Next morning seemed as if nothing had happened; even the tropical sun came out in its total strength. Flora forced herself into going to work, as some of her patients were going through a crisis and couldn’t miss a week of their treatment – she tried to justify herself while she knew, in fact, that it was not true and she needed something else to occupy her thoughts to be able to resume her normal life. She was confused and did not want to feel all that pain for a few moments at least.
She drove her car through the city in "automatic mode" (without pay attention) and soon came to her office, which was a simple chamber, in the backroom of a nice clinic. It was good enough for her, as the success of her work didn’t rest in the furniture.

She worked the whole day, but took small breaks to take the children to school or to fetch them from it, have lunch, or go to the supermarket. The intense routine made her forget the gloomy experience she’d had in the cemetery.

Although she was feeling well, during the coffee break, she remembered her co-worker showed a permanent smile, and always suggested that she drank water instead of coffee since it was healthier. Her death was a mystery, since not even the medical examiner had been able to ascertain its causes. The deceased woman just seemed to have given up life and “shut down”. Thoughtfully, Flora left the coffee cup aside and poured herself a large glass of water, and realized she would still miss her friend for a long time. Then she resumed her work, there were still three patients to go.

Time passed, but she didn’t notice it. Well after the end of the working day, she was alone at her office once her last patient had left long before. Then suddenly, she felt a gust of icy wind blow into the office. Immediately after that the doorbell rung – she thought this was weird since she wasn’t waiting for anyone. Perhaps it was the night guard checking why the lights were on. To her surprise, when she opened the door she found the blonde man of the previous day. He gave her his hand, half smiled, and said:
“Dr Flora? I am Lucius Malfoy.”

Flora shuddered with fear and reacted by looking back at him with the same fixed stare of the previous day, trying to intimidate him, after she was alone and he was an unknown man. She knew her stare used to have a devastating effect on people, and in she used it sometimes to get into her patients’ minds to help them whenever the normal procedures didn’t work. It was the way through which she could access their most hidden thoughts and forgotten memories. It disturbed Mr. Malfoy for a few seconds, but he didn’t seem to want to avoid it. Actually, he seemed to understand it and wish that invasion of privacy. Flora saw in his remembrances that he had come from far away to meet her. He had learnt about her through a document, and she understood he wouldn’t do her any harm. When she tried to access his memories a bit further, she saw a woman with her hair as black as Flora’s, and also a very awkward looking man with a snake-like face. But then, Lucius deflected her gaze.

Flora believed that words of her successful work had reached him and that’s why he was there. She concluded that it was because of the strange looking persons wearing unusual costumes she had seen in that gentleman’s memories. They seemed to have some kind of madness or dementia.

Curious, she invited Lucius in and took him to her office, where she indicated an armchair for him to sit. She excused herself, grabbed the mobile in her purse, and with her back turned to man, called her husband to tell him that a last minute appointment had just turned up. If she didn’t arrive home in an hour, he should come and look for her, but otherwise he shouldn’t worry, as all was well, she completed quickly, but she was not sure whether this had indeed reassured Felipe.

She fetched them coffee and asked what had brought Mr. Malfoy there. He explained that he believed she was Tom Riddle and his sister-in-law Bellatrix Lestrange’s daughter that had been adopted soon after her birth by a Brazilian family visiting England.

Flora had been told she was adopted and brought from Europe when she was still a baby, even so she got surprised at the unexpected revelation of her parents’ names, so she paid great attention to the story. She had her heart in her throat, but took a deep breath to collect herself as she didn’t want him to note how moved she was. Pretending calm, she asked him to continue.

As far as she could understand, the Lestranges worked for this Mr. Riddle, a Lord. And after years serving and blindly admiring this man, Bellatrix’s husband looked more and more uninteresting to her.

