IV

LILY

(H+G)

Free.  That's how I felt when I ran outside in the green summer grass with Albus not far behind.  It was so nice be somewhere where I didn't always have to breathe the polluted London air, with noisy Muggle vehicles called cars.  Sure, at my grandparents' Burrow it was great and all but it definitely wasn't anything like this.  After what felt like an hour in those green flames, Ginny allowed my brother and I to explore this country we had never discovered, although of course with the usual "But remember, don't wander off too far!"  It was beyond anyone's knowledge that one of us would part so much farther than what we had planned.

"C'mon!" I yelled to black-haired, green-eyed Albus.  

"I'm coming!  I'm coming!  It's just that I'm afraid my glasses are gonna fall off!"  He replied, trying to catch up.

I slowed down to a walk, then stopped and lay down, waiting for my older brother, my flaming red hair splayed out around my head.  Then Albus lay down next to me, and said,

"I'm hungry."

"Wow, I'm surprised you're the one saying that.  Usually it's James."

"Yeah well, that doesn't mean I'm never hungry!"  Said Albus sharply.

"I never said that!" I retorted.

"The first one who finds food wins!"  He said as he quickly got up and raced off.

Although taken aback, I easily caught up to him and joined him in his search for food.  Soon enough we found some strawberry fields and started gobbling them four at a time.  After a while when we were finally full, we decided to take a nap then planned to race up a rather far away hill with a big majestic, for some reason shiny, pine tree on top.  Next to that tree, there was also what seemed a really tall statue of some person who's back was facing us.  I rested my head against a tree while Albus placed his head in my lap.  Soon, we drifted off to sleep.

I woke up about an hour later and immediately knew something was wrong.  My lap was cold and empty and Albus was gone.  I got up, and looked around but found no trace of him.  I decided to go back to the road and walk up the hill to the huge, glimmering tree to see if he had gone there, but it wasn't like him to wander off without waiting.

I was really surprised with what I found.  First of all, it wasn't the tree that was shiny, it was some golden fleece...who would put that on a tree, unprotected, when it looked so real and expensive?  Then I realised that wrapped around the tree lay a sleeping dragon.  I thought it looked rather small for an average dragon.  Of course, I hadn't seen one before, but when you have a dad that's had to steal a golden egg from an angry mamma Hungarian Horntail at the Triwizard Tournament, you pretty much get the picture.  Right next to me I also just noticed the huge statue again, of a woman
with a helmet-crown thingy placed on her head and holding out a much
smaller winged person in her right hand.  Again, who would just leave that on a hill outside, completely open, in the middle of nowhere?

I slowly inched away from the dragon, making sure not to wake it.  This place was definitely magical.  Then I looked below me, which what I expected was an empty valley.  Boy, was I wrong.  My jaw dropped to the ground, I was so surprised about what I saw before me.

Stretched out in the valley below me lay a whole village.  Or at least that's what I thought it was at first sight.  Ahead of me was a big blue house, and a little creak which went through a lake in the middle of the valley and continued to what I guessed was the sea.

Then I looked further and saw a climbing wall with red liquid flowing down (...was that lava?), stables with...winged horses, at least 20 cabins, an arena, and some other buildings I couldn't name.  There were also some strawberry fields where Albus and I must've been roaming before and a forest so vast it reminded me of the Forbidden Forest at Hogwarts.  This must've been more of a camp; a magical camp.  Maybe that's how American children were taught magic!  Except, how could that volleyball court not far ahead be magical?  

There were quite some people there, so I decided to check it out and hopefully find Albus.  Besides, I couldn't see why I wouldn't be welcome here; after all, I was a witch.