Lucius found Hermione sitting placidly in the library rocking chair with Lucia as he stepped through the floo from Hogwarts.
Hermione smiled up at him as he brushed the soot off his expensive robes. Holding Lucia up to face him, she burbled to her newborn daughter, "Look who's home, Lucia! It's your Daddy!"
The blond wizard couldn't help but grin stupidly at the sight of his baby girl. Leaning over, he kissed Hermione on the cheek. "Let me have her for awhile," he murmured.
"Why don't you take the rocking chair," Hermione said, moving to sit in another chair once Lucius had taken Lucia from her.
After Lucius settled himself into the rocking chair, neither he nor Hermione spoke for a long moment, as they both basked in the presence of their first born child.
"I think she's finally asleep," Lucius whispered to Hermione after several minutes of rocking and humming softly to Lucia. Rising gingerly from the chair, so as not to awaken her, he moved soundlessly to the nursery, with Hermione close behind him.
Lucius stood gazing down at his sleeping daughter after setting her down to nap, in no hurry to leave the room. Hermione sidled up next to him, taking his hand.
Leaning down to murmur in her ear, Lucius told her, "I want to memorize her every feature, just as she is now. She is going to change so quickly, almost as fast as the blink of an eye. It seems that not too long ago Draco was this size, looking just about like Lucia does now."
"Before we know it, we'll be taking her to the train for her first year at Hogwarts," Hermione said, laughing quietly.
"Don't laugh," Lucius said as they left the room, closing the door behind them. "That day will arrive sooner than you'd imagine."
"Lucia isn't even a month old yet and here we are already shipping her off to Hogwarts!" Hermione said, giving Lucius a wide smile.
"I'm already imagining her as Minister of Magic when I'm an old man," Lucius admitted as they returned to the library. "But that's only after you become Minister of Magic yourself."
"Oh, you know I don't want to be Minister of Magic," Hermione said in mock indignation. "Actually, I've been doing quite a bit of thinking about my idea to overhaul the Muggle Studies curriculum. I think I'd like to get started writing the first textbook. Ideally, I'd like to have all seven written by the time Lucia starts Hogwarts."
"Do you think you're up to getting started?" Lucius asked. "I didn't bring it up again, as I wasn't sure you were ready to begin." After a pause, he said, "And I need to work on my plan for the wizarding world orientation program for muggle-raised Hogwarts students and their families. Horace has been getting after me to draw up a workable program. Not only that, Kingsley Shacklebolt is still most interested in my ideas to establish a network of wizarding primary schools, especially for muggle-raised magical children. I thought it would be a good idea if we worked together on both revamping the Muggle Studies program and devising the muggle-raised orientation program, as the two concerns fit together like opposite sides of the same coin."
"I agree," Hermione said. "In my own experience, I think I could have been saved loads of grief if I'd been better prepared for the wizarding world and also if those raised entirely in the wizarding world had had some understanding of the muggle world. And I'm quite sure Harry would agree with me."
"Speaking of Harry, did he come to visit you?" Lucius asked. "I saw him down in the Leaky Cauldron when I was leaving to go see Draco. He looked like he had something on his mind, so I suggested that he pay you a visit."
"Yes, he came by," Hermione said. "In fact, he's still here; he's in one of the guest rooms taking a nap. I invited him to spend the night."
Lucius quirked one eyebrow up in mock surprise. "What?" he said. "Is there trouble in paradise already?"
"Don't joke about it, Lucius," Hermione admonished him. "He's having a really rough time of it. He's napping now because he's been losing sleep over it."
"Oh?" Lucius asked, entirely unsurprised.
"I'll let him tell you the details at dinner," she said. "He wants to ask your advice on a few things."
A short while later, when they were all seated around the dinner table, Harry turned to Lucius and said, in an apologetic tone, "I hope you don't mind me staying the night."
"Quite all right, Mr Potter," Lucius said smoothly. "Hermione tells me you've been having some marital difficulties."
"Well, as I'm sure you already know, Molly Weasley has been a problem from the very beginning," Harry began.
At hearing this, Lucius tried to discreetly disguise a smirking laugh inside of a cough, but didn't quite succeed.
Harry proceeded, as if he'd not heard Lucius. "I could have dealt with that, if I'd known Ginny was squarely on my side. After all, we could have always moved away if we couldn't stand her interference any longer."
"Go on," Lucius encouraged. He did not add his opinion that they'd likely have had to move to Mars in order to keep Molly Weasley from meddling into their marriage.
"But I found out today that it's much worse than that," Harry continued. "Ginny told me that she didn't want any more children and that she'd applied to join the Holyhead Harpies. What's even worse is that she intends to leave James with Molly and let her raise him!" Narrowing his eyes, he added, "I won't have that! I'll not have that woman raising my son!"
