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Advice 2: Wheel of Fortune	By : Chocho Category: Harry Potter AU/AR > Slash - Male/Male Views: 3448 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or the characters, places or names. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 1-Day I
- 2-Day II
- 3-Day III
- 4-Plus
- 3
- 4
Advice 2: Wheel of Fortune

Four-Shot

Sequel to: Advice

Written by: chochowilliams

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Summary: While a rift forms between the Golden Trio, and Harry and Ginny start having premarital problems, Harry and Draco are growing closer. When a Ministry official is assassinated and the prime suspect turns out to be Draco, just how close these ex-rivals have become is revealed.

Warning: AU, infidelity, romance, drama, slash, OC character death, bashing, possible OOCness, OCs, preg, m-preg, sexual situations, Mary Sues and Brit Picks need not apply.

Pairing: Harry/Draco, Hermione/Ron. Mentioned: past Draco/Astoria, Astoria/OMC, Harry/Ginny, Ginny/Michael Corner

Inserts: recap from chapter 3

A/N: Please enjoy the final chapter of Advice!

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

Last Time

“He said he was happy.”

“Then isn’t that all that matters?”

Ron shook his head; not in denial, Hermione knew. “How…? How can he be--happy with--with…?”

“He’s in love Ron,” Hermione said as if that was answer enough and to most it would be.

“What about Ginny?” Ron retorted, turning around towards her.

Hermione was silent for several long moments as she searched her husband‘s face--for what, she was unsure. But then she found it. “What’s this really about? Ginny or Malfoy?”

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

Chapter IV: Plus

A Week Later - Afternoon -- Auror Department - Ministry of Magic - London, England

Draco was frowning as he scanned over the statement the young mother Jacqueline Mathers had given Aurors just that morning. “I don’t get it,” he said. He glanced up at Harry who was sitting in the chair behind his desk wearing his own frown. “She’s now claiming her daughter’s death was an accident?”

“Right,” Harry nodded. “According to her new statement, she went into the house for what she claims to be no more than a second and when she returned, her daughter was floating face down in the swimming pool.”

Draco flipped through the file to the coroner’s report. “ME cannot confirm her statement as the daughter’s body was too decomposed when it was found. I had the same problem myself.” He’d worked the toxicology examination.

“We do have an approximate time of death though.”

An eyebrow cocked, Draco flipped back through the coroner’s report and smirked at what he found. “The day Mathers reported her daughter missing.”

Harry returned the smirk with one of his own.

Picking up the file, Draco settled himself down in the visitor’s chair. With his ankle resting on the opposite knee and the file lying open in his lap, he gazed across the desk at Harry. “An accidental drowning huh?”

“It happens,” Harry shrugged. “There were two last summer.”

One of those was seven-year-old Marianna Craig who fell into the pool after her ball. She became trapped under the pool cover. By the time the babysitter discovered she was missing, Marianna was already dead. Her parents subsequently fought for, and won, a new law requiring any wizarding establishment with a pool, private or public, to have specially designed protections up around the entire pool area, including the pool itself, at all times. This is supposed to keep unsupervised children from falling in and drowning and if they do, an alarm is supposed to sound.

Draco glanced down at the mother’s statement. “Other than her inconsistencies in her statements, what evidence is there to link her to her daughter‘s death?”

“Nada.”

“Lovely,” Draco exhaled, slumping back in the chair.

Harry sighed. “All we knew before this morning was that Jessica-” the daughter, “-was reported as missing. Almost a year later, she was found along the side of the road in a section of the woods that had been combed through several times not far from the Mathers’ house.”

“That means the body was planted after the search was called off.”

“Exactly,” Harry agreed with a nod. “And by that time, the body was too decomposed to tell us much of anything.”

Closing the file, Draco tossed it on Harry’s desk with a disgusted sigh. “The mother originally reported her daughter as missing correct?”

“Yes. Mathers claimed she left her daughter playing out in the backyard when she went inside to make them lunch.”

“No house-elves? Husband? Wife?”

“Just the two of them,” Harry clarified. “When Mathers came back outside a minute or two later, her daughter was gone; or so she claimed at the time.”

Draco shook his head. His head hurt. “And she left her two year old daughter alone and unsupervised for that long why?”

“The yard’s gated; has wards and all sorts of protections around it, which I confirmed myself. She felt her daughter was safe. And her daughter should have been if those same protections were in place before her daughter went ‘missing’ and if nobody but her parents were keyed into them.”

“Obviously not,” Draco muttered. “And now she’s changing her story, saying her daughter didn’t go missing, but drowned in the backyard pool?”

“Exactly.”

“How the hell did her daughter get into the pool in the first place? Was she already in it when the mother went inside? Was the ladder down? I mean, the mother claims to have all these protections around the backyard, but what about the pool? Were there any?”

Harry flipped through the file to the mother’s statement. “The mother stated that she does have the necessary wards, but that particular day, they never went off.”

“You don‘t believe that do you?”

Harry snorted, “Of course not. We tested them ourselves and they worked perfectly fine. In fact, they were so finely tuned there’s no way she couldn’t have sensed the wards trip. A flea would have tripped them. If Jessica went anywhere near that pool, Mathers would have known unless she momentarily became a squib.”

“So,” Draco drawled as he tried to work out everything in his head, “assuming her daughter’s death was an accident, either she ignored the alarms that had to have gone off or she didn’t have any alarms at the time, correct?”

“Right.”

“Okay, so maybe the daughter wanted to go swimming. The mother refused, said after lunch, or whatever.” Draco dismissed the inconsequential details with a wave of his hand. “She goes inside to do whatever it was she just had to do, but the daughter wants to go swimming now and with a little help of accidental magic, she winds up in the pool.”

Harry nodded. A case of accidental magic could do astounding things. It’d apparated him on the roof of the school once and blew his uncle’s sister into a Marge balloon. Therefore, he could see the daughter’s desire to go swimming linking with her magic and apparating her to the pool.

“But that does not explain how she appeared in the woods almost a year later,” Draco continued. “Where was the daughter’s body for the year she was missing? And why would Mathers lie to Aurors?”

“Mathers claimed she panicked.”

“Panicked,” Draco in a flat voice. “Your daughter drowns and instead of calling Aurors, you take her out of the pool, dry her off, dress her, stuff her in a garbage bag or something and hide her somehow, somewhere, and then call Aurors claiming she’s been kidnapped. A year later, you dump her along the side of the road like a piece of trash.”

Harry nodded. “That’s the gist of it.”

“Unbelievable. She‘d obviously guilty as sin.”

“Of murder?” Harry shrugged. “We can’t prove it, but of lying to Aurors, making a false statement, concealing knowledge of the little girl’s death, concealing the body, illegal dumping, not having adequate protections up around the pool…Oh, yes. Just on the charges the Prosecuting Wizard plans to press, the mother will be going to jail for a very long time.”

“Good.”

Closing the file, Harry set it aside and pulled out another one that had become buried under all the paperwork polluting his desk; he really had to do some organizing. Opening the file, he turned it around and set it on the edge of the desk closest to Draco. “This next case was given to us from Fire Scene.”

Draco leaned forward to pluck the file from Harry’s desk with a cocked eyebrow. “That they’re involving you means the fire was set intentionally and someone died as a result.”

“Sort of,” Harry answered cryptically.

Draco studied Harry’s blank face for several moments longer before turning to the file in his hands. As he scanned the incident report, an incredulous feeling rolled through him. “They were tearing down a house near Wizarding Hertford and discovered a body in the wall?”

Harry nodded. “The Fire Scene Investigators are speculating that the fire that destroyed the house originated in the potions lab. Nobody was home at the time of the fire, but neighbors claim a bunch of ‘shady’ men and women coming and going at all hours of the night and day for over a year-”

“’Shady’?”

“Obvious glamours, features obscured by unnatural shadows or blurred out, hunched over,” Harry explained, “always looking over their shoulders, all doing the same staccato knock.”

Frowning in thought, Draco hummed and returned to scanning the reports.

“-but that the afternoon before the fire broke out, there was nothing, no sound, no movement, no people coming and going, absolutely nothing.”

“They’re thinking it was intentionally set?”

“Yes.”

“And where does this body come in?”

“Not sure yet. It’s still with the ME.”

Something hastily scribbled in at the bottom of the last sheet caught Draco’s attention. He grew excited as he read it. “Did you see this?”

“What?”

“Here.” Standing, Draco circled the desk to Harry’s side. Setting the file down on the desk before Harry, he pointed to what had caught his attention

When Draco went to step aside in order to give Harry room to read, Harry wrapped an arm around his waist, thus entrapping his boyfriend at his side.

Draco gazed down at him with a raised eyebrow and a smile tugging at his lips.

Hooking his thumb in the belt loop of Draco’s Muggle jeans that had cost over two-hundred pounds, Harry gripped Draco’s hip possessively as he leaned forward to read what had gotten Draco so excited.

A smirking Draco, meanwhile, draped an arm around Harry’s shoulders. His fingers played with Harry’s hair and massaged his scalp. When he felt Harry shudder against him and heard the appreciative moan, he chuckled silently.

Harry was trying his best to read the crime scene report, but it was not an easy task. Draco’s proximity alone was driving him out of his mind and that wasn’t taking into consideration the new cologne Draco started wearing. Draco knew the outrageously expensive stuff--sixty galleons for a two-ounce bottle--drove him practically out of his mind. Then of course, knowing Draco, that was probably why he wore it.

Then he found it. “They found significant amounts of the fertility potion in the potions lab including what they believe to have been a stash of the banned substance!” Harry swore.

With a smirk, Draco nodded. “This very well could be the break we were looking for.”

Tapping a thumbnail on the page, Harry stared off across the room. He gnawed on his bottom lip as his excite dwindled. “It could be nothing.” It was best not to get their hopes up just yet. “But we need to talk to this Denis Lomond anyway.” Lomond was the lead investigator who found what could very well be a significant break in the Black Market case he and Draco have been working on for a year now. “And I have to update Moore on this. He’ll need it for his investigation.”

“How is his investigation going, by the way? I haven‘t heard anything.”

“Me either.” Harry shrugged. “Moore said he wanted to keep the whole thing quiet for now.” Didn’t want to spook any suspects, or potential suspects, into fleeing the country.

Draco nodded. “I offered him my services,” he admitted, “when he called me to his office last week.”

Harry wasn’t surprised. After all, Sting--who’d been Draco’s runner before he’d become Harry’s informant--had been murdered when he become caught in the middle of this Black Market investigation.

“He thanked me for the offer but turned me down; said he wanted us to concentrate on our end of things, like this fire,” Draco continued. “If it was deliberately set in order to cover Wilhelm’s death and possibly destroy any trace of the house being the hub of the Black Market Fertility Potion ring…”

Harry started to nod his head, agreeing to what Draco was saying, but then something Draco said gave him pause. “Wait. What? Wilhelm? You’re thinking the body they found is that of the missing Potions Master?”

