Up until he was eight years old, Severus Snape was a very lonely little boy. The only son of a timid, broken-down witch and a jealous, abusive muggle, he spent most of his days hiding in the streets around Spinner’s End, where he lived in Cokeworth. His father’s job prospects had unfortunately declined right along with certain areas of Cokeworth, and so Tobias spent his days drinking away his frustration, before staggering home and taking his disappointment out on his wife Eileen, whose magic was useless to him.

Severus had known from a very early age that he was as magical as Eileen was – and that it was a big part of why his father hated him. It made no difference to Tobias whether Severus consciously used his magic or not – he was beaten anyway. If it hadn’t been for the fact that his mother had sworn never to use her magic on or against Tobias, and was therefore helpless to stop him doing anything, Severus may well have come to the conclusion that muggles were nothing but a waste of space, inferior to wizarding kind.

As it was, Severus grew up only seeing the worst of both worlds. He retreated into books. Tobias didn’t hold with book-learning – having dropped out of school himself at the age of twelve – so most of the books Severus managed to get his hands on were Eileen’s old school books from Hogwarts. He spent hours poring over the books from her sixth and seventh years, dreaming of the time he’d be old enough to have his own wand and could use some of the hexes and curses on his layabout father.

Severus also developed a fascination with potions. They were predictable – if you added two ingredients together, knowing their properties, it was a simple matter to know what would happen. Eileen had managed to teach him the basics, but by the time he was seven, Severus had outstripped her knowledge, and wrote pages and pages on experiments he’d like to try one day.

For his eighth birthday – usually ignored as it was so close to Christmas – Eileen presented Severus with a book on magical theory. Severus spent the next six months devouring it, reading and rereading the book, determined to start creating his own spells.

He was occupied with studying the book again one day in mid-June, hidden in the middle of a prickly-thorn bush, when he realised that the playground adjacent to the scrub-land he was hidden in was no longer vacant. Startled, he raised his head too fast from the book, and his hair caught in the thorns overhead. Muttering curses under his breath and wincing as strands of hair left his scalp, Severus manoeuvred his way out of the bush and squinted at the playground, one hand coming up to shade his eyes.

Almost instantly, his eyes widened and his mouth dropped open. There were two girls playing on the swings, and the smaller was currently swinging higher than he’d ever seen anyone go before. Her voice floated over to him. “C’mon, Tuney, let’s see who can jump the furthest!”

“Lily, no, don’t!” the other girl screeched, her voice sounding like nails on a chalkboard. “Mum said you weren’t to do any of . . . that outside the house!”

“Aw, but Tuney, nobody’s here to see!” the younger girl – Lily – whined. She swung her legs harder, forcing herself higher into the air.

“Don’t you dare, Lily Ann, or I’m telling Mum!” Tuney threatened, dragging her swing to a stop. Lily pouted, and for a brief moment Severus thought she would do as her sister had ordered. But then a look of mulish determination appeared on the young girl’s face, and after pumping her legs three times to get the necessary height, Lily let go . . . and flew off the swing, landing feet first some four feet away from the swing set.

Severus gaped at her, then felt his heartbeat accelerate. She was a witch. She had to be a witch! He’d finally found somebody else magical!

Hugging his book to his chest, he scrambled past the thorn bushes, tearing a few more holes in his father’s old shirt as he went, and raced towards the playground, where the two girls were now currently standing nose-to-nose with each other, the older girl clearly scolding, while her younger sister shouted back at her.

The two looked up as Severus skidded to a halt just beside the old and rusted roundabout they were standing beside. Severus was so overjoyed and flustered, that when he opened his mouth, instead of greeting them normally, the first words out of his mouth were, “You’re a witch!”

“Excuse me?!” The younger girl – Lily – placed her hands on her hips and glared at him.

“How dare you!” her sister added. She peered at Severus for a moment, then stuck her nose in the air. “You have no right to call my sister a . . . a . . . that name!”

“But that’s what she is,” Severus said, puzzled and slightly ashamed. He did have manners, he’d just been so excited to see someone else doing magic . . . “She’s a witch. I’m a wizard.”

