As we arrived at the house a few kids were practising in the garden, Patrick was swinging a stick around while Aileen was practising her transfiguration on small stones, some of the other kids were tending to the plants and animals and I could hear Trippy and the elves tidying away inside.
"Okay, Zodry can you go and get me some things please I'll need them all by noon?" I asked Zodry
"Yes, Master! Zodry will do a task!" He eagerly answered with big shining eyes
"Good, I need 10 sets of these herbs and 10 sets of Crystals from my collection," I said as I handed him a list I had made for the ritual.
"Zodry will have it done master!" He exclaimed and ran off into the house drawing the attention of the children.
"Mister Fenrisúlfr, Miss Cliodna your back!" Aileen shouted as she ran towards us with a smile reaching her ears.
"We're back Aileen, but it's Mrs now, how's everything been here?" I asked as I patted her on the head.
"Mrs!! Did you get married?!" She questioned shouting.
"Yes we did Aileen I'm sorry you couldn't be there" Clio explained as she kneeled down to be at her eye level.
"Aww, I wish I could have seen it!" She moaned in response.
"Ahem, so has everything been alright? No problems?" I asked interrupting the girl talk that would have erupted.
"Well apart from the boys fighting and breaking the fence but we fixed it other than that no problems, Trippy was a big help though!" Aileen confessed with enthusiasm.
"That's fine, and I'll be sure to thank Trippy and the others" I conveyed with a smile.
Just as Aileen answered the girls that had heard about the wedding all ran over towards Clio and started bombarding her with questions, with a chuckle I made my way towards Patrick and the others who were training.
"Morning boys" I announced my arrival and they all turned and greeted me in a symphony of voices, Patrick came forward and looked up at me with fire in his eyes.
"So Fenris can you train me some more? I've been sparing and haven't lost yet!" Came his eager request.
"Not today Patrick I've got to sort out the Yule feast and ritual, maybe tomorrow" I replied.
"What ritual?" He asked with a confused expression.
"I'm going to have the magical kids preform a ritual to boost their magic" I half-heartedly explained as I watched the kids go about their day to day life.
"Can you boost our strength too?!" He shouted
"Hmm, I'm not sure, I'd have to experiment with the rituals as you don't have magic, but maybe in a few years I could make you stronger," I told him as I began to think about it.
"How would you make me stronger?" His excitement was growing as he asked.
"Well, I could turn them, or maybe just a strengthening ritual?" I muttered quietly to myself but it seemed he heard me.
"Turn us? Turn us into what?" He interrogated adamantly
"A werewolf," I replied, I'm not sure if the kids knew I was a werewolf, when I last went hunting I made sure to transform out of sight. They might have caught a glimpse of me when I saved them but I was moving fast so it wouldn't have been a good look.
"A werewolf?! Cool! Can you? Can you?" His excited questioning had gathered the attention of the other kids.
"I might when your older" I answered vaguely
I didn't want to turn anyone at a young age or force it on anyone. I wasn't Fenrir Greyback or Peter Hale, I was me and I would make a loyal pack, not one I had to dominate or brainwash into following me but one that followed me on their own accord. I know when I make a pack each member would make me stronger and my strength has been improving slightly over the years so when the main plots start I'll be unstoppable in the regular world. No idea about Pangaea as there was a Zinogre there even though it's not part of the worlds I asked to be merged maybe there are other beasts even stronger.
"Okay... You best make me a werewolf when I'm older!" Patrick shouted as he ran off to the others and I chuckled at his antics.
For the rest of the day, I was setting up a Ritual site in the garden after Zodry fetched the matierials, it was a simple sigil all interwoven into 10 spirals the children would sit on, at the start of the spirals I had placed the magic gathering runestones and an amplifier rune I had created, this would collect and amplify the magic as it coursed through the spiral for the kids to absorb. I had noticed a lot of the kids were struggling with fatigue while they practised spells most likely from overuse of magic, they had taken their training very seriously and devoted a lot of attention to it, so I thought a small yule ritual would help, with the ritual happening on a solstice it should even benefit it slightly.
Afterwards I prepared some meat for the feast got the vegetables from the garden and handed them over to the elves to prepare.
As the short amount of daylight was fading we all sat down and had a feast while the sigil was gathering the magic throughout the atmosphere. The kids were laughing and chatting loudly with huge smiles on their faces as me and Clio closely sat together in a chair that was higher than the rest watching over them. This would have been the seat of a Jarl in a normal longhouse, as this was pretty much a boarding house for orphaned kids I didn't consider myself their Jarl even though I was "Royalty" according to Odin's blessing.
