Comfortably seated on the couch, Harry Potter was observing his girlfriend, Daphne Greengrass, as she concentrated on reading the parchments scattered haphazardly across the coffee table between them. Daphne wasn't one to display excessive emotion while attending to what she considered business, but Harry could discern the precise moment frustration began to crease her features. Her usual air of haughty confidence, which Harry loved, gradually transformed into a frown of disapproval, hinting at the promise of sorrow and pain for whoever had caused it. Despite the circumstance, Harry still found Daphne infuriatingly adorable, even as she appeared to be contemplating someone's demise.

"Bad news, I presume?" Harry inquired once Daphne set down the final paper and her icy blue eyes shifted to him.

"Indeed. You – you were right," Daphne admitted with obvious disappointment. "It seems the Muggleborn Registration Commission hasn't been fulfilling its duties after all. Not as it should have been, at least," she concluded after having finished reading the dossiers of the current muggleborn population of the Azkaban prison.

"Told you," Harry gently reminded her, prompting a look of annoyance from Daphne that quickly softened when she realized he wasn't being smug. To be honest, he would have preferred Daphne had been right all along and the Commission had been conducting its work in line with Daphne's pureblood philosophy. While Harry mostly disagreed with it, he knew it would have been an infinite improvement over the current situation, and in many respects, also over what they had before the war.

But sadly, Harry had foreseen any organization led by Dolores Umbridge would be rotten to the core, with no regard for ideals – a fact Daphne had failed to acknowledge until now. "This is serious," Daphne stated solemnly. "They're unjustly sentencing far too many Muggleborns to prison, even those who could have been dealt with through less drastic measures."

"Agreed," Harry concurred, nodding encouragingly as he glanced between her and the papers. "So... what do you plan to do about it?" he inquired. Harry knew Daphne wouldn't simply leave the issue unresolved now that she was aware of it. Although he suspected she might already have a plan in mind, it seemed that wasn't the case.

"I... I don't know, Harry. I need more time to think," she admitted, her tone tinged with helplessness and weariness.

Harry offered her a weak smile, fully understanding. It was a distressing topic, and they had been grappling with it all morning. Not only that, it had been a horrible few days – Hermione's ill-fated escape attempt had nearly jeopardized everything, but thankfully, that was now behind them, with his former friend secured tighter than if she were in Azkaban. The impending consequences for Hermione troubled him deeply, but Harry had resolved not to dwell on her any longer. She wasn't worth the concern and was clearly uninterested in his help.

Instead, what preoccupied Harry at the moment was Ron. The specialists in mind healing, who had been discreetly summoned, had confirmed that an entire year of Ron's memories would need to be excised to free him from the bracelet's influence. Harry found it bitterly ironic that it took Hermione's escape attempt for them to discover the bracelet still encircling Ron's wrist. Aside from the personal horror of losing a year's worth of memories, this posed a multitude of other problems. Namely, Ron would have no recollection of the Horcrux hunt or their time at Greengrass Manor, including Harry's relationship with Daphne and especially what had befallen Hermione. Both Harry and Daphne were preparing memory vials for Ron to view after the procedure. Also, Ron was writing letters to his future self to explain everything. But it still felt insufficient; nothing ever would be enough. Ron's situation also posed a strategic dilemma for the war effort, as Harry had hoped to reach the Weasley family and their allies through Ron, but that wouldn't be feasible if Ron had no memory of where he was or how he got there. Ron had suggested postponing the operation until the war was over. It was a tempting proposition, however, the healers advised against it, recommending it be done as soon as possible.

Harry recalled Ron's attempts to dissuade him from the operation altogether, insisting he was content to spend the next decade or so as Astoria's bodyguard. The healers had assured them that the bracelet's influence would naturally wane over time, making Ron's proposal technically feasible. Astoria had even supported Ron's idea when she heard about it, pledging not to exploit his vulnerability. Despite Harry's reservations about his future sister-in-law, he believed she was sincere this time. While the situation was her fault, she seemed genuinely remorseful and ready to make amends. Ron seemed rational when they discussed it and Harry could see in his eyes he truly wanted this. But how could Harry be certain it was Ron's decision and not just the bracelet's influence speaking through him? In the end, Daphne and he had deliberated extensively but ultimately concluded that allowing Ron to serve as Astoria's potentially unwilling attendant for a decade was not an option.

