Acknowledgment—The following is a work of fanfiction, written and posted solely for the enjoyment of readers. The author thanks Ms. JK Rowling for allowing writers to set work among the population and locations found in the Harry Potter series of books. Everything belongs to Ms. Rowling and the author of this story neither seeks nor receives remuneration.
Two Daughters
Chapter Fifteen
A Harry and Daphne Fanfic
By
Bfd1235813
Spring arrived.
Along with Spring, Spring-fever was epidemic. Delphine Black learned that she was susceptible to the malady. She found it was no joking matter. Her symptoms were not severe enough to make her dysfunctional. Mainly, she yearned to take to her bed, or a hammock, at inappropriate times of the day. Nodding off in class is never a good thing, not for any student, muggle or magical. Delphi believed she drew on vast reserves of wakefulness to stay in good standing.
"Something wrong?"
Mary Beth Olson was concerned. Her friend was usually the liveliest of the Slytherin live wires. At least among the first-years, anyway.
"No. Actually, yes. I am tired of lectures, essays and readings. I want to be outside. If I do magic, it will be practical magic. I could see sitting under the gallery in a rainstorm, dispatching an empty cup into the clouds, filling it, retrieving the full cup then drinking the fresh rainwater," said Delphi.
Mary Beth's jaw literally dropped.
"Wow! Can we do that? With magic?" she asked.
"I don't see why not," said Delphi. "If we can levitate a feather, how much more complicated can it be? That's the kind of magic school I want. Go outside in Spring. Send your cup into the rainstorm. Bring it back, full. Drink it down. All magic, all the time. Then, perhaps, stretch out with a good book."
Mary Beth Olson thought she had made some pretty interesting friends during her first year at Hogwarts School, but none more exotic than Delphine Black. The Black witch was continually demonstrating she inhabited a rarer magical Universe than nearly everyone else at the school, student, staff or faculty. Perhaps she had her own asteroid belt that enabled her to hop from rock to rock, Black's Magical Asteroid Belt—Bringing You Great Witches For Over Four Billion Years! Yes, that must be the difference between them.
"Wish I could help, you do know that, don't you?" asked Mary Beth.
"Of course," said Delphi. "I'd do the same for you, anytime."
Mary Beth Olson leaned back into the leather couch, smiling. She was happy in Slytherin House but much happier to have made the acquaintance and developed a friendship with Delphine Black. An outsider to Magical Britain until just a few months earlier, Mary Beth was still learning the internal structure of the magical society.
Witches and wizards had inherited the social arrangements of Britain that evolved from the feudal organization and mix of cultures present after 1066. As the harassment of practitioners of magic became more and more intense, the magical population withdrew from the greater society.
In effect, witches and wizards declared to their non-magical fellow citizens something like: "Fine! If you want it so bad, go right ahead and take it!"
Of course, they weren't inclined to walk away from their homes, farms and manors. Those just disappeared from the everyday person's environment, along with the memories of this or that building or village. After they quarantined themselves, the magical society ceased evolving in company with the non-magicals. Existing titles continued to be handed down. New heroes and legends would pop up now and then. A system of magical government emerged with divisions that looked after the concerns of magical folk. It didn't mimic the muggle version although there were similarities. Drunk and disorderly is a nuisance in any society and/or culture and someone must step forward and deal with it.
Delphi Black was still learning but she knew a whole lot more about magic and magical folk than Mary Beth. Something about the muggle-born's paucity of knowledge of her magical world compelled the eleven-year-old Delphi Black to help her friend understand what she was seeing all around her. Mary Beth accepted Delphi as a friend who was native to their magical environment with a compulsion to help. Mary Beth liked to learn and didn't see Delphi as either pushy or patronizing.
One thing couldn't be avoided that Spring. The end of term approached, and the calendar was relentless. Delphi had big plans, perhaps, unrealistic plans, for a summer of sailing with her father. Harry Potter didn't have a job, so it seemed logical to Delphi that she and Harry ought to be free to take the sailboat out. They would live the life of seafarers, as Merlin surely intended. They would even take Ane, who'd just turned ten. Delphi thought her little sister needed to become better at navigation and boat-handling.
Once again, Delphi and Mary Beth went through a bit of turmoil when the reality of their pending separation set in. This time, they began to feel the stress the evening before departure. The end of term feast was even a bit emotional, as the two witches faced up to the fact that their first Hogwarts year was ending.
"It'll be alright," Delphi said.
She spoke as much to herself as to her friend.
"I know. It's just…all summer!" complained Mary Beth as she buried her nose in Delphi's black hair.
They stood in the Slytherin witches' dorm, their good-bye hug becoming a serious clinch. Neither had prepared for the rush of emotion that overcame their senses of propriety, compelling them both to cling tighter.
"You helped me so much," said Mary Beth.
"I needed someone, to balance the others," Delphi replied.
She meant her cousins, Scorpius and Teddy, who had settled into some kind of wizarding alliance over the term.
"Here. Keep something from me close over break. When you wear it, we'll still be together," Delphi said as she handed Mary Beth her bathrobe.
The robe was terry cloth, Slytherin green, featuring the Potter-Black arms patch that Harry Potter had given to Delphi at Yule. The sixth and seventh year Slytherin witches' attitudes toward Delphi Black had transformed when she began wearing the robe around the dorm. They'd known she was somehow a Potter even though her surname was Black. What they had not realized was that her father had taken Heirship of their house founder's clan. The senior witches consulted and concurred that Delphine Black was due a greater measure of deference.
Mary Beth, although she was friendly with Delphi, had adopted a low profile inside Slytherin. Her first few weeks had made it clear that Slytherin was the house most strongly identified with Salazar Slytherin's intolerant views toward muggle-borns. Mary Beth thought Delphi's acceptance was critical to her survivability in Slytherin House.
"Are you sure?" she asked, fighting her own disbelief.
"Absolutely!" said Delphi. "I'll feel better, knowing you have some Black artifact wrapped around you."
Neither was completely sure what that meant, although it was certainly a nice-sounding sentiment.
Mary Beth took the robe and laid it out on her bed, then came back for some more hugging. The witches were in much better control of their emotions. At least they weren't on the verge of breaking down in tears at the prospect of a summer apart.
"I'll wear it every day. I'll wear it out. You'll need a new one in the fall," came out in Mary Beth's combination of chuckling and sniffles.
"I'll be thrilled," said Delphi. "I can get more. I think."
Packing continued. Mary Beth reserved a space on top of her clothes for last-minute accommodation of her new bathrobe, which she wore the rest of the evening.
