The Phoenix's Key
*~ Prologue~*
Sarah Morley*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
A/N: Rewritten Version.
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"Mum! I hate corned beef! Can't I have ham or cheese or something remotely humane?" Winter shouted as she peered into her lunch box with disgust.
"Not now! You have three minutes to get ready before your father starts shouting at everybody to get in the car." Her mother said, running into the kitchen zipping her dress up.
"He's dropping me at the market on his way to work and it's too much of a hassle getting there alone." She swung open the fridge door and fished out a carton of apple juice.
"Give this too your brother will you." She chucked Winter the drink and pulled out a large basket from underneath the kitchen sink.
Winter sighed and bellowed:
"CEDRIC! YOUR APPLE JUICE!"
"Winter!" Her mother hissed
Winter smiled sweetly.
"Don't you ever take that thing off?" She said, pointing at a small Ankh hanging on a simple silver chain. Ruth, her mother, fingered it.
"This? Oh no. Never. It was a gift from a friend a long time ago."
Winter nodded and grabbed her school bag and her lunch box and started out the door onto the pavement, where her father was waiting, impatiently drumming his fingers on the roof of the car.
"Where is your mother?" He asked huffily.
"Coming." Winter slid into the back of the car next to her little brother and sister. The dreaded twins. It wasn't even eight o'clock yet and they were already kicking and punching each other. Winter squashed herself as far against the car door as was possible. She watched her mother lock the door behind her and scribble furious notes in her FiloFax.
"Will you hurry up!" Her father, Frank, shouted
"I'm right here!" Ruth shouted angrily
"You're not in the car, thus you are not here!"
Her mum sighed angrily and slammed the car door behind her.
"Now I am." She smiled sarcastically.
Frank snorted and sped away down the drive.
"Slow down!" Ruth shrieked, her hands gripping on the dashboard
Frank skidded around the corner and stamped on the brakes. The Mazda missed the street lamp by inches.
"Slow enough for madam?" He spat.
"Have you gone mad? Don't you think for an instant? You could have had us all killed!"
"Ah yes. Or killed you, which wouldn't have been much of a loss."
Ruth's mouth dropped open. Frank covered his face with his hands
"I'm, sorry. I didn't mean that."
"You…I can't believe…you…" She got out the car and slammed the door shut.
"Don't you even think of coming home tonight. Stay with that bloody secretary of yours, I daresay she won't mind in the slightest. Children, get out the car, you're not going to school today." She shouted though the open window. Obediently, Winter grabbed Cedric and Venus's hands and pulled them off the back seat. They hadn't turned the corner when her father started following them down the road in the car.
"Ruth, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it."
"I don't care. You could have killed all of us. Get out of my sight. I don't want to see you again until you've had your license revoked and you're burning somewhere in Hell."
" Ruth in all my life I've never been sorrier about anything as much as I'm sorry about what I said."
Ruth snorted. She spun on her heel and gave Winter her keys.
"Go home. Plant yourselves in front of the telly or in the Library or go back to bed. Order whatever you want from your magazines or whatever." She reached through the open car window and grabbed Frank's wallet that was lying on the dashboard and pulled out his credit cards and threw the wallet in the dustbin on the curb of the road "Take advantage of it. You're not going to have a day like this until you're twenty-one and have a diploma in hand." Her finger shot up and pointed in the remote direction of home. Winter, too stunned to do anything but follow in a trance, her squirming siblings hands in her own. She vaguely heard her mother shouting words that would have made her cry if she was little and sleeping in sac pyjamas. Winter unlocked the door and led Cedric and Venus each to their rooms before heading to the sunroof. She stood there for what seemed like eternity, the wind blowing at her black hair. She heard footsteps behind her and felt her mother's hand on her shoulder.
"Funny. I thought you'd be on the phone ordering everything you'd ever wanted out of a Miss Selfridges's catalogue."
"Oh I will. But not now. It's too early to shop."
There was a moment's silence.
"Cedric and Venus are asleep. Best you be on your way too.
"Mum, I'm not seven. I'm not tired. And besides, I'm going to the library."
'The Library' as it was called was one of the biggest rooms in the large house. It was on the fifth storey, which was just under the sunroof. The fifth storey however, was the smallest of the levels. It had only three rooms and it was accessible only through a spiral staircase that was hidden behind the broom closet in the kitchen. Ruth had converted it into her study before Winter was even born. Ruth was a writer, acclaimed in Britain. Her works included titles such as Eternal and The Lady Of The Moon. The first room was her 'writing set' as she called it, and the second was the smallest room in the house. A single armchair sat inside in front of a wall-sized window that gazed out on a view of Coventry Park. No one apart from Ruth herself was allowed in there. The third room was the Library, where Winter settled that fateful morning, a copy of 'Mansfield Park' clamped safely in her hands.
