Mr Ollivander had really outdone himself with the extension charms this year, Sana thought to herself as she surveyed the typically spartan flat that was now bursting and bustling with people. The flat above the wand shop had been injected with so much Christmas cheer that it was nearly unrecognisable.
Tinsel and baubles and even mistletoe were everywhere, and Sana was certain the only time she ever heard music playing up here was once a year, during the Ollivanders' Christmas party.
Nate, carrying two glasses of mead, deftly sidestepped Mr and Mrs Watts' two small kids, who were giggling and shrieking as they raced by the legs of the adults in the room.
'Here's my proposal,' he said, handing her a glass. 'We take a drink every time Coakley says "away ye goo".'
'Do you want me to die of alcohol poisoning?' Sana responded in alarm. Nate grinned and slipped his free hand around her back, and Sana leaned into him, sighing happily. 'Have you seen Maggie yet?'
'No.' Nate shrugged, looking around. 'Maybe she's not coming.'
'Oh, that would be such a shame,' Sana said. 'I was really looking forward to seeing her.'
'Come to think of it,' Nate said, 'we seem to be missing Todd as well. Think the two of them snuck off somewhere together?'
Sana snorted as Nate laughed into his glass of mead at his own joke. 'Todd wishes. No, I saw him sneak down the staircase ages ago. He looks like he's going to be sick.'
'Gone to meditate?' Nate said, making fun of Todd's tendency to lock himself away somewhere in the moments before he was expected to perform a major apprentice task.
'Gone to have a panic attack, more like. I don't blame him. Asked to make a wand at a party, in front of all these people? What was Mr Ollivander thinking?'
'He was thinking he'd show off his golden child, as per usual.'
'More like make things twice as hard for him,' Sana said, looking towards the staircase. 'I think I'll go check on him.'
'Sure. I'll go with you.'
'No you won't. Stay here. I'll go chat with him.'
'What! Why?'
'Because I want to make him feel better, that's why. You'll just take the piss.'
Nate conceded this with a grin and a shrug. 'All right, fine. Suit yourself. Brimer! Fancy a drinking game?' he said, walking toward Kurt.
Sana made her way down the spiral staircase, clutching her drink in one hand and slightly raising her dress robes with the other as she descended.
No search was required, and she was very glad that she hadn't invited Nate to come with her.
Todd Ollivander had ensconced himself inside what Will had jokingly coined 'the panic room' and what Nate called 'the outhouse'. It was somewhat invisible, though there was plenty of shimmering — not to mention a faint blue light — to give it away. Sana couldn't see Todd inside the 4-foot-wide, 7-foot-tall shields, but she knew he was in there. No one else utilised such a stupid technique to achieve focus while in the workshop.
She knew from past experience that knocking worked. Trying not to snigger, she rapped a knuckle lazily against one of the the invisible walls that Todd had placed around himself. After a moment, she heard some movement inside, and Todd — looking incredibly irritated to have been disturbed — pushed open one of the shields as if it were a door.
'Can I help you?'
'This is a fire hazard, Todd,' Sana said mildly.
'It's clearly not,' he snapped. 'If you're able to interrupt me because you're bored, I think you'd pop by to let me know if the shop were on fire.'
'Eh.' She shrugged. 'It depends. So, what's the point of this, exactly?' she said, gesturing vaguely to the shields. 'What are you even working on at this point?'
'The point is to focus, to get in the right mindset, without being interrupted,' Todd said, frowning. His hair was on end as if he'd been running his hands through it all day, and he did look quite pale. She gave him a sympathetic smile.
'But you're ready,' she said, peering around him to look at the small workshop table around which Todd had erected his tiny makeshift study. Atop the table sat the vine-wood wand half that he'd been working on for months, the preserved dragon heartstring he'd procured, a small knife, and Todd's own wand. 'You've got everything you need. Come upstairs and have a drink until you have to recite the wand-forging incantation.'
'No.' He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, looking stressed. 'I need to be completely focused for this.'
'Have you seen Maggie? It's sort of weird that she didn't come, isn't it? You and your dad did send her an invitation, didn't you?'
'I'm glad you're so understanding about my need to not be distracted right now,' Todd said wearily.
'I hope nothing's wrong... She wrote to me recently, and everything seemed fine. She told me she'd be back in London for the Christmas holidays.'
Todd frowned. 'You got a letter from her recently?'
'Yeah, I like to check in on her occasionally. Why, what's the problem?'
