Pondering on a lost identity...

[Jay Rastan]

Jay Rastan.

By most people's definitions of him would be; calm, collected, laid back, fun, humorous and a wide range of other things of a positive nature. He had always been fairly well liked, wasn't bad on the eye and was usually very polite.

So why lately did he seem to be just a huge jerk? He would be the first in line to admit it he had been a huge prat. Ignoring people he regarded as his friends just to be alone and to brood, not thinking before speaking, picking arguments with teachers, he had even thought about casting a body binding curse on the bird that kept waking him up every morning. Indeed, he hadn't be acting like himself.

Sometimes people took things he said in the wrong way, thinking him the naive pureblood. He was a pureblood, sure, from a old line of wealth, fine and dandy as far as he was concerned but lately he had realized that all that paled in comparison to the biggest burden of his identity.

He was Jay Rastan, son to none other than the great Ryan and Sarah Rastan, Grandson of Theodore and Anastasia Rastan.

It always came back to the same thing: Family.

'But I'm not my father. I never will be and I never wnat to be...' Jay help but angrily think to himself.

This how Jay would have been found, sitting on a stone park bench, which was surprisingly comfortable due to a cushioning charm, in the corner of the school garden wondering where everything went wrong. After walking out of his potions lesson after submitting a far sub par potion he could almost make in his sleep, after getting indignant over a new professor calling him a scone. He didn't even give her a chance. So after a brief stop to his cabin to inform Valpot to clean up and collect his belongings from the potions lab, he had just let his feet lead him to where he found himself now.


He didn't mean to act like a jerk but he at times just felt compelled to be a little meaner to people who didn't deserve it. As if to prove he was worth of something he didn't even know. He was born a Rastan its not like he had to go through hero's trials to be awarded that....so why did he feel like he had to?

"Stupid cousin marries a muggleborn witch and now I have to pay the price for his deviances" Jay muttered kick a stone, feeling like he just wanted to let our a roar of rage and let it all be done with.

Shouldn't his family he happy that one of their own married the person they loved? Shouldn't they support their family member and welcome the new in-law? No. If you marry other than a pureblood you find yourself cut off from the wealth, power, stance and all the perks of being a member of such an old pure, untainted blood line. And in a world of bigotry, Jay knew better than to rock the apple cart.

Now Jay received weekly letters from his parents and grandparentson the same topic of choice; reminding him of what happened to his cousin after the wedding, to stay with his own kind, 'the right and true kind' as they called them. But each letter pointed out the same, fun with a mixed blood is fine, calling it youthful indiscretions but anything other than such a indiscretion would have repercussions of a negative tangent.

A shaking fist clentched around the letter he had recieved that morning from his parents. A particularly nasty one to say in the least, but his mother did tell him to have fun and enjoy himself. But these letters always made him wonder one thing:

"Who would I be if not Jay Rastan, the pureblood?"

[Godric Emerindyl]

Godric Emerindyl,

He didn’t really ever wonder what people might think about him. He knew a lot fo people referred to him as a prep, someone who didn’t everything exactly the way everyone else wanted them done. He upheld the rules. He was very polite to everyone he knew. He stood up for the underdog. He always gave the right answers. Always made the right decisions, and always dressed and kept himself looking respectable. Too, he knew, and not because he was the vain sort, but he was somewhat good looking, and also knew a lot of girls liked him; a piece of information he had gotten from his fourth year girlfriend, who was now his sixth year girlfriend.

That was another thing about Godric, seeing things through was a respectable quality in someone of his status. His father, the great and wise old Lord Emerindyl, and mother the beautiful and caring and always there to stand up for the world; Lady Sylvia Saphricorn. He had a lot to live up to, and a lot that he would never live down, but he knew that he would endure it as always he did. His family meant the world to him, and their opinions meant the world to him. Granted he knew also that his opinions meant the world to his family and so he was not the son who just acted as he was told, but the son who could be trusted to do the right thing; and Godric could not have been more fed up with it.

