Hermione ignored the vehement objections her parents raised about getting married at eighteen as soon as she finished Hogwarts. "You're just a baby," her mother said, and when that had no impact, "You've never even tried dating someone else."

"I don't need to date anyone else," Hermione said. "Draco is my dragon."

Her mother crossed her arms. That was, to her mind, not a persuasive argument.

"My soulmate," Hermione said.

"There's no such thing," Jean Granger said, but she wasn't wholly sure. Maybe with magic in the strange world where her daughter lived there was. That didn't mean she liked it or that she didn't think they were far too young. "I hope you don't expect us to pay for this ill-conceived wedding. Not if you aren't willing to wait until you're at least twenty."

"Twenty-five," her father muttered.

Hermione didn't expect any such thing, and she was not willing to wait. In fact, she was pretty sure that if she tried to get in the way of Narcissa Malfoy's plans, there'd be war. Narcissa booked caterers and photographers and musicians with so much fervor a person might think the fate of the Wizarding world hung on her son's nuptials. The wedding itself would be in Malfoy Manor's gardens. Seventeen years earlier Narcissa had planted two rows of flowering crabapples to create an aisle for Hermione to walk down. There was a perfectly placed brick terrace for the string quartet and a canopy of grapevines for the happy couple to stand under.

"We don't have to do all of this," Draco said, holding her hand in his. "Not if you don't want to."

"I don't mind," Hermione said. "As long as at the end we're married."

"That much I can guarantee," Draco said.

Pansy rolled up the wedding magazine she was reading and hit Hermione on the arm with it.

"Hey!"

"You're getting the wedding of the century and you 'don't mind.' Spare me."

"Well, I don't," Hermione grinned.

Pansy had given her an earful about how stupid she was to get married this young, and Hermione had ignored her the same way she did her mother. Draco's proposal included a brief overview of the story of their other selves, and Hermione had seen all the oddities of her life line up in a way that suddenly made sense. Her childhood love of dragons. The instant connection she had felt with the strange, arrogant boy she'd met at eleven. The glimpses of a nightmare world that seemed painfully, horribly real. She and Draco belonged together, and that was that. No objection of mother or friend was going to stop her when time itself had not.

"If you don't approve, you can stay home," she said.

"Now, let's not get crazy," Pansy said. She had no intention of missing this event – not when she'd already been asked to be a bridesmaid – and when the day of the wedding rolled around she was very present. She fetched champagne for the bride, and shooed the photographer's assistant out of the bridal suite, and hovered as the make-up artist did her work. Luna, the other bridesmaid, was much more easygoing about the entire affair. She kicked off her heels, tucked her bare feet under her on an armchair, and watched the entire task of getting Hermione ready with fascination. There were new spells to learn from the hairdresser and a clever charm to keep butterflies happily sitting on Hermione's hair and Luna had no opinions about whether the bride was too young or in over her head with a society wedding.

"They love each other," she said simply the one time Pansy cornered her wanting someone to agree this was ridiculous. "Everything else is just glitter, but it makes Draco's mum happy and Hermione doesn't care so why not?"

And Hermione didn't care. She laughed with Luna and Pansy as makeup artists came and photographers went. She wiggled herself into the layers of corsetry and stockings that went under her dress, and she obligingly held still as Pansy did up all the tiny buttons.

"It is a beautiful dress," Pansy said as she worked, and it was. Pleated silk organza cut into a tiny waist before billowing out in a skirt that floated and swirled and would almost certainly end up in every young witch's dreams for years to come. Appliqued lace worked in a pattern of lions endlessly leaping for joy covered the whole thing, and Hermione's ethereal veil was embroidered with dots that, if one looked closely enough, were the pattern for the constellation Draconis.

Draco was less sanguine as he prepared. Harry sat in a chair, feet kicked out over the arm, and regaled him with every possible way weddings could go wrong. A guest could get ill and vomit all over Narcissa's carpets. The caterer could have written down the wrong day. Someone they hadn't invited could show up. "Like your other self," Harry said. "That would throw a spanner in the works."

