6 Chapter 2: The next Lord Longbottom

-Longbottom Manor, Meadow District, Midlands, England

-December 28, 1975

When Neville returned to Britain it was already dark and the first thing he did was to go to Longbottom Manor in the magical Meadow District where his great-uncle, Lord Harold Longbottom, who was rarely present at the manor as he used to travel a lot on business, lived.

Once he arrived at Longbottom Manor, Neville took a relaxing shower, then climbed into his bed and went straight to sleep.

He needed to clear/rest his mind and he knew the only way to do that was to sleep.

....

....

-House of Algie and Enid Longbottom, Meadow District, Midlands, England.

-January 1, 1976

-Pov Neville

I blinked open my tired light blue eyes.

I looked up at the pale brown ceiling of my bedroom.

Sitting up in my bed, I first rubbed my hair, then rubbed my eyes as I slowly sat up, stretching my arms above my head before getting out of bed after pulling back the covers.

I headed to the bathroom to take a cold shower and wake up completely.

It had been four days since I started my new life as Magnus Neville Longbottom, son of Algie Longbottom and Enid Longbottom (née Fawley), cousin of Frank Longbottom and second nephew of Lord Harold Bastian Longbottom as well as his next heir.

These days I had already spoken to my parents, Algie and Enid, who used to be my great-grandparents.

Yes, it was weird...

But luckily not that weird, it was just a bit awkward calling them father and mother.

After all, I had lived practically all my life with them before.

And even though they were now my parents it didn't feel so strange to me since they and my grandmother Augusta had been the ones who had cared for me and raised me since I was a year old, so they were already like my parents figures.

I also spoke to Lord Harold Longbottom, though it was only in letters as he was a very busy man and usually only visited Magnus to give him advice or teach him about magic, politics, the economics of the wizarding world, and different things that Magnus needed to know in order to be the next Lord, in short, he was preparing him to take his place in the future.

Of course, I had never wanted or thought about being the next Lord Longbottom.

In fact, I had always been perfectly happy to stay out of the spotlight, even preferring to let others take the important positions or take the credit for everything.

But now as Magnus Neville Longbottom, heir to Lord Longbottom, I no longer had that option, and I had given my word to the previous Magnus that I would honour his conditions.

After a good long shower, I left the bathroom and went to a small, elegant, antique wooden chest of drawers in the corner of the room next to my wardrobe.

I pulled out a change of underwear, a pair of olive green trousers, and a black t-shirt.

I quickly got dressed and finally put on a pair of socks and black boots before standing up and going to my desk with a small mirror on it.

I looked at my reflection and smiled.

I like this face of mine, much better than before with too much baby fat and completely pale.

I tied my light brown hair back like the previous Magnus used to do and let some hair down in front of my face.

As I was about to leave my room, a quick knock on the door startled me.

"Magnus! Hurry up! Breakfast is ready and it's getting cold!" the voice of my mother, Enid Longbottom, shouted through the wooden door.

Yes, definitely it was rather strange to think of her as my mother when she used to be my great-aunt...

But since she was one of the three people who raised me my whole life it was less difficult to think of her as such now.

"I'm coming, I'm coming!" I opened the door only to find her standing in front of me.

Her brown hair fell over her bright grey eyes as she stared at me.

"I see you're finally getting up, what happened to the young morning man I know?" She smiled broadly, which made me smile sheepishly and turn my eyes away a little embarrassed at not being able to keep up with Magnus's daily routine, I still had to get used to doing that much exercise every day.

But at least now I had a much more physically developed body to be able to exercise and make good use of magic.

"Yeah..., well, lately I'm a bit more tired than usual..."

"Uh-Oh is that right? Then you should sleep earlier and not stay up late at night in your father's greenhouse" she reproached me and with a very valid reason.

I loved that greenhouse and it was the only thing that kept me calm when my head wouldn't stop thinking about all sorts of things, I always liked Algie's greenhouse with all sorts of magical plants that didn't judge me or upset me, they were peaceful and if you treated them well they would treat you the same way.

"Well never mind that now, come on, let's get some breakfast before the food gets cold" she huffed and shook her head as she walked down the stairs to the dining room while I followed her.

.....

"What's for breakfast," I asked, smiling as I sat down.

"French toast and eggs, they won't be as good as the ones you ate in France but I'm proud to say they're pretty tasty" she turned and handed me a plate of food.

"Thank you. I love French toast" I smiled before I started eating.

Soon my father, Algie Longbottom, arrived at the table and he grimaced before accepting a plate from my mother.

"This... French food?" he asked with a frown and a tone of voice that showed he wasn't at all happy about it.

"Yes, a small celebration for Magnus' victory in the All-Europe Junior Wizarding Duelling Competition held this year in France. Now eat it, you two, it's getting cold," nodded my mother, paying no attention to her husband's unhappy frown.

"This is your fault boy, you told her you liked French food and look what happened" complained my father looking at me with reluctance clearly blaming me for the meal Enid had made.

