3rd September 1989 – Hogwarts Castle.

I wasn’t actually that familiar with the layout of Hogwarts, though there were obviously some places I recognised It was all the connecting bits of no real significance that were hard to navigate; the corridors and halls.

So we ended up just wandering aimlessly with no real destination other than ‘outside’. Leaving the great hall we crossed the courtyard, which was mostly empty, and walked along the bridge connecting it to the gallery on the other side of the castle.

It was a particularly chilly, albeit clear, day but the view across the black lake was worth braving the cold for. One could just catch a glimpse of the small port where we had made our journey across the lake days prior, but Hogsmeade station was totally obscured by the trees that lined the lake’s banks.

“Satellites,” Rebecca said unprompted as we both leaned on the bridge’s crenelations.

I looked at her from the edge of my vision and raised an eyebrow. “What?”

“It’s a thing we put in space to send signals and take pictures and stuff.” She replied.

I rolled my eyes. “I know what a satellite is, I’m not as ignorant as many of our peers. What I meant was, why are you bringing them up?”

She turned to me and I did the same to her. “Well, they can take pictures of the whole earth, right? So how come muggles can’t see Hogwarts and Diagon Alley and stuff? You’d think someone would at least go and check them out”.

“Mag…” I started.

“Magic.” She interrupted. “Right, but what kind of magic? Because we can still see the stars and stuff so it isn’t like a barrier or anything.”

“I believe it is under a charm to appear like an old ruin to any muggle that sees it, presumably in any photo taken of the castle as well. It is also unplottable if I’m remembering correctly, it cannot be shown on any map or chart. That, and the fact that there are muggle-repelling charms everywhere that discourage any eager explorers ensuring no muggle can find it, accidentally or otherwise.” I explained, racking my brain for what I remembered about the topic.

She frowned as she digested that. “Surely someone would want to know more about the ruins they saw though, like archaeologists or historians or something. Even if they couldn’t find it on a map its not like Scotland is that big, and they would notice if they suddenly changed their mind for no reason. At least I hope they would. And, and… what about the heat vision thing satellites have. I saw it in a movie once, they could see people moving about in buildings so surely they could see all the students in Hogwarts?”

I held my hands up in surrender at her inquisitive rant. “I couldn’t say, but presumably it's all a little more complicated than what we can both imagine right now. If it wasn’t, then we wouldn’t need to be here learning anything now, would we? Also, it's called thermal imaging.”

She mumbled something I couldn’t hear but generally seemed mollified by my words. “Come on.” She said after another minute of just looking out over the lake. “If I don’t move I think I’m going to freeze solid.”

I followed her as she walked across the rest of the bridge and back inside to the gallery. We passed through until we reached the greenhouses at the far end of the castle, peering into all the magical plants as I told her what I could remember about each of them, the ones I actually recognised at least. herbology, even magical herbology, held little appeal to me but Rebecca seemed at least moderately curious about it.

We finally passed outside of the castle proper and began making our way towards the quidditch field as I gave Rebecca the first proper explanation of the sport she’d heard.

“… and if the seeker catches the golden snitch, they score 150 points and usually win the game. I wouldn’t recommend it though; the whole thing is highly unsafe and downright barbaric really… Rebecca… Rebecca!” I had to shout and click my fingers in front of her to bring her attention back down to earth.

She turned to me and I saw a concerning gleam in her eye. “How do I sign up for a team?”

I stared at her deadpan. “You can’t be serious.”

My gaze was met with a smirk. “You afraid of heights or something?”

A vision of my first, and nearly fatal, parachute drop flashed through my mind. The sight of my primary chute being cut away was permanently burned into my brain, and I once again thanked god for reserves. Despite that, I had only slightly hesitated on all the drops I’d done since.

“No,” I said with a frown. “I’m afraid of falling, there is a difference.”

That being said, there was a reason I’d joined the special BOAT service after my time in the Marines, and not their more famous airborne cousin.

Rebecca laughed. “I suppose that’s I good thing, I’d only beat you if we ended up playing against one another. Seriously though, how do I sign up?”

I glared at the girl. It was a good job I was actually a fully grown man, or I might have done something stupid like declare I would join the Ravenclaw team just to spite her. I would definitely beat her so it really wouldn’t be fair so it would actually be immoral for me to do so. Fortunately, I’m far too mature for that.

