The Guardian of Slytherin

This is it! Thanks once more to everyone that read and sent it helpful reviews that didn't take time to insult me or my skills as a writer as they saw them to be. If I haven't said so before, I'll say it now. If you don't like the story, don't read it. Keep the crap to your garden and out of my review panel. Needless to say, I'll delete it. I write fan fiction for enjoyment, not to give reviewers a target for garbage. Thank you.

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Epilogue

Seven years later…


Harry looked out to the quidditch pitch, taking a deep breath and letting out a long sigh. The weather was perfect for flying, but he had lesson plans to make and…He sighed again, contemplating that taking the post may had been too hasty a decision. Having just broken up with the latest of a very long line of paramours, Harry had been hoping for a new start by taking the job with Hogwarts.


Part of him wished that the job of flying instructor had been available, but he had been told that it had been filled the month before. He was still watching the few people flying about overhead, when he felt as if someone joined him in the stand.


“Well, if it isn’t Mr. Harry Potter.” He turned to look at the woman standing next to him. “How are you?”


“Ginny, it’s been…forever,” he said, taking in just how well she looked. “You look amazing.”


“Thank you,” she murmured. “So do tell. What are you doing here?”


“I’m the new D.A.D.A. instructor,” he told her, as he kept looking her over. “Merlin, Ginny, but you’re a sight for sore eyes. Tell me what you’re doing here. Certainly not to see me.”


“Actually, I’m here to take my husband to lunch,” she murmured, looking out to the men that were coming all the closer to where they were talking. “There he is now.”


Harry’s jaw just about dropped when Marcus Flint, of all people, landed with a skill only one of the best broom handlers had a few feet away from them. Smiling he went over to Ginny, kissing her lightly on her mouth. The youngest Weasley glowed from the attention the man next to was giving her, making Harry wonder if he had been transferred to an alternative universe.


“Love,” she said quietly. “Let me introduce you to Harry Potter.”


He looked over to the other man. “We’ve met before. Though I have to say that it was during less than friendly times.” His arm went around Ginny, pulling her closer in a possessive move that wasn’t lost on anyone. “How are you doing, Potter?”


“Great,” Harry answered almost automatically.


“Heard that you’re going to be teaching here,” he murmured. “Perhaps we should make it a point to play a game of quidditch if you’re up to it?” He didn’t wait for an answer before he looked down to his wife. “Ready for a bite to eat?”


“That sounds lovely,” she told him. “What a day I had at work! I swear…”


“Since when did the two of you even meet each other never mind get married?” Harry asked, interrupting her and calling their attention back towards him.


“Uh, Marcus, love, why don’t you go get cleaned up while I have a chat with him?” she murmured.


“I am not leaving you alone with him,” her husband snarled, looking towards the other man.


Glowing with love and happiness, she told him, “Then could you just wait for me here while I talk with him?”


“Make it quick,” he said, his eyes going hard as he stayed there watching Harry.


Swallowing thickly the former Gryffindor looked over to Ginny. “Well?”


“Harry, I got married to Marcus four years ago,” she said. “And it isn’t like we didn’t invite you. My mum and I tried to get a hold of you more than a few times, but I guess none of them got to you.”


“You invited…” He thought back to several letters that he had received from her and ended up burning with the thought that it was her trying to get back together with him. “Uh, I must have misplaced them. I’m sorry.”


“You disrespected my husband with the way you asked,” she explained to him, but then blinked at him with a dawning idea. “You were expecting me to still be pining over you?”


“Well…”


“No,” she cut him off. “I moved on a long time ago.” Ginny’s face went hard. “She was right about you.”


“Wait, who…”


“It doesn’t matter,” she told him, backing away from him. “Grow up, Harry. The world will be a better place once you do, I’m sure.”


***


It was a contrite somewhat shocked Harry that went to the great hall for lunch. Had he expected Ginny still to be single after all this time? The thought of a woman mooning over him made the man that survived slightly ill truth be told. But Harry was honest enough with himself to admit that he thought that at the very least Ginny would still hold a small flame in her heart for the boy he had been even at this late date.


He had been so deep in thought about the meeting that he nearly collided with a witch making her way over to the head table as well.


“Watch where you’re going, Potter!” the deep voice of Severus Snape, had Harry blinking at the woman in shock.


It was Hermione, not only alive and well, but very pregnant too.


“You’re…”


“Yes, that I am,” she answered, as her husband helped steady her on her feet. “Now pardon us…”


“But…”


She stood there looking at him for a moment. “But what?”


“How did you survive?” he asked the only question he could think of.


