A/N: Finally back! I know, it's been forever, but now my computer works again and I'm ready to roll! WOOT!


Chapter 3

Of Muggles And Magic

Deep in the heart of London on a quiet, unkempt street, the evening was settling over the still buildings like a thick, cozy blanket. The very shops themselves seemed to be heaving heavy sighs of goodnight, their windows shuttered and their doors locked tight. If not for the shrill shrieks of trains rattling across the nearby track, it would have appeared that the dusty rows of lopsided stores had simply fallen asleep to the dim glow of the streetlamps. And so it was quite strange to imagine that anyone would be walking over the crooked sidewalk at such an hour, and yet Annabelle Potter found herself doing just that; wandering about, with very little idea of just where she was.

In fact, she hadn't known where she was for several hours now, though it wasn't entirely her fault. She had asked for directions, but every time she had stopped a stranger they had taken one look at the rather large serpent hissing on her shoulder and made quite a scene hurrying away before she could get a decent answer. Of course she had been the one to get herself lost by running off in the first place. But in her mind it was rather reasonable - after six boys sprouted tails before her eyes.

"Oh, this is a right mess I've gotten into this time. Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia will be furious when I get home. If I get home." Annabelle mumbled. "I'm cold, I'm hungry, and I want to go home." Home sounded plenty nice after the dreadful day she had been having, and the higher the moon climbed, the more she found herself wishing for a hot dinner and her warm bedsheets. Her only friend in the whole affair gave a sympathetic hiss and coiled tighter around Annabelle's narrow arm. She let out a thin sigh, the constant click of her not-so-polished-anymore shoes slowing to a stop near a bent lamppost that looked as if it had been run over.

She glanced up at a lonely sign creaking above her head, watching the battered wood rock back and forth in the breeze while she slowly read the name 'The Leaky Cauldron' stamped onto its face. The name didn't bring any ideas as to where she could possibly be, so with another sigh she plopped down on the pavement with her box in her lap and a line of tears forming on her cheeks. This was not how the day was supposed to have gone.

"I want to go home!" The words slipped out on a miserable wail. "My feet hurt and my stomach hurts and my toes hurt and-and-and I don't like this one bit. And it's all because of that stupid git Simon Grunnings and his stupid birthday party and his stupid friends pulling on my hair!" Annabelle was so absorbed in cursing her day she didn't notice the door behind creak open and a tall, lean man step out wearing a slight frown. It wasn't until the keen eyes of her snake friend spotted the intruder that she noticed anything at all besides her own sore legs and cold fingers.

"You could asssk that one for directionsss." Isis' quiet hiss brought the girl's cries to a hiccupping sniffle. Enormous green eyes followed the line of her friend's sight to the stranger who still stood unmoving from his spot by the door. The man's gaze moved to the snake, then back to the girl with the same strange look that the shopkeeper from the morning had worn and for a long while, neither of them spoke. However, after a few brief moments, the red headed man shook his head and fixed a stern expression on her that vaguely reminded her of her Aunt Petunia.

"Annabelle Potter, what on earth do you think you're doing out here all alone at this hour?" A sudden bolt of fear shot down her spine wondering just how the man knew her name. Had she been on the news? Or was she in more trouble than she thought and everyone now knew about Simon Grunnings? "Do you have any idea how much trouble you'll be in when the Ministry gets a hold of you? I can only imagine that they're having fits as we speak!" The Ministry? Her eyes puffed up and her bottom lip wobbled and she promptly burst into tears all over again.

"I-I-I'm sorry! I didn't m-mean to! I don't even know how I did it, really! He pushed me and I called h-him a pig and then… He was a pig! I-I'm really, really sorry! I won't do it a-again! I promise! I just want to go home!" Annabelle blubbered on. The stranger looked to be at a loss, clearly not expecting this reaction. He ran a hand through his bright red hair and sighed, looking back at the door before moving a bit closer and hunkering down next to her.

