Chapter Text
Stellina’s sparkling sapphire eyes opened to the sounds of waves and the smell of the ocean. The Black family’s first vacation was in Greece, where their magic was believed to have originated. She got up out of bed to look out the window and see the white sand beach below. She turned at a knock on her door and smiled at her grandmother. Stellina’s lightly curled auburn hair bounced as she ran to the bathroom to freshen up for the day and changed into a loose dress with sandals. As she walked out of the room with her grandmother to the villa’s dining area, she could hear Sirius’s booming laugh and Regulus’s more controlled one. Her smile bloomed from hearing both her brothers in one place. They had only been here a couple of days, still getting used to the villa and the area. Stellina had been sick from the portkey, since the magic hadn’t bound well with her core, but she was better now.
In the dining area, Narcissa sat by her sister, Andromeda, and Andy’s boyfriend, Edward Tonks. Narcissa, Andromeda, and Edward had joined the trip at the last minute, both because of the stress at their home and for the advantage of Ted’s continued training. Edward was receiving one of his many lectures from Arcturus, which he took in like a sponge. He meant to learn everything he could and prove his worth to marry Andromeda. Edward wasn’t the only one being trained, either: Andromeda and Narcissa also had tea with Melania for two hours every day, learning how to be a proper lady of the house. Melania was appalled by how their own mother had taught them.
When they arrived at the villa, they’d spent most of the first few days learning about the culture of Greece and the history the Blacks were believed to share with it. Sirius, Regulus, and Stellina sat in on this. Sirius hadn’t expected to keep learning so close to being done with school, but he liked hearing about his ancestors regardless.
Tomorrow would be Litha, which was a slightly tougher holiday for Stellina than any other, because it tended to bring on psychic exhaustion. One time she’d been temporarily blinded by the visions. It was hard on her, because these visions were all true visions that couldn’t be changed.
Because of the stress tomorrow might bring, they decided to do something Stellina had really wanted to do: go to the Pan-Arcane Zoological Conservatory. It was one of the few zoos in the world with creatures from every corner of the globe, and remarkable climate control to keep them all thriving.
Orion had been to this zoo before he was married, helping with some of the warding during his mastery. He thought it would be perfect for his daughter, who loved all living beings. It was one of the largest zoos in Europe. He asked one of his old contacts to provide a tour guide for them.
After they finished an unhurried breakfast and it was cleared away quickly under the weight of everyone’s excitement. Orion gathered the family in the villa’s front courtyard, checking that everyone had a firm hold before apparating them, one by one, to a sunlit square at the edge of a bustling wizarding market. The noise hit Stellina first: vendors calling out over stacked crates of dried herbs and dyed silks, the sharp-sweet smell of pastries drizzled with honey drifting from a nearby stall. Sirius immediately veered toward a display of gleaming brass instruments before Regulus hauled him back by the collar.
“Later,” Melania said, amused, steering them both back into the group. “We’ll come back properly once you’ve all had your fill of magical creatures. I’ve no intention of keeping track of you near dangerous animals and in a crowded market in the same afternoon.”
They cut through the edge of the market rather than lingering, following Orion down a narrower side street where the crowd thinned and the air began to carry a different, greener smell entirely, until the noise fell away behind them and the tall iron gates of the Pan-Arcane Zoological Conservatory came into view.
What he hadn’t expected when he arrived was for his old acquaintance to be the tour guide himself.
“Orion!” A man with a rich accent shouted. He had broad shoulders and long black hair tied back. He ran over to the group. “It has been years, my friend.”
Stellina jumped at the loud voice and moved behind Regulus on instinct. Sirius’s eyes shone with admiration, and Regulus scrunched up his nose.
“Nikos, it is nice to see you. These three are my children: Sirius, Regulus, and Stellina. This is my mother and father. My nieces, and my… apprentice.” Orion looked at Edward, not yet sure what word he should use for him. “What are you doing here? Should you be running the place?”
“Of course I would be your tour guide! You saved an entire habitat last time you were here! We could have lost all those creatures in the snow peak area. Greek weather would not have sat well with them.” He clapped Orion on the shoulder, then smiled down at Stellina. “Your father saved many creatures that were getting sick because we couldn’t get the wards fixed.”
