Rowthan – Chapter 9

DISCLAIMER - Everything belongs to JK. None of it is mine (except, you know, the tweaks). No Copyright infringement is meant.

NOTE - Grad School and I have a love/hate relationship right now. I literally wrote this in the last hour.

o-0-O-0-o

Harrison and the other Durmstrang students were awake well before dawn the next morning doing their chores and other menial tasks necessary for The Pelican's maintenance and overall well-being.

When everyone finished with their duties, the gentlemen began their workout – led by Kamarov. The sun was rising as they began to run and by the time they were finished, most of them had their shirts off and all of them were joking around.

They finished their workout and cleaned up before a small group of them – including Harrison, Victor and Katarzyna – gathered their things for their respective Masteries and went in search of the Hogwarts Library. Kamarov explained during their run that Headmaster Dumbledore kindly offered the use of the infamous library (which had a better selection of up-to-date books thanks to Madam Pince) to the Durmstrang Delegation and the Beauxbatons Coterie as they would be so far from their own.

Victor grinned as they left the ship, he could see how winded a few of the sixth and seventh years were. Konstantin, Kyril, Marik and Ric had experimented before they left Durmstrang on a "Mage Stone". Theoretically, the stone could have been used to store energy and to do so it had to be fed energy. It worked, to a certain extent. The stone accepted the feeding energy too well, and kept taking from the four until Professor Maria Noether – the Arithmacy Professor at Durmstrang – stopped it by encasing it in a globe of Hafnium. Since Hafnium was a pure metal, it could stop magic from going through it and therefore stopped the stone from further absorbing energy.

The stone was then destroyed and Konstantin, Kyril, Marik, and Ric spent three days bed-bound in the infirmary.

Rowthan had considered helping them with the stone but was unable to due to the paperwork sent to him by Lady Rowthan regarding their personal charity – a purely magical children's home in Wales. Lady Rowthan established it after discovering she could not bear children and Lord Edmund stood by his wife. In their younger years, Lady Elizabeth and Lord Edmund played with the children and as they aged they became doting grandparent figures to the children. They founded it in 1929, naming it the Radnor Home.

Over the years, especially after the war with Grindlewald, the size grew to the point that the Rowthans hosted several balls and fundraisers for the home which soon grew to have genuine dorms. At first, there were so few children that they each had their own 10' by 10' room with plenty of rooms left over. Now, there were two children to a room for the older ones and in the larger (typically 14' by 16') rooms there were four to six per room as they did not like to separate siblings while they were young into different rooms.

Abuse was forbidden, and many children dreaded the "Red Bench" that was in the playroom/lounge. Simply put, if children misbehaved, they were to sit on the bench and a silencing ward (that neither allowed for sound to enter or escape until the chaperon allowed the child to leave the bench) and watch everyone else play, hang out, and have fun. The older ones thought they could get away with filthy language as no one could hear them but whenever the unacceptable language was used, the bench glowed and the offender was on dish duty for the entire home for the next week. The chore took a while even with the magical aids.

Harry first visited the Radnor Home when he was eight and prior to his officially becoming the Rowthan Heir. He met one of his oldest friends there, and coincidentally Hogwarts student Cedric Diggory. Lady Rowthan took him there and they played for hours together before going to the Ministry. He told his father all about the boy named Cedric who wanted a toy snitch for his birthday in a week's time.

Mr. Amos Diggory overheard them and humored the Potter Heir (at the time) and decided to get the orphaned and abandoned boy the toy. He and his wife, who were childless even though they were only 31 and 32 at the time, went to give the eight year old the toy for his birthday.

Needless to say, Cedric became a Diggory in less than a month and the Diggory's went on to have three more children and were staunch supporters of the Radnor Home.

-HJRP-

The group soon found a long table in the front of the library where Katarzyna got out her Potion's Journal and began revising. Master Snape argued for using crystal stirrers in favor of wooden ones when brewing, or glass if crystal was not affordable, during their two hour discussion during the Quidditch World Cup and Katarzyna brought up the subject with Master Kamarov. It led to an interesting debate that Master Kamarov (a supporter of using natural elements in brewing such as wood) was itching to have with the younger Master Snape.

