49. Life with Granger Around
"My Lord, may I have a word in private?" Astoria said as soon as she stepped out of the fire grate after the Dark Lord. It had been a long day at the Ministry, the subject had been magical beings, a very contentious topic, that had left her with a headache. The specific focus today had been werewolves. And after Remus Lupin's extreme betrayal, a lot of people wanted to exterminate, or at the very least subjugate, werewolves altogether. But that had never been part of the plan, and Salazar help her, if the Light didn't fight against that decision. They were still a bloodthirsty lot and feeling that they had lost the war (had anyone actually won, Astoria sometimes wondered in the dark silence of her bedroom) they wanted to get revenge for their dead children.
The Dark Lord had had to interfere in the discussion between the parties not once, not twice, but three times, and then he began to send people away. She would never have been that lenient with the lot of them, and she knew that less than two years ago the Dark Lord would have used the Cruciatus Curse instead of his voice, but he wanted peace, to keep the peace, and he had learned patience better than she had.
"Of course," the Dark Lord said, and she followed him to the study he had on the first floor of the wing he shared with Harry.
While walking she listened and looked for Harry, or Granger, but didn't see anything of either of them. She hoped Granger was here, hoped she was mistaken and that nothing was wrong, but if she wasn't mistaken, she needed to know, and to know if there was anything she could do. Because the Harry she had seen during the tea with Granger two days ago had been a new man, a man without the world on his shoulders and only grief and loneliness in his heart. She had thought he had adapted well to his new life, but after just that one glimpse of Granger and him together, she knew she was wrong. He hadn't adapted well at all, he had survived, merely survived, and nothing more, and he deserved better.
The Dark Lord was seated behind his desk and made a motion for her to sit before he looked at her.
"My Lord, do you know if something happened the day Granger visited? Something to keep her away, as she still hasn't come back? Has it anything to do with Harry … with Harry screaming that evening, in the duelling room?" She twisted her hands in her lap, she couldn't help herself. If something had gone badly wrong, if the witch had visited and then decided that she didn't like how Harry was now, how he lived and interacted with the Dark Lord, with Draco and herself … She would have to find her and tell her a thing or two about friendship, and about Harry and the relief and happiness she had seen in him that day, and never before.
"No, Astoria, nothing is wrong," the Dark Lord said. "Harry told me that Granger will be back tomorrow. Harry also told me that the reason for this, for the two days between the visits, is a favour to us, to help us get used to them together." His crimson eyes gleamed with something Astoria suspected was amusement. "Apparently, Head Bones, and others, informed them that they can be a handful when together, and that it would be better to ease us into it. He also informed me that this favour has a time limit. Consider yourself warned."
Yes, Astoria decided while watching her Lord, definitely amusement. Which spoke well for the chances of this endeavour, very well indeed. But looking back at that day, at the shut and barred library door, at the tea with the two of them and at Granger's voice booming through the Manor and Harry's screaming, she could also see what Harry's friends meant. There had been more upheaval in the Manor that one day than it usually was in an entire month, now that they had peace. Of course, she doubted all of it actually was Harry or Granger's direct fault, but still …
"I will consider myself warned, my Lord," she said with a smile.
"Good. I will see you at tea in half an hour."
Astoria got up, bowed and left.
Later, she would look back at that conversation to remind herself that she had, in fact, been warned.
XXXXX
Astoria was just a few steps away from the Floo-room when she felt the wards ping with an incoming apparition, then she heard someone stumble and swear up a storm.
"Fuckings Naga! I will bloody flay them for this, just see if I don't … Ah, fuck! Come on, come on …!" More stumbling and Astoria hurried towards the room just to see Granger standing on one knee on the floor, her wand raised in a bloody and shaking hand, while giving that hand a furious look. The wand shook too much to finish a proper spell pattern. The witch then lifted her other, equally bloody hand, to her mouth and whistled loudly. The sound spilt the air, a lot louder than it had any right to be, and made Astoria let go of all the parchment scrolls that she held to cover her ears. As soon as the sound stopped, she lowered her hands and almost ran up to the bloody and battered woman on the floor. Granger was gingerly sitting down with a slump in her shoulders, still swearing beneath her breath.
A similar whistle sounded, this time from another part of the Manor and Granger looked up to see Astoria draw closer.
