Hogwarts:The Lost Tales
Chapter 1: Seren Asher
October 24th, 1975
In her parents eyes, she was beautiful. In the eyes of the doctors and nurses surrounding her, gawking at her, prodding her with various items, she was either a monster or a marvel.
Seren Ember Asher looked completely average for a newborn baby, if you looked past the condition that afflicted her skin. On the left side of her neck, the small of her back, round the right half of her bellybutton, her right wrist, her left knee and ankle and the pinky toe on her right foot...were patches of scales. Not just any scales.
These were Dragon Scales.
They had a green base colour, edged with gold and changed between blue and purple when the light hit them differently. The people of the wizarding world referred to those like her as The Drakena, they were said to be blessed by dragons and possess unique qualities. The condition was rare, to the point were only one or two babies were born with the affliction in every generation worldwide. No one knew why, no one knew how and no one knew what unique qualities this child would possess as they grew up in world were you were either loved, hated or feared for who and what you were.
A doctor had offered to attempt to remove the scales, others offered potions, salves and creams that 'should do the trick, it's why the numbers for this condition are so low'.
Seren's mother, Vera, didn't believe any of them. To Vera, her daughter didn't need a cure or to go through something so painful as to have the scales scrapped off of her skin to then, only be covered in scars. Seren was perfect, her little miracle.
Having a child proved to be somewhat of a difficult feat for Vera and Liam Asher. They had been trying for years with no success, where as Vera's sisters had had all the luck the world seemed to offer. Vera had three sisters: Mabel, Irie and Elena. Mabel was the oldest, followed by Vera, then Irie and finally Elena. Each of Vera's three sisters either had or were soon to have their fourth living child, as she had been told through several letters.
Vera only had Seren. Not that she minded, of course.
However, Vera had spent the first 15 years of her marriage being jealous of her sisters, taking every opportunity to look after her nieces and nephews that she got. To Vera, it was enough just to finally have a child, let alone one that had been blessed by dragons.
Now watching her little girl soundly sleeping, Vera couldn't look away from her sweet face. Seren always seemed to look so peaceful, as is she was so angelic that nothing could harm her. Occasionally, Seren would give her mother a small smile that seemed to make Vera's world even better.
Vera and her family had always been outcasts, Vera more so then her parents and sisters. They were distant relatives of the Black family and frowned upon due to her mother marrying muggle-born wizard. Her grandparents had cut her mother off from her inheritance, seeing her as a blood traitor. Vera had never met her grandparents, her parents had kept her and her sisters hidden from them for their own safety.
Vera couldn't wait to tell her daughter all about her parents, Seren's grandparents. Vera's mother, Claudia Mayfire, was a beautiful opera singer, the best the wizarding world had to offer! She even put the Fat Lady that protected the Gryffindor Common Room to shame. Her father, Aberford Vincent, was an aura for the Ministry of Magic. He knew what it meant to protect those you love from harm as well as the strangers who were known the wiser to the tragedies that could and would befall them.
Sadly, Vera's parents had lost their lives at the very beginning of the war that was now beginning to threaten the wizarding world itself. It had started five years ago now, and casualties were beginning to mount up. Vera and her husband had gone into hiding shortly after, along with her sisters and their families. She hadn't seen any of her sisters in three years. They had kept in contact, updating each other on their lives through letters written with a unique invisible ink that Mabel had created, the writing would only reveal itself after the receiver spilt a single drop of their blood onto the top right corner of the page. No one other than the receiver could unlock the writing.
November 7th, 1975
"Vera, my darling" Liam's voice pulled her out of her train of thought. "I understand that we finally have a child, but you'll risk straining your arms if you are constantly holding our little dragon." Vera looked up, her and her husband smiling at each other with enough love to outlast time itself.
"How was the meeting, my dear?" She asked him. Liam had attended a secret meeting of wizards against the one who shall not be named, led by none other then Dumbledore himself, referred to as the Order of the Phoenix.
"It went as well as expected, how is our little sweetheart?" He asked, but received no reply.
Vera was sat in the same place she had been for the seven days since they got back from the hospital. In her mothers rocking chair, looking through an open shutter window that showed a beautiful view of the lake behind their small cottage. Vera was softly rocking with her daughter in her arms, and a glossed over look in her eyes.
All of a sudden, time froze and the air around Liam grew cold. Something was wrong, deep down Liam knew it. Vera wasn't okay.
She wasn't looking at their daughter, now crying in her arms. Vera seemed fixed on only looking out of the window, looking at the same view that she had all week yet not looking at it at all.
"My darling?" He asked, walking up behind her and placing a hand on her left shoulder. Liam then looked down to see his wives fingers were bloody and covered in dirt, the nails on some starting to pull away from the skin.
"It's alright, dear. We'll be alright." She said.
She stopped rocking, but carried on looking out of the window
"I will put on some tea"
Vera got up from her chair and dropped her arms, as if she had forgotten she was holding their baby girl. Liam lunged forward, grabbing their daughter before she could hit the floor. Horrified.
Liam looked into her face. A small patch of skin on her left cheekbone had turned into scales a couple of days after Seren was born, her eyes also seemed to change colour every now and then. Then there was a crash.
Liam laid Seren down in her basonette that Vera had set up their small lounge area, it was barely big enough to fit a two seater sofa, before running to the kitchen. Vera was lying on the tiled floor, her skin pale and dull, cold to the touch.
"Vera?!" He said as he shook her, tears starting to pool up in his eyes. "Vera!" Louder this time.
Liam got up and, with their daughter strapped to him with scarves, holding his wife in one arm, he dragged himself to the fireplace and grabbed a handful of flu powder.
He took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a moment, before he opened them and said...
"The Burrow"