Daisies • HP Next Generation

Chapter 33: Faith, Trust, and a Wand

I would like to officially announce the ending of this book. It took me... about three years to write, wow. I can't believe that I've stuck with this since I was 13. I think I've improved a lot, but I can't claim credit for all the motivation I've had from comments and votes, and I just really appreciate all of you reading this. There will be a sequel, which you can expect to come out next February or March. I'll post an A/N when it's up to let you know. 

The fifth time Poppy was asked whether or not she thought she would be going to Hogwarts, she decided that being around the magical side of her family wasn't so great after all. This question was like the wizard version of "what you you want to be when you grow up?" It was a question that Poppy didn't know the answer to, made her uncomfortable when she was asked it, and was subject to change.

"Don't let it bother you," Albus had told her. "They're probably just eager to start making guesses on what House you'll be in."

This hadn't made Poppy feel any better.

"Hufflepuff," she pouted, kicking a stone across the ground. "Gryffindor, Slytherin, Ravenpuff - no that's not right. It's claw." The House Daisy had teased she would never get into.

Poppy looked up. She was out of earshot of the house now. A couple of people sat around a picnic table behind the Potter's mansion, but many people had gone back inside. Ginny waved at her from her seat, and Poppy waved back before she kept walking into the patch of trees. She wasn't entirely sure that this part of the land belonged to Harry and Ginny or not, nor did she care much at the moment. She wasn't so far away that no one would be able to see her if they looked.

After passing a couple of trees, Poppy got the odd feeling that she should be quiet. Dead leaves from seasons past crunched loudly under her boots, and she stopped. Looking up, all of the leaves above were green. She wondered if anything lived in these trees besides the normal muggle things.

She sat down under one of the trees, and pulled out Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them from her bag. She had taken to carrying it around with her alongside her sketchbook. When her mom had found out, Poppy had been warned against taking it to her muggle school, but the book followed her there anyway.

None of the other kids at her school ever looked in her bag, and none of them had seen her personal art. They admired her skill in creative school projects, but Poppy had never shown them that she could do any more than that.

During her free time, she had finished drawing the bowtruckle, the hippogriff, and an occamy, the creatures that most seemed to fascinate her. She guessed that the hippogriff and occamy couldn't be found by just walking into a patch of trees, but maybe the bowtruckle could.

The book had said that they were found in wand trees, but how could a wand tree be identified? She scooped up a stick from the ground, and tapped it against each tree trunk as she went in circles around it, looking up at the branches. She didn't see anything except a couple of of ants and woodlice. She scooped up one of the woodlice and waited for it to uncurl itself. It crawled across the stick she had picked up, and she slowly turned the stick in her hand to keep the bug from falling off.

She'd returned back to her original tree by this point, and bent over to pick up the bag she had left behind. When she stood, Poppy caught a glimpse of a creature watching her. Or, she realized, it was watching the woodlouse.

"Do you want it?" Poppy held out the twig and watched as the bowtruckle revealed itself. The small animal climbed out onto the twig, snatched the woodlouse, and returned to its tree, its eyes never leaving her.

Poppy didn't leave her spot under the tree for what felt like a long time. She had hoped that the bowtruckle would pop back out again, but all she had been able to see was the tip of what she thought might perhaps be one of its limbs.