Chapter One - Thornapple



Through the symmetrical glass eyes of a lone casement window, I cast my gaze west. The shoulders of the land lay warm in the fading sun, and the tree tops dipped and bowed to her glory. Beyond them lay the lake and the forest, and further still, the sea; the cold and unforgiving body that encompassed seemingly all. If the wind slept, its roar could be heard across the distance like an awakening beast, soft yet terrible.

But the wind did not sleep today in the softening dusk. It raced playfully about the land, over hills and through branches, to hurl itself at the battlements and buttresses of Hogwarts. It sang high and loud at the window at which I stood. It sounded through my being; it called me into the abyss with whispers and laughter. It was a perverse invitation.

A whirling blackness appeared upon a near hill; a compact tornado composed of cloth and flesh. The figure stood alone against tree and sky, and gold and crimson leaves arose and circled his orbit like so many exotic moons, tumbling and floating.

His silhouette absorbed the light around him-such was always its way-and the sun in all of her radiance dimmed in his presence. Several ravens took wing from their place on a watchful branch and soared toward the dying sun, calling to one another for the birth of nightfall. He remained stationary for a time, patiently allowing the wind to have its way with the tousled locks and robes that swept around him in a black inferno. He watched the red ceiling of the sky grow like a stain, deepening and spreading on the cloth of the world. He then turned and looked toward my window unexpectedly. Wisps of black hair teased his lips; his eyes narrowed in the darkening light. I stepped back as though a blow had befallen my chest.

Damn him. Damn him and this power he has, this unending desire, this longing. Damn myself-for I cannot feel otherwise. Will I never be at peace?

His gaze pinned me to the casement. Unable to either move or breathe, I stood, a shape against the firelight behind me, and searched his countenance for what motives lay beneath. His features made nothing apparent. Stoicism was etched into his very posture; something akin to cruelty-or was it anger?-curled the left side of his mouth up ever so softly. The night swiftly blanketed him from my sight at last, and when again I searched for his figure upon the crown of the hill, I saw that he had gone.

My breath returned to me. A slow anger was then born in the pit of my stomach, flaring red and hot, accompanied by its brothers, self-loathing and pain, until I was consumed by it. I put my hand to my brow and willed myself to not give in to weeping.

"Come away from the window."

Octavia. I lifted my head to see her sitting in a chair in front of the fireplace. The flames flickered in the lenses of her wire spectacles as she pointed to the wing chair adjacent.

"You come and sit yourself right here where I can see you."

"However did you get in again?" I asked sullenly, crossing the room to drop myself in the specified chair. I glared up at her, allowing, to my shame, my anger to seek her out.

"Hmph," she snorted. "We've been over this." She held her wand up to my view and lifted her brows. I got the distinct impression that she believed herself to be talking to an extremely dull-witted child. If she had felt any of my anger, she tactfully ignored it.

"Oh yes," I growled, unable to keep the bitterness at bay, "how could I possibly forget? I am, after all, in a magical castle, where magical people reside and learn, and where anything is possible, am I right?" I loathed the ugliness in my voice, but I could not stop it from coloring my words. And I knew that Octavia would forgive it. I forced myself to say in a quieter tone, "Well, of course, not anything."

"Let me tell you something," Octavia snapped as she leaned forward and pointed her wand at me. "You've got every right to be here. Every right. Don't you let that man play you like this, make you feel inadequate, unwanted." Her gaze softened. "No. Not unwanted." She reached a hand out to my knee and grasped it. "No matter what people say or think-especially that fool-" she nodded toward the window, "you know you belong in our world. You always have."

I remained silent. I did not have the courage to disagree with her kind words, untrue though they were. She reclined back into her chair.

"Damn idiot," she mumbled. "Serves him right, if you want to know what I think. All storm and ice and junk. Hmph." She shot a calculated look at me. "You're not thinking of going back now." It was not a question.

"How can I not?" I said miserably. "There is no reason for me to remain. Now that I think on it, there was never any reason for me to come in the first place. My work has led me to nothing. I think, perhaps, I would be far better off in the world I know." I contemplated the flames in the fireplace, losing myself in their brightness, their hot beauty. "My world."

Octavia sighed.

"Well now, you know I can't stop you from doing what you think is right. You've always been the stubbornest girl I ever did meet. But let me tell you, if ever I thought you were making a mistake, it would be to leave Hogwarts. Nothing is for certain, you know damn well that's the truth, especially here in a place like this. And maybe even where Snape is concerned."

The sound of his name fueled my resolve.

