The Rosier Family Wand
The Rosier Family Wand.
Christmas at the castle was mostly a quiet affair. The older students who had stayed behind were likely to spend most of their time in the neighboring village of Hogsmead than around the castle. Holly spent the first few quiet days reading to get ahead, and then found herself in the Hospital Wing when she got too restless. “Can I do anything?” she asked, nervously, upon entering. She’d hardly helped at all since the dueling club. Everyone was too afraid of her.
“Of course dear! Goodness, I was beginning to think you’d given up on this. Come, take this,” Madam Pomfry beckoned Holly in and slid one of the medi-carts to the side of the room, gesturing for Holly to take over the potion prepping. “Who’s that with you? Would he like to help?” the healer looked past Holly to the hall beyond.
Holly looked behind her just in time to see a mop of blond hair duck behind a pillar. She turned back to Madam Pomfrey, eyes rolling. “It’s just Draco Malfoy. He’s waiting to see me summon the monster.” she explained, tired and frustrated. He’d been basically tailing her since she threw a snake at Pansey. He wasn’t even subtle! The creep. He probably wanted to write home to daddy about it - he probably already had!
“Is everyone still on about that? Rubbish. Come, help me prep these herbs and then I’ll walk you through the mandrake draft we’ll be brewing later this year,” Madam Pomfry promised, turning her attention back to tending over the petrified students, cat, and ghost while Holly chopped herbs for draughts.
A day later, Holly found herself in the headmaster’s office, staring at the ancient wand tome. She hadn’t looked at it since the start of term, and she scarcely had any more idea what to ask it now, either, but there was a certain simplicity in just closing her eyes and letting the book fall open to a random page. It was like she didn’t have to think about thinking. The problem was, it always seemed to open to the same several pages.
She flipped the book open and it fell to a page she knew. Hawthorn, young tree - one of ten wands made. Unicorn hair. 10”, reasonably springy. Crafted 05.14.1987 by Garrick Ollivandar. Sold 08.01.1991 to one Draco Malfoy. She’d seen that page the last time. It had been the first page to open for her that time too. “Ugh!” she growled at the page. “No!”
The book seemed to hear her because it began flipping it’s own pages until it landed on her own wand’s bio. “Why would you show me this?” she muttered to it, “I already know! It's my wand!”
The book rattled as if to say “listen! I’m trying to show you something!” but Holly couldn’t understand.
She dropped her head to the table with a loud smack and groaned into the iron lattice. There was a beat of silence, followed by the flitting of pages. Holly looked up to see something new. Or… no. This too was familiar. Only, Holly couldn’t read most of it. It was written in french. “Professor? What does this say?” she wondered, not sure where in the room the headmaster was, but trusting him to come none-the-less.
“Ah, yes, I do believe you are quite familiar with this one. Blackthorn, old wood - one of one wands made. Basilisk skin. 9”, suitably inflexible. Crafted 03.15.1544 by Luis Etienne De Rosier… it seems he made the wand and it has been passed down through the family and is now carried by Miss Isolde,” he tapped her name at the very bottom.
Holly looked up at the headmaster. “So she didn't get her wand at Ollivanders? I thought everybody who went here did.” she wondered, though, once it left her mouth she realized it sounded stupid. Of course some of those old rich families would have heirloom wands… but that one just seemed so dark!
Dumbledore smiled patiently down at Holly. “I think you’ll find many of your classmates have family wands, Miss Potter. And, many have wands found second-hand.” he reminded her, kindly.
That was true, Ginny’s wand was second hand, Holly knew. But did that mean it didn't bond with her like a new one would? And what if the previous owners were bad? Isolde had said her father was in Azkaban, hadn’t she? Holly so wished she could ask her…
“Professor…” Holly glanced back down at the illustration of Isolde’s family wand, thinking again, that it looked far too dark for a sweet little girl like Isolde. “Do wands… remember? I mean- just- well, do they learn from their owners? When they find new homes or get passed on, do they keep any of what they shared with the previous users?”
Dumbledore pondered that for a moment. “Yes, Miss Potter, I believe they do.”
Holly spent Christmas Eve in the hospital wing, telling Isolde what she’d read about in the record of wands, and about how Ginny hadn’t been seen with the diary in almost two weeks, and how Draco kept following her around, waiting for her to call the monster. She asked Isolde if her ouroboros had made it hurt any less, though she knew, probably, it hadn’t. Tracey joined her in the evening, and brought her dinner. They left Isolde some small christmas gifts, and well wishes, and then went back to their common room trying not to think about how their friend wasn’t with them.
Christmas morning was quiet. They all met in the great hall and exchanged small presents. Mostly candy and a few books. A plant for Neville, an un-cursed diary for Ginny. It had been Isolde’s idea.
After the break, time seemed to fly by. On Valentine's Day, Ginny sent a singing dwarf to Harry. Pansy was merciless for the whole rest of the week, and Ginny was so mortified she didn’t even try to get back at her. Holly and Tracey did though. When Heather Thatcham demanded to know what was wrong with her, Holly just shrugged and Tracey barely even looked up from her nails to suggest that “maybe she should learn to check her shampoo bottle is the right one before she uses it.” The next day she came to class with toad-green hair, and Holly thoroughly enjoyed watching her get detention for it.
Classes were mounting as exams drew closer, the start of spring meant the hospital wing was overrun with students complaining of hayfever, and all Holly could do was think about what the tome had been trying to tell her. She didn’t understand it. Draco. Her. Isolde. No… Isolde’s family? Holly supposed the Rosier’s and the Malfoy’s had a lot in common, based off what little Isolde had told them about her family. Holly didn’t think that was the point though. She kept going back up there in her spare time and always the pages would open the same. Draco. Her. the Rosier family wand. Over and over and over until-
“Basilisk!”