Christmas Break Part III: The Interview
Rita Skeeter gave herself another once over in the mirror before calling out to her cameraman to hurry up with securing his equipment for portkey travel. She had almost dismissed the letter she'd received at the office last night out-of-hand. After all, there was no way that a family as famously quiet as the Potter's had been for the last decade would respond so quickly! It was only when the visiting daughter of one of the Daily Prophet's editors, Lavender Brown if Rita remembered correctly, exclaimed that the owl who had delivered it was the personal owl of Harry Potter and his cousin that she even bothered to break the seal. She was so glad she did, for inside she found the greatest Christmas gift she could have possibly asked for, an invitation to an interview with the Potter Family at large.
Despite the assurances of her colleague, and just in case this was just retaliation over the article she'd written the day before, Rita had procured an emergency portkey from her boss and hidden it in a secret pocket of her robes. One couldn't be too careful when dealing with a family that carries a reputation like the Blacks.
At exactly ten o'clock, Rita and her cameraman, Bozo, gripped the loop of rope that had been provided by Gringotts once they had accepted the invitation and felt the familiar tug of magic as they spun away to wherever Harry Potter and his family had arranged to meet with them. The first thing that she realized upon landing was that they had been taken somewhere muggle. There were several of those bright, flameless candles (light-bulbs, she reminded herself) hanging from the ceiling. Which appeared even brighter due to the fact that all the windows seemed to have been blacked out with tarp.
"Welcome Miss Skeeter, welcome." A kind looking brunette woman said from the other side of the room. She gave a worried glance at Bozo, who held up his camera to identify himself.
"Um," Rita's eyes walked up and down the woman, quickly assuming her to be a muggle based on her dress and demeanor, "I believe there might be a mistake here… I was supposed to be meeting a Potter family today."
"Yes, Miss Skeeter, that's correct." A male voice spoke as Remus Lupin hastily walked from around a partition, "I'm sorry I wasn't here to greet you, I was making a last minute check on the security wards for the interview and lost a bit of time."
"Harry and the others are in the front of the cafe," the muggle woman explained, "Remus thought it would be better for your Secrecy if the portkey brought you here to the back."
"And where exactly is 'here?'"
"No ma'am," the werewolf interjected, "that question, as well as personal questions that might lead to this address, are off limits. We don't need throngs of wizards coming to a muggle cafe because they think they can find Harry Potter that way. The same will be enforced about Harry's home." Rita looked unconvinced until the man locked her with his amber eyes and continued, "You wouldn't want to be accused of breaking the Statute of Secrecy by instigating such a scenario, would you?"
Rita paled slightly at that prospect. As soon as she'd realized that they were in a muggle cafe under an anti-apparition ward she had resolved to try and get a peek at a street sign for her article, or to return later. But now, maybe not. The tarps covering the windows were clearly a precaution against exactly that, and painting the family as overly secretive might work for her story anyways.
"No, you're correct." Rita answered hastily, "I can get ahead of myself sometimes when a story is involved. But I do have to ask, why are we doing this in a muggle cafe? Just to make sure it's actually acceptable for us to be here."
"Because Angela here," Remus indicated the muggle woman, "the owner of the cafe, has a witch for a daughter, so we don't have to worry about Secrecy as long as we keep the windows blocked like we have. Harry didn't want to do this somewhere like the Leaky Cauldron because it would have likely drawn a crowd."
"I suppose I understand," Rita nodded, "may we move on then? If we finish early enough I might be able to publish this as a special Christmas edition."
Remus fought to keep his smirk off his face, that was exactly what they wanted.
When Rita and Bozo followed the muggle and the werewolf around the partition to the front of the cafe they were met with the scene of two boys playing a muggle card game with another muggle that Rita recognized as Harry Potter's aunt. After a nudge from her, Bozo pulled up his camera and got a shot of the family relaxing and playing.
"Miss Evans? Petunia, is it?" Rita asked in a sickly sweet voice as she quickened her pace to greet the woman after the picture was taken, "I'm so glad you've given us this opportunity. I am Rita Skeeter, of the Daily Prophet."
"Dursley." Petunia corrected, causing Rita to pause for a moment, "I am married, my name is Petunia Dursley. This is my son, Dudley. I'm sure I don't need to introduce Harry to you, do I?"
