CXXIV. FOUR SEASONS
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❝I can't tell what you're thinking
Please, tell me what you're thinking❞
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BILL AND FLEUR'S COTTAGE WAS serene as it stood alone on a cliff overlooking the sea, its walls embedded with shells and whitewashed. It was a beautiful, yet lonely place and wherever Lucia went inside the tiny cottage or it's garden, she could hear the constant ebb and flow of the sea, like the breathing of some great, slumbering creature.
She spent much of her time of the next few days tending to the garden with Fleur, though that was just her mere excuse to think about the diadem and the Elder Wand that Harry had supposedly told them of how Voldemort already possessed it.
It was truly a terrifying thought: A tyrant in possession of the most powerful wand that had ever been known to the Wizarding World, being the very wand that was gifted by death themselves... a wand that had been thought to be a myth.
But it was also peculiar.
Why didn't Harry want to go head on and retrieve the wand before Voldemort did? Albeit it would be extremely dangerous, but it wouldn't be such a Harry thing to do if there wouldn't be danger and risks involved. The bizarre of him not wanting to race Voldemort for the wand indeed weirded out not only her, but Harry himself.
His decision somehow still scared him. He could not remember, ever before, choosing not to act. He was full of doubts, doubts that Ron could not help voicing whenever they were together.
"What if Dumbledore wanted us to work out the symbol in time to get the wand?" "What if working out what the symbol meant made you 'worthy' to get the Hallows?" "Harry, if that really is the Elder Wand, how the hell are we supposed to finish off You-Know-Who?"
Harry had no answers: There were moments when he wondered whether it had been outright madness not to try to prevent Voldemort breaking open the tomb. He could not even explain satisfactorily why he had decided against it: Every time he tried to reconstruct the internal arguments that had led to his decision, they sounded feebler to him.
The odd thing was that Hermione's support made him feel just as confused as Ron's doubts. Now forced to accept that the Elder Wand was real, she maintained that it was an evil object, and that the way Voldemort had taken possession of it was repellent, not to be considered.
"You could never have done that, Harry," she said again and again. "You couldn't have broken into Dumbledore's grave."
But the idea of Dumbledore's corpse frightened Harry much less than the possibility that he might have misunderstood the living Dumbledore's intentions. He felt that he was still groping in the dark; he had chosen his path but kept looking back, wondering whether he had misread the signs, whether he should not have taken the other way. Even with Lucia's soft and convincing words of consolation cannot help him this time.
"You didn't know, Harry. Stop blaming yourself, you're not at fault. If anything, it's that bearded bastard's fault— maybe I should curse him out more than Merlin..." she would always say whenever she could.
But she wasn't all that wrong.
He wasn't at fault.
From time to time, anger at Dumbledore crashed over him again, powerful as the waves slamming themselves against the cliff beneath the cottage, anger that Dumbledore had not explained before he died.
"But is he dead?" said Ron, three days after they had arrived at the cottage. Harry had been staring out over the wall that separated the cottage garden from the cliff, sitting with Lucia who was idly making a flower crown out of the blue flowers that she had picked from the garden when Ron and Hermione had found them; the pair wished wished they had not, having no wish to join in with their argument and instead to continue their time alone.
"Yes, he is, Ron, please don't start that again!"
"Look at the facts, Hermione," said Ron, "The silver doe. The sword. The eye Harry saw in the mirror -"
"Harry admits he could have imagined the eye! Don't you, Harry?"
"I could have," said Harry without looking at her.
Lucia rolled her eyes, annoyed.
"But you don't think you did, do you?" asked Ron.
"No, I don't," said Harry.
"This is like they're playing your devil and angel on your shoulders, Harry," mused Lucia, not looking up.
Harry grumbled under his breath.
"There you go!" said Ron quickly, before Hermione could carry on. "If it wasn't Dumbledore, explain how Dobby knew we were in the cellar, Hermione?"
"I can't — but can you explain how Dumbledore sent him to us if he's lying in a tomb at Hogwarts?"
