Trekking in Nepal is never ‘safe’. It takes careful planning and even more careful selection of an appropriate guide to get you up into the Himalayas and safely from camp to camp. Perhaps more importantly, you need a guide who knows how to find the yeti dens, should you be one of those foolhardy enough to go in search of them.

Foolhardy was the perfect word to describe our party in the winter of 2086. We were a ragged group of recent Hogwarts graduates, a bunch of kids who liked adventure and travel a bit too much to stop us from thinking about whether an idea was good or not.

At the end of our first week, we’d moved above the ridgeline of the Annapurnas and the weather was taking a turn for the worse. Our Sherpa guide Tashi made the informed and intelligent decision that we should stay in base camp while the weather passed. If you’ve never been trekking in Nepal, and I assume most of you are smart enough to stay where it’s warm and there’s no danger of avalanches or yeti stomping, you may not realize that even base camp can be bitterly cold, and the air is terribly thin. Most of our group was glad to stop for hot food and some time with a bubblehead charm.

I say most, because I was eager to press on. We were paying Tashi well for his wisdom, but because our time in Nepal was so limited, I didn’t want to waste any time regrouping in base camp. We had warming charms and magicked sleeping bags and a bubblehead charm was as good in a blizzard as it was at the bottom of the mountain.

Against better judgement, Tashi and I headed further up Annapurna South. We hadn’t climbed for more than a few hours before all hell broke loose. The falling snow thickened until I couldn’t see Tashi climbing just ahead of me, and the wind whipped up a wicked froth of flakes until I couldn’t even see my own gloved hands. In spite of my warming charms, the cold was leaching into my clothing, and it occurred to me for the first time that this was dangerous. I’m not sure why that was the moment, when we’d been struggling over snow drifts for days, never really warming up completely. A near miss over the side of a glacier a few days before had left us all patting each other on the back cheerfully, but this, this was different. This was me, alone, in the snow, with only my own stupidity to keep me warm.

And then I fell. It was only a stumble, but I slid backwards down the mountain, loose snow and gravel creating a miniature avalanche under my feet, and then under my hands and knees. When I finally came to a stop, the snow spun a cocoon around me and I was alone. No Tashi, and my wand was lost in the scree.

I cannot put into words how it feels to be alone in a blizzard, to shout yourself hoarse into a roaring wind, to know that whether you continue up the mountain or head back down, your death is nearly certain. I’m not a quitter, but hopelessness was a weight on my chest, pressing me deeper into the snow. I was cold and getting colder, I was lost with no sense of direction towards base camp, and I was alone. The loneliness was the worst part, since I’d left good friends and a new fiancée down the mountain in base camp. They’d never know how much I regretted leaving them behind. No yeti was worth this, worth my life, worth their grief. No adventure was worth the loss of the future I’d been dreaming up with my future wife.

This is the crazy part. The part I’ve never been able to explain to myself or to anyone else. Just when I was thinking about Cat, about the girl I’d left down the mountain, just in that moment, I heard her. There’s this song she’s always singing, half a tune under her breath as she creates something magnificent in the kitchen, and somehow, under the howl of the wind that had stolen my shouts, I heard that song. Just a few notes, then the wind rushed back in, but it was enough to direct my feet the first few steps.

I stumbled several feet, then stumbled a few more, throwing my arms around trees as they appeared suddenly within the eddies of snow. Each time I stopped, I could just hear Cat humming again, this time off to my left, then a little ahead and to the right, and I corrected my course to follow her. I’d been following this woman for years, and I wasn’t going to stop now.

So this is my mystery, or maybe more accurately, this is my miracle. She led me down the mountain. She led me back to base camp and safety and a sleeping bag with a heating charm. She led me back to her.

There are times when neither science nor magic can provide an answer when we need it most. Sometimes there isn't a solution to the greatest challenge you face. It's absolutely infuriating at first. With time, you come to accept that there are events and phenomena that you just cannot explain. I have somewhat come to peace with this. There are still days I wonder what if I had been able to save her but I've learned that it's best not to live in the past. When I write this, I think of my mother and that terrible day.

