A/N: I got a couple of flames from Ron lovers! This is grossly inadequate. I've got a whole packet of marshmellows here, and two weeny flames (BellaTrixieBlack, Per Powerslave Pudding) isn't enough. A/N: I got a couple of flames from Ron lovers! This is grossly inadequate. I've got a whole packet of marshmellows here, and two weeny flames (BellaTrixieBlack, Per Powerslave Pudding) isn't enough.
Thanks to Miranda Aurelia, killing u with umbrellas, Analais, elleminnowpee, minerdude, hpnut1, GinnyLover14, kittydemon18, Tap Dancing Widow, HRInuyashaFan16 and Rebecca Pierson for reviewing the last chapter.
Oh, and Hermione's parents are Felician and Muggle. Most Felicians are Muggle - well, Squib really - in the sense that they can't use magic. A few like Hermione can use magic.
Ronald Belligerent Weasley had a good life, he reckoned. True, he wasn't wealthy beyond his wildest dreams, but he was willing to attribute that to the wildness of his dreams. An Order of Merlin, second class, made up for it. It certainly got the birds into his bed easily enough, that and his glamourous Auror job. He was married to Lavender, but they were long separated as they both preferred seeing lots of people. Presumably they'd get back together in a couple of yours, have a kid to shut their respective mothers up, and then separate again. Or maybe they could swing... now, there was a thought.
Auror work was very different now. There hadn't been much Dark activity in Britain for a while, so they did a lot of travelling when requested by foreign governments. His night life didn't mind. He pitied Harry sometimes, being married and unable to sample exotic delights and all... then again, Harry had always been the Quiet Observer type - unless it was a high pressure situation.
Funnily enough, they hadn't got a foreign post for about three months now. There were rumours around the Auror cubicles that there was a new threat in Britain, but no-one had heard anything about it. Other than Harry, of course. Harry knew everything. Or could know everything if he wanted to. But Harry said nothing. He was content to go home and play with his three kids. Sometimes Ron thought that Harry only became an Auror to keep Ron company, or because he didn't know what else he was good for. He felt Harry would be happier being a house hubby, taking care of the kids.
Amy was the oldest. Her kidnapping had been strange. It had been very well organized - clearly by highly professional kidnappers - and yet she had escaped from them once she got to Ireland. And been saved by some unknown witch who claimed she was the cousin of Hermione Granger. He and Harry had gone back to check, but had found nothing other than their charred remains and, in Ron's case, a splitting headache and a dizzying nausea. Ron had even thrown up once, though that might have been due to a dodgy lamb korma.
Hermione's cousin... that brought back memories of his old crush. It would never have worked out, that was obvious. He'd just wanted her because she was the first girl he was friends with apart from Ginny. He breathed a sigh of relief that his mother's old plan to ensure One Big Happy Weasley Family hadn't worked out.
Molly's plan was simple - slip Lust Potions to Harry and Hermione, and they'd sleep with Ginny and himself. Coupled with the Love Potions she had already been discreetly dousing the duo with, that would be enough to cement their true feelings. At least, that was the theory. In practice, an unfortunate error had led to Harry and Hermione screwing each other, both literally and figuratively.
Fortunately, the situation was not irrecoverable. In a finely concerted effort, they showed that Harry had been doused with a lust potion. Hermione was the immediate suspect, of course, and it wasn't hard to make sure - in the court of public opinion - that her denials were not believed. And since she would be likely to figure out later at least some of what had happened, they kept her away from Harry. So Ron lost out on Hermione while Ginny got her Harry. And Ron was very grateful - unlike Harry, Hermione was not easy to control. Since she'd grown up with a non-abusive family, she was less vulnerable to emotional blackmail and manipulation.
Twin cracks just outside his doorstep signalled only one thing. Wondering what the twins wanted, he walked to the door.
