Part 1. Chapter 1.

Darkness envelops and lulls, giving a pleasant, placatory feeling and a feeling of protectability. Bathing in the waves of the calm, the young man can't say at what moment the feeling of all-encompassing pleasure has gone away.

  At first he has a vague feeling that something has subtly changed, and then he probably rather feels than sees that darkness begins to lose its saturation and density little by little. On the periphery of the vision, he has noticed how the slightly visible contours of something begin to slowly come through it, but as soon as the young man tries to look closely, darkness immediately reappears its opacity and density.

Than this has repeated again and again…The withdrawal of darkness resembles the surf, which first rolls in a warm wave,  absorbing  everything, even the slightest glare of light, then it backs off, gradually dissipating more and more each time, allowing to see more and farther through it.

This allows one to gradually examine the outlines of the objects in the room; also, at some point, the young man is able to understand that he himself is in it. As soon as he comes to understanding where he is, darkness doesn't return as usual but, on the contrary, continues to retreat, dissolving in the dim light of the room.

Now nothing prevents him from looking around and more closely look at the room in which he has suddenly appeared.

The small workroom, a classic desk located almost in the middle of the room, behind which a man now is sitting and working.

Why haven't I seen him? Or will it be more correct to ask – why?

He has short, dark hair with a streak of gray, which contrasts with his appearance. Expensive, tailor-made clothes add an accent and add fineness and elegance to his lean figure. And as in contrast with it, man's hair sticks out in all directions as a grubby stack.

What is on his foot? Simple slippers?  Pshaw …

And what's wrong with the slippers? He's at home.

  The emotional indignation of the young man that has flared is sharply replaced by the calmness that has come from somewhere outside, and he, having forgotten about the slippers of the man sitting behind the table, continues the examination of the room.

  Along the walls, along the perimeter, book shelves are located, and that's why there are no windows in the office. The light in this room comes from the charmed ceiling.

But why and how do I know that the lighting changes at the wish of the owner? Also, what does it mean that the ceiling is charmed? Is this some kind of a joke?

Mmm, yes! And somehow I already know what it means to enchant.

Questions, questions…they appear and immediately disappear without being caught. And so, swimming between the dream and reality, the young man, using incredible efforts, still tries to understand - maybe to remember who this man standing in front of him is.

And why does this man look vaguely familiar to me, though I absolutely can't remember neither who he is nor who I am myself? My memory is silent, and what about the feelings? I've listened to my inner voice, and the feelings are also silent. Who is this man? And who am I?

He's a mage.

But do mages exist?

They do!

It's weird, but it's okay. Then I've such a question: who is this mage, and why am I looking at him?

It's a memory!

Whose memory? And who's answering me?

It doesn't matter. Gradually, you'll sort it out on your own.

The young man has been distracted from the internal dialogue by a pop, and he stares in amazement at the creature that appeared from the air, which has bowed, and says,

«Master Harry! The second master, Lord Prince, has arrived! He's asked me to know when you'll be able to receive him.»

«Where's Lord Prince now», a faint smile has stirred the man's lips, «and what's he doing? »

«Lord Prince now is in his private rooms; he is getting cleaned up after the journey, and then he's asked me to bring him something to eat!», having puffed out its chest with pride, proclaims this creature.

This is not a creature; it's a house elf.

Why does everything seem to me at the same time that this is the right house elf and, in parallel, there's a feeling that elves should be another? I don't understand!

I don't like him; he's a bit disgusting.

And that's all that bothers you?

Yes. And why should I concern myself with the fact that this is a right elf or not?

Ok.

Having distracted from thoughts about elves, the young man misses what the man has said and also hasn't seen when the elf disappears.

Also, the young man is surprised that until he hasn't seen the eyes of the man, it seems he's quite young, but when during the talk with the elf the young man has looked into his bright green eyes, he doubts this because these are the eyes of the person who has grown wise with experience and knowledge that have appeared because of hardships in his past.

And here again, how do I know that he has hardships?