“You’re crazy, is what you are,” the older girl sniffed. “And a poorly dressed crazy, at that. Whose shirt was that – your mummy’s?”

Severus flushed and looked down at the shirt.

“Tuney!” the other girl reprimanded. “That’s not nice!” She turned her glare onto her sister, then took a step closer to Severus. “Never mind her, she’s just turned twelve and she’s turning into the worst snob imaginable.” She held out a hand to Severus. “I’m Lily Evans.”

“Severus Snape,” Severus mumbled, giving her hand a brief shake and then quickly dropping it.

“Snape? Is Tobias Snape your father?” Lily’s sister asked. The sneer hovering around her mouth grew worse. “I’ve heard stories about him. Come on, Lily, we shouldn’t hang around with the likes of him.”

“Oh, get over yourself, Tuney,” Lily snapped. She turned her back to her sister. “That’s Petunia,” she said softly. “Ignore her, she talks rubbish most of the time.” Severus gave her a weak smile, just as her eyes fell on the book he was still hugging to his chest. “Ooh, do you like reading, too? What’s it about?” Her eyes, a brilliant verdant green, lit up, and right there and then, with her long auburn hair curling around her face, Severus knew he would do anything for this girl.

Up until she was eight years old, Bellatrix Black, despite having two sisters and two cousins always running around, was a very lonely little girl. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that her older sister Andromeda was rebelling against the Black family’s purebloodedness, her younger sister Narcissa was obsessed with looking and behaving like a perfect little pureblood, her younger cousin Regulus was a mummy’s boy and always clinging to Aunt Walburga’s skirts, and her cousin Sirius was rebelling against his mother’s rabidness regarding the Dark Arts and their pureblood status.

Thus it was that, on a midsummer’s day at the beginning of July, exactly seven months after her eighth birthday, Bellatrix was wandering through a section of Cokeworth she’d never been anywhere near before. Admittedly, she hadn’t actually ever been near Cokeworth at all, never mind certain sections of it, but she’d managed to escape from the nanny-elf while her family were visiting some other pureblood family who lived just outside the town, and she was determined to have some fun.

Unfortunately, there really wasn’t much for her to have fun with, so she settled for sulkily kicking a large pebble up and down the various streets, occasionally giving it a push with her magic to make it go further.

She was startled out of her thoughts as, when she reached the start of some old rusted railings, her chosen pebble shot up into the air, quivered, and then flew into a clump of bushes a few metres away.

“What the—” she started, and then gave an indignant cry. “My pebble!” Wriggling through the railings, she stormed over the grass towards the bushes.

Sitting just out of sight behind the largest bush, two children were facing each other, a large circle of stones and pebbles surrounding them . . . and hovering in mid-air.

“Ooh!” Bellatrix gasped, excitedly. She’d finally found people to play with!

Startled, the other two children looked up, and lost control of the magic. The stones dropped to the ground with a thump.

“Uh . . .” the red-headed girl started.

“It’s not what it looked like,” her dark-haired companion added.

“So you mean you weren’t doing magic?” Bellatrix asked, raising her eyebrows.  She rounded the bush and plonked herself on the ground beside them. “Bellatrix Black,” she said, proudly, holding out a hand to both of them.

“I’m Lily Evans, and this is Severus Snape,” the red-head said, quickly shaking her hand and letting it go again. The boy – Had the girl said Severus? – stared at Bellatrix’s hand as though wondering whether she wanted him to shake it or kiss it. Lily nudged him in the ribs with her elbow, and he quickly shook Bellatrix’s hand and looked away, his cheeks flushing a dull red.

“You can do magic, too?” Lily asked.

Bellatrix nodded. “Of course. Obviously, I can’t do much on purpose until I get a wand,” she added, honestly.

“So what magic have you done, then?” Lily asked, obviously the more out-going one of the pair.

“I’ve done accio—” Bellatrix paused at the blank looks on Lily and Severus’ faces. “Um, I’ve summoned stuff, banished stuff, levitated someo— uh, things,” she amended quickly. “And I’ve managed to escape from our nanny-elf five times this month alone,” she finished, proudly.