Professor Kamarov attained his Mastery at 28, and was currently training an apprentice of his own after brewing and teaching to his heart's content for twenty years. Apprentice Anton Galenus was to sit for his Mastery in two years' time and Kamarov had the utmost confidence that the Latvian could teach in his absence.

When Master Kamarov was asked by Miss Dmitrova to help her with study materials before she could officially write and request to become an apprentice of one of the Masters and Mistresses in Europe and/or Russia, the man only agreed to be paid for study materials as Katarzyna insisted that her honor could not allow for Master Kamarov to simply give her the materials.

Katarzyna all but devoured the first few books Master Kamarov advised her to read. She slowed down when he advised her to read The Potion's Compendium – the Annotated Version. She was still reading the volumes. She was currently on the fifth of seven volumes. Granted, she only finished the fourth volume prior to returning to school but was flying through the fifth as it compared Healing and Potions. She'd already read through it once and was working on actually taking notes the second time around.

Victor was studying the cultural significance of the Greek Gods in Greece. Many magical Greeks still worshiped the Olympian Pantheon while the Atlanteans paid homage to their Gods – most notably Apollymi the Destroyer and Apostolos the Harbinger. He had to admit that the Atlantean Pantheon was more interesting. According to their own mythology, the Atlantean Pantheon was older than the Greeks and Apollymi had been married to Archon and the King and Queen of the Pantheon reigned from Katoteros (home of Archon) and Kolasis (the hell-realm and home to Apollymi) but when Apollymi gave birth to a son, it was foretold that that son would bring the end of their pantheon. Archon ordered his son be killed and Apollymi refused, hiding her son away on earth.

Apostolos had a rough life and was killed when he was 21 by the Greek God Apollo. It unleashed Apollymi's wrath and she turned her entire pantheon to stone. She sank Atlantis and was only stopped when her son was risen from the dead by the Greek Goddess Artemis. Apostolos cared for humanity and refused to release his mother who was imprisoned in Kolasis. She swore vengeance against Apollo and Artemis for taking her son away from her and according to legend – if that happened the world would be destroyed.

*** see end

Victor knew that he couldn't be a Quidditch player forever and wanted to work for the ICW in some sort of diplomatic function. The Heir of the Viscount of Borgas knew that he had an obligation to his people and to the world to ensure that peace reigned and Victor wanted to ensure that for his country's some 300,000 magical residents would be safe from harm. The only reason he even went to Durmstrang was because of tradition and the fact that the first generation Krum (the only son of the Viscount Milen Krum) Radko Krum born 1762 was accepted to Durmstrang because he was known for being the sole surviving heir of a powerful family that had been dwindled down to the point that the Muggles didn't even acknowledge the title even though the magical world did.

The Honorable Victor Kosta Krum was planning on emphasizing attendance to the Sofia School of Magic and following his father's footsteps and allowing his children to choose whether or not to go to Durmstrang or Sofia. Victor's sister Emiliya opted to go to Sofia and was currently enjoying her fourth year and was already determined to become a teacher at Sofia. She, like Victor, wanted students to be taught at an actual school where they could reach their full potential. Instead, too many magical children in Bulgaria were being taught by families who specialized in one craft or another and only in that one craft – evidenced by SSM's population of a mere 689.

Harrison brought a parchment legal pad and an everlasting ink Quill before he began to browse through the shelves, seeking to locate a text that would aid him in his Masteries.

He asked Madam Pince for help and she steered him to an Arithmacy book that Harry literally did not want to put down. He quickly became absorbed in it and only paused when someone shook his shoulder to alert him that breakfast was about to be served in the Great Hall.

-HJRP-

With some difficulty, even though he was nearly fluent in English, Konstantin found the library. He shook the many who were absorbed in their work or reading before they joined everyone at the Hufflepuff table.

Harrison waved to Fred and George (who were awake way too early and looked way too innocent for him to be comfortable) as he sat down next to Stefan Chmerkovsky, who looked remarkably like his squib cousins Maksim and Valentin, at the table.

"Find anything Rowthan?" the Ukrainian asked as he ate a spoonful of hot oatmeal.

