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SIYE Time:23:04 on 28th March 2024
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Bonds of Blood and Magic
By Duelist

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Category: Post-HBP
Characters:Harry/Ginny, Severus Snape
Genres: Action/Adventure, Drama, Fluff, Romance
Warnings: Mild Language, Mild Sexual Situations, Violence/Physical Abuse
Rating: PG-13
Reviews: 932
Summary: A few days before Bill and Fleur's wedding, Harry vanished. Two weeks later, Ginny disappeared, also alone and without a trace.

Someone has stepped out of the shadows for a moment, moved some pieces on the board, and changed the rules of the game.
Hitcount: Story Total: 406640; Chapter Total: 15467
Awards: View Trophy Room




Author's Notes:
Happy Christmas! I had hoped to have this out just a bit sooner, but ... it grew.




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Fred rolled over and rubbed at his eyes when he heard the rooster crowing. He stumbled down the stairs, grumbling to himself. Sunday mornings, he usually liked to have a lie-in like everybody else, but it was his turn to take over guard duty from Charlie, so he forced himself out of his warm bed and down the stairs. He couldn’t bring himself to regret staying up with Hermione, in spite of his fatigue. Considering how she’d reacted, he thought it would be worthwhile to come up with other good news to tell her, though he wasn’t certain what he could say that would adequately compare to Harry and Ginny’s pending visit.

“Oi, Fred!” Charlie called as he entered the kitchen. “Wipe that stupid grin off your face. You’re supposed to be paying attention in here, not daydreaming.”

Fred ducked Charlie’s swipe at the back of his head as he passed him to get to the stove, where he made himself a cup of tea.

“Anything happen?” he asked.

“No,” Charlie replied, “though Ron mentioned that you were up rather late,” he trailed off with a suggestive wink.

Fred grimaced. He’d forgotten Ron was on the midnight watch. The enchanted map of the farm would have clearly shown that Hermione hadn’t left the attic until after twelve. Well after twelve, in fact. He smiled again at the thought, but then moved back to the table.

“How upset was he?” Fred asked as he sat down across the table from Charlie.

“More resigned than upset, I’d say.”

Fred nodded. “He hasn’t spoken to me in … oh, weeks, except for Order business, or guard duty.”

Charlie quirked an eyebrow. “You expected anything different? He’s fancied her for who knows how long, Fred. Ages, I’d say.”

Fred leaned back in his chair and waved his hand helplessly. “Well, yeah, you’re right. But …”

“Right. He acted an immature prat, and now he has to pay the price of watching her be with someone with slightly more sense.”

Fred sighed. “That was why I didn’t say anything to her at first,” he admitted.

Charlie just shook his head. “Don’t go fouling this up just because you feel bad for Ron. If you like her, and she likes you, then do the smart thing and go with it. Ron will just have to deal with it. Do him some good, really. Maybe next time someone comes along that he likes, he won’t fiddle around for years and waste his chance.” Charlie trailed off, a thoughtful look on his face.

“Sounds like the voice of experience, Charlie. Got something to confess?”

“Not to you, no,” Charlie said with a look that warned Fred not to push it.

“Hey, is there any food around?” asked Fred, changing the subject.

Charlie laughed. “You know no one will be about to make breakfast for a while yet. It’s Sunday. We eat at nine.”

Fred snorted. “Right, Charlie. Mum would never let us go hungry. Where’s the hamper?”

“Ron pretty much polished it off,” Charlie admitted with a shrug as he pulled an empty hamper from under the table and showed it to Fred. “There was hardly a thing left when I came on.”

Fred groaned and dropped his head tiredly to the table.

“Well, then, I’m off to bed,” said Charlie, suddenly chipper as he jumped up from his chair.

“Charlie, wait,” Fred called, sitting up. “I actually needed to tell you something.”

Charlie stopped in the doorway and waited for Fred to speak.

“Harry says he’s bringing Ginny to visit. I’m not sure when, but it should be soon, maybe even today.”

“That’s great, it’s about time they came … wait, visit?” Charlie questioned.

“Yeah, they’re not staying, just visiting. Anyway, like I said, it’ll have to be soon, because he said that we can’t tell anyone they’re coming, or have guests, or leave once we know that they’re coming. Only the family who lives here can know we’ve seen them. If we don’t respect that, they’ll leave.”

Charlie gaped at Fred. “Why would Ginny need to …” he said slowly, but then he stopped. “Harry’d better explain himself a bit better once they get here, or mum’s going to pitch another one.” He shook his head. “Speaking of that, I don’t envy you telling mum and dad.”

Fred’s face fell. “Thanks.”

“No problem, mate. ‘Night.”

***

Nearly an hour after Fred took over the guard duty, other residents of the house found their way into the kitchen. The Grangers had been in the habit of rising early together for many years. Fred was more than accustomed by that time to seeing them, up and taking on the day, between six and seven nearly every morning. Sundays they enjoyed making breakfast.

Miranda Granger started gathering the cooking pans for breakfast, while John set the fire in the old woodstove.

“Before the two of you get too far, I have some very important news to tell everyone. Would you mind terribly if I asked to you have my parents and Aunt Muriel come down here?” Fred asked. “That way I can tell the five of you, without having to repeat myself too much.”

John nodded and said, “No problem, Fred. Should I get Ron, Hermione, and Charlie, too?”

“No, I already told Hermione and Charlie. Just let Ron sleep. I’ll catch him up later.”

John left the room, while Miranda continued preparing to lay out breakfast for the house.

It wasn’t very long before John returned with Molly, Arthur, and Muriel. All three were wrapped in dressing gowns.

Molly slumped quietly into a chair near Fred, while Muriel made herself a cup of tea before sitting at the head of the table.

“What is it, son?” asked Arthur. He leaned over the table and checked the map, but didn’t see anything untoward. “Nothing’s happened, has it?”

“Not yet, no,” Fred said slowly. He mental cursed Harry’s paranoid withholding of information, but soldiered on to tell them what he knew. “Harry sent me a message late last night. He wants to bring Ginny for a visit soon, and he wanted me to tell everyone … there are … that … well, they have some rules for us.”

“Rules? What rules? Why are there rules?” stammered Molly. “I want my daughter home, not some damned rules!”

“Well, Mum, that’s the hard part. I can only tell you that there are rules, and if we don’t all follow them, they’ll leave. And they might not come back for a long time, in that case.”

Arthur put his arms around Molly and whispered something in her ear. She nodded stiffly, but said nothing.

“Well, of course, Ginevra and her friend can visit. They are welcome to stay as long as they wish, Frederick,” Muriel declaimed calmly.

Fred waited a moment. When no one else seemed to have anything to say, he continued. “Basically, no one who is here and knows that they’re coming can leave until after they’ve gone. We can’t tell anyone else that they’re coming, and … they don’t trust anyone else, so if someone else comes before they get here, I’m to tell them and they’ll postpone or call off the visit. If someone comes while they’re here, I expect that they’ll leave immediately. And whenever they do decide to leave, that’s it. Visit is done, they’re going.”

“What do you mean, they’ll leave? Is Ginny just going to go, too? Where on earth will they go? Where have they been staying?” Molly’s rapid-fire style wasn’t quite Hermione’s habitual breathless list of questions, but she more than made up for it with the natural gravitas she gained from being Fred’s mother.

“Mum, I … all I know is, if they want to leave, they’ll do it, and there’s not much any of us will be able to do about it. I have no idea where they’ve been staying, or where they’ll go when they leave, but I have no doubt that they will leave. The more we push them, the sooner it will be.”

“Why don’t they want anyone to know that they’re here?” asked Arthur, who looked a bit perplexed.

“They don’t trust the Order, Dad, so if anyone outside family knows they’re coming, or finds out while they’re here, they’ll consider the farm compromised. They won’t come back. At least, I don’t think that they will.”

“But what about George? What about Bill?” Molly asked. “Why can’t they come?”

“Oh, George doesn’t have to stay at Angelina’s. I told Harry we expect George for dinner, after all, and he said that was fine, but … erm … we can’t send him a message telling him to show up. Someone would ask him why, and that would blow it.”

Molly blinked for a moment as she processed that. “And Bill?”

“Well … they saw him just the other week, and … he was rather rude to them, so … when they got fed up with him, they left us both standing there with our mouths hanging open. I don’t expect that they’d thank me for getting him here.”

Fred shrugged. “Really, that’s everything I know. I suspect they’ll come today. I’ve already told Hermione and Charlie, so I’ll just write a note for Ron, so he’ll know whenever he wakes up.”

He looked around at the stunned faces of his audience and decided that it really couldn’t have turned out any better. No one was yelling at him, at least not yet.

“So, when’s breakfast? I’m starved. Ron emptied the hamper before Charlie even went on guard.” He grinned at them sheepishly.

“You interrupted me making anything, Fred,” quipped Miranda.

“I didn’t mean that you had to wait!” he protested.

“Well, I was about to start the scones, but I could fry you some eggs first.”

“You are an angel of mercy,” Fred proclaimed, falling to his knees at Hermione’s mother’s feet.

Miranda blushed. “The elves let me cook one morning a week. Hardly makes me an angel,” she muttered, but otherwise ignored Fred’s antics and resumed her weekly wrestling match with the woodstove, aided by her husband, while Arthur and Muriel drifted out of the kitchen.

Molly hung back when Arthur left to work in the barn, and moved over to sit next to Fred.

“What aren’t you telling me, Fred? They’re acting very strange, and so are you,” she said with a shining glint to her eyes.

“What do you mean, Mum?” he hedged. “What … what do you want to ask me?”

Her lips flattened into a firm line. “You know very well what I mean. I … I don’t even know where to begin!”

“How can I … if you’re not going to ask me anything, how can I answer you? I’m not supposed to, anyway. Hopefully, they’ll answer whatever questions you have when they get here. I can’t. You’re just going to have to talk to them,” he said, looking away.

“Hmmm,” she muttered, glaring at him.

Fred sighed. When he was twelve, she’d caught him turning Ron’s trousers into a pink tutu with her wand. It was the same withering glare she’d given him then, and made him feel just about as small. “Mum, just … even if I can answer whatever you want ask, I’m not supposed to say. I haven’t even told George, or Hermione. Just wait and talk to them. They want to explain things themselves. I don’t want to speak out of turn.”

She didn’t say anything else, but her continued pained glare spoke volumes.

Fred sighed again, gave her a hug, and went back to looking at the map.

***

Ginny burst out laughing after they appeared in the center of a circle of three stones. It was quite odd to feel like she was being squeezed through a rubber medical tube while her lips were locked to Harry’s.

Harry glanced around warily at the large standing stones before asking, “Where are we?”

“Avebury,” then seeing Harry’s blank look, she elaborated, “It’s in Wiltshire.”

“It’s … a henge,” he stated, placing his hand on one of the stones as he looked up at its mass and height.

“Yeah. Aunt Muriel is kind of in charge of it. Sort of. Comes of where her farm is, and how long her family has lived here.”

“I thought Stonehenge was in Wiltshire,” he said, looking curiously at the weathered stones. “But this doesn’t look like …”

“No, it’s not Stonehenge. It’s Caer Abiri. They call the village Avebury. Muggles call the stones Avebury, too, but that’s just … wrong. This inner circle is called the Cove.

