Chapter Two: His Eyes like Mine
Disclaimer: It would be cool if I owned all of these ideas. If I did I certainly would not be posting it on this fan site and instead would be swimming in the profits I acquired from this tale.
Summary: The heir attracts the attention of the magical world. Toby's not like most wizards of England.
A/N: Wanted this story to be no longer than five chapters. Let's see if I can make it!
Insomniac: Warning, language in this chapter ()
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The fury of a Goblin King knew no bounds as the magical planes shook. Goblins from the world above grew cumbersome and restless, throwing suspicious glances at the thieving hands of the wizarding folk who acknowledged nothing out of the norm as they exchanged goods.
The greedy men often scoffed at their lovely weapons, sneaking into the night to steal their most valued of treasures. It was a reoccurring scene to most magical creatures that had the misfortune of dealing with the hairless wonders. They were so unusually silly.
Over the year, their latent reaction to danger (whether their own or that of society) became a commonly foolish practice of wizards.
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Although considered one of the greatest wizards of all time, Headmaster Albus Dumbledore of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry made several mistakes in his lifetime.
Among these said blunders included allowing a future-tyrant of the Dark Arts to go about unsupervised, encouraging a hardy round of rivalry between Gryffindors and Slytherins, and introducing a generation of Muggle-illiterate students to the delicate sweets their blood-cousins created. However, above all mishaps the professor did nothing – absolutely nothing – when persuaded by his predecessors to rekindle his relations with the inter-magical community.
It was not that he hated their kind per say, Professor Dumbledore just could not see himself liberating House Elves or befriending Giants in the near future.
Perhaps if he had considered strengthening their binds, Albus may have noticed the uneasy, squeamish nature of the elves or the flittering nerves of the magical owls.
No, instead the headmaster enjoyed a cup of tea in his office that fine June morning. With the recent, peaceful spirit of summer still in bloom, Albus Dumbledore could hardly wait for the new arrivals – students that may even rival our beloved Harry Potter in greatness.
Though he highly doubted the possibility, the anticipation for the start of a new year sent jitters down the old man's spine. He just needed to make sure that every student – pure-blood to muggle-born – received their letters and were properly guided by a member of the wizarding society.
It wouldn't do well for a child to get lost in the system.
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When Toby turned eleven, all hell broke loose. Now two months after the previous incident, Toby Williams learned to redefine his prior classification of hell.
His mother – a narrow-minded, depressed, frightful woman – experienced the shock of her life when an owl swooped into their dining room and dropped a particularly familiar letter on the table. Cursing her son for pulling such a ridiculous, sacrilegious prank within her household, the mad woman threw the little demon in the attic and placed the bothersome child in the back of her mind.
Raking his fingernails against the wooden floorboard of the deserted attic, Toby attempted in vain to claw his way out of the terrible mess he was in. Had he perhaps been locked in the basement, his hope for survival may have increased. However, trapped in an attic where his dear, crazed mother left her last cat (the carcass of poor Mr. Whiskers stained the vomit-covered rug near the southern grotto of the room) did not bode well for the young eleven-year-old.
By the third day, Toby viciously stunk of his own sweat and vile excrement. The torment and humiliation could break any child.
It was then, as his stomach panged with hunger and his throat cried for water, that Toby Williams wished with all his heart to escape this wretched prison. Starvation – starving to death – never sounded appealing.
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The silhouette of a man with familiar, mismatched eyes stumbled into his dreams that night, his frustration seeping off him in waves of anger. Something enraged the ethereal being, whose star-blonde hair wisped in the air. A simple smile, a simple snort, a simple glare – the child-babe of his, captured by the tainted hands of wizards. A disgrace, a disgrace to his enchanted kingdom!
"What child?" Toby called out to the hazy figure, "What babe?"
But the man only stared with his mismatched eyes.
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When Toby turned eleven (exactly two months six days from the celebration, to be precise) his room in the attic became a frequent host to the never-ending horde of letter-carrying owls. By the end of the week the floor was littered with the white and brown stains of scat.
"I'd better see those floors spick-and-spam by the hour or I'll beat your hide boy!" the woman he called Mother shouted from the floor bellow.
Rank and pitiful, Toby Williams loathed the owls for their persistence. Someone was going to pay for this awful, god-awful joke. Whispering to the tawny owl in a vengeful breath, the dirty boy complained, "I wish you would all just drop dead! I wish no more of you bloody owls would come! There's enough in my life as it is, these damn letters won't get me anywhere."
THUD. THUD. THUD. Suddenly his bedroom was full of the crap and carcass of owl.
"TOBY, YOU LITTLE SHITHEAD! GET YOUR ARSE DOWN HERE!"
He barricaded the attic door and hid under his covers, kicking a rodent from the premises of his bed. As always, he could hear the ghoulish laughter echoing against the walls. Burying his face into his pillow, Toby cursed his luck. He clearly should have known better than to wish.
