Dark Obsession

For all intents and purposes, Ron would think later, the day had started out ordinarily enough. He'd awakened early, rolling over to curl Mariah into his side and waking instantly when he found that the bed was empty. When his brain finally caught up, he had remembered that she was still with Kalena. Resigned to another day apart, he'd staggered into the kitchen to make some very strong tea and get Rianne's breakfast ready. Mariah was fond of telling people that their daughter had her eyes and his appetite. He was inordinately pleased when she did that.

Speak of the devil

, he'd thought as his daughter began to fuss.

They'd spent a rather tame day together: Ron working behind the counter at Weasley's and Rianne entertaining the customers. He'd left the shop in the helper's hands while he'd fed Rianne her lunch and fed Harry a load of bollocks. Lying had never come naturally to him, and he knew that today was no exception. Harry had glanced way too many times at his ears during their conversation, confirming that Harry had bought precious little of the bull he had been so inexpertly spouting. Damn the betraying things, anyway.

Once he'd closed the door behind Harry, Ron had cleaned Rianne's face and removed her from her high chair. Deciding to take some time just for them, he'd taken his wand out and filled the room with bubbles for her to crawl after on the floor. An hour later, he was still berating himself. And trying to rationalize his actions with the only person available for discussion.

"I don't think he believed me," Ron told Rianne as she batted bubbles to and fro. "But it's not like I was lying to him." Rianne stopped her game and looked up at him. "Not completely. I mean, it's not as if I was keeping anything from him. I don't really have any information. Not solid information, anyway. Nothing that would set his mind at ease, or answer any questions." Rianne continued to stare at him. "Okay, I was lying."

"And you lie horribly," Mariah said from behind him.

Ron spun around and jumped to his feet in alarm while Rianne simply cooed and crawled over and pulled up on Mariah's robes, demanding attention. In one swift motion, Mariah gathered up her daughter and leaned past her to greet Ron properly. A few moments later, Rianne became bored with watching her parents smash their faces together and requested, quite loudly, her fair share.

Once both the loves of her life were appeased, Mariah went into the kitchen and began clearing the dishes that Ron had left from Rianne's lunch. Ron remained where he was, rocking side to side on his feet.

"You having problems over there?" she asked, magicking the now clean baby dishes into a cabinet.

"Shouldn't we be heading over to Harry's? To the school? What happened with Kalena? Did you figure out what was up with the diary? Why did you call Faren by a different name?"

"Whoa, big fella," Mariah laughed, holding up her hands. "One at a time. Yes, we should be heading over to see Hermione. She's got a class now, so there's no real rush. Harry will be heading back there as well, right?" Ron nodded. "I think after classes tonight will be time enough to inform them of all that I've learned. As for Faren..."

Mariah stopped and stared off into space. Ron was growing accustomed to that look by now. She was seeing something, whether past or future he couldn't tell. But he knew enough to keep silent until she returned to the present. The part that made Ron's spine twist was that right before her face had gone vacant, she'd picked up the water glass Harry had been holding.

"Angel?" Ron asked nervously.

"What the bloody hell?" Mariah said softly. "How come I didn't see this? And who is she?"

"Mariah?" Ron said again. No answer. Angel? He asked mentally, putting as much energy into it as he dared when she was so inwardly focused.

Mariah returned to him and met his eyes. The anxiety in hers made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. She walked towards the fireplace, and threw in a handful of Floo powder and dropped to her knees.

"Mum!" she called.

A moment later, Molly Weasley's face appeared in the fireplace. "You're back, then." Molly smiled widely.

"I got back just a few moments ago. Are you busy?" Mariah asked. Ron was amazed at how even her voice sounded, how utterly normal. A part of him hated that she could do that. A very envious part.

"Not in the slightest, dear. Morgan's out with Arthur at the moment. I was just about to go out and make sure they weren't getting up to mischief."

"Would you mind watching Rianne for a few hours? I didn't realize you already had Morgan there, but..."

Molly gave her an even bigger smile, looking first at her son then back at her soon-to-be daughter-in-law. "Like that matters," she said, giving Mariah a wink. "I'm always happy to have my grandchildren over to spoil." She took Rianne from Mariah's arms. Despite the fact that her mother had just returned home, Rianne was already laughing and focused on her grandmother. "We'll have a lovely afternoon, love. Just us girls. We'll keep those boys in line, won't we?"

Rianne was just babbling out an answer as the pair of them disappeared into the fire. Mariah was already moving quickly towards the door to their flat.

"You planning on telling me what the bloody hell is going on?" Ron called after her.

"Only if you get your pale English arse moving, Weasley. I'm not sure how much time we have. It might already be happening, but in case it isn't..."

Ron stared mutely back at her as she told him what she'd seen. Once she'd finished, he decided that dawdling in this situation was not a good plan. He wanted to run, but settled for walking really, really fast.

*^*^*^*^*^*

Hermione's scream was loud and piercing, but as the stone walls were so effective at sound dampening, the only one that heard her was the ghostly Sir Brian, the last remaining of three knights that had once taken residence outside her classroom.

"Milady?" he said tentatively.

"Sir Brian," Hermione said, kneeling down and taking the hand of the body on the floor, "I need you to go to the hospital wing. I need you to tell Poppy to come here immediately. And then...can you leave the castle?"

"Not past the grounds, milady," he admitted quietly.

"Never mind then, just go for Poppy, please."

"As you wish," he snapped his ghostly heels together and left the room via the floor.

"Come on," Hermione said, addressing the body. "Wake up. You have to tell me what happened. You have to tell me where my baby is." Hermione's voice broke on the last word, her eyes scanning the room in the unrealistic hope that in her initial panic, she'd just not seen Jamie. But there was nothing. Nothing. The cradle was empty. Her baby was gone.

A year ago, Mariah had faced the same situation. Hermione now wondered how her friend hadn't gone stark, staring mad. As it was, she was fighting the hysterical urge to start ripping the castle apart brick by brick in order to find her daughter.

"Jamie..." she sobbed, still clutching the woman's hand. Her eyes fixed on the lifeless face on the floor. "What happened to you?"

Poppy stepped through her office fire as Hermione said this and moved swiftly towards the fallen witch. She made a brief examination and turned very worried eyes towards Hermione.

"It's the same spell," the nurse said, briskly.

"The same as Katia, you mean?" Hermione asked, horrified.

"Yes. Whoever attacked her also attacked Sara. I need to get her down to the hospital wing, Hermione." She paused. "It must have happened when she came here to tell you about Katia."

"And whoever did this also has my baby," Hermione sobbed. "But who? Why? WHAT THE BLOODY HELL IS GOING ON?" she screamed, aiming her voice towards the ceiling.