It was a dull life to lead, to always do what others expected of you. Sure it paid off. He had one of the hottest girls in school for his girlfriend. He had the best marks in all of his classes. His family name could quite literally get him into any employment after he graduated at the end of the year. He could quite literally map out the rest of his life from this point until… well whatever. And that thought didn’t really make him feel good. He felt almost as if it was not him living his life, but his life living him. It was a very depressing thought and one he was not all that excited about, but at the same time, he knew he could approach his parents about it, which infuriated him even more as he knew they would respond logically and it would turn out that he was just being petty, and maybe, for once in his life, he wanted to be petty, why couldn’t anyone else just understand that was the way he wanted to feel.

He chastised himself as he thought this, he knew he was being silly, why should he want parents who could not be logical and would be no help to a situation anyway. He knew he should be happy that his parents could offer him the help he required but he could only look at it as if he had no right to be upset and had to continue to be mature about the whole world and ever stinking aspect in it, even the ones he did not agree with.

He knew he shouldn’t be too grumpy about the way his life was going though. His parents were great and he got to be with them all year around while most kids at the school never got to spend time with their parents. Some of them would not see their parents until the holidays, and some others would not see them until the end of the year. Godric could see his parents any day of the week if they were not too busy, it was almost like being at home anyway.

He didn’t really know why he too found himself in the school grounds. He liked it outdoors, he really like it quite a lot, but normally, while reflecting on his life and his issues with it. He would find himself walking slowly around Emerindyl Lake. He knew Elouise was in Potions though and that soon after she would probably come looking for him. And though he really did care for her deeply, he knew she would know to look for him on Emerindyl Lake, and so chose to come here instead.

It wasn’t until he heard the voice of another that he realised he was not alone. He had walked into the section of the gardens where the flowers were all in bloom. There was a stone courtyard with mosaics impressed upon it in patterns that would rival the walls of Pompeii. On each edge of the courtyard there was a stone bench, and on one of the stone benches sat a Saphricorn. Godric saw him and thought to walk past without saying something. He felt better of it though, able to sense something was bothering the boy he knew he could not simply walk on. He stopped a little away from him, told himself off in his own mind for wanting nothing more then to walk away, and then made the resolution to approach him.

“Sorry, I didn’t see you there, were you talking to me?” Godric had heard the boy quite audibly, but he did not feel it was necessary to point that out. And so pretending he had not heard him seemed the next best thing.

[Jay Rastan]

Jay started at the sound of another voice. He knew that voice, heard it around more than a time or two around the hallways of Koalingo but couldn’t place where, but as soon as he looked up from where his head was resting in his hands he knew why that voice sounded familiar. It belonged to the one and only Godric Emerindyl,

“Hey Poster Boy” Jay said with a grin, standing up and listening to his back crack noisily a few times. “I wasn’t talking to anyone; more muttering to myself, didn’t know anyone was around. Been lost in thought”

Jay couldn’t help but size up the other young man with his calculating gaze. He would be blind not to notice some similarities between; both seventh years, both pureblood, both had well know parents, both good looking young men. Jay could even think to himself that Godric might feel some of the same pressures he felt in his life in the way of family. Both had strong willed fathers who would had to have a influence on their futures, but probably to different varying degrees.

“You know your girlfriend was going for the jugular in potions.” Jay said with a chuckle, raising a hand sheepishly to muse up his hair. “Not saying it was totally uncalled for. I don’t know how you do though. Bet she would be a hell cat to date although”

Jay then seemed to realise that his last comments might have rubbed the Emerindyl the wrong way. “I don’t mean any offence man. I meant it all it a good way. Just never been on the receiving end of that before, and don’t particularly want to be any time soon. Bet you two must have have pretty nasty fights, Elouise would have to get pretty passionate over certain topics.” Jay shrugged “I read somewhere that healthy relationship mean that the fights are always big explosions”

Jay knew he was just rambling about nonsensical topics, trying to keep his thoughts from before at bay so he could try to enjoy his current company, but he knew he was just fighting a losing battle. Some thoughts couldn’t be pushed away by sheer will, they just nagged and nagged until you succumb to them.

“So Poster Boy, this might seem a weird question at best but ever feel you are back seat driving your life?” Jay said with a sigh, almost waiting for the other boy to just laugh and tell him to pull his head out of the clouds. But that didn’t stop Jay from feeling a slight bit better knowing that the question was out there and he had a chance of knowing how other people felt. “You know what I mean? Living your life for other people? Watching it through a different person’s perspective, watching it all just drift by helplessly?”

