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Everyone has their own greatest fear. Fear is, at its heart, an anxious knot tied by vulnerability and uncertainty — the sense that something could reach you, and you would not know how to stop it. That is why so many fears grow from what we do not understand, or from what we think we do not understand.
Tell a child that a Horklump — one of the most harmless pests in our world — likes to creep into bedrooms at night and nibble children’s noses, and there is every chance that child will lie awake, trembling, listening for the faintest rustle. Children do not know that Horklumps do not eat human flesh, and that they move so slowly that, even if one tried to attack a sleeping witch or wizard, it would take days simply to climb the bed.
Plenty of witches and wizards became afraid of Lord Voldemort on stories alone. Do not mistake this: Voldemort truly was a monster, and his ways of killing and torturing were more than enough to justify terror. The trouble was that most people feared him without understanding him. They did not know what he might do if they crossed his path. Tales travelled — of curses that left bodies twisted, of screams heard in locked rooms, of whole families vanishing overnight. Many were wildly exaggerated, some were outright nonsense, and yet bodies still appeared often enough to prove that at least a portion of those horrors were real. No one could tell what was true and what was invented, and that uncertainty was its own kind of poison.
So yes — for the vast majority of people, fear is little more than insecurity, most of the time worsened by ignorance and blown out of proportion. We feel weakened by what we cannot name. We feel impotent because we do not know how to fight it, or we cannot see anything we might do about it. And sometimes — worst of all — we convince ourselves there is nothing to be done at all.
Edward Gutermuth discovered what he feared most when he was only six years old — still a child, in every normal sense of it.
He lived with his mother, Hanna, in a small wizarding town tucked away in Bavaria, Germany. It was the sort of place where everyone knew everyone else, where neighbours met in the street to trade gossip about familiar, dull routines. Munich lay close enough that anyone in need of something truly specific simply went to the city to buy it. The town itself had little more than a modest pub and a cluster of houses, and it was unlikely to grow any time soon.
Hanna Gutermuth loved that nameless town. It was cosy, familiar, and — most importantly — it felt safe. Safer than anywhere else had, in truth. She was a petite witch who, though neither especially powerful nor conventionally beautiful, was kind to everyone she met. There was a quiet mystery about her that drew people in, making them eager to know more. Yet Hanna never truly let anyone close. Thankfully, the small community accepted her regardless, cherishing her presence even without understanding her past or her family. Hanna had learnt, the hard way, why it was not wise to let anyone in.
Hanna did not have a family. Of course one day she had had one, but a series of mistakes had made her lose them all. Soon after she was done with her magical studies in a tiny German school for girls, she met Andrej.
Andrej was a dream of a man — a Prince Charming, really. Broad-shouldered, handsome, with a strong face and a laugh that made people turn. He was passionate and devoted to Quidditch, yet there was a silence in him, too: those sad blue eyes that seemed to beg someone to listen, someone to care, someone to hold him close. Hanna was only twenty, and she was drawn to him immediately. Who wouldn’t be? And, thankfully, he fell for her almost as quickly. Their romance was a whirlwind, and before long she was pregnant. German wizarding society, however, was conservative when it came to relationships. Hanna’s family demanded she marry at once, and Andrej’s family were only too happy to agree.
Hanna, on the other hand, didn't accept it. She liked Andrej, he was her best friend. He was a good guy, and he would probably be an excellent father. She knew all the girls her age envied her for having his love, but she couldn't return it the way she initially thought she could. She couldn't love him as a man, simply because she couldn't love him as he was a man. She knew she was different, she knew her interests were rather... unusual and unaccepted in that outdated town.
So she left. She left behind her family, her friends and a blue-eyed broken heart. She didn't listen when Andrej asked, begged really, for her to reconsider. He begged her to stay or to take him with her. He begged her to let him raise his child with her, telling her she could 'sleep with whomever she pleased', but she wouldn't hear it. He told her there were circumstances she wasn't aware of, but she still left.
She then established herself in that quaint town, and that's where she had her beautiful baby Ed. She loved him more than she had ever loved anybody. She loved him more than her family, more than Andrej and more than Karla, the plump brunette (who, in a way, resembled a sweet little spring peeper) with whom she chose to spend the rest of her life.