“Stonehenge is in Wiltshire,” Ginny gestured with her right arm as she twisted slightly to indicate the direction, “but it’s about twenty miles south of here. Caer Abiri is bigger, even though none of its stones are quite as tall as the Giant’s Dance. In fact, this is the biggest henge in Britain. People just know Stonehenge better because it’s out on that plain. Kind of an obvious landmark, that. This one, though it doesn’t get near the attention, is a far more powerful place. It’s right on the St. Michael ley line, so …” she shrugged and started expounding on the history of the landmark.

“Some people say it was the ancient Druids who built the henges, but we don’t really know. Anyway, there’s a number of large henges in this area. Aunt Muriel’s family, the Thurstons, have lived here for generations, at least three hundred years. Their farm begins just outside the henge, but the house is about a quarter mile further,” she said as she pointed northeast through the gap in the stones encircling them.

Harry peered blankly in the direction she pointed. The bank of the henge blocked his view of the farm.

“Oh, you’ll see it from the road,” she reassured him when he looked back at her questioningly. “Ready?” Ginny asked. She handed him his crutches which she had removed from their bag while he was distracted. He hesitated to take them until she said, “The trees will block most of our approach, so no one will see.”

Harry shrugged. The terrain looked mostly level. “Alright, then. Why did you bring us here instead of the farm, though?” he asked as Ginny led him from the double-layered stone circle towards the farm.

She laughed. “Well, I wasn’t sure where the apparition point is, since they’ve put up new wards. I didn’t want to splinch us bouncing off a ward I didn’t know about, but I didn’t want to apparate into the village, either.” She glanced at the village which was somewhat intermixed with the ancient stones on the far side of the henge, some distance away.

“We used to play hide and seek here all the time. That was my favorite hiding place,” she said, gesturing back towards the smaller stone circle they’d arrived in.

Harry stopped and turned to look behind them. Only two stones of the three remained visible. None of the dozen or so that had surrounded the Cove were visible, though a few of the thirty outer stones were. He looked at Ginny curiously.

“What is that? Some kind of ward?” he asked as he painted a detection rune in the air with his fingertip. He grunted at the shimmering result.

“Yeah, fair few. Muggle repelling charms and such. The Druid priests and their followers have spent an awful amount of effort repairing what’s been damaged or dismantled by the Muggles in recent centuries, not to mention all these charms and wards to conceal what they’ve done and what it really looks like. Now, from a distance, you see it as it would be if they hadn’t ever touched it, and the Muggles don’t see any of the repairs. It was always a great place for hide-and-seek. My brothers couldn’t even see the stones I was hiding behind until they got close.”

Harry smiled. “That would make the game more interesting.”

They continued walking towards the farm. As they approached the outside edge of the henge, the large standing stones of the outer circle appeared before them. Opting not to attempt to navigate the rather deep ditch and steep outer bank, they followed the stones to the road where they could cross on level ground. Once successfully past the henge, they turned back to see the monument in full.

“That’s pretty cool,” Harry admitted.

Ginny stepped close and wrapped her arm around his waist and leaned her head against his shoulder as she, too, studied the stone circles. “It is.”

She turned to look at the farm. “The farm’s outer fields start here.”

Harry turned as well. Freshly plowed ground stretched before them. There was no fence around the field, or any real boundary marker, just the dirt road, a bit of space, and then the plowed and harrowed earth. He could sense only some simple wards, and, concerned, again traced a rune in the air. The wards were tissue-thin, transparent, almost not even there. Incredulous at the result, he turned to Ginny with a grimace.

Ginny answered his unasked question, “I don’t think they would have put these fields under the Fidelius. Aunt Muriel hires Muggles sometimes.”

“Why? Doesn’t she use magic?” he asked, frowning.

“Well, sure, of course, but … never on these fields. Nothing motorized either. She says it would disturb the natural magic in the area. Something about ‘Earth energy,’ and ‘balance in the order.’ I never really understood what she meant, honestly, but … it seems to have been a family tradition, at least.”

They walked along the road for awhile before they came to a road that crossed the outer fields. Much stronger wards pulled at them as they approached the inner fields. “They’ll know we’re here now,” Ginny commented.

“If they didn’t before,” Harry added. He felt Bill and Arthur’s familiar magic woven thick through the air, and sighed in relief. The flimsy outer wards had not engendered any confidence that anyone would be safe here, but he could already tell that the inner wards were solid without directly analyzing them.

Once across the inner fields, Ginny led Harry around the tree line to the drive. He stopped and wordlessly handed her his crutches.

“You’re too stubborn for your own good, you know,” she said as she took them and shoved them in their bag.

Harry steadied himself by taking Ginny’s hand once she’d slung the rucksack back over her shoulder. She was right, of course. He was stubborn. He needed to be. Luckily for him, she was stubborn, too.

He only smiled in response to her comment.

She scowled back at him.

Harry pulled her closer and kissed her forehead, and then down her cheek to her lips where he stayed until the scowl was gone, and then turned back towards their objective. Though no one was in the garden, Ginny didn’t seem to be in any hurry to start moving again as she leaned into his side and wrapped her arm around his waist. Grateful for the respite from walking, Harry studied the house, still some distance away.

They stood there for some minutes, just looking things over.

The house was a large stone structure with a thatched roof, paired with a matching barn that was only slightly smaller than the house. The whole scene seemed straight out of the seventeenth century. Chickens and geese strode confidently about the house and barn, pecking, scratching, and chasing each other over their small dramas. A small black dog chased a cat from under the porch, but the cat dashed up a tree by the house and huddled in a high fork, above the roofline.

The coin in Harry’s pocket heated up after they’d been standing there for a while, so he dug out the coin.

HP — what r u waiting 4? FW

Harry laughed and showed Ginny the message. “Looks like they’re getting restless in there,” he said quietly.

FW — any guests? HP

HP — no. rules followed. get in here! FW

FW — k. HP

“Shall we, then?” Ginny asked, since she’d read the entire conversation over his shoulder.

He nodded, and together, they resumed their walk toward the house.

***

A lonely white owl sat staring out an upper bedroom window, not really seeing what it was looking at. In the distance, it saw a pair of people appear on the roadway leading to the house, but did not pay their appearance nor approach any attention. Not, that is, until they were nearly within the yard proper of the house.

Then, her gaze sharpened, and she dove out the window, her wings cupped nearly to her sides as she dropped through the air.

***

Hand in hand, they walked through increasingly stronger layers of wards towards the main house, towards their family. Harry leaned on Ginny from time to time but was mostly able to cross the distance unassisted.

“Thank you for putting up with me on this,” Harry said, “I just want to seem as normal as possible.”

“And what have I said about normal, Mr. Potter?” Ginny asked, archly.

“It’s boring,” Harry answered with a smirk.

Ginny snorted, “Life with you is never boring, Harry.”

He laughed. “Perhaps that is because I don’t do ‘normal.’”

“Incapable of it you mean,” she teased, squeezing his hand. “And of course, I mean that in the best way possible, love,” she said with a laugh.

“Sure, you do,” Harry grumbled.

While they stood there, a white blur appeared from nowhere and whipped past their heads, nearly clipping Harry.

Harry and Ginny both flinched and ducked in reaction, turning to see where the blur had gone. Harry got his head turned just in time to catch the wing of an enraged Snowy Owl across his face.

With a loud squawk, Hedwig again descended out of the sky and landed on Harry’s shoulder. She nipped his ear quite hard, then made a strange crooning sound and rubbed her head against his face, head and neck.

Harry ran his hands over her, smoothing her feathers. “Hedwig!”

The white owl continued to croon at his attentive touches.

“I’ve been so worried about you,” he said softly as he cupped the back of her head and rubbed is thumb under the side of her face. “I’m sorry you couldn’t find me.”

Hedwig leapt out of his arms and shrieked so loudly it hurt his ears.

“Ow!” Harry yelped as she deliberately clawed at him, leaving him with two swipes on his chest before she flew back across the garden and into an open bedroom window above them.

Harry stared up at the window in shock, unable to comprehend the actions of his bird. He could still hear her shrieking and barking as she told the world just how disgusted she was with it. In the midst of the cacophony, Hermione’s head appeared in the window, a confused expression on her face.

“Harry!” she shouted when she saw them. “Ginny! You’re here!” The window slammed shut, cutting off most of the noise, and Hermione vanished.

As Harry rubbed at his chest in disbelief, Ginny said, “Well, I guess they all know we’re here now. You alright, then?”

“Yeah, sure. Ruddy bird,” he muttered.

“That was certainly not normal,” Ginny pointed out. “I think she’s unhappy with you.”

Harry laughed half-heartedly, still staring at the window, and they continued the short distance to the house. As soon as they stepped up on the porch, the front door burst open and a tall, somewhat heavy older witch strode energetically towards them with a smile of welcome lighting up her face.

“Ginevra!” she cried as they stepped towards each other.

Ginny smiled as she clasped both of her hands with the older woman. She tipped her head sideways as she was kissed on the cheek. Harry was amused. It seemed to be an expected greeting between the pair.

They stepped back and released hands.

“Who’s this, then?” the old woman asked brusquely as she turned her face towards Harry, her eyebrow raised slightly.

Ginny turned towards Harry and reached towards him with her hand as she said, “Aunt Muriel, this is Harry Potter. Harry, this is my Great-Aunt Muriel.”

Harry smiled and reached for Muriel’s hand just as Hermione burst through the door, her blouse buttons askew, hair a mess, and wearing no shoes.

“Harry! Ginny!” she cried as she stumbled across the threshold and threw herself at them, charging right past Muriel.

They barely caught her as she nearly fell off the porch. Harry winced and took a step back to keep from falling himself, leaving Ginny to bear the brunt of Hermione’s weight alone.

“Hermione,” she grunted out in a mixed greeting and protest, while helping her to regain her balance.

Once Hermione was back on her bare feet, Ginny stepped back to Harry and put her left arm behind him, inside his jacket, while he steadied himself by placing his arm over her shoulder with a carefully casual air. Meanwhile, Ginny pressed the knuckles of her hand firmly into the muscles on the center-left of his back, hoping by the pressure to keep it from knotting up. If it did, they both knew that he wouldn’t be able to keep walking at a normal gait.

“It is so good to see you!” stammered Hermione, her face red from embarrassment over her fall.

Ginny let her right hand rest lightly on Harry’s arm, giving no indication that she was doing anything unusual as she smiled as pleasantly as she could at Hermione.

“It’s good to see you, too,” said Harry after a moment.

An awkward silence took hold of the group and began to lengthen for several moments, as they all stared at each other until Muriel stepped in.

“Isn’t this a happy day?” she smiled at the three teenagers. “Come in, come in. No need to stand out here in the cold. Everyone is waiting inside,” she said as she ushered them back toward the door.

Harry nodded and stepped forward with Ginny, continuing to hold on to her as he walked. He held out his unoccupied left hand to Muriel and gave her a hesitant nod as he passed her. “Thank you for having us.”

“It’s a pleasure, dear,” she answered graciously, taking his hand. “You are both quite welcome,” she assured them.

“Ginny!” exclaimed Molly as they came through the door. She wrapped them both in her arms, sobbing and trying to talk at the same time. “Been so worried … both gone.”

When Harry started squirming in discomfort, Arthur expertly detached Molly’s arms from him. Patting Harry’s shoulder, he said, “Thank you for bringing her home,” in a choked voice as he pulled Ginny into his own arms.

“Daddy,” Ginny cried, before dissolving into tears.

Harry stood there, stunned at his wife’s sudden loss of composure. It wasn’t long before Molly’s arms encircled him once again.

“Oh, Harry, dear! We were so worried. Are you alright?”

