Prosapia Centonis

Ron paused in his work and reread the sentence he had just written. "No...that's not right," he mumbled. He hit the backspace key a few times, then tried again. Satisfied with this particular wording, he went on to the next paragraph.

Harry came out of the bathroom, his hair in wet clumps around his head. "How's it going?"

"It's...going," Ron answered. "Mail come yet?"

"I was just going to check it. Why, expecting something?"

"Actually, yes."

Harry opened the door and stopped, looking down in surprise. "Is it a package?"

"Is what a--oh, what I'm expecting?" Ron realised. "No, just a letter. Why?"

Harry didn't answer. Instead he called out, "Is anyone in this flat expecting a package?"

"No!" two voices answered from various corners of the flat.

The other two occupants of the small flat emerged into the living room. Draco blew a strand of white-blonde hair out of his eyes and added, "Why?"

Harry picked something up, brought it inside, and set it on the coffee table. Ron abandoned his computer and joined Draco and Neville in studying the thing.

To begin with, it was a large tartan shopping basket, of a kind not generally seen these days. It was also rather heavy, unmarked, untagged, unadorned. There was no logical reason for it to have been left on the doorstep of a flat belonging to four twenty-year-old men.

Neville raised an eyebrow. "Odd. What's in it?"

"I dunno--I didn't have time to look."

"Well, let's look now." Draco fumbled with the catch. "Maybe it's baked goods or casseroles or--"

"Bloody hell!" Harry and Ron exclaimed in chorus.

Staring up at them from the depths of the basket, eyes closed in an obviously deep slumber, was a small infant.

Neville gaped. "Who in their right mind--does whoever left this know who lives here, or were they just hoping for the best?"

"Maybe they made a mistake," Draco suggested.

The four men looked down at the baby. It had a soft fuzz of sandy brown curls and was wrapped in a cocoon of soft knit blankets.

"Is it a boy or a girl?" Neville asked uncertainly.

"A boy, I hope."

"What's wrong with girls?"

"Do you know anything about raising girls?"

"Good point."

Ron reached into the basket and fished out a piece of paper. "Hey, look, a note."

"Read it!" Draco urged. "No, wait, let me guess: 'Dear Bob, this is your son. Face up to your responsibilities, you lazy bum. I'm going to Botswana. If you're not Bob, take the baby to Bob. Not yours, Sally.''

"Ahem." Ron cleared his throat, winked discreetly at Harry and began. "'Dear Bob, this is your son.'"

"Wait, what? No way!" Draco blurted.

Ron and Harry both laughed. Draco sighed. "Okay, okay, big funny on the Slytherin. What's it say, Weasel?"

Ron grinned--the insult had lost its sting by the time Draco had become their friend--and began for real. "'To R.W., H.P., N.L., and D.M.: Please take care of my baby. I cannot take care of her, and I know you will be able to. She is three weeks old. Give her a name, give her hope, give her praise, give her love. I have known and trusted three of you for years, and while I've only begun to trust the other one I know you will give this baby all the love she needs and that I cannot provide.' It's unsigned." He looked up, all traces of mirth gone from his face. "Well, at least we know it wasn't a mistake."

Draco bit his lip and looked down at the baby, which was still sleeping. "Now what?"

"What do you mean?" Neville asked.

"I mean, what do we do? Do we try and raise this baby, the four of us, like her mother wants us to? Or do we take her to an orphanage or something?"

"I don't know about you guys, but I don't think I could bring myself to do that," Harry said quietly. "Abandon her, I mean. I almost wound up in an orphanage myself...but then again, I know how it feels to be raised somewhere you aren't wanted. If you guys aren't all in agreement on keeping her, we'll take her to an orphanage or an adoption agency or something."

Neville opened his mouth to answer, but suddenly the baby's eyes fluttered open.

The four men stopped, captivated. Her eyes were beautiful, a soft grey colour like a pussywillow blossom, and they were aware. She studied the men whose lives had just taken an unexpected turn, and then she smiled at them and closed her eyes again.