Winter hadn't started on Chapter 4 when she head unfamiliar sound of her mother's scream, coming from bellow her.
***
Winter bolted, scrambling around bookshelves, over sofas and stepping over coffee tables. The Jane Austen lay forgotten by the sofa. She flung open the door and ran as fast as she could down the spiral staircase into the kitchen, through the Dining room, out of the Living room and found herself slap bang in the middle of a scene that would stay in her mind for as long as she would live. Two men, dressed in black robes, stood in the Entrance hall, long pieces of Birch and Holly clenched possessively in their hands. One, the taller, had black tousled hair that grew in no particular direction and very round glasses. The other had tame brown hair, no glasses, but a grey and aged dog at his side.
Her mother was standing ten feet away from them, her knuckles white and her eyes blazing with hatred.
"Get out." She hissed at them. The dog and Ruth's old cat, Crookshanks, were watching each other. Funnily enough, Crookshanks didn't attack it. He hated dogs.
"Wait-"
"Get out!" Ruth shrieked
"Will you just listen?"
"No! I've had it with listening to you! I listened to you for 7 bloody years and look where it got me! I've read your letters and I don't care! She's not going!"
"If you gave her a chance."
"I took that chances many years ago Potter and look where it got me."
"Listen, the Prophecies are starting to fulfil. 'The end of an age of Darkness will bring about another, Darker and restless, waiting to take it's revenge.' It's already happened. The Prophecies have to be fulfilled."
"You don't understand do you? Weren't you listening to Professor McGonnagal when she told us how imprecise a branch of magic Divination was? So a new era has dawned, when did Trelawney make that one up, while staring at the headlines?" Ruth snorted
"Trelawney's dead. You know the Prophecies aren't hers."
"Does that change anything? Prophecies never come true Potter! You know as well as I do that they don't! If they did you, Weasley and practically all of Hogwarts would be dead by now!" Ruth screamed
The man sighed and took off his hat.
"You owe me at least this."
"No. I owe you this." She shouted and pulled at the Ankh on her neck. The man called Potter lowered his eyes.
No one spoke for a minute.
"Will someone please tell me what's going on?" Winter asked. No one had seen her so far, hidden behind one of the pillars by the large stairway. Ruth's head snapped around, eyes full of alarm.
"Go back to bed Winter."
"No. Wait. Stay." The man said.
"She's my daughter, Potter, she'll do what I tell her." Ruth hissed.
"She has to know, Hermione."
"Shut up! Shut up Potter! That's not my name! My name is Ruth Tumber. I'm married, I have three children and I'm an acclaimed writer throughout Britain! I went to school in Trinity and Cambridge for University!" She shouted. "Now get out! Get out now!" She pointed her shaking finger at the opened mahogany door.
Something inside the dark-haired man snapped. He ran forward and pinned Winter's mother to the wall. Winter shrieked and ran at him, but the other man caught her by the shoulders.
"I'm so sorry. But you have to know." He whispered.
The dog bit her skirt and pulled her back, tripping her and landing her face first on the marble. She lifted her head up and saw the man with glasses start to shout.
"You name is Hermione Granger! You are a WORLD-acclaimed witch! You went school at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and never went to University! Get the truth right Granger, and deal with it!"
Ruth-or Hermione as she was apparently really called- was shaking profusely, she reached for the phone, but the man pointed the piece of Holly in his hand at it and it flew against the wall, breaking into a million pieces.
Winter's mother collapsed onto the floor, her face in her hands.
"Damn you Potter! It's your own bloody fault I'm here! Why couldn't you have left me alone!" She shouted, her voice uneven and dry from sobbing.
"Because I love you Hermione. At least I did. We all did."
***
Mid day came and went, and the men, whose names Winter had found out to be Harry Potter and Odysseus Devor were still sitting in number 5 Ulverscroft lane. Within two hours, Winter had found out more about the world than she had in all her 11 years.
After putting her mother to sleep with the wood they were always holding, receiving a good many thumps from Winter and managing to wrestle her onto the couch, the two men had proceeded to tell her everything. About how her mother was a witch and went to school with them at an Academy called Hogwarts 15 years ago. About magic in it's own respect and about what she was. A witch. Just like her mother.
"But how is that possible?" Winter stuttered, wringing her hands like a flannel. "I can't be a witch. It's just not possible!"
"Why isn't it possible?" Harry Potter asked.
"Because it just – isn't!"