"I'm leaving for London in the morning," I said firmly. "I'm going back to my old life, my job, my muggle friends, as you call them." The anger was again surfacing. "I'm decided. It will be the only thing that can save me from myself. And nothing you say or Professor Snape says will alter that decision. Nothing. In a few hours' time I'll be back in the world I know, and I will forget all about this place and that. . .horrible man."

Octavia's lips thinned into a straight line as she regarded my words.

We sat in silence for a time.

"What about Penelope?" she asked gently.

"What about her?"

"She won't understand."

"She doesn't need to know," I replied. "No one needs to know."

"She'll think you're abandoning her."

"I'll leave a note."

"I've never known you to be selfish. It's very . . . unbecoming."

"What you regard as selfishness is simply self-preservation."

"You would be a fool to leave now."

"Quite the contrary. I've already been made a fool."

The firelight blazed in Octavia's spectacles as she slowly rose from her chair, her large, black-clad form shadowing me in darkness.

"Have it your way," she said simply. She walked slowly to the door and stopped with her hand on the doorknob before turning to look at me. "You'll be forgetting about me too, then, won't you now?" She absorbed my silence, nodded, then opened the door and stepped into the outer hallway. "But there's one thing I'm sure about."

"And what is that?" I managed to ask. I had to once again restrain myself from sinking into despair as my friend's eyes found mine.

"There's still a few hours left for you here. And anything is possible." Her face, so used to mirth, revealed uncharacteristic sadness. "Whether you believe that or not."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My childhood, I can say with confidence, was completely unremarkable. Aside from the occasional family trip or schoolyard drama, there was very little upheaval. That is not to say that I was unhappy, for my parents were more than kind and attentive, and as their only child, I was often content in my solitude.

On occasion, I would see or hear things that made little sense to my young mind, but I was quick to dismiss them as mere mind tricks or waking dreams. In retrospect, if I had been a more inquisitive, creative child, my life may have been quite different. But I was not.

My parents were spirited and open-minded, and my mother, a dark-eyed beauty from the Basque region, was deeply romantic and prone to daydreams. She would tell me fantastical stories when I was lying abed ill, or when she found me alone on the front steps as I watched London go by. She would press me to take part in fanciful theatrical sketches of her own creation, and, donned in rich and beautiful costumes from her wardrobe, I would fight an imaginary usurper bent on destroying a hapless village, or help rescue an imprisoned princess from a terrible end.

And although I greatly enjoyed these activities for a time, I would soon tire of them and declare to my mother: "This is quite silly. Why should people who have magical wands and such not simply transport themselves elsewhere? Why do they allow a tyrant to bully them? Surely, if they can do magic, they could naturally make the tyrant disappear into thin air."

My mother would sit then, and look at me as though the world's sadness was carried on the shoulders of one woman, and say: "Even their world has rules, Davina, natural laws. If it were not so, there would be no harmony, only chaos. Yes, they may have at their disposal such things that would make one think they could easily do anything, perhaps even save themselves, but it is the individual who carries the ability to make things happen, not a wand or a spell alone. There is great honor in using one's own strength to overcome adversity, one's own undying spirit. Without that. . ." she would then hold out her hand to me and beckon me into her lap. "Without that, well then, that is all such things as wands and spells are . . . just pieces of wood and muttered words. What one does with such things . . . that is the measure of an individual."

"I still think they could do something to defend themselves, something . . . not terrible," I would mutter. "They could turn the tyrant into a large ice lolly, perhaps. Surely that would make everyone happy, then."

My mother would then sigh and slip me off of her lap.

"Well, I can see to where your mind has diverted. Let's go have an ice lolly then, shall we? We shall save the village yet."

And I was quite satisfied with the world.

And then Penelope was born.

Penelope Knight burst into our lives in my 17th year. My parents were beyond delighted, as she was the sibling they had so longed for me to have in my childhood. For my part, I was somewhat perplexed, as I had grown quite used to being the only child in my parents' lives, and was unsure what feelings would surface over this new addition.

But as time passed, I grew to love Penelope as deeply as my parents loved her, and as I was now a young adult, feelings of jealousy that may have been unavoidable in my youth never stirred within me. I watched over her protectively, and was pleased at the amount of joy she gave my parents.

Many times my mother would call to my father across our small, enclosed yard: "Daniel! Come quickly! You must see what she is doing now! It's wonderful!" And my father would scramble to his feet and stride into the house, leaving me to smile into the book I was perusing on the steps.

