Fallen Snow

The sky was a gleaming, opalescent blue as Anna wandered down to the Great Lake with her owl nestled on her arm. A low mist hung over the dark waters, veiling the forest line on the far shore. It wasn’t much for sun-bathing, but it was definitely the warmest weather they had seen all week. Even the Giant Squid was out lounging lazily by the shallows, soaking up the rare spot of sunshine.

The lush bank was the perfect place for flying her owl, just like she used to during those late summer days back at the cottage. Though she had tried not to let it show, the snowy had been a nervous wreck at first. Needing to be carried in Anna’s arms just to leave the house whilst clinging tight to her like a frightened child, and spooking if a leaf so much as rustled too close. But once she had taken to the sky in spellbinding flight, it was clear that she loved to fly.

Anna had hoped that taking her out to stretch her wings would help to lift the heavy spell that she had been under as of late. It was hard to see her so morose and withdrawn, holing herself up in the Owlery and looking as miserable as a wet November.

And it seemed to be working so far, as evidenced by the snowy’s soft chirrups whenever Anna would stroke a hand over her feathers, though she seemed content to stay right where she was, basking in her owner’s affection.

A cool breeze ruffled Anna’s hair and Nix’s feathers as she set the owl down on a grassy mound. “Go on, then. It’s a beautiful day for flying, not a cloud”–or raven–“in the sky!”

The snowy shook her head, holding up her wings like a child that wanted to be picked up, and revealing a crimson-stained feather, which stood out against her white fluffy down like blood spilled on fresh snow.

Nix chirruped again at her, before letting out a startled screech, casting a plaintive look at Anna and the broken and bloodied shaft that she had pulled out before the snowy could catch on to what she was doing.

“It hurts, I know. I’m sorry.” Anna soothed her tenderly, feeling Nix’s small body quiver as she allowed herself to be cradled in Anna’s arms, though she swiveled her head away and refused to look at her.

She hated hurting Nix like this every time it happened. And this was the third bloodfeather she’d had this week! No wonder she hadn’t been wanting to fly.

“Anna! I thought it was you!”

“Mari?” Anna looked round, her expression of surprise shifting to one of relief on seeing the familiar face. “What are you doing here?”

“With weather this good, it’s hard to justify staying indoors, even for a meal!” Mari quipped, holding up the picnic basket in her hand. “Cinder here makes the best pumpkin pie.” She gestured to the fellow Hufflepuff with her. “Oh, where are my manners. Anna, Cinder. Cinder, Anna.”

“And who is this sad floof?” Cinder made to reach a hand to the snowy, her movements gentle and soft, halting when the owl clicked its beak, feathers standing on end. “What unusual eyes she has!”

“This is Nix. And I don’t think she’s accepting pets today.” Anna made the introductions while Nix mustered up a polite hoot, as though her social graces dictated it, even though she very much rather be left alone to be with Anna.

“Listen, Mari. I’m actually really glad to see you–not that I wouldn’t be otherwise, but since we bumped into you, or you bumped into us, could you have a look at Nix’s wing? It’s a little sore after I had to pull a bloodfeather.” She tried to pass the owl to the older girl, an act which Nix didn't look overly thrilled by. Clearly she had been expecting some sort of treat as compensation for her troubles, or at the very least, not to be given away like this.

“She isn’t looking so good, is she? A bad feather day?” Mari frowned thoughtfully. “Although it is quite common for birds to look moody and glum, and various extents of bedraggled, during a moult, which is a stressful time for them. I’m sure she’ll be back to her beautiful self again before the month is up. Meanwhile, a daily misting or two would help her feel better.”

Anna tried not to sigh too heavily. If only moulting-pains were all that were bothering Nix.

A happy and well-adjusted owl was one with healthy, well-maintained feathers, she had read in ‘You and Your Owl’. Whereas poorly-preened feathers would look dull and worn and could even become brittle and break easily.

As possibly the world’s floofiest snowy owl, Nix needed constant preening and a nutritious diet of lemmings and voles to keep her glorious plumage in immaculate condition. But to Anna’s dismay, she had been eating little and sleeping less, and was even neglecting to care for her feathers. All signs of an anxious and depressed bird.

“She’s just going through a bit right now.” Even wild animals could suffer from post-traumatic stress, and Nix was as sensitive as they come, and had a worrying tendency to keep things in, until it all became too much for her.

“Say, Anna.” Cinder turned to her. “I couldn’t help but notice that Nix has been banded twice. What happened to her previous owners?”

“Umm…” Anna exchanged a look with Mari. Nix hung her head.

Cinder must have sensed the sudden awkwardness. “Oh, forgive me, I didn’t mean to pry. It’s just that snowies are known for forming lifelong ‘pair bonds’, and not just between couples but with their chosen humans too. Which led me to wonder if there was some story there.” She motioned to the anklets on the snowy’s fluffy feet.

“Nix was abandoned. That’s all the story there is to it.” Anna grimaced. “She’s still got issues from that that we’re working through.”

The Hufflepuff looked genuinely sympathetic. “Have you ever thought of having her old band removed?”

Anna blinked at the unexpected question. Removing Nix’s band? Could that even be done?

An owl’s band was akin to a binding magical contract, and for that reason, couldn’t be removed except by the witch or wizard who had made it. Though as far as Anna was concerned, the snowy’s former masters had made that null and void when they had cast her out onto the streets, alone and scared and without care, food or shelter.

“It’s a tricky bit of magic, but it’s possible…” Cinder said, as though reading her thoughts. “If you’d like, I could have a look at–”

“Nix! Wha–” Anna hadn’t anticipated the snowy to lurch off her arm with a half-formed shriek, as though she was about to pull another bloodfeather.

Cinder looked taken aback as well. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to upset her.”

“No, it’s not you, she’s got…boundary issues.” Anna tried to reach for her owl, only to receive a feigned nip at her finger.

“Nix! That’s not like you.” She frowned at the snowy, who had scuffled about twenty feet away on foot, shaking her head and doing that gular fluttering that would normally indicate agitation or distress.

“Come on, Nix, come here. Be good.” Anna held out a hand coaxingly. But the owl was still refusing to come anywhere near her.

Well then, time for a change in tactics. “Does the little hoot-hoot want a treat? She’ll have to come here to get it.” She called out, brandishing a box of sweet treats that she had retrieved from her satchel. And not just any sweet treats. Gerda’s homemade lingonberry and white chocolate cookies.

They were Nix’s favourite. She would always looked so put out at being told that it wasn’t food for owls and that she could only have it if she finished her lemming first, pouting in a corner until Anna eventually gave in and fed her some. Honestly, there were times when she wondered if the snowy was actually a human disguised as an owl.

“Looks like we’re going to have to finish this all on our own.” Anna made a show of taking a big bite out of a cookie, crunching noisily. “Mmm, lingonberries go perfect with the taste of white chocolate, don’t they?”

Across from her, Cinder took a dainty bite, swooning with a hand over her forehead. “So this is love!”

It was too much for Nix. With a rustle of wings, she soared up to Anna’s shoulder, nipping at her earlobe to let her know what she thought of her methods.

“See? You’re fine.” Anna stroked her fuzzy head as she nibbled on her treat.

It sounded more like she was trying to reassure herself.

.

“Anna, I don’t think your teacup is supposed to be squeaking.”

They were revising transforming spells in Transfigurations, which were at least easier than vanishing spells, though Anna had still managed to bungle her attempts at turning a gerbil into a teacup, much to her chagrin.

“I know that…! Silencio! There, not a cheep to be heard!”

Rapunzel looked scandalized.

“I’ll do better, please don’t tell my owl.” Anna’s shoulders sagged.

“It’s your OWLs that you should be worried about.” Rapunzel clicked her tongue, though it didn’t have quite the same effect as when Nix did it.