The trip back to King's Cross was mostly uneventful. The more senior Slytherin witches, the former seventh-years taking their last journeys as students and the sixth-years who would be next term's seventh-years, came to the Black cousins' cabin in twos and threes. They knocked before opening the door and asked if they could enter.
That got the wizards' attention. They'd never been asked by a seventh year Slytherin witch if she had their permission for anything.
"Black, hope you had a good year. We wanted to wish you all the best," one of the witches would say, before extending a hand to Delphi.
If she was taken by surprise, their cousin didn't show it.
"Oh, that is so nice of you," Delphi would say as she smiled a great smile. "Best of luck to you, too."
She stood, addressed the older witches by their surnames and inclined her head in respect. Most of them grinned a little grin or nodded back. They didn't offer to shake with Mary Beth but several nodded and said, "Olson."
The witches ignored the two wizards.
"What is going on?" Scorpius asked, unable to contain himself.
"What do you mean?" asked Delphi.
"Well, those witches. No one from seventh year spoke to me, ever," said Scorpius.
"A seventh year called me a werewolf," said Teddy.
"You scare people, even seventh years," said Scorpius.
"Not on purpose! My dad was kind of embarrassed by it, according to Harry," Teddy replied.
The witches looked between the wizards. Not for the first time, Delphi had a feeling that wizards led much more adventurous lives than did witches. Each time reinforced her determination to become a sailing master. That would show them! She looked at her wizard cousins and noticed, once again, that they both had the beginnings of a mustache showing on their upper lips. Talk about unfair.
"What I mean is, we have a certain reputation, inherited, from our parents," Scorpius explained. "I don't have a Dark Mark, but it seems to be common knowledge that my father does."
'Ooooh, watch out! It's a Malfoy!'
"I get that, Teddy gets the werewolf thing, what is going on with you, Delphi?"
"You know! I'm just kind of deliciously different. Maybe they all got a thrill writing home about me," Delphi suggested.
The wizards looked at the other. Their expressions said they were not in agreement with Delphi's thesis, that she was just a bit different and therefore due respectful social calls from the older witches who had ignored them for an entire academic year.
The next time there was a knock on the door, Scorpius looked at Teddy. The door slid open and three Slytherin witches looked into the cabin.
"Excuse me, could we just…" asked the one in front as she let one hand wiggle a bit in lieu of finishing her sentence.
Scorpius stood, then Teddy. The three witches stepped inside and turned straight toward Delphi.
"Just wanted to tell you how much it meant to us, to have you come to Slytherin," said the spokes-witch.
Both wizards looked respectfully at the seventh-year. They knew her given name was Desiree but acknowledged the witch only as 'Bulstrode' due to never being included in as much as a simple, pass-the-time-of-day verbal exchange. Desiree Bulstrode had presence. Substantial, but without rolls or visible flab, she bore herself with a quiet dignity that communicated severe dislike for frivolity. Many young wizards had an excess of energy they burned off by indulging in frivolity, or so the disapproving looks Bulstrode dispensed in the corridors and the Slytherin common room were interpreted by said wizards.
Neither Scorpius nor Teddy was inclined to call witches by pejorative names but some of their fellows, along with a few witches, speculated openly about Bulstrode's sexual preferences. Delphi had heard the rumors, not that she gave them any weight as being factual. Besides, it was no business of hers. Bulstrode never seemed to be hungering to lay hands on her, something she could not say about all the young wizards in Slytherin.
"Olson," said Bulstrode, with a nod.
She glanced at the two wizards, not nodding, just looking their way.
"Excited to see the parents?" asked the second witch.
"Best to your mum," said the third. "Isn't she Slytherin?"
Delphi flinched. Yes, her mum had been in Slytherin. She was also dead. Delphi sensed another long, drawn-out blabfest if she did not cut the conversation short.
"Daphne is married to my father now," she said. "She was in Slytherin at Hogwarts."
Bulstrode, who was better-informed than her friend, knew enough to know Delphi Black avoided questions about her distant past. She had few details but there were allusions, at Yule, to a pronounced resemblance to the late Death Eater Bellatrix Lestrange. Delphi was one of a number of Hogwarts witches and wizards whom one did not want to press for details relating to ancestry.
"So, Delphi, we're not going to be at Hogwarts with you next term, but we wanted to tell you we appreciated your presence in Slytherin and to thank you for your contributions to our House," said Bulstrode.
The three witches shook hands with Delphi. The wizards noticed their palms were down when extended toward Mary Beth, as if they expected a little kiss to their knuckles. Bulstrode spoke for the collective, nodding toward Teddy and Scorpius.
"Wizards," she muttered, the other witches declining to favor them with anything more than a quick glance of dismissal before following Bulstrode out to the corridor in silence.
"Well," said Scorpius.
"You said a mouthful, cousin," Teddy agreed.
"Hush—they just wanted to be nice," Delphi said. "We've got one year behind us, six more to go. They just finished their seventh year. They won't have dinner with the House, ever again. Not as students, that is to say. I wonder how we will deal with that?"
"Yeah, no more Transfiguration!" Teddy said.
"That's funny!" said Scorpius, privy as he was to knowledge of Teddy Lupin's metamorphmagus abilities.
Slytherin's multiple delegations of senior witches were the most prestigious groups to come by during the train trip. That is not to say Delphi's cohort lacked for visitors. The other three houses supplied plenty of first year witches. Wizards popped in, greeting Teddy and Scorpius with monosyllabic grunts and articulations; some managed to rise to the level of communications.
Delphi and Mary Beth had agreed, the night before the students departed Hogwarts, to control their emotions when they arrived at King's Cross station. They planned to step down onto the station platform and go their separate ways. They did not anticipate the path to the Potter-Black party going directly past Mary Beth's father, who had come down to London to fetch his daughter. This caused Mary Beth to stop, taking a pinch of Delphi's sleeve, and introduce her friend to her father.
"Very pleased, sir," said Delphi as they semi-shook hands.
"Equally so," Mr. Olson replied, smiling. "Mary Beth has mentioned you in her letters home. Thank-you for being her friend and helping her…uh…adjustment."
The witches giggled at Olson's choice of words.
"So, see you," Delphi said to Mary Beth.
Her friend's eyes were tearing up, so Delphi's started to do the same. They did hold their good-bye to one hug, then Delphi scurried off to the Potters.
"Who?" asked Potter, who had witnessed the farewell.
"Mary Beth's dad," said Delphi.
