The Summons to Tyen had taken Melanthe somewhat by surprise, especially since her Uncle Caspero was not prone to such forcefulness in his dealings. Or eloquence. It was all out of the ordinary but nonetheless intriguing. What in all of Siberia could have him so riled up that he would go to such lengths to get everyone in the family together. There weren’t many of them about these days but the ones who were around tended to avoid the ancestral abode like the plague.

But not Melanthe.

Still, she had legitimately been away on business for the Tetra Wizard Tournament and did not take kindly to the ultimatum to come rushing back for family business that probably wasn’t urgent at all. Any urgent business was the business that she dictated, not her uncle. And usually Caspero knew his place. Perhaps she had been away too long and needed to remind him, she thought.

The dark witch apparated herself inside of the home’s walls and though she was dressed for wintry weather, she could feel chilled air billow towards her, caused by the immense stone walls and high ceilings. Tyen was not a cozy place to be. It was quite a task in upkeep for the house elves and she imagined when no one was there, they could scale back what was done for the place. But Melanthe could tell that it had been a hasty effort to "revive" the abode for this particular occasion.

Melanthe strode down the main foyer, the heels of her boots clicking against the marble tiled floors as she went. And it continued until she paused at the base of the stairs. The place was eerily quiet, seemingly devoid of anyone else's presence but Melanthe called out, "Caspero?"

Her voice echoed off of the walls and then seemed to die off into the shadows. Turning away from the stairs, she felt compelled towards a wing of the mansion most often avoided -- the one with her father's old office.

She didn't think Caspero would be in there as he often expressed a strangeness in using the office due to his closeness with her father when he was still alive. So Melanthe did not understand the pull towards the room. Maybe it was the similar feeling she had had nearly a year ago when she had happened across Richard Burke, a close friend of her father's, sitting at his desk, that urged her on. And indeed, when Melanthe slipped inside the barely disturbed room she immediately felt a presence there.

Strangely, she felt as if her father were near and then just as quickly the feeling faded away. Her dark eyes went first to the desk to see if anyone was sitting in his chair, but it was vacant. She chided herself for being so foolish about such things and was about to head out when she caught a movement in her peripheral.

And the movement was accompanied by the sound of a match being struck. A small flame burned, danced and then was snuffed out but the glowing ember continued to burn and the smell of tobacco smoke wafted towards her through the shadows.

Melanthe said nothing but her hand instinctively went to where she kept her wand concealed within her cloak. But the other person in the room must have sensed it or caught the movement from where they stood and were quick to address it.

"There is no need for vands," the voice was male and gruff and heavy with the accent of her native tongue. Slowly the figure moved into the light, revealing a tall, burly frame even though it seemed to belong to an aging wizard with a head of shaggy salt and pepper hair. That hair scattered across  his cheeks and chin for a full beard.

The man straightened to his full height and advanced towards the desk. He held a pipe in one hand and extended his other to graze his fingertips over the desktop. When he lifted them again, dust clung to them and he rubbed them together with a certain amount of distaste for such lack of cleanliness. He turned to look at her and the disapproving expression was unmistakable.
 
Melanthe was not intimidated or unsettled very easily, but something about this man immediately set her on edge. It made her bristle with hostility and annoyance. She did not appreciate his presence in her father's office, of all places. She understood that this visitor may be in her home due to business and likely at the invitation of Caspero and as such she should withhold full judgement. But his utter disregard for the importance and respect due this particular space in her home was simply unacceptable.

Melanthe swept forward to stand more directly in front of the man, her cloak and the skirts it covered seeming to swish angrily along with her. Only then was she able to truly see how tall and immense of a figure he was, causing her to stand taller herself and to tilt her chin up in her most defiant manner. She was about to demand to know who he was and what his purpose was here but she suddenly stopped when she peered up into the man’s face.

She noticed that his eyes were as dark as her own and even with his bearded face, she could tell that the structure underneath was strong and angular and oddly familiar. It dawned on her that she knew him somehow. But the truth of it was that she had never met him before. And so that could only mean that he was family.

