A/N: The last chapter before Hogwarts! Next chapter may take a tad longer as I'll need to figure out the staff of Hogwarts and who a good number of the students will be.
Flower of Life
On the thirteenth day of December 1939, Morgana skipped school with a smile. It's not like she would face any consequences for the action after all, she had already used mind magic to place subtle compulsions in the minds of her teachers to ignore her absence for the day. It was a significant day for her, the one that marked the end of her eleventh year in this world, and she would not spend her eleventh birthday being bored to death by the fools in that school.
With the eleventh year of her life at an end, the twelfth year of her life would begin, and with it she would finally enter into a world of magic that she believed she could make into a true home for herself.
That would be later, though. For now, she was content to simply enjoy her birthday in peace and quiet atop the bed that she was currently levitating a few feet above the ground while she read a book she'd recently acquired on ancient greek mythology. She had always enjoyed the stories of the greek gods and heroes. She wondered if perhaps there was any merit to the idea that their gods had simply been particularly prevalent witches and wizards of the time; she'd seen that idea in a story or two her past self had read.
~FoL~
Her memory still wasn't quite perfect. In particular, memories made before she had begun training in occlumency were prone to being fuzzy and missing details. With this fuzziness in mind, she began to feel nervous about the near future when she learned that Germany had begun waging war on France in early June.
If she remembered correctly, the Blitz would begin sometime fairly soon after the fall of France, and she wanted to be very far from London when the Blitz occurred. It certainly would not do for her life to be ended in a random bombing before she even got to begin attending Hogwarts.
This nervousness led her to keep a closer eye on the news of what was occurring with the war, which only made her more nervous if anything.
In particular, the headline for today filled her gut with anxiety. "Paris Falls! France Surrenders!" was not a particularly comforting thing for her to see in late June. She'd hoped the French would last much longer than that, now that they were out of the picture Morgana had no idea how long it would be until the Blitz would begin. All she really knew was that it would begin within the same year, probably within a few months if she was particularly unlucky.
~FoL~
As Albus stepped into the rundown old orphanage, an odd sense of deja-vu spread through him. He felt almost like he was reliving a day from only a couple years previously when he had gone to visit one Tom Riddle and invite him to Hogwarts.
Like that day, a letter written on parchment paper sat in his pocket. Like that day, the child he was coming to visit lived within an orphanage. Like that day, he could feel her presence even before he opened the door to the orphanage like he had once been able to sense Tom in the same way.
It was very uncommon for children of this age to have such a sense of refinement to their magic. A normal witch or wizard only developed to this extent after years of training at a school of witchcraft, and even then some would never gain the level of power he had felt on the day he had met Tom and the day that he was now coming to meet a young girl named Morgana Fata. Hopefully, his actions here today would not have the same effect of causing the girl to become as closed off to him as Tom Riddle had become.
She had an odd name, Morgana Fata. An Italian statue from the 1500s shared the same name in reverse: "Fata Morgana". The name was Italian for "Mirage" or "Morgan the Fairy", or as the figure of legend was more commonly known in wizarding Britain, "Morgan le Fey".
The figure from Arthurian legend was divisive even among witches and wizards, and the truth behind her had been twisted with time. It was unclear whether Morgan le Fey was a benevolent witch or whether she was a more sinister being than that. Legends depicted her as both a student and a teacher of Merlin, as a healer and as an enchantress. Most believed in the darker interpretations of the ancient witch's tale, and it would be those that many of the students of Hogwarts would associate young Morgana Fata with.
Her name hadn't meant too much to Albus beyond his assumption of how the student body of Hogwarts would take it, and so he had come to this meeting with no great expectations. Now, however, he was much more invested in the coming meeting than he had been before he set out for it.
His eyes scanned the small entryway he had entered into and rested upon a young woman that was now looking up at him after he had entered.
"Ah, good morning my dear. My name is Albus Dumbledore and I am here to visit one of your charges. I have an enrollment offer for her from a rather prestigious school." Albus smiled cheerily down at the woman. She looked about thirty, perhaps, with wavy brown hair.
"Which of our charges are you here for, Mr. Dumbledore?" The woman had straightened up at his words, seemingly taking interest in the possibilities he was here to offer to one of the orphans under her care. It seemed she had some level of care for her charges then. That was good to see.
"I am here to see one 'Morgana Fata', Mrs..?" The woman stiffened slightly at Morgana's name. Interesting.
"Ah, you're here to see her. I suppose that makes sense. Oh, and it's Ms. Pierce. My apologies."
"Indeed. Could you tell me anything about her, perhaps?" Albus' eyes locked with Ms. Pierce's and he read the surface thoughts represented as clouds beneath the night sky of her mind as she explained a little about the girl to him.
"Morgana has been with us since she was young, about a month after her birth. She used to be somewhat more lively, but she's been quiet and kept to herself for the most part ever since an incident when she was six. She… witnessed another orphan die at that age." The woman's mind told the same story, though she seemingly had some suspicions that Morgana had been involved in the boy's death in some way. Considering the ages involved and the horror that had been on young Morgana's face in that memory, it seemed likely that it had been an accident of some kind if so. Regardless, he would have to investigate further to make sure.