"Let's take a break then," Harry suggested to his weary girlfriend, who eagerly agreed. With lunchtime approaching and their stomachs protesting loudly, he added, "Why don't we eat?"

"Good idea. I'm famished," she confessed.

Harry nodded before deciding to inject some levity into the situation, a mischievous smile gracing his features. "And since I was right..." he began before concluding with a wink, "... you know what this means."

It took Daphne only a moment to grasp what he was referring to. "Oh, come on!" she exclaimed in frustration, reminded of their earlier bet. "Now?!" she half-heartedly protested, though her melancholy was already dissipating, exactly as Harry had hoped.

Harry shrugged. "Well, it's rather convenient, considering we're both hungry," he said innocently. "Besides, I've already taken the liberty of making the arrangements."

Daphne rolled her eyes at his deliberately pompous speech. "Fine!" she snapped petulantly, crossing her arms defensively. "Let's just get this over with."

Harry smiled and called out, "Dobby!"

The house elf popped into the room, eager to fulfill great master Harry Potter's wishes. Harry quickly explained the situation, sharing a look with his sulking girlfriend. Dobby congratulated him on his 'victory' and vanished, returning moments later with a large plate levitating in front of him. With a flick of his wrist, Dobby gently lowered it onto the coffee table between them. Harry thanked him, eliciting more odes on his greatness from the enthusiastic elf. After bowing to both Harry and Daphne, Dobby bid them a hearty appetite and disappeared.

Alone once more, Harry grinned at Daphne, who eyed the plate warily. "After you," he said gallantly, gesturing towards the food, while also relishing the moment. Daphne rolled her eyes at him one last time before reaching forward with her delicate hand and picking up a slice of hot pizza from the plate. Their gaze remained locked as Daphne blew on the slice a few times before taking a bite.

An outside observer might wonder why Lady Daphne Greengrass, the head of the most ancient and noble house of Greengrass and a staunch pureblood supremacist, was indulging in a pizza.

You see, earlier, when Harry suggested Umbridge and her Commission were up to no good, Daphne insisted otherwise. It led to a brief argument that culminated in a bet between them. The stakes Harry proposed in case he was right was that Daphne would agree to eat muggle-style food for lunch or dinner with him.

The idea had struck Harry as a playful way to tease Daphne, who decisively avoided anything related to muggles. On a more serious note, it was part of Harry's ongoing effort to convince his pureblood girlfriend that muggles weren't entirely without merit and could offer valuable contributions – a campaign in which he had thus far failed miserably.

It had begun with Harry mentioning the Apollo 11 moon landing, which he had learned about in muggle school. As far as he knew, the magical folk never went to the Moon, so it was something muggles accomplished first. Much to his dismay, however, Daphne responded by having Sue Li fetch a copy of an old study from the library. It detailed a wizard's experiment with extending the range of portkeys all the way to the Moon's orbit. Though the wizard never ventured there in person, he collected numerous samples from its surface using automated portkeys. Ultimately, he concluded there was nothing of interest on the Moon that warranted sending a living being. According to Daphne, the more intellectually gifted muggleborns who submitted to her family since 1969 inevitably tended to request funding for magical recreation of the Apollo 11 landing. And each time, Daphne's family had dissuaded them from the idea, citing the study and the fact that even muggles had ceased lunar exploration due to lack of significant findings.

Harry had learned his lesson with the Moon landing and for his next attempt chose something more earthbound, so to speak. Namely, he attempted to introduce Daphne to the concept of muggle television and movies, confident there was nothing comparable in the magical world. Yet again, he had underestimated her. The blonde merely grabbed his hand and led him to the room where she kept the pensieve, showing him a setting that allowed for interactive exploration of memories. In this mode, one could observe the memories as if they were occurring in real-time, rather than from an external perspective. It allowed exploring memories for alternative choices, which sounded amazing to Harry. Even more, Daphne showed him bottles containing commercially produced "memories," designed to be experienced as interactive narratives, either alone or with a partner. Harry tried one and had to admit it far surpassed cinema or television in terms of immersion. Additionally, the pensieve had a significant advantage over muggle entertainment – time spent within it could be compressed for the human brain, allowing for hours of enjoyment while mere minutes passed in the real world, minimizing interference with one's daily life.