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"It appears something odd has occurred Minerva my dear." The bearded headmaster scrutinized a parcel, attracting the notice of the present Transfiguration professor. The strict lady cleared her throat, appearing as attentive as always (however disputable this claim may be – she was not slacking off!)
"What do you mean Albus?"
Professor Dumbledore's finger graced the parchment, "A name has appeared, quite suddenly some odd years ago, on the List. I had Hagrid dispatch the roundly acceptance letters and have discovered thirteen owls missing from the owlry." Blue eyes peered over moon-shaped spectacles, "But you see my dear, that is not what I find most peculiar. Each bird was sent to one address and it seems they will no longer return to said address."
"A coincidence?"
"I think it best to send one of our professors to meet with this student."
With a nod, Minerva McGonagall was dismissed. The task of searching for an attainable and available guide a week before term began would be a troublesome assignment. Dumbledore smirked, if he knew Minerva a devious plan already formulated in her crafty mind. 'So very Slytherin …'
Glancing down at the note - To: Mr. Tobias Williams. Liverpool, England. Locked in the attic. 'A pleasant child this one may turn out to be', Dumbledore thought grimly. The neglected tended to require more nurture – or none at all – when they arrived for schooling.
"Mr. Tobias Williams, a predicament you turned out to be."
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Two weeks locked up in his room. Two weeks without proper nourishment. Two weeks of gutter water and owl a la mode. Two weeks of utter isolation.
Two weeks of nirvana, for one Toby Williams who preferred the company of rodents to his lunatic of a mother.
Truly this sense of tranquility, the state of his mother's apparent disregard for his being, soothed the skeletal, pale boy. Toby could feel trouble brewing that evening, just like he could smell the putrid remains of the flea-bitten birds. A breeze nestled lightly against his thin cheek – wait? A breeze? All the doors and windows were locked!
Not for the first time in his life, Toby became frightful of the yellow-eyed shadows cackling in the walls. Trouble was brewing; he could feel it in the air.
A shuffling, a struggle – down stairs beneath the floor boards, he heard all.
"What the – WHO THE HELL ARE YOU!"
"Move aside, muggle."
"Like hell, breaking and entering." She snorted, clearly conveying little respect for the stranger. Toby didn't know whether to pity or worship the man disrupting her morning coffee. Her face hurt to look at in the morning. "Should call the cops, get your arse arrested."
"Where's the boy? Your son I presume? I hope for his sake that he acquired his amazing attributes from his father. Not that's much to go by; all muggles are dull and brimming with stupidity to begin with."
That word again, muggle.
"The little asswipe? He's in the attic. Now get out of my house you motherfuc-,"
"Charming. Stupefy."
A loud thump. Toby hid under his covers and prayed softly that the boogieman wouldn't find him and kill him too. A green eye peeked over the sheets, astounded to witness a bright light glowing from the other side of his door. A few appropriate, mumbled phrases and the flap blasted off its hinges, revealing an intimidating, hook-nosed man.
Toby much preferred the boogieman instead of a male, murdering adult in a dress.
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In Severus' opinion the condition of this child proved once more that muggles were incapable of caring their young. The gaunt boy stunk, his sandy-brown hair grimy and his clothing something foul. For a moment, a split second, Severus Snape felt pity for this boy (a harsh reminder of his own unstable childhood). However that feeling vanished when he noticed the boy surrounded by bones and scat. 'The owls,' the potions professor thought dourly, 'was the boy that starved?' Indeed the child was thin, looking more of a nine-year-old then his true age.
Again those unearthly green-eyes were eerie.
"Are you Toby Williams?"
A little squeak, the child burrowed beneath the sheets, "Please, don't kill me!"
Snape rolled his eyes at the irritating behavior. He wasn't even in his Death Eaters garb and this child thought him a murderer.
"Moron! My name is Professor Snape. I am the professor that Hogwarts sent to retrieve you and, as I was attempting to explain to that foul muggle, discover what has happened to our school owls."
Nevertheless, a shiver ran up the Potions Master's spine at the thought of eating the dead birds raw. He cleared his throat, "I am merely deducting that those bones are not rats."
"So it wasn't a joke? I mean, I-I'm sorry, sir. I didn't know normal schools had owls."
"Of course not damn muggle-child, do I look like I teach at those godforsaken public schools?" Indeed Toby had not perceived that long dress-robes were not becoming attire for a professor at a normal school. Reaching into his robe, the snarky professor pulled out a piece of parchment. "Have you received this letter?"
"Yes."
"And you haven't responded?" A slight nod, the sandy blonde tresses hung limply with grime on his face. Snape sneered, smacking the boy, "You incompetent child!"
"Sir, you're hurting me." The child whimpered, tearing away from the wizard.
