Forbidden Lore

Forbidden Lore

Prologue

Do you want to hear a story? I have one to tell. It's not particularly special, in fact, I doubt it will be remembered at all, but it's important to me. After all, I lived it, once upon a time. Isn't that how all fairy tales begin, 'once upon a time'? Strange, that I should refer to a bit of my own history as a fairy tale, but that's what it is, a fairy tale, a story that's not to be believed. No one would believe it anyway, all my friends are long since gone, and those around me, well, they just couldn't understand. So I'll tell it to you and maybe, just maybe, you'll believe it, maybe you will learn from it, and maybe, you'll tell it to others so that they too can learn.

You know, memories are very important; they're the first type of lore one learns. We learn from our memories, from the mistakes made in our past, and it makes us better people. Sharing our memories teaches others not to make the mistakes we did, so memories help others as well. Some memories make us happy, and happiness is important too. My story is a series of memories, memories that I've kept to myself for far too long, so I'm sharing them with you in an attempt to find closure.

Before I begin my tale, there are things you must know, the most important of which being the fact that I am a witch, just like in those fantasy books Muggles read. I have always been a witch and I will always be a witch, and that, as they say, is that. But, perhaps you already knew that, perhaps you are a witch or wizard yourself, in which case, my story will have even more meaning. But, there are other things you must know before I begin, things about the story itself. You must know that I'm frightened, alone, and desperately searching for the rhyme, and the song, and the raison d'etre; that I want to understand what happened, and I want others to understand it, and I want that understanding to help people.

If that is not enough, please, read something else, for both our sakes.

If it is, read on, I would so like for you to read my story to the end.

Chapter One

My name was and is Raven, just Raven; I was sixteen years old. I was tall and a bit too thin, my pale skin was made paler still by my long black hair, I had an angular face with high pronounced cheekbones and a straight thin nose. Put simply, I looked rather like an animated corpse. Only my silvery-green eyes showed life, they sparkled and danced, as though lit by an inner fire. As I didn't have a surname, I called myself 'Raven, The-Girl-With-No-Past', which, in a way, was true. I'd never had a family to speak of; I'd never had a home, either. All my life, I'd been shuffled from place to place, no one really wanted me, I'd been to four different wizarding schools already, and I was only in my sixth year.

Now, I was going to Hogwarts, I was already in Diagon Alley, and I was praying that this time things would be different, that this time I'd get to stay. Maybe I'd even make some good friends, friends who wouldn't shun me because I was different. After all, Harry Potter went to Hogwarts, and he was different, maybe I'd get to fit in with his group of friends. Hah, that was a laugh, why on earth would someone like Harry Potter ever want to be friends with a girl like me?

I needed to get out of bed, I'd been awake for an hour, and the same thoughts kept running through my head, the same worries. Usually, I wasn't that insecure, really, but I always got a little nervous when faced with the prospect of a new school. It wasn't every day that one got a brand new start with people one had never met. I don't understand why I got so uneasy. I'd done it four times before, but it was always a thrill, always an adrenaline rush. The moment I stepped into the school to be introduced to the other students was so exciting because it never got boring; it never got old.

It was six-thirty, I supposed that I could go down for breakfast; my current escort wouldn't be up for another hour, I was sure. Escorts, what a joke, they're never around, I could have wandered off and gotten lost by that point, and Jon still wouldn't have noticed; he was too wrapped up in that leggy blonde American witch to care about what I was doing; which was fine by me. I preferred being by myself anyway, I swear, even Voldemort's company would have been preferable to Jon's; he was such a ditz.

The stairwell of the Leaky Cauldron was completely empty, for once, but there were people downstairs, I could hear them talking, one thing I prided myself on was my excellent hearing. Well, it was time to face breakfast, even though I wasn't really hungry. I'd just have a cup of tea and sit in some secluded corner to watch the people. I swear, I was the most ardent people-watcher ever to live; it was my hobby. I'd sit anywhere where there were people, watch what they did, and make little observations in the notebook I carried around. I don't know why, I just liked to. It made me something of an expert on Human behavior, I could read people like books, but no one could read me, I had made certain of that long before. I guess you could say that I was afraid of being hurt, so I hid everything behind a neutral front and never lowered my defenses, for anyone.

On reflection, I decided that I really didn't want that tea, after all, and went to sit at the booth in the far corner. I pulled out my notebook, a quill, and my green ink and settled in to watch the people around me live their boring, normal lives. Normal life held a sort of fascination for me, as I'd never known what it was like myself. My life had been anything but normal, and what I wanted, more than anything, was to know what it was like to have a family and a home. Of course, I was realistic, and rather cynical, so I wasn't even hoping that that would happen. Every time I'd see a family, I'd wish that that were me, then I'd mutter, "Not in this lifetime Raven, keep dreaming".