"Oh," Potter said as he looked back. "I would've liked to meet him. Another time, then."
With that, the parties were off to the apparation point, then Grimmauld Place.
Delphi sensed Ane becoming more and more agitated throughout their short journey from Platform Nine and Three-Quarters to the apparation point, thence home. She really was fit to burst, Delphi thought, probably due to a glass of cider just before Ane and Potter left home. The group went straight to Number Twelve's top step, where they were met by Kreacher.
"Lady Daphne?" Potter muttered.
"Her room, Lord Harry," Kreacher replied.
Her immediate itinerary thus set, Delphi threw her hand luggage down in the foyer and ran upstairs.
"Mum Daphne, I'm home!" she cried.
Bursting into Daphne's bedroom/study, Delphi crossed the room. Daphne was sitting in the chair that served her desk, the desktop covered with file folders. Delphi hadn't seen her stepmother bring her work home, certainly not to such an extent. Of course, anything out of the ordinary, affecting a parent, naturally turns the adolescent's thoughts to catastrophe. Something was dreadfully wrong with Delphi's stepmother!
"Oh, Mum Daphne! What…what is…are you sick?" she demanded.
"Come," said Daphne, swiveling her chair to face Delphi.
Something about Mum Daphne was off. Delphi thought she had put on weight. Daphne was wearing a loose black robe, the same type she wore when she had official lawyer duties. Even with the robe, she looked a bit thick.
"Come," Daphne repeated as she opened her arms.
Once she got Delphi close enough, she pulled her in until Delphi's abdomen bumped into Daphne's.
"What is…Mum Daphne! Are you going to have a baby?" Delphi demanded.
"Yes, bless Morgana, a baby. My healer thinks you will have a baby brother, soon," said Daphne.
After a flurry of hugs for both of the witches, Delphi asked permission to touch Daphne.
"Of course. Close the door," Daphne said.
A quick locking charm took care of any privacy issues.
"Now, we are both witches, so this may be something you see in yourself, someday," said Daphne. "If not, your friends will be doing this, so it won't hurt you to see it. It's private, though. Is that fine with you? You won't be running out in the street telling everyone your stepmother is a whale, will you?"
Through her laughter, Delphi pledged not to tell anyone her stepmother was a whale. When she had her answer, Daphne stood, slipping out of her black lawyer's robe. She had dressed for comfort, not a professional meeting. Daphne's attire now consisted of a bra and very unfashionable white briefs. Her stomach was big. Delphi thought it was the biggest she'd ever seen. She stood, silent and staring.
"May I? I mean, is it allowed?" Delphi asked.
"Of course," Daphne answered, spreading her arms to free up space so Delphi to get close.
After a few, tentative touches, Daphne backed up, sitting down on the bed that still occupied part of her personal room.
When Daphne was settled, she motioned for Delphi to come closer.
"You can touch," she said. "There are some lumpy places. Probably a foot or a knee. If it feels round, that is the head so don't poke around there."
Daphne's belly was the most interesting thing Delphi had ever seen. She hadn't really thought about babies or little animals or where they came from or how they got to Earth in the first place. Now she was allowed to look in awe on her stepmother, who was so smart they made her a lawyer, and now was going to produce a little brother for Delphi and Ane. Leaning forward, she closed her eyes and let her lips just touch Daphne's skin
"So, it's a baby boy?" Delphi whispered.
"My healer thinks so," said Daphne.
Delphi knelt so she could look straight ahead at the great mound occupying the space between Daphne's ribs and the elastic waistband of her panties. The angle was wrong for watching Delphi's face, so Daphne did not see her stepdaughter's eyelids drooping. Delphi moved closer until she was just shy of Daphne. Then the words started. Delphi was speaking directly to her brother. Daphne couldn't understand what she was saying because the sounds were a jumble of 'S-s-s, Ahh-h-h, Hesh-Ah.' Although Daphne couldn't understand, she could recognize Delphi was speaking parseltongue.
"Delphi, sweetheart," Daphne began. "He won't understand anything. Babies learn to talk later."
"Oh! I'm sorry, Daphne," said Delphi. "Talking won't upset him, will it?"
"I don't think so," Daphne said, trying for a reassuring tone. "What were you saying to him?"
"I told him I love him!" said Delphi. "Can I know his name?"
"We were going to name him Cyrus, for Lord Greengrass," Daphne said. "Do you think that's a nice name?"
"Mmm…I don't know. What other names does he have?"
"We told Lord and Lady Greengrass we chose Cyrus Asturias Potter Greengrass," said Daphne.
"Uh-huh," said Delphi. "He's going to be Potter. Everyone will call him that. Potter Greengrass."
She was so assured Daphne let it go. She hadn't pressed for a name that honored her father. Potter came up with that during their pre-engagement discussions at Greengrass Manor. If anything, Potter traded a little sweetener for Cyrus Greengrass's contribution of one noble and well-educated daughter. Potter had already pledged to try for a Greengrass son who could help Daphne hold onto the family assets. A subtle stroke for Lord Cyrus' vanity gland couldn't hurt anything.
Potter kept his opinion to himself because that was what it was. He had no facts to cite as evidence. The real prize among the names, Potter thought, was Asturias. When he'd had the Heraldry Office develop a coat of arms for Scorpius, it revealed the connection of Isabella Greengrass to the Spanish house. Isabella took it with good humor. Potter thought the barely-visible relationship might work to the family's advantage, as long as they didn't overdo. Little Cyrus would, as soon as he touched down on Earth, be entitled as well. He would cry his first cry as the Greengrass Heir-presumptive, second in line, behind his mother. As the son of Harry Potter, he had an embarrassment of arms available to him. Potter thought the Potter and Black crests quite formidable. Added to Asturias and Greengrass, well, need more be said?
Daphne asked Delphi to stand by while she got decent again, by pulling her gown over her head.
"There!" she said.
"Mum Daphne, you are so beautiful!" said Delphi. "Now?"
"Now," Daphne confirmed, as Delphi opened the door.
Ane was waiting for her sister downstairs. She looked very pleased, in a cat-and-canary sense.
"What?" asked Delphi.
"I didn't tell!" said Ane. "Mum Daphne asked me not to and I kept a secret!"
"That's pretty good, don't you think, Delphi?" asked Daphne.
Delphi didn't want to agree but she did recognize that Daphne asked a favor and Ane delivered.
"I suppose," Delphi answered.
Ane's face fell a bit at Delphi's moderated enthusiasm.