'Nothing.' Todd seemed annoyed at himself for asking. He returned to the desk and placed the palms of his hands flat against the table, still standing as he looked down at the objects before him as if he were trying to burn them into his memory. 'I don't know why Maggie's not here,' he said shortly. 'We did send her an invitation. Now, please, let me try to clear my mind. Shut the shields behind me before you leave.'
Sana sighed, resigned. 'All right, weirdo. See you on the other side.' She gingerly moved the shield back into place, and Todd — his back to her — disappeared again behind the shimmering walls. She took a sip of her drink and made her way back upstairs.
The fact that Nate was getting along with Will Kershner was a sign that both men were more than a little pissed. Sana heard Coakely loudly make the exclamation in question across the room, and Nate and Will giggled at each other before they took eager swigs.
'I'm going to fetch Maggie,' Sana announced to the two of them.
'What?' Nate said, looking baffled.
'Really?' Will said before hiccuping lightly.
'I've been so looking forward to having another witch on the team. Maggie's fun, and I want her to be here. Why wouldn't she show up? I don't understand it.'
'Yeah!' Will said, suddenly looking comically affronted. 'We're fun!'
'Please make sure my mead's still here when I get back,' Sana said, smiling as she handed her drink off to Nate.
'No promises,' her husband said happily, raising the glass to Sana. She gave him a look before turning on the spot.
Simon was coughing so loudly that it sounded as if he were trying to expel a vital organ of some sort, and the hacking noises drowned out the soul music that was playing in the Gibsons' flat.
'Are you sure you don't want me to make you some soup?' Maggie called, concerned, from the sofa.
She heard Simon hawk something up and spit into the kitchen sink. 'No,' he croaked. 'I just wanna get to sleep.'
'I still can't believe you still went into work today,' she scolded, settling back into her cosy position under a blanket on the sofa, returning to her paperback copy of Howard's End.
'It weren't this bad till later today,' Simon muttered from the kitchen. 'Fought I'd be fine.'
'The garage will be closed tomorrow for Christmas Eve, right?' she said, grumbling on his behalf.
'Yeah, closed the rest of the week. It'll be our best Christmas yet, Maggie,' Simon joked, his short laugh setting off another coughing fit.
'All right, Tiny Tim, time for you to get some sleep,' Maggie said wryly, pulling off the blanket with the intention of coaxing Simon out of the kitchen and into bed, before someone Apparated in a whirl of robes directly into the living room, and Maggie shrieked.
'Sorry! Sorry Maggie!' Sana said hurriedly, holding up her hands apologetically as Simon raced into the living room, looking alarmed. 'I'm not familiar with your neighbourhood, the only place I could picture in my mind was your living room. So rude of me, I'm so sorry about that.'
'Sana, for fuck's sake!' Maggie said weakly, clutching her hand to her pounding heart. Her wand was already drawn in her other hand. 'You can't do that!'
'I know — I know — I'm so sorry.' Sana winced, but she was grinning as well. 'I've just missed you! I was so disappointed when you weren't at the party today. I had to come and find out what in the world was keeping you.'
Simon, standing in a ratty dressing gown, gave a couple inadvertent coughs and nodded awkwardly at Sana, who looked gorgeous in her blood-red dress robes. He ran his hand through his hair, which was a bit of a mess. 'All right?' he said a little jerkily. Maggie suppressed a smile.
'Simon! How are you? It's lovely to see you again, I know things were a bit dramatic the last time I was here at your flat.'
'Afraid I don't, er, remember you, actually. Unfortunately,' he said with an awkward laugh.
'Oh.' Sana looked a bit mortified. 'Of course. Right. Oh, god, I'm so sorry. Shit. Bloody Mad-Eye Moody... he's the absolute worst...'
'What party?' Maggie asked, puzzled.
Sana frowned deeply at this. 'I knew he must've forgotten to send you an invitation! It's so odd though — Mr Ollivander can be rather absent-minded about these things, but I thought that Todd would remember to invite you, of all people —'
Hazy memories came to Maggie of Todd mentioning a Christmas party to her in the same letter where he'd mentioned he'd been the victim of the Cruciatus Curse. She'd honestly forgotten about it. She hadn't received an invitation, though...
'Oh. Erm. I might've accidentally... burned... that invitation, actually...'
Sana stopped babbling and looked at Maggie quizzically. 'Burned it? What, after you read it?'
'Er... no... before I read it... Sana, I don't think I can go, I'm sorry. I'm not dressed, obviously. And, honestly, I think I'd like to avoid Todd for a while, if I can.'
