Vox Corporis: Rebirth

Vox Corporis: Rebirth

Chapter 82

“Tying the Knot”



Original story by -> MissAnnThropic

http://fanfiction.portkey.org/story/6586/1

Email: MissAnnThropic>



Pursuant to the Berne Convention Implementation Act of 1988 and the Digital Millennium Copywrite Act of 1998, this work is copywrited 2007 with all rights expressly reserved by its author unless explicitly granted. No portion may be reproduced in any fashion without the express written and notarized permission of the author.



Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Harry Potter characters. All characters are creations of Joanne K Rowling, © 2007, to whom I am deeply indebted.



In Gratia: The original story was created so beautifully and so powerfully by MissAnnThropic. I owe a huge debt of gratitude to her for her kindness in letting me ‘play in her sandbox’.



Content Disclaimer: This story contains sexually graphic and explicit material and as such, it is not suitable for minors. If you are a minor, please leave now, as it is illegal for you to be here. If it is illegal for you to read or view sexually explicit material in the community you view such material, please leave now. This story and characters are purely fictional and any resemblance to events or persons (living or dead) is purely coincidental. If you are offended by sexually explicit stories, please read no further. If you are offended by stories featuring group sex, bisexual situations, incest, or any other situation, please check the story code before reading the text. These stories are just that, stories, and do not promote or condone the activities described herein



NOTE ONE: I’ve borrowed a line from the story “What Do You Expect?” by : . I want to thank him for letting me do so. He wrote a wonderful, insightful story and I really appreciate it.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Chapter 81 – “Reporters and Revelations”



One of the down-sides of having an instantaneous, telepathic bond was that occasionally, ideas and images ‘leaked’. The picture that Hermione was trying to keep hidden was too strong for that and too important to her for her to be able to shield it from him. Irrespective of whether he had been looking into her mind or not, he saw it, and in an instant, understood what she had in mind.



“That’s brilliant, Hermione. I love it. Of course, Skeeter-beetles’ not going to love it.”



“I don’t care any longer, Harry. She deserves what I have planned for her. You read the article. I’m not going to put up with it any longer.”



“Ok, ok. What can I do to help?”



“Just find her. I’ll take care of the rest.”



“Breakfast now?”



Hermione's stomach had started rumbling and, counter to what Ron thought, Hermione really did like to eat. “Yes. I’m hungry and we’re not going to get through the day if we don’t.”



The two stood and headed towards the secret portal which was the entrance to their private enclave. Before they stepped through, though, they fell into each others arms and shared the kiss both had been longing for.



“I love you, Hermione. Sixteen days.”



We can make it, Harry, I know we can.

*** *** *** *** ***

10:30 AM - Friday, September 12th – Hallway outside the potions classroom



“Shhhhhhhhhh!”



“But, Luna!”



“Hush, Ron. For Harry and Hermione’s sakes, we can’t just come out and announce to the world that we’re engaged.”



“Why not?”



“Oh Ron. I love you, but sometimes you are so dense.”



Ron’s smile fell as he looked at his beautiful blonde-haired girlfriend. It hurt him to be reminded that he was not the brightest bulb – as least in comparison to Ginny, Hermione, or Harry.



Luna took Ron’s hands in hers and stood on her tiptoes to kiss him. When they broke apart, she looked up at him. “Ron, Harry and Hermione are going to be married in a week. Once they’ve gotten that ceremony out of the way, we can announce our engagement. Until then, it would look like we’re trying to take their spotlight.”



Ron realized that Luna was probably right. Harry and Hermione, at least in his mind, had been through incredible hardships and truly deserved some positive attention



The moment that the realization hit him, he smiled at Luna and moved closer to her, so that he could kiss her. She was wearing the solitaire sapphire ring that he had bought for her on her left hand, muggle-fashion, and the matching sapphire earrings, in place of her standard radish earrings. Ron thought that they looked fabulous on her and was very pleased to see how much she liked her ring. The solitaire was a 2.25 carat, internally flawless, marquise-cut stone set in a plain platinum band. One of the nice things was that on Luna’s diminutive hand, it looked positively huge.



Only the two of them who could see it, and because Ron had never been able to create a sufficiently powerful concealment charm to prevent Harry and Hermione from seeing through it, Luna had cast the charm instead. Ron was pretty certain that the depth of their relationship was still a secret because neither he nor Luna had said anything to anyone about being engaged to anyone, despite the fact that they both really wanted to do so. They both knew that it was going to be a bit of a bombshell when they finally did tell everyone and they wanted to have the timing be good, if not perfect.



Ron was still thanking his lucky stars that Fred and George had happily lent him the money over the summer to buy the ring and the matching earrings so that he could make his unspoken agreement with Luna official. While they had set him back almost a thousand galleons and probably meant that he had indentured his soul to his brothers for what was probably going to amount to the better part of a year, he thought it was more than worth it. He had thought about asking Harry for the money, but realized two things in quick succession: One - he had no idea where Harry and Hermione had been over the summer, and two - Ron did not want to be further indebted to Harry, because of his own pride.



“I love you, Luna.” He said, as he took her hands in his. “I don’t care what anyone says – especially my mother. You are the greatest, best thing that has ever happened to me.”



His voice was soft and there was affection and desire in his tone, as his eyes fixed on her. The amazingly gentle and loving tone of his voice had taken her by surprise the first time she had heard it, but now simply thrilled her heart and made her want to be even better – even more loving and attentive – than she thought she could be.



She looked at him and thought: eat your heart out Hermione. Ron’s not Harry - he’s better. He’s mine, all mine, and I love him, and no one can take him away from me.



It was a shame, Luna thought, that the professor chose that particular moment to come out into the hallway and usher all of the milling students into the classroom. There were so many kisses left unexplored!

*************************

“Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!”



The slightly terrified fifth-year girl dove out of the way as two fast-moving cats; a jaguar and a lioness, ran by her and disappeared down the hallway and then down several flights of stairs in several spectacular bounding leaps.



“Haven’t seen them up close before?” came a voice from behind her.



The young girl turned and looked at her questioner. “No, I haven’t. They scared the life out of me. All I heard was the sound of a couple of footfalls and a growl and suddenly, they were on me. Talk about scary!”



“Think that’s scary? You should see them when they’re actually mad or something.”



She looked at him with incredulity. He held out his hand in response. “Hi, my name is Ethan James du LaCroix”



“Oh? That a Knights Templar name, isn’t it? How did you end up with it?” she said, smiling more brightly.



The young man looked surprised as he scuffed the ground with his right shoe. “My fathers’ a history buff and we’re all French-Canadian, so I got tagged with it.”



She held out her hand in return and looked at him. “Kim Chong”.



He took her hand in his and smiled “Ni how ma”.



“Oh my god! You’re inflection is great! Where did you learn that?”



He laughed. It was a deep, rich laugh that gave her a tingle to hear. “My next-door neighbor when I was growing up was from Zhang Dong and she taught me a bit of the language.”



“Oh?”



“You’re a sixth year, aren’t you?” She asked, before she could pull the question back.



“Yes. Is that a problem?”



She shook her head. No, unless you have a problem being seen with a younger girl!



“You’re new, aren’t you?”



She moved closer to him, feeling his presence more strongly. “Yes. We came over from the States so that I could go to school here. American magical academies are good, but they don’t have the history Hogwarts does and….”



She didn’t have to finish the statement. The other thing that American academies didn’t have was Harry Potter. Magical parents all over the world were clambering to get their children into proximity with Harry. Mostly for the reason that it was well understood that anyone who made friends with him or was a part of his circle was going to do very, very well in wizarding society and partially because some parents recognized that their children had a chance to learn a great deal more with him and Hermione around.



As they walked along, his eyes were mischievous. Kim suspected that perhaps the language was not the only thing that Ethan’s next-door neighbor might have shared with him.



He stopped at the top of the stairs which led down to the second floor and their transfiguration class was to be held and looked at her. “Fancy having lunch with me? I’ve been sitting over with the Gryffindors, just to watch the two of them – and by that she knew he meant Harry and Hermione – but sometimes I sit over with the Ravenclaws.”



She nodded and then did something totally out of character for the normally shy girl who she had always been. She reached out and took his hand. “I’d love that, Ethan.” They both smiled and walked down the stairs, hand-in-hand, to Professor McGonagall’s’ class. Rumor had it that they were going to get to learn partial human transfiguration.

*************************

12:30 – The Great Hall



The post owls had just arrived and as soon as people had started reading their copies of the Daily Prophet, the volume and intensity of conversation fairly exploded.



Harry was irked. When they had come into the Great Hall, he had been harboring expectations of being able to sit and eat a quiet lunch while working on his notes for the Animagus class that they had to teach together at 4 pm. Worse, because there were intense stares at the two of them, he knew that they were not going to get much peace until they acquiesced and answered peoples’ questions regarding Skeeter’s most recent article.



They had taken their seats at the back of the Hall, so that they could slip out early when Harry saw one particular stare – a nasty, possessive stare at Hermione that caught Harry’s attention. Blaise Zabini. Blaise? It didn’t make any sense to him. Blaise had never even been on Harry’s radar as someone who’d pose a problem. Why now? Was the question that came to him immediately.



‘Mione? I’ve got to check something out. Be right back.



“What is it?”



“Unwanted attention at best case; a real problem at worst. If you look over to your right, at the next table over, you’ll see a pretty blond. To her right, sitting opposite to her, is Blaise Zabini. He’s been watching you since we sat down and he gave me a very nasty look earlier. I’m just going to have a ‘conversation’ with him. I’ll be right back.”



Harry stood up from where he sat and crossed the distance to the table where Zabini was sitting. The pretty blonde girl gave a startled ‘Eeeep’ and shimmied down some so Harry could sit for a moment.



The two of them met each other’s gaze, which was perfect for what Harry intended to do.



Legilimens, Harry thought to himself, as he focused his attention on Zabini. The moment the spell took hold, he ran right into a mental wall. “ Interesting. Well, if we’re going to do it that way……”



Zabini’s mental defenses were more show than substance and it took only a moment to batter them aside and find what he was looking for. There were two ways of stopping Zabini from doing what he was planning on doing. One was brute force; the other, more subtle. Harry chose the brute force route, as leaving behind a powerful mental compulsion might be removable by whomever had begun to teach him occlumency.



Once he backed out of Zabini’s mind, he said aloud, “Blaise, you can’t seriously be considering trying to take Hermione from me, can you?”



Zabini had recovered from having his mind invaded and his plans revealed so quickly, so he snarled “You don’t deserve her Potter. You’ve never been man enough to deserve her. She’ll be mine before this is over.”



There was a collective gasp at the table, as people listened to the eighteen year old admit his lust for Hermione and his jealousy of Potter. None of the people had ever heard someone openly admit to having a death wish before. Zabini, for his part, was so focused on his condemnation of Harry and his frustration at being found out that he didn’t see the two very well-known red-heads stand up and walk over to stand behind Harry, and if he had, he might not have understood what it meant. That was bad for him and good for Harry.



Harry felt a tap on his shoulder and turned to see Ginny and Ron smiling at him. Ron said, “We’ll take care of this, mate. You just go back to Hermione. She’s waiting for you.”



Their wands were out and they were looking gleefully anxious.



All he could do was nod and comply, so he rose from the table and made his way back to his wife-to-be.



As Harry walked back to where Hermione was sitting, he looked over his shoulder and saw Ron playing with what looked like a mouse or rat. When Ron caught his eye, he grinned and caught the creature in mid-air – so that he could hold it up by its tail. Ginny was taking pictures of the scene with what looked like a wizarding camera. Other students were looking on with a combination of fear and humor. Ginny and Ron were a ferocious duo and their magical powers were not to be underestimated.



