Chapter one
Oblivious
sunlight bathed everything in the small room where Harry lived, but that didn't catch Harry's attention, for the simple reason that he wasn't there anymore. He was running as fast as he could from Diagon Alley, from Voldemort who was curses at him from behind. Muggles screamed, wizards and witches were trampled under foot when they tripped. Harry looked over his shoulder, it was a stupid thing to do, but he could not tell his head no to. Voldemort cried "Avada Kedavra!" Everything was green for a nanosecond....
But then the dream faded, and a new one took its place....
Harry was sitting, his wrists tied behind him. He was bound to the chair, and there in the corner was Elisa. She sat there, rocking back and forth, knees clasped together in her arms, staring into space, mumbling some kind of nonsense.
"Where and When and How and Why, and and and etc.... why? Why'd ya' go 'way? Help me...."
The dream Harry took stock of his surroundings, and found himself in a dungeon, a wide dungeon, mold and algae grew on the walls of the humid chambers, and chains hung from the walls around him. There was a smell, one that Harry had never encountered before, but strangely enough, in his dream, he knew what the smell was, and it frightened him. It was the smell of and decay.
A cackle from somewhere near him, high pitched, screaming laughter. Pain ran through his very bones, and then, the oh too familiar flash of bright green.
And then Harry woke up, finding that falling off the side of the bed in his convulsions had caused the pain. The young wizard climbed back on his bed, slightly flustered and bewildered. He was having too many dreams like this lately, and he wondered if it was a warning to him, but either way, there was nothing he could do about it except write Professor Dumbledore, which had already done. Harry had also written Sirius, and both had written back, and both letters said the same thing: He can't get you while you're with the Dursleys.
Harry jumped and his bed creaked with his weight; an owl knocking its talon on the window had startled him. He opened the window and the owl flew in. Stood on his bed and looked at him through bright red eyes that were strangely familiar....
And then Elisa had transformed on the bed. Harry gaped, but recovered enough to say "Think of the devil,"
"As if this isn't normal to you by now?" she said, handing him the letter, "tis an invitation to spend the summer with me, Oh ye English friend of mine. And I feel insulted. I never thought of myself as much of a devil, maybe the daughter of one, but not the devil. So I'm more of a Damian."
"Don't think I can. Voldemort's still out there, after my , I think, and Dumbledore says that maybe the best idea would be for me to stay here, and-"
elisa cut him off, "I've already talked to him. Besides my place is as safe as yours is. I'm at risk too, remember?"
"Right I forgot. Well, we'll have to ask the Dursleys..."
"You mean YOU'LL have to ask the Dursleys. i think that if they knew that you had one of your wizard friend in their house they'd have a fit."
"Good point, I'll ask, they should be up soon." said Harry, now packing his trunk. He was sure the Dursleys would let him go. Sirius had a klot to do with it. He turned to see the witch sitting on his unmade bed reading one of the books that Dudley had been given many years back, they were the only things in the room that weren't broken or mangled.
"How could he not read this, the Redwall Series is the best! And look...Enders Games, and Speaker for the , not even touched! How could he neglect such authors as Robin McKniley or David Clement-Davies, Orson Scott Card, or Brian Jacues? He's got the best of the best sitting, immortal, on a shelf in his old room,and he doesn't even touch them. Does he think they're cursed?" she said, shaking her head, "To be sure, you have a strange cousein, Harry...." Her hands skimmed lihgtly over the 600 or so pages of "Xenocide."
Harry heard his uncle lumber down the stairs, the light steps of Aunt Petunia following. Wait a few minutes, and I'll ask, thought Harry.
"Hey Harry," Elisa yaned, not bothering to look up from "the Golden Compass," "If you're sure you're going I think I'll leave."
"Leave? ut how will I get there?"
"Your broomstick of course."
"But I don't have-"
"Directions? Here," she said, handing him a slip of paper. On it was the address for "Elisa Calconn, 5100 N.W. 86th St."
"I don't know streets in Miami."