I sniffed at her obvious bait but answered her question. “We have flying practice tomorrow; they don’t usually let first-years play but if you impress your team captain enough they’ll probably make an exception.” I paused for a moment. “Do not take that as advice to do something stupid, please Rebecca. I will not have your broken spine on my conscience, even if they can heal it.”

She shrugged. “No promises.” Then she walked off away from the quidditch pitch.

I closed my eyes and took in a deep breath. “Bloody kids,” I muttered and went to catch up.

It was something of a trek as we got further from the castle and it was ten minutes or so before we came upon the owlery.

Neither of us owned an owl, Rebecca having forgone a familiar also, though more because she didn’t really know she could have one than my own reasons.

“Why don’t they just use phones?” she asked as we looked up at the tower, watching the occasional owl come and go.

“Magic interferes with the operation of most electronics.” I told her, “Though don’t ask me how. Obviously, the laws of physics aren’t quite as universal as muggles believe.” This time pre-empting her questions.

“But why owls, specifically? Wouldn’t pigeons be easier?” she asked.

That one had me scratching my head, but eventually, I just shrugged. “there could be a reason, or it could just be convention. Personally, I think owls are better than any flying rat anyway, and if they work then why change?”

We moved on from the owlery after the wind picked up and I nearly got pooed on by a passing owl. The forbidden forest came quickly into view as we approached the sundial and Hagrid’s cabin.

It wasn’t entirely dissimilar to Stranglehold Forest, though it felt somehow more foreboding. Especially considering the knowledge I had of what lay within. Normal-sized spiders? No problem. Car-sized spiders? Big problem, literally and figuratively.

“Cool!” Rebecca exclaimed, immediately walking towards it.

“Rebecca, stop!” I called out to her, but she ignored me.

Running up in front of her, I turn and looked her in the eye. “Seriously, we really shouldn’t be going in there.”

“Why?” she asked, quickening her stride and forcing me to do the same.

“Firstly, because that’s out of the castle bounds and Dumbledore told us not to leave them. Second, because we’ve only been here a few days and know next to nothing about how to defend ourselves. Thirdly, because of the giant spiders.” I said, listing off things hoping to dissuade her and finally making her stop on my last point.

“Giant spiders?” she asked wide-eyed.

“Massive, some as big as trucks!” I said, hopeful I could scare her off.

She narrowed her eyes at me. “That’s rubbish.” She said, and pushed past me to keep heading towards the forest.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

I seriously considered just grabbing her but I doubted my body’s chance of actually stopping her, not to mention that it felt entirely inappropriate. “Fuck.” I cursed under my breath. “At least wait for me!” I shouted at her.

If I couldn’t stop her then I damn well wasn’t going to let her go in alone and get herself potentially killed. Hopefully, she’d just see something scary and run out never to return before something dangerous came upon us.

She crossed over the threshold into the forest and I quickly followed suit. “See, there’s nothing to worry about, stop being such a baby…” she trailed off as her eyes focused on something behind me, the same time as I heard a familiar rushing of air.

Spinning on the spot I brought my wand out ready, only to find it pointing straight into another wand, held by someone considerably taller.

My eyes went up and met the gaze of a particularly stern-looking gentleman in the robes of an auror. His brown hair was long but seemed to be smartly tied behind his head, and a pair of deep blue eyes stared into my own. Behind him were two others, both men, one much older with grey hair and a similarly coloured beard that looked well kept, and one looking barely into his twenties with scruffy straw blonde hair and eyes that told me he was more than a little nervous.

I lowered my wand immediately; I doubted I was about to be attacked, and If I was then I didn’t rate my chances in the slightest.

“Identify yourselves” came the demand from the tall man in front of me, his tone deadly serious.

The younger auror behind him frowned as he lowered his own wand. “They’re just first-years, Aden.”

“Victor Thorneheart. And this is Rebecca Keene. We were just leaving.” I said, keeping my tone level and glancing back at a terrified Rebecca.

“Not so fast.” Said the tall auror, Aden, as he put his wand away. “What are you doing in the forbidden forest? I believe the headmaster ordered no one to leave the school grounds, which does not include the forest. It is far too dangerous, especially for two first years.”

“Why?” came the voice of Rebecca, making me sigh internally.

