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[Luke Lagowski]

Luke liked Brightstone, although he'd probably like it a lot more once February came around. When he turned eleven, he'd be a real wizard. Hopefully. Freddie had tried to reassure him he had nothing to worry about, that magical blood was in his veins and there was no way he'd end up being a squib, but it was still a fear that played frequently in the back of his mind, and in some ways he was dreading his upcoming birthday incase it put an end to his dreams.

The boy was the youngest of three, and following in the footsteps of his older siblings was the single most important thing. The Three Musketeers, that's what Susie had referred to them as. Even if things changed, at least they'd always have each other. When he got the chance, Luke liked to come to New Zealand because that where they were. Even if he wasn't at Hogwarts (yet), he could at least pretend to keep up with them by coming to Brightstone.

He'd been walking along the edge of a long pathway, one step in front of the other as he stepped on the thin curb that framed the cobblestone. In his hands he was holding his handheld console, smashing the buttons with his thumbs as hard and as fast as he could. That was, until the little figure on the screen stopped throwing out his shield, and froze in mid air. Luke frowned, squeezing the console between his hands in frustration before looking up into the real world. "S'pose it's here then," he mumbled to himself, retracing his steps just two feet, the character on the screen falling once more to the floor. He saved his game, before tucking the console back into his bag, careful to make sure it was right at the bottom, before turning his attention to the village up ahead. Luke slipped off the curb, moving further into Brightstone with a slight sense of unease and a dash of excitement, curious if any of the shops would take any of his muggle christmas money.

 

[Alfred Gorbach]

So his aunt had told him about this village where allegedly a magical community existed, and had insisted on taking him. He had insisted on refusing with equal force. Magic had done enough damage in his life, he wasn’t ready to encounter more before he absolutely had to.

He was curious though. He figured he should get at least a few glimpses. First, to maybe find a reason why his parents reacted the way they did. And second, to actually prepare better, so he wouldn’t stand out too much when he finally went to the school, open-mouthed and gaping at everything around. So he decided he would go by himself. And Alfred, also not being keen on asking questions to Amelia, and frankly, he didn’t have enough knowledge to even ask the right ones, had entered the approximate location his aunt had mentioned into the GPS on his phone.

He'd already tried coming this way before, but figured he maybe didn’t look up the right time, missed a turn or something, but he couldn’t for the life of him figure out why the navigation suddenly showed he should be going in the opposite direction.
So here he was, round two.
Someone was there.

Okay. No big deal. He was from the North, where people weren't big on small talk and definitely not in the habit of striking up conversations with strangers without a purpose. He was just going to ignore the boy and walk past him confidently, as if he totally knew where he was going.

“Recalculating… make a U-turn,” a loud, robotic voice suddenly blared from his pocket just as he was approaching the other boy.

Someone have mercy. Of course. Embarrassing himself was apparently a new sport he'd pick up. And, evidently, he was absolutely born for it.

He'd completely forgotten he'd turned on voice guidance to avoid missing the said turn. And of course, it had to go off now, making him look like some dazed tourist dad with no idea what he was doing.

He quickly pulled out his phone, trying to mute the navigation as if that would somehow undo the damage.​