"Of course not," Rita returned smoothly, "I am quite sure that any witch or wizard in Britain would recognize the Boy-Who-Lived on sight." She noted that Harry winced at the use of his title, interesting.
"Please refer to my nephew by his name, Miss Skeeter." Petunia insisted as the boys put the cards away, "It is not proper to saddle a child with such as that."
"Ma'am, you must understand. Harry Potter is-"
"We know that people think I did something special." Harry interrupted, earning a reproachful glance from his aunt, "But I was just a baby, I don't want to be treated different for it. I just want to be 'Harry.'"
Rita smiled anew, "Alright 'just Harry,' why don't we begin the interview?"
He didn't get to answer as the front door opened slightly, allowing a regal and well dressed (for a muggle) Andromeda Tonks to enter the cafe with a much more flamboyantly (though still muggle) dressed Albus Dumbledore behind her. Petunia fought back a chuckle as she watched Skeeter's reaction to the new arrivals, she appeared to have to consciously remind herself not to drool.
"You haven't started without us, I hope?" Dumbledore asked as he closed the door behind him and waved his wand at it.
"Oh no, we were just getting some introductions out of the way," Petunia answered, "I was about to inform Miss Skeeter that you were coming."
"Where is Vernon?" Andromeda asked as she took a seat at the large table.
"He will be back in a moment," Petunia answered, slightly embarrassed for him, "the weight management drops he's taking have… you know."
The kids couldn't help but giggle at that, and the group was laughing together as Vernon Dursley emerged from the bathroom. He stopped as he approached and gave a questioning look at the laughing crowd, which only set them off further.
"No respect I tell you." He muttered good naturedly under his breath as he joined his wife and sat across from Rita Skeeter. Once he took the time to look her over he lamented that he hadn't brought sunglasses with him. Her attire looked like some sort of fusion of witches' robes and a non magical dress, but it was a bright green that practically gave off its own illumination. At least the headmaster had the decency to not wear clothes that glowed in the dark!
Rita glanced at Albus Dumbledore, the only one who had elected to remain standing besides her cameraman, not that Bozo was being paid to sit around, "Well, if this is everyone, let me get out my quill set up and we can get started."
She reached into her purse and removed a roll of parchment and an electric-green quill that clashed with her dress.
"If you wish to use that, Miss Skeeter, you may." Andromeda said with an air of disdain as she reached into her own bag, pulling out a jet black quill and her own parchment, "But I will be recording this meeting with a Dicto-Quill. If anything… overly imaginative, I suppose I should say… appears in your article, then we will be contacting your boss."
"Yes well…" Rita huffed as she watched the other woman set up the Dicto-Quill, "in that case it would be more efficient if I simply received a copy of that. There's no reason for us to have to listen to two quills scratching away."
After receiving an imperious nod from the Potter Regent, Rita put her Quick Quotes Quill away and began her interview in earnest. She began by repeating the introductions that had taken place before Andromeda and Dumbledore arrived, and made a point to correct Petunia's name to her married one this time. But she intentionally called Harry by his media given moniker again, eliciting a second round of reprimand from his aunt and uncle. Rita was okay with them being a little defensive since it would make it easier to speculate about them later.
Before diving into the controversial issues that were most definitely the reason she had been invited to this interview, Rita elected to ask Harry and his family, though mostly he and his aunt, about his life before Hogwarts. She practically salivated over the truth that the Heir Potter hadn't known about magic until he was eight when, according to him, he had a bout of accidental magic that simply couldn't be explained away by his guardians. The reporter was already contemplating how she could find a record of said accidental magic. If it was so large that an experienced family couldn't come up with a story, then it could be an interesting tale.
Rita was also already excited for the potential articles she could sell to Witch Weekly and Teen Witch Weekly concerning Harry Potter's specific desire to follow his mother's path. To say nothing of how sweet a "momma's boy" image could be, Harry Potter in a healers uniform would be every teen witch's fantasy by the New Year!
When Petunia explained that Remus Lupin had been a close friend of Harry's father, so close in fact that she actually knew of him despite never personally meeting the man before that year, Rita attempted to pull out of the family whether they'd known the were hiring a werewolf at the time or if that had been a deception by the Blacks.
