Harry Potter: House Magus

Sleep wouldn't come.

I tried. Stretched out on top of the covers, hands folded over my chest, counting each breath the way Rupert once taught me, in for four, hold, out for six, an old soldier's trick for quieting the mind. But it did nothing tonight.

My mind was a tangled skein, bright threads unspooling in every direction. I closed my eyes, but they only lit up with cruel clarity: contracts with ink still drying, Wool's shadowed hallways, Rupert's lined face bent toward his chess pieces, my mother's still one on a pillow that had smelled faintly of lavender and gone sour at the edges. 

Futures branched outward from there, silver fractures across dark glass, each possibility catching a different glint of light.

Every few minutes, I rolled over, sheets tangling around my legs. Eventually, I gave up, exhaling sharply as if I could breathe the restlessness right out of me.

A faint scent of cold iron threaded the air, or perhaps that was only in my head. My hands flexed on the bedsheet, opening and closing like they might seize hold of something just out of reach.

I swung my feet to the floor, wincing a little at the chill of the boards. Crossed to the dresser, toes finding the tiny ridge in the wood by instinct, a flaw I'd memorised, like a scar on my own skin. Outside the window, London slept fitfully beneath a haze of smoke and dim lamps. A lamplighter's pole clicked on cobblestone somewhere far off. The hush was almost oppressive, as if the whole city was holding its breath alongside me.

I retrieved the glass of water and stood there at the dresser, drinking slowly. The water was cool, tasteless, and grounding. My reflection stared back at me from the dark pane above, eyes alert, almost expectant, framed by light brown hair. My shoulders sat differently now, carrying weight without sagging. I searched that reflection for any last trace of the uncertain boy who'd come to Rupert's door, found only a ghost, faint and insubstantial, who dropped his eyes before I did. I turned away.

Legacy was a sharp thing. It could cut just as easily as it could crown. I felt that dual edge pressing down on me now, as if testing where I might give.

Time crawled.

I sat at my desk and ran my thumb along the wood's faint grain, eyes half-closed. Stood again. Crossed to the window and leaned my forehead against the cold pane. Watched a stray cat slip across the garden wall, tail high, like it alone was master of the night, back to pacing.

The minutes dragged themselves toward midnight with aching slowness. Each tick of the small clock on the bedside table felt like a knuckle rapping sharply against my skull, testing for hollows.

By the time the hands aligned at twelve, my pulse was slow but thrumming, a taut line of calm over something darker and eager underneath.

Nothing changed at first. The house remained still, the only sounds Rupert's faint breathing down the hall and the distant creak of settling timber. The air was heavy, as though the whole world was holding its breath.

Then, with no more fanfare than a breath drawn through cold air, the System unfurled itself in front of me, calm, certain, utterly unearthly like a great ledger opening.

[System Notification]

[Congratulations, Host. You have completed Task: Genesis of Legacy.]

[Initiating audit. Recording all relevant experiences, actions, and developments contributing to the Host's Bloodline.]

[.....]

A tremor ran through me, delicate but irrevocable, like a wire pulled taut. Not fear, exactly, closer to awe, tinged with something darker. I lowered myself into the desk chair, hands resting on the arms to keep them from curling too tightly.

[Consolidation complete. Aggregating all behaviours, decisions, affinities, talents, and psychological traits into Bloodline.]

[.....]

The air seemed to tighten. My breath hitched as a subtle pressure coiled around my ribs, drawing everything inward. The hush felt physical, crowding close against my skin.

[Name Bloodline: _____ ]

The prompt floated before me, a silent question. The cursor blinked, waiting.

My throat was dry, but my thoughts were sharp.

"Magus."

[Name registered.]

It slipped into place with a finality that was almost tender, like the last signature on an endless sheaf of contracts. Then the hush deepened, thick enough to feel against my skin.

[Commencing Bloodline Forging]

[Primary Traits Established:]

[Velvet Imperium]

[Family Cohesion]

[Arcana Integralis]

[Raperetongue]

Each word landed inside me like a chisel strike on some hidden tablet. I sucked in a careful breath, feeling my ribs expand under a pressure that wasn't quite my own.