"Fly over the Atlantic, down 'till the gulfstream, up a bit...Just figure it out as you go along, it's what do. Remember though, if you see Cuba, you've gone down too far. Want a map? Here." She handed him a map of Florida. More of an atlas really, from the maps of the U.S. to maps of the streets. "See that there, Sebastian Inlet? Best place to go surf."
"You surf?" Harry asked, Elisa had never mentioned many of the things she did at home, except for reading, writing, and listening to music.
Between replies and statements Elisa gave him a small package with something rather like mothballs in it. When Harry gave her a confused look, she gave the simple answer of "Stick it in your trunk to make it lighter." Then answered his previous question. (I like that in her, thought Harry, she's all questions, but she's also got all the answers.)
"Just the terminals. Henry surfs-"
"Who's Henry?"
"My foster brother, of course! Haven't I told you about him? Damn, is he a pain, he makes me laugh though. But he's gone, to a camp called Endless Summer, but he'll be back before you leave. Bye." With those slightly confusing words she changed and flew off, gliding on the warm currents and then disappearing into the early-morning fog.
a few minutes are up, thought Harry. As if reading his mind, his aunt rapped on the door.
"Up, up!"
"I'm up, I'm up!" Harry answered, pulling on a pair of sneakers, slilently wondering why there were called sneakers. they squeaked too much to be, well, sneaky, didn't they?
After a quick conversation with Uncle Vernon, a cold yet, somehow heated conversation on his part, an aloof, yet also identically frigid one on Harry's, he ws packing his bags. To the Dursleys it didn't matter how he left (once it did, no make that twice...)as long as he was gone.
Packed by ten, he threw his invisibility cloak over him and his warmest sweater (it could get pretty cold in high altitudes), stuffed a mothball thing in his trunk, and flew out his openwindow. Harry's trunk had been attached by some borrowed (in other words, stolen from the Dursley's) rope to the end of his firebolt.
Elisa was almost home; she could feel it in her pinfeathers. She circled her home-city once andthen dived into the depression of the Miami River (making sure she didn't touch the water, it's pretty nasty), and landed on the mast of a passing sailboat before taking off again.
She loved flying, loved the feel of the wind in her tail-feathers, loved the sensation in her stomach, and the thoughts that ran through her part bird braid. Elisa had a strange personality that changed sometimes, not like a Schizophrenic though. sometimes (mainly when she wasn't in the magical world) she was quiet and thoughtful, or poetic. she liked poetry, though most of hers were fairly depressing, the Changling also liked to write about what she was when she slept, for she had strange dreams.
She had dreamed of fencing with the most dangerous character in the Redwall Series, Ferahgo the Assassin, while in her squirrel form (for in the Redwall books all the characters were rodents, though there were some snakes and birds.) Elisa had even travelled with the Hulta tribe in "Wolf Tower" and had clashed antlers (boy deer or not) with Rannoch and Drail in "Fire Bringer."
To Elisa though, this was life, because, tucked away in her trunk, in its special scabbard, was a knife that only a book could create. That book was called "The Subtle Knife" written by Phillip Pullman, one of the greats as Elisa called them. It created a rift between worlds. Elisa had no idea how it came to her. And she was lucky that everyone else was oblivious to it and amazed that her fingers hadn't fallen off....
there was a world for everything, and they created her main entertainment throughout the summer. She really had fenced with Ferahgo, really had rode her horse, Kallack, down the lines of the Hulta, and she really had clashed antlers (boy deer or not, for life really did create strange bodies for her) with Rannock and Drail. She'd found every world there was, even a world of nothing exciting. She called it "The Real World" because in every book she'd read, what she usually went through (the wizard world) sounded like it shouldn't be really. Even so, she was happy it was.
Elisa could also be hyper. Whenever she was, you couldn't stop her, until she went into a sugar low and stopped talking for a while.
Sometimes she talked to the voices in her head (she had voices in her head, but they weren't just her imagination, no matter how fake they sounded. It was fairy magic she had acquired from taking a vacation in the world of "Spindle's End.")
Then she landed on the ground of her back yard, flew quickly out of reach of Gunther, her cat, and good moral friend, screaming through her mind "It's me, you idioit!" and she changed.
