Chapter 21: Wed
A/N: Hello! How long it's been! I'd planned to stop for a month, but that quickly became three. If I leave a story too long, I just know I'll cringe too hard at my writing to continue. Thanks so much to everyone who has reviewed and followed along with this little story of mine.
"If you've changed your mind for any reason, dear, don't hesitate to tell us. Any reason. We can always turn back."
Hermione looked at Molly with some surprise. Mrs Weasley had been nothing but supportive these past weeks.
"If this wedding was influenced even at all by the Ministry…then nobody, and I'm sure least of all Remus, will judge you for not wanting to proceed." Molly brushed a speck of something invisible from Hermione's dress.
Hermione nearly responded––nearly said, they'll take him away instantly and lock him up, don't you understand?––but managed to swallow the words. She said, instead, "I'm very sure about this." A smile. "I care for Remus immensely."
Now it was Fleur who surprised her. "But care is not love, Hermione."
"And I love him," Hermione added. She smiled to soften the words. "I can see why the timing may seem suspect. Thank you all for all the support you've given me and Remus despite…despite our unorthodox relationship. And thank you for your concern now, but I assure you, I'm very sure of this."
She sounded very certain to herself, even if she felt no such certainty in her stomach. She exchanged a glance with Ginny, who raised her eyebrows.
Then the moment was over, and the other women busied themselves again with her dress and makeup. Hermione smiled as they returned to chatting and laughing. Though certain she most definitely was not, she did not feel as unsettled as she'd thought she would. There was no feeling of impending doom; no eleventh-hour fear reared its head. She had every intention of seeing this through.
Soon enough, it was time for the ceremony, and Hermione wanted nothing more than to get it over with. Shell Cottage was even prettier than usual, thanks to Fleur's wandwork, and it was a perfect balmy day. Arthur Weasley had been absolutely delighted to discover the main theme of the day: Muggle Wedding. The only fly in the goblet was the Ministry representative there to officiate the ceremony. Standard procedure, they'd been told, especially when a dangerous magical creature sought to get married.
"On your own time, dear." Molly gave Hermione an encouraging smile, dabbing at her own cheeks with a tissue.
"Thanks," she said, smiling despite her nerves. Ginny caught her eye and grinned.
"You sure you're not going to change your mind?"
Hermione frowned.
"Fine, fine. You sure you don't want me to walk with you? Or Mum, or even Fleur?"
Fleur sniffed. "What is the meaning of even––"
"I'm sure," Hermione laughed. It was odd, but she felt full of some strange mix of emotions that she wasn't quite sure was appropriate for a sham marriage. "I'm very sure."
She kissed them each on the cheek, and with that, the three other women exited the cottage to join the party awaiting the bride. Ginny and Fleur, she knew, would be joining Harry and Ron and Remus in the front.
When Hermione eased open the front door, the sunlight hit her first, then the smell of salt on the sea breeze. She smiled, nervous despite herself, as her eyes fell on the small gathering of friends and family ahead, the petals on the sand.
She met Remus' light gaze across the distance and her nerves quieted to an insignificant buzz. In his waistcoat and cutaway, he was every part the Remus she had grown to know over the last months, not the professor of her past. As she took her first steps towards him, the three-witch band began to play. She could feel everyone smiling at her as she passed. When she was halfway down the makeshift aisle, she paused, as they had earlier arranged. Remus came to meet her in the centre; she took his arm, and they walked together to the front.
"Hermione," Remus murmured.
"I'm sure," she said, pre-emptively. But he laughed softly.
"No––you look beautiful."
The smile she gave him as they stood before the Ministry wizard was instinctive, unabashed, her heart swelling with feeling. It's not real, she reminded herself, this wedding. Yet the look in Remus' eyes was anything but false. She couldn't look away.
"We are gathered here today to join Remus John Lupin and Hermione Jean Granger in matrimony; an honourable estate, not to be entered into lightly or in falsehood, but reverently and soberly."
The Ministry wizard continued with the muggle vows. The words were familiar words, but they took on a new meaning she had never truly understood until today. In sickness and in health, the wizard said, and she thought, yes, always.
"You may say your vows," said the wizard.
Remus swallowed. Hermione said, softly,
"I, Hermione Granger, do take you, Remus Lupin, to be my lawfully wedded husband, secure in the knowledge that you will be my constant friend and my faithful partner in life."
She squeezed his hands when it came to his turn to speak. Do not back out now.
He did not. He stayed, and said his part, and then Harry was handing Remus the ring.
"I give you this ring as a symbol of my love and faithfulness," Remus said. His eyes were a brilliant blue, his gaze almost vulnerable. Her breath caught in her throat as he continued. "As––as I place it on your finger, I commit my heart and soul to you. I ask you to wear this ring as a reminder of the vows we have spoken today."
He slid the wedding ring onto her finger. She recalled him doing the same, months ago, when she had first planned their false wedding. What had she said, then? Thanked him for making their sham engagement so beautiful. She didn't feel capable of such flippancy now.
She had to swallow before she said her part, taking Remus' ring from Ginny and sliding it onto his finger.
"You may kiss," said the Ministry wizard. Then, slowly, surely, she felt Remus' arms about her waist. He leaned in and she up, and they kissed. She kissed him fiercely, the whoops and applause mere backdrop to the pounding of her heart. Somewhere in the back of her mind Hermione remembered vaguely that there was an inspection to pass and a law to overturn. But in this moment, she thought, I love him––I do; and it terrified her.
Mere hours after the reception, as the sun was setting, they bid farewell to the small wedding party and Apparated to their temporary new residence, a cabin on an island surrounded by the Aegean sea. Hermione found Remus on the balcony, looking out to sea. The afternoon sky was pink and orange and the angle of the sun threw romantic, arcing shadows of the rocky cliffs across the weathered face of the ocean.
"Remus," she said, softly, as she approached him from behind. She could not be sure how he was feeling. She was not even sure about herself; there was something swooping in her stomach that could perhaps be put to the gathering twilight and the darkening sea.
Remus turned to her, and she felt her heart skip a beat when their eyes met. She felt, quite certainly, and in an entirely different way than legilimency, that he was looking somewhere far deeper than her conscious mind. And she his, judging by what she felt as they held the gaze: guilt and trepidation, and hunger, and love.
It seemed a wedding and a honeymoon had unfastened him. Finally, at long last, the hunger won, the love. He reached for her and she went to him, their kisses urgent, consumed with need. She could not think of a single word to say. She knew she would not need any.