His children looked up at their father, amazed. Stellina squeezed his hand and smiled proudly at him. “He’s an amazing man,” she said, her voice hushed.
“That he is, Koritsaki,” Nikos exclaimed. He looked at Stellina’s confused face. “It means sweet little girl.”
Nikos led them through an archway veiled in a faint shimmer, and the air on the other side changed at once: warmer, thick with the green smell of somewhere much farther south than Greece itself.
“Climate wards,” Orion murmured, more to himself than anyone, his eyes tracking the faint lines of magic woven into the domed glass overhead.
“The best in Europe, now,” Nikos said proudly. “Thanks to your father, some of them.”
The first habitat was a wide, sunlit lagoon, its water so clear Stellina could see straight to the sandy bottom, until it wasn’t empty. A dozen silver-scaled shapes broke the surface, horses from the chest up, tails curling into fins below the waterline.
“Hippocampi,” Nikos said, as several of the creatures surged toward the viewing rail, chittering. “Old as the sea itself, or so the histories claim. Greek fishermen used to leave them offerings for safe passage.”
Sirius leaned so far over the rail that Regulus grabbed the back of his robes without being asked. Narcissa watched with cool interest. Andromeda smiled softly, one hand resting lightly on Ted’s arm as he tried, and failed, to explain hippocampi anatomy from a book he’d clearly only skimmed.
The second stop was a tall, sun-warmed aviary, alive with the sound of wings. Nikos held a finger to his lips as they approached, and through the leaves Stellina caught a flash of gold and scarlet: a small colony of phoenixes, nesting.
“They do not choose keepers easily,” Nikos said quietly. “Most of ours have never let a human near the nest. Perhaps one in a generation bonds at all.”
She thought of Fawkes, and the strange, warm hum she’d felt in the great bird’s presence at Hogwarts, and said nothing, but Regulus caught her eye like he was thinking the same thing.
The third stop needed no hush at all: a deep stone pit, warded in overlapping bands of silver light, where a creature with a lion’s body and a scorpion’s tail paced behind the barrier.
“Chimera,” Nikos said, with the air of a man introducing an old and difficult relative. “Your father redid these wards himself. Badly needed it. The old ones were failing.” He clapped Orion on the shoulder again. Orion, studying the layered warding with open professional interest, only hummed in agreement.
“Could it get through?” Sirius asked, delighted, leaning back rather than forward this time.
“Not since your father fixed it,” Nikos said, and grinned.
The next stop was the Sphinx, who guarded the archway into the garden that led toward the petting zoo. She lounged before it, easily the size of a lion, her human face composed and ancient, tail flicking lazily as she studied each of them in turn.
“Answer, and pass,” she said, her voice a low, resonant purr. “Fail me, and turn back the way you came.”
“Born of no womb, yet I hold every beginning. I cannot speak, yet I whisper into every choice. Kings have knelt to me, yet I bow to none. What am I?”
Sirius puffed out his chest. “Death?”
The Sphinx’s tail went still. “Wrong.”
“Time, then.”
“Wrong again, little lion.”
“Love?” Sirius tried, clearly grasping now, and the Sphinx let out something that might have been a laugh, low and rasping in her throat.
Regulus stepped forward before Sirius could embarrass himself any further. “Fate,” he said simply.
The Sphinx’s great head dipped once, approving. “Clever child.” She swept her tail aside and let them through, one by one, into the garden beyond.
Stellina lingered at the back of the group, drawn toward a cluster of moon-white flowers growing just outside the archway, their petals folding closed as the afternoon light shifted. She didn’t notice the Sphinx’s eyes had settled on her until she straightened and found them fixed there, waiting.
“You,” the Sphinx said, quieter now, the words meant for no one else. “A child both woven and weaving, like our mother before you. May the gift only deepen, little star, whatever it costs you to carry it.”
Stellina’s chest went tight. “Your mother?”
But the Sphinx only inclined her head, as though she’d already said more than she’d meant to, and turned her face away, finished.
Stellina hurried through the archway after her family, the words settling somewhere cold beneath her ribs. Woven and weaving. Like Fate. She didn’t want to think of herself that way, didn’t want to imagine herself as a force that pulled at the threads of other people’s lives the way she imagined Fate must, distant and unanswerable. It was too much to sit with out here in the sunshine, with her brothers laughing just ahead of her.
