Ginny stood there, completely stunned. She had long since accepted that she would have to wait another year to go to Hogwarts. Sure, she would complain, but in truth, she knew that there was no way to go to Hogwarts before she was eleven, which wouldn't happen for another year. She was still only nine and almost a week away from being ten.

Yet Ollivander said she was ready to wield magic now? To own and use a wand? While her gaze was still affixed to the old wand maker, she saw, at the edge of her vision, how Sunset's eyes lit up as they always did when she wanted to see magic. Seeing Sunset's eyes widen and a smile spread across her face, Ginny absently registered that Sunset had to have found the same thing Ollivander had.

"You're right. Guess I'll have to start training you as well, huh Ginny?" She turned back to Ollivander. "Do you want Philomena to deliver the message?"

"That would be most kind. I do suspect it will be more than an hour still before my own owl returns. And given the paper work involved, I suspect the headmaster will appreciate a speedy delivery. Give me just a few moments to pen the letter."

With that, the old man moved to go back to his workshop, leaving the seven children alone in the shop for the moment. Ron was looking between his sister and his wand. Fred and George were looking back and forth between Ginny and Sunset. Ginny herself was still dumbstruck in the center.

Sunset, Harry and Hermione watched the Weasleys' reactions with mild amusement, leaning against the counter. Sunset still held her wand and was experimentally channeling her magic through it, finding it to be a rather interesting experience. Her wand could channel her magic incredibly easily. Twice again as easy as her horn, but it was far less flexible and she suspected that she would have to practice casting even just two spells at a time with it. It was truly worthy of being called a focus.

She also noted how directionally focused it made her magic. Casting a simple levitation charm she observed that she needed to actively disperse the magic for the spell to affect anything that wasn't within a thirty degree cone around the direction the wand was pointed. Had she been asked to put it in words she would have called it 'efficient, but constrained'.

She opened her bag, using her wand to float out the galleons Emma had given her to pay for it. She still marveled at how easy it was. The wand didn't glow like her horn or hands did whenever she used her kinesis. Only a faint teal glow at the tip indicated that it was channeling magic. The aura around the coins themselves, however, was the same envelope of teal light it always was.

Deciding to practice her focus while Ollivander was busy writing the letter, she took the six coins and separated them into two stacks of three, then let them fly in two linked rings before splitting them up into three rings with only two coins each. In that fashion she went through various patterns, letting the coins assume various formations as they flew before and around her. When she felt Ollivander approaching again, sensing his connection to the wards from the scanning spell she still had active, she let the coins form a line and stretched out a hand, letting the six galleons form a neat stack in her open palm.

Just seeing the end of her exercise and having felt her fine control through the wards, Ollivander smiled as he came through the door again. "Bravo, Miss Shimmer. Impressive control. You have studied magic before, haven't you?"

"And you are eleven now? Oh my, you have quite a complete magical education, then?"

"Back where I am from, I am one of the most accomplished spell casters known." She didn't bother to hide her pride. "Of course, here the magic taught is fundamentally different. Your understanding of magical translocation is almost painfully crude from my perspective, but in the week I've had extensive contact with the local magical community I've already learned of a few spells that simply don't have any equivalent in my homeland. Especially combative magic seems to be far better understood here."

"So you seek an exchange of knowledge?" When Sunset nodded, Ollivander smiled. "Good, I do suspect both communities can only profit from such a thing." Shaking his head, he refocused on the small envelope in his hands. "Here, if you would be so kind as to have your phoenix send this to Professor Dumbledore."

Sunset took the letter and wordlessly held it up to the disguised phoenix on her shoulder. With a pleasant trill, Philomena held out a wing to the envelope, a golden flame dancing at the tip of the longest primary. The moment the flame reached the letter, it was consumed in a flash of golden fire, leaving Sunset's hand empty and, much to the Weasleys and Harry's astonishment, entirely unharmed.

