Disclaimer: This is a work of fan fiction using characters and settings belonging to the world of Harry Potter, trademarked by the marvelous J. K. Rowling, without whom, none of this would be possible. It is meant for entertainment purposes only and is not intended to reap any sort of financial gain.

Chapter 1: A Strange Letter

The thing about foster homes is: they're always loud.

Of course that's not the only thing. They're also messy, smell like melted crayons, and filled with snot-nosed orphan kids that don't like to wash up before dinner.

In the opinion of Lyra Black though, the never-ending racket was the worst. Lyra was what could be considered a veteran foster child. Eleven years old and she had lived in foster homes all over Great Britain and been adopted what must be some sort of record, five separate times. The police constables that got stuck with driving her from one home to the next all agreed it was that which made her so unpleasant.

Lyra would have said it was the noise. Even sitting outside by herself on what should have been a quiet, albeit muggy afternoon, it was loud. Someone had left the dirty old upstairs windows open and the voices of Lyra's twelve newest foster siblings all floated down on the breeze.

Lyra would have liked very much for the lot of them to just shut up for a few minutes. And the singing! If they could stop all that dreadful singing, then maybe it wouldn't be so bad... Lyra had never been so lucky though. The problem was, loud as it was in a foster home, it made eavesdropping entirely too difficult.

So there Lyra sat, one ear pressed to the house's back door, straining to hear what Lyra considered a very important conversation on the other side. It was between the foster mother, Caroline Berning, and Carl Riggs, one of the two constables who had driven Lyra all the way from Exeter that morning. Most likely they were only debating exactly what it was that was wrong with Lyra—these sorts of people always did. She would've liked to know for sure though.

Instead, the only thing Lyra could hear were the 12 other orphans in the home and their 12 obnoxious voices. Worst of any of them was the sickeningly animated voice of the one girl Lyra had met so far.

Her name was Moira Darling. She was the oldest and the pleasantest orphan of the lot, and being such, had taken it upon herself to read an afternoon fairy tale to the rest of them. Most might have called the girl a talented story teller. Her voice was captivating and rather like singing.

"And then," Moira Darling would say, voice full of anticipation, "Angelique dressed in the knight's armour and set off to face the dragon herself."

Lyra was not most though. She dragged herself away from the back door and found the heaviest, roundest rock in all of Ms. Berning's back garden.

"The dragon was taller than the stars," sang Moira, "And had teeth wide as tree trunks."

Lyra lobbed the rock hard as she would a ticking bomb. It flew through the air with impressive speed angling right for Moira Darling's stupid head.

"And when it opened its mouth to growl—hey! Ouch something hit me!"

"Stupid dragon," muttered Lyra and she returned to her spot by the door where she wouldn't be seen.

"Who's out there?" called Moira, "Who threw that? I'll tell Ms. Berning."

Lyra rolled her eyes. "Is that really necessary?"

"Lyra Black, is that you? I'm telling Ms. Berning on you! You'd better come out!"

Now Lyra was stuck. She wanted to keep listening—trying to hear what the foster mother and Constable Riggs had to say about her—but she imagined Ms. Berning would not at all be pleased to find her at the scene of the crime. She gave up on eavesdropping for now and instead snuck around to the front of the house.

There were fewer trees on the front side, and the garden was much less grown over. There were plenty of bushes though, several with wilted flowers that rustled in the breeze and one peculiar bush covered in fruit Lyra had never seen before.

There was a small blue car parked in the drive and the passenger side door stood wide open. The other constable who had driven her that morning sat with his legs out the side, chomping on an unlit cigarette. Lyra grinned when she saw him—perhaps she would find out what Ms. Berning and the other constable were talking about after all.

"Aren't you going to light it," said Lyra, walking toward the man.

His name was Constable Dale Dimms and from the way he jumped and hit his head on the door jam, Lyra determined he hadn't noticed her approach. She smirked.

"What'd'you think you're doin, yeh bl–!" he cut off abruptly and glared at Lyra. He was a portly sort of fellow with thick brown hair and a tanned neck. His glare was not nearly as intimidating as he might have liked though.

"That is," he said, rubbing his head and visibly working to calm himself, "What exac'ly are you doin' out here now, Black? You're s'posed to be inside with the other kids."

"Only wondering what you're up to is all."