‘That sounded weak, Jay. Remember you’re a Rastan. Head high, shoulders back, nose upturned. You’re a Rastan’

There was his father’s voice again.

Taunting him. Haunting him. Luring him.

[Godric Emerindyl]

Godric could see that he had startled the seventh year Saphricorn he had known since he started at Koalingo when he was eleven. And since then they had spoken many times, though they were not friends, strictly speaking they were something more like acquaintances. At any rate though, he knew the boy, the oddly sorted Jay Rastan.

’don’t call me-‘ Godric had only just started thinking that he would like Jay ot refer to him by his name just this once but realised mid thought that it was a waste of time. And so this time, like every other time, he would answer to the title ‘Poster Boy’

He wondered what odd things went through the mind of a guy whose high status demanded something much different of him then Saphricorn House. Godric would never refer to any other house as being better then Saphricorn though he knew a few high society families saw anything but Emerindyl or Ruberagon to be second rate. Which was stupid now he thought about it; Saphricorn alumni usually lead the field in magical sports and animal husbandry, and Ameraid students… well they always ended up with the exam marks to get into anything they wanted after graduation. It was a common misconception these two houses were less attractive to be a part of.

“No insult taken of course,” Godric said smirking and coming to sit on the end of the bench Jay was sitting on. He stretched, looked up at the sky, across at the lawns, being rather subtle to check that Elouise was no where around before he added, “She is a wild child, or what did you call it?” he looked at Jay with a squint of trying to remember something that could have happened a year ago, “A hell cat? Yeah, she’s a but like that,” he smiled ruefully, and knew from that moment until the day he died; he would never be insulted by someone commenting on Elouise’s rather tough exterior. He knew she could look like a Veela at one moment, and then at the next attack you with the ferocity of… well… a Veela.

“Which potions class? Just now?” he was vaguely interested in what had happened. Interested now because he didn’t know about it, but he knew he would hear about it a couple more times before he went to bed that night and so felt he might not want to ruin it for Elouise when she felt the need to vent later.

Godric had only just considered the thought of finding something else to do that night when Jay put to him a question that not only hit really close to home, but also seemed thoroughly out of place for someone from the Saphricorn house. Realising he had been stereotyping, he instantly felt bad for the thought.

Godric was a prefect. And while he wasn’t really sure if he wanted to be discussing the subject with anyone, let alone someone who was not his immediate friend. Godric knew this Saphricorn was reaching out at this point, and it was his responsibility to respond appropriately. All the same he had to fight the compulsion not to block it as blokes usually did by laughing it off and telling him to grow some balls.

“Is something wrong?” Godric thought this was the best way to approach this discussion. This way he was not blocking, but not giving anything up. And still performing his duties as a Prefect to the best of his capabilities.

’If father would here he would be pretty disappointed in that approach, Godric,’ he thought to himself as he waited for the Saphricorn guy to answer. He didn’t feel the need to encourage him though. He had asked enough for the moment. And privately he just hoped the boy dropped it.

[Jay Rastan]

Jay could tell the other boy was skirting around his question.

Although Jay couldn’t really blame him could he? It was a rather person question to ask anyone, and considering he was asking someone who he talked to infrequently about such things as Quidditch team chances for the cup or maybe school homework assignments or maybe, rarely, as passing comment on a member of the opposite gender, not something personal or deep like the pressures of family and expectations set for them for their lives.

“Hey Godric man, sorry I wasn’t meaning to rude and over step the boundary with that question” Jay said giving the other guy a sheepish grin and ruffled his head in an ashamed manner. “It’s none of my business, some things are just messing about in my head and I… I guess I’m losing the battle of keep control over it all. Guess I just need to ‘man-up’ as my father says”

With an almost wicked grin he couldn’t help laugh but let out a deep rumbling laugh as Godric called his girlfriend a ‘wild child’.

“Yeah that was just in potions, I’d say around twenty minutes ago. You’re very lucky though, mate. Elouise may be a hell cat and a wild child, but I can only hope I find a hell cat and wild child like her someday. Or maybe a hell cat for right now wouldn’t go astray either” Jay said with another laugh.

