31st July 1988
Lily silently opened the door to the room the children shared, Amelia stood behind her. They crept into the room and surrounded the bed, growing small smiles at seeing Raven and Harry sound asleep with Susan lying between them, hugging Raven's arm and burying her face into her neck.
"Susan does have her own room right?" Lily chuckled.
"Yeah she does, she just won't sleep in it." Amelia giggled, since the trio had awoken from the bond every night Susan would sneak out of her bed and into that of the twins, never wearing any clothing, Lily hadn't being too happy when she originally found this out but now had grown used to it and accepted that Susan was only acting on what her instincts told her to do, be close to her mates. So Lily never made too much of a fuss about it, as long as they never progressed past hugging. Harry wasn't too bothered about Susan sneaking into bed with them, though he wished she'd wear some clothes, each morning he'd wake up and a blush would adorn his face. Raven liked having Susan in bed with them, it made her feel safe and loved like when she slept with Harry and she didn't mind the lack of clothing as Harry did.
Lily reached out and lightly caressed Raven's cheek, Raven rolled onto her side, her back to her mother in an attempt to remain asleep, her arm unconsciously moving round Susan and pulling her closer in a possessive manor, Susan's smile grew.
"Raven, Harry wake up." She said softly, lightly shaking Raven's shoulder, Raven's shoulder rose higher as she ducked her head, pulling Susan closer. Harry's eyes slowly opened, he glanced up and watched as his mother continued to set about the task of waking Raven.
"Raven, wake up." Lily said a little louder, shaking her a tad more forcefully, Raven let out a low groan, letting a long breath of frustration, her eyes slowly opening to be met with the sight of her naked redheaded mate being held against her, she pulled back her head to get a good look at the sleeping girl, she was taller than her, had been since the bonding. Raven released her hold of her mate and began to pull away only to find herself unable to, she lifted the quilt and looked down to see a scaly black serpent tail with a jaded underbelly coiled around her lower half, connected to Susan.
Raven tried to ease herself out of the coils of the redhead only to have the coils grow tighter and move further up her body, stopping at her torso.
"Err…a little help?" Raven asked nervously, Amelia couldn't help but giggle at the sight.
"Susan let go of Raven." Amelia sighed, Susan made no movement "Don't pretend to be asleep Susan, I know you're awake." She stated, a small smile crept across Susan's face as she squeezed her eyes shut before opening them and sending a mock glare at her aunt for spoiling her fun, she slowly released Raven, retracting her tail and moving to sit up in the bed, not caring for her modesty as she passed the quilt and sat up fully upright.
"Now that you're up, get dressed and that includes you Susan." Amelia stated, her tone carrying authority and making little room for argument, the two adults moved towards the door.
"Happy birthday you two." Lily said as she headed out the door.
"Happy birthday." Amelia parroted, giving them a kind smile before following the vampiress out the door, closing it behind her.
As soon as the adults were gone Harry and Raven slipped out of bed, attired in light blue pyjamas with small brown wolves on them. Each picture moving, acting different motions, varying from sitting and letting out silent howls and moving in circular motion, sniffing and releasing silent snarls up to simple baring their fangs. They headed to their wardrobe, opening it they set about browsing through their clothes. Susan followed after them, stopping a pace or so behind them, reverting back to her human and younger form. Raven glanced back at their mate.
"You should go…and get dressed." Raven said as she gave her mate a small smile, Susan pouted but soon nodded and moved to leave the room.
…
Lily, currently attired in a black low-cut shirt that revealed a small part of her cleavage and dark grey jeans, sat at the dining table, capable of seating a dozen people, Amelia set beside her wearing a scarlet shirt that revealed an ample amount of cleavage with light blue jeans. The room itself was quite barren, the walls only decorated by the portraits of the ancestors of the Bones family, a crystal chandelier hung from the centre of the ceiling and the flooring consisted of wood.
The door opened and Harry entered the room attired in a black shirt and dark blue jeans. Raven followed him dressed in light blue jeans and a red top, her hair an identical shade to her mother's. Susan followed the duo wearing a white sundress with pink flower and green vine patterns on it.
The trio moved to sit on the right side of the table, opposite the adults, Susan sitting between the two as she did every morning.
"Happy birthday." Lily greeted once again, Raven and Harry wore identical sheepish smiles at the repeated statement, three plates materialised in front of the trio, a small pile of pancakes on each one, a collection of syrups, sugars and jams appearing in the centre of the table, Susan's eyes widened at the 'magical' sight before her as she licked her lips, Raven and Harry wore similar expressions having never eaten pancakes when with the Dursleys and with their mother the sweets were a rare treat. Susan's hand shot out and grabbed the syrup and began covering her stack with the stuff.