"That's not going to happen," Theo said.

"Or Voldemort," Harry pressed on, a smirk on his face. "He's come to parties here before."

Draco threw a hairbrush at him, which Neville transfigured midflight to a sparrow. The very confused bird chirped before sailing up to perch on the light fixture.

"Now how am I supposed to do my hair?" Draco demanded.

"You should have considered that before using your brush as a weapon," Harry said.

A knock on the door turned to Lucius, who stuck his head in. "I've been instructed by your mother to tell you that it's time to make an appearance."

"Time to get hitched," Harry said. "Put on the old ball and chain. Shackle yourself to a woman forever, no hope of escape."

If he'd been trying to freak his brother out, he'd picked the wrong threats. Draco's face took on a dreamy, lovesick glow and he smiled. "Yeah," he said.

"I don't get it," Harry said, eying him.

"Me either," Neville admitted.

They both looked at Theo, waiting for him to agree with them that Draco's romantic intensities were alien and weird, but he just shrugged. "I've been informed that marriage is something only the bourgeoisie care about," he said. "But I think it works for them."

"But you and Luna aren't getting married any time soon," Harry said. One wedding was amusing, but the idea that all of his friends would fall into this pit of florists and china patterns was a nightmare. Sirius had done it the right way. One partner at home who loved you and who you loved but also an endless procession of amusing diversions.

"No, no marriage for us," Theo said. "Luna and I are going to open a bookstore in Diagon Alley importing Muggle books."

"That's a choice," Harry said.

"And if you could all make the choice to present yourselves in the gardens, your mother will not come up here to express her displeasure that you are running late," Lucius said.

"More terrifying words were never spoken," Harry said. Draco took one last look at his hair and then all three of them followed Lucius, making it to the site of the ceremony in time that Narcissa was not irritated with them.

She had been up since before dawn checking on all the last-minute details. Not that anyone would know that by looking at her. Her hair was swept up in a chignon as severe as it was fashionable, her robes were the latest thing from French magical courtiers, and her smile was relaxed and easy as she greeted guests.

"You boys look very nice," she said. She picked an invisible piece of lint off Draco's dress robes and leaned forward so Harry could kiss her on the cheek.

"And you look great too, mum," he said.

She reached a hand up to brush his hair back. Draco remained as dedicated to perfect locks as he'd been at eleven, though he'd learned to go a bit easier on the product. And Harry remained as utterly indifferent to the way his dark curls fell over his face. They hid the scar and that was all that mattered to him.

Girls, Narcissa suspected, were more taken with Harry's careless good looks than Draco's precision. And, of course, Draco had never been interested in anyone other than the girl waiting upstairs. Narcissa had sometimes wondered whether the two of them had been as sweet in the other universe. Whether they had found each other as young. Surely, they had. It was impossible to imagine them as anything other than utterly besotted with one another.

"Did Astoria make it?" Neville asked.

Narcissa smiled. So that was how the wind blew with him. "She did," she said. "She's sitting with Blaise."

"Oh great," Neville groaned.

"I don't think he's going to make a move on her," Harry said. "He thinks she's fucking nuts."

"He's not wrong," Draco said under his breath.

"If you could say hello to a handful of people, then take your place," Narcissa said. It was time to begin, and Draco certainly wasn't going to argue. He made his way through the assembled guests milling on the lawn, stopping to say hello to a friend of his father's here and Severus Snape over there. Theo did the same, and Harry and Neville. Then the musicians began to play, they gathered at the back of the aisle, and everyone took their seats.

Minerva McGonagall had agreed to officiate, and the Ministry had fallen over itself to issue her a license. She walked down the aisle now, smiling at former students on either side, a slim volume in her hands. She'd refused to discuss the vows, but if there was anyone in the world Draco trusted as much as his mother and Hermione, it was the schoolteacher his other self had sought out and confided in. If the war-torn version of himself could trust her, so could he.

