The Letter Brought by an Owl

Although Mia knew their Hogwarts acceptance letters would arrive when they turned eleven and take them away from here, life with the Dursley family was truly hard to bear until then.

Today, Dudley wore his new school uniform, and Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon looked at him admiringly. He would be going to Smeltings in a week.

The Hogwarts letters should be coming soon, right? Mia thought.

"Go and get the mail," Aunt Petunia ordered Harry.

At that, Mia eagerly pulled Harry along to fetch the mail. She went through it one letter at a time, and sure enough, she found two that stood out from the rest.

"What's this?" Harry looked uncertainly at the letters addressed to the two of them. Mia raised a finger to her lips and shushed him, then hid the envelopes in her pocket. After giving Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon their mail, she pulled Harry back to her room.

The two of them opened their envelopes eagerly.

Dear Mr./Miss Potter:

We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. A list of required books and equipment is enclosed.

The term begins on September 1. We await your owl with your reply by July 31.

Deputy headmistress

Minerva McGonagall

Yours sincerely

"Hogwarts?" Harry looked at Mia in disbelief. Hogwarts really existed. When they were little, the brother and sister had kept each other company, and Harry had always fallen asleep to the stories Mia spun.

Harry didn't know how Mia came up with so many wonderful ideas, but he had always longed for the world she described.

"It's Hogwarts." Mia narrowed her pretty green eyes. She had finally received her acceptance letter, decades late.

Just as the siblings were basking in their joy, the letters were suddenly snatched from their hands. It was Dudley. He grabbed the letters and ran out, shouting as he went, "Dad, Mum, Harry and Mia have a letter!"

Harry jumped up to chase him. "Hey, that's mine!"

"Who would write to you?" Uncle Vernon took the letters from Dudley and looked through them. When he saw what they said, he turned to Aunt Petunia in disbelief. Aunt Petunia's face looked grim too, and the couple stared at Harry and Mia.

Over the next few days, the two of them seemed to go mad. They locked Harry and Mia in their separate rooms and wouldn't let them out. The doors and windows were locked tight, and any letter from Hogwarts was torn to pieces.

Harry watched Uncle Vernon lock the door downstairs, while Mia looked out through an upstairs window at the Hogwarts owls gathering in the yard.

"Psst, psst, psst." Mia beckoned to the owls. They tilted their heads and flew over to the window. Looking at the adorable little owls, Mia decided she liked them very much.

Over the following days, Hogwarts envelopes were everywhere: in eggs, in the mailbox, in the fireplace, and all sorts of other places. The Dursley family were driven to take the siblings to a rundown little wooden hut on an isolated rock in the sea.

In the dim lighthouse, the Dursley family huddled together on one bed to sleep. Mia and Harry were still awake because the next day was their birthday, and they watched the time on Dudley's watch.

"Happy birthday, Harry/Mia," they said in unison, then smiled at each other.

Just after they said this, the door was suddenly smashed open. A flash of lightning illuminated the newcomer: a huge man with a face full of beard.

Aunt Petunia and the others woke with a start and stared at him in horror.

"Sorry." Hagrid hadn't expected to knock their door down just by knocking on it. He thought he could pick it up and put it back.

"You're trespassing!" Uncle Vernon glared at Hagrid, shielding Aunt Petunia behind him.

"Shut up, you bastard." Hagrid had no liking for the Dursley family. He turned straight to Dudley. "You were just little things the last time I saw you, Harry, Mia. Emmm, Harry, you're sturdier than I imagined. Look at that little belly."

Mia silently raised her hand and spoke up. "We're Harry and Mia."

"Of course it's you. I brought you a present. I accidentally sat on it, but it should still taste good." Looking at the children who had appeared before him, Hagrid pulled out the present he had brought. "I baked it myself, and I wrote on it too."

The two accepted it and opened it curiously. It was a birthday cake, with "Happy birthday, Harry and Mia" written on it. This was the first present either of them had received in eleven years, apart from those they had given each other. They looked at each other and saw the happy expressions on each other's faces, then turned to Hagrid together and politely thanked him.

"An eleventh birthday doesn't come every day, does it?" As he spoke, he sat down on the sofa, then used the umbrella he carried to light the fireplace. Harry and Mia's eyes were full of wonder and excitement. It was the first time they had seen real magic.

"Sorry, who are you?" Seeing how readily the man made himself at home, and how familiar he seemed to be with him and his sister, Harry put down the cake and asked Hagrid.

"Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of Keys and Grounds at Hogwarts. Do you know Hogwarts?"

"Yes." Harry nodded. Aunt Petunia stared at him in disbelief. They had never told Harry about that place; they had even said his parents had died in a car crash.

"There's no way they're going there. From the day we took them in, we wouldn't allow such a thing to happen!" Uncle Vernon snatched the Hogwarts acceptance letters.

"You knew? Why didn't you tell me?" Seeing them like this, Harry understood. They knew too, but they hadn't told him.

"Of course we knew. You're just like that sister of mine. My parents were so proud the day she got her letter. We had a witch in the family, they were so proud. I was the only one who knew she was a freak. Then she met that Potter and had you two. I knew you were the same, and then she got herself blown up, and we had no choice but to take you in."

Aunt Petunia remembered begging Dumbledore to let her attend too, only to be refused. She remembered that her only sister had died in the wizarding world. She both loved and hated the two children.

"Blown up? You said my parents died in a car crash!" Harry demanded in disbelief.

Mia knew the real cause of their parents' deaths: they had died at Voldemort's hands.

"What car crash? Could a car crash kill Lily and James? You had to make up some excuse, didn't you? That's an insult and a slander!" Hagrid couldn't bear to hear heroes smeared like that.

The argument ended with Dudley sneaking some of the siblings' cake and Hagrid giving him a pig's tail. Hagrid took Mia and Harry away.