"Let me help you!" Astoria demanded.
"You can't, but I give you leave to try. Naga venom needs a special kind of antivenom, so unless you have some just laying around …"
Astoria shook her head, but removed all the blood coating Granger's skin and clothes. Now she could see several shallow cuts on Granger's face and throat and chest, cuts that bled far too much to be normal. She shuddered. Naga venom. She tried several healing spells anyway, but the cuts just opened up again the moment after the spells closed them.
Harry ran into the room.
"What the bloody fuck, Hermi! When you said you would pull their tails, I didn't think you meant it literally!"
"I didn't!" Granger rasped.
"Then what the hell did you do?!"
"Lick first, storytime later!" Granger pointed at her chest, still oozing blood in a rather ominous way.
Harry swore, then he transformed into a Naga right in front of her. Astoria hadn't seen this form before, just heard him talk about it, one of his favourite forms. His massive tail was covered in green scales, darker, almost black, on top, lighter, emerald-green, on the bottom. She could see emerald-green scales in some places on his torso and face too, his now almost glowing green eyes had vertical pupils and his hair flowed down his back. Astoria took it all in and felt the small part of her that was still snakelike, approve of what she saw, what she felt, from the Naga. A kindred spirit, someone who had much of the serpent under his skin, like she had, like her Lord had.
Harry coiled up next to Granger that now lay flat on the floor panting, and began to lick her wounds. First the ones on her chest then on her neck and then on to her face. When he had licked a wound, it seemed to close easily enough under his healing spell. Granger's harsh breathing became easier and when Harry sat up, she gave a sigh.
"Fucking Naga!" she muttered.
"Thanks," Harry crossed his arms over his naked chest and scowled, but not very menacingly, down at her.
Granger snorted and began rooting around in her pocket, without getting up.
"Not you, you idiot. The others in that backwater thing they call a village." She found what she was looking for in her pocket, drew out a small box, opened it and put one of the small round stones, bezoars, Astoria realised, in her mouth and swallowed. "They weren't very willing to talk to me, not about what I wanted to talk about, anyway. And in the end, I was apparently considered a threat."
"Fancy that," Harry said, deadpan.
Granger grimaced. "I had, honestly, not done anything at that point, besides asked questions. Questions they didn't like, I will grant you, but not anything that would hurt them to answer. Except that they have a really, really, really old-fashioned view on family and childbearing and that they considered my questions a defamation against their way of life, even if it didn't in any way concern them, but you." Granger looked right into Harry's eyes. "You are never, ever, to go anywhere near that village. Ever."
"We already knew that much, Hermi." Harry huffed, tail twitching.
"No, seriously. You would end up burning them all to crisp before they got out two sentences."
"How come you didn't?" He raised an eyebrow.
"Their backwardness doesn't concern me, the way it does you."
"Care to tell me how you got their venom in your blood, without actually being bitten? Those were claw marks."
"Apparently, Naga that are going to fight produce a lot of venom and lick their claws so every scratch can be lethal."
"Why did you lick her?" Astoria heard herself ask, even if she should be at the Ministry by now.
Harry looked at her with those eerie green eyes. "Naga are in fact not resistant to their own venom, but they produce copious amounts of antivenom in their saliva, so the two neutralise each other perfectly. The bezoar at the end was an extra precaution. Alone it wouldn't have helped, but after the administration of the antivenom in my saliva, it would remove the last bit of venom in her body."
Astoria nodded and got to her feet, so did Granger. She stretched a bit and Astoria kept an eye on her while summoning all her scrolls, but the other witch seemed fine now. Astoria almost lost her grip on her scrolls again when Granger suddenly gripped Harry's neck.
"Change back, Harry."
Harry hissed, his whole tail lashing through the room and Astoria jumped out of the way.
"None of that. Change back. I know what you are thinking, don't imagine that I don't, and the answer is absolutely fucking not! Change!" Granger shook him by the neck and Astoria wondered if she maybe should interfere, but she got the distinct impression that Granger not only knew what she was doing; it was also necessary.
"I can ssssmell him!" Harry hissed.
"Yeah, I know, and that's a problem."
"He isss mine! Mine!"
"Yes, Harry, he is yours, in any and all shapes, that's why you will change back now. Change!"
