It is hard to completely grasp what it means to have a loving family. Having unconditional support and love is something that means all the world to me. My mother has continued to read to me every night and will frequently read to me during the days as well when there is time. I have tried to encourage this behavior by giving my cutest smiles and baby noises when ever she reads to me. Today though I think I have a special surprise for her. When she was reading the the story I look up at her and almost laughed a the look on her face. In stark contrast to her normally well controlled and almost icy demeanor, as she read the story to me she used different voices and was full of emotion for every scene. I give her a big smile and say, "MAMA" as soon as the story ends. A broad smile breaks out across her face and then quickly she gains control again but a small controlled smile remains. "Who is my special little boy? You are so smart to recognize that I should be your first word. I can't wait for your father to hear you." She raises me up and kisses my forehead, and once more think to myself how grateful I am at this chance to have another life full of magic and the love of family.
Later that night as we gathered for dinner as usual my mother placed me into my wooden highchair, and as my father entered and took his customary seat at the head of the table my mother drew her wand and with only few quick movements animated a doll to dance on my high chair. I gave a broad smile and yelled towards her, "Mama!". I see my father freeze for a moment and then turn towards my mother, both joy and betrayal warring across his face. "His first word?" He asks in an unsteady voice. "Yes, earlier today."
"I should have known he would say mama first, you have been there for him more than I… hopefully you have been telling him tales of his dashing and lordly father, so that my name will come soon."
"Of course my Lord, tales of your grand exploits are all that he hears! Stories about how hard his father works to keep us safe and to keep the name of our house strong in such dark times. Even when it means he cannot be with his love ones as much as he wishes." My mothers voice started in a more teasing tone, but by the end was quieter and softer. My father initially had a grin on his face that shifted over to a small smile, "Thank you my dear." He turned back to me and said, "It seems that our son is quite smart, it typically take several more months before children use words with the kind of intension that he seems to be showing. I can't wait until I can start training him."
"When he is ready he will certainly be a credit to our house. I will give him all of the training needed to stand as a peak example of proper Pureblood conduct. No one will be able to question his conduct."
"Just as no one with eyes or sense would question your conduct."
"And yet fools abound, and they will have nothing to use against my son. They will not be able to use the excuse that he was not born among then to nitpick his conduct."
"If they dare do so before me, without just cause, they will remember the cost of impugning the honor of the Most Ancient and Noble House of Prewitt." Despite his words being directed in my defense, it seemed to me that his words were not about me at all. This interaction raised some questions that I had not previously considered. My mother is quite obviously not of the typical English Magical Pureblood families. Her long straight black hair and light brown skin were not consistent with any of the old English families. Surprisingly I had not ever given much thought to the fact that since she is not traditional English, what that might mean for her blood status or treatment among the wider community. Sadly my current age meant that these were not things I was likely to learn about in any detail anytime soon. After dinner wrapped up and I was put to bed.
Several months passed rapidly and I made steady progress working my way through my former life's memories. During this process I made several plans for what the next step would be after I completed moving all of my memories into the mind palace. Two key goals stood out for me. First, figuring out how to create an effective Occlumency barrier (ideally one that does not give away my advanced mental development that is incongruent with my physical age). Second was trying to take information out of memories and including them into Skill Books. The idea being that, rather than sifting through my school aged memories trying to remember the equation for finding the x intercepts of a parabola, I would just open up the Skill Book - Math in my mind palace and search for that equation. This will hopefully be much faster and allow me to more easily compile conclusions about different topics.
Another development as the months passed by was my increasing control over my body. I was able to articulate different kinds of vocalizations and was no long bound to just crying and hoping that my family would understand my needs. Fully articulate language was still beyond my grasp but I was able to force myself to use simple words and my family quickly began praising me for my grasp of these words. My mother especially was proud, and then equally as stern. Once I began using even the simplest words she would try to control me into articulating what I wanted or needed. Such as this morning when I tried to point to the children book "Tales of Beatle and the Bard" as some morning she will read from such children books. Given my knowledge that some such tales are actually based in truth I was very eager to hear as many of them as I could. However to my frustration some sounds were still difficult to complete a clearly as I would like. Rather than allowing my gesture to serve as a request my mother instead said, "What is it my dear? One does not merely point and expect others to leap to your command."
