Chapter 5. The end of the holidays

I walk in the alley,

I look at the windows,

I keep walking. And I'm looking.

And I'm friends with friends.

***

August 4th.

From the very early morning, the Weasley family's house began to look like a disturbed beehive. Everyone was in a hurry somewhere, they were rapidly arranging a morning exercise, while quarreling with each other for a place in the queue.

— Ginny, come on, get out already, — the Fred twin was banging insistently on the bathroom door.

"It's not funny anymore, sis. There are a lot of angry and sleepy people here... Uh-huh," twin George yawned deeply and long, and behind him, as if all the others were gaping along the chain, —Hogwarts students are waiting for you to finally free the washbasin.

For some reason, there was only one bathroom in their house, and the charms on the door did not allow anyone to be disturbed who was there.

Ron said that sometimes he hid from the zealous tricks of the twins there, as this place was one of the most reliable in the whole house. And it just so happened that it was Ginny who was one of the first to get there from the very early morning, after which she did not get out of the bathroom for about half an hour.

— Children-and-and! Have breakfast! Molly Weasley shouted loudly from the first floor, "In thirty minutes we're going out into Oblique Lane-o-o-ok!

—Damn it,— Ron cursed sleepily, which caused him to get a slap on the back of the head from Percy standing against the wall.

"Don't express yourself, brother," he said imperiously, crossing his arms over his chest.

— Oh, ho, — one of the twins noticed this action, — look, George, Percy has become a moral teacher here.

— Nothing, Fred, his ceiling is to scare our little Ron, - George picked up the discussion aloud, distracting himself from negotiations with his sister through the closed door about her obligation to leave the bathroom as soon as possible.

From the very first days of being in the Weasley house, it became obvious that the twins and Percy did not get along. I don't know how it all started with them and whether this is their kind of game, but the relationship between the brothers was heated several times a day, and in one of these cases, the guys even managed to fight, because of which they subsequently received a scolding from their mother.

And here everything was not as I remembered from the canon. Percy might be pompous and boring to some extent, but at the same time he did not tolerate the tricks of the twins, but opposed them in every possible way, not even disdaining to use magic against the brothers. The twins, on the other hand, did not tolerate the patronizing attitude on the part of Percy, so this powder mixture from the Weasleys periodically exploded, sometimes hitting, albeit indirectly, the fragments of the conflict and our trio. Almost every time we all crossed paths together in a certain part of the house.

And now Percy was already ready to answer the brothers, thereby heating up the situation even more, which is why the twins would not have left the last word for him, joining in the escalation of the morning conflict. However, Ginny intervened, who abruptly opened the bathroom door and rushed downstairs at her mother's call.

Before Percy could say anything in response, the twins occupied the vacant washroom, so they had to wait for them now.

—Let's go downstairs," I said to Harry and Ron, "let's wash up and get cleaned up after breakfast."

For the next thirty minutes, I rubbed my eyes, inevitably yawned and tried to wake up completely. We were woken up very early, because today we were going shopping with all the Weasleys to Diagon Alley. Well, we went to bed very late at night - this also contributed to my current state.

No wonder, because the three of us slept in the same room, which means that sleep was constantly postponed until our boyish enthusiasm faded and the topics of conversation exhausted themselves.

After all, the guys are only twelve years old, and I myself have already gotten used to my own awareness of myself as a child for almost a year.

It was necessary to do this, because, as it turned out, adults behave very differently. They joke differently, respond differently, follow a lot of things that young guys don't even think about.

I didn't want the wizards to have additional questions and suspicions about me, so willy-nilly I had to adapt. And it turned out to be quite easy to do this, since all the processes in my body, whether it was the loss of baby teeth, accelerated body growth or the onset of puberty with all the ensuing consequences, contributed to a change in my self-identification system. At some point, I just stopped pretending to be a child, and all these actions began to feel like something familiar and right, although my mind sometimes noticed how childish I sometimes behave.

My friends and I had breakfast, got into the bathroom after all, having managed to do all the necessary water procedures in a hurry, and were already changing into robes in the room when Mrs. Weasley's ominous words rang out from below:

— Whoever is the last to go down to the fireplace of all of you, he will not go to the ice cream parlor after shopping!

