Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, and don't make money off of this. I just put characters places and they seem to do things on their own.
Written for the School of Prompts Challenge:
3-1: The Three Broomsticks. (needs to be ¼ of the setting)
The place where Harry and Daphne finally manage to go on a date, with some other friends involved. (1/4 of the date, other places being probably the new WWW shop and Honeydukes, and carriage ride there)
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Harry glanced around at the group that they were sitting with, on their carriage ride to Hogsmeade. They were a packed full with six people. Daphne leaned against Harry, her head resting on his shoulder. Tracey sat next to her friend, across from Astoria. Hermione sat next to Astoria, creating a small buffer between her and Ron.
"So you two finally get your date together in Hogsmeade. How long have you two waited for this?"
"Who says we haven't been in Hogsmeade together before?" Harry shrugged, giving a small smirk.
"But Daphne never went to any Hogsmeade weekends when you went and you never went to any..." Tracey narrowed her eyes as she trailed off. "That's why you would sneak off half the time, especially near lunch." She pointed an accusing finger at Daphne. "You ran off with Harry under the invisibility cloak huh?"
Daphne didn't say anything, though she had a small smile tugging at her lips. Harry just gave their friends a smirk. They bumped around along the road and talked about the various events that occurred in class. Eventually they arrived at edge of the Village. Ron stepped out, helping Hermione out of the carriage. Harry got out, helping Daphne, Tracey, and Astoria out, before holding hands with Daphne.
"So where do we go first?" Astoria asked the group. Her two of her friends had dates today, so she decided to hang out with her sister and their group.
"How about Three Broomsticks," Ron suggested.
"Its too early for that, we'll go during lunch," Harry replied.
"Honeydukes?" Ron offered again.
Hermione let out an exasperated sigh. "Honestly Ron, do you ever think of a store that isn't food related?"
"Oi! I can think of other things to: you know, like WWW. I hear George is trying to open a shop here. They took over Zonko's old store"
"Alright, lets go check out their shop, if we're lucky George and Angelina might be there too."
They arrived to find the shop was not quite ready yet. The front of the store was the same neon orange that stood out in Diagon Ally, bringing a splash of color to an otherwise earthly colored village.
The storefront was plastered with overlapping posters of announcements of the Grand Opening of Weasleys' Wizarding Wheezes two weekends from now. Another Hogsmeade weekend, to capitalize on the flood of students that will be there.
They six paused outside the store and pondered what to do. "Well, looks like the shop isn't open yet. Where to now?"
"We can listen to Ron's suggestion of Honeydukes and pick up some sweets."
Just as the group turned to leave the door creaked open behind them. "Where do you think you're going Harrikins?"
Harry smiled and turned around. "Hello George, a little bit surprised to see you here."
"Of course, we have to prepare for the Grand Opening. Come in, check out the store! Angelina's back there too."
They walked into the store, and were greeted by a similar interior to the Diagon Ally store. Shelves were lined with all sorts of goods, from the standard dungbombs and sugar quills, to some of WWW more specialty stuff. Peruvian Instant Darkness powder made and appearance, as well as boxes stacked to the ceiling of Skiving Snackboxes.
The group split up to explore the inside. "You guys can buy anything, think of it as business partner bonus. Any friend of Harry's gets special treatment here."
Astoria went to check out the various prank supplies, collecting some dungbombs and skiving snackboxes into a basket. She seemed to ponder over some other objects, before grinning wickedly and adding a portable swamp to the basket. She wandered over to the fireworks section, and observed a firework that had it's fuse lit, but never seemed to go off. She collected some fireworks too.
Tracey found her way over to the WonderWitch products and eyed the love potion wearily, before she headed off to observe the Pygmy Puffs. She found them amusing, but didn't buy anything there. She got bored and strolled over to see what Astoria had collected. One look at the basket she was carrying and she made a vow to not anger the witch.
Hermione and Ron made their way over to the defense products Hermione looked through the products to figure out what they did and how they did it. She found the shield hats and shield cloaks very intriguing. Ron just stood by her side, looking a little bored. He almost grabbed a Skiving Snackbox, but backed off at Hermione's glare.
George stuck with Harry and Daphne. They were shortly joined by Angelina.
"So you must be the Daphne that Witch Weekly is quite cross with."
Daphne nodded at that. "Pleasure to formally meet your Johnson, and Weasley."
"Please call me Angelina, no need to be formal here, any friend of our brother Harry here is a friend of ours."
Daphne acquiesced to that.
"Now, you can get anything you want for free. We aren't sure what you see in Ickle Harrikins here, but we know you are certainly the brains - and the looks behind Harry." George shot Harry a wink.
Harry opened his mouth to protest, but Daphne preempted him. "Harry go make sure Tori hasn't bought out half the store yet. We can't have them losing too much business on account of her pranks."
Harry just grumbled out and stalked over to find Tracey and Astoria. Astoria had indeed had an overflowing basket at that point and was struggling, even with the lightening charms on the basket.
"Well, we clearly know who carries the wand in this relationship," George stage whispered to Angelina, making sure that Harry heard him. Harry just gave him a glare over the shoulder.