Sighing and looking out over the garden like the other adolescent male, Jay had to wonder how it all came down to this point in his life, he often wondered how different things would be if he had been sorted into Ruberagon, just exactly how much different he would be to his laid back, logical and usually collected self. He wasn’t naïve or, bluntly, stupid to think that he would be exactly the same as he was now, maybe he would not be so impassive towards those of muggle heritage, maybe he would be a little more cunning, a little more ruthless and a little more willing to play dirty. This stumped Jay, he was quite ruthless, very cunning and more than willing to play dirty if the situation called for it, maybe it was his control and his ability to assess situations and then decided on what it required of him. Maybe that is why the Ruberagon sword hesitated at last minute; maybe it was his logical sense of justice and desire for peaceful resolutions to most situations.

“Ever wondered what would have happened if you were sorted into another house other than Emerindyl, Poster boy?” Jay asked glancing out at Godric out the corner of his eye, calling him Poster Boy trying to make it seem like a light question, while leant forwards resting his forearms on his thighs and looking straight out ahead of him, his eyes following the movement of a bird weaving and diving threw their air seemingly carefree.

“I only ask because everyone knows who my parents are, hell, people I don’t have a clue to who they where walking up to me and shaking my hand and saying how much I look like an exactly mix of my parents, or how proud I must be to be their child, their only son.” Jay let out another sigh, this one more forceful and agitated.

Jay knew his parents were famous, a extremely wealthy, untainted old pureblood line guarantees some level of wide recognition, but then his mother is one of those most famous wizarding designers Australia had ever seen, and his father worked as a independent potions master, he was continuously published in medical, potion and wizarding journal’s throughout the world, but then again being widely recognised as in the top three world’s best potion’s master did mean that he had worldwide acclaim. They gave money to charities, they were invited and attended the most choice advents of the wizarding world had to off, no matter in what country. Jay wouldn’t be surprised if their was a poster of them each kissing a pureblood baby’s cheek on a billboard in all major wizarding settlements. It was enough to make him sick.

“I mean, you were there at my sorting, I pulled out the Ruberagon sword almost completely to its hilt, only the point of the sword remained in the stone and the Saphricorn one slide out completely. I spend at least one day a week wondering why I couldn’t have just pulled out the Ruberagon sword. Things would be so much easier.” Jay let out a hollow laugh, almost disturbingly dark for a boy of his general outward nature. “You know that both my parents were Ruberagon’s right? Of course you do, everyone does, my parents and their parents. Its goes on both side of my family lines that all my ancestors since we arrived here have came to Koalingo, been Ruberagon’s. My mother said it was probably nerves of a young man on the verge of a life altering experience that is why the Ruberagon sword stalled at the last second. My father, as always, blamed my short comings or faults, on my mother’s side of the family, apparently my grandmother on mother’s side pulled both Emerindyl and Ruberagon, but your house’s stopped right at the end and she was sorted into Ruberagon.”

Jay scrubbed his hands over his face as if trying to scrub all the bad memories away of his parent’s blame game, his family’s disappointment on his house allocation in Koalingo, his inner loneliness. But he knew his troubles wouldn’t go away just like that, nothing in Jay’s life had ever or would ever be that simple.

“Like, what if you had ended up in Ruberagon instead of Emerindyl? Wouldn’t there be a part you to wonder why you ended up there instead of Emerindyl or even Saphricorn given who your parents are” Jay paused for a moment before shaking his head. “Sorry man, that was personal, again wasn’t it?”

[Godric Emerindyl]

Godric didn’t so much feel that he was skirting around the question, more that he wanted to make sure he was giving the correct andunbias answer. He liked to give his opinion when it was asked for and when he felt strongly on the subject, but when it was something important like this, he felt the need to be neutral just a little more. He didn’t want his morals and his beliefs on the subject to cloud the issue, knowing that Jay would need to do a bit of soul searching of his own to find what he wanted to know.

“Don’t apologise,” Godric said to him when Jay looked to feel bad about what he had asked. Truth be told he and Jay were not friends, but neither were they enemies, and so there was nothing with asking for assistance, it was afar braver act then to tell him to go away, “How will you never know the answer to the questions in your mind if you don’t voice them,” he shrugged when Jay started on about losing grip and being told by his father to ‘man-up’ Godric was a little shocked and annoyed by that one, but knew it would be inappropriate to comment on Jay’s father.