Having failed twice to demonstrate the value of muggles and their culture to Daphne, Harry was determined to succeed with his latest idea. Regardless of magical abilities, all humans had to eat. In addition, the advantage the magical folk had over muggles in almost every other way was non-existent when it came to food. Gamp's Law, as it was known and commonly understood, stipulated that food could not be conjured by magic. In reality, anything could be conjured, but doing so with food took such a large amount of magic and control it was impractical for anything but experimentation. According to a book Harry had read in the Greengrass library, it had something to do with the intricate and highly complicated three-dimensional structure of the molecules that made up the food. He had even discovered a spell to conjure a powder containing the basic elements of these molecules, though it tasted like sludge and was not conducive to long-term health. Nevertheless, it served well as a last resort in emergencies, when starvation was the only alternative. Harry had immediately learned the spell, regretting not having known about it during the Horcrux hunt.

In any case, after wondering what dish to choose, Harry settled on pizza as the quintessentially muggle food, enjoyed universally due to its variety of toppings. Of course, his fantasy to have Lady Daphne Greengrass nibble on pizza ran into the challenge of where to get it. It wasn't feasible for him to visit a muggle pizzeria, nor was it prudent to risk ordering the elves to do it for what was essentially a jest. Harry had contemplated baking it himself until the Greengrass house elves intervened, informing him they were capable of preparing a wide variety of muggle dishes. He was surprised by their revelation but was informed that they had anticipated such a demand since learning the future Lord of House Greengrass was raised by muggles and likely accustomed to their cuisine. As a precaution, they had acquired muggle cookbooks, just in case.

Not for the first time, Harry was amazed by the house elves' uncanny ability to anticipate the needs of their masters and mistresses – and also by their cooking skills. After allowing Daphne to take the first slice, Harry dug in as well and soon found himself forced to admit that it was probably the best pizza he had ever tasted, despite it likely being the first time the elves had ever baked one.

"How is it?" Harry inquired of his girlfriend after a while. He had made sure all the ingredients on the pizza were Daphne's favorites, so she couldn't outright reject the dish on that ground alone. Harry anticipated a neutral response to his question, but to his surprise, Daphne replied with enthusiasm.

"It's truly delicious," she declared, echoing his earlier thoughts.

"I… I'm surprised to hear you say that," he admitted honestly.

"Why? Because it's a muggle recipe?" Daphne queried with a raised eyebrow before shaking her head. "Ah, Harry… how little you think of me," she remarked with mock complaint. She took a few more bites while observing Harry intently. "Of course, you realize every single ingredient in this pizza is inherently magical... right?" she suddenly interjected, her smile coy.

Harry paused at her words, his gaze shifting between Daphne's knowing smirk and the plate before them.

"Yeah, I know," he confessed after a moment. When he focused on it, Harry could discern the magic surrounding the pizza slices, his vision otherwise blinded by the aura emanating from magical sun that was Daphne. Ever since she had taught him how to utilize his magical sight, Harry had grown accustomed to seeing magic permeating every corner of the Greengrass manor, forgetting to consider that real muggle food wouldn't possess such a quality. "If it were truly a muggle pizza, I wouldn't touch it," the pureblood girl remarked casually as she continued to eat with relish, enjoying the apparently magical pizza.

Meanwhile, Harry paused in his consumption, staring at her with open-mouthed disbelief. "So you're saying if it were the exact same pizza, only non-magical in origin... it would somehow be inferior to this one, and you wouldn't eat it?" he clarified, unsure if he had understood correctly.

Daphne nodded. "That's precisely what I'm saying," she confirmed.

A year ago, Harry would have dismissed such assertions as the ramblings of bigoted fools. But here and now, he found himself seriously considering Daphne's words and the food before him, wondering if the presence of magic somehow affected the taste. It was true the pizza tasted exquisite. It was also true he had always enjoyed food at Hogwarts and now at the Greengrass manor far more than with the Dursleys. But he suspected that was more due to the Dursleys' poor treatment than the presence of magic. "Surely food is food…" he mused absentmindedly, uncertain of the answer.

There was a brief silence, prompting Harry to tear his gaze away from the pizza and towards his girlfriend. He immediately sensed he had unwittingly walked into a trap when he saw Daphne smiling triumphantly.

"Is it, really?" she questioned with a cutting undertone, her grin deepening. "I suppose we'll just have to see, won't we? Just like you, Harry, I've also taken the liberty of making arrangements," Daphne paraphrased his earlier pompous words, intensifying the uneasy feeling of doom creeping over Harry.