Thanks to the intervention of a helpful witch waitress, Alyx managed to persuade Hermione Jane to sling an arm around her shoulder and allow herself to be dragged out of The Stunned Herring. There were a few cheers from the audience; it wasn't unusual for someone to be dragged out. There was a flash, someone taking a picture. Alyx looked to the barman, indicating that she'd like a copy of it later, for blackmail purposes in happier days to come.
Now she just had to drag Hermione to a Floo Centre. Unlike Wizarding pubs such as those in Diagon Alley, not every one had a Floo-enabled fireplace - that depended on the preferences of the owner. Most Felicians could not use Magic and preferred to come by car. Muggle Felicians like herself could not use the Floo by themselves; they had to be in the company of a Mage (a witch or wizard) who could speak clearly. Currently, Hermione failed to satisfy that last requirement.
"I found this maaaarvellouuus thing I could do with my tail yesteerrrrday," slurred Hermione into Alyx' ear. "I came soooo many times!"
"Right, right," said Alyx patiently, fiddling in her pockets for her cellphone so she could call Brian and Chris. "You can tell me all about it later." Besides, if her suspicions were correct, Hermione was merely trying to tell her something that Alyx had taught her earlier. She found her phone and dialled Brian's number. He picked it up quickly. "Hey, cub. Yes, I got her. Can you get here? We'll be sitting in Tubby Square. Oh shit, she's going to - just get over here, now!" She shoved the phone in her pocket and went to drag Hermione from scooping out the charmed plastic fish (any real ones were quickly eaten) from the fountain in the centre of the square.
Unfortunately, Hermione was already in full Tiger form, so forcibly persuading her to leave the fake piscines alone would be a bother. Alyx opted for giving her a different distraction - she morphed and stepped on Hermione's twitching tail. The tiger roared, and was soon chasing the cheetah around the Square.
As it was quite normal for cats of all sizes to frolic in public areas of Felixity, no-one raised an eyebrow.
The interrogation session with Ron was over. Unlike his earlier brush with Veritaserum that day, this one was not followed by an Obliviation, so he was painfully aware that an old secret had just been unearthed. The pain could be localized to two places - the left side of his jaw and his right shoulder. They were where Fred's fist and George's roundhouse kick, respectively, had connected.
He realized, ruefully, that the other two participants - the primary instigators and beneficiaries, in fact - of the old conspiracy would not receive such physical retribution.
"You f--king bastard!" yelled Fred. "Harry is your friend! How could you do this to him?"
"Are you saying," hissed Ron, getting off the floor, "that our own sister is not good enough for Harry?"
The twins looked at him warily. Ron was taller and better muscled than either of them, and the beneficiary of much training. He wasn't to be trifled with, especially when he was angry. Which he now was, in spades. They moved so they were on either side of him. He could not strike both at once.
"He should have been given a choice," said George.
"What about Mum and Dad?" Ron pointed out. It was a well known fact within the Weasley household that Molly had `encouraged' Arthur's initials attentions using potions. "Or the stuff you sell?" That was a low blow, as Ron knew very well. The twins had stopped selling love potions after Fred had got dosed by a witch - an incident that had cost him his then girlfriend.
"Dad should have been given a choice," countered Fred. "And what about Hermione?" he said, suddenly remembered the other guilty party. "We kicked her out! She was innocent! And now she's dead!"
"Hermione's dead?" asked Ron, genuinely shocked. He held his head again as the headache spiked for a moment. "Blast! How do you know?"
"Stop pretending you care," said George. "You helped Mum and Gin chase her away."
"I do!" shouted Ron. And he did - even if their split had been far from amicable, time had caused him to forget that, and remember the good times they'd had at Hogwarts. The nagging she'd given him for his homework had proved useful in his Auror career, after all. "And you chased her away too."
"Yes, we're guilty of not listening," replied Fred heatedly, "but your crime far outweighs that. And we're going to tell Harry now. You may want to take a medical leave of absence now, because you'll need it when he's done with you."