If the situation hadn't been as tense as it was, Astoria would have grinned after Harry's declaration. She knew that the Dark Lord was quite possessive, he was even possessive over her if someone made trouble for her. She was his lieutenant, his next in command, his, and no one should be stupid enough to forget it. She knew without any doubt that he very much considered Harry as his. More his than anyone or anything else, save, maybe, Nagini. Apparently, the Dark Lord wasn't the only possessive individual in that relationship. She felt that that was as it should be.
Harry changed to his normal shape again and stood silent beside Granger with her arm around his shoulders, before he slowly leaned against her.
"Sorry, that was … that was not on purpose. He isn't even here right now, but at the Ministry."
"You have nothing to be sorry for, it was just instinct. I will continue to work on those Naga and get some answers."
"Not if you come back like this, you won't."
"There was a young Healer there, he might not be as backward as everyone else and might be willing to actually listen to the situation before condemning me."
"Just … be careful. Please, be careful," Harry begged in a low voice before straightening.
"I will, don't you worry. I will shield a lot better next time."
"Or bring back-up, or both," Astoria said. "I would be willing to come with you, if you will have me. If it is important for Harry to get this information about one of his shapes, I would like to help."
Granger's one functioning eye narrowed in on her, then she nodded slowly. "I will consider it. I should probably give them some time to calm down first, anyway."
Astoria nodded at her and saw how Harry turned his face and focused on her, then frowned.
"Oh, it's one of those meetings," he said in a low voice.
She shrugged and then gave a sigh. "Yes, it is. I can't say I like it, but I know that it's very necessary."
"What's up?" Granger asked.
"Every two weeks we meet to discuss the Mug … Nomagi problem."
Granger stiffened and Astoria hurried on.
"Or it might be better to say that we discuss the problem, the threat, the Nomagi can become for us if, when, they discover us, and what we can do to postpone that day, and resolve the situation. The Dark Lord has made it clear that he doesn't wish to rebuild magical Britain only to have it fall to Nomagis in a hundred years or so." She gave a heavier sigh. "So far, we only try to gather information about them and their science and weapons and politics concerning other people, but … those meetings feel so heavy. We are just done with one war, and we are already preparing for another."
"Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum," Granger said, the Latin falling from her lips as if it was her native tongue.
"If you want peace, prepare for war," Harry translated with a nod. "And right now, we come from one war, as you said, right now we remember how to do it and why we don't want to do it again. There is no better time to prepare for war than now."
Granger gave a solemn nod. "I have been reading up on Nomagi politics, weapons, war and general science these past months, just because of this issue. So, Harry and I will join you in the next meeting, before that I will gather all my materials so you can read my sources yourself."
Astoria gave her a little smile. That did absolutely not sound like an offer, but even if it actually had been an offer, and not an order, Astoria would have welcomed it. There were few adult Nonmagi born now, and even fewer that wanted anything to do with their government, which Astoria could understand very well. The people that stood with one leg in both worlds would be the ones that would have the easiest time with finding the necessary information. Like Granger.
"I will keep you updated," Astoria promised, "but now I really need to go."
"You do that. I will get this one a Blood Replenisher and then straight in the shower." Harry put an arm around Granger.
"I can just put up my tent outside …" Granger began.
"Or you could take a look at your own rooms and try out the rather splendid bathroom there."
"I have rooms?"
"Yeah, apparently Voldemort got told before the marriage, from three different sources, that the two of us are a package deal." Harry looked over Granger's head and winked rather knowingly at Astoria. "So, he prepared your rooms at the same time he prepared mine."
"What?"
"They are really nice, I think you will like them." Harry towed Granger with him out the door and Astoria stood alone in the room, bemused. She had thought she would be the only one who would dare to tell the Dark Lord that he got a two for one deal when he married Harry, but obviously not. At least her Lord had known what he was getting himself into. Only time would show if he could deal with it, with them, or not.
Astoria shook herself and hurried towards the Floo. Now she really was late, but at least she could give the news that Granger had done quite a bit of research and would bring it all to the next meeting. When they knew more about what they would be up against, they could prepare better. She hoped.
