The opening chapters of Magical Theory turned out to be less exciting than the title suggested.
They weren’t boring.
The wand was simply lying beside me.
It was hard to read about concentration when, every few sentences, I glanced at the object that could make light or burn a hole in a wall.
I didn’t intend to repeat the latter.
The author devoted a surprising amount of space to the difference between intent and imagining an effect.
I read that passage twice, trying to relate it to what I’d done that morning.
Then I went back a page.
Perhaps that was why the banknote had taken so long.
Knowing what it should look like wasn’t enough.
I also had to make the magic do exactly what I wanted, rather than something fairly similar.
I glanced at the wand.
A few more pages.
I read four.
Then I opened Simple Spells for Beginners.
Just the contents to begin with.
There were things I recognised.
Lumos.
Nox.
The Levitation Charm.
Further down, it became more interesting.
Glacium—creating a thin layer of frost.
Fixato—temporarily fixing small objects in place.
Luxorbis—conjuring a floating ball of light.
Refresco—lowering the temperature of the air.
I ran a finger along the last name.
In summer, my room could become so stuffy that I slept with my legs uncovered and the window wide open.
I’d just learned that the solution lay in a single word and the right movement of my wrist.
I picked up the wand.
Then I remembered the Ministry.
I looked at the door.
Underage wizards weren’t allowed to perform magic outside school.
I knew that.
Harry received letters about it.
Once because of Dobby, later because of his aunt, and later still he was nearly expelled from Hogwarts for casting a Patronus.
I lowered my hand.
Except I wasn’t even at Hogwarts yet.
Things happened around children before they went to school.
No one came to arrest them for regrowing hair or vanishing glass.
Of course, accidental magic and sitting over a textbook with a wand in my hand weren’t quite the same thing.
For a moment, I turned it between my fingers.
I’d used magic without it that morning.
Nothing had happened.
I’d cast a spell at Ollivanders too, although an adult wizard had been supervising me there.
Perhaps the ban only applied to pupils?
I couldn’t remember.
That should have been enough to make me put down the wand.
Instead, I drew the curtain.
One light wouldn’t hurt anyone.
“Lumos.”
The tip shone more brightly than I intended.
I narrowed my eyes and turned it away from my face.
“Quieter,” I muttered, before realising that made absolutely no sense.
I tried to limit the flow of magic.
The light dimmed.
I smiled.
A little brighter again.
Then dimmer.
It worked.
For a moment, I even forgot about the rules.
A brass bell rang in the Improper Use of Magic Office.
The clerk at the nearest desk pushed his cup aside and drew towards him the parchment emerging from beneath the instrument.
He read the spell’s name.
Then the address.
He took out another document and compared the two.
“Miriam?”
The woman at the next desk didn’t look up.
“If it’s the enchanted hairdryer again, the form is in the bottom drawer.”
“Lumos. In a Muggle orphanage.”
Now she looked at him.
“Which pupil?”
“No one registered at that address.”
He handed her the parchment.
Miriam adjusted her glasses.
The reading alone didn’t tell them who held the wand.
Usually, the address, the register, and the type of spell were enough.
This time, the most important part was missing.
“Check earlier reports from the area and pass it to the duty officer,” she said.
“No automatic warning for now. We don’t even know whom to send it to.”
The clerk reached for a blank form.
The bell rang again.
The pencil wouldn’t stick to the desk.
The book didn’t use the word “stick”, but that was more or less what the spell was supposed to do.
Fix an object in place against a surface.
I read the instructions again.
A short arc.
Stop the tip.
Clear intent.
“Fixato.”
The pencil twitched.
I touched it with a finger.
It rolled freely.
I sighed.
At least I hadn’t burned anything.
I tried again, more slowly this time.
On the third attempt, the pencil offered slight resistance.
On the fifth, it wouldn’t move.
I pulled harder.
It suddenly came free, and I nearly hit myself in the nose.
For a second, I sat motionless.
