It wasn't long before the subject of Hogwarts came up again; it was only early September and Draco was just starting to prepare for his transfiguration and ancient runes NEWTs. Potions and history of magic were far easier subjects for him to study on his own, even if they were the more intensive of the courses, which meant that he found himself with absolutely no idea where to start and no study plan to fall back on for transfigurations and ancient runes. He considered owling Hermione and begging for help, confident that a well thought out study plan would allow him to move forward, but he also thought of the suggestion from Harry and his healer that he should return to Hogwarts to study this year.

It was a lazy Sunday morning and they were enjoying the nice weather outside on the lawn in the garden when Draco said, "Harry, I'm considering going back to Hogwarts this year."

"What? I thought you were diametrically opposed to that," Harry replied, turning his gaze abruptly from Sev crawling about on the grass and quickly growing closer to the rose bushes, to look at Draco.

"I'm not going there to live; I refuse to be separated from my family. And I won't take meals there either. I'm talking two hours a day four days a week, just so I can get some direction with my transfiguration and ancient runes studies."

A loud crack was heard and then Mipsy's shrill voice rang out, "Master Severus Malfoy, sir, must not be touching the rose bushes, sir."

"Elf!" Sev exclaimed, sitting back on his bum and reaching out to grab a long ear.

"Elf!" Scorp exclaimed, clapping his hands excitedly and then reaching out for the elf. Scorp was sitting in the middle of the blanket, right where they had left him.

"Eeee!" Teddy squealed happily. He too was sitting up and had cottoned on to the elf mania of the twins.

"Yes Masters Severus and Scorpius, sirs? How may Mipsy be serving Masters Severus and Scorpius, sirs?"

"Elf," Scorp repeated, while Sev was already busy pulling himself up to standing using Mipsy for support.

"How may Mipsy be helping Master Scorpius, sir?"

"Mipsy, just bring Sev back onto the blanket," Draco ordered. Mipsy did as instructed, before vanishing with another crack. Draco turned back to Harry, who seemed deep in thought. "So what do you think, Harry?"

"It's no different from what you've been doing. Sure you won't be in the house if something happens, but I'll have your mum and Andy for help."

"So it's alright with you if I go?"

"Yeah, it's fine."

Draco leaned in and captured Harry's lips in a searing kiss. Harry's pregnancy was still going well, so they'd both started taking the potion which allowed them physical contact without burning Draco.

When they broke apart, Harry said, "I'd shag you right now if your mum would watch the kids." He hadn't appreciated how all of the extra hormones from the pregnancy running through his system would make him so horny all of the time.

They were quiet for a few minutes while they each thought about their physical desires and then squelched those desires by looking at their children. Sev was once again on the grass, crawling towards the flowerbeds, but the irises this time. Irises couldn't hurt the baby, so they let the baby explore.

"Harry, I'm not going to dump all of the childcare off on you either. You know that if you want you can go visit your friends on weekends, right? I know Hermione's at school, but you could try owling Longbottom or Lovegood." Draco knew Harry hadn't gone anywhere since dinner at the Weasleys the day before Hermione boarded the Hogwarts express.

"But weekends are the only days I get to spend with you," Harry said, while thinking about how much he missed Ron. Unfortunately Ron was always busy working, either as an Auror or with helping George at the joke shop.

"We still spend meal times and after supper together every weekday. And I'm not saying you need to spend the whole day out, but it would be good if you had contact with your friends. If you're stuck in the house all day without any intelligent conversation, you go a bit mad after a while; trust me, I know from personal experience." Not that he'd ever been completely without adult conversation, because his parents, grandmother, and Professor Snape had all visited with him.

"Yeah, maybe."

"If you don't make your own arrangements, I will be forced to invite people over to hang out with you. You can either owl Lovegood and Longbottom yourself or I can owl Pansy and Milli to come hang out with you."

"Alright, I'll owl Ron right away and beg him to spend some time with me."

