Heir of Hogwarts

Chapter Nine

Epilogue

Graduation Day

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Every heir is doomed to die a heroic death. I pity the heir of us all. That person will not have a good life, they will not die a painless death.

~Godric Gryffindor

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"...I present to you the graduating class of 2007!" said the Headmaster, loudly.

Seventh year was ended. Around Easter Harry had been kidnapped and taken to Godric's Hollow to face his final battle with the Dark Lord. Needless to say, he won.

Liz and Gavin had to put their wedding day of for three months due to Harry's injuries, but it would go on. They'd married in August instead.

Draco and Anja had started dating shortly after Christmas break, but broke up around the time that Ginny and Harry had gotten back together. Anja moved to Iceland to be with her new boyfriend, a Muggle named Mark. Ginny had dumped Harry, dated Michael, dumped Michael before he went back to the states, and gotten back with Harry.

Ron cleared his throat at the Graduation feast his mother had made and slung his arm around Cho's waist. "I have an announcement to make!" he yelled over the fray. It quieted down in about five minutes. "Cho and I are, erm," he trailed off, turning beet-red. "Cho and I are going to have a baby!"

The news was not met with the best of reactions. His mother started to yell at him ("Ronald Weasley, I thought we raised you to make better choices than that!"), his father congratulated him after he slapped upside the back of the head and told him that he sometimes thought Ron didn't have the sense God gave a duck. Bill and Charlie told him he was going to be a horrible dad, and Fred and George started singing lullabies loudly.

"And--Mum, that hurts! And, um, Cho's due in four months. So, um, we're going to find a place to live and I'm going to get a job and.." he trained off again, since he was fending off hexes that were being sent at him by his mother.

Fred turned to Draco and whispered. "What I want to know is when were they alone long enough to conceive a baby. Unless he went to her apartment for Christmas vacation..."

Unfortunately for Ron, his mother heard this and he was attacked with a strengthened offense.

Four months later...

"It's.... It's... It's twins!" shouted a excited and exhausted Ron Weasley to a full waiting room at St. Mungo's maternity ward. "Identical boys. We're naming them James and Henry! And-" He fainted, from staying up since yesterday afternoon at four, and now it was noon, and he had stayed with Cho the entire time that she was in labor. They had gotten married two months after announcing Cho's pregnancy, making Mrs. Weasley a much happier woman.

Liz walked into the waiting room. She had gone downstairs to get coffee for everyone, but she arrived to hear the news. She and Gavin had married on August 16th, ten-thirty in the morning. Draco attended, as the escort to Hemione. It was a interesting wedding. There were not many humans, as most of Liz's families were leprechauns, so there were five hundred leprechauns, and one hundred humans. Many of the humans that attended the wedding were friends of Gavin or his family.

Her gown was long and white, except for the long red slash down the back. When asked what it symbolized, Liz would answer cheerfully: "It symbolizes the recent death and/or the shedding of Wall family blood."

One month after their wedding, Gavin had been sent by the "authorities" of Lorien to Siberia, which, according to Liz, wasn't good.

"They only do that to test your loyalty to Lorien. They think that you should never be loyal to anyone but them," she'd say bitterly.

In the waiting room Liz grinned at Ron as he regained clarity. "Now what should buy? I mean, I only planned for one kid, so maybe it's not big enough..." she trailed off sinking into thought.

"What'd you get us?" he asked excited. Liz bought people really nice presents.

"Well, I found this absolute gem of a cottage about fifty miles from London. The opposite side of London of where your parents live. It's got five bedrooms, not including the master bed and bath, and seven full baths. A great-great uncle of mine owned it. It has some excellent protection spells around the grounds and it's perfect for a family of four, I suppose, but it seems rather small to me."

"No, no, no, no, no. That's perfect," he said hastily. "Just perfect, wait till Cho hears this..."

Liz turned to Ginny and grinned wider.

"I went to the, erm, doctor day before yesterday," she said eagerly.

"And what did he say?" asked Ginny in the same tone.

"He said that I'm going to have a baby! I sent Gavin an owl to tell him the news, but it came back this morning with 'Return to Sender' stamped on the envelope. And there's only one explanation for that. Either they have him, or he's.... he's...he's...Oh, God I can't say it! I can't even imagine him dead! I don't want to, I just love him so much!" she broke into tears and sank into the chair next to Ginny and buried her head into Ginny's shoulder as Ginny soothed her.

One month later...

Draco, Ginny, Harry, Hermione, Ron, Cho, and the new Weasley twins went to visit Liz at her London house, which was actually about thirty miles west of London. The found her sitting on the stairs staring at something in another room.

"What is it, Liz?" asked Harry.

"G...go look," she stuttered.

It was Gavin's body in a wooden coffin. A piece of paper was nailed into his chest.

It read: 'THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS IF YOU BETRAY THE COUNCIL OF LORIEN BY REVEALING ANYTHING YOU HAVE EVER LEARNED OR HEARD HERE. WE HAVE HEARD THAT YOU ARE ALSO GUILTY OF SUCH ATROCITIES, ELIZABETH WALL! WE ARE COMING. THERE IS NO WHERE YOU CAN HIDE. WE WILL FIND YOU!'

The walked out into the foyer again and saw Liz dashing up the stairs. They followed her into her bedroom, and watched her pack magically.