"Oh, it's alright now, don't cry. Let's get you inside and warmed up before it cools off anymore. Here, let me take this for you and you carry your…friend, and we'll go in and find a bit to eat." He picked up the little white box that had managed to stay miraculously clean (unlike its owner), and caught her elbow before she could argue. Annabelle furiously swiped at her face as he pulled her up, trying to clean off the snot and salt as best she could with little luck. "That's better now, come along. If we sit out here much longer the sun will be up before we know it."

The stranger pulled open the door, letting loose the low sounds of people chattering inside and the clink of glass on wood. For a moment, Annabelle wondered just how she could have possibly missed such noise from the outside, but she soon forgot any questions she might have had as she fully entered the Leaky Cauldron. Maybe it was because the first sight that greeted her was a large mug zooming through the air inches from her face, or perhaps it was the candles floating above the mismatched tables, but she knew that the moment she stepped inside that she had either gone mad, or was somewhere very, very different than her home at Number Four, Privet Drive. She looked up at the man that had come out to help her, her mouth hanging agape.

"It's magic!"


"An auror will be here in the afternoon to take her home, Bill, they had to charm her guardians to keep them calm after they found out she was missing from the whole pig fiasco. There'd be no point in bringing her back until it wears off."

"An auror? That's a bit much for a ten year old, she just wandered off, it's not like she invaded Gringotts for Merlin's sake."

"It's for her aunt and uncle, not her. The Minister wants to make sure they haven't gone a bit off from the charms before they leave Annabelle with them. In the morning your Mum will be by with the boys and Ginny to do the shopping for school. I think it would be good for her if you took her with, besides, she'll need to get her supplies and there's no better time to do it. Shacklebolt will come and find you two when it's time for her to leave. And don't look at me like that, they are her family, she has to go back."

"What would have happened if it had been some drunk muggle that found her, Dad? What then? Or worse, one of His supporters that's still running loose on the streets? She's a ten year old little girl that's still impressed with parlor tricks. She could have been attacked or killed or any number of things."

"And it could have very well been any family that lost their little girl. With as many of you as there are, it could have very well been Ginny under the circumstances. Either way, they are her family, they do care for her, and they are worried sick about her. If the Dursleys are fully recovered, she will be going home tomorrow, and if they aren't, well, then we'll just have to keep her another day or two while the healers take a look at them. But, she will go home."

Tucked deep into the covers of a bed that was not her own, Annabelle listened to the conversation outside of her door with half an ear, picking aimlessly at the edges of the crisp sheets. Seated on the nightstand next to her, Isis curled around a branch in a large, dimly lit tank flicking her tongue idly in and out while the words grew more heated. They were both quiet, worn out after a long night wandering the streets of London, and neither showed any intentions of interrupting the argument that was most obviously about them - or at least about Annabelle.

"She partially transfigured six muggles into pigs, what exactly is normal about that for girls her age? Obviously there was something very wrong for her to be accidentally using magic that advanced. And worse, she's a parselmouth and doesn't even realize it. I found her hissing at that bloody snake, bawling on the corner with no idea of how bad it looked! She needs to be around other magical communities before she gets set off into Hogwarts, not trapped with a bunch of muggles after finding out she can do things they can't. As soon as she gets her wand she'll want to use it, not that she has any idea of how, and imagine what kind of mess that will cause. She could blow herself up or set a kettle on her neighbors or be like Fred and George and accidentally transfigure her pillow into a giant spider and set it loose in Little Surrey!" The voice of Bill Weasley, the man who had found her, rose to a volume loud enough to make both girl and snake flinch in the dark.

"I've had just about enough of this! She is a little girl, Bill! A frightened little girl who did just find out that she is, in fact, a witch after what must have been an incredibly traumatizing day for her. And you are suggesting that we just go off and rip her away from the only family she knows and loves because she discovered her magic in an accident? Muggleborns go through this every year, and even a good number of half-blood children as well. Do you suggest we take them away from their families as well?" The owner of the other voice had lost his patience, something slamming hard enough outside to make the thin door rattle on its hinges.

