Chapter 10

White to Red to Blue

Sirius had chosen to sleep in the room with Harry and Ron, wanting to try and stick to one of the traditions of not being with your bride the night before the wedding. As for not seeing me till the wedding, well that was going to be harder since I was the only one with a valid driver's license and we were all going to the palace in one minibus.

Everyone was ready to go by eleven; my gown and hooded cape were carefully placed in a mokeskin garment bag since I wanted to keep that tradition of the groom not seeing the bride in her gown till the wedding. Amelia was to be my Maid of Honor and Remus was Sirius's best man. And since I had no-one to give me away and Sirius had officially adopted Harry before falling through the Veil it seemed only right that my stepson be the one to walk me down the ail.

We arrived with half an hour before our lunch with Elizabeth and Phillip. Kingsley, Bill, Fleur, Fred and George were all waiting when we were escorted in. Sirius and I, along with Remus and Amelia, were asked to accompany a page to a small chamber where the Bishop was waiting with all the paperwork while the others where all lead to the State Dining room. Once we were finished going over the basics of the ceremony and everything had been signed and filled we joined the others for a grand lunch with the Queen, Princes Phillip, Charles, Will, and Harry, as well as several other members of the royal family. It was all a bit of a haze since all I could think of was the ceremony to come.

Once lunch was over, Sirius and Remus were lead off to one chamber to wait while Amelia and I were lead to another. Inside the small chamber were a makeup artist a hair stylist and two ladies in waiting to help me into my gown once I was properly coiffed. About an hour in a chair being primped and fed sips of champagne and I was finally ready to greet my groom. I looked in the full length mirror and could barely recognize the woman standing there. Black hair in ringlets on top of my head, silver eyes accented with silver shadow and black liner, light pink blush that made my normally pale skin glow and ruby red lipstick that accented the round fullness of my lips. Behind me the door opened and Elizabeth and Harry walked in to get Amelia and I.

"You truly are a gem in the royal crown, Cassian Emrys Dam Merlonius, and we are pleased we can give you this joyous day."

Harry just stood there with a smile bigger that I would have thought could fit his face. The Queen lead the way out, next was Amelia then Harry held his arm out to me and we exited the small chamber to the strains of Here Comes the Bride.

Hermione met us at the door to the blue room to hand me a bouquet of red and white roses with a dusting of baby's breath and silver-tail fern that cascaded like a waterfall down over my hands. The room had flowers everywhere and there were about forty chairs in small rows of five per side on either side of a long white and gold runner. On Sirius's side were Andy, Nym, Cissy, and Draco with the first seat in the first row empty for Harry. Behind them were all the Weasley's that made up the next two rows, two of which I didn't remember meeting but I had to assume were Charlie and Percy. Then in the last Row was Kingsley, Ethan and two other members of the Order I didn't know and one very large hairy gentleman who fit Harry's description of Hagrid.

On my side, from back to front, started with Will and the boys, Will and Xeno has come in via house elf transport that morning and were heading back after the reception, then Xeno and Luna. The next row was Hermione and Lavender along with the Duchess Sarah and her two young daughters. Then in the next row where all the Princes, Charles, Andrew, Edmond, Will and Harry. And in the front row sat the Queen and Prince Phillip, Susan and two people I had come to believe I would never see again, my Aunt Viv, and my Cousin Gaylord, this alone made it hard to keep the tears from flowing.

Then I locked eyes with Sirius, tall handsome and looking very much the dashing man I fell in love with in black velvet robes trimmed in black leather with a silver tie. The look on his face told me I had picked the right gown, off white with gold embroidery in a rose and star pattern around the low scooped neck and empire waist accented by a gold band and a split double skirt, the inner plain ivory silk the outer off white with the same embroidered pattern along the edges and bottom. All that was covered by a white velvet and fur cloak and that all put together I looked as beautiful as I had wanted to for him.