'System.'

'Define each of these.'

[Velvet Imperium]

[Integrates Host's dominant psychological traits into bloodline, expressing themselves in descendants of the Host in varying degrees.]

[Family Cohesion]

[Instils an inherent drive across descendants to maintain House unity, loyalty, and long-term preservation of shared interests.]

[Arcana Integralis]

[Integrates all of the Host's affinities and talents into a unified magical inheritance, granting descendants access in varying degrees.]

[Raperetongue]

[Provides innate capability to communicate with and issue commands to Accipitridae through a unique inherited language.]

A faint pulse beat at my temples. Raperetongue, it explained what might be waiting inside the egg nestled carefully in the drawer by my bed.

Then the text shifted again, cold and precise.

[Performance Evaluation: Above Baseline]

[Host has exceeded standard thresholds in multiple developmental metrics. Additional customisation credits awarded.]

[91 Points rewarded.]

A thin smile tugged at my mouth. Almost absurd how cleanly it all fell into place. How every measured silence, every favour withheld until ripe, every step across old grief had led here.

'System,' I began slowly, 'if I wanted the ability to create branch lines… to ensure my House could split off into cadet families that still tie back to the main line, each perhaps with one thing they excel at above all, but never forgetting who they serve, what would that be?'

[Trait Identified: Lineage Creation]

[Enables formation of branch bloodlines tied to House Magus, each bearing diluted core traits, instinctual loyalty, and a unique, exceptional specialisation, initiated specifically through offspring born of concubines or informal partnerships, while formal marriages produce heirs of the main line exclusively.]

[Cost: 40 points.]

'Then,' I continued, thoughts steady, 'if I wanted to make sure that our line, both main and branch, carries our traits strongly, overwhelming any competing inheritance, so that what is Magus stays Magus for far longer than common bloodlines would manage?'

[Trait Identified: Genae Supremae]

[Ensures House Magus traits manifest as primary genetic expressions, persisting strongly with minimal dilution over successive generations.]

[Cost: 28 points.]

'If I wished for the bloodline to reclaim its own, that is, for the magical power and experiences of my descendants to be quietly reabsorbed into the line upon their deaths, so nothing of value is truly lost, would such a trait exist?'

[Trait Identified: Thanatogenes]

[Upon the natural or unnatural death of a bloodline descendant, residual magical energies and mnemonic impressions are subtly aggregated into the shared ancestral lattice. Over time, the bloodline grows denser in arcane saturation and instinctual memory.]

[Cost: 380 points.]

'Too expensive.'

'And… if I wished to eliminate the usual dangers of keeping the blood close? So that even if cousins wed, the line wouldn't rot from within or lose magical stability?'

[Trait Identified: Sanguis Purus]

[Mitigates biological and arcane defects from consanguineous unions, preserving health and mana integrity within the bloodline.]

[Cost: 16 points.]

'System,' I continued after a moment, 'if I desired a bloodline resonance so profound that loyalty became almost instinct, so that even those marrying in or swearing oaths would feel genuine aversion to betrayal, perhaps even physical discomfort… does such a construct exist?'

[Trait Identified: Resonantia Imperium]

[Bloodline develops a deep psychic resonance that gently but inexorably tunes the loyalties of those who join it by marriage or magical contract. Acts of betrayal induce psychological repulsion, escalating to somatic distress. Encourages multigenerational cohesion and minimises factional drift.]

[Cost: 450 points.]

'Again, too expensive.'

'And lastly, if I wanted our House's mark to be unmistakable at a glance. Black hair, purple eyes. A sign the blood runs true.'

[Trait Identified: Obsidian Violet]

[Establishes dominant inheritance of black hair and vivid purple eyes as a stable phenotypic marker across all descendants.]

[Cost: 7 points.]

'Pick the Obsidian Violet, Sanguis Purus, Genae Supremae, Lineage Creation.'

'What's the total?' I asked, though I already knew.

[Cumulative Cost: 91 points.]