Zabini? Harry mouthed at him silently. Ron laughed and nodded. Serves him right, He thought. In many ways, Harry was glad that Ron and Ginny had been willing to step in and deal with Zabini. As he thought about it, he realized that with Ron and Ginny stepping in, the confrontation was much less like to make the paper while Zabini still got a chance to learn the lesson that he should have learned when Tom had been disposed of over a year and a half prior.



Once he sat down next to Hermione, he craned his neck over to look over at where Ron and Ginny usually sat and saw them talking animatedly with some of Ginny’s friends. Hermione’s thoughts slipped into his mind.



“Everything all right?”



Harry smiled at her. He thought he could take you away from me. Ginny and Ron are going to explain things to him.



Her response to Zabini’s wish was almost mirthful. “Oh, as if…”



“What if he’s just lonely? What if his problem is that he’s not feeling like he fits in? I mean, I remember when I was alone. It hurt. He shouldn’t have to feel that way.”



A quick look over and he saw Zabini looking very pale and shaken.



“I agree. But what are we going to do about it?”



“Find him someone to love”, Harry replied silently to Hermione. Harry looked around and then seemed to stop and focus on one place.



Hermione caught his look and followed his gaze, to see Ginny, Ron, and Luna all sitting together. Ron was holding Luna’s hand, while Ginny was talking animatedly to the two of them. She also looked over to where Zabini was sitting and fixed his image in her head, so that she’d know to be looking out for him, lest he try anything else. Hogwarts still had some pretty dark corridors and she didn’t want to be caught off-guard.



As she turned back, she caught Harry looking at her. “Let’s deal with it before it becomes a problem.”



“Better to have another friend or ally than an enemy.” She looked at him and nodded her agreement. It was better that way, she thought. She had had quite enough of confrontation and war.

*************************

Soon enough, their 4 pm class came and went. As Hermione and Harry were gathering their things, preparing to apparate back to their private common room, the Headmaster suddenly appeared.



Since the initial part of the animagus course was geared towards the tokening process, it was held outside. This day, Harry had asked that everyone gather in the field near Hagrid’s old hut, so that they could stretch out on their backs and continue to work on entering the necessary state of mind for tokening.



Hermione had never stopped telling anyone who would listen that apparition was simply not possible inside the wards that protected the castle and that all one had to do to know that was to read Hogwarts: A History. Recently though, Hermione had become less convinced of her own words, as it was apparent that the Headmaster came and went at times in a way that certainly looked like apparition.



It was neither Harry nor Hermione who saw the Headmaster first, but rather Hedwig, who seemed, of late, to have taken up a permanent watch over Harry. Ever since the start of classes, she could be found near wherever Harry was. Her hooting alerted Harry that something was amiss.



Once Harry looked up, he saw the professors’ smile and seeing it made him return the smile with affection. “Hello, Professor. We didn’t expect to see you out here.”



“Ah, Harry, people have an odd habit of turning up when they’re least expected. I believe that today might be one such of those days.”



“Is everything all right, Professor?”



“Of course, Harry. Unless you can count a small mishap in potions, everything is just fine. No, I came not because I need you, but rather because you might have need of me. Rather, you have need of something I made for you.”



Harry remembered that one early morning, a week prior, when he had approached the Headmaster about getting to Diagon Alley quickly on this particular afternoon, and had explained to him about the muggle tradition of the wedding band. It didn’t surprise Harry that Dumbledore knew all about the tradition already and had encouraged Harry to do it.



“She loves you, Harry. You’re doing the right thing by her.” He had said, affectionately. Harry had only nodded in response; unable to comprehend why a sudden lump of tremendous sadness had formed in his throat.



Harry looked at the Headmaster with both love and appreciation for the support he was being offered. It was too hard, though, to get the words out, so he hugged him and the left, hastily.



Once he had closed the magical, wooden door to the Headmasters’ office behind him and started down the winding stairs, he missed hearing the voice that came from the shadows of the Headmasters’ office.



The voice was soft and full of both love and compassion for the wizard who had just left. “They’re still young, Albus. Are we sure that this is right? I mean…to let this marriage go forward so soon?”



“They’ve never been young, Minerva. Harry’s soul was old when it came here. If I’ve ever been sure of anything, I’m sure of the fact that the two of them are better and stronger together than they ever could be apart. Besides, there’s naught we can do about it now. They’ve already bonded as you well know and not all the Thestrals in the world could keep them apart.”



The deputy headmistress came out of the shadows, wearing only her gold and red silk Gryffindor nightgown. It belied a body that was still quite firm, lithe, and strong, despite the look of advancing age that had so lined her face.



She turned to her Headmaster and lifelong friend. “You know that they’ve let and even encouraged the other seventh-years to sleep together? That the contraceptus charm is now the most frequently performed charm in the school?”



Pulling her close to him, he looked at her – his twinkling blue eyes capturing her grey-green eyes. “Minerva – I had wondered how they had solved the housing matter….but no matter. They’re all of age and there’s precious little we could do about it, anyway. Besides, have you noticed that grades are up thirty percent across the board already for the seventh-years? That the school has never been so peaceful or productive? There’s not been a single detention assigned so far and the worst infractions so far have been limited to some very colorful love notes that were intercepted – by you, I might add?”



She started to protest or at least try to think of a reason to suggest that what was going on was something that should be stopped, but she really couldn’t.



Stroking her face with hands that were both knowing and extraordinarily gentle, he brought his face close to hers. “Besides, Minerva, everyone is entitled to some happiness in life. Surely, it is better to encourage love than to suppress it.”



To that, she had no answer.

*************************

“Yes, sir. Do you have it?”



The Headmaster only nodded and handed Harry a blue orb – very much like the ones that he and Hermione had with them at all times to get to the Heads’ private common room.



Harry looked at him. “Can we leave from here?”



“Yes, Harry, you can. It works the same way as the one in your pocket. Only, this one will get you right past the barriers and wards at the Twins’ shop. I arranged with them a safe arrival point in the back of their shop. I thought it might be more discreet than arriving in the middle of the street.”



Harry looked at Hermione, who returned the look with a giggle. She knew exactly why Harry wanted to go to Diagon Alley. He’d been muttering about it in his dreams and she had picked up on it. To her it made total sense. He didn’t want to make such an important decision without her – as if anything he might do in that vein would be a problem for her. One thing that was true about Harry was that he had incredibly accurate perceptions of what she liked and appreciated – much more so than even her parents did at times. It would have been shocking perhaps to others, but after living and sleeping together for almost nineteen months, not to mention being the only person she talked to for months on end, it was completely natural to her.



“Thank you, Headmaster”, Harry said quietly, as he placed a hand on the Headmasters’ shoulder and looked him in the eye.



With that, the Head Boy and Girl walked a few feet away, held hands, and disappeared.

*************************

“NO.”



“But…”



“I don’t care. You can’t do that.”



“But Mr. Potter, it would work for both of us….”



“No, it wouldn’t.” He was getting exasperated. The woman was just not listening.



Finally, he had had enough. Hermione, you tell her. I’m getting frustrated. I’m going to take a walk. If you get through to her, just give me a yell.

With that, Harry apparated away, leaving Niona Facet to stare at the place where she had been standing and wondering what had just happened. She turned back to find Hermione looking at her with a harsh expression on her face.



“What?....”



“Ms. Facet, I’m going to be blunt for a moment. You just angered Harry and by angering him, you’ve angered me. I’m not as forgiving as he is.”



Facet was taken aback. “Excuse me? I was negotiating with Mr. Potter. You’ve no right to speak for him.”



Hermione smiled her most oily, Malfoy-ish smile. “Perhaps you weren’t paying attention”. Hermione held up her hand, showing off the engagement ring…Lily’s ring…that Harry had given her. Then Hermione undid the next button on her knit-silk jumper and withdrew the Gringotts’ medallion that never left contact with her body. Facet gasped.



“Harry’s my bond-mate.” Facet swallowed hard as that oh-so-familiar sinking feeling settled in. Oh, shit, she thought. “That’s right. Now, do I have your attention?”



Facet just nodded. She realized that she had badly mis-calculated and that only a miracle could rescue the situation. She kicked herself mentally for not remembering that this was the girl who had been featured in the paper so prominently.



“Ms. Granger, I’m very, very sorry…” And she was, too. She had said some dumb things in her life…like “I do” to her third husband, but this was, she surmised, probably her crowning achievement in terms of dumb things leaving her mouth.



Hermione was not unsympathetic, but she knew Harry’s mind on this and she wasn’t going to let Facet wriggle off the hook upon which she had impaled herself.



Hermione turned towards the case which held the wedding band that she and Harry had silently settled upon as being the perfect match for Lily’s ring.



Facets’ eye followed Hermione’s and fell upon the beautiful band of platinum, white diamonds, and sapphires. The band itself was shaped in the form of the double-helix that all muggles knew as being the most likely shape of strands of DNA – deoxyribonucleic acid. At the point where each strand crossed, was set either a diamond or a sapphire. The band was the stores’ most expensive, having been crafted not by a Goblin, but by a Elf who had trained under a Goblin prior to the Goblin Rebellion of 1612.



Truth be told, the ring was problematic for her to have in the shop anyway. Several Goblins from Gringotts had been in to see her about it, believing that since the original owner had died, it should be returned to the person who made it. She had tried to explain to them that Elf had made it and not a goblin, and that since the Elf was long-since dead, the ring was legitimately in her possession. The argument had not sat well with the Goblins. They equated her possession of it with theft or something close to it.



Doing the best to control her voice, she looked at Hermione and said, “I see that good taste is something that is not lost in your family”, hoping that a compliment would help to get her back in the young woman’s good graces.



Hermione was not going to help her by gracing her compliment with a smile. She wanted the woman to squirm a bit first. There was, of course, no way that they weren’t going to buy the ring. The question was how much discomfort, within acceptable boundaries, could they subject her to before-hand. The answer, Hermione grinned inwardly, was quite a lot.



Feeling snarky, Hermione asked her. “I don’t suppose you’d go for just giving it to us, in exchange for our pledge of future patronage and a promise on our part to not fund a competing jewelry store?”



Facet went pale.



She didn’t know how much Harry was worth, but she was very, very sure it was more than enough to do exactly what his bond-mate had just suggested. Plus, she knew that Harry was reported to be the silent investor who helped get the twins started in their business. She figured that his investment in their business had increased by probably 3000 – 10,000%, given how much Weasleys’ Wizarding Wheezes had grown over the few years it had been in business. That she was wrong by a full order of magnitude on the up-side was completely beside the point.



She started to respond, but couldn’t find her voice. “I……I….”



How badly are you tormenting her, Hermione? Harry’s voice resonated in her thoughts.



“Not nearly as much as I would like to, you can be sure”, was her reply



Finally, Niona Facet found her voice and looked at Hermione. “What do you have in mind, specifically?”



It was down to numbers. Fortunately, since Hermione’s parents were both dentists as well as business people, she had learned about business negotiating early on, around the dinner table, as her parents talked about the cost of supplies, insurance, personnel, and all of the other things that it took to keep a muggle business growing and prospering.



Facet was out of her league, but it was all right, as Hermione had no intention of treating her badly or cutting anything more than a fair bargain. However, she didn’t have to tell Facet that. It was better to let her think that she was in control of her own fate.

“You give me the ring, no strings or questions asked, and I will make sure that my brides-maids, and my mother, are dressed in the best jewels possible, courtesy of your shop. You give us 20% off your best number in all future transactions and we will pledge our business to you.”



Until Hermione had said 20%, Facet had been complacent to what was being asked of her. However, 20% really cut into her profit margin and it would be painful to have to go that low, even if she could make it up elsewhere.



“10%” Facet countered.



Hermione grinned. “15%”



“12%”



“15 or no deal” Fifteen percent was fair. It was the same deal she gave the Minister for Magic’s wife - a fact that she had never advertised – and it was a number she could live with.



“Done” Hermione said.