The hooked-nosed man snarled, "You have magic. Deal with it." He jerked the bothersome child from his bed and dragged him down the shaft. Snape snapped his head to look at the terrified child, "Oh, and Tobias Williams? Welcome to the Wizarding World."
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Within moments of entering Ollivanders the finest wand shop in the world, Mr. Ollivander knew without a doubt that this first-time wandholder would be one of the most difficult customers he ever had. Mr. Harry Potter's visit a year ago could not even compare to the complexity of this child's ... magical core.
He almost asked the awestruck, green-eyed boy to leave.
Although understanding the likelihood of finding the perfect wand for Mr. Toby Williams was very slim, Mr. Ollivander humored the boy. "I don't recognize your features, a muggle-born then Mr. Snape?"
"Certainly not my own!" the dark-robed man snorted, exasperated by his annual visits to the most renowned wandmaker. Clearly no one in the Ministry received his requests to hire a specialist to integrate the muggle community. Otherwise some other poor sap with black greasy hair would get stuck with this measly job.
The potions professor preferred concocting Wolfsbane for the mutt over the task of 'finding' untrained muggle-borns. 'Still …' Snape thought wearingly, eyeing the odd green-eyed boy.
Something was off, even the untrained Toby could tell, as he feverously waved the wooden sticks. The pile of wands and un-shelved boxes grew by the hour. Maybe he wasn't cut out for this magic deal, though returning to his mother's humble adobe did not seem like an alternative route for the eleven-year-old. Perhaps he should take his chances at the streets of London? They couldn't be as dangerous as Detroit or Chicago …
Ah, yes. Another wand was handed.
"Difficult, yes… very difficult," the old coot muttered, scurrying around the shelves for a possible instrument for this atypical client. "Are you by any chance a squib?"
A vein throbbed on Snape's head. This muggle-born child had effectively succeeded in doing the one thing the Potter boy had yet to accomplish – grant one Severus Snape a migraine. "Get on with it Ollivander, we don't have all day!"
The magic – it had to be the magic. His wands were well crafted, his dexterity notorious. The boy's magic was off. However acceptance into Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry required a wand.
"It is not perfect, I admit." The wandmaker mumbled in obvious distress as he handed the child another instrument of magic, "I am reluctant to even provide this tool to you Mr. Williams."
A shy voice inquired, "Must you, then sir?"
"Where are your manners, Mr. Williams?" The greasy professor drawled, "Though I am curious, why sell a customer a wand that will not always behave accordingly?"
An all too familiar twinkle of mischief in a pair of soft blue eyes. "Why Severus Snape? Every wizard needs a wand."
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In a magical kingdom ruled by the creature of fae, one king irately lounged upon his throne. The beasts of the land were a jitter with angst as their ruler wrath coursed through their veins. "That foul warlock, Dumble-Bubble! He may act innocent, but it was under his ministry that my child was drafted…to-to wizardry!" The Goblin King ranted and raved in his ball room, obscenities slipping fluidly from his learned tongue. The mere thought, hypocrisy! A royal heir, bound to the laws of man! "Disgusting, disgusting, disgusting."
A tiny goblin, a beast of the upper-world, cleared his miniscule throat, "My Lord, perhaps in the end this alteration can benefit all."
"The Goblins from the Aboveground have begun to suspect the wizards of mischief. They are prepared to revolt if a boundary is crossed. Perhaps your heir will become the test for all wizarding alike." The wise goblin proposed, quite startled at the silence preceding his claim. Great, he was done for …
"Griphook, you're a genius!" Or not …
"I'll watch thy eyes, thy eyes from the dancing crystals! If those wizards think they can corrupt my heir then they've got another thing coming!" the Goblin King barked, cheer and merriment (with a taste of promised vengeance) resounding throughout the stone-walled hall. The stout goblin bowed in reverence to his liege. It would not do to put his lord in another fit of rage.
Mystical eyes gazed upon the creatures of the court, the goblins of the Underground. "You will follow him throughout his … training. Any requests, miniscule or grand, grant it for the heir." With a snap of his fingers, they too vanished. Chortling madly at what to come, the Goblin King laxly drew a crystal and peered into the glass.
"For the heir is the babe with the power," the enchanted king softly sung. "The heir is the babe with the power."
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When Toby Williams decided to sit in compartment 24 after figuring how to get on to Platform 9 ¾ (he really should demand an instruction manual for muggle-borns), he did not understand that this decision would become a life-altering decision. If he had, perhaps he would have chosen to wear his favorite pair of bright, orange Nikes.
In his compartment, Toby met an odd, little girl of silver moon eyes.
"Are-Are you wearing olives in your hair?" He asked in bewilderment. Indeed, black little vegetables clung in her long, blonde hair. Her kind was oh so magical to his mind.
A slight smile, "Oh yes, they repel Hargmunks during the winter."