Calm down and don't worry about this. Why are you tense, is this that elf or not? Has this scumbag passed the hardships or not? Enjoy it while you can; that's all.

Your attitude towards life is impressive.

Of course!

Something tells me that's not good when a person speaks with himself like I do now.

Humph …

The man named Harry continues to work after the elf's disappearance, and that's why the young man soon becomes bored; he wants to see the books on the shelves, and he immediately appears near them.

How has it happened? How can I move like this?

Again, the knowledge has come that mages can move in memories.

Ah, from this statement, it follows that I am a mage? How can this be?

I don't want to be a mage! Because it may result in trouble, and I don't like trouble!

Calm down; I've understood your view of life.

Unlike yours, I have the right view of life! And why are you the boss, not me? This is my body, and I should be in charge here.

But do you know exactly if this is your body?

I feel it! Also, I feel that you shouldn't be here; you're an outsider.

I can agree that this body is yours, but I can't agree with the statement that I'm the outsider.

Bastard…I'll kill you…

And when the young man is going to be absorbed by the next hysterics, he is again enveloped by the strange calmness, and he almost indifferently thinks.

Since I'm a mage and the man sitting behind the table is also a mage, maybe he is me? But I don't feel kinship with him!

Come on, I'm not him; I don't agree with this; I don't like him! Besides, I don't like everything, and I also don't like memories!

Here we go again! What a baby talk? Is there anything you like?

I like it only when people don't bother me and don't pest me; I feel this.

Oh! It seems I definitely have a double personality.

Meanwhile, Harry gets up, stands, and waves his hand towards the bookshelves. The simple wave of the hand and two shelves move off the wall and then drive away in different directions, opening a glass folding-sided door leading to a recessed balcony.

What is happening distracts the young man from further brabbles with himself.

Has he made magic right now? Or are there such sensors that react to the special wave of the hand?

But I like it- one wave of the hand and everything is done!

  I agree with you! Well, I've changed my mind; I want to be a mage!

Hmm, and how many times will you change your mind?

I'll change it as long as it takes!

Ok, ok, it's your right. Probably.

What do you mean, probably? It's my right, and that's it.

Meanwhile, Harry has fully opened both halves of the doors, and standing in the doorway, he takes a full breath of the fresh air filled with a subtle flower fragrance. Having stood like that for a while, he goes into the loggia and sits in one of two armchairs standing in the loggia near a small table.

«Twinkie!»

Like an invisible shadow, the young man follows Harry.

  Harry immediately backs off, thus expanding his arc of vision from where he can observe everything when the house elf has appeared.

«Master Harry has called Twinkie! What does Master Harry want?»

«When Alrus has the grace to visit me, please bring the tea. After this, you may be free». A bow, a pop, and the elf disappears.

Yeah, that's definitely a magic!

Man, what does this elf do! The pop, and he appears; the pop, and he disappears! Though he's still nasty.

Then nothing happens for long enough, and the young man begins to feel bored again, but he doesn't dare experiment again to see what else he can do besides instant movement with his power of thought.

As for Harry, having thrown back his head on the back of the seat, he has already dozed off. When there's a knock on the door leading to the office, the man has twitched awake, and the young man has joyfully lifted in spirits. Without waiting for an answer, the visitor has opened the door, and immediately after it, there is a questionable exclamation,

«Father?!»

  «I'm here! On the loggia!»

There are footsteps, and then a figure of a man appears in the doorway. Above average stature, with a svelte physique, with hidden bestial grace in his every movement. A watchful, sharp look runs through the surrounding space, and the young man freezes for one second because black eyes linger at the place where he is now. The young man has a strong feeling that if he isn't seen, then at least he is definitely felt.

Here his gaze lifts to the father, the delusion diminishes, and the young man, with increased interest, begins to observe them. Having looked at the father, he smiles slightly and says, with a low velvet voice,

«Good afternoon, father! How are you doing?»

«Good afternoon, Lord Prince! I'm fine.»

