Authors Notes: Look! I actually got Chapter Two up this time:) Thanks a whole bunch to Kristine for making some great suggestions for me, I really appreciate it. Any mistakes left are entirely my own. Happy Reading!

Chapter Two- A Truth That Haunts

The alarm clock on the nightstand was still telling her mercilessly that it was in fact 5:39 a.m. when she finally put down the pen. She had written a few pages in the small journal about the new facts revealed by the strange dream, as well as some theories of her own. She had been working on this "project" for the past month and a half, although the dreams themselves had been occurring since the beginning of April. Only recently had she realized that these dreams were trying to tell her something that she simply wasn't getting. Why else would the dreams repeat themselves every night?

Tthere had to be some big picture she was missing time and time again.

'BUZZ!'

Closing the small notebook and placing it safely under her pillow, she realized that she had never turned off the alarm on her clock as it startled her back to reality.

"CARA TURN THAT BLASTED ALARM OFF!" her mother chastised loudly from her bedroom a little ways down the hall, and Cara rolled her eyes in annoyance. She doubted her mother would even get out of bed to give her a kiss goodbye, and yet she was awake enough to hear her alarm clock buzzing from down the hall.

Lazily, she brought a hand up and dropped it hard on her alarm clock, effectively "turning it off". As she slowly rose from the bed, she kept muttering, "It's just a test, just a test…It's just a test…" in an attempt to calm her nerves, which were slowly but surely getting the better of her.

Even though she was pretty much over-prepared, she always freaked out over tests. It wasn't like she was a perfectionist and all like,"OhmygodIdontknowifIstudied-enoughIonlystudiedfor50billionhours!" But instead, she was afraid that she would simply forget all that she learned. That was one of the reasons why she started studying so early, that she would have this extra self-assurance when it came to test taking time. You could say that she had a confidence issue.

Glancing briefly at the clock she realized that she had better hurry up and get dressed before she ended up missing the bus and the test altogether. With a nice white tank top and a short sleeved button up over it, she was ready for face her SAT II. After all, your clothes didn't get graded, your intelligence did.

She strung and fastened her good luck charm on her neck and looked at it in the mirror. It was a sterling silver rain-drop shaped pendant with a large aquamarine gem, her birthstone, embedded in the middle. The perfect combination of her birthstone and her element, water. It hadn't failed her yet.

Slipping her feet into her flip-flops, she grabbed the small bag she had put together the night before with all the necessities, and hollered down the hall.

"BYE MOM! SEE YOU LATER!" She yelled, opening first the door and then the storm door, letting them crash nosily against the door frame as she ran up the road in order to be on time for the bus, which she could already hear picking up others teenagers on the next street over.

The walk to her bus stop wasn't long, and sometimes it was even enjoyable. It was nice to take a short walk just before and after school to clear her mind and relax her from the stresses of school life. It gave her time to just think, instead of working constantly on her assignments, or desperately trying to stay awake in class.

The bus was closer now, just turning onto her street by the sound of it. She was nearly there, the stop was just across the street, on the corner of Washington and Cynthia, but she still began to quicken her pace to an awkward run.

The bus was coming up the road now…10 seconds…she ran a little faster, 9…almost there, 8…just a foot now to go, 7… Made it!

It was between her and the clock now. She was down to her last few minutes… seconds. Only 3 more questions to go. C'mon… C'mon… One left.

"Please stop working, and put your pens down. Remember to sign the declaration before handing the test to your proctor, declaring that you didn't have any knowledge of the questions prior to this test…"
Quickly, she wrote down the answer to the last question while the proctor was talking, something about acids bases and salts. The answer barely registered in her mind as she wrote it down. Lazily, she signed the declaration at the beginning of the test with a flourish and finally set down her pen, feeling accomplished.

"Now that that's over," she said with a grin as she walked into her empty house, swung her bag from her shoulder and dropped it unceremoniously next to the door. The house was completely silent, and if it weren't for the delight that was radiating from Cara, it would have been very tomb-like. She practically danced her way to the bulky, yet extremely efficient stereo system and turned it on. With a push of a button the entire house was shaking with the dulcet tones of Michelle Branch's "Are You Happy Now?"

The weight of the world was off her shoulders and Cara was not about to let it go by without a celebration. Perhaps she wasn't down at the local ice cream shop with the rest of her friends toasting root beer floats to a great summer,but she could make her own toast… and her own root beer float. The only things that was missing was someone to celebrate with. But she didn't need to worry about that now. After all, she had a whole summer to be lonely.

Walking over the fridge to grab something to drink, she spotted a note in her Mother's handwriting by a Scooby-Doo magnet on the fridge;

Cara,

The Salvation Army is coming tomorrow for our yearly donations. If you could go up into the attic and grab the boxes of clothes and put them by the front door for me I would be very appreciative.

Hope your test went well.

