#21 - Gnarled and Hollow

Reena enjoyed the gentle breeze on her face while it lasted. The wind seemed to be much more welcoming to her than the water had been.

But perhaps she was simply more accustomed to it and it was the familiarity of it paired with the lack of danger of drowning with the wind being a reminder of the air that was surrounding her, filling her lungs and caressing her skin.

She touched her hand to the indentation once more and decided to give tapping it with her wand another try.

She touched the wood on the indentation rather gently with her wand, as though afraid she might disturb the old tree if she poked it too much.

She watched with fascinated curiosity as the bark melted away magically to form a hole.
As she saw all five objects in front of her, she let out a sound of surprise.

She hadn’t expected to see them all together.

Was she truly the first one to find them in a thousand years?

There was a warm feeling of pride over this accomplishment and she found herself smiling.

Now she just had to choose.

Which was rather difficult as she wasn’t certain of the purpose of either item, safe the gold.

Her gaze lingered on the bag of gold for a while.
Would it be selfish not to take it?

She did not know what the others did and gold could help them out a lot.

Although, there had been quite some riches in her father’s vault. They just did not have access to it, at least not when their mum was in her usual state.

She wondered for the first time whether her uncle Conrad may have left behind a similarly packed vault. Since there was no wife (that they knew of), that would go to her sister and Ezra?

She was not sure how that worked. Wouldn’t they have it by now already?

However much her thoughts may have strayed, thinking about her father’s vault had actually made her choice easier.

She thought of the memory she had seen of little Little Fox and her daddy in Gringott’s all those years ago and she suddenly knew what was hers to take.

Reena reached into the hollow beech tree and chose the Book of Enchantments.

It wasn’t exactly a substitute for her beloved potions book for children, objectively speaking this was a lot more important and special, but this would be the first in her own private collection.