Calmly lowering her hand as Philomena folded her wing back up, Sunset smiled. "Now I believe I owe you some money, don't I?"

Albus Dumbledore was just on his way back from sharing lunch with the rest of the faculty, when a flash of golden fire in the air before him startled him. With a practiced hand, he caught the letter, recognizing the seal. Wondering what his old friend might want and how he had gotten Fawkes to send the letter, Albus broke the seal, extracted the letter and began to read.

Dear Albus,
How have you been recently?

I'm writing you now to let you know of a
Situation you might want to take action on.
Earlier today I finished a wand for a
customer. I suspect you have heard of
Miss Shimmer. Seeing how she has a
Phoenix at her disposal, I suspected she
would come by rather promptly.
I was not disappointed. She arrived
minutes after receiving my letter,
bringing Mister Potter, Miss Granger
and the four youngest Weasleys with
her. The situation I wish to inform you of
concerns the youngest of the Weasleys.

The daughter of the house shows great
promise and is, in my humble opinion,
ready to wield a wand and learn the art
of magic. Miss Shimmer seems to be in
agreement with me on that matter.
If you need any help on my end to get her
the permission to begin Hogwarts this year,
please let me know.

I suspect that by the time you finish reading this,
they will already have returned to the Weasley
Homestead, in case you wish to take a look for
yourself.

Your friend,
Garrick.

As he read, Dumbledore's eyebrows had climbed ever further up his forehead. The youngest child and only daughter of Molly and Arthur was ready to begin schooling this year instead of next? He had to check the book of admission.

A few minutes' brisk walk later, he arrived in one of the castle's smaller towers. The small, round room, held a single lectern, beautifully carved in the shape of an owl out of ancient, dark wood. Thanks to the extensive enchantments on not only the lectern, but also the leather-bound tome bearing the school's coat of arms atop it and the phoenix feather quill and the simple silver rod lying next to it, it looked pristine as though it had only been carved a day before, yet it was nearly a thousand years old.

With a careful hand, Dumbledore cracked open the ancient book, turning the pages in the ancient registry until he found the letter W. Once he had found the name Weasley, a few pages in it's own right, it only took him a moment to find the letter G and from there, find the line he was looking for. There, written in the blocky, mechanical script of the ancient quill, was the line of text he was looking for.

It was those last three words that confirmed Garrick's suspicion. Ginny was indeed ready to attend Hogwarts. He closed the book and began a mental list of all the paperwork needed for a special permission to attend Hogwarts a year early. It was an unusual event, but not unheard of.

Since ancient times, starting with the founding of the school, children had entered education at Hogwarts when they were ready. Only a few centuries ago, the, at the time, newly founded Ministry of Magic had mandated that all wizarding children were to attend the school starting at age eleven, regardless of when they were ready.

If such early talent was spotted, of course, exceptions could be made, as the headmaster, that was his prerogative. But no doubt the Ministry would make a fuss about it. He sighed as he considered the inevitable. He would have to, once again, remind them of their place.

With a flash of flame, the seven children reappeared back in the orchard at the Burrow. Without much ceremony, Fred and George dragged Ron and Harry off to the Quidditch field, saying something about the two needing some sports practice after the studying of the previous two days.

Finally waking from her shell shocked condition, Ginny giggled. "You know, I never would have thought Ron and studying were words that went together."

As they watched the twins drag Harry and Ron off to their small Quidditch field, Sunset smirked. "Y'know, we really ought to introduce them to Parkour at some point."

"No. It's a French thing. It's a kind of sport as well. We've been doing it for close to half a year now. Want us to show you?"

"Okay then." With a wave of Sunset's hand, the air around the three warped and they vanished.

Looking around, Ginny got her first glance at a muggle living room. It took the other two girls several minutes before they could ask Philomena to deliver a message to Mrs. Weasley so she wouldn't worry and then get to their rooms to change into their exercise clothes.