I couldn't help but place my hand on Clios abdomen as we watched the kids, thinking about my own that would soon grace us with their presence in the coming months. 'I have to find a small island and claim it as my own, maybe the isle of man? Or even some even smaller island of the coast of Scotland?' I thought to myself. The more I thought about it the more ideas I kept coming up with, Rune arrays, muggle repelling charms and what it would mean for the none magical children, would they just venture away from my island if I set them down?
Thinking about all the charms and wards I haven't used or trained made me think of how ill-equipped I was in the magic department, yeah I have a vast amount of magic, and my runes can even be used in battle but I haven't experimented with charms and curses, in the harry potter world there's a vast array of spells and even counters that I haven't even begun to delve into, I need to begin to study some subjects such as arithmancy, charms, the dark arts and astrology if I wanted to start expanding my grimoire. That's not even mentioning the other series' spells in the originals and vampire diaries magic is divided into white and black, white magic is bound to the Wiccan rede and has many limitations and draws on benevolent energy it can not be used for malevolent purposes. Black magic, on the other hand, isn't bound to the Wiccan rede, any spell that disobeys the Wiccan rede is deemed as dark magic, it is also drawn on malevolent energy and is used for negative purposes. This is so different from the magic of harry potter as many of the charms could be used maliciously.
Magic in the true blood world is even more different, everyone and everything is magic. Mediums call on the spirits of the dead, a powerful medium can accept a spirit into their body and share experiences sometimes even their supernatural powers. Maenads that lives of human energy and can influence the mind and behaviour of them. With all these differences in magic, I had a lot to explore and I'm glad I have the time to do it.
The rest of the night was pretty easy going the children ritual went as expected, as they sat in the ritual site that the runestones had gathered magical energy into they began to absorb as they chanted
"On this shortest day,
mother magic help me find the way,
As the moon shines so bright,
Bless my magic on this night,
When the sun begins to shine,
I'll use this magic as mine"
it slowly resulted in the cores of the kids expanding slightly with the guidance I told them before they began. None of them had moved on to the next stage but their reserves had practically doubled, they had plenty of time to progress and I had decided that this would be an annual thing, maybe even on the other solstices of the year. I didn't know if the chant would work I just made it up, it was more so they believed it would.
After that night the magical kids had dived straight into their magic studies, Aileen was becoming a prodigy in Transfiguration she had begun to delve into the more complex spells like conjuration without even knowing the Transfiguration formula, precise wand movement and correct pronunciation of the incantation. This leads me to believe that the magic of this world was slightly affected by the ones I had merged, as conjuration was said to not last long but in Aileen's case some of the duplicates she had conjured had been permanent.
The nonmagical kids that were learning how to fight were a bit jealous that they weren't going to get stronger anytime soon, I wanted to aid them somehow if my theory of magic being altered from the other worlds it could be possible for them to be empowered by magic, but I don't want to experiment on children.
Some of the others had been learning more about potions from Clio but I asked them to not push her too hard, leading to her being pregnant getting out. We had talked about it in great length and the kids were happy for us many claiming to be big brothers and sisters.
Patrick and the other kids had started to train harder as well after witnessing the others gain more magic, and he told them all about being turned into a werewolf when they were older, making them want to prove themselves as well. I didn't have a problem with this, but with the number of injuries gained from mock battles and fighting I had to learn some more healing spells. I could heal with runes and with the speed I cast rune formations it wasn't a problem but an expanding repertoire of spells was never a bad thing.
I talked with Clio about acquiring an island to call our home and asked her to send the birds to look along the coasts of Scotland over the next few days. I had told her about what I wanted to do with it, make it self-sufficient, warded for protection and from nonmagicals so we could live peacefully. She loved the idea but was concerned about travelling, so I told her we would apparate there as soon as possible and she could stay in the snail house while I constructed our manor, the kids could come when I made a place big enough for them.
My idea was to build a manor for our family with some other homes for the kids and elves, in addition to them I would have a training ground, potions lab, a smithing forge, farm land and herb garden.
After a few days the birds had returned and told Clio of a few islands around Scotland that we're mainly empty.
"Okay ill check them out, I won't be long" I told her and kissed her goodbye
"Be safe" was her reply after our lips parted.
"Zodry!" I shouted and with a pop the little elf was in front of me.
"Yes master Zodry is here!" He claimed with a bow.
"Zodry we are going on a trip" I announced as he looked at me and images flashed in his mind I sent through the link of the places I wanted to visit, with a nod of his head he grabbed my hand and we popped away.
After a few seconds, I was stood on a small island