Divining Two Worlds

A feathery fact

Moonlight fell from under the crimson curtains hanging from her four-poster bed as the dormitory was filled with the snores of her roommates. Where a razer beak had sunk into her wrist, it throbbed painfully as she remembered the mighty bird that had attacked her on the train. After Mrs. Harrison had abandoned her on Kings Cross Asteria flew through the barrier like she had imagined so many times, her eyes wide open, trusting the bricks to disappear. Aboard the train she had sat with Remus Lupin, a brown-haired boy who bore scars on his hands, but Asteria knew better, from her own experiences to not inquire

Remus was quiet and calm but if you only got him out of his shell, he was revealed to be kind and funny.Around noon Asteria had strolled up the hallway to ask for the change the trolley witch had forgotten when she had caught in the corner of her eyes a strange scene unveiling through the window of a barren compartment. She stopped in her tracks and slid into the compartment and sure enough saw a flutter of wings that didn't look like owls. Curiosity tempted her to slide open the glass as she stuck her head out and heard roars of squaws fill the blue sky. They stretched their enormous wings and had beaks that glinted like bronze and were unlike anything Asteria had ever seen but had heard before.

No, that's impossible Asteria thought trying to wrap her head around the winged predators.

If they were what they appeared to be, the bird might be Stymphalian birds, the very monsters Hercules vanquished on his sixth labor. While she was gawping at them one looked down and caught her eye. It squawked in surprise alerting the rest of the flock, as they dove for her like eagles hunting a mouse. As she had expected, their poisonous feathers hit the spot of where her hand had been. Though she missed the arrows, she was unaware of a bird swooping from the sky and biting her wrist. The flock filled into the compartment one by one.

She yelped as pain swelled from the reddening spot , in revenge aiming a spell at the bird.

'Stupefy', something she had practiced over and over to kill time from having to sleep at seven-thirty just because Mrs. Harrison found them too noisy while watching her favorite show.

The bird flew backward and fell behind to the rapidly moving tracks. Every dull sense she had was awakened as she felt energy course through her body as if she was trained to avoid death with every dodge of their beaks and arrow-like feathers. With her wand, she shot a burst of light to each bird, but there were too many,for some unexplainable reason no one rushed to her aid from the noise, just opposite of the glass, some fifth years appeared ignorant to the very loud and violent struggle.

An idea sparked in her mind, Hercules had only defeated them by driving them away with the wretched sounds of cowbells. But she didn't know a spell for that. Recklessness took over as she faced death.

'Bos campanis!'

She didn't know a word in Latin yet she managed to summon the words out of an instinct that sounded at the back of her mind as the rough translation was turned into the unbearable sounds of hundreds to cowbells ringing through the compartments. The bird immediately took off, repulsed by the sounds as Asteria shut the window behind them.

'Silencio'

The spell did the trick and soon everything was silent and still. Asteria's heart raced as she wondered why others had failed to see what had happened as if like muggles their eyes were deceived by magic. But more importantly, why were those monsters there? They had sprung from the tales her dad had told her since she was young, what if it was real? What if they were all real? One thing was clear though, her dad hadn't told her everything.