The warm gold of the setting sun lazily spilled across the ancient brick-paved streets of Diagon Alley, stretching pedestrians' shadows long and thin. The air was filled with all sorts of strange scents: the sweet fragrance of freshly baked Cauldron Cakes, the crisp aroma from the magical herbs shop, and... a rich, tempting sweetness mingling cream and fruit, coming from their destination—the "Sweet Swirl" ice cream shop, marked by a huge rainbow swirl cone sign.
Several small outdoor round tables covered in red-and-white checkered cloths stood outside the shop, their brightly colored parasols swaying softly in the breeze. Professor McGonagall was already waiting there. She stood perfectly straight, her dark green cloak especially conspicuous amid the crowd, looking down at an antique silver watch on her wrist.
"Right on time." She looked up, her gaze sweeping over the wands in Lynn and Hermione's hands and the new textbooks in their arms. Hermione also carried an extra paper bag containing a dark blue robe. Her expression did not change. "Have you bought everything?"
"Yes, Professor," they answered in unison. Hermione's voice carried a barely noticeable note of excitement, her fingers unconsciously stroking the smooth shaft of the Moonlight Grapevine Wand as though she could still feel the lingering warmth of its pure power. Lynn was much more composed, though the Star Stone against his chest sent out waves of steady warmth.
"Very good." Professor McGonagall gave a slight nod. "The Hogwarts Express will depart at exactly eleven in the morning on September first, from Platform Nine and Three-Quarters at King's Cross Station in London. Your tickets"—with what seemed like a conjuring trick, she pulled two stiff cards from an inner pocket of her cloak—"are tucked inside the first pages of your new textbooks. Be sure to arrive on time. If you miss the train... you will bear the consequences." Her tone held its usual severity, but when her eyes passed over Hermione's cheeks, faintly flushed with excitement, there seemed to be the slightest softening, almost too subtle to catch.
"Now, you may have some ice cream here as the conclusion to your school shopping." Professor McGonagall pointed toward Sweet Swirl's colorful display window. "I will return in half an hour to arrange for you to go back to your respective homes." With that, she turned away once more, her dark green figure swiftly melting into the bustling crowd and disappearing.
Lynn and Hermione were left standing outside the ice cream shop, bathed in tempting sweetness and warm evening light, with an oddly unguarded feeling of ease settling over them. The clamor of the magical world seemed cut off by an invisible barrier, leaving only the two of them and the dreamlike swirl of sweetness before them.
"Um... what flavor do you want?" Lynn broke the silence first, pointing at the dazzling selection of ice cream tubs in the window. Some flavors even slowly changed color or gave off tiny bubbles.
Hermione's eyes were drawn to them at once, and her earlier nervousness was instantly replaced by curiosity. She leaned close to the glass, her little nose nearly pressed against it as she carefully read the unusual labels. "Fizzing Whizzbees flavor... hiss, will this make your tongue tingle? Bubble Pod flavor... it smells like green apples? And... Dragon-Breath Fire Pepper?! Can people really eat that?" She pointed at a blood-red ice cream covered with tiny dancing sparks, disbelief written across her face.
Lynn was amused by the names too. "To be safe, maybe we should choose something 'milder'? Like... that Moonlight Berry one? It looks like it suits you." He pointed at a pale lavender ice cream dotted with tiny silver flecks, like crushed Moonstone Powder.
Hermione's cheeks quietly took on the color of the sunset again. She shot Lynn a quick glance and muttered softly, "...Who wants to match ice cream?" Yet her feet honestly moved toward the Moonlight Berry display. "Then... what about you?"
"I'll try the Stardust Caramel Sea Salt." Lynn pointed at a dark brown ice cream studded evenly with countless sparkling golden grains.
Soon, each of them was holding a towering ice cream cone as they sat at an empty red-and-white checkered table outside. Hermione cautiously licked her Moonlight Berry ice cream. Its cool, sweet flavor melted across her tongue at once, carrying a wonderful fresh berry fragrance like a forest after rain. The silver particles gave a faint, sandy sensation in her mouth, not unpleasantly gritty but rather adding a touch of fun. She narrowed her eyes contentedly like a kitten savoring a treat.
Lynn's Stardust Caramel Sea Salt was richer and fuller. The sweet-and-salty caramel sauce perfectly balanced the heaviness of the cream, while the glittering golden "stardust" melted as soon as it touched his tongue, leaving behind a faint warmth, as though he had truly swallowed a tiny nebula.