«What, is Twinkie still unwilling to give in? », the young man has asked, sitting down in the chair standing opposite his father, and a faint smile stirs his lips.

«Yes», a groan — «it continues: the Harry master and the second master, the Lord Prince. The main thing is how masterful it is at playing the dense fellow on this issue, so you can't really get angry at it.»

«I feel sorry!»,  with irony in his voice, and then seriously, «You called me, father, is something wrong?»

«Yes, and no.»

His son's left eyebrow has curved beautifully, making his father cheerfully smile, and then he slowly pours himself some tea, drinks it, and only after that says thoughtfully,

«To be honest, Alrus, I'm not entirely sure about the correctness of my decision to reveal my secret to you, and if I do open it, I have absolutely no idea where to start.»

«But isn't it too late for you to ask this intimate question having called me to your place? And you should start from the very beginning, I think so.»

«Yes, you're right; it's too late to rush about», a short pause, and then a sigh. «Well, let's start from the beginning. It started in your childhood, when you entered a non- magical school. It seems you saw your classmate's laptop there and got enthusiastic about it, right?»

«Yes. It took me a long time to get you to buy it for me. I remember that for this, you had to create an artefact that shielded the laptop from the effects of magic.»

«And I fulfilled my promise I had made to you, and when the artefact was created, you and I went to a non-magical store and bought you a laptop. Then I naively thought that I was buying you an educational toy, but just a toy.»

«Yes, I know about it, father. And I decided that first I would master the laptop and learn more about it, and only then would I try to explain my idea to you through a visual example, so to speak.»

«You did it. I was shocked when you, an eight-year-old child, explained your idea to me, and let's say it wasn't a bad one.»

«Of course it wasn't bad! Because of its implementation, you became a famous artefactor and became rich because of orders. Did I miss anything?!»

«That's right, it's now that matters, isn't it?», Harry kept quiet for a moment, then continued, «The content of your proposal was this: instead of the usual pensive… let me remember how you delicately said so that wizards can look respectable when viewing memories.»

«No, it wasn't like that, father», Alrus says, giving a laugh, «I said so that we would stop disgracing ourselves in front of non-mages even if they don't know about us each time we look through memories, in such an uncomfortable position.»

«And how can we call them muggles», the father takes up a slack of memories, «if they watch films, not memoirs, snuggling down in their armchairs or sofas, and we are in the old fashion way ass up…»

«Hrmph, hrmph», Alrus has interrupted his father with a slight cough, «father, there is no need to repeat this ... at that time, I was a child and couldn't always find the right expression.»

«Yes, you're probably right; I've got carried away. But you know that it was this expression from the lips of a child that made me imbued with this idea.»

«I didn't know, but all this time I naively thought that only eloquence inspired you to do this», and they laughed amicably.

Ha-ha, Alrus is great! Keep on! I like him!

And I don't like you!

I don't like you either!

Ha-ha! How interesting! We are totally agree on this issue.

Having laughed off, the father and the son sit in silence for a while, each recalling something. On their faces now and then, repeatedly, appeared bright smiles.

During this pause, the young man compares the two men, and the longer he does this, the more he realises that they are completely different. When he has finally decided that he can't find a relationship between them, he does manage to see a certain, almost imperceptible similarity in their faces, but he doesn't have time to understand in what way it is expressed because the moment of memories passes and the father looking at his son says,

«I don't know if you remember the day I showed you the first experimental model of a magobook. You were so happy congratulating me on my success, and then you said, "I wonder if it is possible to create a room in which a mage would sit in an armchair and the memory would reveal itself around him?"»

«No, I don't remember this at all! I remember how you showed me your invention and called it the magobook; if I remember correctly, I was already fifteen then.»

«Yes, that's right, you learned from me all the possibilities of the magobook with real interest and then took in the experimental model.»

«Of course I took in, you could develop a function for the magobook to conduct calculations for rituals and the ability to design ritual schemes, and a function and an artefact for the magobook to remove memories and view them for weak mages and even squibs. Mmm…» he has drawled, closing his eyes and enlightening his father again, «and that's your additional invention for squibs, which was very useful to me in the past.»

