Gloria had always thought she knew exactly what her life was supposed to look like.

It had always been so... predictable. She would finish her studies at Hogwarts, graduate with honors, and eventually make a name for herself in the Ministry or some other respected institution. She would marry, have children, and live a quiet, comfortable life. Nothing wild. Nothing dangerous.

Everything she had ever wanted was neatly tied up in a plan she had started formulating since she could remember. She was a straight-A student, a reliable friend, a loyal Gryffindor who never bucked the rules—she was exactly the type of person people admired and expected to succeed.

And that's how life would go. Or so she thought.

The letter arrived on a Thursday afternoon, the kind of quiet, sleepy day when nothing out of the ordinary seemed likely to happen. The sun was warm, the air was still, and Gloria was alone in her room, sitting cross-legged on her bed with a Charms textbook opened in front of her. The world outside seemed a little too perfect, a little too serene.

It was around two o'clock when she heard the tapping at the window.

At first, she thought it was just another owl delivering some sort of mundane letter. But when she turned, her stomach lurched. This owl was different. Larger. Darker. Its feathers shimmered like liquid midnight, and its eyes gleamed with an unsettling sharpness. This was no ordinary post owl.

It landed on her windowsill with a soft thud, and before she could react, it extended its leg, holding a letter. Gloria hesitated for a moment, but something about it felt urgent, like she was supposed to receive it—like it was waiting for her to take it.

She pulled the letter from its leg, staring at it. There was no seal. No address. Only her name, written in flowing cursive. Her name, but written with a certain force, a command almost.

Gloria.

Her heart raced.

It wasn't an owl from Hogwarts, and it wasn't a letter from her friends. Her thoughts immediately jumped to Edward, her older brother. Could this be a prank of his? But the handwriting didn't look like his, and there was something in the air—something strange—that made her question the possibility.

She felt a gnawing curiosity settle in her chest. Whatever this was, she wasn't going to ignore it.

Slowly, she opened the letter. As she unfolded the parchment, a chill ran down her spine. The words were written in neat, deliberate strokes, each one carrying weight, each one strange in a way she couldn't explain.

"Dear Gloria,
You don't know me, but I know you. And I know everything you think you know is about to change. You will need to change, too. Time is running out, and the only way to save them is to embrace who you were meant to be. This is your only warning. Act quickly."

Gloria stared at the parchment, her mind scrambling to make sense of the words. She re-read them again, and again, her breath shallow as she tried to wrap her mind around what she had just read.

Save them. Act quickly.

Who was them? What was she supposed to save? And what did it mean to "embrace who she was meant to be"?

She ran a hand over her face, feeling a headache creeping in. Was this some sort of joke? No—it couldn't be. Not with the urgency in the message. Not with the weight of the words. This wasn't something someone would write for fun. She felt that, deep in her bones. The letter felt alive, somehow.

Her thoughts were spinning. She should show it to someone—Lily, maybe? But then she remembered the last line. Act quickly.

She couldn't tell anyone. Not yet. Not with no answers.

The letter gave away from her shaky hands and she realised there was more written on its backside.

Gloria quickly picked it up, brought it close to her eyes and read each word carefully.

The room suddenly felt too small, the air too thick. She could hear her own heartbeat hammering in her chest, her pulse echoing in her ears. Her hands were shaking as she folded the letter carefully and slipped it into the drawer of her desk. It was as though hiding it would make the uncertainty go away. But it didn't.

She couldn't stop thinking about it, even as the evening passed and the shadows lengthened.

What was she supposed to do?

Why her?

And most troubling of all, what did the letter mean by "embrace who you were meant to be"? She didn't know what that even meant. Gloria had spent the last five years priding herself on being disciplined, focused, and responsible. She had prided herself on knowing exactly what was expected of her and meeting those expectations. Her life was carefully planned, and now some mysterious letter was telling her that she had to be someone else—someone bolder.

But that wasn't who she was. Not really.

The night stretched on, and the uncertainty gnawed at her insides. She couldn't sleep. Her mind kept turning over the same questions. What did she have to do? 

