Mute By Choice: The Goblet of Fire

by AvyJC15

(Book IV of the Mute By Choice Series) There is an upcoming tournament between four of the five major schools of magic, with three participants, only one selected from each school by the Goblet of Fire. But what happens when another ancient tournament is brought into the equation, as well? Or when a man keeps appearing in Delilah's dreams? ... or when a woman falls from the sky?

8. Strange Discoveries, Strange Prophecies

Strange discoveries and even stranger prophecies

Seven days before school begins ~ Waverly Place, New York

Justin Russo paced the family room, ready to take action. He had a clipboard tucked under his arm and a whistle hanging around his neck, so he was very prepared. He checked the clock. Twenty minutes had passed since his parents left the apartment. It was time. He glanced at his little brother, Max, who was sprawled on the sofa reading a comic book. His younger sister, Alex, sat cross-legged on the floor.

Justin picked up the telephone. "Hey, Mom," he said when his mom answered her cell phone. "Okay, so you and Dad crossed over into New Jersey, right?"

His parents were spending the afternoon at farmers' markets, buying organic tomatoes, lettuce, and other veggies for the Waverly Sub Station, the sandwich shop that they owned and ran. Justin grinned when his mom said they were long gone from the city.

"Then it's official. I'm in charge," he said proudly.

But his mother didn't agree. She wanted to know why someone needed to be in charge; all three kids were old enough to be left home alone.

Justin sighed and nudged Max's foot off the back of the sofa. Max grunted and buried his head deeper into his comic book. "Because what if there was a tidal wave or something?" Justin asked.

Alex rolled her eyes; Justin could be so dramatic sometimes!

"I know, I know, I know," Justin said to his mom. "But if there was, then would I be in charge?" He waited for the verdict. "Yes!" Justin hung up the phone and blew his whistle. "All right. I'm in charge."

Suddenly, ice-cold water splashed all over him! Justin jumped back in shock. Alex had pelted him with a water balloon!

"Oh, look, a tidal wave," Alex said, unable to control her giggles. "Now you're in charge." She turned to Max, and they bumped fists in celebration. Justin was such an easy target.

"Not funny, Alex," Justin sputtered. "This is my new sweater." He gestured toward the blue-and-navy-striped sweater he was wearing.

"Justin, when you wear it every day for a week, it's not new, it just needs a wash," Alex informed him.

But before Justin could respond, he was ambushed by another water balloon. Water soaked his left sleeve, dripping onto the floor. "Okay. I washed it," Max joked, doubling over in laughter. He gave Alex a high five. "You're welcome."

Alex laughed along with Max. She would have thought that playing pranks on Justin would be getting old by now. Funny thing was, nothing could make her and Max laugh more. Alex stood and straightened her denim miniskirt that she was wearing over her red footless tights.

"Oh, well, have a good day, guys." She headed for the front door. "I'm out of here."

"Alex! Where do you think you're going?" Justin demanded.

"I'm meeting Riley at the street fair," she told him

"You're not going to the street fair," Justin said stubbornly. "And you have to listen to me because Mom and Dad left me in charge."

"Oh, come on, Justin," Alex said. "Let loose. Most sixteen-year-old boys have fun when their parents leave town."

"Being the authority figure is fun," Justin said, dragging her back to the sofa. "Now, I've prepared a wizard-training review sheet on some spells that I feel Dad hasn't covered enough in class." He handed out the days assignment.

"'Murrieta-animata'?" Alex read aloud. "I know this one. It's the one that makes you think you're the boss of me."

Justin giggled humorlessly. "No. Murrieta-animata is a spell for making an inanimate object come to life."

She gave him a sarcastic smile. "Thanks, that's the answer. Well, I'm done with my review. See you later."

And with that said, she ran out of the apartment. Justin merely watched on as the door swung shut. Alex made him so frustrated. Didn't she understand he was in charge? Why did she always have to break the rules? He knew she'd regret it. He wasn't sure how or when. But he knew she would.

Hey, maybe a tidal wave will hit, he thought. Then she'd really be surprised!

Meanwhile, said girl stopped the moment the door shut behind her, resting a moment to catch her breath. Otherwise, she didn't really give a second thought to ditching Justin. She hurried down the stairs and out the building, then headed toward the street fair to meet up with Riley.

Even though their first date was a total disaster, Riley still wanted to hang out with her, which Alex was so relieved over since she really liked him.

When she finally spotted Riley, they smiled at each other. Then, they walked through the crowded street, which was lined with all kinds of cool booths and food carts, as Alex told him all about the latest gossip at their school, which she still wondered why she still attended, considering she never really paid attention in any of her classes and flunk them all... unless it involved magic or art.

"And then Jessica Miller told Marianna O'Shaunnesy I shouldn't be able to get out of gym if no one else could, so then Marianna said that—" Alex stopped rambling when she noticed he wasn't paying attention to her. "Riley!"

He snapped out of whatever reverie he was in and looked down at her. "What?" he asked innocently.

"You were staring at Marianna O'Shaunnesy," Alex accused.

"I wasn't staring," he denied adamantly.

"Is it because she's got bigger hips than I do?" Alex asked. "Because I think they're fake."

Riley sighed. "I was just looking, that's all." He paused. "Alex, why do you always get so jealous?"

"Just looking, huh? As in, just browsing? As in, doing a little shopping around? What are you in the market for, Riley?" she taunted. "A new girlfriend?"

But Riley was distracted again. "Hey, honey."

"You're doing it again!"

"Honey! Honey!" a salesman said, holding out honey sticks.

Riley pointed at him to prove Alex that she was wrong about him checking other girls out. "He's giving out free honey samples!" he exclaimed himself, then sighed. "I mean, come on, Alex, this is crazy." He shook his head. "I don't think we should go out anymore." And he turned to walk away.

Alex's eyes widened, and she quickly followed him; she couldn't believe it. Sure, she'd been secretly dreading this moment since they first started dating. But she'd never really thought he'd do it.

"What? You're breaking up with me? But we're so good together," she said. "I mean, we have so many good memories. Remember, you, me and the penguins at the zoo?" And she waddled down the street like a penguin.

"What are you doing?" he asked, perplexed.

"I'm acting out our favorite memories," Alex said, the desperation obvious in her voice. "And then that one time when we went for a walk." She took long, exaggerated strides in front of him. "And then we went down the stairs." She pretended to descend a flight of stairs. She was sure if he could visualize the good times, then he wouldn't want them to end. "And then—"

"Alex, I'm breaking up with you."

"Okay, I'm not a very good mime. I'll admit that."

"No, it's because you're constantly jealous," Riley said.

"What? I'm not constantly jealous," Alex denied. "I just really like you." Why can't he see that? she wondered. If I didn't like him so much, I wouldn't care who he looked at.

Riley shook his head. "Well, you have a funny way of showing it." He headed down the street.

"No, I don't. I'm constantly jealous. That's how I show it," Alex called after him.

As Riley continued to walk away in the other direction, Alex blinked back tears. She couldn't believe Riley had broken up with her. They were so good together. All their friends said so. But then... why? What should she do now?

Blinking back the tears, she whined, "I need hot chocolate!"

London, England

There was a definite end-of-the-holidays gloom in the air when Delilah awoke two mornings after the awful events having occurred at the Quidditch World Cup. Heavy rain splattered against the slightly open window of her room as she merely turned her head in the other direction, shutting her eyes anew as though that would rid her from the pain in her chest. She couldn't remember much of what had happened before she'd lost consciousness, nor did she know how long her blank-minded slumber had been, but the ghosting feeling of a hand clutching her heart through her chest made her want to knock herself unconscious again as so to not think of it at all. Pain was not a pleasant thing to feel, and the mere thought of it made her want to puke.

After laying there, on her bed, for another twenty minutes, she heaved a sigh, then slowly pushed herself up and back to lean her back against the cushioned headboard of her bed.

Lazily wriggling her fingers, her old white board floated over to her, along with her black marker, which surprisingly still held a respectable amount of ink even after being used for four years, for the most part, over the course of the last six years. After silently uncapping her marker, she let her hand wander across the board, doodling aimlessly. After a moment, she became so lost in her thoughts, and didn't snap out of her endless reverie until someone came knocking at her door. She blinked, then glanced down at her board, letting out a small gasp when she saw what she'd drawn. Then, a startled yelp escaped her lips as an excruciating pain built in the palm of her hand and crawled its way up her arm.

She was almost in tears when her brother all but kicked the door open at the sound of her cry of pain, and rushed in with worry, tensing his slightly disheveled appearance. His eyes swept incredibly quick around the room before they settled upon his sister. He relaxed for a moment, seeing that she was finally awake, but his worry resurfaced when he noticed she seemed to be in shock and pain.

Slowly approaching her, his mouth fell slightly open upon seeing the impeccable black on white replica the colossal skull with a serpent protruding from its mouth like a tongue, which had lit the night, starless sky only nights ago.

