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In Fond Remembrance	By : T-W-O Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Draco/Hermione Views: 22794 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: Harry Potter belongs to the very witty and very rich JK Rowling. I do not make any make any money - from this story. I do own the computer this was typed on.

Chapter List
- 15
- 16
- 17
“All will be as it should, daughter.”
Less than a day remained until the start of Betaine, the Druid calendar's start of spring: a time of renewal and (re)birth. Hours shy of two weeks without Draco left Hermione out of sorts. She sat in the window seat on the side wall, staring at the empty playground and pretending to ignore Draco’s unceasing pounding on the library door with his hands and head.
Lilith banished Aloysius and the other portrait inhabitants to see to Hermione, whose state of stress caused mild magical damage to the surrounding plaster in a perfect imitation of Draco’s magical outbursts. Rare and priceless tomes — including a first edition Davinci diary — flew on and off the library shelves willy-nilly under no one’s control, much to Hermione’s irritation, but she lacked the peace of mind necessary to complete her task and manage the anxiety that levitated the books in the first place.
“Were you and Aloysius bonded before you were married.”
“So strongly I doubt we’d have survived different mates. Set my skin ablaze, the stinging from that man of mine. In truth, we understood little about this bond ’til after we married. ’Twas not so well formed… come from the old, wild magic, it did. Aloysius, the darling, decided a bit of tinkering with it would serve our children and their children and so on.”
All around Hermione the private library transformed itself in preparation for Beltaine. From the pensieve, Draco witnessed the raw magical strength his muggle-born lover harnessed when she had need.
Floor-to-ceiling windows transfigured themselves into a forest protectively edging the missing end wall. Groups of hawthorn and alder trees covered every inch of ground between the side walls, embraced by vines — woodbine, with its Slytherin green leaves and silver-petaled cross-like flowers, and bittersweet drooping with golden petals sprouting deep red berries. The forest canopy filtered the bright ochre sun rays from the lengthening days.
Ancient as the Manor itself, the oriental carpet morphed inch by inch into thick meadow grass, soft enough to rest upon comfortably. In the corner nearest her desk, invisible beavers dammed the newly created stream, trapping a calmative pool of water of the deepest blue in their wake. Hints of mist rose from its surface, evidence of an under-floor hot spring — the source of the warmth that kept the pool a comfortable temperature. Tree limbs and twigs levitated from the expanding forest glen to the pool and inserted themselves into the embankment under construction.
Above Hermione, the ceiling retracted to leave behind a glass-domed skylight the breadth and width of the room. Near the pool some sort of mound rose, the beginnings of a large hump attached through a short valley to a smaller one emerged at the edge of the grass — not much more than a body’s length and width in size. The desk itself twisted and shifted into what Draco assumed was an altar but its purpose eluded him. Its surface lay covered in items of the heart — a photo from Crete of a sleeping Draco, Hermione’s first picture of Lyra in utero, an exhausted Hermione asleep with a newborn Lyra in her arms and Draco reading to his sleeping daughter snoring on his chest.
“That tingle… it started with you two, didn’t it?”
Hermione’d yet to discover any “living” Malfoy portraits in the mansion before those of Lillith and her “Aly”.
“As far as I know. But remember, daughter — Aloysius’ father was a Druid priest. Common lore holds he learned his craft from Merlin himself. We practiced the old ways then — the magic of woods, field and fen — and few of the special-born married. Most were claimed untouched as priests and priestesses. Took almighty effort from my Aly to sway my father and keep me from Druid service,” the witch laughed in memory, “We were hand-fasted and married under the trees, blessed by the Lady on Midsomer Feast day. Later on Aly and his father learned much they could use tinkering with spells in our old barn. That’s where Aly created the legacy and trust spells.”
“You didn’t participate?”
“When I could, but it took my husband little effort to keep my belly full, thanks to me being special and all. Too dangerous to muck about spell-casting with a babe at the breast. Truth be told, Aly got our eldest on me in this very room a month before our joining. Thank the Lady that boy was late birthing! This room will always warm my heart — ‘twas our whole house once, before a later Malfoy placed it here in the ‘Manor’. Aly cut every timber and hewed every log in these walls with his own hands; for us. I gave birth to our first three little ones near that window where you sit now and lost my only daughter when she came too soon.”
“Why so many sons?”
“Aly’s doing ‘though I’ve no clue why. ‘course my father had six brothers as did I so getting a girl child wasn’t expected.”
“Why did Aloysius place that-that… spell on his heirs?”
For the first time in Lilith’s presence the frustration and fear drove the young witch to tears.
“I know this is hard, daughter, but you must see it as it was. My Aly worked like the Devil’s own to build that legacy; with hands and head he earned every knut.”
That disclosure brought a glance over her shoulder at the room from Hermione. The Malfoys weren’t always wealthy, a common misperception about the uber-rich.
“They were hard times but good, us working together to build something for our future. Love got us through our troubles, Hermione. With that spell, Aly tried to give our children a way to know they’d chosen well… so they’d have a partner who’d love ’em and work with ’em to keep the Malfoys going. We had so little when we started… Was it wrong to use what we had to ease the way for the ones coming behind?”
Each woman took the measure of the other as Hermione’s special form of magic, the gift of her birth, continued to alter the space they occupied. A bit of understanding passed between them.
Once done with the pensieve, Hermione made sure her daughter grasped the powerful magic of love joined to a common purpose and the strength it brought to a marriage.
“This house, the trust… ‘tis all to make sure that there’ll be Malfoys until time’s end. And that they’ll come together from love and not a desire to spend a thousand years of Malfoy galleons.”
“What did you do before you had the ‘Manor’?”
“Child, this house was nowhere near this size at my death! Added a few rooms as my belly gave us need but we shared this place with family and friends alike with no shame.”
“Did you have marriage contracts? Did you or Aly pick your children’s mates?”
“Where such ideas come from makes little sense to me. I know times have changed and mostly because of hateful types like Cuthbert and Abraxas. I promise you I’ll take the strap to them until they change their ways. No, we did not.
“As I remember it a simple handshake set the agreement once the young folks spoke their preferences. Time with the young ones and their kin served to tell who was truly paired and who wanted Aly’s money. All my boys married well thanks to that bond. Never failed those who paid its warning heed. My daughters like yourself kept my sons well pleased and my home full of grandchildren.”
“This bond… Being ‘special’… Is it worth it?…”
She’s been through so much… Lilith considered, just a bit more and they’ll put it all to rights as Aly spelled it…
“Yes, daughter. I’ve loved and been loved more than a lifetime by my mate, as will you…”
- 15
- 16
- 17
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In Fond Remembrance