August 14th, 1894 — London

The night had settled over the Townhouse of the Griffiths in the south of London. It was an old house and one expertly disguised. Its façade had long lost its luster. Sometimes it appeared ever so slightly changed. The Griffiths, their wizard neighbours said, were odd people.

Their youngest son was just now visible at a window — well, young he was not anymore. He was a man of 43 years and he sat with his father, who was in his seventh decade.
Mr. Edmund Griffith had all his life been a loose and jovial man. He had enjoyed his years by any cost and any means necessary and now the sun was setting on him. His mental decline was slow but noticeable. His body would one day follow suit. He had not honored it well, thought his son.

Samuel Griffith got up from the writing desk and walked over to the fireplace. He stood over his father, who was seated in an armchair and slept. In his right hand, Samuel held his wand.
"Samuel, is that you? Back for summer?" slurred old Mr. Griffith who just now had awoken from his slumber. Something must have reached him in his haze. Despite not quite knowing the year and the place he found himself at, something in the air surrounding them put him ill at ease. His son stood very grave and silent. "Is something the matter?" the old man asked and tried to focus his greying eyes on the face of the man in front of him.
Samuel Griffith directed his wand at his father and said: "Imperio."

He knew then, that this had likely been the last time his father would ever speak to him and be aware of it. Samuel looked at the soft old face that was so familiar to him and felt that even now, he despised him. His father had tried to be his friend, but since boyhood Samuel resented him for the pain and humiliation he meant for his mother, and for himself. If Edmund Griffith had afforded him the merciful distance of father and son, perhaps he could have loved him. But as things were, what respect had been left in Samuel for Edmund died at about the age of 15, when he had started to understand his fathers ways.

Now he sent him to the writing desk to sign the documents he had prepared for him. And then he sent the old fool to bed.
Samuel opened a window and called for his owl. He fastened a letter to its leg, addressed to one Miss Eleanor Griffith.

To Miss Eleanor Griffith,

I trust this letter finds you well. As you will come to know very soon, changes are about to befall our family and I regret to inform you that Mr. Gilbert Griffith will no longer be involved with the estate, nor shall he be entitled to inherit any part of it.

Since the family does not wish that your prospects in life shall suffer on account of this decision, I formally extend to you the invitation to join my household. I am aware this puts you in a difficult situation regarding your direct relations. However, I assure you that I will provide you with all that is in my ability to secure your future and allow you to be agreeably settled.

It has furthermore come to my attention that your father has arranged for you to get married. Should this not align with your wishes — and forgive me for saying that the intended match in my estimation does not align with your best interests — be assured that I will see to the matter.

If you wish to speak to me in person, you can find me at the townhouse until tomorrow evening. Please inform me if you plan to visit.

Sincerely,

Mr. Samuel Griffith

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Eleanor Griffith

  

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Isabella Griffith’s owl – a pretty, if elderly barn owl and one of the few things Gilbert’s wife personally owned nowadays – delivered a note in reply many, many hours later. The paper had obviously been balled up, but then smoothed back out again in an attempt to be presentable. Some of ink was smudged; there were also little spots and speckles of it in a few places, showing where the quill hovered over the parchment in indecision.

To Uncle Mister My Uncle Samuel Griffith,

I’m surprised confused
What is Why
Agatha says

I don't understand agree that this should all be discussed in person. Please forgive my impertinence in advance: I will be following this letter posthaste, despite the hour.

Yours Your Niece Respectfully,
See you soon,
Eleanor Griffith

The letter sat on her vanity for hours. Now, it was tucked away in her pocket, alongside a quick exchange from her aunt (she was so thankful Agatha was able to write her back so quickly, given the hour).

And Nell was just as torn now as she had been when the unfamiliar owl left her staring at the writing of an unequally estranged uncle. She’d spent the following hours pacing her room like a caged beast, unafraid to wake her parents across the hall (Father was dead to world with the aid of one of those damned sleeping draughts and Mother had been too busy sobbing in the bathroom) before making a dreadfully rash decision.

She hugged herself, kneading her fingers into her arms, with the taste of copper playing on her tongue after anxiously chewing more than one fingernail to the quick earlier. The hot, tender stinging of her finger tips as they dug into her arms through her sleeves and gloves was grounding, in a way, as she loitered next to her miniscule amount of luggage (a hand-me-down carpetbag and a small trunk). After taking far too long to gather her shaky courage, she gently tapped the door knocker against the old wooden frame.