Constable Dimms eyed her distrustfully, "Yeah, I'm sure tha's all it is—an' my name's Charlie Chaplin."

"Well, aren't you supposed to be inside with Constable Riggs?"

"Jus' came out to have a smoke."

Lyra looked pointedly at the still unlit butt.

He shifted, "Alrigh' fine, truth is, I'm tryin' to quit. Nasty habit, smokin'."

Lyra waited, one hand in her pocket tracing the designs of a brass pocket watch. "And?" she prompted.

"Damn persistent, that's what you are," said Dimms, "If you must know, tha' Berning woman's a fright and I didn't much like speakin' with her."

"Why not?"

"Cause she's about as mean as they come. But then again," he added, narrowing his eyes at Lyra, "I imagine the two of you'd fall in like peas in a pod. And that bein' said, listen Black, I know it must be hard on you, always movin' from one home to the next, but that's hardly any reason to—."

"Yeah I know," snapped Lyra, cutting him off. The wind gave a hefty gust, and Lyra contined, "I've heard that before, so you can save it, alright? Just tell me what they're talking about in there." She motioned over her shoulder to the oaken front door of the home.

"Reckon if they'd wanted you to know, they'd've asked you in with them, wouldn't they."

"They should've!" said Lyra vehemently, "It's me they're discussing, so I've a right to hear it!"

"Yeah, yeah, and the guilty party's got a right to face his accuser. I've heard tha' one before so now you can save it."

"So they are accusing me of something, then," said Lyra.

"A course they are! Your file's thicker 'n a brick and that last family, the Hornes want you locked up for bein' a delinquent," Dimms ranted, puffing up his chest as he spoke, "They say you tried to poison their cat, they say. And who knows what you've done to the rest of 'em. The Ashkelons left the bleedin' country, didn't they, and without so much as a forwardin' address. It's all just… just… say, what is that?"

Lyra took a deep breath and relaxed. The sky was overcast like it would soon rain, but the unnatural wind which had just blown through Ms. Berning's front garden had had nothing to do with the weather.

"That's the real reason the Ashkelon's left the country," grumbled Lyra, glaring down at one of the strange radish-looking fruit which had come loose in the wind.

"You say somethin', Black?" asked Constable Dimms.

Lyra looked up.

Dimms in turn was staring at her with his broad, open face, waiting to hear her. He wanted to hear her, even. What an idiot. Did he really think an eleven year old had something that interesting to say?

"Nothing," she told him.

"If you say so."

They were both quiet after that, Lyra wishing she had done much worse to the Hornes and Dimms chewing away like a bloody cow.

At last the constable tossed the butt out on the ground and stretched. He felt around in his breast pocket, and then the pocket of his trousers, searching for something.

"You've not got the time, have you?" he said, still fumbling with his pockets.

"Nope."

He shrugged. "Ah well, I reckon I ought to head back in anyway."

Lyra nodded and picked up the peculiar red fruit from the ground by her feet. For looking like a radish, it was surprisingly soft and it smelled almost… almost sweet.

"And you too, Black!" he added when she didn't move to follow him.

"I'm staying out here," she informed him.

"Oh no you're not. You're s'posed to be inside with everyone else."

"I'd rather stay out here."

Dimms did not look pleased by the news. "It'll be rainin' out here in a few minutes, and then what'll you do?"

"Try not to get wet."

Constable Dimms crossed his thick arms and glared, "Now you listen to me, Black. You'll stop being such a brat, and you'll get inside like I told you. Understand?"

"Only if you let me come with you to talk with Ms. Berning and Constable Riggs."

"If they'd wanted you in with 'em, they would've…"

Dimms trailed off as Lyra turned to walk away.

"Fine then," he said through gritted teeth, "Come along then if you must. I doubt you'll like what you hear."

Lyra grinned.

The front entryway was broad like the rest of the house, and antique looking. On the wall by the door there were these ridiculous looking coat racks made of buck antlers and the floors were a dark wood which creaked like they'd been installed in the 1800s. The most striking feature of the room however, was at the end of the hall where a life-sized portrait depicted an ugly bearded man with a hideous felt eye patch.

Lyra could have sworn the man's one oily brown eye was trailing them as they walked. Dimms didn't seem to notice though, so Lyra made a face at it and continued along toward the kitchen. She'd deal with him later.

