Chapter 1: The Letters
Sylvia and Matilda Ollivander were adopted by the Ollivanders from the orphanage, under the suggestion of the Headmistress of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Professor McGonagall. Four years have passed since they first arrived the Wizarding World, and were now approaching their birthdays.
They were officially welcomed into the Ollivander family by Blood Adoption. They had an older brother named Gerhaze Ollivander, who was already in third year. They were supposed to have an older sister as well, named Lizium, but unfortunately died of a mysterious plant before Sylvia and Matilda had a chance to meet her.
Sylvia was a few months older than her company, though shorter than average. She had medium-length dark brown hair that has naturally curled. Her brown eyes had the slight glitter of more wisdom of her age, and, sometimes mischief.
Matilda, on the other hand, has straight blond hair with emerald green eyes. Her face, unlike her sister, was thin and pointy. The two girls were about the same hight and were both the quiet type.
In mid-September, Gerhaze had already gone to Hogwarts, and Sylvia's birthday was nearing. Mr Ollivander had insisted waiting for their eleventh birthday to let them have a wand, but they were still able to wander around the wand shop.
The Ollivander Manor is a house bigger than normal, but not as big as real manors. It has three floors with five bedrooms in total. Sylvia's favourite place was the huge garden full of wand-wood trees. There were a numerous number of old magical books stored almost everywhere within the house, which meant Sylvia had spent most of her time apart from being in the garden, reading. The whole manor is Unplottable, and its existence remained unknown to most witches and wizards. Letters would usually arrive at the shop, for the manor's entrance was at the very back of the dusty place.
Being able to work in the wand shop meant that they could meet nearly all the students near their age, for the shop was a compulsory stop for new Hogwarts students to be accepted by their wands. There would also be some unusual customers that were older witches and wizards who broke their wands.
They sometimes get to go to Hogsmeade to the other branch of the wand shop. They would go nuts in Honeydukes whenever they had that chance.
October was nearing, but not yet.
Sylvia woke up at six in the morning. Presents were already piled beside her bed by the house-elf, Ollie. I'm eleven today.
She got changed quickly and began unwrapping the presents, when the door banged open.
"HAPPY BIRTHDAY!" Matilda stood there and roared.
"Honestly, everyone will think this is your birthday," Sylvia laughed, "I'm not even half as excited as you are. You're about to explode, by the look of it."
"Do you think the letter will be here?" Her sister looked at the pile curiously.
Sylvia shrugged, "Dunno."
Matilda got her a box of chocolate frogs; Gerhaze sent an interesting book called Magical Creatures, along with a note saying "Happy birthday!" and "I'm glade you'll join me in Hogwarts next year."; Mother gave a set of wizard chessmen, while Ollie knitted a pair of socks. Father, as he had promised, made her a wand. A not beside it wrote: Alder wood, phoenix tail-feather core, 10 and 3/4 inches long, slightly yielding. Sylvia grinned happily at her own wand.
"Is that your wand?" Matilda popped up, "Cool. I have to wait until February for mine."
A warm spark streamed from the wand tip as she held the delicate piece of wood. She felt something else inside it. Something powerful. She ought to ask later.
"Look, there's the letter!" Her sister exclaimed, pointing at the window. A large owl – either barn owl or tawny – was approaching from distance. The owl-shaped dot in the clear sky became bigger and bigger. Sylvia hastily opened the window to let it in.
"Looks like the school knows where we are." Matilda commented as Sylvia opened the envelope that had the Hogwarts wax seal on it. At the back of the letter the address was written in emerald-green ink:
Miss S. Ollivander
The Third Bedroom
South Side
Diagon Alley
London
"Do you think Mother will take me down to buy all these things today?" She wondered out loud after reading the letter.
"If you're lucky." Matilda responded, "I wonder why first years can't bring brooms though, it's not like we'll break our necks." They both have their own brooms: Firebolt Supreme for Sylvia and Nimbus 2001 for Matilda as she didn't fancy flying too much.
"Shame," Sylvia said, "I guess they don't want firsties out-flying the older students at Quidditch teams' tryouts, it would be humiliating."
