May 23rd.
It was an unreasonably bright day as the rain spattered against the high vaulted windows of Hogwarts school. Sun streamed through the clouds almost spitefully, and the surface of the lake glittered as the wind swept over the school grounds.
Elysia's mother sat in a high backed chair facing the current Ancient Runes professor across an ornate dark wood desk. Her dark cinnamon colored hair was neatly twisted and pinned up. Elysia sat in the corner as the two women talked, trying to keep herself occupied by tracing strange shapes and figures into the thick oak legs of the desk with her eyes. The symbols became seared into the wood making it look more like antique that it had previously. She was blissfully unaware that she was being closely observed. The headmaster of Hogwarts stood in the corner diagonal from Elysia with his back resting against a tower of old books. His wavy black hair was streaked with gray, while his short beard was more salt than pepper, and he stood so still the women had all but forgotten him, except for Elysia, who had completely forgotten him.
"Well that'll do it for my part, I'm perfectly satisfied, Mrs. Levanin. Have you any other questions for my future replacement, headmaster?" said the squat witch with thick black –rimmed spectacles. The man in the corner smiled, as Elysia's slate blue eyes widened and rose to meet his for the first time. A look of suspicion dissolved into horrified understanding before she turned her head to face the office door.
"No, no, I am fully satisfied that Hogwarts will somehow survive your retirement Professor Babbling. Mrs. Levanin seems perfectly capable. Tell me young lady," he said, suddenly turning their attention to the small girl in the corner, "how will you like living at Hogwarts when you receive your letter in a few years?" Elysia thought the silence was deafening, but kept her mouth clamped tight and her face as plain as she could, betraying none of the fear and guilt that tightened deep in her stomach.
"Elysia, answer the Headmaster." Her mother said lightly. To which the girl only shook her head, causing her tawny brown hair to fall over her eyes, and pursed her lips.
"When did you take her to see the caves in Lascaux?" The wizard now asked Elysia's mother.
"Last fall, actually, but how did you..-"
"Your daughter has quite a memory for runes, and a flair for visual arts." he said, gesturing to the desk. "Don't worry about the desk, I assure you there is no harm done," he added, before Mrs. Levanin could scold her daughter. He drummed his fingers on the desk and the charred symbols fell away. Her mother gave Elysia a stern look, but the headmaster winked at her, his khaki eyes assuring her that she would indeed like living at Hogwarts when she finally got her letter.
Five years Later…
Cool gray sunlight streamed through the gauzy cream curtains, and the clunking sound of metal cooking pans sounded far away through the open bedroom door. The girl groaned lightly and turned from the window, but the cold morning was already reaching around her goose-down comforter chilling any exposed flesh it found. It was maddening, and successfully keeping her from sinking back into unconsciousness. This was doubly cruel since she could still remember the dream she'd be having before wakefulness had begun its sneak attack on her senses. She tried to cling to the now fading vision: a dimly lit stage, a wooden boat with black masts that rolled and pitched gaily with the painted wooden waves that moved unassisted around the vessel; a song, haunting and jolly and beautiful all at once, but already the tune was lost to her. Finally, she opened her eyes, and dragged her legs up to her chest, so that she was in a tight ball, before flinging her feet over the side of the bed and slowly pushing herself away from her beloved pile of cotton swathed pillows.
A warm buttery smell drifted up through the little house as Elysia stuffed her feet into gray woolen socks and wrapped herself in a threadbare robe, the latter of which didn't fall far enough past her knees to actually fit after her most recent growth spurt. She wandered blearily down a hallway, descending a knobby flight of wooden stairs and threw herself into an oversized green armchair. From where she lay across the chair, Elysia could stare into the kitchen as her grandmother bustled around setting down plate after steaming plate on the thick top of a dark barn-wood table. Fluffy rolls peered over the sides of a shallow platter, and seared sausages were piled high directly beside it. Roasted tomatoes and mushrooms crowded in by the corner of the table, bacon shimmering with grease sat near the middle and three places were set out, each plate with two poached eggs on a bed of freshly steamed spinach.
"If your mother doesn't get here soon everything will be cold," the old women cooed, without looking around. Elysia wasn't surprised, she was sure Gran had known the second she had stopped dreaming, so knowing the girl had ambled down the stairs wasn't much of a stretch.
"She'll be along, Gran. You..know.. a-her" she said stifling a yawn. The light outside was still dingy in the morning fog.
"I know," she said with meaning, "I just wish she'd be quicker about it, your granddad always said we should fix her glasses to read every clock as five minutes later that it really was… that way she might be early for something." Elysia laughed. Her mother was never later for anything, but she was never early either; she had a special gift for punctuality that Elysia hadn't inherited. As she stretched herself out on the chair, Elysia gazed out a large Bay window to the right of the kitchen table. The valley that surrounded the little log-house was laid thick with fog, but you could see the dark silhouette of the trees across the field. They started at the base of the hill and went up and up where hills turned into mountains and trailed off across the distance to the west.
Near the edge of the clearing, right where a few trees dotted the flat land, a disembodied chimney rose high from a full brick fireplace that, as far as anyone living could remember, had never been housed by anything other than the field. It was the faint reddish outline of this chimney that Elysia's eyes focused on, watching as the fog slowly dissipated to reveal the opening to the fireplace. She blinked, and now a figure was walking away from the opening and towards the house.