"I dunno, it could've been his ghost!"
"Well that's impossible," snorted Lucia, not looking away from her final product. "I don't see Dumbledore as someone who's scared of death you know? He would've probably gone on already,"
"What d'you mean, 'gone on'?" asked Ron, but before Lucia could say any more, a voice behind them said, "'Arry?"
Fleur had come out of the cottage, her long silver hair flying in the breeze.
"'Arry, Grip'ook would like to speak to you. 'E eez in ze smallest bedroom, 'e says 'e does not want to be over'eard."
Her dislike of the goblin sending her to deliver messages was clear; she looked irritable as she walked back around the house.
Griphook was waiting for them, as Fleur had said, in the tiniest of the cottage's three bedrooms, in which Lucia, Hermione, and Luna slept by night. He had drawn the red cotton curtains against the bright, cloudy sky, which gave the room a fiery glow at odds with the rest of the airy, light cottage.
"I have reached my decision, Harry Potter," said the goblin, who was sitting cross-legged in a low chair, drumming its arms with his spindly fingers. "Though the goblins of Gringotts will consider it base treachery, I have decided to help you —"
"That's great!" said Harry, relief surging through him. "Griphook, thank you, we're really —"
"— in return," said the goblin firmly, "for payment."
Slightly taken aback, Harry hesitated.
"How much do you want? I've got gold."
"Not gold," said Griphook. "I have gold."
His black eyes glittered; there were no whites to his eyes.
"I want the sword. The sword of Godric Gryffindor."
Lucia crossed her arms against her chest and looked down at the goblin. "Isn't saving your life enough?"
"I am flattered that you even went as far as to beg, Luciana DiFiore, but it is simply not enough," said Griphook.
Harry's spirits plummeted.
"You can't have that," he said. "I'm sorry."
"Then," said the goblin softly, "we have a problem."
Lucia's cracked her fist, "I'm going to chuck you off —"
"We can give you something else," said Ron eagerly fast, pulling Lucia behind him. "I'll bet the Lestranges have got loads of stuff, you can take your pick once we get into the vault."
He had said the wrong thing. Griphook flushed angrily.
"I am not a thief, boy! I am not trying to procure treasures to which I have no right!"
"The sword's ours —"
"It is not," said the goblin.
"We're Gryffindors, and it was Godric Gryffindor's —"
"And before it was Gryffindor's, whose was it?" demanded the goblin, sitting up straight.
"No one's," said Ron. "It was made for him, wasn't it?"
"No!" cried the goblin, bristling with anger as he pointed a long finger at Ron. "Wizarding arrogance again!"
"In the goblin's history, the sword first belonged to Ragnuk the First's, the king of goblins during the four founder's era," Lucia told them from what she remembered reading in the library a few months ago while she was wallowing in her own misery. She heaved out a sigh and ran her fingers through her ebony hair in dismay. "To them, Godric Gryffindor stole the sword from Ragnuk."
"It is a lost treasure, a masterpiece of goblinwork! It belongs with the goblins!"
"Listen here, you old coot," Lucia pushed Ron aside harshly as she came face to face with Griphook. She was irritated. "We found it before you. Finders keepers losers weepers, you los —"
"Nope!" Harry clamped his hand over her mouth before she could further offend the goblin as she struggled in his arms, letting a loud muffle of, "I OUGHTA — !" In which Harry dismissed, not even faltering from his hold around her as he stared at Griphook. "We'll take another price,"
"The sword is the only price of my hire, take it or leave it!"
Griphook glared at them. Harry glanced at the other three, then said, "We need to discuss this, Griphook, if that's all right. Could you give us a few minutes?"
The goblin nodded, looking sour.
Downstairs in the empty sitting room, Harry walked to the fireplace, brow furrowed, trying to think what to do. Behind him, Ron said, "He's having a laugh. We can't let him have that sword."
"Let me chuck him off the cliff," said Lucia at once.
"No, Lucia," said Hermione apprehensively.
"It is true?" Harry asked. "Was the sword stolen by Gryffindor?"