Ron and Harry looked at me in turn, after which we shot down like a bullet. Ron, running next to Ginny's room, slammed the opening door with his body. Then we managed to slip between the twins, overtaking Fred and George on our way to the living room with a fireplace downstairs.

All the inhabitants of the house, without exception, wanted ice cream with magic sprinkles.

Ginny came down last this time, rubbing her bruised forehead. It dawned on the three of us that it was because of us that the girl not only got a small bump on her head, she was also late, which made tears come to her eyes.

"Don't worry, Ginny," Molly admonished her, "I was just joking so you'd come running." You're going to the cafe with all of us too, don't worry.

"And you should have pushed that door open," I whispered disapprovingly to Ron.

—Ice cream, Kyle," he replied in his own defense, but still lowered his head down, "if I had come last, Mom wouldn't have said she was joking like that, I know that.

— It doesn't matter. Apologize to your sister later, Ron. Okay? Harry supported me.

— Yes, well, well... — Ron finally admitted his wrongness, being in the minority.

— So, — Molly counted all her charges, which were, including Harry and me, as many as seven wizards, — are you all ready? Arthur, go first and meet them on the other side.

Inspired, Arthur Weasley climbed into the fireplace and used volatile gunpowder, dissolving into flashes of green flame. Everyone else followed him in turn, and I was among the first again.

After moving, I managed to get out of the fireplace without any problems, which was very close to the brick wall that was the passage to the Leaky boiler, shook off the soot and waited for the arrival of my friends.

Diagon Alley greeted me with leaning buildings and shops, a narrow street lined with stone paving stones and the rays of the morning sun.

— I'll never stop being surprised by the sight of Diagon Alley, — said Arthur Weasley dreamily, standing next to me, — how are you, Kyle? Are you feeling okay?

— Yes, sir. I already moved through the fireplace a few days ago when I arrived at your house from my guardian," I replied to the wizard.

— That's right, that's right. But, you quickly get used to traveling with volatile gunpowder, but the apparatus... It's not an easy case, and certainly not a pleasant one," he shared his thoughts.

While we were waiting for the others, I ventured to ask a question of interest to me, since he himself touched on this topic.

— Tell me, Mr. Weasley, if the apparation can move a wizard to any place he has visited, then why are the borders of magical England closed? It should be pointless, unless the whole country is covered by a special dome, which prevents movement.

He looked at me strangely, but still answered:

"That's an unusual question, Kyle. I didn't know you were interested in this. As for anti-establishment charms for the whole country, they are hardly feasible. Which spells are simpler, such as notifying or signaling an intersection, are functioning, which are controlled by a special department of the Ministry. Well, moving from the islands to the continent, and even more so somewhere far away, will not work, or it will be a very risky business. It's all about the jump distance," Mr. Weasley looked at my expression, which expressed a desire to continue, and even got a little confused, "Um, I'll try to explain it to you the way they teach it in the sixth year of Hogwarts. You see, Kyle, when a wizard apparates somewhere, he does not use magic to distort space, but his own body, moving it to another point known to him. But the thing is, the further away she is from you, the more time it takes to jump. For us, the difference between one tenth of a second and one hundredth is imperceptible, but for the planet... I think you were told at Muggle school that our planet rotates on its own axis. And at the same time, it flies around the sun, and then, in turn, it also moves with all the planets in the space of our galaxy. Because of all this movement, it turns out that the further your jump is planned, the more difficult it is for magic to take into account all these errors, which increases the risk of a critical error exponentially. After all, after a tenth of a second, the point you are thinking about will be in a completely different place, which is why in most cases the so-called "splitting" of the body occurs.

— Wow. Thank you, Mr. Weasley. I didn't know that," I replied, delighted with such a detailed explanation.

To be honest, watching Mr. Weasley's behavior, I did not quite expect that he would be so knowledgeable in at least some area, except for his own work. And even more so, I did not think that Weasley Sr. was capable of such a clear and pedantic explanation, which not every professor at Hogwarts can boast of.

The man smiled kindly at me, and while we were talking about other magical laws and restrictions, everyone else was gradually coming out of the fireplace.