"I am sorry to hear that Ms. Pierce. I'm sure we will be able to coax her out of her shell if given the chance at our school." He smiled gently at the woman. "Now, could I perhaps be shown to young Miss Morgana? She will have a busy day today if she accepts our offer."
"Oh, yes, of course! Right this way." Ms. Pierce led him up the set of wooden steps he had seen in her memory and pointed down the hallway as she turned to face him. "Her's is the last door on the left there. She's usually reading at this time of day."
Albus nodded at her agreeably. "Thank you Ms. Pierce. I will stop by to let you know when I leave, with or without Miss Fata." With that, he turned and headed down the hallway.
When he reached the correct door, he took a deep breath to center himself and knocked. He would have to handle this meeting carefully and adeptly to ensure its outcome was better than the one he had had with Tom Riddle.
A soft voice echoed from within the room. "Come in!"
Dumbledore opened the door with a slight creak and stepped inside, taking a second to look around it.
The room was rather small, smaller even than he remembered Tom's to be. There was a simple short dresser against one wall. On top of the dresser was a small collection of books and toys, and opposite of the dresser was the bed that young Morgana was sitting on with a book beside her, looking up at him in curiosity.
He wasted no time as he locked eyes with her and entered her mind. No resistance was given to him, and when he willed it a star lit up within her mind to guide him to the memory he was looking for.
"Hey Johnny!" She called out from halfway up the stairs, and the older, larger child turned to face her while the other children were walking into their rooms. "What do you want, runt?"
Johnny froze oddly in place for a moment before his knees gave out and he fell down the stairs like a puppet who'd had their strings cut. His limp body pushed her into the wall as he fell and he continued falling past her even as she, too late, reached out to try and grab his wrist. With an odd sense of finality, his body reached the bottom of the stairs and his head slammed into the floor.
Morgana silently stared at Johnny's still body. She… hadn't meant for this. He was clearly dead, and no child, even a bully like him, deserved that. "Morgana? Are you coming to your-" She looked up the staircase, seeing Ms. Pierce through suddenly blurry eyes. The woman had her hands over her mouth as she stared past Morgana at the boy a floor below her. The dead boy.
The memory was saddening, but it did at least assuage his fears as to what might have happened. The girl clearly wasn't at fault for the rather traumatic incident. She hadn't touched the boy until after he fell and there were no noticeable signs of magic use within the memory. It looked like it had been nothing more than a very unfortunately timed fainting spell.
"Good morning Miss Fata. I am Professor Albus Dumbledore and I've come here with an enrollment offer from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, at which I am the Deputy Headmaster." The girl's eyes lit up at the mention of his school, and she immediately launched into excited questioning.
"Witchcraft? Is that what I can do? I've been practicing, you know, mostly levitating things! What kinds of witchcraft can I learn?" As the small girl barraged him with questions, every object and piece of furniture began levitating off of the ground slightly in a rather impressive show of her magic, likely due to her excitement at the possibilities. Abruptly, they fell to the ground as she frowned thoughtfully. "Wait… How am I supposed to pay for something like this?"
"There is no need to worry my dear, in special cases such as yours there is a fund set up to pay for basic supplies and enrollment. It will all be taken care of at no cost to you." He smiled gently down at her as she seemed to cheer up at his words. "Now, on the topic of what kind of magic you will be learning: How would you like me to show you a little bit of what I will be teaching you?"
The girl's eyes lit up again and she nodded at him with an enthusiastic grin.
"I will of course reverse what I am about to do." He carefully explained, before pulling his wand from within his robes and giving it a simple wave at the books atop the girl's dresser. As one, the books all transformed into an assortment of kittens.
In a flash, the girl was across the room playing with the tiny animals and cooing at them, seeming completely absorbed with her interactions with them until, "Ouch!" she was scratched.
Albus let out a chuckle as he waved his wand again, returning the kittens to their previous form and casting a simple silent healing charm on the girl's bleeding hand. "A fan of cats, then?"
"Yes! I've never gotten to do more than look at one, though. Street cats aren't safe and the orphanage doesn't have any." She frowned slightly at the thought, before looking slightly longingly at her books.
"Perhaps you can get one for yourself, then. Hogwarts does allow for familiars after all, and I suppose I could be persuaded to assist you in acquiring one." Getting the girl a pet would be a good action to take. It would both be a morally good action to take to help cheer up the orphan girl and it would help endear him to her so he could help guide her down a positive path in life over the coming years.
Morgana smiled brightly up at him. "Really? When can we? I'd love to have a cat, they're so cute!"
"We can find one for you today, if you are planning on accepting our offer." With that, he reached into his pocket once again and withdrew Morgana's Hogwarts letter before handing it off to her.
After a brief period of reading the letter, Morgana looked up at him with a grin. "When can we leave?"
~FoL~
Dumbledore seemed to like her, Morgana had noticed. That must have meant he hadn't noticed anything in her mind that she hadn't wanted him to see when she'd faintly felt him within it, as if he'd seen what she had actually done he almost certainly would not have been so kind to her.
