Harry leaned back in her chair in the TV Room feeling stuffed after a good meal. Daphne was sandwiched between her and Hermione on a conjured chair. It had taken some very careful use of temporary expansion charms for everyone to be able to squeeze in comfortably, but they were now all ready to watch the Queens speech. A mild soronous charm had been applied to the grill of the separate speakers so that they were now strong enough to be heard by everyone.

The Queen had just started talking about how we have now become a global village when the Floo chime went off. Harry glanced over to see Hedwig launch from her perch through to the Floo. She also saw Amelia taking notes on the speech that the Queen was giving. Just as she was about to turn back to the TV as the Queen was talking about international charity work, she saw Xeno step into the doorway and look wistfully towards Luna.

As the credits started rolling Luna let out a cry of "Daddy" and launched herself across the room.

Enfolding her in a hug, Xeno kisses her forehead, "Hello my little moon, sorry I'm late."

"It's OK Daddy, you're here now."

One of the larger elflings stands up and, ignoring the warning glare from the Matriarch, walks over to the two. The only reason she doesn't say anything is Aityo staring at her.

"Excuse me, I's is almost ready to receive my name and look for a family. If you be willing, I could join your family and remind you to eat and go places."

Xeno crouches down next to the elflings, "What do you think my Little Moon?"

Luna cocks her head to one side, "Do you think you can remember to take him with you if you go into the Sanctury?"

"I remember the tent, don't I?"

"You'll have to swear."

"True, that way magic can remind me."

"It would be nice to have you around more."

"It would."

"You'd also eat."

"Family?"

"Would he be anything else?"

"Anything I've forgotten?"

"Fashion sense."

"Oh yes."

Xeno turns back to the confused looking elflings, "Do you know how to pass in the non-magical world?"

"I's do, Sesame Street is full of tips on how to do that, as are cartoons. Though you'd need two more elves if you want me to use a trench coat."

"No, no, a child or dwarf would be enough. Would you promise to be a full member of the family, not just a servant?"

"I's can do that."

"Well then, welcome…"

Lily interrupts, "Uh huh, not in the house. I don't want to have the TV blow up again. Take it into the back garden."

The three of them look at her and say, "Yes Mistress Lily." in sync before leaving to the back garden.

A few minutes later they come back in and Xeno introduces the new family member, "Everyone I'd like you to meet Elshommam Lovegood. We've adopted him into the family and he has agreed to help me with my work and memory. I have also sworn on my magic that as long as he is a member of our family, I will always return to collect him as soon as I can if I forget to take him with me when I travel to another world."

Sirius jumps up rubbing his hands together, "Right, on that note Presents!"

At a nod from Victoria, one of the elflings pops away and returns with the wizarding camera while another unplugs the TV. Once they return she stands up, "Sirius, I want to give you my present first before anyone else gets theirs. Then you can play Santa's little helper."

"Oh, OK."

The glint in her eyes, and the smirk on her face is all the clue he gets before a wave of her hand outfits him in a very feminine, blue, floor length, prom style dress, stiletto heels, waist length hair curled in ringlets as well as jewellery and makeup. She attires herself in a black pantsuit and get's down on one knee in front of him while he's still trying to get his wits back.

Pulling a ring box from her pocket, she opens it and holds it out facing Sirius, "Sirius Black, will you marry me?"

The flash of the camera allows him to pull his wits together as he looks down to see the anxious look on Victoria's face. Looking at the ring, his outfit, and processing the words, he can't help but start laughing, "Remus old man, looks like I owe you 100G, yes Vicki, yes I'll marry you. This was a proposal fit for a Marauder."

Smiling Victoria puts the ring on his finger using her magic to redistribute the gold so that it's a perfect fit. Once it's in place she stands up and gives him a kiss to the cheers of the rest of the room.

She whispers in his ear, "It's also been video taped so that we can show my parents tomorrow."

Sirius blanches, "What about the statute of secrecy?"

"What about it?" She turns and points out the camera by the front door and the elfling that waves at him.

"It can't see any of the elves, and none of the presents are wrapped in animated paper. Anyway, you wanted to play Santa's helper, so I'll leave you to it."

As she turns back to her seat he calls out, "Can I go back to my normal clothes now please?"

"Sure, whenever you want. It's just basic transfiguration so the normal spells should dispel it."

"Oh, cool. Hey! Where's my wand?"

"I sent it home as it doesn't match your outfit, and the holster would break the statute if we left it on the video."

"But how am I supposed to get rid of it without a wand?"

"Same way I put it on you."

"But you know I'm not good at that."

"Xeno, Amelia, and Tonks all learnt in less time than you've had. So I'm moving up to pranks when you don't practice enough."

"Vicki!" Sirius whines.

"Nope, not happening."

"But my feet hurt in these."

"Oh, very well. There you go, a cushioning charm, I've also put one on the heels Lily so that they don't poke holes in your carpet."

"Thank you Victoria."

"But they still hurt."

