Peverell Might:
House Peverell in magical antiquity possessed any number of achievements, in wizarding England. The traditions of the great house had brought about many Master Artificers, Battle Warlocks, Combat Mages and even distinguished Healers. House Peverell had descended directly from Roman Aristocracy – from the lineage from Gaius Marius, the great Roman war master to be exact. During a temporary stay in France, the family adopted the name Peverell – French for 'piper' as a cover. The name and the conventions became part of the lineage of the house, as they dropped the title of 'Marius'. Eventually, the family moved back to England around 1000 A.D., with the hope of doing research unnoticed by the rest of the world.
After all, surely a house of pipe playing musicians could be of little threat.
But excellence invites attention, or so would Glaucon Peverell often commented. Eventually, the Peverells became known by the public for being stellar artificers.
The Peverell family had been responsible for teaching the initial art of wand making in England. After all, it was a Roman invention. The rough and crude construction became far more refined, as having a wand in your pocket, was far less threatening than a magical staff. Eventually, House Peverell focused purely on wand-making as it had served their ancestors well, and the house began to accumulate its personal wand-making lore. Even the four founders of Hogwarts who were fairly competent at wandless magic, would all patronise Peverell master crafting. After all, one needed a wand to instruct younglings in the art of wand based magic.
Glaucon Peverell would see to the needs of Wizarding England at the time and would continue to pass the craft down to his descendants, via his grimoire and his recorded notes. Eventually, House Olliviandius would send their young but talented son to apprentice under Invictus Peverell approximately five centuries later. After the passing of the last of the artificers, House Olliviandius became the primary and only wand manufacturer in Wizarding England, as the Peverell lineage died out and no male or female could inherit the house magic.
Invictus Peverell, the last of the Peverells by name, was easily a mechanical and magical savant when it came to the construction of things. After teaching Pius Olliviandius wand lore and skills, he retired into ceaseless research. His goal was to eclipse his ancestor Glaucon - He had master crafted three objects that were so powerful that people had begun to spread fairy tales about these objects:
The Death Stick, the Death Cloak and the Death Stone.
While the Cloak had stayed with him, the other two objects had invited much trouble. Many from far and wide wished to accumulate all three objects for themselves. The other two objects, the elder wand and the resurrection stone had been lost to time. Many times, Invictus was forced to remind the plebians who came to acquire the cloak by force, why House Peverell was not to be trifled with via combat.
The Peverell battle magic was descended from magic wielded by Roman commanders in Caesar's time and it was wandless and visceral. Shield charms did very little when a fist was travelling with enough force to crack a skull open with direct blunt trauma. Curses did very little when a backbone was ripped out of a person, predator style - the gruesome movie scenes in the modern world, were accurate representations of the raw strength of the Peverell battle magic. Naturally, interlopers were killed immediately and Invictus had a rather high dead body count, at the end of his life.
If you threatened a Peverell with lethal intent, their motto was simple – No mercy and no hesitation.
While Invictus possessed Glaucon's notes, he often could not understand many of the materials that had been used in the creation of the so-called "Deathly Hallows", as a young man. One material seemed to resemble a hexagon-shaped sheet that was 'one primary unit thick'. Many of the materials such as gold, copper and iron had been known to Invictus, but some of the numbers attached to them seem to puzzle him. Some notes included substances such as Copper-29, Iron-26, and Gold-79. These seemed to be metals that he could easily identify if he disregarded the numbers.
So, what the hell was M-3, M-88, M- 22, M-23, M-78 and M-82? Invictus had reasoned that these were new materials and that the numbers were identifiers. The House Magic had been utilised in conjunction with some type of advanced transfiguration to create an entirely new set of materials. Invictus had been observing the patterns and had come up with a rudimentary table that seemed to predict behaviours, but he was not sure if his hunches were correct. Meanwhile, his only daughter had been more interested in healing and had created unique spells that were of even more importance, than his continuous tinkering.
Lucretia Peverell had created three spells for use within the healing profession. The Crucio was a spell that could forcefully restart a stalled heart by shocking the unresponsive nervous system into action. The second spell, the Imperius could be used to make unwilling patients cooperate by putting them into a pleasant state while the patient's body was manipulated as necessary. Finally, the Avada Kedavra was meant to humanely terminate the life of patients who were essentially unresponsive and in a vegetative state. Truthfully, Invictus was quite happy about her achievements. These spells became a staple for many magicals later on, although the use case had become different as the centuries passed.
With no male heir, Invictus would not be able to continue his lineage – for some odd reason, the Peverell House magic did not take to his daughter Lucretia. Invictus never understood why this was the case, but he firmly believed that if Lady Magic willed it as such, that it was not his job to question the occurrence. He did not want to remarry after the passing of his wife, to sire a son and his daughter had her path to follow.
He, therefore, decided to take an unusual route instead to preserve his legacy. He would ensure the safety of his daughter's descendants and hope that his lineage might survive into tomorrow's world.