"I thought you liked Lovegood and Longbottom? Or is it Finnigan and Thomas you prefer?" Not that Finnigan and Thomas were any better company, with Thomas being muggleborn and Finnigan being explosion prone.

"No, it's Luna and Neville I prefer out of that group. Why?"

"Well it's just that I was under the impression that you were very close with both of them, but the only times you've seen them since the war was at your birthday party, our baby shower, and at funerals. You need to work harder to keep your friendships up. I know everyone in the wizarding world wants to be your friend, but sometimes it's easier to keep the friends who were your friends before the fame."

"Yeah, alright, I'll owl them."

"And make plans to meet with them in person too. You don't need to be gone every weekend, but you can definitely spent two hours a month on catching up with them."

"Alright, fine, I'll do it during naptime." Then Harry realized that Draco spent even less time with his friends than Harry did. There was Crabbe's funeral, the baby shower, Draco's birthday party, Harry's birthday party, and that was it. Draco never had his friends over to the Manor and he never left the Manor. "What about you? You never see any of your friends either."

"Fine, I'll start inviting them over."

"Good."

That settled it and Draco got up to retrieve Sev from where the baby was trampling the irises. They played on the lawn a while longer and then went inside to feed the babies and have lunch. After that they went to the nursery and took turns preventing Sev from making horrible messes everywhere. Sev was now very proficient at pulling himself along using the walls and furniture for support, which allowed him to reach new things, like the crib sheets that he had learned were fun to pull off. The toy box could always be emptied for endless amounts of enjoyment and Sev had recently learned he could get into the cabinet below the changing table, which held all kinds of things he could get into.

Then it was naptime and three babies were laid down in their cribs, while Draco napped in the bedroom. Finally with a bit of quiet time to himself, Harry went to the study and composed two owls, one to Luna and the other to Neville. Then he went back out to the sitting room and firecalled the Weasleys.

Molly appeared first in the Weasley living room, but she quickly called Ron. It was several moments during which Harry could hear the sound of footsteps on stairs, before Ron appeared and said, "Hiya Harry. What's up?"

"Draco reminded me that I need to spend more time with my friends. I know you've been busy lately, but maybe we could hang out sometime," Harry replied.

"I'm free now. Why don't you come on through?"

Harry agreed and arranged for Cissy to keep an eye on the babies. Teddy was doing better with just taking the one nap and not waking up too soon, but he didn't want to risk Draco being woken up.

Draco was still up in the night with the babies, which meant that he often took naps or he was cranky. Harry was also up during the nights, but only to pee and occasionally puke. That made Harry highly jealous of Draco, who still had the urine vanishing charm functioning. Harry had an appointment coming up with a healer to check on the progress of his pregnancy and he was absolutely going to insist upon having that charm put in place on his bladder.

Harry apparated over to the Burrow where Ron was waiting for him in the living room.

"I'm in the middle of cleaning my room. Would you mind coming upstairs while I work? With Hermione gone, Mum expects me to clean it meself."

"Yeah, sure," Harry replied and then followed Ron upstairs.

Ron's room was still the same with bright orange walls and slanted roof, only the bed was much larger and now took up most of the room. Ron had already made the bed, so Harry sat down on it while Ron sorted through the giant mound of things that was mostly composed of trash and clothes, both clean and dirty, but also contained plenty of other things he had accumulated.

"Does your mum know about this bed?" Harry asked.

"Yeah, well she makes Hermione sleep in Ginny's room, but she pretends not to notice when Hermione sneaks in here in the night." Ron shrugged and sniffed a sock, jerking it away from his nose when the smell told him it was dirty.

"That's surprising," Harry replied. He couldn't image Mrs. Weasley turning a blind eye to adolescent shenanigans in her home. "Maybe Hermione's just really good at the old notice-me-not.

"Probably. What's really surprising is that Draco suggested you spend time with me. Now that's shocking." Ron had moved onto hanging up a clean set of robes in his closet. He was under the impression that Draco hated him and was keeping Harry away from him; why else would Harry stop by so infrequently when Harry didn't have anything going on but watching a few babies?

