Chapter 4: Drwgg llarien
Trinity followed Lynne through Diagon Alley, back into the pub they had entered through London. She glanced around at the patrons nervously, keeping a tight grip on her wand.
"Back again, Lynne?" asked a blonde haired, middle-aged witch appearing to be a few years younger than Lynne. She grinned at Trinity knowingly. "Come for a drink before heading home?"
"No, thank you, Hannah," replied Lynne with a smile. "I have to get the children up early for the train."
"Oh—well maybe next time? Be sure to give my regards to everyone." She paused when a tall, dark haired man walked up to them, smiling even brighter. "Got everything packed?"
"Yeah," he responded with a smile. "Allo, Lynne." He gave the witch a quick nod, though his smile had not faded. "I didn't know you had a fourth daughter." He blinked at Trinity.
"Can't say this one is mine," chuckled Lynne. "Trinity, this is Professor Longbottom."
"Oh—hello," she said shyly.
"I'm sure you'll do exceptional in my class—that is, if you enjoy hands on stuff. I don't bother with a lot of theory, except when introducing the plants."
"You teach Herbology, correct?"
"That's me. Too bad you couldn't have taken it from Professor Sprout. She was the best!"
"You sell yourself short, Neville," chided Lynne reproachfully. "Molly loves your class."
"She's one of my best students—her and Mercy both."
"Glad to know that. Now—if only they could both do better in History of Magic."
"Professor Binns is no longer teaching, so that might change."
Trinity shifted her feet as she listened to the conversation, feeling more and more out of place by the second. She stared at the floor while they continued exchanging pleasantries.
"Hate to cut this conversation short, but I really must be getting home. We should all have a drink sometime in Hogsmead."
"Just send an owl with a time and day," laughed Professor Longbottom. "Bye, Trinity. I'll see you tomorrow at the feast."
Trinity nodded quickly before following Lynne out to the streets of London. The streetlights were beginning to turn on. Lynne waited at the street corner, but she made no notion of moving anytime soon. "What are we waiting for?"
"The Knight Bus."
"Are you sure a night bus can get us to wherever it is that you're taking us?"
"The Knight Bus goes anywhere we need it to. Admittedly, Drwgg llarien is in Ireland."
"Bloody Irish," scoffed Trinity under her breath.
"What did you say?" snapped Lynne hotly. She glared down at Trinity, her presence suddenly becoming dark and looming.
Trinity looked up quickly. "N—nothing!" she stuttered quickly.
Lynne continued to glare at her until a double-decker blue bus pulled up to them, appearing to come from thin air. The older woman chuckled lightly when Trinity shuffled back quickly.
"Welcome to the Knight Bus," said a young man with dark, frizzled hair. He smiled down at Lynne and Trinity as he helped them with their luggage. "Where will you be off to this evening?"
"Drwgg llarien," answered Lynne.
Trinity kept her distance from the older witch. She was able to look around for a brief second before she was thrown to the floor of the bus. Several beds were racing toward her, all with sleeping passengers. An indignant squeal escaped her lips before Lynne pulled her to her feet and helped her into an empty bed. "What is this madness?"
"Welcome to the Knight Bus," repeated Lynne with a strained grin. She turned to the young man who had helped her with Trinity's school supplies. "Are you new on the Knight Bus?"
"Hn? Oh—yeah. I got hired just last month. Wallace Hern's the name. Don't you work for the Ministry?"
"Yes," Lynne answered cautiously. "Why?"
"Saw your face in the Prophet is all." He took out a newspaper and started reading it.
Trinity's eyes widened when she saw the picture on the front page of a man with messy dark hair and round glasses move. He smiled proudly. "Um—Lynne?"
"Hm?"
"That picture on the newspaper—erm—did it just move?"
"Blimey! Was this girl raised under a rock?" the young man asked, baffled.
"She may have well as," Lynne sighed. "Trinity, pictures in the wizarding world will move from time to time," she added with forced patience. "Now try and get some sleep. I'll wake you when we get there."
Trinity frowned, but she lay down nonetheless. She closed her eyes, but found it impossible to sleep with her bed moving around so much. Her stomach was also twisted into a sickening knot. Her eyes snapped open whenever the bus stopped to let off a passenger. After what felt like hours, Lynne finally shook her shoulder. She was all too happy to be getting off the Knight Bus. She said a half-hearted good-bye before the bus disappeared again. She collapsed onto her hands and knees shortly after and vomited on the sidewalk.
