Aftermaths, Part 16

by Geri ([email protected])

Rating: Mostly PG-13, but NC-17 for overall story

Pairing: Snape/Lupin, Theodore/Blaise

Warning: AU; events that occurred at the end of Order of the Phoenix were significantly altered from the book.

Sequel to: Always, Summer Vacation, For Old Time's Sake, Three's a Crowd, Return of the Raven, Phoenix Reborn, and Phoenix Rising.

Summary: The various characters deal with the aftermath of the war, and Snape and Lupin try to build a family together with Theodore and Dylan. However, some people are unable to let go of the past...

Author's note: {} Indicates character's unspoken thoughts.

Disclaimer: Characters belong to J.K. Rowling, except Hob, who belongs to William Mayne; no money is being made off this story; consider it a little wish fulfillment on my part.
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Harry went downstairs for breakfast and found Sirius in the kitchen, cooking pancakes on the stove. Professor Blackmore was standing next to him, apparently having just entered the kitchen herself. "That smells wonderful, Sirius," she said. "Do you need any help?"

"Nay, my lady," Sirius said in an exaggerated courtly manner. "Sit back and let your knight in shining armor prepare your breakfast feast." Blackmore giggled and kissed him on the cheek, not looking at all demonic. Sirius bent down to return the kiss, and they smiled and gazed fondly into each other's eyes, looking as infatuated as any of the couples who frequented Madam Puddifoot's.

Harry shook his head; it was very bizarre to see his godfather and his Professor mooning over each other like a couple of teenagers. He noticed that a disgruntled-looking Bane was sitting on the kitchen table instead of his usual perch on Blackmore's shoulder. "What's the matter, Bane?" Harry whispered with a grin. "Is it too mushy in here for you?" Maybe the raven was just being his normal cranky self, but he suspected that Bane was jealous. The bird was protective of his mistress, and he obviously didn't enjoy watching her lavish affection on someone else. He didn't seem to like Sirius, although they had reached a sort of uneasy truce, but then again, Bane didn't seem to like anyone other than Blackmore and possibly Snape.

Bane gave the couple a disgusted look and cawed loudly, causing Sirius and Blackmore to look up. "Good morning, Harry," Sirius said cheerfully. "Have a seat; breakfast is almost ready." He tried to flip a pancake over in the pan, tossing it up dramatically high in the air, and it hit the ceiling batter-side up and stuck there instead of falling back into the pan. Blackmore burst out laughing and Sirius grinned sheepishly. "Oops."

"That's what you get for trying to show off, Siri," Blackmore teased him.

"Guys are always humiliating themselves trying to impress the girls, right, Harry?" Sirius said, winking at his godson.

Harry blushed, but Blackmore came to his rescue, saying, "Although he does get into mischief at times, I've never seen Mr. Potter showing off for the girls at school."

"Yes, well, Harry does have more sense than I did at his age," Sirius admitted. "I could tell you some stories about the trouble your father and I got into..." He sighed, a nostalgic gleam in his eyes.

"Oh?" Blackmore said, raising an eyebrow. "Like the time Professor McGonagall and I caught you and Mr. Potter skinny-dipping with some girls in the lake?"

"Really?" Harry exclaimed. "Skinny-dipping? Weren't you afraid of the giant squid?"

"Okay, Branwen, that's enough!" Sirius said, his face turning red.

"Are you sure you wouldn't like me to recount some more of your adventures for Mr. Potter?" Blackmore asked sweetly.

"Food's ready; let's eat!" Sirius said, hastily changing the subject. He placed a platter of steaming pancakes on the table, and Harry helped himself to some, liberally loading them with syrup and butter. Bane's bad mood seemed to disappear as Sirius gave him a plate of pancakes positively drenched in syrup; much as he liked sweets, it made Harry's teeth hurt just to look at it. As Bane began gobbling down his breakfast, Sirius grinned and said to Blackmore, "I've got to keep that demonic bird of yours fat and happy; I've still got a scar from when he pecked me the last time!"