"I don't know," she said hopelessly. "Wizarding history often skates over what the wizards have done to other magical races, but there's no account that I know of that says Gryffindor stole the sword."
"Because there shouldn't be any accounts," said Lucia in confliction. "But mind you, it is in our history. There's a far bigger chance that all of our history books are made for propaganda so that it shows that we were never the villain of the story. That said, it can also be the same for the goblins history: Theirs told them that Gryffindor stole the sword. Ours told us that the sword was made to Gryffindor's specification. There's no proof weather either are wrong or right. Only those who experienced it first-hand knows," she added.
"It'll be one of those goblin stories," said Ron, "about how the wizards are always trying to get one over on them. I suppose we should think ourselves lucky he hasn't asked for one of our wands."
"You're not really helping our situation, Ron" shot Lucia. "We already saw how those who aren't wizard and witches are treated. Goblins have a pretty good reason to dislike wizards."
"They were treated brutally in the past," added Hermione in agreement.
"Goblins aren't exactly fluffy little bunnies, though, are they?" said Ron. "They've killed plenty of us. They've fought dirty too."
"But arguing with Griphook about whose race is most underhanded and violent isn't going to make him more likely to help us, is it?"
There was a pause whilst they tried to think of a way around the problem. Lucia glanced outside of the window to Dobby's grave and saw that Luna was arranging sea lavender in a jam jar beside the headstone. She cracked a small smile.
"Okay," said Ron, and Lucia teared her attention back to the topic at hand, "how's this? We tell Griphook we need the sword until we get inside the vault, and then he can have it. There's a fake in there, isn't there? We switch them, and give him the fake."
"Ron, he'd know the difference better than we would!" said Hermione. "He's the only one who realized there had been a swap!"
"Yeah, but we could scarper before he realizes —"
He quailed beneath the look Hermione was giving him.
"That," she said quietly, "is despicable. Ask for his help, then double-cross him? And you wonder why goblins don't like wizards, Ron?"
Ron's ears had turned red.
"All right, all right! It was the only thing I could think of! What's your solution, then?"
"We need to offer him something else, something just as valuable."
"Brilliant. I'll go and get one of our other ancient goblin-made swords and you can gift wrap it."
Silence fell between them again. Lucia was certain that the goblin would accept nothing but the sword, even if they had something as valuable to offer him. Yet the sword was their one, indispensable weapon against the Horcruxes.
"Maybe he's lying," Harry said, opening his eyes after closing them momentarily from thinking. "Griphook. Maybe Gryffindor didn't take the sword. Like Lucia said, it might as well be propaganda from either side. How do we know the goblin version of history's right?"
"Not sure if that makes any difference with our situation right now, Harry," said Lucia.
"Well it does changes how I feel about it," said Harry wearily.
He took a deep breath.
"We'll tell him he can have the sword after he's helped us get into that vault — but we'll be careful to avoid telling him exactly when he can have it."
A grin spread slowly across Ron's face. However Lucia shook her head with a sigh, and Hermione looked alarmed.
"Harry, we can't —"
"He can have it," Harry went on, "after we've used it on all of the Horcruxes. I'll make sure he gets it then. I'll keep my word."
"But that could be years!" said Hermione.
"I know that, but he needn't. I won't be lying... really."
Harry met her eyes with a mixture of defiance and shame. He remembered the words that had been engraved over the gateway to Nurmengard: FOR THE GREATER GOOD. He pushed the idea away. What choice did they have?
"I don't like it," said Hermione.
"Nor do I, much," Harry admitted.
"But when you think about it, it isn't like we're doing much wrong? It isn't a lie," pondered Lucia optimistically. "Think of the bright side,"
"Well, I think it's genius," said Ron, standing up again. "Let's go and tell him."
Back in the smallest bedroom, Harry made the offer, careful to phrase it so as not to give any definite time for the handover of the sword. Lucia could not think much of the plan being bad, for she was too caught up by her grudge against Griphook, but Hermione, however, frowned evidently at the floor while he was speaking. She saw the irritated gaze in Harry's eyes, afraid that she give the game away. But that never happened, for Griphook had eyes for nobody but Harry.