Sana blinked. 'Oh. I guess... I can understand that, I s'pose... If it makes you feel better — I mean, I certainly can't promise you that he'll ignore you, but if it makes you feel better, he'll be very preoccupied...'
'Why do you want to avoid Todd?' Simon asked, puzzled. Maggie crossed her arms and shrugged grumpily.
'Maggie, trust me, he'll have other things to focus on tonight,' Sana said with a smile. 'He's making his first real wand tonight — a wand that'll be sold in the shop.'
'He is?' Maggie said, taken aback. 'What, instead of going to the party?'
'It's part of the party,' Sana said. 'Mr Ollivander proposed the idea a couple weeks ago, having him finish the wand at their annual Christmas party. He said it would be ceremonial. Todd's shitting himself.'
'I can imagine...' Maggie said slowly. 'Is this his vine-wood wand he's been working on for ages?'
'That's the one. Have you ever seen someone make a wand before?'
'No, I haven't.'
'It's brilliant. That alone's enough reason to come, honestly.'
Maggie chewed the inside of her mouth. 'All right...' she said, hopelessly giving in to a bit of burning curiosity. 'I guess I'll come. I only have one pair of dress robes, though...'
'One's all you need!' Sana said brightly. 'I can help you get ready in five seconds.'
Turned out Sana wasn't wrong at all when she'd said that Todd would be preoccupied. Maggie nervously kept an eye out for him, clutching a drink and smoothing her bridesmaid robes that she'd worn to Alice's wedding, but Maggie didn't even see him for the first half-hour she was there.
Finally, he'd emerged on the staircase, wearing a pair of simple black dress robes, but Todd didn't even glance her way. It was odd, actually, to have a chance to watch him without him immediately catching her eye. Maggie reddened as she realised that, typically, Todd's gaze seemed to be naturally directed in her general vicinity any time they were in a room together.
Instead, he'd made his way towards his dad, and the two of them spoke quietly for a while before Todd finally gave a curt nod and immediately returned to the workshop without a second glance at the party.
Maggie gave a sigh of relief when he disappeared and actually managed to laugh when Sana made an exaggerated face at her as she transfigured Nate's glass of wine into water when he wasn't looking.
It wasn't that Maggie expected Todd to start flirting with her. She was far more nervous about what she had to do the next time he struck up a conversation with her.
Maggie's delightful conversation with Snape during her detention had solidified her decision about what kind of a relationship she'd have to have with Todd, moving forward: distant, and purely professional. She'd been kidding herself thinking that they could be friends, and it was clear to her now what everyone must think whenever they laughed and talked together.
Maggie now realised that everyone thought she got her apprenticeship because the boss's son fancied her. And, for all she knew... maybe that had been the reason, she thought miserably. All she could do at this point was put a stop to any rumours that she was continuing to take advantage of it for any ladder-climbing here at Ollivander's.
So she needed to freeze Todd out. No more chats about personal stuff, no more letters (although, Todd hadn't sent her any more letters since she'd burned that single one, so maybe that wasn't an issue), no more drinking at the Malkins', no more crying in his arms. Memories of that last moment, in the context of Snape's conversation, particularly made her cringe.
In short, don't do anything that could give Todd, or anyone else, the wrong idea. Don't laugh with him, don't smile at him, and just generally keep your chats short. Was this all a bit extreme? Maybe. Was it cruel? In the short-term, perhaps. But hearing Snape's opinion of her made Maggie want to scream, and she'd do anything to try to reverse anyone else's similar opinion.
At the party tonight, the only person who could successfully coax her out of this gloom of hers was Coakley, who had been delighted to see her, so much so that he even answered every single eager question she had about the wand-forging incantation. Coakley introduced her to his wife, Betty, a sweet, plump witch who listened to her husband with a mixture of amusement and exasperation.
'It'll be a sub-par wand, Maggie, mark my words,' Coakley said airily. 'You'll have tae wait a wee bit tae see how it's done properly, more than likely.'
'Oh Jack, gie the girl peace! Don't pay him any mind, hen, he prattled on all day about how he was just chuffed tae bits tae see Todd debut this new wand. I don't know why you gie the poor boy such a hard time, you said so yourself that he'll pull it off brilliantly the day.'
'Cannae have him getting a big heid, Betty. You've got tae keep the wee tadger in his place.'
'Language, Jack, for heaven's sake!'