XXXXX
Astoria saw Harry and Granger again at tea the same day. Granger seemed clean and whole and completely unbothered by her close brush with death where she sat in the silvery velvet armchair next to Harry with a knee tucked against her chest and an arm around it. Harry sat smiling in the chair next to her, his legs in a lotus position instead of with his feet on the floor the way he had always sat, up until now.
"Alright, so that might not have been the best idea, but we could try a variation …" Harry said when Astoria drew closer. He turned to her and smiled, a bigger, happier and more relaxed smile than she thought she had ever seen on his face. "How did the meeting go?"
"Both better and worse than I feared," she admitted and sat down. Her Lord already sat on his crimson chair next to Harry and Draco was right behind her, so she began to pour the tea. "Some were relieved when I told them that we might have a very good researcher on side that would bring her research to us to help. Others got … nasty when I told them who it was. Granger, might I appeal to you to teach me that soap suds curse you have used with such great success? I'm trying not to curse people too seriously, but today my patience was tried very hard, and I need some outlet on the idiots." She gave her Lord the first cup of tea and he accepted with a nod.
Granger beamed at her, actually beamed at her.
"With pleasure! Right after tea? We have a rule that we refrain from using magic while eating." She pointed between herself and Harry. "It makes for a calmer atmosphere." She turned to Harry. "I think I begin to see why you like her," she said, as if Astoria herself wasn't sitting right there, listening.
"Told you," Harry said, unbothered, and accepted his cup from her and began to doctor it immediately.
"But I won't trust her just because I think I will like her."
"I didn't ask you to change your personality, just to give her a chance."
Astoria found the implication fascinating. Had Harry asked Granger to give Astoria a chance to prove herself as a likeable person, despite their years of enmity? It did sound like that. And if Granger would give her a chance, then Astoria most certainly would return the favour, if for nothing else, then for Harry, to make it easier for him to be around them both.
Granger nodded decisively and then looked at Astoria again. "Harry and I have actually discussed changing the curse a bit, because of the idiots who use a bit too much time to learn from their mistakes." She accepted her cup from Astoria with a nod, but checked it with a wandless and non-verbal spell before doctoring it to her liking
"We are thinking of a disgusting taste that linger in their mouths after the soap disappears. First for an hour, and if they don't learn after three times, then for two hours, and so on." Harry grinned mischievously and sipped his tea.
"We want to make the curse a bit more … sentient too," Granger continued after a sip of her tea. "It won't just be a horrible taste, it will be the worst taste they personally have ever tasted, no matter what that is."
"And just so you don't think we do this just to play a nasty prank on the Dark side, there are plenty of Light affiliated people that could learn to hold a civil tongue when speaking to others, and the curse will work just as well on them," Harry said.
"Like Doge," Granger added smugly, making it obvious that if the man wasn't already cursed, he soon would be. "Damnable idiot. I didn't get to Amelia, as she is locked up tight. Though, she deserves a lot worse than some soap, the bloody traitor." Granger scowled down into her cup and Astoria suddenly remembered the times when someone from the Light side had defected and given information or help to the Dark side during the war, or when their spies had been found out. The extreme majority of them had been executed and displayed very publicly. None of the deaths had been easy ones, going by the looks on the dead faces, and their bodies, if their bodies were found.
There had been a rumour, a whisper, that it would be safer going against the Dark Lord himself, then to turn traitor to the Light. She had tried to pay the rumour no heed, but it was still a fact that a lot, as in nine out of ten, of their Light traitors and spies, turned up dead. The public display of the corpses made the message clear; we might call ourselves Light, but betray us and your are dead meat walking.
Concise, to the point and very, very effective.
They hadn't gotten a lot of Light defectors the last three years of the war.
She swallowed and looked at Harry and Granger.
"How is Severus still alive?" she asked in a low voice.
Granger snorted and she and Harry looked at each other for long moments, obviously holding a silent conversation with glances alone. In the end Granger gave a shrug with one shoulder.
"There is a peace treaty, and he has his pardon like the rest of us," she said. "Punishing him now is out of the question, anyway." She looked at the Dark Lord with a glint in her eye and Astoria knew, just knew, that this was some sort of test for her Lord. To see if he really would stand by the treaty and the peace, when getting information he would not like. And she was absolutely certain he would not like it.