"Is Nymphadora coming?" Harry asked as he reached for the sugar, a month or so after they had awakened from the initial bonding with Susan Amelia arranged for Nymphadora to come and teach Raven under the oath that neither she nor her parents would spill a word about them, they had quickly become friends and the twins began inviting her over whenever they could.
Lily sent Harry a warm smile.
"I invited her to come last week, she said she would and that she'd be here around lunch time." Lily replied, the smiles on both Harry and Raven's faces grew at the news.
"Err…mum?" Raven asked after a moment's hesitation, nervousness entering her voice, Lily turned to face her daughter and hummed to show she was listening "When are you going to take us hunting?" She asked, Lily stiffened, her eyes locking on her daughter.
"I was planning on taking you hunting a little after your eleventh birthday." Lily admitted.
"Ninth." Harry stated, everyone turned to look at Harry, lightly frowning "Can you take us hunting soon after our ninth birthday?" He asked.
"Why so soon?" Lily asked.
"The sooner we turn the sooner we can control ourselves, you said you'd take us hunting after I read all the books you gave us on werewolves, after we ask, we've read them all and now I'm asking." Harry answered as he popped a piece of pancake into his mouth.
"But isn't your ninth birthday a little too soon to activate the werewolf curse?" Lily asked, Harry moved to reply when the door opened, everyone turned to see Sirius enter through the door wearing dark blue cargo pants, a grey shirt and a black jacket.
"You should know Lily that you won't be able to move them from this motion, they're both as stubborn as Prongs and have your intellect, your best option is negotiation." Sirius stated as he moved to sit on the other side of Amelia, opposite.
Lily let out a small sigh, she knew Sirius was right, but what could she say, what could she offer them that would convince them to remain human for a little longer, she was suddenly struck with inspiration.
"Tell you what I'll start your magic education this year if you promise that you'll drop the subject of hunting until your eleventh birthday." Lily proposed.
"Get us wands and we'll hold off until our tenth." Raven shot back, not missing a single beat, Harry glanced at her with a small smirk.
"No matter where we go, if I get you wands the Ministry will be able to trace you and knowledge of where you are will get out." Lily stressed, silence filled the air for several moments.
"You said that Raven's the heir of Slytherin." Amelia said stated, breaking the silence that had settled, all eyes were on her.
"What does that have to with anything?" Lily asked.
"Salazar was said to keep his collection of wands in his vault, and that vault hasn't being opened in a long time, if the rumours are true then it should be easy to get them wands." Amelia explained; Lily frowned.
"But wouldn't Raven have to claim the title and Ladyship in order to open that vault?" Lily questioned.
"Yes, but that is a simple thing to do and the Goblins will keep the whole thing confidential." Amelia responded, a small sigh escaped Lily's lips, she turned back to the twins.
"I'll start your magic education and if the rumours are true you'll get your wands but you have to wait until your tenth birthday before going hunting." Lily stated, seeing that they wouldn't be willing to wait until their eleventh birthdays and that they had raised a good point about the needing control of the abilities that would follow the activation and that they would need to adapt to their inner beast when it was fully unleashed.
"Deal." Harry and Raven answered in perfect unison, large grins erupting upon their faces.
…
After breakfast the residence of the Bones household moved to the living room, the room itself was quite large, the flooring covered by black tiles, three black leather sofas sat about the room, each one capable of sitting three at least, with a large chair of similar material in the far corner of the room, the centre of the room was occupied by a coffee table and at the wall, surrounded by the chairs and table was the black marble fireplace.
Raven, Harry and Susan ran and jumped onto the centre couch, taking up the first two seats, letting Lily sit on the far end, Sirius occupied the single seat and Amelia sat on the three piece sofa on the left side of the room.
"So shall we get straight to the presents?" Sirius asked with a large grin, the twins looked about excitedly, nodding.
"Well since you suggested it Sirius why don't you go first?" Lily proposed.
"Gladly." He answered, raising from his chair and heading over to the twins, dipping his hands into his pockets and pulling out two thick rectangular gifts wrapped in black wrapping paper with golden swirls, though one was quite a lot bigger than the other, he handed one to each of the twins, handing the biggest to Raven and the smallest to Harry.
"I suspect you'll want to share your gifts." He said before heading back to his seat.
Harry and Raven shredded the paper within seconds of the gift being placed in their hands, once that was done within Harry's hands was a single tome but in Raven's hands was a small collection of books, the ones in Raven's possession looked brand new while the one in Harry's looked rather aged.
"The Art Of Pranking By The Marauders." Harry read aloud.
