Megan Potter - A saga of the Heart - Book 3 - Past and Present

Chapter 1 - Thirteenth time's a charm

 Megan Potter was a rather unusual -almost- thirteen year old. For one thing, unlike most school girls her age, she hated the summer holidays. And she liked doing her homework (except when it was related to potions), but had to do it in her room. Her aunt and uncle, only remaining relatives of Megan's, hated anything magical. Because another thing that wasn't so usual about Megan was that she was a witch. It was past midnight as she sat on her bed, leaning against the wall, Megan, her large History of Magic book open by her foot and her roll of parchment on another book, her long fine eagle quill scratching away along the page. She paused to look at her progress so far on her essay: "Witch Burning in the Fourteenth Century was perfectly pointless: discuss". She had already written several lines.

The question of use in Witch Burning over the middle ages depends on which point of view one takes to look at it.

From a magical point of view, it was indeed positively useless. Non-magical people (commonly known as Muggles) were particularly afraid of magic in medieval times, which is to this day known as being one of the darkest periods in human History for Muggles in particular, and it is well known they were involved in many witch hunts, for they were very superstitious. However, they rarely actually caught one, as they weren't very good at recognising them. And when they did, the fire would have little or no effect on them, for the simple reason that they would perform a simple Fire Freezing Charm while only feeling a gentle tickling sensation. A witch named Wendelin the Weird enjoyed the experience so much that she allowed herself to be captured no less than forty seven times using different disguises.

She lifted her quill, thinking. Then, hoping no one else had thought of that aspect, wrote on.

On the other hand, when one looks at the problem from a non-magical point of view, one could say it is not so useless. Of course, ordinary folk had no idea that witch burning was ineffective on real witches, however it looked efficient enough for them to believe they were safe from harm. They were convinced that witches were afraid of them by their having to look for them, and the apparent pain the burning caused them (when it was only Muggles it truly affected), despite their powers, even though tensions were present because of people being burned for nothing and distrust in between people.

She sighed and rested her head against the wall, listening in case the Dursleys woke up, and scratching Mira's ears. They could very well lock up her things in the cupboard under the stairs if they saw her doing her magical homework. But she couldn't just do nothing, or not do her work. The Dursleys, and their perfect little house on Four, Privet Drive in Little Winging, Surrey, were the reason Megan hated the summer holidays. They hated her as well, and had always loathed her magical side. Or to be precise, they hated it because it terrified them. All her youth, they had thought if they kept Megan under tight control, the magic would leave her. But, of course, and to their fury, they had been unsuccessful and Megan had just completed her second year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The Dursleys, in constant fear of the neighbours finding out something strange, thus ending their perfect normal life, had almost locked all her things up right at the start of the holidays, so she had made a deal. She kept them as long as she stayed exclusively in her room at all times except for meals and to go to the toilet. It had been partly because her schoolbooks were her only occupation, but also because her teachers had given her a lot of homework to do, including a particularly nasty Potions essay. But she liked that. She knew her growing up as a Muggle had meant she had more to learn than most witches, and wanted to catch up as much as she could. Not to mention the more she found out about this world she was sure she was meant for, the closer she felt to her parents, who had died when she was a baby.

The following day was more cheerful. The sun was shining, but Megan didn't mind not going out. Mira and Hedwig (Who she was allowed to let out but only at night after all the racket she made if stuck in her cage) were company enough. Just then, her phone rang. She had received calls from Hermione and Cedric, of which she had been happy about. But she didn't know this number.