Hermione Granger was shorter than Duchess expected, but somehow even more formidable in person. Her brown curls fell to her shoulders, and her robes were a deep purple, embroidered subtly with the seal of the Ministry of Magic. She looked—Duchess thought—like a professor who might simultaneously change your life and catch you cheating.
“You must be Duchess,” Hermione said warmly, extending her hand. “Welcome to Diagon Alley. I’m the Minister of Magic.”
“I know,” Duchess blurted out. “I mean—thank you. I read your bio in the packet.”
Hermione laughed. “Ah, the guide.”
“Also! Your chocolate frog card!”
“Could use a little updating, but I’m glad it was helpful. Ron Weasley added those to your welcome packet. He loves those cards.” Duchess didn’t know who that was, but she didn’t ask.
“My dad loves the chocolate. He ate them all!” Ben blushed, but Hermione put her hand gently on Duchess’s shoulder, guiding her down the street.
“Mind if I show you around?”
“Please,” Duchess replied eagerly. They walked down the small street together. Hermione continued,
“A new invention I’ve created. I was hoping you could help me. It’s the idea of a credit card from the muggle world. It was difficult to convince the goblins to try it but they’re willing after I explained to them they can keep all the gold in the bank. Every shop is required to have a credit wand terminal. Some were unwilling, but there’s a decree they must have them anyway.”
They passed a stand of self-stirring cauldrons, a shop with quills that danced behind glass, and a gaggle of young witches crowding the window of Madam Malkin’s.
“Instead of a card, though, you use your wand. Now, you don’t have a wand yet, so we’ll have to use gold for now. I just can’t stand all those heavy coins in my robe, and I can’t carry that satchel around my wrist all the time when I’m trying to work. I’ve even added a rewards program! They can earn 1 galleon for every 100 galleons they spend! Some think it’s a scam. But it’s not. Well, just like a credit card, you have to pay it back every month or they’ll have to pay interest. But I’ve also added automatic monthly repayment straight from their Gringott’s vault.” Duchess was aware of how credit cards work, but Hermione seemed to enjoy explaining it, so she stayed quiet.
Hermione steered her gently toward the far end of the Alley, toward a narrow shop front marked Ollivanders: Makers of Fine Wands since 382 B.C.
The window was dusty. Inside, it was dim and cramped, and the air smelled of cedar and something electric, like the air before a storm. Stacks of long, thin boxes teetered toward the ceiling.
A soft bell rang as they entered.
“Ah,” a voice said quietly from behind the shelves, “A new witch.”
Duchess felt something shiver down her spine—not fear, exactly, but something close.
Hermione gave Duchess an encouraging nod. As Duchess stepped forward, Hermione gently guided her parents out the door and followed close behind.
A voice called from behind the tall shelves,
“I know, you were expecting my father. He’s long retired. You know, he sold Harry Potter his wand. The wand that defeated the greatest dark wizard who ever lived, Voldemort. People used to never say his name until Harry Potter defeated him. Now we know, he was just like any other wizard. You live, you die… anyway,” the man continued, “I’ve heard about you,” Ollivander started as he stepped up the ladder. He pulled out a long box.
Ollivander’s son was a striking man in his thirties, with the quiet intensity of someone who’d spent his life listening more than speaking. His hair, a rich brown, was combed neatly over one side in a style that felt both deliberate and effortless, as though he’d walked off the page of a Muggle men’s fashion catalogue without realizing it.
His eyes, a pale, metallic silver, held a kind of ancient wisdom—eerily reflective, like polished steel catching candlelight. They flicked over wands and customers with the same cool discernment, as though measuring the weight of their souls.
He didn’t dress like a wizard. Instead of robes, he wore a fitted blue polo that hugged the muscular frame of his chest and arms, its collar crisp against his tanned skin. His shorts, tan and well-tailored, cut just above the knee, revealing strong, toned legs. On his feet were clean boating shoes—practical, quiet, and stylish in a way that didn’t try too hard.
Everything about him suggested strength kept in check, power held in reserve. He could have passed for a Muggle athlete, but the air around him shimmered faintly with magic. The kind that makes a room quieter when he walks in.