They shook hands on it. Hermione looked at her and took out her wand. “Two more things. One – I want a Witches’ promise on the 15% and two, a second promise that you will never discuss our presence here. You are never to talk about who we are, what we have purchased, or for whom it was intended. Is that clear?”



Facet winced. What Hermione was asking was a major problem, as she counted on the pay-offs from Skeeter and others, who regularly came in to keep tabs on what people were buying from her. Skeeter had outed more than one politicians’ mistress by buying information from her. Not being able to talk about what Harry and Hermione were buying would put a major crimp in her ‘off-book’ revenue. Unlike others, Skeeter paid in British pounds sterling – a fact that Niona had been grateful for more than once, as she purchased supplies and jewels from muggle wholesalers. Losing access to that much hard currency was going to be problematic.



However – she had also seen some of the articles that Skeeter had written about Harry and his bond-mate – and she recognized that eventually, Skeeter was really going to cross the line and it was going to mean the end of her. Finding out that Skeeter had done so already and her days were numbered was unknown to everyone save a very few, would not have surprised her, either.



The wand that Hermione had been holding casually was now pointed directly at her chest. In wizarding society, just like in muggle society, a pointed wand meant that its owner was no longer in a kidding mood.



Facet swallowed hard again. She had been robbed a few times by men desperate enough to believe that they could get away from the Aurors. She had never, however, had to face someone who had looked death at the hands of the most feared dark wizard in a century and lived to talk about it. She was quite sure that she was not going to be able to talk her way out of the situation and that going for her own wand was both stupid as well as futile.



To her intense frustration, she said “Ok. I’ll do it.”



“Good. I’m glad that you see it our way.”



Her irritation bled into her voice. “You have a pretty high opinion of yourself, Ms. Granger. That could get you into trouble some day.”



“Just get on with it. I don’t have all day.”



Niona Facet looked at her and then resigned herself to the task. She placed her hand on the tip of Hermione’s wand and held it there. “I, Niona Diane Facet, make this Witches Promise that I will always provide to Harry Potter, or whomever acts as his agent, a discount of fifteen percent off my best price from now until we, the parties, shall cease to live.”



The blue glow of the promise swirled around Facet and bound itself to her magic. Hermione nodded. It was a straightforward promise and it did not really compromise her ability to be successful in her business.



The second promise had to be more detailed and required that Hermione attend its wording more carefully.



Again, Facet placed her hand on the wand-tip. Doing so bound her magic in a special way, because it connected her vow to Hermione’s magic directly and any disruption of the vow would cause Hermione to be alerted immediately.



Facet took a deep breath and said, “I, Niona Diane Facet, promise upon my magic and upon my life, that I will never discuss nor disclose to any person, what business transpires between me, my shop, and any person connected to or acting as an agent for Harry James Potter or Hermione Granger.”



Again, there was a swirl of magic, but of a deeper, darker, more intense blue, as the vow took hold of Facet and bound itself to her magic.



Nodding her satisfaction, Hermione put her wand away. “Thank you, Ms. Facet. Now that the unpleasantness is out of the way, I will take the ring. However, I also saw a pair of marcasite and platinum earrings I want for tonight and I really like the lapis lazuli Cleopatra necklace.”



Hermione casually handed Facet the platinum Gringotts debit card which she had dug out of her clutch-purse and then sent a mental nudge to Harry, letting him know that she had concluded the business at hand and that the ring they had agreed upon was being boxed up as they spoke.



Harry’s sudden appearance made Facet stumble for a second, as there had been no sound to his apparition. It was disconcerting to know that he could come and go like that and made her appreciate that he was, at the end, the person who defeated Voldemort. She was proud of herself for being able to even say that name – but like many, not proud of how long it had taken to get to that point. She knew, in her heart, that she had run away at the very moment that it seemed like there was going to be trouble and had not come back until the pieces of Voldemort’s body had been displayed at the great hall of the Ministry for Magic.



Thinking about what it had meant to be able to return to re-open her shop and get back to the life she had known made her much less frustrated with the negotiations she had just experienced. She, like many others, owed a debt of gratitude to Harry and Hermione, and she thought that perhaps she was a fool not to think about the benefits of a mutually beneficial long-term professional arrangement with them.



When she handed Hermione the silk bag containing the earrings, necklace, and the wedding band, she looked at the young woman and the man who was holding her from behind with such affection.



She looked down at her hands, which were trembling, and then up at the two of them. “I’m sorry.”



Since Hermione was the one who had been the one to do business with Facet, it was her right to respond. “Sorry for what? All we were doing was business.”



Facet looked at them, tears beginning to form in her eyes, and said, “No. You mis-understand. What I meant was that I’m sorry I didn’t say thank you to you both before. I owe you both a great deal for what you did. My whole life’s savings are tied up in this business. When Voldemort started killing people, he also started robbing businesses or forcing people to pay ‘protection’ to his followers. I chose not to do so and so I had to close the shop and run. I ran, with all I had, all over the world. I didn’t come back until I was sure that it was over. When it was finally over, though, I found out that my shop space had been protected by the Weasleys. They had set wards and rune-stones around the premises, so that it couldn’t be looted or burned down. I was able to re-open almost immediately because of what you and your friends did for me.”



Immediately, Hermione felt a pang of guilt settle into her chest for the hard bargain that she had driven with the woman.



Harry looked at her, even as his hand tightened around Hermione’s waist. Hermione didn’t feel, at first, the burst of magic from Harry, and when she did, it was already gone.



The expression on Facets’ face was more than enough to tell her that Harry had done something which affected the way the shopkeeper saw the world.



Walking out the door of the shop, Hermione thought about what had just happened and turned to look at Niona one more time – as if to convince herself that nothing untoward had happened.



Ready to go home, Hermione? Harry asked.



Yes, please. I think I’ve had enough of being out in public for one day. Can we go home tonight? It seems like we’ve not been there in so long.



Sweeping her into his arms, Harry could feel her longing for being at Godric’s Hollow and it matched his own. It was time to back to the only place that they really considered home.

*************************

As the two emerge from the shop, Rowena Granger smiled. Her granddaughter was indeed holding a bag that looked suspiciously small: perfect for a bag that held a box that held a wedding band.



The moment that the two vanished – presumably using one of the special portkeys that she knew they always carried with them – a figure appeared from around a corner, across the street from where the jewelry store was situated. The sun was in just the right position, Rowena thought, as the figure lowered the hood of her cloak before entering the store. Rita Skeeter. It was a good thing that she had been watching after the two, Rowena thought and she was glad that Albus had asked her to do so. She would not have been in the right position otherwise.



Well, this ought to be interesting, Rowena thought.



Disillusioning herself and then wrapping herself further in a cloak similar in nature to Harry’s special cloak, she walked briskly to the door of the jewelry store and let her self in silently.



Fortunately, the shop owner and Skeeter were deep in conversation and it was obvious that Skeeter was growing increasingly frustrated by the moment.



“What do you mean” the dye-job blonde said “she made you promise not to talk about anything?”



“Exactly that. I can’t talk about anything relating to them. I made a Witches’ promise, Rita. Please…don’t push it. It’s causing me pain to tell you even that much.”



“You damnable, foolish woman. Don’t you know what you’ve done? You’ve not only gone and thrown away everything I would have paid you, but you’ve made it so that purchases by the most important news subject currently in existence can’t be discussed. There’s no way to break such a promise, if you did it with her. She may even know that I’m here. God damn you, woman!! You’ve screwed up everything!”



Rowena couldn’t contain her laugh anymore – which caused Skeeter to whip around. The moment she did, several things occurred all at once. First – Skeeter threw a stunning curse in the general direction of the laugh – which was answered much more effectively and accurately by the ex-Auror, and second, the door locked itself and an anti-disapparation charm came into existence.



Throwing off her disillusionment charm and setting the special cloak aside, Rowena Granger – heroine of the Cambodian/Kampuchean evacuation and the only winner of the Victoria Cross for valor “in the face of the enemy” in the history of the wizarding world – looked down at the reporter lying on the floor.



Enervate! She thought silently, as she pointed her wand at the unconscious, unkempt, ungainly, bottle-blonde.



As Skeeter stirred, Rowena contemplated what she should do to the woman. If Hermione was correct, dispatching the woman would probably bring kudos and not a few requests for her hand in marriage. However, dispatching the foul woman was her granddaughters’ job. She was only here as ‘muscle’, to reinforce the idea that Harry, Hermione, and their close friends were to be left alone. It seemed to be a message that Skeeter was having some considerable difficulty absorbing.



Rowena laughed to herself as she thought about what muggles usually did to things that were having a problem with absorption: they tried to find a way to make the recalcitrant item more permeable. Permeability usually meant increasing the number of holes in an object…at least up to a certain point. She contemplated all of the ways that she could increase the number of holes in Skeeter without killing her. Sadly, she decided that holes were a definitive problem and that she’d have to find another way.



When Skeeter was alert enough to register that there was a wand pointed at her that seemed to mean business, she tried to apparate away. She tried three times to do so before giving up with the realization that an anti-disapparation charm must be in effect. Next, she tried to use her emergency portkey, only to find that the same thing applied to it.



“Not having any luck getting away?” The older, bushy-haired brunette inquired.



With a pout, Skeeter looked into the face of the woman who had apparently knocked her on her arse.

“Let me introduce myself. I’m Rowena Granger. Remember me? I’m the one you wrote about in that trash heap you call a newspaper. I am Hermione’s grandmother and in case you’ve forgotten, I’m an ex-Auror. Actually, I was an Unspeakable, but I was drafted in the foreign Auror service corps. Anyway, you’ve been harassing and otherwise being a problem for my granddaughter and her boyfriend. I’m here to tell you to stop. I’m your last warning. “



Skeeter must have hit her head, Rowena decided, because the next thing out of her mouth was the very thing that she hoped she would not hear.



“Why should I?”



“Why should you stop? Are you naturally stupid and suicidal or do you deliberately work at it?”



Skeeter looked stunned that someone would say such a thing to her.



Seeing that Niona Facet had made a discreet exit into the back room, Rowena looked down; brining her face and her wand, into close proximity with Skeeter’s face. “Rita, I’m going to tell you this once, and then I’m going to curse you. After that, if you can still move, I suggest you find another line of work. If you don’t, you are going to be killed.”



Rita’s mouth fell open and she looked like she had just been kicked or something.



“Don’t play the innocent one with me, Rita. I’m older than you and do it a lot more successfully. Harry told you already when you ran into him outside Gringotts’ that he will kill you the next time you put a toe out of line. I’d believe him, if I were you.”



“You…..you….can’t…..”



“Rita? Are you having a fit or something? Or are you just sputtering because the light is beginning to dawn with the realization that we’re no longer kidding? Harry is going to kill you if you don’t stop and I can guarantee that the Ministry for Magic will deliberately look the other way when it happens. Your charm has expired there and your star has permanently sunk below the horizon. You’re nothing but an annoyance now…one that they’d love to see be made to go away. Harry’s more than willing to do the job. For that matter, so’s Hermione, Ron, Luna, Neville, and about sixty other people. Some of whom Harry doesn’t even know. One thing I know is that every one of them owes a life—debt to Harry and Hermione and you’d be one small way to pay that debt.”



Rita started to stand up and tried to make a grab for her own wand, but Rowena’s reflexes were too fast for her and the wand soared out of Skeeter’s hand and into her own. Once she held it firmly, she snapped it in two; watching the magical dust which it became fly away with the sudden breeze.

“Now Rita, that wasn’t very smart. You’ve lost a perfectly good wand and you’re still going to get cursed. If you’re lucky, by the time you’ve recovered, a week or more will have passed and you’ll have learned your lesson. If not….well….I’ll say a nice word or two for you at your funeral.”



Standing back, Rowena pointed her wand at the woman’s chest and muttered “Reprobo Veritas”.



