Ember. It means fire. Ember was never safe. Even before she was born she was coverted. Hunted. She's the last of her kind. Once there were many. Once there were four. Four families. One for each element. Air. Water. Earth. Fire. Every other family e...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Harry was the first to wake up in his dormitory next morning. He lay for a moment watching dust swirl in the ray of sunlight coming through the gap in his four - poster's hangings, and savoured the thought that it was Saturday. The first week of term seemed to have dragged on for ever, like one gigantic History of Magic lesson.
Judging by the sleepy silence and the freshly minted look of that beam of sunlight, it was just after daybreak. Harry pulled open the curtains around his bed, got up and started to dress. The only sound apart from the distant twittering of birds was the slow, deep breathing of his fellow Gryffindors. He opened his schoolbag carefully, pulled out parchment and quill and headed out of the dormitory for the common room. He was surprised to find Ember in the common room, fully dressed. She leaning against the fire place, staring at the dieing embers of the once roaring fire.
"Em?" Harry said, heading for his favourite squashy old armchair beside the now extinct fire.
Ember jumped, having been to lost in thought to hear him enter the common room.
"What are you doing up so early?" Ember asked.
"Could ask you the same question." Harry said, settling himself down comfortably.
"I just . . . couldn't go back to sleep." Ember said.
"That dream again? Anything change?" Harry asked.
"No. Its the same except -" Ember said and then suddenly stopped. She clutched Nymeria, who was the size of Crookshanks, closer to her.
"Except what?" Harry pressed.
"The voice. It's getting louder. Almost as if . . ." Ember trailed off.
"As if what?" Harry said, concerned.
Ember turned to look Harry in the eye.
"As if its getting impatient." Ember whispered.
Harry and Ember stared at each other, feeling of worry and panic passing between them.
Who was this voice? Was it even real? What did it want?
"Your turn. Why ate you down here so early?" Ember said after a long tense pause.
"I decided to write to Sirius." Harry said.
Harry unrolled his parchment while looking around the room. The detritus of crumpled - up bits of parchment, old Gobstones, empty ingredient jars and sweet wrappers that usually covered the common room at the end of each day was gone, as were all Hermione's elf hats. Wondering vaguely how many elves had now been set free whether they wanted to be or not, Harry uncorked his ink bottle, dipped his quill into it, then held it suspended an inch above the smooth yellowish surface of his parchment, thinking hard . . . but after a minute or so he found himself staring into the empty grate, at a complete loss for what to say.
