Funerals and Weddings

Disclaimer: The magical world of Harry Potter and all of the characters, places, events and things therein are the property of J. K. Rowling and her publishers. Only original characters and ideas belong to me. No money is being made from the publication of this work of fiction and no disrespect is intended.

For summary, story codes and other information, please see the prologue.

Chapter the first: Emancipation Proclamation
4 January; same day.
No. 12 Grimmauld Place

Harry slipped inside the front door of Grimmauld Place, shuddering as the welcome warmth hit him. After shedding his outerwear, he made his way down to the kitchen, hoping for some of Molly’s famous Weasley Chocolate to warm up his frozen insides.

“Harry dear! You look frozen! Whatever have you been doing out in the cold? Come sit down and have some chocolate. Do you want something to eat with it?” Molly Weasley took one look at her ‘adopted’ son and quickly went into full mother mode, shuffling Harry to the table while simultaneously scolding and clucking over him. Harry just grinned and savoured the steaming cup of chocolate as she continued to berate him for being foolish enough to traipse around in the snow.

The kitchen door banged open as Ron bounded in, followed closely by Hermione and Ginny.

“Hey, Harry! Heard Mum yelling, knew you must be back. Oi! You look a right popsicle, mate! So did you get it?” As usual, the tall red-haired boy let his thoughts tumble directly from his brain out of his mouth as he plopped himself down next to Harry.

“Yes, Harry, did you get it?” Hermione asked while she and Ginny also sat down.

Harry put on a puzzled face. “Get what?” he asked innocently.

He ducked as Ron took a friendly swipe at his head. “Argh, man, don’t be daft!” Ginny and Hermione just groaned and shook their heads.

Harry grinned widely. “Alright, alright! Can’t you take a joke? Yes, I got it!” With a flourish, he pulled a tightly rolled piece of parchment out of his robe pocket and unfurled it. “Ta-da! Signed, sealed and delivered. You, my friends, are now looking at the new-and-improved, Dursley-free, legally emancipated, adult Harry Potter.”

“Oh, Harry, congratulations!” Hermione squealed, jumping up to smother Harry in a hug. Ginny grinned hugely as Ron slapped Harry on the back, both adding their congratulations to Hermione’s.

“Oh, that’s wonderful dear! I’m so happy for you!” Molly dropped a kiss on Harry’s head before turning back to the pantry she had been organizing.

“Yeah, mate, now you’ll never have to go back to live with those horrid Muggles again!” Ron enthused. “Can’t imagine you’re too sorry to be shut of that lot!”

“Now that’s an understatement!” Harry laughed. “Believe me, if I never see Dudley fat ar…” Harry broke off with an apologetic look at Molly’s back. “…er, I mean, face again, it will be too soon!”

“So the hearing went smoothly then? No problems?” Hermione queried. “Since you’ve come in looking so frozen, I was a little worried that you hadn’t gotten emancipated and that’s why you didn’t apparate straight here instead of tubing and walking home from the Ministry.”

Luckily, Molly’s back was still turned and she was humming along with the Wizarding Wireless, so she didn’t hear Hermione’s question or see the death glare Harry shot her. “Yeah, it was fine, no problems at all. Listen, let’s go upstairs and I’ll tell you about it,” Harry said with a meaningful look. “OK?”

The foursome trooped upstairs to Harry and Ron’s bedroom. Harry flopped down on his bed, while Ron pulled Hermione to rest against his chest after settling himself against the headboard of his own bed. Ginny parked herself at the foot of Harry’s bed with her back propped against the wall.

“Well, so tell all Harry. Now that you are a legal adult, you can apparate--even if you aren’t 17 yet. Unless you didn’t pass the test? Is that why you didn’t you apparate home?” At this Harry rolled his eyes and gave Hermione a withering look. “Alright then, if you passed, what were you up to out in the cold?” Hermione looked suspiciously at Harry.

“Who says I was up to anything?” Harry defended himself. “Maybe I just fancied walking back.”

Ginny snorted. “In this weather? It’s the coldest Christmas the country’s seen in 200 years! Harry, you were still blue when we got to the kitchen! C’mon, spill,” Harry shot her a grin.

“Well, I did tube and walk to the Ministry, of course. The hearing didn’t take too long, especially with Dumbledore’s and your dad’s testimony…” he smiled at Ron and Ginny. “…about the Dursley’s neglect and abuse all these years.” Here he paused and sighed. “Of course, the main reason Dumbledore agreed was that the blood protection my mum gave me when she died saving me is all but null and void since the Death Eaters killed Aunt Petunia last fall. Apparently Dudley isn’t close enough for the protection to still apply.”

