Vulnerability || George Weasley

Lavender Cottage

A MILLION STARS scattered across a dark blanket of sky as night-time crept across the small town of Little Hartburgh. The summer air was colder than usual, the wind blowing several trees that stood beside a large lake that reflected the night sky, making the stars look as though they were alive, dancing in the ripples of water.

The calmness of the water was suddenly disturbed by a small rock skimming across the water, jumping three times before sinking down to the bottom of the lake.

"Oh come on!" A small cry broke the silent night.

The cry came from a girl that stood beside the lake. She was rather short and had eyes that were a ceramic blue. Her bright lilac hair was long, rather messy and curly. The girl had a pale, heart-shaped face that was spattered with various freckles and acne scars. Her paleness made her look quite ghostly in her reflection of the lake.

This girl's name was Phoenix Augusta Lancaster. Just like her name, she was quite extraordinary. Not because of her eccentric choice of hair, but because she was in fact a witch. She was an extremely gifted witch at that. She was a Metamorphmagus, meaning that she had the ability to change her appearance, she often experimented with different hair and eye colours. Both of which tended to shift with her emotions, she still hadn't quite got to grips with her emotions and Metamorphmagi skill just yet.

Phoenix bent forward, her eyes squinting as she concentrated on the small stone that she held in her palm. She then threw the stone away from her with great force. It flew across the lake and Phoenix watched as it jumped, one, two, three, four and finally five times. A triumphant smile spread across her face and suddenly her hair changed to her natural colour of mousy brown.

"Finally," she whispered, standing much straighter. She leaned her head back, allowing the cold air hit her face, the wind making her hair dance about.

It was so peaceful, Phoenix thought as she walked across the path that ran around the lake. She quickly found the place she was looking for and lay her back down on the grass, her hands resting under her head as she stared up at the sky, a feeling of content filling her stomach.

Phoenix was enjoying her summer so far, her elder step-brother, William, had been teaching her how to skateboard and taking her to concerts. Her step-cousin Nymphadora, who was also a Metamorphmagus, had been causing a lot of mischief with Phoenix; both witches had been changing their appearances at least five times an hour, confusing everyone in the room.

But now she was looking forward to returning to her favourite place in the world, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Phoenix was about to embark on her sixth and second to last year of school and she could not wait to return. She had so far been spending her summer with her parents, her father Andrei Lancaster and her step-mother, Cecilia Black-Lancaster. Her biological mother, Jane Lancaster, had died suddenly when Phoenix was only three years old, for reasons that her father and step-mother felt it was unwise to tell her.

Her step-mother and father had married nine years after her mother's death. Phoenix's step-mother was a pure-blood witch, whereas her mother had been a muggle, along with her father. This made Phoenix a muggle born, a muggle born Metamorphmagus, which in itself was extremely rare as her Head of House had told her countless times. Her father always told her that when she was born, her hair colour had changed so frequently in the hours after her birth that he and her mother had simply thought she was going mad. So on that fateful day when a fully grown witch, who was Phoenix's transfiguration teacher, Professor McGonagall, had turned up on their doorstep and informed Phoenix and her parents that she would be attending Hogwarts School; it had no less surprised her father, who had already been putting Phoenix into contact with the best secondary schools in the area, and delighted her step-mother to the point of tears.