She found her father a moment later and slipped her hand into his without quite meaning to. Orion glanced down, something in her face making his brow furrow slightly, but he only squeezed her fingers and said nothing, letting her walk silently beside him until it passed.
They continued throughout the zoo, seeing creatures as big as a Cerberus and as small as a bowtruckle, Nikos explaining each one with enthusiasm. The last stop was different from the instant they reached it. The path narrowed and dimmed, moonlight-blue lanterns replacing the bright Grecian sun, and the air went hushed in a way that made even Sirius lower his voice.
“Moongliders,” Nikos said, gesturing to the dim understory of trees ahead, where nothing at all seemed to be moving. “You will not see them. That is rather the point.”
“Why not?” she asked, already searching the shadows to catch a glimpse of them.
“They do not tolerate company well. Not people, not even each other, mostly: we keep no more than one to a habitat, or they sicken with the stress of it.” Nikos shook his head. “In eleven years working these grounds, I have seen one approach a keeper exactly twice. They are said to choose, when they choose at all, but it is rare enough that most who work here never see it happen.”
Stellina crept closer to the low rail anyway, drawn by something she couldn’t have named, and went very still.
A pair of enormous dark eyes was looking back at her from a hollow in the nearest tree.
“Stellina,” Regulus said warningly, reaching for her sleeve, but before his hand closed around it, the small shape unfurled from the hollow, membrane spreading silver-blue between its limbs, and glided.
It landed square on her shoulder, wrapping its tail once around her neck, and let out a string of soft, chiming notes, like the beginning of a lullaby someone had forgotten the middle of.
Nobody moved. Nikos’s mouth had actually fallen open.
“Well,” Arcturus said at last, his gravelly voice unusually gentle. “It seems Fate has an opinion, as always.”
“That does not happen,” Nikos finally managed, staring at the little creature curled against her neck as if he expected it to vanish. “That has never happened. Not to anyone I have known, not in this habitat, not ever, not…” He looked at Orion, half-accusing. “Your family and this zoo, Orion, I swear it.”
She barely heard him. She lifted trembling fingers to stroke the impossibly soft fur along the glider’s spine, and it pressed into her touch, chiming again. Its white spots glowed a soft light blue against the dark fur, faint as candlelight through cloth. Her ring warmed faintly around her finger, the obsidian humming low, almost like approval, the way it always seemed to when someone new settled safely within her orbit.
“Hello,” she whispered. “I think you’re going to be my Wisp.”
Melania was the first to move, crossing to her granddaughter slowly, as though any sudden motion might startle the moment away. She reached out with one careful finger and stroked the length of Wisp’s tail where it curled around Stellina’s neck. “A moonglider,” she murmured, something like wonder breaking through her usual composure. “Oh, little star.”
“Can I hold him?” Sirius asked, already reaching, and Wisp’s spots flared brighter for half a second, a clear warning, before dimming again the instant Sirius’s hand dropped back to his side. “Right. Not yet, then.”
Regulus said nothing at all, but he stepped in close and studied Wisp with the same quiet intensity he gave his charcoal sketches, memorizing every detail. When he finally looked up, whatever he’d been holding back since the Sphinx’s riddle had eased out of his face.
Andromeda and Narcissa exchanged a look over Ted’s shoulder that Stellina didn’t catch, and Ted, for his part, simply looked faintly terrified of the small creature, as though it might judge him next.
Orion crouched down to his daughter’s level, closer to Wisp than anyone else had dared, and studied the little glider for a long moment before meeting Stellina’s eyes. “You heard Nikos,” Orion said quietly, just for her. “Twice in eleven years, and never like this. Whatever it is, sweetheart, it chose you. Not the other way around.”
She didn’t have words for how that settled in her chest: half wonder, half the same cold weight the Sphinx had left there. She only nodded and pressed her cheek briefly against Wisp’s soft flank.
By the time they left the habitat, the Grecian sun had gone low and gold over the conservatory’s glass dome, and Wisp had tucked himself into the crook of her neck as though he’d always lived there. Tomorrow would be Litha. Tonight, at least, she had this.
