January 16th, 2012

A/N: I'm really sorry, guys. I had this chapter saved on my flash drive that for some reason won't work…I would have uploaded this sooner had it worked, so sorry. I don't know if I've gotten the years quite right for every child, but I did the best I can, and if one of you knows the actual years they're all supposed to be born, I would really appreciate it if you told me, as I don't fully trust Harry Potter Wiki.

Thanks as always to Cat for beta reading this!

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

Chapter Twenty Six

Lavender didn't know what to do. The Ministry was hosting a gala of some sort for all of their Aurors, and as Ron's wife she was obligated to go. However, Lavender didn't want to leave her baby girl with an ordinary babysitter, and Ron's parents were attending the gala out of support for their son. Bill and Fleur were in France, Fred and George were busy at their shop, she didn't know Percy extraordinarily well, Charlie was in Romania, and Harry and Ginny would be at the Ministry too. That left Hermione and Draco.

Now, Lavender didn't mind it if those two watched Destiny for the night, but she knew Ron would object. He did.

"I will not leave my daughter with a former Death Eater!"

Lavender could count the amount of times that she had talked back to Ron on one hand. This was one of those times. "A former Death Eater who happens to be one of the most well-respected wizards of his time! I'd rather we had Draco watch her than leave her by herself, Ron! Unless that's what you'd like to do!"

Ron grumbled, but he couldn't disagree with Lavender, and Destiny ended up at the Malfoy household.

"There's my goddaughter," Hermione cooed, taking Destiny from her mother. She kissed the infant on the cheek and looked at Lavender and Ron. "How long do you two expect you'll be?"

"Around three hours. I hope that's not too long," Lavender said apologetically. She went out of her way to be as nice to Hermione as possible – Merlin knew it was the least she could do after stealing the witch's boyfriend way back then.

"Of course it's not too long. Destiny and I love spending time together, don't we sweetie?" Destiny giggled and clapped her hands together, something she had recently learned how to do.

Lavender had asked Hermione to babysit Destiny before, but even though it had only happened a couple of times, Lavender had a sneaking suspicion that her own daughter liked Hermione more. With a heavy heart, she kissed Destiny goodbye, not noticing the way Ron was looking at Hermione.

Draco walked into the sitting room and smiled when Destiny reached for him as soon as he got close enough. As much as he disliked Ron and Lavender, he undeniably adored Hermione's godchild.

Hermione scowled at her husband when he took Destiny from her. Draco laughed and gave her that trademark smirk, which vanished once Ron spoke.

It was quietly and probably meant for Lavender's ears only, but Ron had never gotten the hang of whispering. "I don't know how I feel about this, Lav. I would actually prefer it if Fred or George took over."

Hermione opened her mouth to defend Draco, but Lavender beat her to it. "I trust him with Des, Ron, and I think you should too. Now get moving, or else we'll be late." She turned to Hermione and Draco. "Thank you so much for doing this."

With Destiny back in her hold, Hermione said, "Any time." Meanwhile, Draco coolly met Ron's gaze, and held it until the redhead disapparated.

"Honestly, how much larger could that elephant have gotten?"

Draco blatantly stared at Hermione. "What? What elephant?" he asked.

"It's-Well, it's a term Muggles use to describe an uncomfortable atmosphere; 'the elephant in the room.' Never mind, it's silly," Hermione said as Draco's expression grew more confused. "Let's get Destiny settled in, shall we?"

Draco couldn't get the sound of Destiny crying out of his head. As cute as the child was, she had her mother's lungs, and that wasn't a good trait to inherit.

Hermione tried her best to get Destiny to stop crying, but nothing worked. She transformed into her Animagus form, only to get a clump of fur ripped from her body. Hermione wasn't sure how that would affect her as a human, but at that moment she was experiencing too much pain to care.

Draco pulled Destiny away immediately after she ripped off Hermione's fur. Hermione morphed back to her normal self, wincing.

"I'm going to make sure there's no permanent damage," she said, touching her back as if to check that no skin was missing.

"Do you want me to look you over?"

Even while wounded Hermione had the strength to joke, "Draco Malfoy, there is a four month old baby present!"

"I meant that in the most professional way," Draco sniffed.

"Yes, yes, I know," Hermione said, kissing him on the cheek. "I'm only playing with you. I'll be back in a moment. Can you handle looking after Destiny?"

"Are you insinuating that I'm not fit to care for a child?"

"I won't answer that." Hermione made way for their bedroom, leaving Draco with Destiny, who hadn't stopped wailing.

In a desperate attempt to at least entertain the girl until Hermione got back, Draco shifted into his Animagus form. When Hermione reentered the sitting room, she found Destiny happily petting an arctic fox.

"Why is it that she's not pulling your fur out?" Hermione wondered, not expecting Draco to answer. She scooped Destiny up from off of the floor and set her down in the play pen her parents had brought over.

"Are you alright?" the non-fox Draco asked Hermione, wrapping an arm around her as they sat down on the couch near the play pen.

