84 The Black Star

The Black Star was a five-armed star shape structure that was rumoured to be made by crystallizing the tears of a Phoenix and encompassed with the crystalline structure was a sliver of a Thunderbird's Lightening Strike and a frozen blood drop of Jörmungandr.

Nobody knew how The Black Star came to be in the possession of The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black and none would dare to venture as to from how many generations the Blacks had kept the artefact a secret before a foolish Heir had ignorantly talked about it in The Wizengamot on the instigation of the then Heir Weasley.

Once the news had leaked and spread like wildfire, The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black had been attacked non-stop for almost to a decade but true to their name, the Blacks had the darkest and foulest wards protecting all their properties.

Hence, even though the various properties had suffered from considerable damage, nobody had been able to breach the third layer of wards till date and so, nobody had been able to snatch this artefact that brimmed and thrummed with power.

Some people had even cast doubt as to whether the Blacks really had the artefact or if this was just a ploy by the family to raise their standing in Magical Britannia.

When the naysayers had increased in numbers, the then Lord Black had proposed a meeting of the sacred twenty-eight to showcase the artefact. The only caveat being that any Lord or Ladies who wanted to attend the meeting could only do so under The Guest Rights of Merlin.

The Guest Rights of Merlin were an oath taken by both parties – the hosts and the guest upon their blood and magic.

 In simple terms, it meant that the guests proclaimed on the imminent loss of blood and magic for themselves and their direct descendants that they wouldn't bring any harm – physical, emotional, psychological, monetary or magical on their hosts.

Similarly, the host proclaimed on the imminent loss of blood and magic for themselves and their direct descendants that they wouldn't manipulate or harm the guests in any way or manner whatsoever.

The oath was stringent enough to not leave any leeway for any magical manipulation on any of the parties side.

Though many prominent Lords and Ladies had grumbled at the condition, most of them had easily folded under the thinking that at least the meeting would give them a visual proof of the artefact.

The meeting would later come to be known as The Black Convention.

At that meeting, all the Lord and Ladies had seen The Black Star and it had also cemented the position of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black as the leader of The Dark declared and oriented families in Magical Britannia.

Most people – even the learned Lords and Ladies of various Ancient Houses believed The Black Star to be an artefact that held immeasurable Dark Power and unimaginable Dark Magic.

Afterwards, many Houses had tried to get The Black Star through legal means once they had realised the power of The House of Black – through monetary compensation, as a bride price for marrying their daughters into the Blacks or as dowry for the girls that married out of the family and into various other Sacred Twenty-Eight Houses.

However, everyone had been refused and rebuffed.  Everyone left empty-handed but not before losing a layer or two off their skin for all their overt and covert methods.

It was only after Harry became Lord Black in his last lifetime that he had realised the true importance and value of the artefact.

 Since The Black Star contained residue from the three mythical beings that represented the three types of magic – Light, Grey and Dark, it meant that it could channel, absorb or direct an outside source of magic.

The immense power contained in the miniscule star that was not bigger than the size of a pinky had become mildly sentient over time.

Hence, it could also be used by Slumbering Mages to accelerate the growth and opening of their magical reserves and help them get an extra source of magic if they were ever caught unawares in a tight spot.

 Other people couldn't even use The Black Star to its full potential because the magic had become sentient and couldn't be tamed by people who didn't have the magical reserves to be categorized as A Slumbering Mage.

As of now, only six people in the entire Wizarding World could hope to use The Black Star and not have it backlash at their own magic and leave them as near Squibs.

When the twins – Cygnus and Elladora had been born, Harry had exercised his right as the next Lord Black to get The Black Star out of the Black Family Vault as a joint gift for the twins.

However, to his consternation, The Black Star had only been useful to the twins until their first Magical Maturity.

For one year, Harry had slowly and systematically directed the Grey Magic encompassed inside The Black Star to the twins.

But after their first birthday, their magical cores had increased to a size where directing and channelling any more magic would have brought more harm than good to the tykes. Hence, The Black Star had become redundant.

Harry hadn't wanted to place The Black Star back in the vaults for fear of any other children or adults coming across it and not being able to curb their greed and so, he hadn't returned the artefact back to the vaults but had instead kept it with himself.

Now that he had realised the identity of the other Grey Lord, he felt a surreal sort of camaraderie with the person, not only because the other person had been a respected and much loved elder in the first timeline but also because Harry had the honour of having verbal and written interaction with the said person around a year and half ago.

More importantly, he wanted to help Mykew Gregorovitch for his own selfish reasons as well.

Harry dearly hoped and wished that if he could help the person awaken his magic and magical reserves, the other person would be on an equal footing against Gellert Grindelwald and Albus Dumbledore and that the final confrontation against the madman would be lead by Lord Gregorovitch instead of Dumbledore.

Still, He wondered as to why Gregorovitch had been only known as a wandmaker in the first timeline.

Well, this was another mystery and one thing that hasn't changed about Harry in all these years was that he liked a good mystery and more than that he loved the process of solving the impossible and unimaginable.   

Since this didn't bring any foreseeable danger to him, Harry thought that maybe he could use his time and energy solving the puzzle that was Mykew Gregorovitch.