Her parents were awake, and they didn't like magic, but they loved ehr, so sometimes they put up with it.
"He'll be here within two days, tops." Elisa said as she walked past them. They were sitting one her screened porch, looking into the shimmering waters of their well-kept pool as they talked, and as her mother smoked. Elisa hated that her mother smoked, but she did. The young witch kept remembering a song she heard everytime she went to the movies with her friends. "Every seven seconds, a smoker dies, it's become a routine!" (Courtesy of "Truth").
"How's he getting here?" her kind hearted father asked.
"Broomstick." she answered shortly.
He cringed.
elisa walked into her room, lay down on her own unmade bed, and got out her current book, "Xenocide" by Orson Scott Card. she read until her dad called "Elisa clean up your room!" from the kitchen.
then she got up and turned on her music, and cleaned, while she listened to Sublime and Hole.
"All my friends are embryonic-"
"No, not this song" Elisa thought. She stuck in a different CD.
"When I wake up in my make up, have you ever felt so used up as this...."
Bingo.
A day later, Harry landed by a Church. steps lead up it to a great stained-glass window, and he stared as the morning sun slowly came up, and shined through the two windows on either side of the church. "Epiphany" was written in gold letters across the top. a length of colours, red, green, gold, blue, scarlet, and purple was replacing the blanket of shadow that had been there. It was like a wave, washing away the debris on the shore, moving further up the strand.
"Well, if this is 85th street, then I 'll go one street over and find her house," he said to himself.
"Who's house are you looking for?" inquired a voice from behind him.
Harry turned. Behind him was a young girl of about 13 and her even younger sister of about 10. They had to be sisters; they looked almost exactly alike except for the expression and height.
"Who're you?" he inquired back.
"I'm Antonia, and this is Madsy. We live on that street over there-" when she said this she pointed over her shoulder diagonally to point at 86th street- "with our mom and dad and brother." She had an Australian accent.
"That's the street I'm looking for! Do you know Elisa Calconn?" Harry asked eagerly.
"Course. She's a good friend of ours. Come on, we'll take you there."
There was a long strip of asphalt to go down before they got there, and then they turned to reveal a shorter length of street, suburbia, every bit of it. antonia and Madsy, who wasn't very talkative, brought him to a house of perfectly ordered decay, not too wild, not too perfect. A hedge covered the front. With a goodbye to Antonia and her sister, Harry walked up to the large, wooden front doors, and knocked with the lizard shaped doorknocker.
"Who is it?" came a scratchy voice from the other side.
"Harry Potter."
"I got it mom!"
Elisa opened the door to reveal a small alcove, which led into an African styled area. No, Harry corrected himself, Haitian. An orange, sleek tabby cat walked out from his hiding place under the coffee table, looked Harry over, and said "Meow?" to Elisa. Elisa laughed.
"He says you don't smell like you should."
"What's he mean?" Harry asked, still looking at the cat, which was now cleaning himself.
"Well Gunther, who's been a house cat for too long to have kept the philosophical nature most cats have, is used to having people he knows the smell of around him, and you're new.
"Gotcha," Harry said, feeling as though he needed to find out more about cats if he was ever going to understand what she meant.
"Tengo Hambre, want to go get something to eat?"
"Yes, and I need it more than you do, I haven't eaten in two days."
"Mmm, Henry'l be home sometime today. I cringe at the thought. Where d'you want to go to eat?"
"How should I know, you're the one who lives here, not me."
"Right. what do you want to eat?"
"I feel ilke a mince pie and some roast potatoes."
"This is America, dude, Florida to be more exact. We have Chinese, Italian, Cuban, Indian, Greek, Mexican, and, of course, American food, but no English. Well since this is Miami, let's go for some Cuban, eh?"
"Ok where do we go for Cuban?"
"Mojitos is the best, but there's also the Latin American Cafe, or this place in Sunset Place. Your choice."
"Which is the easiest to get to?"
"The one in Sunset Place."
"Let's go there," Harry said, hoping he wouldn't have to fly. After a while, riding a broomstick can get pretty irritating.
"Ah all righty then, you take Henry's bike, I'll tak e mine, or you can ride on the pegs, either way works for me."