The younger auror opened his mouth, “Because of the…”, only to be slapped on the shoulder by the older one next to him and given a stern look.

Aden looked round at his comrade. “Shut up Erin. It’s nothing you should be worried about, so long as you stay on the castle grounds.” He turned to the older auror. “Frank, escort these two adventurous first years back to the castle and ensure the professors learn of their mischief.”

He turned once more to look at Rebecca and I. “Wasting an auror’s time is no laughing matter. Hopefully, enough detention will be enough to drill some sense into the pair of you.”

With that, he disapparated with the younger auror, Erin, after a moment of standing around awkwardly quickly following suit.

“Alright then you two.” He said in an Irish accent with an irritated sigh. “let's not hang about.” He waved us over and out of the forest. I let Rebecca go first and she gave me an apologetic look as she passed.

Soon we were walking past Hagrid’s cabin, our escort, Frank as he had been called, remaining mostly silent besides from some grumbling beneath his breath.

“Can’t you just teleport us back or whatever, why do we need to walk?” Rebecca complained.

I heard the man sigh. “Can’t apparate within the wards. Believe me, I wish I could a whole lot more than you do.”

We crossed back over to the castle over the wooden bridge, which I only stopped on with some apprehension. How such a thing had ever been deemed structurally sound looking as it did, like some architecture students' fever dream, was utterly beyond me.

Rebecca walked alongside me as our escort led the way. “Sorry,” She whispered.

I looked over at her. I wasn’t angry, or really even annoyed. I could have just not followed her in and avoided this mess, but I was still glad I did and would do again. One never left their comrades to do something stupid alone.

“Don’t worry about it,” I told her, giving her what I hoped was a comforting smile. She looked worried, which was perfectly reasonable, no one wanted to get punished by their teachers as a kid, especially when magic could be involved.

We got some odd looks from the students around the clock tower as Frank the auror led us in. He must have been a student at Hogwarts himself as he navigated us unerringly to McGonagall’s office.

Technically she wasn’t in charge of my punishments, and though our robes marked us as a Gryffindor and Ravenclaw something told me Frank wasn’t going to bother taking me on my lonesome across half the castle on a technicality.

He didn’t bother knocking, much to the annoyance of the Professor who seemed busy with a heap of paperwork. “Auror Thyme, to what do I owe this pleasure?” she asked in her usual dry tone.

“These two set off the perimeter alarm heading into the forbidden forest.” He said as an explanation as we entered the room behind him, Rebecca acting particularly sheepish.

Her stony gaze turned to the two of us, which I met with a passive look whilst Rebecca just stared hard into the ground. “I see.” She said.

The Professor turned to regard Frank again only to find his fleeing form as he shut the door behind him, and she tutted quietly as he did so. “That one never did have any manners.”

“So, what do you two have to say for yourselves?” she asked.

Rebecca looked up, twirling her hair nervously as she opened her mouth, but I beat her to it.

“We both wanted to see the forest, Professor, we weren’t going to go far and we didn’t know there was an alarm or we wouldn’t have gone,” I told her. I generally tried to avoid excuses in general, but I didn’t want to come across as flippant about the whole thing.

“And what about you,” McGonagall asked Rebecca.

“What Victor said.” She squeaked out.

She stared at us in silence with her withering glare, one I could honestly say to be the equal of any drill sergeant I had come across, if not worse. I found myself almost unconsciously moving to attention as I stood there, so deeply was it ingrained in my mind.

“Two days. Two days you have been at this school, and you’ve already gotten yourself in trouble. Doesn’t bode well for the rest of the year now does it?” she said.

“No professor,” I responded.

“That was rhetorical, Mr Thorneheart.” She said dryly. I was surprised she knew my name, but then as I was so often told my family's looks were quite striking. “You beat your father's record even. I see the apple does not fall far from the tree there.”

“And you, Mrs Keene, I expected better. A certain amount of ignorance, perhaps, but it doesn’t take a genius to not walk into something called the ‘forbidden forest’.” She continued, turning her attention to Rebecca.

More silence as she glared at us. “10 points from Gryffindor, and Ravenclaw. And detention, I think, for the both of you. I’ll talk with Professor Flitwick but I’m sure he’ll agree. I’ve heard Professor Snape requires some assistance cleaning the cauldrons. Two hours, every day after your lessons for two weeks. Hopefully, you’ll learn that when one of the professors at this school tells you not to do something, you should take care to do as they say.”