“Preliminary reports from the ME state the person died at least a year ago,” Draco reminded him.

Harry was nodding in earnest now. “It would explain why we were never able to find any trace of Potions Master Wilhelm. He went to them, or they came to him, either way they went into business together, but somewhere along the line, Wilhelm became a liability and they got rid of him.”

Draco hummed in thought.

Letting his arm drop from Draco‘s waist, Harry pushed the chair back and stood up. “I think-Enter,” he called out at the sudden knock on the closed office door.

The door creaked open and Ross Rosenstein popped his head in. “Sorry to bother you sir, but there’s a woman here to see you.”

Harry’s brow furrowed in thought. The first woman who came to mind was Hermione, but he’d talked to her the night before. Apparently, she has been feeling a little under the weather lately and would be staying home from work that day. Then he thought it could possibly be Ginny, but he hasn’t seen or spoken to his ex-fiancée since the day he walked in on her moving into his house without his permission. She hadn’t even responded to his letter. If it wasn’t Hermione and it wasn’t Ginny, he had no idea who it could be.

“And just who is this woman?” Draco demanded. With his hands on his hips, he glared at Rosenstein.

Harry rolled his eyes. “Down boy,” he muttered to his boyfriend.

Snapping his head around, Draco narrowed his gaze at Harry.

Ignoring him, Harry cocked an eyebrow at Rosenstein who was looking decidedly nervous between his boss and his boss’ lover. “Who is it Rosenstein?”

“Uh…” Rosenstein gulped. “Actually, sir, she, uhm, kinda looks like Bellatrix Lestrange only, uhm…”

Harry‘s eyes lit up. He exchanged a knowing glance with Draco. “Sane?” he suggested.

Rosenstein flushed. “I was going to say ‘alive’, sir, but that works too.”

Draco chuckled despite himself.

“Alright. Send her in.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Any idea what Aunt Andromeda is doing here?” Draco asked as soon as Rosenstein vanished, closing the door behind him.

“None. Haven‘t spoken to her since we babysat Teddy a week ago.”

His office door burst open just then followed almost immediately by a screaming, “Harry!”

Harry turned and grinned at the sight of his godson. “Hey!” He crouched down with his arms open as the five-year old launched himself at him. The boy’s short curly brown hair and amber eyes morphed mid-flight to match Harry’s black locks and emerald green orbs.

Standing up, Harry spun around, causing Teddy to giggle and cry out, “Do it again” each time Harry stopped.

“No again. Harry is very dizzy.” To prove his point, Harry stumbled.

Draco rolled his eyes.

A soft chuckle drew their attention. Standing in the doorway watching them was Andromeda.

Hefting his godson onto his hip, Harry strode forward and greeted the older woman with a kiss. “Hey, Andy.”

“Afternoon Harry, Draco.”

“Aunt Andromeda,” Draco greeted with a bow of his head. “You are looking wonderful this afternoon.”

“You are so much like your father Draco,” Andromeda commented. “Such a flatterer.”

“I only speak the truth.”

“In that case, thank you.”

Harry rolled his eyes and mumbled, “Purebloods,” in his godson’s ear. Teddy giggled even though Harry was sure the five year old had no idea what Harry was talking about.

With a mock glare, Andromeda swatted Harry.

Chuckling, Harry asked, “So what’s up?”

“Actually…” Suddenly nervous, Andromeda glanced from her grandson to her nephew. “Draco, do you think you could take Teddy, show him around while I speak to Harry?”

Cocking an eyebrow, Draco exchanged a confused and worried glance with Harry before nodding his head towards his aunt. “Of course. Come, Theodore. I can show you where your mother used to work.”

“Okay!” Jumping down out of Harry’s arms, Teddy rushed to Draco’s side and grabbing his hand, grinned up at his older cousin.

As Harry watched the two of them, he was unaware of the goofy grin or the wistful expression on his face.

Fighting a smile of his own as he watched the boy, Draco led the boy out of the office.

Once the door closed behind them, Harry turned towards Andromeda, but before he could even open his mouth, she blurted out two words that left him blinking. “I’m sorry?”

Taking a deep breath, Andromeda turned tear-filled eyes away from the view of her nephew showing her grandson off to the other Aurors to the man before her. “I’m dying,” she repeated, “and,” she continued, raising her voice over Harry’s protestations, “I want you and Draco to adopt Teddy.”

To say Harry was blindsided would be an understatement. “Y-you’re…d-What?”

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

Same Time - Weasley Residence - Ottery St. Catchpole, Devon, England

Ron had wanted to stay at home to take care of her, but Hermione had practically thrown him out of the house. Due to the uneasiness between him and Harry, Ron has been doing a lot of moping around the house and it was wearing on her last nerve.

It wasn’t as if she didn’t understand, because she did. Ron was figuratively caught between a rock and a hard place. With the discord between Harry, his best friend, and Ginny, his sister, Ron wasn’t sure which way to turn.

It wasn’t easy being caught in the middle, especially when you put yourself there.

The real problem, though, wasn’t Harry and Ginny’s break up, though that had been hard for him. It was Draco Malfoy. Granted, if it had been anybody else Harry had cheated on Ron’s little sister with, Ron would still have been livid at Harry‘s questionable behavior. He still would have been torn between being loyal to family and being loyal to his best mate who was like a brother to him, but because it was Draco Malfoy, Ron remained uncertain, unsure, and just a little angry and disgusted.

Hermione herself was staying out of it. Completely.

As for her husband, just as he’s been doing all week, if he would have stayed home from work in order to “take care of her”, he’d wind up forgetting what he was doing halfway through and she’d find him staring into space. The other day he’d flooded the bathroom when he left the water running in the sink when he went on one of his trips.

She wasn’t sure whether to be more worried or angry at his behavior. Part of her wanted to summon a Mind-Healer. The other half wanted to hex him into next week.

Either way, she was tired of him being underfoot, which was part of the reason why she hadn’t wanted Ron at home that day.

While at first she’d brushed her queasiness off the past week or two as nerves and the stress of both work and having to deal with the emotional turmoil between Harry, Malfoy, Ron and Ginny, she couldn’t ignore it in tandem with her late monthly. Her menstrual cycle had never been late before. Again, it could just be stress. She’d read somewhere that stress could affect one’s monthly cycle. But there’d been this little nagging voice in the back of her mind.

So here Hermione sat on the toilet in the upstairs bathroom with a small vial the size of her pinkie filled with blue liquid. Had she used a drop or two of her blood, the original colorless hue of the potion within the vial would have turned green, but because she’d used urine, the hue had become what the booklet described as “a true pure blue color”. Both indicated a positive result. If you got any other color then something obviously went wrong. Had the results been negative, the color of the liquid would have remained the same clear, colorless color. But it hadn’t so it wasn’t.

“Positive.”

It was a good thing she was sitting because she would have fallen over. As it was, her vision started to go dark. Hermione doubled over to hang her head between her knees. “Oh, Merlin,” she chanted with her eyes shut and her hands fisted at her temples.

When she and Ron had become engaged, they’d talked about having kids and while both wanted a family, neither wanted to start one right away. Each believed it would be more prudent to wait until they were in a comfortable position in their careers and had some money saved up before they even started to think about starting a family.

And that’s exactly what they did. They had amassed quite a bit of savings over the five years they‘ve been together. Ron was in for a promotion at work. She had become Barrister Armand’s top and most trusted solicitor. Life at the moment was good.

There was one problem though.

Lifting her head, Hermione stared down at the vial of blue liquid and smiled through the sting of tears.

She and Ron currently lived in what had been originally a single story house. When they moved in, they’d added a small second floor that was more a loft that consisted of their bedroom and a bathroom. Even with the added space, they just did not have the room for themselves let alone a third person.

Sitting up, she laid the hand not holding the pregnancy test on her flat belly and started laughing until tears were streaming down her cheeks. “Baby. We are going to have a baby.”

But that was okay. Somehow, someway, they would find a way to make this work.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

Half an Hour Later - Auror Department - Ministry of Magic - London, England

Ron was exhausted. His entire body ached from the hour-long standoff in Otterburn and subsequent duel with some young punk. The morning started with said punk, who was no more than a boy really--sixteen if he was a day--breaking into a newlywed couple’s house. He’d intended to steal some paintings, pieces of pottery, jewelry and several tapestries; all of which were priceless and had been in the husband‘s family for generations. The morning ended with the punk a murderer when he flung cutting hexes at the husband who’d surprised him by returning home early from work.

How the punk was able to get through what should have been foolproof wards was still unknown.

All Ron wanted was to go home and fall face first into bed. Of course, he couldn’t do that. He had a report to write up and a suspect to interrogate before he could leave.

“Hey Draco?

Ron stopped cold in the threshold between the bullpen and the Homicide Division’s break room at the sight before him. Teddy Lupin, Remus and Tonks’ only child, sat at one of the tables with one Draco Malfoy. He was not sure what it was about the sight that surprised him the most: that Draco would want anything to do with the boy, that Teddy and Draco appeared to be acting civil towards one another or that Draco Malfoy was sipping what appeared to be Muggle soda pop and munching on pretzels.

Because his head was beginning to hurt, Ron decided to ignore the whole scene as best he could. It was something he was becoming an expert at doing: ignoring Draco Malfoy’s presence.

“Hey what?” he heard Draco say before the man popped a pretzel into his mouth.

“Are you and Harry gonna have a baby?”

Spluttering, his face redder than his hair, Ron tripped. He caught himself on the icebox.

Across the room, Draco was choking on his pretzel. Grabbing his soda can, he took a long swallow. His eyes watering, he turned towards the boy. “I’m sorry?” he coughed.

“Aunt Narcissa came over for tea yesterday and she and Grandma were talking about what color they were going to paint the nursery and that Harry would make a good mommy.”

Mortified, Draco mentally cursed his mother.

This past weekend, he and Harry went to have dinner with his parents. During dinner, Draco told his parents that he was thinking about petitioning the Wizengamot, or whomever it was he had to speak to, about studying and possibly perfecting--if it was possible--the fertility potion created by Potions Master Wilhelm. How his mother had derived grandchildren out of that, he was not sure. But that was the thing with mothers. They heard what they wanted to hear.

“Is Harry going to have a baby Draco?” Teddy asked. Those bright emerald eyes of his were wide and projecting naivety and innocence.

Before Draco could deny the rumor--though at this point, he figured it was pointless as the more you deny something the more people believe its validity--there was a loud thud.

Both he and Teddy turned in their seats and there lying sprawled out on the floor in front of the icebox was Ronald Weasley.

“Why’s he on the floor?” Teddy asked.