"Won't Henry be mad at me?"
"No, Henry be mad at me. Just ride the pegs okay. It's easier that way." Elisa answered.
Finve minutes later, they were in her garage, after elisa changed into her tennis shoes, which were better for bike riding thatn her two inch high sandals. With Harry holding onto her shoulders and standing on the pegs, Elisa put her weight onto the pedals and started riding to Sunset Place. She liked it there; she knew every inch of the place.
The changling and her best home-friend, Dana Kalimar, would go there almost every day, but she was in camp now, gone for the next two weeks, until there was one day left until Elisa left for school. Which reminded her...
"Hey Harry, guess what." She screamed over the wind of the cars passing them.
"What?"
"I've been transferred to Hogwarts."
"Yeah?"
"Yup."
She slowed down as they came to the circle that led into Sunset Place, and they ate lunch sitting on the coral steps of the mall.
Have you ever heard the saying "Time flies when you're having fun?" this was true for Harry and Elisa. Despite the noted encumberence of Elisa's foster-brother, Henry, it was a good summer.
It was the last night until school, and they were going to take the Knight bus (Elisa's foster-parents were given a way to call it, a gift from Dumbeldore) to King's Cross station. Elisa was laying on her bed staring up at the ceiling while Harry finished packing.
"Harry do you like me?" she asked. Elisa was currently in one of her open-minded, quiet moods.
"What?" "I don't know. I like you."
"What do you mean?"
"I like-like you. Ya' know?" She was still staring up at the ceiling, "if I get to know someone, I form a bond, if they're the way I wish people could actually be, or at least close, I form a bigger bond. Do you like-like me?"
"Kind of."
"Still after Cho? She'll be gone next year ya' know."
"Mmm." Harry said.
He took a moment to take stock of his surroundings, to memorize the way Elisa's room looked. It wasn't the way he thought it would be. Elisa said that was because her "mom" had designed it. The walls were painted powder blue, and had a strip of wallpaper running around the top. The wallpaper had pink and blue roses on it. The only thing Elisa-ish in the room was the keyboard and guitar in one corner, along with her stereo, and poetry on the wall. Harry read over one of his favourites, called Sameness, about how, in her old school, before she had gone to Future Thyme's, everyone had been the same, and because she acted different, Elisa had been an outcast. Harry reread his favourite part,
Don't they understand, O those who are Oblivious?
It zigzags, loop-de-loops, then topples over in its own gamboling.
It is constantly changing, spinning, mixing to create other meanings.
No force controls it; no force has it under its power.
It's free as our minds, it's caged as our souls, and it's imprisoned as our ideas.
It, whatever "it" is, will only mean anything to those brave enough to dig beneath the crust,
Those logical enough to see what's right in front of them,
Those creative enough to see unreality, to see the impossible.
He wasn't sure why he liked it. He just did. Then it hit him.
"Yes," he said, "I like you. You're you, and you don't care what other people think. You're brave enough to dig beneath the surface, logical enough to see what's right in front of you, and creative enough to see the unreality and the impossible."
Chapter 2:
"Ahh, 'tis wonderful to be back at Hogwarts methinks." Elisa said, spreading her arms wide. "It has a certain smell to it that's just magical."
Chapter 3
Why did I buy you? Oh I know the answer: I had to get it out, all of it, and why I did what I did, why...So I bought this diary.
Chapter 4
Elisa sat on her bed in the dungeon of Voldemort. The walls around her looked like a cell of medieval times, and the fact that she had been locked in added to the feeling of the place. But she wouldn't run away, not just yet. Besides, it was Christmas Holidays at Hogwarts, no classes to worry about, and no reason to go back, no matter how much she wanted to.
Skippy
The Shrieking Shack //
Snape's Dungeon //
The Gallery //
The Library
Imprisoned as our Ideas
it was evening, and the students were walking up the steps to the castle. Peeves swooped down, crackling an evil, mischievous laugh, and dropping down a water balloon on top of their heads. Elisa dodged one.
"Evening Peeves. Nice to see you haven't given up your day job," she smiled, "you always had cheap tricks. You've got to get something new." Elisa waved her hand to add emphasis to her sarcastic remark.
