Autumo: Magic Without a Wand

"Oh, Dean, it's going to be wonderful!" Ginny gushed. She gave him a winning smile and he relaxed for a moment before the present anxiety crept back into his mind.

"I'm so nervous, though. What if she freaks out? What if she breaks the engagement when she finds out the truth?" he asked her, twirling the mirror in his hand nervously.

"Dean, stop it! It makes me sick when you twist the mirror like that," Ginny said looking at him sternly where his reflection should have been in the hand held mirror.

"I'm sorry..." he muttered holding the mirror still, and instead drummed his hand on the table.

"Look at me," Ginny asked him, and he did so begrudgingly. "She loves you, I can tell. Throughout Harry's wedding all she was doing was hoping that one day it would be you in the tux and her in a beautiful white dress."

Dean smiled at the thought of her at Harry's wedding. Her chocolate brown hair fell in waves around her shoulders and her lavender sundress showed pale skin that was yet to be kissed by the summer sun. Her eyes sparkled like that of a young girls and her smile was never ending, and she smiled the whole time except for when she pouted over the thought of some other lucky girl getting married. Her pointed face would change from sunny to cloudy when she knew Dean was watching so that he would see her true thoughts on their slow going engagement. She had the innocence of the flower girl that day, and she was naive to the two different worlds colliding around her unseen.

"But I've been lying to her for two years now. What is she going to say about that?" he protested.

Ginny sighed and rolled her eyes. "She obviously isn't going to be thrilled and she is going to be shocked. She’ll be in disbelief, probably, but I don't know... I grew up in a family of wizards. She'll get over it, though, your plan for Christmas is enchanting. She will have to forgive you."

Dean didn't say anything and they sat in silence for a few minutes. Awful thoughts of her walking out on him filled his mind, and he tried hard to picture her having a good reaction but failed to come up with a satisfactory answer to soothe him.

"Stop worrying about it, when you stress you get that frown on your face and it is exceedingly unattractive. If I don’t like it, I know Abigail doesn’t,� Ginny finally said exasperatedly. "Please, stop worrying."

"It doesn't matter, I have to tell her and she is either going to accept it or she will reject me, and it is that I am most afraid of.� He paused and looked back at Ginny in the mirror. �I really love her.�

“I know,� she replied giving him a warm smile, “and any girl would be lucky to have you. You are dashing, charming, and sought-after football player of the Muggle World, and a hero in the Wizarding World. She would be silly to let you go, she would regret it the rest of her life. She’s just lucky I didn’t steal you when I had the chance.�

Dean smiled half-heartedly at his old friend and nodded if only to try and convince himself. “I better go and make sure everything is ready. Thanks Gin, have fun with your family.’

“Merry Christmas, Dean,� she replied before vanishing from the mirror, her image being replaced with Dean’s reflection.

“Oh dear heaven, help me,� Dean breathed as he put the mirror back in his desk drawer. He stood up and walked over to the full-length mirror in his room. He ran his hand over the maroon sweater he was wearing and stared at his reflection. He straightened up and nodded at himself again, trying to reassure himself.

He had never felt so nervous before in his life. Not even when he was kicking a penalty shot to win the game for Britain. Not even when he fought against the Dark Lord and his allies at the final battle, with the rest of Dumbledore’s Army and the Order of the Phoenix. Not even when he asked her to be his wife, because even then he was being the man she needed him to be. Now he had to reveal to her the half of him that the rest of the Muggle World never saw - his magical past.

It wasn’t really fair to call it his past; after the fall of Voldemort, Dean took his wand and disappeared back into the Muggle World to find some peace and escape the horrors he witnessed in Voldemort’s second war. He met a contact that worked for the British football team, and he never looked back. He had been playing football in the Muggle World ever since. That didn’t mean he wasn’t in touch with the Wizarding World, or that he never used magic, because he did. What useful magic he learned at school he used when the Muggle way was either too much effort or took too much time; other than that, his wand remained tucked away in his desk drawer. He still talked to Ginny, Harry, Hermione and Seamus from time to time and Abigail knew them too. But his fiancée knew nothing about their magical world.

He looked at his desk uneasily as if he could see right through it and see the magic hidden within it. He walked over to the desk and pulled the wand out, running his hands over the length of the cool mahogany and feeling all the small scars, the nicks in the wood, from battles that his fiancée knew nothing about. Soon they would all be revealed to her and Dean only hoped that the last spell he cast with this wand would not be one that erased magic from his mind forever.

