°°°
SPARROW. °°°
Sparrow’s eyes flew open. It was dark, well
before dawn. Jill’s warm embrace was about her. But she would have
to leave it, for in the moment her eyes had opened she remembered
what she had missed last night – the meeting with
Miranda. She had forgotten to even beg a postponement.
°°° THE
WALKWAY BETWEEN THE ASTRONOMY AND THE DRAGON TOWERS. MEET ME THERe.
°°°
⋄⋄
RIGHT RIGHT, I’M
REALLY SORRY. I’LL
BE THERE SHORTLY. ⋄⋄
°°°
YOU’RE ALWAYS
SHORTLY. °°°
⋄⋄
OH, EVERYONE IS SHORTLY
TO YOU.⋄⋄
Sparrow slid out of Jill’s arms. It was
thankfully still warm within the curtains of the now-repaired
four-poster. Courtesy mostly of Jill, who was a furnace all by
herself. The girl shifted in her sleep, looking a little uneasy, as
if feeling the loss – Sparrow laid a gentle kiss on Jill’s cheek.
That would have to do for the moment. Jill smiled faintly.
Sparrow took a deep breath, and steeled herself
for the cold, before opening the curtains. It would be but a moment
for her to find her wand and cast a warming charm, but in that moment
the cold was stealing into her bones, her fingers and toes aching in
protest, even before she had to put them on the cold wooden floor.
Not a moment after she stood, she felt slender
arms wrapping about her, and she nearly gasped aloud.
"Am I a decent substitute?" whispered
Jocasta. "I couldn’t match Jill, but maybe I can do what I
can."
"Mmm." Sparrow leaned into the
embrace. "Warm enough. What are you doing up then? Couldn’t
sleep?"
"Sometimes I can’t," whispered
Jocasta. "Sometimes it’s a little too loud in this head of mine, even with my
girls here. Don’t worry about that, I’m doing better than I was.
What are you doing up? Wanted
to get your recitation done at the first little crack of dawn?"
"When did I even conk out last night?"
said Sparrow. "Nine? I’d have had enough sleep even if I
wasn’t an early bird."
"Oh no
no," murmured Jocasta. "That’s why you’re awake. Why
are you up, dear? Why
are you leaving poor Jill to be alone?"
Sparrow tilted her head back to rest against
Jocasta’s shoulder. "Had a meeting last night I missed.
Figured I’d apologize this morning. But then I got woken up by her
Sending, like she’s been waiting all night. Pfft. I’m the early
bird and Miranda’s the night owl."
"And this is the time your schedules
meet," murmured Jocasta. "So be it. Unsettling hour to be
about, though, 3 AM is no time for any but
the odd and the underhanded. And us, it seems...can I walk you to
your meeting?"
"Miss me too much to let go?"
"Just want to make sure you don’t trip
and fall down the stairs. Or whatever scrape you might get into
today. Or at least I can be there with my wand when you crack
your skull."
Sparrow
glanced at the four-poster. "And
leave poor Jill alone?"
"I’ll give her a kiss goodbye."
Jocasta released Sparrow, leaving the girl to shiver again as she
climbed back in through the curtains.
As Sparrow was
retrieving her wand and casting a warming charm over herself, she
could hear noises from the four-poster that sounded less like a
gentle kiss goodbye and more like the two of them couldn’t consider
letting go of each other. Nor
indeed did they seem to be stopping, even after Sparrow had got all
her day’s school uniform on. Sparrow
cleared her throat pointedly.
Jill and
Jocasta both tumbled out of the curtains laughing, their hair both
in rumpled messes.
"Run Sparrow," said Jocasta, eyes twinkling with mirth,
"save yourself."
But it was too late, for here was Jill looming
over her, hands cupping her cheeks, leaning down – hesitating –
Sparrow nodded eagerly.
…
Between the warming charm and the fire of
Jill’s kiss, Sparrow was still sweating as she approached the door
to the high walkway, arm-in-arm with Jocasta.
"I’m good from here," said Sparrow.