Harry gathered his friends and George and Angelina gave them a small tour and pointing out some of the new products. Mostly new lines of celebration fireworks and flimsy Voldemort dolls that could be spelled for target practice.
Eventually they left, Astoria putting her stuff on Daphne's tab, getting pretty most things for free (Harry still slipped some galleons to George who just left them on the counter). Ron had to pay normal price—Half off for being a friend of Harry and twice the amount for sibling surcharge. Ron grumbled about it, but it was mostly for show. George had paid him a bit extra when he helped out the shop during the summer.
The group headed out, mostly just Astoria encumbered by her purchases. They headed to Honeydukes and picked up some various sweets. Daphne stopped Astoria from buying anything there, as she would have had to carry it up to the castle herself. Harry thought for a moment, before calling out the Kreacher to pop all of Astoria's things to her room. Astoria just thanked Harry before running through the shop and grabbing her various favorite treats. Daphne grumbled about Harry spoiling Tori.
After they came out of the shop Harry had Kreacher bring all of their things back to their dormitories. They finally headed out to Three Broomsticks for lunch. Harry came in to the shop and was surprised by the large table that occupied most of the center of the inn. Most of the booths around the edge of the store were already filled with third and fourth years talking in quiet groups.
Tracey and Tori just shrugged and sat down at the large table, Harry shrugged and sat down too, forced to sit in the center as Daphne dragged him there. Hermione and Ron filled in the seats opposite Harry and Daphne.
"What would you like to eat dears?" Madam Rosmerta came over to get their orders.
Orders went around, most of them getting butterbeer and something light to eat. Eventually the reason for the large table became clear, though Harry wasn't sure if it had been planned or if it was just a coincidence. Neville wandered in with Hannah and immediately sat down next to Harry. Susan came in shortly after and sat down across from Hannah.
Draco and Blaise walked in together. Harry greeted Draco with a nod and Daphne waved to Blaise. Ron let out a pained groan and Harry saw that Hermione had tightened her grip on Ron's arm. Harry guessed that the groan came from Hermione stomping on his foot under the table. They took the seats across from Astoria and Tracey. Ron just refused to look in their direction.
Ginny and Luna then came in together taking up the various seats that remained. Soon everyone had food and drink in front of them, and the various people started making conversation. Soon chatter and laughter filled the inn.
"Feels wonderful to have a group of friends that can let loose like this right? Even Granger is having a good time without studying." Daphne whispered in Harry's ear.
Harry gave a grin at that comment. "This feels a bit like a family gathering, awkward uncle included." Harry nodded towards Draco, who looked a little bit uncomfortable, but still enjoyed talking to Astoria. "Looks like Dumbledore and McGonagall's efforts at unity paid off a little. We have every house represented at the table."
Harry felt a little bold, and was in a good mood seeing all his friends also having a great time stood up and raised his glass. "A toast, to friends! I hope we can gather like this for a long time to come." He raised his glass and nodded to each and everyone one of them, including Draco. Draco gave a small curt nod back as they all raised their glasses.
Harry sat back down and Daphne patted his arm. "You'll need to work on better speeches when you are Minister of Magic."
Harry gave her a small glare. "Whatever your ambitions for me may be, I will not be Minister of Magic."
Daphne frowned at that, "Fine, then when you are Head of the DMLE."
Harry agreed to that. "Any plans you may have for me as Minister of Magic, you should adapt them to Hermione. I'm sure she would love to be the first muggleborn Minister of Magic." Hermione nodded at that.
Neville, sitting next to Harry heard the entire exchange. "So, planning your next great adventure already Harry? A coup to take over the Ministry of Magic? I can get behind that!"
"With 5 Slytherins here, I'm sure it'd be rather easy to come up with a plan for it. It certainly is an ambitious idea" Blaise added in.
"And with 6 Gryffindors to lead the way-" Ron started.
"To bumble in without a plan?" Daphne appended. Ron frowned at that.
"Two Hufflepuffs, working hard!" Susan added in before Ron could come up with a retort.
"And Two Ravenclaws to make sure you have all the facts you need." Astoria added in.
"To unity?" Hermione offered.
"To unity." Everyone replied.
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WC: 1814
A/N: Huh, so that actually turned out a bit differently than I had originally imagined. Though I liked the idea of Harry and group making plans to take the MoM by storm. I'll probably add stories that show how Harry/Daphne meet with some of the various people for the first time (or for the first time after the battle in Draco's case). Also, I think it would be interesting to write another story of after the takeover of the Ministry and how everyone's dynamic changes in that time.
This group is sadly short of Ravenclaws (Astoria and Luna are the only two), and…. I don't know if I'm going to add anymore to this already fairly large group. That being said, I also need to find pairings for the unpaired characters so far (Blaise, Tracey, Susan, Ginny, and Luna). If there is a pairing you would like to see regarding those characters, I'm open to suggestions.
Anyways, this was sort of an illustration of the people recovering after the war. A year to grieve for those lose to the war, Harry, Susan, Ron, and Hermione might not have fully recovered yet, but they are on their way, and their friends will try to make sure they have a good time.