AN: Oh look, I've actually kept my promise for once! Let's see if I can keep it up.
This chapter could also be called "meals".
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They new year started, and with it, Harry's classes resumed. There were, however, distractions. "Mrs. Longbottom and Neville will be coming for dinner on Friday," Alduin told him during lunch on Wednesday.
Harry looked up from his food. "Oh? Why for dinner this time, instead of the usual tea?"
Alduin frowned. How to explain? "You see, Harry, asking someone to dine with you is really the most proper way of honouring someone. But at the same time, you need a lady of the house for a proper dinner party. I still don't have that, of course, but given that Miss Burke and I are now engaged, it is sort of permissible for me to give small dinners, just for close family and friends, you understand, where she would act as the mistress. Had I been married, my wife would have asked the Longbottoms for dinner immediately after the first two visits were exchanged. As it was, we had to postpone it a little."
"It seems very complicated," Harry commented.
Alduin shrugged. "I suppose it is, when you are new to it, but trust me, you will understand in time, and these rules will come naturally to you. At any rate, the Longbottoms take precedence, given their close relationship to you, but after them, we will be able to ask more people to come. So get ready for being rather busy during the evenings!"
"Who are you going to ask?" Harry was curious.
"Miss Burke's parents, certainly. Then I will ask my closest friend, Abdullah Shafiq, with his family. He went to Hogwarts with me, and I am going to ask him to be my best man, as I had been his, shortly before being put in a coma." Alduin paused as he added more potatoes to his plate. "After that, it is less clear, but probably I will then begin to ask what remains of my relations, especially those that I have always got on tolerably well with. Mr. Shacklebolt and his family, and Mercurius Ollivander and his. Perhaps even the Crouches."
"How exactly are those people related to you?" The younger wizard wondered.
"Second cousins, like you and Neville. Nathan's – Mr. Shacklebolt's – paternal grandmother was my paternal grandfather's sister, and so was Mercurius'. Mr. Crouch is my first cousin once removed, like you, only in the other direction, of course. My paternal grandmother was his aunt. I have more second cousins, but, well. It's the Black side of the family, meaning Sirius, who is in Azkaban, Regulus, who is dead, Bellatrix, who is in Azkaban...the only two remaining from that branch are Andromeda and Narcissa. Andromeda does not really keep dinners, but perhaps I could ask her for tea at some point. I am not certain she would come, though, she cut herself off from everyone after her parents disinherited her. But I will likely ask Narcissa and her family...in time." After it becomes politically plausible to do so, Alduin thought to himself.
"Why was Andromeda disinherited?" Harry immediately fastened on the juiciest gossip.
Alduin sighed. "My cousin married a Muggle-Born wizard. Her parents were not very understanding. It has to be said that she had been very headstrong about it, too, not willing to wait and see if her boyfriend would perhaps grow on her parents in time, at least enough not to cut her off completely. Oh well. She has made her bed, and as far as I know, does not complain about lying in it." He paused. "The only other remaining relations in this degree are the McMillians, and I prefer to see those as little as possible."
"Why?"
Alduin grimaced. "They are a Hufflepuff family. I am from a Ravenclaw one. That has never been a good combination."
"How come you are related in the first place, then?" Harry had learned enough about the wizarding world to know that marriages usually ran within houses, even though the Potter-Travers marriage to which he owed being related to Alduin was one of those exceptions.
"It's through your house," his cousin explained. "Your great-grandfather's sister, my great aunt, married a McMillan. Ernie, the youngest son of the family, is your third cousin." Then, Alduin groaned. "Merlin help me," he said, "but if I remember correctly, he is about your age. That probably means I should arrange a visit there, too. It really does not seem fair – Augusta Longbottom, the McMillians...I swear I would rather see the Weasleys."
"Who are they?" Harry did not remember hearing the name before.
Alduin took a fortifying sip from his goblet. "A family that is notorious for their lack of manners. I take it back, I would not actually prefer them – at least there is only one Mrs. Longbottom, and not that many McMillians. The Weasleys have so many children they could start their own Quidditch team. But, thinking about it, I will not escape them either – they are one of the cornerstone Gryffindor families, and as such, you should meet them. Especially as it is almost certain at least one of their many children is roughly your age, too." He looked at Harry askance. "I hope you will forgive me," he said, "if I will not arrange the visits of people who were connected to your parents as often as I will of my own friends. I do possess only one set of nerves."
Harry laughed. "You don't have to worry about it," he said, "if you don't want to, you don't have to introduce me to any of them."
Alduin shook his head. "This is where you are wrong, Harry. After you have been in the wizarding world a little longer, you will understand."