"I have your word, Harry Potter, that you will give me the sword of Gryffindor if I help you?"
"Yes," said Harry.
"Then shake," said the goblin, holding out his hand.
Harry took it and shook. He wondered whether those black eyes saw any misgivings in his own. Then Griphook relinquished him, clapped his hands together, and said, "So. We begin!"
They began planning the operation; it was like when she, Neville, Ginny, Luna, and Seamus had planned on breaking into Snape's office — albeit, that didn't went all that well... They settled to work in the smallest bedroom, which was kept, according to Griphook's preference, in semidarkness.
"I have visited the Lestrange's' vault only once," Griphook told them, "on the occasion I was told to place inside it the false sword. It is one of the most ancient chambers. The oldest Wizarding families store their treasures at the deepest level, where the vaults are largest and best protected..."
They remained shut in the cupboard-like room for hours at a time. Slowly the days stretched into weeks. There was problem after problem to overcome, not least of which was that their store of Polyjuice Potion was greatly depleted.
"There's really only enough left for one of us," said Hermione, tilting the thick mudlike potion against the lamplight.
"I tried to look through my school bag for any more ingredients, but it doesn't look there are plenty of them or even time to brew more, so we have to settle with it carefully," stated Lucia.
"That'll be enough," said Harry, who was examining Griphook's hand-drawn map of the deepest passageways.
The other inhabitants of Shell Cottage could hardly fail to notice that something was going on now that Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Lucia only emerged for mealtimes. Nobody asked questions, although Lucia often felt Bill's eyes on the four of them at the table, thoughtful, concerned.
The longer they spent together, the more Lucia grown to change her perspective of the goblin and grew to dislike him more and more. Griphook was unexpectedly bloodthirsty, laughed at the idea of pain in lesser creatures, and seemed to relish the possibility that they might have to hurt other wizards to reach the Lestrange's' vault. Lucia could tell that her distaste was shared by the other two, but they did not discuss it: They needed Griphook.
The goblin ate only grudgingly with the rest of them. Even after his legs had mended, he continued to request trays of food in his room, like the still-frail Ollivander, until Bill (following an angry outburst from Fleur) went upstairs to tell him that the arrangement could not continue. Thereafter Griphook joined them at the overcrowded table, although he refused to eat the same food, insisting, instead, on lumps of raw meat, roots, and various fungi.
Lucia felt somewhat responsible for saving the goblin from underneath the chandelier after Dobby's greatest stunt in defying his old masters, but she knew if she had left him there she would've felt the overwhelming guilt swallowing her. And no doubt Harry would have rescued him anyway; not only because of him being the living and breathing existence of bravery, but as well because of their plan to break into Gringotts, which was still wild to her that they were even doing what people would count as impossible, in the first place.
There was just no way they could return the goblin. Not if they want this plan to succeed.
"Oh, how the tables have turned," Lucia smiled when she entered the kitchen with a basket filled with flowers she had picked with Luna. Harry and Fleur were prepping up meals for the rest of them on one blustery April evening.
It was a bit odd, she admit, not being the one to prep the meal anymore. Ever since she reunited with them, she had been the one to be in charge of the food and the well-being of the tent while the others would plan their next move. Of course, she didn't mind it as she wanted to use less of her brain sometimes, but it was quite refreshing to see it not being her in the kitchen anymore. Plus, she got a free view of seeing Harry's cooking skills for once.
She remembered him telling her of how he usually cooks for the Dursleys, but she had never tasted his dishes before, which made her even more excited for this dinner.
Harry glanced up from where he was chopping meat, "Casserole," he smiled.
"Oh, I miss that word! Casserole!" said Lucia with energy, as she smiled beamingly.
"Zhat is good! You are about to love zis!" Fleur declared before leaning to Lucia and whispering to her ear, "especially with 'arry cooking yours," she smirked.