Peeves stopped in mid air, not a moment too soon, for a second water balloon was about to be dropped on Hermione's head. "Looky, what've we got here? You look like wee student beasty, but smell different, y'do," he cackled.
Elisa smiled and waved her hand at him once more, and continued to walk down the long corridor to the Great Hall.
Once inside they all sat down for the sorting, which passed quickly (and I don't think I need to write it down) then Dumbledore got up to make announcements:
The new Quidditch captain for Gryffindor is Alicia Spinnet, and the new players include Ron Weasley and Seamus Finnigan. I'd like to not that Elisa Calconn is now a student here, and that the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher is Professor Ascar Dycat."
A man stood up from his seat at the staff table. He looked Arabian, with dark skin and long hair, but fairly young perhaps only 27. He was given the usual applause, after which he sat down, and the feast began.
(The feast has been written down before, and you know how it goes from there, right? And most of the year has been too. You see, I am extremely lazy and have more important things to write than this. I'll write out the necessary points: Harry is the Quidditch Captain, and Gryffindor wins all the matches, etc. etc., so I'm going to start off once more at the day day before Christmas Holidays, where Elisa is leaving on the Hogwarts Express because her parents requested that she come home for the holidays...)
"See you next year Elisa," Harry waved good bye as did the others. The train drove off into the setting sun. It was like the end of some romantic movie, without the romance.
The three friends walked back up to the school from Hogsmeade, talking about what they would do on holiday break.
"Snowball fights, I think," said Ron.
"Reading by the fireplace for me," said Hermione.
"Whatever comes up," said Harry.
On the train back to Kings Cross Station, Elisa stared out the window. Why hadn't her parents asked her to go home the year before? It was strange that they should ask this year. Oh well, whatever they wanted they could have. They were adults after all.
She got out onto Platform 9 3/4 and got a taxi to the airport, and then onto her plane, which was delayed because of snow. She hated delays, they added to the time you had to spend sitting and doing nothing.
The plane landed in Fort Lauderdale, and Elisa got another taxi home, but when she got there, no one was home. She opened the back door with a key, and walked in. All the lights were on, but the only sound heard in the house was the television, obviously left of by Henry. This was also strange, because her parents were very strict about turning off the lights and anything else electrical when they left. But that light was on, and so was that one, its rays blazing through the hall, warming the leather chairs and the woven rug. The cat wasn't there either. Gone, they were all gone.
Then came a voice from behind, and before she could turn around, stupefy had been yelled, and Elisa was unconscious before she hit the floor.
Voldemort then transported her back to his lair. No one would ever notice she was gone. Fake letters were so useful when you wanted to trick someone.
Logical Enough
It has been forever since I had someone to talk to, anyone. First it was Alexia, but I killed her, I killed her almost fourteen years ago, and she's gone; she's turning over in her grave, yet no one thought to blame me. And they rewarded mefor it! Whoever's up there, help me! Please help me....
Perhaps I should begin from the beginning, where it all started, the source of my grief. Back when I thought the whole world was open.
I was young then, only seventeen, when I found out about the Death Eaters, and I was ambitious then, much too ambitious. I had too much to live up to, as well, and so many people that I had to impress to keep from going insane, although I think I was probably alreay insane back then. But back then is back then, back then is too far back, and I need to start in the near past.
As I said, I have much to live up to, although I have, had, only one sibling: Andrew. He ws so much older than I was, for I was born seven years after him. Now though, I have no one to live up to, because he's dead; I killed him too. He was all that my parents could have wanted. Smart, well mannered, even through adolescence, he got the best grades, he was top of his class, he read the most books, and then got into the best college and got the best job.
And there in the shadows, sat me, aisling. I was the one who was cast aside to let him through. But I didn't hate him, on the contrary. I loved him, praised him, and, sometimes, he loved me back. Yet I never lived up to be what he lived up to be. I was the reader, brought up in a world of fantasy and the impossible. I stopped caring about when people thought of me, and what my grades were like. Instead, I contained myself in my head, and because of that everyone hated me. they called me Bichao, a Portuguese word for some kind of foul insect that makes a nuisance of things. so Bichao I was, and Bichao I remain.