Just as Maggie felt she were finally beginning to relax and enjoy the party, Mr Ollivander clinked a fork against his glass to get everyone's attention and direct everyone down into the workshop below for Todd's demonstration.
Nate snuck up behind Coakley and clapped a conspiratorial hand on his shoulder, pulling Watts in with him as well. 'Shall we make this a bit more interesting, gents?'
'There's nae betting on the quality of wands here, lad,' Coakley said. 'I've too much respect for wandlore to dae that.'
'Coakley's right, that's bad luck, Dobson,' Watts said. 'We're all behind Todd for this tonight.'
Nate looked disappointed, but cheered up quickly as Sana took his hand, and the tipsy, chattering crowd was in high spirits as they made their way down the staircase. They filled the workshop floor, forming a crowd in front of the two Ollivander men who were standing alongside each other near a table and chair. The slightly pink-faced, happy guests who looked on with eager interest couldn't have offered a sharper contrast to Todd Ollivander, who looked pale, tense, focused and determined. Maggie decided to stand near the back to avoid catching Todd's eye, but she needn't have bothered. Todd didn't make eye contact with anyone in the crowd, instead peering straight ahead, slightly over all their heads. Several of the wandsmiths and apprentices in the crowd gave him sympathetic looks.
'I don't think there's a single soul in this workshop who has been able to avoid a conversation with my son about his plans for this wand of his,' Mr Ollivander began, with a shadow of a smile, and any mumblings in the crowd quickly quieted. 'From the beginning, Todd has known what he has wanted it to be. What it wants to be. It's a depth of knowledge that Todd has earned, over the years, through study and devotion to this craft, and with fierce determination to become an admirable wandsmith. At first, I pushed back against some of his plans for this wand, but Todd has earned my trust, and I trust his judgment. If completed successfully, this final task will mark the end of Todd's apprenticeship, and he will become a full wandsmith and begin his professional career at this shop, with me. With all of us.'
Mr Ollivander paused, his wide pale eyes shining through the gloom of the workshop as they roved piercingly over the people in the crowd.
'Many of you, though not all of you, know that I consider the long-held tradition that the wandshop be a family business to be old-fashioned, irrelevant and potentially harmful to the craft. We are the premiere makers of fine wands for Britain's witches and wizards, and there is no reason that role ought to be limited to those who bear the Ollivander name. I was forced into this role I hold now, and I had no intention of forcing Todd into the same line of work. He is here today, not because of the blood that runs through his veins but because of his own, passionate, insistent desire to be a wandsmith. And I expect him to prove himself worthy of the role today.'
Maggie, sensing the end of the moving speech, began to clap as Mr Ollivander finished speaking, though she quickly stopped as she realised with embarrassment that she was the only one. A few people grinned at her. For the first time, Todd looked at her, startled, but then quickly looked away. His father's speech did not appear to have comforted him. If anything, he looked paler now.
'Todd, would you like to share a few words?'
Todd opened his mouth to speak, but only a short, soft strangled noise came out. He swallowed, cleared his throat and tried again. 'I'd just like to finally make this wand.'
'Of course,' his dad conceded, looking just slightly amused. 'Please. You may begin.' Mr Ollivander didn't move, and Todd stared at him.
'Are you just going to... stand... there?'
'Yes,' Mr Ollivander said simply.
Todd nodded several times, looking tense, and finally pulled out a chair at the table before him and sat down. He stared at everything at the table, took a deep breath, and for the first time, seemed to relax somewhat. He picked up the wand half. It was the full length of a wand, but was not cylindrical or smooth all the way around. Instead, it had a sort of trench carved through it.
He pointed his wand at the small jar containing what looked like a sort of thin, bloody, fleshy string. Maggie deduced that it had to be a dragon heartstring, because it obviously wasn't a feather or a hair. The jar popped open, and Todd carefully levitated the heartstring out of the jar and into the wand half. He appeared to be doing some sort of non-verbal spellcasting to twist the heartstring into just the position he wanted within the wand. As he magically twisted it, it grew tighter and thinner, and Maggie could see there was still ample room within the wand's small trench. She caught her breath in anticipation for what she knew came next.
Not taking his eyes off the wand, he picked up his own wand, and pointed it at the trench. In a firm and resonant voice, he began to chant a long, dizzying, disorienting string of what sounded like Greek. Maggie felt a sudden pressure in her ears, and the temperature in the room rose sharply. She could even feel her hair frizzing around her face.