"Kreacher!" his girlfriend called out.

The old elf popped into the room, delighted to serve his beloved pureblood mistress once again. Spotting the pizza on the table, he asked before Daphne could even speak. "Master doubted you?" he inquired, a hint of disappointment in his tone.

"He did, Kreacher," the blonde girl confirmed, her tone equally tinged with disappointment. But hers was faked as Harry could tell Daphne was actually immensely enjoying the spectacle, even pouting at Harry after answering Kreacher's question.

"Will Mistress be punishing the naughty Master?" the elf then inquired, nearly causing Harry to choke on his pizza. Leave it to Kreacher to relish the prospect of his pureblood girlfriend teaching him a lesson. There was a reason why it was Kreacher who usually brought them snacks after their more unconventional bedroom activities. The elves didn't miss much, and seeing whips, gags and other items scattered around the room might have embarrassed most of them. But not Kreacher, who viewed it as a perfectly natural order of things given Daphne's superior blood status.

Meanwhile, Daphne chuckled at the elf's words, fixing Harry with her merciless gaze that flickered with hints of arousal, no doubt already envisioning some of those punishments. "Perhaps later," she finally responded, speaking more to her boyfriend than to the elf who had asked the question. Harry instinctively gulped. "For now… bring it," she commanded the elf, who bowed almost to the floor before disappearing. Just like Dobby, it was only a few seconds before he returned, carrying a plate.

"Here be nasty muggle pizza," Kreacher announced with disdain, hastily placing the plate on the table as if it was on fire. "Thank you, Kreacher," Daphne acknowledged his assistance, prompting one last deep bow from the old elf.

Then they were alone once more and Daphne focused solely on Harry. "This pizza is made of premium-quality muggle ingredients of the same type, you have my word," she assured him. Meanwhile, Harry eyed the new pizza warily ever since Kreacher had brought it in. Against the ever-present ambient magical background permeating the Greengrass manor, it appeared devoid of magic, unnerving Harry more than he cared to admit.

"You knew you might lose the bet," Harry accused her, staring at her incredulously. "So you took it as an opportunity to teach me a lesson," he continued. When the smirking blonde didn't deny any of his accusations, Harry shook his head. "You… are truly unbelievable," he said before smiling and blowing her a kiss across the table, a gesture that Daphne returned while also adding a teasing wink. Harry reckoned being in a relationship with a Slytherin wasn't easy, but it sure as hell was exciting.

"You do have an annoying tendency to be right about things," Daphne remarked, admiration for him overshadowing the hint of reprimand in her voice. "A girl has to take precautions when dealing with you, Harry Potter."

"Riiight," Harry droned even as he reached for the new pizza, ignoring the uncomfortable feelings it stirred within him. He picked up a slice and took a bite. It smelled and tasted virtually the same as the first pizza, proving Daphne wasn't lying when she said it was made from equivalent muggle ingredients. But that's where the similarities ended. To say Harry didn't like the new pizza would be an understatement, as what he truly wanted was to pick up the plate and smash it against the wall. Then he wanted to stamp on it a few times before burning it with his magic to ash! It was a truly strange experience for him. The new pizza tasted fine in his mouth, yet he found it utterly revolting, not in physical sense but spiritually. It was an eerily familiar feeling. Harry reckoned he could probably ignore it and plough through somehow. But then again, why should he when he had a perfectly fine magical pizza next to it that he vastly preferred?

Finally, Harry couldn't take it. He put the slice back on the plate, unable to mask his disgust anymore. He looked up at his smirking girlfriend who watched him with amusement while casually munching on her slice of delicious magical pizza. "Okay, I give up. What's wrong with it?" he finally asked.

"The same thing that's wrong with the mudbloods, Harry," the blonde answered, standing up and joining him on his side of the table. Harry's arm automatically went around her waist. Now that she mentioned it, Harry finally realized where… or rather with whom… he had experienced the same feeling of creeping but ultimately irresistible disgust. How strange to have a pizza and his former friend elicit the same feelings from him.

"Here… this will help," Daphne said sympathetically, handing him a black pouch with grass, moon and stars embroidered on it with silver threads. "Put a little of it on the second pizza," she instructed him when Harry opened the pouch and saw there was finely ground green herb inside. Doing as he was told, Harry picked up some of it between his fingers and sprinkled it on the half-eaten slice he previously put down in disgust. To his amazement, he could perceive a magical aura materializing around it seemingly from nothing. "Looks much better, doesn't it?" Daphne mentioned, watching the sudden appearance of magic as well.

