Authors Note: Just quickly, 2 things. One, this chapter may be quite confusing, but it was hard to write. In the coming chapters it should get more understandable. Oh also, in the coming chapters I will put a link up to a website where you can view pictures of the characters! Won't that be nifty!
Read on…and review!
PrologueThe sound of feet running down the long corridor was painfully loud, due to the almost eerie silence that had befallen Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry over the seemingly never ending summer two years after the rising of the dark lord Voldemort had been announced. It was to be expected however, because the Prophecies did not lie, and the Prophecies had predicted the war between two great wizards.
As Professor Dumbledore, headmaster of the school sat caught up in his thoughts in his office; he knew that the war had started already. Or rather, the second wave of the war. Voldemort had lain silent for over six months now, and as much as Dumbledore hated to admit it, he had absolutely no clue as to what his former pupil, Tom Riddle, or rather, Lord Voldemort, had in plan for not only the wizarding world, but for the muggle world as well. And he feared that, because normally he had at least somewhat of a clue as to what he could expect from the talented, yet evil man. But now, as the time of the climax of the war drew nearer, Dumbledore was no wiser than any muggle in the city of London, where unexplainable killings were taking place. He simply had no idea in the least what to expect. Well, he did know something; he knew that Voldemort had waited for his arch nemesis, and counterpart to The Prophecy, Harry Potter, to be in his seventh, and final year at Hogwarts. Dumbledore did not understand this move, but he knew it to be true.
As the sounds of footsteps ended outside his office door, Professor Dumbledore glanced up to meet the weary eyes of one of his most trusted teachers, Professor McGonagall. Her grey hair which usually sat neatly in a bun on her head, now stood out at every angle imaginable to man, and her normally straight, strict looking features were muddled with those of anger, fear and confusion. Like most of the staff at Hogwarts, she had not slept for quite a while now. She did not even pause at the doorway, like she usually did, but walked straight into the room and collapsed on the chair in front of Dumbledore's table.
"It is," She spoke quietly, her eyes glancing away from the face of the man she was talking too, "As you feared. The Dark Lord has found out about the girl."
Professor Dumbledore took a sharp intake of air. He had hoped it would not come to this, he hoped that the identity, even the bare knowledge of the girl would have remained a secret between himself, Rosie Malvagita, the mother of the girl, and Professor McGonagall, whom Dumbledore had confided in only six years before.
"The Prophecy does not lie then," He spoke, his blue eyes not even blinking as he stared at the teacher in front of him, "Liana is the one then."
"Is it not strange," Professor McGonagall spoke up, after only a moment's silence, "That the Prophecy can speak of a child with the power to end this war? I know, Albus, that the Prophecy uncovered two years ago concerning Harry being connected to Lord Voldemort is the way this war will end, but the fact that their destiny is linked into that of another child, least, a muggle child?"
Despite the situation, Albus Dumbledore felt a huge smile spread across his face. Yes, he was most definitely proud of the linking between the two prophecies, no matter how saddening they were,
"Ah Minerva, you bring up quite a good point, a point I was hoping somebody would pick up upon. True, Harry and Lord Voldemort's prophecy read that neither can exist in the world while the other still breathes, and that in the end one will have to die, killed by the hand, or wand, of the other. But the genius in it all is, that neither can accomplish this feat without knowing the destiny of the girl, Liana, for she is a key factor in the destruction of one of the wizards. Liana, my dear friend, once she has gained the knowledge about who she is, has the ability to be more powerful than Lord Voldemort and Harry, and which way she chooses to use her power will determine the outcome of which soul will perish."
A silence overtook the office; even the men and women in the various paintings were yet to take in the monstrous amount of information Professor Dumbledore had just spoken about. Professor McGonagall stared at the elderly wizard in front of her, and although is facial features did not show it, she knew he was afraid of the inevitable war, no matter how well he managed to mask it. She was dying to ask the many questions that plagued her mind, but as she opened her mouth, she was unable to put even one of those questions into words. She sat there, in complete silence, while Dumbledore simply smiled at her utter bewilderment with the situation, before she finally managing to ask the one question she wanted to know the most,
"How is it that a muggle child will be able to demonstrate such power and that no one in the wizarding world has picked up on it? Surely such power would be recognised!"
