A/N: Chap 27 review responses are in my forums as usual.

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Healing Astoria

There was blood on the rocks—Daphne's blood.

Astoria was in the hospital wing with Hermione, Luna, Susan Bones and Hannah Ab– no, Longbottom, watching her. He wanted to stay as well, but of course Pomfrey kicked him out because there were two other sick girls in the wing, so no boys allowed.

Feeling an urge to flee the situation, Harry retreated quickly back to his room, ignoring the questions from friends and fellow students, changed and fetched his broom, and spent the next hour flying. It saddened him immensely that this was the first time he'd been on his broom since school began. The moratorium on Quidditch had a negative impact on the whole school's morale, which was beaten down first by Umbridge, and then more subtly by Narcissa Black.

He flew around the expanded but empty Quidditch pitch, then soared high above the castle. He hovered there for how long he couldn't say, looking at the shadows of clouds as they splayed across the green hills of Scotland, or the shimmering surface of the lake. It was while studying the lake that a morbid sense of curiosity struck.

Diving, he flew to the banks of the lake and followed it toward the First Year's entrance, which was on the water. In times past, the entrance served as a water-borne escape route in case of attack, when Hogwarts Castle was a fortress that just so happened to also house a school. He rose when he arrived at the back of a cliff that ran up in a seemingly unbroken line to the castle's walls. He knew that the Slytherin Dungeons were built into the rock of the cliff. On one jut of stone a turret rose at a corner of the castle, and toward the upper levels the stone of the castle gave way to beautiful stained glass windows of gods fighting and frolicking.

One of the windows was broken.

Harry's eyes tracked a path from that window down the sheer side of the castle, and below that the cliff wall. His stomach clenched and his hands sweated when he saw streaks of what looked like blood on the lower wall, where Daphne had struck on her way down. He floated his broom down until he landed among the sharp rocks that lined the beach below the castle. One of the larger rocks still had a pool of blood on it, though there was no other sign of what happened. Dame Cassandra was very fast.

The look on Daphne's face as she flew out the window flashed in his mind, and he wondered then if that was the first time in her life she ever felt anything. A sudden, completely unexpected welling of sadness poured out, bringing moisture to his eyes.

"Why are you crying? She was trying to kill your chosen bride."

"It's sad that someone that beautiful could have been twisted into something so broken and evil."

"A shame, truly."

It suddenly dawned on Harry that he was talking to a man behind him he had not seen or heard approaching. Grasping his wand he spun around and sucked in a shocked breath to see Barty Crouch Jr. looking at him with Voldemort's eyes.

"How can you be here?" he demanded.

The figure smirked. "I'm not, Harry." He motioned to his body. "A simple illusion, one many wizards and witches can perform. I'm told Dumbledore often attended meeting of the International Confederation by projection."

Harry backed up another step, catching a rock on his heel and falling painfully onto another. "What do you want?"

"Not much, truthfully. World peace, love among men, your head on a platter." Voldemort laughed uproariously. "I must thank you, Harry. This body is much younger than my first. You did a marvellous job binding my soul into it. I understand you've enjoyed the flesh of several young women, so I'm sure you'll understand when I say I have too. Lucius is quite generous with his wives' affections."

"You only dally with bonded witches," Harry accused.

"Of course, no point in risking a bonding." The projected image of Voldemort squatted down on the stone he seemed to occupy. "You know, Narcissa is quite put out with you, but Cassandra Greengrass…that woman makes me look innocent. She's always quite fun in bed; sadly old Alphard doesn't have much oomph in his love left for the old girl. She was quite generous letting Malfoy learn on her youngest daughter after he bonded, wouldn't you say?"

"I thought you hated women!" Harry said.

"Of course I do," Voldemort said. "I emasculated my old body in a power ritual, so even years before my first death I had not sampled the pleasures of a woman in many decades. But now, in this younger body, after having a second chance? And the most amusing part of it is that these women—these dark witches—have had such complete control over their wizards they've just been dying for a strong man to subjugate them. It would be amusing, if it were not so disgusting."

"Go away," Harry said.

"Go away. Don't bother me. Really, Harry. You sound like a petulant child. What happened to that Gryffindor bravery in the Chamber, or last year?" His projection hopped down from the rocks—Harry noticed his feet did not displace any sand or stone as he moved closer.

"You've managed to convince everyone you truly lost your memories of last summer, but you and I both know they're still there. You remember. Tell me, how is my old friend Garrick doing?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

All signs of humour burned away before a flash of rage. "Don't toy with me, Harry. Do you think you're protected from me? I can have every woman in your life dead by tomorrow if I wish. Do you think Dumbledore will protect you? The old fool can't even protect himself, not after this year. He sacrificed everything to bring you back, and now he has nothing left to give to keep you safe. Answer me, boy. Did Ollivander tell you the secret of the wands?"