"Yeah," Harry admitted, picking up the slice and looking it over with interest. Deciding to give it another shot, Harry realized the feelings of revulsion were gone when he took a bite. If he were to be completely honest, he still preferred the first pizza, but he would have no trouble finishing this one now. Harry put the slice down and looked at the pouch with the green powder more closely. "That's the stuff your people are growing in the greenhouses," he mentioned, which Daphne confirmed. Harry remembered Ron mentioning even his mom was using it in her kitchen. "It adds magic into food?"

"That's right," the girl confirmed. "It's a major source of income for my family," she informed him. "There are more such additives on the market, but ours is one of the best," she told him with pride. When he asked her why, she explained. "Ours contains the most magic per unit of mass while also being completely tasteless," she told him. It took Harry a moment to wrap his head around a spice being considered the best for having no taste at all. "Just try it," Daphne suggested, and Harry obeyed, putting a little bit of the green powder into his mouth. Just as Daphne said, it had absolutely no taste at all. And yet there was something pleasing to it. Harry supposed if the goal was to add magic into an otherwise mundane food, then the lack of distinctive taste would be a desirable quality.

"And before you ask, no, I can't sprinkle this on a mudblood and give them physical magic," the pureblood girl said suddenly. "This is food… it's trivial to infuse it with magic because it's already dead. Mudbloods are alive, which makes their lack of magic so much worse and far more difficult to fix."

"I wasn't going to ask that!" Harry protested.

"No, but you were thinking about it," Daphne shot back, looking at her boyfriend challengingly and daring him to deny it.

Harry sighed. "Yeah, I was," he admitted, looking at the two pizzas in contemplation. Here he was hoping to teach Daphne a lesson, and it ended up being the other way around. It didn't even feel like he had won the bet at all. Although he supposed that if she had won the bet, Daphne would have been riding him around the grounds right now after temporarily transforming him into an animal. Harry suspected that despite his victory, she might do so later anyway…

"Alright, Professor Greengrass," he told her cheekily as if speaking to a teacher. "Then riddle me this – where did the magical ingredients for that first pizza come from," Harry asked with genuine curiosity. "Was the spice also used there?

"No, Mr. Potter" Daphne shook her head, continuing his joke as she addressed him like a pupil. "Most of the food you ever tasted in this house was made from genuine magical ingredients. It's considered something of a luxury. Few people can afford it."

After being exposed to near starvation with the Dursleys, Harry struggled for a moment with the concept of having been eating luxurious food. "Why can't they afford it?" he wondered.

"Because," the blonde answered, picking up a slice of the pizza for emphasis, "… in order to make cheese with natural levels of magic in it, you need a magical cow to produce the milk."

Harry honestly laughed at the term 'magical cow' before probing the beautiful blonde with even more questions. "And I take it magical cows are rare?" he asked, suppressing the urge to giggle at the words.

"They're non-existent," the pureblood girl corrected. "You have to start with a mundane cow and make sure it's infused with magic," she explained. When Harry asked how that's accomplished, Daphne smiled and said, "You already know that. It was the largest fight we ever had," she reminded him.

Harry gaped at her in shock. "Y- you mean the magic transfer?!" she stammered.

Daphne nodded seriously. "In many ways, it's actually easier with the mudbloods as their magical soul is aiding the process. With the animals, it takes far longer… several generations, in fact. You need to take a pair of them and have them and their descendents serve you continuously until they accumulate enough physical magic."

Harry thought about that for a second before something occurred to him. "But there are also naturally magical animals… like flobberworms or unicorns," he pointed out.

"Correct."

Again, Harry was silent for a while as he contemplated the implications. "It almost sounds like there are purebloods among the animals as well," he whispered, lost in thought.

Daphne smiled. "Yes, I strongly suspect our ancestors were inspired by animal breeding when coming up with the terms and facing the issue of just what to do with the mudbloods."

Harry continued to look thoughtful. "Ron told me his family was famous for breeding magical animals in the past," he said next, seemingly unrelated to their previous conversation.

