The High Priestess

"No!"

The word was uttered with much emphasis, making it clear what Harry might do with his bio-improved mash of carrot and lamb, actually not his own idea, but Cho's newest acquisition and supposedly a high-energy food for two-year-olds.

No doubt - had his daughter's vocabulary been large enough, she would have expressed her opinion with the obvious suggestion.

But then, Harry could imagine anyway.

Well, hadn't he known? He had, after a short glance at this jar on which a smiling moon of fat with eyes, totally unlike his daughter, promised happiness among all family members as soon as the contents were manoeuvered down a young throat. Still, Harry had agreed to give it a try, if only to make a caring mother happy, a mother who - at suppertime for their daughter - would be found in her office.

Harry stood up to shove it - into the waste bin, thereby raising satisfaction in the face of his high-energy daughter. Well, truth to be told, in himself too, although to a lesser degree.

Carefully suppressing a grin, he started to get a replacement ready: rice pudding with turkey. Calling it a foolproof menu was the understatement of the year; the stuff in the trash bin had been Cho's desperate attempt on finding any variation in the supper for this very determined bundle which, to the outside, went for a perfectly normal baby girl of almost two years. Had been doomed right from the start, Cho's attempt.

Harry had to be careful with his feelings. It would be difficult enough to confess the failure to Cho, even without the triumphant smile in the angelic face of the little monster. Faster than any words, this smile would tell the monster's mother that daughter and father had reached full agreement upon the matter.

Thank God - Sandra coudn't read yet his mind as Harry could read hers. Yes, sure, it was just a question of time, and in a year, two at the most, they'd be on par. But for the time being, Harry was grateful for the unbalanced state. He could read in his daughter's mind like in a book, while Sandra caught only stronger emotions - from a mind as trained in jaho as Harry's. In contrast, people less experienced in hiding their intentions were easy prey for the girl.

Her mother, for example.

Sandra Catherine Potter, this was the girl's official name as it would appear on documents. This name was the result of long negotiations between Harry and his wife Cho. The mother's choice had been Catherine, after recovering from her disappointment when Nagini, Harry's snake, had told them no, it wasn't a boy inside Cho, it was a daughter.

"Damn, I should have known," Cho had muttered, "how could I ever expect a boy from such a father? You've started collecting daughters five years ago, and who am I to stand in your way?"

Harry had grinned. "If I remember correctly, you've been lying underneath - more or less." Then he had quickly apparated from one chair to the next, until Cho had laughed so hard, she could no longer chase him.

"Let's call her Cassandra," Harry had said, raising a shock of disbelief in Cho. He had been serious but chanceless - no way with his young wife, whose determination had found a worthy heir.

So they agreed on Sandra Catherine, which left quite some room for nicknames of any colour and taste.

Normally, Cho called her daughter 'Cass.' For serious business, she called her 'Catherine,' and if she would start addressing her as 'Sandra Catherine,' both daughter and father knew it was time for a compromise.

According to Cho, the business work in the office represented the easy part of her day. Negotiating about a few million dollars seemed child's play, compared to the efforts of keeping her position as the major educating force in the Potter family.

It wasn't that Harry could be accused of siding with his daughter against Cho. No, the girl simply had inherited the stubbornness and determination from her father, and the determination and temper from her mother. She was hell on legs, with the legs part being true only since recently, and considerably less reliable than the other half.

---

There were just two people who could handle Sandra without ever encountering a battle of the tenacious kind, invariably lost by the opposite party. One was her father, who normally called her 'Sandy' - quite a joke with the girl's black hair - and occasionally 'Sandra.' Soon after a quick and uncomplicated birth, it had made click between father and daughter; since then, the two were inseparable, had almost always the same opinion, and communicated through channels closed for anyone else.

Of course, part of it was Harry's trick repertoire - mind waves, for example. One in particular, the tickling wave, made his daughter helpless within seconds. Harry used this weapon with care, und usually only to balance out between the girl and her mother.

The second person who couldn't do wrong with the girl called her 'Little Dragon,' or 'Sun Dragon,' developed from 'Sandragon,' or just 'Sunny.' This person was her godmother, who recently had started her last year at Hogwarts and who came to visit not more often than she could afford, or so she said: Rahewa Lightfoot.

Sandra Catherine loved Rahewa. Rahewa adored the girl, and as Harry knew, she kept pestering her adopted parents to follow the good example and get a baby child running, if you please, no matter which sex.