“Nanny-elf?” queried Lily.

“It’s a house-elf, but specifically for looking after children,” Bellatrix explained, but it didn’t appear to clear up the confusion. Lily and Severus exchanged a look. Bellatrix frowned at them. “You don’t have house-elves?” she asked.

“Dad’s a muggle,” Severus said quietly. His shoulders hunched inwards, and one of his hands twitched. It reminded Bellatrix of some of her Aunt Walburga’s house-elves, the ones who never seemed to get anything right and were always being punished.

“What about your parents?” she asked Lily. “Or are you poor like the Weasley family?” She sneered at the thought of the red-headed purebloods. Usually they bred like vermin – according to Aunt Walburga – but so far this generation only had the one boy, a weedy sort called Arthur.

“I don’t know who the Weasley family are, but that sounded mean,” Lily said, frowning at Bellatrix. “And no-one else in my family has magic.”

Bellatrix’s mouth dropped open, and she pointed a shaking finger at Lily. “You’re a mudblood!” she screeched in horror, shooting to her feet.

Lily and Severus exchanged yet another glance. “What’s a mudblood?” Lily asked, hesitantly.

“Your parents are muggles!” Bellatrix informed Lily, as though this fact had escaped her notice. “They can’t do magic at all.”

“So?” Severus scowled at her, clearly taking offence on his friend’s behalf. “Her parents are good people, they don’t need magic.”

“You’re only a half-blood, you don’t know any better,” Bellatrix informed him loftily.

“Believe me, her parents are better off without magic,” Severus muttered, almost inaudibly.

“So if I’m a mudblood, and Severus is a half-blood, what does that make you?” Lily asked, curiously.

“I’m a pureblood, of course,” said Bellatrix, smugly.

Expecting her new companions to give gasps of awe, she was completely unprepared for Lily to suddenly burst into hysterical laughter. Lily collapsed to the ground, tears of laughter springing from her eyes. Severus looked askance at her, whilst Bellatrix gaped.

“Lily?” Severus prompted, when it didn’t appear as though Lily was going to calm any time soon. “Want to share the joke with us?”

“I’m a mudblood, you’re a half-blood, and she’s a pureblood,” Lily gasped out, her trembling finger moving from one to the other.

“And?” Bellatrix sniffed.

“We’re the Three Bloods,” said Lily, and then she fell into gales of laughter again.

This time, it was Severus and Bellatrix who looked at each other.

“Perhaps it’s time she went home now,” said Severus, dryly. “I think she’s had too much excitement today.”

With that, he scrambled up, and hauled Lily up to her feet. When she only collapsed against him, still hiccupping with laughter, he slung one of her arms around his neck and started to wobble away, tossing a casual “’Bye,” over his shoulder, and leaving Bellatrix staring after them.

It took Bellatrix several days before she managed to find Lily and Severus again, despite escaping from her nanny-elf every other day. She wasn’t entirely sure she should be looking for Lily – the girl was a mudblood after all. But she hadn’t seemed stupid, or lazy, or ugly, and she hadn’t acted as though things should be done her way – the muggle way. Bellatrix was confused. Lily didn’t match up with the way Aunt Walburga had always described mudbloods. Perhaps the change didn’t happen until they were accepted into Hogwarts? She resolved to ask Lily questions, lots and lots of questions. And if she could get Severus on his own, she could ask him, too. He’d seemed to like Lily, but maybe he was just too cowed to show any different.

Of course, she had to find them first. Where could they be?

When she did finally come across the pair – back in the playground where she’d come across them the first time – she was so frustrated that she didn’t even bother with any greeting as she stormed up to them.

“Where have you been?” she demanded, harshly, standing over them with her fists on her hips.

Lily and Severus blinked up at her. “Um . . . hi?” Lily tried, her brow creasing in confusion.

“You’re the girl who saw us the other week,” Severus said, softly. “Bellatrix, right?”

“Oh!” Lily exclaimed, her eyes lighting up in recognition. “The Three Bloods! I remember!” She gestured for Bellatrix to join them on the ground, where they were examining an old book that looked like it was three-quarters of the way to falling apart.

