Ghosts of Our Past
New Hogwarts transfer student Iñaki ends up meeting a ghost that claims he knows her. She had never met him before. Sebastian Sallow had met her more than a hundred years ago.
In which Iñaki meets ghost Sebastian (before she had accidentally time traveled to the past) on her first day of school.
An AU prequel to Outatime.
Chapter 1 – The boathouse
There are a few rules I try to follow as the new kid at school since this is my second time starting a new school again. The first rule is pretty simple: 1) Don’t make a spectacle of yourself.
It’s a new start. First impressions matter. In short, try not to blow people’s first views of you.
See, this would’ve been easy had I started Hogwarts normally: aka take a train ride to the school from King’s Cross in London to Hogsmeade, Scotland and then get sorted during dinner after taking the carriages to the castle with the other kids in my year.
That didn’t happen with me.
As a transfer student starting in 5th year, apparently, I needed to take the boat ride with the first years. It was an experience I shouldn’t miss, or so I was told. It’s one thing to try and give the new 5th year the proper admission so they can understand what it was like for others who had gone through this as well as enjoy the nice view of the castle at night.
Not gonna lie, it was a sight to behold. The castle’s silhouette against the starry night and lights shining out of its windows made it feel like I was going into a fairytale world. Like I was truly going to start a brand-new adventure as I was stepping into a magical painting that had the feeling of Van Gogh. That sentiment ended when the two first years sitting in the row in front of me and another 11 year old had started a fight, something about which house is better before it turned into WWE between the two boys in under a second. Their movement was rough enough to rock the boat I was on. While I did my best to counterbalance their movements to prevent our boat from flipping over, their roughhousing was faster than my estimates.
For a second, all three of us were on one side.
Then the boat flipped and tossed all four of us into the water.
While I was a strong swimmer and was able to surface, with ease didn’t mean the other kid sitting next to me knew how to. I had to push her panicking butt towards the floating flipped boat so she wouldn’t drown- not that she would considering I could feel the floating charm the rowboat had placed around us before I had to yell “HEY! KNOCK IT OFF!” at the two boat-flipper as they still argued as I splashed them.
Apparently, my New York accent was foreign enough to the three eleven-year-old Brits that they froze and stared at me with awe if I was some tourist trap in the city.
“You’re not from here, are you?” The redhead boy said.
“No, I’m from Camelot, Red.” I said as I rolled my eyes. “Of course, I’m not from here- why else would a fourteen-year-old transfer student be put with you arguing rugrats. I thought Brits were polite and proper; not behaving like some neanderthal cavemen!” I hissed at Red and the black-haired boy, relieved that at least the two boys had stopped fighting and now looked rather guiltily. “Now stop arguing and let’s flip the boat over so we can go back in and follow with the rest of the kids. You two ruined what was a perfectly picturesque boat trip and we could’ve been in serious danger if the water here was colder than what it is without the heating charm of the boat here-” I said as I tapped the wooden rowboat.
Being from New York, I had plenty of opportunities to ride a boat, both nomaj and magical. Most magical boats had charms added as safety features, something I wasn’t surprised to feel the charm on this rowboat either as I did the proper taps with a shove of magic through my palm to allow the ‘flip-over’ charm to activate. It was only at the last second did I remember Panic-girl was holding onto the boat for dear life before I pulled her away from the wooden vessel to let magic do its thing as the magically-powered row boat flipped back onto it’s belly.
By the time the boat guide came by towards us, I was the last person to get back into the boat.
“I ‘eard from the front the row an’ saw the boat capsize while you four was a-yellin’. I got ‘ere as quick as I could. Everythin’ alright?” The giant (not literally, though I wouldn’t be surprised if he had some Giant in him) brown-haired man said.
“We’re fine!” I grunted as I pulled myself into the boat with the munchkins trying to help by pulling on my wet robes like the three eleven-year-olds were fishermen and I was their big, netted catch of the day. Once I was able to sit up-right on the boat, the giant guy that I still couldn’t remember my name looked over at us girls in the back row and the two boys in the front. The boys gave him sheepish smiles.
It was clear as day the giant guy could tell who caused the boat to capsize.
“We’ll be lookin’ over yer memories to see whot happened after the ceremony. If them heatin’ charms on these ‘ere boats weren’t as pow’rful as they are, you lot’d be catchin’ hypothermia, for sure.” He said in some variant of the British accent I couldn’t identify, but it was clear from the narrowed eyebrows and deep set frown on his lips how disappointed he was at the two boys.
As the boats made their way to the boathouse with our boat in the lead next to the Giant Guy, I couldn’t help but see how miserable the girl next to me looked as she sniffed while the two boys in the front had their arms crossed, neither looking guilty for what they had done in knocking us overboard as they glared at each other. They reminded me like cats with their hackles raised, hissing at their opponents. I was more awed that they didn’t start another cat fight, but I assumed the fight was on the back burner with our boat being next to tour boat guy, Giant Guy.
