Chapter 2 - Salem
A gentle breeze blew in from the unlatched kitchen window, causing Harry to sigh in relief at the lucky break from the sweltering summer heat. This was the warmest summer on record, again. At least according to the weather station, which Uncle Vernon kept insisting was exaggerating the temperatures at every opportunity; for what reason, he did not explain. Harry had not asked, of course. Asking questions was generally frowned upon in the Dursley household.
Or at least it was, if your last name just so happened to be Potter.
Harry brushed the last specks of dried gravy from Dudley's favorite plate, carefully dried it off, and stepped up onto the small ladder to place it back into the cupboard. A glance at the kitchen clock revealed that it was half past one. He had five more minutes until he had to take Aunt Petunia's apple pie out of the oven.
The front door slammed with a resounding bang, causing Harry to snap out of his autopilot mode. He could hear voices. One of which was unmistakably his cousin's. That would make the others most likely his gang.
Not that they were much of a gang at a mere eleven years old, but they sure liked to act the part.
The voices steadily grew louder, until he could discern another voice, a voice that made him stop cold.
"Give it back, Dudley!"
There was more laughter from the boys and an irritated shout from his sister. Immediately, Harry dropped the brush and ran over to the living room.
"It's mine!" Iris exclaimed, standing at the exit of the washroom, her passage blocked by Pierce Polkiss. In the center of the living room stood Dudley, a grin on his face, waving a notebook around.
"Is this your diary?" Dudley crowed. Then, with sudden interest, he opened the notebook to the last written page, and began to read aloud in a mockingly girlish voice.
"Dear Sabrina. Today is the 30th of June 2006, and it was... good. I talked a lot with Harry during the break and we made plans on what to read for the summer. Then we had classes again. It was mostly boring. Except when Lisa made fun of my hair again. I wish I had a friend like you in my class-" Dudley broke off at this point and started cackling in laughter, his gang joining in. Iris had tears in her eyes, which made Harry's blood boil. Still, he was stuck in the doorway like a deer caught in headlights. They hadn't really noticed his presence yet, too preoccupied with the show Dudley was putting on. "You gave it a name!" Dudley exclaimed between bouts of laughter. "It's almost like you have a real friend!"
"Let me go! I swear I'll-" Iris shouted in near hysteria, still being held back by Pierce.
"What are you gonna do, Cry-ris?" Dudley mocked with glee.
Accompanied by jeering shouts of "Cry-ris! Cry-ris!" from his friends, Dudley slowly tore out the page he had just read, then crumpled it into a ball, and after thinking for a moment, put it in his mouth. Harry knew that Iris was on the verge of actually breaking down and saw white. Without a plan, he dashed into the room and ran right into Dudley, knocking them both to the ground. Not waiting for him to get his bearings, he snatched up the diary and bolted from the room, past an astonished Pierce, with Dudley crying in rage behind him.
"Get back here, Freak!"
As he turned down the hallway, he stopped in front of the cupboard under the stairs to quickly slide the notebook under the gap of the door. Knowing that hiding anywhere in the house would be useless, he bolted for the door. Dudley's friends were hot on his tail, with Dudley himself following right behind.
Harry slowed halfway down the street to risk a look behind him. All five of them were coming after him, but two of them had stopped to mount their bikes. This time he would not be getting away. But at least, Iris was safe.
~V~
It was a battered and beaten boy that returned to No. 4, Privet Drive half an hour later, Dudley and his friends nowhere in sight. Harry carefully stepped into the hallway, until he heard soft weeping from the cupboard. Carefully, he stepped closer and whispered: "Iris?"
The sobbing stopped in an instant, and a dark-haired missile slammed out of the cupboard and wrapped him into a hug, causing him to wince.
"Harry! I'm so sorry! Are you okay? Did they- Oh my god! What happened? Did they do this to you?" She whispered in panic as she saw the bruises on Harry's arm.
"I'm fine. I got away!" Harry responded, trying to soothe his worried sister.
Iris flustered in indignation "Don't lie to me! They beat you, didn't they! And it was my fault! Again!" Then she broke down in sobs yet again. Harry held her in his arms, unsure what to do except rub her back.
