Disclaimer: I love taking these characters out to play with, along with the wizarding world, but…alas…they don't belong to me.

EPILOGUE: EIGHT YEARS LATER

"Severus! Hurry up or we're going to be late! He would kill us, you know that!" Hermione yelled out of their door and into her husband's office.

The headmaster scowled and finished writing his memo, punctuating it with a particularly hard stab. "Merlin forbid Mr. Potter get upset. I suppose I should start calling him Minister Potter after today," he grumbled.

"Do I have to call him Minister Potter?" asked a small, sneering voice. Snape looked up from his desk and saw his 4-year-old song leaning against the door frame with his arms crossed, unconsciously mimicking his father. Snape smiled and held out his arms and the boy ran to him.

"Daddy was just complaining, Cyrus," Hermione said idly as she walked out into the office with Snape's dress robe overcoat. Her pale green robes showed off her just-noticeable baby bump. "Like always."

A knock came and a second later, Harry walked in wearing bottle green dress robes and holding the hand of his adopted 3-year-old daughter, Karalyn.

"Aren't you ready yet, Severus? You used to be the punctual one," Harry said, winking at Hermione.

"No, I was the one who arrived precisely on time. Hermione was the early but punctual one," Snape corrected, striding around his desk to pick up Kara.

"Uncle Sev! Daddy gonna be Mister of Magic today!" she squeaked out.

"Minister, honey, and daddy will kill us all if we don't get there in time!" Harry said. "Grandpa Albus and Gramma Minny will be there too!" Both kids clapped and squealed.

After graduation, Severus and Hermione had gotten engaged and married that following winter. A month later, Harry and Draco had also married and Draco had opted to take Harry's last name, saying that there was no fixing the Malfoy name.

Dumbledore retired 3 years later and appointed Snape as Headmaster. Next, McGonagall decided to retire with him, to no one's surprise, and asked Hermione to take her place as Transfiguration teacher and Head of Gryffindor.

Dumbledore's portrait now hung in the headmaster's office, but luckily it didn't start to talk until the headmaster was deceased. Snape had often wondered if there was a way to silence or kill a portrait.

Draco had immediately gone to work for the Ministry, trying to earn some new respect and change the wizarding world as much as he could. His smooth talking skills and sharp intellect helped him quickly move through the ranks.

Harry took the Flying Instructor job at Hogwarts when Madam Hooch decided to leave. He said he had enough defending himself against the Dark Arts and wanted the rest of his life to be enjoyable.

A little over three years after they were wed, Hermione and Severus discovered she was pregnant and less than a year later, Cyrus was born. She was now a few months along with their second child and they had yet to find out the gender. Hermione hoped for another boy while Severus secretly hoped for a girl. He had a soft spot for them after Harry and Draco had adopted Kara.

Both being only children and wanting a family, Draco and Harry thought about getting a surrogate mother, but in the end, they both agreed that they wanted to try adoption first. Kara was a beautiful little girl full of spunk with bright red curls and green eyes. They were already going through the process of trying to get another one.

Portkeying to the Ministry (Hermione was still able to for a few more weeks), they quickly made their way down to the enlarged auditorium for the ceremony.

Finally, they found their seats and sat down right as the event kicked off. Many wizards and witches got up to talk about how great Draco was and finally it was his turn to get up and make his speech.

He worked the crowd beautifully; he had them laughing and then serious at all the right times. Finally, he was coined the new official Minister of Magic. The crowd went wild.

After taking a bow a few times and waving, he purposely looked straight at a disgruntled witch in pink and winked evilly, waving to her specifically.

Harry was still on his feet clapping while Kara and Cyrus were standing on their chairs doing the same.

Snape put his hand on his wife's stomach with one hand as his other arm circled her waist.

"I love you," he whispered in her ear.

"As I love you," she replied, turning her head to smile at him, eyes shining with tears of joy for her best friends and for them as well. Life was good. "Forever."

He leaned in to kiss her forehead and said, "Always."

~*Nox*~

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A/N: OMG. So…that's it. I'm done. My first ever fanfic…FINISHED. Thank you to all who read it! Thank you to all who reviewed! If you didn't like the ending…I'm sorry. I had the ending planned out for months lol.

Thank you to everyone. Seriously.

I love Harry Potter, and I love fanfiction. I'll read HP until I can no longer read.

And when people see me with my wrinkled, gnarled hands grasping an HP book and ask, "After all this time?"

I'll reply, "Always."