“I’m… a wizard?” Lux asked the man sitting on the couch in front of him. His name was Robert, and he was in wizarding robes that were black with red, yellow, green, and blue stitched in appropriate places throughout. His parents sat with him, opposite of the man. If someone could have taken a picture of the three, their faces seemed somewhere between bewilderment and skepticism, even after Robert had explained the situation to them. He had shown them the proper credentials, of course, from their government and the UW. Everything seemed to check out, minus the crazy notion that Lux had any magical capabilities.

“That is correct.” The man replied.

Lux snapped his fingers and waved them around. “Sure doesn’t seem like it.”

“That is because you don’t have a wand, yet.” Robert took his wand out from beneath his robes, and the Avery family leaned back on their couch, breath held in anticipation. This received a laugh from Robert. “Don’t worry, it won’t bite.” He held the wand toward Lux, handle first.

Lux gently reached forward and grabbed it from his hands. He expected the thing to go off, shoot laser beams from the tip, or have an overwhelming feeling of power and a strong desire for world domination. Instead, it just felt like he was holding a stick. A plain, wooden stick that had some pretty carvings.

“Now repeat after me,” Robert said. “Lumos”.

Lux did as he said, and the wand gave an extremely weak, faint, glow of light at the end before extinguishing. The man frowned, as if he had hoped for something more, but quickly turned it into a smile. He motioned toward his parents. “Now, if you don’t mind, you two next.” They did as he said, but with no luck.

“How do we know you didn’t just make the wand do that when it was my turn?” Lux asked suspiciously.

“Because, wizards need a wand to do magic, usually. Sometimes, untrained children will demonstrate magic without a wand, or an extremely powerful and skilled wizard after decades can perform several spells without the aid of his wand. I, however, am not an extremely powerful, nor am I an extremely skilled wizard.” He chuckled, trying to throw some self-deprecating humor to lighten the mood.

Robert's humility in his own magical prowess caused Lux to hesitate for a moment, starting to believe the man. When he mentioned the part about untrained children exhibiting raw forms of magic, that sentence caused him to think back to his childhood. There wasn’t a moment, specifically, that made him think that he was a wizard. Random things seemed to happen around Lux, especially when his emotions flared. Hologram’s would flicker when he would laugh really hard… or a drone magically working when he hit the thing hard out of anger. The longer he thought about it, the more moments he would remember.

Lux looked up at his parents. They felt his gaze and looked at him. He could see it in their eyes – they were thinking of the same moments but from their eyes. Even as a baby, technology just happened to glitch around him when he would throw a tantrum or cry from being hurt.

Robert chuckled. “My favorite part! The realization creeping in. I’m assuming you are thinking of some memories that echo my words?” He asked rhetorically. Robert was the go-to wizard Hogwarts-Ilvermorny sent out to muggle-born wizards. He just had a way of staying calm, convincing, and he came across as a pretty simple, nice guy. It made his far-fetched words more believable, even if it wasn’t 100 percent convincing. Hence, the trick with the wand.

Lumos was by far the easiest spell for a wizard to produce, not requiring a lot of concentration. Robert was disappointed at the result, the amount of light produced was actually one of the weakest performances he had seen in recent years. Just another reminder of wizards not being what they once were.

Hours went by filled with more questions and longer silences. Robert was an expert at his craft, however, and continued to be patient and kind. Lux’s parents seemed to accept the truth more quickly than he did, surprisingly. It was like there was a puzzle piece missing when they thought about their kid, and what made him tick, and this was it.

The wizard began to explain the method of transportation to the school, which was located in Scotland, and when he began to describe their destination, Lux had to try very hard to not just burst out laughing at the man. A telephone booth. Yes, that is where Robert had told him they needed to go. The only telephone booths Lux had ever seen were from old history books, showing areas long forgotten from war or nuclear fallout.

“So to be clear” Lux began and he leaned forward on their couch, holding his hand out as he counted off with his fingers. “One. I am a wizard, and our family many generations ago had someone you all call a squib, who lost their magical gene… but now it showed up in me.”

“Yes.” Robert replied.

Lux held up a second finger. “Two, because my parents aren’t wizards, I don’t have much choice in education as I can’t really home school. So now I have to go to somewhere in Scotland, and I get to learn to be a wizard for free, sort of, until I graduate in which I pay the school back with small fees over the course of several years.”

“I think saying you have to is a little strong, but yes, correct.” Robert answered.“Fine. Encouraged then… so I’m encouraged to go to this school and it takes seven years, which I would have to leave my parents for except for the summers if I so choose. Because of this, the school is going to offer some low-powered artifacts to help my parents out while I’m gone.”

“Three for three.” Robert smiled politely.

“Oh I’m not done.” Lux said, holding up a fourth finger.

“I would expect nothing less.”

“Sorry, I’m a bit analytical, just like to have my thoughts straight,” Lux said, shrugging his shoulders. Robert just gestured with his hands to have him continue. “Fourth, technology doesn’t work at the school or around the school grounds. According to you, the magic that radiates off of us, the professors, the enchantments on the school, is too much for modern technology to function properly. So you all use owls to deliver letters, and pictures that can move and be animated… and if my parents are mad, they can send a letter that yells at me?”

“Hopefully the last part you would get to avoid, but all correct. We have tried pretty hard with muggle scientists and engineers to involve modern technology into our magical society, with little success. At best, we can make objects with magic function fairly well, but it usually has to be in the confines of a muggle-dominated population. Schools and ministries that are run by wizards just have too much magic running around in the air. Add in all the enchantments, and it is pretty much impossible .” Robert concluded his long-winded speech, knowing very well a young man like Lux trying to wrap his head around a life without a hologram would be traumatic, to say the least.

Lux let out a raspberry and looked at his parents. “I don’t want to leave you,” he said quietly. It would probably seem silly to most to say something like that when you have a chance to learn magic, but, when you live in a small town and your only true friends are your parents – it was a daunting task.

His mom put her hand on his hand and smiled. “I know.”

Lux’s dad just looked at him, with a serious look on his face. “But you know you have to.”

Lux nodded. Him becoming a wizard, even a crappy one, would be an amazing boon to his family. They had just joked about wizards a few nights ago, looking on them with equal parts disdain and reverence. Funny how disdain quickly fades when you have to opportunity to reap the rewards. The money he would get could pay for several upgrades to the farm, and he would have access to so many different magical artifacts. Hell, he could maybe wind up making a few of them.

Lux sighed and looked toward Robert. “Okay, so tell me how the hell a telephone is supposed to take me to Scotland.”