"You sure?" said Jocasta. "I
wouldn’t mind hanging around, seeing the sunrise with you,
listening to your adorable voice as you do your incantation."
Sparrow sighed. "Well, maybe I’m not so
good from here. So good would be you and Jill with me. But
this talk is personal stuff. Confidential. Asking after why Miranda’s
eyes glow
blue."
Jocasta hissed as she sucked air in through her
teeth. "Right. I’ll just be waiting at some window, then."
She kissed Sparrow on the top of her head, then patted her shoulder.
"Good luck, little bird, and don’t freeze to death, alright?
Love you." There was a small thump of air as she took the
form of a fly and disappeared.
⋄⋄
AND I YOU, MY DEAR.
⋄⋄
• OH I KNOW. •
Sparrow steeled herself, and pushed open the
door.
Immediately she regretted what the warming
charm and Jill’s kiss had done to her, for in the chill of the
night wind, her sweat turned
against her, and she shivered. She should have brought an extra
cloak, instead of relying on her uniform cloak and a charm. Even as
she cast another warming charm upon her, she could tell it was
fighting against the wind chill, and it always did more for her core
than her extremities anyhow. She shoved her hands into her pockets,
hoping the cloth would warm them well enough.
But it was not only the cold wind that set her
to shivering. The figure standing at the battlements, pitch-dark against the starry
sky, looming over her – if Sparrow was a little bird, then the
figure felt like that creature which any little bird most feared to
find in the dark night. She knew what it actually was – she knew
who it was, for it had that striking quality of inexplicable
visibility that could let Sparrow pick out any of her friends in
pitch darkness. But, familiar friend though it was, still little
Sparrow did not dare speak aloud.
"Lumos."
A little bead of light appeared at the end of a
wand, held by the girl whose face was lit with a gentle golden glow –
Miranda McClivert.
"My lady of the cauldron," whispered
Sparrow. "You, uh...seem to have regained the full use of your
arm. Did the potion just take a while to work?"
Miranda shook her head. "I just had to
refine it a bit. A small tweak to the ingredients, a couple new
things from my private greenhouse, a few
precious minerals." She shrugged. "Not what I’d call too
much trouble."
"Well I’ll tell you what’s trouble,"
said Sparrow, as she shivered. "Did we have to meet out here,
where a little bird like me could freeze to death?"
Miranda looked apologetic. "I am sorry, my
friend, I did not consider that issue. I
am never affected by the cold, and I...had to indulge in a bit of
dramatic flair, to feel like I was directing the conversation. In
light of the topic at hand."
Sparrow shrugged. "It’s cool. It’s a
touchy subject, I can imagine you’d feel nervous."
"Can you?" Miranda turned to the
battlements, looking out over the grounds. "Goodness, if I could
make you feel what I feel...you would never forgive me."
"What do you mean?"
Miranda sighed. "I’m not sure where to
begin with this."
"I wish I could say you can take your
time." Sparrow glanced at the horizon. "But there is only
so much time before the dawn. Would you feel better doing this
tonight, when we could take as many hours as you need?"
"No," said Miranda. "No, I… I
need to get this over with." She looked up at the stars. "If
I am to find a way to cease being so distant and cold, I can no longer let my
anxiety dictate my actions."
"Then begin at the beginning," said
Sparrow.
Miranda turned around and lowered herself to
the stone of the walkway, sitting back against the crenelation. She
patted the walkway beside her, and Sparrow sat there, her back
against the cold stone.
"What is the beginning," murmured
Miranda. "Well. Tell me, Sparrow, do you know the names of my
parents?"
"Nnnnnno? Should I?"
"It is an unfair question. There is no way
for you to have known, nor any way for anyone here, even the
Headmistress, in fact. Let me ask you another question, and this will
also be a trick. Do you know where I go home to, when school is not
in session?"
"I will admit," said Sparrow, "I
never sought to ask after the details of your home life. You could be
living in Glasgow, or Liverpool or...you recognized Wren’s accent and – ah, shit, I’ve just run my
mouth off –"
"I know about our favorite redhead,
Sparrow."