Professor Dumbledore did not even blink, for he had been expecting the question. He simply took a small sip of the drink sitting to his left, before beginning to speak,
"If it does not make sense now, Minerva, in the near future it will all come to light, but for now I am afraid you misunderstood the prophecy. It speaks of a muggle child and immediately we come to think of the wonderful people who live outside the world of magic, and have no magical capabilities what so ever. There are some, my friend, some muggles that do not even know they have the power, and even though there is some inkling that they may be different, that they may be special, they choose to discard it, to destroy it within them. Those are the forgotten wizards. Then there are those who have had their power stripped from their very being, until the one who has stripped them, chooses to give the power back. Upon the birth of Liana, her powers were stripped of her for her own safety, and she was placed in the muggle world to grow up away from her destiny, until it was time. For you see Minerva, her mother died in childbirth and did not get the chance to tell the father of the pregnancy, and if the father was to have known, the world we know today probably would not exist, as Liana's father was Tom Riddle."
Her bedroom was masked with darkness, with only the tiniest bit of light shining in through the crack underneath her door. She sat, quite comfortably, on the carpeted floor in the centre of her bedroom, her eyes shut. Her mind was filled with the wonderful sounds of the music blasting through her CD player, and as the lyrics to her favourite song, Wonderwall, by Oasis filled her mind she was able to ignore the sounds of her parents fighting in the room next to hers. She had been sitting in her darkened room for almost an hour now, trying to block out her parent's angry voices as they spat words of hatred at each other. In all her sixteen years of being alive, Liana could not remember a time when her parents had not fought. Sometimes, she knew they fought about her, and why she had not turned out the way they had hoped, and who was to blame for that. Liana had learnt to block out their words of disgust as they raved on about how she acted more like a boy than she did a girl, and how it was her mother's fault for allowing her to wear such clothes, which definitely must have been the cause of the problem. Well, that is what her father reckoned anyway.
"Just because I don't prance about in skirts that have the width of a belt and a top that may as well be not there at all flirting with every sleazy guy I meet and sleeping with a new guy each night does not make me a total and utter reject!" Liana had screamed at her father only a week or so earlier, when he had given her his disapproving look at her trademark baggy pants and white, old t-shirt, "I am who I am, no one can change that. If you took away the clothes I still would not be the perfect daughter you envisioned. So…get…over…it!"
As she had yelled at him, inside she felt no guilt, no sympathy for the man in front of her, because she knew he didn't love her. Nor did he even want to try. No, to him she was not a daughter, but a girl who simply did not belong. Instead he focused all of his attention onto his beautiful twin daughters, Blaire and Morgan who, although they were only just turned eleven, were already starting down the right track in their father's eye. Blaire and Morgan, the brown haired beauties, were very clever though, because they only showed their father what they knew he wanted to see. Liana knew the truth of her sisters though; she knew they hated the perfect daughters their father wanted. Quite like herself, the twins just wanted to be themselves, but around their parents they were forbidden in doing so. Instead of showing their bubbly, jokester personalities, the twins behaved as they were expected to do so in their fathers presence, and they very much hated doing so. Liana and her sisters were quite close, as weird as that may be, but the three got along well, almost as though they were friends instead of family, and so each knew quite well, the others.
So tonight was no different, as Liana sat alone in her bedroom. She knew in the neighbouring room, her sisters were also trying to block out the sound. It had been like this every night for the past week, fighting all day, all night. Whenever the topic about school came up, the fights would begin again. All because of two stupid letters that had come through the mail for Blaire and Morgan.
"Witches!" Her father had screamed, his face going a bright red, "What kind of a stupid prank is this?"
Blaire and Morgan had stood their faces blank faced as their father raved on about stupid practical jokes, while their mother had visibly paled.
Anita Chisholm was a beautiful woman; there was definitely no denying that. Her brown her fell messily onto her shoulders, and her bright green eyes shone out like little light bulbs, but as she sat at the breakfast table after receiving the letters, her eyes had widened until the point they could open no more, and her face had lost all it's colour. Liana had watched her mother throughout that time, and was most curious to know why the letters had had such an effect. Before she had even the chance to ask her mother if she felt okay, Anita spoke up.
"Robert dear," She had spoken ever so quietly, which was a huge contrast to the normal yelling she did, "The letters are no joke. Hogwarts is a fine school, and we are lucky that Blaire and Morgan were chosen to go there."
