Chapter 16

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of its characters. I do however own this story, I wrote it and I do NOT give permission for anyone to post it anywhere else. If you want to share it post a link.

Emma came home from work the next day and asked Hermione to join her up in her room for a discussion.

Harry looked worriedly at Hermione since she'd come down from yesterday's discussion looking upset, but she just gave him a reassuring look as she got up to go upstairs.

"What is it Mum?" Hermione asked.

"Close the door please Hermione," her mother said.

"What is it?" Hermione started to feel alarmed.

"I just didn't want to be overheard. I was thinking through your story the other day and I realised we both might have overlooked something. Did this ritual involve unprotected sex?" Emma asked.

"Yes Mum it did," Hermione admitted looking her mother straight in the face refusing to be ashamed of the fact.

"And were you on any form of birth control at the time?" Emma asked.

Hermione paled, "I was but I brewed it myself and it's one of the most difficult potions I've attempted. I couldn't have it checked by the professor so I'm not 100% sure it worked and then the match notification letter that arrived the day after I bonded with Harry had a fertility hex on it that would have negated the potion," she said.

"Has your period occurred since then?" Emma asked.

"No it's not due for a few more days, and I've heard that the birth control potion sometimes stops it," Hermione replied.

Emma pulled a small packet out of her bag. "Go and use one of these. If it's negative then use the other one first thing tomorrow morning when your urine is more concentrated," she ordered, pushing her daughter into the en suite loo.

Hermione paled and took the bag silently.

She emerged from the loo five minutes later. "I was negative," she said expressionlessly.

"That's a good sign," Emma said smiling.

"I know but we won't know for sure until next week, will we?" Hermione asked insecurely.

"No, we won't but no matter what happens you won't have to do this alone," Emma said hugging her daughter.

"Dad's going to kill Harry if I'm pregnant," Hermione said.

"No he won't! I will not let him, but Hermione there is a bigger issue, you had intercourse with two wizards this month," Emma said.

"Oh God no! what if it is Ron's baby?" Hermione said panicking. "The baby will be Harry's heir even if it's not a Potter. It would devastate him."

"If the test comes back positive then you don't have to keep it. The new chemical abortion pill is readily available, and you can go ahead and finish your schooling before trying again, the ministry never needs to know," Emma said practically.

"Witches don't seem to fall pregnant as easily as nonmagical women Mum. Almost all of my friends are only children. I'm scared that if I do abort a pregnancy I'd be giving up my only chance," Hermione said.

"Are you sure all your friends are only children? Go through the people in your year," Emma said.

"My room mates, Lavender is an only child, Parvati has a twin but no other siblings, Harry, Neville and Seamus are only children. Dean has half siblings but his mother is a muggle, and Ron's one of seven but they're an oddity in this world. My new friends Tracy has a stepbrother but she's her mother's only child, Daphne has sisters but confided that her mother died in childbirth, Bulstrodes and only child but I think Parkinson has a brother, all five of the Slytherin boys are only children. Susan and Hannah from Hufflepuff are both only children and so are Su Li and Lisa from Ravenclaw. I don't know about the rest," Hermione said thinking of each of her friends.

"Would Harry know more?" Emma asked.

"He might know some of the boys but I doubt it, he mostly keeps to his close circle of friends," Hermione replied.

"And how many of these families would have deliberately chosen to have one child, perhaps for financial reasons? Or because the parents' marriage was arranged and they aren't attracted to each other? Or birth complications caused the problem?" Emma asked.

Hermione stopped and looked at her mother, "You know, I have no idea! I hadn't thought about it," she said slowly.

"Hogwarts is expensive and if there isn't an alternative day school there would be couples who made the decision that they couldn't afford to educate more than one child. If there's such things as fertility spells strong enough to guarantee conception, I would expect that having only one child would be a choice in most cases. It was for us," Emma replied.

"I hadn't thought of it that way," Hermione said contemplating.

"How long was it between intercourse with Ron and intercourse with Harry?" Emma asked.

"Three days," Hermione said flushing in humiliation.

"Well for what it's worth if the fertility spell didn't negate your birth control until the day after you had intercourse with Harry then it would be highly unlikely that the child could be Ron's," Emma offered.