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Samuel Griffith

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   Samuel Griffith

The letter from Miss Eleanor Griffith found Samuel at a late hour. Nonetheless, he was still awake. Perhaps it was the events of the evening, but he struggled to settle sufficiently to feel like he wanted to go to sleep; this was often the case in the old townhouse. He slept better in his room in Doubt Street where he kept his laboratory. Those belonged to him alone. But Doubt Street was located in Whitechapel, and he could hardly expect his niece to call on him there.
He had eaten dinner with his mother, Agatha, and Ebenezer. His brother strangely had decided to come down from his study to join them. Ebenezer inquired after Edmund, and Samuel told him what he told his mother — that Edmund Griffith had retired to his bed early today.

It was a delicate moment in time, and he was not yet ready to have his controlled father join them, although he would need to eventually. The atmosphere at the dinner table had been tense. Everyone but Ebenezer, who absentmindedly ate his peas, was already aware of the decision to exclude Gilbert Griffith from the estate, and as a byproduct of that decision, from the family.
The owl with the letter tapped at the window, just as Samuel was going through some offers he had received for parts of laboratory equipment he was selling off. The crumpled appearance of the letter elicited a slight frown; it spoke to a heightened state of emotion. That was to be expected, still, he was unsure what to expect. He and his niece were not very familiar with each other.

He had not been around for the years she had spent at his mother's side; as soon as he had started to take over family matters, tensions with his brothers had been ever-present. As a result, the brothers avoided each other. And by association, that meant Samuel saw little of Gilbert's wife and their daughter Eleanor.
It was not long until a knock on the door announced her arrival. Samuel went down the flight of stairs and opened.

"Good evening, Eleanor. Please come in," he said to the young woman standing in the dark. He stepped aside to make space for her and noticed that she had brought luggage with her. He flicked his wand and the bags followed them inside.
"Let us go to the kitchen," he suggested. "I do not wish to wake the others."
The way to the kitchen led downstairs into the basement. Both the tea room and the small parlor were too close to the rooms of the other family members for his liking.
In the kitchen, he leaned against the stone-top counter and looked at the young woman whom he had invited into his life and who now, consequently, had arrived.
"You must have many questions," he said.

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This was a mistake, a small voice hisses in the back of her mind as the door opens to reveal a practical stranger; she ignored it, though, hugging herself tighter as she followed her uncle into the house. She let – what was to her, at least – an awkward fog of quiet settle over the pair, unable to return his greeting with how leaden her tongue felt in her mouth.

As her luggage floated inside, she wasn’t sure if she was relieved or discomfited to find no one up and about – on one hand, everyone was likely retired for the night or sleeping, and she would hate to bother them; on the other, maybe a tiny part of her had hoped Agatha would have been waiting for her, to offer Nell support in this stressful time.

Head host to a maelstrom of thoughts and emotions, Nell found herself suddenly downstairs, in the kitchen. She fidgeted with indecision, whether or not to take off her coat and scarf, whether or not to break the quiet—

When her uncle spoke first.

To say undivided attention always made her uncomfortable would be a massive understatement, so it was impossible for the teenager not to visibly squirm under the dark gaze of Samuel Griffith. To buy time, she started to take off her scarf, but then aborted the gesture half-way through and started to shimmy out of her thick, bulky coat instead – before, with tangibly miserable embarrassment, she jerked to a halt in hesitation as it pooled around her elbows.

Nitwit, her eyes avoided meeting her uncles as her hands, with their usual tremor, flitted between the two pieces of outerwear, who doesn’t take their coat off at the entrance to a home? Why did you wear it all the way down here?

Well, there was no going back now. So, finally, she settled for stripping off her scarf and pulling her coat back up around her shoulders.

“Yes—of course,” Folding the scarf over her arm, she swallowed heavily with a painfully dry throat, “Definitely—certainly some… I apologize, for the late hour, I'm not normally this rash at all.”

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Samuel Griffith

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In the kitchen, Samuel had for the first time in what felt like years the chance to take a good look at his niece. He saw the awkward, halting manner in which she half slipped out of her coat and then, indecisively, put it on again.

He considered her face, which had a way about it in the slope of the nose bridge and the high cheekbones that gave him a light twinge of a feeling that was hard to name. She certainly carried some of the harsher features of the family — to be frank, she looked more like himself and his long-dead grandfather than she looked like Gilbert or her mother. Samuel's grandfather too had been light in coloring, the blue eyes. That would mean nothing to the girl, of course, because Samuel's grandfather died when he had been a boy of twelve years.