Maggie balked at the thought of having to memorize what seemed like an endless incantation. For the first several minutes, nothing happened as Todd spoke, but he kept a steady pace of words and breaths. Finally, a shimmering, clear substance that seemed to have the consistency of melted glass oozed out of his wand. His brow was furrowed in concentration, and he was trembling slightly, his pale face glistening with sweat.
Still chanting, he slowly put the wand half down on the table and picked up a small knife. He made a shallow incision on his arm and waited for the cut to bleed, then turned his arm upside down so that a couple drops of blood fell onto the clear substance, which began to bubble. The substance began to take on a colour — the faintest, lightest shade of lilac. He was still speaking, but he was leaning his face closer to the wand now. His steady beats of speaking and breathing now seemed more important, and he now incorporated a couple long, slow exhales into the rhythm, whistling out a thin stream of air onto the wand, and the substance began to spin inside the wand half and turned a deeper and deeper shade of purple.
He halted, gasping slightly for air, and for a second Maggie thought that Todd had stumbled, but no. He was done reciting the incantation. Todd cast a couple of spells at the heartstring to manipulate it further. 'Tornus… Comprimere… Tendere...'
Maggie wasn't accustomed to seeing Todd recite spells audibly. The wand-forging incantation must have weakened him considerably. He paused, picking the wand up and examining it closely. He surveyed it end to end, weighing it carefully in his palm. He took a deep, nervous breath, pointed his wand at it again and said 'Germinare.' The wand wood began to grow and swallow the heartstring and the purple substance inside it so that it was no longer a half of a wand but a full, complete one.
Todd sat with the wand in his open palm, staring at it and saying nothing. Enough time passed that Maggie began to look quizzically at the people standing next to her.
'Is he performing wandless magic right now?' she whispered to Sana.
'Er... nope,' Sana said, looking amused.
Finally, Coakley broke the silence.
'If you're pausing for dramatic effect, lad, I think that's good enough.'
Todd could barely conceal the apprehension on his face. With an expression of dread, he grasped the wand, and pointed it into the air. 'Avis,' he said hoarsely.
A tremendous flock of two dozen bright yellow canaries burst from the tip. The birds fluttered and tweeted, their wings rustling frantically as they circled rapidly round the crowd, which had burst into raucous applause, Maggie one of the most enthusiastic among them. Watts stuck his fingers into his mouth, and his whistle mingled with the chirps from the birds, who seemed to be flustered as they circled the whooping and hollering crowd.
Todd turned in his chair and gave them all a weary grin. Watts extended his hand, and Todd rose to shake it, before promptly losing consciousness, and passing out onto the workshop floor.
It didn't take long to revive Todd. Still, the wand creation enchantment had thoroughly drained his energy, and a few members of the crew had to help him up the stairs as everyone returned to the flat while Mr Ollivander stayed on the workshop floor to conduct a few last tests on Todd's new wand.
Despite his weariness, Todd was fully the guest of honour now, and his happiness shined through on his tired face. Every single person at the party was congratulating him, clapping him on the back and wanting to tell him their thoughts, and Maggie could easily blend into the background. She was startled, therefore, as Will walked away from his conversation with her to get another plate of the Iqbals' curry, when Todd's voice was suddenly in her ear.
'Sana tells me Simon's ill,' Todd said, less than an inch from her cheek. 'I thought you should know, Muggles can drink Pepperup Potion.'
Maggie was so startled by his sudden appearance as well as this information that she didn't pull away as she turned toward him, so close that she could see that there were some flecks of blue in his silvery eyes. 'Isn't — isn't that illegal?'
Todd shrugged. He didn't straighten up despite having her attention. 'Only if you get caught, and you won't get caught. Professor Burbage told me that detail about Pepperup Potion ages ago, when she complained about how wizards could easily introduce certain elements and chemicals into the Muggle sciences without revealing magic at all, but wizards can't be arsed. I wouldn't trust anyone else to be sure of Muggle biology as it relates to potions, but, trust me, Charity Burbage knows her stuff. She's ten times the Muggle Studies professor Hogwarts used to employ. Did you know that that professor taught sections on "eckeltricity"?' Todd said, looking amused. 'Anyway. Just thought I'd share. So... er... what, did you. You know. Think? Of my —'
Maggie wasn't sure she could talk about the magic she'd just seen him perform with anything but overwhelmed emotion and enthusiasm, and luckily, she didn't have to worry about tempering that enthusiasm, because Betty Coakley swooped in like a mother hen, taking Todd's face in her hands.