At first, Edward was a happy, curious kid. He loved exploring the woods, listening to Karla's stories from the time she studied in a big castle in Scotland. He soon learned both German and English, often mistaking one for the other.
"No, love, it's broomstick." Hanna would say, with her heavy accent, every time a 5 year-old Ed insisted on saying 'broomstiel'.
Eventually, though, not long after the boy was walking and talking, he started getting afraid of staying away from his mother. He cried, afraid of monsters Hanna couldn't even really comprehend. He pointed at empty spots whenever Hanna or Karla asked him to show them the monster, and if they got at least close to that place, Edward would scream his head off in desperation.
Strange things started happening in their little wooden cottage. Objects fell, food spoilt far too fast and furniture moved. At first, both Hanna and Karla dismissed it all thinking it was a ghost who, for some reason, had decided to keep themself hidden from them. After a while, though, things started getting more violent and Edward started getting more desperate. And finally things started getting out of hand. Edward didn't sleep more than a couple of hours each night, and strange scratches started appearing on the little boy in the morning. It was then that the couple of young women decided they needed help.
There were no healers in their town. If people needed medical care, they went to Munich, and that's what Karla was set on doing. However, Hanna was against the idea, afraid her little son would be diagnosed with a mental problem and held at the hospital, away from her. Instead, she decided to take the boy to an old retired Mediwitch called Frau Pech.
Frau Pech lived alone in a secluded area of the woods, and she was rarely seen anywhere outside her little hut. Still, despite her name and its meaning, she was considered wise and was well liked in their community, principally for her knowledge on medical conditions. It was said that, for many years prior to Hanna's arrival, Frau Pech alone healed every single person in their little village, from conditions ranging from Dragonpox to risky pregnancies. Sadly, though, as she neared the completion of her second century of existence (a fact that was hidden from the Ministry as a means to protect the old woman's privacy, because even by wizarding standards that was very, very old), it became far too hard for her to yield such magic. It was then that the people started to go to Munich for medical attention, but Frau Pech was still sought for her immense knowledge.
"Oh, my..." As soon as Hanna finished explaining what was happening to young Edward, Frau Pech's eyes widened and she looked at the little boy with a sorrowful look. Edward remembered looking deep into the old woman's blue eyes, long taken by cataract, and thinking how restless her image was. He saw a light covering her, irradiating from her skin. It wasn't beautiful, though, but rather unsettling, as this light shimmered on and off, strong and weak.
Eventually, Frau Pech broke their eye contact. She stood up weakly, with the help of Karla, and slowly walked to an old bookcase not too far from the kitchen table (her hut had only one main room). She reached for a book on the highest shelf and slowly took it, her hands shaking because of the heaviness of the book and of her own years. She opened it with the skill that only experience can give. Even if Edward himself was still learning to read, he knew that that book had another kind of language, one whose symbols made no sense to him and to his mothers.
Frau Pech sat down on the worn out armchair that urgently needed reupholstering and spent the next minutes absorbed by whatever story that was in the book.
"Ghost Visperrerr." she finally said, softly, lifting her head to look at the couple in front of her. Although her eyes were fixed on the two girls, it was clear that her focus was elsewhere.
"Excuse me, but, could you repeat that?" Karla asked, believing the old woman's thick accent had somehow made her misunderstand what she had said.
"Interprespiritus," Frau Pech said. "Zey arr known as Ghost Visperrerr in yourr language."
Hanna and Karla looked at each other, but soon they gave their attention back to Frau Pech. "Ghost Whisperer, Frau Pech?" Hanna asked. The old woman immediately nodded. "I'm afraid I haven't heard of them before." She said, looking at Karla, who nodded in agreement.
"It's rarre. Interprespiritus is ze name zey werr given." And so Frau Pech explained to the young couple everything that she knew about Ghost Whisperers, which wasn't much, mind you, as she told them there had been very few of them who actually made themselves known to possess such power. She told them how her grandmother had explained to her what they were, also telling her all about different and rare abilities very few wizards had. Her grandmother had given her that very book which had lots of stories regarding people with special abilities, such as Parselmouths, Animagi (considering not every one manages to become one), Metamorphmagi, Glühenfolk (wizards who could shine brightly at will) and Materiamorphmagi (wizards who can transform themselves into objects at will, without the need of a wand or a potion). Sadly, though, Frau Pech informed them that there was only one paragraph about Ghost Whisperers in the book, and that paragraph only dismissed their existence.