"No!" Harry said.

Rather than be upset, Voldemort smiled and nodded. "You are a very poor liar, Harry, but that gives me what I wanted to know. I'll be seeing you again, very soon."

He disappeared without sound, simply blinking out of Harry's sight as if he'd never been there at all. As he pushed himself up, he felt something sticky and realized with horror that he'd stumbled onto the very stone that Daphne had landed on; her blood was on his hands.

~~Firebird~~

~~Firebird~~

When Harry got back to his new quarters, the sitting room was crowded with people. He stopped just inside the door with his broom and stared at the red robes. "What's going on?"

One of the robes turned to reveal Amelia Bones looking grim. "Where were you just now, Mr Potter?" she asked formally. The other Aurors turned, and Harry did not recognize any of them, which mean Amelia was going to have to go by the book.

"I went for a fly," he said honestly enough. "I was pretty shaken up by what happened." One of the Aurors moved and he saw Luna curled up on the couch with Hermione by her side. "Where's Astoria?"

"That doesn't matter right now," Amelia said.

However, Hermione said, "She's in one of the bedrooms here, Harry," she said. "Dame Branwenna is sitting with her."

Harry sighed in relief. Amelia said nothing, but behind her a pair of Aurors scowled threateningly at Hermione. She ignored them and looked meaningfully at Harry. Amelia activated an interrogation quill. "In your own words, Mr Potter, please describe what happened?"

Give that there were other witnesses, Harry told the whole story without embellishment, even including the part where he picked away the revulsion hex around Astoria. When he was done, another Auror stepped forward. "What made you choose the girl under the revulsion hex?" the witch said. She had that ageless quality about her face that witches and wizards often had after they reached a certain age but were not yet ancient. She could have been anywhere from forty to a hundred, but she wore a sneer on her ageless, sharp-featured face.

Quirking his lips, Harry met Luna's eyes and said, "I thought she was cute."

"Cute?" the woman said, incredulously. "I knew the Greengrasses, and Astoria was anything but cute. She was little better than a squib with a face not even her mother loved."

"And I was raised by an aunt who hated me just as much," Harry said sharply. "I guess I just saw a kindred spirit with her. And please don't call my betrothed ugly. I happen to think she is cute."

"Like your first wife, I suppose," the Auror sneered.

"Whom I believe is quite beautiful," Harry said. "Not that you'd know anything about that."

"Why you…"

"Proudfoot, enough," Amelia said. "You invited it. We're not here to determine why he and his First Wife chose as they did; we're here to investigate the death of a student. Now, Potter, you said you were able to disperse the revulsion hex?"

Harry nodded. "I saw them as yellow strings around her, and I just untied them and pulled them away."

"Yes, you're a tactile/visual Aether, aren't you?" Amelia said, not for her sake, but for the notes and others around her. "Did you, at any time, have your wand?"

"No, that horrid…I mean, Dame Drusilla woke me up and forced me to bathe right in front of her. She watched me from when I woke to after Daphne…died."

"That lines up with other testimony," another Auror said. Looking at all the hard-faced, red-robed women, Harry wondered how men like Dawlish and Shacklebolt got along with their co-workers, or if they ever had a chance for promotion.

"Do you have anything you wish to add, Mr Potter?" Amelia said.

"Only how sad I am that it happened." He did not have to fake his sincerity. "This should have been a happy day—the joining of the Potters and Blacks. Instead, if not for Dame Branwenna, Astoria and who knows who else would have died. I don't know why Daphne did what she did, but I'm saddened by it."

He barely spotted Amelia's wink as she gathered up her notepad. "It is tragic, to be sure. If we have any more questions, we certainly know where to find you. Aurors to me, please"

She led the line of red robes out of the room. When they were gone, Harry released his breath and stored his broom. "Are you two okay?"

"They never had anything," Hermione said. "They just bullied Luna until Dame Branwenna came out and put them in line. She's in there with Tori now."

"Tori?"

"That's what she goes by," Luna said. "Harry, remember we have to bond with her before midnight."

Harry winced at the thought of trying to be intimate with a girl who had obviously been through so much. He nodded to them and walked to the only closed bedroom. Upon his knock, an old voice told him to enter.

Dame Branwenna sat in a conjured plush next to the overly large bed in the room which seemed to swallow the small form of Astoria Greengrass. "Where were you, lad?"

"Flying … Trying to clear my head."

She looked at his wind-tossed hair before nodding sharply. "I'll leave you too it, then." She got up and left.