Lucia looked at Fleur, blushing madly at the veela's words. She almost forgotten how much of a tease Fleur was.
Harry looked at them, tilting his head in confusion, but Fleur merely cover the whole situation with a gleeful giggle.
"Anyway," she went on, pointing her wand at a pot of sauce on the stove, which began to bubble at once, "Mr. Ollivander leaves for Muriel's zis evening. Zat will make zings easier. Ze goblin," she scowled a little at the mention of him, "can move downstairs, and you, Ron, and Dean can take zat room."
Lucia winced, that would not be a such a good idea...
"We don't mind sleeping in the living room," said Harry, who knew that Griphook would think poorly of having to sleep on the sofa; keeping Griphook happy was essential to their plans. "Don't worry about us." And when she tried to protest he went on, "We'll be off your hands soon too, Ron, Hermione, and I. We won't need to be here much longer."
"But what do you mean?" she said, frowning at him, her wand pointing at the casserole dish now suspended in midair. "Of course you must not leave, you are safe 'ere!"
"Fleur, we can't just —" Her words were cut off as Harry nudged her ribs 'lightly'.
Lucia glared at Harry, but soon realised why he had done that. At the corner of her eyes, for a flicker of a second there, she thought she had seen Mrs. Weasley in the French beauty. It almost made her heart leapt.
Not in the good way that she always knew of...
Fleur raised a brow at her, as though challenging her to continued. Lucia was glad that the back door opened at that moment; Luna and Dean entered, their hair damp from the rain outside and their arms full of driftwood.
"...and tiny little ears," Luna was saying, "a bit like a hippo's, Daddy says, only purple and hairy. And if you want to call them, you have to hum; they prefer a waltz, nothing too fast..."
Looking uncomfortable, Dean shrugged at Lucia and Harry as he passed, following Luna into the combined dining and sitting room where Ron and Hermione were laying the dinner table. Seizing the chance to escape Fleur's questions, He grabbed two jugs of pumpkin juice and followed them, dragging Lucia with him before either could endure the onslaught of Fleur.
"...and if you ever come to our house I'll be able to show you the horn, Daddy wrote to me about it but I haven't seen it yet, because the Death Eaters took me from the Hogwarts Express and I never got home for Christmas," Luna was saying, as she and Dean re-laid the fire.
"Luna, we told you," Hermione called over to her. "That horn exploded. It came from an Erumpent, not a Crumple-Horned Snorkack —"
"No, it was definitely a Snorkack horn," said Luna serenely. "Daddy told me. It will probably have re-formed by now, they mend themselves, you know."
Hermione shook her head and continued laying down forks as Bill appeared, leading Mr. Ollivander down the stairs. The wandmaker still looked exceptionally frail, and he clung to Bill's arm as the latter supported him, carrying a large suitcase.
"I'm going to miss you, Mr. Ollivander," said Luna, approaching the old man.
"And I you, my dear," said Ollivander, patting her on the shoulder. "You were an inexpressible comfort to me in that terrible place."
"So, au revoir, Mr. Ollivander," said Fleur, kissing him on both cheeks. "And I wonder whezzer you could oblige me by delivering a package to Bill's Auntie Muriel? I never returned 'er tiara."
"It will be an honour," said Ollivander with a little bow, "the very least I can do in return for your generous hospitality."
Fleur drew out a worn velvet case, which she opened to show the wandmaker. The tiara sat glittering and twinkling in the light from the low-hanging lamp.
"Moonstones and diamonds," said Griphook, who had sidled into the room unnoticed. "Made by goblins, I think?"
"And paid for by wizards," said Bill quietly, and the goblin shot him a look that was both furtive and challenging.
"Er, anyways," Lucia broke the awkward silence between them. "Send the others our love and tell Fred and Erin congratulations from all of us, Bill."
Bill smiled. "Will do,"
"Oh, I've forgotten," Luna disappeared momentarily before emerging from the stairs with a jar filled with seashells. She handed them to Bill, "Make sure to give this to Ginny. She'll know what it means."