Love, Mom

Pouring some Wild Cherry Pepsi, she took a sip and headed over to the hall closet where she knew the ladder to the attic was located. Cara set her drink down outside the door and pulled on the sting hanging down from the rectangular cutout on the ceiling. With a strong tug, the rectangle of wood pulled down and the ladder followed. She had pulled on the sting too fast and down the ladder was about to hit her. Jumping out of its way, it unfolded and its legs hit the old wood floor with a loud crash.
Now that the danger was out of the way (or so she hoped), Cara moved closer to the ladder and began climbing it. With each rung she climbed, she could hear joints creaking and groaning against her weight. She silently prayed the thing would hold up just a little bit longer, at least for her to get up and down safely. When she finally reached the top, she got on her hands and knees and began feeling the air for the small string that would turn the singular light bulb on.

With a click, the small light bulb turned on. Suddenly the small room was filled with a light that illuminated every corner of the room, casting odd shadows from the various bags and boxes on the walls.

"Might as well start somewhere," Cara muttered as she crawled over to one of the boxes in the far back in the attic. She would start from the back and work forwards. There were a lot of boxes in the attic and she didn't know exactly which ones her mother wanted down.

As she opened the box (which looked more like a small trunk) she could still hear the sound of her music echoing from down below the floorboards. She began humming along with the words as she sifted though the various articles of clothing and... Books?

I'm finding my way back to you
And everything I used to be
And waiting is all that I can do
Until you find your way back to me

She began humming along with the words as she sifted though the various articles of clothing and... Books? Prying one out of the small trunk she dusted off the cover, to reveal the title, Magical Theory by Adalbert Waffling.
"Magical Theory?" she read aloud and leaved though the decently size volume. The pages were full of strange words and diagrams involving things such as wands and potions. Cara abruptly snapped the book shut her heart beating. Something was telling her to dig deeper into the trunk, that something in it might answer some of her questions and yet another part of her was telling her that she didn't want to know.

Torn, she opened the trunk once more to place the book back in. As did, she spotted something strange, a long wooden stick next to a red leather bound diary, and stopped. Instead, she placed the other book down and sat crossed legged next to the box.

First, she picked up the diary which had the name Katrina Weatherstone embossed on in gold filigree. Katrina Weatherstone...Weatherstone... Katrina, Katrina! Her mother! Her mother? What was a diary of her mother's doing in a place like this? She thought as she cracked open the old journal, which tried to resist against her intrusion as if some invisible lock was holding it together.

Prying a little harder, the covers finally opened and the pages settled someplace in the middle. Immediately she began reading. As she finished the entry her face contorted in surprise, and her right hand moved down slowly to caress the light colored stick. A wand. Her mother's wand.

And if that was her mother's wand…then she was… and that meant that she was…

Suddenly the small light bulb, which was the only light fixture in the small room died and the room was once again encased in complete darkness. But this didn't phase her, she simply moved over to the small window towards the back of the room and threw the shudders open with a loud creak. A small stream of light entered the room, just enough so that she could read the old handwriting.

She quickly leaved though the old, yellowed pages to the last entry. It was dated June 12th, 1980, less than a month before she was born. Mouth agape, she read:

Dear Journal,

You think that after all these years I would finally grow out of writing in here, but it's a hard habit to break. The world is getting darker by the minute and I fear that the threat to John, myself and our child is imminent. We are leaving today for America. New York precisely, to be with my family and hopefully lie low until this war passes over. We will be staying with them indefinitely and I now fear their safety as well but it is of up most importance that my child should survive. At least that's what Dumbledore told me when he suggested this change of scenery. I'm not sure what he exactly meant by this, but I believe him. You are destined for great things, my love. Never forget that.

Before we left, we collected our research into an envelope and placed it in Dumbledore's care for our child should we not survive this war. I placed a simple identity charm on it, so in case he finds reason to break his word, our secrets will be safe. Its not that I don't trust the man, I just find him desperate. As we all are nowadays, I suppose. Never become as he is, my love.

John is hesitant to leave our lovely little house of dreams outside Hogsmeade because of the chance I go into labor on the trip across the sea but I find his fears unfounded. I fear that should we stay here amongst our own that we will be stabbed in the back. Our research is certainly more important than our lives, and the few who know of it are desperate to have it. Never let them have it, my love.

Love always,

Katrina

It took a few moments for Cara to control her shaking body. If this was her mother's diary, who was the woman who has tucked her in bed every night as a child? Or…is the woman writing here was the same woman who had shouted from her bedroom this morning? And if so… had this sudden change occurred?

Shifting her gaze from the old diary back to the contents of the box, she began to sift though the various items. Strange clothing, more books… and a singular box.

Slowly, she pried it from the bottom of the trunk and examined the long, thin box. Onto, her name was inlayed in gold filigree on the leather covered top. This must be…no... It couldn't.. Could it?

She carefully pried the cover off and examined the thin piece of wood within it. On top, lay another yellowed piece of paper that looked, by the ragged edges, as if it had been ripped from the old diary itself. She unfolded it slowly, as to not rip the fragile paper. On it was only a few sentences.

Dear Cara,

I know that they are going to find us any day now. I'm hoping they take mercy on you. Someday, a time will come when you will need this. Use it wisely.

Love,
Mommy

A little further down, past her mother's signature were a few words, barely legible, scribbled in black ink:

Birch, 11 ½ inches, phoenix feather.