"Some of it is skill and cunning on his side," Harry said and looked at the Dark Lord, gauging his reaction. "Some of it is leniency on ours. Because our own spies told us how he did his best to keep the Death Eaters at Hogwarts in check and protect the students, back when Hogwarts still stood, and he was Headmaster."
Astoria almost gasped. "I remember that! I remember how he went between Alecto and Amycus and the students again and again to defend the students, any student. He helped me more than once; I wasn't able to cast the Cruciatus on the first years."
She hadn't hated the other students. Hadn't felt anything but sorrow and pity for them, and fear for all their fates. Thus, she hadn't been able to cast the curse and the twins had ripped into her on several occasions and told her she was a pathetic Slytherin and nothing but food for worms.
That was back when she, when they all, had thought that the war would be a short one and things would calm down again.
That belief hadn't lasted long.
Beside her Draco nodded. "I remember that too," he said in a low voice.
"To our knowledge Severus never actually turned traitor to the Dark," Harry said, "or became a double spy, despite the Old Goat insisting that he had. He only did what he could in a difficult situation. And while I never will like the bloody git, he did save children from torture, if not death, with his own life on the line, and I can give him some respect for that. Enough to not hunt him down with the same … fervour … that we did others."
Harry was looking at the Dark Lord for a reaction, but Granger gave a lot of attention to her scone.
Astoria herself didn't know what to believe, what to feel. Severus had saved her a lot of pain on several occasions, back when she was a child, but she had never really contemplated the fact that he most likely did it against the Dark Lord's orders, as Amycus and Alecto had been set on the school to whip the students into shape, or to rip them down to make easy targets, depending on the student. Severus shouldn't have gone against the Dark Lord, but at the same time, to torture children wasn't right, would never be right …
Before she managed to slip further down the Niffler's lair the Dark Lord spoke.
"At this point I can hardly complain about actions Severus took to save the lives of children, when I myself was too far gone to realise the rightness of such actions, and the fault of my own orders. I do not believe Severus was as loyal to me as you seem to think, Harry, but again, at this point it no longer matters. If he does not decide to take up his wayward ways again, that is, and risk the peace. We need every magical to help rebuild our world, Light or Dark no longer matters, only the peace and security does."
Astoria almost opened her mouth to speak, but stopped herself in time. Harry looked at the Dark Lord and there was a small smile on his lips, small, but real and soft. The Dark Lord might have chosen the words that would suit Harry best, and she suspected that Harry knew that, but the Dark Lord had still chosen those words, still chosen to take that position, still chosen to let sleeping Cerberus' lie.
And she wasn't going to dispute that, at all. She wouldn't interfere in the Dark Lord's plans and attempts to calm Harry's misgivings and fears, but neither would she again forget that Severus might not be as loyal as he should have been. If Severus did anything to raise her suspicion, she would get to the bottom of the situation before she informed the Dark Lord. That was part of her responsibility, after all, to stop situations like that from ever occurring.
She refilled Draco's cup when he put it down and he smiled at her, silver eyes crinkling, almost certainly guessing what she was thinking.
"Back to soap and curses," Granger said. "I will teach you the original curse after tea and then I will teach you the new and improved one when we have finished with it. We are doing that one more for fun than anything else. To get used to working together like that again, we are going to continue to work on some excellent wards. Not sure if we will try some high powered Nomagi repellent wards or the wards against bombs first. Harry is still thinking about it. Oh, and I will bring all my research on Nomagi and war and all the rest we talked about, in a couple of days, Mrs. Malfoy, so you can distribute it and make sure people have read at least some of it before we join your meeting in two weeks. It's not a … fun read, or an uplifting one. Nomagi, or people in general really, do tend to dislike anything and anyone different. Case in point; this recent war." She gave a heavy sigh and shook her head, her mass of black curls dancing around her shoulders.
"The high-powered repellent wards, then," Harry said, as if they just now had held a longer conversation about that issue. "We have some quite good anti bomb wards already. The longer we can hide, the better. We should try to make the wards mess with their satellites and other technology too, or they might see our areas from the air or space, and that's no good."
Granger nodded to him. "Very well. We should consider a combination of blood wards and wards powered by a ritual and ley lines. I read quite a bit about it some weeks back and I think it might have merit."
"How would you combine two such different ward forms?" the Dark Lord asked with his eyes on Granger. "I have certainly not even heard of the idea before, so where did you read about it?"
