Contrary to popular belief, Pansy Parkinson did not come into the world, snarling like a rabid bitch to be put down. There was no foaming at the mouth, no sharpened glare and certainly none of that piercing shriek.

The room smelled like blood and sickness. Empty potion bottles lined the bedside table, buckets and rags discarded on the floor.

She was born a small, squalling babe - mewling, red-faced and weak. Her legs were pulled apart unceremoniously.

"A girl."

Glass shattered across the hardwood floor.

Her father's rage toppled bookcases, ornaments and inkwells. Her mother was damningly silent.

It was quite obvious from the get-go that she was an unwanted child. She'd known it ever since she was born. She spent all her waking hours alone, staring at the pale alabaster of the ceiling and watching the shadows drift from one end of it to the other as the sun dipped and rose again. Her arms and legs wouldn't do what she told them to. Her neck was too weak to lift her head. Her tongue was heavy and clumsy and there were no teeth, she could not speak either.

All she could do was drift in and out of consciousness, ebb and flow, and wait.

And cry.

By the time her vision sharpened, she had learnt to only cry when she was hungry or she had soiled herself. It alerted a strange entity, sounding its arrival by a pop! It always appeared on one side of her crib, a very strange but perhaps kind oddity. It had large droopy ears and wide, wide black eyes set in a small but pointy face. It spoke broken English, for which she was grateful, and referred to itself as 'Gilli' and herself as 'little miss'. And for the briefest of moments, gentle, calloused hands would hold her and keep her warm, until the being finished it's task.

Crying when she was afraid, when she was upset, when she wanted someone - did not make Gilli appear.

Still, Gilli was the only Other that made itself known.

Objectively, she knew she had to be a baby. Her muscles were floppy and weak; she soiled herself and fed from a bottle, sometimes all at once.

Only - she remembered things from beyond that. She remembered being taller and more mobile and more vocal. She remembered… someone else. She'd had family, friends, hobbies and interests - she was a person.

It didn't matter now, obviously. She was a baby, probably a neglected one at that. And, as the presence of a complete oddity like Gilli suggested, she was a far cry from whatever world or existence she was used to.

There was no point denying that she mourned - she did. She cried until her throat ached and her eyes hurt, and her chest felt so hollow and heavy, like someone was sitting directly on her chest. But after that, she accepted it for what it was. There was no getting back to Before. The woman that existed there was dead, and she was here now.

She would adapt.

The next few years were horrible. The amount of growing a baby had to do in order to become toddler-sized was astronomical. Every growth spurt made her bones ache and her muscles burn. There was no position she could curl in to get comfortable, no relief of any sort.

Tummy time was all sorts of irritating. Her darned head was so darned heavy and her limbs wiggled uselessly at her sides. She was pissed off at Gilli for weeks (until she finally managed to lift her head with pure fucking spite, and then they were there, big eyes bright and proud and little miss did it! Gilli knew little miss could!)

Then there was teething.

It took several days of gnawing and gumming on anything she could get her hands on - her blanket, the bars of her crib, Gilli's hand - before the entity dropped a cold doughnut shaped object into her hands.

A teething ring.

It was smooth and rubbery in her mouth, and gave a slight bounce-back when she clenched her jaw tight. And it was blessedly, blessedly, cool. It instantly became her favourite thing and she never let it out of her sight. Gilli, bless them, tried for about ten-seconds to switch it out with a bottle so that she might feed herself, but eventually resigned themselves to holding it for her.

Victory.

The milk was warm and sweet. Her teething ring clenched between two chubby fists, removed from her mouth so that she could sate her belly. Actually, she pondered it once Gilli left, her teething ring was always cool when it was in her mouth. And she never saw it get swapped out or taken away to be put in a fridge somewhere. How did it stay cool?

She put it in her mouth again, humming around in. Still nice and cold.

The strange thing was, the parts that she held in her fingers weren't cold at all. Just regular room temperature. She pulled it from her mouth and stared. Were there particular cold and not-cold parts? What if she gnawed on the part her hand was just touching?

Back in her mouth it went, ignoring the sticky saliva on her hands.

Still, blessedly cool.

How odd.

The Teething was an ongoing process that never seemed to end. It took hours and hours and days and days, and eventually she gave up on trying to figure out how to make it less annoying and instead tried to find something else to distract her.

Her growing neck strength had finally proved enough to finally get a look at her surroundings.