He went on saying that she had been put up for adoption on Mr. Lestrange’s order, the betrayed husband that, in spite of his rage for the baby girl – that was a live proof of his wife’s betrayal – couldn’t kill her for both fear and admiration for her father. Mr Lestrange had no difficulty in lying to his wife, since the baby was premature and the mother had lost consciousness during the childbirth, so he said to her that their daughter had been born dead. Moreover, he also said that the baby’s birth mother didn’t want the little girl, as she believed the baby to be her husband’s, so she did not want to see the dead child anymore, which facilitated the lie.

Mr Malfoy told her that many years had passed and no one in the family knew Flora existed. Then, one day, Bellatrix’s sister and Mr. Malfoy’s wife, Narcissa, read a document written by an old family servant that had been found by her grandson, Scorpius. Flora had the impression that Mr. Malfoy had implied this servant was a home elf, but imagined she had miss-understood him. It was certainly owing to her difficulty with English. To better understand that, he let her peer into his mind again. Actually, he seemed to wish she did that again. Then, in a large and stylish living-room, she saw a blonde and tall woman showing old and stained papers to her husband.

By seeing how Narcissa told her husband the history that, in turn, her grandson had told her, Flora noted that this servant, Dobby, was greatly despised, although again he was referred to as an elf. “Would ‘elf’ be just a derogatory term?” thought Flora.

“Dobby, that useless and traitor elf, hid a stack of old papers made of newspapers and bread wrappers, which were tied up by a knot with a magical look. In these papers — see, I didn’t even know the bloody elf could write —, he wrote, in an awful writing, things he saw in our home, and some others he did on our orders. If the Ministry just got hold of these papers…”

“How did you find them?”

“Scorpius gave me that. He was playing in the cellar when, without any particular purpose, he did a magic spell that revealed a path in the wall. He followed that path and got to Dobby’s dirty room. I didn’t even know there was such a filthy place in our house. It had a tiny bed, and horrible flowers were drawn in its walls. Scorpius’ intent was to use it as his secret hiding place to meditate ant try his magic powers away from us. He’s so smart!!! However he made the wrong magic and instead of enlarging the piece of pie he had in his pocket, he made the paper wrapping appear. What a disgusting habit of registering his memories the bloody elf had – as if they were worth anything... Anyway, Scorpius found them very interesting. So, he ended up getting late for lunch and I went to look for him... But that’s not the worst. Have a look for yourself”.

Narcissa reached over and handed the sheets to her husband. Disgusted, Mr. Malfoy started reading the papers, but something called his attention and soon he went on reading them carefully sat in an arm-chair by the window to be helped by the light that came from outside. The revelation about a niece he’d never heard about excited him, so that he muttered now and then:

“Bellatrix and Lord Voldemort... Brazilian family bewitched … their holiday trip was meant for them to take home the daughter they would adopt. Mmm... Interesting..”.

He smiled. Narcissa noted a glint in her husband’s eyes. It was as if he had just won the best present in his life. She got weary when he announced:

“I’m going to Brazil. We must know if she’s still alive...”

After writing some messages and asking his wife to send them off Mr. Malfoy said he would pack. Narcissa climbed the winding marble stairs behind him going to the bedroom. Then he said to her that he knew he could not count on his son, Draco, that preferred living in the past as if nothing had ever happened; so, since Lord Voldemort’s death he would not approve of anything like that. Therefore, Mr. Malfoy would ask to an old friend’s son, Goyle to go with him. Goyle was stupid and strong enough to accompany him in any mission. Flora could still see Mr. Malfoy accompanied by a man she recognized as the one that was with him at the cemetery. At first, they were not coming to Brazil, though; instead they were going up north, at least that was what he had told Goyle. At this moment he turned his eyes away from her as not to let her see anything anymore.

Flora focused back the office and startled, she could hardly hide her shock. But nothing was compared to what Mr. Malfoy was about to tell her: He first asked her in a paused voice whether she had ever done anything strange in her life; something the other persons could not do. She did not reply anything then, but she knew she had. In fact, she had always done strange things, although she had never mentioned that to anybody except to her husband, to her deceased friend, and to two of her girl friends that also had something different.