My hands tightened once on the chair, then loosened.

'Perfect. Proceed.'

[Bloodline condensed.]

[Would you like to begin integration?]

I shut my eyes. Drew a breath deep enough to hollow me out, felt every inch of myself align like teeth in a gear.

"Yes," I whispered.

[Commencing Bloodline Integration.]

It poured through me like molten silver. My body seized under the tide, breath strangled out, not from pain but from the sheer density of it, every nerve flaring as if it had been dipped in liquid frost. Shapes burned across the backs of my eyelids, delicate and brutal as rune-work carved into vision. I felt it thread through my marrow, knot around my heart, lace my thoughts into a new lattice.

Somewhere in that blinding silver flood, I thought I heard my mother's voice, soft and fading, and Papa's laughter tangled up with the roar of looms. They slipped through me and were gone, woven into the new pattern whether they'd have wished it or not.

It was a promise of children I'd never meet, of rooms that would carry my crest on their walls, of futures that would wear my laws like a second skin.

When it broke at last, I slumped forward, arms trembling. My pulse was my own again, but a new rhythm wound through it, cool and inexorable. I stood on unsteady legs. I moved to the mirror again, bracing my hands on either side. My eyes were deeper, almost fathomless, a dark purple that caught the light. My hair fell heavier, ink-black against my temples.

My reflection stared back, dark and still, like a portrait painted too carefully to be fully human.

I exhaled.

For the first time in either of my lives, I belonged wholly to something of my own making. Not Wool's, not Rupert's legacy, not even Papa's fragile dreams.

Magus. My name, my House, my words written into living blood.

I made my way under the covers to rest, though sleep wouldn't come. How could it? The world was too wide open now, glimmering with futures only I would ever rule. I lay on the bed anyway, staring at the ceiling, one hand resting lightly over my heart, feeling that steady new cadence, the rhythm of a bloodline that would outlast empires.

At midnight, I had ceased to be merely a boy. Ceased to be merely an orphan.

I was the first of the House Magus.

And the world, well. It would learn that name. One way or another.

Sleep did find me eventually, but only by stealth. One moment I lay there tracing futures in the dark, the next I was falling, not drifting, but dropping, like a stone through deep water.

Dreams came fitfully and thin. I saw corridors lined with strange banners, violet-eyed children running laughing down marble halls, their laughter echoing in eerie, glassy ways. Faces turned toward me, blurred and bright with devotion, until they fractured like cracked porcelain, shards catching lamplight. 

I woke once to the hush of the house, heart racing, mouth dry, the image of a black bird perched atop a jewelled helm still lingering behind my eyes. Then sleep dragged me under again.

Morning arrived almost shyly, creeping past the edges of the drapes in gentle gold. I lay there for a while, eyes half-closed, feeling the new rhythm of my blood, cool, confident, inexorable, still threading itself through every slow beat.

When I finally swung my feet to the floor, the boards no longer felt quite so cold. I padded to the mirror again, half hoping the night's transformations might prove illusions spun by a fevered mind.

But no. My hair pooled ink-dark across my forehead, catching light like lacquer. My eyes were unmistakable now: Purple, small veins of amethyst ran just beneath the surface.

I rested my fingertips lightly on the glass. My reflection was composed, sober, a young lord of nothing yet, but something old already curling behind his eyes.

I let out a careful breath.

Then I began to think. Coolly, precisely.

Appearance could be leveraged or hidden. A distinctive mark was a standard of House Magus that was deliberately etched into the very marrow, but it didn't have to be flaunted recklessly. Not yet. Better to let the world meet Richard Anderson Russo a little longer. While I still reside in the Muggle world. 

Black hair was easily hidden beneath my cap, and my purple eyes were shielded behind shaded glasses.

After having decided what to do about my new appearance. I dressed, tying my cuffs with calm fingers. The world awaited beyond these walls, vast and unknowing. 

Soon enough, it would bear the full brunt of House Magus, but for today, I would let it continue in blissful ignorance, while I arranged the next quiet steps of my empire.

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