He hadn't expected to be nervous, yet now he was. The walk under the flowering trees seemed miles long and also too short. He could hear voices murmuring as he passed, but he might as well have been in a tunnel. He was marrying Hermione. He was marrying her today. He was in dress robes that pinched ever-so-slightly across shoulders that had broadened since the fitting, and McGonagall stood watching him approach. Soon Hermione would be at his side.

Next to Remus was the empty seat for Sirius. He should have been here. He wasn't, and it hurt. Draco smiled at Remus, a hint of the pain that would always be there leaking through, and Remus smiled back. "Go," he mouthed, and Draco obeyed. When he reached the end of the aisle, he took his place and turned to watch the groomsmen and bridesmaids appear.

Neville came first, walking with Pansy. People stirred at the sight of him. Rumors had flown everywhere about the Boy Who Talked to Voldemort, but if the sound of whispered speculation bothered him, Neville didn't show it. He looked straight ahead, meeting Draco's eyes and smiling as he approached.

Pansy was beautiful. The bridesmaid dresses were covered in copper-toned sequins that glittered in the sunlight then sank into the deep black of the mesh beneath them. Not quite the gold of Gryffindor, but close enough no one could complain, and richer. Hermione had run her fingers across the robes when she saw them and said something about how they honored the darkness of the couple who'd brought them all here.

Neville led Pansy to her place, bent to straighten a place her robes had gotten caught on the grass, then moved to stand at his side.

Luna and Theo came next. Draco remembered how hurt he'd been when Theo stopped speaking to him after he'd been Sorted into Gryffindor, then how jealous he'd been of the other boy's friendship with Hermione. He'd been so brave to stand up for her in the face of all his housemates' disdain. So brave to claim his friendship with her in the face of his father's rancid disapproval. Maybe it had taken him a while, but sometimes journeys did. It was funny how they all thought of Gryffindor as the brave House, but bravery could be found anywhere, and cunning too. And friendship.

They took their places, and Harry appeared. Draco's throat tightened at the sight of his brother walking toward him. Harry rolled his eyes as he approached, and whispered, "I might have gotten a dozen swans to complement the decorations at the reception, so be prepared."

Despite the solemnity of the moment, Draco had to swallow a laugh. That was perhaps the best tribute to Sirius he could have asked for. Were the swans romance-themed? Yes. Would they cause chaos? Almost certainly. Was it a bad idea to ask how Harry Potter had gotten his hands on twelve swans? Definitely.

And then it was time. Hermione was at the end of the aisle, her father at her side and flowers in her hands. A cool wind blew through Draco's hair, bringing with it the scent of the gardens and the grass and under it all the slightest hint of the battlefield. I've got her now, Draco thought, hoping his other self could hear. Hoping he knew it hadn't been for nothing. You can rest. I'll take it from here.

She walked through the aisle of flowering trees, an image of loveliness. All the assembled guests murmured how beautiful she was. What a perfect bride. When she reached him, her father let go with a small squeeze of her arm, and then her hands were in Draco's, and her eyes on his. Later, Draco wasn't ever able to quite recall the ceremony. McGonagall said something, and there were vows, and he repeated the words he was supposed to without a hitch, but all he knew was Hermione. All he could see was her face. All he could hear was her voice. And when it was time to kiss the bride, he brushed the gossamer veil away, wrapped his arms around her, and pressed his lips to hers. Something sparkled at the edge of his vision. A spell maybe, or a flash of sunlight off someone's jewellery. Then it was gone, and they were married and walking back up the aisle, hand in hand.

Draco stopped at the head of the aisle to kiss her again. The kiss during the ceremony itself had been reasonably proper. This one was not. This was him drinking deep from the well of their love for one another. She curved her body against his and returned the kiss as passionately as he gave it. This was forever. This was the two of them together. This was peace and happiness and love.

Then she pulled away, tucked a lock of his hair behind one ear, and smiled at him. It was dawn breaking over the horizon on a winter's night. The first note of a symphony. The first sliver of the waxing moon as it appeared from nothing and started its journey to fullness. This was the beginning of all things.

