Harry potter The Boy Who Remembers

However, the way they are designed almost guarantees that any possible blood relation would be able to inherit the crests in case a family is massacred and thus, the knowledge wouldn't be lost. However, these crests need to be activated first to formally be part of the family. They are activated when a member gets his own wand and waits until the age of thirteen for it to integrate into the child's magic. Afterwards, the magic will slowly trickle in, allowing the heirs to access to gradually learn their personal magic until the age of seventeen when the magical archive is entirely made available to the heirs.

It was the way old families safeguarded their personal spells and magical discoveries while making them available for their descendants. Books could be stolen, and the spells inside could be replicated, but with a crest, no one would be able to access them.

Although, magical crests don't need to only have information inside. There were theories in the book about people putting artefacts and family heirlooms inside the crests to make sure that they are not stolen. However, Harry had no idea how that worked, and he wasn't eager to find out. Yeah, the young Slytherin was advanced for his age, but not enough to mess with things like that. Some of the conceptual crap that came with making a magical crest, was very hard to understand especially when he had a hard time understanding the introductory chapters because of how the translation spell worked.

If he needed to mess with magical crests in general, he would need to learn Old English, and that was an undertaking on its own. Harry decided to put it into the back of his mind, and only do it if he finds out more knowledge of magic written only in this language. He was already learning Latin on his own, adding in another dead language just wouldn't be fun. Especially with how much he's probably going to memorize during his Runes Electives, he wouldn't want to burn out, would he?

Still, the upcoming Samhain ritual wasn't really a ritual, not in the classical term. Technically speaking, a ritual is the predecessor to wand spells that are more art than science. They heavily involved runes and sacrifices to shape and channel the magic, which didn't make it any better or worse than using a wand. It was just so much harder than wands simply became commonly used.

No, the Samhain ritual was just an unlocking. It didn't really have to happen in Samhain, only for the subject to drink a potion that relaxes the magical flow and for an outsider of casting the standardized spell to unlock the crest, which already existed connected to their magic in a dormant state. The crests didn't need to be unlocked on Samhain, only for the subject to be between the ages of eleven and thirteen.

The experience is widely considered to be unpleasant, from irritating to agonizing. It depended on both the wizard and the crest, and it was impossible to know how it would work. There were also a few peculiarities that came with every crest. Sometimes the creator of the crests adds in a little extra condition to inheriting parts of the family archives. Sometimes a crest would be barely more than a small peculiarity for generations only for a descendant to fully unlock it later.

However, that wasn't the same as family magic. The spells inside a crest could be replicated if one knew the theory. Family magic was unique for everyone who had it and was built on the dedication of an entire magical line to a certain field of magic until it became a part of their own blood. After centuries, the families start to develop certain traits that naturally came to be. Things like mage sight, metamorphmagus and Parseltongue, occurred either naturally or with some large-scale ritual to be passed down from parent to child, and no one would be able to speak it. There is a reason why Parseltongue was so revered in pureblood circles. These abilities are the epitome of what made a magical family prestigious.

Honestly, Harry didn't know if the Potter family had a magical crest, but it's most likely true. There was no risk to trying it if he didn't have one, but in the house of the snake, it would be akin to being a second-class citizen.

The young Potter sincerely hoped that he would end up having a crest, if only for the potential spell available inside. At least, now, Harry understood what Blaise and Daphne were talking about when they referred to the Samhain ritual. He probably even knew more than them thanks to the book.

In the end, Harry would need to wait until the end of the month to figure out more. However, he put the issue to the back of his mind. His curiosity was now abated, and he had more assignments to finish to compensate for the research time he used up the previous day. Afterwards, well, he did promise that he would spend the day with his friends, after all.

.....

Want to read ahead by more than 60 chapters. Then join my p@treon Right Now.

Link: p*atreon.com/BookReaderBoy (Remove the *)

Also Free members get 2 advanced chapters for Free as well.