The moon ascended slowly, casting a silvery glow over the vast expanse of the ocean below. Waves whispered against the rugged cliffs as with the waning daylight more and more stars blinked into existence.
Holly sat on the windowsill, watching the sea and absentmindedly stroking Hedwig's feathers. Her friends were long since asleep, exhausted after a long day in Diagon Alley. She would be out like a light too, if she hadn't made a promise that she intended to keep.
When the last ray of sunlight disappeared and the night was only illuminated by the stars and the moon dancing in the sky, Holly stood up. With Hedwig perched on her shoulder, she quietly snuck past her friends sleeping in the same oversized bed.
The front door creaked as she closed it again, it was refreshingly cool for an August night. Holly took to the sky, enjoying the breeze, with Hedwig joining her soon after, gliding through the air beside her. It didn't take too long until she landed again by a particularly thick bush, nestled in between two trees. Her goal for the night.
"Enjoy your hunt, Hedwig. Don't terrorise the bowtruckles too much."
Her companion gave her a single look that promised nothing of the sort and then took off to find dinner and definitely scare the life out of more than one bowtruckle. Holly could only chuckle as she approached the shrubbery, Hedwig was such a brat.
Compared to yesterday, her approach was a lot different. Instead of laying down to try and crawl under the bush, Holly confidently strode right at the thing. It magically shrunk, like growing backwards in time, until there was nothing left but a small seedling she could easily step over.
Still, the wall of razor leaves stubbornly remained, not impressed by her newfound confidence. So she waited. In the moonlight, the gleam of the sharp edges looked even more threatening. Then suddenly, a warm breeze pushed her from behind and made the trees rustle in the wind. A shudder went through the leaves, but they didn't grow backwards like the other bush had, no. They took off.
They fluttered through the air by flapping their heart shaped body like wings. Like a flock of little birds, they flew in formation. First they congregated in a sphere in front of her and then rushed at her, similar to a high pressure stream spraying out of a pipe, their sharp tips pointed right at Holly. But they didn't make contact with her, like a tide they split in front of her face and began circling her.
The second time standing in the middle of the leaf tornado, looked even more impressive than the first. Yesterday, when leaving, she panicked and tried to dodge, but now she could see the magic in all its glory. The view through the gaps of the leaves turned blurry and slowly changed to reveal a glade with a massive ash tree towering over her.
With the transition finished, the leaves dispersed in a hectic fluttering of 'wings', just to come together again behind her, forming a new bush. Holly had been transported to an entirely different place. Similarly to the grove in the forbidden forest, she had no clue where exactly, but at least the sky was visible here.
Under the watchful eyes of hundreds of bowtruckles sitting on the branches, Holly approached the ash tree. It was almost comparable in size to the trees in the forbidden forest, it even had a mass of roots breaking out of the ground all around it. And standing on the lowest root, a bowtruckle with a beard of moss, that hung all the way to its feet, greeted her with a little snap sound.
Holly held out her hand for it to climb up on her shoulder and together they climbed over the various thick roots sticking out of the ground and rounded the tree. On the backside were even more bowtruckles, but they were clinging right to the bark. She tried not to step on any of the 'twigs' littering the ground between the roots and watched quietly as one of the bowtruckles let go of the tree from exhaustion and fell. It dropped to the floor, hitting a root on the way and came to rest in the grass where it quickly shrivelled up.
At the end of the process only a dried-out, purple tinted twig, barely half the size of the original bowtruckle was left. The spot where it had clung to immediately revealed what was wrong. Instead of healthy bark, there was a pulsing, purple vein, bloated and threatening to burst and all around it, the bark was black and rotting.
The spot was soon covered by another bowtruckle taking the place of its dead friend, biting down on the vein and began sucking purple sap out of it. The vein visibly deflated, but not nearly enough it seemed, it had spread further than it was just yesterday and would soon overtake the whole tree if nothing was done.
Where there had only been space for a good two dozen bowtruckles to cling to the sickly vein and relieve the pressure, there were now thirty of them trying to slow the spread.
It didn't take long for another one to drop and wither away. This method of dealing with the infection wasn't sustainable. Holly knew it, the bearded bowtruckle knew it, and all the others did as well. Still, they tried anyway, this tree was their home after all. How could Holly just burn it like Hagrid had said?
She wiped a tear from her eye and turned her head to the bearded bowtruckle on her shoulder who was watching his friends die with a drooped head.
"I asked someone for help, they're an expert on wildlife and plants," she began. "He said that this is called the Violet Veinrot… that there's no cure for it and it's best to just burn the inflicted tree, befo-"
The bowtruckles head whipped to look at her so fast, its beard grazed her nose from the force of the turn. It waved a tiny fist at her, angrily shouting sounds of bowtruckle speech at her, probably a variety of obscenities. But with the moonlight illuminating its 'face', Holly could not just identify feelings of anger, but also sadness.
*SNAP* *CREAK* SNAP* *CRACK*
Holly patiently waited for its tirade to die down. Eventually the bowtruckle's shoulders slumped forward and it sat down on her shoulder. Holly also took a seat on one of the higher roots.
