The Last Peverell

Chapter 67

Chapter 67

The morning before the annual Black Family Christmas Party, Jasmine and James finally heard from Sirius. He had floo called them sounding tired, but alright after breakfast. "The family magic accepted me, but then I got an unexpected power boost and things have been exploding around me more than usual. I've just about got it under control," he told Jasmine and James excitedly as something popped behind him and shattered. The fire version of Sirius winced as he apologized to whoever he hurt on the other end. Though, there was only manic cackling in the background.

"Will we see you tonight for the party or will be hiding in your room?" James asked with a smirk and Sirius let out a bark like laugh.

"My father would kill me if I missed the party tonight. I wouldn't miss you, Lils, Jasmine and whoever she is bringing as her guest. My aunt is still guessing as to your mystery plus one."

And there was Sirius, fishing for answers once again. He was definitely feeling better. "I'm not telling you either. James doesn't even know who is coming with me this evening. I want it to be such a great surprise that your family will talk about for years."

Sirius' fire face turned downwards at her comment. "You better not be doing something I would do. If I recall, you usually frown on kinds of ideas."

She rolled her eyes and James let out a snort. "I assure you, no one is more qualified to mingle with your family tonight than my plus one. Speaking of plus ones, is Mikhail coming?"

Sirius made a noise resembling some kind of strangled animal. "You mean the young man my brother is infatuated with? Your friend? That Mikhail?" She didn't even need to be in his presence to feel the sarcasm rolling off of him. Sirius hade it very clear that he wasn't the biggest fan of her Russian friend. His obsession with Regulus might have rubbed Sirius the wrong way. "Naturally. My entire family wants to scrutinize him for all he's worth, which I'm told is a considerable amount."

"Does Mikhail know that your family is going to be judging his every move?"

Sirius grinned, it was reminiscent of Bellatrix, slightly mad and proud of it.

"You do realize that Mikhail and I spent a good part of our childhoods being judged and looked at like cattle. Before that he was, and still is, the son of the wealthiest business tycoons in magical Russia."

It was a pain in the arse dealing with Eastern European magical politics at this point in time since most were locked behind the Iron Curtain for all muggle transportation, but magically, Russia never fell. Even in the 90s Russian magical royalty ruled. Anastasia's disappearance was tragic to the muggle people, but the young girl was a witch who ended up ruling her people while the muggle world fell around them. They had to fake her death with the rest of her family, but she had a long tenure as the ruler of magical Russia. Still it made trading tricky since there were so many banned items from one country to another. Certain fabrics couldn't cross border lines because it could be discovered that they were getting rationed items from a non-Soviet area of the world and so on.

Mikhail's family was making a fortune off of this and the desperate need to make sure that the quickly evolving muggle technology kept up with wizarding magic. Their company was a powerhouse and the Black Family was well aware of it. They would never admit it, but they knew.

"Look, Jazz, he hasn't dealt with my aunt."

Jasmine kept hearing these awful rumors about Cassiopeia, but had yet to see any of them actually come to merit something. The woman was nothing but pleasant to Jasmine. Sure, at first she was a bit frosty, but it wasn't anything like she had been warned about.