Then I began to laugh.
It had worked.
Briefly and not particularly elegantly, but it had worked.
I looked at the door.
Silence.
No one stood in the corridor.
No owl was battering at the window.
I returned to the book.
Refresco was easier.
After a few attempts, I felt cooler air against my face.
Not an icy gust, just a pleasant change, as though someone had briefly opened a window after a hot day.
Glacium left a thin layer of frost at the bottom of my mug.
I ran a finger over it.
Cold.
Real frost.
I sat back and looked at the wand.
“All right, one more.”
I used to say the same thing before another chapter.
I should have known how this would end.
Rufus Notley placed a stack of readings on the desk.
“Same address?”
“All of them,” Miriam replied.
“Repeated basic spells. It’s been going on for a while.”
Notley looked through the sheets.
Lumos.
Nox.
Fixato.
Beside some names, several times were listed one beneath another.
“Someone’s practising.”
“That’s what it looks like.”
He called two officers from the adjoining room.
The older one, Silas Greaves, was fastening a grey coat.
Hemsley was considerably younger and had an ink stain on his sleeve.
Notley handed them the address.
“Muggle residential care facility. No registered pupil, no record of wizards living there. Find out who’s casting the spells and whether any Muggles have witnessed them.”
Greaves glanced at the readings.
“A child?”
“Possibly. Or an adult has decided an orphanage is a good place to perform magic. Establish that first.”
Hemsley put away the address.
“If the child’s alone?”
“Contact the duty officer. We’ll need to establish their identity and care arrangements. Don’t frighten them with an interrogation before we know what we’re dealing with.”
The bell at Miriam’s station rang again.
Notley looked over.
“And do it before they move on to harder spells.”
A ball of light hovered above the desk.
It was slightly lopsided.
I didn’t know whether a ball could be lopsided, but mine was certainly trying.
It drifted slowly to the left, then returned to its place.
Every time my concentration slipped, it sank a few centimetres.
I regarded it with the satisfaction of someone who had just created a sun.
Only a quiet crack outside the window drew my attention away from the book.
I froze.
For a moment, I listened.
A car?
Someone shutting a door in the yard?
Then I heard voices in the corridor.
A man’s and a woman’s.
The latter belonged to the night carer.
I looked at the wand.
Oh, shit.
The ball of light wavered.
I waved at it.
It didn’t go out.
Naturally, now it had decided to work perfectly.
There was a knock.
“Oliver?”
I closed the book, keeping a finger between the pages.
I didn’t answer immediately.
“Oliver, we need to speak to you.”
That wasn’t the carer’s voice.
“One moment!”
I looked around the room.
Wand.
Open textbook.
Frost in the mug.
A ball of light floating near the ceiling.
I didn’t even know where to start.
The door opened before I could decide.
Two men stood in the doorway.
The older one looked first at me, then at the light.
The younger closed the door behind them.
Neither looked pleased.
“Put the wand on the desk,” said the older man.
I did so immediately.
The ball began to sink.
He extinguished it with one movement of his own wand.
The room went dark.
For a moment, we all stood in silence.
Then the younger man switched on the ordinary lamp.
That was a little humiliating.
“Silas Greaves. Ministry of Magic.”
He showed me a badge I couldn’t have distinguished from a fake anyway.
My heart was beating too fast.
I wasn’t going to attack the officials, escape through the window, or do anything else fanfiction protagonists sometimes considered a reasonable solution to a problem.
Mostly, I wanted to know how big the problem was.
“Is this about the spells?”
Greaves looked at the mug.
“Among other things.”
“Nobody got hurt.”
I said it too quickly.
He looked back at me.
“Good. I’d like to keep it that way. What’s your name?”
“Oliver Peverell.”
The younger officer began writing.
“How old are you?” This chapter was taken from g.com without permission.
“Ten.”
“Who gave you the wand?”
“Ollivander. Today. I mean, he didn’t just give it to me. My father left it with him.”
