My apologies for being so late on this...I have literally--I kid you not--had writer's block for about 2 years now (with the exception of Winterstar, fortunately). As this is my first writing attempt in that long, aside from school papers, please let me know if I should continue writing this...(This is a rather long chapter, by the way--I figured I'd put it all in at once and see what people thought.) REVIEW PLEASE! Thanks!!

"Aena!"

The young woman quickly shoved the box of pounds sterling under her bed, kicking cushions away and scattering papers so her room looked like its usual mess. Her dark hair tumbled over her face as she scrambled to her feet. "What, Mother?" she snapped.

"Aena." Sapphira appeared in the doorway. She was no longer young, but still very beautiful. Her lovely auburn hair was pinned up and she was still slim under her apron, which was stained with the residue of various healing herbs. "I need you to come crush some wolfsbane for our next customer." She glanced around the room, wrinkling her nose. "Dear Merlin, Aena, why is it so messy in here?"

"To hide things." Aena grinned wolfishly. Her mother did not smile. Aena was not always joking when she said that. Since she was six and her mother had caught her with a neighbor's chicks hidden in a crate in her closet, the girl had consistently done things that made Sapphira uneasy. Tom Riddle, though she had met him for less than 24 hours, had had an intensity that frightened her as much as it attracted her, and he had gone on to become one of the most feared wizards in all of history.

When she had found out she was pregnant, Sapphira had quickly abandoned the idea of using her herbs on herself--she could not imagine doing such a thing. She made some attempts to find Tom, but discovered quickly that he had disappeared from his job at Borgin and Burkes, which set off a warning bell in her head. Later, when she found out that one of his regular clients, one Hepzibah Smith, had died shortly after selling Tom two antique pieces--one of them a heavy gold locket that was an exact replica of her own--she knew that he would be returning to her. Or for her. The locket must have been fake if he had gone after another identical piece. And he had certainly gone after it for his own ends; she had contacted Borgin and Burkes and they had never seen her locket or the ones purchased from Hepzibah Smith.

She had packed up everything she owned as fast as possible, leaving nothing but various plants scattered about her cottage--for who knew how Tom could use something of hers to find her? Advanced magic was something she knew little about, but respected greatly. She was only a Healer, after all. Compared to her, Tom's powers were godlike, and he could--and would, she was sure--easily kill her and the child she suspected he would care nothing for. She was not so naive as to believe that he felt anything for her after this amount of time.

With that, Sapphira Fremont disappeared altogether and became the auburn-haired, hazel-eyed Sapphira Lexington of an obscure village on the opposite side of England. Aena had never seen her mother's old photographs--they were stashed away and sealed with magic. She did not know that Sapphira had once had blond hair and blue eyes or that Sapphira did not use Muggle dye to keep her hair permanently red. She did not know, in fact, that they both possessed magical powers. At least, Sapphira hoped she didn't. Aena had had quite a few things happen to her accidentally over the years, which Sapphira had explained away as part of the old superstitions still quite strong in the little forest village where they lived. One instance, which she had not been able to explain, stuck out in her mind--Aena had been playing by the road one day without Sapphira's knowledge when a Muggle automobile had roared by and splashed her with water and mud. Terrified of the huge object so loud and so close, Aena fell backwards onto a sharp stick and cut her arm badly. Sapphira came running at the sound of her shrieks and looked up the road just in time to see the steering wheel of the car fall off and the vehicle veer sharply into a tree. Horrified, Sapphira raced to the car; the driver was alive but dazed, and was looking in extreme confusion at his steering wheel, which had simply separated cleanly from the dash, its wires oddly cauterized-looking rather than raggedly severed. She offered him help for his bruises and cuts, but he declined and phoned a repair shop, the nearest of which was several villages over. She looked back at her daughter, who was staring, eyes narrowed, at the car. Sapphira shivered as she felt a ripple of magic in the air.