“It’s quite a tale that one,” she murmured. “But it’s a story I only tell my friends and family.” Looping her arm through the one offered to her by the potions master, Hermione added, “I tried reaching out to you, Harry. I told you that I was letting go of the past. You name it and I told it to you in every one of the letters I sent you. I even sent you an invitation to our wedding. You didn’t bother to R.S.V.P. That right there told me everything you wanted from me in a nutshell.”


Harry’s face went red at recalling the numerous letters and how he had at first torn them up, thinking it was either letters sent out to make him feel all the guiltier or worse—notification of Hermione’s death. The latter missives he didn’t bother to look at but sent straight to the fireplace.


“I’m glad you got better,” Harry murmured.


“Thank you,” she said cordially and with a formality most would reserve to address a stranger. “Pardon us, but lunch here tends to wait for no man, nor starved pregnant witch.” It was with a nod of her head that they two went around him and went over to the head table.


He watched as they sat down side by side. Hermione was so content she was glowing with it. Snape, on the other hand, seemed like his usual self. That is until the little witch he was married to had taken his hand and pressed it to the bump at her middle. A look of joy came to his face, as it was clear that the baby was moving. Kissing her temple, Severus murmured something that had the both of them laughing like school children and getting right back up again.


“It’s a mystery to me how they don’t have more than the four children,” Minerva said with a slight smile as she stepped next to Harry.


“They have four children?” Harry inquired in shock only to receive a sour look from the headmistress.


“This next one will make five,” Minerva stated. “So are you ready for the students arrival tonight?”


“As ready as I’ll ever be,” he muttered, still thinking about the lesson planning he had to get done by the next day.


“Oh relax, my boy,” the headmistress told him. “It’s never as difficult as you think it is starting out. Once you find your footing, everything will be as right as rain, I’m sure.”


***


All the staff attended the first night’s dinner and sorting, whether they wanted to or not. Harry, still too caught up with planning, nearly thought to do so, but it was Hagrid who came over and walked him to the supper with a joke or two, not to mention the first warm greeting he had in awhile.


For the most part Harry had tuned out most of what was happening. He nearly smiled at the sight of WWW products being covertly passed about by some of the students. The first years were brought in with Hermione in the lead, holding the Sorting Hat.


She sat it down on the stool, turning to face the students. Hermione explained to the first years what the hat was and how it did its job. She smiled, telling them all that no matter what house they were sorted into that they should be proud. Stepping aside, Severus took over as she went to sit down.


The Sorting Hat cleared its throat and began to sing. The more Harry listened, the more shock he felt. He knew that voice. His eyes went straight to Hermione only to find her watching him. Everything snapped into place. From the voice that radiated from the hat to how its very syntax radiated how Hermione sounded when she became the guardian of Slytherin. His eyes went back to the hat the moment it finished singing only to watch as its pitch black eyes turned slowly onto him. He should have known, Harry thought, given how the hat could read the very soul of the individual whose head it rested. This was the same one who judged who went into what house. So wouldn’t it also make sense the Sorting Hat would also be responsible for cleaning up whatever mess might have a house in turmoil?


“But why be responsible for only one house?” Harry unknowingly asked weakly out loud.


“He’s the guardian of all the houses, Harry,” Hermione said quietly next to him as the sorting continued. “I wondered if you would figure it out.”


“But why…?”


“Like I said, he’s guardian to all the houses,” she repeated. “It was only the Slytherins that found out all of the Hat’s duties as it were. And now, Mr. Potter, you know.” Hermione got up and went back to her spot once again.


Harry looked back over to the Sorting Hat once again. The pitch black eyes were still watching him. Merlin, he thought, it had been a hat? A part of him wanted to go straight off to the headmistress to tell her everything that had happened and how the Sorting Hat was tied into it all. But it was then that the logical, thoroughly rational side of himself that stopped the idea cold in its tracks.


Who in their right mind would believe that tale? It wasn’t as if he had any sort of proof to offer and pensive memories of other pensive recollections were often times called into question due to it being second hand information.


The Sorting Hat laughed quietly to itself, gave Harry a wink, and turned back to do the only job that most everyone thought it had. If the hat had been allowed to do so, it would have done it years before when Voldemort had first shown his true colors. But Dumbledore had been determined that the boy could change. And Tom did, unfortunately it was for the worse. Then, Merlin help it, there was the prophecy! But finally the Sorting Hat had been permitted to do what he had been spelled to do. His work was now finished. He looked onto the fresh faces of the new first years with the glorious thought that the sorting would be the only thing it would be doing for many, many years to come.


The end


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