I never hated my father.But I never worshipped him, either.

  There was a time—brief, like candlelight before wind—when I thought he could be something more than a legacy-bearer. That perhaps behind his cold eyes and calcuted posture was a man still capable of choosing his family over his name.

  I was wrong.

  Cassian Rosier was born into legacy. Molded by it. Hardened under the weight of centuries of blood purity, social structure, and quiet wars fought in wand-light and whispers. He wore the name Rosier like armor, polished and silent. I was expected to do the same.

  He trained me in his way. Not harshly. But with the quiet disappointment of a man who measured worth in tradition.

  "Your name matters, Caelum," he said once, kneeling before me with a rolled parchment clutched in his pale fingers. “You carry more than yourself.”

  I looked him dead in the eye and replied with what I had wanted to say for years.

  "I am your son. But I only support my family. That means Mother. That means Lyra. And that means you, if you stand with us. But if you tell me I need to protect someone else—a legacy, a name, a house—I can’t promise anything. Because I don’t care for banners, Father. I care for them."

  There was a pause. A long one. No shouting followed. No lecture. Just... silence.

  Then, he nodded once. A short, tired nod. And he never brought it up again.

  He stopped asking me to memorize the Rosier family tree. He stopped reciting bloodlines during meals. And when I sat in his study te at night, he didn’t watch me with narrowed eyes anymore.

  He watched me like a man realizing he had carved his son from the wrong stone.

  Time passed.

  Lyra grew like ivy in spring—tangling her ughter through every hallway. Her magic fred early: floating spoons, shifting colors, books that flew off shelves when she was excited. She was brilliant in that chaotic way only a child with a bright mind could be. She asked me questions I didn’t always have answers for.

  "Why does magic feel warm in the fingers but cold in the spine?""Do wands ever argue with their owners?""Do thestrals get lonely if no one can see them?"

  I answered what I could. She filled in the rest with stories.

  Mother, always watching us from the corner of the room, seemed content just seeing her children alive. Curious. Unbroken. Her eyes softened every time she saw us together. I think she feared the Rosier name would make strangers of us. It didn’t.

  It never could.

  When I turned ten, the letter came.

  It arrived in the morning post, nestled between an owl pellet and a Ministry newsletter no one read. The parchment was thick. Yellowed. Sealed in crimson wax.

  I didn’t need to open it to know what it said.

  But I did.

  Dear Mr. Caelum Rosier,We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry...

  The rest was a list. Uniforms. Books. Potions. Wand. Pet optional.

  I looked up at my mother. She smiled. Not because she was unafraid, but because she refused to let her fear shape my future.

  We went to Diagon Alley on the st Sunday of July.

  The city above was humid and gray, but the bricks behind the Leaky Cauldron shifted with a whisper of old stone, revealing something else—something older and brighter.

  Lyra gasped as the alley opened. She clutched my hand tight, her eyes catching every flickering sign, every owl in a cage, every child bouncing with nerves and new robes. "This is better than your books," she whispered.

  I almost agreed.

  We visited Flourish and Blotts first. The smell of parchment hit me like incense. I ran my hand along spines of books that hummed, wriggled, whispered. One snapped at me. I smiled.

  Next came robes. Bck. Standard. Slightly heavy at the shoulders. I endured the tailor’s fussing while Lyra tried on a pointed hat two sizes too big and marched around as Professor Lyra of Hogwarts.

  But it was the wand that mattered.

  Ollivanders was silent as we entered. Dust and magic settled on every shelf like memory. Mr. Ollivander himself emerged like a ghost from behind a stack of boxes.

  "Ah… Rosier," he said softly. "Old wood in that name. But you... you burn differently."

  I didn’t respond. Just watched.

  The first wand fizzled in my grip. The second sent a bst of wind through the shop. The third turned the lights cold.

  But the fourth—

  Ash wood. Twelve inches. Phoenix feather core.

  The moment it touched my skin, the world seemed to lean toward me. A breath. A click. A resonance. Not the kind of explosive surge others got. No fireworks. No fanfare.

  Just understanding.

  We locked eyes—me and the wand.

  And I thought, yes. You'll do.

  Outside the shop, Lyra tugged on my sleeve and handed me a box.

  It was small. Warm.

  "I saved for it with my allowance," she said.

  Inside, nestled in straw, was a silver-furred kitten with bck paws and sharp yellow eyes. It blinked once and promptly bit my finger.

  I raised an eyebrow.

  Lyra giggled. "She likes you."

  I named her Kuro.

  Mother watched all of it with quiet joy. Her hand found Father’s, and—for once—he didn’t pull away.

  We were a family, then. Not perfect. But real.

  And I was ready.

  Ready for Hogwarts.

  Ready for the next battlefield.

  This one, made of stone and scrolls instead of kunai and death.