She had bundled Aena off home as fast as possible and cleaned her cut, adding a little memory-altering potion along with the pain-relieving one. Her daughter had used powerful magic, and not for the first time (she had brought home strangely inflated frogs and once had set a dress that she disliked on fire, among other things). Sapphira had explained these things away with vague references to natural phenomena and superstitions, most of which she made up. The problem was that Aena started verifying these--or, more accurately, their falseness--with the local villagers. Eventually, Sapphira was forced to admit to the then ten-year-old that she herself was a "Healer" who "knew things" and could "do things" that most people could not do, but flatly denied that she was a witch. Instead, she tried to channel her daughter's energies--and very evident, at least to Sapphira--powers into the art of healing, rather than the art of accidental (she hoped it was accidental) destruction. Aena learned very quickly, both to the delight and trepidation of her mother. As she grew, they both were silently aware that Aena possessed skills beyond her mother, as well as certain personality traits like the ability to lie with great skill. She frequently deceived her mother, generally without apparent remorse, and Sapphira kept a tighter watch on her as she grew older and learned that she was capable of leading groups through near-slavish devotion, young women as well as young men. She liked power, liked it a great deal, and when they disobeyed her, she found that it was easy to make "accidents" happen to them. One boy broke his arm in a farming incident, and his cousin dislocated both shoulders when she dared to flirt with the young man Aena was interested in. Aena was only sixteen at the time.

Soon after these occurrences, Sapphira moved away from that village and set up shop as a Healer in another, more remote one. Aena did not protest, but over the next five years Sapphira became resigned to the fact that large sums of money were "misplaced" every once in a while--a job here, another there--and that Aena could no longer be kept from who and what she was. Thank Merlin, no letter from Hogwarts had ever appeared--Sapphira had registered Aena Fremont as stillborn, and Aena Lexington did not legally exist, either in the wizarding or the Muggle world--but Aena Fremont-Riddle could remain hidden no longer.

Now, standing in her daughter's doorway, Sapphira sighed. "What are you hiding now, Aena?"

"I was joking, mum." The 21-year-old brushed dust off her hands again. "What does Dotty Doris want wolfsbane for?"

"I have no idea, really. I need it done by five o'clock."

Aena stood there for a moment, smirking. "Batty old woman. She's probably trying to poison her neighbor's goats again."

"Most likely." Sapphira sighed. "Come on, then, we've lots of work to do."

"I'm not--"

Sapphira paused. She knew what her daughter was going to say, but turned around casually. "Five minutes?"

"I'm leaving, Mum."

Her mother looked at her silently. She suddenly looked very tired, and Aena winced, realizing that her mother knew what she was about to say.

"I've got money. I may not have gotten it the best way, but Mum, I've got to get out of this place and...and find out why it is that I can do these things."

Sapphira didn't answer. Aena stared at her. "MUM, you have to let me go."

"I am not stopping you, Aena. I would rather, however, that you stay here."

"I can't. I can do these things, they're not superstitions, Mum, they're me. You can do things too, I've seen you." It came out in a rush. "You've healed animals' broken legs in a day; you've made my bruises and cuts disappear when you thought I thought you were giving me 'healing potions', but I watched you put juice into the cup, not herbs...I've done things that aren't natural, or even possible...Mum, this stuff isn't normal."

"No, it's not. I was hoping you would never find out."

"You're a witch, aren't you." It was a statement.

"Yes. But not a very powerful one."

"And so am I, then."

"Yes."

Aena's dark eyes glittered. "And I am powerful, aren't I?"

Sapphira would have laughed to hear a 21-year-old ask such a childish-sounding question, but it was a very serious one. "Yes, you are," she said carefully.

"How?"

"Your father was a powerful wizard."

"Who was he?" Sapphira had never satisfactorily answered this before, merely saying that he was a handsome salesman with whom she had "made a mistake".

"His name was Tom. I never learned his last name."

Aena looked at her with blazing eyes that she recognized from a different face and a different time. "You're lying."

"He told me it was a...a riddle...a puzzle," she ended hurriedly. Sapphira had long had the disconcerting feeling that her daughter could read her mind, quite literally--a Legilimens, the wizarding term for it. Now she felt ripples of magic going through her mind and angrily broke the connection, startled and disturbed at the casual force with which her daughter had taken information from her. Aena nodded, satisfied. "A riddle, yes. Do you remember what it was?"