"But –"
"You seriously think they wouldn’t have
told me, of all people? When I’m busy brewing potions for Iffy?"
"Wren said they wanted to come out their
way!" said Sparrow. "It is not my information to blab! I
have my honor!"
Miranda was beaming. "That you do,
sunshine, that you do. But you were saying about Wren’s accent?"
Sparrow took a deep breath. "As I was
saying, before I was rudely interrupted by myself...you
recognized Wren’s accent, and you seemed to know a bit of North
American dialect, so I thought perhaps you were born somewhere on
that continent. But then you’d...shit, where does Wren go in the
summer? I bet they’re with Iffy..."
"These days yes," said Miranda. "But
after they got apparently exiled to this island, they stayed at the
castle for a couple summers before making an arrangement with Iphis’
family. I’m...not sure what their custody situation actually is, at
this point, I have no idea what manner of communication or legal
paperwork there could possibly be between Wizarding Britain and
Flimsy Remnant of Chicago. They might actually be a ward of
Hogwarts...the same way I am."
"Wait," said Sparrow, "you
what?"
"And there is the answer," said
Miranda. "Where do I go home to? Gryffindor tower. What is the name of my mother and
father? It does not figure, and none here could ever have known,
because they are dead, along with so many, and they died without
records of their existence to their name, nor any such thing as paper
records in my little village by the big river."
"Oh," murmured Sparrow. "I’m
sorry."
"Should you be?" Miranda drew her
knees to her shin and rested her arms on them. "There are none
who ought to be sorry for me. Not after what I did."
"What did you –"
"I killed them."
Sparrow had been reaching a hand out to pat
Miranda’s shoulder, but she froze, unable to comprehend what she
had heard. Here was Miranda, the girl who had been so scrupulous of
her honor that she had demanded forthright honesty towards her benefactor,
heedless of the cost for her or anyone. Here was the one who demanded
integrity, who abhorred duplicity, who would not permit hypocrisy –
she who had only joined Sparrow’s crew when she knew that Sparrow
would not direct anyone anywhere she would not go. This girl, of all
children, had killed her own parents, and more.
Sparrow rested her hand gently on Miranda’s shoulder, prompting the
girl to whip her head around and stare at Sparrow’s hand in shock,
then meet her eyes, utterly bewildered – terrified. She shook
Sparrow’s hand off and scooted sideways, her eyes downcast. "I
appreciate the gesture, but right now I don’t want to be touched.
Wouldn’t want to be even if I hadn’t just said what I said."
"Sorry." Sparrow let her arm fall.
"Why...why did you kill them? What happened?"
Miranda looked up again, giving Sparrow a stony
glare. "Is that the first question you ask? Not ‘how
dare you’? Not ‘will you kill again’? Not even ‘will you face
judgment’? Oh, but of course you would forgive your friend
anything, you’re the perfect Hufflepuff, loyal to a fault and
beyond. You think I deserve anything like pity?"
⋄⋄ I
DON’T CARE WHAT YOU OR ANYONE MAY DESERVE. ALL I KNOW IS THAT YOU
OF ALL PEOPLE COULD NOT HAVE DONE IT OUT OF MALICE. ALL I WANT
TO KNOW IS WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED.
⋄⋄
"You’re not exactly beating my
allegations."
⋄⋄
TELL ME. PLEASE. YOU
WANTED TO LET ME KNOW.⋄⋄
"Alright, alright…" Miranda took a
deep breath, and sat up straight, sitting cross-legged and resting
her hands in her lap, a model of practiced calm. She held silent, a
moment, before speaking. "There were... two things that happened
to me, at roughly the same time. One that could be expected of a
magical child of the age of eight...and one that very much could not.
But let us begin with the latter. Have you ever heard of such a thing
as precocious puberty?"
"I’ve heard of late bloomers," said
Sparrow. "As for early...hm. Among my own people in London
puberty is a thing for 14 and 15-year-olds, really. I was surprised
when I came to Hogwarts and people were already going through it,
even moreso when I started myself! Is it a Wizard thing?"
