CHAPTER THREE

"I am not going to bloody tell you fools if you're fated with someone or not!" Kit snapped, her voice sharp and unyielding as she glared at the group of students who had been tailing her for the past few minutes. Their hopeful expressions faltered, some muttering among themselves, but none seemed to truly grasp the reason behind her bitterness.

Kit had had enough of lovestruck classmates treating her like a Seer or some kind of magical matchmaker.

They always came with the same misguided request, assuming their wands held secrets about their romantic destinies. It was exhausting, and it drained her more than she cared to admit. She hated how this idea of "fated pairs" had taken root in their minds, as though the craftsmanship and artistry behind wand-making were nothing more than tools for playing cupid.

But what truly angered her was how little they seemed to consider her feelings in all of this. To them, it was about their own desires, their own romantic fantasies. Not once did they think about how much it hurt her, how it reopened wounds she was desperately trying to heal.

Kit watched the group finally grumble and shuffle away, throwing annoyed glances over their shoulders. For a moment, she toyed with the idea of hexing them, if only to vent the frustration that had been building inside her. But she sighed instead, knowing it would solve nothing. She didn't want to be cruel; she just wanted people to leave her alone, to understand that their questions weren't as innocent as they thought. Yet no one ever seemed to get the message.

"It's okay to be angry."

The voice startled her, freezing her in place. It wasn't the haunting, spectral voice of her brother that had plagued her for months, and that fact alone made her hesitate. This voice was different—calmer, grounded, and unfamiliar. Kit's heart raced as she debated whether to turn around.

Ever since she had started hearing Cato's voice, the idea of someone speaking to her from behind filled her with dread. It had become a conditioned response, a trauma she couldn't shake. She avoided walking in crowds, preferring to stay behind everyone else in the corridors. At meals in the Great Hall, she always chose a seat with her back to the wall, grateful that the Hufflepuff table's position allowed her some semblance of security.

Slowly, she turned, her brow furrowed as she recognized the boy standing there. Lysander Scamander. A Ravenclaw a year below her, with an easy demeanor and a perpetual air of curiosity. She knew of him—his father often visited her grandfather's wand shop to deliver imported cores, and Lysander, along with his twin, Lorcan, would sometimes tag along.

Back then, she hadn't paid much attention to the Scamander boys, preferring to sit quietly with a book or hover near the adults. Cato had always been the more social one, chatting animatedly with the twins while Kit kept to herself.

"Hello, Lysander," she greeted cautiously, clutching her books tighter against her chest.

"Oh good, you know my name," he replied with a cheeky grin before softening into a more genuine smile. "I still stand by what I said."

Kit tilted her head, puzzled. "What do you even mean?"

Lysander shrugged lightly. "You always look guilty after telling people off. Like you regret it right away. But you shouldn't. You have every right to be angry. They can't keep expecting you to predict their fated matches like some magical fortune-teller."

Kit blinked at him, momentarily speechless. Of all the people who had witnessed her frustrations, no one had ever bothered to acknowledge her side of it—until now. She nodded, mumbling, "Well, I'm glad you can see that... Thank you."

"No problem, Kitty," Lysander said with a mock salute before turning and jogging away.

It took a moment for his words to register, and when they did, her cheeks flushed a deep red. "Why you—! It's Kit! K-I-T!" she yelled after him, waving a hand in frustration.

Lysander didn't stop, his laughter echoing down the hall.

Kit huffed, her face still warm as memories bubbled to the surface. She hadn't heard anyone call her "Kitty" in years—not since they were kids. Lysander had been one of the first to use it, though not intentionally. Back then, he'd had a slight speech impediment, and her full name, Kathleen, had been too much of a mouthful. "Kitty" had been his accidental creation, and to her dismay, Cato had latched onto it immediately, taking it further with "Kit Kat."

Though she'd eventually grown accustomed to "Kit," "Kitty" still grated on her nerves, reminding her of younger days when she'd been teased endlessly by her brother and Lysander. A bittersweet pang struck her heart at the thought. She missed those days—missed Cato's mischievous grin and his relentless teasing.

Now, the nickname felt different—not the sharp, teasing jab it had once been, but a gentle echo of the life she'd lost. It was as if the word itself carried a fragment of her old world, slipping through the cracks of the one she now inhabited. The name, once a source of annoyance, now held a bittersweet warmth. It was a reminder of who she used to be—a girl who laughed easily, who didn't carry the weight of grief like a second skin.

Lysander's teasing, though unexpected, felt like a momentary reprieve from the heavy silence that had become her constant companion. It stirred something in her that she hadn't felt in so long it was almost unrecognizable: a faint, fleeting sense of normalcy. It wasn't much, just a small flicker, but it was enough to make her pause. Enough to make her wonder if perhaps there was still a part of her that could feel something beyond the suffocating void of loss.

She hadn't smiled in what felt like forever—not genuinely, at least—but her lips twitched now, as if the memory of how to smile was trying to resurface. She clung to that faint spark, afraid it might vanish if she let herself think too hard about it. The nickname "Kitty" brought back images of simpler times: sitting beside Cato in their grandfather's shop, listening to his jokes, rolling her eyes at his endless antics, and, begrudgingly, laughing along.

But that life was gone, wasn't it? No matter how much she wished she could reach back and grab hold of it, it remained just out of reach, a shadow of what once was. Lysander's easy humour didn't erase her pain or fill the void, but it chipped away at the wall she'd built around herself, if only slightly.

Kit shook her head, trying to shake off the warmth creeping into her chest. She couldn't afford to let her guard down, not when she'd worked so hard to keep herself from crumbling completely. And yet, as she watched Lysander disappear around the corner, she couldn't help but feel that, maybe, just maybe, the world wasn't quite as empty as it had seemed.