At last, they reached a door near the back of the house and Dimms turned to her. "Now, if they say you can't stay, then you're to go right upstairs with the other kids, do you hear me Black?"

"Fine."

"I'm serious Black, no going outside by yourself."

"Alright, alright, just open it already!"

Dimms gave her one last distrustful look then pushed open the door. Lyra eagerly followed him in.

Ms. Berning and Constable Riggs were still seated inside, across from each other at a long wooden table which filled the majority of the room. There was an unused wood-burning stove behind them and a pot of tea on the old cooker. The walls were covered in shelves and shelves of dishes.

The two adults were deep in conversation and did not notice right away when Constable Dimms and Lyra stepped into the room. Ms. Berning, a stern-looking woman with cropped gray hair and pointed chin was speaking disdainfully toward Riggs. "I just don't see," she said, "Why you had to go and bring that girl all the way here from Exeter. She's the most incorrigible girl I've ever met. Five families gave her back already and I don't want her here one bit."

Lyra came to an abrupt halt. Even Dimms rubbed at the back of his neck in surprise at exactly what they'd walked in on. As she watched him, his eyes grew wide and he looked at Lyra in confusion. "What's that?" he said.

Lyra looked to the side. She had not noticed right away that the two shelves nearest her were rattling. Of course as soon as she had, the shelves' rattling became several times more violent. Then suddenly it was too much. All the glass cups and pitchers that had been resting near her came clattering to the ground. Thousands of tiny glass shards spread out over the kitchen tiles in echoing crashes.

The commotion was shocking.

For a moment Lyra just stood there staring and the constables did the same. Ms. Berning seemed to be the only one entirely unsurprised by the failing of her kitchen shelves. In fact, she looked as though Lyra's being there amidst mountains of broken glass affirmed everything she'd ever surmised of the girl.

"Incorrigible," said Ms. Berning at last.

Lyra turned and left.

Her rucksack was still strapped to her back so she did not slow down or stop on her way out. She went back through the corridor to the entryway, where the portrait's eye remained firmly trained on her, and then through the heavy front doors to the road beyond.

Outside the clouds were moving faster over the sky, darkening the afternoon and threatening a storm. Lyra's heart thrust itself again and again against her ribcage and her thoughts were racing with questions like, where would she go? How would she support herself? She even imagined she saw a pair of golden yellow eyes watching her from within the bush with the strange fruit. She paid it all no mind though, only started to run.

Lyra didn't know how long it took Ms. Berning and the constables to realize that she'd left for real. But while she ran, she imagined what it was they might say when they did:

"Where is that wretched girl, anyway?" Ms. Berning would ask in that nasty voice of hers.

Then Constable Riggs would scratch his head and say, "Ms. Berning, ma'am, she seems to've run away."

And Constable Dimms, looking positively staggered by the very idea of it would stutter out something like, "Run—run away?"

"Yep, flown the coup, escaped the henhouse, took off like a jet pack filled with rocket fuel."

"But why?" Dimms would surely ask.

And Lyra would've been happy to tell him. It was because she was sick and tired of being the unwanted casserole at Christmas time—passed around from plate to plate with no say whatsoever in where she'd end up. No, Lyra had had it with that life. From now on, where she went and when she went there would be up to Lyra and no one else. No more foster homes, no more adoptions, and no more stupid constables.

Maybe she'd go off and join the circus, she thought, still running furiously. Surely any ringmaster worth his salt would be able to find some use for her. And if it came to it, she could always start off cleaning animal cages and then work her way up to lion tamer. At the one circus Lyra had been to with the Wenhams, there had even been a bearded lady who'd seemed a decent enough sort. Maybe Lyra could become her apprentice. Or maybe one day she, Lyra could become the ringmaster.

Well that was one option anyway. The specifics didn't matter, really. Thousands of possibilities had been opened to her. She could do whatever she wanted and nobody would stop her. Why, she should have run away ages ago. This was the best decision she'd ever made! But then… then the sky opened up and it started to rain.

Never had an idea seemed so brilliant one moment and so terrible the next as when the first raindrop landed on Lyra's nose.

For the first time since leaving Ms. Berning's home, Lyra chanced a look behind her. She'd run much further than she'd thought and as the rain picked up, Lyra realized she could not even see the house anymore, nor any of the trees growing near it.

