Fila returned to the manor with a new sense of happiness, something she hadn't felt in a long time. together with Rowan and Elsbeth she unpacked her things.
Of course, she also visited her mother and told her all about the things she had done and seen, she even brought her medal she received and proudly displayed it.
Fila talked about the flower in the common room and from the great hall.
"You would have loved it." she said to the stone in front of her.
The flowers and trees around her shifted slightly as if the showed that they saw it. flowers started to bloom at the tombstone of her mother, white lilies.
Inside the manor the shift in her arrival was felt, maids walked around and cleaned, made dinner. Rowan and Elsbeth sat in their office on the second floor.
But the mood wasn't good, they were discussing something heavy. While looking out of the window, watching the young Grindelwald talking to her mothers gravestone.
"I hate that we have to do this to her." Elsbeth words cut the silence.
Rowan didn't say anything, but he didn't like it either. But he knew that this was bound to happen sooner rather than later. He looked over at the letter on the desk.
Inside laid a letter that could very well change how the little miss would be as a person from now on. It could even ruin the way she lives.
"He didn't say we need to do it right now… but we should tell her. We did say that he wanted to meet her last summer, I think she knows it. she may be young but, she it very intelligent." Rowan answered finally.
Gellert Grindelwald had ones again requested that he wanted to meet his granddaughter.
Something that Ophelia had strongly opposed last summer and said that he needed to wait.
Outside, the lilies continued to bloom.
White petals unfurled with quiet elegance around the gravestone, their fragrance soft, almost weightless in the warm summer air. Fila remained kneeling there, unaware of the eyes watching from above, her voice low, gentle, filled with that private warmth reserved only for this place.
Inside the manor, tension lingered like a storm that refused to break.
Elsbeth stood near the window, arms folded tightly, her gaze fixed on the garden below. "She's happy," she said softly. "Truly happy."
Rowan remained by the desk.
The letter lay before him.
Unopened no longer.
Unreadable only in the sense that neither of them wished to look at it again.
"I know," he replied.
Elsbeth's voice sharpened with restrained emotion. "Then how can we justify this?"
Rowan exhaled slowly, the weight of inevitability pressing into every line of his posture. "Because pretending it won't happen does not protect her."
"It would protect her for a little longer."
"And what then?" Rowan's eyes finally lifted. "Another summer of excuses? Another year of delay?"
Silence answered him.
Beyond the glass, Fila's laughter drifted faintly upward as a breeze stirred the garden. The sound cut through the room with quiet cruelty.
Elsbeth looked away first.
"I remember last summer," she murmured. "The nightmares. The anger. The fear."
Rowan's jaw tightened slightly.
So did he.
Ophelia's refusal had not been childish rebellion. It had been instinctive. Protective. The name Grindelwald did not arrive gently in most minds, even now.
Especially now.
"He is still her grandfather," Rowan said carefully.
"He is Gellert Grindelwald."
The words fell like a verdict.
Rowan did not argue.
Because there was no argument to make.
History did not soften through denial.
The letter remained between them, its presence louder than any raised voice.
"He requested politely," Rowan added after a moment. "Again."
They both knew he had changed when he finally realized he had a granddaughter, even going as far as to give her everything he owned.
Even after Grindelwald was imprisoned in nurmengard, he still retained some of his possessions, often through loyal followers and people in debt to him. But since he still had a child, or Ophelias mother. They allowed him to keep some of his safes and properties.
The reason why Ophelia didn't want to see him was not because his name. but for the simple reason that he didn't help her or her mother when they were in need.
"Let's give it some time. maybe it will be easier." They both agreed to this. maybe she just needed some time for herself right now.
Ophelia walked up into her room and sat down in the armchair close to her big tall windows. She had both books with her.
'You have grown rather impressively, and now soon a second-year student.' The book praised her for her progress. 'Its time we learnt something different, you will still train with the Florae Arcanum. But I want to see if you can use a different kind of magic.' The book continued to explain the it wanted me to try using a different kind of magic, not involving plants or any kind of spell really.
She was a bit bummed out as she really wanted more training with the flowers, but she could paus that for a bit.
