The remaining weeks of summer passed in a blur of blissful, non-explosive domesticity.
Lucius Malfoy, having successfully navigated the treacherous waters of Ministry bribery (officially termed "lobbying for broomstick safety standards"), returned to the dinner table with the air of a conqueror. He listened with varying degrees of interest as his sons recounted their day in Diagon Alley.
Draco's version of events was a colorful fabrication where he was the star of the show.
"And then, Father, I walked into the menagerie and Titan—that's the owl—he looked right at me and screeched! The shopkeeper said he's never seen a bird take to a wizard so quickly. It was destiny!" Draco exclaimed, waving a forkload of peas for emphasis. "And Mr. Ollivander said my wand is excellent for curses. I bet I could hex a Gryffindor from across the pitch!"
Lucius nodded indulgently. "A powerful wand for a powerful wizard. Excellent, Draco."
Then he turned to Narcissa. "And the accounts? I trust there were no... complications?"
Narcissa dabbed her lips with a napkin. Her version was clinical, precise, and devoid of Nifflers or secret cabinet purchases.
"The boys were well-behaved," she lied smoothly. "Draco showed excellent taste in robes, opting for the silver buckles. Orion was... efficient. He purchased several supplementary texts that Professor McGonagall herself noted were advanced for his age. We encountered her in the bookstore."
Lucius perked up. "McGonagall? You made an impression?"
"Orion did," Narcissa smiled faintly. "He was charming. I believe the Deputy Headmistress is already anticipating his arrival."
"Good," Lucius smirked. "It is always beneficial to have the faculty's favor early on. Even if she is a blood traitor-loving Gryffindor."
Orion stayed quiet, cutting his steak. He noticed that Narcissa had conveniently omitted the trip to Knockturn Alley and the purchase of the heavy, broken antique currently sitting under a dust sheet in the East Wing storage room.
Later that evening, as Orion was heading to his room, Narcissa intercepted him in the hallway.
"Orion."
"Mother."
"I did not mention your... purchase to your father," she said quietly, her blue eyes scanning his face.
"I noticed," Orion leaned against the wall. "May I ask why? I expected a lecture on clutter."
"Your father," Narcissa sighed, "views anything broken as garbage. He would not understand why a Malfoy would pay thirty-five Galleons for a cabinet that does nothing at all. He would have had the elves burn it for firewood."
"And you?" Orion asked. "Do you think it's firewood?"
"I think you rarely do things without a reason," she said. "But I must ask... you are not planning to use it for target practice, are you? It is an eighteenth-century piece. It would be a waste."
Orion smiled. He decided a partial truth was safer than a lie.
"You caught me," he admitted. "I don't want to destroy it. It's the runes, Mother. I looked at them in the shop. They are... complex. Ancient arithmetic sequences. I want to study them."
Narcissa's expression softened into pride. "Runes. I should have guessed. You always were the scholarly one."
"I just want to understand how it works," Orion continued. "Right now, my knowledge is basic. But give me a few years... I might be able to fix it. Or at least, write a paper on why it failed."
"A noble academic pursuit," Narcissa nodded, satisfied. "Keep it in the storage room. And do not let Draco play inside it. I do not want him getting stuck inside the box because of those broken runes.."
"I promise, no Draco in the box."
Once he was safely in his room, Orion closed the door and moved to his new trunk.
It was a masterpiece of luggage engineering. The "Undetectable Extension Charm" model. He opened the lid and climbed down the ladder into the main compartment. It was essentially a small studio apartment lined with bookshelves.
"Sparkle," Orion said, sitting on the comfortable leather chair inside his trunk. "Let's review the Grand Plan."
The blue interface flickered to life against the wood-paneled wall of the trunk.
"The plan where we fix a magical terrorist transport system?" Sparkle asked.
"The plan where we create the ultimate commute," Orion corrected.
He visualized the Vanishing Cabinet upstairs. He knew its twin resided on the seventh floor of Hogwarts, stuffed in a room of forgotten things.
"Here is the endgame," Orion explained. "The cabinets are quantum entangled. A bridge between two points. Draco, in the original timeline, fixes the one at Hogwarts in his sixth year to let Death Eaters into the castle. That creates a bridge between Hogwarts and Borgin & Burkes."
"Right. Bad vibes," Sparkle noted.
"But I bought the Borgin & Burkes cabinet. It's here. At the Manor."
Orion leaned forward, eyes gleaming. "If I fix the connection, the bridge becomes Hogwarts to Malfoy Manor."
"Okay," Sparkle processed this. "So you can sneak home for weekends? A bit mundane, but practical."
"Better," Orion tapped the armrest. "I plan to put one of the cabinets inside this trunk."
Sparkle's waveform paused. "Inside... the trunk?"
"Exactly. Think about it. If I fix the pair, and I manage to steal the Hogwarts one—and place it securely inside this expanded compartment..."
Orion grinned. "I will have a doorway to home in my pocket. I can be in the Slytherin Common Room, climb into my trunk, step into the cabinet, and walk out into my bedroom in Wiltshire. Or vice versa. It's a portable wormhole. A way home from anywhere."
"That..." Sparkle's voice rose in admiration. "That is surprisingly brilliant. And highly illegal. Bypassing Hogwarts' anti-apparition wards by using a sub-space pocket dimension to house a spatial gateway? The Arithmancy alone gives me a error codes."
"Draco fixed it in his sixth year while having a nervous breakdown," Orion pointed out. "I plan to do it by my fourth year, with a clear head and your help. We have the Manor cabinet to study now. Once I get to Hogwarts, I'll locate the twin. I'll run diagnostics."
