The birds.
Soaring and swooping and cheeping for joy. Their song both slowly swelled and filled the bleak and lonely hilltop, and Faye's beating heart. Her eyes traced each individual bird, never missing even the smallest ones (for Faye especially loved the smallest ones), watching the patterns that they traced with their tails in the sky.
Their songs were so beautiful.
Hmmm, thought Faye to herself. I wonder. Should I? Should I try it? Yes. I must. I must try it. I need to do it. So she groped in the pocket of her dressing gown, bringing out her willow and dragon heartstring wand.
As she held it in her palm, it vibrated, shooting out her trademark – small silver stars and birds, sending a warm tingle up Faye's arm. She grinned, and gripping the wand tighter, she pointed it up into the big blue sky.
She opened her mouth, beginning to say the charm, the charm to make the birdsong even more beautiful, if possible; even more rich and pure and passionate; the one that she had invented herself, like most of her spells she loved to create, but suddenly a deep, Irish accented voice interrupted her train of thought.
"I thought you'd be up here," the voice said.
Xenophilius. Her husband.
He smiled at Faye with his twinkling pale blue eyes. "Watching the birds again?" he asked gently.
"Yes," she said, and then added with a small, slightly brittle laugh, "I am always watching the birds."
"I know you are," replied Xenophilius fondly, and he swept her off the niche in the dormer window, and into his outstretched arms, wobbling slightly on the narrow ledge as he planted a kiss firmly on her pale lips.
"Careful!" gasped Faye, as her husband quickly stepped his lilac slipper-clad feet back onto the ledge. "Careful! I don't fancy taking a trip from this roof to the ground any time soon! It would not be very good!"
"Else would you die?" a small, childish voice piped up, just behind them, and Xenophilius and Faye simultaneously whipped their heads around.
Gazing out of the window was Luna Amelia, their nine year old daughter.
Luna: clever, dreamy and kind. Luna, with her mussed up, pale yellow hair, sleepy silver eyes and mischievous grin, had been watching them through the window the whole time, and not Faye nor Xenophilius had even noticed.
"Luna!" Faye cried. "How long have you been watching us? You were asleep, deep in your dreams, when I first came up here!"
Luna smiled. "Since daddy came up and found you," she replied serenely, her blue eyes unblinking. Yes, that was Luna in one word: Serene.
"Darling, you really shouldn't spy on grown-ups," Faye said, trying (and failing) to keep a note of laughter out of her voice, whilst Xenophilius snickered with laughter, for he loved his daughter dearly, and always highly encouraged her to be lively and mischievous, brimming over with imagination.
He staggered again, and grabbed once more onto the window frame for support.
"Here," said Luna, tugging at the catch that opened up her window. "Here," she repeated. "Come in here!"
Luna took hold of her father's hand, helping him to climb through, onto the window sill, and to jump down onto the floor, Faye quickly followed, much more nimble and graceful on her feet than her husband.
Luna pulled on her own slippers, and began to clatter down the long, curving metal staircase to their large, circular kitchen – cum – dining - room for breakfast, followed closely by her mother. Xenophilius watched carefully as they as they walked; a small smile on his face.
It was uncanny how they looked so alike, as alike as mother and daughter could be, he thought, except Faye's hair was short, not quite reaching her shoulders and Luna's was long, just reaching her waist.
He was filled with unconditional love for the both of them. He would never let them go.
-X-
As soon as they had finished their lovely breakfast of last night's leftover Fresh Water Plimply Pie (perfect for late breakfasts), and the deep purple, peculiar smelling Gurdyroot infusion (Luna's favourite), the family dispersed to their various rooms to get dressed.
Luna snorted with laughter as she heard Xenophilius warble Celestina Warbeck's "A Cauldron of Hot Strong Love" as he showered and shaved. Faye, passing through, heard what Luna was laughing at and burst out with an uncontrollable snort.
"Not exactly a WWN worthy singer is he?" she smiled jokingly, and Luna had to agree.
Faye traipsed downstairs, sitting down at the table with a quill and parchment, quickly finishing a letter to her elder sister Marie, for the post owl was due any minute.
She scanned down over the three pages of parchment she had written, and then scribbled down at the end of the letter:
Well, love to all, Marie, bye bye, dear, hope to see you soon,
Love from your sister Faye and my Xenophilius and my Luna xx
She rolled it up, slotting it hurriedly into a dark green envelope, just as the tawny post owl, weary from travelling all the way from Diagon Alley, where the nearest Wizarding post office was, zoomed through the window with a soft flump.
It carried one envelope in its gnarled beak, which it promptly dropped into Faye's lap.
"Thank you darling…" she murmured distractedly to the owl as she copied down the address to her sister's house, miles away in Yorkshire.
"Here." She fastened to the owl's leg, and placed two bronze Knut's into the leather pouch it also carried. "Thank you," she said to it. "Please take this to my sister, Marie."