"You did a great job keeping Mum Daphne's secret!" she tried, getting Ane to lift the corners of her mouth.
"So, we have until September First to use our days as we see fit," said Potter. "What do we want to do?"
"I was hoping we could take the boat and go somewhere," said Delphi. "But…"
"But what, Delphi?" asked Daphne. "There will be time. The healer says your brother should arrive between the fifth and tenth of July. I would like everyone to be here to welcome him when he's born, but that doesn't mean you can't sail before or after."
Delphi thought that would work. It wasn't as if she had a choice. Her dream trip was an Atlantic crossing, sailing down the East Coast of America then back via Bermuda. She'd just have to put that off, it appeared. Maybe next summer. That didn't mean her dad wouldn't be available for a day trip or a few hours on the boat. Delphi drew on her patience because she didn't want to open up without time to finish the conversation.
As it turned out, she didn't need the boat, just a visit to Harry Potter's basement alchemy lab. He was headed down to the Blacks' dungeon when Delphi asked if she could join him.
"Of course!" said Potter. "Want to get started on potions?"
"I could," she said. "Don't suppose it would hurt."
"Shouldn't hurt. Just avoid informing the potions master you've been getting tutored by your dad. They could take it the wrong way," said Potter. "What's on your mind?"
"There is a Lestrange in Slytherin," Delphi began. "She gave me a look. I didn't like it. I said, 'What?' She called me a bomation. I didn't know what a bomation was, so I looked at her, like I do with Ane and the Blacks. She looked away and left. That was in the fall."
"Okay, well, have there been any further incidents of that sort?" asked Potter. "And I think she meant 'abomination.' I take it you don't know what that is?"
"No," said Delphi. "Do I want to know?"
"You are so wise and you don't even realize it," Potter mused, pride in his daughter giving him a sensation, of swelling past the limitations of his physical body. "You might not want to know but it seems to me it is time you did know, so here it is. An abomination is something so out of the ordinary it simply should not be. Usually, it's something evil although, it could be ugly beyond belief or lacking in some attribute it really ought to have. For human beings there is an implied deficiency of some critical aspect of life."
"Like someone's mother is a criminal?" Delphi demanded.
"I believe that might be what this Lestrange meant," said Potter. "Bella was a criminal, at one point. That had nothing to do with you, though, did it? Remember? You never knew her and I'm your father. Even the goblins know that. So you can navigate your life free of concern for what went before."
"Lestrange said you're just as bad as Voldemort," Delphi said. "Did you do something to that Lestrange when we were at the marina?"
"He got a headache after he mouthed off to me but I never laid a hand on him," Potter assured her.
He left for another time the full explanation, that he had formed a magical lens that directed photons in a concentrated beam at a tiny area of Lestrange's dura mater, allowing the man's cerebro-spinal fluid to leak enough for his brain to bump around a bit inside his cranium. That technique depended on competence in some esoteric spell-casting that wouldn't be relevant, for Delphi, until she had a few more years of basic magical studies.
"If you're concerned, let me assure you Theobald Lestrange is no threat to the Potters," he said. "We can talk anytime, so don't hesitate to let me know if there are further problems. It sounds to me like your acquaintance is, perhaps, envious? Of you and your magical strength—your power?"
"Could be," said Delphi. "Was my mother, Bella. Was she Bellatrix Lestrange when she had me?"
"Well, technically, I suppose," said Potter.
"Am I related to them?"
"I think, legally, if everything was done according to the law, birth registry and so on, that might have been one possibility," Potter answered. "As it turned out, that was not relevant. Nor is it relevant now. Your mother and her husband at the time, Rodolphus, didn't take care of those things. They thought the Dark Lord was certain to defeat the resistance forces so they put everything off until after. Turned out there was no after, for them, except capture, prison and plenty of time to contemplate their many mistakes. Your step-mum and I straightened all that out as part of the adoption. Are you and I okay?"
"Yes, Harry, I'm fine," said Delphi. "Thanks to you, and Mum Daphne. Can I have a tattoo like yours? Teddy says he's getting one."
Potter felt a whipsawing sensation from the abrupt change of topics.
"Delphi, I told Teddy…Maybe, in a few years, if you still want one. What got you thinking of tattoos?"
"The raven," she said. "I'm a Black. I want to look like one."
Potter had to laugh at that.
"You're a Black, alright," he said. "Whatever he told you, I told Teddy we'd talk about it when he's older. You don't need one now. Maybe we can get you all tee shirts with a raven on the front."
"I want the one with the snake," said Delphi.
"With the snake," Potter agreed. "Did you ever hear of Serpensortia? It's a spell."
"No, I don't think so," Delphi said.
"Let me show you," said Potter.
He drew his wand and pointed it at the floor.
"Serpensortia!" he said, materializing a snake that instantly coiled up into a strike pose.
"S-s-s-s…" Potter began, addressing the snake.
The expressionless snake-face looked from one human to the other as Potter introduced them.
"Okay, now you," he muttered, nodding at Delphi.
"Harry?"
"Just state your name," Potter said.
"My name is Delphi Black," said Delphi, using parseltongue.
"You speak snake," said the reptile. "We all believed the last one who could speak our language died. He was killed by…"
The snake seemed to realize, at that moment, where he was and with whom he was speaking.
"Yes, I never studied. I inherited the language from him," she said as she gave Harry a nod. "What do they call you?"
"Wasn't I conjured?" asked the snake. "We don't have names."
"Oh, I didn't know that," Delphi said. "Do you eat?"
"I don't think so," said the snake. "I don't remember eating."
"You don't sound like a lot of trouble. As a familiar, I mean. Would you like to be mine?" the witch asked.
"What are the duties?" the snake wanted to know.
"When I conjure a snake, you appear. Are you poisonous?"
"I wouldn't know. How does one tell?"
The snake looked puzzled.
"Just pretend you need to bite me, maybe on my ankle?" said Delphi.
The conjured snake drew his head back and opened his mouth. Potter and Delphi both saw the two sharp teeth in the front of the snake's upper dentition.
"Whoa!" said Daphne. "Those do look like fangs!"
"I think she's right," Potter said, addressing the snake. "Can you put them away?"
The snake closed his mouth. Speaking parseltongue did not require a wide opening, apparently.
"How about that?" asked the snake. "I never knew. In all this time…"
Potter turned to his daughter.
"If you need to conjure a snake, try not to do it around students," he said. "Believe me, going by my experience, that leads to a LOT of misunderstandings."
