2 May 2003

Sirius awoke and groggily rubbed his eyes. Turning to his side, he was surprised to find Aletha had already gotten up. Usually on Sundays, she liked to sleep in while Sirius dealt with the kids. Checking the clock, he discovered it was already 9:30. Deciding he had slept in enough, he pulled back the covers to get out of bed.

A few minutes later, he entered the kitchen to find Aletha flipping pancakes.

"Good morning," he greeted, grabbing her hands and pulling her down for a kiss. "A sleep in and pancakes. What have I done to deserve this?"

"Oh nothing, I just felt like it was the appropriate way to celebrate," she answered mischievously.

"Celebrate?"

"Mhhm."

"Celebrate what?"

Before Aletha could respond, Harry came running in from the living room and clambered onto Sirius's lap.

"Daddy! Daddy! I'm gunna be a big bwoder!"

Ruffling Harry's hair, Sirius responded, "You already are pup. You are a big brother to Lyra."

"No, Mummy say I gunna be big bwoder adain."

Sirius looked up at Aletha again, and watched as she broke out into a giant smile. "Your?"

"Pregnant, yup."

"That's amazing!" He reached his arms around her waist as she removed the last pancake from the stove pulling her into his lap as Harry climbed off. "I'm going to be a father, again!"

Sirius placed a hand on Aletha's stomach, thinking about his child to be. Despite being thrown into fatherhood rather suddenly, he found he loved it, first with Harry and then with Lyra. He had wanted another child, but it was unclear whether or not he would be able to father another after Bellatrix's curse. But now… Now he was simply in heaven, pancakes and sleep in forgotten.

15 May 2003

"That was brilliant!" exclaimed Dan. "Absolutely brilliant. I can do this again, right?"

"Anytime Emma and Aletha let us," Sirius agreed as he drove the motorcycle back into the garage.

"Therein lies the problem. As far as Emma is concerned, the only thing worse than a motorcycle is a flying one."

Sirius smiled fondly, "Lily used to say that to my best mate, James. We argued that with all the safety and cushioning charms I had added, the motorcycle is actually safer than most cars. Besides, it flies!"

"And that is why it is ruddy brilliant." Giving the bike one last fond look, Dan dismounted and headed towards the door. "I'll let Emma and Aletha know we are back and you are just checking over the charms."

"Thanks."

Sitting on the back patio, watching the Harry and Hermione play with Harry's toddler snitch, Emma thought back to the conversation she had with the Blacks back in March. "Aletha, Sirius, you said when you first told me Hermione was a witch that we would usually be told only when Hermione turned eleven. Why not earlier?"

Sirius opened his mouth to respond, but stopped. In all honesty, he wasn't sure. Pureblood purists argued it was a risk to the statute of secrecy to tell muggleborns earlier and parents would kill their children if they knew, but if he thought about it, that didn't make sense. Those ideals were remnants of the witch burning days. After all, in an age of science and logic, muggle parents were likely to notice something was different about their child long before their eleventh birthday and take them to a doctor in order to try and figure out what was up. By knowing where magical children were, they could step in if there was a case of abuse or neglect. Besides, telling muggleborns and their parents earlier would allow them to adapt better to wizarding society, be properly prepared for Hogwarts, and stand out less. The more he thought about it, the more he realized he couldn't think of a good reason to wait.

"Honestly," he finally responded, "I don't know. It makes sense to tell a family as soon as the ministry picks up on accidental magic."

"So the ministry already knows Hermione is a witch?" Emma asked, confused.

"Normally I would say yes, but I set up a series of wards around my house that essentially hide the fact that it is a wizarding home. There is a fair chance that those wards would interfere with the ministries ability to sense Hermione's magic unless is was a case of intense accidental magic."

"So she is hidden?"

"In essence, to an extent."

"Hermione is lucky though," Aletha added, "I am muggleborn as well, meaning neither of my parents were magical. Adjusting to the magical world was quite a challenge for me, especially since I started Hogwarts during the war. Hermione hopefully won't have the same problem. She will know all about Hogwarts and magical history. She will likely know a few basic spells simply from watching me and Sirius."

"These things are important?" asked Dan, growing interested.

"Very much so," Sirius sighed. "Wizards and witches live longer than muggles if allowed to reach old age. I know several people who are well over a hundred years old. As a result, wizarding society is a little old fashioned. We live longer, remember things longer, and change slower. So when muggleborns enter the world and ignore social customs and niceties, the purebloods take it as insult, even if it simply lack of knowledge."

"I remember meeting Augusta Longbottom in Diagon Alley while shopping for supplies before first year. I tripped and landed on her feet, spilling my books everywhere. Embarrassed, I quickly picked them up and muttered a quick sorry," Aletha explained.

"Now this might seem fine to you," continued Sirius, "But Augusta Longbottom is Lady Augusta Longbottom and was at the time regent for House Longbottom. She expected Aletha not only to give a formal apology, but also to greet her like the important woman she is in the wizarding world. Luckily for Aletha, Augusta is a relatively liberal woman. She let the incident go upon realizing Aletha was a first year muggleborn. But had that been my mother instead…"

"Let's just say I probably wouldn't be around today," finished Aletha.

"Really?" asked Dan, his eyes full of disbelief

"Really. Although I might add my mother is one of the worst blood supremacists out there and believes all muggleborns should be killed." A wicked grin spilt across Sirius's face as he turned to his wife. "Do you think if I tell her I married a muggleborn to embarrassment would kill her?"

"Probably not, sorry Siri."

"Darn, might be worth it just to see her face."

"That would involve meeting her."

"On second thought, let the woman rot away in Grimauld alone."

Dan and Emma shared a look of confusion. Sirius was a nice guy, and if his description of his mother was even half accurate… well they certainly didn't want to meet her.