That sounded worse than it should have.
I pointed at the box.
“I went to his shop. You can check.”
“We will,” Greaves replied.
“Where are your parents?”
I looked at him.
Then at the room.
I think he noticed.
“I don’t know,” I said.
“I’ve lived here since I was little.”
His tone softened slightly.
“Who taught you the spells?”
I indicated the book.
“I was trying them myself.”
Hemsley picked up the textbook and examined the cover.
“All of this today?”
I nodded.
For a moment, neither said anything.
I would have preferred it if they had.
“Were you aware of the restrictions on underage magic?” Greaves asked.
I opened my mouth.
I could say no.
But then I’d have to explain how I knew who they were and why they’d come.
“I’d heard pupils aren’t allowed to use magic outside school,” I said at last.
“But I’m not a pupil yet.”
Greaves sighed.
Not angrily.
More as though he’d heard similar reasoning many times before.
“That doesn’t mean you can practise alone in a building full of Muggles.”
I looked at the desk.
A few minutes ago, it had looked like the beginning of something wonderful.
Now it resembled a collection of evidence.
“What do I do with the wand?” I asked.
“For now, put it in the box.”
I looked up.
“You’re not taking it?”
“There’s no need, provided you listen to us.”
That helped a little.
Not much, but a little.
They didn’t take me away immediately.
Hemsley stepped into the corridor while Greaves asked more questions.
Had anyone seen the spells?
Had I damaged anything?
Had I performed magic in other rooms?
At the question about damage, I thought of Ollivander’s shop.
“Not here.”
He looked at me more closely.
“Here?”
“I hit a wall at Ollivanders. He told me to aim at it.”
He wrote something in his notebook.
I very much wanted to see what.
When Hemsley returned, he delivered a brief message.
They still hadn’t found me in the register.
The duty officer wanted the matter clarified at the Ministry.
“You need to come with us,” Greaves said.
I tightened my grip on the box.
“Now?”
“Now. We’ll establish your details and how to contact you. You won’t be left there alone.”
“What about the carer?”
“She knows you’re coming with us for a conversation. Hemsley will leave her written confirmation.”
That didn’t reassure me as much as it probably should have.
I had no better idea, though.
I put on my shoes.
I tied one lace wrong the first time and had to start again.
Greaves pretended not to notice.
In the yard, he held out his hand.
“Have you travelled by Apparition before?”
I shook my head.
“Hold on tight. It may be unpleasant.”
That was a remarkably mild warning.
The world squeezed me from every side.
I couldn’t breathe.
For a fraction of a second, it felt as though my body was trying to force itself through a coin-sized opening.
Then, suddenly, I was standing on solid ground again.
I swayed.
Greaves steadied my arm.
“Easy.”
I bowed my head and swallowed.
The Gringotts cart suddenly seemed a very comfortable way to travel.
The Ministry was huge.
That thought reached me once my stomach stopped trying to escape.
We were crossing a lofty hall with a dark, gleaming floor.
Further away, I could see a fountain, rows of fireplaces, and people still hurrying about despite the late hour.
I craned my neck.
For a moment, I forgot why I was here.
Then Greaves indicated the way, and I had to hurry.
In the lift, I held the box in both hands.
Paper aeroplanes fluttered overhead.
One brushed my ear.
Normally, I would have tried to examine it.
Now, I wanted to go back to my room.
We arrived at an office with three chairs, an overflowing cabinet, and an older clerk who looked as tired as I felt.
“Full name?”
“Oliver Peverell.”
“Date of birth?”
“The thirty-first of July, nineteen eighty.”
I hesitated.
“That’s what I was told. They found me after midnight on the first of August.”
The clerk lifted his quill.
“So the date is not supported by documentation.”
“I suppose not.”
He made a note.
No dramatic silence.
No announcement that I was an impossible mystery.
Just plenty of questions I couldn’t answer.
Eventually, I told them about Gringotts.