Harry handed me off to Sirius and I kept my eyes locked with his not wanting to break away for fear I would start crying and would not be able to stop. I had fought with the conventions to create a way to transverse death to bring this man I loved more than I could express back into the world of the living an now we stood here in front of friends and family exchanging our solemn vows of love and commitment. It had been my brother and mother's deaths that had force me to leave and had separated us the first time, then Tommy Boy and the forces of fate had kept up apart till death seems to seal our fates. Till my blood inheritance had made it fated that I was to return to the land of my forefathers and my love, and I knew the only way I would be able to live up to what Fate had in store for me was to have Sirius at my side and I set my sights upon achieving that one miracle.

So here we were, I couldn't hear anything but Sirius's vows, and I automatically repeated what the Bishop told me to say, the world had narrowed to the beating of our hearts. Amelia took my bouquet so we could exchange rings, then the Bishop said you may now kiss your bride and Sirius's lips met mine in a kiss that set my heart to flattering. We turned and the Bishop introduced us to the assembled as Lord Sirius and Lady Cassian Emrys-Black. A cheer went up from the room as we walked out to where the reception line was to be.

Everyone passed and we thanked them all for their coming and sharing in our joy. The last to come before us were my cousin and Aunt. Gaylord explained that they had flown on a plane and had arrived about a bit past noon and had not made it to the palace till lunch was over. I told him that the fact that they were here was all that mattered and then asked who had told them about the wedding. He looked back at Viv who then looked at Amelia.

"I had to Cassy; you needed someone besides Susan and I from your Family."

I hugged Gaylord and then Viv as my only living close relative left stood in front of me. She looked from me to Sirius an odd look in her eyes as she stared at him. "Cassy dear." She just kept staring at him. "Please don't thing me senile, but your young man here looks remarkably like the portrait of our Grandsire."

I leaned forward and kissed Viv on the cheek. "I know Auntie, Sirius has a very small amount of Emrys blood in him, but he also has the Merlin's soul so I guess he comes by the looks honestly."

Her eyes grow wide and she stood stunned for a minute or so, "Then the prophecy has come to pass that Merlin and his beloved Cassian will come back and the Emrys line will once again grow to lead the Wizarding world."

Now it was my turn to look shocked. I wanted to ask her more about the prophesy but alarm bells began to sound. The shields were being hit by countless dis-spelling charms, and Fiendfyre hexes. With a flourish of my hand I was back in my dark work robes and around the room all the other magicals had done the same. I looked to Amelia first, "Get your team out on their lookouts to monitor the shields for any sign of weakness. Sirius and Remus, you're with me, start checking the runes and wards to make sure we have no weak spots developing, there shouldn't be, but I want to be sure." Then I looked to the kids.

Ron was yelling at Draco, "You did this. You turned us all in to your Boss, didn't you?"

I walked quickly over to Ron and smacked him in the back of the head. "Use your head Ron, Draco took an Unbreakable if he had betrayed me, he would be dead along with his Mother."

"Oh yeah," was his only response.

I then turned to Draco. "Do you have any idea how they may have known of the wedding or if they had mentioned anything about attacking the Palace?" He just shook his head as he watched out a window as spell after spell hit and were absorbed into the shields.

"I might know how they found out," came a voice from the back of the room. It was Percy, his father had him by the collar and was marching him toward me. "I had to tell my boss why I needed the day off and instead of just giving him an excuse I told him I was attending a wedding at the Palace. I guess I let my ego get the better of me, after all how often do you get an invitation to the Palace for anything let alone a wedding?"

"And your boss would be?"

"Pius Thickness, the Minister for Magic."

"Are you a complete idiot Weasley? Thickness is one of The Dark Lord's men. Telling him was like writing a message right to The Dark Lord himself." Draco Looked at Ron with a bit of contempt on his face. "Your own brother, Weasley. So what do you have to say now?"