Anna was saved from further discourse by the bell–the period bell that is, as well as Professor Merryweather’s call for them to untransfigure their gerbils and turn in their assignments before leaving.

She turned back to her teacup, giving it a tap with her wand. It sprouted a set of whiskers and a tail. She frowned at it, concentrated for a second, then tapped it again. Nope, still a teacup, but at least it now had a pointed snout in place of a handle and four furry paws that it was frenetically scurrying away on, heedless to the dangers of being a walking teacup in a tide of students.

Why couldn’t they work with tortoises? Or better yet, snails? Anna held back a groan as the gerbil-cup-thing scampered off at full tilt before she could make a grab at it, barreling headlong into the group of seventh years who were waiting for them to emerge from the classroom, one of whom darted out a hand, apprehending the little runaway in its tracks.

Anna exhaled the breath that she had been holding. “Thank you!” She gushed out gratefully. “I–”

Teal eyes flicked up to meet icy blues, and the words froze on her lips.

“I caught your teacup.” Elsa blinked owlishly as she extended a pale hand and the squirming teacup in it toward Anna. “It was running away.”

Anna stared, making no move to take it from her.

Seriously? After avoiding her like the Dragon Pox all week, that was all the Slytherin had to say to her?

“Anna?” Elsa bit her lip. She didn’t look like she had been holding up too well, if Anna was being honest. Her features were wan and drawn and she looked one Victorian dress away from passing off as a Hogwarts House ghost. And there was a nervous edge to her that was at odds with the cold and impassive snow queen with ice water in her veins.

And yet there was something inexplicably familiar about the way she was looking at Anna, an expectant and questioning slant to her head, like an owl that had just brought its owner a small furry gift and was wondering why it wasn’t being given due praise.

“Get away from her, Arendelle!” While Anna continued to stand and stare, Rapunzel had descended on the Slytherin, the latter drawing back with a sharp wince–though that could have been from the tiny bitey teeth that Anna’s teacup had just sunk into her finger in a bid to break free from her clutches.

“You’re bleeding!”

Elsa’s hand was cold to the touch, sending an icy shock through Anna’s as she grasped it in hers. But it was the older girl who recoiled back, retracting her hand and hastily tugging the hem of her sleeve over it.

In the jostle, the teacup slipped from her slack grip, hitting the ground with a hard bounce, looking none the worse for wear as it skittered off between their feet, as fast as its little legs would carry it.

Argh! Anna gritted her teeth but gave chase. Out of the corner of her eye, she glimpsed Elsa being shouldered into the classroom by a peeved-looking Cassandra, who shot them a look that said that she was judging them so hard.

It took two corridors and a flight of stairs, a stitch in her side, and being struck by a growing sense of deja vu before that light bulb moment finally occurred. Damnit Anna, you’re a witch with a wand, and you’re chasing after a bloody teacup?!Use your head–I mean your magic!

“Accio gerbil-cup!” There was the sound of something whizzing through the air, flying across the hallway and into her outstretched hand. She stuffed it into her bag, still mentally chastising herself.

She swore she was going to drive herself crazy if she kept turning over that encounter with Elsa in her mind. It felt like she was banging her head against a wall, knowing the Slytherin was hiding something, yet not knowing what it was. Well, that had been her chance at getting some answers–at least until the next time that the elusive creature known as Elsa Arendelle would deign to show itself, and Anna might as well have been a frozen statue.

She supposed she couldn’t blame Elsa for keeping her distance, not when she was coming up against Rapunzel’s wrathful glares and threats to hex her eyes crossed if she so much as looked their way.

‘She’s dangerous, Anna. She hurt you and Olaf. Should have gotten expelled if you ask me…’

Anna gave a firm shake of her head. Elsa’s not dangerous. She didn’t care if she was the only one to believe that. And yet it was hard to expunge the memory of the stricken girl standing over Olaf’s unconscious form from her mind.