To be precise, there was still someone else doing extremely well with Sandra Catherine: Nagini. The snake called her 'Missy,' and Harry had to register with mixed feelings that the girl's vocabulary in Parseltongue grew quicker than that in plain English. He explained it to Cho with the simpler structure of that language, while Cho would't tire hinting that their daughter might learn English faster if her father would cut himself shorter on his telepathic tricks.

Probably she was right.

On the other hand, once the girl had mastered a word, it came out almost flawlessy. Sandra hated imperfection. She would use a word only after being pretty sure that she could pronounce it properly. And nobody in the Potter household used baby language.

Cho didn't; when she wanted to express her tenderness in words, she used Mandarin. Harry didn't; he used mind waves for the same purpose, or he put his lips on this incredibly large head and started humming. And nobody else dared.

It was one out of few rules, although the one that raised a little row between Harry and his adopted mother. It had happened not too long ago, caused by another of the girl's big determinations.

Sandra hated diapers. For compensation, Harry had learned to be extremely attentive in the most likely timespan each day, to catch his daughter and hurry to the bathroom before it was too late. Both daughter and father waited impatiently for the age in which Sandra's control over her own body functions would be sufficient to hold on for more than a few seconds. And Sandra had learned to indicate her state of urgency with a single word: "Shit".

Ma Weasley looked disgusted, hearing it for the first time. She tried to establish nonsense terms like poo, big job, or number two.

"Stop it, Ma," Harry had said. "It's undeniably shit, Sandra knows what it is, and she can express herself. Please use normal English when talking with her."

Ma Weasley had snorted something about seven children, and inexperienced fathers, at the age of less than twenty-three, and that she could do without his admonitions. Then she had gasped when Harry told her that he wasn't going to force anyone to anything, least of all her, only that then she might communicate with her grandchild through letters.

This had been followed by a little speech from Ma Weasley which lacked any baby language, instead came very much to the point. However, since then, the issue was settled.

In some sense, Ma Weasley had been lucky. Harry had listened to her suada, just smiling, not getting angry at all. Otherwise, the scene would have ended with an accident. If Sandra really got upset, you better ducked low - to avoid dishes and other items sailing through the air. And someone upsetting her father, so much so that she could sense it, was in for a nasty surprise of the hurtful kind.

---

The rice pudding had disappeared - completely. Sandra's mastering of spoons was still limited, but her ability to move food into her mouth, one handy piece after the other, was flawless, though somewhat frightening for the unprepared Muggle. Now Sandra looked at her father with great seriousness.

"Shit."

"All right, my princess, then let's go to your next throne." Harry stood up to snatch his daughter out of the high chair.

Sandra shook her head and smiled at her father. "Summon!" Next moment, her face looked a bit strained - sure sign that Harry better got jumping lest he cause a disaster.

He apparated into the bathroom, summoned his daughter, and managed just in time to get her pants down before a large, healthy-looking pile of body waste landed in the pot.

The girl stood up and inspected her result with great satisfaction. Then she presented her back to Harry for a clean-up - with a spell of the gentle kind; after all, who'd use something as rough as paper on such a nice ass.

* * *

Cho Chang-Potter, chief executive officer and majority shareholder of Groucho Industries, sat in her luxurious office and stared at the display on her flatscreen monitor. The flicker-free surface presented a list of names while Cho tried to think about the persons behind the names, and about their abilities.

Her own name since her marriage was the result of a remark. The remark had been issued by Almyra, Cho's best friend, Rahewa's adopted mother, and Harry's sister in spirit. "Cho Potter?" Almyra had wrinkled her nose. "Sorry, but that sounds like a machine cutting potatoes in the kitchen."

So it had been Chang-Potter. For Cho, the idea of keeping her old name alone had been out of discussion - for reasons related to another bearer of that name, otherwise known as her father.

The monitor display showed an organizational chart of the growing Groucho enterprise. In some sense, this enterprise could be seen as another part of Cho's life-long dialog with her father. The chart ... she hadn't lost track of the company structure, the growth wasn't that fast, but for her current problem, looking at boxes with names offered some help.

Some days ago, Jesamine had announced that she wanted to resign from her position as the CEO of Groucho Biochemicals - to have more time for herself, and make the transit from a couple to a family before it was too late. "You can blame yourself," Jesamine had told Cho, "or maybe your daughter - and since not everybody has such a family-sensitive husband like Harry, I have to slow down a bit. So please, find a replacement, and please find it quickly."

There was no sense in arguing with Jesamine - first because she was one of the three major shareholders and thus a millionaire, second because Jesamine would keep another job in the enterprise, and - although this was the least important reason for Cho - because she was right. Raising a child didn't go well with the position of a CEO, unless you had a husband to balance out.