"They didn't get me. But something... happened. You know what I mean"
Her entire demeanor changed at that. "Again? Like the... you know? What happened?"
Harry blushed and explained, "I was running down the road, and turned over into Wisteria Walk, but when I turned around to see where they were, I was suddenly... on the roof. You know? Of No. 1."
"Like you... teleported?" She asked wide-eyed, with awe in her voice.
"Uh... I guess? Problem was, I could see no way down. At least Dudley couldn't find me, but in the end, I had to jump down into the garden, and well..."
His sister sniffled and asked again "Are you okay?"
"It's gonna bruise, but I don't think anything is broken, I hope..." he admitted.
Iris gulped and looked to the window, where their aunt was still working the garden.
"Let's just hope Petunia doesn't find out," she whispered.
Harrys eyes widened at that. "Petunia... Oh no. The pie!"
He bolted towards the kitchen and was immediately greeted by the smell of burnt food. A desperate glance through the oven door confirmed he had indeed burnt the pie. Petunia was so going to kill him. As he stood in front of the oven, unsure what to do, he almost failed to notice Iris entering behind him.
He sighed and explained, "I was supposed to take this out of the oven over twenty minutes ago. It's probably burnt for good."
However, Iris was silent. As he worriedly looked out the window, he heard a rattling noise and turned back to see Iris, trying to move the stepladder. She gasped, then looked up at him with puppy dog eyes. "Help me move it?"
Unsure of what she was doing, he obliged. They grabbed it together and moved the stepladder over next to the fridge, and he held her while she climbed onto it. He kept observing in confusion, but didn't interrupt. She had that look on her face, the one that always heralded either trouble, or something awesome. Mostly, both. She reached the top of the ladder, then stretched to her full impressive height of four feet two, and raised herself onto tiptoes. Harry looked up to watch, but had to squint his eyes against the ceiling light. It was peculiar. From this angle, her hair always looked a little red.
With a shaking hand, she reached for Petunias wooden kitchen clock, grabbed the minute hand, and slowly started twisting it counter-clockwise. Gears groaned in protest.
Confusion turned to realization as Harry put her plan together. Would that work? If the clock said half past one, she couldn't punish him for burning the pie, if he wasn't to take it out yet. Right? Iris pulled the minute handle all the way to half past one and slumped back down. Finally, she jumped off the ladder and grinned at him victoriously.
Harry however inwardly slumped. Of course, it wouldn't work. Petunia would just blame the pie burning on his freakishness and punish him even more so. But looking at his sister's happy face, as if she was expecting praise, he couldn't bring himself to admit that to her. So instead, he hugged her again with a smile, then watched as she skipped out of the room. She almost seemed to be glowing, her spirits miraculously lifted in the knowledge she had paid him back for his help.
With a sad smile, Harry turned back towards the oven, and then froze in shock. There, inside the metal enclosure, was a perfectly delicious apple pie. No signs of charring, even the smell was gone. It looked just like it had half an hour ago.
~V~
In the end, they had been punished anyway, although it had nothing to do with the pie. Dudley had simply mentioned the Freaks attacking him and his friends, and they had both been locked up for the night. Harry looked up at the wooden boards at the highest point of the side of his cupboard, to a gap where one of them was missing, and was met with Iris' gaze.
When the siblings had grown too big for the small cupboard under the stairs, Uncle Vernon had taken great pleasure in putting his drills to work, all the while rambling on about how they made the work so much easier, and had turned the set of shoe drawers above the commode into a second "room". They were more or less adjacent, although Iris' "room" was a few feet above the ground, necessitating her to climb up the commode when she needed to get in or out. The rooms were originally completely separated, until, within the first week, Iris had somehow pried off one of the old wooden planks. Now, they could at least see each other. It also meant that Harry could once again read at night.
While Iris didn't have as many weird things just happening around her, like they did with him, she did have a trick of her own. Harry could rarely do any of his freakish things on command, they just happened, mostly when the situation was particularly dark. Iris, however, was his light in the dark.