"But wait a minute," Karla said as Frau Pech finished speaking. "If the book says they don't exist, why do you believe this is Edward's... Er, condition?"
"Because my Großmutter told me zey do." the old woman stated simply. "She told me storries about ze time ven she vas just a vee girl. Ein Mädchen. She met one of zem." She then turned to the little boy looking at her with wide eyes. She smiled at him tenderly. "Do you see a light arounz me, Kerlchen?"
Little Edward stared at her for a couple of seconds, and then turned to his mother. Upon her smile for support, he looked back to the old woman and nodded. Frau Pech's smile grew.
"Finally." She said with a sigh.
"What does it mean?" Karla asked, not liking the eerie feeling this conversation was getting.
"You vill know soon enough. But zis confirms my opinion."
"I don't understand." Hanna asked, trying not to get too desperate. "I've seen ghosts before, we all can see! If he can see ghosts, isn't it the same of us? Isn't he just a wizard?" Karla reached her hand and gave it a gentle squeeze, but both of them were far too worked up to just calm down.
"Nein, mein liebchen." Frau Pech said as gently as possible. "Ze name in English is not accurrate for he doesn't see ghosts. He sees spirrits." She then grabbed her wand and, with a swish, she made a small doll made of pure light which hovered between them. "Zerre are 3 states of ze human existence. Ze first one is ze body. Ze physical aspect." She shook her wand lightly, effectively spliting the doll in two. One of them didn't change at all, while the other shone considerably weaker. "Zen, zerre is ze soul, ze second aspect. Only vizards can see ze soul, Muggel cannot." She finally gave a last twist of her wand, creating a third light-made doll. This one was significantly lighter, making it difficult to see if not too close to it. "And in ze end, ze spirrit. Ze verry essence of ze person. Muggel and vizards in general cannot see ze spirrit. Zat's vhat ze little one can see."
"I didn't know that there was something else other than the soul." Karla said, thoughtful. Frau Pech smiled, but Hanna, far too worried because of the recent discovery, didn't even seem to listen.
"What do we do, then?" she asked, her voice an octave higher with fright. "How do you stop this?"
"Ve don't, my dear." the old lady said, looking at Edward's mother with pity. "Ze spirrits he sees arr zose of people who died, leaving behind unfinished buznez, and need a guide. He is zis guide. He needs to help zem move on."
It wasn't long before the conversation ended. Both mothers were exhausted and worried for their little child, but they were grateful for the help they had received. The mediwich even gave them a copy of the page of the book that had the information on Edward's condition, even if they couldn't read it. The boy kept staring at Frau Pech even as they bid their farewells and left the house. Before they actually left, though, Frau Pech stopped them with a warning.
She said: "Be careful. Spirrits zat stay behind far too long wizout zeir soul and worried about zeir unfinished buznez lose zemselves into zeir grief. Zen, zey lose zeir human side, and become monsters." She then entered her hut, closing the door behind her.
~*~*~*~JPSB~*~*~*~JPSB~*~*~*~JPSB~*~*~*~
This is when Edward's life entered a rather unpleasant road. Mere days after their visit to Frau Pech, news came that the old mediwitch had been found dead in her little hut. Apparently, she went to bed one night and didn't wake up at all on the following day. Both girls felt that whatever glow their little boy had seen around the matron had something to do with her death, but they were so scared that they didn't address the topic, not even when it was just the two of them. In fact, anything remotely similar to ghosts and spirits had become taboo inside their home.
Sadly, Edward's fears and scaredy reactions were only intensifying over time. He cried for hours, asking his mothers to "make the shiny booboo" go away. He always ended up wetting his bed, even if he was almost six by then and both Hanna and Karla made sure that he went to the toilet before going to bed. The scratches and lashes only got worse, making it clear that he couldn't be doing that to himself. He talked about monsters, begging Hanna and Karla to do something.
It was when both young ladies thought that they couldn't handle it any longer that things started getting way out of hand. Strange things, weird things that even in a Wizarding household wouldn't be considered normal. Things fell in empty rooms, windows shattered without being touched by anything or anybody and sounds could be heard even if there was nobody in it.