Then, the man took a wooden wand from his stick, pointed it to a picture in the wall, and the image in it started to move. Flora took a deep breath. She knew it couldn’t be a trick, since that picture had hung from that wall since long, and he couldn’t have had anytime to set the scene. At that, she nodded with her head: yes, she had already done many strange things. He asked her what had been that, and she replied that the strangest thing she had ever done was during a family camp, when she prevented a coral snake from leaping at them by simply talking to it. The man’s eyes glinted again, as if he had just met Santa Claus himself. Then he asked her whether she had felt anything strange in the cemetery. She replied encouraged by the enthusiasm with the news and leaving aside the caution that she had felt as if something wanted to command her, but she had managed to regain control over herself and deflect that sensation.

He clapped and said:

“It was me! I tried to cast the Imperius Curse on you, and you resisted! You’re a witch, and like your father, one of the most powerful ones I’ve ever met. You have the same, let’s say, penetrating stare he had” – and the admiring and venerating way Lucius looked at her deeply annoyed her.

To be called a witch was not a compliment, but she already knew that she was a witch. She had always known that, but had never dared use the word “witch” to justify her powers; even why for her witches were just the evil characters of children’s tales. She also knew that, in a certain way, there was evil inside her. Evil drives had always haunted her. However, she had learned to control them and didn’t have any unethical behaviour since she blew up a frog that had frightened her when she was a child (“who did she think she was to ill-treat the poor animal?”). She smiled to the man and agreed: “ok, you got me”.

She could not take her eyes off his wand-stick as she’d never had seen anything like that. For her, magic wands were only found in fairy tale. She went to touch it, but Lucius dodged her movement. He said it was a personal object and that she could buy one in London for herself. (Flora naturally did not know that, but since he was compelled to lend his wand to another wizard – Lord Voldemort, Flora’s father –, and it had been broken, he never ever let anybody else touch his new wand again as if it was a very sensitive part of his body.

“Magic wands in London? How nice? Can you find them on any corner?”

“No, there’s a particular place to buy it. It’s not in Google maps. It’s the Ollivander in Diagon Alley. Muggles are not allowed there, unless they’re accompanied by a wizarding folk. By Muggles I mean, ordinary persons without magic powers. Over there you can also buy books to help you deal with your magic and learn how to better use it.” Answered Mr. Malfoy forcing himself into being friendly, which wasn’t much like him, and which Flora did not notice due to her enormous excitement at the idea of meeting her parents, developing her magic powers and buying magic things.

This immediately fascinated her, as she had never seen a serious spell book before. The closest she’d got to it were old books of herbal medicine. She noted then that whenever she tried their prescriptions, she usually achieved a much better result than her friends, even if they had followed the same instructions. And for a few moments she was lost in daydreams, imagining herself wearing a black cloak and a witch's pointy hat, with her children in a wizarding department store buying golden spell-books and exotic objects, including cauldrons and broomsticks. Then it occurred to her to ask:

“Do my parents live in London? I’ve wanted to meet them since I was a little girl, and learned I had been adopted.”

Mr. Malfoy sorrowfully said:

“I’m afraid your parents have already passed away.”

Flora lost the enthusiasm and muscle tone, like she would sink in the chair. That meant she would never ever meet her parents. She lowered her eyes, looking at something in her bare hands, her eyes began to fill with tears. Her uncle waited for a moment and finally asked her:

“ But whenever you like, I can show you our world. I’m going back tomorrow, but I’ll leave you my address. Your aunt, my wife, would love to meet her niece. So would my son.”

In these last words, Flora noticed the forced amiability. However, she was curious, and deep down she knew she would accept his invitation, at least she would know part of her family and her people. Mr Malfoy stood up.Flora was still trying to assimilate everything he had told, so it took her a bit to realize that he was leaving. Then she tried to smile at him, got up and followed him to the exit, where they said goodbye, and she thanked her “uncle’s” visit.