"I can't stay here," she said. "They'll come and try to kill me." She whipped around suddenly and looked at all of them. "I know somewhere where I'll be safe, at least until the baby is born. It's only another six months, so that won't be hard."

"Can't Eilena protect you?" asked Ginny.

"If I wanted her to die too, yes she could. She wanted to stay with me, but I sent her back to my estate. She is rallying the leprechaun army to take bake their ancient castle Lorien, the one the leprechaun butchers took when they were going to enslave the leprechauns. I need a favor. A really big favor. Can I ask it of you?"

They looked at each other. "Sure," they all said.

"Great. I need one of you to raise my baby for me. After she's born, I'm going after the Council, and most likely I'll take them down at the same time they kill me. Funds are no problem; she'll inherit everything that I have. Every house, car, broomstick, the Quidditch team...Everything. But I need someone to raise her. Preferably all of you. You could live in one of my castles, or mansions, and I can arrange for you to all have a very nice income while I hide. As I've said, money is not, and never will be for my descendants, a problem. All I want is for my daughter to have a normal life. Kind of like you did Harry, until you found out about your being famous and all, but I want her to grow up a normal witch, like most do."

"I just have one question, Liz," said Ron.

"Yeah Ron?"

"Who's the master mage?"

Liz laughed. "I thought you'd have guessed by now. It's me. I have too much power for the scale to balance, Ron. That's why my fate is to die an early death. I always knew that I wouldn't live past twenty, but when you know that you're a marked man, or woman, it hits you like a ton of bricks. Now, I have to pack. My steward will come by as soon as my final plans are made. The only thing I need to know is this: Who's going to raise my baby?"

They looked at each other and nodded.

"We all will," they said simultaneously.

"We know that you can't avoid your own fate, so we aren't going to try to avoid ours," said Ginny.

"But where should we live?" asked Harry.

"Here at the Silvain mansion," said Liz. "There are about eighteen bedrooms and at least twice as many bathrooms. And it's equipped with House-Elves, who I offered freedom to, but they refused. They said that they'd serve the House of Wall until Doomsday. There. All packed. Now I only have to say my good-byes."

She turned to the group with tears running down her cheeks and hugged each of them in their turn.

"I'm going to miss you guys," she said thickly. "But this is the last time you'll see me, so make the best of it."

They went downstairs and saw Liz off. She waved at them as her car pulled away and yelled good-byes at them all. When she was out of sight, the turned and went inside to explore the house.

Two weeks later....

They had all moved into the Silvain mansion and gotten settled the week before. Now, they were waiting for Liz's steward to come and serve them the Guardianship papers.

Two weeks after that....

"Now, if all of you will sign on the dotted line, then we can move on to salaries," said Eilena, who, as it turned out, was Liz's steward.

They all signed on the dotted line and looked at the leprechaun.

She cleared her throat. "Now, as my mistress is not, erm, accessible I will be proposing your individual salaries." Eilena scribbled a amount on a piece of paper and slid the paper over to Ron.

His eyes went as round as dinner plates. "Five thousand galleons a month?"

Eilena frowned. "Isn't it enough, Mr. Weasley? Liz said that we could go as high as ten thousand a month, but really no higher."

"Oh, no, it's not that. I was just expecting something like five hundred galleons a month but not this much."

Cho smiled at Eilena and squeezed Ron's hand so hard he yelped. "We'll take it," she said firmly.

Seven months after that...

It was May 2009 and still the baby hadn't come. They went to bed after preparing the nursery for the expected arrival.

About an hour after midnight Ginny woke up. She was a light sleeper and woke up whenever anyone but a Weasley made noise. No one knew how she could tell Weasley noise from someone else's noise, but she could. She had woken up because she heard a baby wailing downstairs. In an instant her mind was clear. The baby was here! She woke up Harry--they had gotten married on Valentine's day that year-- and went to bang on the doors of everyone shouting, "The baby's here! The baby's here!"

A short while later they were standing around Ginny, who was holding a small bundle of baby blankets.

"Look! There's a note," said Cho. She took the note, that was tucked in the blankets and opened it and read it aloud.

Dear everyone, it read.

Greetings from the Shetland Islands! It's too bloody cold, but cold is good for absorbing magical battle. Anyway, may I present the new duchess of Sleane and Montecrecy Island, Merriam Elizabeth Juliet de Montecrecy-Wall, my sole heir. Don't worry about feeding her; she will drink Muggle 2% milk out of a bottle, heated up to 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit. I am on my way to Ireland to meet with the army that is marching towards Lorien to meet in the final stand against the Leprechaun butchers. I am not going to survive the battle, you all should know that. I will be lucky to have my body be recognizable after I go up against the Trustee's. I know that this is hard to deal with, but I have known it since I was small. Take care of Merriam, please. And give her the letter attached when she turns eleven and prepares to go to Hogwarts. And remind her that I loved her the moment I knew she was going to be born.

Faithfully, friendly, sadly yours,

Elizabeth Wall

They stared down at the baby and wondered at what was in store for them over the next eighteen years. Young Merriam went to sleep, not knowing that her mother would be found on the drawbridge of the castle Lorien, sword in hand, laying amongst the bodies of the Council of Lorien, and not knowing that for the next eleven years she would be fighting for her life.