Draco snorted; uncouth he knew, but he could not help himself as so many different replies went through his head. Most of which Harry would frown upon so he had to be careful. He knew that whatever he told Teddy could come back to bit him on the ass. “He’s a Weasley. Who knows why they do what they do,” he decided upon then said, “And no, Harry is not going to have a baby.”

“Aw,” Teddy whined with a pout, slumping down in his chair.

“As far as I know,” Draco just to add. He chuckled when young Teddy‘s face radiated with pleasure and happiness. “Finish your soda. Then we can go ask Harry.”

“Yeah!”

Draco snickered. This will probably get him kicked to the sofa that night, but it was going to be worth it to see the look on Harry’s face.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

Same Time - Wiley Willie’s Pub & Inn - London, England

It was another Muggle establishment.

Ginny wondered if it was beginning to irk Michael that they hadn’t shown themselves to the magical community as of yet. Michael continued to claim he was willing to wait as long as possible, but even he had to have a limit.

Neither she nor Harry had made an announcement--official or otherwise--proclaiming the end of their five-year long relationship, but somehow it made the front page of every newspaper and magazine--reputable or not--anyway. Maybe it was the missing engagement ring on her finger; or that she and Harry were never seen together in public anymore; or the fact that Harry and Draco were caught snogging in the middle of Diagon Alley last week when they took little Teddy Lupin to get ice cream.

The fallout had been mixed as she had expected.

Her colleagues at The Daily Prophet have been trying to get a statement from her other than “no comment” ever since.

It was a lie of course. She was greatly affected by the continuous updates of The Savior Who Took Up With The Death Eater. Her whole family was in fact.

It was supposed to be her at Harry’s side, kissing him, holding his hand, gazing at him like a love struck schoolgirl from across the store. It was supposed to be her caught coming and going from Harry’s house. It was not supposed to be Malfoy.

Unfortunately, it was him.

Part of her wanted to give her colleagues what they wanted. She wanted nothing more than to blast Harry for being the lying, cheating, two-timing piece of shit he was. She wanted to tear him a new one. She wanted to rant, rave, and throw a hissy fit as if she were five years old. She wanted to confront him in the middle of Diagon Alley and demand he tell her how he could dump her for a Death Eater.

She had chosen, though, to put on a brave face instead of belittling her ex for the asshole he was to the entire Wizarding World. To quote a Muggle author, she had decided to take the road not taken--or was that the high road? Either way, she had decided not to let Harry know how much his betrayal had hurt her. She was not going to give him the satisfaction.

Ginny turned towards Michael as they waited their turn to be seated and smiled. Reaching out, she brushed a hand through his windblown hair.

He turned towards her, smiled, and asked, “How you doing?”

Her smile morphed into a grin. “I’m okay.” And she was. It had only been a week since her life had been flipped upside down, but she really was all right and it was all thanks to this man besides her.

“Good.” Draping an arm around her shoulders, Michael hugged her gently to his side.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

That Night - Weasley Residence - Ottery St. Catchpole, Devon, England

With her arms wrapped around her knees that were drawn to her chest, Hermione sat on the bed watching her husband standing before the window, gazing out at the night.

She called out to him. “Ron.” Getting no response, she tried again. “Ron, please come to bed,” she pled. The only answer she received was from the crickets.

She hadn’t wanted to say anything until she’d confirmed it with her Healer first, but it was time her husband realized there was more to life than fretting over his friend’s love life--like his pregnant wife for example. As she continued to gaze at her husband’s broad back, she started to feel nervous. After all, she wasn’t sure how Ron would take the news. Yes, they’d talked about it, but that and this were two completely different things.

Gathering her Gryffindor courage, Hermione took a deep breath and blurted out, “I’m pregnant.” She hadn’t been sure what type of reaction to expect: joy, shock, disbelief, denial. Heck, she’d even take anger, anything but this stoicism. Ron acted as if he didn’t even hear her.

With a sneer that would have made Draco Malfoy proud, Hermione turned her back on her husband and slid back into bed.

Well, it was nice to know who was more important.

As if rousing from a deep trance, Ron blinked and glanced about the darkened bedroom. He frowned at the sight of his wife asleep in bed. He could have sworn…

“’Mione?” he called softly. Receiving no reply, Ron shrugged and carefully slid into bed besides Hermione. It took him awhile to fall asleep.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

Same Time - Corner Residence - Northumberland, England

No regrets, Ginny thought as she lay besides Michael later that night. There’d been surprise when Michael kissed her, but there’d been no hesitation when she’d kissed him back or second thoughts as they made love. Even now, there was no shame or pangs of guilt from her conscience as she’d expected to feel. There was nothing but a warm feeling of bliss and contentment.

Her parents, especially her mother, as well as Ron may still be in mourning over the death of her relationship with Harry, but Ginny felt that maybe she was ready to put her past behind her and find out what her future had in store for her.

Like earlier at the restaurant, Ginny brushed a hand through Michael’s soft brown locks. She smiled when he mumbled something she couldn’t make out and turned onto his side. Yawning, she scooted across the space between them and spooned him from behind. Wrapping an arm around his waist, she laid her head on his pillow and let her eyes drift shut. She fell asleep almost immediately with a smile on her face.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

Same Time - Potter Residence - 23 Pasteur Drive, Swindon, Wiltshire, England

“Hey,” Draco called softly. “You’ve been quiet all evening. What’s going on? You’re not breaking up with me are you?” Though it’d come out light, it left a heavy feeling in the pit of his stomach. Even he could tell his smile was frayed around the edges.

From his position at the bedroom window where he had been staring out over the backyard that was in full bloom--thanks to Neville--for the past several minutes, Harry scoffed at the notion that he would ever allow what has turned out to be best thing in his life to slip through his fingers. “As much as many would love for me to kick your git-for-brains behind to the curb-”

“Oi!”

Harry snickered. “-I have no intention of watching said behind walk out of my life-” Turning to face his boyfriend, he continued, “-not now. Not ever.”

“Well that’s good,” Draco said with his signature smirk as he slid around to the edge of the bed. “’Cause otherwise I would have been forced to make your life a living hell.”

Harry laughed.

“Seriously Harry,” Draco continued with a concerned expression on his face, “what is going on?”

Sighing, Harry leaned back against the windowsill and turned his head to gaze out at his neighbor’s backyard. Other than the Japanese maple tree that Mrs. Tyltan planted the previous spring, she was growing some sort of purple tomato as well as had several rose bushes. It was simple but effective. He’d tried that route, but failed miserably. His yard had just looked sad. Thank the Fates for Neville and his green thumb.

“Harry?”

Settling himself on the narrow window ledge, Harry stared down at his bare feet, absently noting that he needed to cut his toenails. “What would you think about Teddy moving in with us?”

Taken back, Draco merely blinked at the other man for several long silent moments. “I--don’t know,” he answered truthfully. Talk about being thrown for a loop. Where had that come from? “Why would-? Wait,” he cut himself off. “‘Us’?”

Lifting his head, Harry gave his boyfriend a look that said clearly without words that this was something Draco should already know. So much for being valedictorian, he thought. “This is just as much your house as it is mine, Dray.”

Blushing hotly at the ridiculous nickname he loved hearing Harry utter, Draco’s heart skipped a beat at the knowledge that he had been granted something Harry’s ex had not: a home with Harry.

“You‘re here more often then you are at your own place. Hell,” Harry added, “you’re here more than I am. And don’t get me started on that damnedable demon bird of yours. He still laughs at me every time I step into the owlery.”

Draco snickered.

“It’s not funny,” Harry pouted, though his lips twitched.

“If you say so, love.”

Harry blushed at the endearment.

Suddenly serious again, Draco eyed Harry. “Are you okay with that?”

Harry cocked his head. “With what?”

“With me being here.”

Taken back, Harry blinked at the other man in stunned silence. “Of course I am. Why wouldn’t I be?”

Draco gave Harry a chiding look. “Lover, given your history, can you really blame me for being wary when it comes to us living together?”

Blushing, Harry stood up and sat himself in Draco’s lap. There was part of him that felt ridiculous, but he sent an Avada Kedarva its way and it fell blissfully silent. Smirking at the incredulous look his lover was sending him, he wound his arms loosely around Draco’s neck. Getting lost within those gorgeous blue-gray eyes, he told Draco, “With Ginny…” He looked away to gather his thoughts. “I loved her, but she became an obligation and I found myself making up excuses not to spend time with her or to keep our relationship from going to the next level. But you…” Harry swung his gaze back to Draco’s. Running his fingers through the soft blond locks, he admitted, “It feels natural--right. I’d rather you be by my side than anyone else. I love you.”

“Love you too,” Draco returned. He would never admit it, but his heart grew three sizes in that moment.

The kiss that followed was a chaste press of lips that lasted mere seconds, but it said more than any amount of words ever could.

Resting his forehead against Draco’s, Harry said, “So? What do you think? About Teddy moving in?”

Carding his fingers through Harry’s raven locks, Draco said, “Well, he’s a great kid and he absolutely adores you.”

Harry‘s face lit up. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Draco turned solemn. “But tell me: what is going on? Why do you want to know if I like the idea of your godson moving in? Why would he?”

Sighing, Harry said, “Andy’s sick.”

Draco merely blinked at the man. “Excuse me?”

“She’s dying Dray. Her Healers are doing all they can, but--they aren’t optimistic. She may not live out the year.”

Draco felt as if he had just had the floor Vanished from under him. “Wh-? I…” He could not even get his brain to work right.

“She wants--As his godfather, I--retain guardianship over Teddy should anything befall her and she--She doesn’t want him to see her like--like that and-”

“Okay,” Draco said softly. He still hadn’t wrapped his head around the idea that the aunt he just discovered was going to be taken away from him so soon. “Yeah. I mean--It‘s a lot to take in.”

Harry nodded solemnly. “Yeah.”

Draco cursed silently. “Does Theodore know?”

Harry shook his head. “Andy was going to tell him tonight.”

Draco winced.

“Are you sure about this? About having Teddy move in?”

Draco rolled his eyes. “I said as much didn’t I?”

Chuckling, Harry kissed him. “Love you.”

“You better.”

“Git.”

“Prat.”

“Wanker.”

“Prick.”

“…Sarsaparilla head.”

His lips twitching, Draco cocked an eyebrow.

Harry blushed at the weak comeback.

Shaking his head in amusement, Draco asked, “What am I going to do with you Harry James Potter?”

A sly smile slowly built across Harry’s lips. “I can think of quite a few things actually.”

Desire flashed like lightning through Draco. Not needing to be told twice, he flipped them over and began to ravish his boyfriend long into the night.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

Three Months Later - Afternoon - The Burrow - Outside Ottery St. Catchpole, Devon, England

Things were only just starting to settle down. That was not to say that everything had gone back to normal because they hadn’t, but they were as close to normal as they could get considering. The subject of a certain Savior was still taboo though, especially around her mother and youngest big brother; unless Ron mentioned him in reference to work or he and their mother were trying to get her to realize what a huge mistake breaking up with him had been.