“We all lose grip sometimes, but then you know what they say, don’t you? A grip on reality is a grip on boredom, acceptance of nothing beyond the world we live in, and if that was the case, who – I will ask you – will ever push the boundaries to discover what magic is really capable of?” Godric said as he looked at Jay, knowing that this was completely off topic, but the moral to the story was one he though might help Jay.

“We’re not supposed to accept reality, honestly we are not,” he said shaking his head and trying to compose himself all the while, he didn’t want a passer by to overheard their conversation and think them a couple of teenage girls just dripping with angst, “Accepting reality is… well… its boring, we have to live our lives, not the lives of those who have lived before us, however will we evolve as wizards if all we ever do is what has been done before?”

“I think its fantastic you were sorted into Saphricorn, you know you have probably turned the tide of your family,” he said with a grimace followed by a bit of a lippy smile that was happy but not overly so, he raised his head looking head on into the breeze and his blonde strands of fringe tickled his forehead.

“I don’t know what things would have been like if I was sorted into Saphricorn, one thing I suppose I would spend a lot more time with my mother,” he laughed. This was a bitter complaint of his that he would never have voiced if he thought Jay would tell anyone, “She must love all of her students, they get a great deal more of her time then I ever do,” he said as he thought about it silently, he did not consider for a moment that Jay might say something to his mother. He’d be rather disappointed in him if he did.

“But if I was in Saphricorn, I imagine that I might have been in the house group wondering what it might be like to be in Emerindyl” it always sounded odd when he said his own last name in the context of a house name. To say that he was Godric Emerindyl, of the house Emerindyl, sounded as if he was only stuffing his shirt with pride and self-centeredness.

“You should never regret the way things turned out,” he said falling silent, his eyes unfocused as he watched the sun setting over the walls of the castle. The twilight orange glow that flew across the sky was a sight to behold. A sight so beautiful that Godric almost forgot that he had company. He loved it here at Koalingo. He knew that with his parents around this would be the closest he would ever get to a normal life. One of the pains of going to a boarding school and having parents that worked the same hours your schooled. He sighed as he looked at the sky, it was quite enchanting.

“I was, yes, getting sorted myself, you might remember,” Godric said as he looked at the boy. Godric had actually drawn three of the four swords at his sorting, though he thought that perhaps Jay was so caught up in his own business of getting sorted that perhaps he had forgotten it, “My father chose to put me in Emerindyl even though I could have as easily ended up in Saphricorn or Ruberagon, well… well that is Professor ConDoin beat the Saphricorn candidate and then stood down to the Emerindyl head teacher, which makes me think that my father had a hand in it.”

Godric wasn’t sure how much of his sorting was common knowledge to a lot of people, he knew that he was the only one to ever draw three swords, though he also knew there was that Ameraid girl who had drawn the Ameraid sword and the Ruberagon sword. Something that had never occurred anywhere ever. Fortunately Godric knew that Professor Ameraid was never informed. She didn’t think she would like it if she knew that very student was now a seventh year Ameraid and prefect of the house. Godric didn’t bring it up though; it was not important right now.

“You see though Jay, I could never have been a Ruberagon student,” he smiled as they discussed it, “Not because I couldn’t draw the Ruberagon sword, as I did, but also because I am not like them” he said as he thought of Lucius Sinister, Lakasha Shocanis, Kalika and Skylar Gardan, and then there was Romulus Silvia.

“I am not one of them, and you are not one of them, the swords generally get it right, and when they don’t, there are head teachers… and headmaster’s around to fix their mistakes,” he said as he put both his hands on each of his knees and looked from the sky to Jay and then back again, “Why do you wonder these things? Is it only because your parents were all Ruberagon’s?”

[Jay Rastan]

Why did it bother Jay Rastan so much?

He didn’t really know.

Jay thought about this for a moment as he also looked over the beautiful daily scene of the sun setting behind the turrets of the castle. It would have been an artist’s dream to paint view of the sunset with the castle looming in the foreground. Such picturesque beauty was not wasted on Jay although he knew to appreciate such things inwardly.

’Maybe that’s why I’m in Saphricorn. To appreciate the finer things that nature offers that most overlook…’ Jay pondered for a moment before regretfully thinking about how he hadn’t been spending much time doing that or anything he enjoyed lately, flying, swimming, or just watching his surrounds both environmental and people. He always seemed busy doing something he had to do, not wanting to do but just to keep people off his back.