The girl closed her eyes and held up her hand. He smiled up at her as a small glowing orb of iridescent light lit up in her palm, and bathed the room in color. Its glow brought with it all the colors at once, each shining in different directions many times over, and constantly changing, shifting. Light danced across the walls in kaleidoscopic patterns, shapes like infinite butterflies drawn on a canvas of old wooden planks. After a second, it seemingly decided on a single color, and then slowly started fading through different ones. She opened her eyes again and smiled, as the ball of colorful light gently floated towards the window between their rooms, where it hovered. Iris moved back from it, and pulled out a heavy book. This was the way they spent every night they were locked in the cupboard recently. With her orb of gently shifting light hovering right in the gap, it was just enough to make out text in the darkness.
From beneath a loose floor board Harry produced a second-hand book, parted the worn pages in the spot where he had left his sock as a bookmark, and got immersed once more in the wonderous adventures of one Bilbo Baggins.
~V~
Iris flipped open her copy of A Comprehensive Introduction to How the Universe Works. Ever since she had discovered Sabrina the Teenage Witch this year and declared it her favorite show ever, she had sworn off all other forms of fiction. Instead, she was looking for more information about their strange magical powers, for that's what she was convinced they had to be. So far, without any success. Anything she read either didn't help her explain how she could do what she did, or it went right over her head.
If it wasn't for all the strange things that happened around Harry as well, she would have thought she was going crazy. What was even stranger was the fact that it was so different for them. For Harry, it seemed like magic just happened whenever he wanted or needed it badly enough, and it could do all kinds of things. It was amazing, really. For her, however, the only thing she could do if she focused hard enough was create these little lights. Yes, they were really pretty, but they weren't very useful, except as a glorified reading light. Sadly, it wasn't even doing a great job at being that. While she could make it any color she wanted, if she focused hard enough, she was never able to turn it white, and keeping it any single color took a lot of effort. Harry had never complained though.
When she wanted to do more things like Harry, she had to get creative. The only times she had managed to make any other magic happen was when she used... things... to help her along. She couldn't really explain it, and it didn't always work, but sometimes it just made sense.
Since her magical light was the most solid starting point, she was currently researching how light worked in the physics book she had borrowed from the school library. Apparently, there was a whole spectrum of visible colors, each a different frequency of light, like on a rainbow. Except the color White. It turned out, white light was just a mix of all the colors, who knew? She paused. Could this be the reason why she couldn't make her light glow white?
Armed with this new knowledge, she tried to focus on her light again. If white was a combination of all colors, could she make it white by making her light glow in all the colors at once?
She began to think about all the colors of the rainbow. Now how did that song go? She hummed along and sang in her head. Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, and Purple too... Her light started to cycle through each of these colors. However, she struggled when it came to Purple. Iris narrowed her eyes and looked back at the physics book.
In the book there were actually seven colors. Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo? and Violet... She could try that. With another thought, her light started to cycle through the colors once again, seamlessly fading from one to the next. She focused harder. It cycled faster. Iris grumbled in irritation.
Try as she might, she couldn't make it go any faster; and now Harry was looking at her oddly, clearly annoyed at the distraction from his book. With a frown, she relaxed her focus, and her light turned back to its regular iridescent state.
Was it really too much to ask for a simple white reading light?
~V~
The end of July arrived, and with it came strange letters, strange owls, and a strange bearded giant of a man.
"So it is magic, the things we can do?" an excited Iris asked, earning a rapidly paling face from Uncle Vernon.
"Tha's right, it's magic! Yer a witch an' a wizard, jus' like yer parents! An' bloody good ones too, I reckon..." the man, who had introduced himself as Hagrid, responded with what was probably a smile.
"And there's a whole school for magic? And we can go there?" asked Harry with wide eyes.
"It's the finest school for witchcraft and wizardry in all o' Britain. And yer gonna have the greates' Headmaster Hogwarts has ever seen: Albus Dumbledore"
Hagrid's eyes shone with admiration. Iris was bubbling with anticipation.
A smile came upon Harry's lips. His sister had long since driven it home that they weren't quite normal, and he had accepted that what they could do was magic, so the idea that there was a whole world of wizards and witches out there didn't really come as that much of a surprise to him.