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The Longbottom dinner went as well as might have been hoped for, and once that was over, thankfully, the time for pleasanter social obligations arrived. The Shafiqs were asked to come with the youngest generation, and so Harry was provided with the novel experience of being the senior child and an object of admiration for the younger ones, who were very excited at the prospect of him going to Hogwarts the following year.
"I wish I could go already, too," Abdulaziz complained, "but I still have two more years to wait. Two years! It's not fair."
"You can hardly go to Hogwarts before you can even find it on a map," his father pointed out.
"He gets that from me," Mrs. Shafiq said in a stage whisper. "Geography was never quite my favourite topic, and my parents never bothered much with it. So I freely admit my side of the family is to blame."
"Hey, I resent that!" Miss Burke commented.
Harry was confused. "Why?"
Mrs. Shafiq laughed. "Alexandra and I are cousins through her mother," she explained, and Alduin made a mental note to look over family trees with Harry before any more social visits would occur – every pureblood knew these things as a matter of course. "But I believe she got all her interests from her father. History, I ask you!"
"What is your hobby?" Harry asked, curious.
"Arithmancy," she explained. "That was how we got together with Abdullah – two Arithmancy enthusiasts."
"Oh, that reminds me I have a question for you," Alduin remembered. "I came across it in the Transfiro book..."
"Not the time-travel business?"
Alduin stared. "You have read it?"
"No," Mr. Shafiq replied, "but Philip has and had a number of questions about it, the same ones you are going to ask, I presume. I keep telling you you should be seeing him more often, you two have a lot in common."
"Thanks, but my social diary is a little full now, what with having to fraternize with the Gryffindors," Alduin said, grimacing a little, and Harry felt guilty for indirectly making his cousin suffer through uncomfortable company. He did not envy him the alone-time with Neville's grandmother at all.
"Yes, I have heard you were seeing a lot of the Longbottoms recently," Mr. Shafiq sniggered a little.
"From whom?" Alduin seemed surprised. "I was not aware they kept in touch with anyone, actually."
"As a matter of fact, it was at Philip's, too – the Crabbes were there, and well, you know Wilhelm's father was old Longbottom's cousin, so the old generation takes the trouble of seeing them from time to time, though I imagine they take about as much pleasure in it as you do," Mr. Shafiq said drily.
"It hasn't been as bad as I had feared it would," Alduin replied. "Harry has done wonders with young Neville, drawn him out. Mrs. Longbottom, of course, is as charming as ever. But still, I fear worse is yet to come."
Abdullah frowned. "Surely there are the Shacklebolts and the Greengrasses…?"
"The Shacklebolts, yes, without a doubt. I will ask them soon enough. But the Greengrasses hardly count nowadays, as you know, and so..."
Abdullah shuddered. "Better you than me," he said.
Harry had no idea what they were talking about, and was astonished to see that the Shafiq children did not appear to have that problem. Surely it was impossible that they could remember all these names, when they were so young?
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"So, did you like our guests?" Alduin asked the next day over breakfast.
Harry chewed his bacon before replyin: "Yeah, Abdulaziz's fun to be around. Gamila is still a baby, really, but it was interesting seeing wizarding children."
"She would not thank you for that!" Alduin laughed. "I think she sees herself as quite a grown-up ever since her classes started."
Harry laughed as well, and then said: "All that talk about families was pretty confusing for me..."
"Yes, I noticed. I think we are going to look over the family trees instead of one class today, it's important you know these things."
He followed action to words. Harry was bewildered. "So many people," he said, "and they all seem to be connected to each other in different ways..."
"They are, especially when you look at the families affiliated with one Hogwarts house," Alduin reiterated something Harry already knew.
"Are all of them equally important? The families, I mean?" Harry was trying to get some sense of that mess of lines.
His cousin smiled a little at this, without humour. "Officially, yes – we all have an equal say in the Wizengamot. Unofficially...well. Some have more influence, some have less."
"Which one is the most important?" Harry wanted to know immediately.
"Well, the Burkes and us are prominent in the Ravenclaw circles, the Malfoys and the Blacks in the Slytherin ones – well, the Blacks used to be, in the past. Now there is none of them left. The Smiths and the Fawleys are the champions of Hufflepuff, and it would be your house, together with the Prewetts, who is important in Gryffindor."
Harry laughed. "I asked for one family, and you named eight!"
Alduin shook his head. "It can't be narrowed down to only one. The Malfoys are certainly trying to pretend that role is theirs, but at the very least, the Smiths are contesting that – and the Burkes, too, recently."
"Why only recently?" The younger wizard probed further.