"Only in the sense that magical people
have retained better access to proper nutrition," said Miranda.
"In days of old, before the super-abundance of food in the 20th
century, children tended to begin that process at the ages of fifteen
or even later, due to malnutrition."
"So what?" said Sparrow, "did
you have the best food in the world in your tiny river village?"
"If only." Miranda sighed. "I
wouldn’t have seen elders go off to starve and die to save the rest
of us, were that the case. No. And, when I think about it...if I
hadn’t been suffering the same malnutrition as everyone else, would
this all have happened even earlier? Would my brain have been broken
before I could form the words to understand it?"
"What do you mean?"
Miranda fell silent.
"Are you okay?"
Miranda laughed nervously. "Am I okay!
Have I ever been? Maybe more okay now, I suppose, now that I have a
path forward...now that I’m in a place that can stay my hand if I
go out of control, a place where I can cloister myself for everyone’s
safety without starving. A place where I can throw myself into the
collaboration of research, and forget about pain, for a moment. I
cannot imagine a better place, not even when I am old."
"Not many options left anyway,"
grumbled Sparrow. "But go on, what was that about your brain
being broken?"
"The thing is," said Miranda, "I
was not raised as a girl."
"I know that part," said Sparrow.
"But, like, did you ever come out to your people?"
"Not at the outset. Because it was...not
quite as if I was raised as a boy, either. I simply raised myself as
a girl, and, being rather oblivious at that age, simply forgot to
specify it to anyone. I played with the other girls and nobody
objected, as far as I noticed. I considered myself one of them, and
nobody said otherwise – and at that age we were all wearing the
same hand-me-downs and salvaged goods anyway, so I genuinely didn’t
see any gender distinctions in the people my own age. And as for
the...certain body parts, between one’s legs, well, mine were
different, but I didn’t see what effect that had."
"Until?"
"Until." Miranda dew her knees to her
chin again. "Until I was eight and a half, and certain body
parts began to make themselves known to me. Certain highly
insistent parts, distracting, overwhelming...annoying as hell.
Stupid. Useless. I couldn’t see the purpose. Until finally it was
all explained to me, what I was, or what they thought I was – I at
last objected, and everyone thought I was insane. Oh sure, I was
going insane, what with sensations I could not comprehend and
did not agree with – Pain, pain, only pain."
Sparrow hissed as she sucked air in through her
teeth. "Yikes. I’m sorry."
"We’re getting to the part where I’m
the one who has to be sorry," said Miranda. "What happened
in my year of hell...it wasn’t just that everyone finally specified
to me the different jobs that men and women were supposed to do, it’s
that once they noticed what was happening to me, then they decided to
tell me about what men and women were supposed to do with each other,
and what my role was, and...what exactly I was supposed to do."
"I’m assuming you objected strenuously?"
"I tried to tell them that everything hurt
and felt weird," said Miranda. " I tried to tell them that
I didn’t want to do anything they were demanding because it sounded
boring and stupid. But they wouldn’t listen. They kept insisting.
They...were extremely keen, on the idea of everyone procreating."
"Oh gross," muttered Sparrow. "It’s
like those people in the Slug Club."
"Worse than that," said Miranda,
"there was even a religious aspect to it. Do you remember what I
said, back at the Dragon Tower, about racism?"
"You sounded like you had a lot to say and
weren’t going to say it."
"Yeah." Miranda sighed. "I
couldn’t figure out how, without talking about, well, everything
that happened involving this. It was...my little town, it was on the
Gulf Coast. The South. I don’t know if that means anything to you
as a Brit born and bred, but...let’s just say, in a world living in
the aftermath of cataclysm, plenty of villages of white folks around
were keen on keeping the black folks around them in their place. My
village existed because a particular Methodist preacher gathered
all of us, you know, banding together, and all that, but he was,
well, keen on population growth, for effectively military reasons.
So. Procreation. Mandated, to make up for the infant mortality rate,
and never mind the mother’s
mortality rate."
"Oh God," whispered Sparrow, "talk
about the absolute worst place for someone who wants to be cool and
logical like you."