What Jesamine would keep at any rate was the CEO position for Groucho Triple-A. This branch was a pretty small one in the Groucho enterprise, almost a hobby, but it created more headlines than all the other corporations together. They weren't in the same magazines, agreed, but media presence was an issue.

Triple-A stood for Animal Actors Agency, which was a downright lie, in the literal sense. True, it was an agency. True also, Triple-A provided actors for movies, spector and oldfashioned 2D. True still, those actors looked like animals in the movies, only they weren't. They were Animagi, transfiguring into animal shapes.

There was no question who was Triple-A's star client. It was Harry Potter, appearing as a dragon, a Shetland pony, or a Centaur. The pony was something new, had been developed around the time Sandra was old enough to sit in a well-secured chair on the pony's back. And the Centaur was a fake - conjured up by Harry, following his commands - but so what; with modern computer technology, colouring the golden shimmer to skin shades was a piece of cake while the movements were absolutely genuine.

Of course there were many others. Jesamine herself could become a skunk and was working on a fox. Then there were dogs, and birds - some of them from people at Hogwarts. It was a bit complicated, they had to get their roles scheduled in sync with schoolwork. There had been complaints from the Hogwarts administration, until the agency managed to win a new client - a cat with a very interesting pattern in the face, usually known under her human name Minerva McGonagall.

---

So who might be a candidate who qualified for running Groucho Biochemicals?

Cho didn't know yet. All she knew, Beatrice plainly refused to spend any of her precious time with administration. Beatrice Chagrin was the company's chief scientist, or so her business card said, while Beatrice thought of herself simply as a potions witch who needed every minute of the day to hold the competition at bay.

Which, somehow, was nonsense. The most serious competition occurred in the shape of a freelance scientist whose successful recipes were marketed also by Groucho Biochemicals - Hermione Krum. But for Beatrice and Hermione, the competition was serious. Hermione did pharmaceutical potions; Beatrice did entertainment potions including psycho drugs, and both of them challenged each other with cosmetic pills and drinks.

Well - from the organigram, Cho wouldn't find the answer to her question. And besides, it was time to call it a day and go home. Maybe Harry had an idea.

"MAGIX, attention."

"Madam?"

The voice was almost a falsetto, would have raised the eyebrows of any other user in the small but growing community of MAGIX users - a pretty new operating system, a mix of traditional programming skills from the Open Source movement with magical ingredients. But Cho preferred a voice interface based on Mandarin, for fun as much as for security, and this sing-song voice reminded her of riksha coolies in Hongkong.

"Shut down."

"Yes, Madam. I wish you a nice evening." The monitor display went blank.

Cho stood up and walked through the door into the adjacent office. Chrissy Vanzandt raised her head, looking questioningly. "Done for today?"

"Yes, and you should do the same."

"Just a few minutes."

Chrissy Vanzandt had been Cho's secretary until, close before Sandra's birth, Cho had been forced to have a break for a while - less from her own free will, more from Harry's threats to summon Cho out of her office. So almost two years ago, Cho had appointed Chrissy as her personal assistant, who was entitled to speak in her name while Cho took her maternity leave.

Coming back, Cho had found no reason to change that, quite the opposite. Following Harry's advice, she had passed over five percent of her Groucho share to this Muggle woman with a witch daughter, and had never regretted her decision.

Power games in this company had a short life. Anyone in the mood for playing them would first try getting Chrissy at his side, only to ask himself shortly afterwards which devil had driven him to make such a bad mistake. Normally, this rhetorical question would be asked outside the Groucho building, after having lost the rank and the job which had invited to such a foolish attempt.

"Bye, Chrissy."

"Bye." The woman hardly looked up.

Back in her office, Cho unclipped a small black device from her belt. By most people, this thing would have been called a mobile. In fact it looked very similar, only it wasn't. It was a phony.

A phony did very much the same as a mobile - function-wise. But it offered its services in a different way: voice-controlled rather than menu-driven and button-operated, a phony used a communication technique which was very close to that of linkports and far, far away from satellite-based electromagnetic frequencies. Yes, there were some buttons, but only for short cuts. To establish a connection not placed on any of those short cuts, you had to say the name of the desired person, quite as if there was a human operator in place of the dials on a Muggle mobile.

A phony was quite expensive, about ten times the price of a mobile - the real one, that was, not the price a mobile had when sold with a provider contract. But this marked exactly the point - a phony was a lifetime acquisition, didn't need a contract with some network, worked around the world, and could reach mobiles as well.