I was due to go to university the following year, and I spent a great deal of time preparing my materials and inflating my expectations as my parents, more and more often, would bend close to one another and whisper secretively across the room from me. One night I could stand it no longer, and teasingly asked: "What exactly are you two conspiring over there?"

Their reactions were anything but what I had expected: my father sat quite upright and looked at my mother guiltily; my mother simply looked away and into the fire. I set my book down in growing alarm and stood up.

"What is it? Has something happened?"

"No, no," replied my father, "all is well." Then, more sheepishly: "We were discussing the possibility of moving . . . perhaps somewhere in the country. We think it would be best . . .for Penelope."

"Oh," I replied, a bit puzzled.

"We won't move until you are well situated at university, of course," continued my father, "and you shall come out to the country on your holidays, naturally. Penelope would be disappointed if you did not. Your mother and I just think that Penelope would do well to be brought up in the country."

"Why," I asked, "do I get the distinct impression that there is something you are reluctant to tell me?" I willed my mother to look at me, to say something-anything-to put my increasing concern to rest.

She at last rose from her chair and walked toward the stairs.

"I think, Daniel, that it would be best if she saw for herself. We cannot keep it from her forever."

Shooting a questioning glance at my father, I followed my mother up the stairs and into the nursery, where Penelope slept fitfully in her crib. As I approached, however, I noticed that there were several soft lights floating above her; a starry crown floating inches over her head that cast a golden, peaceful light upon her slumbering features.

"What is this? It's very pretty, isn't it? Is it a new toy or something?"

I reached a hand out to touch one of the lights, and my fingers met thin air. I leaned closer, amazed by this new contraption, but still puzzled as to why such a thing would cause my parents to act so oddly. Only when I was very, very close, when my breath stirred Penelope's blonde locks, did I see that it was in actuality a miniature universe. Small, bright planets rotated gently around a central sun, and infinitesimal bits of light shot off through the surrounding space like sparks; a flea's cosmos.

"Wherever did you find this?" I whispered, entranced. "It's the most amazing thing I've ever seen." I slowly spread my fingers and attempted to gather the matter into my hand, as though strumming a spider's web, only to have my fingers again pass through it blindly.

"We didn't find it," said my mother's voice from behind me. "She . . .created it."

"Come on, don't have a laugh now. Seriously, where did it come from?" I gazed down on Penelope, watching the lights project shadows on her eyelids, her cheeks.

My mother sighed, and I felt her warm hand on my shoulder.

"Davina, don't you see? Those games we played when you were young, they were not truly games. It was my way of expressing something to you, my way of bringing . . .something out in you that I and your father share, and that we hoped you shared as well. Something magical. Something-"

I abruptly turned to look at her. Her face was a picture of sorrow. And yet I detected a certain excitement dancing in the depths her eyes. Madness?

"What are you about?" I asked, backing away from the crib. "What are you saying?"

My mother looked warily at my father for a moment, then pulled a polished stick from her skirt pocket. As I watched, aghast, she approached the crib silently and pointed the end of the stick at the floating stars. They began to swirl more rapidly, faster and faster, until they formed a brilliant wheel of light over the crib. Then, to my utter astonishment, the wheel burst open to emit dozens of goldfish, swirling in gauzy, translucent fins of light, that floated out and swam into the darkened corners of the room and landed like warm kisses over my arms and head before dissolving into nothing.

"Magic," my mother said simply, as though that one word explained life's deepest mysteries.

"What? I don't understand!" I cried. "What is this?"

"Your mother and I wanted to tell you, Davina," interjected my father, "but when it was apparent that you were not . . .magically inclined, we decided it was best to simply raise you as normally as possible. We kept it from you, not out of meanness, but out of love. We wanted you to have a life free of confusion, free of persecution, free of hurt. We wanted you to have friends that were like you, to live in a world that you understood."

I stood in the nursery, open-mouthed and dumbfounded.

"You are nearly a grown woman now," my mother said gently, "and you have a right to know, to make your own decisions about these matters. As Penelope grows up, we want her to be able to cultivate her abilities in an environment that encourages such a thing. That is why we are taking her out of London; we don't want her to be afraid of being who she is."

She reached forward and took my limp hand into hers. I looked back at her, unseeing.

"Please forgive us for keeping it from you, my love. We never meant to hurt you, you must believe that. Our greatest wish is that you will accept us, accept what we have told you, and understand that magic is an integral part of our lives; it has always been a part of yours, though you never saw it."

"But . . .but. . ." I stammered, attempting to find some sanity in the lunacy that surrounded me. "But that can't be! Magic simply doesn't exist!" I cried. "Do you hear me? It doesn't exist!"