Disclaimer: Harry Potter and all related characters are the intellectual property of JK Rowling. I played absolutely no part in their creation nor do I claim to own them or the book series they appear in.
(However, the characters not found in the books that you will read about in here are indeed mine.)
The following is merely the prologue (a back story of the Valentine family, mostly) of the story, so please don't let it deter you from reading on to future chapters.
Family Origins
The Valentine family had not been intrigued by tales of the New World when it was first discovered. Oswyn Valentine thought the idea of leaving his castle behind to go start a new life in a land infested with savage natives and a batch of brand new diseases was absurd. His wife, Parnell Valentine (née Urquart), agreed with his sentiment for she did not treasure the idea of giving up her life of comfort for one of hardship. It was their foolhardy youngest son, Ambrose Gerard Valentine, who decided to travel to that far off land with his Spanish wife, Constanza Paxaraso de Loaysa. He did not lack money or title in their world, but still had a longing for a change to his lifestyle. What better way than to set off for a distant land?
It was during the early 1600s that Ambrose and Constanza left for the New World, traveling by ship with muggles and a few other witches and wizards. It was a terrible trip. Not enough food had been stowed away, so they all had to eat very little portions, several passengers died, and the ship smelled of perpetual filth and death. The two shared a look of great relief when they first saw sight of land. There they would build a grand home, they were sure. Their offspring would be born and raised in this new land.
They did build themselves a home in the New World, though they had searched for a proper location for weeks before finding one. Constanza had insisted that be far away from muggles and the savages that lived in the New World, and so they had a home many miles from any town, protected by wards and concealed with multiple charms so that no one could see it or even come near the house. They started a farm, Ambrose using spells to make the plants grow faster than normal and to be able to grow food that would not normally have been grown during a certain season or in the area. Though he already had family money – his parents had very generously bestowed to him heaps of muggle money before he left – he earned more by selling his crops. He did not need workers or want to have some muggle running about his home, but he did pay passage for people who became his servants. They would work for him for seven years, and then he'd release them.
Constanza gave birth to their first child in 1610, a son they named Gerard Francis Valentine. In 1612, she bore a daughter, Agnes Lucia Valentine, and another son in 1615 named Edmund Gregor Valentine. Gerard married a witch from a fellow pure-blood family named Sybil Rachel Selwyn. The Selwyns still had family back in England, like the Valentines. Sybil and Gerard had two daughters and no sons, effectively ending the Valentine line in that branch. Agnes married the Selwyn's youngest son, Geoffrey Leonard Selwyn; the two had one son. It was Edmund, who married Agacia Christabella Girouard (a French pure-blood), that continued the family line with by having two sons, Cyriack Erasmus (1634) and Gedian Jevon (1636). He also had three daughters – Eulalia Godeve (1637), Frieda Esther (1640), and Mallyn Robina (1643).
Cyriack and his wife, Sabine Fryth, had only one son, Ambrose Erasmus Valentine (1655). His brother Gedian had three sons, two who died in childhood and one that came down with dragonpox as a young adult and died without issue. Ambrose then had two sons, Mathias Oswyn (1678) and Aeneas Ranulf (1681), and a daughter, Christabella Anstis (1684). Aeneas did not marry and died young, but Mathias married Audriell Dorothea Carrow, and together they had Eamon Bertran (1710). Only one son was born for several generations following that of Mathias, Aeneas and Christabella. Eamon married Cicelie Rowle and they had Fabian Jonas (1738). Fabian married Margerie Prince and had Gervase Mungo (1768). Gervase married Lettice Montagu and had Gerard Jevon (1799). Gerard married Petronella Slughorn and had Erasmus Ranald (1839). Erasmus married Isobel Lestrange and had Silas Ezekial (1865). Silas married Aveline Fawley and had Zachei Ansell (1892). Zachei married Beatrix Rosier and had Oswyn Jasper (1927). Oswyn married Elsabeth Selwyn and had Thane Oswyn (1950).
