The Wands

Disclaimer: I own nothing, not the characters, but just the plot and the characters'–oops, almost told you!

Lily rolled over sleepily in her bed. Then she blinked to. It was her eleventh birthday! Lovely!

She jumped out, flung herself in and out of the bath, dressed, and looked in the mirror, grimacing. Her wings needed brushing into place. Argh. She smoothed them into place, making sure her bedroom door was locked so that her sister couldn't see her brushing air. Actually, lately Petunia wasn't a bad sister; she just was a tad indifferent. Not the type to say that you have wings to.

Lily was done now. Her green tee shirt that said Angel on it glittered like her eyes, the jeans were practical, and so was she. Eleven. What a strange age.

Lily ran straight down the stairs, and stopped at once. Wow. She had presents from nearly everyone she knew.

Her mum hugged her, her dad swung her into the air, and Petunia actually deigned to wish her a very happy birthday.

"Darling, you look so grown up!" whispered her mother. Maybe she remembered the chubby, cute roly-poly figure that baby Lily had been. Or maybe she remembered the thin, underfed looking kid. As it were, right now, Lily was a little on the short side, slim, sleek, and streamlined looking. She hadn't begun to look womanly, but that didn't bother her. Right now, she was perfecting stunt flying, and she loved loop de loops.

She opened her tons and tons of presents, finding jewelry, postcards, games, books, and tons of things she mightn't need, but would be fun. Like a bubble kit. (?) She didn't get it. But so what.

And the very last few present she found was from Grandma. She found a large book of favourite faerie stories, which, for Lily would be eternal. The last one was about a girl . . . a little girl with wings. Her face was Lily's, and her wings. She smiled. She found the yummy cookies. And lastly, she found a thick letter.

Dearest Lily, how is my favourite little angel? You are nearly grown up, and your dreams soar, as do you. I have enclosed a letter from elsewhere, which I know is for you and wasn't delivered at your house for fear that your sister would open it and read it.

Love Grandma.

She found a letter in yellowed parchment.

And she couldn't believe what it said.

A few months later . . .

"So, let me get this straight." She was dodging through the hustle and bustle of London with her mother. "I'm going to this school that is a magic school, I have to get supplies, and you're supposed to drop me off by some gadget store?"

Her mother shrugged.

"Here we are." She looked around, and suddenly she spotted something peculiar. It was a small pub, called the Leaky Cauldron.

"Mum?"

"Yes dear?"

"Do you see that pub?"

"What pub? There's nothing there Lily."

A peculiar feeling washed across her spine, and transported itself to her fluttering wings. She nearly lifted off the ground. She felt it. The strongest ambience of magic.

She looked around, and soon spotted a girl and her mother. They were chattering very fast. "Yes, I want to get a decent cauldron for Potions, really for a cheap price. Sarah!"

Sarah was a dark haired, tanned, freckled girl with startling blue eyes. She and Lily stared at each other. Lily was acutely aware that she was short, because Sarah was tall.

"Hello," said Lily shyly. "I'm going to a new school this September, and it sounds like you know where to go. Can you help me? I've never heard of it before." Her heart rate was going somewhere close to flight rate, her wings were fluttering, and she was silently praying she couldn't see them.

Sarah smiled brightly. "What school are you going to?"

Sarah's mother came up, curious. Lily felt even more nervous. "Um, it's called Hogwarts."

Sarah's smile began even more pronounced, and Lily found herself grinning back in return. "Great! Come on, we've got to go to Diagon Alley. In the meanwhile, I'll explain to you and your mum about a lot of things."

So after that day, they were friends. Sarah and her mother showed them where to buy things like cauldrons, books, and even magical creatures. Sarah emerged from the Magical Creatures shop with a large, brown owl. Lily emerged with a sleek, beautiful furred black cat with eyes as green as Lily's own. The cat she called Midnight, the human the cat declared as its property, and immediately curled up in her cage and went to sleep.

Lily smiled.

"Ok, girls, last stop," announced Sarah's mom.

Lily, who had been doing a check list, said "A wand, right?"

"Yeah," said Sarah. "A wand. We'll go to Ollivander's, as it's the closest place. Right her in Diagon Alley."

Lily walked into Ollivander's Wand Shop, and immediately felt a tingle. Her eyes were shining in the darkness. Her heart began the flight rate again, and she was fighting to keep her wings in position of folded. They were trying very hard to spread and let her fly away.

A voice came from the shadows, and with the voice came the owner. She pulled her wings around her body, cold.

"Greetings. And how may I help you?"

Sarah's mother looked businesslike. "These two need to get their first wands."

"Ah!" the man's eyes brightened. "Who'll go first?"

