eiahmon | A Gracey's Chance Chapter 7

Title - A Gracey's Chance Chapter 7
Rating - PG
Summary - Twelve years after Voldermort's defeat, Harry receives a letter from an old friend, with a most unusual request
Disclaimer - I only wish I owned Harry Potter, and if I owned Haunted Mansion, the story would have been told in a much better way.
A/N - The Gracey family history Edward reads really does exist and can be found here.

Edward followed his father into the study and watched as the older man cast the most powerful privacy ward he knew.

"Sit down, Edward." his dad told him softly, and he wondered what was so serious that it required a privacy ward. Edward sat, and after he assured himself that his privacy spell was working properly, his dad sat down in a chair across form him, and seemed to be gathering his thoughts.

"Dad?"

His father opened his eyes and looked at him piercingly. "When I told you the story of how your mother and I found you, we left... certain details out."

Edward didn't like the sound of that. "What kind of details?" he asked warily.

"True, your birth parents died long ago, and you were all alone in that house when we found you, but..." He sighed. "Maybe I should just start from the beginning."

Edward nodded, confused, and more than a little frightened of what his dad was about to say.

His dad sighed again and began to talk. "In 1879, in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, there was a man, named Edward Gracey. He was the last of his family; his mother and older sister and brother had passed on when he was still a boy, and his father had died four years before, but he wasn't lonely or unhappy. He had a father figure in his head servant, who had all but raised him after his mother died, and he had the love of a beautiful woman named Elizabeth Henshaw.

"But Edward faced one large obstacle - racism. Elizabeth was a black woman, the daughter of the house’s caretaker. This was not long after the end of the American Civil War, and slavery had been illegal for not even two decades, so marrying her would have cost Edward everything, but he did not care. He proposed to Elizabeth one night in the garden of his house, during a Mardi Gras celebration. She promised to give him an answer by the end of the night.

“Unbeknownst to Edward, Ramsley, his head of household had overheard their conversation, and when he learned that Elizabeth intended to accept Edward’s proposal, he tricked her into drinking a glass of poisoned wine. He then planted a suicide letter. Edward, devastated that she would rather take her own life than be with him, had no reason to believe that Ramsley had anything to do with it. One week later, unable to bear life without her, he hung himself in the attic of Gracey Manor.”

Edward swallowed heavily; he didn’t like where the story appeared to be going.

His dad continued. “Edward’s pain was so great, that his soul was trapped inside the house, unable to leave, unable to move on. For some reason that no one was able to explain, those in the house eventually became trapped with him, including Ramsley, and unbeknownst to either of them, Elizabeth.

“Fast forward to the year 2003. Edward, who has haunted the house that he once lived in, carries on like normal, as if he were still alive. The other souls in the house do the same. One day, he somehow manages to get his hands on a picture of a woman named Sara Evers, a real estate agent based outside of New Orleans. She looks exactly like Elizabeth, so Edward orders Ramsley to get her to the house by any means possible. Ramsley calls her, and claiming that Edward wishes to sell his property, convinces her to come. Much to Edward and Ramsley’s annoyance, she brings her husband and children with her. After they arrive, a sudden rainstorm washes out the road, which forces them to stay the night.

“To cut a long story short, the truth eventually comes out over the course of the night, and dear old Ramsley gets a fast trip to hell, which the rest of the trapped souls, including Edward and Elizabeth, ascend to Heaven, and everyone lives happily ever after.”

His dad gave him another piercing glance. “Everyone, except for Edward.

“Because he was truly a suicide, he was bounced off the Pearly Gates and sent right back to Gracey Manor. Furious that he had lost Elizabeth again, he became violent and attacked anyone that came in or around the mansion. Eventually, a group of necromancers from New Orleans managed to contain him in the ballroom, and he remained imprisoned there for eight years."

"What happened to him?" Edward asked quietly, not entirely sure that he wanted to know.

"He was found and rescued. Your mother and I went to see him on the advice of an old friend of mine, and I did two rituals: one to recreate his physical body, and a second to return his soul to it, which gave us you."

Edward stared at his father in shock. "You mean that I.. I... ?" He couldn't make himself say the words, but his father nodded. "And that is why I've always had that nightmare about strangling to death and why I always feel as though I'm missing someone."

His dad nodded again. "I also suspect it's why you can play the pipe organ. There is one in Gracey Manor that George Gracey bought for his wife Abigail. It's not beyond the realm of possibility that Edward was taught or that he taught himself."

Edward licked his lips hesitantly. "Did I, I mean, did he..?"

"You may be him, the same soul in a body that is a exact genetic copy, Edward, but you are a very different person."

"He then. Did he.. go with you willingly?"

