Not even a week after Holly's birthday, the Mason's investment into Grunnings, her uncle's company, was finalised. And with it the dates for the start of the Dursley's holiday.
They made her take the bus to London with all her luggage before they got in their taxi to the airport. It was a little cramped to carry everything that way. Who was she kidding, it was majorly annoying.
At least Dudley and Petunia had accompanied her to the bus stop to help her board and wave her off. It was nice, even if Dudley had started complaining halfway to the stop because he had to walk so much. Thankfully she had sent Hedwig ahead so he couldn't poke at her in the cage in his boredom.
It was a short and relaxing ride. Holly had been used to the bus since she'd been much younger and gone to visit her parents in the hospital from time to time.
When Holly arrived at the Leaky Cauldron, the dingy pub that hid the entrance to the wizarding shopping district of London, she took a corner table to wait for her friends.
They'd agreed to meet here today, maybe take a look around Diagon Alley and then go back to Lavender's place, where apparently Parvati had been staying for the last week already.
Honestly, Holly was a little apprehensive about going 'shopping' with her friends, she was still very much not rich. In fact, she was pretty poor, her trust vault not having been refilled for years. Most of her family's money had been used for various treatments after they were attacked by some desperate Death Eaters when Holly was little.
She still carried the scars of that night, usually hidden under gloves. Their origin and dark magic stain hindered her spellcasting, potion brewing and even riding brooms.
Casting spells required extra practice to find ways for her magic to bypass a blockage that was most likely related to the scar. The dark magic still clinging to them interfered with potion ingredients so that Holly could only brew with special magic suppressing gloves that Professor Snape lent her.
Something similar happened with brooms, on her first and last try riding one everything worked until she interacted with the enchantments and the broom instantly went out of control.
It had been the most exhilarating and free she had ever felt. So Holly had really wanted to fly again without falling off, and she did accomplish just that. Using runes, the only kind of magic Holly could study at home from her mother's old books before being of Hogwarts age, she painstakingly crafted her boots into something never seen before.
They allowed her to step on air, or skate on wind currents like a pair of roller skates. They had saved her from danger a lot, and given her a sense of safety even in precarious situations. In combination with the cloak of invisibility she had inherited, Holly witnessed many a wonder that most of the wizarding population would probably never be privy to.
Of course, there were a lot of other things Holly wanted to create, but she was a lot busier at school than she'd thought and hadn't made as much progress except for her flying boots. And with Professor Melanie breathing down her neck now, demanding she learn the boring stuff, she'd had even less time this summer.
Hopefully, once Holly was done with this last worksheet that she was solving while waiting, she could focus back on her own goals. Though, she didn't have high hopes for that.
Taking a sip of tea that the pub owner Tom had graciously provided for free, Holly noticed the flames in the fireplace flash green. And out walked her friends. First Lavender, then Parvati followed a step behind.
Holly jumped out of her seat and rushed over to them, enthusiastically hugging hello.
"Good morning, Holly. It's so nice to finally see you again, we missed you!" They greeted her.
"I missed you guys too," she replied. "What have you been up to?"
"Oh, this and that. You wouldn't believe how long it took Lavender to get ready," Parvati laughed.
They spent a good hour drinking tea and chatting about their summer so far. Apparently Lavender hadn't even started on her homework yet, preferring instead to go out to the beach near her house trying to get a tan. All that did was give her sun burns though. It seemed like even magic couldn't prevent Brit's getting a sunburn.
Parvati excitedly told Holly about her grandparents visiting from India, bringing a lot of different sweets, some of which she had sent Holly for her birthday. They had tasted incredible.
If Holly hadn't promised to keep her meeting the Flamels a secret she'd have told them all about it. As it stood, their 'deaths' had been announced in the magical papers earlier in the summer, shocking the world. It wasn't everyday that the oldest magicals in the world 'died' after all.
So she opted to tell them about her summer homework, various chores, knitting, roller skating, and the one trip she got to go on with the Dursleys. Of course she also told them about Professor Meanie's ridiculous demands, the Professor's house elf, how he thrashed her room and a little bit about runes that usually bored her friends to death.
"Excuse me, Tom, is there any place to put my trunk while I'm in Diagon?" Holly asked the barkeep when it was finally time to head into the alley.
"Of course, just give it here Holly," Tom replied. "Have a good day in the alley!"
As it turned out, Holly didn't have to be afraid of going shopping with her friends. They mostly window shopped, only looking through the displays and giggling over the new robe designs and funny hats that only someone like Professor Dumbledore would wear.