'There are older forces,' the ink continued, dark strokes steady and precise, 'currents of magic that predate structured spellcraft. I think you have that talent to wield it.'
What followed was hours of information and well, a lesson in magic.
Things she needed to know before even attempting to wield it.
What she first needed to do was to actually understand it while also feeling it. sounds hard because it is. And to do that she basically needed to sit out and feel for magic until she saw it.
So she heeded out to the garden and took a seat on the ground in the right far corner of the manor grounds. There was a tree old, an old one at that. She had the feeling that if this old magic would be felt, it would be close to something old.
The books instructions were to just wait for the magic to come to you. she didn't know how it would even look or feel like, but the book had been clear on that you would be able to tell instantly.
So from now on she would go out here a couple of hours every day. For days that turned into a week, then into two.
On the second week she felt something, but she didn't see anything. She focused herself more. Magic that she could feel weren't just feelings, it could almost be seen in her mind. Magic looked like threads floating, in different colors, length and width. So she was looking for something that was unusual.
Today something felt off. One of the threads didn't have another color, or anything that would set it apart from the others, but it just felt weird.
Fila focused on the thread as if she moved closer towards it in her mind.
The thread reacted. A deep blue color emitted from it, and after the thread changed its color to that deep blue.
Fila's eyes flew open.
The garden snapped back into ordinary sight, sunlight filtering through leaves, shadows shifting lazily across the grass. The tree stood unchanged, vast and patient, its roots tangled peacefully within the earth. Nothing outwardly reflected the disturbance she had just witnessed.
Yet her heart raced.
Slowly, almost hesitantly, she closed her eyes once more.
The magical vision returned.
And there it was.
The thread no longer blended among the others. It cut through the tapestry with unmistakable clarity now, a line of deep blue winding beneath the tree, slipping downward into the soil like a current sinking into unseen depths.
Fila grabbed her book and opened it, before even talking to the book it had already formed a sentence.
'good work in finding it, the first step is taken.' Then a long moment of nothing.
The wind blew through her hair, it wasn't cold but the sun wasn't out today and the clouds had rain in them.
'now you just need to learn how to wield it, and that will be up to you on how to do it. you need to understand it, learn how it feels, how it wants to be used. And there is one person in your life who could help you at some degree' the book wrote.
"Who?" she couldn't think of anyone, and she didn't have many people she knew at all. first she thought about Rowan or Elsbeth, but she dismissed that thought fast. And that was it.
She considered them longer this time, if only out of fairness. Rowan's magic was measured, deliberate, grounded in structure and responsibility. Elsbeth's brilliance carried sharp precision, every spell executed with effortless clarity. Yet neither of them had ever spoken of anything like this. No mention of older forces, of magic without incantation or wandwork.
Which left—
Fila stilled.
The thought surfaced quietly, yet once present it refused dismissal.
Her grandfather.
Gellert Grindelwald.
The name settled into her mind with a familiar mix of resistance and reluctant logic. If the book spoke truly, if this magic belonged to something older than conventional spellcraft, then there were very few witches or wizards alive who might understand it. Grindelwald had lived through a different era, studied deeper and darker branches of magic than most ever dared approach.
The book kept on about that he had knowledge about the ancient magic she was trying to learn. And something about a wand that also could be of help, the book didn't say anything else about that wand only that its was created by death himself.
Fila glanced away, her gaze lifting toward the wide grey sky. The deep blue thread lingered faintly at the edge of her perception, woven quietly beneath the tree. Above her, clouds drifted in slow formations, their muted light softening the garden's colors. The air carried the gentle heaviness that hinted at approaching rain.
Her grandfather.
Even thinking the word felt strange.
Not unfamiliar, but complicated.
Gellert Grindelwald was not a presence in her life in any ordinary sense. He existed more as history than family, more as a name spoken carefully by others than a person attached to memory. And yet, the book's insistence settled with uncomfortable logic. If this magic truly belonged to something older, something rarely understood, then knowledge of it would not be found in classrooms or libraries. It would belong to those who had spent lifetimes pushing into forgotten corners of magical study.
Still…
Fila's fingers tightened slightly around the book's spine.