Despite the advanced teething ring, the room - her room - was very traditional. Old fashioned. The white ceiling had scrolling along the ends and corners, so intricate and detailed that she could probably spend hours tracing the shapes with her eyes. In the centre, a large black-iron candelabra, complete with candles instead of light bulbs, was suspended from a complicated rose shape etched into the ceiling.

It was easily the best feature of her room. Other than that, the room was fairly bare, despite its original opulence. The walls were a dark grey. There was her crib, a solid wooden thing that had bars on each side (large enough to stick her hand through but not enough for her head, she'd tried); a heavy looking dresser on the other side of the room and a set of large windows on the far side that caughts glimpses of the tops of trees.

So, there was a world outside her room.

It was relief to know, as silly as it sounded, because it meant that these four walls and this stupid crib weren't all there is. And now that she knew that – her next goal was to escape.

It all sounded quite dramatic when you put it like that but it was what she repeated to herself every time she let Gilli put her on Tummy Time again and again, because if she could figure out crawling – well, walking was just the next step.

As the days trailed by, she was figuring out Gilli a little more. They referred to themselves as Gilli and her as 'little miss'. They also referred to others in the House - a ' Master' and a ' Mistress' . And by the trembling of their limbs and the increased stuttering, Gilli was afraid of them. At night, she started keeping an ear out in case footsteps approached her door, but none ever did.

Also, Gilli never used the door.

They always popped in, appearing out of nowhere. It was completely impossible, like nothing she'd ever seen. It defied all the physics she knews and any explanation she tried to give comes up short. Gilli teleported. Gilli was a strange being that, on top of being definitely not-human, could freaking teleport.

It didn't really register it like that until she tried to climb out of her crib. She was too small to make it tip over, hence the climbing. It was a risky endeavour but she'd been just about sick of those bars and this dumb room, and somehow, somehow, she kept finding the right place to put her hands and feet, and made it right to the top of the bars.

The moment was glorious, and she had a split-second to imagine wind whipping through her short baby hair… before her careful perch wobbles, and oh-

The ground was veeeery far away.

She tried to tighten her fingers around the beam and clenched her toes, but her fingers were too clammy, and her balance was shot because - baby!

She teetered forward, her stomach swooping and –

POP!

All of a sudden, Gilli was there and holding her safe. There was a moment of oh, that could have been bad before she promptly bursts into tears, burying her face into the crook of Gilli's neck. They smelled like dust and baked bread. The knot of the raggedy toga they wore dug into her cheek, but she was safe .

Later that night, she would remember that swooping feeling and how quickly Gilli arrived. Maybe they were keeping an eye on her, normal baby safety stuff and all that. Except there was no baby monitor in this room, she'd checked. There was no obvious cameras either.

Maybe it was a coincidence - Gilli happened to pop in just at the right time and place and with reflexes sharp enough to catch her.

It didn't quite feel right though. She was missing something.

Gilli had looked relieved and then thoughtful.

"If Little Miss be wanting out, Gilli can be doing so."

As promised, the next day, Gilli lifted her out of the crib and set her down onto a new soft, circular carpet on the floor. It was thick beneath her fingers and white in such a way that she hoped she wouldn't stain it. She didn't move at first, distracted by flexing her tiny fingers in the thick threads. It was very soft.

She looked up after a moment and found Gilli standing on the hardwood floor by the door. The door! She put one hand forward, then her knee, then the other hand, and then she was off, almost stumbling over her limbs in her haste. Gilli was going to use the door and she was going to get outside this damn room -

Later, she'd wonder why she could ever think a teleporting being like Gilli would use something as mundane as a simple door.

The smack of something meeting her face was almost painful, taking the full brunt of her weight. Her previous momentum disappeared completely. Her fingertips were right at the edge of the carpet - so close!

There was an invisible, tangible thing holding her back.

Momentum lost, she wobbled and decided to shift onto her butt. From this vantage point, she could clearly see Gilli lowering one outstretched hand and watching her by the door. There was nothing stopping her from going to Gilli. And yet - she smacked her hands into the air in front of her face and met something solid. Invisible but freaking solid.

Gilli pulled at their long droopy ears, distressed. "Gilli is bad. Little Miss wants to explore but Gilli won't let her." They looked up; big, bright eyes locking onto her own. " Master and Mistress mustn't see Little Miss, no, no, they mustn't! Little Miss must stay here!"

And just like that they disappeared.

So, Gilli could make weird forcefields and could use them on purpose against others.

Also, Master and Mistress should not see her.

How ominous.