— That's it. Making an initial plan," Molly said, drawing the attention of everyone else, —Harry, dear. You go with your friends and Arthur to Gringotts to get money from your safe. Ginny, Percy, and the twins and I will go to Ollivander's for now, get her a wand," after these words, Jeanie's eyes shone with anticipation, "and after that we will all buy robes, textbooks, and everything else together. Harry, keep your key and keep it. After the second year of study, you will begin to be considered old enough and independent enough to be able to visit Gringotts yourself in the future," Molly handed my friend a massive key to the safe, after which our large company split up.

Ginny went to buy her magic wand... But in her place, I was still an ordinary Muggle-born Kyle Golden. My first visit to Diagon Alley was preserved only in the memories of one of the personalities.

I was a little afraid to meet Ollivander now. Did he somehow remember everyone who took his wand? At a meeting, he could easily name the wizard and the artifact itself for magic: its length, the type of wood used, and the core. What if he sees any changes in me? I didn't need it at all, so it's even good that we won't cross paths today.

The three of us, accompanied by Arthur Weasley, approached the Gringotts bank, and behind the first bronze doors of the building we saw creepy goblin guards armed with sparkling enchanted halberds and guarding the second doors, already covered with silver.

I wonder if by their presence at the main entrance they really perform security functions, or is this such a demonstration of the power of the goblins and the inaccessibility of their bank? And who, since nothing is heard about the Philosopher's Stone here, would risk robbing Gringotts?

The goblins, despite all the other changes in this version of the Potteriana, still owned the main bank of the wizarding world, whose divisions existed in other countries, excluding the New World. Actually, it wasn't that much of a surprise.

Yes, the wizards of the local version of reality did not hide behind the screen of the Statute of Secrecy, and Muggles were considered almost necessary disenfranchised neighbors on the planet, who can and should be controlled and exploited as they please. But regarding other magical races, radical magical chauvinism was not noticeable. What can I say - we had a werewolf teaching Dark Arts at school!

Half-humans and intelligent magical creatures, based on my fleeting acquaintance with the local legislation, had their rights and opportunities, albeit slightly less than the wizards themselves, but much greater than the same simpletons. House elves remained servants, but that was always the case. The giants lived on their reservations because they were too stupid and aggressive to integrate more closely into the magical community. All sorts of veils, werewolves and vampires had certain diverse limitations, which, however, did not prevent them from living quite tolerably well among wizards. Goblins were considered free creatures according to local laws, which, due to their traditions and culture, interacted with the rest of the world only from the financial side of the issue, in all other situations adhering to their own habitats in the underground cities of their race.

Once upon a time, they competed with wizards, staged uprisings in response to their increasingly strict dependence on the rest of the magical world, which was initially led by humans. After multiple defeats, they fell into a certain kind of bondage altogether, having lost the opportunity to use magic wands and staffs.

Since then, a lot of time has passed and more than one goblin generation has changed. It seemed that now they were satisfied with the established order of things, and they finally said goodbye to the dreams of the supremacy of their own race.

Moreover, when the Statute fell, they, in exchange for the support of wizards, received significant preferences, crushing some branches of the Muggle world under themselves, while receiving not only fabulous profits, which their race valued more than anything else, but also adopting some technologies of the simpletons, along with numerous resources that their race needed for the rather mysterious goblin rituals.

I did not delve into this topic much, having read only one book found by Lockhart about the history of these creatures. Goblins definitely had a significant share of power in the magical world, knowledge from their ancestors, access to resources, and who knows what else. And at the same time, neither the local Ministry of Magic nor other countries seemed to have any concerns about them.

But if goblin uprisings took place a long time ago, and for the magical world it turned into bloody wars, then why is no one afraid of a repeat of such a scenario from these alien creatures? Wizards are not too numerous, and recent wars and confrontations have pretty much thinned their numbers, and this is not counting the insane orders at Hogwarts, because of which not all children wizards live to graduate.

Apparently, there are certain agreements or secret knowledge on the sidelines of the magical elite, because of which the threat from goblins still does not loom on the editorials of the Daily Prophet, and the long-eared shorties are just resting on their laurels working with the finances of the entire magical world, and not staging a worldwide revolution.

