Title: Diverging Reality
Fandom: Harry Potter
Characters: Harry, Draco, Pansy, Blaise, Hermione
Chapter: 7
Word Count: 1906
Warnings: nothing
Edited by: eiliagh
AN: I promised myself I would post this week. And here I am, posting this week. Enjoy!
Strolling through Hogsmead with Pansy, Draco, Blaise and Hermione with him, Harry smiled as Pansy and Hermione deconstructed a rune from their Runic homework as they walked. "I'm so glad that I decided to get a tutor over the summer to learn Runes and Arithmancy instead of taking the class," Harry said. Draco shook his head at the girl who was supposedly his fiance and her friend.
"They're both top of the class, too. Not really surprising since Pansy has been learning the basics since she was a kid from her mother, and Hermione is just that scarily smart," Draco drawled. Blaise snickered as he held his cup of hot chocolate closer to himself, fingers wrapped tight around it.
"Say what you really mean, Draco. Miss Granger-Potter makes all of the blood purists look stupid when they say that the New Bloods are idiots and unworthy of their time," Blaise said, amused at just how things were going down.
Somehow, before Hermione had announced it, Ginevra had found out that Hermione had been blood adopted by Harry as a Potter and thrown a truly epic fit in the middle of a hallway. Hermione had been forced to come out as the Potter Lady and only heir to the Dagworth-Granger family. Apparently, she had squibs on each side of her family tree through her great-grandmothers. She had a lesser claim, even without the adoption, to the Potter family which was why the bonding had taken so hard to her.
"Of course she does. She's the one that thought that all of those who didn't have magic that our people tossed into the muggle world had introduced enough new blood into their families to respark the magic after all," Harry said. Draco huffed quietly.
"Yes, yes. We are discovering that we were all so wrong in the way that we treated the New Bloods. Even father has raged at the fact that three of the vaults that were supposed to open are now closed for another ten years until the new possible heirs come to Gringotts," Draco said, shrugging. "Three of the families are actually vassals to the Malfoy Family back in France and, when we came over, some came with us."
"I find that I should be more upset with the fact that the man that we had followed once before nearly destroyed several lines of families in his madness," Blaise said quietly, gazing over at Harry. "But I hear that he is becoming better?" he asked.
Harry pulled out his wand and casually flicked his wand, creating a moving privacy spell around them. "From what our dear Professor has told me, Lord Slytherin has paused all current plans and is going over them. Reconnecting with older plans. He was most displeased to find that some of his memories have been tampered with and that he had a very old compulsion potion in his system. But with the way that he has come back, and the fact that he is bringing most of his parts into one, he has found it easier to purge the potion out of himself," he told them.
"I heard that he's been taking care of a few of his worst party members," Draco said. He shrugged at the side eye that he got. "He's been either making them get some mental help if he thinks that they can be helped like that. Or they are being gently put down. I know that Auntie had asked to have a few of her eggs removed and frozen when she learned that there was a way for that to go down after she started her own care and learned that her potion meds would make it harder for her to have children. She was quite surprised at just how advanced the non-magical side of the world has gotten. And that a few of the more enterprising New Bloods started to work out how to bring those advancements into our world."
Harry hummed, nodding. "Potions and specialized spells if I read the articles right," he said, Draco nodding. "Is she going to have someone else care for the child? I know that she's not exactly the best to care for a child," he mused.
Draco grunted. "She'll have a nanny elf for her bad days. Before she was on a potion regime that she was supposed to stay on, but when her party's leader started to go insane and the bond that she had with her husband went unfulfilled, because of her parents' hold, it was hard to get them much less take them. She ended up lost mentally for a long time." He wrinkled his nose as they paused next to the pet shop, Hermione and Pansy pausing inside of their privacy bubble. "Then there was Azkaban and they refused to allow her the regime because it dulled the effects of the dementors."
Hermione snorted at that. "We really should work on changing that around so that the prisoners can get the help that they need. Get those damnable creatures out," she said. "The prisons here in the Mundane world are starting therapy plans for their prisoners depending on their crimes and it works, for the most part." Harry smirked as he twitched his wand, dropping the privacy spell fully.