A car accident can be just as effective as someone pointing a wand at you and uttering the word ‘Obliviate’.

I don’t remember much of the accident only pieces here and there. I do remember the date. It was February 24th and it was about 11 in the morning. We had just gotten out of the car park from visiting the Queen Victoria Market in Melbourne. It was my favourite place to go on an early Saturday morning. My brother and I were always promised delicious treats, such as their heavenly homemade doughnuts. These doughnuts were the best. They would always come out hot with the raspberry jelly piping hot. The sugar rolled on the outside would melt instantly once it touched your tongue. This morning, Dad and baby Olivia stayed at home whilst Mum took us boys and our Aunt out to the market. I don’t remember why our Aunt was staying with us. Mum had mentioned something about a bad boyfriend or something like that. She doesn’t even remember know it was a long time ago.

I was seven years old. Sitting in the back of a light blue Subaru, my family and I were waiting for the light to turn green. Marcus, my brother, and I were happily munching away on some delicious doughnuts that we had picked up at the market. In the front, Mum discussed matters with your aunt in complicated terms and jargon that you’d have to be an adult to understand. Trust me. I was a smart and nosy little seven year old whose favourite app was the dictionary on Dad’s smartphone.

I remembered the rain. It started out gently and then slowly increased until the water poured from the clouds. The light turned green. Mum took a moment to pause. The wheels of the car started to rotate and we began to move. Bump. The car and the whole world seemed to spin silently. Everything turned to black.

I don’t remember much of what happened during the accident. Perhaps it was shock that blinded me or perhaps I lost some of my memory of that day. I remember opening my eyes. I blinked them several times, trying to understand what had happened. It’s always hard to understand what happened when you can’t remember. I remember feeling a huge burning pain in the middle of my forehead. My entire body ached. My arms were sore as if I had played a long game of cricket with my brother in the yard. I could barely move a muscle- there was so much pain. I was lost. I wasn’t in the car anymore; I was on the road. Where was Marcus? Where was Auntie Jill? Where was Mum? I glanced over my shoulder gingerly as not to overstretch it and find her. She was on the ground. She was barely moving. My whole world stood still. I ran. Is she alive? Is she dead? I panicked. “Mum?”

I don’t remember what happened within the next hours. She survived but at a cost. She doesn’t remember much of what happened after the car accident. She doesn’t even remember my birthday or my youngest sister. This propelled me into finding a cure for her damaged memories.

First, I looked to science as it always held answers for my father. He had always trusted it. However, science was complicated and used terms that were difficult to understand. I devoted several years to this endeavor. Before I knew it, I was thirteen and headed to England for school. My secret mission to find a cure was tucked closest to my heart. I would find something. I would have too. I even tried to ask my older brother, Marcus, to assist me with my endeavor. He looked at me as if I was an idiot. Marcus and I had grown apart over the years. I still really don’t know the reason why to that. One day, he stopped playing with me. “Nothing you do will ever bring her back. Not even your silly little card tricks, you weirdo.”

Marcus had given me another avenue to explore. Magic.

Within my first few days at Hogwarts, I spoke to the Charms Professor about my mother’s condition and asked him if it was even possible for a charm to help her remember. He didn’t know especially since the injury was a physical one and not a magical one. I left that conversation with a heavy heart yet I was still determined to figure out something.

Several years later, her condition got worse. I still hadn’t found a cure or something to help her. I remember speaking to her on the last day of her life. “You’ve always been such a nice, young man. I wonder who raised you so well.”

“You did,” I had said.

She stared back at me like she didn’t believe me at all. Tears were in her eyes as she reached out and grabbed my hand to hold onto. “You look like my son, Simon, but he’s only seven.” She paused. Silence. "I hope my boy grows up to be just like you."

To her, I’ll always be seven.