For the next week, Lily keeps me company as well as Rose. The younger red head seems to actually be as talented at healing as she is at talking. Growing up first in abnegation, where we were not allowed to think of ourselves and then going through dauntless initiation, where everyday we feared being factionless, I hadn't realized before meeting lily, what experiences I had been missing. She seems way more open than Rose, telling me more about their family than rose ever had. But mostly she shows me different dresses and shoes and new fashions of their time and talking about them all day long. I don't mind it much, its not as if we have many topics to converse about anyways. I suppose I might have had that sort of freeness with Christina…if war hadn't broken us both.
"Are you alright, Tris?"
Lily seems concerned. She isn't as innocent as she seems at first, noticing minute expressions like she does now, scanning my face for any symptoms of pain.
"yeah, I'm fine."
The lie comes easily. We both know it.
She looks at me for a long moment and then says, "you know, you are not going to be staying in this room for the rest of your life."
My heart races. I have been coming and going out of consciousness for the past two weeks, Rose and lily the only people tethering me to sanity. But at nights, this place feels like a prison, when I have nothing but memories of all my sins to keep me company, even if somehow I don't have any nightmares, any dreams.
I open my mouth to ask, beg her to tell me more but then the door opens and Rose enters. Lily frantically gets back to doing whatever she was doing but Rose holds up her arm and looks into her eyes. It lasts only for a second, but rose's gaze is piercing, her eyes almost glowing.
Then she sighs and looks at me. "It seems time has come for you to know everything."
Lily looks alarmed. "Rose, you can't do that! We are supposed to wait fo-"
"I am done waiting! Call my brother and then you can go tattle off to whomever you wish." She snaps, her eyes full of ire, her voice commanding. Lily opens her mouth, but can't seem to find any words. She leaves the room quietly, running as soon as the door closes. To find Rose's brother or to report her, I do not know.
Alone in the room with me, Rose starts pacing. I stay silent, waiting.
She stops her prance and lifts up her chin when we hear footsteps outside. A queen ready to weather down any threat.
The door opens and in slides a boy with the same clear blue eyes as Rose. He has the same lean frame as her and moves with the same clear grace, though without the commanding air.
"Sister." He bows dramatically to both of us and then turns to me, "Hugo Granger Weasley at your service ma'am."
Then, before I can reply, he turns his head sharply to meet his sister's eyes. They have a wordless communication. And then turn to look at me with the same gaze. They move together, as if they know every thought the other thinks. I try to push away the thought of my own traitorous brother.
Rose is the first to speak. "what we are about to tell you, defies all sort of scientific logic, so you had better prepare yourself to hear and see and experience stuff that will make you think you are going out of your mind."
"it doesn't really defy logic though! It just has slightly different principles which, as described by pro-"
"Hugo, shut up. Tris, we are wizards and witches meaning we can do magic."
The room is quiet for a while. I finally find my voice and sputter out, "What?!"
"see? Told you she would say that, now you owe me two-"
Rose just glares at her brother and he opens his mouth to say something but Rose waves a hand. Hugo still speaks but no sounds come from his mouth. I think he is acting till I see him take out what appears to be a stick from his pocket and point it at his throat. Suddenly, as if turning on a speaker, his voice comes back, "Rosie, surely you wouldn't do that to your own br-"
"see? This is magic." She says, completely ignoring her brother, and looks at the glass of water beside my bed. It floats in the air.
I feel lightheaded. I'm sure I'm hallucinating.
"You are not." Two voices say in unison. "Our world is called the wizarding world.", Hugo carries on this time, "we have wizards and witches and vampires and centaurs and almost all creatures of myth you can dream of and more. We have magic flowing in our veins and most of our kind prefer to use it by channeling it through a wand. " he waves his own in the air. "some though, like Rosie, learn the art of doing magic without wands. It's difficult and requires immense practice and concentration but it can be done."
"But why," I ask, and this time they don't look into my mind, "why am I dragged into all this?"
Rose looks at her brother for some moments before turning to me, "You see, wizarding world is a secret society, living parallel to the non- magic, muggle universe. Our lot is glad enough of being left at peace but there are some among our kind who… detest muggles. detest them so much, that they have no qualms about going on killing sprees, torturing muggles for sport. Most of these people use a branch of magic called dark magic, black magic, derived through horrible methods."
My stomach twisted. I had a feeling I knew where this was headed. Killing people for sport….. I wondered if I had left my own broken world for something far, far worse.
"sometimes, these dark wizards form groups. The last time it happened it caused the two great wizarding wars, the last of which ended a decade before. This time… nothing has happened yet, no one is aware of any such activity but…"
Rose stops speaking. "but what?" I dared to ask.
"There was a prophecy. A prediction of the future." Hugo continued as Rose looked away, out of the window that overlooked an overgrown garden, anger flashing in her eyes.
"That prophecy, I don't really know what exactly it but the main content was that… dark times are about to come again. And rule for eternity. There is a group of certain people who can stop this but… it is not clear how many people are there and no one is sure who they are except one person. The girl with flames. The one who will bring together the rest of them."
"who is…"
"Me." Rose stands there, letting flames cover her entire arms. With the rage in her eyes, she looks scary. A queen indeed.
"I had a habit of burning up things ever since I was a kid. When someone would piss me off. But it was considered normal enough, most of us do uncontrolled magic before we turn 11, when we start our study to harness our powers. However my powers... I managed to control the flame. I could do the magic using the wand but it didn't feel…right. So I tried to learn wandless magic and 2 years before, in a rather desperate situation, I managed to wield my flames as a weapon."
She smiled humorlessly at me. "No one told me but I knew that from that moment I had wands aimed at my back. in the past years my powers have kept growing but it wasn't until last month that I knew about the prophecy. I regarded it as ridiculous. But then I touched a time-turner, a device used to transport through time, the last one in existence. And then I got transported to the future, where you lay there dying. My father and uncle Harry, the only other people in the room got transported with me, even though I had never tried to use the thing, had not even thought about travelling anywhere. But then I saw you get shot and somehow, something told me I just had to save you. As you can see, I'm obviously still trying to live off my guilt."
She gave another sarcastic smile. My heart thundered.
Another war.
I was to be another pawn, a weapon to save this world. A world I didn't even know existed till now.
I stared into Rose's eyes and saw, to my surprise, the same hatred reflected there. Not for me, but for the stupid fate that was hell-bent on spoiling both our lives.
But she still had a family, didn't she? She hadn't been betrayed by her own damning brother-
Before I could say or do something I would definitely regret later, shouts were heard and the door blasted open.
Something told me that it was not one of my few well-wishers.
please review.
the next chapter will have more about the intruders and feature way more redheads and also have a small POV from Tobias. if there is any particular character you wish to see of either fandoms, tell in the comments.