The test, Thimgrin, and the signet.
Greaves examined the ring but didn’t ask me to remove it.
“Also today?”
“Yes.”
He looked at Hemsley.
The younger officer added another item to the list.
“I’ll contact Ollivander and the bank,” he said.
“At this hour, it may take a while.”
It did.
They gave me a glass of water.
I drank half of it immediately, only then realising how thirsty I was.
Beyond the door, someone was speaking in a raised voice.
The clerk leafed through ledgers.
Greaves left and returned.
I began to yawn.
I tried to hide it.
Failed.
“Lean back,” he said.
“A little longer.”
“Will I be able to go back today?”
He looked at the clock.
“Today is already tomorrow. But yes, that’s the idea.”
I wasn’t sure whether that was meant to be a joke.
The door opened just as I was trying to find a more comfortable position in my chair.
A short man in elegant robes entered first.
Dumbledore followed him.
I straightened so abruptly that I hit my knee on the desk.
The glass rattled.
Everyone looked at me.
“Sorry,” I muttered.
But I was still staring at the man in the doorway.
A long beard.
Half-moon spectacles.
A face I knew, although I’d never seen it before.
Albus Dumbledore.
Really.
“Is this the boy?” asked the shorter man.
Cornelius Fudge.
The Minister for Magic.
All right.
Apparently, I really had done something very stupid.
Greaves stood.
“Yes, Minister. We’re waiting for the final confirmations.”
“Professor Dumbledore was with me when word of the surname arrived,” Fudge said.
“He thought he might be able to help.”
The Headmaster approached.
His gaze settled on my face, then the signet and the box in my lap.
“Good evening, Oliver. Albus Dumbledore.”
He offered his hand.
I shifted the box so I could shake it.
“Good evening.”
Fortunately, I didn’t say that I knew.
“We’ve been trying to contact you since yesterday,” he added.
“I confess I hadn’t expected to meet you here.”
I looked at him.
“Me?”
“Your name appeared in the school register.”
“At Hogwarts?”
He smiled.
“Precisely.”
For a moment, I felt lighter.
Hogwarts knew about me.
I wouldn’t have to figure out how to get a letter.
Fudge cleared his throat.
“Let us resolve tonight’s incident first.”
The relief quickly faded.
Greaves explained the situation.
Spells in a Muggle institution.
No known magical guardian.
Details requiring confirmation.
Hemsley returned shortly afterwards with confirmation from Ollivander.
The wand wasn’t stolen.
Only when he said it aloud did I realise someone had genuinely considered that possibility.
Fudge listened to everything with a frown.
“No injuries? No Muggles witnessed anything?”
“We found no breach of secrecy,” Greaves replied.
“We checked the room and spoke to the carer.”
The Minister looked at Dumbledore.
“I take it the school can explain the rules to him?”
“Of course. I’d also like to establish what assistance he needs before beginning his education.”
“Good. Complete the documentation and record a formal warning.”
Fudge looked at me.
“And you, young man, must exercise greater caution.”
“Yes, sir.”
This time, I had no desire to test exactly where the boundaries of the rule lay.
The Minister left after a brief conversation with the clerk.
I stared at the closed door.
“Does that mean I won’t be charged?”
Greaves sat down.
“It means that tonight ends with a warning. Don’t treat it as permission to keep practising.”
I nodded.
I certainly wouldn’t.
We didn’t leave immediately.
First came more signatures, the orphanage address, and confirmation that Dumbledore would accompany me back.
Then the Headmaster asked whether I would agree to speak with him somewhere quieter.
He looked at me closely.
“It shouldn’t. Are you tired?”
“A little.”
I yawned.
Dumbledore politely refrained from commenting.
We used one of the Ministry fireplaces.
When he told me where we were going, I looked at him so quickly that my neck hurt.
“Hogwarts?”
“My office. Then I’ll take you back.”
I didn’t care how tired I was.