Harry flushed and patted her back awkwardly. “I’m sorry I worried you, Mrs. Weasley,” he said weakly.

She let go of him abruptly and studied him closely. She patted his cheek and touched the frosted tips of his short, spiky hair. Her forehead creased as she tutted in disapproval before she said, “You’re much too thin, dear. We’ll work on that. Breakfast will be ready soon.”

She turned back to Ginny. “Let’s get you cleaned up, dear,” she said as she began mopping at her face with a handkerchief.

“Mum,” Ginny protested, as she pulled the handkerchief away, “I’m fine. I can do it myself.”

“Of course you can, dear.” Molly pushed Ginny’s hair behind her ears and took her face in her hands. “You’re wearing too much makeup. You’re such a pretty girl, you don’t need it at all, and what have you done to your hair? Is this a glamour?” she asked as she pulled her wand.

Ginny stepped back as she protested, “Mum, stop. It’s not a glamour. I had it cut and colored. We’re hiding in the Muggle world and my hair was just too recognizable the way it was.”

“But you both look so much older,” Molly complained. Her eyes started to show the wrinkles at the sides, and her voice grew strained. “Your clothes, your hair, you don’t …”

Ginny ignored her mother’s distress. “That’s the idea, Mum. We don’t look the same. Besides, I like it.”

Molly looked ready to protest further, but took a deep breath, nodded, and held out her hand for Ginny’s black wool coat as she said, “I know you just arrived, but I need to get to the kitchen to help with breakfast.” She grabbed Ginny into another hug. “Oh, I can’t believe you’re here. I can’t bear to let you go.”

Ginny looked at Harry briefly before saying, “Why don’t I help with breakfast, Mum?”

Molly loosened her hold enough to look at her daughter, “Really, dear, you don’t have to.”

“Of course, I will, Mum. It’ll give us a chance to talk. I’ll just clean up a bit first.” She turned and walked down the hall.

Molly began ushering Harry to a chair, and seeing his hesitant look back at the direction Ginny had gone, confidently said, “She’ll be fine. Come have some tea. I’ll just take your coat,” and held her hands out expectantly.

Divested of his brown calfskin jacket, Harry watched, bemused, while Molly banished it along with Ginny’s coat. He obediently sat and took the cup and saucer Muriel handed to him. She sat across from him, straight and tall, a small smile on her face. She seemed quietly amused by his discomfort. Hermione was slumped on a nearby couch, staring at him in apparent shock. Her eyes were unusually bright. He smiled awkwardly at both women, but grew uncomfortable with their scrutiny and looked around the room to avoid having to look at them anymore.

It was an elegant room, with high, carved ceilings, and was filled with dark wood furniture. Despite its formal, old-fashioned air, it retained a comfortable, lived-in atmosphere. While it lacked the chaotic charm of the Burrow, it had a pleasant charm of its own. Harry felt as though he had stepped back in time. It was in such a well-maintained condition that the house could have been used as a living museum of its time period.

He shrugged. Whatever it was that made the house so pleasant, he liked it. He looked for Arthur, not wanting to engage his strangely behaving female companions in conversation, but he seemed to have gone. Fred stood peering in from a doorway, a piece of parchment in hand. He nodded to Harry and said, “Good show, mate.”

Hermione’s parents looked out from the same doorway, both wearing aprons. Harry waved at them. “Good to see you, Fred, Mr. and Mrs. Granger.”

“You, too,” Mr. Granger replied.

“We’ll greet you properly once breakfast is ready,” Mrs. Granger assured Harry before turning away.

Fred winked at him as Molly approached the same doorway, Ginny in tow.

“Fred Weasley, why didn’t you warn us they were coming?” Molly demanded. “Surely you saw them on the map.”

Fred, not at all apologetic, shrugged, “I thought it would be a good surprise.”

“Thank goodness Hermione has some sense,” Molly murmured as they all vanished, into what Harry assumed must be the kitchen.

He turned back to his tea thoughtfully and took a sip.

“How long will you be staying, Harry?” Muriel asked him.

“Erm, well, we can’t stay long, but we’d like to stay for dinner, and possibly overnight if you have room.”

Muriel paused at his last comment, but then answered, “There is room. The two of you should stay longer, if you can. We would all be happy to have you.”

“Thank you, but we have appointments tomorrow morning, so we’ll need to leave by eight.”

“What!? Harry, you just got here!” Hermione exclaimed. “Couldn’t you put things off and stay a bit longer?”

“No, I’m sorry, but we really need to go.”

“What do you have to do?” Muriel asked.

“Couple of things. Erm … we have physical training, first.”

“Is that what you’ve been doing all this time? Lifting weights?” Hermione asked with disbelief clear in her voice.

Harry choked on his tea. His coughs resulted in a mess of hot tea on his cream-colored, v-necked cashmere sweater. As he patted somewhat ineffectually at the tea on his sweater for a moment, he replied, “Erm, no. Well, yes, I do lift … we do lift … there are weights involved in some of it,” at this point, a look of irritation crossed his features and he waved his right hand over the spreading damp spot. It promptly disappeared, leaving his sweater dry, spotless, and pristine. He continued as if nothing unusual had happened, “but we’ve been doing all kinds of exercise, and studying all kinds of subjects. Physical training is just part of it.”

Hermione’s eyes were wide as she stared at him. Muriel’s face was more controlled, but she was just as stunned as Hermione by his casual wandless control.

Hermione finally picked something to focus on, and asked, “Studying? What subjects?” as she eyed him suspiciously.

Harry thought for a moment. “Mostly, the same kinds of things we all studied at Hogwarts: Charms, Defense, Transfiguration, Potions, History, Ancient Runes, Muggle Studies, Arithmancy. We haven’t done much with Herbology, Creatures, Divination or Astronomy, though they do come up from time to time in other subjects. The biggest change is some advanced studies in Magical Theory, Healing and Wards. Those were a little bit difficult to start with.”

Hermione sputtered, “You didn’t take half of those subjects at Hogwarts. Really, Harry, Runes, Arithmancy? You expect me to believe that you’ve been studying the past four months. Who is training you in advanced subjects?”

“I’m not saying I’m great at them, Hermione, but Ginny did take some of those classes. She helps me and I help her. Mostly we study on our own. We have books. Perhaps you’ve heard of them?”

Hermione stared at him in shock.

“Your efforts are impressive, especially since you have been doing it on your own,” Muriel said as she inclined her head toward Harry. “Your friends here are similarly engaged. I require three hours of study each day of all of the children.”

Harry tried unsuccessfully to smother the smirk that crossed his face at hearing his friends called children. “That’s nice,” he commented once he regained some control. He focused on Muriel rather than Hermione, who seemed to be turning colors.

“Hermione’s always been keen on studying. Do you find it difficult to limit her to just three hours?” he asked with a wicked gleam in his eye.

“I don’t mind if she studies more, as long as it doesn’t interfere with her chores. Hermione is an excellent example of industry for the boys.”

Hermione started blinking her eyes rapidly, and turned away from Muriel and Harry.

Realizing he’d hurt her feelings, Harry said sincerely, “She always has been for me.”

Hermione relaxed somewhat at his words, and seemed to study him out of the corner of her eye while she wiped at her face surreptitiously.

None of them said anything else for a time. Harry sipped nervously at his tea, uncertain what to say or do with himself. Muriel said nothing more, but seemed content to just watch them both over her tea.

“Breakfast is ready,” Miranda called from the kitchen door a short time later, breaking the awkward silence in the sitting room.

Harry was relieved. Ginny appeared as he moved to get to his feet and held out her hands to help him up.

“I’ll show you where to wash up, Harry,” she said, holding his hand firmly and leading him down the hall.

“Are you alright?” he asked her, somewhat alarmed at the amount of anxiety he felt from her.

“Sure, mum’s just been asking about where we’ve been and trying to get me to promise to stay. I haven’t really answered her and she’s somewhat annoyed, so I was getting annoyed, as well.” She seemed to shake herself a bit, and changed the subject. “What about you? Hermione was glaring daggers at you.”

Harry sighed. “I know. She’s not happy with me. She asked about what we’ve been studying and doesn’t seem to believe that we actually have. Muriel didn’t help. I think she enjoyed seeing us both squirm.”

Ginny laughed, “She always has.” She leaned down to retrieve their bag. “She has an odd sense of humor.

Harry grimaced and mumbled, “Yeah.”

Ginny looked at him sharply. “Are you alright? Do you need something before we join the others?” she asked in concern.

“Erm, that might be good.”

Ginny deftly pulled a potion vial from the bag. Harry drank the green liquid and returned the empty vial to her, sighing in relief.

“Better?” she asked as she tossed the empty vial back in the bag. “You were limping,” she said pointedly.

Harry nodded then silently cast a notice-me-not and a tracking charm on their bag as Ginny set it down in an out of the way corner in the loo.

Ginny looked at him curiously.

“Your mum banished our coats. I like that coat, you know. I don’t have a clue where she sent them, and I don’t want her to do that to the rest of our stuff,” he explained. “Might need another potion.”

Ginny laughed as she pulled him towards the dining room. “Good idea. She’s probably hoping we won’t leave without our things.”

“Guess she doesn’t realize we’d summon them and leave in a heartbeat without looking back.”

“Yeah.”

They entered the room and were subjected to more hugs from Hermione’s parents and Fred. Ron stumbled into the room in his pajamas with a dumbfounded look on his face.

“Har-ry … G-ginny,” he stammered, still half asleep. Harry smiled and hugged him.

“How are you, Ron?”

“Good. You?”

Harry shrugged. “It’s great to see you.” He clapped Ron on the shoulder, then let go of him, allowing Ginny access to her brother.

Ron picked her up and swung her around. “Don’t you ever scare me like that again,” he ordered, choking up.

Ginny smiled at him, her eyes watering a bit. She pounded on his shoulders. “Are you ever going to put me down?” she asked laughing. “I thought you came down for breakfast.”

Ron chuckled and lowered her to the floor.

“Harry, dear, why don’t you sit there, next to Ron?” Molly gestured to the other side of the table. “Ginny, you’re here by Muriel.

Seeing that they were being ushered to separate seats, Harry rolled his eyes and ignored Molly. After pulling out the chair next to Muriel for Ginny, he sat down beside her saying, “I’ll just sit here with Ginny. I’m kind of used to her now.”

Both Ron’s and Molly’s faces fell at his choice, but everyone else at the table laughed. Fred sat down in the chair between Harry and Hermione and Arthur moved around the table to sit between Molly and Ron.

Muriel rang a silver bell that was by her plate and food appeared in the center of the table.

Harry’s eyes widened. Ginny leaned closer to him and whispered, “House elves,” as she served him some mash, a scone, and some fruit.

He nodded in reply as he poured tea for them both. Then he asked, “How many?”

Muriel overheard and answered, “Oh, yes, two, Minnie and Nod.”

With two soft pops, the house elves appeared. “You remember Ginevra,” Muriel said, addressing them, “meet her friend, Harry Potter.”

Harry nodded to the elves. “Hello.”

They said nothing, but bowed and held their position until Muriel said, “That is all,” dismissing them.

Harry expected Hermione to make a comment, but instead, she frantically whispered something to Fred, who was making noncommittal noises in return. Her eyes kept darting between him and Ginny, so Harry guessed she wasn’t talking about house elf rights after all. Though curious, he decided to eat while he could and grabbed his spoon.

