September 6, 1993

"Dementors. At you bloody well gone insane?"

This was at least the fourteenth time Amelia had yelled something along those lines to the Minister, but it hadn't as yet done anything. Neither had any of her other attempts to do something about the situation, and it was growing increasingly frustrating, particularly since she had spent the entire weekend fending off parent complaints. Instead of, you know, actuallydoing something about the murderer on the loose.

Sometimes she had to remember that she was doing good work as the department head, even if it meant dealing with paperwork and politics more than the fieldwork she did miss on occasion. Now was a good example of that, since Fudge had somehow managed to look good while simultaneously breaking her well-kept mental records of idiocy. Quite an achievement, that.

As Cornelius's excuses washed over her, she spotted one person she would have never expected to call upon as a potential ally. Desperate times and all that.

"Ah, Lord Malfoy," she said, interrupting what was no doubt an entirely unpersuasive argument for why the dementorsabsolutely had to be there. "Are you here to file a complaint about the dementors' presence at Hogwarts as well?"

Malfoy lifted a single eyebrow. "Although I am opposed to their presence so close to our children, I believe your office has far better things to do than deal with complaints you can not do anything about," he said, before turning towards the Minister. "I must admit I am curious, Minister, why exactly the decision was made to send dementors, instead of a team of aurors or such?"

"Well, I took your advice to heart, Lucius. It really is time that the Ministry put its best foot forward and take a firm stance on dealing with the situation at hand."

Amelia had to hand it to him. Fudge was an expert at talking a lot while saying very little. Malfoy on the other hand looked like he was one breath away from losing his perfect control over his facial features. The beginnings of an eye twitch were certainly there.

"And what exactly was that advice?" Malfoy enquired. "I'm afraid I am having a difficult time recollecting."

"Why, you told me that as Minister I ought to take a more active role in the situation, instead of a reactive one," Fudge said, managing to sound proud.

Amelia leaned forward slightly, ready to see Malfoy's perfect pureblood mask drop, but at the last moment he recovered. She could admit, if only to herself, that she was mildly disappointed, having hoped to see definitive evidence that she wasn't the only one currently suffering from Fudge's idiocy.

"Madame Bones, do you have a few moments to spare?"

"Of course, Lord Malfoy," she said, hiding her surprise well. "If you would just follow me."

"That's it. I'm done. You're turn."

Luna looked at Lucius with amusement. "Harry's in the next room if you'd like to speak with him."

Lucius's face colored slightly. "I apologize. I… Yes, I'll be going then. Not that you… Never mind," he muttered, walking quickly out of the room.

Luna often found Lucius much more amusing than the others. He seemed mildly flustered around her sometimes, though she still couldn't figure out why.

"Your wife is terrifying," Lucius said, alerting Harry to his presence.

"Mywife?" Harry had to make sure he wasn't hearing things.

"Yes."

"But she's so nice," Harry said with a small frown.

Lucius sighed. Harry did not know why Lucius was sighing, but he supposed it could be because he didn't have a bloody clue what Lucius was getting at. "She could take over the world."

"Well, yeah, of course she could. But she's never expressed an interest in doing so. Why? Did she say something?"

Lucius just stared at him for a moment. "You two really are perfect for each other, you know that?"

Harry agreed, though he still wasn't sure why Lucius was saying it like that.

"Now," Lucius continued, "how about you take your non-world domination focused enthusiasm and apply it to getting the dementors out. And maybe Fudge while you're at it. Amelia was ever so helpful is pointing out that neither of our efforts have done any good thus far, nor are they likely to."

"So you want me to make them go away?"

"Yes," Lucius replied, looking very much like an eighteen year old Draco Harry had once known. The resemblance was disturbing, but he supposed familial resemblances did have to come from somewhere.

"And your plan isn't working because…"

And now Lucius looked like an eleven year old Draco. Well, at least Draco had come by it honestly.

