Ilvermorny Year One: The Cursed Witch

Part I: The Escape

Chapter One: The First Letter

It was a hot August day. The Waller Creek Journal, a flimsy daily newspaper that circulated to the few hundred citizens of Waller Creek, Mississippi, had declared it the hottest day in the last 100 years. So hot in fact, the mailman realized halfway through his route that the envelopes were unsealing themselves under the direct heat. A heat so intense that all the stores closed their doors as their refrigerators and freezers could not operate. Humidity levels so high that the adults hovered around the air conditioning vents of their offices and children all were absent from the streets as their parents feared they might be hit a with a heat stroke by even attempting a bike ride. Everyone everywhere was avoiding the unavoidable sweat, the intolerable humidity and of course, the big blaring sun. But then, there was Miles Cassidy.

Miles felt no heat. He dropped not one drop of sweat. You see, Miles had escaped the heat. Quite an amazing feat of a boy no older than 10, well "almost 11" as he would say. How did he do this? The same way he escaped everything "not so good" as he would put it, at the library. Every day. Every single day. Miles found his way to the Quentin L. Roosevelt Community Library, named for a very distant relative of Theodore Roosevelt who apparently attributed a great deal to Waller Creek's founding sometime in the 1800's. Once there, Miles walks past the endless volumes of encyclopedias, historical texts and other books libraries are required to have, and straight to his happy place, the fiction section. To be more specific, Miles loved the fantasy stories. He would sit for hours and hours, almost to the library's closing, reading tales of dragons, talking trees and flying beasts.

Miss. Sallie Sweeting, the librarian and probably Miles favorite person in the world, had introduced him to the section when he grew tired of the tattered generic tales his school provided. Upon handing him the first magical story, Miles questioned "What so special about these books?" Miss Sweeting explained to him that the books came from people with big imaginations, like Miles, and that they told stories of anything and everything. Like a fish, Miles was hooked. He usually being the librarian's only patron, besides old Mrs. Hammish, who only came in to check her email once a week, Miss Sweeting and Miles grew very close. She also became an unintentional ear to Miles home problems, which he vented about in between the chapters of his favorite book, "The Dragon King of Malthazar"

Miles was the youngest child of Wanda Cassidy, a hard working single mother of two who was very strict and did not condone any reading of secular texts among many other things. His 17-year-old brother, Trey, was quite the tinker, despite his limited education. Trey continuously got into trouble for taking things apart and putting them back together in his own way. It started small, but eventually resulted in him rewiring the school's bell system, thus creating chaos within the school and getting Trey asked to leave, permanently. Trey now spent his day knocking on their mother's old car, in hopes that it will start back running and she can stop asking for rides to work, as she saw the act as "desperate"

Feeling like an outcast amongst his family, Miles considered the library his home. He ate there. He slept there. And now that school was out for the summer, he spent all his time there. Miss Sweeting would often watch Miles as he read and wish she could do more to help him. She hoped that he, like many of the heroes he read about every day, would have his turning point. Have his day of reckoning. That he would experience the day that would change his life. A librarian can dream …can't she?

The sun set on Waller County's hottest day and Miss Sweeting began her closing ritual, which included finding Miles and making him go home. She flipped off light switch after light switch and check shelf after shelf, all the time making her way to Miles' corner of the library. As she approached she noticed something rather…odd. Miss Sweeting would usually find Miles holding his book up to a nearby window, reading by the light cast by the nearby streetlight. But tonight she found Miles sitting on the ground, reading the Dragon King, for the millionth time but the fluorescent light above his head was still lit, despite all the others in the entire library being off. Miss Sweeting stood in awe of the electrical mystery.

"Miles." Said Miss Sweeting.

Miles looked up at Miss Sweeting and the light went out like the others. "Yes, Miss Sweeting?" Miles answered.

Miss Sweeting, blinking uncontrollably at what she just witnessed, tried to gather her thoughts.

"Is it time to go?" Miles asked, now curious about the state of his favorite person.

Miss Sweeting , finally shaking herself out of her trance, answered Miles with a solid "Yes."

Miles gets off the ground and attempts to put the book on the shelf, but Miss Sweeting, still heavily contemplating calling the city electrician for an emergency call, ran over and grabbed Miles before he could properly place it.

"But Miss Sweeting, what about the book?!" Miles shouted as he was being hurried out of the library.

"Just take it home. I trust you" Miss Sweeting said as she dragged Miles towards the door, only stopping momentarily to grab her purse. Once outside the library, Miss Sweeting bided Miles a good night and hurried off to her car. Miles laughed at her rushing, as he had not ever seen it before. Miles looked at the cover of his favorite copy of the Dragon King as he could already picture himself reading it that night.