Hurting another student was a serious offense, and she wasn’t excusing the Slytherin’s actions, merely trying to understand them. And Elsa was being disciplined for it. Whenever Anna would pass by the DADA classroom, the girl would always be there, writing lines with a black-feathered quill, late into the night.

Anna couldn’t help but feel a twinge of sympathy. And besides, if spending her evenings in detention with Professor Scathach wasn’t punishment enough, then she didn’t know what was.

A small sigh escaped her lips as she turned and headed back down the main hallway, which was no longer teeming with students, pulling aside a tapestry behind a suit of armour to reveal a narrow staircase, a shortcut that led down to the first floor. She was probably one of the only ones who knew about it, having stumbled across it in her first year by literal accident.

“…who knew there was a secret passageway here…”

“…given that you practically lived in the library for seven years…”

Anna stilled at the voices echoing up from bottom of the stairs. She could only catch fragments of their conversation, but enough to identify who was speaking–Belle and Professor Scathach.

“…old tome…smells like must, and looks like it would fall apart if you so much as breathe too heavily on it…”

She crept closer, leaning as far out as she dared. She knew she shouldn’t be eavesdropping, though it certainly wouldn’t be the first time she had done that.

“Old Norse Magick? How did you even get this?” She could practically hear Belle frowning. “Please tell me you didn’t break into Gringotts, though I can’t say that I’d put it past you.”

“I didn’t have to. Those goblins will do anything for the right price.” Scathach said flatly. “I must say, for someone with twelve OWLs, you really are guileless.”

“You know, you used to be such a sweet kid–”

“Don’t!” Anna imagined the Professor’s features hardening, cold anger in every glare.

“Fine. Are you at least going to tell me why you’re suddenly interested in an ancient runic script that the code-breakers at Gringotts having been trying to crack for centuries? Wait, you don’t think this has to do with–”

“I do–ngh–damnit!” Scathach inhaled sharply with a grunt of pain, a curse escaping her lips. “I’m fine. Don’t look at me like that.”

There was a moment's pause in which Belle breathed a heavy sigh. “I saw Arendelle today.”

“And?”

“You know she didn’t mean to hurt you.”

A sardonic scoff. “Not like she hasn’t done worse.”

“Even so, that’s no reason to treat that poor girl like that.” Belle’s voice rose a fraction. “She’s done nothing–”

“You know full well what she’s done!” Scathach snarled.

There was another sigh from Belle, one that sounded sad and pitying. “She’s really done a number on you, hasn’t she?”

“I don’t need your pity! I need you to find out more about those ravens. It was definitely no coincidence that they were there…”

Their footfalls were drawing closer now. Heart thudding in her chest, Anna backtracked a few steps, and once she was sure they hadn’t noticed her, turned and fled down the hallway.

.

She made it just in time for History of Magic, falling into a seat beside Rapunzel who gave her a probing stare.

“Enough chitter-chatter, all of you.” Professor Cogsworth shushed the class, with a twitch of his moustache. “Now, if you would open your textbooks to where we left off…at the Middle Ages in wizarding Britain…”

That was met with several yawns and sighs, mostly from the Gryffindors.

Mopping her brow with her sleeve, Anna pulled out her copy of ‘Witchcraft and Magic in Medieval Britain’, flicking to the stipulated page, the words that she had overheard still lingering in her mind. Though it hadn’t actually been said, she knew they were referring to Nix–or Nix’s magic, to be precise.

‘The First Use Of Broomsticks For Travel’…‘Growing Strife And Tension Between Muggles And Wizardkind’…‘Old Norse Magic: Fabled Legend Or Forgotten Legacy?’…

Old Norse magic? Anna jerked up in her seat. Rapunzel elbowed her in the side.

“Ahem, as I was saying.” Professor Cogsworth cleared his throat pointedly. “Much of this period is shrouded in myth and legend. But it was a seminal time in our history, marked not least by the founding of Hogwarts itself…”

Anna blocked out his dronings, her eyes travelling down the page, barely blinking as she read through each line.