Lyra continued forward. Her pace slowed, but she refused to give up and walk. Perhaps that was her mistake though; because, not only was the road becoming slippery from the rain, it also began to slant upward.

Lyra's trousers were soaked before long and the short sleeves of her t-shirt were proving highly ineffective in keeping her warm. Her heavy breathing caused tiny clouds of heat to form amongst the raindrops and after a while she was so tired from running she began to see double. That was why she didn't notice right away the rock on the side of the road where she'd made her path.

It was the same size as the rock Lyra had thrown at Moira Darling's head. It was dug into the mud pretty well, but just enough of it was sticking out that as Lyra ran over it, she caught her toe and lost her balance. The road she had been running scaled a narrow hill and Lyra had not realized that she'd made it to the very top until she tumbled over the side and began crashing down.

It was a painful fall. The hill was covered in loose rocks and briars. Branches tore at her on her way down and the rain made it all the worse. She fell and fell and fell for so long that Lyra began to wonder if she would ever stop until at last she did.

"Oww."

Everything hurt. Lyra kept her eyes closed, nervous for the sight of her own blood. Her ankle felt like it was laying the wrong way and there was a ringing sound in her ear that made her limbs feel heavier than they had any right to be. She hoped Ms. Berning and those brainless constables would get there soon and find her.

Lyra reached a shivering wet hand into her trouser pocket and removed the brass pocket watch she had stuffed in there earlier. Water had seeped in under the face and the second hand had stopped ticking.

"Bloody thing," cursed Lyra and that was when she remembered how much she did not want to go back to the foster home.

She was muddy and injured and unhappier with her situation than she had ever felt before, but Lyra Black was not defeated. Her knees were both cut up and her ankle was throbbing too much to stand, but with a determination Lyra had not even realized she possessed, she crawled to her hands and knees and looked around.

During her fall, she had thought she spied an abandoned old farmhouse along the edge of the hill and her goal now was to find it and get out of this awful rain. There! There, she saw it, just over that ledge.

Once she was close enough Lyra realized the dinky old thing was barely more than a shack. The wooden walls were decayed and the roof creaked in the wind as if at any moment it might just give in. "You'll have to do though, won't you," said Lyra, and she pushed on the front door.

It didn't move.

She pushed again. The door still wouldn't budge.

Lyra shoved her entire body weight against it and banged on the wooden panes with her fists. Even that wasn't enough.

"Of all the rotten luck!" Lyra yelled, and then pulled herself up to hobble around the side of the shack. There was one small window around the back, but it was difficult to get to. The building was perched on the face of the hill so that the shack's only windowed wall was pointed down. Lyra really did not fancy the idea of losing her footing and falling down all over again—but she was also entirely fed up with the storm outside.

It took a long time, but somehow, slipping and stumbling all the way, Lyra managed to make it over to the window. She barely peeked inside the grimy, cracked glass before she threw her rucksack at it and smashed it all completely. Hoisting her injured ankle through the opening was difficult, but at last, all of her limbs and body parts made it into the shack—all except a large chunk of her hair that'd gotten caught on a rotted piece of wood just outside.

Thunder roared in the late afternoon and Lyra tugged at her hair, but it just wouldn't come loose.

She was soaking wet and so exhausted from her trek that she barely even thought about what she was doing then. Lyra removed the largest platelet of glass left on the window and clutched it in her fist. Then she hacked at the long strands of her hair until some finally came free. Minutes passed while she sawed away, but Lyra made sure to do a thorough job and by the time she was finished her head was not only free but felt lighter than it had in years.

The feeling pleased her so much after everything she'd gone through that day that she took glass to the rest of her hair. Soon thick black clumps of it covered the debris already littering the shack floor and perhaps it was just a long day making her silly, but the sight of it all made her laugh so hard she nearly dissolved into tears. Chuckling still, she made her way to the wall furthest from the window and slid down onto her bum. She rested her head against the grime-covered wall and closed her eyes.

It wasn't all that warm in the shack with her wet clothes—and the smell of decay was nearly overwhelming. But that was all surprisingly easy to ignore as Lyra drifted off to sleep. She would've rather not dreamed that night at all, but nothing else was going her way, so why should this?