"Who do you reckon they found for Defence Against the Dark Arts this year?" Her sister asked. Even after Voldemort died, the jinx on that job was still there as it had a permanent affect. Like a Permanent Sticking Charm, it doesn't wear off. As ever, no one could stay on that particular post for more than a year.
"Well, they found someone," She looked at the booklist, "There's still Defence book for us."
"How's our birthday girl?" Mother came into the room, "Breakfast is ready. We're going out to do shopping soon."
Mother took her down to Diagon Alley as Mr Ollivander had to stay and run the shop, and Matilda hasn't yet gotten her letter.
School shopping. There were no other things that Sylvia had experienced could compare with its wonderfulness. They didn't need to go to the wand shop as it was already their home, so they first went to Gringotts, the wizard bank, for money.
They were welcomed by a goblin named Bloodthrone. They look weird. Sylvia stared at the goblins, but she wasn't impolite enough to say it aloud.
The journey to the Ollivander Vault was rather sickening. They hurtled down the stone passageway miles under London in a small cart, and Sylvia experienced something similar to carsick. They finally arrived the vault after being poured by what was called the Thief's Downfall, as the Ollivander family was a very old wizarding family and its vault would have extra protection. Luckily, it was the only extra one on the way, they didn't have to face the new dragon, which was even further down, near the Lestrange Vault and some other pureblood vaults. They somehow found a new dragon after the break-in of Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley, and the current Minister of Magic, Hermione Granger. It was rumoured to another Ukrainian Ironbelly, the largest dragon breed that weighs up to six tonnes.
The vault could only be opened by goblins. Piles of golden Gallons were inside, along with some even larger piles of silver Sickles and bronze Knuts. She had never been here before, and breathed out an audible "wow".
After piling some coins into Sylvia's money bag, they went out in the same way. The cart had only one speed available and roared upwards with cold wind batting her right in the face.
"Thank Dumbledore that was over." She muttered quietly as they walked out of the bank.
The other places were far more pleasurable: they went to Madam Molkin's for her uniforms, Flourish and Blotts for the textbooks, Potage's for the cauldron, Slug & Jiggers Apothecary for potion supplies, Scribbuluus Writing Instruments for quills and parchments, then finally Magical Menagerie for an owl.
The owl was pure black with silver speckles on its wings. It was a female. She had deep blue eyes that seemed to see through everything. Sylvia decided to name her Natasha, after a similar character from a Muggle movie.
There were only adults in the Alley at this time of year, as all the children were either already at Hogwarts, or haven't had their birthdays yet. Sylvia was one of the first new students to receive the letter. Usually, after four years of living in Diagon Alley, she had learned that most students would come at nearly the end of the summer holidays, unless they're starting first year then they would receive the booklist on their birthdays, or coming to do their Christmas shopping. She had also learned that Muggle-born students would receive their Hogwarts letter in summer, no matter when they were born, with a teacher from Hogwarts to explain the whole thing to them and their parents.
Days passed away quicker than Sylvia had expected. The question about the wand had completely slipped out from her mind. She mostly buried herself in the books whenever she had the chance. She liked the books about Magical Creatures best. Fantastic Beast and Where to Find Them was interesting, while Magical Creatures covered a darker and more mysterious side of them. It had mentioned creatures that didn't appear in the first book, such as a flying creature Sylvia was really interested in, named Swooping Evil. Despite its foul-sounding name, it's really useful when its fully trained. It could block spells and could bear a great weight.
She was able to practice spells from her school books and had learned most of them by now. she had found her wand very easy to handle and it comes in handy when she wanted to do a silent spell, which she later learned was called non-verbal spells from an old book somewhere in the house.
Matilda's birthday came and went. She had gotten herself a blueish-grey Screech owl named Howard. Father made her a wand as well, hawthorn wood, dragon heartstring, twelve inches long, whippy. They could fire spells at each other and curse some things around. Once Sylvia had hexed Matilda to have her hair sticking upright. She reversed it almost instantly, but the consequence was having her books flying round her that seemed to be ready to hit her on the head. Fortunately, she had learned enough spells by then to cast a simple Finite and stopped them before they did anything.
The only reason they were able to use magic was they were in a magical family. The Trace could only track the magic used around underage witches and wizards, but not who exactly.
Sylvia laid in her bed, trying to get some sleep before the big day – September the first. they were going to Hogwarts tomorrow.