Blackmore frowned a little at her familiar, who was getting sticky maple syrup all over his feathers. "Remind me to cast a cleaning spell on him after breakfast."

"Say, Bran, I was thinking..." Sirius said between bites of pancake.

"I told you not to call me 'Bran,' Sirius," Blackmore said irritably. "'Bran' is something you call a muffin or a bowl of cereal."

"If you can call me 'Siri,' then I can call you 'Bran,'" Sirius retorted.

"Oh really?" Blackmore said, regarding him with the icy stare she reserved for insolent students. "How would you like your name to be permanently changed to 'Snuffles'?"

"Are you threatening to lock me into my dog form?" Sirius demanded.

"Ah, good, so you are able to pick up on hints despite your Gryffindor thickheadedness..."

"I think you're bluffing."

Blackmore gave him a smile that was positively evil, and Sirius went a little pale. "Try me," she purred.

Harry nervously looked back and forth from his teacher to his godfather. Were these two really planning on getting married next month? He was afraid that Sirius wasn't going to survive--in human form, anyway--long enough to make it to the wedding. And aside from his concern for his godfather, if Sirius was permanently turned into a dog or toad, then who would Harry live with? He couldn't go back to the Dursleys; Lupin would probably be willing to take him in, but Harry didn't really fancy having Snape as a stepfather, not to mention two Slytherin stepbrothers...

Sirius saw Harry's face and laughed. "You're scaring, Harry, Bran..." He deliberately paused for a long moment before adding, "...wen."

"And whose fault is that?" Blackmore asked, but she smiled at Harry. "Don't worry, Harry, we were only joking. I wouldn't really permanently transfigure Sirius into a dog...tempting though it is at times."

"It's just lover's banter," Sirius said, winking at Harry, who just gave him a bewildered look. Sirius laughed and said with a sly smile, "Sometimes a little argument adds spice to a relationship; you'll understand when you're a little older."

Harry flushed, feeling embarrassed and just a touch resentful at that last remark; he was nearly seventeen, after all! But it was true that he had no clue what women wanted, because he'd completely botched his short-lived romance with Cho. He didn't understand how an argument could "add spice" to a relationship; he would have thought that two people in love would try to avoid fighting with each other. His argument with Cho over Marietta certainly had not done their relationship any good, but rather had led to their splitting up.

"Sometimes," Blackmore explained gently, "when two people have strong feelings for each other, those feelings can manifest themselves in unexpected ways. Passion can turn into anger, and vice versa." She smiled mischievously. "Remus and Severus, for example."

Harry blushed deeply. "Oh," was his only response. It was true that Snape and Lupin fought a lot (if you could call it that, since the fighting was rather one-sided, on Snape's part), but he really didn't want to think in detail about how those arguments might turn into "passion".

Sirius and Blackmore exchanged an amused, knowing smile, one that made Harry feel as if he were about five years old. Much to his relief, Sirius changed the subject, saying, "Anyway, as I was about to say before I was so rudely interrupted, your birthday's coming up soon, Harry. I thought maybe you'd like to have a party, invite a few friends over..."

Harry had thought that perhaps Sirius might have forgotten about his birthday, since he was so busy with the wedding plans. He hadn't intended to make a fuss about it; living with his godfather instead of the Dursleys was already the best present he could have gotten, but he felt relieved and happy to know that Sirius hadn't forgotten. "Are you sure it's not too much trouble?" he asked. "I know you're busy getting ready for the wedding and all..." But despite his words, Harry felt excited about the prospect of a birthday party--he had never had one before, after all.

"Are you kidding?" Sirius said. "We can't let your first birthday with us pass unnoticed! And Hob loves having kids in the house; he'll be thrilled! Besides..." He grinned at Blackmore. "We could use a little break from those wedding plans."

"The wedding plans are more or less under control," Blackmore assured Harry. "Molly finally agreed to settle on green for the color scheme of the decorations--a compromise between her first choice of pink and my suggestion of black and red, which are the colors of the Blackmore family crest." She smiled, feigning innocent bewilderment. "For some reason she seemed to find them rather morbid. And I asked her to bake our wedding cake; hopefully all those preparations should keep her busy and out of our hair until the wedding."