"Come on, they're not that bad and you know it," I said looking at him amused, there used to be arguments like this before too, only now there wasn't my grandmother Augusta..., well now she's my aunt actually and our families weren't very close since she and her husband, Eugene Longbottom, rejected Lord Longbottom's proposal to make a marriage contract between the Blacks and their son, Frank Longbottom.

Lord Harold Bastian Longbottom was the son of the former Lord Harfang Longbottom and Lady Callidora Longbottom (née Black) who made up the main house.

Lord Harold once had a wife but they never had children and when she died he never remarried, so he was left without an heir.

It was for this reason that Lord Harold decided to choose his heir from among the grandchildren of his uncle Brandon Longbottom of the branch house, who had married Arabella Longbottom (nee Parkinson) and still had a pureblood lineage.

Moreover, by doing so, he could also take advantage of the fact that his uncle's descendants, Brandon Longbottom, were not blood-related to the Blacks and thus re-unite the two families through a marriage contract as his father Lord Harfang had previously done.

Of course, Lord Harold Longbottom first thought of making his heir Frank Longbottom, who was the eldest of his second nephews, but his second cousin, Eugene Longbottom, and his wife Augusta Longbottom (née Montague) refused to make a marriage contract for their son at such a young age, so Lord Harold decided that Magnus Neville Longbottom would be his next heir, as his other second cousin, Algie Longbottom, had agreed to a marriage contract between his son and the Blacks.

So it was then that Magnus not only became Lord Longbottom's next heir, but he also became engaged to Andromeda Black, the second daughter of Cygnus Black III.

And since then Lord Harold Bastian Longbottom took Magnus to live with him at Longbottom Manor where he taught Magnus everything he needed to know as the next heir.

They both attended several of the most important meetings of the pureblood houses where Lord Longbottom introduced him to the most elitist British wizarding society and presented him as his heir to the different Lords of the most important noble and ancient houses, as well as to some of their heirs.

Once Magnus entered Hogwarts he was sorted into Hufflepuff, although the Hat also thought of sending him to Slytherin or Gryffindor, yet his hard work to be a good heir along with an unwavering loyalty to his house and family which was greater than anything else in his life ended up placing him in Hufflepuff despite having great ambition and bravery along with incredible cunning and chivalry.

The Longbottoms had always been either in Slytherin (mostly the main house) or Gryffindor (mostly the branch house) so it was a surprise that Magnus ended up being a Hufflepuff.

But Lord Longbottom was extremely satisfied with Magnus even though he ended up a Hufflepuff and not a Slytherin like he and his father or a Gryffindor like his uncle Brandom and his descendants.

The reason behind this was due to the fact that to this day the results Magnus had shown as heir were outstanding, he had achieved excellent marks in all subjects at Hogwarts except potions, standing out in DADA and Charms, and he had also demonstrated the ambition, cunning, resourcefulness, courage and bravery necessary to be a Lord.

While Magnus' parents were proud of their son, they, unlike Frank Longbottom's parents, always followed the old ways, putting a high value on magical talent, social position, and the honour of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Longbottom.

So they were especially proud to see that their son was the heir and next Lord Longbottom.

At just sixteen Magnus was already renowned for winning two junior dueling wizard competitions, one in his fourth year at Hogwarts and the other in his fifth year at Hogwarts.

In fact, from the memories I now have of him, he died the day after winning the final of his third junior dueling tournament against a sixth-year student from Durmstrang.

Magnus was really skilled with his wand, so much so that he managed to successfully confront the two dark wizards who ambushed him the day he died in the forest, he even defeated one but when the second one got desperate and didn't want their identities revealed he grabbed his partner and tried to escape.

But Magnus was too proud, sure he was also cunning but his overconfidence could blind him sometimes, and that is what caused his death.

Magnus did not want to give his attackers the luxury of allowing them to escape, so he prevented this from happening at all costs..., and in their desperation, the last dark wizard cast a killing curse against Magnus, and before he could see whether or not he had succeeded, he grabbed his fallen partner and quickly left the scene using apparition.

What these dark wizards surely did not expect was that they had in fact succeeded with the randomly cast killing curse.

Magnus was so focused on his offensive to prevent them from escaping that he didn't have time to dodge the killing curse correctly and it hit him in the shoulder due to his carelessness, which ended with him dying in an embarrassing manner.

"Magnus Neville Longbottom, you must understand that nothing compares to a good breakfast with bacon, sausages, roasted tomatoes, mushrooms, bread, eggs..." Algie began to say in a serious tone of voice as he listed everything, it almost seemed like his mouth was watering at the thought of eating that instead of just this French toast and egg.

I just laughed softly before quickly gobbling down my food, they hadn't changed much.

Once I finished eating, I put my plate in the sink and got ready to go train some magic to make up for the exercise I didn't do in the morning.

But before I left, my father, Algie Longbottom, told me to go to his office after my training was over, to which I just nodded and left to train.