Omninihil
Odelia dreamed that she was in a meadow of blue-green grass. A trio of magnificent ebony swans sailed through the peaceful sky. As they winged their way across the expanse of blue, they declared in surprisingly human voices, "Hogwarts letters! Hogwarts letters! Hogwarts letters!" With each exclamation a flower sprouted from the ground, forming a ring of color around Odelia. "Hogwarts letters! Hogwarts letters!"
"Hogwarts letters!" Odelia slid out of slumber to realize that her waking ears heard the same phrase. The young witch hurtled out of bed and stumbled down the stairs of her home - nine eight seven six five four three two one - to find, far from black swans, her parents and sister, with a tawny owl hovering nearby. The three humans were clustered around the round stone table, poring over the contents of an envelope. An identical envelope rested, unopened, near Odelia's father's left arm. Odelia lunged toward the table to snatch at the latter envelope.
"What, no good morning?" her father teased. "Or do they not say that in the Roman Empire?" He gestured to the sheet that was still tangled, toga-like, around Odelia's scrawny form. Odelia tossed aside the envelope addressed to "Odelia Delwin, The Western Room, 37 Magpie Lane" and sorted through the standard acceptance form and list of supplies to grasp a smaller piece of parchment. Bright hazel eyes scanned the spidery writing with the easy movement of a speed-reader. Odelia suddenly grinned and punched the air in triumph, still holding the piece of parchment.
"Yes! Aura can come if she stays with the gamekeeper!" The note fluttered out of Odelia's hand as she dashed toward a catlike creature sitting by the fireplace, leaving her mother to retrieve the papers. "D'you hear that, Aura? You can come to Hogwarts with me!" The child's small hand moved instinctively to the spot between her pet's big ears. Aura, a reddish Kneazle, purred and twitched her whiskers.
"Aren't you even going to read the letter?" inquired the older girl seated at the table. Odette had the same hazel eyes and dark-with-hints-of-red hair as her younger sister, though her skin was rosier and her features less elfin. Odelia shrugged in disinterest, her cheek resting against Aura's back. She had shed the sheet somewhere on the floor, adding to the comfortable messiness of the room. Lulled by Aura's rhythmic purring, Odelia closed her eyes and sighed sleepily.
"Oh, no you don't!" Mrs. Delwin stood commandingly over Odelia and Aura. "Breakfast." Odelia grumbled and allowed herself to be led to the table; she had learned after eleven years that when it came to breakfast, resistance was futile.
"Sign my permission slip for Hogsmeade?" Odette asked her father. He nodded amiably and scrawled his signature on the slip, smiling fondly at his eldest child. Odelia gazed moodily at their cereal; her parents were always so proud of their swan princess. Mrs. Delwin had long ago told her daughters the story of the ballet that had inspired their names: Odette was the beautiful princess transformed into a swan; Odile (a form of Odelia) was the evil magician's daughter and accomplice. They might as well have given us shirts saying 'Favorite' and 'Reject,' Odelia mused bitterly.
"What's wrong, dear? Why aren't you eating?" Odelia didn't reply to her mother's query but spooned cereal into her mouth absently. "We'll have to go buy your textbooks from Diagon Alley," Mara Delwin continued, reaching into her pocket for her notorious List.
Odelia shook her head, sending dark hair flying. "I can just use Odette's old ones, and I already have a wand." Unlike most wizarding children, who bought their wands just before beginning their magical education, Odette and Odelia owned wands that had been in the family for several generations.
Mara, an authoritative-looking witch whose dark scowls had been known to quell several unruly subordinates, raised a thin eyebrow. "Are you sure? They're probably quite shabby." Odelia gave another indifferent shrug, finishing the last of her cereal. In her opinion, shabby books were comforting signs that storms could be weathered. Mrs. Delwin pursed her lips, gazing contemplatively at her second child. "I just don't understand why you never want to buy new things." Before Odelia had the obligatory chance to explain, which she seldom used, her mother added "Well, Odette needs new things, so we'll be going anyway."
Odelia sighed and stood, shoving her chair away from the table despite its groans of protest. She grabbed her empty bowl in one hand, pushed the chair back into position with the other and offered her spare arm to the owl that had brought the Hogwarts letter. After putting her bowl in the sink, she headed out the door.
"Where are you going?" chorused Mr. and Mrs. Delwin.
"Feeding the owls," Odelia called, letting the door swing shut behind her and her passenger. A brief grin crossed her face as she heard her mother complain about young witches who had the temerity to go outside in their nightgowns.