"What the hell is this?" Delilah breathed out, the pain leaving as suddenly as it came, letting her focus on her not-so-doodle doodle.

Inwardly panicking, Seth yanked the white board from his sister's hands and somehow managed to throw it out the slightly ajar window. A sheepish look rose to his face when he saw the incredulous look Delilah was giving him.

"Whoopsie," said Seth, a nervous chuckle rising from his chest. "Clumsy me."

"What the hell?!" she exclaimed herself, pushing herself forward on her bed, getting ready to stand. "Seth! What the hell was that for?! You know how much that thing mea—"

"Where are you go—"

"To get that board back. Why the hell would you throw it out the window?!" she snarled at him.

Seth was taken aback by her reaction. His sister was not a sentimental person; she rarely ever got emotional, and whenever she was caught in such state, she would growl and threaten whoever saw her to keep it to themselves; he never thought she would one day possess an object that would hold sentimental value to her.

"You can't go out there," Seth quickly objected, blocking her path to the door.

She laughed sarcastically. "And why is that? Because it's raining?" she retorted in a slightly mocking tone, very unlike her.

"Well... uh..."

All irritation left Delilah's face as she looked more closely at her brother. He was fidgeting. Nervous and panicked, and clearly hiding something from her. Seth was usually an open book, especially to his sister, but at that moment, he was an unreadable mess; he had come to her room and found she didn't remember exactly what had happened the other night, right after the Quidditch Cup, and he wanted to keep it that way. What had happened was considerably an awfully gruesome night terror, and he had already witnessed once before the way she reacted to her own memories. It was heart-wrenching to see a kind, beautiful girl lose the small bit of happiness from her face and have it replaced with tears of pain and anger.

"That drawing," she began quietly. "You've seen that thing recently, haven't you?" Of course she would manage to see right through him eventually. She always did. Looking more closely into his eyes which were an eerie reflection of her own, she said, "The Quidditch Cup."

Seth groaned softly. "You read my mind, didn't you?" he said weakly, defeatedly glancing down at his feet.

"No," she replied. "You're just more of an open book than I'll ever be. You need to fix that. People can use that against you, and in this world, for people our kind... that's the worst thing that one can let happen to themself."

She took a step closer to her brother and placed a hand under his chin, lifting his face upward to he was looking at her.

"What happened, Seth?"

It was moments like these, when she spoke softly to him and, although remaining rather stoic, emitted a warm and comforting aura that consumed him to the core, that made him feel like a little boy wanting nothing more but to hold onto his older sister as tightly as he could and never let go. For as long as he could remember remembering, he had always wondered what his mother was and looked like, and what it felt like to have a mother. Lara was around, but she never stayed permanently with them, only visiting every once in a while, so he never knew what it was truly like to have a mother.

When he met Delilah for the first time, he knew the rumors were right of her resemblance to their mother. He'd seen old photographs, and if he didn't know any better, he would've thought they were the same person, or perhaps a doppelgänger of the other. As he got to know her, he came to realize that, although his sister and mother looked alike, they were completely different from one another. Sure, as he'd heard, he could confirm that they were both kind. But even their kindness was at two completely different levels.

From what he had learned from his Uncle Daren, Ella-Grace Dawn was the kindest person you could ever come across. Whether you were good or evil, she was always polite and genuinely kind far before she even knew you. Her kindness came naturally to her.

Delilah was, admittedly, unintentionally kind. Like her mother, her kindness came naturally to her. Still and all, Delilah was rather picky when it came to choosing who deserved her kindness and who didn't. She had a good judgment of character, and so she always somehow managed to show kindness to, even, the most horrible people. Perhaps she sought signs of possible redemption in every likely foe, and so they turned into frenemies rather opponents.

Draco Malfoy was a great example that.

Another similar thing between the mother and daughter was their determination to keep everyone safe at the risk of their own life. That was why Seth did not want to tell his sister what had happened the other night; if she knew, she would coddle him and everyone who is dear to her and would do everything she could to find who had attempted to hurt them and fought them till death, so long as whoever it is she fought died along with her so they wouldn't hurt her loved ones.

Delilah's eyes steeled as she tried hard not to read her brother's mind, not wanting to invade his personal thoughts. Suddenly, however, her vision began to cloud before her, her surroundings molding in on each other, everything fading into darkness before she was once again lost in a memory.

A tiny, slightly chubby hand reached up and patted the top of an old man's head, the owner of the small arm babbling nonsense as the child did not know how to speak proper words yet. The old man, who wouldn't have been thought to be as old as he was if it weren't for his gray hair, grabbed the small hand, chuckling, and brought it down to his lips, placing a kiss on it as gently as possible as though she would break if he'd proceeded harder.

"Yes, I am tall, aren't I?" he mumbled, his cornflower colored eyes staring with love and sorrow into her orange-pink morning glory begonian orbs, which were filled with curiosity as they looked at him.

"Labor does that to one's body," he continued, caressing the child's cheek. "Just like difficulties strengthen the mind."

The girl stared at him for a moment, head tilted to one side, before she reached her free hand and patted her own head, as if saying that she was tall as well, even though she was but a baby girl.

He chuckled. "If you aren't in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?"

She pouted slightly and began to babble. After a few moments, it seemed her mind had simply dismissed the height ordeal and was now struck on magic as she was flicking her hand as though she were waving a wand. The old man chuckled again, understanding what she was trying to say. He brought his wand out and waved it a tad bit, murmuring, "Lumos." A narrow beam of light appeared withing seconds and shone from tip of his wand, like a torch.

The baby girl's mouth dropped open as she stared at the light in awe.

"I know, magic does have its beauty," he mumbled, his smile turned bemused, as she reached out a hand toward the light. "But, magic is also dangerous."

She looked back at him, tilting her head to the side, as she gazed at him with confusion and curiosity, as though she were asking how magic could possibly be dangerous. She frowned and pointed at the lit wand.

He sighed. "I know you're but a baby, but you and I both know― everybody knows you're smarter than the regular baby, so remember this Delilah: magic is dangerous― it always comes with a price. And sometimes― most of the time... the price is..." He swallowed hard before saying, "Death."

"Erick?!"

The old man's head snapped up, his smiling face dropping into an alarmed look. Standing at the door of the room was his wife, a breathtakingly beautiful woman with violet-orchidee eyes and long, light brown, slightly reddish hair stroke with gray of age.

Her breathing was ragged and heavy, her eyes tearing up. "They're here. He's here. They've all come to end her. We can't let them―"

"I know," he cut her off. "Send a signal to Ella. Let her know to come as quickly as possible. We might not be here anymore, but that doesn't mean Delilah won't."

Eloisa nodded her head shakily; it had been so long since she'd felt genuine fear for, not only herself, but also someone else. Then, she ran out of the room, leaving her husband to have one last moment of privacy with their granddaughter. Delilah, the baby girl, reached her tiny hand up and caught the lone tear that trickled down his cheek as if to tell him not to go. He grabbed her tiny hand in his and softly kissed it. She frowned, she could tell he was going to leave her, but she didn't want him to leave.

"I have to, I'm sorry," he whispered, letting go of her hand and placing her gently in her crib.

Delilah tried to reach out for him, tears threatening to fall from her eyes that were no longer orange-pink morning glory begonian, but a dull violet lunara. It was a beautiful color for a girl's eyes, but its beauty wasn't something to think about when the reason behind the eye color transfiguration was evident; though she was a baby, she understood something really bad was happening, or, at least, was going to happen. She knew she was going to lose something, and something inside of her told her her grandparents were that something.

"Magic is dangerous, princess," he repeated. "That is why one must always sacrifice themself."

Her frown never left, though it did turn somewhat desperate as she kept trying to reach out for him. By now, she was no longer laying in her crib, but sitting. Whatever sacrifice was, she knew it was bad; she didn't want him to do it. She didn't want him to sacrifice himself.

"Don't worry, Delilah― don't look at it as a sacrifice. After all, it's not sacrifice if you love what you are doing. If you choose to do something, then you should not call it a sacrifice, because it was nothing but a willing gesture towards someone you love."

Grabbing her small hand and kissing it one last time, he reluctantly let go of her and backed away towards the exit, turning his back to her as soon as he reached the door as he couldn't bear looking at the broken look on the three-month-old baby.

She began to cry somewhat soundlessly as the door closed. Why did he leave her?

"Tom... don't do this," she could hear her grandfather say.

"Don't tell me what to do or not do," hissed an unfamiliar voice. Delilah pushed herself to her feet and wobbled her way to the railing of her crib and held onto it, her tears still falling as she stared at the dim light that shone through the space under the door.

Then came her grandmother's voice. "Tom, she's just a baby—"

Her grandfather was cut off mid-sentence, and now, for what felt like forever, all that could be heard was but an utter silence. Delilah leaned forward in anticipation; her cries had stopped, but her tears were still falling.

The door suddenly slammed open, a dark cloaked figure standing there, staring at her with empty eyes.

