A/N: When i use "words" it means it is in french.
A few weeks had passed since the whole obliviating incident, and I'd managed to meet with Louise several times, though I was always careful to maintain the distance Mum's memory charm had created.
It hurt not being as close to her as I was before, watching her walk past with just a casual nod where once we would have spent hours talking, but I knew it was necessary. Better a distant friend than no friend at all.
The upside was that I finally had time to study things that actually interested me: magic. Not just reading about it in dusty tomes, but really understanding how it worked, feeling it flow through me like a living thing.
I'd already started learning the basics of Charms, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Potions, and Herbology. But Astronomy - that was my absolute favorite. There was something deeply comforting about being able to see stars even in broad daylight, especially after the vision I had had while staring at the star a few weeks ago, it felt like that had been the catalyst for it all.
My own magic had developed in peculiar ways too. While normal spells seemed to require Latin incantations and precise wand movements though most powerful wizards and witches could cast magic without words and some very powerful wizards could cast wandless, I appeared to have access to a different kind of magic altogether.
So far, I could only do three things reliably, exchange pain for pain, levitate small objects, and create fireballs. The last two I'd mastered by repeatedly reviewing the memories of that night at Louise's house - memories that remained crystal clear in my mind, like words written in a book I could reference at will.
There was also something else at work with my magic every time I wanted to cast it I had to say two simple words, I Cast. I didn't know why I had thought of saying I Cast at the beginning of my magic it just seemed to come naturally as if that was how both my mind and magic worked.
"Felix, head in the game," Dad's voice cut through my astronomical musings, pulling me back to our French lesson.
I blinked, focusing on his expectant face. "Sorry, Dad."
"En français," he prompted, raising an eyebrow in that particular way that meant I was in for another lecture about the importance of maintaining my linguistic heritage.
Ah yes, the French lessons. Another of Dad's passions that had become my daily ritual, as regular as breakfast and just about as appetizing as his attempts at cooking it.
"Désolé, Papa," I corrected myself, suppressing a sigh that would have earned me an even longer lecture.
"When you go to school, you won't have regular practice," he reminded me, his expression serious. "So this is important. Understood?"
"Yes, Dad."
"If you can find someone to practice with there, please do."
I stared at him incredulously. "You're joking, right? I want to have friends there."
"You'll have friends," he assured me with that familiar optimistic smile that always made me wonder if he remembered what school was actually like.
"Not if I speak French," I muttered.
"You will," he insisted, his eyes twinkling. "Besides, French is the language of love. Even if you don't get friends, you can get a girlfriend."
"I don't want a girlfriend," I protested, feeling my face heat up. "I want friends to talk magic with. So no, I'm not going to speak French at..." I paused, my mind suddenly blank. What was Hogwarts in French? Was it just Hogwarts with a French accent, or was it some complicated combination of the fench words for hog and warts, 'cochon' and 'verrues'? I went with the former.
"Hogwarts."
Dad opened his mouth to argue, but the door burst open, revealing Mum in her teaching robes, her wild brown hair even more disheveled than usual and her golden eyes sparkling with excitement.
"Time for magic classes!" she announced cheerfully.
"Non, attends..." Dad began in French, before catching himself. "No, wait, Felice, we still have a few minutes."
"Sorry, dear, can't hear you," Mum said brightly, already whisking me away from Dad's office. I caught a glimpse of his resigned expression as we left - the same look he always got when Mum's enthusiasm for magic teaching trumped his carefully planned French lessons.
We descended to the basement, which had been transformed from my mom's magic laboratory into my private magical classroom.
The space was immaculate as always, filled with everything a young wizard might need, shelves of potion ingredients labeled in Mum's neat handwriting, herb gardens thriving under magical lights that mimicked natural sunlight, a massive library with books ranging from basic spell theory to advanced magical practice, a gleaming cauldron that still smelled faintly of last week's Sleeping Draught attempt, a divination corner with crystal balls and tea leaves, and even a proper dueling ring marked with protective runes.
"Today," Mum announced, practically bouncing with excitement, "we're starting Magical History. We're going to finish this book before you leave for Hogwarts because if that wretched ghost is still teaching, you'll want to die of boredom. Better to have it all memorized so you can use those classes for something more productive."
She flicked her wand in the wand movements for wingardium leviosa, and a book floated gracefully to the table where I sat. Another wave brought down a chalkboard from the ceiling, its surface pristine and ready for today's lesson.
The book's spine bore gold lettering that read "A History of Magic" by Bathilda Bagshot, the gilt slightly worn which was weird since a simple Reparo could fix it.
"Open the book," Mum instructed, "but don't read from it. That's a terrible and more importantly boring way to learn."
I turned to the first chapter - "Cavernous Wizards".
"The first documented wizards appeared over 150,000 years ago," Mum began, her voice taking on the steady, passionate tone she always used when teaching magic. "Around the same time as homo sapiens. We're still not entirely certain if the original wizards and Muggles are different species or not."
As she spoke, her wand danced through the air, creating chalk illustrations on the board - crude stick figures that moved and interacted, telling the story of our earliest magical ancestors. Some held wands made of bone and sinew, others traced patterns in the air with their bare hands, creating effects that would later be called wandless magic.
"The truth is," she continued, "we're deeply interconnected with Muggles. Almost every non-magical person has some wizard blood inside them - that's why Muggleborns such as myself are possible. The potential for magic exists in everyone no matter what pureblood families would leave you to believe, but we still don't know what actually awakens it in some and not others."
Her wand flicked again, and the chalk figures began to illustrate her next point. "Let's move on from that mystery to something we do know about - the first evidence of magic. It was a cave painting made with blood magic."
She paused dramatically. "Yes, blood magic. It's considered dark magic now, but it was our first type of magic and is still one of the most powerful and primal forms of magic. I'll explain its fall from grace later."
I found myself genuinely fascinated as she explained how wizards and Muggles had coexisted for most of history, with magical folk often serving as leaders and protectors - or more usually than not, as dictators, kings, or advisors to early human settlements.
She made the chalk draw some figures of wizards in places of powers, dictating wars between other leading wizards, they ordered battles muggles against muggles.
I sat there, absorbing every word, every chalk illustration, wondering if somewhere in all this history there might be an explanation for my own unusual abilities.
Perhaps there were others who could cast spells in English, who could see stars in daylight, who had magic that worked differently from everyone else's. Maybe I wasn't as alone as I sometimes felt.
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