"Oh, I didn't read about the result," Granger said, "just the two different ward types and I think it would be possible to bend them to work together. We probably shouldn't try it anywhere close to people, though, in case it blows up in our faces."
"Harry?" the Dark Lord looked sharply at Harry and Harry hurried to swallow his tea.
"We don't usually try out new things before we are certain that it's theoretically sound. If you wish, you can check out the theory before we try it?" he offered.
Granger pursed her lips, but remained silent. Astoria wondered if she also realised that Harry would be happier if his relationship to his husband was a good one, and that getting between them would be a bad idea, for several reasons, one of them being Astoria herself. She hoped so.
"I would appreciate that, thank you, husband mine," the Dark Lord said.
"You are welcome." Harry gave a small smile to the Dark Lord. Again, she judged the smile to be more real than the half grins or smirks he usually gave the Dark Lord where she could see it. It seemed … softer, somehow.
"So, Hermi, what kind of runes would you suggest? Elder Futhark, or maybe Marcomannic Runes?"
"No, I was thinking Mediaeval Runes might be the place to start …"
Astoria had taken Runes and she had been interested in the subject and quite good, she had also taken Arithmancy, but she had never tried to make a new ward, almost from scratch, neither had she tried to combine two kinds of wards, and thus she was quite proud to be able to follow the conversation for as long as she did. She noticed that Draco gave up some time before she had to, but the Dark Lord was as close to riveted as he ever became nowadays, and she wasn't surprised that he left with Harry and Granger to have a look at the books Granger had gotten the idea from.
Before they left, her Lord told her he would meet her at the Ministry for a short briefing with Ministry Leader Zabini in twenty minutes. Zabini had been in contact with Healers in France and Germany, and they hoped he would have gotten a better answer than they had gotten the first time they had asked for help, months ago now.
The three left the conservatory and silence rang in the huge room for several moments before Draco took her hand in his.
"I'm not the only one who has noticed, am I?" he asked in a low voice.
"Noticed that Harry seems so different that it could have been a completely different person living here with us the last few months? No, no you are not the only one who has noticed," Astoria said and squeezed his hand.
"It really could have been another person." Draco nodded. "I thought … I actually thought that it was getting easier for him, that he had found some kind of peace here. Not that it was perfect, far from it, but that it was … good enough."
"It probably was … good enough, I mean. But good enough doesn't mean that it's actually enough. Enough to survive, yes, enough to really, truly live … it doesn't seem like it. Maybe with even more time, but we won't ever find out now."
"I'm actually happy about that." He met her eyes. "If he felt bad enough for it to change his behaviour this much, then I'm happy that the situation has gotten better for him. That Granger has come to stay."
"I will remind you of that next time they shake the walls of the Manor, in one way or another." She had told him about the conversation she had had with the Dark Lord the day before, and the warning he had given.
Draco groaned, then huffed, then got to his feet and kissed her cheek before helping her to her feet so they could go to the Floo-room together.
XXXXX
They had just barely finished their after-dinner drinks that night when Granger got up and thanked them for having her for dinner, before looking from Harry to the Dark Lord and back to Harry.
"Time to withdraw. Better far too early than a moment too late," Granger said decisively.
"Hermi, while I won't complain about you ordering me about, this doesn't concern just me …"
Granger smiled at him and then looked at the Dark Lord. Her smile held far too many teeth in Astoria's opinion. Harry gave a heavy sigh and got up from the table.
"Thank you for dinner, Astoria, Draco, it was delicious as usual." He nodded to them and then looked at the Dark Lord. "It seems you and Hermi can talk over my head about the book you both have read, husband mine, the book we were supposed to read together." He gave the Dark Lord a look.
"Harry, I did not mean …" the Dark Lord almost appeared abashed. Astoria hadn't even imagined him ever looking like that.
Harry huffed out a laugh. "Don't try to deny it. I know you read it. I have spent my whole life with a bibliophile," he made a gesture towards Granger who grinned unapologetically, "I know the dangers of leaving interesting and unread books about. They never stay unread for long. You two can talk about it, and I can see what I get out of it, and then we can continue reading it together at another time. But I warn you, if you don't read it out loud, I will, and you don't want that."