***

“Are your eyes closed?� he asked, smiling at Abigail who had her eyes wide open behind peeking fingers. At the accusation, she promptly shut her eyes and placed her hands at her side. Dean promptly placed them in his. The biggest moment of their relationship was about to occur. He took one last look at her before things changed forever.

Her wavy chestnut hair fell around her shoulder but stayed tucked securely behind her ears, so Dean could see her slender, pointed face and, even though he couldn’t see them, he knew her brown eyes were sparkling with excitement. She squirmed with anticipation pouting a little, to ease her wait he kissed her forehead and opened the door to the closet. Her smile widened to show her teeth from behind her pale pink lips.

“Where are we going, dressed like this? You could at least go back down the stairs before I closed my eyes,� asked Abigail.

“We aren’t going outside the front door,� responded Dean quietly starting to get nervous again.

“Oh, I suppose we will go out the window and scale the side of the house then,� she replied sarcastically.

It was time.

“Just follow me,� he replied as he opened the door to his walk-in closet and guided her in, leading her by the hand. He closed the door behind them after they had walked into the slightly cramped space.

“Open your eyes.�

“We are in your closet, Dean.�

“No, we are in a wardrobe; now I want you to close your eyes again and hold on tight to my hand. Are your eyes closed?�

“Yes Dean, but I don’t—“

“Hold on tight.�

He gripped her hand tightly and pictured the snow-covered land with evergreen trees as far as the eye can see. He could see the metal lamppost among the trees. He could hear Ginny’s voice in his head from the million times he had practiced this. See the forest, hold on tight, picture yourself there and you will be there. Apparition is a piece of cake with confidence.

Dean opened his eyes to a world of white outside in the bright sun.

“Open your eyes, Abigail,� he commanded excitedly.

Abigail opened her eyes and gasped, her hands instantly flying to her mouth in surprise. No longer were they inside Dean’s cluttered closet - they were outside and snow sparkled like diamonds as the sun reflected its light over the earth. Christmas trees surrounded them, also glittering as snow decorated their limbs like tinsel. She could see birds and squirrels in the trees, and a few birds even appeared to be watching her as she gazed around in awe.

Finally she saw it. Not five feet in front of her, rising from the ground, was a lamppost, a metal lamppost that was too nice to be on the streets of London. She stepped towards it to make sure it was not an illusion. After touching it, she withdrew her hand when she felt the cold metal through the cotton glove she was wearing.

The sight before her was amazing and beautiful, but unreal - it just couldn’t be. There was no way they could be in London anymore, the air was too clean and there was no snow in London. If they weren’t in London, though, where were they, and how did they get there?

Only Abigail knew exactly where they were, but it was just impossible. It was just a story; this place didn’t really exist, only in her imagination, only in her wildest dreams.

She stumbled away from the lamppost as her mind reeled over the possibilities of what she was seeing. Dean rushed over to grip her shoulders worriedly. He was at loss as to what to say to her, or if he should say anything at all. All his planned speeches seemed to disappear from his mind and he was scared his nightmare was coming true.

Luckily he didn’t have to decide right away as the carriage pulled up with two white horses pulling it. The sleigh looked mysterious with no driver, but the horses walked purposefully along the path that lay a few feet from the lamppost. As if under orders, the horses pulling the sleigh stopped in front of Dean and Abigail, waiting for the riders to join them on their trek along the path.

“Come on,� said Dean taking Abigail’s hand that lay limply in his, as if she were still in a state of shock. She followed him into the sleigh wordlessly and without a clear expression that gave away anything she might be thinking. The moment Dean and Abigail sat down in the carriage, the horses started moving again and Abigail had regained her composure to speak.

“Dean, what’s going on?� she asked and she almost looked scared. She was so confused, not knowing what was going on; this did scare her.

“Abigail, I have to tell you something,� said Dean, quietly feeling the air rushing from his lungs, which was making it hard to breathe. He turned towards her but found it hard to look her in the eyes because she looked so frightened and because he was so nervous to begin with. Maybe I should have found some other way to tell her. It’s too late now. What was I supposed to say? I had it all planned… Why can’t I remember?