"Hermione!" Poppy said sharply, grabbing her by the shoulders and shaking her slightly. She met the nurse's calm eyes with her own probably frantic looking ones. But the healer's eyes calmed her as well.

Trying desperately to yank a choke chain on her panic, Hermione raised her eyes and took some solace in the calm, determined expression she saw reflected in Poppy's violet eyes. Willing herself to breathe slowly, she listened as the nurse spoke in soft, measured tones.

"I know this is heartbreaking for you, Hermione, but you have to think. Who was watching Jamie when you came down to the hospital wing?"

Hermione started to tell her. Then she clapped her hand over her mouth.

No. It couldn't be.

Annika?

*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*

Harry wasn't sure if his voice was as frozen as his body, but at the moment, it didn't matter. He was speechless. He doubted he'd have been able to move regardless.

After months of wondering, days of worrying, hours of sleeplessness, and moments of sheer panic, he was finally face to face with the answer to his mystery. And it was one of his students. His student. Never in all of his musings and list makings did he give even one thought to anyone in the student body. It was ludicrous. They were only kids.

Apparently, one of those kids had some fairly adult ideas.

Harry cleared his throat. There was sound, and vibration, so he assumed his voice worked. "Annika?" he croaked. Fear for his daughter's precarious position in this unstable girl's arms had dried his throat. "What's going on?"

"Whatever do you mean, Beloved? We're together, finally. We're away from that wretched spellcaster and joined as we should be. As a family."

Anger rose in him sharper than Gryffindor's sword. "What have you done to Hermione?"

An answering anger flashed in Annika's eyes and Harry winced inwardly. He had to keep his temper in check as long as he was immobile and she held Jamie. He had to play this carefully if he wanted to get out of it with his family in one piece.

Annika's anger was fleeting, however. Almost before it began, the fire in her eyes cooled and she offered him a wan smile. "Honestly, Harry, I appreciate the lingering effects of whatever spell she's kept you under, but she's really not any concern of ours anymore."

Where there had been anger a moment before, now there was only cold fear. Could she have harmed Hermione? It was unthinkable, but possible. How else could she be standing here now with Jamie in her arms? He knew his wife, knew her capabilities and her strength. The only way anyone could have taken Jamie away from her would be by catastrophic force. Unless...

"You're right, of course. I'm just a bit curious," Harry said, trying for casual and disinterested.

It must have worked, because her face softened even more. "It seems one of her pet students met with a bit of a mishap and she felt the need to go running off to the hospital wing to check on her. I was the one who told her of Katia's misfortune and she asked me to watch the baby. In the right place at the right time, you might say." Her softened face slid into a sneer. "Imagine, asking me to watch our baby. And the most insulting part was that she actually looked me over as if I wasn't quite worthy."

Tension hunched Annika's shoulders and she stood abruptly. She began to pace. "Not quite worthy," she growled. "I wanted to kill her then and there, but I restrained myself. I know her history. I didn't feel quite prepared enough to take on what some consider the most powerful witch of the age. Besides, she's unimportant. All that matters is us, Beloved."

Annika continued to pace and ramble. Harry wasn't even sure she was aware of him any longer. "No, I couldn't take her on face to face. She'd probably have tried to harm our daughter in her pathetic struggle to hold on to what she knew was rightfully mine. Handling the Transfiguration teacher was nothing, though. After all, who would expect mousy little Annika to strike first? But no matter. I handled her quite effectively." She finally stopped her pacing when she reached him, then settled herself cross-legged in front of him. "And now, my beloved, we're finally free. Free of all of them. Free to be together."

Harry's mind was whirling. She'd attacked Katia. And either Sara or Minerva. She had tricked Hermione into leaving Jamie with her. That, if anything, eased Harry's mind and enabled him to start trying to figure a way out of this. Hermione was safe; she was unharmed. And when she discovered what had happened, she'd be charging to his rescue. Harry allowed himself an inner smile, picturing his wife in shining armor.

In the meantime, he planned to get as many questions answered as he could. Jamie was gurgling up at him from Annika's arms, seemingly content. For that reason, and the fact that Hermione was unharmed, he decided to play at acquiescence. If he wasn't belligerent, if he made Annika think that he shared her affections, he might be able to get out of this without harm coming to any of them. And he might just get some answers along the way.

He'd never been much of an actor, even in school pageants in the days before Hogwarts. But his daughter was relying on him to put in an award winning performance. He did not intend on letting her down.

*^*^*^*^

Hermione was running out of Ron's flat just as Ron and Mariah were running back into it. She Floo'd there after her realization because that was the last place she'd known Harry had been. It seemed as good a place as any to begin searching.

"I wish you'd make up your bloody mind, woman."

She heard Ron before she saw him, his voice broken as he panted while climbing the stairs towards where she stood.

"First we have to run to Hogwarts, then we have to run back here."

"Mariah?" Hermione called, alerting her friends to her presence in their flat.

"Hermione!" Ron and Mariah said simultaneously. The door swung open a second later and she found herself wrapped in their arms. The adrenaline rush she'd felt back at Hogwarts left her suddenly, and her legs collapsed underneath her. Ron steadied her and near carried her to the sofa, kneeling at her feet while Mariah settled next to her and held her while she cried.

"She's got my baby," Hermione sobbed. "She took my baby. Oh Mariah, how did you keep from going mad when Renae took Rianne?"

"I kept my head, Hermione, which is what you need to do now. You've got to snap out of this and snap out of it now. Crying isn't doing anyone, least of all Jamie and Harry, any good."

Ron whipped his head toward Mariah, outraged at her offensive words. That's a bit harsh, isn't it?

She needs harsh right now, Ron. She needs to get good and angry. I don't care if she's angry with me, just so long as she's not like this any more. She needs to put her back against something if she's going to fight.

Ron nodded. It seemed his fiancée knew Hermione just as well as he did, even if he'd forgotten in the face of her grief. Hermione was a force to be reckoned with when she was fighting for something. And anger was the best way to unleash that force.

Hermione hadn't cottoned on yet. She was staring at Mariah, her face soaked with tears and disbelief in her eyes. "Mariah?"

"Are you prepared to fight for your daughter?" Mariah asked her, not backing down from the pain she saw in her best friend's face.

"How dare you ask me such a thing?" Hermione sputtered.

Ron was amazed that the tears on her face weren't steaming off from the heated flush of anger that had started to suffuse her cheeks.

"I do dare. Are you going to sit here and cry woe-is-me or are you prepared to go after her?"

The room was as quiet as a tomb as strong-willed woman faced strong-willed woman. Ron could almost feel the crackle of tension between them. Then Hermione smiled. A fierce, determined get-the-hell-out-of-my-way smile.

"I'm going after her." Hermione wiped at the few remaining tears on her cheeks and stood up. She reached into her robes, removed her wand and stalked towards the door. As Ron and Mariah rose to follow her, Hermione turned back to them.

