The store was dark and
high-ceilinged with a staircase up its left side and rows of shelves filled
with long, multicoloured rectangular boxes. I took another step into the room
and heard a sliding sound coming from between the shelves. It grew louder as if
it neared me and then stopped abruptly. Looking up, I saw a man dressed in
velvet and lace who must have been near one hundred years old positioned on a
rolling ladder attached to a shelf: Garrick Ollivander. He smiled.

“Hello there!” the old man said
as he descended the ladder. His wavering voice echoed the frailty of his
appearance, but there was a recognizable energy coming from his eyes, as if the
prospect of fitting a new wand to a young witch or wizard excited him.

“Hello,” I replied, managing what
I hoped was a smile through my nerves. My voice came out quieter than intended.

Ollivander, who was making his
way towards a shelf at the far end of the store, paused and turned slowly
towards me. I could have sworn that his ears pricked up. “What did you say your
name was, child?”

I felt my cheeks reddening. “Uh…
I didn’t actually. But um, it’s Poppy. Poppy Bellamy Birch.” Ollivander said
nothing, only raised his bushy eyebrows slightly. “Um… Birch is my dad’s last
name so I got that from him… and Bellamy is my mom’s maiden name and my middle
name. So I guess my maiden name isn’t Bellamy, it’s Birch…” I could see the
corners of his mouth twisting up into a smile. “But um… I’m sorry.” At this
point, I expected my face to be a furious shade of scarlet. I gulped. “I’m
rambling.”

He chuckled. “And you are a
muggle-born, I suppose?”

“How did you―”

“I know just the thing for you,
Miss Birch,” he said, cutting me off, as he crossed to a shelf in the center of
the room. He gently pulled a pale green box from the shelf and brought to the
desk just a few feet away from where I stood. I crossed to the desk as he
opened the box and carefully extracted the dark-coloured wand from within it.
He handed it to me.

The wand was cool in my nervous
grasp, its shaft much longer than that of my great aunt’s wand and slightly
curved. Its handle was fairly thick and marginally rough, with little
detailing. To my slight disappointment, it felt like little more than a stick
in my hands.

“What type of wood is this?” I
asked, drawing my eyes away from the wand and back up to Ollivander. “Is this
blackthorn?”

“No, it’s―”

“Ebony?”

Ollivander narrowed his eyes, but
a smile still played at his lips. “Yes. It is ebony.” A moment of silence
passed before he said, “Well, go on. Give it a wave.”

I took a deep breath before bring
the wand up and back down in one swift flick. The light of the lamp on the desk
abruptly flared, and I brought my hand up to shield my eyes in reflex. Eyes
still closed, I heard a loud pop and the sound of glass shattering. The
brightness that I was still aware of through my eyelids immediately dissipated.

The crease between Ollivander’s
eyebrows deepened. “Apparently not.”

He returned the ebony wand back
to its place on the shelf before moving to the left side of the room. Kneeling
down, he struggled to retrieve a lavender-coloured box from the very bottom of
the lowest shelf, mumbling, “Perchance,” under his breath. He brought the box
to his desk.

“This,” he said, opening the box.
“Try this one.” He held the wand he had taken from the box out for me, and I
took it in my right hand. It was slightly shorter and thinner than the ebony
wand, its handle just as smooth and straight as its shaft, and a lighter
colour, too: a faintly reddish medium-brown. As I ran my fingers across the
simple yet elegant engravings that danced upon its surface, it was almost as if
there was a gentle warmth radiating from its core. It felt surprisingly natural
in my hand, like it was an extension of my arm.

Before I even had a chance to
wave it, the warmth grew, spreading up my arm and into my chest and glowing out
of the wand’s tip, now taking the form of a soft yellow light. The small golden
bell that was perched on Ollivander’s desk began to ring, and every small item
in the store, from loose papers to quills to wands free from their boxes, rose
into the air.

I looked up to the surfeit of
levitating, gently turning objects above my head, mesmerized by their halted
motion. This wand had chosen me.

Ollivander’s voice broke me out
of my stupor. “Well then,” he said, watching the contents of his store float
above us. Startled, I lowered my wand, ceasing the ringing of the bell and
dropping every hovering item back down to the surfaces they had come from. “I
believe we have found you a wand, Miss Birch.”

I smiled at the old wizard, the
wand still warm in my hand. “This wand here,” he said, reaching out for it, “is
eleven inches long.” He looked at me expectantly and, with much reluctance, I
gave it back to him. “It is fairly supple, as you can tell. Do you have a guess
as to what wood this, since you seem to be so knowledgeable on the subject?”

I blushed. “I’m not sure. I mean,
it doesn’t quite look like holly, but I don’t think it is cherry.”

“Correct. It is neither of those
woods. This, dear girl,” he said, smiling, holding it out so I could see it,
“is a rowan wand.”

“Rowan?” His words took me aback.
“That’s… that’s a defensive wood, isn’t it?”

“Yes, Miss Birch. A prized wood
for protection, rowan, but not a very common one. You know,” he continued,
placing the wand back into its box and starting to wrap it up in brown paper,
“I remember every wand sold here in this shop.” He leaned over the desk as if
preparing to tell me a well-kept secret and whispered, “Not once has a witch or
wizard left Ollivanders with a rowan wand and turned to the Dark Arts. I
certainly hope that you will not be the first.”

And, with that, he returned to
his usual more or less upright position and finished wrapping the wand box. It
was hard to watch him seal the package when I wanted so badly to be able to
hold the wand again, but I thanked him and paid him eight galleons. He handed
me the box, and I started towards the door, but a thought entered my mind,
causing me to spin on my heels before I got there.

“Mr. Ollivander?” I asked. He had
already moved away from the desk, but at the sound of my voice he turned
towards me again. “You didn’t tell me what the core of this wand is.”

“Ah.” His eyes sparkled. “That is
a phoenix feather wand you have there, Miss Birch.”

“Really?” I automatically looked
down to the package in my hands as if I could see through the wrapping paper
and the material of the box. There was a long pause before I simply said, “Thank
you.”

“You are very welcome.”

I began to walk towards the door
once more, but he stopped me. “Oh and Miss Birch? Good luck at Hogwarts.”

Φ