Chapter 11

Miss Stuart,

I made an unbreakable vow. Clearly that vow no longer holds sway over me, having long been broken, but I had hoped to continue on in the spirit that it did, because if I didn't it would make the last fifteen years of my life have meant something. That is all in vain now, though I do not regret having made the vow. I held your mother in my highest respects, as I did your father.

My family was first drawn into service of yours in 1566, when Her Majesty, Mary Queen of Scots as she was known to the muggle population, gave birth to a daughter. It was toward the end of her reign when the war between herself and Queen Elizabeth I of England was in full force. What the muggles do not know is that the war began when Elizabeth discovered that some of her subjects, Wizards, owed their fealty not to her, but to Mary, the ruler of the magical world.

Mary had been Queen practically from birth, when her father died and spent many years of her life being protected from the warring muggle Highland Clans that she was supposed to rule. When she was eventually sent to France, her rule over both Scotland and Magical Britain was called into question, though the French Monarchy and magical France adored her.

Elizabeth on the other hand had a torrential relationship with Royal life. She was recognised as Princess and later had that title stripped away, being pulled back and forth between political grace and political disgrace for much of her life. By the time she ascended the English throne, both Magical Britain and her catholic subjects believed Mary to be the true Queen of England.

Mary, being the next in line of succession, had expected Elizabeth to name her Heir and to later become the Queen of both England and Scotland, merging together two of her magical subjects' homelands into one. Elizabeth never did so.

Mary, once married to the King of France, and her second cousin Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, and once again enraged her estranged cousin, who was beginning to suspect her an enemy looking to steal her throne. After his death, Mary married a man called James Hepburn, her second husband's suspected murderer. While this enraged the muggle population and she was forced to abdicate the Scottish throne in favour of her son, the magical population refused to accept her abdicating as their monarch. Especially not for a squib son. With no other magical relatives due to the rare magical expressions within their family line, she held firm to her title as Queen of Magic, which only enraged her cousin further.

By this point, Elizabeth had Mary imprisoned, where she gave birth in secret to a second child and later wiped all memory of the pregnancy, birth and child from the minds of every servant that had seen them. Her third husband had fled Britain and was imprisoned in Denmark when their son was born. Mary kept his child a secret from him and sent her child into hiding with one of the only magical servants she trusted, Tavish Grey. I suspect that he was related in some way to Lady Jane Grey, who held the English throne for a short time, though I cannot be certain.

When Tavish left Mary's side to care for her magical child, he was sent with very specific instructions after making an unbreakable vow with her. He could never reveal the royal nature of her child or any of his future line to anyone but anyone to his family line or her son's family line. Any mention of him had to be destroyed, not even an innocent letter could continue to exist. She wanted the magical world to accept her first son as their monarch, as they accepted her squib Father, something that never would have happened if they knew of her second, magical son. She also had him vow to protect her son, and to ensure that he lived a good life, far from the deadly political sphere that was worsening by the day.

Tavish, already married, took in Mary's child as his own and passed him off as their legitimate son. He shared his true parentage with his wife, who made an unbreakable vow with her husband to share in his task. As they had children of their own and they grew older, those children were shared the secret and took the same vows. When Mary's son came of age, he was told his true parentage and had impressed upon him the seriousness of their secrecy, to which he promised to also defend, though he never took an unbreakable vow.

In 1689 when the Statute of Secrecy was instituted, over 100 years after Mary's death, the Greys and the Stuarts decided to further bury their secret. The muggle population had become more and more violent towards the magical, especially after Mary was eventually executed. For fear of not only the magical population discovering their secret but the muggle world as well, they decided to appoint only one caretaker of the Stuart family line. At this point cousins and second cousins had taken the vow, and the number of people who knew, despite the certainty that they would never endanger the Stuarts, was far exceeding that which could ever be considered reasonable. Caelan Grey, who had married a squib Stuart, was chosen as their caretaker, having made his vow directly with Tavish.

Caelan made a second vow with Thomas Stuart, the oldest magical family member of their line, and erased the memories of all his relatives, including his father, mother, wife, and children. Thomas Stuart, who possessed his family magic, selected members of his line who wished to join the Greys in their loss, had their magic and memories taken away as well, leaving only Thomas, his daughter, and his only child with memory of their family origins.

