Chapter 5: getting familiar

"To me, crow!", Daphne called one more time, holding her right arm horizontally in front of her, inviting the bird to sit on it. "I don't think it's working, Daphne. I don't think he wants to land.", Astoria said, while the crow was circling them with the shrieking laughter which they had come to know over the last week. "Still, he seems to be quite interested in us.", Daphne sighed frustrated, "It is not normal behaviour for a bird to keep approaching us like that. I still have the feeling that it should be possible."

The evening after the scary event of last week, when Daphne had nearly lost mother's wand, Daphne had been lying in her bed overthinking what had happened that afternoon. Even though she was relieved with the way things had turned out, it had been strange that the bird had apparently understood her despair and had returned the wand. It had reminded her of something she had read in a book one time.

The next day she had gone to the library and had looked up the book: "The practical guide to bond with your familiar" by Nicholas White. It was generally accepted that having a familiar and having a strong bond with it was a sign of a strong witch or wizard. Daphne did have the ambition of becoming one of the strongest witches. Furthermore the kind of animal you bonded with also was an indication of your strength. Lots of magical people had a strong bond with their cat or even their owl, but cats where domesticated animals and after millennia of breeding for postal services, the owls of the magical world had little in common with their wild counterparts. But really strong wizards like the dark lord or dumbledore were able to bond with wilder, freer animals. This bond would increase the power and skills of both the wizard and the animal. To have a free animal like a snake or even a phoenix, the ultimate magical creature, deciding to bond with you, that was something else than a tamed toad or rat.

Since it was such a fascinating subject, Daphne had flipped through the book before, she now opened it again to find a passage she remembered in the first chapter of the book, how to find your familiar:

Oftentimes the wizard or witch will have a higher level of interaction with their familiar at their first meeting. This interaction could either be a positive or negative. The most famous example being the gryffindor that Goderic Gryffindor fought at their first encounter in the Scottish Highlands, but which later became his familiar and gave him his family name. The wizard or witch should be aware of these interactions in their daily life. A toad that seems to be interested in your work, a cat that tries to mess up your daily chores,… these might be the signs that an animal could have the potential to form a familiar bond with you.

It did seem to Daphne that stealing your wand and then later returning it, was a strong form of interaction. A crow was also a free animal, forming a bond with such an animal would strengthen her considerably as a witch. Furthermore a crow was related to the raven, which had been the familiar of one of her favourite historical witches, Rowena Ravenclaw. Daphne had decided to make it a project to try to form a bond with the strange crow in her garden.

In the last week she had tried different small exercises described in the guide. These had the purpose of starting to build the familiar bond with the animal. She had been able to lure the crow with some food. Another exercise had been to call to the bird and having it reply. This did work a few times, even though she was not sure that it had not been a coincidence, at least Astoria seemed to think it was replying to Daphne. The crow did also seem to enjoy circling her, which according to the book was a good sign. But after these first few more or less successful attempts, the next exercise had become somewhat frustrating.

A key step in forming the familiar bond was for the animal to willingly come into physical contact with you. This was one of the reasons forming a bond with a cat was quite easy, they had a natural inclination to start rubbing against the leg of their owner. But a bird was much more timid when it came to humans. Daphne had been hopeful at first that it would work, but she had become more desperate after a few days of failed attempts.

At least the bird did seem to want to stay in the garden for the moment. She had seen that it had built a nest in one of the taller trees in the back of the garden and did seem to enjoy flying around and doing something aerial acrobatics over the large pond over there. Daphne was not ready to give up her attempts, but it had become quite late today. She would come back tomorrow and try again.

"Let's go home and start preparing our guests tonight, Astoria.", she called to her sister, who had been skipping stones in the pond. That evening the Malfoy and Goyle families would come over for dinner. Her family had a large business, the biggest part of which was the growing and selling of ingredients for magical potions. While her father, as head of the family, also head a seat on the Wizengamot, he was not at the forefront of politics. He preferred to avoid the more extreme political positions, while at the same time protecting their business and other interests. This had helped her family in the past to become the very respectable family they now were.

Still, the membership of the Wizengamot meant that sometimes politics entered their daily lives. For example She and her sister would be dragged along to garden parties, or, like today, people visited their family in the hope to steer her father's position in a certain direction. This also helped her father to be aware of important business opportunities. For her it meant that she also knew quite a lot of kids of pureblood families. For example, Draco Malfoy and Gregory Goyle were usually also at the parties which they attended. They would also start attending Hogwarts this year. Astoria and Daphne went inside and started dressing up, as they had been trained to do, for the dinner that night.