"Not much logic going on in my head at
that point," said Miranda. "I sure was trying. But it was
mostly pain. Even...even to this day, to a certain extent."
"But you have your potions now," said
Sparrow. "And you have your transfiguration now –"
"And both of those only do so much,"
said Miranda. "I’m not as good with wandwork as you – which
is a high bar to clear, I’ll admit – so sometimes, the
transfiguration doesn’t take. Some days it just fails too early.
Those are the moments the old disgust takes me again...when it’s
like I’m wearing a thorned collar that bites me with every move,
when I can only breathe halfway between hyperventilating and hideous
sobs. Those are the days I can only retreat, not wanting to be
touched, not daring to be seen. But...it is easier, these days,
knowing that I have an escape from my pain. It is no longer the same
horror it was. But back then...when there was no escape...when all I
was, was a pressure cooker.
There was a day it all came to a head."
"How?"
"Well." Miranda took a deep breath in
through her nose. "Well. There was an evening, where I was
feeling at my lowest. It was a cold, clear, moonlit night. I was
sitting around the fire with my family. One of my aunts said she’d
finally had enough of my talking crazy, and that she might beat some
sense into my head. And then another aunt said that she knew of a
woman, a proper Conjure Woman in the next town over, who
could...fix me."
Sparrow began to breathe more heavily as her
heart beat faster. "They...what?"
"Don’t let your eyes glow yet, my
friend. The story isn’t over yet. The point of it all is that the
following morning, I was roused early from my sleep by my father, who
said it was time to go. We would be going to the Conjure Woman, and I
would be fixed.
"I bolted out of bed before Papa could say
another word, and dashed out the door of the shack, only to run into
a bunch of people waiting there for me – aunts, uncles, relatives,
siblings, church ladies, oh, half the town was gathered there around
the Preacher Man to see me off, wasn’t I just so lucky to have a
chance to become a man. At least that was the part of the
conversation I heard before I scampered through the crowd and away,
and it took everyone half a second to realize I wasn’t going along
quietly. So, they gave chase, and it was something of an even match,
between their long legs and my ability to slip through gaps in
things.
"I wound up crawling beneath a big thorn
bush. Figured nobody would be able to follow me in there. But then my
mother hacked through the thing with a machete and reached in and
hauled me out – never mind what scrapes that left on me – so, I
was caught. Still wasn’t going down without a fight, though, I
kicked and I punched and I bit and – and then I saw people coming
towards me with ropes and gags."
"So then," whispered Sparrow, "what
happened?"
"Well." Miranda rested her head back
against the stone. "Can you guess?"
"You said something about something
appropriate for your age happening," said Sparrow. "And...that’s
usually the age when Wizard kids express their magic, almost never in
a controlled manner...and you said the cold can’t affect you...and
people call you the Ice Queen...and you did that ice thing when we
met with McGonagall…and you...you said you killed your parents..."
"Let me show you," said Miranda, "the
shape of the first magic I ever did." She slowly rose to her
feet, stepping out onto the middle of the walkway, standing tall. She
faced away from Sparrow, spreading her palms out to her sides,
looking up to the starry heavens. "Here I will let myself
loose."
All at once the wind began to pick up, and
Sparrow was forced to cast an extra warming charm upon herself,
before hurriedly shoving her hands back into her pockets. She
fervently wished for Jill’s embrace as the wind grew wilder and
colder about the walkway. It hissed over the crenels,
it whistled through the embrasures, it howled above. Sparrow wrapped
herself tighter in her school cloak, drawing her knees up to her
chest and ducking her head. And the wind became a gale, and the gale
became a storm, and Sparrow shivered violently, the warming charm
pitiful in the face of the icy blast.
⋄⋄
ALRIGHT, MIRANDA, YOU
CAN STOP.⋄⋄
The wind did not abate. When Sparrow dared to
raise her head briefly, she could see Miranda still standing there,
arms spread wide, a blue aura about her. Sparrow fancied she could
hear Miranda’s wailing amidst the howling of the wind. Snowflakes
were pelting Sparrow’s side, caking the crenels, piling up in
drifts in the embrasures, and even all the way down the walkway where
rose the Dragon Tower.