He hadn’t taken but two bites when Molly said, “Here, Harry, you didn’t get any eggs, or bangers, or rashers,” as she served him some of each to go with the scone and mash on his plate.

At the same time, from down the table by Fred, Hermione asked, “Where have you been doing all the studying you were telling me about, Harry?”

Harry set his spoon back on the table and exchanged a glance with Ginny. He was suddenly glad Ginny had insisted they eat a bit at the cottage before coming, because it looked as though he wasn’t going to get to eat breakfast without some additional conversation. He still had trouble eating some foods in public, but trying to talk at the same time invariably lead to a mess regardless of what he had on his plate, so he’d learned to separate the two activities.

He swallowed carefully and addressed Molly first. “Everything is wonderful, Mrs.Weasley, thank you, everyone who cooked.” He looked down the table at Hermione’s parents. They smiled at him warmly in reply.

“I won’t thank Fred, even though I know he was in the kitchen. I’m pretty sure if he’d had anything to do with this meal, I’d have turned into a canary by now.”

The half hearted laughter that met his response died out quickly. No one was eating anymore. They all just looked at him and Ginny expectantly.

“You’ve been studying, Ginny?” Arthur prompted.

“Sure. We’ve been studying a lot. We need to be prepared and it helps pass the time,” Ginny answered.

“Ginny’s sure been more diligent about it than me. She’s studying seventh year now, more than caught me up.” He grinned at her, his pride obvious.

“Have you really?” Arthur asked Ginny, smiling just a bit.

She nodded in reply, smiling back at him.

“Prepared for what?” Molly asked.

“Well, we are at war,” Ginny pointed out.

Harry added, “But, I hope we’re preparing for life after the war, too, NEWTs and all.”

“But where are you doing this studying and the weight lifting you told me about? You don’t get muscles like those from books,” Hermione said, pointing at Harry’s broad arms and shoulders.

“Weight lifting?” Ron asked, turning to look at Harry more closely.

“Physical training,” Harry clarified, flushing at the attention. “It’s important for Defense to be fit and I needed some help in that department after I got out of hospital.”

“Where?” Hermione asked again.

“At gyms, Hermione. That’s where they have that type of equipment. And we swim in pools. It’s not like there’s just one place. We study wherever we are. We move around a fair bit.”

“Which hospital?” she asked, being more specific.

“Why? Do you want my medical records? Or do you want to pay the bills?” he asked in a snarky tone, plainly irritated.

Hermione flushed, and appeared nearly ready to scream in frustration. Her parents both looked a bit flustered at the turn of tone in the conversation.

“You were in a Muggle hospital?” Arthur asked, intrigued.

“Yes.”

“How was it?” Arthur asked, and was promptly elbowed by his wife.

“Right. I think we’d all like to know where have you been staying, Harry. We’ve been very worried about you both,” he continued, somewhat stiltedly.

“Well, we have used a couple of safehouses, and we were at Grimmauld Place for a bit. I think you knew that.” He saw some nods and continued. “We were on the continent for a couple of months, and we stay in hotels sometimes.”

“Where, Harry?” Hermione pressed.

“Does it really matter, Hermione?” he responded, growing impatient. “We’ve been safe, obviously, or we wouldn’t be here.”

“Could you at least tell us where you’re staying now?” Arthur asked.

“I can’t,” he said unapologetically. “I’m sure you understand. I take our security very seriously.”

“We wouldn’t tell anyone, Harry. How could you think that telling us would compromise your security? We don’t want anyone to be put in danger, least of all you. You should tell us so we can help you more, and so we won’t have to worry so much about you. We have lots of safehouses, and none of those have been compromised,” said Hermione, visibly trying to remain calm and reasonable.

“That’s not what Fred told us,” said Harry just as calmly.

“What did you say, Fred?” she said sharply to him.

Fred was a bit sheepish. “Just that one of the smaller houses got rolled up, and all the people who were there died. But, I did tell him that it was their own fault.”

“Right. Well, whatever they did, I’m sure it was very unfortunate. And I don’t think that any of you would deliberately make a similar mistake, but I’m not going to endanger Ginny or myself. We can’t tell anyone where we are, not even any of you.”

Some members of Harry’s audience appeared angry. Others were, by turns, resigned, dismayed, or pensive.

Ron was one of the latter. “Who’s your secret keeper?” he finally asked. “Couldn’t they tell us?”

Several faces brightened at the idea that Harry and Ginny were under a Fidelius and really couldn’t tell them where they lived.

“Well, I’m sorry, but you’ll never meet our secret keeper,” Harry replied, allowing them to keep that impression.

“Don’t you think you’re being a bit excessive, Harry?” Hermione asked.

“No. The Death Eaters will never touch Ginny. I won’t allow it. If that means that you all think I’m excessive, then fine,” Harry said forcefully.

“But the Death Eaters took Ginny,” Molly stated, confused.

“No, Mum,” Ginny answered. “They had Harry.” She touched his face gently and he turned to look at her.

“When you were taken … Death Eaters …” Molly’s voice trailed off. She seemed to sink in on herself.

“They didn’t get me, though, Mum, and Harry escaped from them to protect me. We both got away, and I’m fine.”

“Why didn’t you come home?” Hermione demanded.

“How could we? Harry needed ...” Ginny glared at Hermione while clinging to Harry’s hand in her lap with both of her hands. “He needed a qualified healer. Even if we could have moved at that point, we weren’t about to try to go back to the Burrow and get caught again trying to get back inside the wards. Good thing we didn’t try anyway, since you’d all left and we didn’t know where you’d gone or where the Order was,” Ginny replied evenly. “We had no owl to send a message. We were just lucky I had Harry’s DA coin with me or we would still be unable to contact you.”

“If you hadn’t left Grimmauld Place,” Hermione began, “we could have…”

“We could have been captured by Death Eaters,” Ginny interrupted.

“It was Moody and Tonks!” said Hermione, her voice rising.

“How was I supposed to know that?” snapped Ginny.

“The whole Order knows where that house is! It could have been any of them!” said Hermione in an exasperated tone, months of frustration coming to the fore.

“Or, it could have been Death Eaters!” Ginny shouted back. “I couldn’t take the risk!”

Harry leaned in slightly touched the side of Ginny’s face with his hand as he said, “Would you both mind calming down a bit? It’s done, and it’s not worth yelling at each other over.”

Ginny closed her eyes and breathed deeply for a moment. “Look,” she said more calmly, “it’s easy to say, ‘They were friends, so you should have stayed.’ But … think about it from our perspective.

“We were hiding in an unsecured location. We knew we might have to leave at a moment’s notice and had plans in place so we could. The wards got breached. It didn’t matter a bit to me who it was, because I couldn’t trust anyone who showed up not to be a Death Eater, or someone under Imperius, or a Death Eater in disguise, or simply to be someone being followed by Death Eaters. I had to get us away, and that’s what I did. What did you expect me to do? Wait around and get us captured on the off chance that it was one of you? Harry was unconscious! I couldn’t take the risk.”

“You are right, Ginny,” Arthur said, speaking softly. “You acted responsibly. You couldn’t have known who was coming.”

Hermione squeaked in protest, but stifled her comment.

Arthur glanced at her for a moment, and then continued, “I don’t understand something though. Why didn’t you just tell Hermione you were there so we could come get you?”

“Harry was getting the treatment he needed from a Healer we trust, and, good as your intentions would have been, I didn’t want that interrupted. I honestly don’t believe that anyone in the Order would have been able to help him at that point, and we don’t trust the Order anyway, so it wasn’t an option.”

“Who gave you the right to decide who could help Harry, or who could see Harry?” Hermione demanded.

“I did,” Harry said quietly.

Arthur looked at him sharply. There was a bit of silence around the table for a few moments before he asked, “Well then, could you explain why you were at Grimmauld Place if you knew it was unsafe?”

“It’s my damn house, Arthur,” Harry said just as quietly as before.

“It wasn’t really unsafe, it just wasn’t the most secure place we had to go,” Ginny jumped in, alarmed both at Harry’s cursing in front of her father, and the simmering tension she felt from him. She moved her left hand to his shoulder and gripped him tightly when he was about to speak. Instead, she continued, “We couldn’t go to St. Mungo’s or any other magical hospital, and a Muggle hospital wasn’t an option until a healer removed the curses on Harry.”

“Curses?” Molly and Miranda asked at the same time. Everyone at the table looked at Harry with concern.

Ginny nodded in answer and continued her explanation, “We needed a magical location that was well hidden, and Grimmauld Place was the only place we could think of to go that we could afford to lose access to. It was already compromised, so if the healer decided to betray us …”

“Or was forced to,” Harry added darkly.

“Right,” Ginny agreed, glancing at Harry, “that location wouldn’t be a loss to us or the Order. It was the best we could do at that time.”

“You said Harry was unconscious,” Hermione started, “but … he contacted me with the coin on his birthday and said he was … safe.” Hermione frowned.

“Well,” Ginny responded, “he was safe. You should have believed him. You should have believed me.”

“I was worried,” Hermione explained, looking somewhat abashed. “You wouldn’t let me talk to him. You kept saying you were safe but …”

“He couldn’t talk, Hermione. He was unconscious.”

“Why?” Miranda asked. “What happened? I thought magic could heal anything.”

“Not everything. Some … not all curses, not completely,” Harry answered, still speaking so quietly that the people on the far ends of the table had to strain to hear him.

“Yes, there are some, but not many,” Muriel stated, looking quite concerned at Harry.

“You’ve seen Bill,” Fred pointed out.

“Yes, but those are scars,” John said, a bit dismissively.

“Magical healing rarely leaves a mark,” Muriel explained. “And those scars …”

“Sometimes, there’s more to a scar than what you can see,” Harry said.

Miranda and John looked thoughtful, and cast more than one sideways glance at Hermione.

“The healer removed the curses, Harry?” Arthur asked.

Harry nodded. “Yes, sir.”

“But there were lingering affects?”

Harry shrugged, “Yeah.”

“But what was wrong with you?” Hermione persisted.

“I really don’t want to talk about it. I don’t even remember most of it,” Harry rubbed at his eyes. “I’m sorry you were worried.”

“Well, you’re obviously fine now, Harry,” Fred commented, “if Hermione was admiring your muscles.”

Hermione turned to Fred, mouth agape.

Harry was silent for a moment then he began to laugh and said, “I am fine. Thanks,” as he clapped Fred on the shoulder.

Ron turned bright red and glared at Fred before looking down and mumbling something to himself.

“You both vanished,” Molly said. “Owls couldn’t find you. Harry was apparently very ill. Of course, we worried!”

Hermione narrowed her eyes at Fred before leaning forward to look at Harry and Ginny. “That’s another thing. Why couldn’t Hedwig find him? She’s got to be the smartest owl I’ve ever seen, but she couldn’t find either of you. Even if you’re under a Fidelius, she should be able to find Harry, but she’s just been moping around here for months, acting as if she were a familiar whose owner died, instead of just being an owl.”

“I told you owls wouldn’t work,” Ginny answered.

“You never explained why.”

“No, I didn’t. It’s kind of hard to explain, but the short of it is that no owl can find us because of some of the things we’ve done to stay hidden. I’m sorry that meant you couldn’t contact us, but I’m not sorry that the Death Eaters couldn’t,” Ginny responded.

“Hedwig has been frantic since the day you disappeared, Harry, but she got worse when Ginny was taken. We thought she was going to die,” Hermione said.

“Don’t you dare try to make him feel guilty about that, Hermione,” Ginny ground out, enraged. “Harry didn’t ask to be kidnapped.” She clutched Harry’s hand again.