— Harry, do you remember, I hope, what we discussed? I said softly to the boy as we approached the counter with the goblin manager.

— You mean the money? Yes, of course I remember. I'll take as much as I can," he answered me uncertainly. I hope he's not shy about taking his own money out of the safe?

Having a friend who has natural mountains of magic coins in his safe, I did not hesitate to take the time to unobtrusively lead Harry to the idea that this money could be very useful to us in our further studies at Hogwarts, and they will help us with purchases at the school itself just fine.

I did not feel any embarrassment or remorse about this at all. Despite all the "choiceness" of the boy, he does not have any special immunity from standard school threats. This means that using this money for my own protection is a fairly logical and acceptable action, without hurriedly affecting the hardening strings of my morality.

To bribe, if possible, some undergraduates who will teach us spells of increased complexity and provide a "roof" from problems with other students. To give some valuable thing to a teacher who, in gratitude, will not tinker with us too much. Yes, buy the same bags with enchantment for expanded volume and light weight, or buy a subscription to send newspapers to school to get information about what is happening in the world while studying. There are a whole bunch of uses for galleons!

Yes, I understood that I would not be able to pull off some of my own ideas. Who knows: maybe teachers bathe in this magical gold for this style of teaching, and they don't need any "gifts" at all. Or the upperclassmen during their studies will not be led to galleons from the second year, and will send us far away, since they themselves are not in poverty. But, in any case, it is better to exist in this gloomy world with a bag of gold coins in your bosom than without it.

Well, the fact that I will enrich myself in a certain way at the expense of my friend... You don't have to choose the means. When our lives are at stake, the exploitation of Harry Potter's funds does not look like something completely wrong.

Anyway, I've already become friends with him, I've already supported him in a difficult hour with these damned trials, I've already spent time with him in the summer even more than the Weasleys, which is why I became Harry's second best friend. Well, since I'm going to use the boy's money to essentially protect him, any selfish motives of mine magically turn into good intentions.

We weren't allowed to take a ride on a trolley to a friend's safe, so Ron and I waited for Harry and Mr. Arthur in a specially designated room.

— Kyle, can we go to the broom shop for now? There's nothing to do here anyway, except to look at goblin faces... — Ron grimaced, — but there you can see a new broom - Nimbus 2001! Let's go, huh? He made a pleading face.

I looked around: no one seemed to be paying attention to us. Neither the other wizards, much less the goblins, cared about the two ordinary sophomores in the waiting room.

—Okay, let's go," I agreed with Ron's suggestion, "just take a quick look and come back so as not to make your father worry."

— Yes, we'll be right there and back! — He said and jumped up joyfully from his seat.

— Moreover, we will need to see if Seamus has already arrived at Diagon Alley. I texted him about today's shopping trip, even though I didn't think we'd be here so early...

As a result, our short-term absence was imperceptibly delayed. After looking at the display cases with brooms and advertisements with flying Quidditch players on posters, we met Seamus and met his mother: a tall and slender sorceress.

And when I realized that Arthur might already be looking for us, he himself appeared, accompanied by Harry, who carried a heavy backpack full of coins on his back.

Father Weasley began his harsh speech about our misconduct and responsibility, but it quickly faded away as soon as Molly and the other children joined our company. As it turned out, she suspected something was wrong when she saw her husband with some young lady from Ollivander's shop, so she came to clarify the situation.

They're funny, these Weasleys, after all. And it seemed like even without the scary skeletons in the closets, which I was still a little afraid of, living with them under the same roof. I've seen enough of the professors and the director, so I'm afraid of a similar darkness in all other wizards.

In general, the world of magic outside of Hogwarts turned out to be not so gloomy as I imagined it to be, being in the castle itself. The adult wizards I met overwhelmingly seemed adequate enough to me, and the magical world itself was inhabited by the most ordinary people, even those gifted in magic.

It turns out that Hogwarts itself has changed much more significantly here than the rest of the magical community. My fears about continuing to exist in a continuous dark dystopia, at least a little, but they were dispelled.

