TINUVIEL AT HOGWARTS
Tinuviel and Thorondil looked out of the window. The train had been slowing down for a while, and now came to a stop. The big, peeling sign on the platform said, 'Hogsmeade'.
'We're here,' said Tinuviel, excitedly. Her big blue eyes shone in her pale face under her long, dark hair.
'About time, said Thorondil grumpily. He had already been fighting with another child on the Hogwarts Express, who had said something about his ears (which were admittedly a bit on the big side). The combatants had given each other bloody noses before the prefects broke it up. He was blonde and hazel-eyed.
Suddenly, along the platform cake a gigantic human. He wore a huge, fury coat, sported a vast, bushy beard and hair that was pretty wild. 'What's that?' Tinuviel was a little scared, but she saw his eyes were laughing and kind.
'He's huge,' said Thorondil. 'Hey!' his eyes lit up, 'maybe he's a giant! I've always wanted to meet one!'
Tinuviel rolled her huge, blue eyes. Thorondil loved magical creatures, just like their dad.
'Firs' years, come wi' me!' called the huge man.
'That's us, Thor!' said Tinuviel, 'let's go!'
The twins lugged their trunks off the train and onto the platform. Thorondil's ferret chittered, the Tinuviel's owl sat quitely.
'Leave yer luggage there,' called the giant. 'The porters will take it up to Hogwarts for ye. Now, Firs'-years? Are ye all here?' He looked at the small crowd of young faces, then turned about, saying, 'Follow me!' It was easy for the 11-year-olds to someone so tall, everyone could see him. He led them down the platform, through a gate to a long flight of stone steps, painted white on the edges. The evening deepened as they climbed down, and the street-lights shone yellow. They came to a long jetty along a river, where the giant addressed them again: 'My name is Rubeus Hagrid, in case none of you know of me, yet. I'm the Care of Magical Creatures Master.' Thorondil pumped his fist, saying 'Yes!' under his breath. Tinuviel snickered.
The huge teacher continued, 'All first-years ride to boats to Hogwarts. Please climb in carefully, four to a boat only, and no fooling around! It's not too soon to get detention!'
The children all climbed into the small, wooden boats, Thor and Tinny noticed they were all tied together with long ropes. When they were all in, Professor Hagrid tapped his boat's prow with a funny little pink umbrella, and it pulled away, drawing all the other boats along behind him. The river ran into a lake, and they saw Hogwarts Castle on the other side, splendid with birght lights in every window. It was a beautiful sight!
The boats went right underneath it, through a curain of willow branches, to a large cave where they all got out at another long jetty. The climbed a long flight of stairs up into the castle. At the top of the stairs stood a a very strict-looking witch in midnight-blue robe and hat. They all lined up in front of her. 'Good evening, children; I am Professor Passmore.' There wasn't a sound as she watched them line up.
'In a few minutes we will go through these doors behind me, for our welcome feast. Before you can sit down, you must be sorted into your houses. Now, when I call, you will come up to the front of the hall, I will place the Sorting Hat on your heads and it will tell you which House you should go to. Now, wait here,' and she went into the Great Hall. In a few seconds she opened the door and they all filed in.
The Sorting was just as Tinny and Thor were expecting; they were excited as Professor Passmore worked through the alphabetical list. When she read out, 'Hardcastle, Thorondil!' Thor leapt up and nearly tripped on his long robe (their mum had got long ones to allow for growth) on his way to be Sorted. The Sorting Hat descended, nearly covering his face. After a few seconds it called out 'Ravenclaw!' and Thor joined the table under the blue and silver banner.
Tinny managed a lot more dignity when she went to be sorted. The Sorting Hat did cover her face, and she heard it voice saying 'Another one! You must be twins, your minds are unlike anything I've ever seen before. You really don't seem old enough to be here... but since you're both so bright, it had better also be -' and it shouted out loud, '- Ravenclaw!' and Tinny skipped down to join her brother.
When the Sorting was over, Professor Passmore went up to the staff table. Then the Headmistress stood up: she wore a bit, emerald hat and a long emerald robe. Her hair was snowy white, pinned up under her hat; it was Professor McGonagall.
'Welcome all,' she said in a quavery, old voice. 'I have a few announcements to make before we start our feast. As usual, please note that there is to be no magic practiced outside of classrooms, and that the Dark Forest is strictly out of bounds. Also, because our Seamstress is retiring a Halloween the year, any uniform repairs will have to be handed in before then – we do not as yet have anyone to take over.' She looked down at the Ravenclaw table. 'A special welcome to our new first-years,' she said, 'We expect great things from this group.'
So, the new school year began. Although Tinny and Thor didn't really need them, they had new wands in the human style: African wild-olive wood with their mother's hair inside. Because they were halfelven, they were visibly smaller and less mature than the rest of the students, though they were still more clever than most. It took only a day and a half before their ears became widely noted. They had to explain them to others at least three times each.
The Twins' mother had come from another world (perhaps even another universe), when an experiment by one of their wise had opened a bubble between their world and Earth. It had sucked the mage's whole house into our world before popping, leaving them stranded in Hertfordshire for twelve years. By the time the mage had worked out how to go back home, and gathered enough energy to achieve it, his daughter had met and fallen in love with a wizard, a breeder of magical creatures called Robert Hardcastle. He and Miriel had married, and Tinuviel and Thorondil were there first set of twins. Miriel stayed on Earth whil her family returned, but they visited every year, for a week around mid-summer and another around Christmas. Her father had worked out how to make the bubbles more easily.