Currently, Ginny was hiding out in her bedroom.

She’d made the mistake of telling her nag of a mother and youngest big brother that there was no way she would ever be getting back together with Harry because she was seeing someone else. They’d been hounding her ever since.

For something to do, Ginny had taken to straightening out her pigsty of a bedroom. It was a good thing too because she’d discovered an antique cameo necklace she’d inherited from a late aunt was missing.

She reached into her nightstand drawer. While the necklace was not there, something else was. It was unread post. Her name was scrawled on the front of the envelope. Frowning in confusion, she turned the envelope over and saw the familiar coat of arms stamped in the wax. That’s when she remembered. It was the letter Harry sent her months ago. She’d forgotten all about it.

Sitting down on her bed, she wiggled her finger under the flap and tore the top open. She pulled out a single sheet of parchment that had been tri-folded. Unfolding it, she cleared her throat and began reading.

Ginny-

You probably won’t read this. I know you won’t. You’ll incinerate this letter the second you realize who it’s from and who could blame you? Were our positions reversed, that’s what I would do. But, if by some chance, you do read this, you’ll probably expect a bunch of excuses to justify my actions or groveling on bended knee for your forgiveness and you’re probably going to be a little angry when you realize that is not the intention of this letter. It would be a waste of both of our time;-

“So what?” Ginny bit angrily. “It still would have been nice to ignore a groveling Harry Potter begging for my forgiveness. I think that’s the least you could do Asshole.”

-for nothing I say or do will make up for how I needlessly hurt you. For that, I will apologize.

Tears stung Ginny’s eyes. “Guess that’s as close to an admission as I’m going to get,” she muttered with an angry sorrow building within her.

That was never my intention. You deserve so much better.

“Got that right buddy,” she muttered.

I knew we were having troubles; that my feelings were changing, and I was a coward to not talk to you about them. No matter what happens between us, I will always love you. If nothing more, I would like us to be friends. Can we meet? I think it’s time we talk.

Love, Harry

Ginny turned to gaze out the window.

Harry was right. They had been having troubles for some time before The Incident, but she’d tried her best to ignore them. Pretend the pink polka dot manticore is not wandering through the potions lab and maybe it’ll just go away. Both she and Harry were spot-on in regards to that, but what differentiated the two of them was that she hadn’t been the one to have an affair.

“But maybe…”

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

The Next Day - Morning - Potter Residence - 23 Pasteur Drive, Swindon, Wiltshire, England

In a tight deep purple T-shirt--a present from Draco--tucked into a pair of fitted black jeans, Harry was running a comb through his damp raven locks, which had finally been cut, when he felt the wards trip.

That day’s post had arrived.

As he’d learned his lesson three months ago, Harry made sure he had shoes on and had his wand as he made his way up the owlery, noticing how quiet the house was along the way.

It was eerie how silent it was. He could not remember the last time the place had seemed so empty and foreboding. Draco was at the Malfoy Townhouse in London overseeing the contingent of house-elves--commandeered from the Malfoy château in France where his parents were currently residing--pack and move his belongings here. And Teddy had stayed at Andromeda’s this weekend. Harry would be apparating over there in a few minutes to bring him home.

As for Andromeda, her condition was slowly deteriorating. Whatever sliver of hope may have been present three months ago was gone. The army of Healers Harry, Draco and Narcissa insisted on hiring may bicker over every little detail of her mysterious illness, but they agreed on one fact: she would not live through the year’s end. When she refused to burden him and Draco with taking care of her on top of a rambunctious five year old, Narcissa had invited her to stay with her. Once again, Andromeda tried to protest, but apparently, the invite hadn’t been voluntary. Her move was scheduled for next weekend.

Teddy knew his grandmother was sick, but he didn’t know how serious it was. Harry dreaded that conversation. Teddy absolutely loved his grandmother.

Harry gazed briefly around his office as he passed through on his way to the owlery. Two separate murder boards had been erected over the last couple of weeks. One was the murder of the maid from the Leaky Cauldron. A businessman from Germany found her dead in his bed with a thin wire wrapped around her neck. It’d practically been imbedded. The other case involved a possible accidental suicide of a teenager due to erotic asphyxiation.

Strangely, he wasn’t itching to get back to work even though it was his day off. Since Teddy moved in, it seemed as if his priorities had changed. It wasn’t a complete one-eighty and it hadn’t happened overnight, but for the sake of the boy who was his son in all but blood, he had decided it was time to reprioritize his life.

He sneezed as he opened the door to the owlery and stepped inside.

Lucifer trilled softly at him. Draco’s damnedable demon bird on the other hand squawked shrilly. Harry couldn’t tell if Ares was laughing at him or was yelling at him for waking him up.

“Hey, boy,” he greeted his own Demon Bird.

Lucifer preened under the attention while Ares squawked, turned around, lifted his tail and shit.

“Ha,” Harry barked as he danced out of the way. “Miss-! Oh. Ew.” A grimace scrunched his face.

Bopping his head up and down, Ares squawked. This time, Harry knew he was being laughed at because while in the process of removing his feet from Ares’ target zone, he’d stepped in a fresh pile on the floor.

“Et tu Lucifer?” He turned to the black as night bird who was laughing. “Et tu?”

Draco thought he was being ridiculous when he claimed Ares was deliberately targeting him, but Harry knew differently. And now the damnedable demon bird was corrupting Lucifer.

Harry eyed the eagle owl. It only made Ares squawk louder.

A soft hoot drew his attention to the third owl. Harry recognized it immediately. It belonged to Ginny.

“Hey, girl.”

Warily, he approached the large chestnut colored bird. Her beady little eyes watched him just as cautiously. His heart beating like a bass drum, Harry relieved the owl of its burden while keeping one eye on the sharp beak and the other on the even sharper talons. That he was able to take the scroll and step away without a scratch surprised him. He was certain Ginny’s owl would channel its owner and peck him to death.

“Now I know how the people I send post to feel,” he muttered as he unfurled the scroll as his heart rate returned to normal.

As if knowing he was being talked about, Lucifer peered across the owlery at him.

“’Harry’,” he read. “’I’m not promising anything, but I think it’s time we talk. Pick the time and the place and I’ll be there. Ginevra Weasley.’”

Gazing over the top of the letter, Harry looked at Ginny’s owl warily. She stared right back and hooted.

Unsure what to expect, Harry took a shaky breath and went into his office to write a reply. He honestly hadn’t expected Ginny to take him up on his invitation. That she had…He wasn’t sure if this was good or bad.

“Only one way to find out,” he murmured.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

Same Time - Malfoy Townhouse - London, England

An androgynous house-elf appeared with a muffled pop in the foyer and bowed so low its long hooked nose touched the travertine tiled floor.

Draco turned from his examination of the formal sitting room that was just off the entrance hall. What he had decided to leave behind--mostly the bigger pieces--was being recovered with preservation charms by those house-elves not involved in the packing.

“We is being done Master Malfoy, sir,” the house-elf said.

“Good.” That was fast. Of course, he would expect nothing less from Malfoy house-elves. “Begin moving everything to Harry’s.”

“Yes, sir, Master Malfoy, sir.”

As the house-elf turned and ran off, Draco had an urge to cackle like those evil witches in those muggle fairytales Harry‘s godson seemed to enjoy. What Ginevra Weasley had not been able to do in the five years she and Harry were together, he managed to accomplish in under three months. Life was sweet.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

Half an Hour Later - Tonks Residence

“Do you think it’s a good idea though?” Andromeda was asking Harry as the two sat at the kitchen table.

Sighing, Harry shrugged as he stared down into his coffee. “Who knows,” he answered truthfully.

“But you’re going anyway.”

“Yeah,” Harry nodded in agreement. Lifting his head, he gazed directly into the eyes of his godson‘s grandmother. “I have to.”

“Alright,” she sighed with a shake of her head. “If you’re sure…?”

“I am.”

“Well then I wish you luck. You are definitely going to need it,” she added as pushed away from the table to dump her mug into the sink.

Draping an arm over his forehead, Harry pretended to faint and gasped, “You wound me!”

“I think you have been spending way too much time with my nephew,” Andromeda commented dryly as she turned from washing her mug.

Harry grinned widely. “Not according to Draco.”

“Oh, Merlin,” she groaned. “I did not need to hear that.”

Harry laughed.

“Which reminds me,” she muttered as she made her way back to the table. “Teddy! If you don‘t stop preening I am going to make it so that you can never preen again!”

Harry snickered.

“You are turning my grandson into Draco Malfoy II,” Andromeda accused with a critical eye.

A blushing Harry tried to defend himself. “It’s not my fault!”

Andromeda cocked an eyebrow. “Oh?”

“It’s not! I swear. It’s Draco! Blame him! I’m telling you, if I didn’t know he was in love with me, I’d be jealous of how much time he spends in front of the mirror and Teddy, well--He thinks Dray’s cool and--has sorta--taken to--ya know, imitating him.”

Andromeda continued staring at him.

Harry coughed.

A thunderous explosion of sound echoed through the house then. Both turned towards the kitchen door just as Teddy burst through.

“Hey, little man,” Harry greeted his godson as the boy climbed onto the bench besides him.

“Hi,” Teddy replied. Automatically, his brown curly hair and amber eyes morphed to match Harry’s raven locks and emerald orbs.

“Did you have a good time with Grandma?”

“Yup! We made s’mores.”

“Oo! Yummy.”

“Uh huh! They were so good. I had like a hundred!”

“You did?”

“Uh huh.”

Andromeda snickered.

They spend the next several minutes discussing what all Andromeda and Teddy did all weekend before Harry decided it was time to return home. Not only did Andromeda have a lot of packing to do still, but also Draco was probably waiting on them. He turned to the boy sitting besides him and brushed a hand through his hair. “Alright champ. You ready to go?”

“I guess,” Teddy muttered with a sudden crestfallen expression.

Harry heart broke at the dejected expression on the boy‘s face. “Hey. You know you can visit Grandma anytime right? But Grandma has lots of packing and a million other things to do before she moves in with Aunt Narcissa next weekend remember? And you, mister, have school in the morning and you still haven’t finished your homework.”

“Yeah huh,” Teddy protested.

“Oh really?” Harry cocked an eyebrow. “You finished everything? Including your math?”

“Yeah, well, maybe no. I think I finished most of it.”

“You think huh? Why don’t you go and get your stuff so we can leave okay?”

“Okay,” Teddy sighed.

A reluctant Teddy slid off the bench and began a slow march out of the kitchen and back to his bedroom.

“And no stopping to preen along the way,” Harry called out.