Wisp’s tail was wrapped snug around her neck now, a thin line of warmth against her skin, and it was that detail, how easily he’d already made himself part of her, that brought the worry to the surface.
“Papa,” Stellina said slowly, “will he be alright in England? It’s not warm there. Not like this.” She glanced at the dim, humid trees around them. “And I don’t even know what he eats.”
Orion looked to Nikos, who was still staring at the pair of them like he half expected to wake up from it.
“Moongliders bond to a person, not a place,” Nikos said, recovering himself. “Whatever warmth he needs, he’ll find close to her now, rain or shine. It’s the bond that keeps them steady, more than the climate ever did, part of why they’re so particular about choosing at all. A poor match, and neither one settles right.” He crouched slightly to look Wisp over, careful not to reach for him. “As for feeding him: dried fruit, a bit of honey, the odd sap if you can manage it. Simple tastes, for such a rare thing.”
“That’s all?” Stellina asked, relieved despite herself.
“That’s all. Spoil him properly and he’ll never leave your shoulder.” Nikos’s mouth quirked, some of his earlier astonishment finally easing into warmth. “Which, from the look of things, was rather the plan already.”
Orion rested his hand briefly against her hair. “We’ll have somewhere warm and quiet set up for him before we even reach the manor,” he said. “You won’t have to work any of this out alone.”
Wisp, as though he’d understood every word, gave a small, satisfied chirrup and burrowed further into the curve of her neck. She laughed, a real laugh, the tightness the Sphinx’s riddle had left in her chest finally easing all the way out, and reached up to steady him with one hand.
As they made their way back toward the entrance, Sirius spotted a low stone enclosure full of indignant, chattering Kneazles and towed Regulus, Andromeda, Narcissa, and Ted over to it, already trying to coax one close enough to pet.
Nikos touched Orion’s elbow before he could follow, tilting his head toward a quieter stretch of path. “A moment, old friend. And you, little one,” he added, glancing down at Stellina, who still had Wisp curled warm against her neck.
Arcturus fell into step behind them without a word, his sharp eyes already reading something in Nikos’s face that made him not bother asking permission to listen.
Once they were out of easy earshot, Nikos lowered his voice. “There is history to these creatures I didn’t say back there, with so many ears about.” He nodded at Wisp. “Moongliders were sought after, long ago, by healers, by empaths. Seers, most of all. Old wizarding midwives in the Mediterranean tradition used to keep one near a birthing bed, if they could manage it. Their song was said to settle a distressed infant faster than any charm could.” He looked at her then, something gentler in his expression. “They are drawn to a mind already tuned to feel more than most people can carry. What happened today was not chance, little one. It rarely is, with them.”
Stellina’s hand crept up to rest against Wisp’s back without her quite deciding to do it. “So he knew,” she said slowly. “About the visions. Before I even told him anything.”
“Something like that, yes.” Nikos’s mouth curved, not unkindly. “He would not have chosen you otherwise. I told you, they cannot stomach most people at all.”
Orion’s jaw had gone tight in the particular way it did when he was turning something over and wasn’t yet ready to speak on it. Arcturus, beside him, said nothing either, but his gaze had settled on her with a weight that made her want to look away.
“Fate rarely wastes a gesture,” Arcturus said finally, gravelly and quiet. “It seems this one was hardly subtle about it.”
Nikos glanced between the two men, clearly sensing there was a great deal more behind that sentence than he’d been told, and, wisely, didn’t ask.
“Papa,” Stellina said, tugging his sleeve lightly. “Is that a good thing?”
Orion crouched down to her height, the way he so rarely did anymore now that she was getting older, and cupped her cheek in one broad hand. “It’s a very good thing,” he said. “It means you were never carrying any of this alone. Not really. Not from the day you were born.”
Behind them, Sirius let out a delighted shout as a Kneazle finally allowed itself to be petted, and the stillness broke gently, the four of them turning back toward the rest of the family as though nothing at all had passed between them.
The zoo’s shimmering archway spat them back out into blazing Grecian daylight, and past the treeline waited a market unlike anything Stellina had seen in Diagon Alley: awnings dyed deep saffron and cobalt, snapping in a warm sea breeze, stalls piled with dried herbs, blown-glass charms, and pastries glistening under drizzled honey.
