Plot Twist [GEORGE WEASLEY]

69.

Wherever she was, it's maddening, deafening and quiet all at once. The sudden shaking of trees and cawing of crows faded in and out like a dial twisting back and forth. Something was trying to get her attention.

Her vision cleared. She was in a forest. The shade blocked out any warm sun from reaching her. A biting wind teased the hem of her coat which was strange; she hadn't registered she was wearing one.

An innate knowledge sat on her ribs. She'd been here. Once. As herself and not. That knowing rattled in her till she rushed through the trees. Eventually coming to a stop at a clearing.

She caught a glint, blinding her, in her peripheral. A large, round mirror was propped against a tree trunk. Her reflection goggled at her as she came up to the mirror. Her fingers brushed the surface. She studied herself.

Why would a mirror be here?

Then, a flicker of blonde in the trees frightened her. The person dove into the forest for cover. A crack formed in the edge of the mirror. It violently traveled to the other side, shattering the entirety of it.

She turned around to see where the intruder could've gone and gasped. The entire forest had transformed, not being what it was. Mist blanketed everything, the ground nonexistent. A foot ahead was a woman and a tree with miniature carvings.

The back of her head seemed familiar enough. She rolled back her shoulders. "I hope you've been paying attention, Amara."

Amara? Right. It was her name. She'd misplaced it in this realm of consciousness as one lost the memory of where they kept their keys. The other pieces fell back into their place too.

"Mom."

Grief tightened her chest. This woman was her mother, same as the other dream. Except that one she didn't acknowledge her existence. How was this possible? Amara walked to her side.

"I am not her but, I hold enough of her to communicate with you," the face of her supposed mother morphed from a younger version to the version she saw in her newspaper obituary back and forth. "Are you paying attention?"

"The mirror..."

"You won't see unless I show you what you where to look. Someone is watching you."

"They're here? In this forest?" Amara whirled around in alarm.

"No. In reality, this is the truth," the woman said. "This is a dream. I didn't know how to communicate in the human language. So, please listen carefully. You're in danger."

"I'm listening."

"Someone knows you've my fragment. They have the other fragment too. I can feel her more now after you've awakened me from my prison."

"Your prison?" She felt warped as if she couldn't exist by herself here. Her presence of mind depended on her asking this woman. She seemed to know her name too. "If you're not my mother, who are you?"

The woman jabbed her chin at the tree. Amara followed her line of sight and froze. Full moons were carved into the tree. She'd looked at this tree not long ago. Fog cleared from her consciousness.

This dubious tree had been an object of curiosity for Amara to pore over whenever she could. Why was this tree so significant and why had her mother been staring at it in the last vision?

As for the woman next to her, it wasn't a person but the...

"Like I said, I am just holding some of her to communicate. This tree is connected to me for some reason. I don't know why. It's connected to this other person too. The ones who has been watching you for a long time," she said. "You've to destroy me as soon as you find the other part."