"Okay, but if the potion didn't work properly in the first place?" Hermione asked.

"That's less certain but the dates still make it more likely to be Harry's baby all other things being equal," Emma said.

"Let's hope there is no baby," Hermione replied, looking at the pregnancy test again.

"Don't say anything to Harry yet about today's test being negative, use the second test tomorrow and the third the morning you go back to school. You can tell him then," Emma said.

"But what if he's worrying about it too?" Hermione asked.

"It will be harder for him to accept it if you're pregnant and have already told him about a false negative first. These tests aren't as reliable if they're taken too early," Emma warned. "If you get scared about it and use the third test early, let me know and I'll buy you some more."

"Okay then," Hermione agreed, but two days later she didn't need to take the tests she woke with cramps in the night and by morning her monthly flow had started. She took a couple of aspirin and went downstairs to make herself a hot water bottle.

"Are you okay?" Harry asked looking at her hunched figure and pale face with concern.

"I'm fine Harry," Hermione said smiling brightly at him. Surprised he was already awake.

"You're in pain, why are you happy?" Harry asked confused but no less concerned.

"I am fine Harry it's just menstrual cramps. It's a good thing, it means that I'm not pregnant," Hermione replied.

"Oh," Harry replied blushing furiously. "That's good. Is there anything I can do to help the pain?"

"No Harry the aspirin I've taken and the hot water bottle will help and I'll be better in a day or two," Hermione replied smiling again at his thoughtfulness. "What are you doing awake so early?"

"Couldn't get back to sleep," Harry said sheepishly.

"Did you have another nightmare?" Hermione asked.

"Yeah, just an old one, nothing too bad," Harry admitted.

"You should have come and woken me up," Hermione said gently hugging him.

"You need your sleep and I was fine," Harry replied.

"So fine that you're on your second cup of tea before seven in the morning?" Hermione retorted.

'Third actually' Harry thought guiltily.

-o0o-

"Do you have an appropriate place where you know you won't be interrupted? Somewhere that's not a cold drafty unused classroom. Because it will be incredibly difficult to relax enough to make things pain free while you're uncomfortable or worried about being discovered," Emma asked. "If not I'd suggest you start trying here while your father is at work."

"It's not the problem, we have our own room," Hermione replied.

"You share a room?" Emma asked shocked.

"All married couples were offered married quarters and it was important that the ministry took the marriages seriously so we accepted. It's nice only sharing a bathroom with one person and Harry's very tidy," Hermione explained.

"So you've been sharing a bed, how is that going?" Emma asked.

"It's fine. Harry had less nightmares when I'm with him," Hermione replied.

"Isn't it awkward if you don't have that sort of relationship?" Emma asked.

"It was at first, we've got used to it," Hermione admitted. "I haven't been sleeping that well this week without him."

-o0o-

Christmas Day dawned early Hermione woke her parents right on the dot of six o'clock and Harry had breakfast ready for everyone when they came downstairs.

"What are you doing. We have presents before breakfast," Hermione said.

"Hermione, your parents need coffee before they can enjoy presents, and I made an American breakfast casserole, it can sit in the oven until we want it," Harry replied, handing over the precious coffee and passing Hermione a cup of tea.

"How long have you been up?" Emma asked.

"About an hour. I finished prepping the veggies for lunch, finished the desserts then made breakfast," Harry replied.

"How did you manage to whip the cream without waking us?" Emma asked.

"I did it by hand," Harry replied.

"You didn't need to do that Harry. It would only take a few minutes with the electric mixer later," Emma scolded.

"I've always done it by hand," Harry dismissed.

"Let's do presents," Hermione said excitedly.

"You're as excited as Ron is on Christmas morning," Harry said indulgently.

Hermione blushed. "It's Christmas Harry!"

"I didn't mean anything bad by it. It's nice to see you so excited," Harry said.

Hermione sobered realising that Harry had never had a really good Christmas, he'd enjoyed the Christmases at school more than with his relatives but the only family Christmas he'd had was with Sirius last year and it had been overshadowed by Mr Weasley getting bitten by Nagini and Harry's reaction to his vision of it happening. She reached over and hugged him. "I promise you Harry that one day you will be just as excited about Christmas as I am," she said sincerely, taking him by the hand and pulling him towards the lounge.