"Interesting enough." He said as Katarzyna made him a bowl of oatmeal with brown sugar and thin slices of peaches and put it in front of him with a glare that said EAT. She knew that if Harry opened the book he'd been reading in the library, he would forget to eat in favor of reading.

He smiled and picked up his spoon as Fred and George came over. Harry kept one eye on the door and the table itself. He knew Cedric was attending Hogwarts, the two of them were only three weeks apart in birthdays after all, but for the life of him he could not remember what house Ced had been sorted into. That letter was years old and their latest was arguing over the effectiveness of using a Seeker to break up a Hawkshead.

"Good morning, oh wondrously boring Rowthan." Fred said with a slight bow that Harry raised an eyebrow to. These two Weasleys were declaring loyalties to a Neutral Wizengamot Party and not to the Light faction that their father was a part of. Interesting.

"Gred, Forge." He said as he nodded his head and put the spoon down and wiped his face off with a napkin.

"Any plans for the day?"

"This day being the great day of Sun?"

"Perhaps." He answered with a raised eyebrow.

"And you, our brooding Bulgarian friend?" George asked with a grin.

Victor didn't answer, he just noticeably got out his wand and put it on the table next to his plate.

"Oh Victor-"

"One might think-"

"One being us-"

"That you-"

"Didn't trust-"

"Us." They finished together.

Victor looked between the two, "That is because I do not."

Fred and George tried to look innocent and failed miserably. "Who? Us?" they asked as they caught Harrison's glare.

"Just watch, Prongslet. We've claimed first prank this year. A genuine Marauder in the school and his heirs. We throw the gauntlet."

Harry looked at them before glancing at his father who looked as interested as Harry didn't.

Katarzyna, who had some familiarity with the twins, asked, "Did you specialize the potion?"

Professor Snape, who was walking past, slowed when he heard the word "potion".

Fred nodded, "We mixed it with a subjective truth potion."

"Serum." The Potion's Master corrected. "Truth Potions are known as serums and I will expect a dramatic improvement in your scores in my class Misters Weasley."

The twins nodded, "Yes sir, Mister Potion's Master sir!"

Snape walked off and Harry turned to the group. "Everyone!"

The Durmstrang students all looked to the Head of the Delegate.

"Has anyone eaten anything from the Gryffindor Table?"

Down the table, Kyril Roch nodded. "I had the eggs."

Harry turned to the twins, "The eggs?"

Fred nodded, "Everyone likes 'em."

"You have ingested a subjective truth serum." He told the teen.

"Subjective?" Aleena Vishnevskaya – one of the five 16 year olds who would submit their names into the Goblet – inquired as she looked at her beau.

Kyril bowed his head, "At least tell me it was tasteless, let me preserve some of my dignity. Pranked by breakfast by an Englishman at the worst!"

"We did brew an antidote." Fred added in as his brother got out the small antidote bottle, enough for three doses.

Harry shook his head, "Not a chance, I'm actually curious what he'll say as he was stupid enough not to cast a detection charm. It's the first thing you do at Durmstrang."

Victor nodded his agreement, he'd cast detection charms the second he sat down and he saw Kat do so for Harry's food. Just because they weren't at Durmstrang doesn't mean that the lot of them should feel secure enough not to cast the charms.

"Yeah, the hard part was removing the sassafras smell from the potion. It would have been a dead giveaway that something was wrong with the food." George explained.

"True, but Aleena will want to know what he says." Katarzyna said as she gestured to the Transylvanian girl who'd moved to Ukraine and later to Northern Poland before attending Durmstrang. She had brown eyes, shoulder length brown hair, a button nose and deep red lips. Like all Durmstrang students, she was wearing blood red robes. Unlike them, the fur on her robes belonged to a species of wolf only found in Transylvania. Her family bred the wolves as they were loyal companions and fierce protectors, the fur on her robes was that of a male who'd lived to see 22 years and died in his sleep like old dogs do.

Fred and George's eyes lingered on her for a moment too long before Kyril's wand joined Victor's on the table.

Their attentions turned back to the Gryffindor table just in time to see nearly everyone at the Gryffindor table, a couple dozen Ravenclaws and even a few Slytherins (Hufflepuffs knew better than to eat anything from the Gryffindor table as the Weasley twins preferred to prank their own House) who took the food because apparently knicked food tasted better.