Ron gulped as they Disapparated.
Harry was back in Ireland, in the forest where he had found Jane. He had been hunting for her place for an hour now, and could find nothing. He wondered if he was simply lost or if the only way someone could find her house was if she led them to it.
He didn't doubt Ron's confession. In fact, he was going through a lot of memories of his to see what made sense and what didn't, and things made a lot more sense now. His marriage with Ginny was comfortable enough, but it was more inertia and their three kids than anything else. The kids made all the difference.
Speaking of kids, he was no clue what to do with the two that had just popped up ... right in front of him.
Ah. He hadn't expected that. Not so literally, at any rate.
One kid was in tiger form, while the other - Brian, he thought - was in his biped form.
"What are you doing here?" asked Brian.
"I'd like to see your Mum," replied Harry as confidently as he could. He wasn't nervous that they could beat him in a duel - now that he knew not to underestimate them, he was on his guard. Emotionally though... he was a man facing a child he had just discovered, a child whose opinion of him was barely higher than used dishwater - where the use was cleaning out dog kennels.
"Why do you want to see her? She's not feeling well."
"I'd like - I'd like to ask her where Hermione - your birth mother - is buried." Harry wasn't sure what he had come for, but he did now. He felt it was right to pay his respects, and he ... well, it had been years, but what he remembered of Hermione was that she gave good advice. Perhaps he'd know what to do once he was where she was, even if she couldn't say very much.
Perhaps Brian saw some of this. After a quick visual check with Chris, he said to his father, "Come." Meanwhile, Chris ran off ahead.
Hermione was at home and sober, having been tricked / persuaded / armtwisted by Alyx into imbibing a sobering potion. She wasn't amused. How dare they take her alcohol away from her? No, she wasn't an alcoholic! Okay, not yet. She was getting there, but ...
Blast the Felician Council! Blast the job they had ordered her to do with Harry Potter! She had never wanted to see him again, and now she had to do it. And they weren't even going about it the right way - the kidnapping had almost certainly traumatized his daughter. True, Amy was Ginbitch's daughter as well, but ... she was innocent. Hermione knew she wouldn't want Brian or Chris facing a Cerberus alone, even if it was being monitored all the time. They wouldn't know that, and it would be the subject of nightmares in days to come.
And what on earth had they done to the kidnappers? Hopefully they got some bigoted House-Elf-abusing wizards to frame and flame, instead of some innocents. She'd need to ask O'Neill about that. Or some Muggle rapists; that would explain the castration they got before they died.
Gain Potter's trust, they said. Show him you were innocent, they said. Tell him of his connections to Felician society, they said. For our society's sake. We'll give you a shiny medal if you do. And a ball of yarn and a new scratching post, no doubt. Hah! Why couldn't she leave Harry in his Amortentia-based little Weasley bubble if he was happy about it? And at some point, she'd have to explain to him that she wasn't Hermione's cousin at all. She'd need to take an umbrella - he'd probably go all rabid with rage and spew her with spit and lose control of his magic and cause a thunderstorm. After all, he'd been hanging out with Ron for a decade.
No, she decided. She would have to come clean with Harry. True, he was part of an old life of hers, and he had betrayed her, but... he was her first friend. In a way, he was a victim as well. And if that screwed up her mission ... what was the worst thing that could happen? Two societies destroyed? She could live with that. But ... Brian and Chris hurt? No, that was a non-starter. Not even the Felician Council or the Wizengamot or their oblivious father was going get between this tigress and her cubs.
Maybe she'd leave the bottle alone for a while.
A/N: Some readers will be upset that I've made Hermione have addiction problems. Would you have preferred that I made her a lily white character with no weaknesses? No - that's for idiots - usually boys - who write super-Harry fics. The mistake I am most likely to make in this fic is that Hermione will not have enough weaknesses, so quit complaining, you half-arsed Mary Sue lovers.