Harry couldn't believe it but he gave Hermione a lopsided grin not wanting to ruin her day. He was honoured, amazed and incredibly grateful that she'd been prepared to give up this special day with her family so he wouldn't be alone, but he was pleased she hadn't had to.

Hermione had bought Harry some new Quidditch protective gear as the set he'd been given when he made the Quidditch team was wearing out, and a super warm long coat and new Gryffindor scarf.

Harry had bought Hermione books, a locket and a pretty jacket that he'd seen her admire while they were shopping for clothes for him.

The Grangers had bought them both muggle books, Hermione the latest releases from several favourite authors and Harry something the bookshop owner had recommended for a boy his age.

Emma loved her new shoes, particularly once's she'd tried them on and felt how comfortable and supportive of her sore ankle they were. Daniel was less impressed with his inserts until he put them in his shoes when he got dressed.

"How come your mum got shoes and inserts but I only got inserts?" Daniel asked.

"Because we didn't think that you'd appreciate dragon hide shoes. Even the less unusual dragon

hide looks more like crocodile than leather," Hermione said.

"But you said your shoes have the same charms and they look like leather," Daniel protested.

"They are, the charms on mine are maintained by ambient magic or the magic of the wearer. But you live in a muggle area. Therefore, you need a material that holds magic to maintain the charms," Harry explained.

Daniel sighed. He wasn't against magic itself, it was just difficult to watch his daughter being drawn into a world where he could never follow her and the reminder that Harry was also part of that world burned his gut. It didn't help that all the other gifts Hermione had given he and Emma came from the wizarding world as well.

-o0o-

Hermione's grandparents arrived about eleven o'clock. "Did Hermione tell you that my Mum and Dad don't know about magic?" Emma asked, quickly gathering up anything distinctly magical and hiding it away.

"No she didn't. Where does she think Hermione goes to school?" Harry asked.

"Hogwarts school for the intellectually gifted," Emma said.

"I'm not sure I can pull that off," Harry said.

"I'm sure you can Harry," Emma encouraged. "Mum and Dad aren't going to quiz you. Just be yourself."

"Okay. Is there anything else I shouldn't talk about?" Harry asked.

"Obviously not your marriage, and we didn't tell them about Hermione getting hurt last year either," Emma said quickly.

"Should I tell Hermione to take her ring off?" Harry asked.

"No it's not worth upsetting her. I'll ask her to call it a promise ring. You're still a bit young for that too but hopefully Mum won't object too vocally," Emma said sighing.

"I'll tell her, you go say hello to your mum before she wonders why you haven't come," Harry said before he moved to talk to Hermione who had just finished hugging her grandparents.

"And who is this?" Mabel Puckle asked.

"Hello Ma'am I'm Hermione's boyfriend Harry Potter," Harry introduced himself before Hermione could introduce him as her husband.

Mabel looked at the now nicely dressed young man in front of her. "Surely Hermione's not old enough to be bringing boyfriends home for Christmas. Where's your family young man, you should be with them," she asked imperiously.

"Dead Grandma," Hermione said bluntly. "Harry can't spend all day sitting in the cemetery in this weather, and I am seventeen, more than old enough to date."

"Still not too old to be impertinent I see," Mabel said. "I told you, you shouldn't have sent her to boarding school, Emma. There was nobody there to remind her to watch her manners and teach her some respect."

"Hermione's more respectful to the professors than anyone I know," Harry interrupted.

"And Harry is a guest in our home," Emma added, before her mother could criticise his manners as well. "He and Hermione have been best friends for five years now before starting to date and I expect that he will be around for quite some time to come."

Harry looked surprised at Emma standing up for him. Hermione's grandmother hadn't been that bad and at least she hadn't brought a vicious dog with her like Vernon's sister always did. He ducked away to check on the food.

"Hello Princess," Alan Puckle said hugging his grand-daughter.

"Hi Grandpa, what have you been reading lately?" Hermione said.

"I've been reading "Breakfast of Champions" by John Vonnegut," Alan said.

"I haven't read him. Is it any good?" Hermione asked eagerly.