"He didn't say. He just said it was an...enigma." She prayed her daughter would not realize the connection between the word and the name Riddle. She tried--for the first time consciously--to make her mind as blank and neutral as possible. Aena had turned away, though, and was digging out a large box of pounds sterling from under her bed. Sapphira had a twisted smile on her face as she looked at the stolen money. "So that's where it's all gone. I've suspected."

Aena, to her credit, did blush faintly. "There wasn't any other way. I love you, Mum, but when were you planning to tell me that I'm a witch or a sorceress or whatever the term is?"

Sapphira sighed heavily. "Go. Be careful and don't tell people more than you have to." She left the room and returned with a bag, pulling a map out of it.

"You knew I was going to leave," her daughter said in an accusative tone.

"Yes, I've been expecting this, but not so soon. Go to Hogsmeade--it's full of people like...like us. You'll find work there."

Aena's eyes lit up and she took the map and bag from her mother with a nod of thanks. "Hogsmeade."

"There's an apothecary there." As she watched Aena sling a larger bag and a cloak over her shoulders, Sapphira realized with a sudden jolt that her daughter was leaving--now.

"Come back and visit, Aena." She smiled the same twisted smile again as Aena flashed dark eyes--Tom's eyes--over her and knew she would not see the young woman again for a long time. Aena kissed her on the cheek, murmured, "Love you, Mum," and stepped out of the cottage, greeting "Dotty Doris" on her way out. Sapphira was left staring at an empty room with cushions and papers scattered everywhere.

Aena set out along the road that led in the direction of Hogsmeade, which was fortunately not terribly far from their village, perhaps 60 km. The day was pleasantly warm, and she cast about in the small bag that her mother had given her. It contained the map along with a bag of dried fruit and some biscuits...and what felt like a thick pencil. "What in the world..." she muttered, pulling out something totally unexpected. It was a long, thin stick, slightly knobbly in places, and it felt strangely warm in her hands, responding to her touch as she tapped it experimentally with a finger.

A wand? she thought. Wands in little kids' magic kits were invariably black with a white tip on each end. This looked like a stick. Maybe it was part of one of her mother's herbal-remedy plants and had fallen into the bag, but it looked fairly big, and the strange warmth was hard to ignore. She dug around further in the bag and found a carefully-folded note, which she opened to find her mother's handwriting.

My dear Aena,

If you are reading this, it means you have set out to discover who you are, as I have long hoped you would not wish to. Your father was immensely powerful, and you will be as well. Take this wand--it was my spare. Use it carefully and know that you hold much in your grasp.

Your true name is Aena Fremont, as mine is Sapphira Fremont. I will not tell you any more because it will endanger you. Keep that name close and never use it unless absolutely necessary. To the world, Aena Fremont is dead, and Aena Lexington does not exist. I beg you to keep it that way. I have hidden you to protect you from him.

Before you go to Hogsmeade, you will need your own wand should this one not work for you. Wave it--it should feel...right.

Aena put down the letter and waved the wand. It still had the vague warm sensation, but it did not feel as if it were hers. She tried aiming it at a leaf on the ground and, feeling silly, whispered "Ignite!". The leaf did nothing. She focused mentally on the leaf, as she had done to the dress that she had set on fire years ago, envisioning it in flames. It shuddered for a moment, then lay still. The wand felt like an obstacle. Setting it down, she focused again on the leaf in cold anger and it began to smoke. It was not as effective as her rush of pure hatred toward the horrid dress had been, but it was clear that she was more effective without the wand. She sighed and turned back to the letter.

If the wand does not feel right, it can still be used. Go to Ollivander's wand shop in Diagon Alley...