'Oh Todd, well done today, well done!'
'Oh, thanks Mrs Coakley,' Todd said, looking embarrassed but pleased.
'If Elsie Ollivander were still with us, she'd tell you that you're becoming more and more like your father every day. It would be a compliment, and — a warning,' she said, her eyes twinkling.
Todd chuckled and responded with something that Maggie didn't catch as she scuttled away to join the other apprentices and Nate, noticing out of the corner of her eye that Todd looked a bit surprised to see her leave as he continued to talk with Coakley's wife.
Maggie made her way across the massive hall that the Ollivanders' living room had temporarily become. For the first time, she was in the flat itself to hear the befuddling, mysterious chimes of their grandfather clock up here.
It had been days, when she'd hear it in the floors below, before she realised that the number of chimes didn't correspond to the hour (other than the fact that they did always sound on the hour, every hour). It began, as it always did, by playing a simple tune that Maggie didn't recognise (different than the Westminster Quarters that typically proceeded the chiming of the hours).
During the Christmas party today, she made sure to count the chimes. The pattern and sounds were always a bit different each time. This time, she heard two deep, slow bong... bong... then three rapid, high-pitched ding... ding... ding of descending notes before it returned to deeper noises again, but this time more rapid and arrhythmic: bongbongbong... bong... bongbong... Then she heard a whir, a click and a whizz, before the top of the clock finally emitted several soft puffs of purple smoke into the air.
And just as Maggie thought it had finished, there was one final Bong, for good measure.
'Is that just whimsical,' Maggie said to Will, Sana and Nate, jerking her thumb to the tall, thin clock in the flat that nearly stretched to the ceiling, 'or is there a purpose to those noises?'
'Hm.' Will frowned and looked at Nate, who shrugged. 'They all mean something... but I can never remember, to be honest.'
'Todd would know,' Sana said.
'Todd!' Will shouted across the room. 'Get over here, mate, Maggie has a question for you!'
'Oh, no no — never mind —'
Todd, smiling and nodding absentmindedly at something Mrs Coakley was saying as he nursed a glass of wine, looked up. Maggie saw Mrs Coakley finish up what she was saying and gesture good-naturedly for Todd to join the apprentices. Maggie'd known that avoiding Todd would be a bit impossible at this event, but the whole situation was giving her a bit of a panic attack. She could ignore Todd, certainly, but for him to get the message to leave her alone, she'd have to be somewhat cold towards him. But seeing him in person again, watching him do brilliant magic, seeing him so content and happy after he'd looked so stressed and terrified... all she wanted to do was laugh and drink with him and congratulate him and tell him how wonderful it was to see him.
Maggie swallowed. For the first time, it unnervingly occurred to her that Todd might not be the only one she wanted to keep from getting confused.
Shit. Why hadn't she brought Robbie to the party? Maggie reassured herself that it was just that she'd had no advance notice. Sana had just shown up at her flat, and everything had happened so fast...
Maggie started when she realised Todd was suddenly standing across from her and was squinting as he listened to Will, who was babbling and gesturing drunkenly to the clock. Todd nodded and shot a couple amused glances at Maggie. He opened his mouth a couple of times to answer, each time having to close it again as Will continued to explain in a rambling fashion that he couldn't remember the significance of the noises and ticks and puffs of smoke and it's all very mysterious and kooky, and don't historic wizarding families have the weirdest, most fascinating antiques?
'It's not nearly as interesting as Will makes it out to be,' Todd finally began. 'It just... it takes the temperature, both literally and metaphorically. That's why it's so bonkers today.'
He smiled back at Maggie, not elaborating. It takes the temperature both literally and metaphorically? What the hell did that mean? She narrowed her eyes at him. Did Todd really think that was a sufficient answer? Or did he just like it when she asked him follow-up questions?
Luckily, it was Sana who took the bait. 'OK well that's cryptic nonsense. What in the name of Merlin does that mean?'
'Well, the literal temperature is fairly straightforward. That's what the first round of gongs mean. There were two, right?' Todd yawned widely, making a lazy attempt to cover his mouth with the hand that held his wine glass. He looked a bit spent after creating the wand, but it was a happy, satisfied sort of exhausted. 'Yeah, so that puts the outdoor temperature somewhere just below zero, as expected. The bells that come after tell you whether the temperature's going up or down, so since the notes are descending that means it's going to get colder tonight. Then, the gongs after that... well, those are really tricky to read. You have to know the combinations, and I only know a fraction of them by heart. But they essentially tell you the mood of the people in the flat.'