He was more worried about the expression on Iris' face. That damn glimmer in her eyes.
It looked like he would have his hands full trying to keep her out of trouble.
~V~
"What an honor, Mr. Potter! Thank you."
Harry shook yet another hand of someone he had never met, yet who still seemed to know him for some reason. This was certainly not what he had expected from a secret wizarding world. He looked over to the bar of the dingy pub, where Iris was standing next to Hagrid, shuffling awkwardly as Harry kept being overrun with strangers. The boy felt kind of bad for making them wait, however he also didn't know what to say to these people so they would leave him alone.
"Would you please sign my Boy Who Lived copy? My daughter is your greatest fan!" A woman wearing a bright green top hat almost begged.
Harry had no idea what a Boy Who Lived was, nor why he would have a copy that needed signing. Turning to the next person, he tried to smile, but the man's words didn't really register in his mind anymore. He just nodded instead. Just as he was about to tell the man with the turban something to hopefully make him go away too, he felt a tug on his shirt. Iris was there, looking at him with wide eyes. It seemed she was as uncomfortable with this situation as he was. He muttered an excuse and fled the crowd towards the waiting figure of Hagrid.
"Who was that?" asked Iris, once Hagrid pulled them into another room.
"Who? Er... I don't think I remember a single name... I mean Doris... something? But there were just so many..."
"No, the last one, with the turban" Iris clarified.
As Harry shrugged, Hagrid cut in. "Ah, tha's a Professor from Hogwarts, he teaches Defense against the Dark Arts this year, ya see? Bit of an odd fella if yeh ask me... Come on now, best get goin'. Lots ter buy."
"Why'd you ask?" Harry turned back to Iris with a questioning look, but she just shrugged.
Harry's follow up question was cut off as Hagrid tapped his umbrella on a stone brick on the wall in front of them, and a whole new world opened up.
"Harry, Iris, welcome. To Diagon Alley."
~V~
Harry took a breath and swished.
With dismay he was forced to watch as yet another wand catastrophically malfunctioned and destroyed part of Ollivander's dusty shop. The strange and excitable old man seemed almost giddy as he removed the mahogany wand from his shaking fingers and put it back in its box, only to produce another one.
"Ah yes, we're on the right track, but maybe something less temperamental it seems..." Mr. Ollivander muttered to himself.
"I wonder..."
He was holding a nondescript wooden box wrapped in a leather belt. Without another word, the eccentric wandmaker opened it up and handed Harry yet another wand. With a worried look he glanced at the pile of already discarded wands, and gave it a half-hearted swish. Or he tried to, as the moment his fingers touched the wand, he knew it was the one.
Harry let out a gasp as fireworks of red and golden sparks shot from the tip of the wand, and his arm was filled with a gentle warmth as magic thrummed through the air and tingled with a sense of power.
"Bravo, yes, bravo!" Mr. Ollivander and Iris were both excitedly clapping.
"Curious, Indeed, how very curious-"
"Congrats, Harry! Can we do mine now?" An excited Iris cut in, almost bouncing in anticipation.
Harry chuckled as he ruffled her hair. He was a bit worried, though. With how much chaos his own wands had caused, he shuddered to think what kind of mayhem Iris would leave in her wake.
~V~
"Not Thestral hair either, eh? You're proving an even more tricky customer than your brother, Ms. Potter..." Mr. Ollivander said with a dubious tone.
Iris stood in the center of the room, awkwardly holding yet another wooden stick, feeling silly as she waved it around. Was something supposed to happen?
"Let's try something more exotic... Fourteen inches, elder wood, chimera heartstring, quite swishy, one of my father's you see..." He took out an ornate pale wooden wand from a very dusty box and handed it over to Iris.
It felt just like yet another twig. She shrugged and waved it around. Again, nothing happened. Mr. Ollivander frowned. He counted something off on his fingers, as he took the wand back.
"We could try... ahh this one? Thirteen and three quarters, yew, unyielding, with a Thunderbird feather core. A very rare combination, probably the only one in the shop..."
Iris looked helplessly at Harry, as she waved the piece of dead wood around to no avail. He gave her a look back and shrugged.