Including the receiving line.

And a dozen swans.

The swans were quickly herded to a pond toward the back of the garden, but the receiving line was interminable. Draco shook hands. He smiled as men he didn't know congratulated him in a tone that made him want to punch them. More witches kissed his cheeks than there were hours in the day. If it had been anything else, he'd have taken off and headed for the back corner of the yard where, as the crowds shifted, he could glimpse Harry and Blaise. He didn't even much like Blaise, and he'd love to be there right now. By the slowly growing edge in her voice, Hermione felt the same way. Multiple matrons congratulated her in a way that made it clear they thought she was a gold-digging hussy and both Narcissa and Draco would live to rue the day she conned them into letting her into their family. More than one made reference to her muggle-born status.

"Is that a problem for you?" Hermione asked about forty-five minutes into the proceedings when an old biddy was not quite subtle enough in her pureblood disdain. "Because if it is, I can make sure you aren't invited over anymore. Wouldn't want to offend your sensibilities or anything."

The witch couldn't reassure Hermione fast enough that of course that wasn't a problem for her. She was only warning Hermione about how other people might feel.

"She's an idiot." Severus Snape was next in the line, and he looked so appalled at the idea of shaking hands with either of them – much less kissing Hermione's cheeks – that Draco relaxed in momentary relief. "I went to Hogwarts with her grandson," Snape added.

"And you weren't study partners?" Hermione asked a little cheekily. Draco was still sure he would rather die than be that fresh with Professor Snape, even if it was his wedding day.

"I dislike tutoring dunces," Snape said, "so no."

Minerva McGonagall came up beside him and said, "Severus, Lucius has a wireless tuned to the Quidditch game. Wish them happiness, grab a drink, and come with me."

"Well, children," he said. "The Quidditch cat is out of the bag. I have removed the swans, but try not to require additional assistance as I will be otherwise occupied."

McGonagall smiled at both Draco and Hermione, but it was clear she had no intention of waiting in line for the chance to shake her pupils' hands, much less stand in the receiving line herself. Snape nodded to them both, then followed her, saying, "Minerva, you're almost purring."

"Was that a cat pun?" Hermione asked under her breath.

"I… I think it was." Draco was flabbergasted. Severus Snape making a joke? And to Minerva McGonagall, of all people. That humanized him in a way that was far too unsettling. Teachers needed to stay inside Hogwarts where they belonged and not make things weird.

He turned to greet the next elderly friend of his parents, a witch wearing enough perfume for five. Somehow, he hadn't ever considered that his wedding reception might be painfully boring but so far it really, really was.

#

Jean Granger kept a tight grip on her champagne flute. She'd known the Malfoys were wealthy, of course. But somehow, in all the years Hermione and Draco had been together, she'd never quite realized how wealthy. This was opening your house to public days sort of rich, and she was very sure she did not approve. Jean was not a monarchist. She didn't like the peerage, didn't like the way rich people protected their hereditary wealthy with tax laws designed to favor them, didn't like the casual obscenity of all this money. And she couldn't fathom Hermione being happy in a house like this. It was little more than a museum, for God's sake, even if the pictures moved.

Still, she'd come to the wedding thinking she really couldn't let poor Lucius Malfoy keep on suffering the way he so obviously had since she'd met him, and even if he wasn't at all poor in any literal sense, he could still be struggling with a mental health issue the wizarding world didn't know how to address. Though he was better. He hadn't flinched quite as obviously as he used to when she shook his hand, and he'd managed to stand in the receiving line for almost an hour greeting people. But she'd brought a card with Dr. Haufstock's name on it, and she was going to give it to him.

"Mr. Malfoy," she said, stepping in his path as he walked by.

He smiled at her with absolute agreeableness. "Please, Mrs. Granger, call me Lucius."

"Lucius," she said, then took a deep breath. "The wizarding world has so many beautiful things."