"I understand that you don't want to lose your home, but we have to do something about this before it can spread to other trees and threaten the rest of the forest as well."
They sat there in silence, the bowtruckle contemplating her words. Holly was a little startled when it unexpectedly began climbing down her clothes, then into her lap, where it turned to look up at her again.
It gave her a determined nod and faced the tree again. It effortlessly climbed up the trunk, even with its age. At least Holly thought it was older than the other bowtruckles with the beard and air of authority it displayed talking to its branch now.
Holly didn't understand their language, but the wild pointing and shaking of heads painted a clear picture. It was trying to convince the others to leave, going so far as to try and push them to the trunk and force them, pleading with them and crying little sap tears. None of them budged. They would rather go down in flames with their home than die from the lack of magic.
She had done her research, and according to Mr. Scamander's 'Fantastic Beasts', bowtruckles were born from trees once they accumulated enough magic. As born protectors their life and magic was bound to the tree. Losing their home would be equivalent to having their magic ripped right out of them and whatever crumbs remained would slowly drain, along with their life. Until nothing but empty husks remained, even worse than whatever happened to them when they drank the Violet Veinrot sap.
It was a terrible thing indeed, and Holly understood why they all wanted to stay. Didn't make having to burn them all alive any easier of a decision. When the branch elder had given up, the bowtruckles that had been fighting the sickness began scaling the tree to join the others, waiting for the end.
Holly swallowed thickly, the Veinrot's spread was now visible to the naked eye. With each pulse of purple, the vein bulged more, cracking the bark around it and slowly ripping the tree in half. Now that the bowtruckles weren't fighting it, she would have to burn the tree sooner rather than later.
Digging around her pockets for her wand, Holly almost fumbled and dropped it out of nervousness. She took a couple steps away from the tree and raised her arm and took aim at the exposed purple vein.
Before Holly had even uttered the spell, she could feel the warmth spread from her heart through her whole body. The pressure kept building in her hand, her fire eager to do her bidding.
In unison with her whispered 'Incendio', the branch of bowtruckles bellowed out a shrill, grief filled warcry. But Holly didn't hear it for long, the sound of flames rushing from her wand soon drowned out the world around her.
If anyone were to witness the spectacle from the glade's entrance, they could have observed Holly's robes billowing in the windless night as she raised her wand and prepared the spell. With the moon behind her, her face was shrouded in shadows, but slowly getting more illuminated as a small glow spilled through the robe fabric around her arms.
Holly of course, noticed none of it…
What she did notice was that her flames never impacted the trunk. They split in two streams around the tree instead, like the magic leaves did around her earlier. At first she thought something was wrong, that the vein had some kind of inherent magic protection so the tree wouldn't burn.
But then the two streams came back around, slightly higher this time, slowly continued snaking around the tree and growing taller, until they formed a fiery double helix around the entire height of the purple vein.
When the streams met and fused at the top, Holly felt the feedback instantly. The feeling of elation that always accompanied her usage of fire, was strengthened by a profound sense of rightness. No, there was nothing wrong with this situation at all.
She was pushed back a little by the power of the flames, making her feet dig into the ground. To compensate, she gripped her wand with both hands. It got hotter and hotter with each passing second, pressing her back further. Holly struggled against the heat, sweat dripped down her forehead, sizzling and evaporating before it could hit the ground.
Holly's hair was getting whipped around her head, by a sudden gust of hot air that spread all throughout the glade, rustling the tree's leaves and drying the dew off the blades of grass. In danger of being blown off, the bowtruckles had to hold on to the branches for dear life.
Finally, beginning from the tip of her wand, the fire started to change colour. It got brighter and brighter, spreading along the streams and in the end, turned a brilliant white. Just like the night she had faced the book demon in the forbidden corridor.
An otherworldly shriek pierced the night, the vein convulsed, pulsing faster and faster as if trying to escape. The sound of crackling fire was joined by the cracking of bark and a sizzling of evaporating sap.
Even with the blinding light of the fire, the edge of Holly's vision started to turn dark. Her strength slowly started to leave her, until finally the consistent stream of flames from her wand spluttered out. The world tilted in front of her and she fell backwards into the soft grass.
The last thing she saw before the world turned black were the remaining wisps of fire licking at the night sky above her.
'It's about time she did something about the…'
'No, why should… can do it hers…'
'You're too soft on the youth…'
Holly groaned, there was a weight pressing on her chest and someone was poking her, but she really didn't want to get up. She was way too tired.
"L-lemme shleep," she slurred.
Even with the poking, she drifted off again. Whatever they wanted, it couldn't have been too important anyways…
It was dark, but still, she could feel her surroundings.
'Quiet, she's finally seeing…'
Water dripped down the cave wall, splattering onto her… nose? It tickled her, but she couldn't move to wipe it off.
Water? She, she was, really… thirsty…
'Oh bugger, so cl-'
Holly's eyes snapped open.