Then I found the Death Eaters, and I joined them because I wanted power, and because I wanted to be recognized. I got myself initiated, and at the same time, I got myself into a big mess. They told me that if I wanted to be a Death Eater I would have to kill my loved ones, any who weren't Death Eaters weren't worth loving, someone told me when I was given that news. I had to get any burdens off my back, so that I was free to be a camel to my master and carry his.
So I followed orders. The first to go was mother, because I loved her, but only with a small amount of my heart, then Father, because he was the same. Next went Alexia, my dearest friend, my only companion, gone forever in a flash of acid green. Then went Andrew, the only one left to admire for anything, and finally, my boyfriend, David. Beloved, that's what his name meant, and he was my beloved, forever. There for only a moment,and then gone, just like the others. But I cremated him and spread his ashes across the ocean that he loved so much.
I was a Death Eater to the flesh, but not to the heart or soul, they were mine to keep, whether I wanted them or not. They burned that hideous mark onto my left arm, and I held the pain because I would not let them see my weaknesses. I didn't want to be a Death Eater anymore, I wanted to wake up at home and know that my family was safe, and that Alexia and David would be there for me. Too late.
After that, life was a flurry of parties, deaths, tortures, and laughter during it all. Grim humour, that's what any author would call it. Bit I wasn't an author then; I was only Bichao. I felt like an insect. I wanted to be an insect, I wished that I were able to curl up on the ground and wait for the bird of death to eat me for breakfast.
One day, the Dark Lord held a party, the largest one I had been to yet. And I fuond out why soon enough. I had never known that he was having any kind of affair, but then I saw the child, and learned of the dead woman Elisabeth. He killed her, and she had given him an heir.
But still there were surprises. As it turned out, it wasn't an heir, but a female, and a Changling at that. Yet strangely enough, he loved her as a father should love a daughter, and so he threw a party for his new child. He fed her the milk of his snake, Nagini, and harmed anyone who dared do so much as smile at her. He namer her Elisa, short for Elisabeth, after the mother, and she grew to the age of one.
Then my luck changed; the Dark Lord with the cold heart disappeared, and I had yound Harry Potter to thank for it. No one bothered to question me. The authorities didn't check for a Dark Mark. they didn't suspect me; I was home free, free to live my life. But there wasnothing worth living for, except my books. So I dedicated my life to fantasy.
I lived my life the way I had as a child; in a fantasy world unknown to anyone else. And I had books published; my ideas were wondered over and discussed in Internet chat rooms and forums and message boards. I made muggles and wizards alike a world where they could escape to. They could do what helped me so much in my youth, for then I was nearing twenty, and already I felt as if life had passed me by.
But then, fourteen years later, he came back, and the mark that was scarred into my arm burned red like it hadn't in fourteen years. And I apparated to him, in a circle around the boy, the boy who had caused his downfall, and I watched him toy with the child a like a cat would a mouse.
"Bow to me!" he hissed, as he mercilessly forced the boy's spine to curve.
Yet somehow the boy managed to escape, and he was free once more.
But the Dark Lord continued to call us, once was when he finally trapped the boy once more, but his daughter, thought to be lost forever, saved him from the clutches of Voldemort. Yet somehow, he managed to capture her, and we were called yet again for a feast in her honour.
"You," he said to me, "I believe they call you Bicao yes? You may sit near the head, for you did not denounce me when all thought me gone." so I sat near the head of the table, next to Elisa herself, and I looked into the sad, red, cat eyes of the child.
She chewed on her nail, and spat it onto the ground behind her. "You're an idiot," she said. She had an American accent to add to her abnormality.
I lived up to the insult; I idiotically retaliated with, "and you're masculine!"
"Don't let him hear you say that," she nodded toward the Dark Lord who was speaking to his servants, as he called them. "He'd kill you. But unlike you, I have reason acting in favour of my taunt."
"Really, and what reason is that?"
"You joined him; that's idiotic in itself, whether you want to face the facts or not." I silently agreed.