"Yes, I noticed how fond you two were of reading and I thought this would be the perfect gift so you are perfectly prepared for when you do go to Hogwarts, that there is a book containing every prank the Marauders made while we were at Hogwarts, we each wrote certain chapters, including your father." Sirius explained, a warm smile grew upon Harry's lips, the same one his mother now wore even if the touching gift would teach her children how to make her life a living hell until they went to Hogwarts.
"Thank you." Harry said quietly, emotion filling his tone as he stroked the cover of the old book.
"Books on Transfiguration." Raven acknowledged.
"Yep, going from transfiguring a pen into a sock up to animagus transformations." Sirius explained, a wide grin erupted over Raven's face at that.
"THANK YOU!" Raven praised, her eyes twinkling as she looked over each title of the book.
"Sirius why did you get them magic books when they're not supposed to even starting to learn magic for another three years?" Lily asked in a sickly sweet tone, Sirius merely tapped the side of his nose while giving her a knowing smile.
'He knew I'd decide to start teaching them early didn't he?' Lily inwardly deadpanned.
"Guess I'll go next." Amelia volunteered, conjuring a single gift, though quite large, wrapped in green wrapping paper with silver snakes upon it "Now this is for the two of you to share." She said as she placed it between the two of them, on Susan's lap, the trio set about opening the gift.
One all the paper was gone the twins' eyes widened as did those of Susan as they saw what the gift was. Books, containing information on at least half of the dark creatures of the wizarding world that had been discovered, along with a tome or two concerning rituals, both light and dark.
"Thanks." The twins chorused.
"Well looks like you two are going to be busy for the next couple years." Lily chuckled.
"You mean the next couple weeks, have you seen how quickly they go through books?" Sirius chuckled, the twins sent him a mock glare.
"Well, I guess it's time I gave you my gifts." Lily sighed, she snapped her fingers and the closet at the back left corner opened and two rather long items levitated out and headed towards the twins, covered in brown paper and bound by string, the second it was in their reach they set about unwrapping it. Their eyes shot out of their sockets as they saw what was within them, two brooms, cleansweep Sevens.
"That's right you two I plan to start teaching you flying, you both used to love your hover brooms when you were little so I thought it was an appropriate gift, but they are charmed to not go above a certain height and so that they won't work without the presence of an adult core, or in other words no flying without an adult watching." Lily explained.
While the twins were a tad disappointed about the charms they were still thrilled to own a broom each, they both launched at Lily, Raven jumping over Susan to get to her, only to end up sprawled atop her at first, not that the redhead minded much, Raven quickly crawled over to her mother and she and Harry hugged her tightly.
"THANK YOU!" The duo yelled in perfect sync.
Green flames erupted in the fireplace, everyone turned to face the fireplace just in time to see Nymphadora fall flat on her face, her clothes covered in a thin layer of soot and floo power, her clothing consisting of plain black pants and a light blue shirt, her hair a vibrant pink. She stumbled to her feet.
"A graceful an entrance as always Dora." Lily chuckled, Nymphadora blushed, averting her gaze as she set about the task of brushing off her clothes.
Raven sprung from the sofa and charged at the fifteen year old metamorphmagus, pouncing on her and bringing her arms and legs around her, Nymphadora stumbled back but maintained the hug and her balance.
"Nymphadora, you're here." Raven praised, a bright smile on her face, her own hair turning pink, the elder girl chuckled as she watched the younger girl's hair change colour.
"How many times do I have to tell you to call me either Dora or Tonks, I don't like my name." Nymphadora whined.
"But I like you're names, it's cute and unique like you." Raven replied, leaning in and giving the older girl a peck on the cheek, quickly followed by the puppy dog eyes.
"She's got you there Nymphadora." Harry remarked, a warm smile adorning his face, Nymphadora sent him a mock glare, Raven removed herself from Nymphadora, the elder metamorphmagus dipped her hand into her pocket, retrieving two miniaturized gifts, she resized them with a wave of her wand, once again glad for Amelia adding her to the wards that ensured the Ministry wouldn't detect her use of underage magic.
"Well, happy birthday you two." Nymphadora sighed as she handed a gift wrapped in pink to Raven and one in blue to Harry, they tore the wrapping paper open to find two rather large boxes of chocolates, one normal box and another charmed box.
"Just remember to share you two." Nymphadora chuckled.
"Thanks." The two chorused all the while considering how they could trick the adults into consuming the charmed chocolates (1).
A/N Was supposed to be longer and contain multiple time jumps but it sort of went over so I'm just going to publish this chapter here, hope you all liked it, even if not much actually happened, open to any suggestions and please review.
In case anyone lost track, 8th birthday.
(1) Basically the sort of sweets you'd find at Fred and George's shop but from somewhere else.