He commissioned a new grimoire that contained all the wanded battle spells that had made House Peverell feared on the battlefield and gifted it to his daughter. His daughter would then carry these spells into the Pottarius family, as she was going to marry Marcus Pottarius soon. Also, she would carry the Death Cloak into house Pottarius. It would be well received and it would be used to make the enemies of her daughter's line suffer. The Pottarius family were also a family that descended from Rome like his own. However, the family currently specialised in pelts, hunting and pottery – they had taken to a more commercial outlook on life. Invictus could remember that the Pottarius Clan were initially Centurions in Caesar's army, and he considered the family excellent candidates to receive his wanded combative magic.
Yes, they would do well, a house that was suited to war like his own.
His plan involved the creation of a portrait. This portrait would not be able to retain all of his immense knowledge, but it would be able to act as a coach to guide a young future heir into magical competency. As long as the portrait resided along with the grimoire and his notes, somebody could finish the work.
To protect his financial legacy, Invictus finally enlisted the help of the newly created Gringotts Goblin Bank. He created a vault and ensured that enough gold would be left for his descendant. He also made another rather unusual request to Gringotts. Every forty years his portrait would be brought out of hibernation temporarily and provided with enough written material for language acquisition. This would ensure that the Portrait would be able to keep abreast with the language as it changed throughout the centuries in Magical England. He also arranged for a representative from the Goblin nation to appraise his Portrait of notable historical events. He would stay awake for one month and learn about Wizarding affairs before returning to his sleep. The portrait would wait until a worthy descendant came forth.
Naturally, this arrangement was not free, but the Goblins reasoned that profit was profit. Twenty Five thousand galleons for the service, every time it was activated was better than absolutely no gold being used in the vault. The fee at that time was considered a stupidly large amount of money and the Goblins were only too happy to facilitate the Peverell Head of House - he had always been respectful in his interactions with the Goblin Nation. King Ragnok II had recently assumed the throne, and Invictus had always shared a laugh with him, as they discussed what could be done to patch up the rough relationships between the Goblins and Humans. Invictus had offered a large amount of gold, to be smelted into coinage gratis, under the condition that King Ragnok would look out for his distant descendant.
"Are you sure you would freely contribute such a large amount of gold?" King Ragnok asked.
"Yes. I am already beginning to see that we are becoming stagnant. Somebody has to kick these morons in the behind, or they won't build a single thing. I have enough for my descendant. All that I require is that you keep an eye on my distant grandchild. Make no mistake, I see the relationship between wizards and your people getting worse. People often asked me to come to the political forefront, but I rather not soil my character."
"Agreed. I will ensure your descendant continues your legacy. I know that when your legacy is protected, I will eventually gain much. And I say this not because of the galleons – our relationship has been much more than that. You are one of the few men I would hold counsel with, and I hope that Lady Magic will be kind to your descendant."
"I hope so, too. I feel the end coming. I am not in the best of health. All that lives, must die."
"I will miss having tea with you. Perhaps your descendant will give me a laugh, just like you…"
King Ragnok found the arrangement agreeable, as Invictus hoped that jumpstarting the economy with his wealth would aid in bringing about innovation and competition. Along with the gold that had been provided by the founders almost five centuries ago via verbal agreement, his sizeable contribution would allow Gringotts coinage to be common currency, and sufficient gold reserves to be stockpiled. Good customer relations always meant more profit down the road for everyone.
The Goblins had reasoned that if the unusual arrangement worked, eventually one of Gringotts' oldest customers could come to the forefront. The Peverell Vault was worth approaching 8 million galleons – which was almost the equivalent of multi-billionaire status in the wizarding world in the 15th Century.
Eventually, Invictus Peverell passed on to the Veil. While he had left the realm of the living, he was content in his final moments that his lineage was safe. A small private funeral was held and the Peverell Manor and the Pottarius family attended and performed the last rites, as Invictus had requested that every inch of his body be cremated. Lucretia would then eventually pass away much later on, but the Peverell grimoire which had been gifted to House Potter (renamed from Pottarius) would make the Potter men dangerous on the battlefield until the spells became lost within the historical clutter.
The portrait of Invictus Peverell continued to sleep as the 38th year of his current 40 year cycle was in progress. The process would continue until the Peverell magic had judged someone to be worthy of being a creator of things. If an heir came forward, then he would awaken if the house ring was claimed. Otherwise, the cycle would continue.
The last time he had been awake, the Wizarding world had recently been suffering from the consequences of Grindelwald's Wizarding war. The last of Lucretia's bloodline was Charlus Potter, and the rumour was that he was getting married soon. When he was last awake, he hoped that he would hear of a child, or possibly a grandchild in the future. He then committed himself to his great slumber.
When the Peverell Portrait would rise from his great period of hibernation, the facsimile of Invictus would eventually cry long painful tears as he became aware of the plight of the last living descendants of his dear Lucretia – only a single Potter would be alive.