Prologue

I plopped down on the cushy, boulder sized bean-bag chair, surrounded by the expertly painted walls of Hanali's "Lord of the Rings" themed basement. I swear, just about every time I entered that room I had a tiny nerd spazz. Though, Lord of the Rings wasn't the most important fandom in my mind today. I waited in anticipation for the start of a Harry Potter marathon- the second one my friends Hanali, Krista, and I had accomplished.

And this time, I was determined not to fall asleep through any of it.

Hanali plopped onto one of the two other beanbags beside mine. As she did, she offered a confused look to the battered paperback sitting in my lap.

"What is that?"

I grinned sheepishly, "Prisoner of Azkaban. I brought it for a bit of nostalgic reading."

She continued to stare at the book, which was missing the front cover and half of the first chapter. The book was one of my most prized possessions, and I had almost literally read it into oblivion in the fifth grade, soon after the onset of my true Harry Potter obsession.

"You killed it."

I merely nodded to her in agreement, turning my attention to the dilapidated paperback once again. I skipped to the last few chapters, starting at the moment when Ron is dragged by "the Grim" into the Whomping Willow with the pretense of reading to the end from there; a section I had read so many times that I almost knew it by heart.

Krista bobbed down the basement stairs and plopped on the bean-bag next to me as well, carrying her wand, which I had made for her as well as ones for the rest of Hanali's family and myself for Christmas.

"I'm so excited!" she grinned, brandishing the wand, her fiery red hair falling in her face, she adjusted her "Ravenclaw" T-shirt that I had also made for her.

I quickly stashed my worn copy of 'The Prisoner of Azkaban' out of sight, knowing that my dearest Ravenclaw buddy wouldn't be too pleased with a book in such a state of disrepair. I smiled back at her. "Me too! I had a whole bunch of tea today so I wouldn't fall asleep like last time."

She laughed, "Yes little Hufflepuff, no napping during the movies!"

"I only fell asleep for two hours!"

She gave me a rather motherly look, reminding me of Mrs. Weasly, "Sweetie, it was more like three."

I merely grumbled and turned my attention to the TV as Hanali loaded the disc for the first movie.

Hanali turned and sat back on her bean-bag, reaching down to pick up her half-full can of diet Pepsi. For a moment, she froze.

"Kyla?"

"Hum?" I asked, only half paying attention to her, eyes focused on Harry Potter waking up in the closet under the stairs.

"Your book is glowing."

She said it so bluntly that I thought that I must have heard her wrong, I turned to her with a confused frown.

"Did you just say my book is glowing?"

"Yeah." She said, throwing me completely off-guard, "Look!"

Both Krista and I immediately leaned over in our bean-bags to see what Hanali was talking about. Sure enough, there was a soft, greenish-blue light glowing out from between the pages of my Harry Potter book, right where I had left off in my reading.

"What in the…?" I trailed off, reaching for the book.

Just as my fingers brushed against the book's battered spine, the pages flew open, and suddenly all three of us were blinded by the greenish light.