Harry was quiet for a moment, wrestling once again with the guilt he felt over Petunia’s death. Then he pushed it firmly aside and continued his story. “Anyways, they both said I was mature enough to be emancipated, especially since I really won’t be on my own til after I graduate. The judge agreed, obviously, and after some paper signing, it was done.

“The Apparation Test was a bit of a joke; it’s the learning how that’s the difficult bit, isn’t it? Once you know how, the test is a piece of cake. So relax, won’t you, Ron?” Harry grinned as Ron flipped him a two-fingered salute.

“It wasn’t until I was leaving that I overhead some people talking about Lucius Malfoy’s funeral being today. Did you guys know it was today?” Seeing all three shake their heads, he continued. “Well, after I heard that, I just…felt I needed to go to it. I don’t really know why, there was just this feeling I couldn’t shake that was urging me to go.”

He looked around at his friends’ stunned expressions. As usual, Hermione was the first to find her voice.

“Harry!” Hermione gasped. “You didn’t really go, did you? I mean, I can’t believe the Malfoys would let you in!”

“Yeah, mate, and why the bloody hell would you want to go? This is Lucius Malfoy we’re talking about here. I seriously doubt the Malfoys would be chuffed having you show up to do a happy dance on Lucius’ grave!” Ron chortled, earning him an elbow in the gut from Hermione. “Ow, ‘Mione, what? Can you honestly say you’re sorry that git is dead? After everything he’s done?”

“Well, no, I can’t say I’ll miss him,” Hermione replied, still frowning. “But that doesn’t mean that Harry should go running off to the funeral to gloat!”

Harry held up his hands for peace. “I didn’t go to gloat. And they didn’t even know I was there. I’m not spare enough to waltz up to front door of Malfoy Manor and pretend to want to give my condolences! I used my Invisibility Cloak and snuck into these woods that bordered the graveyard. I watched everything from there.” Harry quickly summarized what he had seen, including Draco spitting into the open grave, but leaving out the bit about Draco almost catching him in the woods. He didn’t think Hermione would like that part.

“Blimey!” Ron exclaimed. “He spit into the grave! Why on earth would he do that?”

Harry shrugged. “I couldn’t believe it either. The only reason I can think of that someone would do that is if they hated the person.”

“But Malfoy always seemed to worship his father,” Ginny said. “He was always going on about how great he was. Why would he do that if he hated him?”

“No idea,” Harry lifted a shoulder. “It doesn’t make sense to me either, but I swear I saw him do it. And throughout the whole funeral service, his face was totally blank. Expressionless. You’d have thought he was at the funeral of his neighbor’s pet budgie for all the emotion he showed. So maybe he really didn’t get on with his father the way we think he did. It’s just one more thing to add to the list of how... un-Malfoy Malfoy was this past term. At any rate, we’ll probably never know for sure, it’s not like I can ask him about it!”

Hermione looked sternly at Harry. “Well, that’s for sure! Harry, I can’t believe you went at all. There were probably Death Eaters there! You are so lucky no one saw you!”

Harry lifted a shoulder and dismissed it. Changing the subject, he asked them what they had been up to all day. He was glad he hadn’t mentioned the eye-locking moment with Draco. Not only did he not want to listen to Hermione harp on about it, but there was something about that moment that he wanted to keep private…he couldn’t explain why, but he just knew that moment had been the reason he had needed to go to the funeral. He just didn’t know what it meant yet.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Harry was just drifting off to sleep that night when he heard Ron getting up from his bed and shuffling quietly to the door.

“Tell Hermione I said hello,” Harry said, without opening his eyes.

“Shit!” Ron yelped quietly. “You ‘bout near gave me a coronary. Sorry, Harry, didn’t mean to wake you.”

“You didn’t,” Harry replied. “Wanna borrow my Cloak? It’s in my trunk, on top.”

“Cheers, mate,” Ron said, opening Harry’s truck. “G’nite,” he said, closing the door softly behind him.

Harry sighed and rolled over. He couldn’t help feel a bit jealous of Ron; after all, it had been some time since he himself had had gotten laid. Not that he blamed Ron, of course. It was the last night of the Christmas hols and tomorrow they returned to Hogwarts to continue their sixth year. Finding the privacy to have sex with one’s girlfriend was hard to do in a castle populated by nosy teenagers, lurking portraits and seemingly omniscient teachers. Not that Harry knew from experience; he’d never had sex in the castle. Harry shifted in his bed again. He was half-hard now, with all this thinking about sex. Harry reached down and started to stroke himself as he let his mind drift back to the previous summer…