He raised a hand, holding a stick that looked an awful lot like a wand, and hissed, "Avada Kedavra."

His words were followed by a blinding flash of green light that shaped itself into a rather frightening skull with a serpent protruding from its mouth like a tongue. A rushing noise followed suite, and an excruciating pain Delilah had never felt before that reached the left side of her neck; that was the last thing Delilah saw, heard and felt that night before everything around her dimmed and went black.

Delilah's eyes snapped open, a small gasp escaping her lips as her sight cleared before her, meeting the worried eyes of her little brother. Her hand flew to her mouth as her eyes widened, watering with tears upon the remembering that event from so long ago, as well as remembering what had happened the other night. She did not complain or protest when her brother immediately pulled her into his arms and held her gently yet tightly, trying to bring her as much comfort as he could.

They remained so for a while, having barely moved, only to settle onto the floor at Delilah's bedside. After a moment, Seth used his magic to levitate the white board he'd thrown out the window to bring it back to her room. Neither said anything else for a long while, til eventually they couldn't either way, for the siblings had gradually dozed off into sleep, neither letting go of the other.

Waverly Place, New York

"Okay, I'm done with my wizard homework," Max told Justin the next day. He handed his paper to his older brother. "Can I watch TV now?" he asked as he hopped off the sofa and looked for the remote control.

"Sit," Justin commanded. "Let me check it." He sat in the chair next to the sofa, pulled the pencil off his clipboard, and studied Max's work. "Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh," he said after reading each answer. "Hmm. Yes." He handed the paper back to his brother. "You might want to look at spell number five."

"I got spell five wrong?" Max asked.

Justin snorted. "No. Spell five is the only one you got right," he said.

Max stuck his tongue out. "You're meaner than Dad."

"Thank you." Justin decided to take this as a compliment. His dad was a good magic teacher. "Okay. You need to think harder about the Murrieta-animata spell. If you leave animated objects animated too long, then they develop emotions."

Max picked up one of Justin's boxed action figures from the coffee table. Justin loved action figures. "You mean if I turn this doll into a person, it'd feel bad about being stuck in the box?" Max asked, waving the box in the air.

"Don't touch that!" Justin cried. He snatched the box from Max. "That's Calico Woman in her Legion of the Superladies uniform. They only made a thousand of these lovely ladies." He looked at the box lovingly. "Isn't that right, Calico Woman?"

"So what you're saying is, there's nine hundred ninety-nine other guys who couldn't get a girl to talk to them," Max joked.

"Don't listen to him," Justin whispered to Calico Woman. His brother had a lot to learn— about magic... and about action figures.

Six days before school begins

Alex sat on their living room couch the next day, a magazine in hand and a thoughtful look on her face when Justin walked over and showed her a leather jacket. There parents were back from their two day trip, and so the two siblings had much more free time, so Justin began preparing himself to go out for the day.

"Okay, what do you think is cooler for my date? Leather jacket? Or this hoodie?"

"You got a date?" his sister asked, seemingly impressed.

He nodded. "And I'm really nervous, so please tell me which one of these will make me look cool and not nervous."

"Oh, let's see." Alex put the magazine aside, jumped to her feet, grabbed the leather jacket and examined it. "Nice leather... or what if we..." She glanced over at the hoodie Justin was already wearing and pulled hood up. "Good..." She tied it close in his face.

"Aargh!" Justin exclaimed.

"Yep, I'd go with the hoodie!" Alex exclaimed herself as she plopped herself back down onto the sofa.

"Take it easy; I'm a mouth breather!" Justin grumbled as he untied the hood from his face and sat down.

"I can't believe you let your Wiztech buddy set you up on a blind date," said his sister. "And all you know from her is what you've learned from her profile on Wizface."

"You haven't even seen her; she's hot!" Justin was quick to defend his possible future girlfriend. "And she's into all the same things that I'm into."

Alex snorted. "Puh-lease. Listen, everybody's hot on Wizface, because they don't show their real picture, and they lie about what they're into. What picture did she see of you?"

"Oh, I don't think pictures capture my essence, that's why I posted a complicated mathematical equation." Alex gave him a blank stare. "Come check it out."

Alex moved over beside Justin as he opened the page on his computer.

"Oh, I get it. Because you're hard to figure out, no one cares enough to try," Alex said teasingly, earning a sarcastic laugh from her brother as she leaned forward and clicked through some other pages of his Wizface profile. "What other embarrassing things do you have on your embarrassing page?" After a long moment, she snorted again. "Oh, my gosh! I can't believe you posted that picture of you and that centaur. Don't you wish she had told you she was half horse and half girl before you asked her to Wiztech prom?"

Justin shrugged. "I saved a lot on the limo."

Alex shrugged and sighed. "I am just saying. People or horses are not always honest on Wizface."

Suddenly, the doorbell rang, and Justin stood quickly to go and answer.

"OK, that's Isabella now," he said, starting for the door. "I guarantee you; she looks exactly like her picture on Wizface."

When Justin opened the door, Alex jumped in her seat and bit her lip, fighting back a laugh upon seeing an older woman standing on the other side of the door. The lady was somewhat pretty, but clearly far too old for her brother.

"Is this the Russo residence?"

Before answering, Justin looked back at Alex guilt-ridden, and Alex responded with a crazy laugh on her face.

"Hi," Justin said ever so shyly as he handed the woman a decorative object. "... here's your floral bracelet."

The woman took the bracelet, regarding the boy with confused eyes. "Thanks... and here's the mail that came to my apartment by accident."

Alex clamped a hand over her mouth to hide her silent laughter as she watched her brother awkwardly take then letters from the woman. As the latter was just about to leave, Justin called her back and quickly swiped the bracelet from her hand before closing the door.

"Phewf," the boy exhaled in relief, plopping himself down onto the couch.

"I wouldn't 'phew' so fast," Alex said. "At least that lady only had two legs."

The doorbell then rang for a second time.

Justin stood quickly to go answer it. "Okay, I'm sure Isabella is normal," he said defensively. He then halted in his step and turned around upon remembering something. "Oh, forgot the floral bracelet."

As he walked back to get it, Alex jumped up and opened the door, revealing a very pretty young girl standing on the other side. The girl smiled hesitantly upon seeing Alex.

"Hi, I'm Isabella, is Justin here?"

Alex grimaced in disappointment. "Oh, well you're cute, boo!" was all she said before turning and walking toward the kitchen, not bothering to close the door or even the invite the girl in.

The girl looked on at the figure standing in the middle of the living room with their back to her, their face hidden under the hood of a gray sweater.

"Justin?"

Justin glanced over at her from where he stood near the couch, his face shielded by his tightened hood.

"Isabella..." he said a bit hesitantly, before quickly snapping out of his momentary daze as he undid his hood and walked toward the girl by the door. "Wow. You're even prettier than your pictures on Wizface."

Isabella smiled and mused, "And you, don't look anything like x=y2 over a cosign of pi."

Justin grinned widely at her. "I know, everyone says that! So nice to meet you," he told her as he ushered her in. "And even nicer for you to meet my sister Alex, who thinks she knows everything!" As he said that, he gestured toward Isabella, looking pointedly at his sister, while the former smiled at Alex, not noticing Justin's hand gestures. "Here, take a seat. I'll go get you some of your favorite diet Wiz-Fizz. You know the soda. I remember it from your profile."

Justin ran up a spiral staircase that led towards the bedrooms upstairs as Isabella plopped down onto the long sofa in the living room. Standing by the kitchen island counter, Alex stared at the girl on the couch a moment longer before rolling her eyes, bored of staying there any longer.

"Well, this was fun," she said, a bit too sarcastically as she walked around the counter and headed toward Isabella. "Can you pass me my sweater please?"

With the bark of a dog sounding, Isabella grabbed the sweater from the coffee table in her mouth. She turned back over the couch, with the sweater hanging from her mouth, earning herself a weird look from Alex.

"Erm... okay..." the brunette went to grab her sweater, but Isabella wouldn't let go.

Alex tugged on the sweater, but Isabella merely tugged from her side. The little tug of war went on a couple more times before Alex, eventually, managed to tug her sweater free from Isabella's mouth.

"Now that was fun!" the latter exclaimed herself excitedly.

"Really? 'Cause my word was awkward," Alex retorted before hurrying out of the apartment.

Little less than an hour later, Alex found herself getting bored and annoyed as she watched her brother; she had been spying on Justin and Isabella, trying to figure out what the girl was hiding. It was undoubtedly something big that she didn't want to reveal it on her Wizface profile.

"Ow!" she suddenly grunted as her body phased out of a tree someone had just stapled a poster on.

She had been spying on her older brother and his girlfriend as a tree. She yanked the poster off and rubbed the spot it had been stapled to on her torso, a pout jutting out of her lips. At that same moment, her little brother walked by with a friend of his, both walking a dog.

The young boy looked at his sister excitedly and approached her. "Hey, Alex! We're getting cups on a chain so we can drink around our necks!"