The sound of spells hitting the shield had almost stopped and Amelia's people had all reported back that the shield strength was up another fifty percent. That was when another alarm sounded and a report that two dragons had been spotted heading this way. I pointed to Harry "Stay here and make sure the Royals are kept safely away from any windows. The shields should hold but the pressure wave from their blasts might pop some windows in some of the ministry buildings and the Palace." I then called to the other teens. "Set up internal shield just in case of breakage."

The group all saluted and headed off with the help of palace adds to cover the interior of the palace with protections.

Finally, I called to my new Husband, "Let's get to the roof and see how well our work holds up to beasties."

We were joined by Cissy, Kingsley, Gaylord, Bill and Charlie. Charley and Gaylord wanted to make sure they weren't any of the Dragons either cared for because if they were it meant that the preserves had been compromised and the dragons were under an Imperius. They were two Hebridean Blacks being ridden by a couple of Death Eaters. Neither Charley nor Gaylord were happy at the sight but were relieved that they weren't from either preserve. Everyone around us stood with wands at the ready, Sirius and I just stood watching, confident our work would hold up.

"So have I missed anything?" Remus had finally gotten back from his check of the wards.

"Nope not yet." Was Sirius's reply, "So anything to report from your inspection?"

"Just the smoking of about a dozen or so of the Tommy Boy's shock troops, before they realized there was no way they were getting in. Oh I did hear one of them make a comment about wondering why the attack had been moved up to today instead of keeping it on Beltane."

I shook my head and looked up just in time to see the first of the two dragon's fire off a blast. The pressure wave was not as bad as I had feared it would be but I still could hear the sound of windows popping in several of the ministry buildings. Then when the rider of the second Dragon realized the fire had done nothing he decided to put his Dragon into a dive hoping to pierce the shields. This resulted in both Dragon and Rider being ashed. The first rider, having realized the folly of the attack, turned his mount and headed back north in the direction they had come from.

The entire attack had lasted a little over an hour and had resulted in an increase of the shield strength of about 75% over all, no loss of life on our side, and minimal property damage. Reports from around the shield had estimated around 70 to 80 ashed of Tommy Boy's followers, which included several squibs with guns. Like the spells, the bullets had not penetrated the shield either.

I half listened to the comments from Cissy, Kingsley and the Weasley Boys as we made our way back down to the reception room. All those who had not seen the shields at work before were in shock of how well they had worked and amazed at the fact that not only hadn't they fallen under such a fierce attack, i.e. nothing has ever held up like this under that much Fiendfyre. But that they had absorbed the attacks and used the energy to increase the shield's strength.

We found the Queen still sitting calmly on her throne while everyone else was righting chairs and taking their seats. "Well My Merlin, you have proven yourself and your work to be of the level you had promised. We are impressed with what you have achieved and would like to honor you and your assistants with medals of service to the crown once this war is over."

I once again thanked her Highness for her complement and changed back into my wedding gown. No Death Eater attack was going to ruin my day. Even Amelia was impressed and kept telling me so the more champagne she had. All in all, the day had turned out to be everything I had wanted and more. Even with the attack and reports of minor skirmishes with disheartened Death Eaters being arrested only to have them turn to ash when the arresting agent tried to bring them through the shields to incarcerate them.

At the end of the reception as we were all getting ready to leave two pages pulled Sirius and I to the side to inform us that a wedding chamber had been prepared for us here in the palace. When I objected stating that there was no one else capable of driving the minibus, I was informed that the Queen had already assigned one of her drivers to take the family back to the Row house and that all other arrangements had been seen to. So Sirius and I said our goodnights to everyone and were escorted to the Wedding suite.

The doors to the suite were swung open to reveal the room, splendid with a very tall canopy bed decked out in fine linens and bed drapes, a small table set by the large windows held another bottle of champagne alone with plate of caviar and biscuits and other decadent little morsels, and a roaring fire in the fireplace, Sirius swept me up in his arms and carried me into the room as the pages closed the doors behind us, leaving us alone for the first time in what seemed like forever, even though I knew it had only been a day. But what a day it had been, and now we would truly start our lives as Husband and Wife.