The clothes were another bit of culture shock for Ginny, having been raised among wizards beyond the outskirts of a rural village in Devon, had not prepared her for what was a common sight among muggles in a suburb of Birmingham. She giggled when she realized that Sunset had her hair tied back in a ponytail. Hermione had hers in a single braid behind her, her ribbon woven into the braid as usual.

The tight fitting, knee long trousers and light, flexible shoes were ideal for maintaining freedom of movement, their equally tight shirts would be sure to stay where they should regardless of their position and make sure that during rolls of various kinds, they would not touch the pavement. With their expertise in magic, scratches were easily healed, but they were still unpleasant and inconvenient. The gloves they wore served the same purpose. Unaware of where they were going and what they were doing there, Ginny was rather confused by them.

Sunset and Hermione both smirked, the latter providing, "oh, you'll see," as the only answer. Moving to the front door, Hermione tapped the lock with a finger, unlocking it, and opened the door. The three stepped out and Sunset closed the door behind them, re-locking it with a snap of her fingers.

Ginny was still marveling at the casual use of magic when the two older girls broke into a leisurely jog. It was quickly revealed that the two were in far better form than Ginny was. She may have made a habit of breaking into the shed and practicing on her brothers' brooms, but flying hadn't trained her legs all too well. By the time they reached the small skate park, another concept she was completely unfamiliar with, Ginny was exhausted. She was still breathing easily, but her legs hurt.

Sunset, however, was in top shape and Hermione, too, was only slightly winded. For the next five minutes or so, they went through various stretches to limber up, then they began their usual practice routine.

To say that Ginny was impressed by their ability to simply jump over and slide under obstacles as though they weren't a hindrance at all, not to mention fall several times their own height and land unscathed, or combine a few techniques and traverse a wall twice their height while barely loosing momentum, would be a complete understatement. Suddenly, their skillful landings after their first floo travel made so much more sense.

Finally, they stopped and came over to sit down beside her, breathing heavily. Ginny simply stared at them. "How did you learn to do all that?"

The two took a few more moments to let their breathing calm down, then Sunset made to explain. "Well, our teacher showed us the sport in PE during my first week of school here. He said he picked it up on vacation in France. I decided that I enjoyed it and did some more research, then I started practicing."

"I joined in whenever I felt like it. I started doing it more regularly after the hols started."

Ginny took a moment to mentally parse the explanation, but kept running into a word she didn't understand. "Uh, what's PE?"

The girls both shrugged. "Beats me," Sunset admitted. "Anyways I mostly started doing this to keep in shape. So my magic gets stronger."

"Well," Sunset started again after a few more moments, "let's head back. We can get back to the Burrow and get started on training your magic. You do have a bit to catch up on."

Still rather shell shocked by the day's revelations, Ginny dumbly nodded, getting up as well. "I still can't believe I might get to go to Hogwarts this year. I mean, I'm only nine!"

The two older girls shot her questioning looks. "I thought you were going to go to Hogwarts next year? Wouldn't you have to be eleven by then?"

"Eleven by September first. My birthday is on Monday, I'll be ten by the time Hogwarts starts."

"I see." Sunset suddenly wore a smile that could be generously described as 'mildly concerning'. "Ginny?"

"Your mother strikes me as the kind to throw her children birthday parties. Is that true?"

Worried by Sunset's sudden shift in behavior, Ginny quietly nodded, not daring to take her eyes off the girl.

From the girl's other side, Hermione put an arm around Ginny's shoulder. "Don't worry about that. It's a cultural thing. Apparently where she's from they have a habit of celebrating at every opportunity they get. So for big things like birthdays, the parties need to be more special. You should've seen what she did for mum's birthday."

Hermione giggled quietly. "I'm tempted to tell you. But I really don't want to ruin the surprise."

A Phoenix Beyond the Veil - The Philospher's Stone

by gerandakis

[RVS]18 - Wand Wonders