Alex momentarily faked a laugh before telling him ever so seriously, "Well, Justin's girlfriend's a dog," she decided. "Watch." She stepped in the middle of a frisbee game and asked the pair of friends playing, "Hey, guys. Can I play?"

Neither boy saw any wrong in it, so the one holding the frisbee hand the object over to her.

"Thanks," she said distractedly. Pointing over at Isabella who was standing by a bubbler with Justin, she called out to the girl, "Yo, Isabella! Go fetch!"

She throws the frisbee and Isabella instantly chased after it, catching it in her mouth. Justin went to Alex's side as a puzzled Max walked away with his friend and dog.

"Hey, Alex. Isn't Isabella great?" the boy said with a content smile. "She's so... so athletic, and friendly. She says 'hello,' to everyone in the park!"

"Yeah," Alex faked another small laugh before getting straight to the point. "Your girlfriends' a dog."

"What are you talking about? She's beautiful! You just hate that we're perfect for each other."

"She put my sweater in her mouth and played tug of war with me! Isabella is hiding something," Alex deadpanned.

"Oh, you just don't like the fact that I'm falling in love! Yeah. Yeah, I am, I'm falling in love!" Justin said, though it sounded more like he was trying to himself more than his sister.

"She ate a dog biscuit like it was a chocolate chip cookie right out of the oven," Alex insisted. "She jumped in the air and caught a plastic flying disk in her mouth!"

"We both love catching plastic flying disks in our mouth," Justin defended his girlfriend. "That's one of the many things we have in common."

Alex gave her older brother an incredulous look. "You can't catch a plastic flying disk in your mouth— you can't catch a plastic flying disk in your hands!"

Justin huffed at the insult. "Oh, yeah?" To prove his point, he turned toward the guys playing frisbee, who also happened to be boys from his grade in school. "Hey, Gunner, hit me!"

As Justin bent down into position, with his mouth open and his hands out, the frisbee came flying at him and hit him in the forehead as it fell to the ground.

Justin forced a laugh as he stood straighter, trying to brush it off as if nothing wrong had just happened. "Good throw!" Turning back to his sister, he looked down at her worriedly, a clear look of pain in his eyes as he pointed at his forehead. "Am I bleeding?"

Back in the Russo's living room, twenty minutes later, Isabella was lying on the grown, playing with the fur on the carpet. Meanwhile, Justin was sitting on the couch with an ice pack on his forehead, his sister hovering over him with an exasperated look on her face.

With a roll of her eyes, she yanked the ice pack from his hand and threw it onto the coffee table. The boy began to protest, but she merely cut him off with a glare and a reply full of sarcasm.

"The swelling's going down; you cried it out... you're gonna live."

She plopped down onto the armchair nearby and shifted her focus down to girl on the floor. "Now, Isabella. Did you leave out one piece of crucial information out on your Wizface page," she started her phrasing kindly, before just bluntly skipping to the point. "Like the fact that you're a dog?"

Justin groaned in irritation toward his sister. "That's ridiculous! I wouldn't be ready to commit myself to Isabella, without having a pretty good idea, of who she is." However, the hesitation did not get away as he thought back to the many times his sister had unfortunately been right. Looking down at Isabella, he asked her, "You're not a dog, are you?"

The girl chuckled and shook her head. "No."

Justin grinned triumphantly back at his sister. "See!"

"I'm a werewolf!"

The two Russos stared at the smiling girl, both in shock. After a long moment, Alex chuckled, her gaze shifting between the very nonchalant girl on the floor and her still very shocked brother.

"Well, I did not see that coming," she said, her amusement at the situation breaking the shock she had previously been in.

"So what!" Justin suddenly said, trying to brush off the pause that had clearly shown he was shocked. His cracking voice, however, did not help him in the convincing department. "Not seeing things coming is the roller coaster of love."

Alex had no doubt her brother was trying his hardest to convince himself that he felt as he was saying.

"And I'm strapped in, ready for the ride. Today I find out my girlfriends' a werewolf... yay!"

And the amusement did not stop pouring— her brother looked just about ready to cry, and she was ready to make fun of him if he did.

"How many other guys can say that?"

"Well... none. 'Cause I'm guessing anyone who can say that has been eaten," she replied with a chuckle.

"That's a stereo type," Isabella suddenly said. "We're actually very loving."

Justin gave her a strained smile. "I sense that about you."

Alex rolled her eyes and stood, getting really irritated with her brother's irationality— usually she was the irrational one. "Oh, Justin, come on! Just admit it. You don't know anything about her."

Justing stood in his turn. "Oh Alex, I can't believe your level of jealousy," he said, earning a weird look from his sister. "I just hope that one day, you can be as happy as we are!"

By now, Isabella was standing up by Justin, and finishing his speech off, he planted a kiss on her cheek.

Suddenly, as if remembering something, Isabella looked at Justin and smiled at him. "Oh, Justin! There is just one more thing that you should know about me."

Justin gave her a bright smile. "Yes, my love?"

"When you kiss a werewolf, you turn into a werewolf!"

Justin smirked with unsettlement, Alex hid her disbelief by covering her mouth.

"... ah... perfect." Pacing back and forth behind the couch, Justin began to ramble in his panic. "Oh, my gosh, this is going to be so painful! As my genetic structure is changing, as my spine shifts from human to canine, as my hands elongate and become lupine waiting for the claws to shoot out of my fingernails!"

He gasped and dramatically fell to the ground behind the couch he had been standing beside. He raised his hand and screamed, "I love you, Isabella!"

The girl merely smiled at his reaction, finding it more adorable than weird. "That's another stereo type," she reassured him, "The change is pretty fast and painless."

There was a moment's pause before Justin popped his head from behind the couch to reveal his suddenly very hairy face— he had a beard of black hair shooting off his chin and up the sides of his face, and his sister found it hilarious.

"Really?"

Isabella's face was transformed by now as she nodded over at him. Staring at both of them, Alex felt herself rather accomplished despite the sudden— confusing— turn of events of her brother becoming a werewolf upon kissing one.

How the hell does that happen?

She shrugged, not really caring anymore. "Oh, well, my job here is done!" she exclaimed herself, making her way over to the kitchen.

Justin looked after her, panicked, then rushed after her. "Alex!" he called out to her in a whisper. "What are we going to do?"

"Well, don't ask me," she shrugged him off. "I proved you guys don't know each other, my work is done."

London, England

"Okay, that's bull crap!"

"Joseph, watch your tongue," Delilah playfully chided her brother in a perfect imitation of Mrs. Weasley.

The boy sitting by the foot of the long sofa rolled his eyes at his sister. "Oh, please, don't tell me you don't agree with me."

"I never said I disagree." She shifted her gaze toward her uncle. "You're shitting us, right?"

Daren chuckled, amused by the siblings' choice of words. "I'm afraid it's true."

"But how does that work?" Will chimed in. "Someone turning someone else into a werewolf with just a kiss? That's impossible!"

"That's magic," Lara retorted from where she sat on a chair beside Daren's armchair.

Delilah rolled her eyes at the lame response. "So what's next? There's such thing as sparkling vampires?" She laughed with her brother and his best friend.

Daren and Lara shared a look at this, a look that did not go unnoticed by the young witchy hybrid.

"You're shitting me!"

Lara cringed at the girl's choice of words. "Can we please stop mentioning sh—"

"How in Tartarus does that happen?"

"There are many different kinds of most magical creatures in existence," Lara said. "Take Wiccans, for example. Wicca is a general term of a different kind of witchcraft."

"Why do we call Wiccans... Wiccans, then?" Will asked.

"Because it's easier to generalize those practicing it, rather than calling them by what type of witch or wizard they are."

"It also happens to be less offensive," Lara added.

"What type of Wiccans are we then?" asked Seth, leaning his back against his sister's leg.

"Well, there are Pagans..."

The young trio merely blinked at the vague response.

"Isn't pagan another general term for Wiccan users?" Delilah said quietly, her fingers absentmindedly reaching out to twirl one of her brother's thick locks that had already started to grow longer.

"Let me have my smart moment!"

Delilah raised her hands in a fake-surrendering motion as Seth and Will laughed, while Daren chuckled at his cousin.

"We are polytheist pagans," Lara said. "The eldest Wicca practitioners."

"What's poly... that other word you said before? What's it mean?" Will asked.

"It's the belief in and veneration of multiple gods and goddesses," Delilah answered him, a thoughtful look crossing her face. "In our case the belief in... Hekate... mostly. Right? She's the goddess of magic and the night."

"That's right," Daren agreed. "Legend has it that millenniums ago, when the goddess had descended from her home to visit the mortal world below, monsters from the underworld had intercepted her trip and began to attack her."

"A young girl from a family of hunters saved her life," Lara continued. "And so to thank her, the goddess gave her and her family power like nothing anyone had ever seen: magic."