Since the dawn of time, men have stood up to charging bulls, fought in wars without fear, and ruthlessly ordered subjects to their deaths. But not one man in all of documented history has ever been smiled at by a baby girl without turning into a pile of mushy goo.

Harry swallowed hard and looked up at his roommates, who seemed more than a little shell-shocked. Finally, Draco said what was on all their minds. "She stays."

Neville trailed a finger softly along her cheek. "What are we going to name her?"

"Well, how does one go about naming babies?" Harry asked uncertainly.

"Dad said I was named after his best friend in school," Neville answered slowly.

"Mine was my maternal grandfather," Ron added.

"I don't know what Dad named me after--probably the constellation," Draco said. "I think he said something about what it means, though..."

Ron brightened. "Hey, I've got an idea!"

"What?" the other three asked together.

"Come here." Ron dashed across to his computer. Harry scooped up the as-yet-unnamed baby and followed Draco and Neville over to where he sat.

Ron pulled up something on the computer and began typing quickly, talking the whole time. "I found this website the other day, it might be able to help us."

Harry, Draco, and Neville crowded behind him, Harry still holding the baby awkwardly in the crook of his arm. Ron clicked on a small box in the lower half of the screen, where a cursor began flashing. "Okay, look. So I type in 'Harry' and hit 'enter' and..."

Harry squinted at the screen. "'Medieval English form of HENRY,'" he read aloud.

"Okay, so I click on the big blue HENRY and we get..." Ron read aloud to his companions while Neville fumbled about in his pocket for his glasses. "'From the Germanic name Heimerich which meant "home ruler", composed of the elements heim "home" and ric "power, ruler". This name was introduced into Britain by the Normans. It was borne by eight kings of England including the infamous Henry VIII, as well as six kings of France and seven kings of Germany. Other famous bearers include arctic naval explorer Henry Hudson, novelist Henry James, and automobile manufacturer Henry Ford.'" Ron nodded and scribbled something on a pad of paper. "So we've got 'home ruler' now. All right, so I go to the little box at the top of the screen and type 'Ron' and..."

Two names popped up. Draco raised an eyebrow. "Your name means 'song, joy'?"

"No, my name is short for Ronald." Ron clicked on the link that said RONALD and sighed a little. "'Scottish form of RAGNVALD, a name introduced to Scotland by Scandinavian settlers and invaders. American actor and president Ronald Reagan is a famous bearer of this name.' Okay, so I click on Ragnvald and..."

"Find out that you need to see Reynold," Neville completed as the window popped up.

"You know, this is getting to be more trouble than it's worth." Ron clicked on REYNOLD and read aloud. "'From the Germanic name Reginold, composed of the elements ragin "advice" and wald "rule". This name was brought to Britain by the Normans.' So we've got two 'rules' and one 'advice'. Got it. Back to the little box up here, and I type 'Draco'...not that I really expect anything I don't already know...and...yep, I was right, it means 'dragon' or 'serpent'. So now we type in 'Neville'...and we get 'new town'."

"Two rules, one advice, one dragon, and one town," Harry recited, counting them off on his fingers. "All right, so now what?"

"Now..." Ron hit a button a couple of times until the home screen came back. "I just type in 'rule', 'advice', 'dragon' and 'town', then push 'enter' and..."

Neville leaned over his shoulder to study the list of names that popped up. "I don't really like the looks of any of the names for 'rule'...but I like Sumari."

"I think Belinda looks good," Draco said a little loftily. "But then so does Darby."

"Try 'queen' instead of 'rule'," Harry suggested. "It's almost the same, right?"

"Close enough." Ron went back, changed the word, then pushed "enter" again. Thirteen new names replaced the three that had previously been under "rule".

Harry pointed to one of them. "I like the sound of that one. Rhiannon."

"So we'll use all four," Ron suggested. "In the order that they're listed, that would be Rhiannon Sumari Belinda Darby."

"I like that!" Neville declared. The other two quickly agreed, and it was decided to give her Harry's last name, as it was the most normal of the four. And thus Rhiannon Sumari Belinda Darby Potter became possessor of a name considerably more imposing than herself.