While Karla was preparing lunch once, a knife fell barely inches from her foot. As Hanna was taking a bath a couple of days later, while Karla took Edward to the market, she felt somebody holding her head under the water, almost drowning her. Edward cried and cried every single minute he spent inside the house. He didn't eat and he didn't sleep. Hanna and Karla couldn't stay more than seconds away from him, or he would try to escape from the house and go Merlin knows where.
It was then that it finally happened.
It was a somewhat quiet night. Karla had come down with a furious cold and had spent the whole day inside her bedroom resting. Hanna took care of Edward while she prepared some soup for dinner. She heard a dry thud inside the master bedroom, so she ran to it to see what had happened. The only thing she saw was Karla lying on the floor, a pool of blood forming under her head. She didn't see what hit her on her head, and she didn't see the fire from the stove, which had somehow grown enough to reach the ceiling, consuming their cosy little wooden cottage. She didn't see anything at all.
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When Hanna woke up, she felt... weird. She couldn't exactly put her finger on what felt so weird, but she felt... empty. She didn't feel anything, it seemed as if she wasn't even there. With a start, she realized she had been sleeping on the grass area behind her cottage, not too far from the woods. 'Karla is going to kill me' she thought. She couldn't pretend that she didn't like to have a few drinks every now and then, but she had never drunk so much she had forgotten to go back inside. In fact, she didn't remember drinking at all, something that had never happened before either. And where was the splitting headache she always had when she went a little bit too far?
"Mamma?" Her head snapped towards the woods. She would recognize his voice even if was just a whisper, like it had been.
"Edward?" Hanna couldn't help but notice how etherial her voice sounded, as if it weren't coming from inside her, but rather from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. She didn't dwell on it though, because she finally saw her little boy, sat with his back on the first tree of the woods, covered in soot. He wasn't crying, but he looked at her with fear, his eyes big as saucers. Something inside her twisted as she approached her son. She had seen that look before, she had seen him look like that a couple of times, but never when he looked at her. Never when he looked at Karla.
Only when he saw those monsters.
"Mein Junge?" she asked, reaching for her son, who visibly recoiled, still looking terrified, staring at her as if she had fangs. "What's wrong, love? Edward? What are you afraid of, son? Please tell mamma, please, Edward, what's going on, love, WHY ARE YOU SHAKING?"
As soon as she shouted, she regretted it, and for completely different reasons. First of all, she never lost control like that, she never screamed at anyone like that. Second, Edward immediately started crying, while his body language showed Hanna that the only thing holding him there was the tree behind him, and the fact that the only way he could run away from her was passing by her side, thus getting closer to her. And third, while she shouted, she felt her face twisting, reshaping, remodeling, as if it was made of air and it couldn't handle such strong reaction. Her vision blurred, she couldn't think straight and it felt like she hadn't been in control at all.
"I'm sorry..." She murmured with the same disturbingly unnatural voice. "I'm sorry, love, mamma is a little bit tired, that's all." She was tired, wasn't she? She felt like she could just lie there and sleep for hours, but she couldn't do it. Not when she had a son to take care of, not when she had to take him home. She tried to reach for her son, but Edward just whimpered and hid his face with his tiny hands, still silently crying because of he outburst.
"Please, my baby boy, talk to me," She pleaded, trying to ignore the desperation that was threatening to climb her back. She didn't want to scare Edward, but she couldn't shake the feeling that something was very wrong, and that she had to take him home, that she had to protect him. She didn't want to, but if he didn't talk to her, she would have to take him inside against his will. He was a silent boy, but he had to talk to her!
"M-mamma is a b-booboo n-now." he finally stuttered, still not looking at her. A booboo? Why would he think she was a booboo?
"I'm not a booboo, honey." She said, kindly. "Look, mamma is here!"
He carefully lowered one of his hands, but as soon as he saw her, he flinched and covered his face again with another whimper. Hanna sighed, standing up. She would have to carry him, then. She couldn't keep on waiting for him to calm down by the woods, as she knew that there were creatures inside those woods.
"Edward!" She turned around rapidly when she heard somebody calling her son. It was Klaus, her neighbour. A good man, as far as she could tell. He was a good friend, principally considering he was one of the only villagers who could speak English fluently. Karla's German was still not that good, so Klaus had become a family friend soon enough. He lived alone since his wife, a woman named Frida, had passed away a whole year before their arrival, and sadly he could barely take care of himself as the claws of depression were still deeply stuck in his soul. He was running towards them, a frightened look on his face.