Andromeda muffled a laugh behind her hand.

“Aw!”

Harry laughed quietly.

A few minutes later, a misty-eyed Andromeda was watching as Harry and Teddy along with the five year old’s duffle bag and a box of assorted toys were squeezing into the small fireplace to floo back to Swindon.

“See you next weekend Andy,” Harry called over his shoulder. Before she could lob a protest, Harry had tossed the floo powder and called out, “Potter-Malfoy Residence,” before being enveloped by a bright green flame. When the flame died down, Harry and her grandson were gone.

Without warning, Andromeda found herself on the floor. She lifted a trembling hand over her mouth as she sobbed quietly. Her vision blurred behind a heavy veil of tears.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

A single tear wiggled loose and traversed down her cheek.

If given a choice, she would prefer not to die, but she had come to terms with her pending death.

She’s had a good life--a fulfilling life.

She’d defied her family’s extreme Pureblood beliefs in order to marry a Muggle. This had caused her to be disowned and burned from the family tree--until Harry became Lord of the House of Black that was. Her parents had mistakenly believed cutting her off from the family fortune would cause her to “see the error of her ways”. It hadn’t. Money cannot buy long lasting happiness. But Ted had brought it--happiness that was--to her for the first time in her life. He had been a loving devoted husband who hadn‘t cared that she could turn a mouse into a tea cozy. Together they’d had a beautiful daughter who grew into an even more beautiful woman who, like her mother, had fallen in love with a man many frowned down upon. Together they sacrificed themselves in order to ensure a brighter future for their son.

The only regret she had was that she wouldn’t be around to watch her grandson grow up, but she knew he was safe. Harry would be a good father to Teddy.

But just because she had come to terms with dying, didn’t make it any easier to face it head on.

Just knowing how heart broken her grandson would be by her passing was enough to break her heart.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

That Afternoon - Amelia R. Roschenwot Memorial Center for Reproductive Services - Devon, England

Hermione was five weeks into her second trimester and she felt like a whale. Ron ensured her that she had never looked more beautiful. She hadn’t appreciated the implication that she hadn’t been beautiful before swelling up like a balloon. Ron had wisely changed the subject.

Instead, they began discussing the pros and cons of the bungalow in a small wizarding village not far from Durham versus the much larger house in Godric’s Hollow.

It had been decided that instead of building another addition onto the house where they now resided, much like what the Weasleys had done, they would move into a bigger place. Well, Hermione had decided and Ron had agreed after spending a few nights on the sofa. She had put her foot down and kept it there. There was no way she going to raise her children in a deathtrap. As much as she loved how welcoming and homey The Burrow was, like the stacks of documents in her office, it only remained upright by magic. It was a catastrophe waiting to happen.

Molly was upset at the prospect of them moving out of the area. That they would only be a quick floo call away made no never mind to her.

Now, though, they were in the examination room of the Reproductive Services clinic waiting for the Healer. Today was hopefully the day they found out the sex of their baby. This would be the third attempt.

“I wonder…”

Her husband‘s voice broke into her thoughts. “Wonder what?” she asked over her shoulder. Ron was gazing at the wall of baby photos. Presumably, every baby in the pictures had been born thanks to the wonderful staff here at the clinic.

“What Ginny and Harry’s baby would look like.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Ronald Weasley,” she hissed, “I swear to God that if you bring that up one more time I am going to make sure that this is the last baby you ever make.”

Ron gulped. That was no idle threat either. Hermione would do exactly that. Sometimes she frightened him more than You-Know-Who ever did.

“Harry and Ginny broke up three months ago,” she continued. “She’s with Corner and Harry’s with Malfoy. Deal with it and move on. This obsession of yours in not healthy.” It still amazed her that she’d been able to get him to focus on her long enough to learn about the baby.

“But ‘Mione-”

“But nothing! I am sick and tired of--of…everything! One more word, Ron, just--one--more, no matter how insignificant, and I swear by the Four Founders of Hogwarts that you will be petitioning the Wizengamot for visitation rights!”

Ron paled. “’Mione,” he breathed. She wouldn’t go that far would she?

“I get it,” Hermione continued in a softer, calmer tone of voice. “Corner was a stuck-up little prick in school and Malfoy was an arrogant, haughty, self-righteous, ferret-faced git and a Death Eater in training who made life miserable for us every chance he had.”

Ron grinned. He could not have described the two banes of his existence any better. “Exactly-!”

With a sad little smile, Hermione shook her head.

His face falling to confusion and worry, Ron asked, “What?”

“Don’t. Just…don’t. It’s time to let it go. Keep this up,” she continued, raising her voice over the inevitable protestations, “and you will lose everything. Everything, Ron. Harry, Ginny…me…the baby.” By the end, a sob chocked her voice off to a whisper. She didn’t want any of that, but at the rate Ron was going, it was unavoidable.

The door opened just then and Healer Jason Ambrose waltzed in. Sensing the tense atmosphere, the brilliant toothy grin vanished into a frown. “Is everything okay here?”

Hermione eyed her husband.

Ron was torn. He loved Ginny and he loved Harry, but he hated their choice of partners. Michael Corner was not good enough for his sister and Draco Malfoy certainly wasn’t good enough for his best mate. He despised both with a passion. Nothing would ever make him accept them.

But…

He supposed he could try harder to at least pretend to be civil to them. He could only pray that Ginny and Harry would come to their senses one day and realize what a huge mistake they were making.

He would try, for nothing more than to keep that miserable expression off his wife’s face. It was breaking his heart to know what he was doing to her.

Stepping forward to stand besides his wife, he gave the Healer a forced smile and nodded. He didn’t trust himself to speak at the moment. Who knew what would come spewing forth.

An answering smile on her face, Hermione squeezed Ron’s hand. “Thank you,” she mouthed.

Ron squeezed her hand back.

“Good!” Healer Ambrose exclaimed with his brilliant toothy grin back on his face. “Shall we get started then?”

As Ron watched Healer Ambrose help Hermione lie back upon the examination table, he couldn’t help but notice a heavy feeling in the pit of his stomach.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

Same Time - Potter Residence - 23 Pasteur Drive, Swindon, Wiltshire, England

A crash sounded through the house.

“Watch it,” Draco barked at the house-elves who were staggering under the weight of his desk. They’d carelessly banged it into the wall besides the staircase. The desk was a mirror image to the one up in the office. It also happened to be an antique purchased by his great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandfather.

“We is sorry Master Draco,” one of the struggling house-elves apologized.

“Put that upstairs in the office,” he ordered.

“Yes, sir, Master Draco.”

“And be careful! You damage it in any way-!”

With an eep, the house-elves and the desk vanished with an almost silent clap.

“Incompetent. Every last one of them,” he sneered.

A cascade series of thuds had Draco spinning around. Littering the foyer was a sea of stuffed animals. A giggling blond haired, blue eyed five year old jumped on top of the pile while a fidgeting house-elf watched on nervously.

Draco’s lips twitched in a threatening smile. “Theodore,” he called out to the boy. “This is neither the time nor the place. Put your toys into your room. You’ll have time to play later.”

“Okay! You heard Draco,” Teddy snapped as he jumped to his feet. “These go upstairs in my room.”

“Yes, sir, Master Teddy.” With a snap, the toys vanished. A second snap and the house-elf vanished.

Shaking his head in amused exasperation, Draco watched his lover’s godson run out of the house screaming, or was it laughing? It was so hard to tell when dealing with children. Crossing towards the front door, Draco watched as Teddy righted his navy blue Muggle bike, jump on and then tear off down the street. “Don’t go too far,” he called out. “We have to meet Harry for lunch in a little bit.” Why the boy preferred a bicycle, of all things, instead of a broom was beyond him.

“Okay!”

Draco stood there watching the boy wistfully and found himself wondering what a child conceived by he and Harry would look like.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

Same Time - Bean Sidhe Café - Bannum Alley

Ginny had finally agreed to meet with him. They had a lot they needed to talk about, even though both had moved on. Ginny was with Michael Corner; they’d dated for a brief time back in Hogwarts if Harry wasn’t mistaken. And Harry was with Draco. Harry had suggested the Bean Sidhe Café in Bannum Alley. She’d agreed. Draco hadn’t. He’d whined, bitched, moaned, and threatened to withhold sex, of any kind, until Harry promised “compensation” for tainting what was supposed to be theirs with his ex.

Harry had argued that Bannum Alley was one of the only places in Wizarding Britain that would afford him and Ginny the privacy they needed. He was not at all comfortable going to The Burrow or Ron and Hermione’s house given that the Weaselys were still a little sore about his and Ginny’s break up as well as his “shacking up” with Draco. He was sure Ginny felt the same way about his house. They couldn’t go to Grimmauld Place because Harry had taken to renting the house out after the war and the Potter residence in Godric’s Hollow had been left as a museum--for now.

Usually, if Harry was in need of some privacy, he’d go out into the Muggle world, but it wouldn’t work in this case. While it would grant them anonymity, they would have no privacy for humans, by nature, were curious and nosy and Muggle or not, a heated argument was bound to bring some attention--for there was no doubt that any talk the two of them had wouldn’t remain passive for long. Diagon and Knockturn Alleys were out for the same reasons. Just substitute “muggle” with “witches and wizards”. That left Bannum where they would have all the privacy and anonymity they needed.

He just hoped Ginny actually showed up.

“Harry,” a soft voice called out his name.

Spinning around, Harry spotted Ginny heading towards him. All his nerves seemed to intensify a million fold at the sight of the tall, leggy redhead. Gulping, he hurriedly stood up. In his haste, his chair toppled backwards, falling to the floor with a loud clatter. Embarrassed, Harry righted the chair just as Ginny stepped up to the table.

“Hello, Harry,” she greeted with a nod.

“Ginny.” For some reason he felt fourteen all over again. “Oh!” He circled the table and held the chair for her.

“Thank you.”

He returned to his own chair and tried to smile. He wasn’t so successful. He was too nervous. His insides felt like they were doing the samba. “So, uh…,” he faltered, unsure how to go about saying what he wanted to say. Harry wanted to make sure he said everything he wanted to say in a manner that didn’t leave the rift that had grown between them even wider. They might not have worked out as a couple, but he still deeply cared for her.

Either she sensed his hesitation or she wanted to get something off her chest before he had a chance to speak because Ginny sighed and said, “Look, Harry, let’s get something straight. If you called me here to ask me to give you a second chance-”

An image of Draco and Teddy flashed through his mind and his heart soared. This time, he smiled more easily. Shaking his head, Harry found the words tumbling out with ease, “I love you Ginny. I have since sixth year and I always will, no matter what happens between us, but--Things--I mean--I wanted to apologize for the way I treated you. It was unnecessarily cruel and you deserved more than that and no offense, but despite how much I still care for you and even though there’s a small part of me that regrets what might have been between us, or what your family may want, I don’t think that we, uhm, that we-”

“-could work,” Ginny finished, “even if we wanted to try.”