When the ancient witch was gone, a tremulous voice said from the bed: "Come to shag me, then?"

To illustrate, she threw down the covers to reveal her naked form on the bed. As happened with Daphne, he felt a sudden, sharp pull as his magic instinctively reached for her. However, remembering what happened before, he sank himself into his Occlumency and envisioned that same warm, safe feeling he had whenever he heard the echo of his mother's voice. Rather than rush forward and ravish the girl, he walked calmly to the side of the bed and studied her. She stared back, surprised at his restraint.

Obviously she had bathed; the rank smell was gone, replaced by a pleasant floral scent he recognized as one Hermione favoured. However, he noticed that not all the bruises were gone—they were covered in a light, barely visible sheen, save for the low, weak flush of white healing magic. He gently reached across and touched the one on her shoulder.

"Draco?"

Astoria bit her lower lip viciously and shook her head.

"Daphne? Pansy?"

She shook her head again. "Davis Runcorn, seventh year: Bonded to a girl out of school already. He did a favour for Daphne, so she gave me to him."

Fighting back a sudden, blinding rage, Harry closed his eyes and took a deep breath. When he opened them again, he studied the bruises, the bruise cream, and her magic. The cream was working, but very slowly because of the small magical core it had to pull from. All healing potions drew on the magic of the patient, and unfortunately Astoria simply did not have that much magic.

He remembered how he was able to help Luna, and with that thought in mind he placed his hand on the bruise and pushed his own abundant magic into the salve until it dissolved completely into her skin and finished healing it entirely, as it would have done had she been a normally magical witch. Hesitantly, he placed a hand on the still healing but obviously vicious bite-mark on her left breast. "Runcorn again?"

She nodded, and he again charged the bruise cream. To do so, he had to cover her small, petite breast entirely with his hand. Astoria's breath hitched as she felt heat from his palm; when he lifted his hands the bite was gone. She looked up at him with moisture welling in her eyes.

"Why are you doing this?" she whispered brokenly. "Everyone hates me. You're supposed to just shag me and get the bond over and then throw me in a corner somewhere."

"Did you know Daphne was going to try and kill Luna and Hermione?" he asked, ignoring her question.

A tear ran down the girl's face as she nodded. "Mum said they needed to get you under control."

Harry moved on from her small breasts to a huge, blacked bruise over her ribs that still had a visible film of cream. Beneath her skin, he saw the white glow of Skele-Gro. "Runcorn again?"

"Mum," she admitted with a quickly bitten off sob.

He placed both hands on her ribs and again charged the cream. He was not healing her, not really. He was simply providing the magic necessary for the creams and potions to do their job. "Let me see your back, Astoria. Please."

She bit her lip again and rolled over; Harry sucked in a breath at the sight of scar tissue across her narrow back. Beneath, he could see her ribs clearly. "Oh, Tori," he whispered.

With her face buried in a pillow, her sobs came out muffled. Harry walked to the door and stuck his head out to see Luna, Hermione and Dame Branwenna speaking. "Luna, could you get my potions kit?"

"Dittany?" she guessed.

Harry nodded, and Luna disappeared into the room Harry used the previous night, emerging a moment later with dittany. She accompanied him into the bedroom, followed moments later by Hermione and Branwenna. Looking up in obvious fright, Astoria said, "What are you doing?"

"We're healing you," Luna said. She knelt down on the floor beside the bed so she could look her year-mate in the face. "In the nine months I've been Harry's wife, the one thing I've learned most is that he can't stand to see people in pain."

"But…but I'm only…"

Luna hushed her with a gentle kiss that left the girl stunned. Harry, meanwhile, climbed onto the bed with the dittany. He emptied half the phial onto her back and then began rubbing it into her scarred flesh like massage oil, his hands taking on a luminescence as he used his own magic to charge the potion.

Astoria closed her eyes, astounded at the sensation. "I don't understand…"

"This may have been a political match," Luna explained, "but Harry chose you because he hated seeing you in pain. He wants to help you, Astoria, and bonding you to us was the only way to do that."

"When you're done with her back, I could use a rub too," Branwenna said with one raised brow.

No one could tell if she were joking or not, but Harry grinned up to her. "I think I'm booked for the day, but I bet Hermione could make an appointment for you."

The ancient witch laughed, and then shook her head. "Nana Branwenn told the whole family about you, Harry, how you were more than just the Boy Who Lived. She said you were Voldemort's equal and opposite, and that everything he hoped to do through fear, you would do through love. I frankly thought she was senile, but seeing that…I'm just not sure any more."