‘Considered mythical by some, the first intimations to this arcane magic are believed to have come around the end of the ninth century.’

‘Legends tell of a succession of unnatural and portentous happenings, of which specific mention was made of a great tempest that rose out of the North Sea, carving a path of terror and destruction through the Scottish isles and highlands, with whirlwinds larger than anything ever seen before or since, and roiling dark clouds that blocked out the Sun as arcs of lightning lit the sky.’

‘For days the treacherous storm raged on, fed by a dark and powerful magic. And just as it lifted, the longships appeared, emerging from across the North Sea just as the storm before them.’

‘The Celtic clans took up arms but were soon to retreat inland, striking a reluctant pact with the local warlocks–a requital of land for their aid in repulsing the marauders. There would follow a string of cataclysmic duels, great clashes of magic that would rend the sky and earth asunder, razing villages to the ground, bringing down whole castles and cleaving a colossal rift that would split one islet in two, if the tales are to be believed.’

‘But the scenes of grim destruction would lead many to decry the feuding, eventually bringing about a truce. And in the years to follow, the descendants of these Nordic witches and wizards would come to settle into small communities alongside their wizarding kinsfolk, furthering their ties through intermarriage and the sharing and expounding of magical knowledge, eventually coming to adopt the native ways and languages over the old Norse tongue.’

‘It should come as no surprise then, that a good number of British-born witches and wizards of today would possess a bit of Nordic ancestry in their heritage. Some ancient wizarding families may even have direct lineages tracing back over generations to these Old Norse bloodlines.’

‘As for this forgotten magic, it simply faded into history, passing into myth and legend, save for a few surviving manuscripts and runestone inscriptions. Degradated and mildewed though they may be, scholars have dedicated their lives to deciphering these ancient runes, hoping to learn the secrets of these lost magical arts.’

The page ended there, bringing a frown to Anna’s brow. That couldn’t be it. She re-read the section again, but it offered no more useful information than before.

The rest of the hour seemed to pass in a blur. She had hoped that Professor Cogsworth would be able to lend some insights into this Old Norse magic, but the stuffy Professor had merely groused over it, asserting that there was little point in speculating over old folklores, and that even if such magic once existed, it had long since been relegated to history.

Only it hadn’t. Not if what Professor Scathach had said was true.

Magic kept so secret that it all but vanished from history. And for good reason, it would seem. What a darkly terrifying power. How could a little snowy owl like Nix even come into a magic like this?

She was still lost in her cluttered thoughts when the bell went and everyone began filling out of the classroom. Somehow, she made it down to the Great Hall, spending most of dinner staring vacuously at her steak pie.

Could Nix have belonged to one of these Old Norse families before she had wound up on the streets of Diagon Alley? The snowy was certainly a dignified owl, who always behaved with the utmost propriety befitting of a familiar to a noble wizarding family.

It sort of fit with her other quirks too. Like her weakness for Gerda’s lingonberry jam, for instance. Not blueberry, raspberry, or elderberry; it had to be lingonberries. And despite her discerning taste in food, she had once polished off a whole serving of lutefisk doused in melted butter. In her own defense, Anna had probably been too horrified that anyone would actually eat that stuff to put too much weight into it then.

Perhaps, amidst the shadows that hung over Nix’s past, there had once been someone whom she had been well cared for by. Someone who treated her gently, who fretted over her going off her feed, who would make sure to cut up her food into smaller bits lest the snowy protest. And perhaps some part of Nix remained devoted to them, if her resistance to the removal of her old band from her foot was anything to go by.

It felt like someone had stabbed a hot poker into her gut. She set her fork down, the steak pie suddenly tasting like ash in her mouth.

No. The past was in the past. Whoever Nix’s former masters were and whatever their reasons for abandoning her, none of that mattered now that the snowy had begun her new life with her. Though Anna was willing to bet every galleon she owned that those reasons had to do with Nix’s magic.