Annabelle squeezed her eyes shut and clamped her hands over her ears, desperately wishing that she was somewhere downstairs where she couldn't hear them. She would have much rather have been sitting on one of the three legged bar stools watching the old barkeep and the late night customers go about their business. It would have been a thousand times more relaxing to watch beer mugs full of something called firewhiskey bob around the air threatening to spill their contents and chairs dance and flip up by themselves as customers came and went. A familiar roaring noise filled her ears the more she thought about it, but this time there was no faint pop. This time there was a deafening bang like a car backfiring in the room and she was quite suddenly jerked into a sickening spin.

Then as suddenly as it started, it all came to a screeching stop and, instead of lying comfortably in bed, she found herself sitting up, staring in shock at the equally surprised Tom at the bar downstairs. Just like she had imagined, she was sitting on the crooked barstool with her hands still over her ears and her hair a wild mess of loose curls. Tom, of course, recovered twice as quickly as she did and set down a glass he had been holding to flash her a cheery grin.

"Guess you were still a bit hungry with all that shouting going on, eh?" He said with a wink. Annabelle blushed a deep, cherry red, her bare toes curling in embarrassment. These accidents of hers were becoming a little too frequent for comfort. Tom just chuckled, leaning back and all but roaring at the stairwell. "ARTHUR! SHE'S DOWN HERE!" Almost at once the two men, or wizards as they called themselves, came thundering down the steps with panicked looks while the barkeep disappeared into a backroom. The two wizards came to a stop a few feet away around the same time Tom reappeared with a small tray of biscuits.

"Annabelle, are you alright dear?" The owner of the unknown voice hurried a bit closer, looking over her worriedly as if to make sure all of her parts were still attached. She saw his hand disappear inside some hidden pocket in his shabby robes and assumed that must have been where he kept his wand. A moment later her suspicion was confirmed when he extracted the item in question and started muttering under his breath. "Annabelle, you gave us quite a fright, young lady. You have to be very careful, transfiguring is one thing, but Apparition can be very dangerous for a young witch like yourself. You could have very easily splinched yourself."

"You're not going to take me away from Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon are you?" Both wizards paused, then the elder wizard with the thinning hair gave the younger a withering glare.

"Of course not dear, but you really must stop disappearing every time you have a bit of trouble." Tom had left again, depositing the tray next to her so she could pick at it before he went off about his business. Now she was all alone with the two that had been at odds over her since she had gone to bed. "Annabelle, you're not in trouble, you do understand that, right?" The older man asked somewhat gently.

"Bill said I was bad because I'm a parsley-mouth or something."

"He didn't mean it like that, dear. Parselmouths are witches and wizards who speak Parseltongue, or in other words, people who can talk to snakes. It's very rare to find even in the wizarding community and so there are some people, not to mention most muggles, who might not take it as well as Bill or myself if they happened across you speaking to a snake." Annabelle scowled, the freckles her nose scrunching together as she did.

"Well that's stupid. That's like being mad at someone because they speak French and you don't, it's just a language. It isn't like I can pull a word out of thin air and beat someone with it…Or at least I don't think I can." To be entirely honest, she wasn't exactly sure what was possible and what wasn't. After all, mirrors weren't supposed to talk either yet hers had been having a splendid time complaining quite loudly for half of the time she had been in the room.

"Unfortunately, not everyone thinks that way, Annabelle. But you shouldn't let that bother you." She looked down at the tray on the bar, not feeling very hungry at all.

"Will I be able to go home tomorrow?" She asked.

"I can't say yes with one hundred percent certainty, but if not tomorrow, then the day after or the next definitely. Your Aunt and Uncle were put under some very strong charms to help them calm down and it can make some people a bit strange for a while after, like a potent medicine that stays in the system too long. You shouldn't be too worried though, you'll have plenty to do in the next few days. Now then, you really should be getting off to bed, you have a big day ahead of you tomorrow." Though she wasn't very hungry, she was exhausted, so it was with no complaint that she slid off the stool and started back up the stairs with the two wizards watching to make sure she got tucked in alright. Before she fully settled, she turned to look at Isis who had fallen asleep in a patch of steamy soil and whispered goodnight, hoping that tomorrow would be a much brighter day.