Odysseus Devor laughed
"I quote the man who told me I was a wizard Winter: " Not a wizard eh? Never made things happen when you were scared or angry?" Harry Potter asked.
Winter looked away. Perhaps, a few times, it was true. When Donna had been in a car crash and had laid in a coma for weeks, and one day when Winter was visiting her, and she'd collapsed in tears at the sight of her best friend lying there helpless, and the life support machines had started to buzz and the heart monitor's beat had lost all sense of rhythm and Donna's eyes had snapped open. But that couldn't have been…but then what about the time in the bookstore when she was the twin's age, and her parents wouldn't buy her a book. Winter had thrown a temper tantrum and the book, miraculously had flown straight from her hand onto the counter. No she could have thrown it. But there was a bookshelf blocking her way. It would have had to turn around it.
Winter looked up at the two men, who were watching her. Odysseus smiled.
"Winter, you are a witch. You had a 50 / 50 chance of becoming one and you took your mother's path."
Silence reigned over them for a moment.
Harry Potter sighed.
"I think it's time we woke her up. We have things to tell her. We can't leave until it's done."
He took out the holly that he had told Winter was his wand and pointed it at Ruth – or Hermione –or Ruth. Winter didn't know anymore
"Enervate."
Her mother's eyes fluttered open. It took her a few moments to realise where she was and who were the people around her. Then she screamed.
"Shut up!" Harry Potter hissed, clamping a hand over her mouth.
It was the strangest feeling. Winter had thought she'd known her mother. But now all she'd thought to be real had been thrown over her head. It was like she was looking at a strange spirit occupying her mother's body. It wasn't the same person. The woman sitting rigidly straight on the white sofa wasn't the same woman that she had known for 11 years. Winter didn't know what to make of her.
"Hermione listen" Harry Potter hissed. "We've told her alright! She knows!"
Her mother's eyes brimmed with tears as she struggled to push the man's hand of her mouth.
"We've told her about Hogwarts, we've told her about magic and we've told her she's a witch. There are some things she'll come to find out in the next few years. But now there are things we need to tell you."
He released his grasp on her face and she sprung back. Her eyes darted from Harry Potter to Winter to the dog to Odysseus Devor. She turned back to Harry Potter and to Winter and collapsed her head into her hands
"Hermione there are things we can't tell you right now, that you'll find out in the time to come. It might be years, it might be months, but either way, we can't tell you."
Harry Potter said. Hermione-Ruth gave a hollow laugh.
"You come in barging into my life, wrecking everything that I've struggled for and un-surfacing the life I left behind for a reason you know is good and you expect me to let you say this? I deserve to know what the hell is going on and why my daughter has to be whisked away from me! Damn it don't you understand! I can't live like this! It's not me! It's not the way I chose to lead my life!"
"How you chose to lead your life and how you need to lead you life are two separate things. Dumbledore told me before he died that you can't be who you want to be. You have to be who you need to be. Isn't that enough of a reason? No Hermione there are things we can't tell you, and we have as much a right not to tell you as you do not to tell Winter why you left. But there is one thing we can give you. You might want it for later."
Harry Potter said. Odysseus Devor was staring out the window completely detached. The dog limped over to a satchel that lay in the middle of the room and gave it to Harry Potter. He opened it and pulled out a long thin box. Hermione-Ruth sobbed.
"I don't want it! You've taken Winter from me isn't that enough? Can't you content yourself with that? I've lived without it for 15 years Harry! I can survive without it now!"
"You have. But you might not for long." Odysseus Devor said. They were the first words he'd spoken to her. Harry Potter put the box on her lap.
"Your call. Do you want to live or not?"
"Stupid question. Do you think I have the choice?" She snapped
"No. I know you don't. But it'll help you."
Hermione-Ruth sobbed.
"I can't do this!"
"You can. You defeated Him. You can do anything."
"I can't! I can't do this! I thought I'd proved that to you long ago!"
"No. You proved to me that every person could be afraid. I never thought I'd see you tremble."
"It's been too long! I can't do anything! I've lost everything!"
"You can't. It's impossible."
He reached forward and opened the box. It was a wand.
"Just try. You'll see."
She coughed harshly and reeled forward. Harry Potter put the wand in her hand.
"Please. For this." He touched the Ankh on her chest. She looked at him through her tears
"It's not going to work."
"Like you once told me: how do you know if you don't?"
She sobbed.
"I can't."
"You can."
"No! No I can't!"
"Priori Incatatem." Odysseus Devor whispered.
She nodded and whispered though her bitten lips.
"Priori…Priori Incatatem."
There was a moment where nothing happened. Then a flash of white light and two words stretched across the air.
Aeternus Eternus.
Eternity
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