"I'm fine, it just hurt a lot," Hermione said, snuggling into Draco's side. "Remind me to never morph when around children."

"Teddy hasn't ever done that, though."

"Well, Teddy's Teddy. He's much older than Destiny. It's different with him. Destiny's inherited her mother's habit of clinging to people."

Draco snorted and twirled locks of Hermione's hair around his fingers, his forehead resting on her head. He almost fell over when Hermione shot to her feet.

"I almost forgot! I need to run to the grocery store and get some diapers for Destiny before she gets fussy. I can't believe they didn't think to bring a diaper bag for her."

"They probably assumed that we had a store of baby essentials by now," Draco said dryly.

"Please, I'm not even pregnant yet. We're not so desperate to have a child of our own that we'll buy things a baby needs quite yet," Hermione said, kissing Draco and smiling at Destiny before she walked out the door.

It took her all of ten minutes to buy anything Destiny would need for the remaining forty minutes she would be at the Malfoy house. As Hermione headed back to her husband and goddaughter, she was grabbed from behind.

She had loosened up from the war considerably, but ever since that time with the Death Eaters Hermione was suspicious of any person that grabbed her, so long as they weren't Harry or Draco. Right then, Hermione was certain it was neither.

"Whoa, whoa, Granger – well, I suppose it's Malfoy now, but that's beside the point. Don't you think Cat and Ange would get rather angry if you hexed their blokes?"

Hermione froze and twisted around. "Fred! George! You scared me to death! What are you doing here?" she asked, elbowing Fred's ribcage until he let her go. That's what he got for frightening her.

"We're here to keep you occupied while phase three is completed," George said, glancing at his twin, who was swearing in a loud whisper.

"I had almost forgotten about your 'brilliant' plan," Hermione said, sighing. "How long will this take?"

"About forty minutes."

"I don't have that much time! Lavender and Ron are going to pick up Destiny in," Hermione checked her watch, "thirty five minutes, and I need to get these things back there so the poor child's not uncomfortable."

"Destiny will be fine," George assured Hermione, as Fred was still recovering. "Don't worry so much, Hermione. It's all according to the plan."

"Why do I find that to not be the slightest bit reassuring?" Hermione asked somewhat rhetorically.

Ron apparated into what he thought of as Hermione's kitchen and looked around for the curly haired witch and his daughter. It was dark, so he lit up the tip of his wand and wandered about. He heard Destiny laughing before he saw her.

He found Destiny playing with a fox, of all things. And not a stuffed fox. A stuffed fox Ron would have been fine with. Where was Hermione, and why was she letting her goddaughter occupy her time with a wild animal?

His Auror training kicking in, Ron lowered his wand until it was level with the fox's nose. He slowly levitated it away from Destiny, so as not to upset her, and was positively aghast when the fox was replaced by Draco Malfoy.

"What the-"

"I'm an Animagus, Weasley," Draco said, frowning. "You'd think that once in a while something would make it into that thick head of yours."

"Where's Hermione then?"

"Out shopping for your child. Where's your wife?" Draco retorted, handing Destiny to her father.

"Already at home," Ron replied, smiling at Destiny for a scarce minute before he continued to glare at Draco. "She was tired so we decided I'd pick up Des alone."

"More like you decided," Draco muttered. "Alright then, see you – whenever."

"Shouldn't we wait for Hermione to get back?"

"Unless you need extra diapers and such for your daughter," Draco said.

"Oh, well, no, we don't need any more – my mum has been unloading all sorts of stuff on us since Destiny was born."

The small talk died and the two men, both of whom had loved Hermione, stood carefully regarding the other.

While that was happening, Hermione was convincing George and Fred to let her go back home.

"It's been over forty minutes by now! I think I can go home now, boys!"

"Might I remind you that we're two years older than you?"

"Yes, but you act as though you're twelve," Hermione snapped, wrenching her arm out of Fred's grip and determinedly walking away.

Fred shook his head, but a faint smile was threatening to emerge on his face, hidden by the dark. "Bossy as ever, I see."

"Did you ever expect that to change?" George asked, grinning.

Hermione looked over her shoulder. "It might do you good to learn to lower your voices once in a while!" she called, as she could still hear what the twins were saying.

"It might do you some good to consider the fact that you were meant to hear that, Granger!" George called back.

"Honestly, you're twenty five, George," Fred sniffed in a very good impression of Hermione. "It shocks me to think of how immature you can be."

"Sod off, Gred."

They had been trying, but it was a complete accident, Hermione getting pregnant on Christmas night. Eggnog led to butterbeer, which led to firewhiskey, and as they say, the rest was history. Hermione didn't know how to tell Draco. He would be ecstatic, but her pregnancy was big news, and she couldn't suddenly announce "We're going to be parents in nine months" at dinner. These were the thoughts running through Hermione's mind as she and Draco got ready to go to Narcissa's winter gala, which had become an annual event and which was on December sixteenth that year. She also didn't want to spring something like that on Draco right before his mother's celebration, so Hermione was at a standstill.

