Chapter Text
Mary Poppins was bored. This was not exactly uncommon – after a lifetime of daring adventures and darling charges, any sort of lull could prove positively stale. That was also not the problem; the problem was that boredom led the nanny to restlessness, and from there, it was a dangerous slide into the slums of positively Gryffindorish urge for enterprise. This energy built up in her veins, crackling like an electric charge, begging her to do something. Her fingers drummed on the handle of her dear umbrella (a sentient and pernickety parrot named Henry) trying to exorcise some fragment of it. Lucky for those same fingers, he was too busy trying to inspect the scene outside to even scold her. The world had gone mad.
Mary had lived many, many lifetimes. She had seen some truly ridiculous things – bananas on pizza, dogs holding office, Salazar Slytherin turning up to breakfast wearing Merlin’s floral pink nightgown – but never had she witnessed something so preposterous as the news from today. Firstly, it was delivered by perfectly ordinary post owls. (While quite quaint in the way the English often were, she couldn’t understand why they hadn’t been equipped with some sort of disillusionment. She might flaunt her magic, but even she knew how to cast a damn memory charm when the situation called.) The second thing that was sending her soul straight to the bottom of her carpet bag and making her umbrella arm twitch was the idea that the blasted war that had raged over and around her for nigh on ten years had been ended by a child. Mary treated the recognised bounds of magic like the start line for a relay race, circling it and scuffing it with her heels, but no mortal child could survive a killing curse unless they had been blessed by old magics, hidden magics, the kind of magics little Lily Evans would find utterly horrifying.
She had quite liked Lily, when she had visited Manchester not so long ago. Determined, fiery, with just enough kindness to be well liked and just enough cleverness to use it – oh, yes, Lily could have gone so far. She was certainly better than either of her two companions. Severus, even then, had far too much anger to be soothed with a spoonful of sugar, and resisted all attempts to make him channel his rage rather than leaving it a simmering pot, bound to boil over. He had that in common with Petunia; they were far too alike to have any hope of getting along. The other Evans girl had the potential to be a real beauty, with grades that could get her anywhere and a frankly frightening dedication. She also had a nasty habit of glaring at Mary’s back when she thought it was turned, finding fault in every piece of wonder she created. Lily had her flaws like any child, but she was not afraid to grow.
Now thoroughly lost down memory lane, Mary barely even noticed the wizards in full robes wandering the streets like children on school lunch, huddling in corners exchanging giggles and whispers. She had had many years of charges, some turning fair and others oh so foul. If Lily had boundless potential, then Albus Dumbledore was quite rooted in place – terrified to grow, even at the tender age he first met the nanny after his mothers funeral with eyes full of suspicion. He was afraid of anything that didn’t fall strictly within his power, and she certainly fit the bill. Mary often wished that she had been called to the Dumbledore household years before she had, but a nanny couldn’t always predict which children would need her most – not even a magical one. By the time she felt that tug of a child in need, it was too late for any of them. She gave Arianna a few moments of wonder, but she couldn’t give back the magic.
Mary Poppins was many things. She was ancient, and she felt too young for her responsibilities. She was powerful, but incapable of saving everyone. She was something other than human, and she felt so much more keenly the pain her charges went through. At the heart of it all, though, Mary Poppins was a nanny, and a nanny’s job was clear.
“We simply can’t let it happen again, can we, Henry?” She said, shaking her head clear of cobwebs and setting her shoulders ready. Her dear parrot squawked quite loudly, loud enough to set several of the owls aflight. She made sure to apologise as she herself rose into the air. It was time to do what she must always do: she needed to find her newest charge.