One minute and 47 seconds later at exactly 10:20 a.m. Elysia's mother opened the kitchen door and the curtains around the bay window fluttered from the gust of summer air that accompanied her.
"Morning dear, how's the floo holding up out there?" Gran asked.
"Perfect as always and with much less mess than if I used this one," she said, removing her professional looking robes and hanging them on a post by the door, so that she was left wearing a thin olive dress. "Everyone safely on the train and off to Kings Cross, and not a minute too soon, because I could certainly use a holiday. What about you, darling?" she smiled at Elysia.
"What do you want to do on your Holiday, mummy?" Elysia said slipping of the chair to give her mother a hug. Her mother squeezed the little girl's shoulders and furrowed her brow as she considered the question.
"I have a few ideas," she said finally, "but first BREAKFAST!" and she sat heavily in the closest chair and inhaled deeply from the still steaming plates before her. "Sit, sit. I missed breakfast at the castle, directing all the luggage and first years down the path." Elysia sat across from her mother leaving the chair at the head of the table open for Gran, the matriarch of their little clan.
After breakfast, Elysia's mother leaned back in her chair, visibly exhausted from their little feast, grinning contentedly. She sat up again suddenly as if just remembering something.
"Elle dear, the Headmaster told me to be sure and let you know that letters will be sent out by mid-July, and -"
"Professor Callodian specifically told you to tell me that? So, I'm really getting my letter this year? You're sure?" Elysia gasped.
"Let me finish, please." And Elysia sat back in her seat and folded her hands in her lap in a convincing profession manner. "He told me to tell you that letters will be sent by owl by mid-july," and she paused dramatically getting up from her seat, "but that he wanted you to have this immediately." She removed a letter from an inside pocket of the robe she'd taken off earlier and presented to Elysia.
The girl only gazed at the spidery handwriting, touching the ink and mouthing the words to herself. She turned the envelope over and traced the purple wax-seal. A smile started slowly at the corners of her mouth but quickly spread over her face and she beamed up and her mother.
"Demeter are you sure that's such a good idea so early in the Summer? Now how will we keep her out of the shops in Diagon Alley? It was hard enough already and she wasn't even trained up." Gran said half-smiling.
"Can I open it now, mum? Please?"
"Oh, go on then."
The Summer seemed to drag on for Elysia that year. They went on Holiday to Corsica in the last days of June. Climbed the mountains ,traipsed the dense woods, explored the most famous historical sites side-by-side with muggles, but none of this was really new to Elysia. Not that she'd been there before or didn't learn and enjoy herself, but her mind was elsewhere, and muggles were nothing new to her. She thought seriously about how easy it was to blend in with them if one simply paid attention, especially surrounded by so many tourists. The food was a nice treat, and the beaches helped it to feel like a real summer holiday, but her mother was mostly there for magical research purposes and while she was busy getting access to and examining old artifacts, Elysia wandered and watched. She was good at that; seeing people, and not just noticing them, but really seeing them. What they did, why they did it, and so on. It wasn't magic, but sometimes Elle felt like it was. People didn't always notice she was even there, and if they did they weren't bothered by it, no matter what they were saying on their mobile phones or in whispers to their closest friends. She was good at listening too. People, she observed to herself, were strange. Muggles, wizards, it didn't really matter. Sometimes they didn't say what they meant, and sometimes they didn't mean the things they said. It wasn't hard to know one way or the other, but most people didn't seem to catch on.
After Corsica they went into Italy. They spent a little time in a peculiar old farm house, which muggles never seemed to notice was there, before travelling to Rome to remind themselves what the city was like. It was just like Elysia remembered; crowded streets and masses of tourists, air so hot you'd think the sun itself was breathing on your neck. And as they walked they licked cones of sticky-sweet gelato from a wizard's shop, it was the only gelato in Rome that didn't melt down your hand in two-seconds flat. Elysia watched people here too. As she and her mother strolled the Via Nazionale, she suddenly decided that the people in Rome seemed more honest somehow, but it was an in-the-moment sort of honesty. Just because someone spoke sincerely and lovingly to the person they draped their arms around, it didn't mean that they weren't already married to someone else. Elysia then decided that life was very complex and that people just made it worse, and she didn't understand that at all.
Demeter waited until July 13th to take Elle to Diagon Alley for her school things. They still beat the rush of students that would arrive in two days when the official owls were sent out, but the lanes were still thrumming with activity. Witches and Wizards, selling and trading on every side of them, called out their wares and prices along with promises and guarantees of "highest magical quality," as they passed. Elysia had already been warned that she would only be allowed to get what was listed in her letter and nothing more, though if she was well-behaved for the rest of the summer she may get a special gift in August before leaving for school. Elysia didn't mind not getting a magical animal until August, she had very few friends her own age, and was more excited for texts books and potion ingredients, and her very own wand. It would be difficult, she thought to herself, to refrain from attempting any spells or potions before she was on her way to Hogwarts… and if she did want a pet, she would certainly have to put up a valiant effort to stay grounded. Maybe she should find some other way to occupy the rest of the summer..