“I can’t have people looking at me like this…” The girl sniffed as she wringed her robe to get rid of the excess water. “I look like a soaked dog…I wanted to look nice for the sorting.” She whispered to me.
I sighed and took my borrowed wand out, pointed at her and mumbled the drying charm to make her job easier. The brunette looked surprised at how quick her clothes dried up as if it was put into a dryer.
“Oh…thank you.” She said and gave me a grateful smile.
“It’s nothing kid.” I said with a quick before I looked at the two boys who were looking envious at Brunette for being dry unlike them. I sighed.
While I preferred for the two rugrats to stay wet for causing this wet mayhem in the first place, they looked pathetic like two wet puppies in a tub who wanted out.
“Apologize to- what’s your name?” I said to the Brunette.
“Athena.”
“Apologize to Athena for making her panic when we went overboard and I’ll dry you two up.” I said. I was still pissed at them for knocking all of us out of the boat. And maybe I didn’t mind holding my mastery over some magic over their heads if it meant they had to apologize and recognized they messed up.
The two boy both mumbled their apologies to Athena while looking down.
While I preferred for one to look at their victim in the eyes to apologize on how you wrong them, I wasn’t going to push my luck with the two rugrats. Once they finished apologizing, I kept my end of the deal and dried the two up.
Both looked at me in relief and gratitude.
Unfortunately, I barely had time to dry myself up completely.
Which is how I ended up staying back and letting all the munchkins go ahead of me while I stayed back and dried up at the entrance of the boathouse. I was tall enough to catch up to the kiddos with a quick sprint if needed.
Once I dried up my hair of course.
Drying my curly hair takes longer.
And being up north here in Scotland, the warming charm I placed on myself wouldn’t be enough to prevent me from catching a cold if I didn’t dry my hair first.
“Iñaki-is that you?!” A voice said. I could hear the faint echo-y wail it carried that all ghosts had to their voice.
I wasn’t going to lie.
I shrieked and jumped backward. I felt a faint coldness go through me as if the ghost was trying to prevent me from falling into my doomed fate of getting wet again as I fell back into the water.
Then I felt cold hands gripping my arms, pulling me above water before they dragged me back to the pier and helped pull me back onto the wooden boardwalk as I crawled on it. I coughed on my hands and knees before I looked up and froze with a terrible realization.
“CHUTA. MY WAND!” I gasped as I felt the cold hand on my shoulder, as if to stop me from going back into the water. I ignored it completely as I threw out my hand towards the water and forced all my magic towards it as I shouted, “ACCIO WAND!”
The wand shot out of the water and straight into my hand.
I sighed in relief as I felt its phoenix feather core warm my hand through its wood. Even if it was just a borrowed wand, I already had grown close to it seeing how I accidentally left my original wand home in New York since I left it in the wrong box not meant for moving. Instead that box was sent to storage, waiting dutifully for its owner to return while I was stuck using a borrowed wand a professor found for me to use.
“You were always good with that spell wandlessly Iñaki. I guess somethings never change” The voice chuckled behind me, and I turned around and looked back. A boy who looked around my age stared at me in wonder with a soft smile, as if he was seeing the non-light-polluted night skies away from NYC for the first time. It would have been a look I loved seeing on people’s faces.
Just not dead ones that recognized me without me ever knowing them.
“How…how do you know my name?” I said as I narrowed my eyes and glanced back towards the first years that had paused making their way towards the castle as Giant Guy made his way back towards me from the rocky staircase.
“Out of all possibilities…I didn’t expect to see you reincarnated…” I looked back at ghost boy, who was looking at me like he was about to cry happy tears, as if he saw the birth of his firstborn child. “You’re alive…you’re really alive again!” He gasped if he tried to hug me.
And he did.
He managed to solidify enough to do so to my surprise as I froze.
No, literally I did. I could feel the water freezing on me before I pulled back and landed backwards on my hands.
“YO, WHAT WAS THAT FOR?!” I yelled as I shivered.
“Iñaki…don’t you recognize me?” He said, looking like a kicked puppy despite being a ghost. “I know reincarnation can make you forget some stuff from your past life…but surely somewhere in your soul, you remember me…right? Your best friend, my uña to your carne? It’s me, Sebastian…Sebastian Sallow?” He said as he kneeled in front of me, like I was some injured animal. He offered his hand, as if I could shake it despite him being a ghost.
And out of all of the things I could say, I said:
“How do you know Spanish?” I blinked at him, more startled by that fact rather than the fact he knew my name. Because it made no sense for Scottish ghost boys to know Spanish, let alone the proper usage of the saying ‘uña y carne’.
“You taught me. Over a hundred years ago in your past life. When we were both alive. Please Iñaki…please say you remember me Yank…surely when you reincarnated you didn’t forget me…” He pleaded. His eyes were sorrowful, moreso than the usual look that ghosts held.
I took one breath, staring at his ghostly eyes and felt that oddball magic I always had relaxed in his presence. As if it knew him like it did with my friends.
On my second breath, I bolted.