"Like technology, though, magic evolved plenty since then," said Daren. "It's parted into different religions, as well as different types of magic altogether. The ones that remain the most powerful are the Eclectic Pagans. They have a more... individual approach toward magic that picks and chooses from many different traditions and creates a personalized form of witchcraft that meets their individual needs and abilities."

"They do not follow a particular religion or tradition, but study and learn from many different systems and use what works best for them," Lara added.

"And then there's us," said Delilah.

"Us..." Seth and Will echoed softly.

"How dangerous is our magic?"

Daren saw the worried and frightened look in her eyes and instantly swallowed what he was bluntly about to reply. "... it's powerful, let's leave it at that."

Seth glanced up behind him at his sister and watched worriedly as she bit her lower lip while momentarily staring down at her lap, brows furrowed and plump lips pursed.

"Yeah," she scoffed softly. "Powerful enough to have us hunted down to extinction."

Waverly Place, New York

Back at the Russo's house, outside on the deck, Justin was in a barrel full of a liquid which looked similar to milk. Alex and Max were sitting on the steps watching as Jerry poured in the final spoonfuls, with a very worried Theresa hovering behind him. Behind Alex sat her friend Harper, who boredly looking through the Russo's wizard mail.

"Dad, this is embarrassing," said Justin, glaring at his siblings and Harper, all three who kept giggling every five to ten seconds.

"I know," Jerry replied, a nonchalant smile brightening his face. "It's a potion, and a punishment, all in one!"

"I don't think it's working," said Max. "He's still hairy."

"Well, I'm cool, as long as he doesn't use my brush," Alex said with a laugh, half-jokingly.

Harper chuckled along with her friend before looking up Jerry. "Mr. Russo? Are you sure it's a bathing potion?" she asked, accidentally dropping an envelope from the pile of mail she was going through. "I mean, I know I don't know much about this magic stuff, but aren't most potions drinkable?"

"Yeah, since the change is more inside of Justin than out, maybe he has to drink the potion to cure what he's got inside, and that, in turn, will cure his werewolf hairiness too," Max chimed in, causing everyone to stare at him, stunned.

"That has got to the smartest thing you have ever said," Alex told him, absentmindedly picking the envelope her friend had dropped, before turning to look back at her father. "Dad, if Max said something smart, it's right. He's gotta drink it."

Jerry frowned, hesitant, before glancing down at the book in his hands, reading over the recipe he had concocted. "Oh... maybe you do drink it." He read it through again, then chuckled. "Yep, it's a drinking potion."

Theresa looked at her husband in disbelief. "What? You mean I didn't have to scrape the egg shells and coffee grounds out of the bottom of that thing?"

The man had the audacity to laugh again. "Yeah, looks like we learned a couple of things today."

Theresa glared at Jerry. "Yeah, Justin learned not to trust people on Wizface, and you learned what the word 'ingest' means."

"I thought it meant 'joking,'" Jerry replied defensively.

"Am I supposed to drink my own bath water?" Justin asked, his face scrunched in disgust.

Alex and Max momentarily glanced at each other, sharing a mischievous grin, before they turned back toward their older brother and began to cheer him into drinking the potion. "Chug! Chug! Chug! Chug! Chug! Chug! Chug!"

Closing his eyes, Justin went under and a few moments later came back up with his face as normal.

"Ah, I think I swallowed an egg shell!"

Justin looked around, embarrassed, as Harper, Max, and Jerry laughed, while Theresa took a sigh of relief. While the others were enjoying themselves, Alex tore through the letter she was holding, her eyes widening with excitement, upon reading its content.

"Dad! Can we go to Wiztech this year?"

The man stopped chuckling at his son's embarrassment upon hearing this and gave his daughter a curious look. "What?"

"Also, what's a Triwizard and a... NeoWigan? Tournament."

Two days before school begins ~ London, England

Delilah's P.O.V.

There were red droplets splattered across my handkerchief after I had coughed in it. I couldn't even stop to think why this was— why this was suddenly happening to me— as the coughing took over me again.

"Bloody hell, Deli," Clary's voice came from behind me. "Are you sure you're going to be 'lright for the night?"

I quickly hid my handkerchief in the pocket of my trousers. "I'll be fine," I spoke softly, as to not strain my voice. "It's just a little cough. I think I breathed in some dust from the tray locket."

From the corner of my eyes, I could tell Clary did not believe me by the way she was shaking her head, amused, and rolling her eyes. "You would've sneezed."

"If I sneezed, it would've meant I was sick, and I don't get sick."

"Sure, you don't."

"Hey, it's true!"

"Right," Clary chuckled. "The mayor's just arrived with his kid. Can you serve his table?"

"Sure," I replied, letting her lead me to the doors of the kitchen.

We peered through the circular window from the big white kitchen doors and looked out at the crowd of famished people, some already digging into their served meals, others waiting to be served. I finally caught sight of Sir Christopher Walford, the mayor of London. Beside him sat a woman I could easily recognize to be his wife, but then on his other was a young man. There was no sight of a little boy I was expecting to see.

What the hell? "Clary, you told me the mayor had a little boy!"

The woman had the audacity to look amused and chuckle at me. "He is little... compared to me."

"Yeah, because you're so tall," I deadpanned sarcastically, staring down at the short woman.

She rolled her eyes at me. "Oh, you know what I mean," she retorted. "Now go serve that table."

"No! There's a boy sitting at that table."

"So?"

"So? I will not serve a table where a boy— who is not such much a boy, but a young man— is sitting. They tend to stare at me in a way that creeps the hell out of me."

"Deli," Clary sighed. "The others are taken, so you'll have to endure this once. Just once, alright? I won't make you do it ever again. And if it makes you feel any better, your uncle and aunt, and your brother are here."

"How is that supposed to make me feel better— what are they even doing here?"

"They came with a friend of yours. Her... Hermeeone? They said it was because she wanted to meet the mayor."

I rolled my eyes and groaned. "Her-mi-o-ne," I corrected her pronunciation. "Only she would make up such an excuse," I grumbled, running a hand through my somewhat decently styled hair— I had to look presentable in front of the mayor somehow.

I threw my head back and gazed at the ceiling in exasperation before clearing my throat, looking back the door and taking the notepad and pen from Clary's hands; it seems I have no other choice.

"Alright, I'm going in."

The mayor was a very decent man. He was old and heightingly shortened from age, but his physique could never surpass his kindness and wisdom. His wife— oh, the woman was ever so lovely. I have never been complimented so much in my entire life as I was in the three minutes I spoke with her. Their son, on the other hand... however polite he was, he made me very uncomfortable speaking in a subtly suggestive tone his parents seemed completely oblivious to.

Oh, what a night this was going to be.

Seth's P.O.V.

I wanted to break that man's jaw. It irked me how familiar he thought he could act around my sister. I doubted she even knew he was flirting with her, but it was clear he was making her uncomfortable, and that only made me dislike him even more.

"What are you frowning about now?" I was suddenly snapped out of my murdering thoughts toward the man by Hermione's voice.

I turned to look at her and blushed slightly— by no means did I have a crush on Hermione, but she really did know how to clean up well. When she really put herself up to it, she could really make her beauty spring out from its usual subtly, much like my sister could.

"You seem to be doing that a lot, lately," said Hermione.

My brows furrowed at her words. "Doing what?"

"Frowning," she said simply. "You should stop— you'll get frown lines."

I snorted. "You do remember who my sister is, right?"

Hermione chuckled. "It's kind of hard to forget when she's my best friend."

"Hey, Hermione, can you pass me a bread stick?" Will asked.

My sister's friend chuckled again, in that way mature people tended to chuckle at kids in amusement as she passed him the basket of bread sticks. Uncle Daren grabbed one while it was being passed.

"Don't fill yourself with bread sticks," Aunt Lara chided him, gently slapping his shoulder. "We're gonna be served soon."

Right on cue, I caught my sister heading our way, her eyes stuck on the notepad she was writing on. She stopped right at our table and began to welcome us with the same speech I heard the other waiters and waitresses giving other customers.

"Good evening, ladies and gentlemen," she spoke kindly, though before she could go on with her speech, her eyes shifted from her notepads to us, and her clearly forced, kind smile morphed into a scowl. "Oh, Jesus, Hekate, gods," she grumbled. "Why are you people here?"

"I came to meet the mayor," Hermione instantly said.

Delilah rolled her eyes and sighed. "I know that, Herme," she said. "And the rest of you?"

"We wanted to enjoy the apparently amazing performances One Mayfair offers," said Uncle Daren.

Delilah scoffed. "Oh, please, you just want to see me embarrass myself."

Aunt Lara laughed at this. "Yeah, we do!"

I frowned at her. "No, we do not," I objected. "We came to support you." Then, motioning toward Hermione, I added, "And to meet the mayor."

I hadn't noticed the frown was still on my face until my sister's gentle fingers smoothed the creasing lines between my brows. "Stop frowning," she said. "People will start mistaking you for me."