There was a set of directions to Diagon Alley in London and a diagram showing which stones to touch. Looking at the diagram, with the bricks colored in and numbered in the order that they should be tapped, Aena realized with a rush of interest that there was an entire world she knew nothing about, yet was born a part of. She felt bitter resentment toward her mother for keeping this from her, and thought to herself that she should have left long ago. Her father might be a powerful wizard, but she was no fool. Whatever fear her mother had of her father, she would prove herself his equal. She could feel the power that she had inherited from him, far more than that she had from her mother.

She wondered what he had been like, her father. She had dark hair and very dark eyes, so different from her mother's light hazel ones. She suspected that she looked more like Tom-the-enigma than Sapphira, and the thought made her smile. Yes, she would be powerful, and when she was powerful enough she would protect her mother from whatever it was that Sapphira feared in the man who had given her the child he did not know about.

The next village had a bus to London. Aena purchased a ticket and handed it to the bored-looking driver, then settled herself between two old women who were nodding off in the warm spring sunshine. Smiling to herself, she reread the part of the letter that said Your true name is Aena Fremont...

She got her first real shock when she found herself looking at the blank brick wall that supposedly led to Diagon Alley. Digging out the diagram, Aena hoisted the bag back over her shoulder and carefully tapped the bricks in order. Nothing happened for a moment, then the bricks began to move by themselves, revealing an entrance to a bustling marketplace. Aena jumped backward in shock. No one around her--"Muggles", her mother's letter said, along with several other explanatory terms--seemed to notice. Eyeing the bricks suspiciously, Aena walked through them, hurrying forward as they began to close behind her.

She found herself in a part of London that she knew was invisible and unable to be found by Muggles, or non-magical folk. It was a bustling street full of shops, each overflowing with things she had never heard of before or, at best, sounded like they belonged in a children's story book. SID'S FINEST CAULDRONS--10 GALLEONS, advertised one shop in shimmering red letters that floated in the air. Aena looked around for some sort of projector, but there was none--the letters seemed to be formed out of thin air. The next shop was crammed full of cages containing owls of all shapes and sizes. There was a particularly beautiful gray-and-white specimen, regal-looking with lethal golden talons. Aena eyed it appreciatively as its golden eyes stared fiercely out at her. Still other shops advertised magic-spell books, cloaks, broomsticks, and more until Aena's head was swimming.

Just past the apothecary, which she promised herself she would return to, was a shabby, run-down-looking little shop crammed between two other buildings. "OLLIVANDER'S," the faded sign proclaimed. "Makers of Fine Wands since 382 B.C." In the window was a wand--she assumed it was a wand, since it looked like yet another slightly-smoother-than-normal stick to her--on a purple cushion that looked as if it might indeed be from 382 B.C. Skeptical to the utmost, Aena stepped inside.

She found herself in a narrow, dark shop in which all the walls were covered with stacks of narrow boxes, like shoe boxes but thinner. She forgot how dusty the shop was as she stared around in fascination. How many types of wands were there? Were they not standard, like children's play-wands?

A thin, strangely ageless-looking old man--he was old, but how old was not clear--appeared from somewhere in the back of the store. He had eerie silver eyes like twin moons and they focused on her, blinking for a moment and looking as if he recognized her, but he shook his head. "May I help you, madam?"

"I'd like to, er, buy a wand." The words felt strange coming out of her mouth, and she made her face expressionless.

"Of course." He bowed. "I am Mr. Ollivander, at your service."

With that, he said no more to her, but busied himself looking around the walls at the stacks and stacks of boxes. Aena watched him, bemused, wondering whether she should ask him for a particular type of wand, but as she didn't even know what her current one was, she decided to stay quiet and simply watch.

Ollivander suddenly lit on a certain box and pulled it out of the stack without so much as shifting the others. With a flourish, he presented it to her. "Beech, 12", pliant, unicorn hair," he said, opening the box. "Take it, please."

Unsure what she was supposed to do, Aena awkwardly picked it up. There was a bit of warmth in her fingers, as had been the case with her mother's spare wand, but nothing happened. Ollivander looked at her with more interest. "You have not used a wand before."

"No," she admitted.

"Yet you are far older than Hogwarts students."