One by one the students declared secrets that earned smirks, slaps and shock as the declarations were made. Then it was Kyril's turn.

"I love Aleena Vishnevskaya."

Aleena slapped him before she realized what he said. "You… love me?"

Kyril held his cheek and tuned to her. "Yes."

She hugged him, much to his surprise, and kissed him.

Harry grinned, "It's about time." He said as he saw Jacob Potter walk into the Great Hall. His red hair was in every direction and behind his glasses (a curse Harry thankfully had been spared from) his hazel eyes were bloodshot. His little brother probably drank a little the night before.

Jacob turned his head and allowed the hall to see his scar. It began just above his right eye, going through his eyebrow, down his eyelid and continued for another centimeter or so below his eye. Harry didn't know how to tell his brother or the Wizarding World that Jacob got the scar when a glass lamp next to his crib exploded in the magical backlash after Voldemort's spell rebounded.

"Glad we could be of assistance then." Fred said while George munched on an apple.

"It's the one hit wonder." Marik said with a grin to their group as Potter sat down at the Gryffindor Table.

"Please tell me some of that serum is delayed." Harry jokingly begged the twins.

They looked regretful. "We really should have thought of that."

Cedric laughed as he came over to the table, his hair was wet. It looked like the Hufflepuff Seeker woke up late.

Harry looked at one of his oldest friends. "Hey Ced."

"Row." Cedric said with a grin. The two of them were pretty even in height but Rowthan had more muscle in his upper body that came from being a full-time Chaser over a full time Seeker. Professional Quaffels weighed more than the ones schools used and for a difference of 5 kilograms; throwing a Quaffel a few dozen times had an effect.

They shook hands and Cedric bowed slightly to his soon-to-be liege lord. As much as Amos and Amy Diggory opposed it, Cedric owed his loyalty to the House of Rowthan and vowed that it would remain so.

Harry grinned; thankfully he was facing the Gryffindor Table and wouldn't be obvious about looking at his baby brother. Jacob was sitting next to Ronald Weasley and Jacob's girlfriend Hope Meshing and a few other Gryffindor fourth years.

Jacob looked more like a mix between their two parents than Harrison did. He had red hair and hazel eyes with their father's tall height and their mother's slight build (or he would have their father's height if his current height was any indication). He also had the oval face shape of the Evans' and the facial lines of the Devereaux family on their Grandmother Potter's side, which were softer and more curved than the 1/3 Potter Harrison had in him since the blood adoption shortly before Lord Rowthan died.

"You really should not call him something like that." Lorah said as she looked around them for signs that anyone understood Marik. "You do not know who understands us."

"She has a point, Marik." Ric reprimanded. "You need to watch what you say. England has a different opinion of the boy than the other countries."

"They worship the ground he walks on for something that he cannot remember, nor has he duplicated anything even close to it. The boy is remarkably… ordinary." Marik retorted.

Silence met his words as the mail came.

Most of them went to Hogwarts students but one of them, a simple brown barn owl, swooped down and dropped a letter near Rowthan's unfinished breakfast.

-0-

To: Heir of Rowthan, Earl of Radnor

From: Lord James Potter, Head of the Most Noble and Respected House of Potter.

Lord Rowthan,

I wish to send a request to meet and converse of the current political and social climate. I seek to clarify a few things that my actions may have presented.

I seek the meeting upon your convenience.

Lord J. Potter

-0-

Harry couldn't help but grin as he folded up the letter and put it into the inner breast pocket of his blood red robes before he got out his legal pad, turned to a clean piece of parchment and penned a reply.

-0-

To: Lord Potter

From: Lord Harrison Rowthan – Heir of the Ancient and Socratic House of Rowthan, Earldom of Radnor

Lord Potter,

I must concur with your motivations for our future conference; several issues are murky within my mind. A meeting would be desirable should we come to an accord as to the time and date.

The circumstances demand that I check with my school administrators as to when I may be available. Perhaps it would be best for me to schedule around you.

