From the Memoirs of a Seer

Her full name was Sibyll Patricia Trelawney-Valmont.

She had possessed the Gift all her life, but it emerged for the first time when she was eight.

Being half-blood, courtesy of her Muggle father, Sibyll had been raised to be comfortable in both the wizarding world and the Muggle world. She had gone to a Muggle primary school, instead of the ones set up for wizards and witches, and had loved every minute of it, until that day.

It was a sunny day, which was outrageous in its audacity. Such events were only supposed to occur on gloomy, stormy nights, but that was in the stories, and this was real life.

Real life was always harsher than the stories.

Real life was real.

Her small hand was tucked safely in her mother's larger one as she hop-skipped forward to keep up with her mother's larger steps. She wore a pale violet dress, one of her favorites at the time, and had a matching bag, which she swung about with her free hand.

It was then that she saw him.

With golden ringlets and bright green eyes, he was a beautiful little boy - even being a little girl herself, she had recognized the fact immediately, and told her mother so, not at all abashed. She had skipped the 'cooties' stage of childhood entirely, always having been too mature for her age, even before she knew things that other people didn't.

Her mother laughed, the laugh of tinkling silver bells, and agreed.

"He's such a lovely boy," Sibyll repeated, her voice taking on a dreamy tone. "It's a shame that he has to die so soon."

With a startled gasp, her mother reigned her in sharply, jerking on her arm. "Sibyll! You do not say such things! Telling stories will only get little girls in trouble!"

She stared at her mother curiously. Why was she acting as if Sibyll had done a bad thing? Bad things were when she stole, or lied. She had not stolen anything, and she had not lied.

"But mummy, I can see him," she told her, matter-of-factly. "Standing right next to that boy, waiting to take him away."

"See who?" Eyes narrowing, her mother had crouched down to face her, hands coming up to rest on her tiny shoulders.

Sibyll turned back to watch the little boy, who was playing tag with a friend of his. She ignored the friend, ignored the boy, and focused on the dark and handsome man behind him, his clear skin alabaster, his perfect, angular face expressionless. She knew that no one else could see him, just as she knew who he was.

"Death."

"Sibyll!"

"It's true. I can see him. He's not scary looking, like in the pictures, but he feels scary," she continued, her voice lowering to a whisper.

Suddenly, she gasped, her blood running cold, her small hands trembling. Turning her back on the man, on the boy, she burrowed her face into her mother's shoulder, shudders wracking her small frame.

"Oh," she moaned. "Oh, no..."

Worried now, dismissing her daughter's former words, her mother embraced the girl, rocking her back and forth, not caring that some people were looking at them.

"Oh, Sibyll, honey, what is it? Hmm? Tell mummy all about it, hon."

"He looked at me," Sibyll choked out in a harsh whisper. Her indigo eyes were wide and her breathing was erratic. "He looked right at me!"

Unable to understand who her daughter was talking about, unwilling to believe that her daughter could see Death, Sibyll's mother took a firmer hold on the girl and stood up. She would soothe her daughter and talk with her when they got home, not here out on the open. She ran across the street, checking carefully for cars, and shifted Sibyll's still trembling form to one arm.

She was just digging inside her purse for the keys to the house when she heard it. Rubber squealed in protest as brakes were slammed on at the last minute. There was a thump, the car halted immediately, and the driver got out, pale and horrified.

"Someone call an ambulance!"

A crowd gathered, and someone ran into their house to do as the driver had pleaded. Others crouched down in the middle of the circle, checking something that Sibyll's mother couldn't see.

Sibyll shifted slightly, enough to place her mouth close to her mother's ear. "It's happened."

As if drawn by a magnetic force, Sibyll's mother slowly headed for the crowded scene of the accident, eyes flickering from her daughter's ashen face to the crowd.

When she was close enough, she saw him.

Automatically shielding her daughter's eyes, Sibyll's mother gasped, her stomach churning as she rapidly turned away.

Mind whirling with thoughts, denials, and so much more, she struggled to stay calm, for her daughter's sake. Running back towards the house, she fumbled open the door, and collapsed on the couch, Sibyll still in her arms.

"By Merlin," she said as she ran a shaky hand through her daughter's ebony curls. "By Merlin!"

Sibyll said nothing in reply, and simply hugged her mother closer.

Her mother sighed, tightened her hold on her daughter, and let her head flop back to rest on the couch. In a vain effort to block out the image of the little boy - his golden curls soaked by his blood, his green eyes staring blankly at nothing - she closed her eyes, letting a few tears leak out.

Maya Trelawney-Valmont had never dreamed this would happen, not to her beautiful, precious, one and only daughter. It had always been a possibility, of course, because the Seer gift was one passed down through her family. Her great-grandmother had been the renowned Cassandra Trelawney; her grandfather, her father, and her son had all been denied the Gift, as she herself had been, but it seemed as if the Gift of Sight had survived the generations - in Sibyll.

"Why you?" she mumbled into her daughter's cheek. "Why you, darling, why you?"

Finally, Sibyll stirred. She sat back to look her mother straight in the eyes.

"I don't know why."