"I do believe you, Harry," said Delphi. "All I had to do was show up at Hogwarts. Then Lestrange had to stick her nose in. Add a snake to that and…well, yeah, misunderstandings."
"So, ready to let our friend get back?" Potter asked.
"Sure. How do I do that?" asked Delphi.
"Snake No-Name, we'll say good-bye until a Potter-Black needs you again. Are you ready?"
"Do I have a choice?" the snake asked.
"It's for your own good. I'm pretty sure you don't eat in this manifestation so you would starve if you stayed too long," Potter said. "Us keeping you would mean a terrarium, for you, and humans stopping to stare at you through the glass. That's what I call horrors."
"True. Fine, then, go ahead," agreed No-Name.
Potter leaned across and spoke into Delphi's ear.
"The spell is evanesco. Ev-a-NESS-co. No particular wand motion. Just point."
Delphi pointed Gorr and gave the incantation. No-Name the snake vanished with a definite 'pop.'
"Good job, Black Witch," said Potter. "You can conjure him tomorrow, but we really ought to let him rest tonight. Merlin knows what he has been doing for exercise lately. Was there anything else?"
"When can we get the shirts? I want one so I'm sure Ane will want one. Teddy's the Black Heir so he'll want one which means Scorpius…and Mary Beth."
"Would Mary Beth want one or are you projecting yourself onto Mary Beth?" asked Potter.
"She'd want one, if I have one," Delphi assured him.
"What is our Black Family motto?" Potter asked.
"Toujours Pur," said Delphi, an unmistakable, prideful swelling pumping her up as she spoke.
"See the problem?" Potter asked.
"Mary Beth isn't?" said Delphi.
"Exactly. Do you think she would feel bad if you gave her a Black shirt? What with our motto and all. I'm not, of course, but Sirius adopted me so all the jinxes, Kreacher and so on are compelled to respect me. Go along to get along. Mary Beth is all muggle-born, through and through, start to finish. You, Scorpius and Teddy—all magic, all the time. Something to think about."
"You're right," Delphi said. "Wow. Now I don't know what to do."
"Tell you what," said Potter. "We'll work on the shirts. That has to come first, so we'll just do that. We won't put the motto on. We'll do the raven."
"Standing on the snake," Delphi reminded him.
"Yes, standing on the snake," Potter agreed.
"Then there's no problem!" Delphi said. "What are you going to do now?"
"You mean down here? I have a tiny bit of Philosopher's Stone. The production of more requires the tiny bit plus some chemicals. Plus paying close attention to a complicated manufacturing process. Sound like something that would interest a witch like you?"
"Definitely!" said Delphi. "What do you want me to do?"
The things Potter wanted Delphi Black to do involved safety glasses and a leather lab apron. After getting set for working in the home alchemy lab, Potter would have preferred his daughter sit on a tall stool across the dungeon room from his lab table. In other words, Potter wanted Delphi to stay back a safe distance. On the other hand, she was Delphine Black, daughter of Bellatrix Black Lestrange and Lord Harry Potter-Black, via some inexplicable sequence of events. Potter's preferred scenario was quite unrealistic.
"Okay, bring that stool over here," he said. "Maybe not that close. There. Now, I'm going to put drops in this beaker, to start, so we need an accurate count. Just count, along with me. One, two…"
The alchemists began to count. Solutions and suspensions were measured, shaken, stirred with glass rods and poured into tabletop distillers. Potter and Delphi worked for two solid hours, then Potter dropped the fragment of Philosopher's Stone in the last beaker and watched the reaction. There was a bit of hissing, some bubbling and eventually something like a boil, although the beaker wasn't over a heat source.
"That's it," Potter declared. "What do you think?"
"Will it work?" Delphi asked.
"It doesn't, usually," said Potter. "Not for a first-timer, like me."
"Why not?" Delphi wanted to know.
"I'm not sure that is well-understood," said Potter, turning as a creaky stair announced they had a visitor.
"Daphne," said Potter.
"Mum Daphne!" Delphi exclaimed.
"That stair," said Potter.
"Mum Daphne, be more careful!" Delphi ordered.
When she got to the bottom, Daphne drew her wand and stood before the stairs, reinforcing each one in turn. Delphi didn't know what spell she cast but the steps sounded like a marimba when Daphne's wand did its work. Delphi looked at her father, who shrugged.
"Maybe she should be the alchemist," Potter conceded.
"Maintenance 101," Daphne said. "Mother insisted, since I would be the 'Dame,' as she said, of a noble house someday, that I had to know how a true lady kept hearth and home suitable. The Seat to which my lord repairs after a hard day of lording about over kith, kin, heathens and all sorts of lesser beings. Where he lays his head on the lap of his helpmate and is restored to full vigor by her love and caresses."
"I don't think that would work right now, Mum Daphne," said Delphi. "There's no room for his head."
"Delphi, I'd be careful," Potter muttered, before turning back to Daphne. "What can we do for you?"
"Just checking. The life of Number Twelve goes on upstairs. Is everything quiet and regular down here?" Daphne asked.
"Fine. Our daughter is showing she has an affinity for alchemy. Or maybe it is laboratories, beakers, jars and jars of alchemical materials."
Delphi blushed at Potter's comments, looking pleased all the same.
"We're waiting to see if we have made a new Philosopher's Stone," said Potter. "If everything went well, the tiny fragment will be the catalyst around which a new stone forms."
"I thought we might all have a cup of hot chocolate together, on Delphi's first night back from Hogwarts," said Daphne.
"Great," said Potter as he turned toward his daughter. "You can just leave the apron and goggles on the stool and go. I'll finish up here."
So it went.
As would be expected, the conversation over hot chocolate was dominated by Ane asking Delphi questions about both large and minute aspects of life at Hogwarts. She didn't overdo, but Delphi edited out accounts of friction with any of her schoolmates. The obnoxious Lestrange wasn't even mentioned while the young witches were still up.
"There's a Lestrange at Hogwarts," Potter began when he and Daphne crawled into bed.
"That's just great," Daphne said. "When I'm in St. Mungo's you'll have something to do. You can duel a Lestrange."
"I'm not going to duel a Lestrange," said the mildly put-out Potter. "Delphi said the other one called her a 'bomation.' Can you imagine? She didn't know what it was."
"You told her, didn't you?" asked Daphne.
"Sure," said Potter.
Daphne's reaction was not encouraging, a long sigh and folded hands on top of the sheet.
"A sanitized version," he said.
"So, what else?" Daphne asked.