"Thank you," she said to Mariah. "I think that was more effective than a slap in the face."

"You're welcome," Mariah replied as she reached Hermione and clasped the hand that wasn't holding the wand. "Now, shall we go and mobilize the troops?"

"Do what?" Ron asked.

"Mobilize the..." Mariah broke off and shook her head. "One of these days, I'm going to get a television, a movie player, and we're going to spend a weekend getting you up to speed on American and Muggle slang, Ron."

Hermione chuckled and Ron merely continued to look puzzled.

"I mean, we need to get help if we're going to find them," Mariah clarified. "We need Draco for this."

*^*^*^*^

The last time Harry had experienced such a chilling silence, he'd been on a broomstick. Moments later, he'd fallen fifty feet to the ground. But there were no Dementors here now. It was just him and her, with his daughter between them.

Annika glanced up at him, her eyes filled with an insane delight and he could almost feel the weight of her madness pressing in on him. How on earth had this ever happened? He tried for a small smile as his mind searched back into the past. He tried to come up with a time, an instance, where he'd done something inappropriate. Something to send her into this state. He couldn't come up with one. In truth, he'd never given her much thought except during their lessons. If he'd been preferential with any student, it had been Katia - because she reminded him so much of Hermione. And he'd always, always, bent over backwards to ensure that he was the only one who knew of his inner favoritism.

As he hadn't heard grumblings, or even whispered asides, about her being labeled a teacher's pet, he figured he'd done a fair job of it.

"You're worried about something," Annika said abruptly, her own brow furrowing.

"What?"

"I can always tell when you're upset. Ever since you started teaching. It was my fourth year, and I remember it so clearly." She laughed, a high, girlish laugh. For a moment, she sounded almost normal. "How could I not? I knew then, from the moment our eyes met, that there was something special between us. Of course, I didn't realize then that we were soul mates. I thought it was just a crush. But as time moved on, it became clearer."

As she spoke, Harry was mentally scrambling, trying to remember his first class with the fourth years. He remembered being nervous, newly sober, and desperate to make a good show of it. For Dumbledore. For Ron. For Hermione's memory. Closing his eyes, he pictured the classroom, then the faces. Then he saw her, even though she was obscured from his direct line of vision by the burly boy in front of her. But it was a different Annika than the one before him now. She had glasses, dirty blonde hair scraped off her face in a tight plait that fell nearly to her waist, and her acne covered face had been almost as bad as Eloise Midgeon's. Harry had to keep from gaping as recognition flooded him. She reminded him of what Myrtle must have looked like in her days as a student.

"You've changed since then," Harry commented, taking in the non-bespectacled eyes and casual crop of hair that fell in feathers around her clear complexion.

Annika smiled then, her face almost rapt and somehow gentle, yet her eyes were still showing the wildness of her delusion. "I knew you'd noticed. I spent the summer getting ready for this year. I pleaded with my parents for the Occulus procedure to rid myself of those hideously thick glasses, had my older sister help me with hair styles, and my skin finally cleared." She preened as she outlined her physical changes, but when she'd finished, her smile turned into a rather ugly frown. "You didn't say anything, though. Why?"

Think fast, Potter.

"Oh," he cleared his throat, praying for inspiration, "well, I couldn't, you know. I'm a teacher. It's not looked on favorably for teachers to notice such things about their students. At least, not publicly." He tacked a lame smile onto his face, praying now that she bought it.

"I thought it was something like that." She smiled back, appeased.

Harry grinned back, genuinely. Perhaps his skills as an actor weren't that lacking after all. He glanced down and saw that Jamie had fallen asleep in Annika's arms. He hoped she'd stay that way. With luck on his side, this would be over by the time she woke.

Luck. He thought of finding Hermione, of the day Jamie was born. And a tingle of unease filtered through him. Dare he wish for more luck than that?

He saw Annika move slightly. Towards him. But she didn't have evil intent on her face; if anything, she looked quite amorous. One thing he knew for certain, his acting skills didn't stretch that far. He cast around for something, anything, to keep her from closing the distance.

His eyes traveled from Jamie to Annika's face. To her eyes. And he knew. With a blast of clarity that would have knocked him off his feet if he'd been standing. He'd seen that look before, in light brown eyes. Eyes surrounded by wavy brown hair and the face of the one he truly loved.

"It was you," he said softly before he could stop himself. "In my office."

"Yes, it was," she replied. Her face twisted into a sneer, the same ugly sneer he'd seen that afternoon on Hermione's face. It never ceased to amaze him how anger could warp a normally attractive face into something grotesque. "That was a miscalculation on my part."

"Miscalculation?" Harry asked, hoping that perhaps the sane part of her mind was trying to break through the twisted bent of her obsession with him. If there was a small break, then perhaps he could make it a bit bigger.

"Yes. There were times when I was sure you were ready to see, ready to be unchained. Released from her spell. We had talked earlier that day, and you seemed so distracted. I thought you were fighting it, fighting her control. You had always been so strong before, so resistant to other forms of mind control that I hoped your true feelings for me were finally breaking her spell. But then...your reaction. . It troubled me deeply and I must admit that it was so frustrating to find you still deep under her influence. And I'm sorry I took my frustrations out...physically. I usually have more control than that. I tried to run my turmoil out, but that didn't work. By the time I'd reached the school gates, I was still very angry. And...and...I'm sorry."

Harry was bewildered for a moment before the memory swam before his eyes. The broken pane of glass in their kitchen, the vandalization of his office. He hadn't connected the two events. Draco's accident. Watching as Mariah brought Draco back from the edge of death had eclipsed everything else.

"But you've lost your temper before," Harry prodded. He needed to get further into her reasonings if he had any hope of finishing this. And there were more questions that needed answering.

"We all do, Beloved," she agreed. "I'm not proud of that, but it's perfectly understandable. I've been under a great deal of stress." Her voice hitched as the color in her face rose. "I've spent years...years, Harry. Watching as she wove her spell around you, making you oblivious to everyone and everything but her. And as I was due to leave Hogwarts at the end of term, time was running short. I've been waiting for you, waiting for you wake up...to fight. But you haven't, Harry. If I didn't know better, I'd think you didn't even want to fight."

She was shouting now. She'd stood and resumed her pacing around the room. Jamie was stirring in her arms and Harry was kicking himself for pushing her. He was also beginning to feel a bit of sensation in his fingers and toes. Just to be sure it wasn't his imagination, he wiggled his toes inside his shoes. They moved. Whatever spell he'd been hit with, it was starting to lose its strength. Discretion might be the better part of valor, but it was also his way out of this. If she didn't know he could move, he'd have a split second of surprise in which to act.

