Caparison: to dress richly; deck.

April 10, 2022

Dominique Weasely gaped at the girl standing before her. Shimmery, satin robes in soft spring green swished around her ankles. Gold bracelets clanked at her wrists, a sparkling necklace hung at her throat, her hair was twined up on the top of her head and pinned in place with a jeweled clip. This girl looked fresh from some rich soiree, about to wrinkle her nose and clutch her purse as she scuttled down the street.

Dominique had to work hard to hide her disgust as she turned away from the mirror.

"Erm, Vic?" she said tentatively, peering at her sister across the stuffy, taffeta-filled back room.

"What?" Victoire said distractedly. She was rifling through the big red bag she'd taken to carrying with her, crammed with binders and files of center pieces and flower arrangements, church descriptions and fabric samples.

As Dominique tried to figure out a tactful way to break it to her already-nerve-stretched sister that there was no way in hell she was wearing this posh ensemble out in public, a dressing room door slammed down the hall.

"Now what?" Victoire exclaimed, looking up from her frantic leafing and seeming dangerously close to tears.

Without so much as a warning, the door flew open and Louis burst in, carrying a heap of shimmery buttercup yellow material in one arm.

"Knock much?" Dominique asked, tossing one of her discarded flip-flops at her brother. "We might have been changing, you prat."

Louis paused long enough to roll his eyes. "Gran used to put us in baths together."

Dominique chucked her other flip-flop. Louis batted it aside and tossed down the heap of yellow robes, already turning his attention to his other sister.

"No way," he said, crossing his arms.

"What's wrong with them?" Victoire demanded, voice cracking shrilly.

"They're yellow for a start!" Louis exclaimed.

"Yellow's neutral!" Victoire told him indignantly, snatching the robes up and shaking them out.

Dominique saw that the cuffs and hem were edged in gold.

"Maybe for girls, but you'll have to stun me and tie me up before you can get me into that thing," Louis declared. "Why do I have to dress up, anyway? I'm not a bloody bride's maid!"

Victoire turned to Dominique with a desperate expression. Louis gave her a 'what-the-hell-are-you-wearing?' sort of look over Victoire's shoulder. Dominique sighed and yanked the jeweled pin out of her hair, letting it tumble down in its usual messy swirl of red.

"What Lou is trying to say," she said, casting her brother an annoyed look, "is don't you think this is a little much? I mean, all this satin and gold is making us look dangerously like Teddy's great aunt."

"Who will be at our wedding!" Victoire burst out, burying her face in her hands.

With a rising sense of alarm, Dominique and Louis saw tears trickling out from between her fingers. They looked at each other, having a silent, furious argument that Dominique somehow lost. Cursing herself for not insisting their mother come with them ('it's just a fitting, Mum. Honestly, you'll just drag it out!'), she kicked off the precariously high heels Victoire wanted to dress her in and walked over to her sister.

"Vic? Do you not want Mrs. Malfoy at your wedding? Because I can tell her she's not invited. Fred and I'll bring our bats, just in case," Dominique offered, rubbing Victoire's shoulder comfortingly.

"No," Victoire sniffled, pulling her face out of her hands in alarm. "No, don't do that. She'd probably take offense and then Andromeda would be back where she was eight years ago."

"Well if we can't kick the stuck-up old –" Dominique said a word that made her brother snicker and her sister say, "Dom!" "– out, then I don't know how to help you because we're not wearing this walking bank account. And you can bet Fred and James'll boycott your wedding if you even show this to them. Come on, Vic, since when do you care about this sort of thing?"

"It doesn't matter if I don't care!" Victoire cried, flinging her hands up. "They care! Mum gave up her big white French wedding because of the war. Teddy's parents practically eloped. Mum and Grandmere and Teddy's Gran, they want at least one perfect wedding. And don't they deserve it?"

She looked up at her brother and sister through streaming eyes. Dominique and Louis exchanged another look.

"No," Louis snorted. "You're the one getting married. If you don't mind us running round in flour sacks, why should they care?"

"Because they just do," Victoire wailed, burying her face in her hands once more so that her voice came out muffled. "And the greenhouse says they haven't got the flowers we picked out, and no one's booked a band, and I just want to be married to Teddy and I don't care how it happens!"

"Okay," Dominique said in her best soothing voice. Soothing was not her area of expertise. Victoire was usually the one who always knew how to put everyone back together. "Okay, you've still got four months. Louis'll find a band for you, I'd bet Neville could get you any flowers under the sun and several under water, and as for me, I'll have a chat with Mum and Grandmere about your wedding and how you want it, alright? So can we please stop dressing up as some snobby, high-society family now?"

Victoire gave a watery chuckle, tugging the lacy collar of Dominique's robes up around her neck like a frill. "So long as you promise never to act like one."

"No way in hell," Louis and Dominique vowed at the same time.

A/N: Inspiration goes to alohamora080, who suggested some more obscure next gen stuff. :) I liked this idea better than the original one I had and I hope you enjoyed it, too.