It was the yarn stall that stopped her in her tracks: skeins piled in every shade she could imagine, spun silk beside rough-carded wool, threads that shimmered faintly with worked-in charms for warmth or softness. She drifted toward it without quite deciding to, trailing her fingers over a deep midnight blue that reminded her instantly of Regulus’s eyes.
“Oh no,” Sirius groaned, already dragging his feet. “She’s found the yarn.”
“We could be here an hour,” Regulus agreed darkly, though he made no move to actually leave.
“Ten minutes,” Stellina said, not looking up from a skein of pale lavender. “Maybe fifteen.”
While she deliberated, Regulus drifted two stalls down, where a wizened man sold pigments ground from crushed stone and dried flower: deep ochres, a blue so bright it seemed lit from within, a black that shimmered faintly silver when tilted toward the light. He picked through a small case of brushes with the same careful attention he gave his charcoal portfolio, entirely absorbed.
Sirius, meanwhile, wandered toward the leather-goods row, where a craftsman was tooling intricate patterns into a stretch of dark hide with quick, practiced strokes. He watched, uncharacteristically quiet, running his thumb along a finished cuff banded in silver studs, then set it down self-consciously as soon as he noticed Andromeda watching him smile at it.
“I didn’t know you liked that sort of thing,” Andromeda said, amused.
“I don’t,” Sirius said, too quickly, and picked the cuff back up anyway.
Andromeda herself had drifted to the yarn stall alongside Narcissa, both of them fingering the skeins with the mild, unpracticed curiosity of people who’d never been taught to do anything with their hands beyond hold a teacup properly.
“I never learned,” Narcissa admitted, turning over a spool of pale silver thread. “Mother thought needlework was beneath a proper lady’s hands, unless it was done by someone else, for her.”
“Small hands may learn crooked stitches, but eager hearts learn quickest of all,” Melania said, joining them with a faint, knowing smile. “If either of you are truly curious, I imagine Molly would be delighted to teach you both properly. She’s been trying to get Stellina to learn a proper cross-stitch from her side of the family for ages.”
Narcissa and Andromeda exchanged a look that wasn’t quite a decision yet, but wasn’t a no, either.
Farther on, past the spice stalls, Orion and Arcturus had stopped before a weaver’s tent hung with tapestries: one depicting a long, winding family tree stitched in gold and silver thread, another showing some old battle between wizards and a great horned beast. Arcturus studied the family-tree tapestry for a long moment, saying nothing, his gray eyes distant in a way that made Orion, beside him, go quiet too.
By the time the family had drifted back together, the sun had shifted enough that shadows stretched long between the stalls.
“Fruit stall,” Stellina said suddenly, tugging Narcissa’s sleeve. “I need to get things for Wisp.”
Narcissa arched a brow, but let herself be pulled along without complaint. “Well. We can’t have your new shadow going hungry on the walk home.”
The stall was run by an old witch with silver rings on every finger, her table heaped with dried figs, apricots, and jars of honey in every shade from pale gold to nearly black. Stellina hovered, overwhelmed, until Narcissa leaned down beside her.
“Not that one,” Narcissa murmured, nudging Stellina’s hand away from a jar crystallized at the bottom. “Old stock. This one.” She tapped a jar glowing faintly amber in the sunlight. “Fresh enough to still be humming with the bees’ charm-work. Always check for that, if you can, you’ll never buy honey wrong again.”
Stellina blinked up at her. “How do you know that?”
“Grandmother’s tea lessons aren’t only about posture, you know.” A small, private smile. “Some of it’s actually useful.”
Wisp, still curled at Stellina’s neck, uncoiled enough to sniff hopefully at the jar just as the witch wrapped it, and Narcissa let out a soft, surprised laugh, an unguarded sound Stellina hadn’t heard from her before.
“He likes you,” Stellina said, delighted.
“He likes the honey,” Narcissa corrected, though she didn’t pull her hand back when Wisp leaned toward her fingers to investigate.
They paid for the fruit and honey together, Narcissa carefully steering Stellina away from an overpriced stall twice, and fell into step at the back of the group as they wound through the market toward the villa road.
“What do you want to do tonight?” Narcissa asked eventually, watching her resettle Wisp more comfortably against her shoulder. “Before tomorrow.”