"A wand created by Death," she murmured quietly.
The words sounded unreal when spoken aloud, like something pulled from legend rather than instruction. The wizarding world was filled with stories, artifacts wrapped in exaggeration, myths polished by generations of retelling. She had grown up hearing enough of them to know that truth and fiction rarely remained separate for long.
Yet the book had not written it dramatically.
Not like a tale.
Simply as fact.
Fila stepped into the office where Elsbeth and Rowan sat in. they were sitting in opposite couches drinking coffee.
They looked at the girl who just stormed into the room.
"Fila is there something wrong?" Elsbeth asked.
"Yes and no" she simply said and sat down next to Elsbeth. "I think its time I meet with Grandpa"
The word hit the room like a hammer. Neither Rowan and Elsbeth even thought this girl could even form that sentence.
For a moment neither Rowan nor Elsbeth reacted, as though the words needed time to settle into something believable. The quiet clink of porcelain against saucer, the soft ticking of the clock on the mantel, even the low crackle from the fireplace seemed suddenly louder in the stillness that followed. Elsbeth's hand froze halfway to her cup. Rowan's gaze, which had been resting absently on the window, shifted slowly toward Fila, his expression caught somewhere between surprise and careful restraint.
Fila, meanwhile, sat with an ease that felt almost out of place against the tension gathering around her. She leaned back into the couch beside Elsbeth, the self writing book now tucked calmly under her arm, her posture composed, though a faint trace of nervous energy lingered in the way her fingers traced the edge of the cushion.
"Yes and no," she repeated, more gently this time. "Nothing is wrong."
Elsbeth recovered first, though only just. "You want to meet… your grandfather?"
"I think I should," Fila replied.
Rowan set his cup down with slow precision, eyes narrowing slightly as he studied her. "May I ask what changed?"
Fila hesitated briefly, not from uncertainty but from the simple challenge of putting thought into words. "My training," she said. "The book is teaching me something different this summer. Older magic." She glanced between them. "It says he might understand it."
The exchange of looks between Rowan and Elsbeth was immediate and layered with unspoken conversation. Concern. Calculation. A flicker of something else that might have been inevitability.
Elsbeth's voice softened. "Fila…"
"I know," Fila said quietly. "I haven't forgotten last summer."
The room shifted again, not in mood but in weight. The memory lingered between them, familiar and uncomfortable, yet Fila's tone carried none of the anger or fear that had once defined the subject.
Rowan leaned forward slightly. "Meeting him is not a small decision."
"I'm aware."
"And you're certain this is your choice?"
Fila nodded. "Yes."
Elsbeth studied her face for a long moment, searching for signs of pressure or persuasion, for the restless edge of doubt. Instead she found something steadier. Thoughtfulness. A maturity that seemed to have arrived quietly over the course of the school year.
Finally, she exhaled.
Rowan followed with a slower breath of his own, rubbing a hand briefly along his jaw before speaking. "He did request another meeting."
Fila's eyes lifted. "Recently?"
"A few weeks ago."
She absorbed that without visible reaction, though her shoulders straightened faintly.
Elsbeth reached for Fila's hand, squeezing it gently. "If we do this, we do it properly. No surprises. No rushing."
Fila squeezed back. "Okay."
Rowan rose from his seat and moved toward the desk, where the letter still rested, its presence no longer abstract but suddenly, undeniably relevant. He looked down at it briefly before lifting it in one measured motion.
"Well," he said quietly, "it seems the timing has decided itself."
Fila watched him, heart still fluttering faintly, though beneath it now rested something new.
Resolve.
Not excitement.
Not dread.
Simply the calm understanding that some steps, once considered long enough…
…eventually feel natural to take
Rowan turned the letter once in his hands before breaking the seal, the motion slow and deliberate, as though care might soften the significance of what followed. Elsbeth remained seated beside Fila, though her posture had shifted subtly, shoulders drawn straighter, fingers still loosely wrapped around Fila's. The room, so recently filled with quiet domestic calm, now carried a gentle alertness, the kind that arrives when conversation crosses into territory none of them could treat lightly.