"Irecommendedto the Minister that he take a more active approach to dealing with the situation. I meant it as a way to send aurors instead of dementors, or actually track the madwoman down instead of just waiting for her to appear, but apparently he took it as encouragement to place the dementors there. Besides, I can't very well push for their removal too aggressively. Neither can Black, for that matter. I suppose a few of the others could press a little harder, but so far parent complaints, even from those Fudge will inevitably have to face in the Wizengamot, have done nothing to sway him. Amelia can't get through to him, and I want this taken care of before any of my children get their souls sucked out by a dementor that strayed too far."

"Your children?" Harry asked with amusement.

"Our chil…Thechildren."

"Mmhmm. And since when is she Amelia to you?"

"We bonded over the idiocy of Cornelius Fudge," Lucius deadpanned.

"Yeah, that'll do it," Harry muttered. "Alright, so why me though? What'd you mean you can't push too hard?"

Lucius gave him a very unimpressed look. "Please try to remember that Bellatrix Lestrange is my sister-in-law."

"Right," Harry grumbled. He could have done without that particular reminder.

"Make no mistake; that woman is mad and dangerous, and I would much rather see her dead than within a hundred miles of my son, but the world does not easily forget your blood."

"Indeed," Harry mumbled. "And I suppose that same could be said of Sirius as well."

Lucius nodded and Harry sighed.

"Fine. I'll… do something more. Any suggestions?" What an interesting direction his life had taken, for him to now be asking advice of Lucius Malfoy.

"You could do it yourself, I am sure, but if you have one or two others behind you, preferably people to whom there would be no objection or accusations of aiding the fugitive…"

Harry caught on to what Lucius was trying not to come out and say. "You mean if I ask Augusta really nicely," he said with a cheeky grin. Oh how he enjoyed the look of pained resignation on Lucius's face at that moment.

"Yes, well, I suppose that might aid somewhat."

"You can just say it, you know."

"You are all ruining my reputation," Lucius grumbled.

September 26, 1993

"That bad?" As soon as Harry said it out loud he regretted it. Snape's glare didn't help either.

"Whatever gave you that idea," Snape drawled in a way that was apparently a multiversal constant.

Harry cleared his throat. "Right. So, what did you need to speak with me about?"

Snape continued to stare at him for moment without saying anything. Most people would probably be uncomfortable by that point but Harry was long since immune to that type of stare. Finally Snape spoke. "I think I liked it better when I believed you might possibly be the Dark Lord's replacement," he said. "Albus still thinks you are, of course. Well, he thinks you might be the Dark Lord himself at any rate. Minerva, on the other hand, has assured him that you are Canadian and therefore can't possibly be the next dark lord, or a reincarnation for that matter. I believe her exact words were, 'you've never heard of a Canadian dark lord, now have you?'"

By this point Harry had his head on the table in front of him. "Why me," he muttered to no one in particular.

Snape didn't even acknowledge his complaint. "So of course, Albus listens toher, as if I haven't been telling him more or less the same thing for the last year. He's not entirely convinced, of course, but since when does evidence matter to him," he said a bit bitterly.

Harry couldn't really blame him.

"And now, in all his 'greater good' nonsense, he's stopped eventryingto get the dementors removed, because he sees it as a good way to test your daughter's magical power and prowess."

Harry was about to say exactly what he thought about that, but Snape waved him off. "Don't worry, he has me continuing the work on her patronus, and I'm afraid I've always had a talent for understating things at times."

Harry exhaled with what was both a chuckle and a sigh of relief. "Are the boys still working on it?"

"I'm afraid so," Snape answered. "Longbottom's bear is satisfactory, I suppose."

"Either of the others get a clear form yet?"

"Not quite, although they both have the beginnings of one. Zabini's was looking suspiciously feline, and a brief glimpse of Draco's looked far too similar to those blasted peacocks for my taste."

They both shuddered minutely at mention of the Malfoy's peacocks.

"Well, good. That's good. Hopefully they'll both get it down soon then. Anything else?"

"Well, I suppose congratulations on your most recent status change are in order."

"My what?" Harry briefly (and with absolutely no sense of panic) thought back to the last few times he had been in Gringotts. The goblins had been as happy as ever, but he didn't think they had managed to get anything past him. He hadn't signed anything either, so…

"It seems you are now officially Ivy Potter's father, as opposed to her guardian."