Swirls of colors melted into dreams filled with faces she had not seen in years. The Derwents. The Ashkelons. The Nevins. The Wenhams. The Hornes. But who was it before them? Dark hair like Lyra's. Dark hooded eyes. Dark clothing. Dark smile.

Would she ever know? She wanted to. The curiosity over it burned in Lyra's stomach. Burned so much that it woke her and for a while Lyra just lay there clutching at her abdomen. And then she realized that wasn't what was bothering her stomach at all—she was hungry.

Lyra groaned and sat up. Sunlight was streaming into the shack through the broken window in such a way that it could only be morning. Her clothing was still damp and she felt decidedly light headed—though perhaps that was just all her missing hair.

Lyra looked down at the matted pieces of it strewn all over the floor and laughed all over again. If only Ms. Berning could see her now… the woman's head would likely explode from Lyra's newfound level of incorrigibleness. And nobody would ever try to adopt Lyra now—they'd take one look at her and say, "No thank you, haven't you got any ordinary looking ones?"

The more she thought of it, the more she smirked. Really, this should have occurred to her ages ago. As soon as the constables picked her up from the Wenhams, she should have taken shears to her hair right then and there. And later on she should have slammed the door in Kenneth Horne's stupid, smiling face.

Lyra's stomach gave a loud rumble and her smirk faded.

The nice thing about foster homes is: they generally ensure you're given plenty of food—so long as you don't run off and enrage the caretakers. With that depressing thought, Lyra crawled over to her rucksack and opened it up. Of course there wasn't any food in there, why would there be? But her stomach insisted she look anyway and so she pulled her few belonging out onto the floor and searched.

Much to her surprise she actually found something though. Well she wasn't completely sure it was edible, but it had smelled sweet when she found it. It was better than nothing anyway. Lyra seized the radish-like fruit from Ms. Berning's garden and sat back in her spot by the door. She stared across the shack to the window and was surprised to notice that without the rain she could make out the bottom of the hill she'd been climbing.

It was the Channel! She could have fallen right down the side of the hill and into the sea! She would have drowned! Running away was turning out to be far more dangerous than she had thought—but that didn't mean she was going back.

No, she'd managed to find shelter for the night and somehow she hadn't yet been found herself. All things considered, and much despite her negativity the night before, she wasn't doing too badly. She was still alive anyway and the sunlight certainly helped things. Lyra lifted the fruit to her lips and took a bite.

Several things happened all at once.

An owl, in broad daylight, landed on the broken window ledge and gazed at Lyra with a pair of unblinking, golden yellow eyes. There was a knock at the door right beside Lyra, and from Lyra's spot there, she could just tell it came from somebody quite tall. And finally, Lyra tasted the radish-fruit for the first time and realized what a horrible idea it had been to sample the unknown bit of produce. It was absolutely disgusting—sourer than eight lemons covered in spoiled milk.

Lyra spit it out so hard that the bit of chewed fruit went flying up rather than down. And it just so happened that at that exact moment, the door to the shack cracked open to reveal an old man who was precisely the right height for the wad of saliva covered radish-fruit to hit him directly in the eye.

The hit was all the more impressive considering the man was even wearing glasses, albeit, a pair shaped like half-moons that slid down his nose a bit.

"Ah," he said, wiping at his eye with the tip of his long white beard, "A dirigible plum. A most intriguing choice in breakfast projectiles."

"What?" said Lyra, far too shocked to come up with anything more eloquent.

"I imagine it was quite sour, wasn't it? Yes, dirigible plums can taste very sweet if you look after them while they are still small, but left untended, they will grow to be as large as a grapefruit and doubly sour. I think sometimes it is the same with people, wouldn't you agree?"

"Erm—who are you?"

The man released his beard and surveyed her with a pair of bright blue eyes. "My name is Albus Dumbledore," he said serenely, "And I believe the more important question is, do you know the date?"

"August the thirty-first?"

"The first of September actually, and I am afraid to say, we are running rather behind schedule."

"Behi—did Ms. Berning send you?" Lyra wanted to know.

"I did speak with Ms. Berning, yes. She was the one who informed me you were out for the morning. In fact, she seemed quite convinced you had run away."

"That's because I did," said Lyra crossing her arms, "And I'm not going back there—you can tell her I said so."