The strangest thing about all this was, perhaps, that the graduates of Hogwarts, who have now grown up, showed themselves to be relatively balanced personalities. After all, having studied in such a nightmare for seven whole years, everyone willy-nilly has to get himself various psychological traumas and hiccups. Or is it much easier to treat in the magical world than the Muggle method with psychologists and lifelong sedation?

Perhaps, in senior years, they finally got used to tin and did not become madmen. Maybe such training has affected many wizards, it's just that I haven't encountered them yet, getting to know only a more or less adequate part of society. There is also a possibility that such cruelty was gradually aggravated, and the same generation of Weasley seniors had not yet found that Dark Hogwarts, with which I was familiar, to the full.

It's pointless to guess. I will have to learn this the hard way, since I will not be going anywhere from the "school of witchcraft and wizardry" in the coming years.

A further shopping trip surrounded by friends and their families was really cool, without any excesses or regular discoveries. Harry and I were even given a certain amount of galleons from the Ministry, for basic purchases for school. Arthur Weasley made a fuss, because in fact, at the moment we were considered to be his temporary wards.

We bought the necessary textbooks, although Mrs. Weasley told Ron to save up points for renting books from the school library for next year. It turns out that there was such an opportunity at school. It allowed students to save several galleons and not spend money on old editions of educational materials, which were more than enough in the bowels of the bookshelves of Hogwarts.

Our company has not bypassed the potion shop either. It turns out that in the first academic year, a student buys a boiler as a kind of payment to the school. The same applies to the ingredients that we purchase annually, but they go into the general stocks of the educational institution, and the pool is different for each course. Thus, seven courses ensure the availability of basic ingredients for cooking classes, and the rest are handled by greenhouses and gifts in the Forbidden Forest.

That is, during Snape's lessons, we do not use our own boiler, but one of the professor's supplies. And we use common ingredients, since some potions use very rare components, and putting everything you need into a classic student kit is a difficult task. I hadn't even thought about such a system until this moment.

We also visited Madame Malkin's shop, where we bought clothes and really "for all occasions", as the slogan of this shop said.

In fact, the enchanted clothes had, albeit small, but significant advantages over their Muggle counterparts. Simple charms of durability and dirt repellency, as well as much more serious durability when exposed to various kinds of magic, made quite expensive items of everyday clothing simply necessary.

More than once or twice, my Muggle clothes were torn and spoiled in lessons at Hogwarts. No wonder there was a recommendation in the letter of admission to take more of these clothes. Otherwise, I myself do not know how I would repair and clean the old one, not knowing the spells "Reparo" and "Evanesco", and acquire a new one, without an owl and connections in both the Muggle and magical worlds.

Separately, we need to say about our spending of Harry Potter's blood money. With the generous hand of the boy, we did get three good-quality suitcases of the same type with the charms of expansion and weight relief. In addition, the three of us, under the mixed gazes of adult wizards, swept everything from the shelves of the counters that might have seemed useful to us at Hogwarts. Amulets against various evil eyes, a couple of expensive hematopoietic potions and antidote potions, an owl for Ron, which he was immensely pleased with, a broom for Harry...

Yes, Harry Potter bought himself the same Nimbus 2001. The twins did their best, as they were sure that Harry would join their Quidditch team, in which they were listed as beaters. It turns out that the participants of the Quidditch teams were actively interested in the results of the lessons with Madame Trick, selecting potential candidates even from the first year for the next academic year.

We never attended a single Quidditch match in our freshman year, because to get there as a spectator it was necessary to spend two dozen points per person. And even though this access was given until the end of training, but we were busy with something completely different, and we didn't have any extra points at that moment, although Harry and Ron were really eager to watch at least the last matches of the teams.

In the end, when the purchases were made, and the narrow Diagon Alley was already bursting with customers and other onlookers, we had a great time in a friendly company at an ice cream parlor, after which, loaded with purchased items, we returned through the fireplace to the Hole.

***

August flew by very quickly for me, and the school holidays did not end up with any pitfalls or events. Compared to Hogwarts and its rules, that Lockhart's life, that the neighborhood with the Weasley family seemed more like an attractive resort in which you don't have to worry about your life, health and morale every day.