"I'm enjoying it," Alan said.

"Come on in and get settled, Hermione will want to give you your presents before lunch," Emma said.

Hermione all but dragged her Grandpa over to the couch and plonked him down before running into the kitchen to fetch Harry and dragged him back to the lounge. "Grandpa this is my best friend, boyfriend and future husband Harry. You need to be nice to him because Grandma and Dad have already been a bit mean and I don't want my family to scare him away," she said bluntly.

Her grandfather laughed. "Okay Princess I promise to be on my best behaviour, it will be difficult, you know I'd only do it for you, but don't you think you should introduce me, I'm sure he doesn't want to spend the day calling me Princess Hermione's Grandpa, it's a bit of a mouthful," he said, winking at Harry.

"Harry this is my Mother's father Alan Puckle," Hermione said blushing.

"Pleased to meet you Mr Puckle Sir," Harry said shaking his hand when it was offered.

"That's nearly as bad as Princess Hermione's Grandpa. I can't be called Mr Puckle by Hermione's best boyfriend. Call me Alan, and tell me a bit about yourself. You must be pretty special to have captured my princess' attentions," Alan said smiling.

"I don't know about that. Hermione has been my best friend since were eleven. I'm nowhere near as smart as she is," Harry said.

"Hermione doesn't need someone as smart as she is, she needs someone who isn't going to use her for her brain or turn on her in jealousy," Alan said.

"I'm not jealous of her smarts, I think she's amazing, and I do my own homework, Hermione reads it through for me but she offers more often than I ask and if she tells me to do it again and put more effort in, I do," Harry said.

"I know that lad, Hermione would never have brought you home to meet us if you were using her," Alan said.

-o0o-

"This is delicious. You've outdone yourself Emma. I wish my pastry was half as light and flaky. Is it choux pastry?" Her mother asked.

"I'm afraid I cannot take the credit. Harry made the desserts. In fact, he did most of the work with the roast before we got up this morning too. It was a real luxury not to have to rush around and squeeze presents in between food preparation," Emma said.

"You're a great cook, but it's an odd hobby for a boy your age," Mabel said.

"My Aunt taught me to cook when I started school. It's peaceful," Harry replied.

Hermione frowned, knowing that Harry found cooking peaceful because eating was the one thing his uncle and cousin liked more than tormenting Harry and they'd leave him alone while he was cooking so the food wouldn't be ruined. She could barely eat her perfectly cooked dessert and only choked it down so as not to upset Harry.

Emma gave her daughter a concerned look but Hermione shook her head silently begging her not to say anything. She looked down at her dessert, the perfectly cooked and presented individual trifles, the mince pies with pastry made from scratch, the shortbread that melted in your mouth. She couldn't have made any of those as well as they were made. It dawned on her what Hermione was upset about, this level of skill took hours and hours of practice and Harry had spent most of the year, including Christmas, at school since he was eleven.

Daniel, Alan and Mabel ate obliviously, complimenting Harry on his cooking.

After dinner Daniel kicked the cooks out of the kitchen and he and Hermione dealt with the washing up as per the Granger family tradition. Hermione was reluctant this year, she didn't want to leave Harry alone with her grandparents.

"Hermione says you've been friends since she started at that school, why hasn't she brought you home before?" Mabel asked.

"I don't think that her father would give her permission to bring me home before now," Harry said mildly.

"I wouldn't think he would this year either, so what changed?" Mabel retorted.

"I gave Hermione a promise ring and Emma wanted to meet me," Harry said.

"Where do you normally spend Christmas? Where would you have spent Christmas if Hermione hadn't invited you home?" Alan asked.

"At school, there's always a few students who can't go home and some of the professors live at the school year round so they put on a pretty decent Christmas dinner," Harry replied.

"That must get lonely," Emma said.

"Not really usually the Weasleys stay at school, fourth year nearly everybody stayed for the ball and last year my Godfather was in the country so I stayed with him," Harry replied.

"Why aren't you staying with your godfather again?" Mabel asked.

"You know that never made sense to me, Mrs Weasley acts like family means everything to her and she treats Ron and Ginny like they're still eleven half the time but she left Ron, Percy and the twins at school in Ron's first year to take Ginny to visit her brother Charlie in Romania," Hermione interrupted loudly.