A few steps brought Odelia to her home's small Owlery. She slipped through the door into the dim, quiet space that housed the family's three owls. "Good morning Sherwin, Ashwin, Darwin," she greeted them in a hushed voice, setting the guest owl onto a spare perch. With practiced hands she measured out food for each of them, including the guest. "Feel free to go back to Hogwarts when you're done," she told the last one. "Safe journey."
"Odelia!" Odelia would have recognized her father's half-yodeling call anywhere. After waving quickly to the owls she started back for the house. "Come here and get some proper clothes on!" The voice was her father's, but Odelia was sure that the command had come from Mrs. Delwin. A family friend had once commented that Mara Delwin "wore the pants in the family" and Odelia knew it to be true. Barely pausing to notify her parents that she was back, Odelia galloped up the stairs - one two three four five six seven eight nine - and prepared herself for the day.
---
Aura entered Odelia's room half an hour later to find its occupant perched in front of the large oval mirror on the side of the room opposite the window. A habit that began when she was under the Pinocchius Charm, Odelia examined her face in the mirror each day to make sure that it hadn't changed overnight. Aura wound herself around Odelia's feet, shedding liberally.
Odelia's reflection was the same as usual. At age eleven, her face still had the normal roundness of childhood, though not in excess. Smooth, sallow skin interrupted by the occasional birthmark stretched across this face, darkening at the lips that were more mobile than wide. Large hazel eyes with a slight slant to them and a sparkle that spoke of an intense nature, wide-set and framed by the expressive eyebrows that were a legacy of Mrs. Delwin. A few golden freckles smattered themselves over the tiny, almost-tilted nose. High-set ears and a pointed chin gave Odelia an elfin appearance, adding surprising strength to such a young face. Finally, black-brown hair with hints of red hung like curtains around the back of the girl's head. A few strands were tucked firmly behind her ears but managed to stick out like tiny wings. Odelia stared into herself, four pools of brown-brackish water, green algae and glints of golden sunlight, childlike innocence mixed with bitter wisdom.
"Considering an anti-freckle charm then?" questioned the mirror, which had a frame of blue stained glass. Its indolent voice continued, like water rolling over stones. "And then perhaps you could charm a bit of pink into those cheeks, more like your sister's."
Odelia's serenity shattered into red-hot crystals of pain. Her fists clenched and she glared, but what could she do to a mirror? "I like my face just the way it is," she whispered in a voice trembling with rage. "I like myself just the way I am. Talk about changing me again and you're out of this room for good." Aura rubbed her head against Odelia's ankle soothingly. Breaking the bond between herself and her mirror-self, Odelia crouched next to her pet, twining thin fingers in warm fur.
"Some people," sniffed the mirror, but it was experienced enough to sniff softly.
---
"May I go into Flourish and Blott's while you buy Odette's supplies?" Odelia requested, speaking loudly to be heard above the bustle of Diagon Alley. Mr. Delwin gave a thumbs-up as Mrs. Delwin consulted the List, a scroll of parchment, which was clinging to her wand. Odelia wove her way through the crowd, taking the quickest possible route to the bookshop. Dodge the flying stroller, duck the owl pellet, hop over the puddle, and - safe at last - Flourish and Blott's.
There she performed her familiar ritual: look at each book in the window and guess what it's about. Look at each person and guess what he or she is doing. Some of these were no-brainers; Quidditch Through the Ages was obviously about Quidditch, and the bookseller was, of course, selling books. The young people gathered around the front of the store were likely Hogwarts students, and the curly-haired man singing about an octopus's garden had to be the parent of a Muggle-born student.
"I just got my wand," a tall boy declared. "It's oak with phoenix feather, just like my father's."
"Mine's maple with a unicorn hair - it was so long they had to fold it in half!" The girl who owned this wand had a note of pride in her voice.
Odelia thought of her own wand in a velvet-lined case at 37 Magpie Lane. It had belonged to her great-aunt, a delicate-looking woman with a will of steel. Odelia was reminded of Aunt Miranda each time she ran a finger across the smooth, silvery surface of tapering white pine or inhaled its invigorating scent. Nobody knew what was inside the wand; it hadn't been crafted by Ollivander but by a Ukrainian wandmaker. The base was certainly heavier than the top; Odelia was of the opinion that it contained magical seeds or jewels.
"Hey, kid, are you going in or just blocking the way?"
Odelia whirled to face an older girl in a green cloak, hand on hip, waves of auburn hair cascading down her back. With knee-high boots and a gold chain circling her forehead, all she needed was a sword to look like something out of Tolkien (Crandall Delwin encouraged his children to read Muggle books). Then again, due to the impatient look on her face, this was not someone Odelia wanted to arm.