I was so caught up in my thoughts, that I didn't even notice the young man who walked over to me until he spoke.

"Morning, mind if I sit here?"

I shook my head without looking up and continued writing my observations on family and belonging. I read through it once I was done and, finding it satisfactory, left it alone. The young man interrupted me again.

"You know, you're one of those people who look like they could be a anything from a tourist to a hired assassin. Very interesting."

I looked up, meeting his blue eyes, "My name is Raven and, this particular morning, it pleases me to be neither.

"Really? What are you than?"

I chose to answer him with a quotation, "'All the world's a stage and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts, his acts being seven ages.' I am a mere player in this particular show."

"Are you an actress, then?"

I smiled slightly, "No, I am just Raven, who is pleased to be no one in particular. I am content to let my universe just be, I needn't have a specific role. Can you say the same?"

He looked a bit confused, "I've never really thought about it before, so I don't know."

"How fortunate that you have found the way to wisdom.

"Huh?"

Again I smiled, this time patiently, "Telling yourself that you know something is the perfect barrier against ever learning anything. So, admitting that you don't know allows your mind to accept and process the information it receives. If you think that you already know about something, and you'd be surprised at how often people do this, your mind will reject all new information on the subject as it will contradict what you think you already know."

He blinked in surprise, "Wow, that's never occurred to me before, it makes perfect sense too. It's completely logical."

"'Logic is neither a science nor an art, but a dodge.' Sorry, I couldn't resist."

"Where'd you learn all those quotes and stuff?"

I shrugged, "All over, I've been to so many places, it's hard not to pick some stuff up. I've got a head full of odd quotations and things like that."

"Wicked, oh, I'm Ron, by the way, Ron Weasley."

"As I said, I'm Raven, I don't have a surname, it's nice to meet you."

I held my hand out and he shook it, I wondered if, perhaps, I'd made a new friend. It didn't seem likely, but I figured, what the hell? He seemed nice enough, and fairly harmless; besides, he had to have guts to stick around as long as he had. If I hadn't scared him away by then, I was pretty sure that I wasn't going to scare him off any time soon. Let's just say that I had a less than perfect track record with getting people to stick around longer than two minutes.

"You don't have a surname? That seems kind of weird, I mean, you can't be much older than me, and I'm only sixteen."

"I'm sixteen, too, in fact, I'm going to be going to Hogwarts next year. Will I see you there?"

"Yeah, I hope you're in Gryffindor, I am; Harry Potter is too, he's my best mate. I think you two would get along well."

"Considering that, I hope I get to be a Gryffindor. Then I'll already know someone and I'll get to meet Harry Potter. It will be fun."

He grinned. "So, Raven, where're you from?"

"Nowhere and everywhere, I don't have a home, but I went to Beauxbatons last year; I went to that school for a year and two months. I've been to three schools besides that, though."

"So, Hogwarts is your fifth school? Wow, I've only been to Hogwarts, myself."

"I'm something of a special case. Since I don't have a family, I've sort of lived with whoever would take me in, so I've lived just about everywhere. I wish that it wasn't like that, though. Sometimes, I wish that I could be just like everyone else, you know, with parents and siblings."

"You can have some of my brothers if you want them, I have five."

"Wow, you're so lucky, I'm completely alone in this world. I never knew my family and no one can tell me who they were."

"I'm sorry, that must be tough. If you meet my mum, she's going to start fussing over you, she does it to Harry; she likes to act as substitute mother if a friend of mine doesn't have a mum of their own. Be prepared."

I laughed. "Thanks for the warning, but I think I can handle it."

Ron and I had a nice conversation and I ended up wandering Diagon Alley with him; his younger sister, Ginny, joined us at about noon. They were very nice and I had a really good time. By that point, I knew that I wanted to be a Gryffindor; the two I'd met were wonderful people. I met the rest of their family late in the afternoon and Mrs. Weasley invited me to sit with them for dinner; as I hadn't seen Jon all day, I smiled and accepted the kind invitation.

Dinner was a pleasant affair, it was so nice to sit with a whole group of people instead of alone, and I supposed that that must be what it was like to have a family. The Weasleys' asked me a lot of good-natured questions, which I was happy to answer, and I saw that Ron had been right, Mrs. Weasley began fussing over me the minute she learned that I was an orphan. She kept trying to get me to eat more and I kept insisting that I had plenty and wasn't malnourished or anything. I don't think she believed me on the malnourished part, because I caught her sneaking potatoes onto my plate and I had to tell her, yet again, that I didn't need anything more to eat.