Best of all, phonies were Groucho products, manufactured by Groucho Communications, the newest daughter company and most likely the one that would dwarf the others pretty soon. The established network providers and mobile manufacturers still fought legal battles, but they were going to lose them without exception. They had known so in the beginning, though, had filed suits nonetheless for buying time. The lawsuits had drained quite some money from Groucho's resources, and Narita, their partner in the spector business, hadn't been helpful at all - well, little surprise, considering Narita's own position in the mobile market. No matter, within the next two years Groucho Communications would reach break-even.

Until then, some of today's enemies would have knocked at Cho's door and asked for licenses, after having realized that the conventional mobile technology was dying. Then they would learn how fatally misguided they had been in first place.

Because Cho had a good memory, and a very Chinese habit of responding favours with favours. She never forgot, and she never forgave.

Some of them would survive - those with enough diversification in their portfolio. The others would follow Helix - once a major player, now an entry in the history books of economy. Helix' mistake had been to blackmail Groucho in general and Cho in particular. They had tried so only once, and although the attempt failed miserably, this had been once too often.

---

Cho pressed the first button in the top row on her phony and watched as the word Home appeared on the display. Moments later, she heard her husband's voice.

"Hello, my little big dragon."

It never failed to make her smile. Little dragon meant Sandra, and the big dragon was of course Harry. Once - only once - Almyra had asked, "So is Cho the medium dragon, then?" The answer had been a snappish, "I'm not medium." While Remus unsuccessfully had tried to suppress a chuckle, Harry had said, "That's true. She's a big dragon - a little one."

Cho asked, "What are you doing?"

"Drowning a monster. Wait a sec - the last bubbles are just popping."

So he was bathing their daughter, probably together with Nagini. The snake could manage this particular task even better than Harry. With her tail around Cass' chest, and the front part of her body at a handle mounted for this purpose, Nagini could move the girl quickly through the water. Due to the phony's flawless audio transmit, Cho could hear that the snake didn't even bother hissing at Harry's shameless lie.

"I'm done," she said. "Can you fetch me?"

"Sure. Ready?"

"Yes."

A short instant that felt like falling, then Cho stood in the large bathroom. By now, close to the end of the bathing procedure, the room showed water everywhere, some of it even in the bathtub.

Not Nagini's fault. The snake could move the girl without so much as spilling a drop. This mess was Cass' work: since Foolish Harry had shown his daughter the trick with the water balls, the girl trained them every evening.

Well, she did so only in the bathroom, after Harry had made it clear that the other rooms in the house were no training area for that - not until the girl had mastered the spells to remove the damage.

Harry, wearing no more than pants in this wet environment, came up and kissed Cho, smiling. "Hi, beauty."

"Hi, beau."

It was sort of a ritual. After giving birth to her daughter, and after having regained her old shape - with a little help from Beatrice's potions - Cho made the last step from pretty to beautiful, and Harry told her so. His own title was established later, when Cho became aware that her husband had achieved the figure of a model athlete - simply from walking around most of the time with a daughter at the chest and a snake at the back, or vice versa. The daughter was his free choice, while the snake, considerably heavier than Sandra, was the daughter's choice.

Coming home, seeing this muscular torso, would have been a good reason to delay supper for a while, after getting rid of her business clothes - well, if not for Cass, who welcomed her mother with a beaming smile and a piercing shout.

"Mummy!"

Cho bent down to kiss her daughter. "Hello, my little one. How was your day?"

"Ginny."

"Ginny? You've visited Ginny?"

Sandra nodded. Then a devious smile spread her face, and Cho quickly retreated before her daughter had time to levitate a dash of water into her mother's face - not that Cho was really secure a step apart, only it would be more stressful for the girl and therefore unlikely as part of a normal welcome.

Cho looked at her husband. "So you had fun while other people were working hard for a dollar, huh?"

"Yep. We went to Milan, there was a fashion show with Ginny as one of the models."

"Really? I must have missed the invitation."

Which was only natural. First, because a fashion show in Milan, eight o'clock in the evening local time, was noon here in Santa Monica, California. Then because Cho had mixed feelings toward Ginny, Harry's adopted sister, who worked as a model, slowly approaching a rank in the top twenty of her profession.

But most of all, the thought of Harry jumping through the world with his daughter, most likely also with Nagini, gave Cho the creeps. Not even Harry himself could tell her exactly what took place - was it Harry summoning his daughter, or Cass pursuing him, or did she apparate into something, only to come out at her father? All Cho knew was that Harry jumped with daughter and snake, to reach his destination still with them.

Looking at her husband, she saw that Harry wasn't going to respond to her remark, which was the best he could do. She asked, "So how was it?"