Harry blanched and clung desperately to Ginny. He looked down at their clasped hands and wouldn’t meet anyone else’s eyes as he struggled to hold back dark thoughts and memories that started to leak into his conscious mind.

“No one thinks Harry wanted to be captured,” Arthur said calmly.

Ron scoffed, “Of course we don’t. He’s not mental.” He leaned back in his chair and asked eagerly, “So, Harry, what did happen that day?”

Harry did not reply at first. He just breathed, trying to calm down. When he felt more relaxed, he lifted his eyes and stared at Ginny for a minute before he forced himself to turn away from her and pay attention to the others in the room.

“Erm, do you mean the day I was taken, Ron?” he asked quietly, looking across the table at his friend, “or the day Ginny disappeared?”

“Well, yeah, the day you left,” Ron replied somewhat sheepishly. “I mean, how did the Death Eaters get you?”

“We couldn’t find a breach in the wards,” Fred chipped in, open curiosity on his face.

Harry and Ginny both sighed resignedly.

Harry hung his head. “It wasn’t the wards.”

“What?” asked Fred.

Ginny held his hand tightly. “He walked out of the wards. So did I.”

“Why would you do that?” demanded Arthur, consternation clear on his confused face.

Harry answered first. “I didn’t mean to,” he said somewhat defensively. “I was just taking a walk, trying to clear my head. I didn’t even know I’d left the wards. I guess I was distracted. I don’t really know. I mean, I’d been to the Burrow enough to know where your ward lines were, and I could sense them anyway, so I thought I could go for a walk without getting myself into trouble. The next thing I knew, I looked up and realized I was nearly to the village. I should have noticed way before that, but I didn’t, and that’s where Snape and Bella found me.”

“They took you to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named,” concluded Arthur, who now looked a bit shocked.

Harry nodded.

“So the wards were fine!?” Arthur said, a bit more energetically.

Harry nodded again. “Yeah, as far as I know, there was nothing wrong with them.”

Arthur shook his head and muttered, “Unbelievable.” After a moment, he asked, “Ginny? Why … after Harry, why did you go outside the wards?” His voice was strained, and the look on his face just made her want to crawl into a hole.

She braved it out, though, as she looked him in the face and said, “Because Harry was out there, and he needed me.”

“What do you mean, Ginny?” Arthur asked. He stood and walked around the table to crouch at her feet, his eyes never leaving her face.

“A … Death Eater helped Harry escape. He brought him to the Burrow, just outside the wards, as close as he could get. Then, he sent me a patronus saying that Harry was there and needed help. I ran outside and saw him. I thought a member of the Order had found him. I thought they were the only ones who could use that charm.” Ginny wiped at her eyes roughly before continuing.

“He was a mess, slumped up against a tree, his clothes hanging off him in tatters. He didn’t even look alive. There was so much blood everywhere …”

A gasp from Hermione interrupted Ginny, who gulped and looked briefly at Harry before turning back to her father. She continued, “I didn’t stop to think. I didn’t call for help. I just ran out there to help him and before I could drag him back inside, the man stepped out from behind the tree. His wand was in my face, so … there was nothing I could do. We were gone before anyone could have done anything.”

“Well, that explains why we could never find a breach in the wards.” Arthur sighed. He held Ginny tightly by the shoulders. “He didn’t touch you? You were never held by Death Eaters?”

“No. I was safe. I was with Harry.”

“Thank goodness!” Molly exclaimed, seeming to actually understand and believe her finally.

“Yes, thank goodness you’re both safe,” said Arthur. Then, he turned back to Harry. “Harry, do you know where they held you?”

Harry shook his head.

“Anything you can tell us, even some small detail, might help us find them.”

Harry closed his eyes, allowing the flashes to come for a minute. He breathed deeply and slowly, staying calm. “It was a fancy house. A big one. Dark wood, heavy beams and stonework. Might have been the Malfoy’s. They were all there, after all.” He shook his head. “But, I don’t know where it was. I couldn’t even begin to take you there. I didn’t see much of it, just my room,” Harry laughed bitterly, “if you can call it a room, and a large chamber where I was … questioned.” He trailed off and was silent for a bit. “I didn’t have my glasses, so I really couldn’t see much. That whole time is a blur.”

“That’s all right, Harry,” Arthur said quickly.

“He didn’t even know how long he’d been gone,” Ginny added. “He had a bad concussion.” She squeezed his hand.

“Why didn’t they kill you?” asked Ron, a bit quietly.

Harry coughed and patted Ginny’s hand which had tightened around his so much it hurt. “Erm, well, I’m sort of glad they didn’t, actually,” Harry said, with a bit of an incredulous look on his face.

“Well, of course I am, too, Harry, but …” Ron sounded abashed.

He sighed. “They kept me alive because they wanted information, but I wouldn’t tell them anything. I just knew I was dead either way, so … You know, eventually, no matter what I said or did, so I just … didn’t.

“Then … erm, well … Snape was ordered to get Ginny, and I heard them say what they … Anyway, I knew he would do it. He got me, after all, so I knew … and then I knew that they would … I couldn’t let that happen. I had to get away from them, and try to save her.” Harry looked up suddenly and stared into Arthur’s eyes, intently.

“I would have told them anything, I would have … they would know everything, every secret I knew. Anything I could do, to keep her from being hurt, to keep her alive, I would have done it. I wouldn’t have even hesitated.” He took a deep breath before continuing.

“I think Tom knew that. I just … I couldn’t risk it, so, I got a chance, and I took it. I smashed a vase over my guard’s head and escaped. I got as far away as I could …” Harry hung his head, “only, I was so weak by then … a Death Eater found me not long after I got away.”

Molly gasped and tried to get up but a look from Arthur held her in place.

Harry looked at her and smiled slightly, “He wasn’t … he didn’t hurt me. He just took me to the Burrow and, like she said, grabbed Ginny. But it wasn’t to hurt us, he just wanted to make sure to get her away before she could be taken by the others, before she ended up … like me.” Harry shook himself free of the image his words brought to his mind, before continuing, “He treated my injuries, and gave us potions for Ginny to use on me, and then sent us to a safehouse. When potions weren’t enough, he found a Healer we could trust and, well, we’ve been hiding in the Muggle world ever since we left Grimmauld Place, while I recovered.

“It’s all been rather strange, actually.”

“Who is he? This Death Eater who has been helping you?” Hermione demanded.

“I …” Harry paused in his answer, but then more positively stated, “You don’t need to know that.”

Hermione snorted, “Of course not.”

“Harry,” Mr. Weasley began.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Weasley. I won’t tell you that.”

Arthur turned to his daughter. “Ginny, please. It’s important.”

“Dad! No. I’m sorry, but Harry’s right. You don’t need to know.” Ginny’s face was just a bit angry, and hurt.

“Harry, this is dangerous. You’re trusting a, a Death Eater, to keep you safe? You don’t trust the Order, or us, but you trust this Death Eater!? You can’t … How can we know that you’re really protected? It was Death Eaters that kidnapped you in the first place!”

“And yet, we’ve been safe for months! I know what you’re thinking. You think maybe it’s all a big trick, and … you want to make sure it’s not. But you know something? If he wanted us dead, or to give us back to Tom, we would have been, and there was nothing we could have done about it.”

Arthur nodded.

“Believe me, I … I haven’t been ignoring the possibilities here. I mean, he really could have been playing a game with us. I mean, in the beginning, for all we knew, this could have been some elaborate plot Tom thought up. But … it’s not. I didn’t trust him at all at first, but we didn’t really have much choice. We just had to do what he said and hope for the best.

“Turns out, he’d been helping me ever since I was captured, slipping me healing potions and confunding my guards every chance he got to reduce what I would have had done to me. He’s kept us safe for three and a half months, and helped me get the help I needed to recover from my stay with Tom. To be honest with you, I don’t really like him, but … I respect him, and I trust him. It’s taken me a long time to be able to say that, but … we’ve trusted each other with our lives for a long time now, and I won’t betray his trust in us.”

“But … if he’s really on our side, he could help the Order. He could make a huge difference in keeping others safe, or in the fight against the Death Eaters,” Hermione claimed.

Harry studied her for a minute then sighed. “I think he is making a huge difference,” he said quietly, looking down at Ginny. He pulled her to him tightly and held her.

Arthur made a strange sound in his throat and sat down suddenly on the floor next to Ginny’s chair where he had crouched. Harry knew he’d just made his point, at least with one of them. “I have to tell you, Mr. Weasley, I don’t trust the Order. Not at all, and I can’t put his life in their hands.”

“Why not? We’re all members of the Order. Don’t you trust us?” Ron asked.

“Of course! You’re all family!” he exclaimed, looking around the table.

Hermione’s face softened a bit after that statement, and Molly beamed.

Harry continued, “The rest of them? Maybe we can trust Remus, too. I really hope so, but that’s not the point. I really don’t trust the Order, and I’m not going to anytime soon.

“Look, Tom’s people knew that I was at the Burrow within hours of my arrival there. You can’t deny that. There’s only one way that could have happened — someone in the Order told them. That taints the whole lot of them, so I can’t trust any of them, not with our lives, and not with the lives of those who’ve been helping us.” He glared at Arthur obstinately.

“Harry, it might not have been the Order. If you just walked out of the wards the way you say, then the Death Eaters who kidnapped you may not have had any special information at all. All they needed to know was where we lived, and then … they just had to wait around for someone to go outside the wards and make themselves vulnerable. It may have been … it was probably just some incredibly bad luck.”

“No, it wasn’t. They had a plan, and … it was well-executed. They bragged about it. They knew I was there, and they had a team waiting for me. They knew how to get to Ginny, too, when it came down to that. The one who saved her was supposed to be part of the team that grabbed her. He just pre-empted the actual grab. We were lucky, Mr Weasley! Lucky in so many ways, but … just lucky the Death Eater who found me decided to do something good for once in his life. We should be dead, both of us.

“His life is forfeit if it gets out that it was a Death Eater who helped us. They’ll figure out it’s him, and that … that is not acceptable. You can’t tell the Order anything, not even what little we’ve told you. You can’t even tell them that we’ve been to see you, or we’re not going to be able to come back.”

“They’ve been searching for word of you, trying to help us find you,” Molly said. Arthur nodded in confirmation.

Harry glared at them. Ginny’s gaze wasn’t any more pleasant. “We know,” she said shortly.

Harry continued, “Ginny told you that we were safe, to let things be, and you didn’t believe her. We were managing just fine, and you had the Order push their noses in where they weren’t wanted or needed. It interrupted my healing, and forced us into the Muggle world with no access to Healers. Can’t tell you how much that was appreciated.” He pushed his nearly untouched plate away and scooted back from the table, suddenly feeling confined.

“It wouldn’t help us any more to be found by them again,” Harry continued. “They could accidentally lead the Death Eaters to us, to boot. You need to tell them to stop looking for us. We’re safe, as safe as anyone else is. More so, even. I suppose you could tell them that you’ve heard from us, and that we’re safe, but that is all. Not one word more — or they could find us again, and they’ll lead the Death Eaters right to us.

“You know enough now to put us and our friends in serious danger. Please don’t do that. I don’t have anything to say to the Order. I don’t know where they are or what they’re doing and I honestly don’t want to know right now. Maybe we can help each other later, but for now, that’s just not possible. Keep their secrets, but please keep ours, too.”

Harry stared at Arthur intently, willing him to understand.