For a few seconds, I wasn’t tired at all.
Travelling by fireplace was better than Apparition only because it was brief.
I stepped out of the grate coughing and brushing my sleeve.
Then I looked up.
The office.
Portraits.
Silver instruments moving on tables.
And a phoenix.
I stopped mid-step.
The bird tilted his head.
“Fawkes,” Dumbledore said, noticing where I was looking.
“He’s…”
I stopped.
Beautiful sounded too ordinary.
The feathers stirred slightly, and red shifted into gold as the light changed.
“Yes,” the Headmaster replied, though I hadn’t finished.
“I think so too.”
I could have stood there much longer.
Dumbledore indicated an armchair.
“Sit down. Water? Pumpkin juice?”
This time, I didn’t refuse.
As soon as I sat, exhaustion returned so quickly that I sank into the backrest.
I placed the box on my lap.
The Headmaster sat opposite me.
“Let’s begin with the simplest question. Has anyone spoken to you about magic before?”
I shook my head.
“Not really. Only today, in the shops.”
“And the first signs?”
I thought of the doors, the dust, and the strange dreams.
“Things happened before. More often lately. But this morning was the first time I managed something on purpose.”
Dumbledore nodded.
“What did you do?”
“Made a light.”
Despite everything, I smiled.
“A small one.”
“That must have been quite a moment.”
I looked at him.
He meant it completely seriously.
“It was.”
For a moment, I saw the spark above my fingers again.
Then I remembered two officials in the doorway.
“I think I got a little carried away afterwards.”
“Yes,” he replied gently.
“But I understand why you wanted to keep trying.”
It didn’t sound like absolution.
More like permission to stop pretending I’d had a sensible plan.
The question about Diagon Alley came a few minutes later.
“How did you know where to look for it?”
My fingers tightened around the glass.
I’d expected the question.
My answer still seemed poor, but the truth would have been much harder to explain.
“I had a dream,” I said.
“What sort of dream?”
“There was a figure dressed in black. It told me I was a wizard.”
That last part was my own addition.
Dumbledore was listening, so I continued before I lost my nerve.
“It told me to find the Leaky Cauldron on Charing Cross Road. It explained how to open the entrance in the yard. And said I should go to Gringotts because there might be something waiting for me there.”
I took a sip of juice.
The figure had indeed appeared in my dream.
It hadn’t offered a beginner’s guide to magical banking, though.
That part came from the books and my own improvisation.
“Did it tell you who it was?” Dumbledore asked.
“No.”
“And you decided to test its directions?”
I looked at him.
“That morning, I managed to make light. Without matches, without anything. I thought perhaps the rest might be real too.”
At least I didn’t have to fake the wonder of that moment.
Dumbledore was silent for a while.
I wanted to add something.
Some detail that would make the whole thing sound more convincing.
Fortunately, I couldn’t think of one.
“I don’t know what the source of that dream was,” he said at last.
“But if the figure appears again, don’t follow any further instructions without speaking to an adult. Even if its first directions proved helpful.”
“All right.”
I couldn’t tell whether he believed me.
For now, at least, he asked no more questions.
When I mentioned Ollivander and my father’s name, Dumbledore looked at me a little differently.
“I knew Elias,” he said.
I raised my head.
“My father?”
“Yes.”
I hesitated.
“Did you recognise me by the surname?”
“The surname caught my attention in the school register. And when I saw you… your father had very unusual eyes.”
I instinctively touched my cheek.
“Like mine?”
“Yes.”
For a moment, I looked at my reflection in the glass.
Ollivander had said the same thing.
“Do you know why?”
Dumbledore shook his head.
“No. Elias never explained it to me.”
The answer was brief.
There was no story of ancient magic behind it, no information waiting to be drawn out with the next question.
At least, that was how it sounded.
“Did you know my mother too?”
“Yes. Aria came to Britain from France. She was fourteen when she began studying at Hogwarts.”
France.
