Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter but I do have the pleasure of owning Aurora and this plot.
Aurora Pov.
The water in the pond rippled in the light breeze, and the overgrown goldfish that my godfather Remus won at the seaside swam around unaware that it was being watched. Goldfishes were just as interesting as any other animal, if given the chance even fish won from a run down fairground could grow to be as huge as one purchaged from a shop. And the dim eyes that bulged on the sides didn't push its secrets onto me. Like all Muggle animals, it was as stupid as a troll, albeit a little bit more entertaining than trolls were.
Unlike the fish, I felt the piercing gaze on my back and looked behind me at the old cottage house I called home to find green eyes peering out the kitchen window. Remus stood at his usual spot overlooking our small garden, only with a frown marring his pale face. My godfather looked older than he was, his once brown hair becoming more grey as the months passed, and the lines on his face more prominent. He was also thin, and every now and then he would have fresh cuts on his face or hands. All of it was down to an illness he had tried to conceal from me for years: Lycanthropy.
But the truth had always been there for me to see. I was what people called a natural-born Legilimens, which meant I could see into the minds of anyone around me. Most people thought of it as mind-reading, and essentially, it was. Only thoughts were not scribbled into the mind, able to understand easily, the mind was a many layered thing, images, memories, feelings were all for me to see and feel. I could delve so far into a persons mind that I could see everything that made them, them. Remus thought my talent a gift, one many trained themselves to achieve and even then, still not coming as close in skill as a natural Legilimens but he didn't understand what it was like to have such a loud mind or to know what everyone around me was thinking. Sometimes I wished I could shut it off, especially when the pity thoughts began.
Turning away, I glared at the pond as Remus left the house and came to sit down beside me. I could 'feel' his mind, almost taste his humour and bristled. Maybe it was because I spent so much time with him that his mind was easier to 'see' into, like I was more familiar with it. The same went for his father Lyall, who was the only grandfatherly type figure I had. My parents were dead, killed when I was only a few months old by the dark wizard Lord Voldemort. It was that same night he met his demise at the hand of my older brother, Harry, who like my parents, I only knew from the glimispes stolen from my godfathers mind. Harry Potter, or famously known as The Boy who Lived, had been left with our mothers Muggle ( non-wizard folk ) sister and her family, to grow up where he could be safe, away from the prying eyes of the wizarding world.
Remus held a thick yellowish envelope out, and the loopy green writing that formed my name only made me angrier.
Miss A. Potter,
The back bedroom,
32 Oak lane,
Yorkshire.
"I told you to burn it. I don't want to go."
"You look more like your mother everyday, more so when you make that face." Remus said amused as he broke the purple wax bearing a coat of arms; one I would recognise even asleep. A lion, an eagle, a badger and a snake surrounding a large letter 'H'. My Hogwarts letter had finally arrived, carried by a rather radiant brown barn owl. For a few minutes, I had been elated, squealing and jumping around like I had been gifted the best broomstick in the universe. I was going to Hogwarts, where all the memories Remus replayed in his head happened, where my parents had learned all their magic and where my brother currently went to school. I would have my own wand. That was the true dream; my own wand. I wouldn't need to steal Remus' or Lyall's to practice the spells in the books I had thumbed more times than my tattered copy of Beedle the Bard. But out of everything I would experience, it was finally meeting my brother that I looked forward too the most.
My bubble of joy popped when I locked eyes with Remus, and saw his longing smile. I saw a red steam engine, the Hogwarts Express, thick clogs of smoke covering the platfom, the parents and children that filled it and suddenly, I was running. Or Remus was. I saw an image I had seen a thousand times before. The first time Remus met my mother and father. They had been friends since that day, since they boarded the Hogwarts Express at my age until the night they died but such a thing was impossible for me. I never had a friend before, or even spent much time with children my age. And when I did, I found them more unbearible than I did adults. The mind of a child was even more of a maze than I cared to deal with.
"My mother wasn't a freak, Remus. I am." He sighed, rolled his eyes and pulled the letter out. Unable to stop myself, I glanced at it.
HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY
Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore
(Order of Merlin First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)
Dear Miss Potter,
We are pleased to inform you that you have a place at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.
Term begins on 1 September. We await your owl by no later than 31 July.
Yours sincerely,
Professor McGonagall
Deputy Headmistress.
Trying to sound firm and the joy of my face, I snapped at him. "I'm not going."
It was as if talking to a brick wall. My godfather looked over the book list, smiling lightly. Probing into his mind, I was annoyed when there was nothing to see. His mind was clear, focused intently on the yellow colour of the parchment in front of him.
"You are blocking me!" It was frustrating. I hated when I couldn't read someone, a very rare thing for me. Remus did it by boring me out of his mind, focusing on a blank wall or picturing a clear sheet of parchment or in this case, its colour. If he focused hard enough, and with a good grip on his emotions, he could successfully keep me out. For a little bit anyway.
"If you don't want to go, then you won't. But if you worry you won't make friends because your a Legilimens, then such fears are silly." said Remus lightly. "Your a bright witch, with a great talent, and with more magical knowledge in your pinky finger than I did at your age or your parents for that matter. If a werewolf can make friends at Hogwarts, then so can you."
I sighed, stood, took one look at the yellow parchment and turned away.
"Lightening never strikes in the same place twice, Remus even at Hogwarts."
He laughed, a wolfish laugh.
"Actually, such rare phenomenons do accure. Lightning can strike any location more than once, in fact Muggles have found that given enough time, it is actaully inevitible. That includes Hogwarts." Remus had an answer for everything, just like I did but it was infuriating in times like this. Hogwarts was any witch or wizards dream, and it had been mine for as long as I could remember but I would be the freak of the school. The freak that read minds, and had a werewolf for a guardian. Then there was the fear that Harry would hate me for not being shipped off into the Muggle world like he had been. From what Remus had been told, he had been Sorted into Gryffindor, and at the end of the year, once again twarted Lord Voldemort. I dreaded to think what his mind would be like. "You'll get a wand. I'll throw in a pet. Not a toad though, your dad would haunt me."
A smile tugged at the corners of my mouth and without looking at him, I nodded. "As long as we can have ice cream at Floreans."
"Make it chocolate ice cream and you have a deal, Potter."
I hope you like this chapter and Aurora. Reviews and comments are more than welcome, as is criticism, but try not to be too harsh. The next chapter will be up soon, hopefully in a day or two Thanks for reading!
