For the Love of Chaos

Family Relations Revealed

She looked up and locked eyes with Lizzie, a similar expression on her twin's face.

"What the actual fuck?" they exclaimed at once.

"Language," muttered Hatty.

"What does yours say?" Lizzie demanded, flipped her parchment so that Cassie couldn't see it.

"It says that I, or I guess we, are descended from the McKinnon family and that I'm the heir?" Cassie said in disbelief. (They already knew that part, but it was still weird to see it on an official paper.)

"Does that mean you have to do paperwork?" Lizzie asked with a strange gleam in her eye.

"I—I don't know." Cassie said helplessly, looking overwhelmed.

She stared down at her results, trying to fully process what she was seeing. She was a McKinnon, her mother a squib. She released her breath and looked at her sister. Lizzie's eyes were wide and her shoulders were set. She was freaked out the same way that she had been when they were ten and their parents had died. She had had the same expression and set of her shoulders when they had sat in the principal's office and been told their parents had died in a car accident.

Cassie gave her sister a reassuring smile—that she didn't feel at all—and motioned for Lizzie to read her results. She wasn't expecting anything different than her own, especially as they were twins, but maybe that was where she went wrong.

"Why're the letters in my name changing colors?" Lizzie asked, her voice full of both fear and excitement.

"Let me see."

Cassie grabbed the parchment from her sister and stared at the shifting colors. As she watched, they changed from red to purple, to yellow and blue alternating. She looked up, perplexed, and from the corner of her eye, the goblin looked intrigued. It was almost scary.

"May I see that?" the goblin asked politely.

Cassie handed him the parchment and Griphook's eyes narrowed. He searched around in his desk for a minute and, finding no answers there, walked out of the room at a brisk pace. The twin's eyes met. Lizzie looked disturbed and panicked with her wide eyes and slightly agape jaw.

Cassie stood up and sat beside her sister, resting her hand on the middle of Lizzie's back in comfort. The taller girl leaned into it and Cassie felt her shoulders relax. Lizzie gave her a grateful smile as the goblin returned. This time with a second one behind him.

"This is Baldrid. They are an expert from the inheritance department."

The twins waved cordially at the goblin as they sat down behind the desk. The goblin gave Lizzie's test a long look and said, "I have not seen this in over a hundred years. This means you are a shifter of shape. I believe you humans call it being a Metamorphagus."

Lizzie gasped. "No??"

"That's not how that works Liz," Cassie giggled.

"Wh—buh—huh?" Lizzie sputtered incoherently.

"You're a Metamorph, like Ton—" Cassie cut herself off. Spoilers after all. "You're like Dora from OoTP.'

"I know what it means!" Lizzie pouted. She resisted the urge to shudder as she heard the incessant theme song to that children's show.

"Then why were you so hysterical about it?" Cassie demanded, though her voice was somewhat teasing.

"Because I'm a METAMORPH!" Lizzie had forgotten about the others in the room until they jumped in surprise. "Sorry for volume."