"Sorry. I'll move." Odelia scrambled aside with a polite nod, ingrained by years of etiquette training. The cloaked girl looked amused and entered the bookshop, heading for what appeared to be the history section. Probably checking out How to Be Medieval In A Week, thought Odelia without malice. She let out a wide but quiet yawn and ran her eyes over the crowd. No sign of the Delwin entourage; Odelia took advantage of the opportunity to duck into the bookshop.
Once inside, she took a deep breath and her stiff-as-a-ramrod posture, another result of her parents' instruction, relaxed slightly. Places full of books always had that effect on the youngest Delwin. With a slight smile, she ambled over to the magical creatures section. Her eyes sparkled as she spotted a book full of pictures of dragons in their natural habitats. Lifting the hardcover with a small grunt, she moved to a sunlit corner and proceeded to gaze into the eyes of a Romanian Longhorn, which snorted a slight puff of smoke at her.
Several amazing dragons later, Odelia felt a tap on her shoulder. She tilted her head upward to see the smiling face of Odette. Younger sister raised an eyebrow at the elder, who clarified "It's time to go. Are you going to buy that?" Odelia stroked the snout of a Welsh Green before shutting the book and nodding an affirmative. The sisters joined their parents at the checkout line, where Mara tapped the List with her wand to magically check off each item while Crandall browsed the bestsellers. Odelia handed The Splendor of Dragons to her father, eyes still locked on the Swedish Short-Snouts that soared across the cover.
"Yes, Odette's a third year," Mrs. Delwin addressed another customer. "Hufflepuff's best Chaser already, or that's what the team captain says. Odelia is starting this year." Odelia wondered what her mother would say in two years. Odelia's a Ravenclaw; people say she'll be Head Girl. Odelia's a Slytherin; all of her teachers like her. Odelia's a Gryffindor; she's the best in the dueling club. Or Odelia's a Hufflepuff too. Mr. Delwin finished paying for Odelia's book and Mrs. Delwin signaled for the List to curl around her wand. "Let's go, girls; you want to get a good night's rest for the train ride tomorrow." Yes, thought Odelia, that's the one thing I want most in the world.
---
Odelia dreamed that she was in a meadow of blue-green grass. A trio of magnificent ebony swans sailed through the peaceful sky. As they winged their way across the expanse of blue, they declared in surprisingly human voices, "Hogwarts letters! Hogwarts letters! Hogwarts letters!" With each exclamation a flower sprouted from the ground, forming a ring of color around Odelia. "Hogwarts letters! Hogwarts letters!"
"Hogwarts letters!" Odelia slid out of slumber to realize that her waking ears heard the same phrase. The young witch hurtled out of bed and stumbled down the stairs of her home - nine eight seven six five four three two one - to find, far from black swans, her parents and sister, with a tawny owl hovering nearby. The three humans were clustered around the round stone table, poring over the contents of an envelope. An identical envelope rested, unopened, near Odelia's father's left arm. Odelia lunged toward the table to snatch at the latter envelope.
"What, no good morning?" her father teased. "Or do they not say that in the Roman Empire?" He gestured to the sheet that was still tangled, toga-like, around Odelia's scrawny form. Odelia tossed aside the envelope addressed to "Odelia Delwin, The Western Room, 37 Magpie Lane" and sorted through the standard acceptance form and list of supplies to grasp a smaller piece of parchment. Bright hazel eyes scanned the spidery writing with the easy movement of a speed-reader. Odelia suddenly grinned and punched the air in triumph, still holding the piece of parchment.
"Yes! Aura can come if she stays with the gamekeeper!" The note fluttered out of Odelia's hand as she dashed toward a catlike creature sitting by the fireplace, leaving her mother to retrieve the papers. "D'you hear that, Aura? You can come to Hogwarts with me!" The child's small hand moved instinctively to the spot between her pet's big ears. Aura, a reddish Kneazle, purred and twitched her whiskers.
"Aren't you even going to read the letter?" inquired the older girl seated at the table. Odette had the same hazel eyes and dark-with-hints-of-red hair as her younger sister, though her skin was rosier and her features less elfin. Odelia shrugged in disinterest, her cheek resting against Aura's back. She had shed the sheet somewhere on the floor, adding to the comfortable messiness of the room. Lulled by Aura's rhythmic purring, Odelia closed her eyes and sighed sleepily.