But who?

Melanthe tried to mask her surprise and confusion as she attempted to sort through who he could be but she could see something in the man’s expression start to change. His gaze became a mixture of mocking amusement which only infuriated her more.

As if reading her thoughts, the man quietly grizzled, “It vill come to you soon enough, don’t you vorry.”

Melanthe did not want him to see that his patronizing tone and look was frustrating to her. But hiding that reaction was difficult when she was intent on figuring out who this mysterious relative was before her. Still, she needed to regroup and turned to move to the other side of the desk, placing some distance between them. When she looked at him again, she still struggled to place his likeness. To bide her time, she inquired, “Where is Caspero?”

Instead of answering, the man moved around the desk to where the chair was and proceeded to pull it out and lower his large frame into it. He carefully folded his hands on the desktop and looked back expectantly at her before finally saying, “Ushli.” He drew out the word in her native tongue that meant gone, heavy on the “s” sound and a look of smugness to go with it.

The nerve of this man! Sitting in her father’s chair as if he knew Orfeo Grumman or that he somehow deserved to occupy that place of honor and respect in her family! This was not acceptable and Melanthe intended to put a stop to this right this moment, no matter what the connection this man had to the Grummans. At the very least she could teach him that she was not to be trifled with.

Melanthe brandished her wand so quickly that she couldn’t imagine that the old man would have time to retaliate. She uttered the incantation of her signature curse, “Incendia verbero!” and waited with own expression of smugness for the blazing reddish-orange spark to produce the familiar fire whip.

But rather unexpectedly, there came an equally swift movement from the other side of the desk, though mainly concealed in the shadows. But what was not concealed was the fact that the spark sending the fire whip curse in his direction seemed to be swallowed up in mere nothingness before it had a chance to get anywhere near him.

Melanthe’s eyes went wide with shock at the realization of what had been done. She looked from her wand towards the man’s face...

Vadim’s eyes danced with pleasure to see his granddaughter’s reaction to his snuffing out her curse. But it really wasn’t her curse now, was it? And she absolutely had no idea of its malicious origins. But then, neither had her father who was likely the one who had taught it to her. And sloppily at that.

Vadim begrudgingly rose once more from the chair and moved around the towards Melanthe who was still caught in a fit of shock. The encounter had taken a different turn than he expected but then he didn’t know why he was so surprised by his granddaughter’s hotheadedness. It was quite Grumman of her.

A tall witch in her own right, Vadim still towered over her in his approach and he could sense her recoil as he reached out and fiercely grasped the wrist of her wand hand. Leaning close, he gruffly barked, “Dorogoy papa[1] never taught you da counter-curse, hmm? Iz no surprise for someone so nebrezhnyy[2] and lenivyy[3].”

His words were said with a sneer that he could see caused the fire in her eyes burn a little deeper. Yes, she was a daddy’s girl, alright. She certainly seemed immuned to his faults or probably did not know the half of them. He would cure her of that ignorance real fast since his nephew, Caspero, surely had failed to do so.

He watched as Melanthe’s face contorted with horror filled pain as he continued to apply pressure to her wrist until her wand fell from her fingertips. Before it fell to the floor, Vadim summoned it into his own open palm. The young witch started to struggle then against his hold, her eyes blazing with fury now. But he shoved her away from him and towards the vacant chair opposite the one he had occupied on the other side of the desk and practically roared at her, “Sidet'[4]!”

Melanthe fell pitifully into it chair and took to rubbing her sore wrist but her eyes followed him as he moved back to the other side of the desk. But this time he did not sit down. He sent a murderous glare in her direction before he cast his dark eyes down at the wand he had confiscated from her.

“I should have known you vould get it,” he muttered simply. From within the folds of his own cloak, Vadim produced a wand that looked identical to it and held them both up. Then he continued to speak. “You must know it vas not the only one, da?”