"Sorry?"

"I believe it started with young Miss Nott's declaration to Ivy that she had, and I quote, 'the best dad ever.' I believe both Nott children held you somewhat responsible for the, how shall I say,lackof reaction to the surprise sorting?"

"I really didn't end up doing anything," Harry said.

"Be that as it may, your willingness to involve yourself at the very least made an impression, and since Miss Nott declared you 'the best,' her simultaneous and unrelated declaration of you as Ivy's father has caught on. I believe you graduated from Uncle to Dad. So congratulations on that."

"Thanks?" Harry didn't know how he was supposed to respond to that. "I think it sort of just… happened? That's probably why Ivy didn't correct her or anything."

"Well your other nephews seem to have secured your previous title."

At Harry's confused look Snape did what could be considered the Snape version of rolling his eyes (since Harry was sure Snape didn't actually do things like that).

"Longbottom, Zabini, and Draco have all taken to calling you 'Uncle Henry.'"

Oh, well that kind of made sense. "There are worse things to be called," Harry said with a shrug. Now if he could just get them to change it to UncleHarry… Ivy had always insisted on Henry, saying it fit him better, but maybe there was still hope for the other three…

"Indeed," Snape said with a slight drawl.

September 30, 1993

"Is it weird being back here now?" Ivy asked.

Adrian and Terence both shrugged.

"A bit," said Adrian.

"Has it always been this quiet at the Slytherin table?" Terence asked.

Kenneth Burke, sitting across and down a few spots from them lowered his book and peered over it at the group of quidditch players before shaking his head and resuming his reading.

"I'm pretty sure Gryffindor is just loud," Adrian answered.

"Well, how was Hufflepuff?" Ivy asked.

"Good, good," Adrian replied. "They're so happy all of the time. I don't think I've ever had so many younger kids following me around."

Ivy snorted, having some idea ofwhythe (mostly female) Hufflepuffs had enjoyed having Adrian around two of the past four weeks. Just down the table Kenneth snorted from behind his book as well.

"Well, you must've liked it, right? Or you wouldn't have gone back for the last week?"

Adrian shrugged. "Yeah. It was good. Liked it better than the other two anyway."

Terence nudged Adrian and gestured up to the head table. "Is Professor Snapesmiling?"

All three looked up at the head table, and sure enough, Professor Snape looked like someone had just told him he was getting unlimited potion ingredients for Christmas. Or something. None of them precisely knew what could land a look like that on his face.

"He's just happy to have Weasley gone," Kenneth said, eyes not leaving his book.

The three turned toward him now. "Which one?" Adrian asked.

"I would say both of them, but I think it is more especially to do with the one that came back."

"Well, Fred did say he wanted to try out Slytherin," Ivy said with a shrug.

They ate in silence for a moment after that before Draco came in and joined them. His smile was nearly identical to their head of house's.

"Missing someone?" Terence teased.

Draco's smile didn't falter. "I know you are trying to rile me up, but it won't work," he said cheerfully. "I just survived my second week with Fred Weasley living in such close proximity and nothing you say can ruin this morning's joy. It's quite a lovely morning, wouldn't you agree? Pass the tomatoes, would you?"

Kenneth levitated the dish down.

"Thank you Burke," Draco said. "Now, the twins have gotten it all out of their system, so Slytherin can go back to being…"

"Good morning, dragon," a chipper voice called out.

Ivy, Terence, and Adrian all watched with rapt attention as Draco's face lost it's cheerful visage, going first to anger, then to irritation, before finally settling on resigned.

"And it was going so well," Draco sighed, before picking up his plate and heading over to the Hufflepuff table, Cedric and Hannah making room for him without a comment.

"Morning," Fred said cheerfully, taking Draco's now vacated spot.

The others all chorused their greetings.

"Aren't you supposed to be back at the Gryffindor table?" Terence questioned.

"Probably," Fred said.

Ivy nudged the two other boys and gestured up to the head table. Professor Snape's smile had been replaced with an eye twitch, noticeable even from that distance.

"All in a day's work," Fred said with a wink. "Pass the potatoes?"