Rowena said to her. “I have just made it impossible for you not to tell the truth – in anything you say or write.”



Rita, thinking that one curse was enough, made a dash for the door of the shop. Fortunately, a jelly-legs hex and then the full-body bind curse caught her and she fell, hard a stone, to the ground.



“Oh, Rita. You make this so much more fun that it would otherwise have been!” Rowena’s tone was mocking. “Do you honestly think that I was finished cursing you? I’m just getting started! The only thing is…I’m really sorry that some of the students at Hogwarts can’t be here to see this.”



She laughed for a moment and then reached into her purse. She made a show of rummaging around for a moment before pulling out a camera and seeing the horrified look on Skeeter’s face. It was obviously a wizarding camera, because it had none of the look of a muggle digital camera. More, it had the distinctive logo of three W’s, arranged in a pyramid shape, that signified Weasleys’ Wizarding Wheezes.



Rowena started taking pictures of her victim and laughing as the various curses took hold. There was the infamous bat-bogey hex (Ginny’s favorite); the slug-vomiting curse; the hair-loss hex; and then, finally, the boiling blisters curse.



By the time she was finished, Rowena had decided that Rita needed to suffer her curses in peace, so she sent Skeeter to an abandoned warehouse in East London. If she was lucky, the various curses and hexes would lift in a day or so. The boiling blisters curse was going to take longer, but…that was the cost of doing business.



After cleaning up the store and making everything presentable and nice again, Rowena summoned a dozen long-stemmed roses of various colors and set them in a beautiful vase.



She looked around and realized that her task was done and she could leave, so she walked towards the door and faded away. It was apparition, but it looked like the movement of a ghost. Harry would have thought it very, very cool indeed.



*************************

Monday Morning, September 16th – 11:30 – NEWT Transfiguration class.



“It was them, I’m telling you. There were there. My aunt saw them when they came out of the shop.”



“You didn’t know that they’re together? I mean….that’s not exactly news.”



Adrianne looked at her friend and shook her head. Sometimes the girl could be just so dense. “Please tell me that you realize that just because they were coming out of a jewelry store together, it doesn’t mean that they’re getting married immediately. Dumbledore said that the ceremony won’t be New Years’ Eve and I think he should know.”



Michelle Sullivan was not exactly obtuse, either, and Adrianne’s superior attitude sometimes grated on her nerves. She meant well, but she always thought that no matter what room she was in, she always was the smartest one present. That Adrianne didn’t hold a candle to Hermione was a source of endless satisfaction for the seventh-year girls in Ravenclaw and of enormous frustration to her.



“Michelle” Adrianne said in a tight whisper to the striking Amerasian girl seated to her right. “Don’t you think that if Harry was shopping for something as special as a wedding band, the jeweler come to him, and not the other way around?”



Michelle laughed. It was not an easy thing to do in a class where quiet study and hard work was the expectation and extraneous talk, frowned upon.



“Adrianne. You’re smart, but you’re a muggle-born from the States and you really know nothing about Harry. My oldest cousin, Marie, is a nurse at St. Mungo’s. She said that Harry didn’t leave Hermione’s side for almost four days. He wouldn’t let anyone near her who wasn’t a doctor or a nurse or family. He loves her in ways you can’t even imagine. He’d do anything for her and at least he’s not above going out and shopping like everyone else.”



Michelle loved Adrianne for a lot of reasons – not the least of which was that she was smart and creative. However, that love and affection had not ever kept her from needling Adrianne about the amount of money her family had. Adrianne’s step-dad was very, very wealthy and was generous to Adrianne – perhaps almost to a fault. It would be entirely like her father to ask a jeweler to come to their house, so that they didn’t have to go out.



A scathing retort started to form on the tip of Adrianne’s tongue, but just as they were about to really get into it with each other; Professor McGonagall made her presence known between the two of them. After inspecting their work, she pushed on, but not before passing judgment on at least several peoples’ work.

*************************

As class ended, Adrianne and Michelle both looked around. Harry and Hermione were still nowhere to be seen – which struck both of them as odd.



Had the two known about Godric’s Hollow and what it meant to the two heroes, neither would have been surprised to learn that the Head Boy and Girl were at that moment still asleep in each others’ arms. The two of them had spent the free moments of their weekend writing and then re-writing their wedding vows. They had spent part of Sunday attending church with Hermione’s parents and meeting with the Bishop who was going to officiate at the ceremony. It had been emotionally exhausting, but completely worth the effort, they both believed. They had retired to their bedroom early Sunday night; each wanting to love and be loved by the other.



As the sun poured in through the open skylight, Harry stirred and his innate time sense told him that it was very late morning. He was, to his own surprise, alert enough to ask Hermione if she was going to class.



Hermione was just awake enough to understand what he was asking and to reply. “I’m going to Runes at 3 and then we’re teaching at 4. I don’t want to stay at the school any longer than we have to, today”.



Most days – at least all the days that they had been actually teaching – had been fun. There had been a definite sense of accomplishment to see that several six- and seventh-year students had already collected his/her first token and to hear that others were starting to have dreams that were clearly premonitions of what their animagus forms were going to be. Harry suspected that having a guide through the whole process was significantly going to speed up the process of getting students to complete the animagus transfiguration successfully.



However, none of that was sufficient motivation for either one of them to want to get up.



He rolled over, feeling Hermione’s lithe body pressing against his. They were both naked under the warm, down-filled quilt, having spent the previous evening lost in the pleasure of each others’ touch. He licked his lips and tasted the residue of his last oral assault on Hermione and the memory of how she had clutched his head between her legs as she rode wave after wave of orgasm made him hard again.



Hermione? He nudged her again with his rampant organ.



Yes, Mr. Potter? Is there something you want?



Harry showed Hermione exactly what he wanted, via their link, and the resulting exchange of ‘favors’ left them both breathless and still turned on.

*************************





Tuesday, Sept. 17th – Editor’s Office - The Daily Prophet – 8 am.



“You mean they’re getting married in a Muggle ceremony on Thursday? Where’s Skeeter? Isn’t she supposed to be here?”



“She’s not been seen for several days. Last I heard, she was looking into some leads in the Alley and she disappeared.”



That one of his best known journalists was missing was alarming enough, but that she disappeared while looking into some leads was not surprising. Wizarding society had become particularly violent since the fall of Voldemort. More people were settling scores with violence, rather than wait for their neighborhood MLE squad to investigate.



Inkwell Blaine, the third, tacitly agreed that many of the conflicts that had sprung up in wizarding society were not the type that could be settled easily or quickly in front of the Wizengamot and he knew that it was likely that the judicial system in wizarding Britain would never become robust enough to handle the kinds of conflicts that the muggle judicial system routinely handled. The response to the problem was the unfortunate development of a very punitive, direct style of law enforcement – where the MLE squads meted out justice, as they were able.



“Who’s on Potter-watch, other than Skeeter?” Blaine asked, playing with the quill in his hand absentmindedly.



His deputy, a short, fat, balding wizard by the name of Gordon Potts, met his eyes for a moment and the answer to the question was unmistakable. No one.



“Merlin’s beard, Gordon! Why in all creation haven’t we assigned someone else to that duty?”



He knew why, for the most part. Money. It didn’t help that no one else could be convinced to take the job, for any amount of money. The rumor on the street was that Potter and his intended, Hermione Granger, wanted to be left alone. A lot – and they were willing to do just about anything to ensure that they were left alone.



Many people had seen Harry and Hermione as the great cats – but for the vast majority of those, the view had been that which had been created as the product of an incantation – and not one from a live encounter. The smart wizards and witches in and around greater London did not want a live encounter with the great cats feeling, quite correctly, that such an encounter was not something to be wished for by anyone who hoped to remain healthy.



“Blaine”. Potts never called the managing editor by his first name, except in the direst of circumstances. “No one wants the duty”.



“What? Why the hell not?”



Potts leaned back against the corner of his bosses’ desk; ran a hand through his hair, and looked at him. He decided that the best way to break the news to him was the directly. “Look, Blaine, the few stringers we had had on payroll all bolted when they learned that Harry and Hermione were the ones responsible for killing all of the death eaters the night Voldemort was killed. Harry and Hermione are just extremely dangerous and everyone knows it.”



The sour look on his bosses’ face told him how much he thought of that bit of news. Pressing on, he said, “I might add that their friends from school have become reasonably well known for being cranky around reporters and not a few of them know more spells than the current batch of Aurors working for the Central London MLE.”



“How do you know that?” Blaine snapped.



“Blaine – stop and think for a moment. Ginny and Ron Weasley were the ones who kept everyone away from Harry and Hermione when they were at St. Mungo’s, after Voldemort was killed.”



“I remember,” Blaine shot back.



“You should. It means that the two of them should be considered almost as dangerous as Harry and Hermione – especially now. They stopped full-grown wizards from entering Ms. Grangers’ hospital room. It’s said that they beat back several Aurors and the Minister for Magic himself and that would be no mean feat. I mean – the Minister is a former Unspeakable. They’re supposed to be the most powerful, best-trained wizards in our society.”



Potts emphasized his last words very carefully, so that his meaning wasn’t misunderstood. What was perverse about the situation, as he thought about it, was the fact that the Minister for Magic must not have been that anxious to get into Hermione’s room – if, for no other reason than the fact that Harry Potter was still next to Hermione, in his animagus form and his mood was extremely unpredictable. No one, not even the Minister himself, was really sure what Harry might have done if he thought that Hermione was in danger or the Minister himself was a threat. It was obvious to the hospital staff – especially those who had operated on Hermione - that Harry loved her and had killed to protect her. The quiet, informal consensus was that it would have been reasonable to believe that he might have done so again without a thought if he felt pushed to it. Some, privately, thought that having the Minister done in might not have been such a bad thing….



A major vein on Blaine’s head started to throb as he swiveled back and forth in his muggle-made leather chair and contemplated his limited choices. He could choose not to pursue Potter and all of his friends – and therefore not have any photographs to put on ‘above the fold’ on the front page; he could try to chase Potter down and perhaps earn his permanent enmity and try to get pictures that might carry his sales for a couple of days. His final option was to try to ask Potter and Granger for an interview – and pay them for it if he had to. It was a very unappealing situation, given the level of bribery that he felt he might have to use. Potter had him over the proverbial barrel and both Potts and Blaine knew it.



Blaine looked at his number-two guy – the guy who had been with him for almost thirty years – and said, “Send him a letter, Gordon. Tell him we’ll pay him or his favorite charity whatever he asks, within reason, for a half-hour interview with him.”



Gordon winced. He knew that the papers’ finances were not in great shape. The Quibbler had been eating their lunch with the advertisers over the last six months and the one thing that could put them back into a positive cash flow for a while – was a sit-down, extended interview with Harry Potter. He knew that if it didn’t happen, the Quibbler would probably buy them out; burn their production facility to the ground; and start fresh. He hoped that they could reach an agreement – and fast.

*************************

Wednesday, September 18th, Office of the Headmaster – 12:15 pm.



“But they can’t!”



“Yes, they can, Septima. She’s seventeen tomorrow, which makes it legal. Not only that, but since it’s being done in a muggle church, there’s nothing you can do about it.”



“Minerva! How can you condone them being married and flouting school rules so blatantly?”



“Septima, that’s my doing, if you mind.”



The tall Headmaster appeared out of the darkness which covered a paneled recess of his office and walked towards the diminutive Arithmancy professor.



Vector looked at him and then at the deputy headmistress, as if to try to suss out whether she was in on the news. It was easily apparent by the look on McGonagall’s face that she had known all along that the Headmaster was allowing the marriage to go forward.



“Why, Albus?”



“Because Septima, ultimately, Harry and Hermione deserve it.”



Minerva saw the flicker of real sadness in her friend’s eyes. She was the only other person who knew the real cost of defeating Tom.