"She... will?" Bill looked sceptically down at the jar. He didn't anyone would understand whatever it meant.
"Oh yes," said Luna airily. "She will know,"
Bill blinked in confusion, nonetheless he nodded. "Alrighty then... Um, Mr. Ollivander?"
A strong wind gusted against the cottage windows as Bill and Ollivander set off into the night. The rest of them squeezed in around the table; elbow to elbow and with barely enough room to move, they started to eat. The fire crackled and popped in the grate beside them. Fleur, Lucia noticed, was merely playing with her food; she glanced at the window every few minutes; however, Bill returned before they had finished their first course, his long hair tangled by the wind.
"Everything's fine," he told Fleur. "Ollivander settled in, Mum and Dad say hello. Ginny sends you all her love. Erin hopes to see you again, joking that sisters-in-law needs to stick together. Fred and George are driving Muriel up the wall, they're still operating an Owl-Order business out of her back room. It cheered her up to have her tiara back, though. She said she thought we'd stolen it."
"Ah, she eez charmante, your aunt," said Fleur crossly, waving her wand and causing the dirty plates to rise and form a stack in mid-air. She caught them and marched out of the room.
"Daddy's made a tiara," piped up Luna. "Well, more of a crown, really."
Lucia perked at the mention of the crown. A model of Rowena Ravenclaw's diadem, she remembered.
"Yes, he's trying to re-create the lost diadem of Ravenclaw. He thinks he's identified most of the main elements now. Adding the billywig wings really made a difference -"
There was a bang on the front door. Everyone's head turned toward it. Fleur came running out of the kitchen, looking frightened; Bill jumped to his feet, his wand pointing at the door; Harry, Ron, and Hermione did the same. Lucia stood quickly in front of Dean and Luna, drawing her wand out as well. Silently Griphook slipped beneath the table, out of sight.
"Who is it?" Bill called.
"It is I, Remus John Lupin!" called a voice over the howling wind. "I am a werewolf, married to Nymphadora Tonks, and you, the Secret-Keeper of Shell Cottage, told me the address and bade me come in an emergency!"
"Lupin," muttered Bill, and he ran to the door and wrenched it open.
Lupin fell over the threshold. He was white-faced, wrapped in a traveling cloak, his graying hair windswept. He straightened up, looked around the room, making sure of who was there, then cried aloud, "It's a boy! We've named him Ted, after Dora's father!"
Lucia felt the beat of her heart paced rapidly, a bright smile crept its way to her lips as Hermione shrieked.
"Wha — ? Tonks... Tonks has had the baby?"
"Yes, yes, she's had the baby!" shouted Lupin. All around the table came cries of delight, sighs of relief: Hermione and Fleur both squealed, "Congratulations!", Ron said, "Blimey, a baby!" as if he had never heard of such a thing before, and Lucia could not help but hopped and clapped profusely with excitement, saying, "A baby! A baby!" over and over again.
"Yes — yes — a boy," said Lupin again, who seemed dazed by his own happiness. He strode around the table and hugged Harry.
"You'll be godfather?" he said as he released Harry.
"M-me?" stammered Harry.
"You, yes, of course — Dora quite agrees, no one better —"
"I — yeah — blimey —"
Harry felt overwhelmed, astonished, delighted; now Bill was hurrying to fetch wine, and Fleur was persuading Lupin to join them for a drink.
"I can't stay long, I must get back," said Lupin, beaming around at them all: He looked years younger than Lucia had ever seen him. "Thank you, thank you, Bill."
Bill had soon filled all of their goblets, they stood and raised them high in a toast.
"To Teddy Remus Lupin," said Lupin, "a great wizard in the making!"
"'Oo does 'e look like?" Fleur inquired.
"Did he get Tonks's Metamorphmagus?" Lucia asked. "Oooh, I can already imagine how adorable he is!"