Sirius laughed, and Harry felt relieved. After Mrs. Weasley's and Professor Blackmore's first heated argument over the wedding plans, Harry had made himself scarce whenever Mrs. Weasley came around, hiding upstairs with Buckbeak, and once, under the stairs with Hob. He'd felt a bit cowardly and guilty about it, but after the incident with Bane last year, there was no way that he was putting himself between an irate Blackmore and the object of her wrath. Poor Sirius hadn't had the luxury of hiding since he was the prospective groom and both his fiancee and Mrs. Weasley had expected him to take an interest in these matters, so Sirius was probably even more relieved than Harry!

"Well then, if you're sure it's no trouble..." Harry said, unable to keep the eagerness out of his voice.

"No trouble at all, Harry," Sirius said in a hearty voice, and Blackmore smiled at him in an almost motherly fashion.

"I'd like to invite Hermione and Ron, of course," Harry said. "And Ginny and the twins, if that's okay. Um...do you think Professor Lupin would like to come?" They'd barely seen Lupin this summer, except for the few days they had spent cleaning Blackmore Manor together. Maybe he was too busy with Snape and their two new foster sons to bother with a childish birthday party...

"Of course!" Sirius replied. "Moony would be hurt if you didn't invite him. Same goes for Tonks."

"Okay," Harry said, cheering up. Lupin and Tonks were his two favorite Order members, apart from Sirius.

"If you're inviting Remus, you ought to invite Severus and the boys, too," Blackmore said.

"Do I have to?" Harry wailed in dismay.

Blackmore gave him a stern look. "I thought you had realized that the Slytherins are not your enemies, Harry."

"Yes, well, but..." Harry stammered, unable to work up a coherent argument. It was one thing to realize that not all Slytherins were evil, but quite another to invite them to your birthday party! Yes, Snape was a hero; he had risked his life spying on the Death Eaters and had protected Harry these past six years, but he had been no less strict and acerbic in class after the final battle. Harry respected the man and was grateful to him, but he wasn't really sure that he liked him. And he wasn't quite sure how he felt about Lupin's newly-open relationship with Snape, either. A part of him felt a little hurt that Lupin seemed to have aligned himself with the Slytherins, not just in his choice of Snape as a lover, but by moving into the dungeon and adopting two Slytherin boys; he was also a little hurt that Lupin had visited so seldom this summer. The more logical part of him--the part that sounded an awful lot like Hermione--knew that he was being childish, and that he should not begrudge Lupin whatever happiness he'd managed to find after years of hardship. And if Lupin was too busy to visit, there was probably good reason for that: not only did he have a new family to look after, Harry had learned from listening in on Sirius's and Blackmore's conversations that Snape and Lupin had been involved in a legal battle with the Ministry over the Nott and Rosier estates. Or maybe, Harry thought with a small smile, Lupin had been staying away in order to avoid being caught up in Mrs. Weasley's and Blackmore's battles over the wedding plans; he couldn't really blame his teacher for that!

"Aw, come on, Branwen!" Sirius argued on his godson's behalf. "It's Harry's party; it's supposed to be fun! Let him invite who he wants."

"It would be rude to invite Remus without inviting the others," Blackmore insisted.

"Snape won't come even if we do invite him," Sirius pointed out.

"Maybe so, but it would still be polite and proper to issue an invitation, regardless."

"Since when were you so concerned about being proper?" Sirius grumbled.

"Never mind," Harry said quickly, trying to head off another argument, not sure if this was a real fight or another example of adding "spice" to a relationship. Better to be safe than sorry. "I'll invite Snape and Nott and Rosier, too." Sirius was probably right; there was no way that the Slytherins would actually accept the invitation, so it was better to meekly agree with Blackmore rather than make her angry--that way, everyone was happy with no real cost to himself. He smiled, feeling very satisfied and just a bit smug.