"Honestly, Hermione, what's got your knickers in a twist?" Draco asked, summoning his wife's missing shoe when she straightened up from manually searching under the bed. "You can't be nervous about going to the Manor after all these years."

"I'm not nervous about the gala," Hermione said, slipping her shoe on. "It's…well, I'll tell you later."

Draco stopped at the doorway, not even blinking when Hermione collided into him. "You don't have a life-threatening disease, do you? Or is it a life-threatening mission now?" He kept his tone light-hearted, but he feared that Hermione would suddenly disappear in an attempt to rid the world of all evil.

"I'm fine, love, so don't fret the way Molly does when we don't show up at the Burrow for Sunday dinners once," Hermione said, kissing Draco's cheek.

At the gala, Hermione veered away from elf-made wine and champagne and alcohol in general. It was bad for the baby.

Draco didn't know enough about pregnant woman to know the reason for Hermione's aversion to liquor. He figured it was one of those mood swings of hers that caused her to dislike or like something to the extreme in a short amount of time. Narcissa, on the other hand, did know quite a bit about pregnant woman, and questioned Hermione after all of the other guests had gone.

"Narcissa, I don't think this is the right time… What you're asking, I haven't told Draco the answer yet, and I don't want him to learn about it that way," Hermione said, biting her lip.

"Don't worry, Hermione. I gave explicit instructions to my house-elves to send Draco home with the leftovers from tonight. I also gave them individually, so even if he orders one to stop, he'll have to go through twenty nine more."

She is undoubtedly thorough. Maybe that's not such a bad thing, Hermione thought. "Alright, yes, I'm pregnant. You guessed correctly."

Narcissa gasped as her hand flew to her mouth. Why do females in general do that when they're caught off guard? Hermione wondered internally.

She suspected Narcissa would have begun sketching an outline of her future grandchild's entire life plan if Draco hadn't come up from behind Hermione then.

"We'd better go, before the elves give us enough food to feed all of Hogwarts," Draco said. He kissed Narcissa on the cheek. "See you soon, Mother."

"You never mean that," Narcissa replied, hugging both Hermione and Draco goodbye. "I suppose 'soon' doesn't mean the same for you that it does for me. Molly Weasley has you around more often and you're not even directly related! Humor your mother, Draco. Come have Sunday brunch with me next week." She halted in her rambling and exchanged a look with Hermione. "That is, unless you're busy."

"Since when has she ever cared if we were busy or not?" Draco whispered in Hermione's ear. Struggling to keep an innocent expression on her face, Hermione shrugged. Draco was still perplexed by Narcissa's strange farewell as he disapparated.

Hermione quickly slipped into their bedroom to change into something more comfortable. In the next nine months, she wouldn't be able to wear clothes nearly as form-fitting as that dress had been.

Five minutes later, Draco found Hermione sitting on the bed with her knees drawn to her chest. He lay down beside her and pulled her down onto him, so that her head was on his stomach.

"I need to tell you something," Hermione said quietly. Draco laced his fingers through hers.

"Okay, what is it?"

"I'm pregnant."

Having Hermione lie down on him had not been a good idea. Draco bolted upright, helping Hermione sit up when she fell face first onto the comforter.

"Silly me, I thought a Malfoy would react in a much more dignified manner. Then again, your mother looked like she was going to cry when I told her."

"You told her before you told me?" Draco exclaimed indignantly. Hermione chuckled and squeezed his hand.

"She pried it out of me. She saw that I was avoiding any kind of alcohol and more or less got on my case about it," Hermione explained.

"How did I not notice that?"

"I wouldn't expect you to know too much about pregnancies, Draco, even if you are a healer. But…you're going to be someone's daddy," Hermione said, smiling. Draco beamed at her, and out of nowhere they were laughing. Well, Draco was laughing. Hermione was crying. At first Draco was concerned, but she assured him they were happy tears. It had taken so long, but they were finally going to be parents.

Neither of them remembered that they were only a few years over twenty. Later, though, they realized Ron and Lavender's story would still outshine theirs by far, and Hermione and Draco were perfectly fine with that.

A/N: Woo! They're having a baby :) I realize that I might have gotten my own time line mixed up with the pregnancies, so I would appreciate it if you all over-looked that. For the children, though, I think I have their birthdays right.

Destiny - April 7th, 2002. Gryffindor.

Rose - February 1st, 2006 (this is actually my birthday, and the age gap is almost the same as the one between me and my sister). Gryffindor.

Fate - February 1st, 2006. Gryffindor.

Hugo - December 3rd, 2007 (in honor of my mother, for supporting me in all my obsessions). Gryffindor.

Those were the Weasleys :) I suppose I've ruined any surprises, but you'll be seeing them soon in the sequel anyways!

Also, I will not be writing an epilogue, only because there IS a sequel and you'll find out what happens then. I won't be focusing on Draco and Hermione or any of the adults as much - it's mostly Rose and Scorpius and just the second generation - but they'll have their moments.

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