Sarah and Lily exchanged glances. "I'll go," said Sarah.

The silver eyes of the man tilted as he nodded. And then her friend began to try the wands. Each little wand refused to respond.

Sarah's mother looked confused. "This isn't supposed to take so long."

But Sarah didn't look bothered. Her blue eyes became guarded, and a hint of silver flashed into them. "Why?" And she looked at him. "Mr. Ollivander, surely, there has to be one more wand. Please?"

He nodded. And he handed her a strip of wood, with a silvery sheen to the wood. "Dragon heartstring and beech wood, thirteen inches."

There was an odd look in Sarah's eyes as she took the wand and suddenly, as she took it, a shower of silvery sparks erupted out of it. They shimmered, and then disappeared straight into Sarah. It was in that moment she realized something was strange about Sarah.

Ollivander, unbothered, said gleefully, "A match! Now, to help your red haired friend."

Lily, it seemed, was just as hard to match a wand as Sarah. Endlessly it seemed he was holding her hand, whisking away another wand, and giving her another. Her wings slumped, she was bored. And then something strange happened. She saw a shower of sparks—from a non existent wand.

The next wand past the next.

The words flared into her head. Where had the sparks and the picture come from? But Ollivander was handing her yet another wand, whisking it away, exuberant.

He placed the next wand into her hand. Something strange happened. Her fingertips grew warm, blistering hot, and then she felt something inside channel into her fingertips, up the strip of wood, and a shower of gold sparks glittered up out of the wand. And then she felt them sort themselves back into her skin.

Sarah and Lily exchanged startled glances at each other. The identical thing had happened to them both.

"Perfect. 10 ¼ inches. Phoenix feather and willow, good for charms. Your friend's wand is good for Transfiguration."

Lily nodded, and Sarah caught her wand as Lily tossed it.

Lily felt very strange. She felt almost as if, somehow, she'd do this more than once. More than one time in her life, this would happen. She smiled at her friend, almost reassuringly, as if reassuring her self, telling herself it was ok. Her head felt strangely odd, and then she felt her friend touch her arm.

"Lily? You ok girl?"

She nodded. "I'm fine."

"Good. It's time to get something edible, I'm starving."

She laughed at this. Her face cleared, her wand in her pocket, and she walked with Sarah in front to the door. Their parents followed behind. As she held the door open, a girl bumped into them.

"Hello, oh, I'm sorry," said Lily. The girl stared at her, confused looking, almost shocked. "It's–it's ok. Don't worry."

The girl had long golden blonde hair, and strange eyes, strange eyes of amber gold that she thought were beautiful. Good, thought Lily, if she was here, she would see her at Hogwarts.

The girl started at something that she was staring at. "It's ok," she repeated. She shook her head lightly.

"Ok."

The bed was warm, safe, and secure.

But outside the air called.

The night called to her.

Lily crouched on the windowsill, her jeans and shirt still on, her shoes under the bed. The pale moonlight shone through her window, milky and cold. The wind was chilly outside.

She looked out. The wind was perfect for flying. It caught and ruffled her hair, sent it whipping into the air. Her eyes glowed as she stared over the suburban area that she lived in. The ground seemed so mundane. Each street light glimmered in perfect place. She wasn't suited to it, the wild thing she was.

She tossed her head to the stars.

Then she put her heels on the sill, and kicked off.

The wind felt as perfect as it always did, tugging at her toes as she dived down, the spread her wings and flew up, higher and higher, until she saw the velvety blackness of the sky and the diamond of the stars, instead of the street lights.

She dove down, then soared up drifting with the wind.

Then she did a loop de loop, and another, and another until she was dizzy with joy.

Then she turned the last loop de loop, and she could have sworn her heels hit the stars.

She was dizzily happy, and shouted it to the world with the long cry that she gave. She was so far away from the ground, far away from civilization. In this wildness, she was happy, utterly happy.

Lily Evans was not quite human.

She returned home an hour later after drifting high into the sky. She sat down and began to read some of the complicated looking text books that she had bought today with the strange wizarding money. She instantly remembered what they were—knuts, galleons, and sickles. Weird.

Her books looked rather interesting, and she kept reading them until her clock told her twelve o' clock. Midnight sat on the bed and watched her. Midnight had already tried to catch her feathers, but she batted her cat absent mindedly with her wings.

Often she'd smile into her cat's green eyes, so like her own.

She felt glad. She was starting a new life, a different life from the one she had lived before. Her old life was too mundane, too ordered. She did not like it. She was a normally dignified girl. Her wings changed that, and she was glad. This school would change it again. It looked like fun.

Hogwarts.

It sounded great.

Well? What did you think? Please review.