His eyes traveled over the front of the shop, where his grandson and apprentice, Alphonsus, was talking with a tall, slender young man of around seventeen or eighteen. Mr. Ollivander recognized the boy, of course; seven years before, he'd been in the shop with his mother to buy his own wand. Remy Lupin: sixteen and a half inches, olive, supple and swishy, dragon heartstring core, an ideal wand for transfiguration. Today he was with two children of close to the same age, the elder of which - a girl - was bent over the selection of wands that Alphonsus had laid out in front of her, eyeing each one as if her choice could affect the fate of the world. The younger one, a boy, tugged impatiently at Remy's sleeve. "Come on," he wheedled. "Cel's going to take forever. You said I could get some ice cream."
"She won't take long, will you, Cel?" Remy asked. The girl shrugged, not breaking her concentration as she mumbled, "You and Teddy can go get ice creams if he wants, I'll stay here 'til you get back."
Apparently, however, the younger boy, Teddy, was not really interested in ice cream - he merely wanted his sister, if sister she was, to hurry up, because he pouted and crossed his arms, but made no move to leave. Now, if Mr. Ollivander had guessed right - and he was a shrewd guesser - the girl was the daughter of Minstrel Lehman, and therefore the sister of Remy. The two of them took after their mother in coloration and demeanor (more than three decades before, Minstrel Lehman had looked nearly exactly the same as she bent over the same task), but the third child - Teddy - was of a different cast... now, what had he heard about this before...?
Mr. Ollivander's mental review of the Daily Prophet's Society columns was broken when the girl decisively picked up a wand. The wand gratified her by producing a jet of purple fire. The fire twisted in the air like a serpent, and after a while dissipated with a sweet smell like incense. Alphonsus seemed delighted. "A match on your first try!" he exclaimed, "that's great!"
Mr. Ollivander smiled, remembering a time when he's had much the same reaction to a girl who resembled this one. "Don't celebrate yet, Alphonse," said Mr. Ollivander dryly, using the shorter familiar form to address his grandson. "Have her try other wands. If she's anything like her mother was at that age, the choice she makes might surprise you."
"I thought 'the wand chooses the wizard', Grandpere," Alphonsus quoted with a questioning glance at his mentor, although he obediently handed the girl a new wand. She took it, and this time the wand created a wreath of bluebell flames that danced around like will-o'-wisps. Alphonsus seemed astounded. Mr. Ollivander smiled. "Well, give her another one, go on," he said with gentle amusement, and watched Alphonsus's jaw drop further and further as each wand unerringly swore its allegiance to the little girl, if only she would buy them.
After the little girl had gone through some twenty-odd wands, each time producing a variety of non-burning flame, Mr. Ollivander himself chose a wand from among the shelves and handed it solemnly to her. This time the wand produced a ball of silver flame, which stretched out what seemed like wispy wings, tail-feathers, and a crested head which swiveled around on a long neck as if looking for something. The silver flame-bird flickered for only a moment and then died.
Mr. Ollivander nodded gravely, although even he was a little shaken by what he'd just seen. The flame-bird had looked uncannily like a Patronus, and a corporeal one at that. He'd heard that Harry Potter had managed the Patronus Charm at thirteen, but he was an extreme rarity; yet here was a ten-year-old who hadn't even started school... then again, her mother had quite surprised him, too - but Remy had been normal enough... "Was that a Patronus?" he asked in a would-be-disinterested voice.
Remy Lupin, who had been watching the proceedings in silence, now let out a wry chuckle. "I know how you feel," he said. "But to Celes, it's nothing special. She produced a Patronus as her first sign of magic, and she's been able to produce a corporeal one since last year, about the same time I learned it, although the form of hers varies every now and then. I admit it was rather a pressure on me to manage it before she did."
"I can imagine," Mr. Ollivander said weakly. Was her magic so strong, then? He turned to his apprentice. "And that, my dear boy, is why sometimes it is still the wizard that chooses the wand - there are some wizards around whom any wand would be just too pleased to serve. That is the type of wizard every wand-maker aspires to be, but sadly, it is often achieved only by the end of a very long and productive life." He beamed at Celes. "I never managed to convince your mother to follow in your grandfather's and my footsteps, but I don't suppose YOU might want to be a wand-maker someday?"
The girl seemed to consider this very seriously, although Mr. Ollivander, at this point, was rather thinking that perhaps there wasn't anything the child did NOT take seriously. "I don't know," she said at last. "I always wanted to be an Auror, like Uncle Harry."
"Well, there's plenty of time for you to decide," said the old man genially, privately thinking that if this child were to become an Auror she would quickly eclipse the legend of Alastor Moody and maybe even match or surpass her "Uncle Harry". He noted in passing that the little boy had perked up at the mention of Harry Potter; probably, in another year or two, when he had his turn in the shop, he too would announce an intention to become an Auror. Times had truly been dark, to have created a generation of children bent on making the capture of Dark Wizards their career path... "Have you made a decision on your wand yet, though?" he asked Celes.
"I think... this one," she said, holding up the last. "It feels... different from the others."
The old man's smile widened. "How is it different? Can you describe it?"
"I... well, it's... um, some of those wands felt pretty straightforward, I guess? There were some wands with kind of blendy feelings, like two tastes or colors together, but that's not quite the way this one feels different... I'm not sure," she said, biting her lower lip, "it's not as opinionated as the others, can wands be like that? Like, it doesn't feel like it's so set on how it wants to do things, it's readier to try and adjust to me? But at the same time it's got these real.. ideals... it wants me to live up to?" She chuckled, a rather adult sound that was, all the same, not entirely unexpected. "Does all that sound silly?"
"It sounds exactly right, in fact," Mr. Ollivander said. "Show your wand to Alphonsus."
"Why, it's mine," Alphonsus said, delighted. "Thirteen inches flat, fig, leprechaun hair. You're the first person to match with one of my wands!"
"Well, I like it," Celes said simply.
"How much for it?" Remy said, and, when told, handed the amount over.
"Finally!" said the little boy, Teddy, who had jumped down off his perch as soon as Remy opened his money pouch, and was now fairly bouncing with impatience. "Okay, Teddy, you've been good," said Remy, laughing, "we can go get that ice cream."
"Me too!" said Celes, grabbing her new wand and hurrying after her brothers, after all just like any child.
When they had left, Mr. Ollivander turned to Alphonsus, whose eyes were bright as he continued to look outside of the shop. "Alright, wipe that look off your face," Mr. Ollivander said, though his tone was full of encouragement and indulgence, "you'll be selling more wands soon, though it does seem propitious she of all people was your first customer. She said something I hope you were paying attention to..." And now he was once more the teacher and Alphonsus the student. "Which wands gave her the "blendy" feeling, do you think?"