Eleanor was rather tall for her age and seemed profoundly uncomfortable. She handled her limbs with a bewildered self-loathing that Samuel tried not to judge but did.
It occurred to him then what he had given only fleeting thought so far — he knew that Gilbert was a father figure that left much wanting; his wife was not placed much higher in Samuel Griffith's esteem.
What he had failed to consider in depth were all the things that were left undone by them in raising their daughter. This great lacking was written all over his unfortunate niece. All that had been missing from her life and upbringing that ought to have been there and been impressed on her. He frowned and looked away.

As he often did with Agatha, he felt now a certain indignation at the consequences of the many ills that were rooted in his family and that he spent all his life either running away from or fighting against. His younger sister too often exhibited signs of the disservices her upbringing had given her, and Samuel disliked that, although he knew it was hardly her fault. He thought about Edmund who slept in his bed, his mind tethered to Samuel's will on an imperceptible cord, and he felt all the more resentful of all of this.

Well, however he felt about it, he had a responsibility to fulfill and he would.
"No need to apologize, I understand this is a pressing matter," Samuel said.
"I take it you have not yet spoken to your father? He might not know of the decision regarding the estate and, well, you, until tomorrow."
There was a slight pause.
"He will, of course, be very angry and his ire will be directed at me in particular. Things will remain difficult between us, I suppose. However, I am ready to uphold my promise to you — if you wish for me to take on responsibility for you, I am ready to break off your betrothal and re-enroll you in school. Am I correct in presuming that is what you would like? Agatha told me so."
What little he knew about his niece he had been told by his younger sister, who seemed to have a close bond to Eleanor.

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Eleanor Griffith

  

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That first, single question caused her whole frame to seize; doubts swarmed in immediately. Despite knowing her uncle was still talking, she was only distantly processing it.

Should she have told her father? Was… was she supposed to? Did she need his permission to be here? She’d assumed— the letter had read like, as if this were a secret matter for them discuss beforehand, before news got around… Merlin’s beard, had she misread the whole thing? A larger part of her knew she hadn’t, but the louder voice in her had persisted otherwise…

Her throat made a soft clicking sound as she swallowed, the gesture painful as her throat was still very dry. Crossing her arms nervously, she tucked her hands into her armpits and gnawed on the inside of her bottom lips.

At the mention of Gilbert’s rage, she hunched in a bit more on herself. Inside her chest, she could feel that familiar something rushing through her nerves, her veins, like a frightened bird, demanding flight because inaction was deadly. She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, taking a deep and steadying breathe, trying to focus more on the rest of what Uncle Samuel was saying – instead of spiraling down into a pond of dread, as she was wont to do, when considering the consequences of her actions.

“No—no,” She finally murmured, filling the quiet in the wake of her uncle’s last words, “Father—you’re correct: he doesn’t know… Neither he nor Mother do.”

Rolling her shoulders in closer to her ears, she took several small steps towards the counter; if possible, she hugged herself tighter and fought down the urge to scuff a shoe as she tried to fight the rising tide of disbelief at the back of her mind. This all felt too good to be true, but she couldn’t turn back now – couldn’t let the flood of worst-case-scenarios drown the flickering flame of hope in her chest. Now more than ever, she wished Agatha was here, if only so she could have her reassuring face in her peripherals.

“If…” Merlin, this was going sound so dramatic… she almost didn’t continue, but knew she had to know certain things before jumping feet first into this decision. “I may not be… able to go home, wh-if I accept… Where—where would I stay? With whom?”

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Samuel Griffith

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"You would stay here, with us—with my mother and Agatha and myself. Your grandfather is here, of course. But he has been unwell recently and might stay up in his rooms," Samuel answered. His eyes remained calm. There was no hint in them that the topic of his father might cause him distress—it looked more so as if his gaze became more impenetrable; more devoid of expression. One had to know Samuel Griffith very well to interpret this correctly, and few people did really know him at all. He continued: "At least until term starts at Hogwarts. By end of the year I will make more permanent arrangements and you will be free to live with me." Living with his niece was a peculiar thought, he had to admit. His usual manner of living on his own would not suffice, it would not be proper. An actual household would need to be established. Samuel studied Eleanor's demeanor, her tightly drawn up shoulders and crossed arms.

Then he moved towards the kettle. It seemed appropriate to offer her tea. "I have secured a position at Hogwarts. Teaching Alchemy." The water began to heat with a tap of his wand. "Which means you would see more of me than you might wish for, should you choose to return to school. As for your current home—it is not my wish to make you choose between your parents and the opportunities I offer. However, your father's reaction to these changes may force such a choice upon us, regardless."