Once or twice they tried on something, but never bought. It was safe to say that Holly paled whenever she saw a price tag on the newest fashions. Most shocking of all was seeing some new racing broom going for hundreds of galleons. She was once again glad to have her boots. But if flying was that expensive maybe she should start selling her design to others? Or maybe something small to start out with, she already had something in mind for that.
Holly would have to ask around how one did such a thing, but who, the goblins? Professor Babbling probably knew… yeah, she'd rather not.
With the possibility of taking the floo back to Lavender's, they stayed way longer in Diagonal Alley than Holly had ever before. It was beautiful at night. Enchanted lamps and candles hovering in the air above them, spreading a cosy mood with their warm light.
Though she swallowed thickly seeing dark, unilluminated side streets looming dangerously close by. It was probably just Holly's leftover fear of the cursed creature she'd encountered last year. Even with it gone now, some mental scars remained, hopefully they would heal soon.
When they returned to the Leaky Cauldron it was packed with guests eating a late dinner and enjoying whatever adult wizards drank for fun, Holly had never asked what it was called.
Spotting them, Tom waved them over.
"Had a good day? Your trunk is in the backroom, if it wasn't so busy I'd get it myself, sorry," he told them. "Hey, Smithens, get off the table! Excuse me girls."
After picking up her trunk from the backroom, they lined up to use the floo.
"Have you ever used the floo, Holly?" Parvati asked her.
"Ehr, no. But I've seen it used often enough in Saint Mungos, just throw some powder into the flames and state your destination, right?"
"Well, yes. But make sure you say it loud and clear or you might end up in a random fireplace," Lavender pointed at the floo. "Like that guy."
Holly turned just in time to see a clearly drunk wizard in blue robes stumble into the green flames with an incoherent mumble. It looked terrifying, like he was being sucked into a tornado, spinning around himself.
Thankfully they weren't next in line as the poor guy emptied the contents of his stomach all over the place before he was completely gone.
"I don't think his robes will still be blue when he arrives wherever he went," Holly tried to mask her nervousness with humour.
"No, definitely not," the others giggled. "Let me take your luggage, Holly, carrying something through the floo takes practice."
"Thank you, Lavender."
"I'll go first, you second and lastly Parvati, so she can come after you if you say it wrong," Lavender explained. "And remember, the address is 'Hillside Hideaway'. See you in a bit."
With those departing words, Lavender disappeared in a flash of green. Now it was Holly's turn. The floo powder in her hand felt like silk, smoothly gliding over her skin, as if trying to escape. She'd expected it to be more like ash.
Parvati gave her an encouraging pat on the back, exchanging a smile with Holly.
"Hillside Hideway," she stumbled over the words and a torrent of green fire filled her vision. It felt like the world was spinning around at incredible speed with Holly as the centre. From time to time the image of a living room would flash past, but never stay long enough to focus on it.
Then the fire died down and she arrived in the final fireplace with Lavender standing in front of her. They were in a homey living room, wooden walls and floor, though mostly covered in fuzzy rugs.
There was a comfortable looking couch right behind Lavender, walls decorated with animated portraits, the windowsills were covered in weird plants Holly had never seen before. Unfortunately it was dark outside, so she couldn't see where exactly they were.
Trying to step out of the fireplace, Holly would have fallen on her face if Lav hadn't caught her. The world was still spinning and her legs were all wobbly.
"Hey, good job not throwing up on your first time using the floo!"
Barely a second later Parvati walked out of the fireplace behind her and breathed an audible sigh of relief.
"Thank Merlin you arrived here safely, Holly. It's 'Hideaway' not 'Hideway'," she giggled out, Lavender joining her after registering what she'd said.
"Come on, let me show you to my room, we can build a pillow fort and have a pillow fight…. Not necessarily in that order."
The following days were the most fun Holly had ever had. After staying up way too late the first night, gossiping in their self-built pillowfort they got woken by the early sunlight streaming in through the window.
She had a spectacular view of the sun rising over the ocean, making the water sparkle in red light. Lavender's home was located on a small hill with a cliffside facing the ocean in the east. There was a beach visible way down below, as well as a little town a bit further south along the coast.
With Lavender being such an outgoing and fashion liking person, Holly hadn't expected her to live this far out in nature. Though, magic travel could easily make going to a bigger city possible.
Holly also met the Mrs. Brown who had made them breakfast. It was clear whose features Lavender had inherited. Blonde hair and a more mature beauty that her friend would still have to grow into.
It was fascinating to see breakfast being made with just a flick of a wand, Sandwiches assembling themselves, tea hovering over to the table and getting poured into cups by invisible hands.
After a couple of questions about growing up with muggles and how she found Hogwarts in comparison, Mrs. Brown soon excused herself to prepare for work.