"Ah, I guess she had a disparaging comment about me, but that didn't sound serious. Delphi settled things down by giving her a look. That scary one. When she…"
"I think I know the one, Harry," said Daphne. "I'll have to see if I can get her to talk to me about it. The last thing she needs right now is a simmering conflict. It could follow her all the way through school."
"True, those happen," said Potter. "Caution her not to burn bridges. The story of how Draco and I got to where we can have a civil conversation is not really credible. It would be better if Delphi didn't have one of those situations on her hands as she's clawing her way to adulthood."
"You married me. My sister is married to Draco," said Daphne. "Force majeure. I must have tranquility while I decant your son."
"Exactly what I suspected," said Potter. "Always an ulterior motive."
With that, he rolled onto one side and pressed his back against his wife.
Potter had been staying close to the townhouse as Daphne approached her projected delivery date. Daphne thought that a bit overdone as she had not had any signs of the onset of early labor. Besides that, her healer was confident in her calculations.
Of course, the healer knew her business and young Cyrus Asturias Potter Greengrass arrived in accordance with the schedule. Delphi and Ane demanded to know when Potter would get himself motivated to commissioning a coat of arms for their new, noble brother. Potter said he would have to make an appointment with the proper person in the Herald's office, fill out some forms and turn everything in, including the documentation of young Cyrus' illustrious heritage. Only then would the Heraldry Office get busy creating the lad's arms.
"They'll call him Potter," said Delphi.
It was the morning of their brother's first full day on Earth.
The family, minus Daphne and Young Cyrus, was eating breakfast in the kitchen at Grimmauld Place.
"Why do you say that?" asked Potter.
"Dad," Ane began. "You're Harry Potter. Everyone knows. I think you're the most famous wizard in the world, so does Delphi, but Mum Daphne told us to keep it to ourselves because it isn't good to get TOO famous."
"Listen to your Mum Daphne," Potter growled.
"Everyone knows he's your son so even if you gave him so many names, people will just naturally call him Potter because his last name is Greengrass," said Ane. "That's what we think."
Potter glanced at Delphi, who nodded agreement with her sister.
"You might be right. In fact, I think there is a good chance you are right. Still, there might be people in the family who are attached to another name. Cyrus, for example. He is the young man's grandfather. I expect he and Lady Isabel will be extremely proud. They didn't have any sons. If Daphne hadn't married and given you a little brother, she and Astoria would have been the last of the Greengrass family. Scorpius was already the young Malfoy. You see?"
They didn't sound convinced when they delivered their, "Yeah, I guess," responses.
"People take those things seriously," said Potter. "You're proud to be Blacks, aren't you?"
Ane and Delphi swelled, visibly, looking at one another, their pride in being representatives of the Ancient, Most Noble, etc, etc, fully displayed.
"Of course, Harry," said Delphi. "Anyone would be."
"Anyone—who wouldn't?" added Ane.
"All I'm saying is your step-grandparents, Cyrus and Isabel, will no doubt be proud of having such a fine grandson carrying on their name, keeping House Greengrass going, perhaps for another hundred years. Of course, if he marries and has children, House Greengrass keeps marching forward, even beyond that. If the next hundred years thing comes about, I'll be long gone, Mum Daphne, too. You could have families of your own. Children, grandchildren, maybe even great-grands. All of you getting together for Yule, birthdays, a big bonfire on Samhain. You'll teach your children about uncles, aunts, cousins and how we all have fun together. They will learn about the holidays and how we keep track of the seasons with the help of the Wheel. You will help the family when they need it and ask them for help when you could use some. That's magical life."
"Will I have to let them kiss my hand?" Delphi asked, sounding genuinely fretful.
"Only if you want them to," said Potter. "You will be Dame Delphine. You will get to preside over any gathering of your descendants."
"What you say goes!" Ane nearly shouted.
"I can hardly wait," Delphi semi-affirmed.
Parents and teachers share an attribute, seldom acknowledged. The deeper meaning is just too frightening. Neither a teacher, nor a parent, knows where or when their influence will end. That is true, for good or bad, better or worse. The Black Witches' solidarity was already established, firmly, when they had their chat over breakfast. It began, afterwards, to take on characteristics of granite.
Young Cyrus Greengrass became the center of his extended family's attention from the moment of his arrival. He was subjected to coos, chin-tickling, passing around among groups of family members and other standard methods of greeting little humans.
Delphi knew her father had made a likeness of her birth mother using his wand and suitable paper stock. Her Mum Daphne kept it in a frame on her desk at home. She knew Daphne spoke to the picture now and then. Delphi had never engaged her late mother's picture due to some volatile feelings going back to her abandonment in the care of the unsympathetic witch Euphemia Rowle.
Delphi wasn't under orders not to speak with the picture. She had discussed all of that with Potter. She knew she was likely to blow up at Bella, partly because of the ill-treatment she suffered at Mrs. Rowle's house, partly because she missed out on all the mothering she was due.
'How could she?' would always make an appearance in Delphi's internal monolog. Of course, at twelve years, no psyche is capable of answering that question because there is no answer. Humans, magical or muggle, readily overlook certain obligations if they can convince themselves there is something even more important that they simply must do. Then they put off whatever they ought to do, substituting what they really want to do. They tell themselves they will get right back and do their duty as soon as possible, even if that duty is mothering their little girl while, instead, they are off helping the Dark Lord Voldemort kill Harry Potter. The best-laid plans of mice and men, of course…Bella didn't see it coming. To be fair, neither did anyone else.
"Mother—it's Delphi," she said.
The enchanted likeness her father made looked back, eyes steady, face neutral. Delphi waited.
"MOTHER!" she demanded.
"Are you here to forgive me?" Bella finally asked.
"Do you want me to? Forgive you?" asked Delphi.
"I don't deserve it," Bella admitted. "I wouldn't, if you were me and I was you."
"I wish I could have seen you, just once. When you were alive, I mean," Delphi said.
"This will have to do," said Bella. "If you have to be someplace…"
"Harry's my dad," Delphi declared. "The goblins said so. Ane and I are sisters, all the way."
"…"
"You didn't know. No one told you?"
Bella looked like she was trying to remember.
"I don't think so," she said. "One ought to remember something like that. There was a lot of confusion, there at the end. I'm glad I thought to send him to find Mrs. Rowle. I'm glad everything worked out, eventually. It came out better than it would have if we'd killed Harry. Even if that had freed me to come back for you."
Delphi pondered that statement for a long time.
"You're right," Delphi conceded. "I will be excusing myself now."