He tapped the kettle with his wand and tea and cups started to prepare themselves. There was a strange mundanity to these acts. "Agatha has already prepared your old room upstairs. Unless you would prefer different quarters, away from the family wing. There is space enough in this house."

Samuel paused. "You need not decide everything tonight. The hour is late." The teacups, finally, settled down on the table. Samuel left behind the secure distance of his place by the stove and sat down at the table opposite of his niece. He looked into her eyes briefly before he took his cup of tea. It was his opinion that he was doing the right thing -- however, and he thought of his brother Gilbert, his maneuver would seperate her from her family of birth entirely. It was sadly not avoidable.

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Eleanor Griffith

  

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It was as he spoke about ‘staying here’ that it truly hit Nell, square in the chest in fact: Samuel Griffith, Agatha's older brother, was a complete stranger to her; the face that stared back at her, as her gaze lifted (something like hopefully), was impossible to read. The realization was met with a chilly kind of worry that crawled down her spine, like a trickled of rain water seeping under her layers.

He’s reconsidering, a tiny, venomous voice hissed. You’ve taken too long.

She’d asked too many questions. Who looked a gift horse in the mouth?

Her heart plummeted into down into her shoes as he moved over to the stove, waving his wand at the kettle sitting there. She jerked towards his back, but thankfully the counter catching her hip kept from doing anything too foolish – maybe grasp at his clothes, drop to her knees, or grovel in some other fashion? All those ideas flashed through her brain in rapid succession. Dropping one hand, she braced herself against the cool surface in an attempt to ground herself.

Her skull left like an echo chamber of those thoughts as he spoke of her old room in the house – the one that had only ever been temporarily hers, a space she’d always been aware she was visiting, never truly staying – and not even the mention of Agatha could ease her mind.

She couldn’t go back, though; not the future her father had in store.

"No!" She cringed as the word leapt past her lips, seeming to ring in the quiet that followed his last statement – reminding her, tauntingly, that the hour was indeed late and that reasonable people were sleeping; that she was too loud.

Steeling herself visibly, she gingerly joined her estranged uncle at the table. The tremor in her hands became all the more noticeable when she took the cup in her grasp.

"No—no, um, thank you," She stared at the murky reflection in her tea, soft steam curling around the edges, "I… Yes. Let’s not delay—your offer is very generous and… I accept."

"Thank you, Uncle, for the – uh – opportunity." The words – no that whole sentence – was horribly awkward, though calling the man across from her uncle felt even more so... Closing her eyes tightly, she took a long pull from her cup – almost emptying it as she hid behind the porcelain.

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Samuel Griffith

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   Samuel Griffith

Sensing the sudden movement like a prickle on the back of his neck, he half turned and saw his niece up from her place, frightened. He looked at the skittish girl, with something like a semblance of understanding, but no real connection to her fear.

Samuel knew, of course, what it meant to grow up wanting for security, although he had it not as bad as his niece. He had his mother back then to be a haven to him, as little as she could be part of his life, as a muggle. Eleanor could not rely on the fitful woman Gilbert married. She must be alone and alienated. He had been alienated too and learned early to rely on himself alone. It had filled him with scorn but he had grown defensive and hostile, until the abilities formed in him to make life what it needed to be.

At 16 years of age, he had been an adult for all intents and purposes, carrying himself with dignity and determination that forced his peers and his superiors alike to begrudgingly respect him.

Eleanor, on the other hand — he saw little dignity in her bearing. It was an unkind thing to think, but one he contemplated nonetheless. He was not mad or disappointed, but unsettled. How could he manage to instill that in her, after all the damage done by his pathetic brother?

Thankfully she sat down now, and drank the tea in too-fast gulps that must surely scald her tongue. He watched her.

"I am glad you accept—" he said. To be called uncle was very strange. "You can call me Samuel, if you want," he offered. He would not call her "niece" to address her, nor would Miss Griffith do. Eleanor, it would be.

"Let us get it sorted that you have everything you need, starting tomorrow. For tonight — Well, it is late. You need to rest."

He stood up. She would find her room on her own. As nervous as she was, perhaps it was kinder to give her space now.

"We'll talk tomorrow. Good night, Eleanor," he said to her and then he left, to wander upstairs to check on his father.

After making sure everything was in order, he would take his leave and spend his night at his laboratory in Doubt Street.

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Eleanor Griffith

  

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