The first term went well until about a week before the Christmas break. Thorondil had become a bit touchy about his appearance, with the boys always saying something about his ears. When Scorpius Malfoy, a Slytherin, called him an 'overgrown house-elf', it had ended badly for him. Though shorter, Thor had landed a beauty of a punch on his nose. In the resulting scuffle, Thor's robe was ripped and bloodied. By the time the Potions master had broken it up, a large crowd had gathered in the corridor and they both got detention. Tinny saw the whole thing and thought, 'Oh no, mum's going to kill him! His uniform's torn all the way down one side!' For the last two days of term, Thor had to wear his other robe (even when he got a custard stain on it), because there was no seamstress at the school. He even had to wear it on the train home. At least he could change on the train.
Their mother was alone in the crowd on Platform 9 ¾ at King's Cross when the train pulled in. After hugging them both she led them out to the muggle part of the station, to get another train home.
'Where are the little ones, mum?' asked Tinny as they slid through the turnstile, pushing their luggage. She spoke in Sindarin, their home language.
'Your father is away in South Africa,' she said, 'if you remember, looking at a new breed of Nifflers. I thought it better to leave the twins and little Mardil with your granny. Travelling with toddling twins and a baby in a buggy isn't much fun, especially when we have to be unnoticed.' Their mother's ears were hidden under a wooly hat, and she wore long trousers and boots, which was most unlike her. She favoured medieval-looking dresses at home.
They maneuvered their trunks onto the platform for Potters Bar. For some time now, Thor hadn't said much, but Tinny knew mum would have to be told about his uniform disaster sooner rather than later. She caught his eye and nodded significantly. Thor looked sour as he muttered, 'Er, I, um, my uniform got torn.'
'What's that, dear?' Mum said calmly. She knew this tone, and hoped it wasn't serious.
'My uniform robe got torn,' Thorondil admitted more loudly.
'Oh, that's just great,' mum said with a long-suffering sigh. 'I hope I can mend it, or we're going to have to buy a new one, in Diagon Alley.'
Thor looked hopeful.
'Don't push your luck, we are not going to Weasley's Wizard Wheezes.'
The last time Thor had gone to the joke shop, the half-elf had eaten Puking Pastilles and vomited all over the shop before the manager could whisk it away with his wand.
Back home for the holidays, time seemed to fly by. Tinny and Thor spoke their mother's language, Sindarin, all the time, with their grandparents visiting. Altar ar' Altara were just as fair and merry as ever – they never changed, even as their human grandparents became grey and deaf.
Thor's grandfather Celebtil told him that he was old enough in the reckoning of the Eldar to get his first bow. He wanted him to come with them next summer to start practicing in the archery range, and to start learning woodcraft. All elf boys started learning archery as soon as they were teenagers.
Thor couldn't wait to go, but first he had to finish Hogwarts. Then he would be old enough to begin his education on the other side of the bubble. In the meantime, he hadn't even finished his first year.
Before they knew it, New Year was over, the twins' dad had gone back to South Africa; and then their mum remembered Thor's robe. It was a dead loss, torn right through.
'Darn,' said mum quietly. 'I forgot all about this with the Christmas rush. We'll have to got to Gringott's on our own.' Her face showed some disgust.
'What's wrong with that, mum?' Tinny asked.
'I just can't stand Goblins,' mum replied. 'I'd love to be able to send you both in yourselves, but you're just too young. I'll just have to hold my nose and get on with it.' She grinned.
'I could do it,' Thor said, confidently. Mum just smiled.
So, leaving the younger twins, Sara and Dorveg, with their grandparents, and pushing baby Mardil in his buggy, they took the train to London. When they came to the street where the Leaky Cauldron was, mum had to command the place to show itself to her, since like a muggle she couldn't see it. The twins however, could see it easily. They went through to the hidden entrance behind the pub, trundling the buggy over the cold, wet cobblestones to the shiny white bank at the end of Diagon Alley.
It was an effort to pull the buggy up the bank stairs, and once inside, little Mardil began niggling and fussing after all the bumping. By the time they had spoken to the Goblins, he was crying loudly, and people were looking at them. There was no way Mum was going to take a crying baby on the roller-coaster cocopans through the vaults. As she took the baby out to comfort him, she said, 'Thor, you said you could go and get our money out of the vault – now's your chance. We just need 7 galleons, that should last us until your father gets home, and pay for a new robe for you.'
Tinny wasn't very happy, but at least her tough brother was there. Mum said, 'Tinny, please make sure your brother doesn't jump out of the cocopan, or touch anything he shouldn't.' Tinny immediately felt more grown-up with a bit of responsibility.
So, the twins followed the Gringotts goblin. He really was an ugly creature, and only a little taller than themselves.
Tinny was scared by the ride, but Thor seemed to enjoy it. The goblin stopped at their vault and opened it with a tap of his claw. Their vault wasn't that full at the moment. It had a lot of silver sickles and bronze knuts, with a little pile of big, golden coins at the far end.
The goblin handed them a sack. 'Thank you,' said Thorondil and went to the pile. Tinny counted out 7 of the gold coins and put them in the sack while Thor held it. 'Yow,' he said, 'this gold is heavy!'
They left only 2 galleons in the vault. When the door was swinging closed, Tinny said, 'Look!' and pointed up. There, just below the rocky ceiling, floated a handful of mostly bronze coins. 'Hey!' called Thor, 'Some of our money's escaping!'