Bellatrix dropped to the ground, ignoring the dirt that would surely end up on her pale dress. The house-elves would clean it later. “I’ve been looking for you,” she said, sticking her lower lip out in a pout. “Where’ve you been hiding?”

“We weren’t hiding,” Severus denied.

“We were in school,” Lily agreed. It was Bellatrix’s turn to look blank. “What, you don’t go to school?” Lily asked, amazed.

“I don’t know. What’s school?” asked Bellatrix. Lily and Severus glanced at each other.

“Where you go to learn stuff?” said Lily, but it came out as more of a question than a statement.

Bellatrix frowned at them both. “But I thought you had to be eleven before you went to Hogwarts.”

“What does Hogwarts have to do with school?” Severus asked. He shook his head slightly, tossing his dark hair out of his eyes.

“Well, Hogwarts is a school,” said Bellatrix. She paused. “Right?” she added, uncertainly.

“Well, yeah, but that’s a big school,” replied Severus.

“There’s a little school?” Bellatrix chewed her lip. “I never heard of that.”

“You’ve never heard of primary school?” Lily gaped at her. “Where have you been going all this time?”

“I haven’t been going anywhere!” said Bellatrix, stridently. “You two are the ones that disappeared!”

“So if you don’t go to primary school, how do you learn to read and write?” Severus queried. “What about maths, and science, and history?”

The light dawned on Bellatrix. “Oh, I have tutors for that,” she said, relieved.

“You have tutors?” Lily echoed. She exchanged glances with Severus. Bellatrix wondered if perhaps they were envious of the obvious sign that her family was wealthy. But then Lily surprised her. “Doesn’t that get lonely?”

“Lonely?” Bellatrix gaped at them. “Why would it be?”

“Because there’s just you,” Severus replied.

“But it’s not just me,” Bellatrix argued. “There’s Medra and Cissy, too.”

“You have sisters?” Lily asked, perking up. “Are they magic, too? Sorry, witches,” she corrected herself, pulling a face at Severus, who smirked at her.

“Yes, my whole family has magic,” Bellatrix informed her. “Andromedra’s my eldest sister, and Narcissa’s my little sister.”

“I’ve got an older sister, too,” said Lily, excitedly. Then her face fell. “Her name’s Petunia, and I think she hates me now.”

“She’s just jealous that you have magic and she doesn’t,” Severus said, comfortingly, and placed an arm over Lily’s shoulder. He blinked as he thought of something. “Hey, if you’re the youngest sibling, and Bellatrix here is the middle sibling . . . since I don’t have any siblings at all, does that make me technically the eldest?”

The two girls looked at him in silence for a moment, then both burst out laughing. Severus tried to scowl at them, but couldn’t hold the expression, and within seconds was laughing along with them.

When they were nine, the three children, who were close enough friends to be siblings themselves by now, decided to make themselves siblings in fact, and did a blood-binding ceremony. Standing in a circle on the spot where they’d first met, they all made a cut on each palm, and then stood with their palms pressed together. Even before they said anything, they could all feel the magic begin to swirl around them, drawing in ever tighter.

“By blood we bind, never to part. We will always be in each other’s heart. This blood we share, we siblings three. As we will, so mote it be!”

They repeated the chant three times, and at the end of the third repetition, the magic, which had coalesced into a tight swirl in the circle centre, exploded soundlessly outwards. Gripping each others’ hands, they tried to stay upright, but the magical force was so powerful it pushed them all apart, and they ended up flat on their backs some distance away from each other.

“Whoa,” Lily murmured, blinking up at the bright sky.

“Ugh, head-rush,” groaned Severus, lifting a hand to his head.

“Merlin, I’ve never seen any spell do that before,” said Bellatrix, struggling to prop herself up. She made it up to her elbows, but couldn’t summon the energy to rise any further than that. “Rattler!”

Three seconds later, one of her family’s house-elves popped into view beside her. “You is calling, Miss Bellatrix?” it asked.