If Daphne found is sudden change of topic odd, she didn't let it show. "He's right. If I remember correctly, some of his ancestors went so far as to claim they have invented the process," Daphne acknowledged. "As far as I know, they didn't. But they were arguably the best at it for a very long time."

"He also told me they lost their business when his ancestors became pro-muggle," Harry pointed out. "That, to punish them for their views, other wizards and witches wouldn't buy from them anymore."

"And? Do you think that's what happened?" Daphne asked with curiosity, her icy blue eyes studying him intently.

Harry was silent for a while before saying, "If- if it's the same as with muggleborns, then I think… I think they might've lost their ability to breed the animals when they stopped seeing themselves as superior," he suggested and saw Daphne give him an immensely proud look.

"I really love you, Harry," she whispered fervently before nodding in agreement. "Yes, I too suspect that's what happened. Our ancestors stopped buying from them not so much to punish them, but rather because they could no longer do their trade effectively," she suggested before shaking her head. "It's ironic, really. Trying to help people in wrong way made them destitute, and in the end… unable to help anybody."

Silence settled between them as they both digested the conclusions of their discussion and ate more pizza. In the end, it was Harry who broke the silence first. "So, stuff like magical cheese is expensive because it takes a very long time to breed magic into mundane animals?"

"Exactly," Daphne confirmed. "It also takes a lot of manpower to conduct fully magical agriculture," she added. "It's far cheaper to just buy the food from muggles and add a little of our spice, which is what most wizards and witches rely on."

Harry once again almost choked on his pizza as she mentioned that. "Our people are buying food from muggles?!" he asked between the coughs. When Daphne nodded, he asked cautiously. "And you're okay with that? How is that even accomplished?" he wondered. It's not like he ever visited a grocery shop in Diagon alley and asked where the displayed food came from. All his meals in the magical world came from the elves at Hogwarts or from restaurants. Harry had also never heard of magical fields or farms aside from those dedicated for potions ingredients.

Daphne smiled at his shock. "Harry… I've never claimed muggles have absolutely no uses at all. In fact, endlessly toiling in dirt and manure is something they are uniquely qualified for," the blonde pointed out with a wicked but beautiful smile that Harry hesitantly returned. "As for how it's done, nowadays it's all part of a global system set up by the ICW. It makes sure that there's neutral balance of trade between us and muggles. Otherwise, we would eventually drain our economy of gold and crush theirs with inflation."

"You mean… we sell something to muggles as well?" Harry summarized. "What is it?"

"Anything they are making at the time," Daphne answered. "Only using magic, we can make the manufacturing process infinitely more effective and dirt cheap while selling to them at full price," she explained and grinned before adding. "I expect you know what this means."

"We… we are getting the food from them for nothing," Harry extrapolated.

"Almost nothing," Daphne corrected. "There are still various expenses, but it allows us to keep the price of food really low compared to the muggle world."

"And that's okay?" Harry hesitantly asked, his initial instinct screaming in the nagging voice of his former friend how it wasn't fair to the muggles at all.

Daphne honestly laughed. "That's the beauty of the arrangement. The muggles are really happy with it!" she told him, surprising Harry. "They get goods from us we can make cheaper than they ever could, while we get the food. Both sides are happy."

Now that he thought about it, Harry could see her point. "Still… Hermione would go nuts if she heard about this," he mentioned, practically being able to see and hear her ranting about how the magicals were exploiting muggles with such an arrangement.

Daphne's expression twisted up at the mention of Hermione. "Yes, I'm sure she would… which would be ironic as the system benefits her kind greatly. It's what allows them to exchange their muggle money for ours at reasonable rates. Without the trade arrangements, nobody would be interested in their printed paper thrash. They would be utterly destitute when entering our world."

The two of them slowly finished their meal. At the end, Daphne turned to him and asked in a cheeky voice. "Now, Mr. Potter… is there anything else you wish to know?"

"Actually, yes, Professor," Harry admitted while picking up the black satchel from the table. "This herb… what's it called?" he wondered, realizing it wasn't mentioned at any point of their discussion.

Daphne tensed at his question before looking slightly embarrassed for some reason. "It has an old elvish name… literally, it translates as green grass."

Harry blinked. Once, twice. Then he started laughing. "S-seriously?" he managed to get out between fits of laughter.