"What is Hogwarts?"

Ollivander looked almost shocked, then smiled eerily. "Yet there is something in you--you are a witch, yes?"

"I am, yes. Newly so. My mother...revealed this to me yesterday. I have been trained as a Healer." This seemed enough information, vague but satisfying, and Ollivander bowed in understanding.

"You'll have a spare wand, then?"

Suddenly uneasy for no clear reason, Aena nodded slowly.

"May I see it?"

Aena reluctantly handed the wand to Ollivander, who examined it carefully for what seemed like less than a minute before looking her in the eye. "This is Sapphira Fremont's wand."

Aena nearly dropped her bag. "How do you know that?"

"I remember every single wand I have ever made, and every single person I have sold a wand to. I did not know she had a daughter."

"I was raised a...a Muggle." The word tasted strange to her. Ollivander smiled eerily again. "And your father?" he asked.

Much as she had long been able to sense her mother's thoughts--in more detail than she should have through intuition alone--Aena suddenly understood that she should not reveal this particular name. "I never learned it", she said coolly.

"Ah. No matter." He blinked disconcertingly and handed her back the wand. "Another?"

The next wand, a 9 3/4" holly with a dragon-heartstring core, unyielding, actually began to glow when she touched it, and she felt an undercurrent of power running down her arm. "Wave it!" Ollivander said excitedly. She did, and gold sparks fizzled out the end--she nearly dropped the wand in surprise. But Ollivander seemed to think something was still not right, and pressed several more on her, each reacting differently to her touch.

The strange old man stood surveying the boxes he had already brought out, apparently deep in thought. Then, with a birdlike motion, he turned and scanned the boxes behind him, running his hands over a row near the bottom, stopping at one. He pulled out the box and handed it to her. She felt a sudden weight in her arms that could not be the wand alone. Opening the box, she had barely touched the ordinary-looking light-brown wand when it shot green and gold sparks that nearly set Ollivander's robes on fire. Jerking back, she pulled the tip of the wand up. As she had when she had consciously ignited the leaf, she felt raw power rippling through her entire body, but now it was channeled into her arm and felt as if it were multiplied a thousand times. She mentally seized that power and commanded it to stop, and immediately the sparks ceased, leaving her shaken and Ollivander ecstatic.

"Wonderful, wonderful!" he exclaimed. "I thought that would be the right one--always takes a few, you know." He took the wand from her and carefully laid it in the box. "Rowan, 10 1/2", flexible, dragon heartstring. Perfect for Sapphira's daughter."

Aena wondered what that meant, but decided not to ask--he knew enough about her already. The fact that he knew her mother's wand by sight was enough to make her cautious with her name. What had Sapphira done? Perhaps he knew everyone's name, as he claimed, but it couldn't hurt to be careful. She didn't think it was necessary to conceal her father's name--he hadn't asked further about that--but perhaps she would in future. She paid for the wand--he looked somewhat irritated at her use of Muggle money--and left the shop.

She didn't know how she had missed it before, but everyone here was wearing what looked like graduation robes or cloaks. She was apparently using the wrong money--was there an entirely different monetary system in Britain? How was this world hidden from the "regular" world? Stopping a random passerby, who looked shocked to see someone in Muggle clothing in Diagon Alley, she asked where she might find a money exchange place. "Gringotts, of course," the woman said confusedly, pointing down the street toward a gleaming white building. "Thank you," Aena said vaguely. The woman walked off hurriedly, muttering about "nutters".

Aena approached what appeared to be an enormous edifice made of white marble. It had enormous bronze doors and...a goblin? standing outside in a scarlet-and-gold uniform. Aena tried not to stare and hoped he was nothing more than a very ugly little man, but his ears were far too long and pointy, and his skin was decidedly not a human shade. Perhaps, she thought, I'd better be dressed for this place. Somehow Muggle clothes, no matter how conservative, just didn't seem right for such a building, and her outfit was already getting glances and whispers from the wizards and witches around her. She saw a sign that read "Madame Malkin's Robes For All Occasions" and walked toward it.

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