Ollivander hadn’t remembered the country.
“Did they meet here?”
“They did. After school, both belonged to the Order of the Phoenix. It was a group that opposed Voldemort during the war.”
At the name, I instinctively looked at Fawkes.
The bird was attending to his feathers.
“I didn’t know they had a child,” Dumbledore continued.
“Your name has only just appeared in the school records. Minerva McGonagall was helping me establish where you lived.”
“Why only now?”
“I don’t know yet.”
I rubbed my thumb against the edge of the glass.
All day, people had confirmed things I’d expected.
The surname.
The vault.
Magic.
Now I was beginning to realise how much lay beyond that.
“Are they dead?”
Dumbledore didn’t answer immediately.
That was what made me look at him more closely.
“They disappeared during the war,” he said.
“I haven’t heard from them since. I don’t know the circumstances of their disappearance.”
I lowered my eyes.
I didn’t know them.
That morning, I couldn’t have given their names.
Even so, I would have preferred a different answer.
Dumbledore let me be quiet for a moment.
He didn’t tell me what I ought to feel.
He didn’t try to convince me that everything would definitely turn out well.
He simply waited.
Eventually, I yawned so widely that I had to cover my mouth with both hands.
“Sorry.”
“I think that’s enough for today,” Dumbledore said.
I felt relieved.
Then immediately remembered the books in my room.
“Am I not allowed to practise any more?”
The Headmaster looked at the box.
“Not alone in the orphanage.”
I sank further back into the chair.
I’d known he would say that.
I still didn’t like it.
“Even the simple spells?”
“Today, you decided several spells were simple and safe. Would you have known how to stop each of them if it behaved differently from what you expected?”
I remembered the ball of light I hadn’t been able to extinguish in time.
“Not all of them.”
“That is precisely why you need to learn under the supervision of someone experienced.”
For a moment, I turned the glass in my hands.
“I won’t go to Hogwarts for another year.”
Saying it aloud was particularly unpleasant.
A whole year.
After everything I’d seen today.
“Yes,” he replied.
“But that doesn’t mean you must be left without any help in the meantime. We’ll return to this once you’ve rested and we’ve settled the basic arrangements.”
He wasn’t promising private lessons or access to the school library.
Even so, it sounded better than “put the wand away and wait”.
“Can I read?”
He smiled.
“Certainly.”
“And they won’t take my wand?”
“Not for what happened today. Let’s make sure there’s no reason for another intervention.”
I looked at the box.
Then nodded.
“All right. I won’t use magic at the orphanage.”
This time, I genuinely intended to keep my word.
I remembered the return journey less clearly.
Exhaustion finally caught up with me when I stood.
I glanced at Fawkes once more before leaving, then had to concentrate on not tripping by the fireplace.
Dumbledore took me back to the orphanage.
He spoke briefly with the night carer.
I stood beside him, clutching the box and answering when she addressed me.
She didn’t ask about the wand.
I didn’t have the energy to wonder why.
At my bedroom door, Dumbledore paused.
“Good night, Oliver.”
“Good night.”
I was about to go inside when I turned once more.
“Thank you for coming.”
He gave a slight nod.
“Try to get some sleep now.”
I closed the door.
The book still lay on the desk.
The pencil had rolled onto the floor, and the frost in the mug had left a little water behind.
Everything looked so ordinary, as though I’d stepped out for only a few minutes.
I placed the box beside the textbooks.
For a moment, I wanted to check that the wand was still inside.
I didn’t.
I took off my shoes and sat on the bed.
That morning, I’d managed to make a small spark.
Now I knew the way to Diagon Alley, had a vault, a wand of my own, and a formal warning from the Ministry.
I’d seen Hogwarts.
Spoken to Dumbledore.
Learned my parents’ names.
I lay down, avoiding the familiar spring.
Tomorrow, I would start with reading.
Just reading shouldn’t bring officials to my room.
Although, after today, I preferred not to assume anything.