Lord H.J. Rowthan

-0-

He allowed the ink to dry before carefully removing it from the legal pad, folding it and sealing it with the family seal he wore on his right middle finger. He then put it into his pocket, determined to mail it as soon as he got back to the ship – never mind that he could just walk up to the staff table and give it to one of the nearly thirty teachers there. Lords (and their heirs) had a proper set of decorum to follow in regards to certain things, it was one thing that his mother refused to understand – there was a decorum they followed and most people already knew it.

Cedric saw the message; he also caught sight of the seal on the letter. While he had his suspicions, he would not say them. He knew that his family drama was not on the same level as Rowthan's. His younger siblings were enraged over the fact that their older blood-adopted brother was to inherit over the biological heirs. Nevermind there was two girls, Caia and Cordelia were in their second and first years before the youngest (and surprise) Caradoc was born last year. Caradoc had already been named Cedric's heir to the modest inheritance that would have allowed the usage of the family seal and the family home in Devon. Both of their parents worked and they didn't even have a house elf. The children were raised to pick up after themselves and clean their rooms but somehow that didn't matter to the girls.

-HJRP-

Across the hall, Jacob couldn't help but laugh at a joke Ron made. Meantime, he was glad for a reason to be smiling. His brother was here.

True, at one time he and his brother looked more alike before the blood adoption anyway. He hadn't seen his brother since he was 9, the summer after his brother's second year at Durmstrang. Not face to face anyway. When Harry broke out as a Quidditch prodigy for the Bulgarian Nationals, with dual citizenship to boot, his picture was all over the place.

It was sad when the closest he got to his brother was when his brother and he both made the first page of the society section when Countess Alverdine threw a fund raiser for the Children's Wing at St. Mungo's. The sad part was that he'd actually looked for his brother at that fundraiser last April only to discover that his brother's attendance at the fundraiser was cut short by NEWT preparation for the then Durmstrang 6th year.

He really wanted to know what his brother was thinking when they won the Cup. He was a typical Potter, Quidditch obsessed and thinking about all of the great plays that he wanted to do if and when he went pro.

When he saw Rowthan stand up to leave, he stood up as well. He waved goodbye to Hope - who contrary to popular belief was not his girlfriend… well, not really. He and Hope were barely at the "kiss on the cheek" stage. Somehow when Hope went with him to the Hollow Ball, the annual ball that his father threw in support of the Dragons and the families of fallen Dragons, they turned into boyfriend and girlfriend.

He followed his brother out of the Great Hall and through the doors.

"Rowthan!" he called out.

Harry turned, saw who it was and turned back and started to walk faster. They were near the Pelican when Harry finally stopped.

"What do you want Heir Potter?" Harry said too formally for Jacob to feel comfortable.

Jacob, like other Heirs, knew what type of language would be used to keep things formal. But the language was also a wall that was used to keep others from doing things that the Heir(s) were not ready for.

"What happened to 'Jake'? You're the only one who ever called me that. Mum doesn't, says it isn't right. Dad doesn't because he says that it is not proper for an Heir to be addressed by anything other than their given name."

Harry scoffed, "Fine, Heir Jake. What is it that you would like to ask of me?"

"I want to talk."

Harry raised an eyebrow in a 'yes and?' motion.

"To my brother."

Harry's face went stony and he glared at Jacob for saying that aloud. If anyone heard…

"Please? I just want my brother back."

Harry groaned, "Heir Jake… you and your brother write each other."

"Once a year doesn't count." Jacob retorted. "I wonder if he would tell me about his relationship with that girl he was seeing. I heard he might have proposed."

Harry nodded, "I have heard the same. I have also heard that he was extremely nervous, and asked after the World Cup. His intended, of course, replied affirmatively."

Jacob grinned, "My thanks, Heir of Radnor."

"Perhaps your brother may wish to converse with someone elder and perchance, if someone younger were to happen upon their meet the younger and the brother may have the chance to converse."

Jacob nodded, bowing his head in thanks.

"As you have made your choice, Heir Potter, I will take my leave." He said as he turned sharply and walked away and back to his own ship.

*** (From Sherrylin Kenyon's Dark Hunter Books. Highly recommend them! Again, no copyright infringement is meant, just kudos!)