I smiled slightly at that, in spite of myself. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, why wouldn't I be?"

I nodded my head toward the table she had come from. Following my gaze, she glanced over her shoulder, and the scowl returned to her face before she shrugged me off.

"It's nothing I can't handle," she said. "Now, what would you guys like to eat tonight?"

Before any of us could answer her, another waitress, dressed as a maid, rushed over, a nervous look on her face. "Deli! Lilah! Delilah!" she sang softly, pulling my sister away from our table. "Clary needs you."

"Not right now, Lisa, I have to—"

"I'll take care of it," she told my sister with a nervous smile.

Delilah sighed. "Alright, fine. Have them served generously, though," she warned.

She patted my head gently, then shared a look with Hermione before turning on her heels and ever so gracefully walked to the other end of the enormous auditorium-like room we were in to a couple of doors I could only assume lead to the kitchens. She was gone for such a long time that when she resurfaced in the room, we were already being served our meals, and Delilah being unnoticeably forced up onto the stage, now wearing an outfit that covered much less of her body than I knew she likes to reveal.

She was being pushed and pulled by two guys and two girls.

"Why do I have to do this? I don't sing!" I heard her grumble.

"Because Eli is sick, and you're the only other person who knows the lyrics to the songs," the girl I recognized as Lisa, the waitress who had ended up serving us, replied with a grunt. "God, how are you this strong?!"

"I am determined to not go on stage, that's how!" my sister retorted.

I could tell Will, my uncle and aunt had noticed this too as they turned to look the same way I was looking. Hermione, noticing our distracted looks, found what we were looking at and hummed in amusement.

"What's going on?"

"I think they're trying to get her to sing," said Will.

"Come on, Deli!"

"No! I told you, I can't sing!"

"Sure you can," one of the guys told her. He was a seemingly nice-looking fellow with dark skin and long braided hair. He was also tall, with a strong built, that I was surprised it took him, another guy and two girls to pull and push my sister.

"Not everyone can sing!" she objected.

"Not everyone can sing well," the guy corrected her as they finally managed to pull her on stage.

The room suddenly darkened, then, before my sister could run off, a light suddenly hit the stage, encircling her and the dark-skinned guy.

My sister looked very pretty, though I could tell by the grimace she was fighting, that the black heeled boots were not the only thing making her uncomfortable. The dress she wore was a deep purple color, with a sort of crocodile texture embossed in the metallic material. It was asymmetrically folded across the front and back, only having one strap as a sleeve, diagonally covering her chest up to her right shoulder. The dress was, although seemingly flexible, tight against her body, stopping right above her knees.

They were introduced to the public by the other guy that had been pushing her, before the dark-skinned one settled on the bench behind the grand piano in the center of the stage and Delilah was given a wireless microphone.

I watched as she nervously glanced back at the pianist, but relaxed a tad bit when he smiled at her reassuringly.

A soft, slightly jazzy tune began to play, followed by the guy— Andrew's voice. He sang no words, but his voice seemed to belong with the music he was playing as it flowed softly across the whole restaurant.

Suddenly, a seemingly softer, female voice took over. It surprised me to find it to be my sister who owned such a pretty and rich voice.

"The situation turns around..."

I always thought her voice was quite soothing when she didn't speak out of anger or stress.

"... enough to figure out that someone else has let you down so many times, I don't know why..."

Her voice was naturally soft and melodic, but now it just reached a whole other level of soothing.

I watched, completely forgetting the plate of delicious food in front of me, relishing the genuine smile curling onto Delilah's lips as she let herself relax and flow with the music. "But I know we can make it, as long as you say it! So tell me that you love me, yeah!"

She glanced at Andrew and smiled at the toothy grin he sent her before joining in the chorus. "And tell me that I take your breath away." Another waiter walked up and helped her sit on the piano, where she crossed her legs and leaned back. "And maybe if you take one more, then I would know for sure there's nothing left to say. Tell me that you love me anyway."

I was quite an unexpected sight when Delilah jumped off the piano and walked down from the stage and began to a journey from table to table, singing to the customers the lovely song that poured from her mouth like a waterfall of the cleanest water.

"Waking up beside yourself and what you feel inside is being shared with someone else." She smiled kindly at an old couple before walking up to the very stiff looking bodyguard standing nearby. She did a little silly dance and flipped his tie around. "Nowhere to hide, I don't know why," she continued, cracking a smile out of him.

"But I know we can make it... as long as you say it!" She skipped a step and did a little jump, smiling brightly at a pair of little girls who stared up at her with bright smiles full of awe. "So tell me that you love me, yeah!"

Her bright smile did not fade as she came over to our table. She grabbed hold of Hermione's hand and squeezed it gently before throwing an arm around my shoulders. "And tell me that I take your breath away." She kissed my cheek before straightening up and ruffling Will's hair before making her way back toward the stage. "And maybe if you take one more, then I would know for sure there's nothing left to say. Tell me that you love me anyway."

The same waiter standing by the stage helped her up onto the instrument again. "Show me— look what we found." She twisted her body so she lay on the piano, smiling down at Andrew. "Turn it around every day. I can hear what you say. Now I know why, know we can make it... if you tell me that you love me, yeah! And tell me that I take your breath away and maybe if you take one more..."

Delilah jumped off the piano and walked down the stage once more as the song transposed into a higher note. She did another round of the tables before climbing back onto the piano from the empty space beside Andrew on the black bench.

"There's nothing left to say!" She leaned forward, smiling at Andrew as they finished the song together. "But tell me that you love me anyway."

The restaurant exploded with a round of applause, cheers coming from our table mostly as my sister walked to the front of the stage and, holding hands with Andrew, bowed to the audience.

"I did not know she could sing like that," I spoke, eyes widened with awe toward my sister.

Hermione smiled, applauding along with everybody else. "Neither did I," she said admittedly. "Neither did I."

Back to Delilah's P.O.V.

"Uncomfortable ride?" I asked with a chuckle upon seeing my best friends arrive at King's Cross.

The three of them were severely scratched, the boys looking more so irritated than Hermione.

"It's that bloody cat!" Ron complained. "I swear, if I get scratched one more time by that bloody demon, I will skin it alive and make a fluffy hat out of its fur."

Hermione, startled by his words, hugged the fidgeting cat closer to her chest, while Harry laughed, seemingly in spite of himself.

"And I'm guessing the pouring rain doesn't really help your boat of irritation to float," I retorted sarcastically as my brother and Will joined us.

"Gee," my brother snorted. "You guys look more like a drowning cat than Crookshanks."

"Little Dawn will be the head I'll use to model that orange fluffy hat," Ron grumbled, earning another chuckle from me.

By now, I was very well used to getting onto platform nine and three-quarters by now. It was a simple matter of walking straight through the apparently solid barrier dividing platforms nine and ten. The only tricky part was doing this in an unobtrusive way, so as to avoid attracting Muggle attention.

We did it in groups of two today; Harry and Ron went first, followed by Seth and Will, then Hermione and I; we leaned casually against the barrier, chatting unconcernedly, and slid sideways through it, and as we did so, platform nine and three-quarters materialized in front of us.

The Hogwarts Express, much like Hogwarts itself, was a sight I could never grow tired of. The gleaming scarlet steam engine, was, as every first day of September, already there, clouds of steam billowing from it, through which the many Hogwarts students and parents on the platform appeared like dark ghosts.

While Seth and Will set off another way to find their friends from their year, my friends and I set off to find seats, and were soon stowing our luggage in a compartment halfway along the train. We then hopped back down onto the platform to say goodbye to Mrs. Weasley, Bill, and Charlie.

"I might be seeing you all sooner than you think," said Charlie, grinning, as he hugged Ginny goodbye.

"Why?" I asked keenly.

"You'll see," said Charlie. "Just don't tell Percy I mentioned it... it's 'classified information, until such time as the Ministry sees fit to release it,' after all."

"Yeah, I sort of wish I were back at Hogwarts this year," said Bill, hands in his pockets, looking almost wistfully at the train.

"Why?" Fred and George echoed my earlier question, impatiently.

"You're going to have an interesting year," said Bill, his eyes twinkling. "I might even get time off to come and watch a bit of it."

"A bit of what?" said Ron.

But at that moment, the whistle blew, and Mrs. Weasley chivvied us toward the train doors.

"Thanks for having us to stay, Mrs. Weasley," I said as we climbed on board, closed the door, and leaned out of the window to talk to her.

"Yeah, thanks for everything, Mrs. Weasley," said Harry, Hermione nodding and smiling fondly at the woman from where she stood beside me.

"Oh, it was my pleasure, dears," said Mrs. Weasley. "I'd invite you for Christmas, but... well, I expect you're all going to want to stay at Hogwarts, what with... one thing and another."

"Mum!" said Ron irritably. "What d'you three know that we don't?"

As curious as I was, I found the jumping subject quite amusing.