The clouds in the sky had such a pretty orange colour… Her heart almost jumped out of her chest. Oh god, had she torched the whole forest? She desperately tried to sit up, but her body barely moved. She only sluggishly managed to lift her head a little and came face to face with Hedwig sitting on her chest, staring down at her with calm eyes.
No, no. Everything was alright, or Hedwig wouldn't be so relaxed. The owl's presence on her chest really soothed the panic in Holly's heart, even if a claw did dig into the sensitive tissue quite uncomfortably.
She sighed and let her head drop back into the grass, closing her eyes. She would have gone back to sleep too, if her throat wasn't so parched. Alas, her body still didn't feel like obeying her instructions and laid there uselessly.
"Wa-tahr," she croaked, barely audible.
There was a quick shuffling of steps beside her head and something small began to climb her shoulder. Too weak to protest, she watched as a little bowtruckle came into view and pressed a leaf to her lips, dripping dew right into her mouth.
The process was torturously slow, each drop took forever and barely made a dent in her thirst. At least the bowtruckle always had a new leaf with collected dew ready when one ran dry. She didn't question how that worked.
Holly must have fallen asleep again, because when she next opened her eyes, the sky was visibly brighter. Though, it wasn't quite dawn yet.
This time she managed to sit up, Hedwig fleeing to sit on Holly's knee instead. Some strength had returned to her body, but she was sore all over. Even worse than when she'd first learned to skate and overdid it by staying out all day.
A quick look around herself confirmed that she hadn't burned down the forest, but neither had she burned the bowtruckles' home tree. The massive ash tree was still standing proud and tall.
Speaking of bowtruckles, they were assembled all around her and cheering. What was going on? The elder stepped forward and gestured at the others. In no time Holly held a leaf filled with morning dew in her hands with many more on the way, getting passed in a straight line by the mass of bowtruckles.
Hedwig gave a quiet hoot, reminding Holly to drink. It took quite a lot of leaves to satisfy her, though a furry feeling on her tongue remained. Her lips were also completely dried out and the skin on her face stretched uncomfortably when Holly moved her head. She grumbled, stupid hot fire.
The bowtruckle elder climbed her shoulder again and pointed at the tree, definitely upset.
"I'm sorry it didn't work, I'll try again once I'm feeling better," she apologised.
But it shook its head, pointing at the tree again. Wiping at her glasses and squinting her eyes to see better, Holly realised what had happened. There was no purple glowing vein splitting the tree anymore. The bowtruckle wasn't upset, it was excited.
As Holly tried to get up, Hedwig fluttered onto her other shoulder and nipped at her ear playfully, making her laugh. It certainly didn't help with standing on her wobbly legs, but she pushed on, heading for the tree. The sea of bowtruckles around her parted to make way and excitedly followed along.
She stumbled once or twice on the way over the roots, but always managed to catch herself. Whatever magic happened last night had really drained her. Taking a closer look at the trunk once she'd arrived made it all worth it though. Not a single trace of purple was left, even the dead bowtruckles at her feet had lost the weird tint and looked like regular sticks now.
One could still see where the vein had been, but it had been replaced with fresh bark, making it look like scarring. The bowtruckle elder poked her cheek and pointed at the trunk again. Too curious about what he could want, Holly reached out and touched the tree.
Nothing happened, so she let her arm drop back to her side. She felt a little stupid, what had the bowtruckle expected would happen when she touched it?
Holly startled badly when suddenly the entire branch of bowtruckles behind her began to cheer again. The world seemed to shake with their cheering and then all of a sudden the floor beneath her feet crumbled away. Holly fell into darkness… for a good two seconds and then hit the ground, making her crumple to her knees.
Hedwig had taken flight the second she dropped and sitting on a root above her, angrily hooted down at the bowtruckle elder who had fallen off her shoulder. Holly took a quick look around herself, she was on some kind of staircase leading further underground. The bowtruckles from outside started flooding the stairs, happily running around and past her.
Holly of course, did the only sensible thing, picked up the elder and followed along, deeper under the tree. A short while later, Hedwig landed on her shoulder again, still glaring at the bowtruckle elder.
The further in they got, the less light streamed in from the entrance to illuminate the way. When there was a bend in the tunnel, it surprisingly didn't get any darker. Instead, after the bend, the ceiling had turned from dirt to roots that glowed slightly.
Inspirited shouts and clapping from up ahead spurned Holly on to walk faster. She was blinded by the light from the tunnel's exit, but when her eyes had adjusted, Holly was gobsmacked. She stood in a familiar grove, bowtruckles dancing through a big patch of grass littered with beautiful silver flowers and mushrooms.
In the middle of the grove, right where she had buried the unicorn, sprouted a little silver sapling. No, this was definitely the grove from the forbidden forest. How had a physical staircase brought her here?
*snap*
The elder gave an order from her shoulder and soon the bowtruckles were watering the sapling with dew filled leaves. She turned to look at the elder who smiled up at her.
It seemed like she had gotten help with caring for the grove, how convenient.
Author's note:
Merry Christmas/Happy holiday or whatever else you celebrate.
Hope you enjoy the early chapter as a gift!