“Yes. Could we have some food, please, Rattler?” she requested. Lily had been horrified the first time she’d heard Bellatrix speak to a house-elf, and had refused to speak to the girl until she’d learnt to speak politely to them

“And something to drink!” added Lily from her prone position.

The house-elf clicked his fingers, and a large picnic basket appeared beside them. With a short bow, the house-elf popped away.

It took another ten minutes before Severus and Bellatrix were able to climb to their feet and stagger the few steps towards the basket. Lily didn’t even try to do so, instead crawling towards it. They made short work of the food, consuming it within a couple of minutes.

Barely an hour or two later, they discovered that their ritual had an unexpected side-effect. Occasionally, groups of older boys roamed the neighbourhoods around the small playground, taunting and bullying any younger children that they came across. One such group happened to come across the three magic children as they rested on the grass near the thorn bushes.

Despite the group being at least four years older than them, Severus had stood up, trying his best to defend the two girls, who had huddled together on the ground behind him, clutching at each other in fright. Spreading his arms, Severus had attempted to make the leader back down. Laughing, the older boy had taken a step towards them. Panicking, Lily and Bellatrix both made a grab at Severus’ arms, just as he had yelled at the bullying thug to “leave us alone, and GO AWAY!”

A fierce rush of magic had swept out of the three of them, pushing the rest of the older boys a good three feet back from them, and the leader had given a wild, terrified yell, and disappeared. The rest of the thugs had looked at each other, and then turned tail and fled, almost falling over each other in their haste to get away.

As it turned out, they discovered later, the gang leader had been discovered in a town a hundred miles away called Raketon and after a night’s stay with the local police had been brought back home a changed person. He never bullied any of the local children, and in fact went out of his way to avoid coming anywhere near any place he thought he might come across Lily, Bellatrix or Severus. Much to his mother’s disbelief, he became an upstanding member of the community.

Their ritual also had an unexpected side-effect for Bellatrix’s family. Much to the surprise of the entire Black family, Lily and Severus’ images had appeared beside Bellatrix’s on the Black Family Tapestry. Of course, it had been hard to disguise the fact that neither were purebloods, and Walburga Black had thrown a fit, threatening to blast Bellatrix from the Tapestry, and therefore the family, unless the “contaminations” were removed immediately.

Cygnus and Druella, Bellatrix’s parents, strenuously objected to this, and the resulting argument split the Black Family Tree in half. Walburga was a rabid fan of the Dark, but Cygnus and Druella were less enthused, seeing the value in keeping allies in all walks of life. They had also been increasingly worried about the amount of time Bellatrix had been spending on her own or with her cousin Regulus – and therefore her Aunt Walburga – and Sirius, who was currently fighting against every one of his mother’s rules, whether they were actually for him or not. But since becoming friends with Lily and Severus, Bellatrix’s temperament had evened out again, and her parents were loathe to see her backslide. As a result, within a week of the ritual, Bellatrix and her family had moved to a house near to their friend’s, just outside of Cokeworth, allowing the trio even more time together.

By the time Lily turned eleven at the end of January and received her Hogwarts letter – the last of the trio to do so – the Three Bloods, as they still called themselves, had gained a new nickname amongst their parents. Lily’s father had started it; upon seeing them approaching Lily’s house one day, he had called to her mother, “Honey, here comes Sev, Lil and Trix,” and then after a pause he had dissolved into helpless laughter. From that point on, the Evanses, the Blacks and Eileen Snape all called them ‘Sev’s Lil Trix’. The three didn’t really mind this name; in fact, they found it quite funny as well, once it had been explained to them.

However, they were all much more excited at the prospect of finally being able to attend Hogwarts in September.

“My dad’s offered to take us all to Diagon Alley next weekend,” Bellatrix said, one day in mid-February, speaking around a mouthful of Blood Pop.

Lily gave a mock squeal at the sight of it. “Eeeuwwwww, Trix!” she wailed. “We don’t want to see you dribbling blood!”

“Not unless you want to share,” Severus suggested, grinning at her. Bellatrix stuck her red-coated tongue out at both of them, then laughed and withdrew the packet from behind her, offering one to the others. They all sat in silence for a while, contentedly sucking away.