As he'd learned countless times in the past, a second's hesitation could mean the difference between winning and losing, between success and failure. Between life and death.

"You did, didn't you?" she asked, stopping her pacing just long enough to stare at him. "You were trying to fight her, weren't you?"

Moment of truth, Potter,

his subconscious spoke up in Draco's voice, prove to me that the Sorting Hat had a reason for wanting you in Slytherin. That there's a part of you that can lie with the best of us.

"Of course I was fighting, Annika," Harry replied, trying to do everything Ron didn't do when he lied. He met her eyes, kept his voice calm and even, adding just a bit of hurt into it for good measure. "But it was unlike any spell I'd ever experienced."

He was rewarded with a smile. She calmed almost at once, ceasing her pacing. Harry exhaled the breath he wasn't aware he'd been holding. He nearly raised his hand to rub the bridge between his eyes, but remembered just in time that he wasn't supposed to be able to.

"Well, that doesn't matter now. It's over." Annika crossed the short distance that separated them and resumed her spot in front of him. "You're completely free. Of those that would harm you, of those that would try to control you. We can be together, just the three of us. It's been too long in coming, but the waiting will pass into sweet memory for us. The past is gone, the ugliness is behind us. All that's left is a glorious future."

Something in what she said set off alarm bells in his head. Something about "those that would harm him". Now that was just preposterous. Hermione would no doubt be rolling her eyes and telling him he needed to stop reading mysteries again. But he had to know.

"Harm me?" Harry asked. It was hard to keep the adrenaline now coursing through him from showing in his voice, but he gave it a go. "Do you mean the Dursleys?"

"Those horrid people," she fairly spat. "The world is well rid of them."

"Did you...?" Harry asked again, unable to finish the question.

"I certainly did," she said, looking for once this crazy afternoon like the student she was. Eager for praise from a Professor on a project well executed.

For the first time since he'd opened his eyes, Harry felt real fear.

Hermione had been wrong. She wasn't just harboring an innocent crush that she'd taken too far. She wasn't simply obsessed with him to the exclusion of everyone else.

She'd set the fire that killed the Dursleys. And if she'd already killed once, could he be guaranteed that she wouldn't do it again if things didn't go her way?

Whatever you're planning, Hermione,

Harry thought, you'd better make it fast.

*^*^*^*^*^*^

Draco was holding his front door open with one hand and his robe closed with the other. He stared at the three people on his landing with something like shock. It didn't help matters that they'd all started speaking the moment he'd opened the door. "Hang on a bloody minute," Draco said, shaking his head. "One at a time. Harry and Jamie are missing?"

"Yes. And I think..." Hermione began.

"Oi," Ron interrupted, drowning out Hermione's voice. All four of them looked at him. "Can we perhaps move this inside the house? More importantly, can we request that Malfoy put on some pants?"

Draco shot an eyebrow into his hairline. "Tempted, Weasley?"

"You wish," Ron muttered. "Now go. I have nightmares enough thinking about you with my sister. I don't need to see evidence of it waving at me."

Draco looked mortified, then snuck a quick look down. His robe was still covering all the important bits. When he returned his gaze to his brother-in-law's, he found him smirking slightly.

"Made you look," he grinned.

Draco rolled his eyes, but Ron knew he saw a trace of a smile on the other man's face as he turned to head up the stairs.

"You two, honestly," Hermione sighed. "Harry and Draco are bad enough, do you have to participate as well?"

"I don't know what you're on about, Hermione. I was having horrid visions of that robe opening. I don't think I could have handled the sight of Draco's pride and joy and still been able to concentrate later. I'd have to bleach my brain like Harry wanted to after seeing Snape's backside."

"That's pride and joys, Weasley, plural," Draco called from midway up the stairs. "Unless there's something you haven't shared with the class, you should have two as well."

"Sod off, Malfoy," Ron answered.

Muttering about men who refused to grow up and used pathetic attempts at humor to get through stress, Hermione and Mariah entered the house and walked towards the kitchen. Ron followed, sending thanks to whoever was in charge that he hadn't seen anything under that robe.

There was an air of barely contained patience in the kitchen as they waited for the Malfoys to compose themselves upstairs. Ron paced while Mariah and Hermione sat at the scrubbed wood table and drummed their fingers. Before too long, the five of them were gathered together. Hermione and Mariah took it in turns to tell them what had transpired that afternoon. They were all hoping that if they each told their part of the puzzle, they could get a clear picture.

And finally solve the bloody thing.

Hermione told them of Katia's accident, and the attack on Sara. Her voice nearly broke when she told them about finding Jamie's crib empty, but it held firm. It stayed firm as she told them who'd been with Jamie at the time.

"And you know for certain that this Annika is behind it all?" Draco asked, facing Hermione.

"Yes," Hermione and Mariah said in unison. Mariah continued, "When I got home from Kalena's, I was clearing dishes and I picked up Harry's water glass. I saw him with her. She was holding Jamie, and I heard Harry say her name."

"Did you see where they were?" Hermione asked. Mariah had merely confirmed to Hermione as they'd rushed to Draco and Ginny's that she'd seen Annika with Harry. Before she'd had a chance to question Mariah, they'd been knocking on the Malfoy's door.

"I wish I had, Hermione. I'm still running over what I saw in my mind, but it wasn't a clear vision. All I could see behind her was a wall."

"Perhaps I'm missing something here, but who's Annika?" Draco asked. Ginny shared the same puzzled look and shrugged her shoulders.

"One of Harry's students. A seventh year Gryffindor."

"A student?" Ginny said, looking puzzled. Then her face cleared. "This is the one you were talking about a few months ago, isn't it? The one that wants to become an Auror?"

"Yes. And apparently, she has a real chance. She's the first student in years that has."

"Or did before she went mental," Ron supplied.

"True enough," Draco responded. "From the Aurors I know at the Ministry, they like them sane at the onset. There's time enough for them to go barmy as they get used to the job." Everyone in the room, save Mariah, was remembering Mad Eye Moody.

"So we're talking about a very accomplished witch. We can't take anything for granted with her. And we can't face her with the mindset that she's just a student. I'd say, from what I've heard Harry and the others say about her, she's on par with my skill level at seventh year...perhaps better."

"Merlin's beard," Ron groaned. "You were hard enough to handle...but you gone all mental just about scares the red from my hair."

"Too right," Draco agreed. "But I'm still trying to get past Harry's stalker being one of his students. Once this is over, I'm going to have to make sure to give him hell about it as often as possible."

"For now, can we concentrate on how we're going to get past it? And where they could be?" Hermione asked, her patience growing thin. Her husband and her baby were Merlin knew where and no one seemed to feel the need to be doing anything about it.

"They're probably at your house, Hermione," Draco said laconically. "I thought you knew that."