«And when have you, a powerful mage, had any use for the artefact designed for squibs?»,Harry asks pointedly, leaning forward.

«Let's not be distracted by insignificant trifles», Alrus has shrugged his shoulders, and without letting his father insert even a word, he changes the subject, «so what am I talking about? Oh, yes. I remember well everything that was connected with the demonstration of the magobook to me, but the fact that I then put forth some other additional ideas I don't remember at all.»

«Like I said, that was! You pitched your idea aloud and forgot, or maybe you didn't even realise it, but I didn't. I'd heard, remembered, and hadn't forgotten.»

«Wait, wait! Are you telling me that all these years you were working on the idea that I said then?», says Alrus with an astonished face. «But you've never mentioned it…»

Without finishing the phrase, Alrus thinks for a while, then his face flushes with joy, and he leans forward, peering intently into his father's face, and asks,

«Were those two strange potions for the creation of artefacts of material illusions that I developed for you needed for this project?»

«Yes», Harry says with sadness in his voice, and then, having shaken off like a dog after the bath, in a more cheerful voice, he continues,

«At first I didn't want to tell you about this in order not to surprise you; I dreamed of seeing your face when I took you into a room with eyes closed, and then I would show and tell everything, but it happened to be during the working process that I understood that the world mustn't see this project …»

«Did you create a weapon? No way; I can't believe that you could create something destructive. You're not interested in any of that. You even rejected the readymade elder wand. And I can't imagine you creating a weapon… I really can't do this.»

«You're right; I didn't create a weapon. But I created something that could get me chained or killed."

«Is everything so serious, father?»

«Well, yes. And that's why, before I'll show you my project, we'll sign a magic contract that will secure you and me from any methods of investigation, both magic and non-magic ones.»

«Dad…»

«Please. Don't interrupt me! I understand that it's meant to drag you into this. I can keep silent, but I wanted to share my triumph and knowledge at least with someonе», and almost not heard, «and to share with someone …my problems.»

After these words that have been said with such pain, there's a deep silence, that Alrus doesn't know how to stop it and how to help his father. That's why he does what's not customary for them, the Englishmen, and is considered a bad tone.

«I'm with you, father!» says Alrus. He gets up and, having dragged his father from the armchair, hugs him.

Faugh!  They are snivelling like a baby! No, like women! I get sick of looking at this!

Shut up!

So they've stood for a while when the father collects himself, and having freed from the hugs of the son, he looks him in the eye and says,

«Son, thanks for the support». After a pause, he continues, « That's why in the last half a year I prepared a contract for you and me and also for me and my lawyer so that it'll be impossible to find out what kind of a contract that we already have signed he was preparing for me.

I understand that I behave like an egoist, dragging you into this, but besides this, they asked for my help, and I promised to talk to you about this with the condition that you'll agree to provide a service voluntary.»

«What's with the help I should give?»

«For the time being, I'll discuss not the concrete support but a preliminary agreement on intention about possible help in the future. I serve as an intermediary.»

A second pause, and Harry continues,

«You can still refuse the secret; I don't insist. You simply take an oath that you won't tell anyone that I have a secret.»

«No way!», emotionally has resented Alrus. «You have intrigued me so much, and now there's "you can refuse from it; I don't insist"», he has cited his father. «Сome on, show me where your contract is.»

The last words of Harry's son make him break down. All these feelings, emotions, and experiences that he has been keeping under control for many years come to the surface and resulted as inadequate behaviour.

Unable to think, he ajogs heads to his office on the way, almost sweeping the doors; he bangs against the table in a full speed, not even noticing that he has swept part of rolls from the table, and then he begins to brokenly search for the contract on the table, being angry and swearing because of the fact that he can't find it.

The young man watches with interest how Alrus pulls a long face, how his eyebrows raise, and how he, with ever-growing amazement, looks at his father's behaviour.

