This was originally written for Dramione Duet on LiveJournal, for darkcivet. They wanted a marriage law fic. This is one, I promise. Huge thanks to my lovely beta GryffinKitty, who turned this around in a flash. Any remaining mistakes are my own.


Chapter 1

-oOo-

"Here's to the Minister!" Ron raised his tankard, amidst a chorus of "Hear! Hear!". In the corner, Lucius Malfoy took a sip out of a delicate crystal flute, brushing off the drops of beer Hagrid had spilt on him with nary a sneer.

"Seraphina Selwyn – what a woman." Ron was in an expansive mood, and today he had a grateful audience. "Couldn't accuse her of being the sharpest tool in the box, but she did the business. Almost wet myself before she signed that bill earlier – did you notice she hesitated for a few seconds?"

"That's when I hit her with a Compulsion charm." The champagne was superb – Hermione had not intended to admit that.

"You always were excellent at Charms." Professor Flitwick beamed at her from the comfortable armchair he had conjured next to Pansy Parkinson, whose hand he was holding, and Hermione relaxed.

She was among friends.

"It's like waking up from a bad dream," Romilda Vane-Yaxley-Weasley-Boot said at the other end of the room, and half a dozen voices agreed with her.

"Only – what happens now?" Ginny asked. She looked eerily like her mother these days – the events of the last few years had been enough to banish every trace of youth that had survived Voldemort. "Do we all get divorced, or what?"

As always, Ginny hit on the salient point. She had done so before, just after the war.


"Wasn't that Sorting awfully quick?"

Ginny's brisk strides had Hermione almost hopping to keep up – it was odd to wear robes again, after spending the last year in jeans running from Voldemort.

"I suppose some parents might be waiting for the renovations to be finished before sending their kids?" Hermione suggested. The number of first-year was the least of her worries – thank Merlin she wasn't a prefect anymore, having to shepherd them around.

Ginny didn't seem convinced. "Possibly. Or else not many eleven-year-olds got a Hogwarts letter this year. Bill told me his Sorting lasted three hours – they were forty Gryffindor first-years that year. He almost fainted before they got fed."

Hermione was shocked. "There were forty in our whole year! Before – you know." Ginny and Hermione were in the same year, and they had been more concerned with noticing who was back (Malfoy) and who wasn't (other than Harry and Ron) than counting. Nevertheless, even their two years combined could only dream of reaching those numbers.

"Bill was born in 1970, before the first war really kicked off. By the time we started school, lots of people had been killed – even if they managed to have children first, they may only have had one or two."

It had never occurred to Hermione that the Potters may have had more children if they had survived. She dismissed the thought – she had enough to be doing grieving for people she had known, never mind those who never had been born in the first place.

"Like Malfoy – imagine if there had been seven of him?"

They laughed, and Hermione forgot the conversation until the usual headlines in the Daily Prophet ("Latest War Trial – Why Yaxley Must Receive The Kiss" and "Diagon Alley Reborn – A Sneak Peek At The Reconstruction Plan") were replaced with "Population Crisis – Why Hogwarts May Close Down in 2025".

It wasn't just Hermione who nearly choked on her breakfast tea. Some wizards could indeed do maths, and it only required a cursory read to realise the situation was dire indeed, despite the Prophet's tendency to exaggerate.

Minister Shacklebolt was a busy man and couldn't do everything at once. He did get around to it by the time Ginny and Hermione had finished up their eighth year and were trying to figure out to do with the rest of their lives. Their first inkling it may not be as straightforward as choosing between getting their own place first or move straight into Grimmauld Place with Harry and Ron was another headline:

"Marriage Law – Bold Attempt To Heal The Scars From The War Or Sheer Lunacy?"

The Prophet gamely managed to squeeze it onto its front page in two lines, leaving plenty of space for a picture of a pensive Kingsley.

Ginny was so angry sparks were flying from her ears. "Is he possessed by Pixies?"

"Or on drugs?" Another possibility hit Hermione. "Or maybe someone is pretending to be him?"

"Let's find out." Ginny's expression didn't bode well for the Minister.


Harry got them into the Minister for Magic's office, but it was Ginny who led the charge when they burst in:

"Kingsley, what the fuck?!"

"Ginny, how nice to see you. Hermione, Harry, Luna, Neville and Ron too, I see – I'm certainly in luck this morning. Why don't you grab a seat?"

"Don't we need to get married first?" Hermione asked surlily.

"I see why I'm having the unexpected pleasure of your company." Kingsley rubbed his eyes – he looked even more worn out than usual. "I assume it's my attempt to increase nativity rates that has roused your ire?"

"What?"

"He's saying he wants us to encourage us to have children," Hermione explained to Ron. "Which is fine, as long as it takes the form of telling people it's a jolly good idea, and possibly paying them something the Muggles call 'child benefit' if they oblige. What is not fine is trying to run people's lives for them."

"But I'm not!" Kingsley spread his hands out. "All I'm doing is to say that if someone wants to work for the Ministry, they should give serious consideration to the population crisis we're facing. If they don't want to start at family at their time of life, they are of course free to seek employment elsewhere."

"We will, trust me. You haven't won this, Minister."

"My dear Hermione, I would be delighted if you can find another way to solve the problem. Unfortunately, the Ministry's coffers are rather strained, what with the rebuilding efforts everywhere, so I'm afraid throwing money at the problem is not an option."


For a while it seemed to be working – the birth announcements certainly got a lot of column inches in the Prophet. The Ministry was the biggest employer in the wizarding world, and if one was going to get hitched anyway one may as well do it now. It wasn't as if one couldn't get divorced later.