“I don’t understand, Albus. I know that you are unusually close to both of them, but that doesn’t mean that they should be allowed to be married and what...live together? Have a blatant sexual relationship while their peers are not?”



The Headmaster chuckled. “Septima, of all the professors here, you were the last person I would have suspected of harboring such jealousy.”



The Arithmancy professor’s cheeks reddened and her breath flared, in what sounded like disgust and frustration.



McGonagall looked at the Headmaster, who inclined his head ever so slightly, and then stepped in front of Vector, to cut her off from looking at the Headmaster. “Septima, please. You must understand something. Harry and Hermione have been living together, alone, at Godric’s Hollow since they left St. Mungo’s. Harry is now Head of Clan Potter and Clan Black, as well as of several other minor houses. Hermione is of age as of tomorrow and her parents have already given consent to the marriage, though they didn’t need to have done so. They are being allowed to marry because if we had not allowed them to do so, they might very well have left the school and never come back. Frankly, we needed them here as Head Boy and Girl, and parochial rules be damned.”



Professor Vector looked aghast. Sitting down hard on the chair that had suddenly materialized behind her, she looked around the room, trying to get her thoughts to stop spinning wildly. It would have never occurred to her to suspect that Harry could have taken the mantle of leadership for his family; nor that he would have accepted the leadership of Clan Black. Knowing that he had done so changed everything.



Looking up from the chintz chair, she said hesitantly, “Albus? Is it really true? I mean…what the paper has said about Harry killing all those death eaters? Does Hermione understand, really, what happened?”



The Headmaster looked old. Old and tired and frail; as if acknowledging the truth of it took some of the vitality out of him.



“Yes Septima, I am afraid that it is. There was an investigation within the Wizengamot and I had to give evidence of what I knew and what I suspected. I knew, because Minerva told me, that she, Pomona, Ron and Ginny Weasley, were planning on ‘admitting’ to use of the terrible curse that Harry used that night. Of course, I didn’t believe, nor could I have been expected to have believed, that the Ministry would conduct an investigation into the matter. I thought, and expected, that they would want to put the matter to rest as quickly and quietly as possible and begin the rebuilding of wizarding society just as soon as was practicable.



It was foolish of me, perhaps, to be so hopeful. I had hoped that they would simply accept the deaths of all of Toms’ followers as the natural results of combat with Harry or a residual curse by Tom, intended to prevent any one of his followers from testifying against the rest. We were not so lucky, though, and very quickly, word got out and Pomona, Minerva, and the Weasleys all had to testify.



Once it was discovered that Harry was the one who performed the magic, it left the Wizengamot with a quandary. They could bury the report; classify it and make sure that it never saw the light of day, or they could follow the path to its natural conclusion. Fortunately, they were enlightened enough to see that prosecuting Harry for the passing of eighteen death eaters would be casus belli for a civil war against the Ministry in many quarters of wizarding society.



So, word got out that an investigation happened, but that was where things ended. The report has been shredded, except for one copy that resides in the office of the Minister for Magic, and all of the minutes from the meetings of the Wizengamot relating to the matter have been erased.



That takes us to tomorrow. I am allowing Harry and Hermione to be married students here at the school because we need them and because I will not stand by any longer and see Harry or Hermione denied the happiness that they deserve.”



Minerva McGonagall leaned back against the Headmaster’s outer-office desk; folded her arms across her chest, and looked at her colleague – as if she was trying to assess whether or not there was going to be cooperation with what the Headmaster had decided.



“Are you going to be alright with this, Septima? You know Hermione. She is neither impulsive nor rash. She would not have accepted Harry’s proposal unless she really believed that it was the right thing to do.”



Finally, the fight went out of her. She had come into the Headmasters’ outer office thinking that there was a reason for a fight….or at least a reason to protest allowing the Head Girl and Boy to marry. Certainly, she thought that Hermione was a fine young woman and Harry, a model of courage and loyalty – the likes of which, she readily admitted, had not been seen at Hogwarts in a thousand years. But married? She just could not fathom it.



However, she had to admit that it was the Headmaster’s call and that Hermione’s studies had not flagged even one little bit. However, she didn’t like the idea of having to explain to the other students, if the issue ever came up, that marriage had certain privileges and that they should not be expecting the same rights and freedoms.



“Headmaster, if I may, I will take my leave. It seems that I jumped to conclusions and am fighting the wrong fight. I will not second-guess your decisions, nor will I raise the matter with anyone else. You can be sure of that.”



Dumbledore nodded his head. “Thank you, Septima. I am sure that Hermione and Harry will appreciate that.”



He turned to face Minerva; giving his back to Septima. She read this, correctly, as a polite, but definitive dismissal and took her leave from his office.



Once the door closed behind the Arithmancy professor, McGonagall turned to her Headmaster, her eyes twinkling. It was a look that Albus Dumbledore had come to appreciate over the summer and he took the opportunity to reach out and with one hand, pull her close.



“There’s no reason for her to know, Albus. Certainly Hermione and Harry aren’t going to tell her, and the seventh-year students are bound by that amazing oath that Hermione concocted.



The Headmaster’s hand made a flicking motion and suddenly, the outer office was filled with the sounds of a romantic, Chilean waltz.



“For once, I am happy to have someone to share a secret with, Minerva.” His eyes were bright and full of affection as he looked at the woman he had grown to love over their long years of partnership.



They let the music carry them together as their hands and bodies moved with knowing steps and for the first time in too many years, Albus Dumbledore was not a Headmaster, but again a man in love.

*************************

Thursday, September Nineteenth, 6 am. – Head Boy’s bedroom.



Hermione could never remember a day when she felt more alive and awake. The early morning sun that was streaming through the upper window of their bedroom had been warm on her face and had woken her, even without an additional alarm. Today was their wedding day and she was determined to make the very best of the day that she possibly could.



Word had gone out from Ginny and Ron, in their continuing roles as protectors of Harry and Hermione, that no Gryffindor would receive, talk about, distribute, or otherwise have anything to do with any newspaper. That meant that the Quibbler as well as the Prophet were both effectively banned within the areas controlled by Gryffindor House.



Similarly, Neville and others had made sure that no one crossed either Harry or Hermione on this very special day of days. Warnings of the direst consequences for anyone who so much as put a toe out of line were circulated by all of the Prefects and the warnings were taken to heart.



Hermione looked down at her sleeping husband-to-be and not for the first time, reveled in the joy and love that she felt with Harry. He had his back, at that moment, towards the center of the bed, so that if he had been awake, he would have been talking to a wall.



She put one hand on his shoulder, to feel the warmth of his skin, and to steady herself as she sat next to him. She was having a hard time comprehending the fact that in less than twelve hours, she was going to be legally and forever married to Harry Potter and would no longer call herself Ms. Hermione Jane Granger, but rather Mrs. Hermione Jane Potter. She also would be called Hermione, Lady Potter-Black, and be the first and youngest person to ever bear the combined title.



Soon, Harry began to stir, and the covers fell away from his body as he stretched. As he rolled onto his back and continued stretching, Hermione looked up and down his body. One of the things she loved about his build was how lean and taught his body was from all of the hard Quidditch training and subsequent running and overall toning that he had done and continued to do. One muscle, however, caught her eye. On this particular morning, it was standing up an away from his body at roughly a 45-degree angle; was just over 21.5 centimeters long, and 9.5 centimeters in circumference. It made her drool every time she saw it.



Hermione had long since given up any pretense of being demure or hesitant about touching him and so she reached out her right hand and encircled it. It throbbed in her hand; being both silky and hard. Her hand was barely able to close around it, a fact which made her thrill with excitement. The sexy toys that she had bought all those months ago were not nearly as big around as the staff she now held and she knew how well her toys had filled her.



However – it wasn’t just the fact that she and Harry were going to share that last, most amazing intimacy, but that they were at last going to be able to share their magic in the way that all other couples did.



Harry?



Her ‘voice’ was warm and soft in his mind.



Love?



He rolled over, so that he was facing her. His eyes were still closed, but his mind was wakeful.



Feels good, ‘Mione. Please don’t stop.



Ah, but I have to, Mr. Potter. Have to have something for tonight, don’t we?



Hermione could feel, almost simultaneously, both his disappointment in the moment and his elation about the fact that they were going to be married in less than twelve hours.



Very well, Mrs. Potter, since you insist. But – I reserve the right to pay you back for the tease at a time and place of my choosing.



“Oh, bullocks, Harry. You know you can’t say no to my charms,” She said silently to him with a leer and a good bit of pride.



“You like that, don’t you Mrs. Hermione Potter? You like the fact that I can’t resist you.”



“You better believe it”, She said, smiling, as he propped himself up on one elbow, his eyes now open and focused on her.



I love you, Hermione. I can’t believe we are getting married today. It seems like we met only yesterday.



She reached out and stroked his cheek; drawing closer to him so that she could kiss him. “That was six long years ago, Harry. I’m sure that if you had told that scared eleven year-old girl that she’d be married before her seventh year had really begun, she would have probably tried to hex you.”



Harry put his free hand over hers, so that he could press her warm hand into his cheek and so he could be in that much more physical contact with her. “Aren’t you glad that no one said anything, then?”



Her lips met his as she leaned in close to him and he was glad, for once, that she hadn’t bothered to see his thoughts, because she would have known that he was setting up for a grab.



The moment their lips met, Harry pushed himself up almost fully and grabbed her with his free arm while twisting his body in such a way that she was suddenly on her back and he was up on both elbows, looking down at her beautiful face.



“Sneak” she thought at him.



“You’d have known something was up if you had bothered to look at my thoughts. It was pretty obvious.....or at least it should have been…that I was about to be ‘up to something’ “



Hermione giggled – a trait that he found amazingly appealing. “I was busy contemplating what was in your other ‘head’.”



The lewdness of her statement and of the images she was projecting at him momentarily threw Harry and he didn’t know how to respond. He decided that if he replied in kind, they might not ever make it out of bed, so he put every positive, loving feeling and every bit of desire for her he could into a mental ‘kiss’ and pushed it at her over their link.



She cried out with joy as the mental ‘kiss’ assailed her thoughts and senses. A moment later, he had the immense satisfaction of watching Hermione convulse in orgasm, as she was reduced, as he once had read, to “an incoherent puddle of very satisfied goo”.



He watched her as the pleasure continued to wash over her for several long moments before her head fell back to the pillow on what had become her side of the bed. In those few seconds, he saw how unspeakably beautiful she truly was and he knew that there was no way that he would ever do anything to jeopardize their relationship. To him, marriage was for forever. It was a selfish thought, he knew, but he had also been told that there was a place for all things…even the selfishness of wanting to spend the rest of eternity with someone.



As he looked down on her, he was tempted to let her go back to sleep after that, but there was still much to be done and she’d be very frustrated with him if he didn’t insist on her getting up. So, dutifully, he reached into her mind and worked on rousing her. It was not going to be easy, he knew, and so he steeled himself against the tirade that was probably coming.



It took more than five minutes to get her to respond with anything that even vaguely resembled coherent speech. Finally, a couple of caresses to places Harry knew very well and Hermione said ‘eeep’ and tried to guard those places from Harry’s assault-tickle.



Harry!!! Stop it! I’m awake, I’m awake!



He pulled back from his tickling and looked at her as she sat up. “How do you feel, Hermione?”



“Damn you Mr. Potter. You must have known that something like that was going to happen.”



Harry grinned. “Nope. Didn’t know anything more than you do. I just got ‘lucky’. “



Hermione actually laughed out loud and the sound filled Harry with a great deal of happiness as the sound of it actually bounced around their bedroom. It was laughable that he could say, even with a partially straight face, that he was the one who got “lucky”.



If I were wearing any, I’d say ‘feel my knickers’ and tell me then who got ‘lucky’.