She found her father sitting at the dining room table, with Ane, painting. Each artist had a tabletop easel and several shallow saucers of water and pigment. It didn't strike Delphi as a table of incipient masterpieces, but she was willing to delay judgment.
"Are we going to Greengrass Manor this weekend, Harry?" asked Delphi.
"As I understand it," said Potter. "Why?"
"I just wondered," Delphi replied. "Why are we going?"
"Young Cyrus is Cyrus and Isabel's grandson. Someday, gods willing, he will carry on the family name, continue the Greengrass line that stretches back and back and back, hold the estate, the seat in the Wizengamot…What else? They want to welcome your brother, properly, to his holdings."
"Ah…" Delphi said.
"Comment?" Potter asked.
"No. I haven't seen that before," said Delphi.
"Do you remember when we first came to this house?"
"Yeah. It was kind of…scary," Delphi said. "I remember my skin felt all prickly."
"You were a young Black," Potter explained. "If we were ordinary or conventional Blacks, you would have been born here. Then you certainly would not remember when all the wards, charms, jinxes and family magic reached out to you. As it was, that happened after you were old enough to make memories. Do you have nightmares about it? Having to live through it all over again?"
Delphi and Ane both started laughing at the prospect of nightmares deriving from first experiencing Number Twelve. They seemed to accept that that was all just part of life as a Black.
Isabel and Cyrus organized a feast in honor of the new Greengrass Heir. Young Cyrus, at less than one week of age, spent an entire Saturday being welcomed to what would one day be his very own manor. Sleeping, happily, through most of the day, Young Cyrus was greeted by his grandparents and the elves, then carried through the house. He was assigned a bedroom of his own. Daphne used her wand to equip the room for a newborn.
Astoria knew the Potter-Blacks would be present, so she prevailed upon Draco and Scorpius to accompany her on a visit. A decade or two always dropped away when Daphne and Astoria reunited at their childhood home. They allowed Potter, Cyrus and Isabella to take turns holding Young Cyrus while they organized the garden-strolling with Scorpius, Delphi and Ane.
"Comments?" asked Potter.
The group was sitting in the shady section of the patio that overlooked the gardens.
"Beautiful baby," said Isabel.
"Fine young wizard," Cyrus declared. "Looks right at home here, doesn't he?"
Potter withheld observing his son would look right at home almost anywhere since he hadn't been on Earth long enough to be right at home in any specific place. He understood Cyrus was confirming Young Cyrus as his heir and namesake, as Potter had agreed when he negotiated for Daphne's hand.
"And no problems?"
Potter looked over at his mother-in-law.
"None," he said. "Daphne sailed right through. Exhausted, by the end."
"Your wife thinks she is sparing everyone any gory details, Harry," said Cyrus. "Always been that way. Hence Isabel's need for a second opinion."
"Cyrus," Isabella tutted. "Harry was there…"
"Yes. It was—well, it was a capital M moment, that is what it was. The Blacks were outside with Andromeda and Daphne wanted them to come in and meet their brother immediately. We let the professionals finish up, first. Then it was family time," said Potter.
The strollers began trickling back, Daphne and Astoria leading the rest. Daphne walked straight to where Isabella sat, Young Cyrus cradled in the crook of her left arm. She didn't say anything, but her body language indicated Daphne really wanted that sleeping baby back in her own arms.
"Sit?" asked Isabella as she slid closer to Cyrus.
Daphne accepted her mother's offer and promptly reached for her new son. Cyrus and Isabella offered the Potter-Blacks an overnight at Greengrass Manor. Potter yielded to Daphne who begged to put that off for just a few weeks.
"Will you be calling the lad Cyrus, Harry?" Cyrus Greengrass asked at one point.
Delphi gave her father a sharp look. He was aware of Delphi Black's opinion, that by the time he finished school, her brother would be known as Potter Greengrass, no matter what his parents and grandparents might envision.
"Right now, he's Young Cyrus," said Potter, earning an appreciative grin from Cyrus Greengrass.
Young Cyrus, his father, mother, sisters, Cousin Scorpius, Auntie Astoria and Uncle Draco all left the manor for their homes. The Potter-Blacks reconvened at Grimmauld Place. Delphi got her correspondence materials out and composed a short note to Mary Beth. She reported on Greengrass Manor, her step-grandparents and the other members of her extended family. Scorpius had asked Delphi to pass along his greetings.
She addressed a muggle envelope and put on muggle postage in preparation for dropping everything in a muggle mailbox the following day. From there, the bread-and-butter note would, theoretically, make its way to Mary Beth Olson at her muggle address near York.
"He's going to be Potter Greengrass," Delphi told her father.
"Could be," said Potter. "It does have a nice rhythm."
"Now that he's here, can we go for a sail?" she asked.
"It's traditional for a husband to stay near his wife and their newborn, at least for a week. Where did you want to go?"
"Cornwall isn't that far," Delphi observed.
"And Penzance has good pub grub," said Potter.
"Well-l-l," said Delphi.
"Newlyn?"
"I liked it!" Delphi answered. "Did you?"
"It's artsy," Potter admitted.
"It wouldn't hurt if we left for an hour tomorrow morning, went to the boat and looked around. We could make a list. Make-ready items to do before we plan an actual excursion," said Potter. "Want to negotiate with Mum Daphne?"
Delphi led the negotiations. She got permission for Potter, Ane and herself to apparate to the boat for up to ninety minutes. After that they should plan to be back so they could check on Daphne and Young Cyrus.
The visit went well. Delphi returned home to take a quill and some parchment, to draft a list of items she wanted Potter to procure for the boat. She had a plan for the Bella, to make her ready in advance, so they wouldn't have to do that in a rush later on. Ane unpacked her supplies and commenced memorializing the visit of her father and the Black sisters to their boat.
Later on, Potter and Delphi went down to their home alchemy lab. Potter picked up the beaker with the solution that was supposed to contain a new Philosopher's Stone.
"Aha!" he exclaimed as he emptied the liquid. "There it is!"
Potter held up a crystal that was not a great deal larger than the tip of an adult's little finger.
"Is that good?" asked a puzzled-sounding Delphi.
"Most witches and wizards fail once or twice," said Potter. "We started with that little chip, remember? Looks like we made one five or six times bigger."
He rinsed the new philosopher's stone, then shook off the liquid. Potter put the stone on a scale and pulled a spiral bound notebook over. He recorded the weight and compared it with the weight of the original fragment.
"We have, roughly, quintuple the stone, by weight," he said.
"Is that good?" asked Delphi.