“I think you’re making a mistake, Harry. I think that the Order needs you.”

Harry looked at the floor for a moment. “Not the point, Mr. Weasley. Maybe they do, but I can’t help them. Linking up with the Order right now is not smart or safe for us, and that means that we can’t. Honestly? I don’t need them yet. I may in the future, but it’s not time for me to work with them.”

Exasperated, Arthur jumped to his feet as exclaimed, “You know things no one else knows, and you’re playing things too close!”

“Yes, I do! And if I could get away with it, I’d play it even closer than I am now! Don’t you get it? The things I know are dangerous! The more people who know them, the less secret they are. I’m keeping things close because I have to!” Harry hissed intensely.

“You’re doing something for Dumbledore.” Arthur stated it as a plain fact.

Harry didn’t deny it, just nodded. “Sort of.”

“Tell us. We’ll help you.”

“No. If you were supposed to know, he would have told you himself. The fewer people who know about this, the better, as far as I’m concerned.”

“Harry,” Arthur paused and shook his head for a minute.

When he opened his mouth to argue further, Harry held out his palm and met his gaze, just staring for a moment. Slowly, he rose to his feet.

“How far are you willing to go, Mr. Weasley?” Harry demanded as he leaned forward, resting one hand on the table, the other on the back of his chair. “How far? The Death Eaters tortured me for information for weeks and I didn’t tell them a thing. If they hadn’t threatened Ginny, I may well have died in that house, but I would never have said a word.”

“Harry,” Arthur said placatingly, but Harry ignored him.

“What are you going to do? Do you really want me to tell you? Well, that’s just too damned bad. I won’t. Nothing you can do … I won’t. I won’t do it, and if this is how you’re all going to act …”

“Of course not, you know us better than that!” Arthur protested, horrified.

Ginny reached out and took Harry’s hand. He looked down at her, and then slowly sat back down. “I do. We wouldn’t have come otherwise.” He nodded to Arthur.

Silence fell like a shroud. Only the airy sounds of many people breathing broke it for several minutes.

“The things I know have gotten people killed. Now is not the time to tell,” Harry said in a weary voice. He laid his head on the table and closed his eyes.

“Why did you tell Ginny, then?” asked Molly. “I don’t want my daughter in this kind of danger, Harry,” she pleaded. “Why did you involve her?”

Ginny placed her hand on his head, preventing him from sitting up and said forcefully, “Mum, it’s not his fault. I was already involved!”

“Everyone calm down,” Arthur sighed. He placed his hand on Harry’s back, and kept it there even though Harry flinched at the contact.

“I’m sorry, Harry,” he said, tears beginning to well up in his eyes. He coughed uncomfortably, before continuing, “I won’t … Tell us when you’re ready, Harry. I won’t ask again. Thank you for looking out for our little girl, and for bringing her back to us. We’ve missed her.” Arthur pulled Ginny into a hug.

Harry slowly sat up and turned to look at Arthur. “She’s mostly been taking care of me, actually.” He looked down at his lap and let silence fill the room.

Molly suddenly burst into motion, clearing the plates of cold food from the table. Miranda stood and began to help her, while several people at the table grabbed scones or fruit from their plates before they were cleared.

“Well, that’s my cue,” Fred said. He stood and placed a hand on Harry’s shoulder. Harry noticed that the parchment in his other hand looked suspiciously like the Marauder’s Map. Fred just quirked his eyebrows at Harry’s curious look while he walked away from the table nibbling on a scone that hadn’t been cleared yet.

“Ginny, could you help us?” Molly called in from the kitchen.

Ginny sighed and stood as well. “Come on, Harry. You can talk to Fred while I help. I know you’re dying to ask him about that parchment.” She held out her hand expectantly until he took it and stood with her.

Arthur stopped them silently before they left the room. He held out his hand for Harry to shake.

Harry studied him for a moment before briefly shaking Arthur’s hand. As he left the room, he heard Hermione’s dad say, “Well, that was certainly not what I expected.” Arthur murmured in agreement.

If Molly was disappointed to see Harry, she didn’t let it show as she put Ginny to work. Harry watched her for a minute. She made a face at him when her mum wasn’t looking.

Fred laughed. Harry turned his attention to him and moved to sit next to him at the table.

“So, what is this?” Harry asked.

“Looks a bit like the Marauder’s Map, doesn’t it?” Fred said.

“Yeah, more than a bit,” Harry agreed as he peered closely at it.

“You can see the outer wards here,” Fred said as he pointed out the outlines of the property.

Harry nodded. “That’s a lot of ground to watch.” He could see that is wasn’t just the farm, but the Henge and part of the village were also covered.

Fred shrugged, “True, but the map makes it easy. Remus helped us set them up for several of the safehouses. Ron let him borrow your Map for reference, but he remembered how they’d put it together without it. Too bad he’s missing. We’d like more of them, but no one else can figure it out. Hermione tried, but … it’s not like she can’t do it,” he corrected himself quickly as he glanced towards the dining room door Hermione had disappeared through, “but she hasn’t gotten much of it sussed yet. Might be a while.”

“Remus didn’t teach anyone else?” Harry asked.

“No. He said you were the only one he’d be willing to teach, but you …”

“Yeah.” Harry turned his attention from the grounds to the main house. It was too small to see much detail until Fred tapped it with his wand and it enlarged.

“Thanks,” Harry mumbled. He found the kitchen, and saw a green blur next to “Fred Weasley,” and over by the sink and counter … “Muriel Thurston”, and two blurs.

Harry’s eyes widened a bit, before a look of confusion crossed his face.

Fred shrugged. “I figured you’d know what it was. I’m assuming you both are still magical?” he said with a bit of a smile.

Harry jerked his head up and stared at Fred. “Of course we are. But, erm, we are magically untraceable. I’m surprised we show up on the map, even as blurs. Is the other blur Hermione’s mum?”

Fred nodded. “Hermione’s parents don’t have magical signatures. Well, at least they’re not strong enough for the map to label them, so they show up as blurs. Remus had to alter the spells a bit for it to show Muggles at all. Kind of important when we have them at nearly every safehouse.

“Anyway, I wanted to give you a heads up. Miranda is supposed to take over for me in about five minutes. I think she’ll notice.”

“How can she, erm, do …” Harry waved his wand then tapped the map causing it to show a close up view of the dining room.

Harry studied the tableau even though he hadn’t actually intended to look at anything in particular.

“Well,” Fred responded, “Hermione’s parents insist on doing their fair share around here. They can’t take watch at night obviously, but during the day while others are in the kitchen, there’s no reason they can’t keep an eye on the map.

“The wards get highlighted when any person passes through them, or is blocked by them. Friends and family are shown in green. Anyone who hasn’t been welcomed to the property by Muriel shows up in black, and a small chime sounds whenever someone new enters the wards. All the known Death Eater’s names will show up in red. Even if the words are too small to read, it’s easy to see the difference between friends and strangers and there’s always someone around who can check anything suspicious.”

“We’re not as helpless as you might imagine,” Miranda said as she joined them at the table. She pulled a magnifying glass out from under her shirt that was hanging on a chain.

“Could you reset it to the full view, Fred? Then feel free to show Harry around.”

“Erm, actually, Mrs. Granger,” Harry said, trying to sound innocent. “I’d like to study the map for awhile, if you don’t mind.”

“Why? Surely you’d like to catch up with your friends.”

“Well, I can do that while I’m sitting here, and I’d love to learn more about this map. Maybe Ginny and I could use something like this.”

“Are you sure, Harry?”

“Yeah, it’s … a lot like one my dad and his friends made when they were in school,” Harry said as he determinedly turned back to the map. Hermione and Ron were still sitting at the dining table and Mrs. Weasley was moving about, still cleaning up breakfast, but Mr. Weasley and a green blur were about to walk out of the door.

Harry nudged Fred.

“Oh, Dad’s due to walk the wards. Looks like John is going with him.”

“Walk the wards?” Harry asked.

“Sure, Dad walks the grounds every day to check the wards and fix any weak spots. It takes him about two hours. Someone has to go with him. You know, as back up.”

“But,” Harry paused and looked at Miranda a bit apologetically before he asked, “what would Mr. Granger do if there was trouble?”

Miranda laughed. “The twins have outfitted us with a few things. We can’t do magic ourselves, obviously, but we can activate magical objects with physical triggers. Things that detonate on impact or …”

She held up her wrist. “This bracelet is actually an emergency portkey. If I break it, it’ll bring me and whomever I’m touching to the kitchen. We all have them.”

“That’s great. We’ll have to take a look at your new toys later, Fred.”

“Why don’t you do that now, Harry?” Miranda urged. “Or go talk to Ron and Hermione. They’re probably waiting for you in there.” She gestured at the map. “They’ve been rather lost with out you. Let me take my turn here. Go be with your friends. That’s why you came, after all.”

Harry looked over at Ginny. She nodded at him, encouraging him to go. He shook his head at her and looked back down at the map.

Ginny walked over. “Are you okay, Harry?” she asked.

“Sure,” he answered, pulling her into his lap.

Ginny let out a yelp of surprise. “Harry!”

Fred and Miranda laughed.

Harry ignored them and held Ginny in place. “Look at this,” he said gesturing to the map. “Look at the detail.”

Ginny looked.

Miranda just shook her head. “Well, I suppose I could help with the dishes until they’re done.” She looked to the sink where Molly was still working. “But then I’ll take over the watch.” She shook her finger at Harry.

“Yes, ma’am,” Harry responded quickly, smiling innocently at Miranda until she walked away.

“Harry, I really should be helping,” Ginny said, gesturing to the counter where Muriel was setting out ingredients.

Harry quickly tapped the map on the area of the house, then the kitchen, and pointed at two blurs on the map situated exactly where they were in the kitchen.

Ginny’s eyes widened as she turned back to Harry. “That’s unexpected. I didn’t think we’d show up at all.” she whispered.

“Remus fixed it so the Muggles would show up. You know, it’s probably good that we do. It would look odd if they could physically see us but the map said nothing was there at all. I don’t know what kind of sensors the Death Eaters are using, but this should mean we can pass as Muggles. As far as your family goes, we told them we’ve done some things so we can hide better. This just proves it,” he whispered back. “Good thing, too. Otherwise, it would show our names.”

Ginny looked at him sharply.

“Our real names.” When she still looked like she didn’t understand, he said even more quietly, “Your real name, Mrs Potter.”

“Yeah, lucky,” Ginny said as she briefly closed her eyes.

She took a deep breath, opened her eyes and kissed Harry on the forehead.

“I’m going to help Muriel. But we should tell them we’re married when daddy comes back. This … we should just tell them. I don’t want someone to discover it by accident, and then …” she shuddered at the thought. “It’s going to be a … it’s just going to be rough enough as it is.”

“Erm, yeah, I suppose we should,” he whispered back.

“Definitely,” Fred added in a low voice. “Hermione is going to kill me for not telling her, not to mention mum.”

The three of them silently exchanged glances after that. There didn’t seem to be anything left to say, so Ginny got down off Harry’s lap and went back to the counter where Muriel and one of the elves were still working.

Harry returned to his study of the map while Fred grabbed the financial scrolls he’d been looking at before breakfast and continued to balance his business accounts. A pleasant stillness fell over the kitchen in spite of the work being accomplished.

Harry could hear Ron and Hermione talking in the next room. He realized that they were actually bickering as their volume rose and he could understand some of their words. He grinned, and looked at Ginny, mouthing, “Just like old times.”