"Trinity? You going to be alright?"
"I never—want to—ride that—bus—ever again!" she panted forcefully.
"C'mon, you've got to get up," Lynne said gently. "We've only got the gravel lane to walk down, then you can sleep 'til morning." She helped Trinity to her feet, and while still holding onto the school supplies, led the young girl down the dark gravel lane.
Both sides were lined with large trees. It was unlike anything Trinity had ever seen before. She took a moment to take in her surroundings. The air had a cold bite to it as she breathed in.
She followed Lynne down the drive, and stopped when they came to a lone house with lit up windows. It was two stories high with a thatch roof.
"It doesn't look like much, but muggles tend to stay away," said Lynne softly, looking down at Trinity with a smirk.
Trinity could not find the words to say. A short dark haired skinny girl running out to hug Lynne interrupted her muddled thought process. "Mum!"
"Mercy!—" grunted Lynne when the girl, whom Trinity presumed was Lynne's daughter, collided with her.
"Is this the girl you picked up from the muggles?" the girl, Mercy, asked, cocking her head to the side.
"Yes, this is Trinity."
"Pleasure." Mercy held out her hand, which Trinity shook. "Molly sent Vance with a note saying that she'll be late getting back from Victoire's," she told her mother matter-of-factly.
"Oh really?" Lynne sighed heavily. "Mercy, would you show Trinity inside? I'm going to put her stuff in the living room so that it's ready in the morning."
Mercy grabbed Trinity by the wrist and led her inside. Trinity's mouth gaped when she saw the inside and how much bigger it looked. The ceiling to the foyer extended high above her head. Plants hung from the ceiling, all of them longer than she was tall. Mercy led her to the staircase, though it was obvious that there was more to the first floor of the house.
"You can see that after you get settled," she explained.
"How is this place bigger on the inside?" Trinity asked as she was dragged up the stairs. In the light, she could see that Mercy's skin was pale, almost alabaster.
"It's secretly the TARDIS," answered Mercy, smirking.
"The what?"
"You were raised by muggles, and you don't know what the TARDIS is? What do they teach you?" She sighed heavily.
"Math, English, and History mostly," murmured Trinity under her breath. "Seriously—what's the TARDIS? Is it some kind of gaming consol?"
"Gaming consol?" Mercy looked over her shoulder and blinked. "I don't know what that is." She shook her head helplessly. "Haven't you ever seen Doctor Who on the teleeviseon?"
"Erm—it's pronounced tel-e-vision. And no, can't say that I have."
"Where are muggle priorities these days?" They stopped after three flights of stairs outside the first door to the right. "Anyway—the TARDIS is an old 1940s blue police box that's bigger in the inside. Now, this here will be your room tonight. My room is the next one down, if you need anything. Mum will call us down when dinner is ready." She waved as she walked down the hall and into her bedroom.
Trinity was left, feeling overwhelmingly confused about everything she had experienced that day. She gripped her wand tightly, which she still had in her hand, before opening the door to what would be her room for the evening. It looked, for the most part, unused, but clean. A small, twin bed sat in the corner with a window off to the side. A small bookshelf sat next to it, doubling as a nightstand with a lantern and candle on the wooden surface.
After several minutes of standing in the doorway, she walked in, glad to be left alone. She walked to the bed and sat in it; surprised to find that it was soft and more comfortable than the bed she had back at the orphanage. She took her wand and set it on top of the bookshelf before skimming through titles. She was not surprised to find that most of the titles were unfamiliar to her. She grabbed the one titled Hogwarts, A History by Bathilda Bagshot.
She went back to the bed and cracked open the thick volume. It was quite some time before there was a knock on her door, making her jump.
"Dinner's ready!" called Mercy.
Trinity closed the book, making note of her place before scrambling to open the door. She was pleasantly surprised to see that Mercy had waited for her.
"Da's home now—so's Molly." She smiled brightly as she led Trinity down the stairs.
"Erm—how big is your family?"
"My immediate family is just Mum, Da, Molly, and Alex. Pure blood families are all related to each other though."
"Pure blood?"
"No muggles in the family. Although, Da is a half-blood."
"Oh," Trinity muttered. "Does any of this matter at Hogwarts?"
"Not so much anymore. Occasionally there've been students who want it to go back to the old ways of allowing pure bloods in only."
"And the teachers?"
"None of them really care about students' blood-status." Mercy shrugged nonchalantly.