“I haven’t told you something about myself, Abigail, and I didn’t want to but I was afraid that if you knew, then you wouldn’t accept my engagement ring. I was hoping that now it won’t matter and that we can overcome it together. I would do anything not to lose you but I can’t keep lying to you either, because you mean the world to me.�

“Just tell me, Dean,� she pleaded, looking even more frightened than before as her mind fathomed only the worst things he could possibly tell her. Her eyes searched his face for something familiar, it seemed that everything she knew was crashing down around her. He was supposed to protect her, so why was he confusing her?

“Remember when I told you I went to a private school in Scotland? Well, that’s true except for at school they didn’t teach us the normal things like math and English, that’s why I play football,� he said, trying to make a joke to calm his nerves. Abigail just stared at him desperately. He sighed, no more stalling, he had to be serious, he had to tell her.

“I went to a school called Hogwarts, they taught us magic, and I can do magic most of the time. I’m a wizard or that’s what they call us in the Wizarding World. Oh Lord, there is so much to tell you about. That’s how I got us here today - magic, look…� he fumbled around in his coat and pulled out his wand and handed it to her. The explanation felt so vague, but how was he supposed to cram the entire Wizarding World into a brief explanation?

She stared at him but her expression had become vacant. She looked at him hard as if trying to discern if he were real or just a dream. Finally she turned her attention to the wand. She ran her hands over it, feeling the same scars Dean had felt earlier that day. Her chocolate eyes searched it for some sign of magic, some evidence that Dean was telling the truth. However, just the fact that he had a wand would seem unlikely if he weren’t telling the truth. She had known him for over a year now, and she knew he wasn’t crazy. What if it was a joke, though, or what if she was dreaming? Maybe she was the one going crazy.

“I don’t know Dean…� she said finally, looking at him sadly. She wanted to believe him but there were so many things that just weren’t right about it and she was scared to ask him to prove that what he was saying was true.

Dean looked at her like a frightened child but asked her like a gentleman. “Do you want me to take you back home or we could keep going? Whatever you want, whatever you need.�

“Just keep going, I don’t want to ruin what you had planned,� she replied, taking hold of his hand and smiling; there was no sense ruining a perfectly good day. The last thing she wanted was for them both to have a miserable Christmas, if she just put this behind her she could deal with the intricacies another time. Besides, it was absolutely gorgeous here. Just like from the book.

The sleigh carried them along for another twenty minutes or so and they didn’t speak, but rode along feeling each other’s warmth as the cold wind surrounded them. Then the cottage came into view; it was nestled to the bottom of a rock cliff. It was round and constructed out of stone - the only cottage in sight. It was small; from the outside it appeared as if it would only have one main room.

“Look at this cottage, it’s just like…� before she finished the sentence she caught herself. “It’s supposed to be his cottage, isn’t it?�

“If you’re using your imagination,� Dean replied, giving her a teasing smile as he opened the door to the cottage. Inside the cottage was cozy; there was a bookshelf on the back wall filled with classic books that looked as if they had been read again and again. There was an armchair and a loveseat in front of an empty fireplace and a small stove in between the bookshelf and the fireplace. Finally, there was a bed next to the door facing in towards the center of the cottage.

Dean took her coat and scarf, revealing a light blue sweater underneath. Abigail walked around mesmerized by the little cottage and smiled as she picked up a small flute from the mantle above the fireplace. Next to it was a picture of a faun.


“Look at this,� exclaimed Dean conspicuously as he picked up an old book off of the loveseat. He sat down and invited Abigail to sit with him. “This is a good Christmas Day story, don’t you think?�

She just nodded and leaned her head on his shoulder as he opened the book and started to read. “Once there were four children whose names were Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy…�

“Dean,� Abigail said looking at him her face close to his. “I still don’t know if what you told me about your school is true but you don’t need a wand to make magic.�

She kissed him and he grinned, kissing in her thankfully in return. “It doesn’t hurt. though.�

“No, and never in my wildest fantasies did I think I could visit Narnia, but the day you asked me to be your fiancée was the day that my deepest dreams came true. I’ll love you no matter what or who you are.�

She snuggled up against him and he put his arm around her as held the book open with his other hand. “This story is about something that happened to them when they were sent away from London, during the war, because of the air-raids...�

She was right; no wand in the world could create the magic he felt when her head rested on his shoulder. A wand couldn’t create the smile on her face when she was caught up in the fairy tale he created. Most importantly, a wand couldn’t change the way she felt about him and that was all that mattered. Stories about wizards and magic could wait for another day because during this Christmas they had all the magic in the world.