"Top quality stones sell by the gram, so a five-hundred percent increase in weight would be worth the wizard's while, definitely," said Potter.
"Can I learn to do it?" Delphi asked.
"Sure. It's just measuring accurately, then following the instructions to the letter. Want to go into business?"
"What am I not hearing?" Delphi wanted to know.
"Ah—that is a very profound question, Delphi," said a smiling Potter. "Alchemists are supposed to be careful with the knowledge of how to manufacture philosopher's stones. Care to guess why?"
"Witches and wizards, some of them, get up to mischief…?"
"Exactly!" said Potter. "Thus, the ethical considerations. Know what those are?"
"I guess it means doing the right thing?"
"Yep. Or it might be more accurate to say it is doing the best thing for all concerned. We made our own philosopher's stone for some legitimate purpose. To use in a potion, for example. Another person might want one to use it in an explosive, let's say, to hurt someone or blast their way into a bank vault. If we gave that person access to our stone, that would be unethical."
"What if they used it for self-defense?" asked Delphi.
Potter was overcome by a memory, of standing on the deck of the Bella, two days' sail past Tobago, fending off an attack by some pirates in a rust bucket of a yacht. The pirates fired a warning shot through his mainsail and demanded he halt and wait to be boarded. Bella Black stiffened his spine and Potter sent the boat and its crew to the bottom of the Atlantic.
"Self-defense is always allowed," said Potter. "The problem is, you see, that if you're dealing with an unethical person to begin with, that person could be trying to manipulate circumstances to give them cover for doing something wrong. The thing they wanted to do, all along."
"Did you ever have to fight someone like that?" Delphi asked.
Potter felt he'd been bludgered again, as if he were back above the quidditch pitch, facing off against Marcus Flint. His daughter, at twelve, seemed to have a knack for pitting her father against moral conundrums drawn from his own colorful, all-too-often violent history.
"If I answer your question, will you keep it to yourself? We don't want to upset your Mum Daphne, and we don't want to give Ane nightmares. Okay?"
"Okay, I guess," said Delphi.
"That Dark Lord that I fought tried everything. He had a lot of people convinced that he was the one who could promote their interests. Like most of those types, all he wanted was absolute power, in his own hands, of course. He wouldn't leave it alone, when he had a choice. At the end, neither one of us would back away. I hope you don't think that is any kind of constructive situation for a young, talented witch such as yourself."
"Uh…no, not exactly," said Delphi. "Couldn't the aurors deal with it?"
"The Dark forces took over the Ministry. They had the aurors under control. Besides, lots of the pureblood wizards, and witches, wanted what they thought was the Dark Lord's program. He would promote the interests of purebloods, keeping halfbloods and muggle-borns out of Ministry jobs and any positions where they could promote their own group's interests."
"Slytherin was all Dark when you went to Hogwarts?" Delphi asked.
"Not all, but the ones who weren't kind of stayed quiet and out of the way," said Potter.
Delphi stopped asking questions, sitting for a bit, staring toward some indeterminate spot a few meters distant. Potter watched her take a deep breath, then let it out.
"Harry?" Delphi said.
"Yes?"
"Am I like her? Am I really an abomination? Like Lestrange said?" asked Delphi.
Potter wondered when he would get hit with that one. Now he knew. He'd assumed, years before, that his daughter would learn enough and begin putting everything together, or most of it. Then, like all children with difficult histories, she would be seeking answers.
"I promise to tell you everything, at some point," he began. "Right now, let me say this: I loved your mother. You want to know how that can be, don't you? The answer is people can change. Sometimes it is a natural process, like maturing, the simple passage of time. The scatter-brained youth ages, gains experience, studies a little and so on. The brain gets organized. That is how I understand it. When I met your mother for the first time, face-to-face, without either of us having any backup standing by, there was some kind of exchange. We spoke frankly. We spoke from our hearts. I knew then that she was not the person she portrayed in public. She knew I had a conscience and wasn't a simple hunter and killer of purebloods. Magic. What more can I say?"
Potter shrugged, sending his daughter a half-smile.
"When was this?" asked Delphi.
"Late winter or early spring," said Potter. "Ron, Hermione and I were on the run, sleeping in a tent in the woods."
"I was born just before you fought him," said Delphi. "She was pregnant with me."
Potter was rocked, literally, back on his lab stool.
"Yes," he whispered.
Potter felt all wobbly, trying to cope with the revelation his daughter delivered. He had to admit she was right. The timing of the midnight visit from Bella meant he had spoken to the witch who, at the time, was expecting his child.
"She had to have been, didn't she?" he confessed.
"What if one of you had killed the other one?" asked Delphi.
"Let's not spend any time thinking about that," said Potter. "She would have known about you by then. She'd have thought you had a different father."
"So would you. You might have killed her, to stop me," said Delphi.
"Maybe. I hope not. We liked each other. As individuals. Even then. I can still feel it, in here."
He tapped his chest, right over his heart. Delphi sat, very still, staring.
"Magic," said Potter.
"Hmm?" Delphi wanted to know.
"That's got to be the answer. Magic. Right now, it seems to me that Magic had to have been working out the solution, all along. Luckily for you and me, the good side beat Voldemort and his crowd. Before she died, Bella thought to tell me about you and send me to check and see if you were okay. Magic saw to it that you were returned to me. Now, I'll raise you up as a proper Black witch."
"Thanks, Harry. That's just what I want to be," said Delphi.
He thought he could see some sniffles coming on, but the Black witch stayed in control, at least long enough to turn to the stairs and go back up.
Potter sat on his lab stool, staring, well after Delphi had left the dungeon. How had he never put Bella's pregnancy together with their encounter in those woods? Potter felt the proverbial chill as he thought it over. He also thought about all the things that could have gone wrong. Bella drew her wand, which was the trigger that resulted in him casting expelliarmus. He could have cast something much more harmful.
He remembered telling Bella he should just kill her right then and be done with it. He meant it, at the time. The only reason he hadn't was his enemy was standing before him, disarmed. The act he contemplated felt a lot like murder, an offense he was not yet prepared to commit. Potter's stomach was churning. Merlin and Morgana! She was carrying Delphi! That meant Potter had given serious consideration to killing his first real lover and their child.
He focused on his breathing as he waited for his head to clear and his muscles to return to his control. Potter thought he had faced up to a lot of responsibilities so far in life. He felt, suddenly, that the sky was off its props and only Harry Potter would be tasked with holding it up. What random alloy of events and Magic had resulted in Potter getting such responsibility overload?