Four sets of eyes bore down on Draco and he realized that Harry had meant what he said; he hadn't told a soul what they'd done. "After Harry's office was ransacked and you found the evidence of someone having used your fireplace to reach his office, Harry asked me to help him set up a few wards so it wouldn't happen again."

"Why would Harry need your help?" Hermione asked.

Draco shot a nervous glance at her, then at Ron and Mariah. He didn't answer until he felt Ginny's hand on his thigh, giving him the support he needed. It wasn't as though they thought he pushed paper around all day, but he'd never come straight out and told them what exactly he did for the Ministry. This was about as close as he'd ever come. Or ever would, if he could help it.

Oddly enough, he felt support coming from an entirely unexpected place. Mariah was looking at him with something like encouragement, as if she knew what he was about to say. Taking her powers into consideration, Draco thought, she just might know, at that.

"It doesn't matter," Hermione said, noting the discomfiture on Draco's face. "I don't need to know the whys of it. But how can you be so certain that they're at the house?"

"Harry and I set up several wards, specific wards...er," Draco cleared his throat. "These wards are...er," Draco paused again.

"Look," Ron broke in, "I think I speak for everyone here on this. Stop stammering about how they were done and fill us in on what they do."

"Right then," Draco said, visibly relaxing. "Because of these wards, the only way Annika would have been able to use the fire, was holding Jamie. The fireplaces in your offices only connect outside Hogwarts if someone related to you, either of you, by blood uses it."

Hermione held up a hand. "And what stopped her from using the house fireplace to Floo from there..."

"Further," Draco said, a bit more loudly, "the fireplace in your house connects only to Harry's office unless used by you or Harry."

Hermione still wasn't convinced. "And which ward, precisely, kept her from simply walking out of the front door?"

"Samantha would have seen her, and followed her," Mariah soothed. "Your house has been under surveillance for a while now."

This time, all eyes turned towards Mariah in shock. Hermione was the first to break the silence. "Pardon? Who the ruddy hell is Samantha?"

"Faren," she replied calmly. "To cut down on confusion, I'll use her alias. Faren never really left her post as Jamie's guardian, Hermione. She just hasn't been doing it from inside the house. That's what I've been doing with Kalena. It took the two of us to break that diary and learn its secrets, but we were able to do so. Unless something happened to Faren, Annika hasn't left your house."

"You knew this?" Hermione looked first at Ron, then at Draco.

"It's news to me," Ron said, his attention divided between the verbal conversation and the mental one he was trying to have with Mariah simultaneously. "There wasn't time for her to tell me what she'd found out before we went tearing out of the house to find you."

"As curious as I am about Faren," Ginny spoke up, "I think we need to focus on getting Harry and Jamie away from this lunatic before we do anything else."

Everyone nodded in agreement, but no one said anything.

"And how, exactly, are we going to do this?" Hermione finally voiced what they were all thinking.

Brilliant plans were thin on the ground, however. Silence reigned as blank stare met blank stare.

*^*^*^*^*^

It was unreal. Almost surreal. How many times in his neglected youth had he lain awake at night and wished the Dursleys away? He couldn't count. Many things traipsed through his orphan's mind while he lay at Mrs. Figg's, as well. Of another horrible car crash intervening in his life, this time setting a wrong to right, and setting him free of their cold indifference.

And then, one spring day, those long ago thoughts had come to pass. The Dursleys had died and he was free of them forever. Granted, when it happened he'd been an adult and already shut of them. Nevertheless, he'd had a more difficult time coping with their deaths than he'd expected.

An almost unreasonable sense of vengeance began to pulse within him. He wanted to rage at her, to tell her that no matter how vile they were as guardians, she'd no right to take their lives.

Then Jamie began to gurgle, waking slightly from her short nap, and he fought to calm the anger within him. Losing control, criticizing her in any way, could have consequences infinitely more dear than the loss of his surrogate family. In the end, as he'd come to understand this year, family was family. The one he'd grown up with might have been nothing compared to the one he had now, but it had still been his.

"I'm sorry, Annika. That...what you just told me...I'm a bit taken aback. Why the Dursleys? They haven't been a part of my life for a very long time."

"See?" She grinned madly. "This is why I love you. You're so selfless. So willing to let the past bleed into memory and forgive."

"But I'm really not, Annika," Harry said. He had a thought that if he could gently crack some of her illusions about him, he could stop this before it went any further.

Annika merely nodded at his statement, and smiled indulgently at him. "You're thinking of that time when you lived in the Astronomy Tower last year."

"I am," Harry replied, knowing that his brief separation from Hermione bordered on venturing into treacherous waters. He wasn't sure what he expected from her in reaction, but it wasn't the soft, loving smile and a small laugh.

"Oh, Harry," she sighed, "how like you to bring up my fondest memory. That was when I knew. That was when it became so achingly clear to me that we were destined. That was when I realized you were under a spell of some kind and my mission to free you from it became apparent."

Nonplussed, Harry kept his face as blank as possible. More to the point, he tried to keep his thoughts from transferring to his face. Because all he could think, at that moment, was barking bloody mad.

"Really?" he said, and it at least sounded like he was interested instead of attempting to keep his skin from crawling off.

"Oh yes. I saw her, you see. The witch they call your wife. I saw her with the Slytherin, saw her kiss him. It was like a revelation, Harry. How could someone so faithless be meant for you? No matter what I heard about the great Gryffindor love story, I just couldn't believe it. Not after seeing that. I knew then that no one understood what you really needed. Someone who will put you first and foremost. All year long, I'd been trying to reconcile your choice within me. But...but when I saw her, saw what she did. And then I saw you. I hid in the shadows of the corridor as you passed by. Oh, Harry, it just broke my heart. You looked so lost. I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, but that was the closest you ever came before now of breaking free of her spell. I'm right, aren't I?"

"Yes," he choked out. "You're right." What else could he say? Somehow he didn't think she'd take kindly to him telling her she was full of bollocks. The more she spoke, the more insight he was given into the state of her mind, the more frightened he became that he wouldn't be able to keep up this charade any longer. Every paternal instinct within him was telling him to grab his daughter and run.

"I had such hopes then, Harry. I really did. But she somehow managed to get you under her control again. And I realized that drastic measures were needed. It took me most of the summer to put everything together. I researched, read past issues of the Prophet, every written work about your life and your defeat of V-Voldemort."

Harry, wisely in his opinion, did not correct her. Proud as he was of his wife's achievement, the last thing Annika needed to hear right now was that Voldemort's defeat was entirely Hermione's doing.

"With everything I read, it became clearer and clearer that we were meant to be together. Destined. That you were my beloved. The hardest parts to read were the stories of your earlier years, your time with those hideous Muggles. How dare they?"