"It was Remus that introduced me to Andromeda and her family." Petunia answered evenly. Her husband had warned her that Rita Skeeter tended to ask maliciously worded questions in her interviews to get more 'exciting' reactions, "I contacted him to serve as Steward of Harry's accounts after we were reintroduced to the magical world last Christmas. At that time, Dumbledore had realized that he didn't have the time to keep doing so, due to his other obligations, and was thankful for the reprieve." She glanced over at Dumbledore, who nodded imperceptibly in thanks.
"So you didn't know that he was a werewolf?"
"Of course I did." Petunia answered, thankful that Dumbledore was willing to take this blow for them, "He's been a werewolf the entire time either James, or Lily, have known him."
"But that's not possible, he went to… I mean-" Rita began, trying to form coherent thoughts in response to that even as words began to tumble out of her mouth uncontrollably.
"That is why I am here today, Miss Skeeter. To corroborate and explain." Albus Dumbledore spoke over the woman, using a small bit of wandless magic to silence her for just a moment before releasing it. "It has been a closely guarded secret since his time in school, but Remus Lupin was bitten by Fenrir Greyback when he was only five years old."
That had exactly the expected reaction on Rita, who covered her mouth as she looked at Remus with sadness and a measure of newfound pity that he did his best not to get offended by.
"I felt that such a tragedy should not ruin his chance to have an education and a better life." Albus continued, "So I arranged a place off Hogwarts grounds, where young Mister Lupin would be escorted each full moon. This system worked for all seven years of his time at Hogwarts, and the only people to learn the secret were Remus' dorm mates, of whom James Potter was obviously one, Lily Evans, and Severus Snape who were both just too clever to not figure it out. Mister Lupin even made prefect in his fifth year, he worked hard in school and never let the periodic weakness brought on by his affliction stop him from excelling."
In that moment Rita wasn't seeing Remus Lupin the werewolf, she was seeing Remus Lupin the child victim. Or at least that was who he would be by the time she was writing a piece or three on his struggles to survive to adulthood and ultimately become the Potter Steward. It was really easy to hate and fear werewolves, but no rational adult could hate a child like that.
"When he pieced it together, I thought James was going to turn me in. Or at the very least not speak to me again." Remus added, "But instead he laughed it off and said he would never abandon a friend over just some 'furry little problem.'" Remus looked at Harry for a minute before adding one final comment, "I think that was the moment I knew that he and Lily were meant to be together, even if they hadn't figured it out themselves yet. That was exactly what Lily had called my condition when she found out about it too."
"So both of the Potters were aware of your lycanthropy and accepted you into their lives anyways?" Rita didn't need to ask whether he was really a friend to the Potters, anyone who had done a piece on them knew that Potter, Black, Lupin, and Pettigrew had been inseparable up until Black's betrayal.
"Yes, that's correct. James and Lily stayed my closest friends until their deaths." Lupin nodded, his eyes misty as he fought to keep from thinking too much about better times, "In fact, Lily told me she was going to try and find a cure for lycanthropy someday. She never got the chance, but she did work with Horace Slughorn to improve the Wolfsbane potion."
"That's something I definitely want to do." Harry included, smiling at Remus as he did, "I want to make the cure my mum didn't get to, to help my dad's friend. My Uncle Moony shouldn't have to hurt and ache like he was on Sunday when that picture was taken."
"Uncle Moony?" Rita pressed, "A play on his condition?"
"'Moony' was a nickname that James and the others called me in school once they found out, it stuck to me." Remus explained.
Shortly after they moved off the topic of Remus Lupin being a werewolf in school, Dumbledore took his leave, citing a last minute meeting with Madame Bones, and called his phoenix to pick him up and move him directly through the anti-apparition wards. Rita didn't miss the not-at-all subtle reminder of just who was standing behind the people she was interviewing, but was avidly curious about the old man's meeting with the Head of the DMLE.
As the interview moved on, the story that Rita was originally planning to write changed drastically. Knowing beyond any doubt that Remus Lupin was a werewolf and that Andromeda was the older sister of Bellatrix Lestrange, she had been sure that the final draft of her story would include a lot of dramatic pleas for help in saving a young, impressionable Harry Potter from encroaching Darkness. The whole Wizengamot was still reeling from the shock of Amos Diggory losing the Potter proxy after ten years with literally no warning or explanation, and that would have added fuel to the fire. But now it began to become clear that anyone who spent twenty minutes in a room with this family could see that they were close, and attacks on that family would be rebuffed. It was apparent that Andromeda was still sort of an odd-woman-out, but she was also the newest addition, according to their story, so that was understandable. Couple all of that with Petunia's assertion that Dumbledore kept Harry Potter and his guardians out of the loop with regards to the magical world "for their protection" and the sudden, sweeping changes made sense.