And swiftly it piled up against the translucent
dome of golden light that Sparrow cast over herself. There was no
sense in enduring this foolishness without some sort of protection.
Yet, to her dismay, Sparrow realized that though the dome blocked the
wind – which did a marvelous job of cutting down on the cold all by
itself – the dome itself did not prevent a loss of heat, any more
than it had blocked the heat of Jill’s fire back in the empty
tower. The cold was creeping more slowly into Sparrow’s bones, but
in it crept, until once again Sparrow’s warming charm was
struggling.
And to her horror, Sparrow realized that, now
that she had let things go this far, were she to let the shield drop
she would be instantly flash-frozen – and
yet if she did not, then who would reach Miranda and get her to stop?
She was caught in a trap of her own making. And outside, the wind
raged on.
Sparrow squeezed her eyes shut and concentrated
on the image of Jill in her head. But though she could soon see the
figure made of flame, against the starry sky, she felt as if she
could only see it through frosted glass. ⋄⋄ JILL, HELP.⋄⋄
But the figure did not acknowledge her in any
way.
⋄⋄ JILL – AH, SHIT.
⋄⋄ Sparrow
let the connection fall. It had been no connection at all. She cast
her memory desperately through the bits of the MSL spells that she’d
bothered to pay attention to. There was a warming charm in there
somewhere, it would probably work against this cold – more likely
turn her bones to ash.
Yet the howl of the wind at once began to ebb,
and Sparrow looked up, to see Jill, standing there facing Miranda,
arm raised, reaching to brush her fingers against Miranda’s cheek.
Sparrow immediately dropped the shield spell to
shout at Jill to stop – but as she drew a breath in she realized
how hasty a decision that had been, for icy air filled her lungs. She
fell to her knees, hacking and coughing, gasping for breath. ⋄⋄ JILL!⋄⋄
But Jill was already brushing Miranda’s cheek
with her fingers. Miranda’s head whipped around, staring at Jill,
eyes alight with icy blue. At once the wind howled again, the snow
pelted again, all in one direction this time – directly at Jill.
But though the wind howled, Jill did not bow to
it. She stood like a rock, letting all the wind blast her, and no
snow could find purchase on her. Once more she reached out – but
not to Miranda’s face, this time. She offered the girl her hand,
palm up.
Miranda took it. The glow from her eyes faded.
And the wind at last went still.
Miranda’s legs were shaking, knees buckling.
She held Jill’s hands as she was guided down to kneel upon the
stone, back bowed, head hung low.
Then all at once Jill was sweeping Sparrow up
into a fierce embrace, and Sparrow felt warmth spread all through
her, her fingers at last unclenching, her toes at last uncurling.
Jill was sitting down, curling Sparrow into her lap.
"I’m sorry," whispered Jill. "I
saw you, in my dream, but I could not hear you. Jocasta had to come
tell me what was happening."
Miranda remained kneeling upon the stone, still
with her head hung low, staring at nothing. Until her head snapped up
and she looked around wildly, as if searching for something – she
spotted Sparrow and froze.
Then she scrambled backward until she was up
against the other side of the walkway, before trying to rise to her
feet, looking back and forth at either tower –
⋄⋄
MIRANDA. IT’S
ALRIGHT.⋄⋄
°°°
HOW COULD IT POSSIBLY
BE ALRIGHT? I ALMOST KILLED YOU! I TRIED TO KEEP IT UNDER CONTROL AND
I COMPLETELY FAILED! °°°
⋄⋄
HOW MANY OF US HAVE IT
UNDER CONTROL? SOMEDAY EVEN MY TIME MAY COME. ⋄⋄
†††††
EVEN I BEAR YOU NO
ENMITY, MY FRIEND. I KNOW WHAT IT IS LIKE TO LOSE ONE’S GRIP. †††††
Tears brimmed in Miranda’s eyes. "I
don’t – I don’t understand."