"That's something that we can focus on at a later date. We have that power, but I need to claim my Lordships before I can really flex that power," he said. "Hermione, did I hear that you and Neville were going to be walking around the greenhouses tomorrow?" he asked her teasingly, moving their conversation on.
Hermione blushed softly and huffed at her brother. "He is simply showing me some of the new plants that he and Professor Sprout have been able to crossbreed into existence. Some of them will hopefully be highly useful in potions," she said as she turned to the animal shop and pulled the door open. "Professor Snape is going to test some of them and see how they affect potions and if there is anything that they need to breed out of the plants."
Harry smirked, raising an eyebrow at his other companions as Pansy giggled behind a hand. "I know for a very good fact that Neville is extremely protective of those plants that he and Professor Sprout have been growing. Do tell, what is going on with you two?" he asked, following his sister.
Hermione sighed as she rolled her eyes. "We're just seeing where things go between us. Despite what people think, I am not going to date one Ronald Weasley, no matter how many times they tell me that we'd make a cute pair. He needs to grow up in more ways than I think he would be willing to," she stated. "I can't stand his manners, and he thinks that he'll be able to get a job with the aurors? With his kind of grades? I don't think so," she continued, smoothing her robe sleeves down as they stepped into the store. "I am thinking that he has the same kind of thinking that the more snobbish purebloods have. I hate to say it."
"And what kind of thinking is that?" Pansy asked. They picked up the wicker baskets offered and headed for the bird section first.
"That just because they are Pureblood that means that they do not have to work for a job. Never mind the fact that the Auror corps are one of those jobs where that kind of thinking will not work. If you are unable to do the job, you simply won't last past the training. And if you somehow do get past the training and show that you can't do the physical part, you end up in a dead end desk job for the rest of your career," Hermione stated. She smirked over her shoulder at her brother. "I know for a fact that the last pureblood that got in on his name alone is still in records. He has tried to get out, but he's always failed the physical tests."
Harry, Blaise and Draco all snickered as Pansy smiled and gathered some of the packaged mice for her hawk-owl. "And that is what you get for not backing up your name with power and strength, both physically and magically," she simply said. Harry smiled and shook his head before he headed for the snakes.
He and Hermione had talked about finding a snake for each of them, but so far, none of them had ever felt right when he had visited the various shops the last four times. But today he was feeling like he would find one of the snakes at the least. Pausing before a new snake in a tank, he smiled at the little being, listening as it sassed at him about how he looked with his rat's nest of hair. Hermione stepped up behind him and giggled at the sassy little snake before she blushed as the snake caught sight of her and talked about how beautiful she was.
For a human at least.
'Do you like my sister, little one?' he asked, speaking just low enough that only the snake and his sister could hear. The thin chocolate brown snake sat up and flicked his tongue out a few times.
'I have heard of speakers before from my hatcher, but I never thought that I would find one here,' the magical hognose said in return.
'I am not the only one here, but we tend to hide our abilities,' Harry told him. 'Would you like to come home with her? Crookshanks, her half kneazle, has been most adamant that she get a snake familiar for her parseltongue practice. That and I think he just wants a friend who he can carry around.'
The little hognose hissed in delight and slithered up to the side of the case, wanting what Harry had said, waiting for Hermione to put her hand down so that it could wind around her waist. 'I have a sister that may want to come with,' he said, looking at Harry. Harry turned and found the other magical hognose lounging under the heat light of her cage.
After a few minutes of speaking with the little snake, he handed her off to Pansy, the two bonding as the girl cooed softly, stroking down the snakes back as Harry bought what they would need for the two snakes. When the two women went to protest, he just stated that he was buying them early Christmas gifts and to suck it up.
Once they had gotten everything they needed and had the things shrunk down, the girls placed their snakes into little pouches that they wore around their necks with warming charms, before the group headed for the stationary store.
Harry made sure to carefully avoid seeing Ginevra. Draco and Hermione helped him with that while he picked up his personal order of family labeled parchments that he had started to use for his official correspondence. He also picked up several new ink colors and some basic parchment paper for correspondence between himself and friends or family.
They were able to get out of the door and down to the Hog's Head just as Ginevra walked out of the stationary store to find them already gone. She growled and stamped her foot before going to pay for the parchment scrolls that she needed.