On his, Bellamy Blake's 11th birthday a stranger entered his old tattered apartment .
The man was carrying an envelope addressed to Bellamy Blake scripted in green ink. The man introduced himself as Headmaster Kane then held out the letter.
The man sat on the moth-eaten sofa in what could barely be called a living room waiting for Bellamy to finish reading the letter. As Bellamy peruses through what appears to be an acceptance letter his younger sister Octavia leaves only to return with a cup of water which she offers to Headmaster Kane.
Bellamy read the letter three times before he looked up to the man and spoke, in a gruff, slightly hysterical voice, "Do you take me for a fool. This is the most ridiculous scam I've seen ever." Bellamy tossed the letter to the floor. "Do you think I would actually believe that I am some sort of a wizard and there is a school for magical people, where they study what sorcery?" Bellamy gestured to the door. "Please leave and try your luck somewhere else. We don't have any money to give anyway."
Headmaster Kane smiles a little, only a small smirk appears on his lips. He puts his hand inside of his long overcoat pocket. For a moment Bellamy believes the man was going to pull out a knife, to threaten them for their life savings or something, but instead he produces a stick from his pocket.
The man taps the stick against the cup of water Octavia had brought him. And infront of an astonished Bellamy the water turns purple.
"Try it." Kane looks at Octavia but Bellamy reaches for the cup first and takes a tentative sip.
"It's grape juice," he mumbles. Octavia lets out a small shriek and holds out her hand making grabby signs. Bellamy reluctantly gives her the cup and stares at Kane.
Bellamy takes a pause and thinks back on all the odd things that always happened around him. How whenever one of his mother's boyfriends got into one of their rages and tried to come after him and his sister they would never be able to find him or his sister. When the missing man was supposedly in Octavia's sight she clenched onto Bellamy afraid he would will himself invisible. Until now Bellamy had always thought it was because the boyfriends had been drunk but maybe it was because they were actually invisible.
He turned to Headmaster Kane, "Is Octavia one too, a wizard or a witch or whatever you people call it?"
Kane shook his head, "We are not allowed to name anyone before they turn eleven."
"But is she, because I'm not going if she isn't." Bellamy questioned further.
Kane sighed and bowed his head he seemed to be thinking things over balancing the pros and cons, finally he looks up and says, "Yes, she is. Both of you are."
"So she can come with me, right?" Bellamy asked.
"No, she can't. No one can enter Hogwarts before they are eleven." Kane replied with a somber face.
"Then I can't go not without O." Bellamy said.
Kane had tried to change his mind, explaining that due to his economic condition the school will be giving him a stipend for his books and other materials. He boasted about the school and how Bellamy's life would be if he joined. He asked Bellamy to come have a look at the castle. Truthfully Bellamy was tempted, he wanted to leave the dreadful life he was living and instead study magic, which sounded so interesting. However, Octavia was his responsibility and he could not leave her with their mother and her frequent guests.
He met Kane again some two and a half years later a day after his mother was incarcerated on prostitution charges.
Bellamy was a month away from his 14th birthday and Octavia was ten. Bellamy had spent the last two and a half years reading any and all books on magic he could afford. He bought them from a second-hand book shop in Diagon Alley. Kane had taken Bellamy there at his first meeting to try and sway his resolve.
When Kane met Bellamy he presented Bellamy with an irresistible offer: to become his foster children and live with him at Hogwarts. Bellamy had hesitated at first, in a state of grief and uncertainty he considered the offer as pity and almost rejected it, but after consideration he couldn't refuse it. The offer was almost like a dream come true. To be able to go to the place he had been dreaming about since he had been made aware of it, and having Octavia be taken care of.
Bellamy accepted the offer and became the first 14 year old first year student at Hogwarts.