Alduin paused for a moment, seeming to think about how best to explain, before he said: "They are actually one of the younger families among the Noble and Most Ancient houses, but they have been very careful in the war, never getting too friendly with either side, and it stood them in good stead, politically – they all survived, an almost unique feat, and are in a good position now. People like them, and they are very well connected – they made very good marriages."
Harry giggled. "Like Miss Burke?" He asked.
Alduin smiled calmly. "Yes," he said, "in fact, I am very eligible – as is she. She had waited longer than is customary, you know, to get engaged. She knew she could pick and choose. At the same time, the moment I reappeared, she knew this was as good as it was going to get – as I did in her case."
Harry frowned. "It doesn't sound exactly like the reasons I thought people should get married for."
Alduin laughed at him. "You watched too much Muggle telly," he said. "You're imagining passionate declarations of love. That might be well and good for an affair, but for marriage, you need something that will last. Alexandra and I come from the same circles, have similar temperaments, share the same hobbies and understand each other. That is a better basis for marriage than most have."
Harry still seemed dissatisfied. "But what if you fall in love?" He asked.
"With someone else, you mean?" Alduin clarified. "But marrying purely for love does not protect you from that. Rather the contrary – if you marry someone only because of what you feel for them, then the moment you start to feel the same thing for someone else, you lose any reason you had to stay with the first person."
Harry shifted in his seat, uncomfortable with the topic, but persisted, unwilling to let himself be persuaded: "But, I mean, if you love the person you married, you will not fall in love with someone else, will you?"
Alduin smiled. "It's more complicated than that," he said, "but I do not think I can explain this without you having at least some kind of experience with girls. We will continue this conversation in a couple of years."
Harry, flushing a little, said: "All right. Can you at least explain who you were such a good catch? I mean, I already know why Miss Burke was..."
"Because I am the head of a family already. Usually, when a woman marries, she has to live in a house with many generations of her in-laws before she becomes the mistress, when she is quite old. With me, Miss Burke gets to be the lady of the house immediately. That is very valuable, and an advantage your wife will have, too, in time, though in both of our cases it was dearly paid for. But anyway, to continue about the families," Alduin pointed to certain places in the drawing of the family tree that lay at the table before them, "the Smiths are not liked at all, though they are well respected because they are descended from Helga Hufflepuff. The Malfoys have a lot of political influence, but they have one family tradition that hampers them."
"What is it?"
"For several generations now, they always have only one son, and no daughters. It is their way of showing superiority, you see, of saying that they do not have to provide daughters for people to marry and other families are still going to offer them theirs. Only," Alduin shrugged, "well, it's incredibly stupid, because that means they lack the family connections that would have provided them with, and they have to work very hard to supplements it. Another thing is that they got a little entangled with Riddle and that lost them some credibility."
"They supported Voldemort?" Harry asked incredulously.
Alduin frowned at Harry's shock. "I already told you many people did, including my own uncle. Mr. Malfoy managed to get out of prison saying that he was magically controlled and made to obey against his will. It is almost certainly not true in the sense he claims, but there are other ways of controlling people. He has a wife he loves, and that wife's sister is one of the most fanatical supporters of Riddle. Lucius likely found himself between a rock and a hard place."
"What do you mean?" Harry did not understand.
"Quite plainly that he feared for his wife's life, if he did not do what Riddle wanted." The war was a brutal time for everyone.
Harry was frowning. "He supported the guy who killed my parents, and who attacked you! How can you be so okay with it?"
"It is very easy to judge someone when you are not in their situation, Harry. If someone threatened you or Miss Burke, I do not know what I would do." That was very close to being a lie – Alduin had a very good idea what he would do, but ti was not the sort of thing he could share with Harry.
"But it was still wrong!"The boy insisted.
"It was certainly not right, I grant you that. But I repeat, it is very easy to judge." Alduin sighed. "At any rate, whatever your opinion, I would ask you not to discuss this in public, and certainly not in front of the Malfoys, once you meet them. It would be a very unpleasant faux-pas."
"I don't think I want to meet them, if they supported Riddle!"
Alduin sighed again. He had feared a reaction like this, but he had had to tell Harry, or the Longbottoms would have, sooner or later, and they would have couched it in far worse terms. He knew perfectly well he was painting Lucius much whiter than the man really was, but he saw no other way to convince Harry to act at least passably civilly to him. Hopefully in time, he would learn not to see everything as so black and white, but for now he was too young and Alduin had to work with what he had.
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AN: I fully admit that I made up that "we're engage so we can throw small dinner parties" rule. But I was thinking, well, the wizards are old-fashioned compared to us, but they have had *some* development in the last hundred years, so that's my idea of how the etiquette would evolve.