"How is it?" Lynn asked with a smile as he watched Hermione's satisfied expression.
"It's delicious!" Hermione nodded emphatically, a little pale purple ice cream still at the corner of her mouth. "It's much better than Marks & Spencer's! What are these little silver grains? They feel so strange."
"I don't know. Maybe some kind of magically processed edible mineral powder?" Lynn guessed. His gaze fell on the ice cream at the corner of Hermione's mouth, and he naturally reached for a tissue from the box on the table. "Here, you've got some."
His movement was so natural that his fingertips nearly touched her cheek. Hermione's body instantly stiffened, her long lashes fluttering rapidly as the temperature in her cheeks shot upward. She instinctively wanted to wipe it herself, but Lynn had already gently brushed the corner of her mouth with the edge of the tissue, with extraordinary care.
The touch was as light as a feather, yet it carried an impossible-to-ignore current that spread from the corner of her mouth to the tips of her ears. Hermione's heart thudded wildly, nearly drowning out the noise of the street around them. She could clearly smell the faint scent of stardust caramel on Lynn's fingertips, mingled with the clean scent of rain-damp grass that clung to him—the scent of his new school robe fabric.
"Is... is it gone?" Her voice was barely louder than a mosquito's buzz. She stared at the cone in her hands, not daring to look up.
"Mm, it's gone." Lynn withdrew his hand as though he had merely done something entirely ordinary. He folded the tissue and set it on the table, then calmly continued eating his own ice cream. Only he knew that the lingering warmth and softness on his fingertips had made his heart skip a beat as well. The Star Stone at his chest seemed to sense something too, sending out a more noticeable warmth than usual.
The atmosphere became quietly thick and strange, with only the soft sounds of the two of them taking small bites of ice cream. Golden sunlight filtered through the gaps in the parasol, falling over Hermione's fluffy brown curls and giving them a fuzzy halo of light. It also illuminated her small earlobes, which were red enough to seem almost translucent. Lynn's gaze was unconsciously drawn to her, to the fair nape revealed when she lowered her head and to her lips, lightly pressed together in nervousness and glistening with a trace of ice cream.
"Um..." Hermione seemed to want to break the heart-racing silence. She looked up, only for her gaze to collide with Lynn's focused eyes. The sunset and her small figure were reflected in those deep eyes, and their attentiveness sent another flutter through her heart. She hurriedly looked away, her gaze landing on the dark blue hardbound notebook Lynn had placed on the table, the one he had just taken from the vault. "Is that... your diary? No, your notebook?" She tried to change the subject.
Following her gaze, Lynn picked up the notebook. "I'm not sure what it is yet. I found it in the vault." He weighed it in his hand, then tentatively opened the cover.
There was no name on the title page, only a line of flowing, elegant dark blue writing arranged like a Starlight Trail:
> "Stars guide the path; knowledge reveals the essence."
Further inside, the pages were blank, but their texture was extremely unusual. They felt cool and smooth, carrying the distinctive texture of the Star Stone, as though they were not paper but some kind of dark blue metal foil as thin as cicada wings. Lynn tried running his finger across a blank page. Where his fingertip passed, it left behind a blue trail sparkling with faint starlight. The trail seemed alive, remaining on the page for several seconds before slowly fading.
"Wow!" Hermione instantly forgot her earlier embarrassment, completely captivated by the magical phenomenon. She leaned closer, her large eyes full of wonder. "It can record things! With magic? Or..." She instinctively extended her index finger, wanting to try drawing across the blank page herself.
At the very moment her fingertip was about to touch the page, the Star Stone at Lynn's chest and the Moon White Stone at hers both grew faintly warm! On the page, right where Hermione's fingertip was about to land, a line of tiny words automatically appeared, glowing with a soft milky white light:
> "Where the mind reaches, the writing forms."
Hermione's finger froze in midair, her eyes widening in astonishment. "It... it can sense my thoughts? No, is it our stones?" She looked at Lynn, then at the Moon White Stone pendant at her chest.
Lynn was astonished too. He picked up the Pen of Stars, which he had also found in the metal box. Its shaft seemed both wood and jade, while its tip was set with a sapphire that shimmered with shifting starry light. When his fingers closed around the pen, the Star Stone sent out that familiar warmth again. He lightly touched the tip to a blank page and thought, Test.
As soon as the thought formed, dark blue characters spelling "Test," exactly matching the word in his mind, appeared beneath the pen tip. They were smooth and clear, as though ink had flowed out of the pen on its own, but the characters themselves glimmered with faint starlight.