His dad nodded again. "He did. The wards around the ballroom could not be taken down. Doing so would have initiated a cascading failure that would have destroyed him and anyone nearby, so I had to find another way to let him out. I ended up deciding on the original version of the ritual that Voldermort used to give himself a new body. The biggest difference, is that the version I used requires only a sacrifice from the caster, and no one else, and it requires good intentions on the part of the caster. As soon as I explained to him what I could do, he asked if we could do it right then and there. He was so desperate." His dad shook his head sadly at the memory, and then he added: "I have a book of the Gracey family history for you, if you want to see it."

Edward nodded, a bit shell shocked by the story that he had just been told. His dad traced rune in the air with the tip of his wand, and then he seemingly reached his hand into nowhere and pulled out an old book with a faded and worn cover.

"Be careful." he warned as he handed it over "I cast several preservation charms on it, but it's still very delicate."

Edward nodded numbly, and clutching the precious book to his chest, he walked out of the room as soon as the privacy ward was down without a word or a backward glance. He didn't hear his dad's sigh as he walked down the hall to his room.

*****

Edward sat on the edge of his bed, staring at the cracked leather of the book in his hands. He had been staring at it for the past several minutes, but he wasn't sure if he wanted to open it and read what was inside. It would likely confirm everything that his father had just told him.

He had known from a very small boy that he was adopted; his parents made no attempt to hide the fact, and it was doubtful that they could have anyway with him having a different surname. Like many other adopted children, he had been curious about his birth family and had asked about them many times, but he had only been told the version that he now knew to have been heavily edited.

Closing his eyes and taking a deep breath to steel himself, he opened the book and began to read. Within minutes he was lost in tales of Ambrose Gracey, a young captain of a clipper ship that built Gracey Manor and furnished it with every luxury imaginable. The man had a shady dealings with Jean Laffite, a local pirate, and this allowed him to gain even more wealth.

In due time, Ambrose Gracey married, and it wasn't long before the marriage produced a son, George Gracey. George was home schooled, and during a visit to England, he met a young butler named Ramsley. Ramsley was looking at a jail sentence for a offense that had actually been committed by his employer's son. George smuggled the man out of England and to the United States, ensuring him a most faithful servant. George then assumed control of the family money and property after his father died in a carriage accident, distanced himself from the piracy, and started a shipping company.

Not long after, Ramsley arranged a meeting between his master and a young woman, Abigail, that was the daughter of a state senator. The two fell in love and married, and soon children began to appear. A daughter, Sarah, was born first, followed two years later by a son, Jacob. Four years later, a third child, Edward, was born.

When Edward his seven, his mother took him and his siblings to visit her family in Georgia, but while they were there, all three children contracted scarlet fever. Sarah and Jacob succumbed, while Edward survived. He and his mother returned home, and Abigail died from grief within a few months.

George turned the care and education of his son over to Ramsley, and at the age of 15, Edward was sent off to Boston to attend school there. After he finished school, he accepted a post at a Boston law firm and remained there until George's death . Twenty four year old Edward returned home, and, encouraged by Ramsley, he jumped into New Orleans' social circle feet first. However, five years later, the yearly Mardi Gras parties stopped, the house fell silent, and Edward stopped his social whirl, and all of New Orleans whispered about what had happened, though no one seemed to really know.

The book ended there, and Edward set it aside The rest of the story, he already knew.

"Are you alright?" He looked up to see his dad standing in the doorway.

He nodded. "I'm just... surprised by it all."

"I imagine that it is a bit to take in all at once."

"How could such a place be forgotten? Surely, it would have been found, and someone would have bought it and leveled the place and built something else."

"I think part of it was the mystery that surrounded it. I'm sure also that there were some... unpleasant rumors of what had happened, so most people would have stayed away out of fear or disgust. Of course, once the curse kicked in, no one would have been able to approach it."

Edward curled up in a ball on his bed. "He was so miserable, for so long, simply because someone he trusted thought he knew better."

"It is something I'm familiar with."

"Dumbledore?"

His dad nodded. "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Ramsley honestly thought that he wad doing his master a favor by murdering Elizabeth, and it blew up in his face. He did not anticipate Edward's suicide, or the curse that it caused."

Edward nodded, but the nod was interrupted by a jaw cracking yawn. "I think I'll turn in early tonight, Dad."

His dad chuckled at him. "Alight then. Goodnight, Edward."

"Goodnight, Dad."

"And Edward?"

"Hmmm?"

"No matter what, this changes nothing. You are still my son, and I love you."

"Love you too, Dad." He yawned again. "Goodnight."

"Goodnight."

Chapter 6 -- Chapter 8

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