"Klaus! Edward is-" Hanna started, only to stop when she realized that he was not even looking at her, but at her son sitting by the tree. In fact, it seemed as if he hadn't even seen her. He kept running and Hanna only realized that he wasn't going to stop when it was too late. She closed her eyes waiting for the crash and... nothing. She heard him whisper something to Edward and opened her eyes just to see him lifting her still stressed but visibly less scared son.
"Klaus, Edward is having a tough moment, he-" She started, only to be cut by him.
"I'm so sorry, kiddo." He said, holding him close. Hanna saw that both he and her son were shaking, and, when he turned to face her, she saw that his face was wet with tears.
"Klaus, what's going on? Please, talk-"
Her neighbour didn't even seem to hear her as he walked towards her. She prepared herself, thinking he was going to hug her, but he didn't stop... passing right through her.
She blinked. He had just walked right up to her and passed, as if she hadn't been there at all. She was sure she hadn't imagined it, but still, what...?
She turned around to see Klaus carrying her son towards his house, and suddenly she froze in her spot. It was the first time since she had woken up that she had faced her cottage.
Correction, it was the first time that she had faced what had been her cottage.
It was nothing more than a black mess. It had burned down completely, from its pretty white roof to its wooden walls. Everything had become nothing more than ashes and twisted coal. It was obvious that there was nothing left to save, there was nothing left to lose. She approached what had been her home in a trance. She couldn't believe it, she didn't understand how that had happened.
After staring at it for more than ten minutes, she went to the neighbour's house to retrieve her son. She didn't have to go very far, as she soon saw Klaus with her son sleeping on his lap, talking to a woman who lived not too far away that Hanna didn't know very well. They both looked full of sorrow as they talked in German, whispering so as not to wake the boy up.
The topic that they were discussing, though, made Hanna's blood freeze. She tried to call their attention by talking to them, but they didn't hear her. He was explaining to the woman that he had seen Edward's memory. She didn’t even know he knew legilimency. He had seen how she, Hanna, had forgotten the stove on, how their cottage had caught on fire, how Edward had tried to wake his mothers up, how the little boy realized that he had to run away from the house and how she and Karla had been killed by the fire.
Hanna felt dizzy. She had never been so scared in her whole life. Memories of the previous night came rushing, stumbling upon each other to make her remember everything. She remembered the soup, she remembered seeing Karla lying there and she remembered being hit. 'Mamma is a booboo now'. It finally made sense to her. Actually, it had finally dawned on her.
She could feel herself starting to hyperventilate. She couldn't breathe and it felt as if there was a hand crushing her insides. She felt herself falling to the ground. She wanted to cry and she wanted to scream, but as this bubble of desperation climbed her throat, it seemed to get stuck there. The world had become a blur, while her ears were about to burst because of a loud noise she didn't know from where it was coming. Her baby was alone. The love of her life was dead.
There was only one thing going around inside her head while she wailed in desperation before she finally blacked out: 'I am dead'
~*~*~*~JPSB~*~*~*~JPSB~*~*~*~JPSB~*~*~*~
When she finally came back to herself, it was night already. She stood up carefully as the events of the day came back rushing to her. Hanna didn't really know what to do. She wanted to cry, she wanted to scream, and yet she lacked the strength to do either. Her throat constricted as she thought about her Karla, who was nowhere to be seen. All their plans, all their hopes, burnt down as if they were nothing more than straw. Her heart ached as she thought of her son, who had nobody left and still had to deal with being able to see ghosts- she could no longer pretend it wasn't real, could she?
Hanna breathed slowly, trying her hardest to keep her emotions under as much control as possible. She didn't even look at what was left of her cottage. 'What's the point?', she thought. She entered her neighbour's house, praying to whichever deity that her son what there, safe and sound.
It didn't take her long to find him in the kitchen. It was a good thing that they were friends with Klaus, so she knew his house well enough to know the rooms. Klaus was feeding her son, which she knew he didn't need to do, as Edward knew how to eat alone already, but the guy didn't seem to know. Edward really was smaller and thinner than he should, as he barely ate because of all those freaky things that happened to him. He might have been six, but he looked as if he was four, maybe younger.