"What do you plan to do?" Lucius asked.
"I've decided to quit the Aurors in order to take care of James full time," Harry told him. "I really didn't like being an Auror much, anyway, and James needs me so much more. And I want to look into starting divorce proceedings as soon as possible. I'm going to go tomorrow and look for a flat to rent to use during the separation period."
"I'd strongly advise you to hold off on filing for divorce just yet," Lucius said. "Timing is of the utmost importance in such matters." Pausing to take a sip of his drink, he continued, "While I fully understand and share your sentiments in this matter, you cannot rush headlong like a Gryffindor into divorce. Rather, you must think like a Slytherin and consider the timing of your moves carefully."
Giving Harry a calculating gaze, he asked, "First of all, why do you think Molly Weasley was so keen on having you marry her daughter and why do you think she's so intent on controlling your marriage now?"
"I don't know," Harry admitted. "I figure she tries to control us because that's just the way she is; she tries to control everyone. But Ginny and I fell in love on our own, at school."
"While I don't think she went so far as to use a love potion on you, from what Hermione has told me, I believe that she did all that she could to encourage the relationship and to create conditions favorable to its growth," Lucius told him. "Think about it for a moment."
"Don't you remember the summers we spent at the Burrow where she'd always send you and Ginny off on errands alone together?" Hermione put in. "And when you weren't around, she used to always talk about how wonderful you were to Ginny. And that's only what she said when I was present. Who knows how much more blunt she was about it when no one else was around?"
Harry remained silent as he considered the implications of their words.
Lucius did not wait for Harry to respond, but plunged ahead. "I'll tell you why, Harry. First and foremost, she's had her eye on the Potter fortune, probably since the moment she befriended you. Getting you to marry her daughter just gave her the opportunity to get access to your money."
"But I didn't have anything when I first met the Weasleys," Harry said. "I was wearing my cousin Dudley's ragged hand-me-downs that were way too big for me when I met them at the train station. She didn't know how much money there was in my vault and I didn't mention it to them."
Lucius chuckled lowly at Harry's naivete. "The Potter fortune is no secret to anyone in the wizarding world," he told the younger wizard. "The Potters are one of the oldest pureblood families -- almost as old as my family. It was well known to everyone that James and Lily Potter lived in the lap of luxury. Molly Weasley would have had to have resided under a rock not to know how much money you'd come into once you came of age."
"Well, she did seem to be too good to be true when I first met her," Harry said in a small voice. "She treated me like I was her own child from the moment she met me and pretty much took over seeing after my needs right away. It did seem a little weird at first, but I figured that I didn't know what a real family was supposed to be like because of the way the Dursleys neglected me."
"Getting back to my original point, I advise you not to start divorce proceedings just yet," Lucius told him patiently. "If you were to sue for divorce at this particular point in time, the Weasleys would stand a good chance of winning a large percentage of the Potter fortune in the settlement. Ginevra has not yet made good on her plans to join the Holyhead Harpies, plus she's just very recently given birth."
Pausing a moment for effect, he continued, "If you started proceedings now, I guarantee you that Molly Weasley would go straight to the papers with it, presenting her daughter as an innocent victim who will be left to raise a child alone in poverty, while you ran off to indulge your own selfish interests. Considering the fact that Molly Weasley was voted "Mother of the Year" by Witch Weekly several years in a row, the public is already predisposed to believe what she would say on such matters."
"What do you suggest I do, then?" Harry asked helplessly. "When should I divorce her?"
"First of all, you need to present yourself as a caring, loving father," the older wizard said. "You've already taken a good first step by resigning as an Auror in order to be a full time father. Secondly, you need to wait until Ginevra actually joins the Harpies and starts practicing with them. In other words, you need to wait until she hangs herself with her own rope."
"That's makes sense," Harry said, beginning to understand where Lucius was going with all of this.
"Plus, I think you should get involved in something philanthropic that benefits children," Lucius said. "In my opinion, you should volunteer at the orphanage. It has the benefit of both underscoring that you're good with children and it's also an activity that you can include James in, as you can bring him along on the days you volunteer. I happen to know that the orphanage could use some help right now as Narcissa is having to cut her hours back because of her pregnancy."
"That sounds like a good idea," Harry conceded. "Plus, it's something I think I'd like to do, anyway, considering that I'm an orphan myself."
"I'm sure you'll do an excellent job," Lucius told him.
"You've given me a lot to think about today," the young wizard told Lucius. "I'm quite grateful for your advice and I'm glad I thought to seek it before running straight to a lawyer."
"You are quite welcome," Lucius drawled. "I'm glad that I was able to assist you. And I will put you in touch with one of my lawyers who will be able to advise you on the proper time to file for divorce."
"Thanks," Harry said. "I appreciate this more than you will ever know."
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A/N Next chapter as yet unnamed.