The owl gave a regal hoot, and flew off out of the window.
She watched it fly away with a soft, sad smile on her face, and she thought what it would be like to fly away too, to fly away to a distant land, to visit the land beyond the sea, to go somewhere beyond anyone's wildest imagination.
Xenophilius entered the room, followed closely by Luna. He pointed his unusually long wand at the noisy, diplidated old printing press in the corner of the room. At once it began to churn out copies of the Quibbler.
"What are we doing today?" Luna asked Faye as she scratched Pocahontas the cat's soft ginger ears, before running a small finger all down Pocahontas' back until she reached the tip of her tail. "And did you know you had a letter on your lap?"
Faye jumped out of her reverie.
"What? Oh." She picked up the letter resting on her lap, turning it over to see who it was from. "Maybe it is from Molly Weasley," she said slowly. "She promised she would send me her recipe for that wonderful treacle tart she makes…when I try it, it never seems to go quite right…oh!"
Her clear blue eyes fell upon something in the corner of the corner of the letter.
Suddenly, all the colour drained from Faye's already quite pale face. She slit the envelope open with slightly shaking hands, quickly stashing it out of sight so that neither her husband nor her daughter could see who it was from.
She did not want either of them to see the ornate, heavily embossed black "M" on one corner.
Xenophilius looked up from his printing press to see Faye reading a long sheet of parchment, looking distinctly upset.
"Is something wrong?" he asked her. "Has someone died?" Luna jerked her head up, quickly switching her attention onto her mother, rather than Pocahontas, whose tail she had been attempting to tie up with some lurid pink ribbon (to try and attract the Crumple Horned Snorkack, of course!).
"What is it mummy?" she whispered softly.
"Oh…I…it's nothing!" she nervously squeaked, clutching the letter to her chest so that it rustled rather threateningly.
Xenophilius looked alarmed. "If nothing is wrong," he said quietly, his eyes glimmering, "then why are you crying?"
Faye crumpled.
Her head hit the table with a dull thunk, sending several sheets of parchment fluttering gently to the floor. She took great heaving breaths, loud, shuddering sobs racking her body.
Luna ran around to her, nestling up close, trying to fit her little head under Faye's arm. "Mummy?" she whispered, "what's wrong?"
Faye sat up, brushing damp and snotty tendrils of blonde hair from her tear stained face. She gazed up at Xenophilius, and he saw in her eyes a sadness so great that he nearly began crying himself, a sadness to smoulder, to wrap the room in its dull, smoggy arms.
"Love," he said quietly. "My love…what is it? Please!"
Faye shook her head. "I…I'm just being silly…she whispered. "It's from the…the Ministry. They d-don't like my…my spells. They're…they're having me…tried."
Xenophilius blinked. "Tried?" he asked, a note of confusion in his voice.
"Before the Wizenagamot!" Here Faye's voice cracked, and she broke into a wave of fresh sobs.
"Oh Faye!" Xenophilius cried. "Oh my Faye! Why? When? Oh my goodness!"
Luna slipped out from under her mother's arm, sinking down onto the floor with a silent sigh. "Is mummy going to the Dementors?" she murmured.
Faye screamed. "No!"
Xenophilius picked Luna up in his arms, kissing her forehead. "No, my Luna," he breathed. "Your mummy has done nothing wrong. This mess you will be sorted out, everything will just be the same as it ever was. Really."
He was so comforting, so reassuring, when he did not know himself what was going on, when he himself was just as scared as his Luna.
"When…when is this trial?" he asked his wife.
"Today," she sighed softly, a stray and solitary tear trickling down her face. "I got the initial letter last week. I hid it. I did not want you to find it…I did not want to worry you…" Here her voice trailed away. "I'm due at the Ministry at half eleven," she said dully.
Xenophilius plonked a quivering Luna back down.
"I'm coming with you!" he declared passionately. "Me, and Luna too! They need witness's for defence, don't they?"
A sudden thought entered his head. "By the way…" he asked, "which spell?"
Faye smiled wanly, a sad, half smile that crooked only one side of her mouth. "All of them. And thank you, thank you, for –"
"Coming with you" Xenophilius finished for her.
"Yes."
-X-
Faye Lovegood was due at the ministry in an hour and a half.
Xenophilius had his egg-yolk yellow travelling cloak festooned around his shoulders, the one that had the symbol of the Deathly Hallows (Xenophilius' obsession) embroidered in silver around the hem.
Faye pulled on her calf length, khaki green trench coat with a worn Thin Lizzy patch on it. She had found it in a muggle charity shop, and though she had no idea who or what Thin Lizzy was, she liked it anyway.
Luna was in a plum coloured cloak that only reached her elbows, for she was growing out of it, but Faye had not yet made her one.
The family moved into the living room, where the big fireplace was. Faye and Xenophilius looked at each other, their faces full of love.
Then they threw the green Floo powder into the fire, and together cried the words:
"Diagon Alley!"