Granger pretended to shudder. "No, you most definitely don't want that, Slytherin. Harry's French isn't bad, neither is his Greek, but his Latin …" She shuddered again. "I prefer the Cruciatus, myself."
Harry tossed a wandless hex towards Granger who dodged out of the way with a small laugh.
The Dark Lord rose from the table, and because Harry was completely insufferable about it, Astoria and Draco did not get up when their Lord did. Harry smirked at them, pleased about the fact that he had gotten them out of the habit of always getting up when the Dark Lord did. As Harry put it, they were housemates, they simply could not stand on ceremony all the time.
"And if we get tired of talking about books, I could always regale you with the tales of my horrible dates," Granger said while following Harry and the Dark Lord out the door.
"Dates, plural?" Harry asked.
"Two. And equally horrible. Do you know what a society lacks after years of a terrible and bloody war? Sane people to start families with."
"Hermi, you aren't exactly the picture of mental health yourself," Harry said.
"My point precisely! And still, I didn't hold a candle against my two dates. Holy fuck, I almost wanted to invite Dragon to eat them!"
Harry laughed. It was a pure, free laugh.
"Hermi, you can't do that! The poor creature would get indigestion!"
Granger snickered. "She would do it for me if I asked, I'm sure."
The door closed behind them, and Astoria looked at her husband. Draco watched the now closed door.
"I don't think I want to consider how that is going to work. Didn't Harry say he needed skin against skin contact to help his condition? And now Granger is with them?"
Astoria got up and made a gesture at Draco to make him get up too. He did and met her at the head of the table. She captured his chin between her fingers and his lips with hers and kissed him hard. He was responsive, but careful, judging whether she wanted to be met with equal force or submission. She strengthened her grip on his chin, digging her nails into his flesh, to make it clear she wanted him submissive, she wanted to take, to demand and to dominate. He opened his mouth to her and met her insistence with soft moans. His submissiveness and wanton sounds made her tingle with delight.
"We are not going to think about anyone else, but us, but the family we want," she whispered against his mouth. "I want a family with you, Draco, so you are going to give it to me. I want a baby. I want the Malfoy Heir." They had tried for a baby since their wedding night, a year ago now, and nothing. They had even tried several different potions, but still nothing. Astoria really, truly, did want a baby, a family, with her husband.
Her hand slipped into Draco's silky, blonde hair and she tugged hard, dragging his head back, exposing his throat. She nipped at the pale skin on his throat, and he moaned again, making her lower abdomen clench with desire.
"Yes, love. Your wish is my command," Draco said in a hoarse voice, not even trying to fight her when she pushed him down to his knees. He stood there, looking up at her from his knees. Big, silver-grey eyes gleaming in the candlelight, so beautiful, so hers. She had fought for him, both in the war and against his parents and their unreasonable expectations, she had even fought Draco's own arrogance. She would do it all again, to have him on his knees in front of her. Happy and ready to obey her wishes, even her whims, happy to try for a family with her. Happy with her. With how she was. How she loved.
She tugged hard at his hair again, but made sure he could see her eyes when she said:
"I love you, darling, so very much." She meant every word, with the very fibre of her being, with every single bit of magic in her core. She made extremely sure that he knew that.
"I love you too, with everything I am," he answered before he gasped and grimaced at the pain when she tugged even harder at his hair. His responsiveness made her heart flutter. She smiled and stroked his cheek. He met her gaze again, his eyes were already going soft and the look made her hungry for more. She wanted to repeat the action until he was a whimpering and needy mess at her feet, but it was best to wait until they were in their bedroom. Then she could have him.
She bent down and kissed his cheek before whispering in his ear.
"Come now, darling, let's go and make a family together."
He got up and smiled at her, anticipation and lust making his eyes gleam. She knew that look, and knew that he wouldn't ask, because she didn't like it when he asked when she had taken control like this.
"Yes, yes, there will be more pain. I'm not cruel." She patted his cheek and he grinned at her, boyish and eager. She hummed in amusement and turned away, Draco following a step behind her.
Her Draco. Her love.
A/N:
I hope you liked the new scenes where Harry and Hermi interacted, and Astoria's thoughts on it all.
Thank you so much for the comments, the favs and the follows! They are much appreciated! I love to read what you think about the story and the characters! It makes writing this story even more fun! Each and every comment makes me smile!
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