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Grigori grew up the son of Dr. Vladimir Razin, a theoretical physicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Vladimir moved often, changing schools every few years, and has written numerous books on string theory and entropy/chaos theory. His father is a bonafide genius, and Grigori shows all the same propensities as his father, and a keen interest in mathematics and physics.
He was introduced to the world of magic at age ten, when he awoke from a binding curse strapped to an altar, a cultist’s knife poised over his chest. He was living with his father in Moscow at the time, and the cultist was brought down by a Rassvet, (the Russian equivalent of an Auror) seconds before ending Grigori’s life. His world of academics and science was shattered by the intrusion of magic, and Grigori learned that he was heir to a complex magical legacy. Grigori is the direct descendant of Grigori Rasputin, the ‘Mad Monk’ of Russia, a wizard arguably of a power to contend with Merlin, Dumbledore, or Voldemort. Rasputin is well and truly dead, but Russian wizarding places an enormous amount of emphasis on blood, and the connections of blood ties.
A powerful wizard, a Dark Arts practitioner named Iliodor believes that a complex blood ritual linked to Grigori would allow him to absorb the late Rasputin’s power and skill. He is a rising name in the wizarding world; while not a match for the legacy of Voldemort, there are definite similarities. The Rassvet continue to pursue Iliodor, but some of his followers had already begun to infiltrate magical institutions in the motherland. The Rassvet (Piotr Stanis) tested Grigori’s capabilities, found him to be a fledgling wizard, and arranged for his transfer to Dohm Yaga, the Russian wizarding institution. Within a week of his arrival, a second attempt was made on Grigori’s life, and the fledgling was shipped off to England. His father, a bit befuddled by notions of magic and wizarding, was reluctant to see him go. He promised to take a position at Oxford as soon as he was able.
A week later, Iliodor’s cultists murdered Vladimir at home. Grigori became a ward of the Ministry of Magic, but his mentor and hero and father had already been killed by wizarding politics, and Grigori had a great deal of difficulty adapting to the Junior Wizarding Academy. That was not to say that Grigori was troublesome – he made an active effort to avoid causing trouble, studying hard in his classes and keeping his nose and head down as much as he was able.
Grigori has lived in Bucharest, Berlin, Moscow, Boston, Los Angelos, New York City – he speaks Russian and German fluently, though his grammar is occasionally imperfect in English. (He has a terrible time with the romance languages, period.) He still grapples with his own legacy as well as attempting to create some sort of paradigm in which the laws of physics and the laws of magic can coexist peacefully, and the strain of trying to accept both ‘realities’ sometimes gets to him. He doesn’t do well with chaos and disorder, and sometimes the wizarding world seems to be an exercise in managing chaos.
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