"Curious..." Mr. Ollivander muttered, "and you did both get a Hogwarts letter, yes?" he asked carefully.
"Erm... yeah? What's that got to do with anything?" Iris asked in confusion.
"Not to worry... I guess I'll just have to pull out all the stops then!" Mr. Ollivander declared.
Thirty minutes later, Iris had been made to go through several more awkward rounds of 'hold this, wait never mind', and then the old man had seemingly decided to switch tactics and had made her hold several wooden boxes, feathers, and other strange objects, while he inspected them with a tiny monocle. Sometime throughout all that, Hagrid had returned bearing gifts, and was now warily watching next to Harry.
"My apologies, Ms. Potter, you seem to have me stumped... We've tried every single core type in my shop, but you don't seem to have any reaction to any of them. Yet you did perform accidental magic, yes?"
Iris shuffled nervously. Was he thinking that she was... not a witch at all? But she could do magic, couldn't she? Her eyes narrowed. Yes, she thought, she could do magic. She would show him.
The girl raised her hand, opened her palm, closed her eyes and focused on the familiar feeling.
A flash of light, and the dusty shop was lit up in all the colors of the rainbow.
Mr. Ollivander's eyes went wide. "Marvelous! Truly marvelous! Magical indeed..." he seemed to mutter to himself. "But never have I..." he trailed off, as his eyes came to rest on a wooden crate. "...could he truly?"
Once again lost in his thoughts, the old man stumbled towards the crate in the back of the shop, and removed a small package containing three smaller boxes, each sized like any other wand box.
Iris frowned and let go of the iridescent ball of light. It faded out of being, specs of color being chased by the gloomy dusty atmosphere into corners far away.
Mr. Ollivander wordlessly removed a black wand and held it out to the girl.
As Iris' fingers slipped onto the handle, her eyes widened. This was definitely not made of wood, whatever it was.
Three pairs of eyes looked at her in anticipation, as she held the stick of... something.
"Well, give it a wave," the old man encouraged. Iris did so.
Nothing happened. She slumped, then looked back at the wandmaker, expecting him to take it back again. However, the old man was just staring at her expectantly.
Iris frowned and looked down at the wand. It was made out of solid black material, and felt like cold hard stone in her hand. The surface was carved with intricate patterns, but on the handle, as well as at the tip, glinted embedded crystals of some kind. She looked at the shiny crystal sitting at the top, which seemed to be a different color from every angle she looked at it... just like her-
Her eyes widened. Without a second's hesitation, she focused on her light again and called it back into her hand.
There was a blinding explosion of color. Light seemed to almost take on physical form as it was refracted by the crystal in her palm, shot out of the tip of the wand and flooded the room.
Wherever it struck, magic followed. Boxes were levitating, curtains were rustling, glassware was singing. For a moment, it seemed all the colors in the room had inverted, before deciding it was just a trick of the light.
One second, and it was over.
Harry was slack jawed. Mr. Ollivander was clapping excitedly. Iris had a silly grin on her face.
"Truly, a momentous day!" the wandmaker exclaimed, still clapping.
Iris smiled and asked, "What kind of core was it, sir?"
"That's just the thing—it wasn't," crowed Ollivander.
Iris frowned at that. "What do you mean?"
"Well, just what I said. This wand has no core, Ms. Potter. It is made from obsidian, thirteen inches, and contains an amalgamation of quartz, emerald, and amethyst crystals..." he trailed off.
"At least from what I can tell. You see, this is one of my father's possessions. I have never made a wand like this, and likely neither had he. I've tried several times over the years, but never have I ever managed to match even one of them. I truly cannot imagine the purpose for which they have been created, nor their capabilities, for to my knowledge, nobody has ever even used one before."
"Erm... But you think it could work for me?" Iris asked carefully.
Mr. Ollivander sighed. "None of the other wands showed even the slightest indication of any connection with you. I dare say you wouldn't be able to do magic with any regular wand, Ms. Potter."
He paused, then continued. "It seems that a wand like this truly is your best bet, if it could even be called a wand... It's more of a focus as I see it, although I have no idea as to what you might be able to accomplish with it. That is up to you to find out, I'm afraid."