"Oh, no you don't!" Mrs. Delwin stood commandingly over Odelia and Aura. "Breakfast." Odelia grumbled and allowed herself to be led to the table; she had learned after eleven years that when it came to breakfast, resistance was futile.
"Sign my permission slip for Hogsmeade?" Odette asked her father. He nodded amiably and scrawled his signature on the slip, smiling fondly at his eldest child. Odelia gazed moodily at their cereal; her parents were always so proud of their swan princess. Mrs. Delwin had long ago told her daughters the story of the ballet that had inspired their names: Odette was the beautiful princess transformed into a swan; Odile (a form of Odelia) was the evil magician's daughter and accomplice. They might as well have given us shirts saying 'Favorite' and 'Reject,' Odelia mused bitterly.
"What's wrong, dear? Why aren't you eating?" Odelia didn't reply to her mother's query but spooned cereal into her mouth absently. "We'll have to go buy your textbooks from Diagon Alley," Mara Delwin continued, reaching into her pocket for her notorious List.
Odelia shook her head, sending dark hair flying. "I can just use Odette's old ones, and I already have a wand." Unlike most wizarding children, who bought their wands just before beginning their magical education, Odette and Odelia owned wands that had been in the family for several generations.
Mara, an authoritative-looking witch whose dark scowls had been known to quell several unruly subordinates, raised a thin eyebrow. "Are you sure? They're probably quite shabby." Odelia gave another indifferent shrug, finishing the last of her cereal. In her opinion, shabby books were comforting signs that storms could be weathered. Mrs. Delwin pursed her lips, gazing contemplatively at her second child. "I just don't understand why you never want to buy new things." Before Odelia had the obligatory chance to explain, which she seldom used, her mother added "Well, Odette needs new things, so we'll be going anyway."
Odelia sighed and stood, shoving her chair away from the table despite its groans of protest. She grabbed her empty bowl in one hand, pushed the chair back into position with the other and offered her spare arm to the owl that had brought the Hogwarts letter. After putting her bowl in the sink, she headed out the door.
"Where are you going?" chorused Mr. and Mrs. Delwin.
"Feeding the owls," Odelia called, letting the door swing shut behind her and her passenger. A brief grin crossed her face as she heard her mother complain about young witches who had the temerity to go outside in their nightgowns.
A few steps brought Odelia to her home's small Owlery. She slipped through the door into the dim, quiet space that housed the family's three owls. "Good morning Sherwin, Ashwin, Darwin," she greeted them in a hushed voice, setting the guest owl onto a spare perch. With practiced hands she measured out food for each of them, including the guest. "Feel free to go back to Hogwarts when you're done," she told the last one. "Safe journey."
"Odelia!" Odelia would have recognized her father's half-yodeling call anywhere. After waving quickly to the owls she started back for the house. "Come here and get some proper clothes on!" The voice was her father's, but Odelia was sure that the command had come from Mrs. Delwin. A family friend had once commented that Mara Delwin "wore the pants in the family" and Odelia knew it to be true. Barely pausing to notify her parents that she was back, Odelia galloped up the stairs - one two three four five six seven eight nine - and prepared herself for the day.
---
Aura entered Odelia's room half an hour later to find its occupant perched in front of the large oval mirror on the side of the room opposite the window. A habit that began when she was under the Pinocchius Charm, Odelia examined her face in the mirror each day to make sure that it hadn't changed overnight. Aura wound herself around Odelia's feet, shedding liberally.
Odelia's reflection was the same as usual. At age eleven, her face still had the normal roundness of childhood, though not in excess. Smooth, sallow skin interrupted by the occasional birthmark stretched across this face, darkening at the lips that were more mobile than wide. Large hazel eyes with a slight slant to them and a sparkle that spoke of an intense nature, wide-set and framed by the expressive eyebrows that were a legacy of Mrs. Delwin. A few golden freckles smattered themselves over the tiny, almost-tilted nose. High-set ears and a pointed chin gave Odelia an elfin appearance, adding surprising strength to such a young face. Finally, black-brown hair with hints of red hung like curtains around the back of the girl's head. A few strands were tucked firmly behind her ears but managed to stick out like tiny wings. Odelia stared into herself, four pools of brown-brackish water, green algae and glints of golden sunlight, childlike innocence mixed with bitter wisdom.
"Considering an anti-freckle charm then?" questioned the mirror, which had a frame of blue stained glass. Its indolent voice continued, like water rolling over stones. "And then perhaps you could charm a bit of pink into those cheeks, more like your sister's."
Odelia's serenity shattered into red-hot crystals of pain. Her fists clenched and she glared, but what could she do to a mirror? "I like my face just the way it is," she whispered in a voice trembling with rage. "I like myself just the way I am. Talk about changing me again and you're out of this room for good." Aura rubbed her head against Odelia's ankle soothingly. Breaking the bond between herself and her mirror-self, Odelia crouched next to her pet, twining thin fingers in warm fur.
"Some people," sniffed the mirror, but it was experienced enough to sniff softly.
---
"May I go into Flourish and Blott's while you buy Odette's supplies?" Odelia requested, speaking loudly to be heard above the bustle of Diagon Alley. Mr. Delwin gave a thumbs-up as Mrs. Delwin consulted the List, a scroll of parchment, which was clinging to her wand. Odelia wove her way through the crowd, taking the quickest possible route to the bookshop. Dodge the flying stroller, duck the owl pellet, hop over the puddle, and - safe at last - Flourish and Blott's.
There she performed her familiar ritual: look at each book in the window and guess what it's about. Look at each person and guess what he or she is doing. Some of these were no-brainers; Quidditch Through the Ages was obviously about Quidditch, and the bookseller was, of course, selling books. The young people gathered around the front of the store were likely Hogwarts students, and the curly-haired man singing about an octopus's garden had to be the parent of a Muggle-born student.
"I just got my wand," a tall boy declared. "It's oak with phoenix feather, just like my father's."
"Mine's maple with a unicorn hair - it was so long they had to fold it in half!" The girl who owned this wand had a note of pride in her voice.
Odelia thought of her own wand in a velvet-lined case at 37 Magpie Lane. It had belonged to her great-aunt, a delicate-looking woman with a will of steel. Odelia was reminded of Aunt Miranda each time she ran a finger across the smooth, silvery surface of tapering white pine or inhaled its invigorating scent. Nobody knew what was inside the wand; it hadn't been crafted by Ollivander but by a Ukrainian wandmaker. The base was certainly heavier than the top; Odelia was of the opinion that it contained magical seeds or jewels.
"Hey, kid, are you going in or just blocking the way?"
Odelia whirled to face an older girl in a green cloak, hand on hip, waves of auburn hair cascading down her back. With knee-high boots and a gold chain circling her forehead, all she needed was a sword to look like something out of Tolkien (Crandall Delwin encouraged his children to read Muggle books). Then again, due to the impatient look on her face, this was not someone Odelia wanted to arm.
"Sorry. I'll move." Odelia scrambled aside with a polite nod, ingrained by years of etiquette training. The cloaked girl looked amused and entered the bookshop, heading for what appeared to be the history section. Probably checking out How to Be Medieval In A Week, thought Odelia without malice. She let out a wide but quiet yawn and ran her eyes over the crowd. No sign of the Delwin entourage; Odelia took advantage of the opportunity to duck into the bookshop.
Once inside, she took a deep breath and her stiff-as-a-ramrod posture, another result of her parents' instruction, relaxed slightly. Places full of books always had that effect on the youngest Delwin. With a slight smile, she ambled over to the magical creatures section. Her eyes sparkled as she spotted a book full of pictures of dragons in their natural habitats. Lifting the hardcover with a small grunt, she moved to a sunlit corner and proceeded to gaze into the eyes of a Romanian Longhorn, which snorted a slight puff of smoke at her.
Several amazing dragons later, Odelia felt a tap on her shoulder. She tilted her head upward to see the smiling face of Odette. Younger sister raised an eyebrow at the elder, who clarified "It's time to go. Are you going to buy that?" Odelia stroked the snout of a Welsh Green before shutting the book and nodding an affirmative. The sisters joined their parents at the checkout line, where Mara tapped the List with her wand to magically check off each item while Crandall browsed the bestsellers. Odelia handed The Splendor of Dragons to her father, eyes still locked on the Swedish Short-Snouts that soared across the cover.
"Yes, Odette's a third year," Mrs. Delwin addressed another customer. "Hufflepuff's best Chaser already, or that's what the team captain says. Odelia is starting this year." Odelia wondered what her mother would say in two years. Odelia's a Ravenclaw; people say she'll be Head Girl. Odelia's a Slytherin; all of her teachers like her. Odelia's a Gryffindor; she's the best in the dueling club. Or Odelia's a Hufflepuff too. Mr. Delwin finished paying for Odelia's book and Mrs. Delwin signaled for the List to curl around her wand. "Let's go, girls; you want to get a good night's rest for the train ride tomorrow." Yes, thought Odelia, that's the one thing I want most in the world.
---