And what has he come up with? Or is it right to say, I came up with? Yes, as before, there's nothing…no echo of remembrance.

Ha-ha, it's so cool, I watch the memoirs, but I can't remember a thing.

Having recovered a little, Alrus goes through after his father to the office; he has fluently cast over the opening picture and immediately finds what his father unsuccessfully tries to find. Two rolls with the signs of a lawyer tied together lay on the floor together with the other rolls.

Shaking his head, Alrus, with a delicate gesture, beckons them to him. Having caught the arrived rolls, he goes through them in order to make sure that these are the very contracts.

«Father, aren't you looking for them?»

Having interrupted unsuccessful searches and having raised his head, he looks at the rolls in his son's hands and hoarsely exclaims,

«Yes, it's them!»

Having seen the trembling hands of his father, which reach for the contract, the son shakes his head, diverting the hand with the contract so that his father won't be able to get it, and at the same time, with another hand, pulls out the vial from the purse hanging on his belt. He hands the vial to his father, saying,

«Here, father, drink it. It's a sedative of my development. As always, add three drops of your blood while I study up the contractsб if you don't mind.»

Having nodded because his throat is obstructed, Harry takes the vial, sweeps around his table, sinks to the chair, and barely has opened it because the treacherous trembling in his hands can't be stopped. Finally, he's managed to fulfil his son's instruction, and he becomes quiet for some time.

«Every time I use potions developed by you», Harry's voice is already calmed, and he looks fresh, « I'm happy to see that you're just a genius in potion making as your father.»

I didn't understand. What other father? What, a man who has two fathers?

Maybe one father is a biological, and the other is the one who adopted him.

But have you seen a certain resemblance between them?

But maybe it only seemed to me because I wanted to find the resemblance between them?

Yeah, that can be.

«Thank you!», without stopping to study the contract has uttered the son. «You know, that for me, your attitude towards what I create is very important.»

«Yes, this is a great development. It works very gently, and there are no such side effects as distraction of attention and fuzziness of the thinking process.

I already stand the fact that I'll never know the truth about why you have decided to develop such potions that heal me bypassing the destructive effect of the basilisk poison walking through my blood.»

Having indefinably shrugged his shoulders in response to his father's words without stopping to study his version of the contract, Alrus comes to the Blood quill in order to put his signature when his father asks,

«Alrus, for how many days do you plan to stay at my home?»

«For one day, I've an important meeting the day after tomorrow, and I need to prepare for it. And why do you ask?»

«When the project started, I couldn't tear myself away from it for a year; I studied its possibilities».

A warm smile doesn't leave his face when he says this, and after this, he unwittingly plunges back into memories. Then, in the silence of the office, there's barely audible,

«However, the time there passes differently …not to say about the other worlds…»

But his son has heard this, and his eyebrow arches, but Harry doesn't realise that he's said the last words aloud, as well as his son's reaction already in full voice continues,

«I advise you to free up at least one week to study the project.»

Well, mages! The time passes differently…How so? And the other worlds? What the hell is he talking about?!

I hope we'll see the memoirs about the other worlds! But you suggest I not to lose any sleep over all these matters and only have a ball?

You're right! Fuck it all!! I don't believe in other worlds!

  Hmmm.

  And again, tranquility descends on the young man, and now neither time passes differently nor other words fire his imagination.

  «All right, father, I'll follow your advice. Tempus», and before the Alrus's eyes appears information about the time. Then he continues,

«In this case, I'll leave you in an hour and reappear as soon as I can free up time to study your project.»

Having decisively taken the Blood quill, he signs the contract and answers the question that appears in his father's eyes.

«I don't want to tell my wife even this meager information that you gave me, and I will simply say that I have a contract with you for the joint development, so I'll just go live with you for a while.»

«Yes, you're right; this will be easier, and there's no lie. And the announcement of our joint developments will not surprise anyone and will not attract unwanted attention.»

«See you, father!», Alrus has stood up, respectfully  gives a bow to his father, and without waiting for a response, leaves the office.