We just spent time like normal teenage children, adjusted for the magical component. Every day we found something to do.

When Harry and I wanted peace and quiet, we could sit in the room all day, studying our purchases in Diagon Alley and flipping through new textbooks for the second year, despite Ron's frequent and verbose complaints about the boredom of such a pastime.

If we wanted some kind of activity, and the energy in our bodies was in full swing, we went to the garden and had fun throwing garden gnomes, which was an occupation, albeit meaningless, but fun enough even for me.

There was something funny about this business: unwinding small humanoid pests, launching them into flight and listening to them go on a short-term air trip with a heart-rending squeak. Strangely enough, I had no sympathy for the garden gnomes in this activity. They looked too much like ugly and bizarre potatoes on legs, and they did not receive any damage from their launch into the sky.

Sometimes, when the twins had their mini Quidditch training sessions, we would join them, flying on simple brooms and tossing a quaffle in the air between each other. I think we were very lucky, since the Weasleys didn't have a bludger in stock, which is why our flights on broomsticks were not accompanied by danger, which the twins seemed to even miss a little.

Well, when Harry tested his new broom, the whole Weasley family immediately distributed a queue to sample such an expensive artifact. Both the twins and Ron were just thrilled, and I also experienced a bit of adrenaline at such high speeds of the broom.

A couple of times we went to the nearest river, and one day we were even allowed to go, accompanied by Percy, to a Muggle village nearby. Mrs. Weasley needed to buy some groceries, and their family had plenty of Muggle money.

The Weasleys preferred to live in an ordinary magical house among similar few wizard neighbors with exactly the same houses, which is why they did not have servants among the simpletons, and the whole household was based on Molly herself and her charms.

As far as I understood, in the magical world, it was quite important for public opinion where exactly a certain wizard and his family lived. Due to the monthly payments of pounds from the Ministry of Magic, anyone from the wizarding world could comfortably exist among Muggles, while acting secretly or not hiding their magical talents from anyone at all.

This way made it possible to fully enjoy all the benefits that the simpletons could offer, and protection in this case was provided by a special paramilitary organization of Muggles, which was supervised directly from the Ministry of Magic and was the most influential law enforcement body of the puppet system of the Muggle government.

However, the reputation of wizards who could not fully provide for their lives in the magical world and therefore moved to the world of simpletons was quite low. Such magicians were treated the way many conservative pureblood families of the canon treated muggle-lovers and adherents of equal status between purebloods, half-bloods and Muggle-borns.

Let everything go completely along different tracks in this reality, but there were reasons for one caste of wizards to despise and treat the other with disdain. And in this case, the Weasleys were among those who agreed to live a poor life in the world of magic, making life easier for themselves and providing comfort with spells. But the same Seamus, as far as I knew, lived with his mother on a Muggle estate and enjoyed all the available preferences from generous ministerial payments.

This separation of wizards was rather an indicator of success. Someone could secure a good position in the Ministry or set up their own business in the world of magic. And someone did not realize himself in any way and could at the same time live a carefree life in a similar luxury without any problems, thereby irritating wealthy wizards.

It's good that this had little effect on school relationships, if at all. And in this case, even a Muggle-born who could find a steady income in galleons could disdain a pureblood without a magical penny behind his back, and, in fact, would even be right about something. After all, in this case it was not so important who the wizard was born with - whether pureblood or Muggle-born. It was precisely what he managed to achieve with the help of his knowledge and talents that was appreciated, and such a value system seemed to me quite sound compared to the ideology of purity of blood.

Magical houses differed from Muggle houses mainly in that in the first everything was built on magic, and secondly it gave way to electrical appliances and technological innovations. And since magic and electricity were in serious conflict, and this was a well-known fact, hybrid houses simply did not exist.

Because of this, such a division was so contrasting: either a wizard equips and maintains his home with the help of magic and money from the magical world, or buys a house without any magical enchantments and equips it with the latest word of technological progress with government money from simple people. In this case, even the most run-down and unemployed wizard had the opportunity to live a completely comfortable life in the Muggle world at the expense of the Ministry, which itself shamelessly withdrew this money from the controlled treasury of Muggles, which is why poor wizards in theory should not have existed as a class at all. At least in one of the worlds.