"You'll find out this evening, I expect," said Mrs. Weasley, smiling. "It's going to be very exciting— mind you, I'm very glad they've changed the rules—"

"What rules?" said Harry, Ron, Fred, and George together.

"I'm sure Professor Dumbledore will tell you... now, behave, won't you? Won't you, Fred? And you, George?"

The pistons hissed loudly, and the train began to move.

"Tell us what's happening at Hogwarts!" Fred bellowed out of the window as Mrs. Weasley, Bill, and Charlie sped away from them. "What rules are they changing?"

But Mrs. Weasley only smiled and waved. Before the train had rounded the corner, she, Bill, and Charlie had Disapparated.

Harry, Ron, Hermione and I went back to our compartment. The thick rain splattering the windows made it very difficult to see out of them. Ron undid his trunk, pulled out his maroon dress robes, and flung them over Pigwidgeon's cage to muffle his hooting.

"Bagman wanted to tell us what's happening at Hogwarts," he said grumpily, sitting down next to Harry. "At the World Cup, remember? But my own mother won't say. Wonder what—"

"Shh!" Hermione whispered suddenly, pressing her finger to her lips and pointing toward the compartment next to ours.

I rolled my eyes upon hearing the familiar drawling voice of my Slytherin friend drifting in through the open door.

"... Father actually considered sending me to Durmstrang rather than Hogwarts, you know. He knows the headmaster, you see. Well, you know his opinion of Dumbledore— the man's such a Mudblood-lover—"

My jaw clenched upon hearing this, and I tried to tune his voice out, grabbing my big family book out of my dear shoulder bag and gently settling on my lap. I ran my fingers of the edges of the visibly old hardcover as I mumbled the commanding spell under my breath.

"Patentibus."

The familiar mechanical-looking lock appeared on the bronze colored hardcover, and I watched, still fascinated, as the gears turned one over the other before that little 'click'ing sound reached my ears, indicating the book was open and ready to be read.

I smiled as I muttered another, longer, spell under my breath. "Ostende mihi signa, ostende mihi significant," (Show me the signs, show me the meanings.)

What I love about this book is that it doesn't just show me the history of my family all the way to the life of my ancestors from far before the name Dawn was even chosen to be our family name. It also shows me information on Wiccans and all sorts of different magic. It shows me all I can learn about not only magic but also the different magical creatures in existence, most dating back to the time Wiccan magic first came to light.

"— and Durmstrang doesn't admit that sort of riffraff. But Mother didn't like the idea of me going to school so far away. Father says Durmstrang takes a far more sensible line than Hogwarts about the Dark Arts. Durmstrang students actually learn them, not just the defense rubbish we do..."

I groaned; how did I ever become friends with that guy? "'Mione, can you shut the door? His voice... or rather mere presence is getting in my nerves."

"How did you ever even become friends with that pompous git?" Ron asked.

Harry snorted. "Took the words right out of my mouth."

I chuckled halfheartedly. "Funny enough, I was wondering the exact same thing," I said admittedly as Hermione got up, tiptoed to the compartment door, and slid it shut, blocking out Draco's voice.

"So he thinks Durmstrang would have suited him, does he?" Hermione said angrily. "I wish he had gone; then we wouldn't have to put up with him."

"Durmstrang's another wizarding school?" said Harry.

"Yes," said Hermione sniffily, "and it's got a horrible reputation. According to An Appraisal of Magical Education in Europe, it puts a lot of emphasis on the Dark Arts."

"I think I've heard of it," said Ron vaguely. "Where is it? What country?"

"Well, nobody knows, do they?" said Hermione.

"Er— why not?" said Harry.

"There's traditionally been a lot of rivalry between all the magic schools. Durmstrang and Beauxbatons like to conceal their whereabouts so nobody can steal their secrets," said Hermione matter-of-factly.

"Come off it," said Ron, starting to laugh. "Durmstrang's got to be about the same size as Hogwarts— how are you going to hide a great big castle?"

"But Hogwarts is hidden," I chimed in, distractedly. "Everyone knows that..."

"Well, everyone who's read Hogwarts, A History, anyway," Hermione reminded me.

"Just you two, then," said Ron. "So go on— how d'you hide a place like Hogwarts?"

"Oh, I don't know, Ronald, maybe it's bewitched!" I stated sarcastically, looking up from my book. "If a Muggle looks at it, all they see is a moldering old ruin with a sign over the entrance saying DANGER, DO NOT ENTER, UNSAFE."

"So Durmstrang'll just look like a ruin to an outsider too?"

"Maybe," I said, shrugging.

"Or," Hermione continued, "it might have Muggle-repelling charms on it, like the World Cup stadium. And to keep foreign wizards from finding it, they'll have made it Unplottable—"

"Come again?"

"Well, you can enchant a building, so it's impossible to plot on a map, can't you?"

"Er... if you say so," said Harry.

"But I think Durmstrang must be somewhere in the far north," said Hermione thoughtfully. "Somewhere very cold, because they've got fur capes as part of their uniforms."

"It's in Bulgaria, actually," I stated, returning my attention back to my book.

"How do you know?" Harry asked me.

I felt my cheeks burn as they had done a lot lately and bit my lower lip. "... 's a long story, I'll tell you about it someday." More like never.

"Ah, think of the possibilities," said Ron dreamily. "It would've been so easy to push Malfoy off a glacier and make it look like an accident... Shame his mother likes him..."

The rain became heavier and heavier as the train moved farther north. The sky was so dark and the windows so steamy that the lanterns were lit by midday. The lunch trolley came rattling along the corridor, and Harry bought a large stack of Cauldron Cakes for us to share.

Several of our friends looked in on us as the afternoon progressed, including Seamus, Dean, and Neville, a round-faced, extremely forgetful boy who had been brought up by his formidable witch of a grandmother. Seamus was still wearing his Ireland rosette.

After half an hour or so, Hermione, growing tired of the endless Quidditch talk, buried herself once more in The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 4.

"Gran didn't want to go," Neville he said miserably. "Wouldn't buy tickets. It sounded amazing though."

"It was," said Ron. "Look at this, Neville..." From the corner of my eye, I caught him rummaging in his trunk up in the luggage rack and pulled out something small.

I grumbled under my breath, shaking my head to myself as I tried to tune out their voices, with much difficulty. I carefully flipped through the pages of my book and felt my brows furrow as the subtitle on this page caught my eye.

Pars Venator

There's no literal translation for those words, so I could not tell right on the spot what it meant. The whole scripting beneath was, for some reason, also written in Latin, some words being so old I could not fully translate it.

I realize I had mainly just been flipping through the pages, so I was not sure what lead up to this.

"Oh wow," said Neville enviously.

"We saw him right up close, as well," said Ron. "We were in the Top Box—"

"For the first and last time in your life, Weasley."

I groaned in exasperation, tearing my eyes from the page before me and hitting my head a couple of times against the cushioned headboard behind me, internally wishing it were just metal or stone so the hit would knock me unconscious and I wouldn't have to endure these ridiculous confrontations.

Draco appeared in the doorway. Behind him stood Crabbe and Goyle, his enormous, thuggish cronies, both of whom appeared to have grown at least a foot during the summer. Evidently, they had overheard the conversation through the compartment door, which Dean and Seamus had left ajar.

"Don't remember asking you to join us, Malfoy," said Harry coolly.

"Weasley... what is that?" said Malfoy, pointing at Pigwidgeon's cage. A sleeve of Ron's dress robes was dangling from it, swaying with the motion of the train, the moldy lace cuff very obvious.

Ron made to stuff the robes out of sight, but Malfoy was too quick for him; he seized the sleeve and pulled.

"Look at this!" said Malfoy in ecstasy, holding up Ron's robes and showing Crabbe and Goyle, "Weasley, you weren't thinking of wearing these, were you? I mean— they were very fashionable in about eighteen ninety..."

"Eat dung, Malfoy!" said Ron, the same color as the dress robes as he snatched them back out of Malfoy's grip. Malfoy howled with derisive laughter; Crabbe and Goyle guffawed stupidly.

"So... going to enter, Weasley? Going to try and bring a bit of glory to the family name? There's money involved as well, you know... you'd be able to afford some decent robes if you won..."

"What are you talking about?" snapped Ron.

"Are you going to enter?" Malfoy repeated. "I suppose you will, Potter? You never miss a chance to show off, do you?"

My head snapped up, eyes narrowing into a very irritated glare. "Either explain what you're on about or go away, you stupid snake," I said testily, my hands tightening on the corners of my book.

A gleeful smile spread across his pale face. "Don't tell me you don't know?" he said delightedly. He looked at Ron and sneered. "You've got a father and brother at the Ministry and you don't even know? My God, my father told me about it ages ago... heard it from Cornelius Fudge. But then, Father's always associated with the top people at the Ministry... Maybe your father's too junior to know about it, Weasley—"

"I will snap your neck if you don't leave this instant, Draco," I told the boy, glaring ferociously at him.