At first, she wondered if perhaps she was Gilli's secret child. After all, she had never seen her own reflection so she could look like the entity. And she'd never met this Master or Mistress so it was reasonable enough to believe that Gilli could be hiding her from them. But after a while, she discarded the thought. Gilli called her little miss - Little Miss - never by name. If she was Gilli's child, she thought wistfully, she would probably know her name by now. And besides, her hands were clearly human-like, not like this strange other that Gilli was.

And whoever this Master and Mistress are, they made Gilli so afraid that she doubted Gilli would have the courage to do something as major as hide a child.

So - Master and Mistress must have known she existed. Gilli must have had their permission to look after her.

Gilli, for all their inherent strangeness and occasional fearfulness, was her only contact in this odd place. Gilli, who had the ability to pop in and out of this room whenever they pleased. An ability that was looking more and more like the only viable way to get out of this place (ignoring the door - she didn't even know if it was a real door, afterall she certainly hadn't seen anyone use it).

She resolved to get Gilli to teach her their strange abilities. She'd never seen anything like it before but with how this new life was turning out to be, she could probably take all the help she could get. Maybe when she was older, they could escape this place together.

During the day, she practiced crawling in circles on her carpet and experimentally tested out the forcefield from different angles and with different appendages. The result was mostly the same, but it was slightly entertaining - at least for a while.

At night, she practiced speaking. She'd figured out she must be a few months shy of her first birthday going by the milestones she was hitting and the added strength to her body. Learning to speak was a difficult task and her tongue and mouth were endlessly stubborn. Occasionally, she caught the tip of her tongue or the fat of her inner cheek on her newly growing teeth and had to stop to cry it out. She had tried not to cry, humiliated at the harsh sound and the sting of tears, but Gilli must have known somehow that she wasn't actually hurt and never did come to check on her. Crying was not as embarrassing on your own.

So, she let it overwhelm her and cried it out until eventually it subsided, like a wave breaking against the shoreline, and after a few hiccups she could breathe evenly again. She got back to practicing, forcing her lips into the right shape.

She figured, if she was going to get her caretaker to teach her their mysterious abilities, she'd have to give them something first. Right now, she's probably just another task that they had been assigned. So, she was going to have to change that to make sure she mattered.

It was a few weeks later before she was satisfied enough with her progress to make her attempt. Gilli had put her down on her carpet as usual and disappeared promptly. And as usual, she had duly done her normal crawling practice. She was picking up speed now, confidently, and was pretty happy crawling. Of course, she doubted she'd ever be able to out-crawl a grown adult, but it was decent progress. She'd tried a butt-shuffle last week, planting her hands on the ground and pulling her butt towards them but it seemed like too much effort so it was right back to the crawling.

Ideally, she'd work on walking now. Given her confidence on four-limbs, it was a good time to start on two, but she needed something to lean on. The carpet was completely bare and there were no chairs or walls within distance to balance against or pull herself up on. Her crib would be perfect but it was just out of reach, behind the stupid forcefield! If she could just put her hand on the bars, she could try standing - it was infuriating!

She reached out to slap the offending forcefield in anger, her hand meeting its surface solidly with that familiar feeling. Like water tension, but without that give.

Then paused.

Hmm… it could work.

She eyed the air speculatively and slapped it again. Solid. And, no matter how many times she'd tried, she had never managed to break through it.

She tried her weight on it, leaning on one shoulder. It didn't give. There were no hand-holds, of course, and certainly no good surfaces to grip, but she test her hand against it, pushing with as much weight as she could. It wasn't slippery. Her hand stayed in the same place.

Yes!

Sitting with her knees bunched against her chest, and her feet firmly planted, she placed her hands on the forcefield on either side of her head. One… two… three - and pushed with her feet. Immediately, the tension in her hand and shoulders gave way, and she pitched forward, her face smushing against the invisible barrier.

Eyes tearing now, she forced her hands to move down the barrier until they reached hip level. She'd never be able to stand with her body in such an odd posture. She had to get her face off the forcefield, and her weight off of her face and back onto her feet.

A deep breath – and now!

It was an awkward position for sure. Her hands were down low, pushing against the forcefield, her body was at a slight angle and her legs were trembling.

But.

She was standing!

It was at this point that the scheduled pop occurred, of Gilli arriving with her milk. She met their eyes across the invisible boundary and let them have a moment to take it all in. They froze, hands lowering ever so slightly, big bulbous eyes widening even more so. Gilli's jaw dropped faintly.

And then she beamed at them. Maximum cuteness.

"Gii!"

They dropped the bottle.

As what could only be a reward, she was given a low stool in the middle of her carpet - small enough to be at a useful height but heavy enough that she wouldn't topple it. It was perfect for figuring out how to walk.