Her eyes softened a little, “your weekends are your own. But I expect not to see either of you in trouble for the foreseeable future or you won’t get off so lightly. Report to Professor Snape's office for your detention tomorrow. Dismissed.” With that, she went back to her paperwork as though we weren’t there.

I opened the door for Rebecca and we left together as I shut it behind us. “Well,” I said with a huff, “I suppose that could have gone worse.”

Rebecca looked at me teary-eyed. “I’m sorry.” She said, then ran off before I could get another word in.

I watched her go with a heavy sigh. “Fuck.” I muttered. Looking back, she really hadn’t had a good day. Chasing after her probably wouldn’t help, but I really wasn’t a people person, so what do I know? Hopefully, she just figures out whatever it is she needs to and doesn’t do anything stupid in the meantime.

Kids are bloody exhausting. With that irritatingly true thought, I wandered off myself, deciding to head to the room of requirement and blow off some steam destroying the dummy over and over.

I ended up wandering a bit until I found a place I recognised and navigated from there until I was back on the seventh floor. Finding and opening the room of requirement was far quicker and easier than the first couple of times now I knew where it was and had some practice visualising what I wanted.

Inside was the same desk as last time along with the dummies. I had my new books with me in my pack along with my notebooks and the materials needed for charms and defence against the dark arts, so I didn’t need to return to the dormitory for anything.

I sat down on the comfy chair and let out a groan. This body wasn’t used to being on its feet for so long, especially lugging around so many heavy books and I was aching in more places than I cared to admit.

What I really needed was a good cup of… the thought trailed off as I blinked and found nothing less than a steaming hot cup of tea just as milky as I liked it sitting on a plain coaster on the desk.

I smiled and looked up at the ceiling. “Thank you,” I said genuinely, hoping whatever magic governed the room was at least sentient enough to understand my thanks. I knew magic couldn’t create sustenance so it must have been taken from somewhere in the castle, but I wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

The image of a professor turning around to find their cup of tea had disappeared made me smile as I took a sip and let out a satisfied sigh. I brought out ‘Visualisation and incantation: How words hold power.’ And continued from where I had left off earlier in the day.

It was a fascinating read. It started simply telling the history of how various incantations had come about. The answer was, rather unsurprisingly, Latin, as the first proper spells were devised in the language and it had become customary since, not specifically in Latin but something similar.

The reasoning was, as the book said, that the words had to be recognisable enough that you could link them to a purpose, like incendio to fire, but not actually in use so as not to muddy the waters in one's mind as to whether one was casting a spell when saying it. It did mention that those countries that didn’t speak Latin-derived languages often had trouble casting such spells and usually had their own incantations for effectively the same spell.

Of course, not all incantations were linked to their purposes quite as neatly as incendio, but that was down to the creators of the spells, many of which were better at naming their creations than others.

It continued, explaining that shorter incantations were better for spells that weren’t particularly complex and didn’t need extensive visualisation, but benefited from speed. Longer incantations, it read, were better for more complex spells in order to help visualisation. Too long, however, and attention to visualising the spell could wane, not to mention it was entirely unpractical. Which was a long-winded explanation as to why most incantations were just one or two words.

Further in the book, it talked more about the visualisation aspect of spellcasting. It essentially boiled down to this; every witch and wizard does it differently, here are some mental exercises to help you figure out what works best for you. It wasn’t quite that concise, but that’s the lesson I took from it.

I was about halfway through when I found my attention waning and decided to try something more practical and maybe incorporate a little of what I learnt. Stretching out as I stood up, I heard my bones cracking after having spent what was likely a couple of hours hunched over reading.

Brandishing my wand, I approached the closest dummy and was about to throw some magic at it, when the lights in the room flickered for a moment and I heard an odd groaning coming from the walls.

Frowning, and more than slightly concerned, I look around hastily for any threat, only to see the entrance to the room quickly closing behind another wizard standing only meters from me.

His robes marked him out as a Slytherin and he looked old enough to be a fifth-year, yet the green eyes behind his blocky glasses displayed the same shock likely present in my own.

He opened his mouth to speak after a moment of awkward silence. “Uhhhh… hello?”