Her son had his back turned towards the entrance of the room, which sort of relieved Hanna. She really didn't want him to see her and get scared. She wasn't sure what Klaus' reaction would be. A loud knock resounded around the house, and Klaus quickly stood up. It was clear that he had been waiting for someone. He gave Edward a sad smile and used his wand to clean the boy before leaving the room.
Hanna took the opportunity to get to Edward.
"Eddie?" She said, loud enough for the boy to hear. The unnatural sound created by her voice made her cringe, but not nearly as much as when she saw her baby boy stiffen on his chair. She made her way around the table, finally seeing her son's scared face. He eyed her with such a terrified look that she had to resist not to go there and hold him in her arms. The fact that it was her the one who scared him so much simply crushed her heart.
"Hello, love..." She said, with as much kindness as she could put in her voice. Edward seemed about to cry, so she just went on speaking. "I know you are scared, honey, but it is still me, mamma. I love you, mein junge, and I will not do anything bad to you. Mamma is here to help you, love." As she said it, she saw that her son calmed down slightly. He was still afraid, but he wasn't about to cry.
"Mamma is a booboo now." He said, his voice barely a whisper.
"No, l-love, I'm not a g-ghost," She said, trying, and failing, not to stutter, but being called a ghost by her son shocked her deep inside. She thought for a while while she looked at her son and he stared right back at her. "Ich bin eine Fee. I am a fairy. Remember when I read those stories to you? About fairies who help little boys and girls?" She hated lying to her son, but it was the only way that he would trust her. He nodded, hope filling his eyes. She smiled at him, controlling the tears which insisted on forming in her eyes. "So, my little one, I'm here to help you."
"Mamma!" He said, a tear escaping his eyes as he jumped up and ran at her and hold her legs in a bone-crushing hug. Hanna felt relief flooding inside herself, but sadly it was short lived. She tried to lift her son but found out she could barely lift his thin arms, and even that made her extremely tired. She wasn't complaining, though, at least she could touch her son. She knew she couldn't touch anything more, as she had effectively entered the house through a closed door.
"Yes, it's me, love." She said, sadly patting his head, no longer being able to hold her tears. It was then that Klaus returned to the kitchen, startling both her and Edward.
The kind man gave him another sad, sorrowful smile. He advanced- passing through Hanna- and knelt in front of Edward.
"Edward, this is Mr. Edmund Leid." Hanna and Edward turned to look at the man who had entered behind Klaus. He was somewhat old, but seemed to be a good person, his face kind and gentle, and a little bit sad. "Edmund is here to take you to your mother's family in England." Both Hanna and Edward started at this. Hanna's family lived in Germany too, she herself had never stepped a foot in England and the only person she knew from there was-
Finally, it dawned on her. Karla was Edward's mother too! When she moved to that town, she had already stopped having any contact with her family. She didn't speak about them, so she knew that people didn't even know what their names were. Karla, on the other hand, had become Klaus' friend. Although she wasn't very fond of her family, it was possible that she had mentioned them enough for Klaus to know where to find them.
Upon seeing that Edward didn't react to what he had told him, Klaus continued. "We couldn't contact your aunt, but Mr. Leid will take you there and talk to her, okay?"
Edward turned to look at his mother, who smiled at him to try to tell him that everything was okay. As he turned and nodded to Klaus, Hanna tried to control the icy fear that climbed her insides. She didn't know Karla's sister, but, as far as she had heard, the woman was far from pleasant. 'Or maybe she isn't', she tried to convince herself. Needless to say, it was in vain.
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It took them a bit more than one day to get there, but they finally arrived at Lavenham, a tiny little village in England where Karla's sister was supposed to live. They managed to find her house quite fast, as everybody seemed to know who the woman was. Much to Hanna's fear, though, they all seemed unhappy to have to talk about the woman.
In the beginning, the conversation didn't go very well. At first, the idea of keeping Karla's partner's son seemed to disgust the woman. Her interest only piqued when Edmund showed her what they had managed to save from Hanna's cottage, which included some of their treasures and gold, which were magically protected from burning. After that, Karla's sister quickly accepted the boy, reassuring Edmund Leid that he would be taken care of and loved as if he were her own. She swiftly thanked him and made him leave. That's when things started going straight down.