I found out more about this, oddly enough, from Percy, who, during our walk to the Muggle village, willingly told everyone interested, including Harry and myself. He talked in his instructive manner, but this did not prevent me from perceiving such a detailed disclosure of the topic of interest to me. He was immensely proud that his family was not tempted by imaginary wealth and was quite satisfied with living in a Hole. And even though she was not a shining example of wealth in the wizarding world, she kept, according to Percy, in a good average.

The most disastrous property in the wizarding world was considered to be the apartments in Kosy and Lyutny lanes. There was no such thing, but a private house with an adjacent territory was considered a sign of the well-being of the family living there in comparison with them.

A separate lesson for the whole of August was the study of new spells and the practice of those already studied. I emphasized this especially strongly, since it was the mastery of various charms that could help me both survive my studies at Hogwarts and in the theoretical future play a significant role in becoming a full-fledged wizard in the realities of this world.

Since fate had "rewarded" me with Muggle ancestry and the absence of at least some acquaintances in the wizarding world, then the bet should have been on magical practices.

We couldn't learn new spells ourselves, because with the knowledge of any spells, the first thing we needed was a good curator who would follow your actions, point out mistakes and give useful advice. And there were a few problems with that here.

I don't know how things were in other wizarding families, but the Weasleys didn't really try to teach their children any charms. Molly Weasley, after my polite request to teach us some kind of spell, replied in all seriousness that there was a school for this, and in the summer you need to rest. Relax!

As I found out later, neither Molly nor Arthur contributed in any way to the building of knowledge in their children, leaving this process at the mercy of Hogwarts. Either they had too many children, and the parents themselves turned out to be quite busy with other things, or they really seriously held the opinion that every child should enrich himself with knowledge and experience, so to speak, "in castle conditions."..

Maybe there was some other reason unknown to me, but the result remained the same: we could observe the daily witchcraft of adult Weasleys, we could clarify the trajectory of a wave or pronunciation of a phrase from them when using everyday non-verbal charms by adult wizards, but hope that we would be given enough time to fully learn spells ahead of time the school curriculum, we really shouldn't have.

The Weasley brothers, unlike their parents, agreed to train the three of us in spells... For ten galleons for one spell studied! And since Percy was also not eager to mess with his little brother and his friends, we had no choice but to use Harry's reserve money and pay for lessons from the twins.

They're all crazy here if they think that children don't need to be prepared for school! I can understand the situation with the first year and Dumbledore's rules, but how much kinship empathy must be distorted in order to leave a sibling or son to fend for themselves in such a dangerous place without using the opportunity for additional education at home?!

Maybe I was just offended that no one was bothering with us too much and preparing us for the new dangers of the castle, but the friendly Weasley family actually turned out to be not so friendly. Whether this was the fault of the director's imposed ideology with his insane version of social Darwinism, or whether the adults themselves believed that: "it's right, because we've been through this ourselves," is unknown.

But despite all this, I mostly enjoyed being at the Weasleys'. Our relationship with Harry and Ron became even stronger, I made a close acquaintance with my friend's older brothers, who studied at Gryffindor and could, as I hoped, if anything help me with problems that would definitely appear during the school year - it couldn't be any other way, don't go to Trelawney here.

In general, I think the summer holidays have been good for me. I vaguely remember my condition after the tests I passed. That depression over Dean's death, the melancholy over the endless unanswered questions...

During these two months, I managed to taste the normal life of a teenage magician. Who is not afraid of every rustle and is not under constant stress in the ongoing lessons, which at any moment can be overtaken by cruel and painful punishment.

Therapy, consisting of fresh air, freedom of movement, constant delicious food and unlimited use of magic, brought me back into the system. Yes, I still remembered my first year and still had nightmares that reminded me of the brutal realities of Hogwarts. But at least now I didn't shudder at the thought that I would have to return to this school soon. I did not torment myself with the fear that I would have to spend my whole life in this world in this way.

I've known the life of a free wizard. And he was determined to live until the next vacation to plunge into it again.