Harry nodded sadly. “Yeah.”

Ginny was silent for a minute, staring out at Bannum Alley. “That was one of the hardest realizations I was forced to confront. That sometimes, no matter how much you care for someone, Fate has something different in store for you and there is nothing you can do to stop it from happening no matter how hard you try. If we were meant to be, I believe that no matter the obstacle, it would have worked out in the end.”

“But we didn’t.”

Ginny shook her head. “We just weren’t meant to be then.”

“Maybe we were,” Harry exclaimed suddenly.

Ginny turned towards Harry, suspicious.

“I mean, we were together for six years,” Harry explained. “Maybe that was how long we were supposed to be together. Hermione said you’re dating Corner, right? And I’m with Draco. Maybe Fate put us together so that we could find the ones we were truly meant to be with.”

Ginny frowned, thinking. When an image of Michael flashed through her mind, Ginny blushed bright red. “Yeah. Maybe you’re right.” Clearing her throat, she searched the dining room. “So where’s this waiter? I am absolutely starving.”

Remembering the last time he was here, Harry tossed his head back and laughed.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

That Evening - Potter Residence - 23 Pasteur Drive, Swindon, Wiltshire, England

With his hands clasped between his dancing knees, Harry scooted to the edge of the chaise longue and stared at the floating head of his best girl mate in the undulating flames. “So,” he drawled. “Did you or not?”

“Maybe,” Hermione teased.

“’Mione,” Harry whined.

Hermione giggled. “Okay. Yes. It’s a girl.”

“A girl? Really? Congratulations!”

A beaming Hermione could not stop grinning. “Thank you Harry.”

“Have you thought of a name yet?”

“Not yet. Ron was so adamant it’d be a boy that he hadn’t even considered the possibility of it being a girl.”

Harry tossed his head back and laughed. It was joined moments later by Draco’s deep chuckles and Teddy’s high-pitched squeals that floated up to the attic from the living room where Teddy should be finishing his homework. “That’s why I asked if you thought of a name yet,” he said, his emerald eyes twinkling in mirth.

“As a matter of fact,” Hermione said with a haughty air, “I was playing around with…‘Rose’.”

“Rose, huh. Cute,” Harry said after a brief contemplation.

Uncertain suddenly, Hermione bit her lip. “You think?”

“Definitely,” he confirmed with a nod.

Back to grinning, Hermione asked, “What about you?”

“Me what?’ Harry asked blankly.

“Kids!”

Harry blushed. “Maybe,” he confessed.

Hermione’s eyed widened to the size of golf balls. Her mouth popped open. “Oh. My. God,” she whispered in shocked amazement. “Don’t tell me!”

Harry blinked at her in confusion. “What?”

“Are you pregnant?”

The blush that had begun to dissipate was renewed instantly.

“Oh my God you are!”

“No! No! I’m not! Honest,” he added at Hermione’s look of disbelief.

Hermione narrowed her eyes. “Are you sure?”

“Yes! Positive. Draco and I have been very careful about that.”

“So were we.”

For the third time in a short span of time, Harry felt his face grow hot. “But, I, uh…I wouldn’t--mind, ya know…”

A gentle smile crossed Hermione’s lips. “I do. Have you and Malfoy talked about having kids?”

With an identical smile, Harry shook his head. “Not really, but I’ve seen the way he looks at Teddy when he thinks I’m not looking, so…”

“Awe!”

Harry snickered. It was too bad Draco was downstairs. He would have loved to see the look on his lover’s face when he realized he was being cooed at. “So, is Ron-?” His inquiry as to the whereabouts of his other best mate was interrupted by the fire flaring brightly. “Oh.”

“What was that?” Hermione asked.

“Call waiting,” he deadpanned.

Hermione cocked an eyebrow at him.

“No, I’m serious. I have another floo call. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

“You better.”

Harry snickered. The fire flared again. “Tell Ron I said hi.”

“Will do. Give my love to Teddy.”

“Will do,” Harry echoed with a wide grin as Hermione rolled her eyes. Snickering, Harry reached forward and tapped the marble encased hearth with his wand. Hermione’s face blinked out of the flames only to be immediately replaced by a frantic looking Narcissa Malfoy. “Mrs. Malfoy? What-?”

“Andy’s been admitted to Saint Mungo’s,” Draco’s mother rambled without any preamble.

Harry flung himself up out of the chaise and onto his knees before the flames. “What?” he shouted in alarm and panic and a hundred other emotions. “Why? What happened?”

“I don’t--I’m not…sure. She was supposed to come over for dinner and when she didn’t show up I floo’d and saw her laying on the floor and--and--She’s stable for the moment, but…the Healers--they aren’t, I mean…”

Oh, God, no, he thought in anguish. “We’ll be right there.”

Jumping to his feet, Harry tore down two flights of stairs to the ground floor where he found Draco and Teddy wrestling in the living room. He wasn’t even breathing heavily, but his chest was tight and despite the glasses, his vision was blurry.

With Teddy trapped in an headlock, a grinning Draco glanced up from the noogie he was bestowing on the five year old and the moment his gaze landed on a white-faced Harry Potter, an alarm went off. Dropping Teddy, he strode forward and clasped Harry’s shoulders. “What?” he demanded. “What is it?”

“Andy…Andy’s been…”

“Is Grandma okay?” a small scared voice spoke.

Draco stepped aside giving Harry a full view of the five year old who looked to be on the verge of tears.

Harry gulped. How were you supposed to explain death to a five year old? Striding around Draco, he slumped down onto the antique Victorian straight back chair and held out his hands to his godson. “Come here, Teddy.”

Teddy slipped into Harry’s lap.

Harry glanced at Draco over Teddy’s head. Draco gave him a reassuring smile. “You know how we told you that Grandma’s sick?”

“Uh huh,” the sniffling five year old said.

“Well…”

With a little help from Draco, Harry tried the best he could to explain the situation to his godson: that the only mother he has ever known might very well not live through the night. Just because Teddy lost both of his parents and his grandfather when he a mere babe, did not mean he understood death. At twenty-two, Harry wasn’t sure he could.

By the end of what Harry was sure was a blundered explanation, not just Teddy, but all three of the males were sobbing out their grief.

Grabbing their cloaks, they piled into the fireplace and floo’d to Saint Mungo’s where they met Narcissa and Lucius. By the devastated expression on Narcissa’s face, it was not difficult to decipher that it was too late. Andromeda Tonks nee Black had already passed away.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

8 Months Later

“Of course, we made the front page once again,” Harry was saying with an exasperated roll of his eyes. Just the day before, he, Draco and Teddy had gone to Diagon Alley for ice cream. Apparently, nothing of real importance was happening anywhere in the world. The daily comings and goings of what The Daily Prophet had taken to call “The Savior and his Family” was what evidently kept the world revolving around the sun. “Seriously. You’d think we were the Royal Family or something.

“Oh! And you were right.” Much to Harry’s dismay and frustration, which was quickly growing into irritation and annoyance, Teddy was indeed becoming Draco Malfoy II. As a result, it took him twice as long to get ready in the mornings. Draco found the whole thing amusing. Harry not so much. “I’ve threatened to take his mirrors away and make it so that he could never see his reflection in anything ever again, but…” He shook his head. “But then of course, he’s taken on a few characteristics from me as well. Draco claims he has my ‘atrocious manners’ and eats like me--well, the way I used to eat before this happened,” he amended with a wave at his engorged belly.

He really should have listened to Hermione. Nothing is one-hundred percent effective; not even wizarding contraceptives it seems.

“He also does this look.” Harry heaved a disgusted sigh. Whether it was intended towards his six-year-old godson or himself, Harry was not sure. “He used it just this morning after I threatened to take his mirror away if he didn’t get his metamorphmagus butt down to breakfast.”

A small blond blur raced into the solarium and flew into a chair between him and Draco. Eyes just as stunning an emerald color as Harry’s sparkled up at him with unshed tears. Pouting and his jaw trembling, Teddy sobbed, “Please don’t take away my mirror.”

“It’s the same damn look I’ve used on Draco once or twice.” Of course, if one was to confirm this with Draco, said man would claim to have been on the receiving end of that look quite a few times. If Harry were American, he would be forced to plead the Fifth on that.

Pausing in his monologue to take a sip of his juice, Harry took the opportunity to study the three headstones before him. Nymphadora Lupin nee Tonks and Remus Lupin had a shared gravestone. Next to theirs was Ted Tonks, Tonks’ Muggle father, and besides his was the newest one belonging to Andromeda Tonks nee Black. Bouquets of fresh flowers lay against all three.

His eyes misted and his throat constricted around a lump.

Clearing his throat violently, Harry blinked away the unshed tears and exclaimed, “Oh! I didn’t tell you! We’re having a boy. Can you believe it? Teddy is thrilled with being a big brother. Draco’s been strutting around like one those albino peacocks of his.” Harry rolled his eyes. “Bloody nuisance,” he added, though the corners of his lips twitched. “You know, as soon as we were told that no I didn’t the flu, but was pregnant, Draco started to demand an astrological name for the baby. I know it’s a Black family tradition, but still! I certainly couldn’t see naming my son Io. How about Lupus or Centaurus, Lynx, Lyra or Vega? Dear Merlin. They sound like names for characters in an MMORPG.” He shuddered. “Not that I have anything against astrological names, but some of them just aren’t appropriate baby names. Myself, I’m partial to James after my father, but Draco is adamant on Scorpius. We’ll see. Maybe if he’s lucky I’ll allow him to give James an astrological middle name.”

“How very considerate of you,” drawled a new voice from behind him.

Startled, Harry whipped around. Striding towards him was Draco. “Hey,” he greeted with a grin. “Where’s Teddy?”

Draco jerked his chin over his shoulder.

Leaning to the side, he peered around his boyfriend and saw Teddy chasing ducks around the pond.

“So,” Draco said as he sat upon a blanket he’d transfigured from a leaf, “have you told her about Moore yet?”

“Not yet,” Harry answered as he turned back around. He was leaning back with a hand behind him. The other hand was rubbing his thirty-week pregnancy belly. Ten more weeks and he would be able to hold his son in his arms. He wondered who he’d look like.

“Well,” Draco was saying, “Moore was named as the new Head Auror and Constantine was named as the new Assistant Head Auror.”

Harry had not been the least bit surprised.