"We had fun. People, too - when Ginny came along with a really dreadful piece of magenta and black, Sandy decided to change it to something reasonable."

"Did she?"

"You bet. The couturier wasn't pleased at all."

Cho started to grin. "Why not?"

"Well, you know our daughter's preferences, so a moment later, it was yellow. It looked more joyful, that's true ... Just a bit watering the eyes."

"And Ginny?"

"She took it with grace - probably she's been the only one knowing what was going on. We had a drink afterwards, and at that time, she could laugh about the scene."

---

Harry turned to his daughter. "Okay, my little otter - time's over. Out with you." Before the rosy bundle had even time to protest, it came out of the bathtub and floated into Harry's arms - a manoeuver which no longer made Cho's heart miss a beat.

Harry walked to a padded table. "What today? Airstream or towel roller?"

The girl had the answer ready. "Roller."

Harry wrapped Sandra into a towel which covered the little body from the large head to the small toes, then he quickly rolled the bundle across the table, and back again, while muffled gurgling came from the cylindrical shape.

With great pleasure, Cho watched as Harry opened the towel to find a breathless girl, then took a bottle with baby oil and started to distribute it all over the small body. He used his hands - not the most efficient technique, a vaporizing spell would have done the job quicker, but neither father nor daughter would miss this opportunity for intensive skin contact.

For a moment, Cho felt breathless too - when Harry reached Sandra's vagina, incredibly large at this small body. Seeing him at these administrations toward their daughter always had a certain effect toward herself, in particular when Harry was wearing no more than his pants.

Unfortunately, it was quite difficult to make love while Sandra was awake. The girl caught some of her parents' arousal; she would look quite flushed and rather breathless when they had reached the clouds and the rain.

Cho's husband hadn't worried much. Actually, he hadn't worried at all. But Cho felt more reluctant. Maybe it was true that a two-year-old didn't suffer from sexual arousal, only she couldn't push the thought aside, which of course spoiled the pleasure considerably.

Harry had completed the oiling. Now the small body disappeared inside a shirt, panties, and a full-body pyjama with a remarkable capability to hold and handle wetness. When Sandra had refused to accept any more diaper, Harry had looked around until he found this special fabric. When the girl peed in sleep, the fabric would suck it in and send an alarm signal. Seconds later, Harry would reach his daughter to change panties and pyjama.

It was about the only time when Sandra showed something like embarrassment. However, within the next four to six months, she would have mastered enough control.

They walked to the dining room. Harry sat down with the girl in his arm. Within the next ten minutes or so, Sandra would fall asleep. Five minutes later, Harry would put her down in her bed.

Cho took her phony and pressed the second button. "Hello, Dobby, Winky, good evening. We're ready."

Moments later, plates and bowls appeared on the table, sent by the two house-elves.

House-elves, that was true luxury. Cho could hardly remember how it had been before Harry managed to lure them away from Hogwarts. Both Dobby and Winky were free and worked for a salary, although Winky still had trouble with that. She also had been the difficult part when asking them to work for the Potter household. Harry's announcement that Cho was pregnant hadn't helped much, more the opposite, because Winky had never overcome the trauma with Barty Crouch junior. Only when hearing that it would be a girl, Winky had accepted.

---

Cho watched her husband starting to eat almost ravenously. She saw how Sandra watched him too, to close her eyes moments later, her face probably a mirror of her father's feelings with the first food reaching his stomach. Suddenly, Cho remembered something.

"How did it work with the new baby food? What did Cass say?"

"Not much." The girl's father didn't look up, seemed busy with his adult food.

"She ate it?"

"No. That's both, the answer to your question and her full comment when she was offered the stuff."

Cho sighed. "And then?"

"What do you mean, and then? Then I gave her something to eat - what do you think?"

Cho never had thought anything else, never would. Food was sacrosanct in this household - something to be treated seriously, no subject to stupid jokes, certainly not a means to put pressure into the girl's education ... As if this would work.

But always rice pudding?

"Harry, we have to find some alternatives. Rice pudding with turkey day in, day out - that's not the proper way to feed her."

Cho's husband nodded. "You're right. I think we should try it with chicken ..."

She glared at him.

"... or maybe duck."

Harry looked totally innocent, although Cho felt sure - he knew perfectly well he had disarmed her with this word - reference to Cho's nickname from old times, never spoken out aloud, always good for a hint: China Duck.

Harry's face showed no expression. "Millions of Chinese ..."

Cho tried to keep serious.