"Yeah, well he said I'd been cooped up in the house too long and I needed to get out and see my friends at least once a month. I went to that muggle hospital event three weeks ago, but I haven't felt like going anywhere lately; I guess I'm worried that something might happen to the baby if I do." Harry's hand drifted down to cup his stomach, which was slightly more substantial than it had been, but was probably only noticeable to him.

"You're really going through with this having another one thing?" Ron asked. He'd seen Harry several times since finding out about the pregnancy, but this was the first time he'd been alone with Harry. He knew better than to mention anything negative about a pregnancy in front of witches, so he'd kept his disapproval to himself.

"Yeah, I am."

"I would've thought three kids with Draco would be enough."

"We certainly have enough boys, but we want a little girl."

"Yeah, but you don't have to have her with Draco. You could still get a divorce, marry a nice bloke, and then have a daughter."

"I am married to a nice bloke and I'm not gonna terminate this pregnancy."

"You know he lies to you whenever it suits him."

"I haven't caught him in any lies."

"That you'll admit to."

"Can we just drop this? I love Draco and I plan on living the rest of my life with him."

"Alright, but if you do decide to leave him, know that I'll be here for you. Mum would absolutely love it if you moved in with those three babies. Ginny would too and you could have Fred and George's old room."

"Ron, I'm not getting a divorce and even if I was, I wouldn't take the babies away from Draco."

"No way; you can't possibly want to leave the kids there with him! They'll grow up to be just as slippery."

"I promised him when he was pregnant that I wouldn't take the twins away from him and I mean to stand by that promise. There's nothing wrong with Draco's parenting."

"For now, when the babies are too little to indoctrinate. By the time they're off to Hogwarts, he'll have 'em all spouting the pureblood racism that his parents taught him."

"That's not gonna happen. I told you he never really believed the nonsense he used to spout. Now I thought we were gonna drop this. You signed that contract."

"Alright, fine. What do you want to talk about instead?"

There was a long discussion then about Quidditch, before Ron asked, "Hey Harry? What are you doing with Grimmauld Place now days?"

"Storing house elves mostly. We go there on dates sometimes."

"Do you think I could move in there? I'd only take up one room and I could pay you rent if you'd like."

"I'd have to ask Draco; it belongs to both of us now."

"You put up your house in the marriage contract?"

"He put up the Manor in our marriage contract and I put up Grimmauld Place. Obviously the Manor is the better property."

"Yeah, it is. But still, I'd really like to move out of here. I don't fancy living with my parents forever and I don't want to waste money renting a place. Hermione said that if I save up my Auror money this year and we add in the Auror money we both received for helping you kill Voldemort, then we'll have enough to buy a small house somewhere."

"I'll ask, but I wouldn't count on Draco saying yes."

"Thanks mate." Ron didn't know if discussion of Bellatrix's funeral were off limits or not, but he couldn't help but ask Harry about something that had been bothering him. "Hey, did you ever talk to Narcissa and Lucius about Bellatrix's funeral? If you could get the list of attendees, that'd really help us out over at headquarters, mate."

"No, I forgot. Draco said he didn't know and that his father wasn't there, but he didn't know if Narcissa had gone."

"Well if you get a chance, mate, find out who all was there and owl me the list."

"Yeah, alright, I'll ask. I have to use the bathroom," Harry said, getting up from the bed.

Harry went down the stairs to the bathroom and then came back up when he was done. While Harry was gone, a beam of sunlight broke through the clouds and shone through Ron's small bedroom window. When Harry sat back down on Ron's bed, the sunlight gleamed off of the snake bracelet Harry wore. Ron had seen it on Harry ever since Harry's birthday, but he'd never realized that there was anything special about it before. He had thought Draco had given Harry a snake bracelet to mark Draco's claim on Harry, but now he'd just been through the course on recognizing blood magic in Auror training.