Trinity remained silent as she followed Mercy down the stairs, deep in thought. She did what she could to suppress the urge to start asking every question that came to mind. Her muddled thought process came to a sudden stop when Mercy opened the door to the dining room.
Like many of the other room in Drwgg llarien, this one was larger than it should have been in respect to how small the house looked from the outside. A long oak table sat in the middle. It had the look of being ancient, possibly having been passed down from generation to generation since the Middle Ages. A pot of soup was being lowered right as they walked in. A middle-aged man with neatly trimmed salt and pepper hair was standing at the head of the table, apparently deep in thought. He looked up when Mercy and Trinity entered, and smiled at them. The smile reached his deep green eyes, and it was then that Trinity realized how green Mercy's eyes were.
"You must be Trinity," he said, to Trinity's surprise, in a Cornish accent. He extended his hand to her. "Lynne's told me all about you."
"Oh—well, there must not have been much to tell," replied Trinity, blushing.
"On the contrary, she's been talking my ear off for the past forty-five minutes—since I walked in the door, actually." His grin widened as he put on emerald rimmed glasses.
"John, leave the poor girl alone," chided Lynne. "She's not used to our lot."
"She will in time."
The room went suddenly silent when the door opened again. A girl maybe a couple inches taller than Lynne and a willowy frame, with long flowing blonde hair, walked into the room. She smiled at the family as though her appearance were the most normal thing to happen.
"And that would be Molly," Mercy whispered into Trinity's ear.
"Who's this?" Molly blinked, her dark brown eyes looking rather confused at Trinity's appearance.
"This is Trinity," said Lynne. "Trinity, meet my middle child, Molly. She's also attending Hogwarts, though this is her last year—Hufflepuff."
"Pleasure," said Molly curtly, extending her hand, which Trinity shook.
"Now that we've got the family together—let us eat," announced Lynne with a clap of her hands.
Trinity glanced around uncertainly, not sure of where she should sit. John took the head of the table, and Lynne sat to his left, and Molly to his right. Mercy sat on the other side of Lynne.
"Trinity, sit next to Mercy," Lynne instructed gently.
She quickly went to sit down, and was pleased to see that Lynne had enchanted the ladle to serve the family.
"So Trinity—I understand that you were raised by muggles," said John to break the uncomfortable silence.
She blushed a bright shade of pink. "Well—I grew up in an orphanage in Cambridge," she muttered.
"And you had no idea you're a witch?" He took a bite of his soup.
"Not until I got a letter from Hogwarts," admitted Trinity sheepishly. She stared blankly at her soup bowl.
"They're some of the worse lot of muggles I've seen in a long time!" Lynne said quickly. "They had Trinity believing that the magical community is evil! Then the caretaker of that place tried refusing Trinity leave to go to school!"
"Lynne—not all muggles are like my mother," John explained kindly. "I remember some of my neighbors from my childhood. Whenever I returned home from Hogwarts, they would throw rocks at the house—after, of course, my father passed away."
"Do people—erm—I mean, muggles have reason to be so afraid?" asked Trinity.
"Some," admitted Lynne. "There have been some dark witches and wizards over the years, but like I told you at that orphanage, some muggles go real bad too."
"It doesn't happen all that often though," said Mercy casually.
"That often?" squeaked Trinity, looking over at Mercy with wide eyes.
"Well—there was a wizard who liked to be known as Lord Voldemort, but he's been dead for many years."
"Alright—off to bed! All of you! I will not have his name uttered in my house!"
"Mum! Trinity hasn't even finished her dinner!" cried Mercy.
"Off to bed!" Lynne repeated irritably, pointing to the door.
"C'mon, Trinity," Mercy groaned, glaring at her mother. She grabbed Trinity by the wrist and dragged her away. "Normally she isn't like this. But You-Know-Who's name still instills fear within the magical community."
"Why?" asked Trinity as she followed Mercy up the stairs.
Mercy grimaced. "You'll learn about him soon enough. Just never say his name in polite company."
She frowned at Mercy's response. She opened the door to the bedroom she was being allowed to use until the morning when she would be going to Hogwarts. She paced back and forth, thinking on Lynne's reaction to Mercy bringing up Lord Volde-something. It was some time before she settled down enough to crawl into bed for the night.
A/N: Sorry for the wait. There were issues (many of them) with screwing up my formatting. Everything for the longest time was in a single paragraph. Hope everyone had a happy and safe Halloween and Guy Fawkes day.