Hanna wanted to murder Karla's hag of a sister as she saw her throw her boy in the kitchen, giving him a broom and forcing him to sweep the floor. Edward started crying, but after the horrible woman threatened to punish him, Hanna made him calm down enough so that his tears fell silently.
The following days were terrible to Hanna and Edward. Karla's sister pretended the boy didn't even exist. The only times she actually talked to him was to tell him to do something. She didn't bathe him, she didn't give him any food. Hanna had to teach him how to shower and she had to wake him up during the night so that he went to the kitchen to steal fruit and vegetables from the lowest part of the fridge, the only one Edward could reach.
It was exactly one week after that Karla's sister finished going through the expanded suitcase that held Edward's things.
"Worthless! Everything here is worthless!" She shouted at Edward. "Just like you, your freak of a mother and that bitch that I had to call a sister!"
Edward's eyes filled with tears immediately, but Hanna whispered calming things to him, so as not to give the hag a reason to mistreat him. Sadly, she was not fast enough. As the first tear rolled, the first blow came.
"STOP CRYING!" Karla's sister screamed after slapping Edward's little face, which quickly became bruised. Once more, for the hundredth time that week, Hanna threw herself at the woman, but she just slipped right through her, only managing to make it seem like a soft wind had blown her hair a bit.
Hanna was getting desperate. The food they could steal was ending, and soon enough the hag would find out what Edward had done. That poor excuse of a woman had taken all the gold in the suitcase, so there was nothing for them to buy food with. There were times Hanna got to tired, which made her disappear for some hours, and then her son was left all alone with that horrible woman. Soon, Hanna didn't see any other solution, if nothing changed, Edward would have to run away.
That night, Hanna’s silent prayers were finally answered. Karla’s sister decided she would not keep the ‘useless boy’ any longer. The next morning she took Edward to Godric’s Hollow — the nearest place with anything like an orphanage. It was not an orphanage at all, not really: it was a wizarding family who took in unwanted children and put them to work. She left Edward and his shrunken suitcase on the front step, then disapparated without a backward glance.
Hanna and Edward looked at each other — and for the first time in days, they managed a real smile. They hugged quickly, fiercely. It might not be a good future, but it was certainly better than staying with that woman.
What Hanna still struggled to understand was this: the despicable witch who had treated Edward like dirt was the elder half-sister of her former lover Karla Umbridge, Dolores.
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Even if the elderly couple who ran the 'orphanage' made the young children work, they actually cared about them. They gave them food and took care of them. Edward was, obviously, the youngest of them all. 4 of the 6 children were actually pureblooded squibs who had reached the age of 11 and hadn't gotten their Hogwarts letter. They were then disowned and ended up in these kinds of orphanages, where they would do tasks that did not require magic but wizards still needed.
Being only six and looking as if he were four, Edward didn't have to do much. He made his own bed and helped Mrs. Henn with simple things such as calling the other children and finding missing objects around the house. Mr. and Mrs. Henn and the other 6 children had liked the little, (at first) silent boy almost immediately. The three girls (two of them were squibs, the other one was the fruit of an extraconjugal relationship) doted on the boy, giving him food and taking care of him. The boys (two squibs and an orphan who had no relatives alive) played with him and taught him games. Mr. and Mrs. Henn finished teaching him how to read and write, and how to do simple math.
All in all, after around nine months with them, Edward was finally a bit happier. He had turned seven and he wasn't as afraid as he had been before. He knew he could see ghosts and spirits, and he tried as much as he could not to get near them at all, but he still had his mother around him. She was always there for him, taking care of him.
When Edward turned seven, he already knew Godric's Hollow well. It wasn't a big village at all, so it didn't take him long. He knew the church, he knew the stores (one of the girls worked in one of those) and he knew the big houses around the village. One of the things he liked to do the most was run errands to the family, but they barely ever let him do them alone. What they didn't know was that he was never alone, as his mother was always with him. So, when they asked him to do something outside and to find someone to go with him, he did exactly what he was told. They just didn't know it was his mother who went with him.
"Edward," Mrs. Henn called him, days after his birthday. She was always very gentle and nice to him, and he cared deeply for her, but lately, he started seeing her glow a little bit. It was random and it didn't last, but it still scared the boy. He knew that glow, it was the same glow that his mother had. As soon as he entered the old kitchen (the whole house was old), he saw that she was shining again. She had a smile on her elderly face, and she seemed unaware of the light she was emitting. "I need you to go to the greenhouses to ask Karin to come back home, can you do that for me?" Edward nodded. "Thank you dear. And remember, find someone to go with you."