“So,” Bellatrix started again, eventually, “Diagon Alley next weekend? Dad said he’d help us get our school stuff.”

“Can one of my parents come?” Lily asked. “They need to know how to get into Diagon Alley too.”

“Will they be able to see it? It’s completely magical,” said Bellatrix, doubtfully.

“I should think so,” said Severus. “After all, the muggleborns usually have their parents go with them, don’t they?” They had all stopped using the word mudblood after Severus’ mum had overheard them laughing about it one day. None of them had been able to sit down comfortably for several hours after that, and Severus hadn’t been allowed out to play with them for a whole week. After that, they just whispered it occasionally among themselves when referring to their Three Bloods nickname.

“I thought the teachers at Hogwarts took them,” Bellatrix said. She frowned, confused, then turned to Lily. “That professor who came to see you when you got your letter – didn’t they say they’d be taking you in August?”

“Yes, he did,” answered Lily. “Mum told him he didn’t need to, ‘cause of Sev’s mum and your parents.”

“But the parents still go with them,” Severus pointed out, reasonably. “More than likely, it’s just the entrance muggles can’t see – they’d only need someone magical to help them get through it.”

“In that case, I can ask Dad if he’ll take one of your parents, too, Lil,” Bellatrix said. “What about your mum, Sev?”

“She won’t be coming,” said Severus, quietly. “But I doubt she’ll object to me going with you.”

Lily and Bellatrix patted him on the shoulders, consolingly. By now they were both well aware of Tobias Snape’s temper, and had helped Severus to keep away from him numerous times, most often by having Severus stay at their homes for awhile. They also knew that Tobias Snape liked to pretend the magical world didn’t exist – or if it did, that it didn’t concern his wife and son. There was no way that he would permit Eileen to take Severus to such a magical place, and since he was currently out of a job – again – then it wouldn’t be easy to hide the knowledge from him.

“So what House do you think you’ll be in?” Lily asked, to turn Severus’ thoughts to happier things.

“Probably Slytherin for me,” Bellatrix said. “My whole family’s always been in Slytherin, apart from the odd Ravenclaw.” She suddenly grimaced. “But I hope I don’t get stuck with my cousin Sirius. Merlin, I’d even be in Hufflepuff if it meant I could avoid him!”

The other two children laughed at the face she was making. Despite the split between their families, her cousin Sirius was no friend to Bellatrix. He’d seemed to take their leaving personally, and took every opportunity to belittle them. Cygnus and Druella had become very worried about him, but every invitation for him to stay with them for a while was turned down by Walburga before it ever reached him.

“I’ll probably be in either Slytherin or Ravenclaw,” Severus said, once he and Lily had calmed.

Lily shrugged. “As long as I’m with one of you, I don’t care where I go,” she said.

“Careful,” Severus teased, “with an attitude like that, you’ll end up in Hufflepuff!”

“I’d do great in Hufflepuff!” Lily exclaimed, indignantly, and pounced at Severus, who ducked and rolled away from her, laughing. “Trix, help me!” she called, also starting to laugh.

“Yeah, Trix, help, the little Hufflepuff can’t catch me by herself,” whooped Severus, and he shot to his feet and darted away.

“We’ll show him who’s a Hufflepuff!” yelled Bellatrix, and, cheering and hollering, they raced after Severus.

When they arrived in Diagon Alley that weekend, Mr Black suggested that since finding the right wand could take some time, they should get their school books and robes first, and therefore leave time for Mr Ollivander’s when they wouldn’t have to worry about shops closing or making a return trip another day.

As it turned out, this was a very good idea. When Severus, the first of the trio, still hadn’t found the right wand for him after three hours, Mr Ollivander closed his shop for the day and called his assistants to come and help.

With all three of them trying together, the shelves soon emptied, and the pile of rejected wands soon overflowed the counter and fell to the floor. The apprentice wand-makers were murmuring in hushed voices, and the trio exchanged worried glances. Despite receiving Hogwarts letters, were they not magical enough for a wand to choose them?