"Quit whining, they're only 3 inches. Or do you think you're less capable than most of the humans here?"

Sirius looks around at just who's here for the first time and realises that out of the 20 or so human guests, only Xeno, Remus, Arthur, Dan, Dudley, a couple of the neighbours, and himself are men.

As Sirius sags his shoulders and heads over to the presents Lily looks over to Dudley, "Dudley, Ginny, would you let the goblins know that we're starting the gift giving if they'd like to join us."

The two of them scamper upstairs and return without the goblins, "They thanked us for the invitation, and apologised as it's not a holiday that they celebrate."

Present giving was all fun, and all the house elves were surprised to be included in the gifting, as the elflings all got apparent age-appropriate toys, and the matriarch was given a nice fine china tea service with her favourite Disney characters on it. Once the presents had been given out and opened, the children that hadn't grown up too fast went upstairs to the games room [Dudley's room] with the elflings, they also drag Astoria with them as they feel like she hasn't had enough exposure to non-magical games. Conversation downstairs turned to Karen's trip to find Petunia.

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Duncan laughed at something that Randolph said as he glanced around The White Wyvern. Seeing that there was no one close enough to notice privacy charms, he discretely puts up a charm that his lord invented that replays a conversation from a memory. Keeping his jocular look on his face, his tone turns serious.

"Randolph, you need to let your shadows know that they need to take extra care with their masking charms. Our lord is doing something that's exposing our mark."

Randolph laughs and then replies in just as serious a tone, "Yes Lord Greengrass, is there anything else we need to be aware of?"

"My heir has broken free so we will need to find a new contact for the shadows once our Lord returns."

"Do you need her to be broken in again?"

"She is unassailable, and I can't use the spare as she is watching her too closely."

"Very well. We will distance ourselves from your family."

"I'm also activating Laughing Man just in case I get compromised. Use this key if the secret drops."

Randolph laughs, "I will, I hope it's not needed. Is Malfoy still the public face of the shadows?"

"For the moment, though I will recommend to our Lord that his son is passed over. He is too brash. For now, your report?"

"We now have a shadow monopoly on the most common potion ingredients. We own 51% of the Daily Prophet through 10 families. We have new members in Scandinavia, Eastern Europe and Greece, as far as we're aware the Ottomans aren't aware of our foothold there yet. We retrieved the tablets that were sent to the Russians."

"Tablets?"

"Ancient tablets were discovered in Egypt over the summer, and there were two variations there. A set of each were sent out to allied countries, our new contact in Eastern Europe was tasked with delivering the one sent to Russia, so he switched them out with sugar paste replicas and sent them to us. It's how he earned his mark, and 1,000G."

"Very well, I'm sure our Lord will be happy to have them to examine. Did a set come to England?"

"Yes, it was given to Hogwarts."

"Morgana, that's out of our reach then. How's the war chest looking?"

"We should be able to fund the same activity levels as the mid 70's for 24 months before we need to leverage our hidden business assets."

"Very good, any upsets?"

"Yes, there seems to be a new source of quills and inks that are much cheaper than we can provide. They're not quite as magical as our ink, and lose their charms if they're in a low magic area for a few hours, but that's been sold as an upside for the newspaper and magazine companies as a way to reduce exposure with the statue of secrecy. The fact that it's around 10% of our price means that we literally can't compete with them unless we pay our potioneers absolutely nothing. Quibbler subscriptions are up, and we're starting to see more legal muggle artifacts on the market. We think this is due to the establishment of a new magical country, the magical United Kingdom. We weren't able to get any information about why this was established, but it coincides with the designation of a town in Surrey as a magical enclave. A Little Whinging if memory serves. Whispers in Gringotts say that the Goblins have somehow started to build a town there without breaking the treaty too."

"Hmm, keep an eye on that, we need to ensure that we're still producing ink so they can't shut down the Prophet by refusing to sell to them. Also try to find out where the ink is coming from and I'll pass word to the Death Eaters to put pressure on them. Also start trying to cultivate contacts and sympathy in the Emerys Academy, as Hogwarts is going to become an increasingly hostile environment for us. I predict that next year a lot of the current pure blood second years will be going there too."

"Very well, any reason?"

"Hogwarts is now an international school, and they their latest tuition contract says that if you don't pass the end of year tests at the end of second year, you will be returned to your national school. Which for Magical Britain is the Emerys Academy."

"I've heard of it, don't know much about it though."

"I'm not surprised, you went to Hogwarts a few years before me. The only reason you're not in my position is you're not from a noble house. Though where did you hear about it?"

"Most everyone that works in the shops or the farmers market went there, so it comes up once you've graduated. Don't get many shopworkers from Hogwarts though, as it takes them too long to learn the skills needed."

"That's good to know. Unless there's anything more I think we're done."

"No, that's me done."

"We're currently talking about the quality of French cauldrons."

"That conversation again! I hate that conversation."

"Yes well, it starts off funny and then gets boring and depressing quickly."

"OK, get it over with."