Thane Oswyn Valentine attended Bythovion School of Sorcery, which was co-founded by his sixth great-grandfather, Eamon Bertran Valentine, and a distant cousin, Gareth Ewan Girouard. He excelled in Alchemy and Dark Arts classes. It was in his seventh year at the yearly inter-school dance held by Salem Witches' Institute that he met Asterope Black, a British-born witch that told him her father said Hogwarts had become a disgrace of an institution, as it allowed muggleborns and half-breeds to enter. He knew about her before he met her, of course. The Blacks were notorious pure-blood extremists; his mother's family had married into the Black family several times. He would do well to marry a witch from such a respectable, pure-blood family, his mother had told him many times.
And they were married, he and Asterope, six months after the dance. It was a marriage arranged in part by their parents and because Asterope had implored her mother – her father had died when she was nine, which had been a big push for her mother to move to the states – to let her marry the handsome Thane rather than one of those Nott or Goyle boys she'd had in mind. She obliged her wishes, remembering that her own family descended from the Valentines when their surname was still Valentinus.
The young couple had their first son, Nigellus Oswyn (1969) a year into the marriage. He was Asterope's favorite son, bearing the strikingly good looks of the Black family, whereas her other two sons resembled the Valentine males. It was unfortunate that he died while fighting alongside Voldemort in Britain during the first Wizarding War of the twentieth century. Though she was distraught over his death (not that Thane wasn't as well), she still had two more sons, Caelum Regulus (1971) and Phoenix Ambrose (1974).
Caelum married Helena Rowle, a girl from a respectable pure-blood family. They had two children together born late in their marriage, Corvus Thane (2001) and Lacerta Isobel (2006). Caelum was a good pure-blood wizard and worked for the United States Wizarding Government as one of the judges on the Supreme Court. His daughter looked remarkably like her grandmother, but had a difficult time earning the woman's love when she had to constantly compete against her cousin.
Phoenix was wed to Lyra Elsabeth Casadavade, a French American witch who attended Beauxbaton's Academy of Magic. The Casadavade family was of noble, pure-blood origin, though Asterope had heard tell that in recent years there was question as to whether that was still true. The rumor was that Lyra's father, Alexandre Casadavade, was the offspring of a pure-blood wizard and magical creature. There was no knowing whether the rumor was true or not unless the Casadavade family owned up to it, which would result in shame upon their name. This was why Asterope was so opposed to the union of her youngest son and Lyra Casadavade. She had begrudgingly allowed them to marry once her husband went above her head and gave them permission, though she sat unhappily throughout their wedding ceremony.
In 1992, they had their first child, a daughter named Cassiopeia Phillippa Valentine. Though Asterope admonished the two for having a child so soon into their marriage and at a young age, she could not help but feel a slight affection for the giggling child her husband would often hold. The very next year, they had Ronan Gerard Valentine (1993), Asterope and Thane's first grandson. This time Asterope did not berate the two parents, instead criticizing her older son and daughter-in-law for not yet having children while rocking the baby lovingly in her arms. Three years later, Phoenix and Lyra had another son, Andreus Oswyn Valentine (1996), who was a rather rowdy child that liked to run around outside and dirty his clothing. There was also Samuel Alexander Valentine (1996), Andreus' twin, the child that had died far too young. Tristan Sirius Valentine (2003) was born two years after his uncle and aunt had their first child, Corvus. The two boys, though separated by two years, played together often as children and had the closet bond among Thane and Asterope's grandchildren.
It was with an unexpected surprise that Lyra and Phoenix had another child after Tristan, born in the same year (though months later) as Caelum and Helena's only daughter. Nyssa Christabella Valentine was born on a Saturday, ill and likely to die before she reached one month of life. The grandparents went to see the child, but did not pay much mind to the baby, thinking that she would soon die. When the baby lived past her first month, there was hope, and when she was six months they knew all would be well. Nyssa (2006) became Asterope's favorite granddaughter, though the child was unlike her other grandchildren. Rebellious and curious, it was refreshing to her, and she indulged the girl's every whim when possible. But she did punish Nyssa those many times Lacerta had come running to tell her that she was playing with muggle children. That was the one fault she found with her favorite granddaughter, her nature to see those beneath her as equals.
The future that lay ahead of the old and noble pure-blood Valentine family was fraught with blood supremacy, war, death, despair, and ruin. For centuries the family had been untouched by such terror as was to befall them. And Nyssa Christabella Valentine was at the center of it all.