"I think he looks like Dora, but she thinks he is like me. Not much hair. It looked black when he was born, but I swear it's turned ginger in the hour since. Probably be blond by the time I get back. Andromeda says Tonks's hair started changing colour the day that she was born." He drained his goblet. "Oh, go on then, just one more," he added, beaming, as Bill made to fill it again.
The wind buffeted the little cottage and the fire leapt and crackled, and Bill was soon opening another bottle of wine. Lupin's news seemed to have taken them out of themselves, removed them for a while from their state of siege: Tidings of new life were exhilarating. Only the goblin seemed untouched by the suddenly festive atmosphere, and after a while he slunk back to the bedroom he now occupied alone. Harry thought he was the only one who had noticed this, until he saw Bill's eyes following the goblin up the stairs.
"No... no... I really must get back," said Lupin at last, declining yet another goblet of wine. He got to his feet and pulled his traveling cloak back around himself.
"Goodbye, goodbye — I'll try and bring some pictures in a few days' time — they'll all be so glad to know that I've seen you —"
He fastened his cloak and made his farewells, hugging the women and grasping hands with the men, then, still beaming, returned into the wild night.
"Oh... I can't wait! to see the kid..." slurred a very drunk Lucia, who was laying down on the couch while her friends laughed at her.
This was the very first time they had seen her like, well, drunk. Perhaps this was even her first time getting drunk in general; Lucia had never been one to accept alcohol, purely out of her distaste for them, but it seems that she had taken a little too many drinks of them without even knowing the context of it.
"I told you we should've never let her drank them!" Hermione chided Ron, as he tried to pull Lucia to sit back up only for her to fall back on the couch.
This was proving to be a problem for the sober lot.
"It was just her first dri — why in the bloody hell are you crying for?" Ron gaped when Hermione had turned him around to look at the now sobbing Lucia as she cried nonstop on Dean's lap. The Thomas helplessly looked at his friends helplessly as he combed through the drunk DiFiore's hair in attempt to calm her down.
"Because... because I can already s-see how adorable little Teddy would be!" she wailed loudly, causing them to gaze at her sheepishly.
"Nice going, Ron!" Dean sneered at him. "Now you've done it!"
"I didn't —"
"Oh, Harry's not going to like this," said Luna serenely, sipping the tea that was laid out.
"No one better blame me," Ron pointed fingers at all of them challengingly. "I wasn't the one that gave her the goblet — Bill did!"
"A-And then Harry's the Godfather?" Lucia recoil for a moment before bursting into tears once again, hugging Dean like a koala, sobbing in his shoulders instead. "Dean, He's going to be t-the best Godfather ever!"
"Yes, yes, we know," sighed Dean. "You've been crying about that for the pass few minutes,"
Lucia suddenly stopped crying at this.
She snapped her head to face Ron and Hermione, who recoiled together by her action. They eyed hergingerly, but soon they caught the tears that were welling in her eyes once more. They grimaced.
"You three have the best friendship anyone could ask for and it's not fair!" she sobbed into her hands.
"Uh... What's going on here?" Harry entered the living room area, confused as to why they, excluding a dreamy Luna and a... sobbing? Lucia, were collectively looking horrified. He was more concern as to why Lucia was crying in the first place.
"Harry!" Hermione let out a sigh of relief. "Thank goodness you're here!"
"What happened?" Harry asked, crouching down in front of Lucia as she lolled her head back and forth, muttering in a watery manner something about... babies?
"She drank. For the first time and it wasn't my fault," started Ron quickly.
"She's lightweight," chirped Luna dreamily. "Because she never drank alcohol before, not even a butterbeer,"
"And the she went all " Teddy's s cute" and stuff..." grimaced Dean, who was now standing. "Turns out she a crier. Very emotional." He added awkwardly.
"Why did the moon have to live so far away from us!" Lucia cried, sipping another goblet of wine she had found.
Harry swiftly snatched the goblet before she could take another sip, earning a pathetic "Hey!" from her before she wrapped her arms around his waist. He felt a tap on his back, making him look down directly at her glassy night eyes as they looked back up at him melancholically. It made his heart shatter before he had to remind himself that she was drunk, she may not even remember anything by the time she were to wake up the next morning...