Stellina considered it. “Something calm. Maybe we could watch the stars from the terrace. It barely gets dark this time of year, and I want to see it happen, even if it’s late.”
“That sounds nice.” A pause, and then, more careful than she expected: “You know I’ll be close tomorrow, if you need someone. Not just your brothers.”
She looked up at her, surprised by the offer and the softness underneath it. “I know.”
“Good.” Narcissa reached out and tucked a stray curl behind Stellina’s ear, brisk and businesslike, as though she hadn’t just said anything at all. “Now come along, before your brothers eat everything at the villa without us.”
By the time they reached the villa, the sky had gone that long gold color unique to summer evenings this far south, the kind that lingered instead of falling. Dinner was quiet and easy: cold lemon chicken, bread still warm from the villa’s oven, Sirius recounting the Kneazle incident for the third time with increasingly implausible details.
It was Stellina who brought the ritual up, turning her spoon over in her hands rather than looking at anyone directly. “I found something. In one of Grandmother’s books. For tonight.”
Melania set down her cup, her attention sharpening the way it always did when Stellina mentioned the Wheel of the Year unprompted. “Tell me.”
“A Fairy Blessing Ritual. For Solstice Eve.” Stellina recited it carefully, the way she always did when something mattered to her: milk, honey, and flower petals, left at twilight beneath an oak, an ash, or a thorn tree, with a wish for creativity and joy whispered into the dark and never looked back on. “It’s supposed to honor the Fae, while they’re most active. I thought, if I did it properly tonight, maybe tomorrow won’t be as hard.”
The table went quiet. Regulus’s jaw tightened the way it always did when Litha came up. Sirius, for once, didn’t crack a joke.
“That’s a good instinct,” Arcturus said finally, his gravelly voice thoughtful. “The old families used to do such things more often, before it became fashionable to pretend the Fae didn’t notice us at all.” He glanced at Melania. “There’s an ash near the eastern wall, isn’t there?”
“There is,” Melania said, already rising. “Come, little star. Let’s see it done properly.”
The whole family trailed out behind them as twilight settled over the villa grounds, the sky deepening to a soft violet that hadn’t quite let go of the day yet. The ash tree stood alone near the low stone wall marking the property’s edge, its leaves rustling faintly though there was no wind she could feel.
Melania helped her prepare the offering: a shallow dish of milk, a careful drizzle of the honey she and Narcissa had chosen that afternoon, and a scattering of petals gathered hastily from the terrace planters. Wisp, still riding her shoulder, went very still and quiet as they neared the tree, his white spots glowing the faintest blue in the deepening dark.
“Whisper your wish,” Melania said softly, stepping back to let her granddaughter kneel alone before the roots. “For creativity, for joy. Then walk away, Stellina. Don’t look back, no matter what you hear.”
Stellina set the dish carefully in the grass. She thought of everything she wanted to ask for: for the pain to be smaller this time, for the visions to be kinder, for someone to simply make it stop. But the ritual wasn’t for that, and some small, stubborn part of her didn’t want to waste it on fear.
She thought instead of her hands: of the crochet hook she never quite left behind on any trip, tucked into her trunk without anyone even having to ask; of the neat rows of stitches she’d turned into scarves and small stuffed animals for everyone she loved, each one a small new thing pulled out of nothing but thread and patience. She thought of the old woman at the market that afternoon, hands flying too fast to follow at her loom, and how badly she’d wanted to stop and ask to try it. Embroidery, maybe, next. Or real weaving, not just the small careful stitches she already knew.
It struck her, kneeling there in the grass with the ash leaves whispering overhead, that it wasn’t so different from the other thing about her: the visions, fixed and unbending, that she couldn’t change no matter how hard she tried. Her hands, at least, got to make something new every time. Nobody had already decided the shape of it before she even began.
“I wish,” she whispered, so softly even Wisp barely stirred, “for it to still feel like something beautiful. Even when it hurts. For my hands to keep making new things, even on the days my Sight can’t.”
She stood, made herself turn, and walked back toward her family without once looking over her shoulder, though behind her, just for a moment, she thought she heard something like laughter, bright and small and pleased, rustling up through the ash leaves.