Will blinked. 'What? Their mood? You mean their emotions?'
'Yeah.' Todd grinned. 'I'll be honest, I'm not always a fan. It can be kind of jarring to become so suddenly self-aware. Sort of an invasion of privacy, also. It's most closely tied to the emotions of the people who live here, so what you're hearing now is mostly me, since my dad's downstairs.'
'What a weird thing for a clock to do...' Sana said, baffled. 'So, what does that pattern mean now? I think I heard three, then one, then two? What are you feeling right now, according to this mental little timepiece?'
Todd smiled and shrugged, looking a little embarrassed. Maggie saw some colour creep into his cheeks. 'It's not a pattern I hear a lot, honestly. If I'm not mistaken, it's just... well, it's just... happy.'
'Oh, Todd.' In a sudden blur of scarlet robes, Sana had pulled Todd into a swift hug, and he stumbled back.
'Whoa, steady on, Sana.' He shot Maggie a bemused smile and patted Sana awkwardly on the back.
Nate snorted and didn't look bothered, though he did ask, 'Sana, should I be jealous?'
'He's just grown up so much,' she choked out, wiping away a tear as she pulled away. 'You're like a little brother to all of us, Todd.'
'He acted like one, too,' Nate said wryly to Maggie. 'When I was an apprentice, and Todd was this puny little git, he used to constantly correct me if I got something wrong. "Actually, Nate,"' he said, imitating a preteen boy with a cracking voice and pushing an imaginary pair of glasses up his nose, '"it's Antipodean Opaleye dragon heartstrings that are the most pliable, not the Norwegian Ridgeback's."'
'Oh for Merlin's sake, Dobson, will you ever update that bloody impression of me?' Todd said, but he was laughing with the others as well.
'You think Maggie thinks of Todd as a brother? Or something more?' Will said with a wink at her. Maggie blinked, taken aback. She felt the heat rise in her face. The implication was so rude, and so brash, but Sana and Nate were so tipsy that they didn't have much of a reaction and only giggled slightly, not taking issue with this joke that Maggie, who had a boyfriend, might be destined for someone else.
She chanced a glance at Todd, wondering if he'd missed it, but of course he hadn't. He was taking a few preoccupied swigs from his drink, but he had reddened considerably, and it was clear from the way he kept glancing at her out of the corner of his eye that he was very interested in her reaction to this question.
'I do think that I think of Todd as something of a brother, just like all of you do,' she said shortly, making stony eye contact with all of them. Her sudden annoyance had emboldened her desire to set the record straight. 'I think he's sort of like another big brother to me. Is that a problem?' she said, directing the question at Todd.
'No,' he said, looking uncomfortable and nervous, his flush deepening. 'That's fine. That's great.' The others in the group shifted awkwardly as well.
Maggie wasn't sure exactly how to fill the silence at this point. She was planning to coldly excuse herself and talk to a different group of people for the rest of the night, when everyone in the room was suddenly distracted by the appearance of Mr Ollivander, who had appeared at the top of the spiral staircase, carrying Todd's new wand.
'What's the verdict, sir? All good?' Watts said, loudly and congenially.
Mr Ollivander gave a vague smile that Watts took to be the confirmation he was looking for, and he turned to the crowd.
'Before we head downstairs to place Todd's wand on the shelves,' Watts said jovially, 'I'd like to make a toast. I overheard all you apprentices earlier talking about what Todd was like when he was younger, and I think we can all agree, that even now, Todd's still working to grow out of his insufferable know-it-all phase.'
Everyone laughed. Todd, who seemed a bit thrown off by the interaction with Maggie, gave an uncertain smile.
'I think, however, that despite all this, most of us consider ourselves lucky to have gotten to know Todd Ollivander and to watch him grow up. He can be terse and he can be high-strung at times. But he can be funny, and he can be kind-hearted. He can be interesting to talk to, can be helpful as you attempt to work out a problem. His brilliance can startle you sometimes, as evidenced by today. I've watched Todd grow and mature as a wizard over these past nineteen years of his life, and I have to say that he has impressed me time and time again with his natural talent as well as his fierce work ethic to master every single aspect of wandlore. But even more importantly, I've watched him grow into a man of conviction, who is interested in what role Ollivander's can play in this war — not only how we can protect this institution, but also how this institution can protect others in the wizarding world.'