Still, that didn't meant he felt all that better.
"Harry," she whispered, an unreadable expression crossed her face for a flicker of a second there. "Do you feel happy?"
His eyes softened at her. "I —"
"Per'aps izz is bezzer if you bring 'er up," Fleur said. "I 'ad no idea she was lighzzweizz,"
"Look at her," pointed Ron. "Already asleep. Wished that happened while we had to deal with the chaos... Ow!"
"Go on, Harry," said Hermione, as though she hadn't just slapped Ron's arm. "Bring her up,"
Harry looked at them suspiciously. Something was definitely not adding up, it was as though they wanted him to be alone with Lucia. As he narrowed his eyes at them, ignoring Ron's constant grumbles to Hermione, Harry slowly lifted up the half asleep Lucia into his arms and carried her up the stairs to the room she shared with Hermione and Luna.
Carefully he set her down on the bed and sighed, brushing her bangs out of the way. "You're going to be the death of me, do you know that?"
She merely groaned.
"You're not going to like waking up tomorrow, but you have to," mused Harry, admiring her sleepy figure. Perhaps it was weird that he was watching his ex-girlfriend sleeping, but then again she had watched him asleep way too many times that he ever did. "Next time you should be careful what you're drinking, love. Or else this happens. We should be lucky that it wasn't Butterbeer..."
Her face screwed as if she could prominently taste the drink and the after-effect from her land of slumber.
Harry breathed in a chuckle as he shook his head. "Honestly... Good night," He squeezed her hand momentarily, and was about to leave when something tugged him back.
Lucia was wide — well, as wide awake as she could be, but there was no detection that she was about to cry. Instead, she smiled intoxicatedly. "Harry,"
"What is it? Do you want anything? Should I get you some water?" Harry asked at once, coming back to her side.
She shook her head. "Congratulation,"
"What?"
"Y-You're a Godfather, Harry," said Lucia thick and hoarse, indicating the tiredness in her voice. "You're going to be the greatest Godfather to ever live. Teddy's going to love you."
"I hope so..." said Harry in a faint manner after a short pause. "Well, I hope I get the chance to meet him one day anyway," he added quietly.
"You will," She took a hold of his hand, smiling up at him, genuine. She brought his hand up to her cheeks and leaned into his touch, "You will." Lucia told, not faltering her gaze from him. Harry managed to acknowledge glimmer in her eyes that made the moment infatuating. "We all will. I promise you that,"
Harry swallowed. He wasn't all too sure about that. With how their hunt was going, it could take years until he would be able to meet his Godson. Merlin, It was weird saying those words with his own tongue. My godson. He was a Godfather. A Godfather that could not even see Godson just yet without attracting danger. And even then, he was not even sure if he would be able to. He wasn't sure what his future has instore for him... What if it consisted of merely death?
He couldn't imagine not even getting the chance to become a Godfather. And with their current plan, it seem as though he was inevitably setting his own path to become just as reckless a godfather to Teddy Lupin as Sirius Black had been to him.
Not wanting to think more about it, Harry masked his sadness with a soft smile. "Go to sleep, you need it." He said delicately.
"Hmhmm," Lucia let out a yawn. "Night, night, Harry."
As Harry went to the door, he snuck a short gaze to Lucia, who had already blacked out. He chuckled softly in amusement and wrapped his hand around the doorknob before freezing on the spot.
"...Teddy... I want a Teddy one day..." He heard her say.
Her own Teddy? Did she meant her own child?
Of course she did. He remembered vividly; her dream of having a family of her own. If he were to not live through this and she would, would she find another love?
Now that he thought of it again, he didn't think he could bear it.
Would that person marry her and be the father of her children?
He really did not like the thought of it,, and it made him infuriated as he gripped the doorknob tightly. Harry's jaw tensed
He couldn't let that happen — not while he was still alive. He promised her to stay alive, and with that promise he would keep no matter what. For everyone... For Ron and Hermione... For Teddy...
For her.