"But back to the matter at hand," started Sirius, "Yes, knowing about the wizarding world and being a part of it from a young age will help Hermione immensely. She will even go to Hogwarts already knowing some of her future classmates such as Harry and Neville."

"I'm glad it will help her," began Emma, "but I wish there was some way we could give the same advantage to all the other muggleborns out there."

Sirius looked at Aletha, meeting her eyes for a moment. Seeing her agreement, he tentatively replied, "We might actually be able to do something about that…"

5 June 2003

Chaos grew exponentially with the number of children, Aletha decided. There was simply no other explanation as to why getting ready for a trip to the beach was taking so long. First, Harry's swim trunks had gone missing. After about ten minutes of moving room-to-room accioing the trunks, Sirius had remembered they were still in the trunk of the car. Hopefully nobody noticed the small article of clothing jumping around the trunk as she tried to summon it. A few minutes later, Harry was dressed, only to find Hermione forgot her water wings. So, holding the three (and three quarter!) year old's hands, Aletha made her way over to the Granger residence, where Emma appeared with the forgotten floaties. They were just getting ready to leave, when Dora (clumsy as ever), managed to topple over the large container of blocks in the living room. So they paused, and cleaned up the mess.

Finally, thirty minutes after they were supposed to leave, Aletha climbed into the passenger seat of the car. Sirius, giant grin on his face, started the engine and asked, "Who is ready for the beach?"

"ME!" cried the three oldest as he pulled out of the driveway.

"So, what does everyone want to do once we arrived?" he asked, his face full of excitement.

"Swim!"

"Sandcastle"

"Bigger Sandcastle!"

"Magic sandcastle?"

"There will be no magic at the beach," warned Aletha, turning towards her husband. "Even to build massive sandcastles. It is a muggle beach."

"But what if it is subtle? So nobody notices?" pouted Sirius.

"No. But, if you behave, we can get ice cream." With that, all of the children (Sirius included), celebrated, promising to be good.

The beach was beautiful. Long, sandy, and sunny. As Sirius grabbed Lyra from her car seat, Aletha enlisted Dora's help to grab the buckets, floaties, towels, cooler, Harry, and Hermione. (The beach supplies were inside a bottomless bag, not that Aletha would tell). Making there way down the sidewalk, Dora, Harry, and Hermione scouted out the perfect sand.

"There!" Dora shouted, pointing a dry patch of sand near a small river of water. "Aletha and Sirius can sit on the dry sand and we can use the water to help with the sandcastle," she explained.

Agreeing quickly, Harry and Hermione followed Dora onto the sand.

"I suppose we should follow," smiled Aletha as she watched the kids start digging in the sand.

"Yup," grinned Sirius, eager to join in the fun. With a subtle levitation charm on Sirius's wheelchair, the two made their way down onto the sand.

Sliding off her shoes, Aletha ran her toes through the warm sand, relaxing on her towel. Next to her, Sirius was on the ground building a sandcastle for Lyra. She watched as Lyra knocked down the towers as soon as Sirius completed them, giggling wildly. After about ten towers, he groaned, lamenting the loss of his fort and began tickling the 'sand monster' on her stomach.

Aletha turned the other direction, and saw the other three attempting to build a massive castle. Dora was digging out a huge moat, piling the sand on the center, while Hermione used the buckets to mold towers. The towers were actually quite good, and Aletha smiled at the sight of Hermione sticking her tongue out in concentration. Harry, in his usual fashion, was trying to imitate his friend. Unfortunately, being almost a year younger meant that he didn't quite have the skill to successfully create the towers. His tended to be destroyed by the bucket as he attempted to lift it.

Satisfied that all the children (again, Sirius included), we happily occupied, she pulled out a book and began reading. She made it roughly three chapters before a small body came plowing into her.

"Go swim?" asked Harry, jumping up and down in excitement.

Aletha put her book down to find Harry, Hermione, and Dora standing eagerly around her. "Alright. Harry, Hermione, lets put on your water wings. Sirius, are you staying here with Lyra?"

"Sure, maybe we will join you later."

"Okay, hands," she asked, waiting as Hermione and Harry each grabbed one. "Let's go swimming."

The water was cold, Aletha discovered. Even only up to her knees, she felt chilly as the waves lapped against her. Hermione too, looked chilly, but Harry and Dora seemed to love the cold water. After watching Dora swim around a bit, she allowed her to take Harry out a little deeper while she remained with Hermione.

"Are you enjoying the beach?" she asked Hermione, keeping an eye on the other two.

"Yah. I like sandcastles."

"I'm glad. What do you think, after those two are done should swimming, should we have some lunch?"

"Pasta?" asked Hermione, growing excited.

"I think we packed some," Aletha responded, laughing slightly at Hermione's excitement. Her current favorite food was pasta with Sirius's Seriously Cheesy Sauce (his name, not hers).

Hermione gave one last shiver as the other two came splashing back to shore, soaked and smiling happily.

"Alright, lunch time!"

By the time they left the parking lot, Dora was the only one awake, and Aletha could tell she was losing the battle against sleep. After a long day of sand, water, and fun, they had bought ice cream. The combination of activity and sugar put the kids out like a light. Even Sirius seemed a little tired.

"Good day?" Aletha asked.

"The best," Sirius responded, kissing her lightly on the cheek. "The last few months were so busy, between the Wizengamont and the trials. I am glad things have slowed down and we have time to spend with the kids. And the new one on the way."

Placing her hand on her stomach, Aletha responded, "I'm glad too. I had grown accustomed to our isolation from the wizarding world. I am glad you managed to keep it away from the kids for so long, but I suppose it is time for Harry to meet some more friends, isn't it?"

"Perhaps, but we can take it slow."