"That's incredible!" Hermione could not help exclaiming. She looked from the Pen of Stars in Lynn's hand to the notebook where writing appeared by itself, her eyes shining with pure fascination for an unknown magical creation. "This is practically the perfect learning tool! Recording, thinking, organizing... without any obstacles!" She looked at Lynn, her voice filled with excited certainty. "This notebook and pen must have been meant to help you master profound knowledge! That line about 'knowledge revealing the essence'!"
Her affirmation and pure delight affected Lynn. Looking at the girl's shining eyes as she discovered a magical item, warmth surged through him as well. He smiled and held the Pen of Stars out to Hermione. "Do you want to try it? With your 'thoughts'?"
Hermione hesitated a little, but her thirst for knowledge and curiosity about this magical combination ultimately overcame her reserve. She carefully accepted the warm, smooth Pen of Stars. The instant her fingertips touched the shaft, the Moon White Stone at her chest immediately sent out a clear warmth, as though it faintly resonated with the starry sapphire at the pen's tip. Imitating Lynn, she placed the tip against the blank page and thought, Magic is the most rigorous art of logic.
A clear, beautifully written sentence glowing with soft milky white light immediately appeared on the dark blue page, not a single word different from what she had thought! The milky white glow and the dark blue writing Lynn had left earlier reflected one another, like starlight and moonlight dancing together across the page.
"It really works!" Hermione cried out in delight. As she looked at the sentence she had "written," an unprecedentedly wonderful feeling rose in her heart. This was not merely recording something; it was more like a direct projection of her thoughts.
Lynn watched her excited little face, his heart stirring. He picked up the notebook, turned to a fresh page, and once again set the Pen of Stars against the paper. This time, he did not think of words. Instead, he focused and tried to sketch in his mind the breathtaking scene from the wand shop: two lights—dark blue and milky white—fiercely intertwining and resonating around each other.
Something magical happened!
No writing appeared on the dark blue page. Instead, as Lynn concentrated, flowing lines and colors began to emerge! Dark blue streams of light surged like a rushing Milky Way, while milky white light gleamed like bright moonlight. They twisted together, collided, and merged, forming a dynamic image of light and shadow that was abstract yet full of power and strange rhythm! Though its details were far less vivid than the real sight, its intense sense of resonance and visual impact had been captured and presented perfectly.
"This..." Hermione stared in stunned amazement, so absorbed that she did not even notice melting ice cream dripping onto her fingers. She recognized the scene depicted by the lights and shadows. It was the soul-shaking moment of wand resonance that belonged to the two of them alone! A powerful sense of shared feeling struck her, making her chest grow faintly hot.
Lynn set down the pen. As he looked at the wondrous image created by the Pen of Stars, recording something they had experienced together, his heart filled with an indescribable feeling too. He gently pushed the notebook toward Hermione. "It's for you."
"Ah?" Hermione abruptly came back to herself. Looking at the notebook pushed before her and the one-of-a-kind image of light and shadow upon it, her face instantly turned bright red. She shook her hands repeatedly. "No, no! This is far too precious! And... and it's yours..."
"Knowledge should be shared, and so should memories." Lynn's tone was gentle, but carried a seriousness that allowed no refusal. "Besides, without your 'moonlight,' this picture would not be complete, would it?" He pointed at the entwined light and shadow on the page. "Consider it... a return gift for your school gift?" His eyes meaningfully flicked toward the paper bag holding her new robe.
Hermione's heart raced. The words of refusal rolled around in her throat several times, but in the end, she could not say them. She looked at the image symbolizing the strange bond between them, then at Lynn's sincere eyes. Finally, her fair little hand trembled slightly as she gently pressed it to the notebook's cool dark blue cover. It seemed to still retain the warmth of his fingertips.
"...Thank you." Her voice was as soft as a sigh, her cheeks as red as ripe berries. Yet her bright eyes were filled with a joy sweeter than ice cream, nearly overflowing, along with a trace of dependence that she herself had not yet noticed.
Just then, Professor McGonagall's dark green figure appeared at the street corner exactly on time. Half an hour of sweet moments had quietly passed amid the faint glow of the Starlight Trail Notebook and the fragrance of ice cream. The sun had sunk lower, coloring both of them and the dark blue notebook on the table—which held the wonderful memories of their first encounter with the magical world—in warm gold. The paths of stars and moonlight silently intertwined more deeply in London's twilight.
Before you continue