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The last thing Karen expected when she finished telling everyone about her visit to the Winter Court was Harry tearing upstairs shouting, "Dudley, we've got a new sister, and Karen's pregnant with another one."

Bemused she looks around at the other people present. Hermione sticks her hand up.

"Hermione, we're not at school right now so you don't need to put your hand up."

"It's just, I don't know about Daphne, but I know I'd be really excited to find out I was getting a new brother or sister." She looks hopefully at her Mum at that, who shakes her head slightly.

"After all, I'm an only child. I can't imagine what it's like for Harry. As she's only had a family for a few years now, and she's only now starting to believe it won't be taken away. Anyway, I you're going back aren't you."

"I will be, every night if I can help it with a few exceptions."

"I was just thinking, would it be an idea to take a few things back with you for Lyassa? To play with."

"Lyasa, and I was going to, but they already make most of the wooden toys that people used to play with. The only things that they don't really use magic to create are those that are intended to be long lasting. That goes for their every day things as much as it does for their toys and games. In many ways their life is a lot like ours was pre-gunpowder in the west. On top of that, their world is inherently untameable, so most people either work in food production, hunting, or as warriors."

"Oh. Well, how about things like an etch-a-sketch, spirograph, a few boxes of printer paper, and crayons, coloured pencils, and water colours and good quality paints?"

"Why an etch-a-sketch?"

"Well, mundane electronic devices don't last long at Hogwarts, and Victorias watch stopped working when you took her to get magic. So until we know how bad the effect is there, it's a simple machine that doesn't rely on precision components."

Emma glares at her daughter, "And how do you know that?"

"Uh, I may have taken my one apart?"

"That explains why there was silver sand everywhere for months after it broke."

"Sorry Mum. Oh, you could also take one of the model steam engines they sell in the science museum. They're made from brass so it shouldn't cause them any problems, and it should also be apparent if slightly more precise machines stop working too."

Emma shakes her head, "I suppose you're going to want her to write a report with observations taken over a period of time to see if there's any sort of pattern to when it stops working."

Hermione loses control over her excitement, "Oh, yes, that would be great, then we can get together with Septima and Beth and see if there's a rune scheme that we could use to counteract the effect."

Harry comes down with Dudley to Daphne hugging a red-faced Hermione as the adults all laugh good-naturedly at her.

"What did I miss?"

Daphne smiles at her over Hermione's head, "Hermione just fell into research mode."

Harry goes over to Hermione and gives her a hug, "Ah. It's ok Mi, it's one of the things we love about you."

While Harry is reassuring Hermione, Dudley dives straight into the integration, "Hey Book Mum, what's this about having a new sister? Is she nice? Can we meet her? What's her favourite colour? Does she like music?"

Karen laughingly puts her hands up in surrender, "I give, I give, I'll tell you all about it."

For the second time that afternoon she finds herself talking about Lyasa and Selene.

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Ginny grimaces as she tries to explain how to use the satellite phone to Charlie for the 3rd time. She needs him to get it so that she can go back to staying in little whinging while her parents are visiting. She ruefully thinks back only a few years to when this would have been a really exciting trip, but there's so much to do in the non-magical world that being stuck here seems to be a chore. Especially as she's only here because it's cheaper for her parents than buying portkeys. In a couple of days she's taking them to Egypt to see Bill and taking another satellite phone with her. She was also given a generator with a rune to make fuel on the cap for the tank so that they'd have something to charge the phone with. They'd need to top it up every few hours as the conjuration fails, but that shouldn't exactly be a hardship. But first she needs to teach these luddites how to use a simple phone.

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Excerpt from the New Years Eve edition of Le Monde.

Le court d'hiver arrive en France ?

Une série d'enlèvements non résolus par un groupe se faisant appeler le court d'hiver a eu lieu au Royaume-Uni entre avril et octobre de cette année. En exclusivité, Le Monde met en lumière des enlèvements similaires qui se produisent partout en France. Le premier enlèvement connu s'est produit à Château-Chinon dans la région Bourgogne-Franche-Comté en septembre, près d'un mois avant les derniers enlèvements connus au Royaume-Uni. Depuis lors, il y aurait eu près d'un enlèvement par jour dans la majeure partie de la France. Les seules régions épargnées sont le nord-ouest du pays. Nous comprenons que la Gendarmerie nationale est en pourparlers avec ses homologues britanniques pour savoir comment ils ont pu empêcher que cela se produise.

Winter court comes to France?

A string of unsolved kidnappings by a group calling themselves the Winter Court took place in the UK between April and October this year. In an exclusive, Le Monde is bringing to light similar kidnappings happening all over France. The earliest known kidnapping happened in Château-Chinon of the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region during September, nearly a month before the last known kidnappings in the UK. Since then there is reported to have been nearly one kidnapping a day across most of France. The only regions that have been spared are in the North West of the country. We understand that the Gendarmerie nationale are in talks with their British counterparts to learn how they were able to prevent these from happening.