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"Book, pwease." I say as clearly as I can. "Of course my dear, if you would like me to read from the book this morning I would be happy too. Thank you for saying 'please.'" She said while annunciating and speaking slowly. "Let us start with 'Babbitty Rabbitty and her Cackling Stump.'"
As the months passed I found that I was also able to crawl, not with any grace at first but at least I was no longer bound to the same spot. The different this made was immense because it offered to me opportunities to see more of my family. My lack of crying without reason and being able to quickly identify what I needed meant that I was brought along with my family around the house at almost all times. The only time that I spent in my nursery at that point was when large gathering were ongoing or when I was to be sleeping. For some reason that I have not really understood while my family has no issue with me being see by individuals any time there is a gathering I am tucked away before it really begins. This is rather frustrating as not much of import is discussed during these time. Recently my family hosted several other families over for a large dinner to celebrate the new year. While it was initially exciting to see some new faces, my desire for information about the particulars of what was going on made it difficult to enjoy be passed around like a toy. After obligatory comments about, "Can't believe how big he has gotten!" "He will be so handsome he is taking after his father already!" The only thing I really learned was that the year was 1977, soon to be 1978. Meaning that it will be almost 2 and a half years before the birth of Harry Potter. Then I was tucked away into my nursery with Janus to check on me until the festivities were over.
Dinner quickly grew to be one of my favorite times of the day. This was not only because my family was together, but also because of the conversations I could hear. Last night after the first course had been completed my mother asked, "How did the conversations go with the Dragon preserve?"
"As well as can be expected, they are getting frustrated with my constant badgering for more dragon dung and scales. The amount that they produce is essentially fixed and my requests for them to find ways to increase the amounts are not helpful." My father responded with a defeated sigh.
"Where they able to come up with any ideas?" My mother asked while motioning to Janis to bring in the main course.
"Not really, they promised that they can make the shipments more regular if we are needing them right now, but that will increase costs since that will be sending less in each shipment."
"Unfortunate that they will not be able to help us then. At this rate how long will we have before we can no longer meet our obligations?" She said while maintaining an even tone.
"We have six months if I draw from our store houses. Another three years if I use your families contacts to buy from the Nepal reserve given the transportation costs. All told, if nothing changes we have about three years before our coffers will be in such a state that we need to make a final decision or risk not being able to recover. Our farms and regular contracts cannot continue to supply both our businesses and our agreement with the Dark Lord's forces indefinitely." My father explained, with a kind of tired tone that seemed to me like he was repeating a line that he had gone over several times already.
My mother nodded her head in a slow controlled way and responded in her normal even tone, "That is about what I thought from the my review of the books." With that my father seated at the head of table in our private dining room seemed to lose something. Normally when he was sitting at the head of the table he seemed like a Noble lord from the stories of my past life. With the finely carved wooden chairs and the fireplace behind him it would seem as though he was being silhouetted by the fire. This would add to his strong posture and darkly colored robes. However, in this moment with the loss of his strong posture instead of silhouetting him, the fire behind him seemed as though it was trying reach out to consume him.
Later that night I lay in my crib and thought about what I learned. If my mental timeline was right then my families wealth will last them until around February of 1981. Well before the Dark Lord was defeated in the story. Frustration built as I realized that regardless of my future knowledge I am powerless to change the reality of the situation. When my family is at the breaking point I will be around 3 and a half, powerless. Even if I came up with an idea to help, what is the likelihood that my family would listen to me? Unless I want to let another into my mind to reveal the source of my knowledge and insight. However, what would be the fallout of such an action. What would be the chance that they would react with fear? Reject me… think I have stolen the life of their true son… Quickly I wrenched my mind from such thoughts. I will not loss my family again, no matter what! Regardless just because I am unable to affect the outcome does not mean that all is lost. I will do what I can, try to be the best that I can be and hope that when the time comes in the future where I can act then I will have the ability to make a difference! Given how heavily connections can weight in on businesses as well as some of the odd cultural aspects I have noted perhaps me showing further signs of a precocious genius might give my family further leverage in order to obtain options to free themselves.