"... get along with rice only. And our rice is the best money can buy, with all the healthy stuff, not the castrated mush that goes for rice here ..."

Which was true - once a month, Harry went shopping in Japan.

"... and she doesn't look as if she's missing anything. And with the meat - do you know which meat has the highest protein ratio compared to weight? Mice."

"Mice??"

"Yes. The NASA found out, in the early days of space travel."

"And why didn't they use it?"

"Dunno. Maybe they couldn't find approval among the astronauts."

Cho stared suspiciously at her husband, and for good reason. The story itself had to be true, because Harry never lied to her, except in obvious jokes like over the phony. But every now and then, Nagini was fed with living mice, with Cass always being caught in fascination from such a spectacle.

Harry grinned. "I could imagine she would even accept carrot mash in this combination - "

"Thanks, but no thanks."

"Well, then ..."

Cho became aware that the discussion was over, the fight lost. It hadn't been a fight - there was nothing wrong with their daughter's nourishment, Cho knew that, it was just that every once in a while she felt an irrational impulse to do something ... Probably some sense of hidden guilt - wasn't she supposed to play the caring mother twenty-four hours a day? Instead, she played the caring chief executive officer while Harry was perfectly happy with his role as the house-husband.

Nobody had a problem with that, least of all Harry himself. Occasionally, as Cho knew, he met someone who couldn't suppress teasing remarks, seeing Harry walk around with his daughter. This someone would bitterly regret his remarks still before the end of the conversation. How long was it since Harry had told her about such an encounter? Quite a while ... Cho suddenly realized that her hidden guilt wasn't that hidden; her husband had stopped telling those stories on purpose.

Looking up, she saw him smile at her. "How was your day?"

"Mixed. We need a replacement for Jesamine - she's going to give up Biochemicals. Any idea?"

"Not at the moment. Did she figure out that she's rich enough?"

"That's not the point - and besides, she'll keep Triple-A. No, she wants to increase the family."

Harry grinned. "That's why. Well, the idea has appeal, no denying that. Quite inspiring, actually - "

"Inspiring, huh?"

Several times in the past months, Harry had - very carefully - hinted that he wouldn't mind another child, no madam, not at all. Cho had warmed up to the idea, though with some reluctance.

Cho looked at Harry, then at the girl. "If I knew it would be a boy ..."

Her husband kept his face steady.

"... I might send you to get your hands free right on the spot. Not that this is the right time of the month, but a bit of training - "

"Won't hurt, I fully agree with that."

Cho's smile deepened. "You know what the scientists say? They say, if the man's really exhausted, chances for a boy are significantly better than otherwise. Naturally, the woman can't be the - er, subject at which he's going to become exhausted, so he has to find another means."

"Does he?" Her husband's eyes started to sparkle. "And who might that be?"

"I'll give you who! There's a training hall downstairs, remember? You should, after all, you've been the one who built it. Three hours hard training, so you can barely walk to the massage table, which means I have to help a bit - "

Harry's green eyes were darkening. "That's an excellent idea. Maybe we should start with the walking and your helping a bit, I'm sure that needs more training than my getting tired with aikido ..."

* * *

Fleur Weasley passed the guard post with the two Goblins, giving them a smile and a "Bonjour", getting in return not a smile - those guards never smiled - but an appreciating glance.

The glance felt totally unlike that from other men, from humans. A French man's glance would have scanned Fleur's body, her face, her hair, to pass quickly over the pram, registering the baby inside and Héloise outside only as a fact that proved her state - married. While the Goblins ...

Two years ago, the special guard at the Weasley house had been abandoned, only to establish the same guard now fifty yards away, counting for the entire street here at the border of the Goblin quarter in Paris. Never since the uproar five years ago, when Fleur had lost her first, unborn child, another accident had happened, not even an insult shouted in the night - small wonder, these Goblins would shoot first, not caring to ask afterwards.

And they would do it even for an insult, people here in the quarters around knew. Their looks ... When Fleur passed, the guards looked up and down the street on reflex, then at Héloise, then at the pram, obviously longing to glance inside, so Fleur made sure to pass close enough for giving them a chance. The glance would end in her face, to check whether she looked okay, and to express their approval and their respect.

Fleur hadn't cared about Goblins in the past. Not for reasons of contempt, only they were Goblins, and she was a Veela. Quarter-Veela, okay, but ... Then Fleur had met Bill, who worked for the Goblins, and then Bill had received this Classified Request, which had earned them the magnificent house Fleur would reach in a moment, and the never-ending support of the Goblins because Bill and Fleur had promised to raise their children in the spirit of friendship between Veela, humans, and Goblins.