“I don’t know if it is my parents as much as everyone in my family. And their friends. And people that I don’t even know that they know.” Jay said, his hand going to his hair to mess it while he thought. “Its like everyone when they mean me automatically assumes that I’m a Ruberagon house member. My parents never correct them, they just respond that I am enjoying my time here. They are ashamed of me for that fact that I’m not a Ruberagon. Although they are happier with a Saphricorn for a son than an Emerindyl.”

Jay sometimes wonder if it was some lesson that was instilled into the Ruberagon students when they were sorted in first year that Emerindyl’s were some sort of dirt beneath them. Having spent many a social gathering by his parent’s side making the rounds, it often seemed to Jay that the Ruberagon alumni were still school children with all their jokes and snide comments about Emerindyl students both former and current. Jay just didn’t see the point, shouldn’t they have grown up and out of the silly teasing contest they seem trapped in. It was like two wizards consistently boasting over whose wand was longer; it wasn’t going to be any different of a result as the first time.

“I think its more off a fact that they blame me. Like I should have refused to go into Saphricorn or something. But it’s not like I really had a choice.” Jay said with a shrug, as much as he thought about that day and what might have been different if the situation reversed, he was happy in Saphricorn. He had great friends who proved good company; he had his place set up exactly how he liked it, and he had freedom to wonder the plains at his disposal.

“I know people are meant to make mistakes and learn from them. But what if someone doesn’t view an action or decision as a mistake. I mean do that condemn then to repeat it all throughout their life time? Won’t they regret it?” Jay looked down at his feet now, thinking of many times he himself had mistakes but was often informed by his father that ‘Rastan’s don’t make mistakes, so therefore it was destined to happen as it did’

As he listened to Godric talk about his own mother’s lack of time for him, her own son. Jay could admit he often saw Lady Saphricorn just walking around the plains checking up on animal and their progress and also her students.

“You know the last few times I’ve spoke with her, she has mentioned you. She mentioned how it seemed like all her seventh years had just been sorted into her house and we had suddenly just grown up in front of her over night. Especially you,” Jay said, nudging the other boy with his shoulder hoping to lift his spirits on the issue. “I was going to make a wise crack remark but thought better of it. You know what they say about Mother lions; don’t touch the cub if you don’t want to be bitten. She probably thinks she is giving you a bit of freedom to grow into your own man, not the son of Lady Saphricorn and Lord Emerindyl. Best intentions often use the most twisted logic”

Jay couldn’t help but wonder if he had grown into his own man himself. He didn’t have to see his parents daily, but they wrote at the very least weekly. He looked in the mirror and saw his father’s hair and chin and his mother’s delicate features albeit ruggedly. People often remarked on how similar he looked to his parents, how he had a powerful stance like his father had at his age. It was like their past haunted him, making him unable to make his own mistakes, his own past and especially his future. He was good at potions like his father, had a eye for male fashion like his mother, but these things were instilled in him, not his own natural gifts. Anyone could teach someone how to excel at potions.

“I guess neither of us was obviously destined to be in Ameraid. Maybe we will need to marry some really brainy girls to equal out the equation. You never know what the future holds, especially when everything around here seems to change more daily”

One comment of Godric’s really made Jay think about things. What really did make them different from the students of Ruberagon house? The colour of their robes was something superficial that could easily be changed with a flick of a wand. It wasn’t their blood that could be questioned, both family lines were in the top of the purest. It was often recalled to be said through history that it’s the attitude that makes a witch or wizard who they are. But while most people thought that Ruberagon’s were evil that was not true on all accounts. Jay’s cousin was a shining example, a jokester who was so happy go lucky it didn’t even bother him that he had been disowned by his own flesh and blood, but lived by the motto of ‘what will be will be’

“You know poster boy, I think I wonder about things like this is because sometimes the line is too blurred between them and me for my liking. I have nothing against them, a person is accountable for their actions, not of those around them. But I look at some of them, their actions, vocalized thoughts, and I can see the point of them, even the malicious things. I can see their point of view. And I don’t want to. So what does make you and me so different from them? I just can’t figure it out!”