Harry laughed in return, as he let the sexiness of her last statement echo in his head. “Hermione? We’ve got to get a move on. It’s already 6:50 am and we have a ton of things to do this morning before we leave for your parents’ house.”



The mention of having to go to her parents’ house before the wedding was the last bit of push that she needed to switch out of ‘amazingly sexually satisfied teenage witch to ‘Head Girl, consummate student, professional organizer, archivist, opera singer, and book analyzer’. She looked at him as she reached out to intertwine her hands with his. “Ready to get married, Mr. Potter. I know that I am.”



He rose off the edge of the bed to meet her next kiss. “I can’t wait, Hermione. There’s nothing that I will ever want to do more than to be married to you.”



Since Hermione was naked, except for her Gringotts necklace, engagement ring, and a green silk chemise, and Harry was in only his silk boxer shorts, it wasn’t going to take much to get ready to take their shower together.



Stripping, the two climbed into the shower and proceeded to get lost in the joy of each others’ touch.



A full twenty minutes later, they exited the shower and made their way together to their bedroom.



“I can’t believe that we took that long, Hermione. I’m so sorry.”



Hermione looked at the grandfather clock in their bedroom and resigned herself, again, to the fact that when they were together, things just always moved more slowly. It seemed to be a governing rule of their relationship



“No worries, Harry. I’ve accepted that it’s just the way things are. We just can’t seem to stop touching each other or loving each other long enough to get things done with quite the same speed.”



The ‘getting-dressed’ portion of their morning did not seem to pass with any greater efficiency, even though they were both cognizant of the time. Hermione could not resist touching and stroking Harry’s erection every time he was close to her as he searched out the right pants and shirt while Harry could not keep his hands off her ‘bits’.



Eventually though, they were able to contain their urges just enough to get dressed by the time the clock stuck twenty-five minutes past seven.



“Ready to go, Hermione?” Hermione wore a beautiful, but simple silk top and form-fitting silk pants that showed off her build beautifully while Harry wore a long-sleeved, dark green linen shirt and light-weight dark gray wool slacks to go with it. Their Head Boy/Girl badges were affixed permanently to their school robes, so they didn’t have to bother with those, ever.



“Yes, I think so. I just can’t believe that we are going to classes this morning and then blowing off the rest of the day.”



Harry sent a mental image of a tall, disapproving McGonagall looking down on them. “You think we’d get out of having to go to transfiguration? In another life, maybe?”



That earned a snort from Hermione, as she took the image in and sent one back of Harry being transfigured into a ferret.



What is it with us and ferrets? We’re obsessed with ferrets.



That comment reduced Hermione to a fit of giggles. “I love you, Harry”.



Harry felt her love as she pushed it at him over their link and it warmed him all over.

He took her hand and they made their way out the secret entrance from the Heads’ rooms and down towards the Great Hall, breakfast, and their last classes as single people.

*************************

NEWT Transfiguration class – 11:30 am. – 2nd floor lecture hall



“Ahhhhhhhhh! Ron! You’ve turned it into a pink toad. Change it back!”



Ron looked sheepish as he waved his wand over the pink toad and changed it back into the Bank vole (Clethrionomys glareolus) that it had been. They would have used brown rats in the class, but between Crookshank, the Acromantulas, the owls, and the hippogriffs in the forest, nothing larger than a vole survived in or near the castle. The voles they were working with in class had been captured in the greenhouses by Professor Sprouts’ live traps and then given to Professor McGonagall for her use. They were supposed to be released within twenty four hours, according to the rules set up by the schools’ Board of Governors. Harry thought it a bit odd that the Governors should care so much about non-magical animals, but have no problems allowing the use of Thestrals or the growing of things like Blast-ended skrewts. It was another area in which there were not logical or consistent rules between the two worlds. Harry thought it no wonder Hermione sometimes went out of her mind trying to rationalize the two.



Professor McGonagall, for her part, seemed very lost in thought, as the students around them struggled with the difficult concepts governing live transformations. Hermione, of course, had no problems with the subject – but then again, she never seemed to have problems with any of the subjects they were taking. She had easily, even casually, turned her father into a ferret the night of the schools’ memorial service. Human to animal transfiguration was the most difficult of all live transfigurations and required huge amounts of mental discipline and concentration.



In comparison, Harry - whose grades had improved noticeably over his fifth year marks because of his increased attention to the details – was able to do live transfiguration because of the strength of his will and almost unlimited, raw magical power. Luckily, he had recently come to realize that Hermione’s success in school had much more to do with giving back to the professors what they were looking for than it did with pure ability or raw power. As a student, he had never failed to accomplish the bits of magic that had been required of him in their classes…but he had not appreciated the fact that he should be able to explain why certain bits of magic worked as they did. Putting quill to parchment had never been Harry’s strong suit until Hermione had explained to him how she did what she did. Now he saw some of the details as being not only important, but critically important to the effective and accurate use of magic.



Harry? Are you paying attention even a little bit?



Not hardly. I just want to blow out of here. Get our notes from someone else and call it a day. I have a wedding to get to!



I know. That’s how I feel, too. But, I need this grade. WE need this grade, if we’re going to pass our NEWTs.



Harry whined. “Right now, Hermione, I could care less. We both can do all of these transfigurations with our eyes closed. In my case, I can do them wandless. Once we are able to share magic publicly, you’ll be able to do it, too.”



Hermione reached over and squeezed his hand under the table. “There’s nothing that I want more than to be able to do that, Harry. Soon…very, very soon…I promise.”

*************************

The class did finally, mercifully, end.



Since they had their bags with them, albeit in a shrunken form, they bolted straight out of class. Not bothering to go to lunch at the Great Hall, they met and embraced Ron and Ginny in the hallway. Quickly, the four made for the schools’ enormous front doors. With Harry and Hermione in the lead, they found themselves running and not walking towards the apparition point outside. Harry said aloud, for Ginny and Ron’s benefit, “Last one to Hermione’s parents’ house is a rotten egg!”



Hermione’s mental reply to that was “You think so, Mr. Potter?”



His disembodied laugh was loud and clear in her mind. “What’s taking you so long?”



A moment later, Hermione appeared in her parent’s yard next to Harry. His grin was infectious. He had disapparated without warning and had done so completely silently, in a typical, Dumbledorean fashion



Prat!! You didn’t tell me that it was a race. You know I would have beaten you here.



Harry reached out and pulled her close, while they waited for Ginny and Ron to arrive.



The magic of a portkey is different from any other kind of magic, and it had a distinct feel to it, Harry thought. Presently, the hairs on the back of Harry’s neck all stood on end – which told him that a portkey gateway was about to be activated. Hermione, he thought, could probably feel it too. She seemed to be looking at once spot very intensely – as if she knew that it was about to produce a Weasley.



Sure enough, Ginny and Ron arrived at the same moment, as the swirling blues and whites of the magical gateway opened; flared with the arrival of the two; and then faded into nothingness again.



Once Jake and Miranda came out, the four teenagers walked across the backyard to greet them. Ron and Ginny hanged to the rear, so that Hermione and Harry could talk to them first. Once the four separated, Harry would not see them again until the ceremony itself. Ginny would go with Hermione while Ron would go with Jake. Ron had already turned seventeen, so he could do magic in the presence of a muggle if the need arose. In this case, the need was great. Ron had to make sure that the food was magicked to stay perfectly warm or perfectly cold until it was served at the reception which was to follow the wedding.



Before they separated, Harry took Hermione in his arms and pulled her away from the others. “Hermione? I…..I love you. You make my heart sing. I can’t wait to be your husband.”



Hermione was not one to shed tears unnecessarily, but there were moments when tears just could not be avoided. This was one of them. In six hours’ time, she knew, she would be saying her vows with Harry. They were vows that the two of them had written together and there was special significance in the way that they had been worded. She was proud of them and was looking forward to sharing them with all the guests who were going to be at the church.



I love you, Harry. Be good. I will see you at the church.



Harry swelled with pride in the love that he felt from her. “I promise my wife. I love you.”

*************************

It was just as well that Harry ended up being the one to answer the door when the bell rang. They weren’t expecting anyone, but that didn’t mean anything. Like in many neighborhoods, children still wandered around at certain times of the year, selling things, in an attempt to raise money for various causes or soliciting straight-up donations.



This time, however, it was neither of those things.



The person standing at the door was wearing a very crisp military uniform and was carrying the insignia of a Subedar Major in the Queen’s Own 6th Gurkha Rifles. Harry was taken aback for a moment. He had not ever expected to see such a high-ranking officer up close. The man was about Harry’s height – which was typical for a Gurkha officer. The man snapped a crisp salute and spoke. “Sir! I am looking for Mr. Harry Potter.”



Harry looked at him, staring dumbly for a moment, before saying, “I am he.”



Nodding, the man reached inside his jacket and read his instructions. “I have been instructed to say that you must prove your identity by becoming your animagus.”



The first thing Harry did was to open his mind to Hermione, who was out on the backyard patio with her mother and Ginny, to tell her and show her what was going on. Her response came fast. She told him silently to keep the man talking, so that she could become the lioness and come up on him from behind. If he was up to no good, he was going to be in for a surprise.

“Ok. I can, but who are you to ask? Why would an army officer come here? What can you possibly want with me? How did you know to ask me to become my animagus?”



The man did not fluster. Harry gave him credit for that.



“I am Major Sumerendra Bahadur Rana, of Her Majesty’s Sixth Gurkha Rifles. I was told to come out here today to deliver a note to Mr. Harry Potter. Now, you are stalling. Are you going to do what I have asked or not?”



Harry grinned. “If you look behind you, you’ll find out that you’re no longer alone. I must warn you that if you even so much as move the wrong way or do something that makes my wife nervous, you are not going to survive it.”



The officer turned his head and saw Hermione, in her animagus form. She had taken up a position that effectively cut him off from any possibility of retreat. Her teeth were bared and it was obvious she meant business. The moment that Harry saw that she was in position, he transformed without a sound, so that the officer was hemmed in and had nowhere to go.



In order to let the man know that he had done as requested, Harry let out a low, throaty growl. The low rumble of it and its proximity made the officer’s head swung back around to look at the spot where Harry had been standing. It took him another moment to have the presence of mine to look down. When he did, he saw a great, black cat. Clearly unnerved, he tried to make himself as small and unthreatening as possible.



There might have been some levity to the moment, if Harry hadn’t suspected that something was definitely not right with the world. High-ranking officers from Her Majesty’s private guard just did not play the role of errand boy unless the errand was very, very important indeed.



With a somewhat audible ‘Pop’, Harry transformed. Hermione, however, remained as Sagehunter.



As crisply and with as much dignity as he could muster, the man reached into his other vest pocket and withdrew an invitation-sized envelope. He carefully handed it to Harry.



Harry’s infectious laugh broke the tension of the moment when he looked at the man who was now sweating a bit and said. “It’s alright. I don’t bite….at least not lately.”



Opening the envelope, Harry took out the card that was inside and opened it.



What he read staggered him.



‘Mione? Transform. We need to talk.



Just as silently, Hermione transformed back into her usual, beautiful self and pushed past the Major.



Harry was standing in the doorway, holding the card open which had been inside the envelope. Carefully scripted by hand, on an unfolded note, was the following:



September 18, 1997



Dear Harry and Hermione:



You will no doubt have been alarmed by the presence of my messenger. Please forgive me for that. I can’t do anything personal without having to resort to using stand-ins in various ways. It was my hope to have you brought here, so that we could speak personally, but affairs of state have done their best to interfere with the things that I would have preferred to have been doing.



In all of the years that I have had the tremendous joy of watching out for and representing our nation, I have had very few chances to say thank you to those who have, each in his or her own extraordinary way, protected our nation and done what I could not. Today, then, is a rare and wonderful day.



I did not have the opportunity to tell you how deeply your speeches affected me and for that I am sorry. Your headmaster was protective of you both and insisted that you be left alone, to comfort each other and to grieve in your own ways. I honored his wishes, though I had wanted to say a more personal thank you to both of you.