She was pacing again. But more importantly, Jamie was starting to fuss. And she was starting to reach for him. It took a Herculean effort to keep his arms limp at his sides and not reach back. By the wild look in her eyes, Harry could tell Annika was getting worked up again and he had to think of some way to calm her. She seemed less agitated when talking about the things she did to help him break the spell, so he steered her back in that direction.

"I just realized something," Harry said evenly, cutting off the vicious diatribe she'd been spewing while he was thinking. He waited for her to stop pacing and turn to look at him.

"What?" she bit out, now shifting an increasingly agitated Jamie on to her shoulder.

"Come sit with me and I'll tell you."

That cooled her off. She stopped, mid rant, and turned towards him. Her face lost the ugliness of rage and slid into the serenity of her madness. She moved towards him and dropped to a cross-legged sitting position directly in front of him. Jamie shifted in Annika's arms to sit in the hollow of her legs. She grinned up at Harry and he grinned back. Content to have him close, she settled down to gnawing on her knuckles. When she did that, Harry knew, she was getting hungry.

He didn't have long.

*^*^*^*^

"You want me to what?" Ron asked.

"Before we do anything Gryffindor, and by that I mean brave and stupid, I'd rather ascertain that they really are in the house."

None of the Gryffindors at the table rose to the bait. There would be time enough for that later. For now, they had the beginnings of a plan forming.

"So you want me to take Harry's Invisibility Cloak, summoned from his closet, and fly around the house peering in windows?"

"Yes, that's precisely what I want you to do. I could go on about finding your inner Slytherin and using stealth and sneakiness to size up your opponent, but that would just get me told to sod off, so we'll skip that bit."

"Sod off anyway," Ron muttered. "I mean, come on, Malfoy. You're cracked. Won't she be expecting something like this?"

"I don't think so," Ginny said. "If we're operating under the assumption that she believes Harry returns her affections, and I think her letters to him bear this out, she won't be looking for anyone to come after him. She'll be so overjoyed to have him to herself, think that they're finally together and everything is finally right with the world."

"I hope you're right," Hermione said quietly from the end of the table. She'd been silent as they'd batted ideas and plans around. "I hope they're all right," she said, more to herself than to the room at large.

"They're fine," Mariah answered her anyway. "You have to believe that, Hermione."

"I'm trying." She looked up and met four pairs of eyes. "Right then. Let's get Ron airborne and see exactly what is going on in my house."

They decided to Apparate straight to the house's kitchen entrance, just on the off chance that Annika was watching the high street. The house looked still and silent, just as it had done that morning when they'd left for Hogwarts. They kept their voices at a low whisper as windows were open all over the upstairs. Mariah looked around as Hermione set about summoning Harry's Invisibility Cloak. It fluttered down through their open bedroom window.

"Samantha isn't here," she said as Ron mounted the broom and Draco and Ginny tossed the cloak over him.

"Is that good or bad?" Ron's voice asked from under the cloak.

"I don't think it's a sign we should call off this party and head over to the Three Broomsticks for butterbeer," she said gravely.

"I thought not," Ron muttered. "I'll be back in a few."

"Check every window, Ron. And don't just glance in them, really look around."

"I'm not exactly a newcomer to sneaking about and spying, Hermione," Ron hissed.

"Fight about it later," Ginny interjected. "Off with you, Ron."

*^*^*^*

"What did you realize, Beloved?"

"My scar," he began. "Several times this year, I've felt it tingle." He paused briefly as his brain tried desperately not to reveal what it had just seen out the window. "That was your doing, wasn't it?"

He threw the question out there to get her talking. He needed time to process what he'd just seen. A head of bright red hair floating right outside. Ron, he thought. Due to his height, Ron had never quite gotten the hang of keeping his entire body invisible. One part or another usually showed through. More often than not it was his feet, and on one memorable occasion it had been his arse hanging out. This time, the top of his head wasn't covered properly. Probably because he'd been riding a broomstick.

And if Ron's head was floating outside of his window that meant the cavalry had arrived. Hopefully with some sort of plan to get Jamie and him away from this mental case before she went completely around the bend.

"So it was a simple thing," Annika rambled, "to get the towel charmed and hand it to you after Quidditch. That touched your scar and we were connected." She stopped, beaming at him. She seemed to realize at once that she didn't have his full attention. "Harry?" Annika said sharply, recalling his focus back to her. She looked petulant, brows knitted together and toe tapping. "You didn't listen to a word I just said, did you?"

"Of course I did," he placated. At least he hoped he'd caught enough of what she'd been rambling about to bluff his way through. "You were just about to show me where you'd made the connection spell. I must say, Annika, that I'm quite impressed. That's very advanced magic for a seventh year. I think you'll be quite a credit to the Auror's Institute."

"The...?" her brows drew together again.

"After leaving," Harry said, the small hairs on the back of his head standing on end. Whether from the fire spitting from her eyes or the creak on the staircase, he wasn't sure. "I realize the letters haven't arrived yet, but I'm positive you'll be accepted."

In the time it took him to blink, her face went from confused to livid. Blood suffused her cheeks, her breathing became harsh and ragged. "How dare...I thought...I thought you understood. We need to be together, Harry. Always. There's no way I'll leave you for that long. And you'll have to stop teaching as well. We're going away. Away from everyone...where we can be together in peace."

Harry was frantically trying to think of something to say to that declaration when he felt it. The swish of a cloak that wasn't there across his ankles. Then he smelled Hermione's shampoo. Hermione was in the room with them, under his Invisibility Cloak. Instinctively, he knew she was there for Jamie. And he knew exactly what to do.

"Annika, love," Harry soothed, trying not to choke on the endearment. "Please, come here."

She walked over to him, eyes still wild, a petulant frown on her face. Before she reached him, Harry pictured Hermione on their wedding day and offered up what he hoped was the same beaming smile.

"Put our baby in her crib and come sit with me," he said, keeping his voice low and intimate. This was the most difficult thing he'd ever done. First, trying to pretend it was normal for one half of a couple to be frozen to the floor. Second, sweet-talking one woman while his wife was mere feet away.

Perhaps it was his calling her "love", or his referring to Jamie as their baby, but she acquiesced. Placing a small kiss to the baby's forehead, she lay her down in the crib and crossed to Harry, sitting in front of him and taking his hands in hers.

He spoke before she could. "Of course I understand that, Annika. I just wasn't sure you were ready to give up your dream of becoming an Auror...just for me." Harry saw a flicker of movement over Annika's shoulder. His eyes darted once to the crib and noticed it was empty.

Hermione had Jamie. His daughter was safely away from this lunatic. The rush of relief within him was staggering, but he kept his voice even. Even better, he was fairly certain he was completely free of the spell she'd cast on him to keep him immobile. He wasn't about to share that information just yet, however. If he knew anything at all, he knew that Hermione would be back in this room the moment she'd ensured that Jamie was out of harm's way.