Daphne narrowed her eyes at him. "Just for that, you are making me a handmade mug for my birthday, Harry Potter," she said, stressing his surname. Then she added with a quite growl. "And if I don't like it, you can say goodbye to your orgasms for at least a week," she threatened, her hand firmly touching his lap for emphasis.

Harry immediately stopped laughing after that.


Astoria never liked the Greengrass vaults. Aside from a few genuine valuables, it was mostly a repository for the countless magical fuck-ups her ancestors had accumulated over the millennia – all the twisted experiments with unintended results that couldn't simply be destroyed. Added to that were the research endeavors of the Wild Hunt as a group, resulting in a veritable exhibition of ill-conceived goals and questionable research ethics. Due to the compromising nature of many of the items, only the head of the family and heir had access by default. Everyone else needed the head's permission to enter the vaults.

For this reason, Astoria had been stymied on how to gain access without going through Daphne, which would have alerted her sister to her actions. Astoria had spent hours trying to devise a clever plan to break in before realizing it was unnecessary – with her older sister being the head of House Greengrass, Astoria, for the moment, was the heiress presumptive, allowing her to simply walk in. It was probably an oversight on her sister's part, but she wasn't complaining.

From time to time, Astoria couldn't help but envy Daphne's power a little bit. But seeing the vaults again made her glad she wasn't the head of the family, as the idea of being responsible for everything inside made her ill. Thank Merlin her future family historically focused on trade instead of magical research! Astoria knew for a fact there was nothing like this hidden in the depths of Malfoy manor. She had once explicitly asked Draco about it. To her joy, after searching the manor from top to bottom, Draco reported finding mostly old dusty contracts. In fact, the most exciting thing he discovered was a set of exotic poisons and various deadly weapons concealed as female jewelry. It would seem several centuries ago, one of the Malfoy women was a budding assassin, and it was her old kit Draco found, carefully hidden in the attic. It was perhaps slightly disturbing, but Astoria could live with that.

Another reason why Astoria didn't care for Greengrass vaults was they were, in her opinion, a perfect example of pureblood hypocrisy. For times immemorial, her family had insisted muggleborns needed supervision and firm guidance as they entered the magical world. Her ancestors wrote numerous treatises on how dangerous it was to leave mudbloods on their own. One of the repeatedly stated reasons was that without supervision, muggleborns caused disasters while experimenting with magic. Yet, as she walked through the vaults, Astoria was literally surrounded by the results of magical disasters her pureblood family had caused. Granted, her ancestors were able to contain their mistakes, if not fix them. Astoria also knew for every failed experiment, there were many more successful ones. But in the end, one of the arguments her family had for subjugating muggleborns was to stop them from doing what Greengrasses had been doing all along. They wanted to put a check on muggleborns' ambitions while their own ambitions knew no bounds.

Astoria once questioned her sister on the apparent hypocrisy. Daphne's answer was that magic could not possibly bear the damage that would occur if every new muggleborn was allowed to experiment with their powers freely, over and over with each new generation. Astoria suspected her sister might be right about that. Actually, seeing what was in the vaults, she was certain Daphne was right. But that didn't make the situation any less unfair to the muggleborns. In the past, the purebloods heavily benefited from being able to run the potentially magic-damaging experiments. They were still benefiting from them to this day. Yet the same opportunity for advancement and development was being denied to the muggleborns, by claiming it's too dangerous and magic can no longer take it.

Astoria finally reached the vault room she was looking for, one storing the more useful objects. She had no trouble locating the box she was looking for, as it was still standing on the table in the center, likely left there by Daphne after recently taking it off the racks. A quick search through the box, and Astoria was pulling a golden necklace out. Holding it by the chain, Astoria lifted it up, examining the thing that dangled in front of her eyes. Slowly, smile plastered itself on Astoria's face as she realized her plan might work after all.

After a moment of introspection, Astoria placed the necklace into her pocket. She looked around nervously while doing so, imagining how angry Daphne would be if she knew she was taking it out of the vaults without her permission. Her sister would be even more furious if she knew what Astoria was planning to do with it. With one last contented smile, Astoria turned around and walked away.

As she exited the vaults, her hand absentmindedly brushed the place on her neck where Granger's blade cut her. This time Astoria actually managed to smile while doing so. Very soon and with a single action, she would help a friend and take responsibility for her actions, while also having her rightful revenge on Granger. And the best part was the murdering bitch would never even know about her revenge. She would never know of the potential future that Astoria was going to take from her forever.