Amaranthine - A Hogwarts Fanfiction

CHAPTER 1 - JOSEPHINE

23th June - 2007

Books upon books framed the tall walls of the tower - ancient ones with broken papers, some with incomprehensible handwriting, and those with hardcovers written on one of the Muggle's most useful inventions - typewriters. Nothing of the old, ripped wallpaper could be seen - everything was covered from top to bottom in old hickory shelves. Something all these books had in common was the dust covering them, from top to bottom. As a matter of fact, the entire room was covered in dust, dirt and perhaps some cobwebs - even the ancient wooden flooring that was usually tended to frequently, was covered in layers of dust and filth. Stepping into this room - Josephine reflected back on the decision to abandon it completely. What had they thought, just simply letting the precious and antique tower just rot.. It had been her fath.. - right. Her father. This was her dead father's old office - caught in their months of grief no members of her family, or any servants, had dared to enter the grand tower of the estate. And now she was going in there, alone, for the first time in six months. It looked worse than she had thought it would - maybe they should have at least paid a little attention to it. By the way things were looking now it would probably rot away in a year or two, and based how she knew her mother to be - it would most likely be three years before she would even think of entering the southern tower - not to mention stay in the place where everything left of her late husband existed.

But she hadn't entered here by choice. Oh no - their stubborn barn owl Laces had been trained to enter the old, large window in her father's dusty study - When he had passed away, she'd refused to enter through anywhere else, so now they had six months of letters lying on her father's old, dusty and luxurious desk. Of course, not the important ones - they had been delivered by other owls to their front door, but other letters, such as the ones from her friends, was lying in the very, very tall pile on the desk. Luckily, her friends knew about her stubborn owl and hadn't waited for any replies back, although some of them who were smart enough (Laurel and Reyna) had sent their own owls. Now, again, she regretted not gathering the guts to enter this room earlier - all these letters would be a pain to sort through. She had only decided to enter it to receive the letter containing her results from the OWL's, and this year's letter from Hogwarts containing all materials she had to gather. You would think that Hogwarts would send their letters through another way than this window - but turns out, no. They're just as stubborn as her wretched owl.

Luckily, the letters had just arrived so she didn't have to dig through the whole pile to get to them - yet. The two letters with the Hogwarts crest felt light - just as usual. It wasn't often the envelopes contained anything else than papers. The larger letter of the two seemed to contain the results from her OWL's, and her curiosity taking the better of her, she ripped them open.

She was just as quickly out from the tower as she had entered. Sorting through her father's office and all of the letters had to wait.

-o-

"Mum! Mum!" Josephine's buoyant voice echoed through the hallways of their manor.

"Yes, what is it, darling?" Her mother sounded just as broken as usual, her voice cracking - sounding almost without a soul. And in a way, she didn't have one. They had been so close - one half of each other. Completed each other so perfectly, like two puzzle pieces belonging together. Now one was gone, and her mother felt.. Empty. Hollow. It was a shame that she couldn't do anything about it. Just.. sitting around. Seeing her mother suffer. Not being able to offer any help - it was an outright nightmare, but then again, her whole life was a nightmare at the moment. Well, except her grades. Those were pretty good. She wasn't bragging - she had the evidence in her hands.

"Look - look! I got seven O's!"

She was delighted, waving the papers as she ran towards her mother's seat in the kitchen. Even though Jo was by far the most cheerful of their family at the moment, even she was often sullen, so it was a little of a surprise to see her beloved daughter running towards her with a brilliant smile on her face. A smile she hadn't seen in months. And frankly - it was contagious.