[Godric Emerindyl]

Godric listened without saying a whole lot off his own back. He was good at listening when he knew people just wanted to speak, and while he listened to the words of comfort about the relationship he had with his own mother and father, it seemed nothing in contrast to what Jay had to put up with his own parents. In the end he decided that Jay was a lot wiser about things then he first thought he might be, and at the end of his words, he had answered his own question without knowing it.

“Perhaps that is the answer?” he said as he looked at the boy he knew so little about and yet felt as if they were more alike at this moment then any moment before. “You know how to see things from their point of view, and you can agree and disagree, but do so on your own terms, a lot of people hear things said by Ruberagons and their alumni and a lot of people agree with them, but find that they are too ashamed to admit it to anyone purely because the thoughts come from a Ruberagon and they are afraid of people associating them with Ruberagons, the thing though, and this, I think you will find important and will have a lot to do with you personally, is that you have the choice to agree or disagree, you do not blindly agree with a Ruberagon because that is what, as a Ruberagon, you feel you should agree to,” Godric wondered if this made sense, he was speaking and trying to keep up with his own mind.

“Do you see what I mean? You are separate from the usual Ruberagon in that you have a mind of your own and are prepared to think in ways considered radical to those around you, and that goes two ways aswell,” Godric said as he sat back just a bit to express his words, “People should be able to respect that it is your choice to feel the way you want to on the many subjects, and that goes for those in your own house,” he said lowering ihis voice in case any such Saphricorn’s might be eavesdropping.

“I heard about some debacle near the pools?” Godric said letting on that he knew a little of something he actually knew a lot about. “It isn’t a nice feeling when people in your own house have issues with you befriending people they don’t like, it might make you feel like a bit of an outcast?” he was reading into Jay’s mind without actually knowing it, something Godric knew he was capable of, due to being who he was, but something he tried never to do, “I have been an Emerindyl since I was born, both as a family member but as a member of the Koalingo House of Emerindyl, and not because of my blood, but I believe of who I am, and that is how I think the swords were told to choose people for their houses, with the exception, perhaps, of the Ruberagon House, it is known that Ruberagon will only choose those with the blood fit for the house, but on the turn side of that it is also known that the other houses are as capable of sorting people of pureblood into their midst,” Godric said as he looked away from Jay again to consider this, “Saphricorn’s are free thinkers, and perhaps a lot of your friends were a lot more open minded when they were sorted, life affects us more then we perhaps think it does,”

“Your friends, particularly Mariana,” Godric levelled off on this name for a moment, striking a thought in Jay’s head that he would likely have wished Godric had not seen, “Has her prejudices against people in Ruberagon for the same reason a lot of students, and alumni do,” Godric said as he continued, “They are not always a very nice bunch of people, and it is not simply who they are, but it is who they become, I don’t think Ruberagon sorts people into its house because people are evil, I don’t believe anyone is born evil, they simply become it with the affections of forces the rest of us might prefer to stay away from,”

“I know Lord Ruberagon, Jay, and I know Robbie Ruberagon about as closely as if he were my brother, and I can assure you that he is a far cry from what you might see in Lucius, perhaps, and especially in Romulus,” Godric said betraying one of the thoughts that had troubled him for some time now, “Romulus concerns me a little more then I am happy with,” he said, knowing at this moment that he could say this to Jay without being afraid of the boy laughing at him or telling anyone else about it, this conversation between the two of them would be as secretive as if the two had made an unbreakable vow never to utter a word of it to anyone ever,”

“Romulus, and Lucius were brought up a lot different to what you were,” Godric said as he leaned forward with his elbows on his knees, he knew this was not good for his back, but for the timebeing it was comfortable, “I know this because you three could be no different,” he smiled as an indelicate sound uttered in the marks of his own mind as if foreseeing it as a reaction Jay might have, “Lucius and Romulus are as much different as you and Lucius, though their upbringing’s were similar, didn’t you know neither of them have living parents?” Godric said stopping to see Jay’s reactions, “Did you know also that it is a common belief, amoung certain rings, that both of them had a hand in the demise of their families?

“Idle gossip possibly, but the group discussing it when I could not help but overhear, are usually right when it comes to such things,” he laughed a little, embarrassed about his own sneakyness and listening into other peoples discussions, “The difference between them is that Romulus’ mother and father are dead, Romulus’ mother appears to have been burned at the stake, something that would not normally kill a witch unless of course she was incapable of performing a tickling charm on the flames, Romulus’ brother; Remus was drowned when he was younger, now this we do know; Romulus drowned him, or at least failed to attempt to resue him when he was drowning,” Godric paused just long enough for Jay to be surprised.