Kenneth once again obliged, though the bowl did take a quick detour to land briefly (and with a tiny bit of force) on top of Fred's head.

October 2, 1993

"If you two ever pull something like that again I am going toeviscerateyou," Angelina hissed to the twins.

Fred and George both gave her their best expression of innocence.

"Someone had fun in Ravenclaw," Fred said. He got a smack to his stomach for his trouble.

"Five weeks," Angelina said. "This has been going on for five weeks."

"Well, to be fair, I kind of thought they'd have stopped by now," George defended.

"You really believed that?" Alicia asked skeptically, joining their hushed conversation. "Oliver isn't going to back down on any idea of how to make quidditch more intense."

"To be fair, we didn't really calculate quidditch into our plans," Fred replied.

"Obviously," Terence muttered under his breath. So maybe the conversation wasn't quite as hushed as they had thought.

Just then their quidditchdictatorscaptains joined the rest of the players on the field. To be fair, both the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff captains were a little nicer about this whole thing. Wood and Flint didn't believe in niceties on the quidditch field, however, and today was apparently their turn to run drills again as Wood pulled out his ridiculously loud whistle and Flint began shooting fireballs into the sky.

The group of fifth years collectively groaned.

"All right. Today's practice will be focused on dodges and rolls," Wood called out.

Flint looked positively gleeful. They all groaned again.

"Remind me whose fault this is again?" Adrian muttered.

"Fred and George," came the nearly collective reply.

"Ivy," said Cedric. When everyone else looked at him he just said, "What? They were worried about their quidditch teams so Ivy suggested they hold a combined practice for the first couple weeks. A shoe camp or something?"

"Boot camp," came a simultaneous response.

"Yeah, that one," Cedric said.

"I'm still blaming the twins," Alicia said.

"Same," came multiple responses.

The twins in question just shrugged. "At least we'll all be really prepared for next year's olympics," George stated.

"Let me guess. A new event?" Terence asked sarcastically.

George just grinned at him.

"Hey Flint, feel free to throw a couple extra fireballs over this way," Angelina called out, jabbing a thumb in the direction of the twins.

"I have never been so exhausted in my life," Draco complained on the way back to the locker rooms. "Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse, it did."

"Well, at least you didn't get singed," Ivy said.

Draco grinned at the memory of Fred getting one side of hair singed off and George losing the bottom few inches of his robe. "Yeah, that was pretty great," he said.

Ivy rolled her eyes. "I'm sure they'll settle down," she said. "Everyone is back in their houses now anyways."

Draco shook his head. "Nope. You gave them all the inspiration we never needed them to have. Flint and Wood are unstoppable now."

"Well, at least they graduate this year?" Ivy said.

"Oh thank Merlin," Draco said with an exaggerated sigh.

October 7, 1993

"Alright, we have thirty minutes before our meeting with Professor Flitwick, so let's get started."

Seven fifth-years sat in a semicircle, waiting for Weasley to continue.

"Now, as you know, we have had a vested interest in Ivy Potter's… success, over the past few years. Unfortunately, we will no longer be able to continue with this level of attention after this year, seeing as we will both be graduating," Weasley said, gesturing to Thomas who was sitting next to him.

"So you want to recruit us," Terence inferred. He had wondered why Marcus and Wood were there too. He wasn't sure which pair he feared more at the moment.

"And I'm the only girl you could find?"

Terence couldn't remember the Hufflepuff's name.

"Sorry Bridget," Thomas said. So that was her name. "We tried."

Weasley cleared his throat. "Yes, well, that part's not important."

"Because Angelina said no," one of the twins said.

"And Alicia," the other one added.

"And every fifth year Slytherin girl."

"And Ravenclaw."

"We didn't actually ask any Ravenclaws," Weasley interjected.

"Why not?" Cedric asked. "I thought this was about helping Ivy study?"

"Well…" Weasley looked a little nervous.

Thomas sighed and pulled out a stack of parchments. "Here is the list of books we have done our best to direct Ivy away from. Ongoing, mind you."

Terence wasn't loving the way this was going.