Melanthe nodded and feebly responded, “Yes. Caspero has one just like it. Only a different core.”

“Did he tell you about others?”

“Well, he said there was one that belonged to my grandfather. And his father. But I always thought that was his. Or that one which belonged--”

“To your father.” Vadim’s mouth formed a grim line as he carefully inspected the two wands in his hands. He knew them intimately and though they appeared exactly alike, he knew about their key differences. “There are five altogether,” he announced to her, glancing up briefly to note her response. Then he continued, “But do you know vy this one vas his? Or now vy it is yours?”

He could see the wheels turning in Melanthe’s mind, as if she knew the answer to the rather simplistic question, but in that moment, her words would not come. Perhaps it was all the new bits of information that he kept throwing at her that rendered her speechless. But her silence did nothing to comfort him that his granddaughter was astute, accomplished and worthy of a wand of such power. “It is because you are a parselmouth!” he thundered.

Melanthe flinched and seemed to shrink back further into the chair. Vadim could see that she her dislike for him was growing by the minute. She finally asked the question he had been waiting for.

“Who are you, starik[5]?”

1.	daddy dearest
2.	careless
3.	lazy
4.	sit
5.	old man

Even as the words left her mouth, Melanthe knew that she did not need him to answer the question for her. There were plenty of clues already revealed from their encounter thus far and she had already surmised that he was a family member.

Her brow furrowed deeply as she peered more closely at him, waiting for the answer to reveal itself. She was looking for such a prolonged period of time that her vision blurred and when she refocused, she took in the bigger picture around him. Behind the old man and the desk were several portraits of Grumman ancestors, her father being one of them. But flanked on either side of him were the portraits of the many other Grumman men who had used the office and were no longer living.

This man clearly resembled all of them -- Her father, Orfeo. And the Orfeo before him who had also been a parselmouth. And then there was Angus, the one who had been born in Siberia and started the family in their illegal doings in the Runespoor trade. And the last portrait her eyes fell upon was his son and her grandfather, Artur. Her younger brother was his namesake and yet they all knew so very little about the man. He had died well before she had been born and neither her father or Caspero had said much of him except that he was a hard man to please.

Who else could this relative be? She had sifted through all the known men in her family and unless there was a disgruntled branch of Grummans who had been hiding all these years, she still stumped.

Again, the old man seemed to be reading her thoughts. He released a slow rumbling chuckle before he revealed, “I vas never very fond of my portrait. But there was never any time to have it redone. Maybe that vas best.”

Melanthe followed his gaze back to the portrait she had last reflected on. The man in frame was nothing like the one standing before her now. Dark, brooding and lively, yes. Youthful and handsome, too. How could that man have become the grizzled, menacing old tyrant who had invaded her home? How could he be--

“Dedushka[1]?”

He glowered at her in response and Melanthe’s mind went reeling with the implications of that realization. But she barely had time to process it fully when a comment cut into her thoughts.

“You are no vnuchka[2] of mine.”

It both confirmed his identity and managed to burn her deeply with its accusatory tone. And before she could produce a proper rebuttal to his statement, Artur Grumman proceeded to rail on,

“You are your father’s daughter, through and through,” came the first part as he wagged a slender, scolding  finger towards her. He cut her off when she tried to interrupt. “I have sat back long enough to vatch you and the others waste your talents. And spoil this family’s riches and power of influence.” He narrowed his dark eyes -- ones so much like her own -- and then leaned forward to forcefully pound the desktop with his fist causing her to flinch yet again in discomfort. No man had ever made her feel like such a reprimanded child before. Or not allowed her to get a word in edgewise, compounding her feelings of lost control.

And just when she thought she had composed herself and was ready to respond, this man -- her grandfather returned from the dead -- was intent on beating her down further with his mockery of her.

“Other families and our business associates should fear and respect the Grumman name,” he quietly seethed. “But you and Caspero have mismanaged everything. That ends tonight.”

1.	grandfather
2.	grandchild