“Lucius is a little different,” he sat up and cracked his knuckles releasing the tention in his hands as he did so, “Lucius’ parents are alive and well,” he said before adding, “They live in a pond with lots of colourful fish to look at and plenty of lillypads to sunbake on,” he smiled and looked Jay straight in the face, “They currently live as frogs, and have done since Lucius was old enough to cast the curse upon them. Of course old Lucius was never able to undo the curse, or at least so he says, I believe he is more then capable, but as it is not a crime to transfigure ones family into an animal…”

Godric smiled, they had gotten a little off topic, and he had perhaps not made his point, and felt that Jay seemed to require closure on the topic and so thought he should elaborate in closing, “Lucius could never kill his family, he is so proud of his blood and his heritage that he does not have it in him, Romulus is, I believe, a lost cause, though try telling that to my father,” Godric made an indelicate sound of his own as he looked skywards, “You’re quite different to them, and the fact that you can agree with them does not make you evil, in fact the mere account that you can disagree with them is what makes you different. You have your own mind, and that is what makes you Saphricorn, or so that is my belief,”

[Jay Rastan]

“I must admit to having known that they were raised without the normal parent guidance that most of us have and while my parents did one day said of the, um, shaded circumstances behind death of Romulus parent’s but nothing was ever said really just that he would be at school the same time as me” Jay said almost forgetting the real reason he and Godric had been talking, or rather the topic of their conversation and while some of the things he had heard has surprised him he had tried to keep a neutral expression.

While he didn’t agree with all his parent’s thoughts, beliefs and aspirations for his future he, like Lucius, was proud of his heritage and blood line and couldn’t, wouldn’t harm his parents, nor would he ever contemplate it at all. It sounded like Lucius’ parents had a pretty sweet deal, well, from a frog’s perspective anyway. All the while it was not polite to speak ill of people he couldn’t help but wonder if it was safe to have a person who was morally corrupt and questionable as Romulus was, coming and going through the hall ways as he pleases. Jay was not worried for his own safety but for that of a younger student who might unknowingly cross the Ruberagon student.

Although he picked up on the tone and perhaps frustration of the other boy on how he obviously disagreed with his father over the Romulus situation, Jay had more tact and common sense then to question further on what was obvious a topic that was to and would know stray anymore than between them. It was good knowing that even though he was competition in more than one way, that he could share this confidence with the Emerindyl boy and not have to worry.

“You know what was really strange about the whole thing with the cow and the pool? I was only trying to help out. I really didn’t think the cow was having fun; it kept slipping and crying out. I didn’t understand how they could do that to the poor cow. But I guess it is like the age old question of why aren’t all Saphricorn’s vegetarians, the people who ask it must never have seen tofu!” Jay said chuckling and shaking his head as he mentally thought about all the times he had been asked that very question.

“I think that if I was in Ruberagon I don’t think it would change much in the way of my family. I mean sure my parents would be more proud of my accomplishments but they spend that much time and effort trying to convince me to their way of thinking that I still spend that much time with them when its possible although it might have been in a more positive light” Jay said almost in reflection, and almost as if in that realisation the day seemed a little bright to him.

While many things would have been different in large proportions, some things wouldn’t have changed all that much. He still would have been Jay Rastan, a only child, and someone’s grandson, he would be the same age, and the sky would be blue, the grass green. He would have acted a little differently, thought a more than a little different, but he would have still stood tall with the same self pride.

“You know what Poster Boy? You’ve been a great help, I know that I am Jay Rastan as I was yesterday and will be tomorrow and I’m proud of that. Different isn’t something to be discouraged but it could grow into something greater than expected.” Jay said, rubbing his palms over his slacks and grinning.

“I think perhaps we both needed this little discussion. I guess I best be going, I swear here was something I was meant to do back in Saphie Land.”

Holding his hand out to for the other boy to shake before he departed.

“We’ll have to do this again some time.”

[Godric Emerindyl]

((Well I think its pretty obvious this thread has now ended, no point responding to a farewell when the other character has left =) ))

**Thread Closed**