Spells in Silence

Chapter 1: Silent Tears

This work brings together a number of related ideas that have been dispersed across several of my stories, some published and others not. I have no clue where it is going. Will it be a tale of the Dark victorious like the Black Queen series? Will it have a happy ending like What Happens in Vegas? Will it descend into bleak depression like Deal with a Devil? I hope not the third one, but there is no way to predict anything right now.

It is in some ways yet another reaction to what is probably my biggest beef with the Harry Potter franchise: how in a world where every main character is a wizard, there is no mysticism or real magic in what they do. It's all point a stick, say a few rote words, and move on to the next task. There is no effort, no creativity, no individuality.

Let's fix that.
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"Where'd she go?! She was right here!"

A too-thin girl slowly leaned over the edge of the rooftop and glanced down at the six boys milling around aimlessly in the narrow dead-end between two school buildings. All of them were practically vibrating with confusion, their thoughts bouncing around as they tried to figure out where the target of their 'fun' could have gone, but the biggest and meanest of them had a thread of fear running through him. Thoughts like "People don't disappear" and "She has to be here" warred with "How'd she do that?" and "Freaky..." in his head. The blond boy lifted his head higher, as though thinking she might have climbed up the walls, and she pulled back so he would not get a glimpse of her shaggy black hair or her green eyes.

"She must have jumped over the fence."

"We were right behind her, Dudley! She's not that fast!"

"You got a better idea?!" Dudley demanded. No one answered him, and even from on top of the building and out of sight she could still feel the satisfaction that flooded through him at their acceptance. Three years he had spent putting his little gang together, she knew, and even now he still feared that one of them would challenge his authority and knock him from the top. He had reason to fear this, too; Marcus had considered it several times over the last year, and the only thing that was stopping him was that he in turn was afraid that none of the other boys would back him up and instead would hold him down where Dudley could beat on him. "Let's go. We'll get back at her tomorrow."

The 'her' in question flopped onto her back with a quiet huff. She rarely expected tomorrow to be any better than today, and after hearing that she felt her doubts were once again going to be well founded. Boys were not supposed to hit girls, that was something the teachers constantly told everyone at Little Whinging Primary School, but none of those same teachers would lift a finger to defend her.

Everyone from the other children to the teachers to the principal all thought the same thing. Hazel Potter was weird, a freak, and she deserved whatever happened to her.

Hazel pushed herself upright and glared at the pockets of snow still lingering on the tiles. It was not as if it was her fault that strange things always seemed to happen to her! Like the time her Aunt Petunia told her she had to wear a black and white dress that looked like it was from the 1930s, a dress she knew her aunt had picked up for less than a pound at a charity shop. Her aunt had been so pleased with herself about that, about how ugly she knew the dress was and how Hazel did not deserve to have 'normal people money' spent on her. The next morning, Hazel had woken to find the dress had shrunk overnight so small that it would not fit even a doll, let alone her. She had spent a week locked in the cupboard under the stairs after that, even though no one ever tried to explain how she was supposed to be responsible for that.

Or the time when one of the girls in her class had been making fun of how quiet she was only to start braying like a horse. Marissa was unable to talk normally for the rest of the day and had to be taken home early by her mother. Because Hazel had been the victim, the school had called Aunt Petunia to tell her about it. Hazel's shoulder twinged at the memory of Uncle Vernon's punishment for being 'freakish' in public like that.