At this, he quickly beckoned to Crabbe and Goyle, and the three of them disappeared.

Ron got to his feet and slammed the sliding compartment door so hard behind them that the glass shattered.

"Ron!" said Hermione reproachfully, and she pulled out her wand, muttered "Reparo!" and the glass shards flew back into a single pane and back into the door.

"Well... making it look like he knows everything and we don't..." Ron snarled. "'Father's always associated with the top people at the Ministry.'" He scoffed. "Dad could've got a promotion any time... he just likes it where he is..."

"Of course he does," said Hermione quietly.

I sighed, looking at my redheaded friend. "Don't let Malfoy get to you, Ron—"

"Him! Get to me!? As if!" said Ron, picking up one of the remaining Cauldron Cakes and squashing it into a pulp.

I smiled, in spite of myself, and chuckled. "Alright, tough guy."

He rolled his eyes at me. "What are you reading anyway? That doesn't look like one of our school books."

"That's because it's not." I closed the book and glanced down at the hardcover, tracing my fingers against the gears that would roll when the locket either opened or close. "This book... this book contains the history of my family dating back to first Wiccans that ever existed. It shows me what I ask it— all sorts of different Wiccan magic that ever existed, all magical creatures you wouldn't find in the Monster Book of Monsters. It spells every little as it happens, from the history of magic to the history of each and everyone one of my ancestors."

"No way!" Hermione breathed out in awe. She put her Standard Book of Spells, Grade 4 down and reached toward mine. "May I?"

I knew exactly what she wanted to see, so I close the book and quickly mumbled a spell to revert the book to its usual content before handing it to Hermione. I watched as Harry and Ron huddled forward, reading over Hermione's shoulder as she flipped through the pages.

"The page with your name," Harry suddenly said as the three of them stared at the book with furrowed brows. "It's empty."

"How is that?" Ron asked. "I mean, even Seth's slot is quite filled up."

I bit my lip as I leaned back against my seat, wrapping my arms around myself. "I don't know," I said admittedly. "Seth told me that it was because I was in denial."

That seemed to confuse them. "What?"

My brows furrowed as I shifted my eyes to the ground. "This book has a chapter for each family member of the Dawn family, all the way to before our family name even was Dawn. We can read the story of most of our ancestors, but that's only because they've given their consent."

"... their consent?"

I sighed. "This book is like an entity of its own. It's alive, bewitched— call it what you will. But, basically, most of my family that has died and found peace with themselves don't mind, anymore, people reading about their life because they have accepted what has happened to them, whether it was good or bad. Anyone can see Seth's because he doesn't mind it. Mine doesn't show up, not even to me, because apparently I still haven't exactly come to terms with it. Until I do, no one— not even myself will be able to see it. As for anyone else reading any of it, no one can unless a Dawn magically gives their consent, letting the book know that we let certain people read it."

A look was shared between my friends, and I furrowed my brows, for the first time, trying to decipher it.

Ron then walked over to my left side and nudged his shoulder against mine. "You're one of a kind, you know that, Deli," he said softly.

"I know that," I deadpanned. "You don't need to rub it in my face."

The redhead laughed, along with Harry and Hermione. "That's not what he meant, Lilly," said Harry. "You're unique, and that's a good thing."

"Yeah," Hermione agreed. "If everyone was the same, this would be a ridiculously boring world."

I glanced down at my lap and grumbled. "You ass-kissers," I muttered, earning a chuckle from my friends, and I could not help the halfhearted smile that curled onto my lips. "Being different isn't always all that great though, especially when you're people like me. Or anyone in my family..."

"What do you mean?" asked Hermione.

I bit my lip and frowned slightly as I grabbed the large book from her hands and closed it, mumbling the first spell I had cast earlier when I had first opened my book today.

I flipped through the pages until I came upon the chapter where each and every prophecy in my family was displayed. "Latin class was too boring to attend, how about an English decryption instead?" I muttered.

A golden light covered the pages in front of me before revealing a translated text of the Latin encryptions.

"You just made that spell up!" Ron exclaimed himself, surprised.

"Yeah, I don't know why I didn't think about that earlier," I muttered as I thought back to the earlier chapter I could not translate very well.

I showed my friends the prophecies that worried me the most.

"These are the last two prophecies in my line, and they both revolve around me," I told them.

"I'm sure that's not true," said Ron, grabbing the book from my hands. "'Two halves meet light on the eleventh full moon'— see, already there it talks about two people, not you."

"'Two halves'— that would be my mother and her twin sister."

"I'm sure it's not," said Harry, placing a comforting hand on my knee. "Go on, Ron."

"'To vow separately the night thou reach their womanhood. Both heads, none tails, as is in their hybrid blood'—"

"Mom and her twinnie," I insisted.

"'One will reach their hopes, while the other reaches their loss,'" Ron continued, completely ignoring my interruption. "Bloody hell, this is depressing."

"That's why it's definitely them," I deadpanned.

"'The loss will find light within two different pieces... and create a new light for many others in need of it...'"

"It's not like I'm an angel or anything, but that's totally me."

"'Though one will be cursed, and forever doomed...'" I waited patiently, watching Ron mirror my earlier frown. "'That is, unless thou reaches their final phase on their final full moon'... it says thou, not she— it's not you!"

I rolled my eyes at him. "I know you're trying to make me feel better, but lying to my face about something I already know is not really helping."

"Well, how 'bout the other one," said Hermione, reaching across me to grab the book from Ron's hands. I watched as her brows shot upward and her eyes widened, before she looked at us and held the book to her chest, hiding the content in it. "... it's not about you."

This time, Harry rolled his eyes. "Oh, let me see that," he said, snatching the book from Hermione's hands. He read through it, then a look similar to Hermione's crossed his eyes. He looked up and locked gazes with both Ron and Hermione before finally looking at me.

"Well?" I said impatiently.

Harry sighed, then began to recite the second prophecy aloud. "'Child of three, darkness and light... trapped as a beast of day and night,'" he slowly began, and I noticed his tone was slightly shaky. "'A choice and a phase must be made before eighteen... as a half-blood reaches thou's seventeen. The hybrid shall be the one to hold the key to help the half-blood and thou self fail or succeed. That single choice, that single phase shall begin or end the heir's days...
the homes of all living to preserve or raze.'"

For a moment, none of us spoke, the four of us simply staring at the book. Suddenly, the pages glowed a bright golden colored light, and Ron, Hermione and I jumped back startled when Harry suddenly yelped in pain, dropping the book. I quickly reached forward and caught the book, my eyes widening in surprise upon feeling how hot it had somehow gotten. I flopped the open book onto my lap and frowned as I watched it revert back to Latin, a new encryption gradually appearing underneath the one Harry had read.

"This is new," I commented, my brows furrowed under the feeling of perplexity.

"What does it say?" Ron whispered, glancing over my shoulder at the page displayed before me, Harry and Hermione huddling closer as well to have a better look.

My eyes squinted slightly as I narrowed my gaze on the little paragraph.

"'You shall delve in the darkness of an endless maze,'" I started translating. "'The dead, the traitor, and the forgotten ones raise. You shall rise or fall by your mirror image's hand...'" What the hell is this? "'The Child of the Moon's final stand. Destroy with a hero's final breath... and lose a love to worse than death.'"

I blinked, staring blankly at the neat cursive writing on the yellowed page.

"Well that's a blunt emphasis to my point," I stated, my sour mood not getting any closer to fading. Sarcastically, I added in a mutter, "Cheers to strange discoveries and even stranger prophecies."

My bad mood continued for the rest of the journey. I didn't talk much as we changed into our school robes and was still glowering when the Hogwarts Express slowed down at last and finally stopped in the pitch-darkness of Hogsmeade station.

As the train doors opened, there was a rumble of thunder overhead. Hermione bundled up Crookshanks in her cloak, and Ron left his dress robes over Pigwidgeon as we left the train, heads bent and eyes narrowed against the downpour. The rain was now coming down so thick and fast that it was as though buckets of ice-cold water were being emptied repeatedly over their heads.

"Hi, Hagrid!" Harry yelled, seeing a gigantic silhouette at the far end of the platform.

"All righ', Harry?" Hagrid bellowed back, waving. "See yeh at the feast if we don' drown!"

First years traditionally reached Hogwarts Castle by sailing across the lake with Hagrid.

"Oooh, I wouldn't fancy crossing the lake in this weather," said Hermione fervently, shivering as we inched slowly along the dark platform with the rest of the crowd.

A bunch of carriages stood waiting for us outside the station, the reins that would be pulling them attached to skeletal horses. Like, literally, there were dead horses standing there, nothing but bones, waiting for us to climb in so they could take us to Hogwarts.

I grimaced. Ugh, magic is just plain weird sometimes.

Harry, Ron, Hermione, and l climbed gratefully into one of the carriages, the door shut with a snap, and a few moments later, with a great lurch, the long procession of carriages was rumbling and splashing its way up the track toward Hogwarts Castle.