Then, after the streetfights, Fleur had felt grateful for the security. When Héloise was born, three and a half years ago, once more Harry had insisted on selecting a Goblin as her godfather. He had been right - without saying a word, the Goblins had told Fleur time and again that battalions of them would die in the defense of her children, should the need arise. And this was an incredible feeling for a devoted mother, inevitably leading to thankfulness and sympathy.

The Goblins would give their life also for Michel, although this time Harry hadn't found another excuse, or maybe just because of that - seeing the guards' faces when coming down the street in the company of Harry and his devil daughter told Fleur enough. Harry, the bearer of the Goblin Request, was known by every Goblin. Bill said Harry was a Goblin, had to be because of the Request, so Michel's godfather was Goblin and human and bearer and that was why Michel seemed still more precious to the guards than Héloise.

Poor Héloise - as if she hadn't trouble enough coping with this rival, ten months going eleven. Thank God, the worst was over in this regard.

---

Fleur reached the house and levitated the pram with both children upstairs. Opening the door, she knew Bill wasn't back yet. Well - hopefully he would arrive within the next hour, giving her a chance to take care of her children and get ready for the welcome she had in mind. After one week with Bill in Egypt and this country's neighbourhood, Fleur felt a bit - er, single-minded.

Dropping the baguettes she had bought, she turned to her daughter. "Alors, ma petite, what about your hunger?"

"I'm not hungry yet."

Of course Héloise wasn't - Fleur knew perfectly well by herself, only next moment she would start feeding Michel, and she had learned to ask his older sister first.

The tip had come from Rahewa, her sister Gabrielle's friend at Hogwarts. It was a Cree habit, asking down the scale from the oldest to the youngest. Only, there was a difference - Cree honour demanded to decline until the mouths were filled in reverse order, while Héloise felt no such restraint.

But it had effect, undeniably. Some days ago, for the first time Héloise had answered, "Feed him first" - a bit flippant still, as though embarrassed from her own generosity, but her mother's beaming had changed the pouty face to a smile.

"And what do you want to do while he's feeding?"

The most likely candidate would be the picture book in which the touch-sensitive figures talked about themselves, thereby unfolding the simple story. Or the spector; since Cho had given Héloise the new cassette with Groucho's first kid movie - The Little Witch and the Giants - this kind of entertainment was slowly climbing the ranks in Héloise's personal charts.

"Ummm ..." The girl looked self-conscious. "Want to watch me play?"

Fleur's eyes widened. "Harp?"

A nod.

"That's a beautiful idea, Hély - table music."

Feeling breathless of joy, Fleur followed a beaming girl, to sit down in her room, opening her blouse, to breast-feed her son while her daughter was doing her experimental music.

The harp was a present from Wynor the Whistler, Héloise's godfather. Half a year ago, when he'd arrived with the bulky box, Fleur and Bill had looked at him incredulously. "A harp?"

The dark, leathery face hadn't smiled. "It's a Goblin harp. I want to give it a try, and if it doesn't work out, well ..." Then Wynor's voice had turned urgent, which was highly unusual with him.

"But don't push her, and don't ever let her be lectured. Let her find her way."

This way would be long, no question about that. But some weeks after that birthday, Fleur had heard these sounds like no others coming from her daughter's room, and a while later, Héloise had asked her for the first time whether she'd like to listen.

Shortly afterwards, a very startled Bill had returned from another business trip. "I found out a bit about Goblin harps."

"Really?"

"Yes. They asked of course how our daughter was doing, and I told them she's experimenting with her harp, and they asked a little more. Well, and I said all I know it's a Goblin harp, and the plate says Felison." Bill looked worried. "And when I saw his awestruck face, I pushed a bit - and then he told me."

"Told you what?"

"A Felison - he said, there are just six known harps of this manufacturer, and if I'd tell him the rest of what's engraved in the plate, he could find out."

"Oh my God - it must have been awfully expensive."

Bill had laughed humourlessly. "Expensive? Fleur, these pieces are priceless. I don't know what to say to Wynor the next time."

Wynor the Whistler hadn't laughed, because Goblins only laughed about jokes. But with great satisfaction, he had used the opportunity for expressing himself in human slang. "Don't wet your pants, Bill - it's a present like Harry's, and Héloise will have to decide to whom it has to be passed further."

Of course, he had meant Fleur as well - only he would never address her directly with such a disrespectful remark.

---

Fleur switched her son from her left tit to her right. Breast-feeding at the age of ten month was considered unusual among humans, while not among Veela. And it saved her from the contraceptive potion - Hermione's new stuff was definitely less distasteful, however still leaving room for improvement.