~V~
Harry let out a breath as they finally left the wandmakers shop, their purse fourteen galleons lighter.
He had been worried after Gringrotts, where Iris had almost accidentally started some sort of feud with the goblins, and even more worried when the time came to get their wands. And while she had once again found a way to make the experience truly unique, it seemed she had actually managed to stay out of trouble for once.
"What's next on the list anyway?" Harry asked, as they followed Hagrid out onto the street.
"Robes, gloves and a hat... A pointy hat, like in the fairy tales?" Iris giggled at that.
Hagrid pointed at a shop with the words Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions printed above the entrance.
Harry smiled. Well, at least there was no way she would have time to cause trouble while clothes shopping, right?
~V~
"Hello," a smooth droll voice sounded from the chair next to her. "Hogwarts, too?"
Iris turned to look to her right and gasped.
Smooth honey blonde hair, eyes like pale sapphires, and the youthful features of what would definitely grow up to be a fairy tale prince.
"Yes! We are going to be classmates, then?" Iris tried to sound as calm and composed as she definitely wasn't feeling.
"I suppose," he said slowly, "any inkling as to which house you might be in?"
Oh my gosh he even talks like a prince! Iris internally gushed.
She scrambled for an answer that wouldn't reveal her total ignorance on the topic.
"I might have some idea," she said mysteriously.
The boy chuckled at that. "I expect I'll be in Slytherin. Although I suppose Ravenclaw wouldn't be too awful..."
Iris shot a quick look across the room where Harry was still getting his robes tended to by the older witch, and was throwing them odd looks of his own.
Then she decided to be bold. "My name's Iris, pleasure to make your acquaintance."
She cringed internally at her words, but hoped that she came off as sufficiently posh.
"Draco Malfoy," he said smoothly. "I'd shake your hand, but I'm a bit pinned down at the moment."
Iris giggled at that. She didn't even know why; it wasn't all that funny.
Draco said something else about families, but she didn't really pick it up, so she just nodded. She was mostly paying attention to the way he said it.
He was just so damn cool.
~V~
"See you at Hogwarts!"
Harry shifted nervously as Iris waved to the blonde boy from the clothes shop. Hagrid beckoned them across the street bearing two large ice cream cones. He hadn't heard much of their conversation. The boy knew he should be happy that Iris finally seemed to have made a friend, but he still couldn't shake the feeling of unease that was settling in his stomach. Something told him that this boy was bad news. However, he knew better than to voice his worries when his sister was in such high spirits for once.
Iris bounced back over to Hagrid, but instead of grabbing the ice cream, she took the cage from his other hand. It held her newest favorite pet, a black cat that Hagrid had gotten her as a gift alongside with a white owl for Harry, and which she had promptly named Salem. Never mind the fact that the cat was actually female, the moment she had seen the black fur ball she was dead set on her choice.
"Who's a good kitty? Did you miss me Salem?" Iris cooed over the cat, trying to pet her through the bars of the cage, resulting in an irritated "Mroww!"
Harry smiled and walked up to Hagrid, and gratefully accepted the cone. As he watched yet another stranger bow and thank him in passing, he turned back to Hagrid and asked the question that had been burning on his mind.
"Hagrid? How is it that all these people seem to know who I am?"
The large man sighed. "...I need a bloody pint fer this."
~V~
Dear Sabrina,
today is the 1st of August 2006, and I made a friend!
Draco is a wizard too and he will go to the same school we will be going to in September. He is also super cool! I can't wait to ask him all about magic! He must know a lot about all kinds of things.
I'll have to practice so I can show him something cool too when I see him again.
I don't think Harry likes him much, but I think that's because he doesn't know him a lot. I hope they will get along though.
Also, I found your cat, Salem! Well, he was a gift from Hagrid, and also, he is technically a she. But she's so cute!
And we're really going to a magic school! And learn actual magic! We have a class called Transfiguration, where it looks like we can learn all cool kinds of spells like turning things into animals and people into things, like you do! I think that's going to be my favorite class!
I really hope I can make lots more cool friends like Draco at Hogwarts. I can't wait until we finally get there, it still seems forever away...