For the life of him, Toby could not recall reading about Hargmunks in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Well, Newt Scamander could not have found all of the magical creatures of the wizarding world.
"Um…It's the end of summer."
"Yes, we should all get ahead start."
"That's true… I'm Toby."
"My name's Luna."
There was something about this eccentric girl that warmed his heart. "Let's be friends."
The yellow-haired girl cocked her head slightly, confusion eminent. "Really? I don't have any of those." Children always thought her strange, a puzzlement of lunacy. They avoided her like the black plague.
"Neither do I."
His honesty won her over.
From the shadows, a pair of mismatched eyes watched the serene scene through a crystal glass. Smiling like the ruler aught to smile, the Goblin King remarked "To be frank, I prefer this mortal over our dear Elena Douglas. This one's a dreamer."
But the children could hear nothing but the churning of the train's engine.
The Hat was old and stuffy. The Hat was ancient and knowledgeable. The Hat was everything that the founders would expect the Hat to be.
It sat in the Headmaster's office for the entire year, awaiting the annual ceremony of sorting first-year students. The Hat had sat on the heads of the most brilliant, the most cunning, the most brave, and the most successful minds in the wizarding world.
Never before had the Hat sensed a presence like this one Toby Williams.
"Hmm … hmm … you are not what you appear, young Williams. There is darkness, great darkness in you. The magic in you pulses, not like that of wizards. Be wary Mr. Williams, should any find your worth -"
"Aren't you supposed to sort me?" the child's voice whispered, noticing the antsy expressions of the older students. The last child, behind Weasley, Ginerva, had yet to be sorted after all.
"Impatient as ever. Or perhaps the most patient of the evening. Very loyal and extremely tolerant. No drive for learning, for anything really … not Ravenclaw or Slytherin. Brave like a Gryffindor but only to a fault. Not much of a worker either, so not Hufflepuff. A dark past, a hazy future. You face much turmoil. Whatever path you follow, know that dreams and reality can sometimes intertwine."
"MOST LIKELY …" the Hat called out and sealed his fate.
When Toby Williams was sorted into Hufflepuff there hadn't been a thundering cheer, merely a polite applause. Somehow, Toby's heart fell at the sight of his allotted house.
There were six other children his age, two boys and four girls, chatting eagerly among one another. 'I should-I should join them,' he thought hesitantly. Oh did Toby wish he was with Luna instead, who sat alone at the Ravenclaw table. They laughed around her. Her grey-dew eyes ignored their gaiety, picking at an olive in her hair.
Unreachable, yet still tangible. An arm slung over his shoulder, catching him off guard. The bright yellow of Hufflepuff, Toby would have to get used to their friendliness, their cheerfulness, their tolerance. They take anybody that didn't fit in with the status quo. It surprised Toby that the house wasn't any larger.
After all, the magical world had their handful of oddballs.
"Last year Harry Potter and his friends faced life-sized chess pieces!" the second-year Ernie Macmillan exclaimed to the excited first-years. Toby's face broke into a smile, the first in quite sometime.
"Like Alice in Wonderland?"
"Who in where?"
Toby ignored that statement. It wasn't his fault wizards were ignorant. "Was that a test?"
"What? No, no, jeez muggle-born first-years … the philosopher's stone was here. They protected you see." The Hufflepuff student explained sullenly, "Unfortunately Gryffindors won the house cup last year cause of last minute points. Better them then Slytherin. A nasty bunch, I'd keep away if I were you. Oh, look the feast is about to begin."
The heir's eyes wandered across the table, the pulsing of odd magic thumbing through the air. Food materialized out of nothingness. "I want something exciting, like last year, to happen." He dipped his spoon in the marmalade and licked up its contents. To think a week ago he survived on owl. Those birds still haunted him from time to time.
"But that's too much to ask for, isn't it?"
The monsters in the walls cheered as they heard their master's great desire. Oh what mischief they could play tonight, lingering in the shade of the aged castle. Their magic, more ancient and pure, weaved undetected by the stony fortress of Hogwarts. Not even their cousins, the House Elves, would dare to expel them!
"The heir cries for more!" Some jeered and shrieked.
They shouted, "We'll give him more!"
"Did he wish it?" a concerned chubby goblin voiced, doubtful that their powerful liege would allow such free reign over their magic in a citadel tainted by humans.
A roar - "Close enough!"
All of this goblin naughtiness, the Goblin King surveyed in his crystal glass. Although the moon-lit ruler watched, his attention drifted to a boy in black and yellow, lying silently in bed – listening to the voices in his head. Only the daft would ignore what they say, the wise know this true.
"Ha-ha, a lovely chap he is, my heir – I'll call him Jareth!" the king declared in his heir's nightly dance of dreams, mismatched orbs ablaze. "After all, he's got my eyes!"
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