Now that she'd uttered the first syllable of Gilli's name, she babbled nearly all the time, like a dam that just broke. It struck her after she'd surprised them, that she was probably a very very quiet baby. Oh, she cried - for sure - but she didn't make other sounds or humm or groan or whimper. Babies did that. Normal ones. They made sounds and soothed themselves. She only made sounds when she was crying or she was practicing her words.

Sure, Gilli didn't seem to have noticed but they didn't strike her as someone with a massive amount of baby experience. All the same, it marked her as unusual and she wasn't sure if that was good or bad yet.

Resolved, she started babbling anyway. It couldn't hurt.

When she finally, finally, got their name right – Gilli gave her a toy.

Her very first toy.

It was a soft, slightly squishy ball made of some odd silicone-like material and it glowed. Gilli showed her how it worked, holding it in one hand and saying ' Pink' and the light changed. Soft, rose-tinted light emanated from the ball. 'Orange' and the glow was tangerine-warm. And Gilli must have made it – because she hardly thought Master or Mistress would approve of buying toys, if they haven't been to see her even once.

The ball was her most favourite thing ever.

Life was almost looking up. She was making progress with Gilli - hello, first toy! And her room now had the addition of a carpet and a chair. She was learning to walk and picking up speed with her words. She could point at things and tell Gilli what she wanted.

Gilli was a treasure trove of information. Oh, she always knew that would be the case but it was good to be right. A wide-eyed repetition of Master had them hastily correcting her – to Father. Logically, Mistress must then be Mother. So, the neglectful guardians were not just random people, but possibly also her biological parents. Terrific.

She repeated it back to herself, tongue clumsy and baby lisp ever-present, " Father. Mother." Then patted Gilli's arms when they started looking worried. "B'ue!" She shrieked aloud, instead of saying anything more and threw the ball at them.

It would have been nice if Gilli was their parent, she mused as they dropped down to pick the blue ball off the floor. It would have been really nice.

Gilli placed the ball into her outstretched hands and then lowered her into the crib.

"Gilli, nigh'?" She asked as they tucked her in.

"Yes, Little Miss, Gilli be saying nighty-night now."

She hummed as they put the teething ring into one hand and her ball in the other. One last question before bed. "Gilli pop?" She thought of the teleporting Gilli did, the ease of warping space to their will . " Me? Pop too?"

Gilli paused – and then slowly, reached forward to pat her head softly. "Gilli is house-elf, popping be Our Magics. Not Little Miss's. Little Miss has her Own."

She stilled as the entity disappeared.

Her own?

No - wait a minute - Gilli was a HOUSE-ELF!

As in, a JK Rowling, slavery abomination, House-Elf?

And MAGIC?

THIS WAS MAGIC?!

Abruptly, the pieces began slotting into place. The glowing ball that changed colour according to what she said. A mysterious forcefield - what? Some sort of ward? Enchantment? A teething ring that stayed cool and never make her hands feel too cold, freaking House-elf Magic! And the droopy ears, the big eyes, the pillow-case toga!

Of course, Gilli was a freaking HOUSE-ELF. She could scream at not having seen it earlier because it was all so freaking obvious now in hindsight.

Was she in Harry Potter right now? When was she? Was there a war waging on? Was she on the good side? Or was she part of one of those families that Voldemort utterly destroys?

Fuck.

She collected what she knew. House-Elf. Gilli. There was a Master and a Mistress. Father and Mother. Very archaic and traditional sounding, and they had a house-elf, so probably a well-off, at least half-blood family. Gilli was afraid of them - so they must treat house-elves badly. Probably not nice people. Doesn't necessarily say Good or Evil side… but…

But - probably not the Good side then.

Her room had fancy furnishings - not the actual furniture itself - but the fixtures: the Georgian-looking elaborate covings and cornices on the ceiling and the seamless molding in the dark walls. The furniture itself, despite its minimalism, was good quality. She could practically see the age and care in the dark wood of her crib.

So, either very rich, or inherited properties/items.

Conclusion - rich, half-blood or pure-blood family, with possibly Dark leanings.

If she was lucky, this was after what happened in Harry Potter, (in the Story! - some part of her mind hissed viciously), and everything was hunky-dory and Voldemort was gone. No threat of death, no threat of torture, just happy little kids learning magic.

If she wasn't…

She licked her lips, squeezing her ball tight with one hand.

(This was supposed to be freaking Story! I'm not supposed to be here!)

She could –

– she could still figure this out.