"Ron admitted they couldn't afford to take all of them," Harry said softly.

"I'm not surprised. I wouldn't have thought they could afford to go at all but wouldn't it be cheaper to pay for Charlie to come home for Christmas. Then she could have had nearly all the family together," Hermione countered.

"You're right, but what about it?" Emma said.

"I think she might have done it for Harry. She'd never met him so it would've looked too strange if she invited him home for Christmas but she sent him a present, a hand knitted jumper which was odd too," Hermione said.

"You think she had an ulterior motive?" Emma asked.

"I don't know but she's really upset that Harry isn't going to marry Ginny. Far more than you'd expect for the mother of a fifteen-year-old," Hermione said. "She wrote and abused both of us for getting together behind her children's backs."

"She wrote and insulted you for dating the boy her daughter wants to date? That's ridiculous," Mabel said.

"I couldn't agree more," Emma said.

"She didn't send me a Christmas present either, I've never not got one from them since I met her son, even though I only met her for a minute or two on the platform," Harry said.

"I'm sorry Harry, I didn't even notice she hadn't sent you a present but maybe Errol is just running late or not fit enough to bring it. She might want to give it to you when she sees you on the platform on our way back to school," Hermione said.

"No I don't think so," Harry said shrugging. "Don't worry Hermione I'm not upset about it, I just noticed when you started speaking about sending me one that Christmas when we'd barely met when they showed me how to… find the platform."

Hermione frowned realising that Harry's story of meeting the Weasleys on the muggle side of the platform didn't make much sense either. Molly had been striding about breaking the statute of secrecy and then had apparently forgotten the number of the only magical platform at Kings Cross Station. Had it all been a set up for some reason, and why? Surely, it wasn't all so Ginny could marry the-boy-who-lived? If it was, Hermione wouldn't want to be Ginny when Molly found out that she'd refused to marry Harry before he could even ask, because she had no doubt that Harry had been planning to ask Ginny to attempt the ritual with him, since Ron already told him that he'd asked Hermione. She wondered whether Molly would ever apologise or whether Harry's howler had angered her enough to not care that she'd been unfair or possibly it just no longer mattered now she and Harry could no longer marry Ron and Ginny.

"Do you take a cooking class at school?" Mabel asked.

"No unfortunately they don't offer cooking or food preparation classes," Harry replied. "I wish they did." Inwardly he thought to himself that potions was fairly close to a cooking class but the instructions were so exacting, Snape was so unpleasant and such a bad teacher that he didn't find it pleasant in the least.

It had taken time for Harry to wrap his head around the fact that in potions it mattered which way you cut an item, whether you stirred clockwise or anti clockwise and measurements had to be absolutely exact. He'd been cooking long enough to know none of those things mattered and that playing with the amount of one or two ingredients sometimes improved the results. By the time he'd understood it was too late for him to respect Snape enough to try his best in class and he realized most of the time it wouldn't have mattered anyway, even when he stopped making mistakes Ron made plenty and he couldn't pair with Hermione. She was needed to stop Neville from blowing himself up. It was a pity because he was sure with decent teaching right from the start, potions could've been his favourite subject.

"What is your favourite class?" Alan asked.

"Defence" Harry replied without thinking.

"They teach a self defence class. Is it based off any particular martial art?" Alan asked interested.

"I don't know I just like it because it's active. There isn't any other physical education class," Harry replied, hoping it was an acceptable answer.

"Hermione says you don't have any sports teams either. That's a strange school you go to. Don't they believe in exercise?" Alan asked.

Harry didn't know what to say. He couldn't explain that they got plenty of exercise walking around the castle because he didn't know what Hermione had told them about Hogwarts but he wanted to agree that wizards were basically lazy and should place more importance on exercise. The whole wizarding world seemed Quidditch mad but less than 10% of students tried out for a team and only a few more than that joined in the rare pick up games they had.

"I can't understand why Emma let Hermione go to boarding school. There are plenty of fine prep schools she could have gone to close enough to home. What made your parents choose this school?" Alan asked.