A new narrative began to congeal in her head as she spoke further with Andromeda and Remus, and surprisingly Vernon and Petunia as well. She had expected the muggles to be mostly listeners once they were done speaking about Harry Potter's young life, but they had quotable statements throughout that she wasn't going to pass up. A vindictive Wizengamot member hungry to reclaim power he thought was somehow his by right, all while blinded by hatred for victims of a disease. Andromeda Tonks, who had been specifically brought up because she was a healer, like Harry Potter said he wanted to be (though it wouldn't do to discount that his father was an auror in the finished article), in addition to distant family. Rita was loathe to mention in text that the Boy-Who-Lived was only a few generations removed from the Blacks, but it was necessary to explain how she had become Regent and not merely proxy.
No, calling attention to the Blacks wasn't ideal. But getting the chance to snipe at Dumbledore for failing to properly protect the political interests of the Boy-Who-Lived was worth it.
One other thing that she couldn't help but take note of, and the Dicto Quill wouldn't let her conceal, was that Harry was completely at ease around all of the people here. He didn't let them dictate his opinions either, whenever she asked a question of the boy he answered clearly and concisely, but without any obvious signs of coaching. The amount of controversy and political intrigue this was going to generate easily made up for the loss of face the Prophet would have to deal with when they printed this effective retraction of Monday's article.
The group spoke for almost an hour and a half in total, and the parchment that Andromeda's Dicto-Quill was writing on had to be replaced multiple times. As Rita became more and more aware that her subjects were angling to leave, she decided to ask her final question.
"Before we finish, there is much ado about Harry Potter's ability with wandless magic." The reporter began, "Do you think we could get a few shots of you showing that to us?"
"Wouldn't we get in trouble?" Harry asked.
"Actually, I anticipated that she would ask that." Andromeda answered, "I asked Dumbledore to authorize permission for this morning. No underage magic will be reported from this location until noon." Technically that didn't matter, as wandless magic wasn't trackable by the Ministry, but there was no point in making it seem like Harry Potter was ignoring the rules.
Petunia watched Harry without stepping in, curious how he would handle this, she wasn't disappointed when he shrugged and turned to Dudley.
"Help me out?" Harry asked, nodding his head at the table.
"Sure." Dudley answered, getting up and standing beside Harry while Bozo got ready with his camera. They closed their eyes for a moment while they held hands, before raising their unencumbered hands and lifting not just the table, but also all the occupied chairs around it with a simultaneous incantation of "Wingardium Leviosa."
Bozo the cameraman almost missed the shot entirely, so awed was he by what he was witnessing. Remus and Petunia were giggling like children as they hovered five feet above the ground. Rita and Vernon were united in their unease at flying under another's power, both were warily glancing over the edge of their chairs at the floor. Andromeda smiled as well, but fought back the giggling in favor of praising the boys for their strength and control.
"That was like nothing I've ever seen." Rita stated as her chair casually returned to a resting position on the floor. There was some tea and pastries that had spilled on the table, enough to be considered a mess, but the boys were too impressed with themselves that they had kept all the chairs level enough that no one fell out to notice.
There was nothing left for Rita to ask that could have trumped that most impressive display of magic. Most adults could only cast one or two simple spells of low power wandlessly, and to see that Harry Potter had cast the spell in concert with his cousin was just another tantalizing story waiting to be explored as well, so Rita bid the family a Happy Christmas, gathered her copy of the interview transcript and prepared to activate the return feature of their portkey. As she landed back in her office she glanced down at the loop of rope, but was disappointed to find it had burned to ash moments after arriving. With that gone, she had no way of finding Angela's cafe again. At least, not unless one of Bozo's pictures happened to have captured the place's name. Something she doubted would happen since anywhere she would have expected it to be visible had been covered up when she glanced around herself.
"Well?" Her chief editor was sitting in the corner of the room, where he had clearly been waiting for quite a while, "How did it go?"