She couldn't ignore it. The letter had called her to action. It had told her things no one was supposed to know but she did. And yet, she didn't know what she was meant to act on. She couldn't even begin to comprehend what that might look like.

Gloria knew one thing, though. She couldn't let it go. She couldn't ignore this strange new twist in her life.

She had to figure out what this was. And if the letter was right—if it truly came from someone who knew what was going to happen—then she had a very limited amount of time to figure it out and fix things.

She knew only one way ahead. And she knew she had to put it to action the very next day.

The next morning felt like any other before the happenings of the previous day came rushing back to her. She quickly smoothed her blonde curls, shaking off the remnants of sleep, and headed down the staircase. As she entered the kitchen, her mother looked up, a hint of worry in her eyes. 

"Gloria, are you alright? You're usually up with the sun."

"Yeah, just a late start," she replied, forcing a smile that felt half-formed, "I'm fine."

Her father nodded, though he exchanged a glance with her mother that spoke volumes.

When one said it was unusual for Gloria to sleep in, they meant it. Her classmates often joked that she studied harder than Lily Evans, the girl who seemed to excel at everything with effortless grace. While others spent their afternoons in the sun, gossiping or practicing spells for fun, Gloria could be found in the library, her nose buried in ancient tomes and textbooks, scribbling notes with a fervor that left no room for distractions.

The letter's words rang in her mind. Her eyes widened, she knew exactly what she had to do. She darted upstairs, her mind buzzing with possibilities.

She had to talk to Edward.

Edward. Her older brother. The troublemaker. The prankster. The one who had left Hogwarts three years ago and had spent the last few years living a carefree life, never worrying about responsibility or consequences. He was the one who could do whatever he wanted and get away with it. He was the one who always lived on the edge, pushing boundaries, bending the rules to his advantage.

And now... now she needed his help.

She found him one afternoon, sitting out in the garden, sipping from a mug that probably held more than just tea. His messy hair was tousled as usual, his reading glasses perched crookedly on his nose, and his grin was wide and knowing, as if he had anticipated her coming.

He always knew when something was wrong. Always.

"What is it this time, Glor?", Edward asked, his voice light but with an undertone of concern, "You look like you've been carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders. Don't tell me you've gotten into trouble already?"

"I need your help," Gloria said, sitting down next to him on the porch. 

Her voice came out in a whisper, though she didn't know why. She didn't want to tell him what had been happening in her mind, but she had no choice. Not anymore.

Edward raised an eyebrow, his grin growing wider.

 "Uh-huh.", He chuckled lightly, clearly assuming it was another one of her typical overachieving schemes, "Going a little rogue, are we?"

Gloria shook her head, trying to ignore the nervous flutter in her stomach. She wasn't sure how to say this, but she had to be blunt.

"I need you to teach me......mischief"

Edward's grin faltered for a split second. He studied her for a moment, his eyes narrowing. 

"Wait, wait, wait—hold on."

 He set down his mug with exaggerated care, as if he couldn't quite believe what he was hearing.

 "You? Gloria—the Queen of 'I'll make sure everything is perfect and orderly'—wants to learn the ways of trouble? What is this? Some sort of secret crush on Potter? Mischief is definitely the way to his heart." 

He winked at her, his teasing tone loud and unmistakable.

Gloria flushed, a deep red creeping into her cheeks. 

"What? No!" She practically shouted, slapping his shoulder in mock outrage, "No crush. Nothing like that. I need to—"

She caught herself, the gears in her brain running to come up with the most believable e

 "I've been... asked to help them. Its crazy, I know. I don't how I am supposed to handle that bunch. But I have to, McGonagall insisted. And I need your help to figure it out. And I know if I want to be close to them, I need to learn how to be like them—how to be bold, how to break the rules."

Edward looked at her for a long time, as though weighing something heavy in his mind. Then, he laughed, a deep, throaty chuckle that made her feel both relieved and embarrassed. 