Ginny shook her head at him.

“He’s following her around like a lost puppy,” Hermione exclaimed loudly enough to be heard in the kitchen.

“What, are you jealous?” Ron taunted.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Ron. I’m saying, I just don’t think it’s healthy. I’m just voicing a concern.”

“This isn’t good,” Fred whispered to Harry before standing and walking towards the dining room.

All activity in the kitchen ceased as the occupants froze, listening to the growing shouting match in the dining room.

“Ridiculous! Ha! Ridiculous is you, asking him about his muscles.”

“Would you guys like to come into the kitchen and talk to Harry instead of just yelling about him in the next room?” Fred asked when he reached the doorway.

“Don’t encourage her, Fred,” Ron ordered. “If she’s eying Harry now, she might just be getting ready to chuck you. ’Course if she’s after muscles, I’d be a better pick.”

“You’re delusional,” Hermione said scathingly.

“And I haven’t had to lift any weights to get them, either.” Ron bragged.

“I can’t talk to you when you’re like this,” Hermione cried.

Two sets of footsteps pounded towards the kitchen.

“The sad thing is, you figured out they were together before they even got here. You told me your ‘theory’ weeks ago. I thought you’d be used to the idea by now. What? Is my sister not good enough for the Great Harry Potter?”

“Just stop, Ron,” Fred ordered. He pulled Hermione through the doorway and into his arms as he stepped back from the dining room entrance.

Ron followed them, though, shouting, “Stay out of it, Fred. Trust you to take her side, since she was in your room well past mid-night last night, both of you doing who knows what!”

Fred said nothing as he released his hold on Hermione and stepped in front of Ron. He punched Ron in the face with a resounding crunch which was followed by a much louder thump as Ron’s head hit the floor.

Hermione covered her mouth with her hands as she screamed.

“Fred Weasley!” Molly bellowed.

“Sorry, Mum,” Fred mumbled shaking his hand. “He was completely out of line.”

“You’ll march straight into the sitting room, if you know what’s good for you, and wait for me,” Molly ordered, waving her wand threateningly in Fred’s face before levitating Ron.

“You just worry about Ron, Molly. I’ll deal with these two,” Miranda said as she escorted Fred and Hermione to the door.

Molly nodded and directed Ron’s unconscious form to the kitchen table.

Harry hurriedly grabbed the map and Fred’s scrolls from the table as he scooted his chair away before Ron landed with a thump. He stared at his friend in shock until Ginny stepped up next to him and put her hand on top of his head, running her fingers through his hair absently as she drew her wand.

“Hermione’s with Fred? Really?” he asked her dumbly.

Ginny quickly kissed his cheek, then said, “Yeah, for a while now,” as she stepped up to where Molly had just vanished the blood from Ron’s face.

Molly cast an episkey charm at Ron’s obviously broken nose as Ginny joined her at the table.

“Don’t wake him up just yet, Mum,” said Ginny softly as she cast a silent purple spell at his face.

“Ginevra Molly Weasley, you know you’re not allowed to do magic!” Molly said, shocked at her daughter’s blatant use of magic, right in front of her mother.

“Of course I am, Mum,” Ginny replied calmly as she cast another spell at her brother’s face. “You missed a fracture here,” she stated pointing at Ron’s cheekbone.

When Molly lifted her wand, Ginny shook her head. “I already fixed it,” she said as she cast another diagnostic charm that covered his head in blue for a moment. It left a faint trace on the back of his head. “Alright then, he’s got just a bit of a concussion. You have Zingiberaceae draught or a different anti-inflammatory on hand, don’t you? It’s pretty minor, but he’ll feel better if you treat it. Get over it faster, too, I suppose. I don’t think there’s a charm that’ll fix it. I don’t know one, anyway.”

Molly stared at her daughter. “What?” Ginny asked. “I do know what I’m talking about, Mum.”

“That’s rather obvious, Ginevra,” Muriel said quietly. She now stood near the table watching Ginny work.

Ginny nodded, and turned back to Ron. She cast a full diagnostic scan on Ron’s whole body. Molly gasped aloud as colors erupted in the air over him.

“His energy is a bit low. Looks like general stress and fatigue. Was he up late last night?”

“He had guard duty part of the night,” Muriel replied.

“That would probably do it.” Ginny canceled the diagnostic and sat down in the chair next to Harry. She looked at her mother. “Otherwise, he’s perfectly healthy. Do you want to wake him now, or just let him sleep?”

Molly seemed stunned. “What would you do?” she asked studying Ginny as if she couldn’t recognize her.

“It depends on what you want. We could give him some Pepper-up and the Zingiberaceae, ennervate him, and let the prat suffer for the rest of the day. He’d be in no danger, but well aware that he got punched in the face. Whether or not he figures out that he deserved it is another thing entirely.”

“Ginny,” Molly said disapprovingly.

“Sorry, Mum,” Ginny replied reflexively. “Or, give him the Zingiberaceae with a pain relieving draught and a sleeping draught. Let him sleep for six hours or so, and he’ll feel pretty good when he wakes up. Might actually be fit for company after that.”

Molly looked askance at Ginny. “We don’t have all of those potions. The Order’s supplies are stretched a bit thin since we don’t have a potions master anymore.” She raised her wand and summoned two items from a cupboard. “We only keep essentials on hand,” she explained as she set the bottle of purple potion on the table, opened the canister and began rubbing a paste on Ron’s emerging bruises.

Ginny rolled her eyes. “We’ve found having a good anti-inflammatory around is essential. The Zingiberaceae is pretty easy to make, and mostly herbal so you’ll have no trouble getting the ingredients. You still grow ginger and Turmeric in the kitchen garden, don’t you, Aunt Muriel?”

“Of course,” she replied.

“Well, you probably have all the ingredients, then. I prefer pomegranate juice for the base, but red wine or grape juice will work fine. Add in willow bark and it’s a pain reliever as well. I’ll help you brew some up this afternoon for your stock if you’d like. We have some with us we could give Ron right now, though. Will you get our bag, Harry?”

Harry summoned the bag rather than getting up from the table, actually remembering to use his wand. Once it arrived, Harry pulled out a small vial of orange potion and set it on the table next to the purple potion Molly had gotten, and then placed the rucksack under the table. He hoped that Molly would forget about it, or at least, that she would leave it alone.

“Where did you learn those healing spells, Ginny?” Molly asked. “I don’t know half of what you did.”

Ginny blushed, and turned her attention to the potions. She sniffed the purple brew, thought for a moment, and measured out a dose. Then, she poured both potions down Ron’s throat. She used her wand to force him to swallow, which made the whole process much quicker than her first experiences getting Harry to take potions.

“You’d pick them up fast if you needed them,” she said to her mother as she worked. “You handled everything the seven of us managed to do to ourselves just fine, and learned from each experience. That’s the same thing I’ve been doing, really. Even Ron, just now, would have been well cared for, if we hadn’t been here.”

Molly nodded. “The Aurors we have in the Order are invaluable with their medic field training, despite their awful bedside manner. They know quite a bit more about healing than I do in most areas. We miss having Madam Pomfrey as a resource though, now that we’ve lost Hogwarts. But we get by with Andromeda Tonks. She’s a bit less experienced, but still an excellent Healer.”

Molly returned the potions to their cabinet then looked at her daughter. “You haven’t answered my question.”

“I’ve learned from experience, too. Erm …” Ginny looked at Harry before continuing, “Harry should have been in St. Mungo’s. But, as that wasn’t an option, his Healer needed all the help I could give. I had to learn fast. I couldn’t do much but force-feed him potions at first.” Ginny laughed and cast a cooling charm at Ron’s face. “Made a proper mess of it the first time.”

“You knew more than that before,” Molly protested.

“Yes, but I still felt pretty useless. Well, Ron’s sorted. Shall I help you get him upstairs?”

“Please,” Molly replied.

When Ginny held open the kitchen door for her mother, raised voices could be heard from the sitting room. She let it close once Molly had levitated Ron through it, cutting off the sound, but not before Harry heard Hermione yell, “Mother! We do not need a curfew! We are adults!”

Muriel set a cup and saucer on the table in front of Harry and sat down across from him.

“Your visit has provoked more excitement than we’ve seen in months,” Muriel said. “You’re just full of surprises, Mr. Potter.”

Harry smiled at her and took a small sip of tea, hoping Ginny would get back soon.

Muriel studied him for awhile then said, “There’s something about you. I can’t quite …”

Harry found her gaze unnerving . When she didn’t continue, he asked, “How long have you lived here, Mrs. Thurston?”

“Oh, I’ve always lived here. Born in this house, probably die here, too. And, you can just call me Aunt Muriel, dear. I never married, after all. Just the doddering old maiden aunt. Don’t have the temperament for marriage, really. There was a boy from over in Loxley, I might have married him, if he hadn’t gotten himself blown up fighting in the Great War. He used to visit the Priestess for some … advice once in a while.” She smiled craftily, like she was keeping a secret. “I never cared for anyone else that way again.

“Don’t doubt I would have been a champion as a mother, though. I ended up raising Marianne and the twins, after all.”

“I’m sorry, who?” Harry asked, confused.

“Your Ginny’s mother, Marianne Prewett, of course, and her uncles, Fabian and Gideon. The boys were nearly adults when their father died, but little Mary was just five.”

Harry looked at her in shock.

“Yes, looks like some family history is in order.” Muriel summoned a plate of scones from the counter and pushed them towards Harry.

“My brother, Eion, died fighting Grindelwald’s early forces. He was an Auror and was asked to help with the clean up of the Great War. He died in Germany after the fighting was supposed to be over. Such a waste.” Muriel shook her head, and then continued.

“He left a wife, Martha, and young daughter, Hannah. They stayed here frequently. My parents doted on them both, of course. I did, too, but Hannah especially. She was just a lovely girl. Quite a few boys were after her, I can tell you. Well, she married Brendanus Prewett and they had a fine family together. Marianne came as a bit of a surprise to them.” Muriel laughed. “The twins had been quite the handful, I assure you, and they weren’t planning on having more.

“Brendanus was distraught when Hannah died birthing Marianne. He blamed himself. She’d caught Dragon Pox at the end of her pregnancy and they couldn’t treat her without endangering her child. She refused, of course.”

“But why …”

“Why did Brendanus blame himself?” she clarified.

Harry nodded.

“He was a dragon handler, thought he’d exposed her. More likely, it was the twins. Hogwarts had an outbreak that year.”

“But … dragonpox doesn’t really come from dragons, does it?” he asked. With all their recent experience in Muggle hospitals, Harry and Ginny had quite a crash education in how diseases come about and are transmitted. It just didn’t make sense to him to have a cross-species disease come from animals that typically ate whatever humans they encountered.

“Well, we didn’t know that then, did we? And some still think that it did originally. Skin disease, and that awful fever! Oh, it’s an awful disease. Such a relief that so few get it anymore. Anyway,” she said, waving her hand in the air to dismiss the subject, “he left the children here with me most of the time while he worked with his dragons. He died five years later, burned to a crisp, and I raised your future mother-in-law.”

Harry blushed spectacularly at that, but made no denial. “Erm, I’d never heard her called anything but Molly.”

Muriel laughed. “Well, her brothers gave her that nickname and it stuck. Rest their souls, it broke my heart when they were killed. Both on the same day, too. It was quite a shock.”

“Moody said they died like heroes,” Harry said softly, thinking of a faded photograph.