Rita grinned and held up the Dicto-Quill transcripts, "I have a lot of work to do if I'm going to get this parsed down into a workable story by tomorrow's release. I'll need to think of a title, too, something suitably dramatic and eye-catching for the occasion."
o0-0oo0-0oo0-0oo0-0o
It was a lucky thing that the Dursleys had anticipated the interview running longer than an hour, so they had already packed what they needed for their Christmas get-together with their friends from non magical school. Their excitement at seeing their old friends quickly morphed to nervousness, however, as they were bombarded with questions about their "special boarding school" and realized they didn't know how to answer half of them. The slightly late arrival of Hermione with her parents at the youth center where the get-together was happening saved them, as Hermione had apparently already spent some time figuring out code words for magical things that would seem more mundane. Potions became chemistry, charms became physics, and so on.
The three magical children had a great time getting to play a proper game of football again with their friends, and the little party ended up lasting slightly longer than originally planned. During that time, Harry managed to tell Hermione a little about the letter his parents had sent him, and before the group split up for Christmas Eve with their families she promised that she would see if she had any books on divination that could help with the prophecy business. After all, her parents hadn't restricted her from reading about magic, just talking about it.
o0-0oo0-0oo0-0oo0-0o
After a thirty minute shouting match that ended with Amelia Bones flooing out of his office to begin an undercover investigation of her predecessor as Head of the DMLE, Albus Dumbledore was holding his head and wondering if a dreamless sleep potion at noon was truly a bad idea.
The woman had entered his office on the offensive, accusing him of covering up something about the Potter Incident of '81. Apparently she'd found out about the missing trial transcript and assumed he had hid it. It took far longer than Albus would have liked to convince the irate woman that he was looking for the same information she was. Unlike him, however, she immediately decided to investigate the man who had been in charge at the time. For some reason she believed there must be some kind of conspiracy for this kind of oversight to happen, Albus was confident that there was simply a glitch in the system that he would ultimately track down.
She's probably just taking it personally because he was one of her aurors at the time, Albus mused to himself as he fought to suppress his headache. When the incident occured Amelia had recently been promoted to Head Auror under then DMLE Head Barty Crouch. I suppose it makes sense to want to know "why" though. Not for the first time, he wondered that himself.
"Why did I never look into this before?" Dumbledore moaned aloud to his empty room.
o0-0oo0-0oo0-0oo0-0o
Hermione was exhausted when she finally went to bed on Christmas Eve. Normally she would have found a book and quietly hidden herself in a corner, or perhaps her room, while all of her family was visiting and celebrating and making noise for the holidays. This year, though, Hermione had tried to get to know her cousins a little better. She only really saw most of them at Christmas anyways, and being around Harry as he slowly learned that he wasn't alone except for his aunt, uncle, and cousin had made her appreciate family just a little bit more.
Unfortunately, one of her own cousins had decided that Hermione's new outgoing personality was the result of a boy. Cousin Melody had taken multiple opportunities to sneak into Hermione's room to try and find proof of her "secret boyfriend," and pretty soon Hermione was so frustrated with her that she could scream.
Their argument came to a head towards the end of the night. Hermione had been with her father, seeing off some of the last guests when she heard a thud from above them. Running upstairs to make sure no one was hurt, she found Melody trying to pry open her school trunk with a claw hammer that she'd likely taken from the garage.
"Melody!" Hermione shouted, startling the girl into falling over backwards and hitting her head, "How dare you? Get away from my things!"
The girl ran out of the room, holding her head, as Hermione checked that the lock had held against her cousins attempts at intrusion. Wizarding trunks like this one didn't have very strong or sophisticated physical security because it was usually assumed that the owner would put their own wards on it. Perhaps she could figure out how to do a sticking charm wandlessly? She'd already been warned by her parents that she couldn't use her wand except when she was at school until after fifth year.
As she came downstairs, she heard Melody crying to her parents about how Hermione was "selfish and mean, and she pushed me down," and Hermione's parents gave her a disappointed look as they noticed her at the foot of the stairs. They think I'm just mad at them! She realized as she began to tear up. Emma, however, noticed the rapid change in her daughter's demeanor, and wiggled her hand a little like a stage magician on the telly.
Was she snooping around something magic? She seemed to ask her daughter with her eyes, garnering a tearful nod from the bushy haired witch.
"We will speak to Hermione about this." Emma spoke over her husband's response to his sister after giving her daughter a candid wink, "She had company coming over this weekend, now she won't."