"Well then, we are in luck, as I am not here to bring you back to Ms. Berning's, charming woman though she may be. No, I am here to bring you to a boarding school called Hogwarts."

Lyra stiffened. "You're—you're a wizard!" she accused and scooted herself away from the man. She should have known! The waistcoat the man was wearing was just the most jarring shade of purple and Phillip Nevin had always said you could tell a wizard by his clothes—they didn't have a clue how to dress decently.

"To—my dear, there is no need to be afraid. I assure you, I mean you no harm. I am only here to bring you to the train for school. It will be leaving London's Kings Cross Station in—," he paused and removed a pocket watch the likes of which Lyra had never seen from his coat pocket, "Less than half an hour," he concluded.

"Well I won't be going," said Lyra.

The man, Dumbledore, did not seem perturbed by her refusal—but neither did he seem convinced. "Miss Black, you are a witch of great potential. With proper training, you will be able to do all sorts of wondrous things. Allow me to demonstrate."

Dumbledore reached into the breast pocket of his coat and removed none other than a real wizard's wand from within. It was nearly as long as Lyra's arm and had peculiar designs, almost like berries carved into the wood. It was the first wand Lyra had ever seen and so as soon as he started waving it, Lyra—well-aware of the dangers of wizardry—backed as far away from Dumbledore as possible.

Just as she feared, the spells Dumbledore weaved arched through the air heading straight for Lyra. There was a yellow one, a blue one, and a fishy technicolor one all sent in rapid succession. The first one dried her clothes, the second one mended them, and the third caused all of her injuries to stitch themselves back up leaving hardly a scar on her.

Lyra was left utterly bewildered. She didn't know what game this wizard was playing at, but she did know her ankle felt much better. She would be able to continue running away far more easily now than she would have before. The only problem was, Dumbledore seemed set on dragging her off to Hogwarts.

"What if I don't want to go to Hogwarts?" she tried.

"My dear, nobody is going to force you to go against your wishes."

Lyra did not believe him for one second. She stood up and was shocked at how good, how rejuvenated her entire body felt. It was as if she'd just woken from a sleep in the most comfortable feather mattress. Dumbledore was powerful alright. He would have no trouble whatsoever in bringing her to Hogwarts no matter what she wanted. And that being the case, there was no way she was about to actually thank him for his efforts in healing her.

Instead she said, "I think there's been some kind of mistake."

"Oh?"

"Yes, you see, I'm not a witch."

He chuckled, "How can you be so sure?"

"I just know, alright. Hogwarts will have to do without me I'm afraid. Not that it wasn't just fantastic to meet you, Mr. Dumbledore, but I'd better be off…"

"There was no mistake, my dear," said Dumbledore smiling as though he saw humor which Lyra could not yet understand, "You are most assuredly a witch."

"I don't think—."

"Your name is on the letter," said Dumbledore, "Your name would not be on the letter if you were not a witch. Indeed we had difficulty finding you—."

At this, the owl who'd landed earlier on the windowsill gave a squawk of protest. Lyra had almost forgotten he was there.

"But alas, we've found you now and here," he said, reaching into yet another pocket of his coat, "Is your letter."

"What letter?" said Lyra, taking the heavy parchment envelope into her hands, "What is this?"

"Your acceptance letter to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

Lyra looked at it. "Who's Bernicia?" she asked, reading the name on the front.

"Ah, my mistake," he replied easily and retook the letter. He stuffed it into one side of his coat and removed another letter from the opposite side, "Here is your letter Miss Black. Properly addressed this time I should hope."

It read: Miss Lyra Black, Shack on the Side of the Hill, Dover.

Lyra nodded.

"As I mentioned before Miss Black, we are unfortunately running short on time. The Express train to Hogwarts will be leaving King's Cross very shortly and you will need to be aboard."

"And how exactly do you expect me to get to London in ten minutes?"

"An excellent question, if you will allow me?" He smiled and tapped his wand on the tip of Lyra's unopened letter. "Portus".

The shack disappeared.

A.N. Thank you for taking a chance on this story! If you haven't noticed by now, it is a fairly blatant Mary Sue type of story. I've always been a fan of that sort of thing and before I began writing, I started with this question: What would it look like if you combined all of the typical elements of a Mary Sue into one character?

I decided the poor girl probably wouldn't cope all that well.