“Of course they did,” Muriel proclaimed vehemently, pounding the table with a fist. “They were Prewetts, even if the one did join that stupid church.”

Harry gaped at her.

“Never mind me, Mr. Potter,” she said more softly. “I’m just an old lady who has seen too much and has too many opinions. I have more family and friends dead than alive. Though,” she snorted, “Marianne has done her best to change that.”

She laughed then. “We have something in common in that, don’t we?”

Harry looked her in the eye and nodded. He wasn’t sure what to make of Ginny’s odd aunt, but he liked her.

He turned to the door, a smile forming, just as Ginny returned.

“Sorry, Auntie, Mum was just fussing. I’ll help with that baking now,” Ginny said in a rush as she entered the room.

“Not to worry, dear, I haven’t started yet. Minnie isn’t back from the barn, after all. Your Mr. Potter and I were just getting acquainted. Quite the handsome beaux you have here.”

“Yes, he is,” Ginny replied, leaning over to kiss Harry on the lips firmly.

Muriel laughed. “Reminds me of his grandfather. Nathaniel Potter was a seventh year when I was in my first. He probably didn’t know I existed, even though we were both in Gryffindor, but I had quite the crush,” Muriel said causing Ginny to blush and look sheepishly at Harry.

He just laughed and said, “Gryffindor girls do know how to make a bloke feel special.” He winked at Ginny. She slapped at his shoulder and followed Muriel to the counter where Minnie had just popped in and started pulling out things for baking.

Muriel continued reminiscing as she worked. “I thought it quite the shame he fell in love with that Scottish princess. I had built up quite a few fantasies, I can tell you! So had the rest of the girls in the school.”

“My grandfather married a Scottish princess?” Harry asked incredulously.

Muriel looked over her shoulder at him and grinned. “Oh, my, yes! It was quite the scandal. You see, your grandfather vanished from society for over ten years after he left Hogwarts. He was wealthy enough, being the Potter heir and all, that no one ever expected him to get a job, but to just disappear? He left on a Grand Tour and didn’t come back.

“He even missed his brother, Edward’s wedding. People said he was dead. We heard rumors every once in a while saying that he was in Japan, or Africa, and even South America, but nothing firm. Then, out of nowhere, he appeared at the Ministry’s Christmas Gala in 1912, with a wife no one had ever seen before on his arm. No one had any idea he’d gotten married, and Alesta hadn’t gone to Hogwarts, so we knew almost nothing about her.”

Harry stared at Muriel in shock. “You talk about it all like it just happened yesterday.”

“Don’t be so surprised, my dear. I may be one-hundred and seven years old, but I still remember things!

“Your grandmother was beautiful, exotic and wealthy. She was the subject of hours and hours of gossip and speculation from London to Paris. And when it came out that her family ruled Scotland anciently, well! You can just imagine! In fact, her parents gave them a small castle as a wedding gift, so you can understand how the title, ‘Scottish Princess,’ came about.

“The pureblood extremists hated that she’d ruined any chance of one of their daughters getting her claws into the Potter fortune. They started rumors about her, said she was a siren or a veela or some such nonsense, and that she’d entrapped him, but they couldn’t afford to snub her directly. It was all rubbish anyway. The Potters were Old Blood and Old Money, and so was she, even if no one had ever heard of her. They were a very powerful combination.

“Everyone expected Nathanial to make Minister by the age of 40. He would have been a good one, too, but he refused to run. Preferred his quiet life in Scotland to the bustle of London. I never blamed him. I feel the same way about Wiltshire.

“Oh, your grandparents weren’t complete hermits, though. They had a great reputation for entertaining. I don’t really know how often they were in town, but they gave at least one grand party at Potter Manor every Christmas. It was the event of the year. I attended several of their balls, even a masque once. There are pictures here somewhere, and a few old news articles. I’ll look for them for you, if you’d like.”

“Thanks, I’d like to learn more about them,” Harry said quietly.

“Well, I don’t know how much truth you’ll find in those old articles. The Potters liked their privacy, after all. It wasn’t as though they were giving out interviews very often. Hardly anyone was ever invited to their castle, which was where they actually lived. Or so everyone said, anyway. I certainly never was. But, they were the great tragic love story of their day, so they got a lot of attention. The wizarding public was enthralled with their mystique.”

“What do you mean?” Harry asked.

“Well, it was rumored that a jealous witch had cursed Alesta to be barren in a fit of rage. Some believed she was too beautiful to be mortal and only took human form a few nights of the year. Others said she was some Amazon-type warrior princess and didn’t want to be a mother.”

“Really?” Ginny asked. “People said that?”

“Oh, yes and many other things, as I said before.” Muriel scoffed. “Ridiculous, all of it. James was the joy of her life. They both spoiled him rotten. Of course, no one blamed them. They’d waited nearly fifty years for him to come along. I mean, really! Marianne’s not yet as old as they were when they had their one, and she’s about to be a grandmother herself! It’s really quite a shame you never knew them. You …”

“Yeah,” Harry said as his face closed off. “Erm … thanks for … well, thanks.”

He pushed his chair back and climbed slowly to his feet. “Maybe I’ll take that walk now,” he said quietly as he gathered the map from the table.

Ginny hurriedly began to wash her hands as he stiffly crossed the kitchen and exited the back door. “Harry, wait,” she called from the sink. “I’ll show you around.”

Muriel stepped over and stopped her as she dried her hands. “He’ll be alright. It’s good for him to know about his family.”

Ginny danced out of Muriel’s reach as she said, “No, he’s not alright. I’ll just be back in a bit.”

“Oh, Ginny, don’t be …” Muriel began, but Ginny cut her off with a raised hand.

“He’s not alright, Aunt Muriel, I need to …” she said, but stopped when a twisted look of shock, dismay, and rage raced across Muriel’s face.

Muriel finally strode forward and grasped Ginny’s hand, turning the palm fully towards her face. Then, she turned pale as a bleached sheet. “GINEVRA! WHAT did you DO? WHO DID THIS TO YOU? What arrogant BASTARD dared TOUCH a member of MY FAMILY!?! I’ll KILL HIM!!”

Ginny shrank back from Muriel with a confused, shocked look on her face.

Muriel’s face started to show some color as she took in several deep, slow breaths, her eyes closed. When she opened them again, she appeared to be much more calm.

In a more moderate voice, she said stiffly, “So. Are you pregnant?”

“NO!! What on earth are you talking about!?” Ginny finally managed to squeeze out.

Muriel’s brow furrowed a bit as she took in the young woman. “Hmmm. Whoever did this can’t have given you a very clear explanation if you haven’t … You have, haven’t you?” she asked meaningfully.

“Have, what?” demanded Ginny, panic rising in her heart.

“Consummated, of course, girl! If you haven’t … how long has it been? You only get forty-eight hours, you know. Do you need to go upstairs now? Where did that boy go?” Muriel concluded as she turned to look at the door Harry had exited.

Ginny shook her head in clear denial as she sputtered even more frantically, “No, no, no,” but Muriel continued as if she was incapable of speech, thought, or communication. Ginny watched her, wide-eyed, as she carried on with her fussing.

“I’ll just get you a room put up, then,” she muttered as she turned and started toward the hall door, shaking her head in disgust. “Thought she’d sleep in with the Granger girl. Didn’t think I’d have another couple to put up in here. Have to re-arrange. Maybe the twins can squeeze in a bit, move Ronald up there. Stupid boy’s still unconscious, though. Maybe Charles ... Have to change his bed out for something larger,” she continued to herself as she approached the door.

“Auntie Muriel! Please, stop! Wait a bit,” called Ginny out in panic as she rushed after her.

A low crack sounded through the room as Harry suddenly appeared next to Ginny, his wand held low by his leg. Both Muriel and Ginny froze as he scanned the room, poised and ready to do battle, until he relaxed when he saw that Ginny and Muriel were alone, and that nothing obvious was happening.

“Are you alright, love?” he said as he turned his focus directly to Ginny.

“Yeah, I’m just … I think it’s time, Harry,” she said somewhat determinedly.

“Are you sure?” he asked as he sheathed his wand without a trace of embarrassment.

“What is it, child? I’ve got things to do,” Muriel replied with a bit of terseness.

“Well, I think you already know, don’t you?” Ginny replied resignedly.

Muriel simply walked over to Harry, took his right hand, and turned the palm over so she could look at.

She sniffed and shook her head. “I just don’t understand why in Morgana’s name you resorted to this,” she muttered as she turned back to the door.

“How did you …” Harry started, but Muriel continued on her way. Ginny just shook her head at him when he turned to her.

Molly came through just then. “What did they do, Aunt Muriel? This was just getting to the good part, it sounded like,” she said as she came through the door. “What are you going on about? What has happened?” Molly was clearly building up a head of steam, but was still attempting to control her volume and tone. The result was a quiet, clipped voice that all the Weasleys knew meant trouble, and likely that a fiery explosion wasn’t far away.

“It seems that Ginevra and Harry have gone and gotten themselves married,” said Muriel with a sniff and a sigh.

“What! Harry! Ginny!” shrieked Molly, switching her focus from one to the other. Her shocked face turned splotchy, which was never a good sign.

“The part that truly bothers me about this is not actually that they’re married. Plenty of witches and wizards have been married even younger and survived the experience. The issue, Marianne, is that whoever did this performed a Druidic blood ritual, and I don’t even know if they’ve completed it yet,” Muriel explained. She turned from Molly and studied the two teens, concern and speculation clear on her face.

Harry didn’t notice. He’d abruptly discovered that the adrenaline that rushed through him when he’d thought Ginny was in danger had faded away. Remaining upright became his sole concern. Ginny stepped closer and wrapped her arm around his waist when he began to sway, while he found that he had trouble following the thread of their conversation.

“Harry. We have to know. Have you done your job yet?” Muriel demanded bluntly after several moments of silence.

At Muriel’s question, Harry turned white, and looked as if he was about to faint. He clutched Ginny tightly as he looked at the two older women, eyes wide and darting back and forth between them. Ginny, in turn, buried her face into his chest, hiding from her mother and her great-aunt.

While he’d been prepared to tell her family that they were married, the idea of discussing the intimate, private details of their marriage completely threw Harry’s mind off any rational thought.

“I expect not, since she says she’s not pregnant,” Muriel informed Molly after turning back to her. She looked Harry up and down and asked, “Do you know how?”

Harry’s mouth opened slightly, and his eyes glazed over. Muriel shook her head and mumbled, “Lad’s pretty young, likely he doesn’t.” Muriel continued in a rambling monologue to herself as she again turned back toward the door. “Got a book around here, shows everything. Don’t feel like describing the process to him myself. Doubt Arthur’ll do it. Perhaps that John Granger will. Healer, isn’t he? Boy hasn’t got parents himself, after all. Can’t be helped, got to get this done before …” She stopped, and turned to Harry and Ginny again. “How long has it been since the bonding ritual?” she finally demanded.

Ginny’s face couldn’t possibly have been redder, but no one could see it, buried as it was in Harry’s chest. Harry’s mouth started opening and closing in random spasms, but no sound came from it. He clung to Ginny like she was a lifeline, or a shield.

Ginny pulled her face back from Harry’s chest slightly, but did not turn to face her mother and aunt as she whispered, “Months.”

“What was that?” asked Muriel, leaning toward them.

“It’s been months, Aunt Muriel,” she said more strongly, her color returning a bit closer to normal as she turned to look her mother in the eyes. “Mum, Harry and I were married in July.”
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