“This is most peculiar,” Ollivander himself said, finally, when Lily failed to produce anything with the last remaining wand on the shelves.

“What does it mean?” Mr Black asked. “I’ve never seen someone fail to be chosen by a wand before.”

“Not to worry,” Ollivander said. His eyes glittered as he stared at the trio. “It just means that no ready-made wand considers them acceptable. They will require custom-made wands.”

Lily bit her lip and looked nervously at her parents. “Won’t that be expensive?” she asked, tentatively.

“Not that much more so,” Ollivander assured her, kindly. “It will just mean that you’ll be unable to take your wand home today. Now . . .” He turned to rummage through some boxes on the floor behind him, underneath the shelves. “Where did I put those cores . . .? Aha!”

He straightened up, and hefted a medium-sized box onto the counter, pushing several of the useless wands out of the way. Opening the box, he beckoned the children forwards. “Place your hand over the box, and the core destined for you will call to you,” he said. He turned to look at his apprentices. “Laurel, if you would start putting these other wands back. Jamison, please fetch a selection of hollow woods.”

One by one, Lily, Bellatrix and Severus held their hands out over the box of wand cores. Each felt a vague pull, but seemed unable to locate the core that was calling to them. Ollivander frowned at them.

“How odd,” he mused. “It’s as if none of you are complete. Curious – very curious!”

At his words, Severus glanced at his palm, then at Bellatrix and Lily. “Perhaps if we all tried together,” he suggested to them softly. “We should make sure we’re holding on to each other, too. It might be the blood ritual.”

“That’s true,” Lily mused.

“Our accidental magic has been stronger when we’re touching,” Bellatrix agreed.

Nodding at each other, they moved to surround the box, Severus ducking behind the counter, to shocked gasps from the Blacks and the apprentices, who had stopped to watch. Mr Ollivander, however, just stepped back to give him room. The trio stacked their left hands over the box of cores, and then hovered their right hands over the box. With a strong tug that caused all three of them to waver towards the box – and the magical adults to raise their eyebrows at the feel of it in the air – a long string of multi-coloured plaited hair forced its way up through the cores and launched itself into the air, twisting itself around their joined hands.

“Well!” Mr Ollivander gasped. “How very unusual – that is plaited unicorn, thestral and hippogriff mane . . . all of it willingly given. It’s been sitting in that box for over two hundred years – I’d almost forgotten I had it!” He reached to untangle it from their wrists.

Just as the elderly wand-maker touched it, however, a golden shimmer ran over the entwined hair, and it dropped to the counter in three separate pieces in front of the three children, each of which very obviously had one kind of hair slightly longer than the others. Ollivander’s eyebrows were all but invisible in his hairline now, and the two apprentices were gaping. No core had ever done that before!

Ollivander cleared his throat nervously, and beckoned to one apprentice for the various woods he’d been sent to fetch. Spread out across a cleared space on the counter, this was the quickest part of the entire business. Within minutes, Lily was holding a springy strip of willow, Bellatrix had a stout bit of ebony, and Severus was staring at a bit of pale oak that had barely waited for him to hold out his hand before leaping into it. After being informed that their new wands would be owled to them within the week, the group finally left Ollivander’s.

The weirdness continued when they visited Eeylops Owl Emporium and the next-door Magical Menagerie. A calico Kneazle darted towards Lily as soon as she set foot near the shops, almost tripping up a family of four who were discussing the screech owls perched outside the Emporium. A barn owl, the same colours as the Kneazle, almost fell off its perch it was so desperate to get to Severus. And a very strange multi-coloured bat – also the same colours as the Kneazle and the owl – fell from the Menagerie rafters to land on Bellatrix’s shoulder, causing Mrs Black and Mrs Evans to scream in fright.

Mr Black just sighed as he looked at her daughter cuddling what was obviously her new familiar. “Well, I know Hogwarts would prefer a toad,” he said, “but I’m sure there are other bats there anyway, and I’d like to see them try and deny that one entrance.”

Shaking his head, Cygnus went to pay for the animals. He’d be glad to get home – this had been one very strange shopping trip, even for magical people.