Aunt Rachel, Melody's mother, watched Hermione's tearful reaction before agreeing, "I can't believe you let her act this way, on Christmas no less."
As Aunt Rachel and her family left the Granger home, Hermione caught Melody sticking her tongue out at her.
"What was that young lady?" Daniel began laying into Hermione as soon as the last uncle had left to go home for the night, "I know you don't like people going through your room, but you should know that you can't push down your cousin just for wanting to see."
"She was in my closet dad!" Hermione cried back as her mother wrapped her in her arms, "She was trying to get in my school trunk! All I did was yell at her!"
"Dan," Emma warned, "I told you at the beginning of the night that this was going to be a problem, the very first time Melody went into Hermione's room this evening I told you that she would go snooping where she shouldn't."
"She had a hammer and everything," Hermione muttered, "and then she lied about it."
Daniel Granger was at a loss for words. He knew that his family sometimes overstepped their bounds when they came over. He hadn't come from money, and as a dentist he was the most successful of his family, so they tended to take advantage on the rare occasions that any of them came by. He knew that, and was inclined to accept it, but it was clear that he was going to need to put his foot down a little. He'd never had something like magic that he needed to keep from his family before.
Hermione woke up the next morning refreshed and excited. Her father had apologized for not trusting her last night before she went to bed, and her mother had promised a special surprise for Christmas, so how could she not be? Sitting up to take a look at her alarm clock, she was slightly disappointed to see it was before seven. Her parents probably weren't awake yet. At first she tried laying in bed and going back to sleep, but by seven-thirty she was going spare with curiosity over what gifts she'd received.
Deciding that sleep was for the weak, Hermione rose and quickly prepared to wake her parents and go downstairs. As she was getting out a robe to put over her pyjamas, it was December after all, she heard her parents stirring as well and slowed down to descend at the same time as them.
Christmas Morning was much less stressful than the night before, and the Granger family enjoyed a large breakfast as they opened gifts and discussed their plans for next week when the Patils were over. The closer it got to time for the two magically-raised girls to arrive, the more Emma had begun to passively worry that something would go wrong or that one or both of the girls would accidentally reveal magic due to not understanding the non magical world.
Hermione was quite happy about the things she had received from her parents. There were over a dozen large books that she was especially glad for, among other, less academic, things as well. Most of the books were magical in nature, her mum had gotten her two different tomes on magical first aid that she was particularly excited to tear into. For their part, her parents had enjoyed the things she had picked for them. Her mother held up a snow globe with a magically animated Hogwarts castle within, and her father had received a book with simple household potions that didn't require magic to brew. When he had first unwrapped the gift he smirked at her, Emma was a terrible cook so Daniel tended to take care of everything in the kitchen.
While they had been opening things, the mail owl arrived to deliver the Daily Prophet with the interview Harry's family had done with Rita Skeeter. After reading the article, Hermione immediately asked to call Harry and ask about it, only to be reminded that she couldn't until Friday.
The one thing that Hermione had not been able to figure out so far was what the "surprise" her parents had talked about was going to be. That question was answered around noon when she prepared to get dressed to go visit Grandma and Grandpa Puckle, who were the only other members of her mother's family left. Grandpa Puckle wasn't feeling well, having just gotten over a cold, so instead of going today, they were waiting until tomorrow when he would feel better. When Hermione inquired what they would do instead, they always visited her mother's family for an early dinner on Christmas day, she almost screamed in excitement at her mother's response.
"I'm sorry again for not trusting you last night, sweetheart." Dan said as his daughter launched herself at first her mother, then him, after seeing the loop of rope that served as a portkey to Potter Isle.
"It's okay daddy." Hermione replied with her face still crushed against his chest.
"I guess you know what this is." Emma said as she put the rope on the table. Petunia knew that Hermione was grounded, but she had mailed them a portkey anyway, 'in case of good behaviour' she'd said in the accompanying note, "But how?"
"I can feel it, the magic I mean." Hermione answered happily, "I read about portkeys, and I can't think of anything else that could be. I didn't know it went to Harry's island until you said so, obviously, but I could guess."
"Well, Petunia gave me this just in case we decided to ignore your restrictions. Go get dressed for slightly warmer weather, and grab anything you want to take with you for the day." Emma instructed as Hermione got her excitement back under control, "We're having Christmas Dinner with the Dursleys and the Smiths this evening."