⋄⋄YOU
DON’T HAVE TO. JUST, COME HERE. BE HERE, WITH US. NOT AS A COLD AND
DISTANT ALLY, BUT AS A FRIEND.⋄⋄
At last Miranda stepped forward from the
battlements, warily approaching Sparrow and Jill – eyes alert upon
them, as she lowered herself to sit a couple feet away, tears
streaking down her cheeks.
There was a small thump of air as
Jocasta appeared, bending to wipe the tears from Miranda’s eyes.
Perhaps it was a mark of how exhausted the girl was that she did not
even flinch away this time, only gazing into Jocasta’s eyes with a
pitiful expression.
As for Jocasta, her teeth began a racket of
clattering as she shivered violently. "Fuck’s sake," she
muttered, "this is what I get for an insect animagus form,
I can’t keep my body heat for
shit. Whoa!" She yelped as Jill grabbed her by the hand
and dragged her down to enfold her in the embrace with Sparrow.
"You’re all really not mad?"
whispered Miranda.
"I kind of figured this would happen,"
said Sparrow. "I ask the people I love to let me in, their magic
starts to get out of control...this is what happens when we’re
sealed by secrecy, while the pressure of pain and guilt builds.
Right? Pressure cooker. We explode if we let loose without letting
off steam. I’ve been through this twice
already."
"You’ve endured a portion of it
twice already," murmured Jill.
"Maybe I’ll face the full blast
someday," said Sparrow. "Miranda, do you want to continue
the story?"
Miranda let out a long breath. "If you
wish to hear the rest? Well. What I was about to do to you, slowly,
I did to a crowd of people in an instant. I
found myself standing there, amidst a field of corpses frozen so
suddenly that they remained upright, even for a little while in the
summer heat. And...then the rest of the townspeople, coming to see
what had happened...they said at once I had done it, that I was an
evil witch. Some of them came at me with sticks, the rest fled far
away from me.
"But there were still the people with
sticks, so I ran, and I ran, and I tumbled down dry creek beds and
stumbled over rocks, and then – there was a pale lady standing over
me, clad in leather that was strapped to her torso and arms and legs,
and she had a neater broom than I’d ever seen, and it hovered in
the air, and she offered me a place on it...and it wasn’t any odder
than what I’d already seen that day."
"Hang on," said Jill, "am I
supposed to be hearing this?"
"I got through the most confidential
sections," said Miranda.
Sparrow nuzzled closer into Jill’s embrace.
"Stay."
"Seconded," said Jocasta.
"Alright, alright." Jill chuckled.
"Continue."
"You see how I came to this castle,"
said Miranda, "on the broom of Professor Clearwater. She must
have known...I wonder how much she foresaw, and could have forestalled. But I
should not ask her. The point is, I became a ward of this castle.
Here is the room that is mine, here is the food I am given, here is
the home that will always take me in, until I am of age, if not
forever. And here is…a headmistress and divination professor who
both know what I did, and I fear they remain wary of me, along with
much of the faculty."
"That’s hardly fair," whispered
Jill.
"I’d call it fair," said Miranda.
"Or formerly fair. Before it was clear the rest of you might go
off bang, the faculty knew I could. Perhaps that’s why I was
encouraged to spend time in the greenhouses? But there I met the
professor who, above all others, saw not my past, but my future.
Professor Neville Longbottom."
"Ah yes," murmured Jocasta, "your
– uh –" She chuckled nervously. "I was about to
put my foot in it again."
Miranda fixed Jocasta with a level glare.
"Professor Longbottom took me into his care and guidance, those
years before I was to officially begin my schooling. It was he who
introduced me to the world of Wizarding Britain; he who let me help
him with the greenhouses; he who bought me my wand; he who comforted
me, who dried my tears when I was told that I could never see North
America again, per the Statute of Wizarding Secrecy. It was he who
advocated for me, before the rest of the faculty, that I would pose
no more danger to the students than any other student, if I was given
the chance to focus on my learning, like any other student. I would
never say he has favored me as a teacher, only held me to higher
standards that I have met, and yet...though I might never say it to
his face, I see him as my adoptive father."