Fila watched without speaking, her gaze steady, curiosity flickering faintly beneath the composure she tried to maintain. From her seat, the letter looked ordinary enough. Cream parchment. Dark ink. Nothing about it suggested the weight Rowan had earlier assigned to it.
He scanned the contents briefly, eyes moving with practiced efficiency, before reading aloud.
"Miss Ophelia Grindelwald," Rowan began, his voice even, neutral. "I hope this letter finds you well and that your studies continue to bring you success."
Fila's brow lifted slightly.
Grindelwald's handwriting was unmistakably refined, each stroke precise without being ornamental.
"I write again with the sincere wish that you might grant me the opportunity for a meeting this summer. I understand your previous reluctance and hold no resentment toward it. Time, I believe, grants perspective where insistence cannot."
Elsbeth's grip tightened faintly.
Rowan continued.
"There are matters I would prefer to discuss in person, not as expectation, but as invitation. Should you agree, arrangements may be made at your convenience."
A pause.
Then the final line.
"With respect,
Gellert Grindelwald."
Silence followed, though it no longer carried shock. Only thought.
Fila leaned back slightly, absorbing the words. "That's… surprisingly polite."
Rowan allowed the smallest hint of a smile. "He has learned patience."
Elsbeth's expression remained harder to read. "Or caution."
Fila considered that, then shrugged lightly. "Either way, it doesn't sound like a trap."
Elsbeth sighed softly. "Fila…"
"I'm joking," she added quickly, though her tone stayed gentle rather than flippant. "Mostly."
Rowan folded the letter neatly. "If you truly wish to meet him, we can respond today."
The simplicity of the statement seemed to settle something in the room. What had once been an abstract possibility now stood plainly before them, stripped of drama, reduced to logistics and choice.
Fila nodded after only a moment's hesitation. "Yes. Today."
Elsbeth studied her again. "Are you nervous?"
"A little."
"Afraid?"
Fila thought about it honestly. "Not really."
Rowan raised a brow.
She shrugged again. "I've faced worse things than an awkward conversation."
Elsbeth laughed softly despite herself, tension easing just a fraction. "You sound far too calm about this."
"I've had practice."
Rowan moved back toward them, placing the folded letter on the low table. "Then we'll arrange it properly. No rushing, no pressure. Neutral ground."
"Nurmengard?" Fila asked.
Rowan nodded. "yes, he is imprisoned there. Well prison is a stretch, its more like a very prison looking home." He explained that Grindelwald was the only one there, and he could leave but he swore not to.
Fila blinked. "He could leave?"
Rowan gave a small nod as he settled back into his chair, his tone measured, drifting naturally into explanation rather than lecture. "Technically, yes. Nurmengard still stands as a prison, but his confinement there has long since become… unconventional. There are protections, of course, wards layered into stone and boundary, yet none designed to hold him by force anymore." He paused briefly, choosing his phrasing with care. "He gave his word that he would remain."
Elsbeth's fingers stilled around her cup. "A promise he has kept."
Fila leaned back slightly, absorbing that. The idea felt strange, not unbelievable, but difficult to picture. "So he just stays there?"
"In essence," Rowan replied. "Nurmengard is empty otherwise. No guards pacing corridors, no prisoners filling cells. Only maintenance charms and the occasional Ministry inspection." A faint, thoughtful exhale followed. "It is less a prison now and more a residence shaped like one."
"A very grim residence," Elsbeth added dryly.
Fila's expression shifted between curiosity and something softer, harder to define. "Why would he stay if he doesn't have to?"
Rowan glanced briefly toward the window before answering. "People change, Fila. Priorities shift. Regret has a way of settling heavily when there is finally time to sit with it."
Elsbeth's voice was quieter. "And some choices cannot be undone, only lived with."
Fila nodded slowly, gaze drifting to the folded letter resting on the table. The edges of the situation continued to rearrange themselves in her mind. Grindelwald, the distant and complicated figure of history, now took on a shape that felt unexpectedly human. Still intimidating. Still burdened with everything his name carried. Yet no longer quite as unreachable.
"So," she said after a moment, "we'd go there?"
Rowan nodded. "If that remains your wish."
"It does."
No hesitation.