To the wandering eye, the small boy sitting on the derelict swing would appear to be asleep. But of course a wandering eye would not be able to distinguish him from the darkness of night surrounding him for his size (or lack thereof) and the fact that he happened to be wearing dark clothes.

The boy, no more than nine years old, sat barely pushing the swing back and forth. After some time, he decided that the action was fruitless and abandoned it.

And it was at this moment that the boy's head cocked up at the sound of feet pounding on the pitch-black pavement.

The girl (apparently his age) who had been running slowed down to a stop. She hesitated for a moment, eyeing him up and down before sitting in a swing to his right. She snuffled quietly, leaning her head onto the chain that held the swing up.

He gave her a moment to settle, maybe the moment she needed to trust him. "Why are you crying?" he tried to ask politely.

She considered him slightly for a minute, but obviously deemed him trustworthy. "My dad," she answered, wiping away her tears with the back of her small hands. "Or my stepdad, really. My mom wouldn't approve of him if she knew him really. He's horrible! So I ran away, but if I knew it was this cold, I would've brought a bigger jacket." She shivered as she wrapped her thin grey cotton jacket around her. He chuckled lightly at the sentiment. "I've shared," she frowned cutely, "it's your turn now."

"My aunt and uncle, and cousin of course, were being horrible as well. I ran away… but now I'm lost."

"That's quite a fix you've gotten yourself into."

"You too."

"By the way, what's your name?"

"Harry. Harry Potter."

"Aeryn. Aeryn Prince," she mocked him, putting out her hand to shake. He shook it lightly as she began to examine him with narrowed eyes. "When's the last time you've eaten?"

He looked pensive. "Yesterday, I think. Around breakfast time."

"Goodness gracious, you must be starving. Here you go," she said, handing him a deliciously perfect chocolate chip cookie from a saran wrap bulge in her hand he only now noticed.

"Where'd that come from?" he asked as he took it.

"I took some with me before I left."

A dream, of course. Just as she must be a dream. Or maybe they're from heaven. He took a bite from the soft, buttery treat. "This is good."

"I should hope so – I made them myself."

"You did a good job," he complimented as he looked up from his crumb-sprinkled hand to her beaming face. "Do you cook everything at your house?"

"Yeah."

"That's me as well." He paused then, unsure of what to say. "Just curious, but why is your step dad still taking care of you if your mom wouldn't approve of him?"

She paused in return, taking a steadying breath. "She died about a year ago. I have no idea where my father is, though I don't think she did either, since she left me with my step dad."

He grimaced. "I'm sorry I said anything."

"You shouldn't be. Of course I miss her, but I have a feeling that she has ways of watching over me, wherever she is."

Harry liked her. She seemed almost like she was older than she looked, the way she talked, the way she sat in her swing with a spine as straight as a wooden plank, but he still felt like they were equals, which is more than he could say for any of the other kids his age.

"Like that snowy owl, you see – that one on the roof?" Harry nodded yes, turning to where her index finger pointed high towards the roof of a nearby house. "It's been watching us the whole time."

He paused for just a moment before changing the subject in an attempt to comfort her. "My parents died in a car crash when I was a baby. They said that it was amazing that I survived with nothing but this scar." He lifted his bangs to show her.

"That's a lovely scar!" Pure joy lit up her features, then pouting only made her face look cuter as she curled her bottom lip. "I wish all scars came in pretty shapes like that."

Harry laughed at her. He hadn't meant to – it just sort of slipped. "Any scar in particular?"

"Don't laugh at me like that. And yes, this one right here," she said, pulling down the collar of her lavender blouse to show him her left shoulder. It was a strange sort of line that curved around and around, one line seemingly tangling with another, as indistinguishable as the next. It was not white and dull like a healing scar, but still amazingly red. "I'm pretty sure it is a scar, but I've had it since I was born. My mom always told me that's how she first knew that I was special – because I couldn't just have a normal birthmark."

Harry began to laugh loudly. At first Aeryn frowned at him, but gradually joined him, both of them nearly falling off of their swings. They would've laughed until they were sore and breathless (but happy), but their fits were interrupted when the white owl they had observed earlier landed forcefully on Aeryn's right leg.

"OW! What is it, birdie?" She cooed, petting its beautiful feathers, their black tips standing out as much as the blinding headlights that crept into her vision. Aeryn gasped in horror.

"What is it?" Harry asked worriedly.

"It's my step dad! We have to hide!" she searched the playground frantically. Why could she only find places to hide when it wasn't necessary? "There! That bush over there, come on, quickly!" she grabbed his hand and pulled them along as the white owl flew beside them.

They crouched down behind the shrub, a rhododendron by the leaves poking her in the eye, listening intently to the sound of the car pass slowly by the playground. Aeryn gave a sigh of relief and almost said something to Harry but he clapped his hand over her mouth and pointed in the direction of the playground.

'What is it?' her question echoed in his mind. He looked tremendously surprised at the clarity of her voice in the hollow silence of his terrified mind, but motioned for her to listen. She then heard the faint crunching of gravel beneath the feet that she somehow knew belonged to her stepfather; maybe it was the impatient, heavy steps that she had grown accustomed to hearing barrel their way down the (thankfully) non-creaking staircase.

A tense moment followed in which none of them moved, the man listening fixedly and the two children scarcely breathing. For a moment, Harry and Aeryn were afraid that they had been discovered, but the distance between them and the grinding slowly increased, the children letting out a breath they hadn't truly been aware they were holding.

"How did you talk? I mean, without speaking? I heard your voice in my head but you weren't really saying anything." Harry began after a lengthy pause.

"I don't really know," she answered ponderingly. "It's something my… my mother taught me… the day she died."

Harry wasn't sure what to say to that. He imagined how she must feel; talking about things she probably hadn't talked about in a year (much less with a boy who was a complete stranger to her) must have been difficult.

"So… where should we go?"

"We could stay here tonight. I can't really think of anywhere else to go."

"All right."

The two huddled together closely against the chilly early-autumn air, a single blanket from her handy bag over them. She whispered a thanks to the beautiful owl perched like an amber-eyed sentinel over them and he whispered a silent prayer for his brand new angel.