"Now, we of course don't want tostifleher, or prevent her learning. It's just…"

"We'd really like Hogwarts to remain standing past the next few years," Thomas concluded for Weasley.

"Hey, we are doing an excellent job with that," one of the twins said vehemently. Terence thought it might have been George. He would have never thought he would be sitting here, thinking of how one of the Weasley twins was the (albeit occasional) voice of reason and restraint in any scenario ever, yet here he was.

"And we appreciate your efforts," the older Weasley said.

Terence really needed to remember his name. There were too many Weasleys here for him to keep referring to them all by their surname.

"But we just think it might take a bit… more than that. Especially given the amount of time you spend in the library."

"Fair point," the other twin said.

"Okay, wait. Can we go back to why you didn't ask any of the Ravenclaws?" Walker asked. "Wouldn't they be perfect for this?"

Christopher Walker was making a wonderful point. Terence liked the Hufflepuff even more than he did during their week in Gryffindor together.

"Well…" Thomas started, obviously not quite sure what to say, even as he gestured at his lengthy booklist.

"They're afraid Ivy is going to get too many ideas and take over the world," Marcus said from the back.

"Now that's not exactly..." Thomas began, but Percy stopped him.

"We'd rather not have anyone likely to encourage her to research more obscure or arcane texts than she already does," Percy explained. "Not that we're keeping her from being friends with the Ravenclaws. Not at all. We just…" He gestured vaguely but everyone seemed to get the idea.

Next to him Adrian cleared his throat. On the other side of Adrian the Hufflepuff girl (Bridget, that's right), looked amused.

"So you want us to hide library books?" Adrian asked.

Weasley and Thomas both looked pained.

"Just, don't suggest books on weather," Weasley said.

Thomas glared at the redhead. "You said you weren't going to bring that up."

"It's a good example."

"It's… Oh fine," Thomas grumbled.

"Don't encourage hurricanes in the dorm rooms," Marcus said again before getting up and walking to the front. "And don't let her neglect quidditch."

"Is that the only reason you two are here?" Cedric asked the two quidditch captains.

"Yes," Marcus said firmly.

"And to offer moral support," Wood added. "But mostly quidditch."

"And we shall not fail you, oh captain, our captain," the twins chorused.

Wood just rolled his eyes. "I was talking to Cedric, but good. I'll hold you both to it."

"I'm sorry, but what was that about hurricanes exactly?" Bridget asked.

At that question there were couple grins, mostly from the twins and Adrian, who all knew what was being referenced, a visible eye twitch courtesy of Thomas, and a few perplexed looks from the Hufflepuffs.

"It's really not that important," Thomas insisted. "But maybe I suggested a book, and she may have possibly been practicing in her dorm room, where asmallhurricane was conjured. It really wasn't that big of a deal."

"So essentially you want us to… not do that."

"Yes," Thomas ground out, sounding slightly pained.

Terence sympathized with him greatly at that moment.

"Okay, we are all talking about the sweet little third year, right?"

Everyone turned to look at Walker.

"What?"

"First lesson," Thomas said firmly, "sweetness and chaos are not mutually exclusive."

"Second lesson," Percy continued, "boredom is chaos's enabler."

"Third lesson, quidditch is a great distraction from taking over the world and also a great way to make sure we don't hunt you down for letting all our hard word go to waste," Marcus said with a tone of finality.

"We really…" Weasley began.

"No. That's all they need to know. Go protect babies," Marcus said, shooing Weasley and Thomas out the door.

"Protect babies?" Adrian mouthed to him.

Terence just shrugged and shook his head. He had no idea but he was happy to leave before they got recruited into doing something else.

"Oh, and Ivy found out about what they were doing last summer, so tread carefully," Wood said, before he and Marcus departed as well.

"Well, I'm sure everything will be fine," Cedric said, using his best "I'm reassuring because I'm a Hufflepuff" voice.

Terence personally thought the prefect's time in Gryffindor had ruined the effectiveness of the voice. And also probably the other wizard's ability to view things from a reasonable standpoint. Of course he himself had willingly returned to Gryffindor for a second week, so he probably didn't have much room to talk.