Today is a day for magic. Not the kind that you showed, Harry, during the memorial service, but the kind that only a husband and wife can share. To that end, I wish to add something special, because I remember what it is to marry someone you love and I would have you both know that joy in this life and the next.



Whoever has delivered this message has several things to give you. One, Harry, is for you, another is for you, Hermione, and a third is for you both. I hope that they will speak to you both over the years and carry with them my pride in you both and my everlasting gratitude for what you have done for us all.



May God bless you both on this special day.



The note was signed simply, Elizabeth.



Harry stood, trembling. He had never, ever, in his most wild and vivid imagination, thought that he would draw the notice of the Queen. It awed him that they should be thought of so well and with such obvious affection and appreciation.



Hermione took Harry’s hand in hers, and after laying the note on the side table in the hallway, turned to look at the Major who had remained standing in the doorway. She looked at the Major and said, quietly, “Please forgive us.”



It was the Major’s turn to be surprised, as he looked at the beautiful young woman who stood before him. He saw that they were holding hands and realized that they were clearly a couple and more, had been so for some time. He blushed for a moment as he thought of his own bride, Rama, with whom he often found his hands intertwined.



Inclining his head, he said, “I have things to give to you, if you will receive them.”



Hermione squeezed Harry’s hand and nodded, as did Harry.



The Major spoke into a microphone on his collar tab and after a moment, three burly, heavily armed men came up the front walk, toting a very secure-looking box and a briefcase that was chained to the wrist of the soldier in the lead.



The Major looked at Hermione and Harry, who indicated to the men that they should come inside the house.



At that moment, Jake and Miranda came out of the shadows, so that they could have a better view of what was occurring. Hermione had clearly warned them to stay back, in case there had been something wrong or dangerous about the Major’s presence. It was a bit unnerving for them to see how heavily armed the other soldiers were. It was incredibly unusual to see anyone with a firearm in the UK, given the nations’ amazingly strict gun laws, so to see both machine guns and pistols adorning the soldiers meant that theirs was not an ordinary excursion into the country-side.



Harry showed the soldiers the table where they could place the secure case. One of them went to open the case and Harry waved him off. He was just cautious enough to want to open the case magically.



Focusing his magic for a moment, he felt the perimeter of the case and then explored the contents. Satisfied that there was not even a trace of magic in, on, or around the case, Harry waved a hand over the case and thought “Alohomora”.



Obediently, the case sprang open, to both the horror and amazement of the three soldiers. By their expressions, someone had told them that it was a very secure case. Harry smiled at them and thought to Hermione, “Security is relative, eh?” to which she just raised an eyebrow and smiled at him.



The Major looked at him, shook his head, and then took out the case-within-a-case. It was done in blue velvet and locked in front with another clasp. Hermione undid the clasp with a wave of her hand and the case sprang open. The moment the case opened, she almost dropped it.

Oh my god, Harry. I see it, but I can’t believe it.



Believe it, Hermione. She’s serious and I am very sure that it’s for you. For today. It’s a wedding gift.



Hermione’s jaw was still threatening to hit the floor as she lifted the item out of box. As the light caught it, Hermione heard her mothers’ breathe catch in her throat.



It was hair band of some sort – though not something anyone could find anywhere other than in the jewelry stores on Mayfair Street or at Harrods. It was woven trellis made of Platinum, approximately twenty-two centimeters long and four centimeters across, with triangle-shaped, two-carat diamonds and sapphires at each of the points where the bands of platinum crossed.



It was breathe-taking.



“Mother?”



Miranda looked up as she saw Hermione struggling to put the hair band into her hair correctly. Since she was taller than her daughter, still, by almost seven centimeters, Miranda was able to help Hermione set the band into place correctly.



Once it was in, Hermione turned and flung herself at the Major. She gave him an enthusiastic hug. The Major, cautious as he was, kept one eye on Harry as he put one arm around Hermione and gave her a quick squeeze.



After Hermione had broken the hug and retaken Harry’s side, the Major stepped forward with a large, official-looking binder.



“Mr. Potter, these documents were drawn up last night and this morning, and I have been asked to say that should you have any questions at all, the Chancellor of the Exchequer will be most pleased to take your call and explain any details that you might feel are lacking.”



With Hermione holding one side, Harry opened the large binder, to find two sets of documents. Each set bore the Seal of the United Kingdom. Not knowing which to pick first, he took the one closest to him.



Since the book was awkward to hold, Harry helped Hermione to a seat on the sofa. He motioned for the Major to sit, along with the soldiers behind him, but they demurred. The Major did not and seated himself stiffly on the chintz chair that was nearest to him.



Harry found the Chancellor’s card in a discreet slot on the first page of the first packet. Making note of it, and the private cell number which was hand-written at the bottom of the card, he began to read through the documents; occasionally stopping to comment on one thing or another.



They might have continued with it, if the grandfather clock in the living room had not struck 2 pm. Somehow, that was a magical witching hour – because hearing the two chimes drove Hermione and Miranda to rise and ask to take their leave from the gathering. The Major, sensitive to the day upon which he was intruding, rose and signaled for the three soldiers to follow him.



Harry rose with them and accompanied them to the front door.



The three soldiers filed out and the Major was about to take his leave when Harry stopped him. “Sir, can I ask you a question?”



The Major nodded, so Harry looked him in the eye. “Do you know why you were sent here today and who I am?”



A smile came to the Majors’ face and he nodded again. “Harry,” he said quietly, “My grand-nieces by marriage are Parvati and Padma Patil. I know everything they could tell me. Until this morning, though, I couldn’t really believe it. Now, however…..” His voice trailed off, as if he didn’t know how to put into words what he felt.



Harry understood. It was like that with many muggles who struggled to come to terms with having a sibling, parent, son, or daughter who was magical. It took a long time, often, to accept that there were things that were beyond explanation or understanding and that magic really did exist.



His throat tightened as he thought of what almost happened to the Patil twins and how close they came to being killed. “For what it’s worth, Major, they’re safe now. He’s never coming back.”



“Thanks to you, Harry.” he said, very quietly. “I have to take my leave now, Harry. I will not forget what you did to protect Padma and Parvati.”



He drew himself up and snapped a formal salute to Harry and then turned and walked down the driveway to his awaiting car.

*************************

For whatever reason, Harry felt a sudden wave of fatigue that he could not resist. Knowing that he wanted to be extremely alert and awake for the wedding...and the joy which would follow.. he forced himself to lie down on the bed in the room that he and Hermione had come to think of as ‘theirs’. As his thoughts drifted away, he knew – could feel - that somewhere, nearby, Hermione was doing the same thing and that she loved him.

*************************



5:45 pm.



The hours of personal preparation and dressing that followed Harry’s nap became a blur that he would soon forget. It was as if someone had put a time-turner on fast-forward and had spun it repeatedly, until everything around them moved with hyper velocity.



Almost before he could blink, he was dressed, muggle-fashion, in a black silk tux, which had been tailored for him specially by his private tailor at Burberry’s in London, and was being escorted to the fully restored, white, 1958 Silver Wraith Rolls Royce by Jake Granger and Remus Lupin. Harry had just the barest moment to admire the car and appreciate that someone had taken the time to rent it for them, so that he would arrive at the church in style.



Harry, usually a nervous wreck before any event that was particularly emotionally charged, had planned to maintain an almost Zen-like calm before the wedding. He knew that he had done everything within his power to make sure that the wedding came off without a hitch. However, his insides were shaking at the moment and he felt like he might just lose what little lunch he had eaten.



Lupin saw his ashen face. “You all right, pup? You look like you’re going to lose your lunch or something.”



Harry could only nod. He hadn’t been this nervous since his very first Quidditch match.



Hermione?



There was a plaintive quality to his voice that Hermione knew meant that Harry was feeling uncertain or scared.



Her response was as welcome as anything could be. “I’m nervous too, Harry. It’s all right though. We’re going to do fine. I love you and I know you love me.”



“I do love you, Hermione. I’m so scared that I’m not enough for you or that I won’t be a good husband to you.”



“Stop it, Harry. You know that you’re the best thing that has ever happened to me and that I love you. More, you’re my very best earthly friend. How could we be anything but brilliant together?”



“Hermione! I’m at the church. We’re going to do this, right?”



“Harry, calm down! You’re going to work yourself into a twist if you don’t take some deep breathes. Do your tokening meditations or something. I’ll be there soon!”



Harry did as Hermione suggested - resting a moment against one of the Dorian columns that graced the Church.



Remus Lupin grinned at his young charge. Harry Potter had never been a burden, but he had often been a source of some consternation, as his own ideas of right and wrong met head-on with the judgments of those who were considerably older, and supposedly, wiser. The jury, Lupin thought, was still out on whether it had been wise to leave Harry and Hermione to their own devices in the fight against Voldemort or whether it would have been better to have helped and trained the two of them. In the end, it hadn’t mattered.



Lupin had always come down on the side of helping them as much as possible, and certainly, Sirius did as much as possible, given that he had been on the run for a considerable period of time. Lupin winced, as he thought of Sirius. It made him very sad that Sirius had been killed in such a needless and out-of-hand way and that Harry would be deprived of his company and great good humor at the moment.



Lupin did not know, nor did he need to know, that Harry could talk to Hermione telepathically. It was a very closely guarded secret and Jake knew that both Hermione and Harry wished to keep it that way.



“Harry? It’s time to go inside. Hermione will be here in a moment and it’s time to get this show on the road. I don’t know how the Headmaster did it, but all of the seventh-years are here and a fairly good number of the sixth-years are with them. I have to say, I’ve not seen this many witches and wizards dressed as muggles since you stopped Tom as a baby. It seemed like most of the wizarding world was out that day.”



He didn’t have to be a mind-reader to know that he had put his foot in it. The expression on Harry’s face said it all and Lupin immediately regretted bringing up that awful day, when Harry’s parents were killed. Harry simply nodded; his face a mask of barely concealed pain over the sadness of his parents’ absence. He turned his back to Lupin – as gesture that the former DADA teacher understood - to walk inside. Not really understanding the significance of what had just happened between professor and student, guardian and ward, Jake grabbed Harry by the arm and pulled him close. “Don’t look so glum, Harry. Somebody….namely me…might start thinking that you don’t really want to marry my only daughter. That would be bad.”



Something popped in Harry and he started to laugh. Jake was right, of course, and Harry knew it. Hermione would always be worth smiling about.



Turning resolutely, Harry entered the church with Remus Lupin on one side and Jake Granger on the other. He made his way up the center aisle, smiling and waving as he saw so many of the faces that he knew from school. The Headmaster was present, as was Professor McGonagall, which left Harry to wonder, momentarily, who was in charge back at school.



Harry knelt and said a half-remembered, half-improvised prayer before the altar, doing his best to observe the traditions as they had been explained to him.



Rev. Langton, watched Harry from the alcove where he stood, putting on the last of his vestments before the service. He had been impressed with the young man when they had first met and struck by how much in love he was with Hermione. Seeing Harry praying simply reinforced his initial impressions of him.



The Bishop had known Hermione since she was a little girl and had come to adore and treasure her. Not only had Hermione always been respectful and kind, but she had shown herself to have a remarkable perceptiveness regarding peoples’ needs and frailties.



When they met on Sunday, he had chastised them for wanting to marry at such an early age and taking them to task for their (obvious) sexual openness with each other. To his chagrin they had returned his chastisement and showed him, in the context of their confessional relationship as priest and supplicants, who they really were. With his faith very much intact, he was still coping with the wondrous powers they had shown him. Theirs was a secret that he would take with him to his grave, and gladly so, for they had shown him things he could never have believed possible.