At any point in time only one Grey would ever hold the knowledge that had been defended for a century, and would continue to be defended for another three.

When I took my vow, it was at my father's bedside as he lay dying. He shared with me the secret history of not only my family but yours and impressed upon me the importance of never sharing my knowledge, not even with another Stuart. It was then that I discovered that one of my students, Dorcas Meadowes, was in fact a Stuart. Her parents had chosen to forget that information when she later discovered it upon the claiming of her family magic. She came to me during her sixth year, expressing her concern about a new group emerging in the wizarding world, Death Eaters. She was worried someone could find a way to exploit her and force her to use her family magic for Voldemort's gain and didn't want to be forced to take away magic from any muggleborns.

She shared a dorm with Lily Potter, Evans at the time, and was fearful that should the Death Eaters find out about her talents, she would be forced to take away Lily's magic. It was then, back when she was barely a year older than you are now, that we decided to remove the Stuart family magic from her bloodline permanently. Her sister had allowed it to bleed away and her parents had already had her take theirs away. It was only a few years later, during the height of the war that she fell pregnant. It was too dangerous to remove her magic when you were unborn and couldn't bring herself to remove yours and never allow you to see the world she found so bright and full of life.

Dorcas and your father planned everything out and had me make an unbreakable vow to follow it to the letter. You were to go specifically to a family struggling to have children and they were to believe you were theirs in every way. It all had to be above board in the muggle world, nobody could suspect any wrongdoing in your adoption. Your name on the school register was to be altered, something I have frequent access to writing acceptance letters each year to students. You had to be sorted into Gryffindor, both so I could keep a close watch of you and so you wouldn't be surrounded with students possessing family magic and the relevant knowledge for you to claim yours. I could not approach you in any way relating to your blood, whether detrimental to you or not. I could only approach you about your blood once the family magic had burned out, and was to explain all of this to you for as long as you would sit to listen.

You may be wondering, why did you trigger the Stuart clause and none of your forebears. This was because of the way they conducted their claiming rituals. They would do it under heavy dampening wards and usually with the fidelius charm on the residence. This contained the burst of raw magical energy that is released during the ceremony and could not be detected by the ministry. It was imperative you not have access to the ritual, nor complete it. They wanted your family magic to die out. Without it the clause could never be activated, and you could not be captured and forced to use it against your will.

At the time they didn't know the war would soon come to an end, nor did they know that a second war would start, but the moment Potter was entered into the Triwizard tournament that it was starting again, so I endeavoured to keep your family magic from being discovered. I confounded Poppy when you went to see her, made her believe you were experiencing a simple muggle ailment, and not have her see the truth of what was happening. She would have known, even from a single glance, what was happening and everything we had done in the last fifteen years would have been for naught.

Your mother became more involved in the order once you were born, despite the fact that she had stripped herself of all her magic. She was sent on a counter raid in Blackpool and was killed because she had no way to defend herself. She'd tried to get out of several assignments in the past, knowing her lies would only last so long and they did. Your father is a muggle, he had no way to protect her. They both knew it was a suicide mission and that she had no further choice in the matter. Dumbledore was becoming increasingly more frantic, risking Order Members far more and for much longer than he had previously.

I have written to your father only once since then, to let him know you claimed your magic. I have received no response and my owl returned with the letter. I do not know what happened to him.

I do not know when I will send this letter, having only just received your summons to Hogsmede, but I need you to know that whatever moment in time you are reading this, all of our actions, even those of my family and yours from centuries ago, has been to give you a good life. It may have not been the life you were destined, or without strife, but we have only wished you the best. I have wished for it since before you were born, back when Dorcas stood in my office, at 16 years old, asking for help.

Be angry with me for keeping this a secret. Be angry with your parents, for all of their decisions. Be angry with anyone mentioned in this tale, Elizabeth, Dumbledore, Tavish, but do not be angry with yourself. You could not know what claiming your magic would mean, and for my part in that I am sorry.

Should you wish, I will reverse the charms I placed on your muggle parents.

I await your decision and reply.

Minerva McGonagall,

Your Caretaker