"Does your bracelet have blood magic on it?" Ron asked.

Harry looked down at his bracelet and spun it around his wrist with a finger. "Yeah, Draco said it's a family heirloom that recognizes Malfoy blood."

"Blood magic is dark magic; it's illegal."

"Draco said this is benign blood magic. It'll only hurt you if you try to steal it."

"He's turning you dark one gift at a time."

"Why do you always think the worst of Draco? I'll have you know it belonged to his dead grandmother and before she died, she told him to give it to whoever he married."

"Because the worst is normally the truth with him. I can't believe he has you wearing a cursed bracelet and that doesn't even bother you. We should destroy it right now."

"I'm not destroying it; I like the way it makes me feel."

"And how's that?"

"Like I belong to our family."

Ron was well aware of the fact that Harry was an orphan and had only had him, Hermione, and the Malfoys for family, but Harry seemed to be overly attached to the Malfoy family. "This reminds me of that story with the cursed ring that the hobbits grew addicted to and refused to take off and destroy, even though it was corrupting them."

"You've read The Lord of the Ring?" Harry asked surprised.

"No, Hermione takes me to the movies."

"Oh."

"Well the point is your bracelet is like the ring, because it's corrupting you and making you feel good while it's doing it."

"Lay off my bracelet; there's nothing wrong with it and if you can't accept my husband and the gifts he gives me, then I don't see how we can continue to be friends. I can't believe you're being such an arse about Draco when he was the one who suggested I spend more time with you. He doesn't say anything negative about you and I can't understand why you can't do the same."

"Fine, I'll lay off of it, but will you at least get an Auror to look at that bracelet?"

"No Ron. It's fine and I'm going home," Harry said, officially having enough of Ron for the day. This was the first time he'd been alone with Ron in Merlin knows how long and Ron turned into a complete arse without someone there to keep Ron in check. He wouldn't make the mistake of visiting Ron alone again; that was for sure.

Harry disapparated back to the Manor, where Draco and the babies were still asleep and Narcissa was sitting in the sitting room, sorting through photos of the babies to put in each of the three baby books they were working on. Harry sat down on the settee opposite.

"Cissy, can I ask you something?" Harry asked.

"Sure Harry," Cissy replied, looking up from the stack of photos.

"Did you go to Bellatrix's funeral?" Harry asked.

"I did, but Lucius and Draco did not," Narcissa said, lying about Lucius' attendance. Draco had come to her and Lucius several weeks ago with news of Harry finding out about the funeral. They had long since gotten their stories straight, only she'd been expecting Harry to come to her to ask questions long ago.

"Can you give me a list of which Death Eaters were in attendance?"

"Sorry Harry, but none of the real Death Eater players showed up. From what I've read in the papers ,almost all of them were captured or killed. I haven't heard any mention of any of them still being alive and in hiding."

"But Flint was there."

"Flint was a baby Death Eater. He's a relative and to my knowledge he didn't do anything other than boost the Dark Lords numbers. Lucius said the Death Eaters didn't trust Flint with any serious tasks."

"Were there other baby Death Eaters there? Can you give me their names?"

"No, I will not divulge the names. Dark Mark or not, if they were adolescents who made a mistake and never saw any real battle nor committed murder, I will not turn them over to the Aurors. We need to forgive the children and rehabilitate them into society or there will be backlash that will cause another Dark Lord to rise up.

"Yeah, alright. But if any of these baby Death Eaters have trouble adjusting and start committing more crimes, can you turn them over to me?"

"Yes, that seems agreeable."

With that settled, they went back to their task of updating the baby books and sorting through photos.


Author's Note: It was unanimous: everyone voted for Harry to have a drama free pregnancy, so I will do my best to write one :D

Ron was being an arse again, in violation of his truce with Draco, but only just. Harry's get a bit sick of Ron, so I think he'd visit Neville next instead and he has a healer appointment coming up.

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