"Goal accepted," Sparkle chirped. "Operation: Portal is a go."
With the heavy theoretical planning out of the way, Orion decided it was finally time.
The real time.
He climbed out of the trunk and stood in the center of his bedroom. The moon was shining through the balcony doors.
He rolled up the right sleeve of his silk pajamas. He flicked his wrist.
Snap.
The Hawthorn wand shot from the holster into his hand. It felt warm, eager, and welcoming. Unlike the Blackthorn wand, which felt like holding a live wire, this felt like holding a torch.
"Okay," Orion whispered. "First conscious spell. No glitches. No explosions. Just magic."
He took a breath, centering himself. He felt the indigo ocean of his core. He guided a small stream of it down his arm, through his wrist, and into the Hawthorn wood.
The wand accepted the magic greedily, amplifying it, shaping it.
"Lumos."
It was instant.
A pure, steady, brilliant white light bloomed from the tip of the wand. It wasn't a strobe light. It wasn't a laser beam. It was a perfect sphere of illumination, banishing the shadows of the room. It was steady. It was controlled.
Orion stared at it, mesmerized. The light reflected in his dark blue eyes.
"It works," he whispered. "It actually works."
DING.
The sound was loud in the quiet room.
Orion flinched, but the light on his wand didn't waver.
[ ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED! ]
"I knew it," Orion grinned, the light casting long shadows on his face. "I knew the first spell would trigger one."
"Hold your horses, cowboy," Sparkle interrupted. "Don't get cocky."
"Is it possible," Orion asked excitedly, ignoring her, "that every spell I cast for the first time gives an achievement? Wingardium Leviosa? Alohomora? Avada—well, maybe not that one."
He didn't wait for an answer. He wanted to test the theory.
"Nox," he commanded. The light extinguished instantly.
He pointed the wand at The Art of Warding lying on his desk.
"Wingardium Leviosa."
The book rose smoothly into the air. It hovered perfectly still, rotating gently at his mental command. No velocity. No ricocheting. Just perfect levitation.
Orion waited. He stared at the air next to the floating book.
...
Nothing.
"Colloportus," he first locked his wardrobe shut.
"Alohomora," he pointed at his locked wardrobe again and cast. Click. It opened.
...
Nothing.
Orion lowered the wand, letting the book settle gently back onto the desk. He let out a sigh.
"Okay," Orion grumbled. "So it's not a farming simulator. Why did Lumos trigger it, but not the others?"
The interface floated down to eye level. Sparkle let out an audible, digital sigh.
"Orion," she said patiently. "You didn't get the achievement because you cast 'Lumos'. You got the achievement because you finally, after a month of failing with the Stick of Spite, managed to cast a spell without endangering your own life. It's a milestone achievement. 'First Successful Conscious Magic'. It's about the breakthrough."
"So I won't get one for every spell?"
"No. That would be inflation. And boring," Sparkle explained. "However... if you cast something massive? Something that requires significant emotional or magical maturity? Like a Patronus? Or a Fiendfyre you can actually control? That might trigger something. But basic curriculum? No."
Orion nodded slowly. It made sense. The System rewarded narrative peaks, not grinding.
"Fine," Orion said. "Show me the loot. I earned this."
The screen expanded.
Tier: 1 (Basic)
Name: Guiding Light of Success
Description: "When all other lights go out." You did it. You finally cast a spell that didn't result in property damage, a light show, or the liquefaction of your bed. You have proven that you are not, in fact, a squib with a glitched UI, but a wizard capable of the absolute bare minimum. Congratulations on finding the 'On' switch to your magical core.
Reward: 1x Prismatic Marble (The Rainbow Maker).
Orion read the name and the description, a chuckle bubbling up in his chest. "Guiding Light? Really?"
"It felt appropriate," Sparkle defended. "You looked very dramatic holding that wand."
"And the reward..." Orion checked his inventory. A new icon had appeared. A small, swirling sphere.
He summoned it.
It was a glass marble, perfectly round, but the glass seemed to shift and swirl with internal colors.
"A marble," Orion said flatly.
"Use Lumos on it," Sparkle urged. "Go on."
Orion held the marble in his left hand and his wand in his right.
"Lumos."
The white light from the wand tip struck the marble.
Instantly, the marble didn't just glow; it refracted the light. It split the pure white beam into a dazzling, intensified cone of rainbows. A vivid, spectral fan of color projected onto the opposite wall, painting the Malfoy silk wallpaper in brilliant reds, oranges, blues, and violets.
It was beautiful. Useless in a fight, perhaps, but undeniably pretty.
"It makes rainbows," Orion said, watching the colors dance as he rotated the marble.
"It's a mood lifter," Sparkle said. "And hey, if you ever need to blind someone with pure, unadulterated color, it works for that too."
"Nox."
The light died. The room returned to darkness. Orion slipped the marble back into his inventory and holstered his wand.
"I'll take it," Orion yawned, the adrenaline of the casting finally fading into exhaustion. "It's better than a knock on the head."
He climbed into bed—his solid, non-liquid bed—and stared up at the cherubs.
"I can do magic, Sparkle," he whispered, the reality of it settling deep in his bones. "Real conscious magic."
"You sure can, kiddo," Sparkle whispered back. "Now get some sleep. September 1st is coming."
Orion closed his eyes, a contented smile on his face. He had the gear. He had the plan. He had the power.
Hogwarts didn't stand a chance.