It might have ended there, if Rodolphus Lestrange hadn't managed to sneak into the great reopening of Diagon Alley.

Polyjuiced, he got a clear shot at Kingsley, and the Wizarding world was thrown into turmoil.

When the dust settled, Philomena Tuft emerged as the new Minister elected on a program to increase the population. As her opponents pointed out, it was easier to put the responsibility for the future on the younger generation than continuing Kingsley's reform program. The Minister dismissed them as begrudgers, and set about designing a marriage law that would have been more suited to breed Thestrals.

"Look!" Hermione threw the Daily Prophet on the ageing kitchen table in Grimmauld Place, where Ron and Neville were playing Wizard's Chess. Ron's Queen was playing with one arm, which slowed down Ron's inevitable win somewhat.

"What fresh hell is this?" Neville asked wearily. No one was naïve enough to expect good news these days.

Hermione's voice was shaking with anger as she read: "Any wizard or witch between twenty and seventy-five who is as of yet unmarried, despite the Ministry's earnest encouragement to the contrary, has until the 3rd of December to address the issue. They will then be assigned a partner by the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, or be stripped of their wand unless they can prove mitigating circumstances such as infertility."

"Right," Ron said. He looked dazed, not even watching as his rook was taken down by one of Neville's pawns, which couldn't believe its luck.

"Are they – I mean, what happens if you can't find anyone who wants to marry you? What are you supposed to do then?"

Normally Hermione would have taken Neville to task over his lack of self-confidence, but she had other fish to fry. "The Ministry will helpfully suggest someone who also is single that they think you would be compatible with. There's even an enchanted questionnaire to help you find the perfect partner."

"How nice." As usual, it was impossible to tell whether Luna was being serious. She emerged from the corner chair where she had been reading. "What are you going to do?" she asked conversationally.

Someone stomped down the stairs like a herd of Hippogriffs. Harry burst through the door brandishing the Prophet as if it were a torch.

"Did you see –"

"Yes," Hermione cut in. She had no desire to hear it twice.

"I guess this is it, then," Harry said quietly.

Luna glanced sharply between Harry and Hermione. "You're leaving, then?" If you wanted to get ahead of Luna, you had to get up very early indeed.

"Yes," Hermione said, with a voice belonging to something else.

From the outside, it might seem easy – she had a boyfriend, why not just get married?

Just like Ron was far more complicated than anyone gave him credit for, so was their relationship – Hermione could vaguely see a future where marriage would be on the cards, but it was not now. If they allowed the marriage law to dictate their lives, they would be divorced before they were twenty-five. It didn't seem like the best option – not when Hermione could call the Ministry's bluff and decamp to the Muggle world until things got back to normal.

Taking Harry with her would underscore the point – the only question was if he would go.

"The funny thing is," Harry said with a smile that wasn't really one, "Ginny's the one who thinks I should go."

"Oh, Harry." It was far too easy to forget Harry's experience of the Muggle world was completely different to her own.

"It's not like we won't be able to visit," Luna said. "Watch out, Ron – that knight just tore the head off your king."


One would have thought the Muggle world would be safe from a deranged Minister, unwilling to back down when her pet project met with resistance.

One would have been wrong, as Hermione found out when she returned home from a late shift at the library. A snow-white owl was waiting on her windowsill. Hermione stared at it through the glass as if that would make the owl go away.

It didn't work, so she sighed and opened the window.

"In the immortal words of Neville Longbottom," she muttered, "what fresh hell is this?" Even Neville had mastered the Muggle post by now. There was no one she actually wanted to hear from who would send an owl.

Miss Granger,

You are hereby notified that, as per the 1st of June 2003, the scope of the recent Marriage Law will be extended to include all wizards and witches who have attended Hogwarts, regardless of whether they currently live as Muggles.

The Ministry is aware that not all wizards and witches may keep up to date with current legislation, and therefore wishes to ensure that you have been informed of the latest developments pertaining to your legal status.

In recognition of the law previously not being applicable when a witch or wizard chose to retire from the Wizarding world, there is a grace period of three months before the requirement to be married takes effect. After the deadline, any unmarried wizard or witch will be assigned a partner from the appropriate class by the Ministry's Matching Bureau. Should you wish to marry a partner of your own choosing, we strongly urge you to make advance arrangements.

Non-compliance will be regarded as treason and punished by a mandatory sentence to be served in Azkaban.

The Ministry wishes to thank you for your cooperation – together we can relegate blood prejudice to the past!

The signature was illegible, and for a precious second Hermione hoped it was all a joke. It was just like George –

The sinking feeling in her stomach and the thick, familiar parchment told her otherwise, but she persisted until she had spoken to Harry on the phone.

Afterwards, she sat with her head buried in her hands for a long time.

It was true.

Mercifully the madwoman in charge had stepped short of state-sanctioned rape, only requiring her pawns to get married to satisfy the legal requirements. What happened next was up to the lucky couple. The Minister had also made divorce conditional upon having at least two children, which was so ruthless it looked like a masterstroke.

Fuck the Minister, anyway.

The only thing that made it even halfway bearable was that Hermione would get to use magic again. The tingling in her right arm reminded her how much she had missed it while she had voluntarily cut herself off from what she loved to do most in the world.

Magic – ever-changing, eternally fascinating, with possibilities one could only dream of exploring in a lifetime. Including some very nasty curses that would do Minister Tuft a world of good.

Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad.