The Years that Passed
Elizabeth Taylor was never told about the magical world of witchcraft and wizardry when she was growing up. Her parents didn't trust the magical community at all with the regards of protecting their daughter. You see, Elizabeth Taylor was 14 years old and, unknown to her, she was a witch. Her parents were muggles and even though they did not discriminate against the magical community they had heard terrible goings-on at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. First off, one of the teachers turned out to have You-Know-Who attached to the back of his head, the second was that there had been a basilisk using the piping system to move around the school and petrify all the muggle borns in the school and to top it all off the beast belonged to You-Know-Who himself. And finally, last year a highly sort out criminal, Sirius Black, had been able to get into the school without any of the teachers knowing how it came about. All in all, Hogwarts didn't have the right background that Elizabeth's parents thought fit to send their child.
However, the headmaster of the school, Albus Dumbledore, had another opinion altogether. He always sent letters on Elizabeth's birthday in hopes to get her enrolled at Hogwarts. Every year, however, her parents would rip them into shreds and ignore the letters. Sometimes Elizabeth would see one or two of the letters but she would never question them; she knew that her parents were ripping those letters up for a good reason, even if she didn't know what those reasons were.
So, as you can imagine, it came as a very big shock to Elizabeth's parents the day she turned 14 when she came downstairs with a Hogwarts enrolment letter in her hand and a look that screamed bloody murder sketched all over her face. Elizabeth was usually always calm and collective when it came to situations but this situation obviously was the last straw.
"How could you have kept something like this from me!?" She asked, the letter screwed up in her hand tightly.
"Darling, you don't know what dangers lay at that school. We've heard nothing but bad things about it and we don't want to put you in danger." Her Father tried to soothe her, "How did you end up getting that letter?"
"A bloody owl was rapping at my window to get my attention and when I opened my window it dropped this on my bed! Owls at daylight! Well, at least it wasn't the shock that I got when I opened up this letter. I'm a witch now! No wonder why all the kids stayed away from me at school when I couldn't explain why I could make objects move and accidently hurt people without touching them." Elizabeth rambled on, growing angrier with every sentence.
"We were going to explain to you, love, but we didn't want to scare you. We were going to wait until you were 18 to let you know so that you could decide for yourself whether or not you would want to be part of that world." Her Mother explained to her.
"This isn't an election, Mum! It's who I am. You can't just decide to keep these things away from me and expect me to be able to choose between what I have been all my life to what I truly am. I'm sorry, but that is just plain stupidity." Elizabeth suddenly stopped, aware of what she had just said.
"It's quite alright, dear. We knew that you would be mad with us when you eventually found out and I understand your logic on this situation. Let us just explain the reasons why we kept this information from you." Her Mother said, looking at Elizabeth expectantly.
It took awhile for Elizabeth to regain her self control but in the end she nodded and sat down in her favourite comfy armchair next to the fire place. Her parents explained the back history of the school and the events that had been going on in the previous years and how people like themselves had been affected by the events.
"You see, honey, the reasons why we don't want you to go are valid. We're not saying that we hate wizards and witches because we know that there are great ones out there but with the events that are happening and the fact that people like us are being affected by them we feel that the magical community is becoming even more powerful and dangerous than the last time that magical events affected people like us." Her Mother explained, smiling sadly at the memories.
"What other events?" Elizabeth asked keenly, trying to learn everything about this new world that she had never known.
"You'll learn about those soon enough. We don't want to bear you with too much information." Her Father told her hurriedly, looking at her Mother with pleading eyes.
"Why can't I be told? I'll be going into that world with no knowledge of what has happened before and people will think I'm an idiot for not knowing about their past." Elizabeth whined.
"No you won't. Even Harry Potter didn't know what his past was until he got told he was the most famous wizard of the century." Her Mother smiled at her.
"Harry Potter? Who's he?" Elizabeth asked, intrigued by the name.
"Mary, I don't think we should go into the past of Harry Potter. Elizabeth will be wondering how we know this much stuff about the magical community without talking about him. In fact, I'm wondering why she hasn't asked that exact question." Her Father enquired, looking at Elizabeth curiously.
"Well, sorry, but I've just been too immersed in the information that you've been telling me about a world I don't know to wonder how exactly you know about it but now that you've put that into context; how do you know about this world if you're not magical yourselves?" Elizabeth asked.
"Well, you're great-grandmother on your Mother's side was a witch and their family was intent that her child, your grandmother would be a witch too but, unfortunately, she became a squib. A squib is someone who is a wizard or witch but they have no use of their magical powers. Needless to say your grandmother's family was very disappointed in her and then the expectation came down onto your Mother. However, she turned out to be a muggle; a non-magical person. We thought that all the magic had gone out of the family until you came into the world. It took us a few months to figure out if you were a witch or not but when strange things started happening around the house such as when things kept going inexplicably missing then we knew straight away that you were a witch." Her Father smiled at her.
"So you're happy about me being a witch but you're not happy with me going to school?" Elizabeth questioned him.
"You must have understood our reasoning, Elizabeth. That school is dangerous but if you want to go and you know the consequences of going then we'll let you go in September." Her Father sighed, feeling defeated.
"Of course I want to go. It's where I belong and where I always will belong." Elizabeth said, defiantly.
Her Father looked over to her Mother and her Mother nodded while saying to Elizabeth, "Well, if you're sure dear then you best send that letter back with your answer. Just put it on the leg of the owl that sent it to you and it will go straight back to Hogwarts."
As Elizabeth went upstairs to complete that task she couldn't help but thinking that Hogwarts was a very strange name to call a school.