"Well, well, well. Looks like someone's going to be giving the Marauders a run for their money."

 He stood up and gave her a sly grin, "Alright, Glor. You want to learn how to break the rules? I'll show you how. But don't blame me when things start getting out of hand."

Gloria felt a mixture of excitement and anxiety swirl within her. This was it.

The next few weeks were a whirlwind of change, each day a blur of mischief and new lessons learned. Edward, with his usual grin and wry sense of humor, was eager to take her under his wing, showing her the ropes of Hogwarts' hidden world—one where rules were mere suggestions, where boundaries were meant to be pushed, and where chaos was an art form.

"Alright, Glor, let's see if you've got the courage to pull this off," Edward said one evening, a mischievous glint in his eyes as they stood before a broom closet in an abandoned corridor of their mansion.

"Broom closet?" Gloria raised an eyebrow, "What exactly are we—?"

Edward grinned and interrupted her, "You'll see. We've got to move quickly. You need to get used to working on instinct. No thinking—just doing. Remember, it's all about the perfect timing."

He pushed open the closet door, revealing a massive stack of empty cauldrons, a few old brooms, and a box filled with Dungbombs—the same kind the Marauders had once used for their pranks. Gloria couldn't help but grin, despite herself. She hadn't expected to find a treasure trove of pranking materials just waiting to be used.

Edward tossed her a small vial filled with a faintly glowing liquid, "This'll help you slip by unnoticed. Think of it as your invisibility cloak, but for getting away from trouble, not into it."

The potion shimmered in the dim light, and Gloria took it with a mixture of awe and nerves. She'd never been the type to break into professor offices, or sneak around doing anything remotely dangerous. Yet, as she felt the cool glass against her fingertips, there was a sense of excitement bubbling inside her—an unfamiliar, exhilarating feeling she hadn't expected to enjoy quite so much.

"Here goes nothing," she murmured, uncorking the vial and swallowing the contents.

At first, nothing happened, and she felt a twinge of doubt. Then, in a blink, the world around her seemed to shift. Her body grew lighter, her edges blurring like smoke in the wind. She could still see everything—Edward's smirk, the brooms hanging from the walls—but it felt like she was disappearing, as though she had become part of the air itself.

"Better?", Edward asked, as she stood there, invisible to anyone passing by.

Gloria nodded, her voice hushed. "This... this is incredible."

The two of them moved through the castle, slipping through corridors and hallways with the quiet confidence of seasoned pranksters. They'd just narrowly avoided a near run-in with their mother near the kitchen, and Edward's voice, laced with quiet pride, came to her ears, 

See? You're getting the hang of it."

As they ventured deeper into their house, Gloria's heart began to race—not just from the thrill of dodging her gigantic family, but from the realization of how easy it was to break the rules, to step outside of the lines she had drawn so carefully in her life. There was something about the freedom of it—the absolute lack of consequence in this world of mischief—that was utterly intoxicating. She wasn't just following the rules; she was making her own.

And it wasn't just the pranks. With every lesson, with every new trick she learned from Edward, she felt herself changing. It was like slipping into a second skin—one that didn't care what the rules were.

The thrill was undeniable. The power, intoxicating.

But there was always that nagging thought at the back of her mind, the weight that refused to leave her chest, no matter how many pranks they pulled off together. The letter—the mysterious letter that had started it all—was always with her, its words echoing in her thoughts.

Every time she felt the rush of a successful prank—every time she laughed at the chaos she had caused—a voice whispered in her mind, reminding her of the purpose behind her actions. She wasn't just fooling around. She wasn't just rebelling for the sake of it. She had a mission.

She had to get close to them, but how? She wasn't one of them. She was the quiet, studious girl who had always kept to herself. She had never been part of their world—the world of jokes and pranks and endless adventures. She wasn't bold like they were. She wasn't mischievous—at least, not in the way they were. She didn't know how to approach them without seeming awkward, out of place.

But that was the problem. She had to. The clock was ticking, and every day that passed brought her closer to the unknown disaster the letter had warned her about.