.
"I see." Suzannah resumed eating.
"You don't know by any chance where that errant brother of yours is as of now, do you?" Claudia asked, completely off topic.
"I do, in fact. He left for Sunderbans yesterday to hunt for some old texts about some long dead form of runes." Suzannah replied smiling and resumed eating.
They silently finished their meal in the next 15 minutes. Finally, breaking the silence, Claudia pointed towards the gifts pile and said, "It looks like the entire staff of the academy and all your schoolmates have outdone themselves with birthday presents this year. I have already stored the sweets and other eatable for your school trip. There is a large collection of muggle clothes, master harlord has apparently crafted you a wand holster. It's a piece of art I must say. I think that tome on magical herbs is from Miss Cortnis. And the rest are general books of magical theories and history."
Suzannah was browsing through her birthday gifts. Her dark grey eyes were brimming with excitement as she tore open a box and took out brand new wand holster. It was made up goblin silver. The entire body was etched with various runes that decorated the masterpiece along with supplying it power. She quickly wore it on her right arm and attached her wand to it. The whole apparatus glowed for a while and then returned to its former state, now resized to fit Suzannah's arm perfectly.
"Wicked! I will finally be able to give Marcus a run for his money in our usual duels." Suzannah said excitedly.
"As if! You are a novice at best when it comes to duelling. Marcus doesn't have to raise his wand to beat you. Claudia scoffed at her niece's statement.
"Whatever! A girl can dream." Suzannah continued the drama.
"Yeah right!" Claudia shook her head. Suzannah rolled her eyes at that. It was these small healthy spats with her aunt that restored some semblance of normalcy to her life. Otherwise, with the tight schedule of classes' day in and day out, Suzannah practically led the life of a timed puppet. The clock ruled her life. Her uncle, lord Marcus corvinous had hired tutors for his darling niece for every subject ranging from muggle sciences to etiquette to history to potions. He himself tutored her in the art of duelling. Suzannah had a keen interest in alchemy and wandlore. The professors in the academy tutored her in charms, transfiguration, basics of healing, potions and the wizarding laws and customs. Suzannah was a gifted child, in most senses to the word. She was the daughter of Sirius black, who was the scion of the most ancient and noble house of black and Sophia black nee riddle, the only daughter of tom marvolo riddle, best known as lord voldemort and Miriam corvinous, the previous head of the house of corvinous.
Marcus corvinous was the lord of the house of corvinous ever since the death of his mother, Lady Miriam around 32 years ago. He was part vampire and part werewolf, the direct descendent of godric Gryffindor and Rowena ravenclaw. Suzannah was seven years old when she nearly died from falling off a cliff into the sea. Marcus gave her his blood to save her life and thus named her his heir by default.
After finishing their dinner, the two ladies parted ways. Claudia went to the staff room for the staff meeting while Suzannah checked her packing for the 5th time since the last week. She opened the remaining presents that were transferred to her rooms and was pleased to find that apart from the wand holster, she had also received some of the books that she had been itching to read since the past year. The huge book on magical herbs and fungi was the encyclopaedia of all the magical plants. There were so many muggle and magical clothes in the gifts that she had to repack her trunk after expanding it to twice its original size to stuff them all inside. She was not taking any chances with Hogwarts.
It took her 2 very long hours to finish opening and arranging the bigger packages. After that, her attention shifted to the smaller and more fragile looking packets. Suzannah had learned it a long time ago that size of the gift could never tell you about its usefulness. She picked up a small silver wrapped box that was too small to hold anything bigger than a ring and as expected, the box housed the most beautiful onyx ring that Suzannah had ever laid eyes on. And mind, having grown up as a princess and niece to Claudia, who was very partial to jewellery, Suzannah had seen and enjoyed access to quite a lot of beautiful rings. This ring however was brimming with magic. The ring was made of goblin gold hand crafted by wizards. The large onyx stone was set on it had beautiful carvings that glittered in gold light. Below the ring, there was a small note.
My dear princess,
Many many happy returns of the day. Please accept my apologies for my absence from your birthday. The conference in India will at least until November to be over. That means I won't be able to see you off to Hogwarts.
This is a very special ring Suzie. As long as you wear it on your right ring finger, you will never lose your way in any territory. No matter how heavily it is warded. I know about your apprehension regarding going to Hogwarts. Hopefully this little ring will ease up your worries.
I'll write to you as often as I can. But you already know that it will never be as often as any of us would like. But there is nothing stopping you from writing to me. So I better get at least one letter from you every week.
Take care,
Marcus.
Suzannah slipped the ring in the correct finger. The ring resized itself to fit around her finger perfectly. Smiling, she resumed opening her gifts. By the time she was finished, the shelves in her room and the desk were full of little trinkets and sweets. Her walk in closet was overflowing with clothes, both wizard and muggle. She had to transfer all her stuff to a bigger trunk as the former trunk could not hold all the stuff. Her new trunk had seven large compartments, specially designed for holding clothes, shoes, bags and accessories, potion ingredients, magical instruments, books, parchment and quills and other miscellaneous stuff respectively. It was well past midnight when she finished repacking. She changed into her night clothes and went to bed. Tomorrow would be a long day.
The next morning Suzannah was roused from her peaceful slumber by Nancy the elf who was carrying a tray of fruits and a glass of fresh lemonade.
"Nancy wishes young mistress a very happy birthday." The elf bowed and after setting the morning snacks on the table, vanished with a small 'pop'.
Suzannah stretched in her bed and checked the time in the table clock on her bedside table. It was 5 am sharp. Smiling at her elf's efficiency, she hopped out of bed and went to the bathroom for her morning rituals. She came out 15 minutes later, fully awake and completely clean. She ate her fruits in silence and then drank her lemonade. At 5.30 am, Suzannah made her way to the castle's gym and began her daily workout. After 2 hours of training exercises, Suzannah returned to her rooms and got ready.
After a quiet breakfast, she went to the library where Claudia was waiting for her. She found her aunt in the very back of the library, effectively hidden from direct line of sight by the rows and lines of books and tomes, some of which were long thought lost to time.
Claudia was sitting on a sofa, reading a large book. Glancing up from her reading, she smiled at her niece and gestured her to take a seat beside her. Suzannah obliged and took the offered seat, without a word.
"I received a message from the headmaster. He says that the school will start on 1st of September. You will be leaving via portkey tonight. It will take you straight to a cottage Marcus has rented in the diagon alley. Nancy will accompany you and stay there till the end of the holidays. I have set up a vault in your name in gringotts. The money should suffice for the year. You will receive your Hogwarts letter and the list of required supplies in the coming week. Should I trust you to buy all the required equipment responsibly and take care of yourself?"
Suzannah continued staring at her aunt for a complete minute before replying. "I think so. Marcus gifted me this ring that will help me find my way around the alley. And I will have Nancy with me. So I should be fine. Plus it's not like I'll be going anywhere outside the alley."
"True. But you have to promise me that you'll not venture into the muggle world. You may visit and adjoining magical sites but no muggle London till 1st of September." Claudia said. Then, her expression softened, "Suzie you have to understand that I don't want you to get in any trouble, especially when I won't be there to help you out. You know I desperately wanted to come with you. But the fort will need strict supervision this month, what with entrance tests starting for the upcoming session next week. Please promise me you'll write to me at least once a week. It'll keep me sane. Please." Her eyes help a pleading look Suzannah had never witnessed before.
"Of course aunt, I'll be good, promise." Smiling, she hugged her aunt with all the affection she had.