Edward nodded again and left, but not before giving her a sad look. She was still glowing.
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Edward was becoming rather talkative, and for that, Hanna was grateful, so she didn't care that he was talking non-stop while they went to the common greenhouses, located on the outskirts of Godric's Hollow. Edward loved it there, there were big, beautiful manors there, and the area was relatively calm. Hanna liked it much more because there weren't any 'Earthbound Spirits' (what she called entities like her), while there were some of them downtown, principally close to the church and the cemetery.
Hanna was shocked to discover that she could also see them now, and she finally understood why her son was so afraid of them. They were terrifying! Few, very few of them actually looked human. Some had a decayed look, as if parts of their bodies had rotten. Others had claws and fangs, eyes of monsters and even horns. There was a particularly scary one which had hair all over its face, which was at least twice the size of a normal one. Hanna noted that, as time passed, they became much more like monsters and much less human, and that scared her. Would she become one of them eventually?
The problem was, they seemed to be able to sense that Edward could see them. Every time that her son got less than 20 feet from them, they would see him and follow him. The ones who actually resembled humans would ask Edward to help them, and, sometimes, it was something he could do, such as pick an object from a place and give it to one person, or tell someone something. When Edward managed to do whatever they asked, they apparently moved on, finally completing whatever it was that was their unfinished business.
Sadly, though, there were some who needed things Edward could not provide. One young woman needed to give her widowed husband a son, and there was this old man who wanted to have his manuscript published. When Edward couldn't help them, they attacked, and Hanna had to physically (was it any physical?) stop them as her son fled. Hanna then saw the rest of their humanity slip through their fingers. They became mad, crazy, and she could see their face twisting unnaturally and becoming less human and more feral, more monster-like. They eventually lost the ability to speak, much like the other one which were already monsters, and would immediately attack if they saw Edward again, also like the ones who were already feral.
As they walked through the path to the greenhouses and Edward talked about this and that, Hanna reflected on how much her little boy had improved. It took her months, but she finally managed to convince him to give the human spirits a try and not be so afraid of them. She couldn't help but think how terrible it would have been if she had to live every day in the desperation of not being able to fulfill her unfinished business, which she was pretty sure that it was protecting her son. She often wondered if she would become one of those monsters too, but she tried not to think too much about it.
"Mum?" she turned to see Edward staring at her, having stopped in front of the entrance of a house. "Are you listening?"
"I'm sorry, son, I was just thinking about something else." She said with a smile. Edward huffed, he hated when someone didn't listen to him. He then turned to the house next to them, his face brightening up with a smile of his own.
"Look, mum, it's the ruins!" He said excitedly, running to grab the decayed fence that separated the destroyed house from the road they were on. Hanna looked over the short wall that barely made it to her hips to see the ruins of a cottage.
Of course Hanna knew which cottage it was; everyone around Godric’s Hollow did. The Potter cottage. Edward had asked her to tell the story over and over again, and he always listened as though it were the first time. He had begged her to let him go inside the ‘ruins’, as he called them, but she had never allowed it. The broken shell of the cottage was not a pretty sight, and it carried one of the wizarding world’s saddest stories — yet Hanna had always felt a fierce, private satisfaction when she looked at it, because it marked the end of a dark era.
Not today.
Today, as her gaze slid towards the entrance, her stomach dropped. On the porch sat a man — or rather, a spirit.
His hair was a mess, his face pale in the way many pure-bloods were, and he wore torn clothes that looked more like old pyjamas than anything else. Glasses sat crooked on his nose. He was handsome — but that was not what caught Hanna’s attention. Even from a distance she could see he was crying, his face hidden in his hands. She knew him at once.
James Potter.
"Mum, can we go there today? Pretty please?" She heard her son asking but paid him no mind. She made her way through the fence. Edward let out a squeal of delight and swiftly opened the fence to follow her, but froze as soon as he saw the man.
As always, the moment Edward came close enough, the man stopped crying. He looked up sharply, startled — hazel eyes glittering with unshed tears behind his glasses as he took in the small boy by the fence, and the woman beside him.