“Let’s try this one…” As Ollivander slowly stepped back down the ladder, she saw that Mr. Ollivander was a young man. He looked nothing like the man in the packet Professor Granger left with Duchess.
“What did you think when you received your letter to attend Hogwarts?” Duchess suddenly looked sad,
“I thought my brother was playing a trick on me. Mike’s always popping out at me and playing pranks. He’s a menace like that. I don’t think Bill had anything to do with it, but he just ignored it and never really defended me.” Ollivander laughed,
“Well, you’ll be playing tricks on him long enough.” Duchess suddenly stood up straight and grinned. It was the first time she didn’t look scared or nervous since they arrived at Diagon Alley. He handed Duchess a light wand.
Immediately, Duchess felt a wind blow across the room. The cool air left a chill in her spine and she suddenly felt she was flying. “I knew it!” Ollivander said. “I’m too good!” he exclaimed commenting himself. “Your hair and your eyes… This is a willow wand with a Veela hair. I know my father used to say it’s so tempermental, so he didn’t make any wands with with it, but I had to make just one. I could tell, this wand will be loyal to you.”
Ollivander wrapped up the wand in a neat box and handed it to her. “Ten galleons,” Ollivander let her know. Duchess took out her wand and looked up at him not knowing quite what to do. “Oh, right,” Ollivander chuckled. “You’re the first one who’s trying this money wand thing, you know? Let’s see if it works.” Ollivander took out a golden music box that fit in the palm of his hand. Only it wasn’t a music box . It didn’t even open. Duchess tapped the box and his cash register suddenly gave a ring. Ollivander went over the cash register and opened it. “Oh… it works. Fascinating. There’s actually a function to have it go directly into my vault in Gringott’s, but I don’t want to do that quite yet. I’d like to keep the galleons close so I can make sure it works.”
Duchess carefully put the wand in her expanding satchel.
“Thank you,” she whispered to him and left the shop.
A goblin named Grimblethorn came up behind Duchess and Kim, “Right this way, Ma’ams.” They followed the goblin down the great bank, with their shoes clacking on the marble floors. Ben stayed back, still in awe, looking up at the ceiling. Duchess and her mom followed the goblin to the back of the bank.
“Feels like everyone’s watching us,” Kim said, looking around.
“We are,” Grimblethorn replied.
The heavy gold doors magically opened up to them, and a golden carriage zoomed forward and made a sudden stop in front of Duchess and her mother.
Duchess eagerly climbed in, and as her mom carefully stepped in, not trusting the tracks as she looked into the canyon underneath.
Some time between Kim giving the American dollars over to the goblins and the quick arrival of Duchess to vault 8487, the American currency had been exchanged into wizarding money. “Wizarding world is smaller than Muggle world,” Grimblethorn growled, “we use the same currency around the world. Here’s your vault. All in galleons.”
Duchess carefully stepped into her vault and looked around at her new wizarding money, stacked high. “Just take a few galleons, knuts… don’t need too much. After you get your wand, it will automatically connect with your vault.”
Grimblethorn took a step back as Duchess grabbed a handful of gold.
“Is this enough?” She turned to ask her mother.
“How should I know?” Grimnlethorn grunted. Duchess grabbed another handful.
“I told you already. You don’t need a lot since they’re trying to implement that contraption at all the shops.” Duchess turned around and stepped out of the vault and back into the cart.
The moment Duchess stepped into Diagon Alley, it felt like the air had changed—not just the smell, though it did smell different, like parchment and chimney smoke and something sweet and metallic—but the air itself seemed alive, as though it breathed with her. Her sneakers clicked oddly on the cobblestone, and she held tight to her mother’s hand, half in awe, half in nerves. They had just landed in London that morning from California.
Duchess was a tall, half-Vietnamese, half-white eleven-year-old with hair that had always grown in a silvery white with a tint of blue shimmering as if dusted with starlight. Not like the hair of an old woman—it looked enchanted, like something belonging to a magical creature, and people were often left staring in awe. She wore it just past her shoulders, where it bounced in soft, natural curls at the ends.
Her parents often joked she must have been adopted, that her real parents were fairies—but aside from the ethereal hair, she looked unmistakably like them. She had her mother’s heart-shaped face and delicate features, and her full lips mirrored Kim’s exactly. Her bright blue eyes came from her father, Ben. She even had his chin dimple, but her nose was a perfect mix of the two—long like her mother’s, but with the height and structure of her father’s.