"She works for Witch's Weekly Magazine as an editor and one day I hope to follow in her footsteps," Lavender informed them. And Holly could definitely see her friend doing that kind of thing very well.
Lavender's father on the other hand, she told Holly, was already at work in the ministry. He had to go in early because some recent event had created a lot of paperwork for his department.
Leaving through the front door to explore left Holly flabbergasted, the house looked like a mix of how you would imagine a witches hut combined with a forest cabin, but the surprising part was the size. Looking from the outside, there shouldn't be more than two rooms in the thing, but Holly had seen way more, it even had 2 floors more than were visible.
"Hey Lavender, how does your house work?"
"What do you mean?" Lavender gave her a confused look. "It's just a normal house…"
"I mean, how do three floors with like 5 rooms each fit into this little cabin?" Lavender's confused expression changed to one of understanding.
"Oh that, the space is expanded with a permanent charm, most modern homes have them," she explained.
Holly looked back at the house, this was considered modern? Though, space expansion sounded neat. She'd have to look into that in the future.
"I'm surprised you didn't notice this earlier, the shops in Diagonal also use expansion charms for more store space and storage. Come on now, Parvati should be by the spring already!"
Contemplating what Holly had learned, she followed Lavender on a small dirt path into the forest covering the western side of the hill. It wasn't nearly as dark as the forbidden forest in Hogwarts with lots of light filtering through the canopies. Apparently it was still a somewhat magical forest, but clearly not comparable to the forbidden forest.
Before they could reach the spring however, Parvati crashed into them.
"There you two are," she hastily greeted them and started pulling her by the sleeve. "Come on, come on, come on. There's a water nymph in the spring pool!"
That got them running instantly, maybe it was more magical than she had thought, encountering a nymph of all things here was almost a miracle.
Compared to the merpeople in the Black Lake, Nymphs were very rare creatures and mostly lived solitary lives and tried to stay hidden as much as possible from humans.
They inhabited the domains they were named after. Supposedly a water nymph living in a big lake gave King Arthur his magical sword, though the goblins were of a different opinion. According to them, it was a goblin made treasure, stolen by some wizard.
It was said that there were a couple of wood nymphs, sometimes called dryads, living in the Forbidden Forest. Holly didn't know if it was true or not, in all her forays into the forest she hadn't met one. Which wasn't a surprise to be honest and probably wouldn't happen anytime soon either, if at all.
They slowed down when they got close, as to not make too much noise and scare the nymph off. There was a small clearing ahead and Holly could hear the pitter patter of the spring filling the pool with water along with an enchanting voice singing in a language that she couldn't understand.
Taking cover behind a tree and some bushes, the three girls took a peek at the serene pool of water. In the middle of it stood a person halfway submerged, facing away from them. Beautiful fiery red hair covered her entire back, so long it floated on the water's surface. The nymph was washing herself and singing.
Holly blushed crimson when she noticed that the nymph was entirely naked behind the curtain of hair. A twig snapped to her right, but the sight was too captivating to avert her gaze and investigate the source of the sound.
"Shhh, Lav…"
The nymph turned her head, looking directly at them over her shoulder. It seemed like she had heard as well. Blue met green, the nymphs' eyes locking with her own. Holly swallowed thickly, she didn't dare look away.
"Shh yourself, you're being just as loud." And now her friends were fighting. They didn't seem to notice that the singing had stopped.
The nymph's expression turned to an amused grin. She winked at Holly, then with a giggle and quiet splash she dove into the water, disappearing from sight. Holly's first instinct was to follow right after, but the moment the last ripples on the water smoothed out, she snapped out of it. Whatever magical effect the nymph had had, it vanished along with her.
"Urgh, Lav. You're gonna scare her away!"
That made Holly laugh out loud, disrupting their argument.
"Now what's so funny, Holly?"
"What's so.. oh, I just think she played a trick on you," she pointed at the pool. "She's already gone!"
"What!? Oh you've got to be joking," Lavender dropped to the floor after seeing the empty pool. "I've been living here all my life and I have never seen anything as magical as a nymph and now when I had the chance I barely got a glance at one."
Parvati and Holly sat down next to her, patting her on the back in consolation.
"I'm sure you'll see one again, don't you think so too, Parvati?"
"Oh, yes yes. And I'm sorry for snapping at you, I don't know what came over me."
They just sat there in silence after, spectating the pool, listening to the spring pattering into the pool and the sound of the departing creek, streaming down the hill.
Suddenly Lavender stood back up, shooting them an enthusiastic grin. Apparently she was cheered up again.
"Now, who wants to take a dip in the magical nymph pond?"