"It's where they met, and they had so many great memories of their time there that they enrolled me at birth," Harry said with a smile.

"So you're a legacy student," Mabel said condescendingly.

"Harry is second in our house for our year level," Hermione retorted. "He May be something like the twentieth generation of Potters to attend but he still earned his place."

"Don't exaggerate, Hermione," Mabel scolded.

"I'm not. There was a Hendrikus Potter who was head boy in the year 548," Hermione said angrily.

"There's no guarantee that he was related to Harry," Mabel said.

"Actually, he was. I have a book with my family tree in it. I remember the name because I wondered if his friends called him Harry too," Harry said.

Did your book reveal any living relatives?" Emma asked.

"Distant ones," Harry agreed. "I was third cousins with Sirius and third cousins once removed with Draco Malfoy through his mother, fourth cousins once removed with Neville Longbottom, and some sort of fifth cousins with the Weasleys, Susan Bones And a couple of others."

"So you're closest living relative is Malfoy's mother. If you hadn't gone to your aunt, you could have been sent to the Malfoy?" Hermione asked in horror.

"And Tonks' mother. I'm sure if there was any danger of the Malfoys getting hold of me, Dumbledore wouldn't have sealed my parents will, and I'd have gone to live with the guardians they chose," Harry replied.

"Yes I suppose he would have," Hermione said frowning.

"That or had me kidnapped and the Dursleys blackmailed to keep me," Harry said cynically, only remembering to replace the word spelled with something Muggle at the last second. Unfortunately, 'Blackmail' wasn't the best word to use in front of Hermione's grandparents, especially since they were talking about the headmaster of a school her grandparents didn't approve of in the first place.

"You're accusing the headmaster of your school of being capable of kidnapping and blackmail?" Mabel screeched.

"Yes, only for my own good of course," Harry replied trying not to sound sarcastic.

"Do you think Neville knows that you're cousins?" Hermione asked curious but mostly to change the subject.

"He's almost sure to, I don't know why he never told me, maybe he thought I'd already know, but he probably has a lot more cousins at school than I do, both his parents are from old families, and most of them are related somewhere along the line if you go back far enough," Harry replied.

"That's ridiculous," Mabel snapped.

"It's only marrying ancestors, siblings or first cousins that's illegal. Most people couldn't even tell you all of their fourth or fifth cousins. If it helps any, I can guarantee that Hermione and I are legally less than ninth cousins," Harry replied.

"Harry's right. I couldn't even begin to know whether Daniel and I are that distantly related," Emma said.

"That's okay, even animal studs only look back six generations. Beyond that the genetic diversity is sufficient not to cause birth defects unless a family is a known carrier of a genetic disorder," Alan said jovially.

Hermione looked faintly revolted.

"What's wrong Hermione?" Harry asked.

Hermione offered herself and Harry to make tea and dragged him into the kitchen. "Sirius said his parents were first cousins. That it was normal amongst his family. Where you father's parents related?" She whispered.

"They were seventh cousins so only very distantly but through more than one branch of their family trees. Sirius family tree has more than a few closely related spouses, there are only so many pure blood families who believe in pure blood superiority in England so the range of choice for someone like Malfoy would be quite small and I'd imagine he's already related to most of them," Harry replied.

"Do you think that there was something wrong with him? Sirius, I mean, not your father," Hermione asked.

"He wasn't quite sane, I assumed that was due to his exposure to the dementors and the conditions in Azkaban but I also heard someone refer to the Black family madness. His cousin Bellatrix was certainly insane and rumour has it that she was before she went to Azkaban too."

A/N: Thank you to mikanMD, BMS, katmom, tyrannicpuppy, Rori Potter, KrisB-71854, Firehedgehog, mwinter1, Jostanos, Ghostisreading, Melikalilly, mooneysfate, jkarr, nette91, Tyler'sPrincess, Ronin Kenshin, sandipi, HinataMorningstar, roon0, Village-Mystic, gabrieljuarezl, rb2312, Beyondthesea16, J.F.C, N7SPARTAN-Commander-Jay117, Cecily Mitchell, Kreaacher, EvanescoVeritas, HoneyBear84, serenityselena and all those who followed or favourited this story for your support.