"Oh," murmured Jocasta. Her eyes grew
wide. "Oh."
"Yes," said Miranda, "he is not
a sugar daddy."
Jocasta hung
her head. "I trample upon the feelings of others too
often."
"Better that than flash-freezing your
whole family," said Miranda. "How does anyone put up with
me, when they know?"
"Because they see you," said Sparrow,
"and they see what you’ve become, what you’ve made of
yourself, beyond what you were. They see what you’re trying to be.
You wear your ambition on your sleeve, you bear the heart of a lion.
It is what I saw of you from the start, even before our dance last
October. I daresay it outweighs your past."
"But –"
"And you were eight years old," said
Sparrow, meeting Miranda’s eyes. "You were a child, and from
your story you clearly didn’t know much about anything."
Miranda’s gaze was warm. "You were also
eight. Do you blame yourself?"
"I can only resolve to do better now. So
it is for you. Do you understand?"
Miranda looked up to the starry sky. "I
can do the same. But...getting close to anyone, emotionally or
physically, well. It’s easier to hang back and away like the moon,
and cast my light down upon people. Always easier to be cold. Safer."
"And yet you danced with me?"
"I said easier," said Miranda.
"I am a Gryffindor. I must show courage."
"That is certainly something you can
continue to exercise," said Sparrow. She glanced up, where the
sky was just beginning to lighten. "And we can think of the
dawn, and the days ahead, instead of the days behind." She
unfolded herself from the embrace of her girls, rising stiffly to her
feet, and, facing the dawn, shook her wand out of her sleeve,
pointing it at her heart. "Amato animo animato animagus."
As she felt the spell take hold, she spotted
Iphis and Wren coming through the door to the astronomy tower. She
whirled to face her friends. "Right, and that’s the other
thing. Miranda, Jocasta – Iphis, Wren, good morning – here I must
speak as your captain. Not even in a lighthearted pirate-adventure
way, but as the one you asked to lead you all. Jocasta. Do you truly
believe that your expertise in transfiguration can aid Miranda and
Iphis in their quest for human transmutation?"
Jocasta looked prideful. "I should think I
could offer insight at least! I should think the details of
transfiguration provide a solid foundation for transmutation.
Goodness knows an animagus form holds itself indefinitely, it does
not depend on constant mental upkeep."
"Very good. You two –" Sparrow
pointed at Miranda and then Iphis – "need to either allow
Jocasta to consult with you, or –" but then Wren was grabbing
Sparrow’s pointer hand and dragging it to themself. "What,
three?"
"I did
say I wanted to be the girlfriend now and then," said
Wren.
Jocasta sprang to her feet and thumped Wren’s
shoulder lightly with her fist, grinning madly. "I like the cut
of your jib, mister-sister."
"Okay fine! You three! Get Jocasta here
involved or, I don’t know, gird up your loins and ask McGonagall to
help, and also ask Madame Abbot to give you your potions so you have
your cauldron more free for other things, because we are going to be
very busy."
Miranda looked frustrated. "I have my
reasons for avoiding that request. I have never believed that the
faculty could help me directly."
"Well stop avoiding it," said
Sparrow. "Get that out of the way instead of going it alone. I
don’t want any of my crew to suffer. Understood?"
"Is that an order?" said Miranda.
"Do I have to make it an order?"
Wren saluted smartly. "Aye, cap’n."
"Yo ho ho," muttered Iphis.
"Come on," said Miranda, taking Wren
and Iphis by the hands. "There’s enough time to do research
before I fall asleep for the morning. Jocasta, you come along too."
Jocasta looked shocked. "Now? But it’s
four in the – oh alright, hang on." She gave Sparrow and Jill
each a kiss on the cheek, then turned into a fly and lighted on
Wren’s shoulder.
Sparrow turned to Jill. "That just leaves
us, then...back to…" But she did not complete the sentence,
for she was out nearly as soon as she had collapsed into Jill’s arms.