Todd's smile was no longer uncertain, even though he looked quite embarrassed. 'Thanks mate,' he muttered, sounding touched.
'I am looking forward to working alongside Todd as a fellow wandsmith, and I have no doubt that he will one day run this shop with wisdom, with kindness, and with bravery, and I'm sure this wand of his that we'll be placing on the shelves downstairs today will be the first of many that —'
Mr Ollivander cleared his throat, and Maggie suddenly noticed just how uncomfortable he looked. 'Let's not get ahead of... I never actually said...' He faltered, looking around the room, before he appeared to change his mind. 'Well, then. Indeed. Let's raise a glass to Todd, shall we?'
Though everyone raised their glasses, the atmosphere in the room changed as people looked around nervously. Todd looked suddenly tenser than he'd been before he'd performed his incantation.
'What do you mean, "Let's not get ahead of ourselves"?' Todd croaked. A lot of the blood had drained out of his face.
Mr Ollivander held up a placating hand. 'Nothing, nothing. We'll discuss it afterward, in a more private setting.'
'Is something wrong with the wand?'
'Todd, for heaven's sake,' Mr Ollivander said, exasperated, 'we're in the midst of toasting you right now. I'd also like to join John in his kind praise of my son, it is well-deserved.' John Watts looked deeply nervous and slightly horrified, as if realising that he'd jumped the gun.
'But — I don't understand — the charm, the birds — I was able to —' Todd stammered, looking slightly manic.
'Everyone, let's just — to Todd,' Mr Ollivander said loudly, raising his glass higher.
'To Todd,' the guests said automatically, raising their glasses and drinking, though it was an extremely halting response. Watts now looked like he very much wanted to crawl into a corner and die, though of course that was nothing to how Todd seemed to be dealing with this new development.
Mr Ollivander made his way over to his son while Todd stood stalk-still and Sana, Nate, Will and Maggie all exchanged tense, apprehensive looks. Maggie, thinking of her last words to Todd, wondered that if Watts and Todd were about to find respective corners to go die in, she might also join them.
'What's wrong with it?' Todd repeated as soon as his dad was close enough to speak to.
Mr Ollivander pulled out the new vine-wood wand, looking slightly helpless as he fingered the wand with a single, intact vine pressed in a curl around the wand. 'It's — I'm terribly sorry, Todd. It — it doesn't work.'
'What do you mean it doesn't work?' Todd said mechanically. Maggie very much wanted to back away from this very private conversation, but she was frozen on the spot, like the other apprentices. She, like Todd, simply didn't understand. 'You saw me perform the Bird-Conjuring Charm. It clearly works.'
'It's not responding to me,' Mr Ollivander said sadly. 'It's a shame, Todd, and I don't understand it, either. But, see for yourself — Petrificus Totalus.'
He pointed the wand at his son, and though Todd did look quite rigid and petrified, it was clear when Todd snatched the wand out of his dad's hands that the spell hadn't taken.
'Reducto,' Todd said, pointing the wand at his wine glass. It was a bit of a reckless choice, and Maggie and the rest of the apprentices flinched, still half expecting glass to shatter in all directions. But nothing happened. Or — almost nothing. Maggie did notice a quick, sharp crack appear in the glass, but it certainly wasn't the effect that the Reductor Curse was meant to have.
Todd looked stunned. 'Did I perform the incantation incorrectly?' he said desperately. 'You must've noticed how I slipped up — got a word wrong, or — or a motion, or —'
'You seemed to perform it perfectly, as far as I can tell,' his father said, his brow creased. 'But, as you know, there's a good deal I can't observe — your focus, your state of mind…' He trailed off, as if he knew this wasn't helping. Todd just looked tired, and confused, and terribly, terribly sad.
'It's a fickle process, Todd, as you well know,' his dad said gently. He hesitated, then said quietly, 'I did tell you that a Swedish Short-Snout heartstring would better fit a wand of this exterior…'
Todd, the wand still in his hand, walked away abruptly and made his way toward his bedroom, which took a lot longer than it usually would have due to the Temporary Extension Charm. He ignored several guests' attempts to comfort him as he walked through the clusters of people, including Coakley's unusually kind movement to put a hand on his shoulder, but Todd shrugged them all off. As he walked, he absentmindedly tapped his wine glass with the vine-wood wand, and he swore under his breath when nothing happened. He produced his own wand and increased the volume of the wine significantly in his glass before he wrenched open his bedroom door and closed it behind him with a quick, sharp snap.