Diagon Alley on the other hand was anything but friendly at the moment. There was an air of nervousness and anxiety that hung over the place like a shroud, and it had lingered even within the halls of Gringotts when they'd stopped there to pick up the funds they would need. She could only assume it had something to do with the war with Grindelwald.
Over the following hour they had made their way through the alley, stopping at various stores to acquire the necessities she would need for Hogwarts. Most of what they had gotten had been from second-hand stores, though Dumbledore seemed to make sure that everything they got was of a reasonable quality. The first exception he had made was for her potions supplies, second hand cauldrons were likely to have defects apparently.
The second exception he had made was for her wand, and that was why they were now within Ollivander's store.
"Ah, Miss Morgana Fata. I've been expecting you. I wonder if you'll live up to your namesake… But no matter, let's find you a wand, shall we?" With his characteristically odd words said, the man began grabbing wands off of the shelf and bringing them to her one at a time for her to try out.
"Nine inches, springy yew with a unicorn tail hair core?" She waved the wand to no effect and it was immediately taken from her hand.
"Twelve inches, rigid oak with a dragon heartstring core?" She waved the wand and a nearby vase exploded violently before the wand was hastily removed from her hand. "Definitely not that one."
"Eleven inches, nice and supple holly with a phoenix feather core?" She held the wand that she thought might one day be Harry Potter's for a brief second before it was snatched away. "No, not quite."
"Perhaps this one will do. Ten and a half inches, flexible birch with another phoenix feather core?" She waved the wand yet again. It felt comfortable in her hand, but no reaction beyond that. Ollivander took it from her. "Still not what we're looking for."
"Let's see… Perhaps? Ah, this one might work. Twelve and three quarter inches, pliant maple wood with a phoenix feather core." She waved this wand, and a sense of rightness flowed through her as violet and silver sparks poured from the wand's tip.
"Ah, a perfect match, just what we are looking for. You know…" Here Ollivander stopped and gazed at her briefly with considering eyes. "A combination of Maple and Phoenix Feather is rather unusual. Maple wands often choose high-achieving travelers and explorers, those who go out into the world to do great things, while phoenix feathers are notorious for their pickiness in their chosen masters. I think perhaps we can expect you to be quite exceptional."
Morgana smiled good-naturedly at the odd man. "No pressure I'm sure. I'll do my best Mr. Ollivander."
"How odd, I didn't tell you my name."
"It's above your door, sir." She laughed a little as she headed for said door while Dumbledore paid the man for her wand.
With that strange encounter out of the way, it wasn't long before Morgana was at Magical Menagerie 'oohing' and 'ahhing' at the cute cats they had there. None of them really called to her though, and it took a good bit before anything caught her eye. "Hey, Professor Dumbledore?"
"Yes Morgana?" The man smiled cheerily down at her.
"You said I could pick out whatever I wanted right?" She smiled back at him charismatically.
"Of course, my dear." A twinkle entered his eyes as he no doubt realized she'd decided on something unusual.
"Awesome!" With that settled, Morgana walked over to the black bird that had caught her attention. It turned its head to face her and let out a loud 'Caw!' noise.
"Yes, you're perfect, aren't you?" She reached out carefully, allowing the crow to inspect her hand carefully before lightly rubbing under the bird's beak. She moved her other hand close and the bird considered it for a few seconds, before moving from its perch onto her hand.
"Well, that is an unusual choice. I'll have to get you special permission for him, you know?" Albus had tried to sound disapproving, but he mostly seemed amused at her choice for his own mysterious reasons.
"Something about him called to me. I'm not even usually a fan of birds." She shrugged, before walking with Dumbledore to purchase her newly acquired familiar.
~FoL~
When Morgana finally got home from Diagon Alley with her school trunk full of supplies, she collapsed onto her bed and let out a massive sigh of relief. 'Thank god that went well.' She moved her head to the side and gazed across the room at her dresser where her new familiar was perched precariously atop one of her books that looked about ready to fall over and knock the rest of her books down like dominos.
'He certainly doesn't seem bothered.'
She had of course had some confidence in her ability to make sure Dumbledore wouldn't be able to find anything suspicious in her mind, but at the same time the wizard wouldn't go on to be as renowned as he would become for no reason. She'd had plenty of reason to believe he might find his way around her defenses, but it luckily hadn't happened.
From there it was just a matter of being herself, she didn't really have any reason to hide her personality after all and it would've later become suspicious if she did. Still, it was nerve wracking to be around the middle aged wizard, she could feel the man's magic and it went well beyond eclipsing her own in power.
He seemed kind enough, however, and as long as she gave him no reason to suspect her she was fairly sure he would stay that way.
Some of her future plans might give him a reason, but she had hopes that she could keep him on her side at least for most of the time she was in school. She would just have to play her cards right. 'Actually…'
Her eyes returned to her familiar, who was now picking at one of her books' covers with his beak. "Do you think Blackjack would be a good name for you? Cause I do."
The bird looked up at her briefly before returning to ruining one of her muggle books, he didn't seem to care. "Blackjack it is then."