Silence had befallen the Chisholm family after that announcement; even Liana was silent in shock. She didn't even believe in witches and wizards. Blaire had been the first one to recover from the shock, and although at that time she did not know the implications of her question, she spoke up loud and clear.
"How do you know that mum?"
Anita's colouring definitely came back after that, and it was like her confidence was suddenly handed back to her on a silver platter. Turning to face her twin daughters, who sat next to her, she replied quite calmly, "I know that Hogwarts is a brilliant school because I went there. I was a student there from when I was eleven years old, until I turned eighteen. What I learnt there can never be matched to what you will learn in the non-wizarding world. I'm so proud of you too!"
There was no need for any more explanations after that, because after the realisation that Blaire and Morgan were indeed witches, their voices full of excitement had drowned out the sound of their shocked father.
"Why did you leave there?"
"How do we get all our school stuff?"
"Is aunt May a witch too?"
"Is daddy a wizard?"
"Is the wizarding world nice?"
"How come Liana isn't a witch?"
The questions all came at once, and it took a moment for Anita to take all of them in. She paused for the briefest of moments, before looking at her husband. He definitely had not known about this part of her life, and although she may have had an idea her daughters may have been witches too, was not eager to share that bit of knowledge with him.
"I finished at Hogwarts in 1977, and stayed in the wizarding world for I think about six months before I was forced to leave. You see, not all witches and wizards are good. Some choose the path of evil, as cliché as it sounds. One wizard did, a man called Lord V…Vol…I cannot even say it. In the wizarding world he is referred to as He-who-shall-not-be-named. He recruited many dark wizards, and they became what are called Death Eaters, and did his dirty work for him. There were those who stood up to him of course, those who fought. But he was just so strong. He killed without a second thought. So, under my parents instructions, I moved into the non-wizarding world and to America, where I met your father."
There was a pause while the people sitting at the table tried to comprehend all of the information, and as Liana was listening to her mother's tale, she couldn't help feel a small tingle run down the back of her spine. It was almost as if…she knew this story. But she couldn't have. She didn't even believe wizards existed. No one got the chance to speak, because her mother continued,
"There is a place called Diagon Alley, in London where we will go to get all of your school supplies, do not worry about that. To your third question, no aunt May is not a witch, as my father was a wizard and my mother was not, and so there was only a 50% chance that either one of us would get the wizard gene."
Her mother paused, before a slightly guilty look passed onto her features, but in a split second it was gone and Liana wasn't sure she had just imagined it, "Which explains why Liana is not a witch, for your father is not, and so she must've received his gene."
There wasn't even a silence, because Liana had been watching her father even since her mother broke the news of her life. His face had slowly gone from surprise, through nearly all of the emotions up until now. His face was red and his eyes flaming with anger.
"NO!" He yelled so loudly, everyone sitting at the table visibly jumped, "I will not have this…this…idiocy in my house! It has been almost seventeen years since we were in America Anita, seventeen years! Why the hell did you not tell me about this? Did you think I would care? You left that life behind!"
"I did not leave it behind by choice Robert," Her mother yelled back, her voice filled with the same anger her husband felt, and from that moment on, the constant screaming in the Chisholm house began.
Her father did not want to believe his wife, the woman he loved, was a witch, and that his two favourite daughters were as well. And he most definitely didn't want them to go to a school that actually taught witchcraft. "Insane" was the word he used.
Sitting in her bedroom, Liana could still hear the shouting, and it was no surprise to her when she heard the hurtful, insulting, hate-filled words leave her father's mouth:
"It shouldn't be the twins! It should be Liana! She should have to go to that freak show; after all, I'm sure it was her family who did this to us! That's where she's from, isn't she Anita?"
Liana had understood his comment quite clearly, although there were a few holes left in her theory. She was obviously not her father's daughter, and due to the hatred in her father's voice, there was a chance her real parents came from her mother's world.
Any normal child would have felt emotions on the opposite scale to what Liana was feeling. A huge smile had graced her features. She now knew why she did not belong.
A/N: Sorry if this is bloody confusing, but it's hard to write a first chapter/prologue thingy. In the coming chapters it will all clear itself up, don't worry! The plot line will develop too, because right now I know it's a bit shaky! Please review, cos if people review, I'll know people actually read my stories! Please?