"Yes," he said, and his face became a trifle more sincere. "It does."

"But, of course, the… the normal world has many strengths as well."

"Of course," he agreed, though Jean was fairly sure he was lying. It was only natural that he'd be prejudiced toward his own world. "You don't need to worry about us trying to cut your daughter out of the Muggle world," he added.

That was not where Jean had been going, but she could see why he might think that. "One of the places I've noticed the normal world seems a bit ahead of yours is… um… mental health care."

"I beg your pardon?"

"I don't mean to be intrusive," she said as quickly as she could. "Or invade your privacy, but over the years I couldn't help but notice how you never seemed to want to touch my hand, or my husband's. How you wiped your palm off against your trousers when you left our home. And I've felt so terrible for you. One of my aunts had a touch aversion that made her life very difficult for many years, but she went to see someone and things got a lot easier for her after that. And I've asked around – not mentioning you by name of course – and the woman she saw has retired, but many people recommended Dr. Eileen Haufstock, and I got a card with her contact information for you."

She held out the small white business card and Lucius Malfoy took it with a poorly concealed grimace. "Thank you," he said. "You are very kind to think of me."

"You have a lovely home," Jean Granger added, and, having gotten that unpleasant task done, took herself off to the table weighted down with cheese. These people might be insanely rich, and she might not approve, but the brie and cheddar and stilton were already out, and if guests didn't eat it, it would only go to waste.

Astoria had already loaded a plate up with as much cheese as she could fit. "What I don't understand," she was saying to Neville as she dragged him away from Hermione's dull Muggle mum and back toward a slightly hidden corner, "is how you didn't know."

"It's not the first thing you think of," Neville said.

"It'd be the first thing I'd think of," Astoria said. "Is this diary evil, and if so what can I ask it?"

Neville almost choked on the cracker he was eating. "What?"

"God, he would have been amazing for history papers. He was there." Astoria popped a slice of stilton into her mouth, chewed happily, then said, "You should show me what he taught you."

Neville goggled at her.

"In private."

"Are you hitting on me?" he asked.

"Is it working?"

"Maybe?"

"Then I'm maybe doing it," she said. "Let me know if it starts to work and then I will be doing it." She shifted to a perfectly cheerful and appropriate conversation about what she planned to do with her life. Beauxbatons was boring, and she wasn't going to stay in France. She was going to come back to Britain and open a shop and sell dresses to people who actually had style. She was halfway through a complicated explanation of the spell-work required to do a self-sizing French seam and how she was trying to adjust some historical magic she'd found in the archives behind the stairs where she wasn't technically forbidden to go but which the teachers at Beauxbatons probably would make off-limits if they discovered when Neville put a hand on her arm and stopped her.

"I do know a spell that might be adaptable to that," he said. "It's not in the curriculum, but I could show it to you. In private so as not to upset anyone."

"Of course," she said.

They disappeared until the cutting of the cake. When they returned, Neville was rumpled and couldn't get the smile off his face.

#

Draco and Hermione cut the cake. She danced with her father, and he with his mother. "I'm very proud of you, as well," Narcissa told him.

"Because I didn't tell any of those old witches in the receiving line where to go?" Draco asked.

"Among other things, yes."

Hermione held her father's hand lightly in hers as they approximated an awkward waltz, turning around the dance floor and managing not to step on one another's feet. "I like him," her father said. "Always have, since he was a scrawny kid holding out his hand for me to shake."

"I'm glad," Hermione said.

"We'll miss you," he said. "I know your mum wasn't that keen on you getting married so young - wasn't myself - but seeing you today, I can tell you'll be happy."

Hermione glanced across the dance floor at Draco, dancing far more skillfully with his mother than she and her father were managing. The last rays of sun caught his pale hair and turned it into a halo. "Yes," she said softly. "We will be."

"But if you're not," her father said. "You just tell me, and I'll take care of him for you."

Hermione laughed. "Okay, dad," she said.

"I mean it," he said. "Wizard or not, if he hurts my little girl, I know people."