The bells which had begun ringing signaled Hermione’s arrival in front of the church. He wished that he could see the arrival, for it had always thrilled him to see a beautiful bride arrive by carriage and he knew that Hermione would be a bride more radiant than any other he had ever seen.



As Hermione arrived in the vestibule of the church, she was met by her father. The bells lessened and the organ and trumpeters began playing Clarke’s’ Trumpet Voluntary – the “Prince of Demark’s March” in D Major. It was a glorious sound in the old, stone church and filled the space with a joyous sound.



The moment she stepped into the light with her father, so that she could begin the processional, no one was more shocked and thrilled than Harry. At last, he could see his bride and the sight of her brought happy tears to his eyes. She was more beautiful than he could have ever imagined. Gone were the unruly curls which had plagued her so often. In their place was a golden mane of waving hair that seemed to move together, gracing one shoulder and then the next. The hair band was set atop her head in a way that made it seem a natural part of her, as if she, too, were royalty and had been but missing her crown.



About her neck lay the one necklace which she would never remove while she was still alive. Her ears were adorned with round, fiery diamonds, also set in platinum. The dress was fashioned of the purest white silk. No straps supported the dress, which sat in a line just about her breasts. Cascading over her breasts, the silk flowed to a tapered point at her waist and then gently over her hips and to the floor, where it stretched out a few feet behind her in a train.



The silk made a soft rustling sound as it moved with her as she walked up the aisle and Hermione’s smile, he knew, was only for him.



Her thoughts were so warm in his mind. Every word was a caress. “I love you, Harry. I’m coming for you. To be your bride”.



Harry ached for her. Every part of him wanted to bond with her forever. “Hermione. You are so beautiful. I love you”.



The Bishop watched Hermione and her father approach the dais and saw Harry, his eyes taking in every measure of her. Jake Granger moved to his daughter’s left, accompanied by Ginny and Luna, who were also dressed spectacularly in their silk brides-maids dresses and jewelry. Each was wearing a necklace given to them by Harry and Hermione. To her fathers’ shock, Ginny wore a necklace of purest platinum, surrounding an enormous, perfect round ruby set with twelve trillium diamonds. The ruby looked like a radiant, red star surrounded by points of fiery brilliance. Luna’s necklace was of the same design, but done with a perfect yellow sapphire at its center, surrounded by twelve brilliant blue, trillium tanzanites, in the exotic metal bluish-white metal palladium. Each girl wore in her hair, a wreath of bluish-purple and white flowers.



To Harry’s right, Ron and Neville stood, wearing new tuxes which had been tailored for them. No longer was Ron’s hair a ragtag mop, but had been cut and feathered back, to give him a decidedly cool look. They looked like young men come into their own and seemed to carry with them a new sense of purpose and dignity. On the first bench, the other Weasleys sat, including Bill and his wife, Fleur Delacour, with Mrs. Weasley notably absent. It struck him as odd that she would not be there, but it was a question that was going to have to wait for another time.



Once the music had ended, the Bishop stepped to the lectern. “My friends, people, followers of Christ, we are gathered here today to celebrate the marriage of a local girl, Hermione Jane Granger, to her love and protector, her best friend for the last six years, Harry James Potter. It is my great joy to officiate at this union, for I have known Hermione her whole life and I know that she comes to this day with true love and devotion to the young man who has met her at this altar.”



He cleared his through and looked at the two, standing together before the altar; their hands joined. Harry caught his look and smiled. He wondered, briefly, what the Bishop would say if he were to discover that both Neville and Ron, his best men, were probably within a year of being before a very similar altar, each in their own home towns.



The service moved on, with prayers and worship music, until it was time for a reading. The Bishop looked at Harry and then over at the second row of seats. Albus Dumbledore rose and came to the lectern. His smile was warm and affectionate. “Harry, Hermione, I didn’t know if we’d ever make it here. There were days when I despaired of it. But – we are here – and you two have shown many others what real love and commitment is about. Some have learned the lesson late in life…and others are seeing it for the first time, as they watch you both.”



The Headmaster’s eyes were full of mirth as they fell first to Ron and Neville, and then to Ginny and Luna. Mr. Weasley knew his headmaster well and followed Dumbledore’s gaze as it fell to both his youngest son and daughter. He might have been alarmed by it if he hadn’t already had a pretty good idea that he was going to see them both married off before they went to University.



Dumbledore continued. “Today’s reading is something that I should have told you both, back when I first knew that you two had discovered for yourselves what the rest of us had known for sometime.



On This Day



Mend a quarrel. Search out a forgotten friend. Dismiss suspicion, and replace it with trust. Write a love letter. Share some treasure. Give a soft answer. Encourage youth. Manifest your loyalty in a word or deed.



Keep a promise. Find the time. Forego a grudge. Forgive an enemy. Listen. Apologize if you were wrong. Try to understand. Flout Envy. Examine your demands on others. Think first of someone else. Appreciate, be kind, be gentle. Laugh a little more.



Deserve confidence. Take up arms against malice. Decry complacency. Express your gratitude. Worship your God. Gladden the heart of a child. Take pleasure in the beauty and wonder of the Earth. Speak your love. Speak it again. Speak it still again. Speak it still once again.”



When the headmaster was finished, he looked at Hermione and then Harry and smiled. He stepped down from the dais and walked, slowly, to where Minerva McGonagall sat. If Harry or Hermione could have craned their necks around to follow his progress, they would have seen Minerva McGonagall, their proper and dignified transfigurations teacher, wipe a tear from her eyes and take the Headmaster’s hand in hers.



A young man stood and walked to the piano. Harry looked at Hermione and smiled, as he disengaged his hand from hers and, leading Ron to where the piano was situated; turned and gave a signal to the pianist.



The opening chords struck Hermione as very familiar and she was about to lose herself in their simple beauty when Harry and Ron looked at her and sang the duet:



Perhaps love is like a resting place

A shelter from the storm

It exists to give you comfort

It is there to keep you warm

And in those times of trouble

When you are most alone

The memory of love will bring you home



Perhaps love is like a window

Perhaps an open door

It invites you to come closer ( you wrote close)

It wants to show you more

And even if you lose yourself

And don`t know what to do

The memory of love will see you through



Oh, love to some is like a cloud

To some as strong as steel

For some a way of living

For some a way to feel

And some say love is holding on

And some say letting go

And some say love is everything

And some say they don’t know



Perhaps love is like the ocean

Full of conflict, full of change

Like a fire when it’s cold outside

Or thunder when it rains

If I should live forever

And all my dreams come true

My memories of love will be of you



When they had finished, there was not a dry eye in the congregation. Luna looked at Ron with eyes so full of love, desire, and affection that Harry thought she might try to join them at the altar with Ron, to make sure he never got away.



Harry? How do I tell you how much I love you?



He could feel ever ounce of her love and his magic desperately tried to answer her love. “You just did, Hermione”.



Bishop Langton looked down from the lectern, to see their need written so plainly on their faces.



“Friends, members of the church, all who are gathered to witness this marriage. Are there any among you who know of a reason that this marriage should not go forward? Speak now or forever hold your peace.”

He looked around, not expecting to see opposition.



“Seeing none, and rejoicing in the love and commitment that has brought these two together today, let us bind them in marriage.



Hermione, Harry, appealing to these witnesses of your commitment, do you, Hermione Jane Granger, offer this man who stands beside you, choosing him from all the world, to be his lawfully wedded wife? Having promised to trust him and to be his best earthly friend, will you promise to share your heart and spirit only with him? Do you promise to defend, love and support him in all things, with all that you have for this life and all eternity?”



Hermione looked at him; her tears threatening to break through at any moment. “I do.”



“Harry James Potter, do you offer this woman your whole and complete heart? Choosing her from all the world, do you promise to be her lawfully wedded husband? Do you promise to trust, love and protect her and to be her best earthly friend? Will you share your heart and your spirit only with her and defend, love and support her in all things, with all that you have for this life and all eternity?”



Harry brought her hand to his chest and said, “I do.”



“Would you now speak your vows to each other?”



Harry went first. “Hermione, I could never have imagined this day would come. On that day three years ago, my world opened up when you said, ‘I love you’ and since then, I have walked with air under my feet and joy in my thoughts. I asked you to marry me because I see in you the same joy, hope, and excitement that I have always felt and I knew that I could not live happily without you by my side, forever.”



“Harry – I asked you to marry me because I see in you such a joy for life and such an incredible potential. I want to share in your happiness and hope by being your wife.”



“Hermione, these things I promise to you, with all of the love and energy that I have: that I will always be with you in all that life brings us, in good times and bad. I promise that the works of my hands and the love that is in my heart will be for you alone. I promise that I will protect you always, in all that I say and do, for our happiness together.”



“Harry, I promise to be your life’s partner; to cherish and adore you, love and support you. I promise to give of myself completely in the pursuit of our happiness together. I promise you that there will be nowhere that you will go that I will not be by your side. I will buoy you up when you are down, laugh with you when we are so moved, and comfort you in the sad moments that life may bring us. You are my everything and I promise to be yours.”



Bishop Langton stepped in front of them and said to them and to the congregation. “Do you wish to symbolize the promises you have made through the gift of rings?”



Hermione and Harry smiled as they both said, “We do”.



“Harry? Please repeat after me: "With this ring, this symbol of our bond, our love, I bind my heart and my soul to yours forever."



As he slipped the ring onto her finger, he said, “Hermione? With this ring, this symbol of our bond, our love, I bind my heart and my magic – he added silently - and my soul to yours forever."



The Bishop turned to Hermione, giving her the ring which Ginny had held up to him. Hermione looked at Harry; slipping the ring on his finger. “Harry, with this ring, this symbol of our bond, our love, I bind my heart, my soul and my magic – she added wordlessly - to yours forever”.



The moment the words were out of her mouth, the magical promise that they had made to each other broke the dam in each of them. It made Hermione’s knees weak as she felt her power suddenly amplified a thousand-fold. Harry looked at her with wonder as his own core blossomed in a way that he would never have believed possible. He could feel her power totally intertwined with his, so that their magic was more than just their own – it was an extension of the others’. It was like the most powerful adrenalin rush he had ever felt.



They struggled to contain their joy and excitement as they took each others’ hands and turned to the Bishop. He clasped their hands in his and looked out. “Friends, family, congregants all. Here these words and take them with you as you go out of this place. Keep these words in your own lives. My charge to you all is that you help Hermione and Harry sustain and protect each other and remind them, when they are feeling sad or hurt, that they have made promises to each other. Jake, Miranda – help guide Hermione and Harry as they begin their life’s journey together. Be supports for them and let them learn from your experiences.



Hermione, Harry. My last lesson to you both is from the New Testament; 1st Corinthians, Chapter 13.



Love is patient; love is kind and envies no one;

Love is never boastful, nor conceited, nor rude;

Never selfish, nor quick to give offense.



Love keeps no score of wrongs;

nor gloats over other people’s mistakes,

but it delights in the truth.

There is nothing love cannot face;



Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.



There is no limit to its faith, its hope; and its endurance.

Love will never end.



Now, Hermione, Harry. Go out into the world as man and wife. Be for each other and remember this blessing from the Native American nations.



“Now you will feel no rain, for each of you will be shelter for the other;

Now you will feel no cold, for each of you will be warmth to the other;

Now there is no more loneliness, for each of you will be companion to the other;

Now there are two bodies; but there is only one life before you;



Go now to your dwelling and enter into the days of your life together, and may

your days be good and long upon the earth.



Harry, Hermione, by the power vested in me by the Holy Anglican Church and by the Government of the United Kingdom and Great Britain, it is my joy to pronounce you husband and wife."



“Harry, you may kiss your bride”.



Hermione could no longer contain her tears of joys. She melted into Harry’s arms as he cupped her face and kissed her soundly.



As Harry kissed her, the congregation came to its feet as one and cheered.

*************************



Next chapter – “Matched pairs”.......