Kim stood tall at five foot six, just a shade shorter than Ben, but anyone could tell Duchess would soon outgrow them both.
Her mother had grown quiet since they passed through the Leaky Cauldron, her eyes scanning every crooked window and fluttering sign. Her father, Ben, looked out of place, broad-shouldered in his cat t-shirt, but his eyes twinkled as they always did when they saw something new.
They were looking for Gringotts.
Duchess adjusted the strap on her backpack and turned to the ornate map the Ministry had sent in the welcome packet. It was heavy paper with an enchantment that made the little sketch of Diagon Alley shimmer faintly. The map was mostly plain, except a colorful icon that glowed switching between all the colors imaginable with little explosions coming from it reading, “Weasley’s.” A red dot pulsed where they were. A blue one glowed up the street—Gringotts. The map always knew where you wanted to go.
“There,” she said, pointing past a teetering shop of broomsticks.
And there it was, just like the book had said: a gleaming white marble building that towered over every crooked shop around it. It looked as though it had been jammed into the street by accident, too grand for its neighbors. The steps were wide and shallow, and flanking the doors were two goblins in armor that shimmered like oil.
Inside, the air shifted again.
The lobby stretched long and tall, with crystal chandeliers dripping from a vaulted ceiling that caught the gold light and threw it in soft patterns on the marble floor. Rows and rows of goblins sat behind high counters, quills scratching in ledgers, some counting coins, others examining gems with tiny monocles. Duchess already knew they were goblins—small, sharp-featured, with long fingers and eyes like ink spots—because she’d read about them in the Ministry’s “Muggle-born’s Guide to the Wizarding World.” The packet had arrived the week after the Minister herself came to visit their home in California and told Duchess she was a witch.
“I’m here to exchange currency, please.” A goblin looked up at her.
“Exchange rate is posted,” he said in a gravelly voice.
Kim stepped forward with a large duffle bag full of cash. Fresh bills all 100s and neatly wrapped. It took months for the US mint to get it to her, but she didn’t want to take any chances insulting anyone at the wizarding bank with dirty or old money. They tried to question her about why she needed so much cash in brand new bills. She didn’t know what to say. It was supposed to be a secret. Then one day, all the questions stopped.
“The minister says you will exchange muggle American dollars for me,” she told the goblin and with a thump, lifted the bag onto the counter. It looked like drug money from a movie, but Kim had taken extra care to request uncirculated bills from her own muggle bank. The goblin did not appreciate that. Ben would have had the strength to lift it more easily and not drop it on the counter so hard, but he was distracted staring at the ceiling at the magical succulents that continually bloomed and disappeared only to bloom again.
Hermione had mentioned there were scholarship programs if Duchess needed it. But her parents were well off enough. Her parents owning several businesses between them in Orange County, California.
The goblin accepted them without blinking, he turned to the end of the row of goblins and just gave a short growl. A large man, at least 12-feet tall came, lifted the large bag, emptied it out into a gold box being the goblin and it all the cash quickly flew up the shoot. The man folded the bag as best he could and politely handed it back to Kim with 2 hands.
The goblin returned a small velvet pouch heavy with coins.
“Galleons, Sickles, and Knuts,” he said. “Try not to lose track. Granger told me not to give you too much. She wants you to try that credit wand thing, but you’ll need some in your pocket.” The goblin looked back down as he mumbled to himself, “Bloody mad woman.”
Suddenly, a mining cart pulled up behind the goblin and he stepped down to open the gate next to the counter.
“Step in,” he commanded. “Grimblethorn will take you to your vault.”
She thanked him, a little awkwardly, and stepped behind the counter and into the cart. There wasn’t any room for her parents.
“Witch only,” Grimblethorn growled at them. A little taken aback, they nodded and stepped back.
This story is from my own imagination based in a world created by J.K. Rowling. I’m a writer– not an artist. All images are 100% AI-generated. They are, however, prompted and come from my imagination. The images were generated from paragraphs of description and details written by myself and revised over and over again.
A story of a Hogwarts first-year student with absolutely no drama– just magic.
