Day 4- Every Christmas From Now On, I'll Be Here By Your Side:
When the magical buzz on her arm woke them both up, Hermione kissed her fiancé on the cheek, whispering "merry Christmas sweetie." His eyes still shut, Draco smiled with contentment before following her out of bed to the nursery just down the hall. The first night after they'd put Scorpius into his own room she'd aired her shock to Finky, Draco's childhood nurse, that they hadn't been woken up in the night. The elf had shifted guiltily on her feet and it quickly became clear that she'd soundproofed the room so as not to disturb them! Hermione did want her son to be independent, so she now held herself back from going to him in the night, but she didn't want him to be lying awake alone for hours, even if his nappy could magically absorb his excrements. "And happy holidays to you too my angel!" She grinned, lifting the crying boy out of his cot, dropping his crying.
"Ooh!" Draco gasped in an over exaggeration that had her sniggering. "What's this?" He took off the tiny stocking at the end of the cot and they both widened their eyes, pointing at it. Scorpius's little grey ones followed their lead. The first object he pulled out was a Honeydukes tub of mince pie baby food, which they allowed Scorpius to try as a special festive dessert for breakfast. Hermione crossed her fingers behind her back, and indeed, her little boy's face lit up with a beam. "Just you wait till you try an actual one of those!" His daddy chuckled as he produced the second stocking filler; a rattle with tiny reindeers inside zooming through the sky, led by a familiar red-nosed one. This delighted Scorpius even more than the food had, even causing his face to crumple as it momentarily disappeared, but Draco quickly produced more gifts from the tiny storage space, until his hand came out empty.
Hermione jiggled him up and down, glancing at Draco. "Time for Mummy and Daddy's present now!" Her lips felt dry with anticipation; only a few more hours.
After dropping Scorpius off with Molly, the pair were pulled apart by their friends and parents with only a quickly mouthed "love you" from her to him, and an amusing response that "I know"- she'd shown him Star Wars for the first time last night! Pushing her down into a chair, Ginny called out for a series of increasingly ridiculously named makeup items to be passed to her by Daphne Greenglass- she and Draco had decided to try to join their friendship semi-circles into one, which had gone surprisingly well- at least with all of his friends except Pansy Parkinson, who was out of the bridesmaid lineup and their lives for calling the bride a grimy skank. Things had gone less well with her friends, but Ginny seemed to be getting along with Daphne now, and hopefully the boys were following suit. Behind her, Narcissa worked wonders on her hair whilst her mother sat blubbering about embarrassing childhood stories that had everyone hooting and, at one point, the lipstick painting Hermione's lips twice as big as Ginny lost all control and burst out laughing!
Meanwhile the men were taking advantage of the magically heated tents to play a game of Quidditch, all sworn to secrecy for fear that Hermione would curse them with spells they didn't even know if she found out what they were doing in her wedding venue! They decided to switch up the teams which meant that Harry, Draco and their trainee (Hermione's father) played against Ron, Lucius and Blaise- whilst Theo, who was a little bitter about having broken his arm in their last game meaning that his wife was forcing him to make it heal naturally, umpired. It was a true bonding exercise, and to his utter shock Draco actually fist bumped the Boy Who Lived at one point! His weaselling sidekick seemed a little jealous of this, but Draco knew just how to resolve the tension. After the game he snuck the boys down into the kitchen, all of them working together as component parts to successfully carry out their reconnaissance mission! They would have succeeded too, except for the one house elf a little too good at their job who noticed him reaching for a canapé and slapped his hand away, chastising him to go get ready. With a taste of the delicious food to come in his stomach, Weasley was a lot more amiable, still a little cautious, but the two Gryffindors actually joined in the others' conversations for the first time! It didn't take them too long to get ready, certainly not the endless hours he suspected the girls were undertaking, but nonetheless, a lot of care went into the process. Placing Hermione's favourite flower, a lily, into his lapel pocket, Draco took a nervous breath and turned to the lions. "How do I look?"
The two of them exchanged a confused look, silently communicating on what to say. "Instinct wants me to say like Moaning Mrytle's toilet water," said Harry, shifting his glasses as if to get a better look. "But that wouldn't exactly be true..."
