"Charlie! Carrie! Where are you?" Paul called out to his brother and sister, but no answer came. He kept on walking the unfamiliar streets, hoping to find something or someone he recognised. The streets were narrow and people were rushing past him. He heard the bells of Big Ben toil eight. His stomach grumbled.

While he had looked forward to going on an adventure on the bed again, he did not really like being on his own like this. He had never been afraid to be on his own while he had lived in London, but London was big and he did not know where he was. To be with his siblings was different from being alone. When he was little^, he had played outside the door with his friends in the streets, but his mother had always been close. Or a neighbour. These days Aunt Eglantine was making sure he came home in time, she kept his stomach full and his clothes clean and sent him off to school.

He looked around.

There was a young woman leaning against the wall, smoking a cigarette. Paul walked up to her and plainly asked:

"Have you seen my brother or sister?"

"Nah." She shrugged. "Wot they look like, love?"

Her accent sounded familiar. The roughness, the melody, so different from Aunt Eglantine's sounded like happy times he had had with his mum. A tear welled up in his eyes.

"Charlie is about as tall as you and he has dark hair and he is wearing long trousers and he has a brown jumper and Carrie has a long plait and she is wearing her new shoes."

The young woman laughed.

"Sorry, love, but no. You best run 'ome to yer Ma."

Paul swallowed away the tears that threatened to fall and walked on.


"Emelius?" Eglantine's voice sounded incredulous and happy.

"The one and only. As far as I know, of course."

"Oh..." She was obviously dumbfounded and his own heart was doing spectacular somersaults at hearing her.

"Not a social call, I'm afraid my dear. I'm calling to tell you..."

"That the children are with you." She plunged in. He chuckled.

"Yes, well, Carrie and Charles are, but Paul seems to have wandered off." He kept his voice as casual as possible, but knowing Eglantine, he was bracing himself for her answer.

"Wandered off?" Her voice was dangerously calm.

"Probably into Seven Dials*."

Silence on the other side of the line.

"He'll be fine. He's a dapper lad."

"I'm coming over. It will take a while to get on the train to London and then to arrive, but I'm coming now."

"Wait!" He managed to shout so she wouldn't hang up on him. "You could use a spell maybe?"

"A spell?" She whispered.

He told her the words and the movement**.

"What if it doesn't work? Or halfway works? Or I'll find my arms are in London but my legs are still here?"

"Won't happen." He spoke with confidence. "You are a very powerful witch. I have every faith in you."

Charlie and Carrie nodded enthusiastically in the background and Carrie called 'sorry!' towards the phone.

"I'll try."

"We'll see you shortly, then."

"Goodbye."

"Goodbye; my dearest." He replied awkwardly.


Eglantine stared at the words she had jotted down. Deliberation seemed key and somehow it didn't seem very difficult to find that. Paul was missing and it was enough to want to find him as soon as possible, keeping him out of harms way and her worry for him fueled her with intention.

She put on her coat and scarf and stepped into the drawing room. She pushed back the coffee table and took her place. Then gulping in a big breath, she moved and murmured the words.

She felt as if she was being squeezed from head to toe through a rather too tight rubber band and it knocked the air out of her. The squeezing stopped and she opened her eyes, which she had shut tightly due to the force of the spell. She stumbled a little but managed not to fall. She was just brushing some dust (and soot, unfortunately, must be the London air) off her coat when she heard a boy's voice call out her name:

"Aunt Eglantine!"

The boy ran straight into her arms and she enveloped him in a warm embrace, kissing his cheeks and head.

"Oh Paul! I was so worried about you."

He looked up with sparkling eyes. "I knew you were still a witch!"


^ Of course being seven is a lot bigger than being five - we are led to believe Paul is six in the movie and since a year has passed, he should be seven

* Thank you Wikipedia and Google Maps for pointing out to me where the War Office is, where the Cockney Rhyming slang originated and for showing me where Emelius might be living

** I know this is totally stolen from Harry Potter, but I find it quite hard to come up with spells and such myself, so best 'borrow' from someone who can. Right?