"Harry," Annika sighed, scooting closer to him. "Nothing is more important than our being together."

"Except for one minor little stumbling block," Hermione said from the doorway. She was visible and the sparks shooting from her eyes would have sent a giant scurrying off in fear. "That's my husband you're planning this grand getaway with, and I'm not quite finished with him yet."

"Yes, you are," Annika said smugly, gripping Harry's hands tightly. "Tell her, Harry. I want to see her face when she realizes her days of controlling you are over."

With his daughter safely away, Harry felt the burden of his pretense lift from his shoulders. He took his hands from hers and eased himself to his feet. Pins and needles shot down his legs as the blood returned to them, but he steeled himself against it. The pain would pass.

She was watching him closely as he stood. From the look on her face, she seemed to be waiting for him to carry on removing Hermione from the room, from their lives. At least, that's how he interpreted the cat-after-canary look on her face. His eyes darted to his wife and he had to smother a smile. The barely contained anger was likely only noticeable to him. Ron, too, probably. They'd both been on the receiving end of that look often enough to know it well.

And now, to end this. Once and for all.

"I wish I could, Annika, but I can't." He was at Hermione's side, his arm draping casually over her shoulder as they faced his student. "I'm afraid Hermione's had control over my heart since we were not much younger than you. Not from any spell, or mind control. Simply by being who she is. I love Hermione; I always will."

Annika stared at them, eyes wide in shock. She stood, shaking her head from side to side as if trying to clear it. Before either of them could react, she'd drawn her wand and leveled it at them. Hermione's wand rose to meet Annika's, but the girl had finished the spell before Hermione could do anything.

"Riddikulus!"

It took a moment for what she said to register. Hermione lowered her wand as they both stared at her openmouthed as one more piece fell into the puzzle. Their eyes met, both of them clearly remembering the day they'd encountered Annika in the corridors and the boggart Harry had captured. And the way she'd looked at them after encountering it.

At some point during her descent, her boggart had changed from a basilisk to a Harry and Hermione deeply in love.

Arm shaking, eyes still wide, Annika repeated the spell.

Surprisingly, it was Hermione that approached the girl, holding her hand and lowering the wand. "There is no boggart, Annika," she said, softly.

"It...it has to be. There's no other explanation. Harry loves me, and I love him and we're going to be together."

"I'm not doubting that you love Harry, Annika. But it's time you realize that those affections are not returned."

Annika's face twisted into rage in the blink of an eye. She pulled her hand from Hermione's grip and pushed hard on her shoulders. Hermione, caught unawares, was knocked to the ground.

"They might not be, but they will. They will. Once you're dead." Annika's wand raised to point directly at Hermione's heart.

Now familiar with her rapid-fire mood swings, Harry had his wand in hand the moment Hermione approached Annika. With this thing so bloody close to done and over, he was taking no chances.

Neither, apparently, was Annika. When his wand raised to disarm her, she swung out with her free hand, knocking the wand from his grip. He hadn't been prepared for a non-magical move from her and watched, stunned, as his wand flew across the room.

"Accio

wand!" Her voice was calm, eerily so, as she faced the pair of them, a wand in each hand.

Harry felt a moment's panic. His arms dropped to his sides, real fear coursing through him. She was capable of anything now. Her eyes had lost any sense of rationality as they moved between Hermione and him. Wracking his brain for something to say, to do, to divert her attention, Harry nearly yelped when he felt a wand being pressed into his hand. Gripping it tightly, he shifted it so it was straight down and not as visible.

"Expelliarmus!"

He shouted the spell the moment her eyes left him and moved to Hermione.

Both wands flew from her hands and floated innocently above their heads. Annika watched in silent horror, her eyes truly mad now as Harry leveled his wand directly at her.

"It's over, Annika." He kept his voice low, soothing, but it didn't seem to matter. Now that all of her leverage was gone, her illusions shattered and reality staring her in the face, she merely stared at him with blank eyes.

"No," she cried, then repeated the word over and over as she began to tremble. "It can't be, it can't be." She wrapped her arms around herself as she shook, sinking to the floor and rocking herself back and forth. "No, no, no."

Harry kept his wand trained on Annika, but only loosely. She was a danger to no one now, except maybe herself. Harry crossed to Hermione and helped her to her feet. "All right, love?"

"I am now." She smiled slightly, casting a worried eye towards the now gibbering girl on the floor. Harry pulled her into a one-armed hug and pressed a kiss to her temple. "Where's Jamie?"

"Right here, Harry," Ginny said, walking into the room, a gurgling Jamie in her arms, Draco on her heels. Harry took the baby from her at once, wrapping his arms around his daughter and kissing the top of her head. Draco took his wand back from Harry and trained it on the girl on the floor.

"How's Faren?" Hermione asked Ginny, reverting to the nanny's alias for Harry's benefit.

Harry, who had completely forgotten about finding the nanny in the room before his ordeal with Annika began, whipped his head around to the hallway. It must have been her foot he'd seen right before Annika started talking. Her single foot. Immobile.

He raised concerned eyes to Ginny, his mouth gaping open when he saw her shake her head.

"Mariah tried. But whatever spell she," Ginny indicated Annika, "used, it was powerful. And it was too late for Mariah to do anything about it."

Hermione gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. "Faren's been watching over Jamie. Even after I...even after she left. And now she's...she's..."

Harry tightened his arms around Hermione, disbelief threading through him. "Draco," he said over the top of Hermione's head, "can you take Annika away? The Ministry, St. Mungo's, wherever, I don't care. Just out of this house."

"Of course," Draco replied. With a quick kiss to Ginny's cheek, he crossed to Annika, took the girl by the arm and they Disapparated.

Harry led Hermione and Ginny down the stairs to where Faren, or Samantha, lay peacefully on their living room floor. Mariah and Ron were at her head, Mariah crying quietly in Ron's arms.

"I've got to get her home," Ron said, the moment they entered the room.

"Go," Hermione said softly, "Annika is gone. Draco's taken her to the Ministry. We'll look after Faren."

"It's all over," Harry said softly.

^*^*^*^*^*

They laid their nanny to rest in the Hogsmeade cemetery, a simple marker proclaiming the dates of her birth and death and the legend "guardian". She had no family, near as Mariah and Kalena had been able to find, so they'd decided to keep her close to them. For Hermione, he knew guilt played a part since she'd distrusted their nanny. For Harry, he felt it was the last honor he could give her. A resting place close to those she'd guarded.

As Harry stood over her grave, he remembered standing over four others not so long ago.

Then, he'd been saying goodbye to those that should have watched over him but didn't. Now, he was standing over one who had given her life for him, for his daughter, for his family. Guardians came in all shapes and sizes. Some were equal to the task, some weren't.