She ignored me from then on. And when I tried to strike up conversation, she elongated only her canine teeth and sneered at me. Then Elisa got up and walked into the darkness. The Dark Lord, for some reason beyond me, was too indulged in coversation to notice, or maybe he already had something planned to keep her from escaping. Perhaps she knew better than to leave. The child came back as a wolf, a dead rabbit in her mouth and began to eat.
I watched her as she ripped it apart to get at the soft flesh, blood dripped down her muzzle. I could hear her muttering, through some strange telepathy.
"All the world will be your enemy, prince with a thousand enemies, and if they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you. Digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning, be cunning, and your people will never be destroyed..." Watership Down, a book I only vaguely remember, that's what that was from. And she was giving the rabbit its last respects. She was the thousand enemies all rolled into one.
"You read?" I asked.
She looked up from her devoured dinner and changed back. "Do you?"
"Of course."
"Who's your favourite?" she kicked the carcass into the undergrowth.
"J.R.R. Tolkein, you?" We had found something in common.
"Yes, he's great...." And so it went on, though I can't remember it all. Eventually, both father and daughter left, and so did his faithful Death Eaters.
Home at last, a home devoid of love, but a home all the same. I threw myself onto my bed and immediately fell asleep to the usual dreams of past death and destruction.
Good night, diary.
Aisling.
Top of Page
Uncomprehending
Christmas went past, and only days remained until she would have to return. So she devised a plan; dig out. Loosen a stone and tunnel out like the rabbit she had eaten for dinner. It was the only way.
She lay down on her bed and remembered that evening.
All the world will be your enemy, prince with a thousand enemies, and if they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, runner, prince with the swift warning, be cunning, and your people will never be destroyed. That's what she had thought as she ate the rabbit, and the girl had somehow heard her. It reminded her of a book she had once read, called "The Shining" Red Rum! Red Rum! Elisa laughed out loud at the thought of how many times people had made jokes of that fine piece of work.
Wait till he's asleep, thought Elisa, but does he ever sleep? Maybe...her's only human, or close enough, I suppose.
Find a loose stone in the floor, the Changling told herself, or the walls even, this is a dungeon after all, or better yet, the roof. There it would be less noticable, if he didn't look up,k though he almost certainly would. she stood on her bed and reached up to touch the ceiling.
There! That one was loose! Work it out, get your claws under there.
Elisa fell back onto her bed, the giant stone almost crushing her, but she managed to get up and put it gently on the ground without so much as a clank. Little bits of grit fell from the hard-packed dirt in the roof above her onto her bed. But now, Elisa's eyes were drooping, and she yawned like a cat, mouth wide, with a slight growl, with a shake of her head afterward. She brushed the dirt off her bed, and slept, the large stone pushed underneath the frame that held her mattress.
Voldemort paced his room, he needed a new plan to get h=to his arch nemesis. He cursed himself. My plans were foiled by a child.
Then he laughed. Elisa would have chided him for saying that aloud. He had bothered himself enough to read the muggle books she loved so much. what made them so enjoyable to her? But he didn't understand much of them. India and Pakistan were at each other's throats? That had never reached his ears. Muggle affairs, that's what they were. They didn't concern him. Eventually he gave the books back to Elisa. A child did this? Voldemort asked himself after reading "Ender's Game" and "Ender's Shadow" and after much scratching of his head. Oh well, that author can live in his fantasy world.
He went over the possibilities for new plans in his mind:
Use Wormtail again, as bait? Voldemort knew of the boy's want to live with his Godfather, Black, hah! and they thought the he was my servant? Idiots!
No, the Dark Lord said to himself, he needed something new. Capture the boy, then kill him. Bring him to where not even Dumbledore could find him.
But I have the child to handle, he thought. Oh well, she wouldn't be too much of a burden. Force a potion down her, or maybe even a muggle drug, to keep her silent. And there would be no servants there to handicap him either. That was what he'd do. Only Pettigrew would be witness to the murder.
He laughed at the plan, so devious.
The Library Annex //
The Theatre //
What's New
The Floo //
The Kitchen //
The Marauder's Map