Draco chuckled slightly at the reluctant honesty and put a firm but friendly grip on either of their shoulders. "I'm asking because apart from her father- who I'm honestly more terrified of in this precise moment than I ever was of the Dark Lord-" the three of them glanced over to the man who was laughing with the pure geniality of a hippogriff. "You two are the closest to her, and I want this day to be perfect for her. It's been quite the buildup."
Ron surveyed his face with sincerity, then dipped his head to gather courage before fixing Draco with genuine eyes. "You look pretty bloody dapper mate." And he knew the redhead was a terrible liar, so that meant more than any ridiculously overstated sonnet would have.
As Hermione was exiting her preparation room, the protection detail in front of her started to scream, spinning her around as she heard a rustle from in front of her. "This is ridiculous!" She declared in a giggle, knowing that her fiancé was just a few feet away experiencing the same over-protectiveness.
Sure enough, Draco's voice chastised her, "I want to give you the muggle traditions you deserve!" As his voice got further away he quickly added, "but don't worry sweetheart! As we agreed, there'll be plenty of Wizarding ones too!"
With the boys gone Narcissa took her hand. "Come on dear! Time for you to legally join my family already!" They all laughed at the poised woman's bubbly childlike excitement, galloping behind her out to the garden, as well as they could do in at least three inch heels!
As the wedding march began to swell, Richard Granger turned to his daughter with a tear in his eye. Hermione's mouth formed a shocked O as she gestured for her maid of honour Ginny to send the other bridesmaids down the aisle. "Dad?" She asked, gently taking his hand.
He wiped at his eyes a little shamefully. "Oh Hermy I'm sorry," it was a symbol of the emotion of the day that she didn't cringe even a little at the childish nickname. "I should be the one holding it together! I just can't believe my baby girl's a grown up mother, witch and, in only a few minutes, wife!"
"It just adds to the reasons you can love me Daddy," she promised, hugging him delicately so as not to crush her dress or hair, even though she knew it had been magically set, the natural urge was still there. "You're not losing any part of me. I won't be disappearing into the Wizarding World, and I'm not getting rid of the Granger name- I never want to forget who I am and what I've been through."
And then it was their turn. She smiled at her guests as she walked down the aisle, winking at their mothers and her son, who all looked slightly more put together than her father. With red eyes, he told a sheepish Draco sternly "look after her" before softening up to add "I know you will son, you already have."
She felt quite tearful herself watching her father and fiancé embrace, but she managed to gather herself together for her speech; Wizarding weddings consisted of these rather than any technical priest jargon. "If you'd have asked me my opinion on this man in the first couple of years of school, I'd have told you point blank that he was the least tolerant, most hateful little bully I'd ever met!" Draco arched his eyebrows in a mocking 'thanks!' "If you'd asked me in sixth year I would still have believed he held those beliefs, but I defended him against my friends' accusations of unabashed villainy, identifying that he wasn't the ultimate evil we were facing." At this, Draco's face clenched briefly with the memories of that awful year but somehow simultaneously softened as he realised she hadn't hated him entirely in his darkest hour. Whilst we were on the run we ended up being captured and transported to Malfoy Manor, but when Draco refused to identify us I truly believe he saved our lives, even if I didn't come away entirely trauma free." As if he recognised the horror of their memories, Scorpius chose that moment to shriek extremely loudly. Luckily it just made the congregation laugh, as Hermione told him it was all okay, they were getting to the good part now. "Draco is truly a marvel to me. Truly a different person than the one I used to know. I recognised that change even before he and his parents chose their final side, but since then we grew closer first as co-head students, then friends, and finally more." She put a finger to her lips, gesturing at the baby, which made the flower girls- Bill and Fleur's respectively 3 year and 18 month old daughters- giggle with unadulterated delight. 5 year old page boy Teddy Lupin's hair changed from snowy white to a romantic pink as he joined in as well. "Those who've known me for a long time, or perhaps even a little, will know that I have an internal locus of control- I don't believe in fate or destiny, and I never thought much about love before Draco. I still don't fully trust in that whole one soulmate thing, I don't believe that this magical day is the final page of a storybook and we can go waltzing off into the sunset." She glanced around at the winter wonderland they were standing in and continued, "There will be snowstorms, struggles, disagreements, and I want there to be. I want a full, 'no regrets' life with you," This last sentence she addressed only to him. "Because maybe you weren't destined to be my soulmate, but you're the only one I want."