Miles hopped on his old rusty bike and began to pedal his way home through the sleepy town. As he approached the red dirt road he lived on, he noticed birds flying above. As Miles inspected them closer, he realized that they were owls. Owls, no strangers to the rural south, did not scare him; however owls flying above his home did start a bit of wonder in the young boy. In all the books Miles had read owls were always noble creatures. They always brought about a change or some profound message. Miles could not help but think that the same was true for real life. He paid no attention to the road he pedaled along as he was focused on the owls.

He pedaled and pedaled until the owls flew out of sight. Miles stopped his bike and gazed upon the night sky. As usual, he would always stop before he turned to pedal to the house and wonder, "what's up there?" Miles lingered on his star filled thoughts for a moment longer then made his way home. Him calling it home being more of a gesture than a fact. Miles and his family had bounced around from apartments to houses to even their car once, all in search of this thing called home. Miles had abandoned the idea until he discovered the library. But, he still held hope that his brother and mother could find their homes one day.

Miles parked the bike closer to the dilapidated mobile home in which they now resided and then he turned and walked up the rotting wooden steps. Inside the small space, Trey sat at the kitchen doing his usual tinkering, this time on an alternator.

"Where's Momma?" Miles inquired.

Trey continued to screw and hammer on the part and Miles started to become irritated from being ignored.

"Trey, I asked you a question" Miles said trying to remain firm in his voice.

Despite Miles firmer statement, Trey continued to tinker and Miles became more irritated. He knew Trey heard him. He knew that Trey was ignoring him…again. Miles was a very calm person, as most avid readers are, but there was one thing he could not tolerate: being ignored. And Trey knew it. Miles continue to boil as Trey tapped away at the part with the tools. Just as he was making the final adjustments with the screwdriver-

"Ow!" Trey yelled as he jumped to his feet and snapping Miles out of anger filled glare. "The damn thing shocked me!"

Miles began to chuckle as his brother sucked his shocked finger. Trey gave a Miles a hard look and the chuckles stopped. Trey stomped hard over to his little brother with a face full of anger, as he too had a pet peeve: being humiliated…especially by his little brother.

"What's funny?" Trey growled.

Miles feigned fear for a second and then said "This," as he delivered a forceful shin kick to his brother and then proceeded to run for his life. As Miles made his way towards the door, it flew open and he stopped in his tracks. Momma was home.

"What's going on in here?" she asked not blinking an eye.

"Nothing" the boys said in unison.

Wanda delivered a hefty "Mmmmhmmm" as she closed the door behind her. She drug her feet as she walked over to the nearby counter. She sat her seemingly 100-pound bag on the counter with a sigh and begin to scan through it until she pulled out a stack of mail.

"Bill" she said as she tossed the envelope across the counter. "Bill" went another across the counter. "Bill" went the third as it this one went overshot the counter and hit the floor. Wanda continued with this routine until she reached a tan brown square envelop. Miles noticed it stuck out from the white rectangular ones scattered across the floor and counter. Wanda's eyes grew wide and large as she scanned the envelope front to back.

"Momma what's wrong?" Miles asked.

Wanda ripped the envelope down the middle and Miles swear he saw a flash of green dust rise from the two pieces.

"Nothing but the devil trying to get in my house" Wanda shouted. "You can't have my babies" she shouted with another tear to the envelope. She continued to tear and tear until the envelope was nothing more than scraps of paper. She crumpled the paper into a ball and threw it away. She looked at Miles with a crazed look on her face and then she grabbed him by the shoulders.

"You stay outta that mailbox! You hear me?!" she said staring deep into Miles' eyes.

"Ok Momma, but why?" Miles attempted to ask.

"Just stay out of it!" She said "And that goes for you too" she added while giving Trey a cold look.

Wanda released Miles from her clutches and leaves the room. Trey walks over to console his shaken little brother. Still with questions lingering in his eyes, Miles looks over at his brother and hugs him tight.

"It's alright man" Trey said with doubt in his voice.

Miles lets go of his brother, grabs his backpack from the nearby couch and scurries off to his room. Trey walks back over to the table and returns to tinkering on the alternator. In her room, unbeknownst to her sons, Wanda knelt in front of her window and prayed to God to protect her from the evil that the letter held. But while she prayed, she also angered. She grew angrier and angrier as she begged God, she pleaded with God, every single day that this horrible event would not come. Yet, it did. It sill happened.

"Haven't I done enough Lord?" she asked with tears streaming down her face "Did I not pray enough? Did I not fast enough? Was my sin so great, that my son couldn't be saved?"

God's silence haunted her. She wanted answers. She wanted to know! But there were no answers. There were no reasons. It was then Wanda knew what she had to do. She had to react. She had to handle the situation because God wouldn't. Because God was silent. Because he was ignoring her. She had to take the matter into her own hands, just like last time. Last time, she made it go away. Last time, there were no problems. Last time, she was in control. The silence was a confirmation for Wanda. Confirmation that she had to make it all go away. Confirmation she was in control. Confirmation that in this situation…she was God. She rose from her knees and sat on the corner of the bed. She smiled devilishly as the moon illuminated her face. Her mind was working. She had a plan