The Auror Department has flourished under Moore’s administration as temporary Head Auror. The number of cases being closed had tripled. Even some of the cold cases had been reopened and subsequently solved; they were even considering creating a Cold Case Squad. Crime in general had been cut practically in half while the number of complaints being filed against the Auror Department had dwindled to practically nil. The riffraff, including incompetent and corrupt Aurors and other staff within the Department, had been weeded out. Among those fired were the group of seven Aurors who’d had Draco arrested that day in Knockturn Alley. Overall, it was a completely different Auror Department than it had been some six months ago. Harry even had some new recruits, as did many other divisions and units within the Auror Department. Many of these new recruits were volunteers.

As for Adelphos Constantine, the Auror who had questioned him after Pieletska’s stroke, the man was one of the best Aurors the Department had. Harry couldn’t think of anyone else to be named as the new Assistant Head. The man deserved the promotion.

“As Moore’s first act as Head, he filed formal charges against Pieletska’s Private Goon Squad,” Draco continued. He was, of course, speaking about the group of Aurors who arrested him for a murder that did not happen. It also turned that they were those so-called VIPs Sting had told him and Harry about mere hours before he was murdered--information subsequently confirmed by the year long investigation headed by Moore. “Among the charges I believe were conspiracy, murder, assault, battery, forced imprisonment, distribution of illegal substances…”

Harry nodded. “They’ll be going to jail for a very long time.”

“Good.” Draco’s eyes hardened into steel.

Knowing Draco was thinking of Sting, Harry sat up and laid a hand over Draco’s fist.

Draco’s gaze softened as it landed on him. Uncurling his hand, he turned his hand over and laced their fingers together.

Leaning forward, Harry pressed his lips to Draco’s. Pulling back, he whispered, “I love you.”

“Love you too,” Draco whispered back.

“Oh!” Harry exclaimed suddenly.

He turned back to the grave of his godson’s Grandmother who also happened to be his late godfather’s cousin. Now that he thought about it, hadn’t Sirius and his father been cousins? He would have to check the Black or Potter family tree tapestries, but he was sure that he was blood related to the Blacks somehow. If it turned out to be true, didn’t that mean that he and Draco were related through Narcissa since Draco‘s mother was Andromeda‘s sister? Harry shuddered to think that he might have been related to Bellatrix. Well, he supposed if he and Draco did turn out to be cousins or whatever, it just meant that they were following Pureblood tradition. He had to laugh at that.

Draco began to look at him funny.

Harry ignored him in favor of trying to remember what it was he‘d wanted to say before his thoughts distracted him. “And it turned out that body they found in Hertford was indeed Potions Master Wilhelm,” Harry added.

Draco nodded. “Explains why we were never able to find him.”

“Yeah. Oo! Tell her about the fertility potion.”

Smirking, Draco turned back to the gravestone of his late aunt. “Well, the Wizengamot finally approved my petition to work on Wilhelm’s banned fertility potion and I have to say Wilhelm must have been going senile in his old age because it turns out what he made was nothing short of liquid Avada Kedarva. I mean any Potions Master should know never to place wormwood, seeds of a rowan tree or white bryony into a fertility potion! It‘s amazing anyone even survived ingesting the stuff.”

Scooting his large girth across the blanket, Harry wrapped his arms around Draco’s waist and rested his head against Draco’s shoulder. “Speaking of babies, I’m sure you know by now that Hermione and-” he faltered at his best male mate‘s name.

The only time Harry saw his best male mate nowadays was at work, but their interaction was strictly work related. The only time it veered was when Ron congratulated him on his pregnancy. It saddened Harry when he thought about how distant the two of them had grown in the past two years. Ron just could not accept Malfoy as anything other than the sneaky Slytherin git from their Hogwarts days, not even for Harry. He saw Ginny socially more often than he did his best mate.

As Draco said, that was in the nature of being an adult. You grew up and your priorities changed. Suddenly, there were more important things to worry about than the girl giving you the once over from across the pub--ya know, the one with the skirt that barely covered her fine ass. Spending a nice quiet night in front of the fire with your significant other on a Friday night was preferable to going deaf at the new nightclub downtown.

Knowing all that did not make the hurt go away, though.

Shaking off the melancholy aside, for it wasn’t good for the baby, Harry continued, “Hermione and Ron had a baby girl. Hermione got her way and named her Rose. She is the cutest thing!”

Currently, with Harry’s emotions going haywire due to his pregnancy, there was no telling what the man would do to him if Draco were to mention the girly squeal, so he ignored it and instead added with a sneer, “Of course she has the Weasley red hair.”

“My mother had red hair.”

It was an old argument. Draco rolled his eyes. “Yes, but she didn’t have the Weasley red hair, which is more orange than red. Your mother had true red hair. There is a difference. If I had a choice I would much prefer Lily red to the Weasley red.”

Harry beamed. “Really?”

“Yes, really. I have told you this how many times now?”

Tightening his hold on the father of his child, Harry smiled wistfully into the sky. Then the content expression fell into a pout. “I want a girl.”

Another old argument. “And you shall have a girl. Just not this go. Patience love.”

Harry tilted his head back to look up at Draco. “Promise?”

“Sure.”

Grinning, Harry settled back at Draco’s side.

“Teddy,” Draco called out, causing Harry to go partially deaf. “Leave the ducks alone and get over here and say hi to Grandma!”

“By the way,” Harry spoke up, “you know Ginny and Corner are getting married? She wants me to go help her pick out her wedding dress this weekend.” He rolled his eyes. Just because he preferred men over women and was pregnant did not mean he knew anything about wedding dresses. Did he look like a fashion expert? She would be better off inviting Draco.

Draco had gone still besides him at the mention of the wedding.

“Ginny and Michael Corner are getting married and they aren’t even pregnant,” Harry continued in a matter of fact tone. “Funny that.” Raising his head, he turned to look square at his boyfriend. “Don’t you think--Draco--Love?”

Going pale at the false sweetness, Draco gulped. It hurt. His heart was pounding. He was sweating profusely. Forcing a smile, he somehow managed to squeak, “I love you?”

His eyes narrowed, Harry opened his mouth-

“I was going to wait till our anniversary tomorrow,” Draco interrupted. He reached into his pocket. “But…” Fisting the object he found within, he held it out to Harry.

Blinking, Harry stared blankly down at it. It--was a ring.

“It is the Malfoy betrothal ring. A family heirloom,” Draco said. “Been in the family for generations. Notice the Malfoy family coat of arms engraved in the amazonite.”

“Yes. I see it,” Harry said with an unnatural calmness.

The green gemstone, which Harry now knew to be amazonite, was sitting in a setting of five swirling thin bands. He recognized silver, gold and copper, but the other two he was not sure about. There was a black band and another one similar in color to the silver band, but the hue was slightly different. And indeed, there engraved at the bottom of the amazonite was the Malfoy coat of arms. It had not been readily noticeable, but it was there for all to see.

“Wait. What?”

Draco watched in amusement as comprehension slowly lit Harry’s face.

With another one of those girly squeals, which Draco was not going to say anything about until after the emotional rollercoaster blew out of town, Harry launched himself at Draco shouting, “Yes! Yes! Yes!”

“Funny,” Draco whispered into Harry’s ear, which cause said man to shudder against him, just as Teddy finally made an appearance, “that’s what you said the night we conceived little Caelum James Malfoy.”

“And I’ll be saying it again tonight,” Harry whispered back between sobs, tightening his hold.

The promise made Draco’s cock stir to life. “Can’t wait,” Draco whispered huskily.

Harry laughed.

“Why’re you crying?” asked a small curious voice.

Still laughing, Harry pulled back and showed the boy the ring that had somehow found its way onto the ring finger of his left hand. He had no memory of how it got there, but he didn’t care. “Draco asked me to marry him.”

“Really?”

Draco cringed. There was that squeal again. “Why don’t you tell Grandma the good news?” he suggested to the six year old.

“Okay!” Teddy jumped to his feet and raced to his grandmother’s final resting place. “Hey guess what?”

“Thank you, Dray,” Harry whispered.

His heart skipping a beat at the nickname only his fiancé could get away with, Draco captured the hand caressing his cheek. “What for?”

“For everything.”

“In that case, you are very welcome.”

“Prat,” Harry chuckled as he leaned in for a kiss.

A short time later, the three of them were strolling out of the cemetery. Draco and Harry hand in hand with Teddy skipping along ahead of them.

“And to think,” Harry thought aloud, “this all started because you wanted to talk to me about a prenup.”

Draco chuckled. “Greatest advice ever.”

Harry rolled his eyes. No regrets, he thought. “Oh and by the way, it’ll be James Caelum Potter.”

“I don’t think so.”

“I do.”

“Don’t.”

“Do.”

As the two adults continued to bicker like children, Teddy giggled happily.

+ FINIS +

spB�g:>�`rp>

Ginny bit her lip and glanced at a towering pile of books in the far corner that had to be held up with magic for gravity surely would have pulled the stack down long ago.

She wasn’t sure if she could do that--befriend Malfoy that was. There were just some things she wasn’t--couldn’t--refused to forgive Malfoy or his family for--not even for Harry’s sake. That was what she told Hermione.

Hermione gave her a sad little smile. “I know and that’s fine. Nobody said you had to, but for Harry‘s sake and for the sake of your relationship, you‘re going to have to learn to at least pretend, because trying to come in-between Harry and Malfoy or any of his other friends is only going to cause you heartache in the end. I should know,” Hermione continued. There was a sorrowful note to her voice now. “Both Ron and I have never liked Malfoy and we hated it when Harry started associating with Draco and then Harry said he considered Malfoy a good friend…we’ve tried talking to Harry about it, telling him how Malfoy was no good… but all it’s done is make things worse.”

Cursing, Ginny bent over and dropped her face in her hands.

“Look, Gin,” Hermione said, sliding to the edge of her chair. “What you should do is go talk with Harry, even if you have to bind him to a chair or something.”

Ginny giggled and lifted her head.

“Tell him what you told me. Talk things out.” Hermione emphasized the last part by punctuating each word as if it its own sentence. “Okay?”

Ginny nodded. “Alright. Yeah.”

Hermione smiled. “He loves you. You know that right?”

A warm feeling washed over Ginny. She nodded. “I do. I love him too.”

Both women stood up.

“Thing’s’ll work out. You’ll see,” Hermione whispered as she hugged Ginny.

“I know they will,” Ginny whispered back and she returned the hug. “Thank you. Really. For everything.”

“Of course,” Hermione said as she pulled back. “What’re sisters for?”

They shared a laugh.

Hermione walked Ginny back through the house in silence. Each was lost in her own thoughts. At the door, Hermione waylaid her sister-in-law with a hand on her shoulder. “Give Malfoy a chance,” she suggested.

Ginny’s eye twitched. She knew that if she wanted to keep Harry in her life, she had to polish up on her acting skills, but giving Malfoy a chance was outside her comfort zone.

“He’s not--He’s not such a bad bloke,” Hermione continued, seeing the hesitation on the ginger-haired girl’s face.