"But dear," she said, "You're so thin that it looks like even a small wind could carry you away. Please eat some more."

I put a hand on her arm. "Really, Mrs. Weasley, I'm not hungry anymore and I don't need any more to eat. I always get fed enough and haven't been really hungry in a long time."

She still looked worried, but she did stop trying to force more food onto my plate. Other than that, the meal was the most enjoyable I'd had in a long time, and I was becoming very fond of the Weasleys'. But the best part was, they all seemed to like me! That had never happened before; I usually scared people off in the first two minutes of conversation. But that night, I was on my best behavior, and went to bed feeling happier than I had in a long time.

* * *

A week after my dinner with the Weasleys', I was escorted by Jon to King's Cross Station to board the train that would take me to Hogwarts. I was excited and I had to try very hard to sit still on the way there. As soon as I had my things on a trolley, I bid Jon farewell and went to find platform 9 ¾. When I reached the barrier between platforms 9 and 10, I saw a welcome sight; the Weasley family was there and Mrs. Weasley was seeing off her two youngest children.

"Hello," I said upon reaching them.

"Oh, hello, Raven dear," Mrs. Weasley said, giving me a hug (I was a bit embarrassed, but quite pleased), "This is your first time at Hogwarts? Just walk through the barrier, dear and Ron will go with you."

I nodded and grabbed my trolley, Ron said, "Ready? Lets go!"

We ran at the barrier and went straight through it, I saw, for the first time, the gleaming red Hogwarts Express. I was touched with a sudden feeling of being where I belonged instead of where I had to be, for a change. Ron led me onto the train and to a compartment near the back.

"This is where we always sit, Harry, Hermione, and I, you can sit here too."

"Thanks, you know, I really appreciate your being so nice to me, people normally aren't."

At that moment, two people came into the compartment, a boy with untidy black hair and glasses, and a girl with frizzy brown hair. I knew they had to be Harry and Hermione, Harry, of course, being as famous as he was, was hard to miss.

I stepped forward with my hand outstretched. "Hello, I'm Raven."

"I'm Harry Potter," Harry said, shaking my hand.

"I'm Hermione Granger. Are you new?" the brown-haired girl added.

"Yes," I replied, "I went to Beauxbatons last year. I've been to four wizarding schools, this is my fifth."

"Really?" Harry looked interested, "Why?"

"I don't have a family, you see, and I've lived in so many different places that I've had to transfer schools a lot. The longest I've ever gone to one school, was the year and two months I spent at Beauxbatons. I hope I can stay at Hogwarts for the rest of my schooling."

"I hope so too," Hermione said, "And I hope you get to be a Gryffindor with us."

"Me too, as I've already met you three and Ron's sister, so I wouldn't be completely alone. Besides, judging by the Gryffindors I've met so far, Gryffindor is the best house to be in."

A snort from the doorway alerted us to the presence of another, Draco Malfoy stood there, Crabbe and Goyle flanking him on either side.

He smirked and said, "Gryffindor is only the best house if you're a Mudblood or a commoner, and everyone knows it. Are you either?"

"My parents were purebloods, I do know that much, Mudblood is a very nasty thing to call someone, I don't consider myself a commoner, and my name is Raven. You are?" I said, all in the same breath.

"Draco Malfoy." He held out his hand, I took it and released rather quickly, I wasn't certain I liked this Draco Malfoy.

"What's your family name?"

"I haven't got one, I've never known any family."

He looked at me for a moment, then Ron tried to start a fight with him, and he left. My new friends were all quick to assure me that I didn't want to be a Slytherin with people like him. I had to agree.

When we got to Hogwarts, I felt a bit uneasy, I hated being chosen for things. Hermione explained that I had to put the hat on and it would look into my head and decide what house I was best for. That just made me even uneasier.

Professor McGonagall told the school that I was a new sixth year and would be trying on the hat with the first years. I waited as she read through her list; eventually, my name was called.

"Raven."

The name sounded small and awkward in the Great Hall of Hogwarts School Of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

I knew that was I, so I stepped forward and put the tattered hat on my head. It slid over my eyes; I gripped the edge of the seat.

"Hmmm," said a small voice in my ear, "Courage, a brilliant mind, my goodness yes; power and talent as well. You're also very independent, but you long for friends. Where shall I put you? No preference? Than, better be, GRYFFINDOR!" the Hat's weary voice yelled.

The room thundered with applause as I walked over to join my friends in my new house. I had a feeling that I was finally where I belonged.