"Thank you, Faren," he whispered, dropping a bouquet of forget-me-nots onto the raised mound of earth before walking away. He couldn't call her Samantha. It was foreign to him. He'd known her as Faren and that's how he'd remember her. Always.

*^*^*^*^

Over the next few days, the lingering details of all that had led up to that horrid day finally became clear. Mariah told Harry what they'd found in the journal. That Faren/Samantha had been sent to them by Allison, Mariah's mother. The older Diviner had been nearly overtaken by the desire to get close to Renae and her baby and wanted a spy close to Mariah in order to achieve that. She'd intended on using Faren/Samantha's skills as a Knower to her own ends. But Allison hadn't counted on Faren/Samantha growing attached to those she was sent to spy on. She'd tried to control the girl, but failed.

Once the dust had settled, Mariah had wasted no time going to her mother and flaying an inch of skin from her, figuratively and almost literally. Everyone, after hearing Mariah's account of the mother and child reunion, was fairly sure that they wouldn't be hearing from Allison any time in the near or distant future.

The hardest part to cope with, for Harry and Hermione, was finding Faren's letter that night as they put Jamie down. Hands shaking, grief still a raw wound yet to scab, they'd taken the letter downstairs and read.

Harry and Hermione,

I didn't know how to say everything I need to say in person, so I've written it here. So you'll understand.

There is danger here. Of the greatest sort. A black shroud covers your house and all that inhabit it. A black shadow moves closer to you every day. This mind is closed to me, whether by madness or malice, I'm not sure. But I can see nothing save death. And closer it moves.

I've tried to watch over you, watch over Jamie, as best I could. The journey Allison sent me on seemed a noble quest at first, but one I soon came to realize served no one but her. When I was able to piece together why she wanted me here so badly, I did my best to shield all of you from her intents. Please tell Mariah and Ron that I'm sorry for deceiving them, but that it was the only way I could ensure that Allison remained as far away from them, and their daughter, as possible.

I've been watching, and will continue to watch over, all that have grown dear to me. Until the shadow passes, I will guard you in whatever way I can.

Samantha (Faren)

Harry and Hermione read and reread the letter, well into the darkness of the night.

*^*^*^*^

The final mystery was solved when Katia woke up. As with the first time, it took several days before she was awake and coherent enough to speak. Once she was, however, it all came tumbling out in one long speech.

"I'd gone to see Annika, she was going to help me with something for Charms, and she wasn't there. But her wardrobe was open and it looked like some clothes were spilling out onto the floor, so I' thought I'd help her out and at least fold them. When I opened the wardrobe door, though, it was covered with pictures of Professor Potter. There was a blanket, a big stuffed dog that I remembered seeing Jamie holding, Professor Potter's award for special services to the school. And an open journal," she paused only long enough to blush. "The entries were very disturbing. I put the journal down and ran out of there, straight towards your office, Professor. But she saw me running and stopped me. I reckon I wasn't too good at concealing what I'd found. Then, boom. Next thing I remember I'm lying here."

"Professor?" David, her fellow third year, asked from where he sat. Holding Katia's hand firmly in his. "Where is Annika now?"

Harry could hear the tension in the boy's voice. He offered David a slight smile and a reassuring touch to his shoulder. "She's in St. Mungo's, last I heard, David. She won't be leaving there any time soon. If at all."

"Good."

*^*^*^*

Ron and Mariah's wedding day dawned bright and clear. Despite the drama leading up to it, the simple ceremony went off without a hitch. Nearly. When Ron agreed to take Ron as his wedded wife, the laughter took a few moments to subside, as did the redness in the groom's ears.

After the ceremony, Ginny flitted from table to table, checking on details, until finally dropping into her seat at the head table and slipping the shoes from her aching feet.

"I don't care if the roof collapses," she sighed, rubbing the instep of her left foot, "I'm not putting those torture devices back on again. Mmmmm," she sighed as Draco took the right one and began massaging it. "Love, you've got an hour to stop that or I'll get angry."

"Never knew you had a foot fetish, Draco," Harry commented idly, sitting back in his chair with his arm around Hermione's shoulders.

"There are many things you don't know about me, Harry," Draco said on a smirk.

"True, that," Harry agreed, matching the smirk. "Although now I can say that I know what your wand feels like."

"Please," Ron piped up from across the table. "I'm eating here."

"When aren't you, love?" Mariah grinned, taking up his free left hand and kissing the plain gold band there.

"My point," he grinned back, eyes bright with promises for later.

"I meant to tell you, Draco. About your wand...?" Harry grinned.

Draco's eyebrow rose. "Yes?"

"Bit smaller than I expected."

Laughter erupted around the table as Harry and Draco exchanged wand banter. Except for Ginny and Hermione. Their eyes met in mutual exasperation. Then Ginny's face spread into a wide grin and she leaned over to whisper something to Hermione. With Hermione's nod, Ginny slammed her hands onto the tabletop to get everyone's attention.

"Right, then. I've had about enough of this with you two," she said seriously, looking back and forth between Harry and Draco.

"It's just teasing, Red," Draco said, trying to look abashed.

"Perhaps," she replied, biting the insides of her cheeks. "But Hermione and I have decided it's time for you two to either put up or shut up, as the Muggles say."

"Put up...?" Harry began.

"... or shut up?" Draco finished.

"Yes," Hermione interjected, trying for her own serious glare. "In other words, either get about snogging each other or leave off the innuendo altogether."

Harry and Draco stared at one another. In the space of a moment, they came to a mutual understanding. Their wives may be having them on, but no way were they going to back down. Draco raised his eyebrow as if to ask "you game?" Harry's answering grin settled it.

Without any fanfare, they both rose from their chairs, met right behind Ron and Mariah, and kissed. It might not have been full on snogging, but they held the closed-mouthed kiss a moment or two longer than absolutely necessary.

"Great Merlin's ghost, my eyes!" Ron lamented, torn between laughter at their not backing down from a bluff and nausea. The laughter won as he noted the shocked looks on both Hermione and Ginny's faces.

When Harry and Draco broke apart, they merely nodded to one another and resumed their places next to their wives. Silence reigned as glances were exchanged among the six of them.

"Well," Ginny said, her voice shaky, shifting slightly in her seat, "I don't know about you, Hermione..." She didn't, couldn't, finish the sentence.

"Yes," Hermione nodded, taking Harry's hand and squeezing it tightly, her voice nearly as unsteady as Ginny's. "Me, too."

Ron and Mariah laughed as Draco and Ginny and Harry and Hermione Disapparated from the table without another word.

"Guess it's just you and me, Mrs. Weasley," Ron sighed, pulling Mariah to standing and into his arms.

I wouldn't have it any other way, Mr. Weasley.

~Fin~