Moriganna

Backstory

Bibury, England, is a small village about an hour from London, England. This tiny village is where my sister Esther and I are born to our parents Agatha and Thomas Halliwell. Our quaint village was small and rolling in green hills. It was very close knit, and sparingly with different sorts of people. Either magical or non-magical, it was a mixed community but friendly. While I was tending to our local community garden in the center courtyard of our neighborhood, my sister went to the local park. She found a leather bound journal sitting on the bench; inside this journal was written in a dark pen with information on the world our family knew nothing about. But she was the first. Growing up she and I where close and never hid anything from each other, but for a while she kept this journal a secret to herself. She poured herself into it, studying it, taking notes, researching. She spent many days with her head burrowed into the journal with books around her that she had gotten from our library near us. She wanted to just know what it was all about, the secrets, the messages, the hidden knowledge we didn't know.  

As we grew older we still remained close but I could tell Esther was keeping things from me, she continued to hide in her room, pouring over books and scrolls, ink was drenched into the wooden floor scuff marks from the tips of quills. While I was down in the kitchen crushing herbs to make a concoction for a squirrel that had fallen out of the tree that was wrappd up on our island, I began to feel a shake coming from upstairs. I located Esther staring at her bookshelf, the source of the noise was one of her books on the shelves, as she continued to stare at it, I followed her gaze and the moment my eyes locked onto the book itself, a vine started to grow out of the pages, but the book remained closed. My eyes darted to hers, as my mouth dropped open. She lifted off the ground the journal that I had seen for so many years, but never was able to look at, she finally reached it out  to me, so I began to learn as well.

The day we both got our letters, I hadn’t seen Esther. I received mine in the post, though I thought it had been a mistake. I thought our neighbor Toby Oxforth had played his pranks and jokes on me, typically it was mail covered with thistles but this letter wasn’t. Opening the seal wax envelope I could hear a owl in the distance screeching as if it was to confirm that he had delivered his letters. Reading down upon the enrollment, I came across a list of supplies. I knew that any shop in our country wouldn’t have what was required. I went downstairs to see Esther talking with our parents, in her hand was the exact letter that was also in mine. We both knew now what was to be true, we were witches, and we both were attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Not only was it my sister, but it would be my best friend attending this journey to this newfound world for us both. We took the tube (Subway) down to Charing Cross in London, from there we went down an alleyway to a local pub, on the outside it was a  brown colored brick building and the sign said “The Leaky Cauldron”. Our parents traveled with us to get our supplies, though they did not quite understand what was happening around them, all they could see and feel was our excitement and desire to be at Hogwarts. The one thing they kept telling but more so, asking, was we were to be required home for Christmas. The innkeeper was an odd fellow, hunched over and quite small for a man. He had a rough sort of voice, but was considerably friendly when any guest came into the pub. He always made me laugh and smile as later he would know us as soon as we walked into the establishment. He pointed to a brown door leading almost to the trash area, but it was a small courtyard out back. Heading out the rear door, Tom followed behind our parents, a brick wall stood before us, Esther opened up the journal, searching for clues to this mysterious brick wall, but Tom pushed his way between all of us, pulling out what looked to be a small branch but was his wand,  and slowly tapped on it  and the brick began to part away from one another and opened up into an alcove. Many shops were on our left, and many more were on our right. We followed the map that was printed and pasted on the other side of the brick wall that located all the different shops of Diagon Alley. We read our supply list again, and followed each other around to the different shops to get our supplies. The coolest part of Diagon Alley was picking up the Herbology gear. I just love plants! I might finish with “One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi” before school even starts.