Harry smiled and nodded in satisfaction. The thick bands of scar tissue—terrible evidence of lashings left untreated—were now barely visible white lines, and even those would eventually fade with time and magic.

With hands still hot from magic and essence of Dittany, he moved to the bruises and bite marks that Pomfrey had treated with creams only because of the need for their bonding. Harry had no doubt she would never have been released if not for the need to bond by the terms of the contract.

Astoria squeaked as he gripped her arse firmly and rubbed more dittany in, but after a moment her face fell back into the pillow, which she clutched with both hands.

"Wow, Harry," Hermione said, watching with wide eyes. "Where did you learn to do that?"

Harry visibly shuddered, but did not stop rubbing. "Aunt Petunia used to make me rub Aunt Marge's feet."

"Sounds unpleasant."

"Her feet were about as big as Astoria's whole back and smelled like three week old fish. And if I didn't do it right, she'd sic that blasted dog of hers on me. Then Aunt Petunia would whip me for letting blood get on her precious carpet even though it was because the blasted dog bit me."

He realized he was rambling; and that the other women in the room were staring at him, even Astoria, who was looking at him over her shoulder. He shrugged and smiled at Astoria. "See, the grass isn't always greener is it?"

"Harry, please don't try to make jokes, you're awful at it," Hermione said. However, Astoria smiled shyly at him for the very first time ever. She actually spread her legs to let him better get to the bruises and bite marks on her inner thigh.

"How old were you, the first time?" Harry asked.

Astoria looked back down at the pillow. "Thirteen. Daphne got fifty galleons for it. She bought me a chocolate frog."

"Did Snape know?" Harry asked.

"Yes," Astoria said, "but he couldn't do anything. Tradition, you know? Daphne told me I should be thankful. I was ugly, with tiny baps and a flat arse and hardly any magic at all. Mum told me they were going to sell me to the goblins after my O.W.L.s."

"Surely she…" Hermione started.

"Yes, they would," Harry said darkly. "Something I learned when I had to visit the Goblins about my estates. They tried to work something in that would force me to give my first-born daughter to them."

"But why?"

"It was a question the Weasley twins asked me, once. Ever see a female goblin?" Harry asked.

The implications made Hermione pale. "Oh Morgana."

Harry meanwhile had finished one leg and was pleased to see that the combination of his magic and dittany had erased most of the evidence of her recent abuse. He placed a few more drops on his palm, rubbed them together, and started on her second leg. He was not mid-way down her thigh when she suddenly tensed, her whole body throbbing and her small magical core boiling. She continued twitching for a moment.

"Are you okay?" Harry asked, concerned.

"I'm fine," she said without lifting her face from the pillow.

"Are you sure, I could stop…"

"NO! No, I'm fine, please…"

"You know what, Luna," Hermione said, eyes wide and cheeks flushed, "I don't really think I need to be here. Harry…you owe me a rub like that when your bonding period is done."

Harry looked at her, wide-eyed. "Oh, okay."

He turned to Luna, whose normally pale white face had to bright pink dots. "What was that about?"

"You appear to have very good hands," Luna said. "I would like a rub like that too, later."

Harry shrugged. "That's fine." He started rubbing again, and once more Astoria stiffened tensely, trembling under his touch. He wanted to get it done, though, so continued down her leg until he finished with her feet.

"I think I may have wet the bed," Astoria said from the pillow.

"I most certainly will need to change my knickers," Luna agreed. She stood abruptly and started pulling off the simple dress she wore. "Astoria, are you ready to bond with my husband as his second wife?"

Wordlessly, her face still buried in the pillow, Astoria nodded.

"You understand that you will also need to bond with me, as we are both actuating Aethers."

That caught Astoria by surprise. She looked up, her face a bright red, and stared. "But…but you're a girl."

Luna smiled gently at her, rolled her onto her back, and then climbed in the bed beside her. "Love is blind to gender," she whispered. She stared Astoria deeply in the eyes, and Harry could see their magic responding. Luna reached on her own, as the already bonded spouse. As soon as the link was done, the two came together in a tender kiss that overwhelmed any mental barriers Harry might have had.

"Second time I've seen this and it still stuns me," Harry whispered as his wives made love.

Branwenna also stared, surprised. The surprise though, gave way to a shrewd look. "That explains it, then. I've sworn to help you boy, but you'd better be careful who finds out. You've not seen any drop in your power at all, have you?"

"None, Dame Branwenna."

The old witch nodded, and then smiled at the small cry from Astoria. "Well, lad, I do believe she's ready for you."

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Author's Note: Very special thanks as always to Teufel1987, JR and Miles for beta reading. If there are any major faux-pas, they are entirely of my own doing.