Fleur wondered what a music teacher might think of Héloise's chords. She didn't really care, and young Michel seemed quite content with this combo of sensations. Which was a relief, because he was a bit - well, difficult, not at all the easy-goer like her daughter.

Michel wasn't recalcitrant. Just - difficult, had weeped a lot more than Héloise, and still did, often for seemingly inexplicable reasons. Everybody told Fleur Veela boys always were like that, nothing to worry about, the only mistake was to expect them behaving like Veela girls.

Of course, Fleur always had a last resort, even during Bill's office hours. Only - it was a bit embarrassing, for a Veela mother, wasn't it, and then the time difference - but Michel's godfather could calm down the boy almost at the first touch with his tricks.

Actually, Harry's daughter could, too. Only there was always a price to pay - Sandra and Héloise together, that meant asking for trouble. Héloise would tease Sandra, sneer at her, and then Sandra would respond with one of her tricks, then Fleur's daughter would start crying - and next moment Harry had to manage with a boy, two girls, and a snake.

Well, he did, and Fleur herself was the only one feeling embarrassed.

The harp had brought a change, although not for the better yet. Once - only once, Sandra had heard Héloise playing. She had been standing frozen in a trance, until a moment later Héloise had recognized her, stopping abruptly.

It was the only time Fleur had ever heard the little devil weep.

Just barely, she had avoided ordering her daughter to play. Harry had explained to Sandra that there was just one way of hearing this music again, by saying the magic word and waiting patiently. Without hesitation, Sandra had said, "Please. Please, please, please," to no avail.

Harry had comforted his daughter, probably suppressing a nasty accident in the next second, and had found the presence of mind to tell Héloise that she was the only one who could play that music for Sandy. The half-quarter Veela had looked very satisfied, sitting motionless otherwise.

Well - if Héloise was ready to play for her brother, then, with a little luck and some more patience, Harry's daughter might see her dream come true.

---

The door downstairs cranked shut.

The girl had registered the sound and stopped playing. Her head jerked up. "Papa!" Then she hurried toward the hall.

Fleur listened to the welcome outside and waited for father and daughter to appear in the door. When they came into sight, Héloise on Bill's arm, Fleur felt startled - Bill looked horrible, not at all his normal self.

"Salut, ma reine." He bent down to kiss her.

Next moment, Fleur felt really worried - with the weight of his daughter, Bill had almost stumbled, and worse, the expected remark didn't come, that about him being envious at his own son, feeding from such sources.

"Bill - what is with you?"

"Erm - I feel a bit dizzy; must have caught one of the germs that are offered so generously down there."

He obviously tried to sound casual. That, together with the lack of another joke made Fleur feel really alarmed - in normal state, Bill couldn't use the word dizzy without a remark about Veela power.

"Come into the kitchen." Fleur closed her blouse - Michel had stopped sucking already before - and rose to store her son in his bed before she went to feed the rest of her family.

Bill wouldn't eat, also declined the coffee. "May I have a cup of tea?"

Another bad signal. Bill had adjusted to French habits; café au lait was his normal drink. Fleur touched his forehead, sensing palpable heat.

"You're running a fever. After the tea, I'll put you to bed."

Héloise smiled at these words, finding the idea funny.

Bill tried to smile. "That's what I had in mind, only the planning was somehow different. Sorry, my angel, but I'm afraid we have to delay that - maybe with a few hours sleep ..."

Fleur didn't think so.

Two hours later, she knew it was serious. Bill's temperature had passed forty. His pyjama was already soaked, his sleep uneasy, and his breath audible.

Past seven. If Fleur had needed additional proof, this was - serious illnesses always started outside office hours. Which wasn't a problem for her, because she knew whom to ask for help. But first she needed someone else.

Whom to ask - her mother or her mother-in-law?

Molly, her mother-in-law, did better with Michel while Fleur's own mother did better with Héloise, not to mention the language. And Molly would of course try to take over Bill's care, leaving Fleur the children, which settled the case.

Fleur grabbed her phony and punched a button, feeling thankful for great favours - her parents had accepted the idea of walking around with this device only after Cho had implemented a new feature which could suppress any incoming call except for selected numbers.

And she was one of three exceptions.

Her mothers voice asked, "Fleur?"

"Salut, maman. I'm sitting at Bill's bed - he's caught a fever in Egypt, and I want to go for the doctor. Could you please come over to look after Héloise and the boy?"

"But yes, my little. Just a minute."

Fleur, about two inches larger than her mother, started to plan her next steps.