Ginny rounded on Hermione. “What?! Not so bad? What the fu-?”

“I saw them today,” Hermione was saying as if she hadn’t heard Ginny. She stared past Ginny’s shoulders at the night sky where a sea of stars twinkled majestically, knowing she probably shouldn’t say anything, but knowing she had to. “At the café.” She turned her gaze towards a furious Ginny. “I watched them--saw them interact.” She dropped her gaze to her slippered feet, gathering her thoughts. “It’s obvious--Malfoy seems to be the only one who can talk sense into Harry sometimes.”

The fury ebbed away at the words only to be replaced with a cold dread. It was the same feeling Ginny came to Hermione to get rid of. Now here Hermione was confirming what Ginny had already suspected. It was like a replay of what had transpired with her talk with her mother. Ginny felt nauseous.

“Like I said, talk to Harry. It’s obvious you have some things to talk about.”

Ginny could only nod.

“At this point, the only suggestion I can give you is to not make my mistake. If you force Harry to choose between you and Malfoy…He will choose Malfoy over you.”

The bottom fell out of Ginny’s stomach. This was not what she’d wanted to hear when she came over.

Somehow, Ginny made it home without splinching herself, undressed, crawled into bed and was asleep before her head hit the pillow. Her last conscious thought was that she both dreaded and looked forward to seeing Harry in the morning.

As Hermione was crawling into bed besides a snoring Ron, she silently apologized to Ginny as she remembered what she’d witnessed back in Bannum Alley earlier that afternoon. She had a feeling that it was already too late. Harry just might have already chosen.

+ HARRY POTTER + ADVICE 2: WHEEL OF FORTUNE +

That Night - Potter Residence - 23 Pasteur Drive, Swindon, Wiltshire, England

With a glass of wine in one hand, Draco stood from the sofa and waltzed over to one of the built-in bookcases flanking the fireplace. Only a couple of the shelves had books on them. The rest of the space was interspersed with knickknacks.

From the sofa, Harry sipped his wine and watched Draco. Maybe it was the large consumption of alcohol he’d consumed that day, but he found his gaze roaming the other’s tall, lean figure with growing appreciation, lingering on the tight ass that filled out those fitted Muggle designer jeans almost a little too well.

Draco ran a finger across the spines of the books and paused over one with a burgundy-red cover. “The Adventures of Lucius Caecilius Iucundus,” he read. He cocked an eyebrow over his shoulder.

Harry shrugged, ignoring the warmth that spread across his cheeks.

Setting his wine down, Draco pulled out the book and flipped carefully through its yellowed pages. He could guessimate its age to be a little over two centuries old.

“I was given the book by a Mrs. Fredrick J. Smith,” Harry said. “It was during one of the very first cases Pieletska assigned me to.”

“Really? What happened?”

“Early one morning when Mrs. Smith woke to let her dog out, she found a body floating face down in the small pond located on her property. It turns out that she had a noggle-”

Draco marked his place with a finger and turned towards Harry. “A noggle?” He’d been under the impression that the Noggle inhabited the Shetland Islands; or used to at any rate. Last he heard, there hadn’t been a noggle spotted there in decades.

Harry nodded and took a sip of his wine. “Yeah. They appear only by water as a small gray horse with bridle and saddle, its tail curled up over its back-”

“Yes. Yes,” Draco said with a wave of his hand. He knew damn well what a noggle looked like. He wasn’t an idiot.

“Well, then you know that they’re usually fairly harmless-”

“Except to mills and idiots who think it’s cute to ride a miniature horse.”

Harry chuckled. “It turns out the guy Mrs. Smith found face down in her pond was a thief. Went by the name Thrasymachus.”

Draco cocked an eyebrow.

“His real name was Wendell,” Harry deadpanned.

Draco barked out a laugh. “Wendell?”

Harry laughed, his emerald green eyes sparkling in mirth. “He’d been on the run for at least a decade. Has hit hundreds of houses--both Muggle and magical--and the Aurors were no closer to catching him than when he first appeared on the scene.”

“Useless. All of them.”

Harry shrugged. “We speculate that this guy heard rumors of Mrs. Smith’s collection of antiques that included that book,” Harry waved a hand at the book Draco still held, “and that particular night he’d planned on a little shopping spree, but got, ah, waylaid, as it were, by the sudden appearance of the noggle.”

Draco snorted. “Idiot.”

“Again this is all speculation.”

“Of course.”

Seeing as “Thrasymachus” was dead, it was difficult to know what exactly the man was doing on Mrs. Smith’s property. It could be that this guy was just passing through.

“But whatever he was doing there, he saw the noggle and maybe thought it was nothing more than a miniature horse and decided to take it for a ride, but once he got on the saddle-”

“He couldn’t get off.”

“Right,” Harry said with a nod. “And thus drowned when the noggle immediately went into the water (2).”

Draco returned his gaze to the book clasped around his finger. “And as a reward, Mrs. Smith gave you this book?”

Harry shrugged. “Yeah.” Noticing he was running low on wine, he reached for the wine bottle in the ice bucket and poured himself some more.

Opening the book to the page he‘d marked, Draco went back to flipping through the pages.

“It’s about this well-known Pompeian banker Lucius Caecilius Iucundus and his family on that August day when Mt. Vesuvius erupted.”

“Have you read it?”

“A little,” Harry confessed, “but it’s slow going since I’m not fluent in Latin.”

Draco nodded. “As with all Pureblood children, I was taught to speak Latin, as well as French, fluently,” he explained haughtily, “but it’s been awhile.”

“A bit rusty huh?” Harry teased.

“A bit,” Draco agreed with a twitch of his lips. He flipped to the last chapter. It was titled, “finis”. Without even reading the chapter, Draco felt it was safe to assume what happened. “iam nubes atra ad terram descendebat; iam cinis densissimus incinerate. plurimi Pompeiani iam de urbe sua desperabant. multi peribant (3),” he read. “Now black clouds were coming down to earth; now very thick ash was falling. Most Pompeians now about the city were becoming despaired. Many were dying,” he translated roughly. He mentally winced. It really had been a long time. Snapping the book closed, he slid it back onto the shelf. “A very depressing read Potter.”

Harry saluted Draco with his wine and a chuckle. “Even without knowing Latin, I could have told you that.”

“Yes. Seeing as it is about a man living in Pompeii when Mt. Vesuvius erupted and buried the town,” Draco said as he returned to the sofa besides Harry.

“Exactly.”

“Have you had it appraised at all?”

“No.” Harry set his glass on the coffee table.

“You should.” Draco downed the last of his wine and placed the now empty glass besides Harry’s. “Given its excellent condition and its rarity, you could probably get a fair price for it.”

Harry shrugged.

“I know some reputable dealers I can recommend.”

“I’ll think about it.”

“Just let me know.”

Having a book appraised was not very high on Harry’s list of priorities at the moment.

Silence enveloped the two men. It was a comfortable lull and not the least bit strained.

As Harry sat staring at the undulating flames dancing erotically within the fireplace, for aesthetic appeal rather than warmth this warm spring night, he sensed rather than felt movement besides him. That was when he found himself suddenly aware of Draco’s presence besides him. There was Draco’s arm thrown casually along the back of the sofa behind Harry’s head that Harry was certain was not there moments before. Warmth flooded his face. Suddenly feeling nervous for some inexplicable reason, Harry fidgeted and forcibly cleared his throat. Was it him or was the space between him and Draco growing smaller and smaller?

He jumped when a hand that did not belong to him settled onto his thigh just above the knee and ever so slowly started sliding upwards. Harry gulped. His pulse was racing. His heart was pounding. He couldn’t catch his breath. He tried to speak--to tell Draco to remove his hand from his person, but he couldn’t find the words. All that came out was the name of the man besides him who was currently in the process of molesting him.

“Draco.” It came out as a breathy whisper. It didn’t sound like his voice at all.

When the hand halted a hairsbreadth from his groin, Harry breathed a sigh. He wasn’t sure if he was disappointed or relieved. What he did know was that his pants were uncomfortably tight and causing certain parts of him to chafe.

“Har~ry.”

His name rolling off Draco’s tongue sent a pleasant tingle rolling through him. Or maybe it was the hand that was suddenly cupping him through his pants. “Oh, God,” he moaned, arching into the gentle, but firm touch that seemed to be burning its way through the layers of cloth between it and his aching cock.

Draco ran his thumb over the head of Harry’s pulsating cock.

Pleasure shot up Harry’s spine. He moaned again and thrust his hips into the touch.

His head was spinning. Merlin help him. He had no idea what was going on, but he wanted more.

He’d readily admit to finding Draco attractive. It was fact like the sky being blue and the grass being green. So what? Even the straightest of men would find Draco to be a good-looking bloke. He’d even admit to having several very erotic wet dreams staring the blond Adonis as of late. But that didn’t mean anything. Who didn’t have a homoerotic dream at least once? It was no big deal. Dreams weren’t meant to be taken literally after all. Just because he’d dreamt of this very scenario countless times didn’t mean that over the course of their post-Hogwarts relationship, he’d fallen in love with the man.

If that were the case, though, then why wasn’t he telling Draco to stop?

Panting, Harry rocked his hips in time to the hand jerking him off. He dropped his head back against the top of the sofa as the building pleasure overcame any doubts, questions, and uncertainties.

Harry watched Draco from hooded eyes as the blond haired blue eyed Potions Master slid off the sofa and sank to his knees in front of him. Draco looked up and caught his eye. Harry’s breath hitched.

Without taking his eyes away from the lust filled emerald ones, Draco unclasped Harry’s pants and lowered the zipper, being carefully not to get Harry caught.

Harry gulped. He clawed at the delicate fabric covering the cushions. His toes dug grooves into the floor.

Draco grabbed Harry’s cock, hard yet soft and throbbing, and freed it from its uncomfortable confinement. When he took the entire length into his mouth, worshipping it, loving it, Harry’s eyes rolled back as wave after wave of pleasure rolled through him. Moans, grunts, and other nonsensical noise filled the otherwise quiet of the house.

Harry knew he should stop Draco before it escalated any further, but for the life of him, he couldn’t remember why.

+ TO BE CONTINUED +

Brónach (BRO nakh): Traditional Irish name. Possibly meaning “sorrow”. Other spellings: Brona, Bronagh.

Heinin: Welsh name. Not sure what it means.

Magnus Hallucinari: Great Dream

(1) Get the pattern? First a male is killed, then a girl, then a boy, then a girl, etc, but there’s more to the pattern then that. Can you see it? Here’s a hint. Jack Jackson’s last victim would have been Zach Aaserud.

(2) Info from Magickal Mystical Creatures by D.J. Conway

(3) Taken from the fourth edition (2001) Cambridge Latin Courses Unit 1. Please excuse the crude translation.
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Advice 2: Wheel of Fortune