"Can I kiss you already?" Draco asked, making everyone laugh aloud, including her. She felt a slight weight lift off her shoulders, thankful that she'd done it right. She wanted the parts that they had assigned as magical to be exactly what Draco knew and wanted, and the only Wizarding weddings she'd been to were Bill and Fleur's and Harry and Ginny's- and the Weasleys weren't exactly traditional Purebloods! Her fiancé took one of her hands in his, tracing a gentle pattern up it, before taking the other hand as well, holding them softly as if they were porcelain china. She glanced at him in confusion. "Touching you is something that I balked at as a child." She squeezed his hands gently, noticing that he looked as if he were about to beat himself up. Her assumption was correct. "You're right, I was a prejudiced, evil boy. It's no defence, but that is just how I grew up." She had to keep all of her support focused on Draco, but she knew his parents would be remorseful in their seats too. "I was told that I was a prince, and one day everything would be restored to its rightful order, with me leading the charge." He broke their eye contact for only a moment to look not out to the audience but specifically at their son as if Scorpius was sending him the strength to carry on. It felt as though everyone else melted away. "I thought my fairytale was finally coming true when the Dark Lord returned, but in actuality it was the beginning of my nightmare. I won't mislead you into thinking I had noble intentions in defying him, no, I started to question my position for a value I still hold as superlative; my family. But yes," he admitted. "That fracturing of loyalty started me down a path of questioning everything I used to know. When I made the decision to return to school after the war I saw everything in an exceedingly different light. I'm not saying it was easy, quite the opposite. My father knew it wouldn't be, and he begged me to just start training under him, that he could find ways around the qualifications I technically needed." He sighed. "But I saw it as some sort of penance. I didn't expect to be made head boy, and I was even more surprised to receive a letter asking for peace from the new head girl." She remembered writing it, taking a break from searching for her parents, hoping that he didn't laugh her off. She didn't tell Harry or Ron in case he did, but she'd been thrilled to receive an amicable response. "Some of my old friends were a little awkward at first, and if that was my friends, you can only imagine how awful it was with my old enemies." Now he did turn to the audience slightly. "I don't ask you to pity me. Please don't. I deserved for the tables to be turned, but that doesn't mean I was any less thankful for the kindness and partnership Hermione offered me in our roles, and the friendship that developed out of it." Lifting her hand, he kissed it gently, making her desperate to kiss him on the lips. "As a naive man, it was only on the night of the Yule Ball that I realised my feelings," he explained. "But when I did, I had to acknowledge that begrudging admiration had been there through all the cruel years, and that those feelings weren't a sudden thing, they had been sprouting for months." With more intensity than ever before he looked into her eyes and promised, "just as you stood by me that night in front of everyone who hated me, I swear to stand by you forever Hermione. I don't believe in fairytales anymore either, but I believe in you and me."
She felt a tiny tear trickle down her face, and saw one on Draco too, like matching tattoos. Their mothers stood up, one holding Scorpius, the other a cushion with two rings on it. Ideally they'd wanted their son to be ring bearer, but then they'd decided they didn't want to wait any longer to get married, so he was getting a little help. Narcissa levitated one ring into the baby's little fingers, guiding it to a drop into Draco's hand, which the blond thanked him for, everyone chuckling with delight. After slipping the rings onto their hands, the audience jumped to their feet; the symbol that they could finally swoop towards each other for the kiss that symbolised their official union. They didn't notice the cheering or even the magical release of snow that poured down on them all until their lips parted and she leant her head gently into her husband's shoulder, looking out at their worlds combined, something she never anticipated. Along with their friends and family, the newly married couple indulged in their Christmas wedding feast and then they danced all night, after transfiguring her huge furry skirts into a more manageable cocktail dress!
OMG 10 DAYS TILL CHRISTMAS!