She returned to her office and collapsed into her lilac armchair, where she remained for a few minutes, looking once again to her empty hands. She would never know who gave her those long and pale like the moon pianist’s fingers... Then her father was a wizard, and just as she, he could read minds. She needed to tell all that to Felipe. Felipe! Suddenly she remembered that her husband was waiting for her, so she quickly grabbed her purse and put on her coat while turning off the lights and closing the clinic. Flora got to the street in a few moments and soon was in her car. She could barely breath due to her enormous distress. By remaking the talk with Mr. Malfoy, the idea that she was really a witch was contaminating her with euphoria.

Numb and lost in her own thoughts, Flora drifted home. When she got there, she met her husband at the door-step, holding the car key..

“Who was the last-minute patient? The children were already asleep, so I hesitated to go, but I was worried about you ...”

“Oh, love…” Flora said, looking fondly at her husband. She hugged him. As he knew her very well though, he soon realized by the change in her attitude that she was excited and euphoric.

“Did you notice that blonde gentleman in Sophia’s burial?”

“I can’t remember very well ... Who was he? What did he want? You were late; I was worried.”

Then she took the key from him and pulled him by the hand into the house, excited. She sighed and said with her voice slightly sharpened because of the excitement:

“Felipe, he is my uncle! Well, actually he’s married to my birth mother’s sister... Oh, Felipe..." Flora said, lowering her voice and looking at the floor "my parents have passed away..." She paused briefly, he hugged her stronger. She wept, wetting her husband's clothes with her tears. Learning of her parents' death, she felt alone as she had never felt in her whole life. After all they were parents with whom she dreamed of for her entire life, parents who never would know the colour of her eyes, or how she was a good mother and a generous person, parents who never would feel proud of her as her Brazilians parents did... To think about her Brazilians parents calmed her down. She sniffled and continued, getting excited again: “and what would you say if I told you there’re others like us, and that there’s even a kind of shopping mall for ‘witches’ and ‘wizards’?”

She smiled and her eyes shone when she said the words ‘witches’ and ‘wizards’. Her husband was one of the few to understand her nature, as he was somewhat strange, or a wizard himself, since he, as a computing teacher, had power over broken down electronic devices that always started to work again with his ‘magic’ touch. These things were not normally mentioned, not even to her witch friends. Nevertheless, either as witch and wizard, neither Flora nor her husband had ever heard of any true instruction books meant to help them tame their power. So every spell book they had read till then had been but a fraud. Felipe raised an eyebrow. Flora tried to explain:

“Well, my uncle told me there’s a true magic world... And said I’m his sister-in-law’s daughter, born from an off-the-wedding love affair, a mess that her husband found out. So, he told his wife I had been born dead, and ordered a servant to put me for adoption. As far as I could understand, my father was a kind of Lord and my mother worked for him. Both were wizarding people. Ah! Do you know those magic wands found in fairy tales? They’re real. I’ve see one of ’em!”

Her husband put a hand on her forehead to check her temperature... It seemed normal. He looked his wife deep in the eyes and asked:

“Have you drunk anything? Is this all true indeed?”

She smiled:


“Of course it's true. Why would we be the only ones? Nevertheless, my uncle’s a bit sinister... What do you think about all of this, honey?” And she went on talking on and on in such a way that her husband could not get to his own conclusions.

Felipe tried to be rational and calm down his wife. He invited her to take a lemon balm tea (to calm the nerves), while they discussed the subject. Flora accepted it and they went to the kitchen. Felipe asked her to tell the story from the beginning so that he could understand it better. Felipe was also curious about Mr. Malfoy talk, and when she finally finished her narrative they both agreed it would be interesting to check it. However, her uncle spite for Dobby and the natural way he talked about killing a baby made them believe he may not be a good person. Therefore, she could go to London by herself, this way they would spare their kids from being seen by those people until both of them were sure they would not offer them any danger. Besides, she had not mentioned anything about her daughter and sons to Mr. Malfoy, Therefore, her travel would move these people’s focus from their family, and keep it just on her.