She very much doubted he did, but appreciated the sentiment, and leaned forward to kiss him on the cheek. "You are the best father."

When Draco and Hermione finished the obligatory dances with their parents and finally got to step onto the dance floor and hold one another, Hermione leaned into his arms. "Long day?" he asked.

"Let's just say I'm looking forward to the honeymoon," she said.

"Me too," he agreed. He'd spent more than a little time thinking about how he and Hermione were going to be alone. In hotels. His mind boggled, but he was pretty sure he'd be up to the task. "Me too," he repeated.

"I love you, my dragon," Hermione said softly. "I'm glad we found one another."

Draco held her a little more tightly. He agreed with her about that, too.

#

When the last guests had left, and the caterers had swept away all the trays and tables, Lucius and Narcissa were left standing alone in the gardens of a house that suddenly felt very big and very empty. Lucius tucked a lock of Narcissa's hair behind one ear. She was still as beautiful as she'd been when he'd been young and an idiot and very much in love with her. "You did it," he said.

"We did," she corrected him. A sharp wind caught some of the fallen blossoms and blew them up in a whirlwind of white.

"Mmm." Lucius wasn't so sure of that. If it hadn't been for Narcissa, he wouldn't have taken Harry Potter under his wing, wouldn't have overlooked his son's Sorting into Gryffindor, wouldn't have kept up the façade of loyalty to Voldemort even as she undermined him one Horcrux at a time. "I think you can take credit for this."

"If I must." Narcissa leaned against him and let out a long sigh. It was strange to look into a future where everything was different. She'd been working towards this moment for almost two decades – seeing Voldemort defeated, always and absolutely yes, but also seeing her son happy and laughing at his wedding instead of covered in blood and soot. And now she'd done it, and he and Hermione were off on their honeymoon, eager to travel through the whole of the Continent. They were young and in love – and out of school – and the whole future was theirs.

She just didn't know what she was going to do now.

"I didn't tell you," Lucius said, "but I had a chat with Hermione's mother?"

"Oh?"

"Over the years she's noticed I am, uh, how shall I say, 'uncomfortable' with Muggles."

"Unsurprising, really. They don't even have a proper owl post, poor things."

"Quite," Lucius said. He fished the business card Jean Granger had given him out of his pocket and handed it over.

"What's this?"

"The contact information for a muggle Mind Healer," Lucius said with a completely straight face. "To help me work through my issues with touching people."

Narcissa began to laugh. She covered her mouth with her hands, but the mirth continued to spill out. It wasn't really that funny, but after the wedding and her brief melancholy, she needed the release. "I shouldn't," she said around giggles. "I'm sure she meant well, and it was really very kind of her, but… all these years she's thought…."

"Imagine if she met Thoros Nott," Lucius said, and Narcissa was reduced to utter whoops for several minutes at the image of the dour, cantankerous old man brought face to face with an actual Muggle and one who wasn't impressed with him at all. Jean Granger would be polite and condescending in her quintessentially British way, and Thoros would get angrier and angrier but be too trapped by convention to do anything about it.

When she finally regained her composure and wiped the tears from her eyes, Lucius took her hand in his. "How about we go upstairs in our newly empty house," he suggested, "and I demonstrate how very not averse to touching you I am."

Narcissa found this suggestion most agreeable. She knew – oh how she knew - that love could change time and alter history, but a wedding day was only a beginning. Love shines through all the years of our lives, changing and growing as we grow and change but burning steadily on. Even in death we are loved, and we slide from this world eased by love's warmth.

May its light guide your steps for all your days.

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~ Fin ~

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A/N - Thank you to arleney and trelevona for beta reading this chapter.

Thank you to everyone who patiently hung in there for the five-year trek it took to get this fic written. I appreciate your kind words and support.

I plan to do one 'outtake' of the alternative timeline when Draco and Hermione make the decision to travel back in time because numerous people asked to see a glimpse of that world. I'll post it as 'chapter 66' sometime this summer.