Sirius blinked, looking surprised at how quickly Harry had given in. "Are you sure that's okay with you, Harry?" he asked dubiously. "This is your party, you don't have to--"

"It's fine, Sirius, really," Harry said reassuringly.

"Well...okay, then," Sirius said reluctantly. "So let's see...Hermione, Ron, Ginny, Fred, George, Tonks, Moony, Snape, Theodore, and Dylan--that makes ten. Wait, if Tonks is coming, then maybe she might want to bring Kingsley. Eleven. Plus us, so we should plan on having enough food and favors for fourteen people..."

"Fifteen," Blackmore corrected. "I think you ought to invite Draco, too."

"Do I HAVE to?" Harry wailed again, forgetting his newly-found equanimity.

"He's lost his father and most of his friends," Blackmore reminded him in a quiet voice. "He's lonely. I know that you and he aren't the best of friends, but you've managed to get along over the summer without killing each other, and I think it would be nice of you to invite him. Besides, he's family; he's Sirius's cousin." She paused for a moment, then added, "Narcissa's lonely too, I think."

Sirius and Harry stared at each other, then both sighed heavily, knowing without needing to speak that they couldn't fight Blackmore on this one. "Sixteen, then," Sirius said in a resigned tone.

{Well, maybe Draco won't want to come,} Harry thought hopefully.

After they finished eating, Sirius said, "Why don't we go to Hogsmeade today? We can do a little shopping, buy some party favors and invitations...and I know you'd probably like to stop by Honeydukes and Zonko's."

"Great!" Harry said enthusiastically. "Let me go get my wallet!" He actually got an allowance now from Sirius in exchange for doing a few chores around the house, although Hob still did most of the cleaning. It wasn't really necessary, because he could draw on the Potter account at Gringotts, but Harry liked it, because it made him feel like a normal kid with a normal family--although perhaps "normal" wasn't exactly the word most people would use to describe his new family. But still, they were more family to him than the Dursleys had ever been, for all that they weren't related to him by blood. And Harry treasured the small freedoms that his friends probably took for granted but were new to him: no longer being begrudged food and shelter, having an allowance, being able to leave the house to visit friends or go shopping, and now a birthday party. He ran out of the kitchen and up the stairs to his bedroom, forgetting that he'd been put out about having to invite the Slytherins.

Sirius and Branwen smiled at each other, ignoring the loud, clomping sound of Harry's footsteps as he took the stairs two at a time, waking Mrs. Black's portrait, who began yelling, "Begone from the house of my fathers!"

"That was a good idea you had about the birthday party, dear," Branwen told him, raising her voice a little to be heard over Mrs. Black. "He seems very happy about it."

"Well, he probably never had one before, poor kid," Sirius replied. "We'll have to make sure it's a great party, to make up for all the ones he missed." Then he grinned and said, "Maybe I need to sit down and have a man-to-man talk with him, though. It's clear that he's never had a passionate kiss-and-make-up session after a good fight!"

Branwen laughed. "That will come with experience, love. He's only had one girlfriend, after all, and he hasn't had much time for romance this past year. Besides, not everyone has stormy love affairs--believe it or not, there are some couples who have tranquil, harmonious relationships."

"Sounds kind of boring to me," Sirius said skeptically.

"To each his own," Branwen said. "You can give Harry some fatherly advice if you wish, but let him choose his own path and take things at his own pace."

"Yes, Bran."

"Didn't I just tell you not to call me that...?"

Harry ran back into the kitchen a few minutes later. "Okay, I'm ready to--" He saw his godfather and Professor locked in a passionate embrace and kiss. He abruptly did an about face and ran out of the room, and Branwen and Sirius burst out laughing.
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A white owl scratched at the window of the cottage, and Lupin got up to let it in. "Hello, Hedwig," he said. She was holding a thick packet of letters in her claws; she pulled one out with her beak and dropped it into Lupin's hand. She paused to accept a brief scratch on the head from him, but didn't linger, apparently eager to be on her way and deliver the other letters. Lupin opened the envelope, pulled out the card inside, and read it. "We're all invited to a birthday party!" he announced cheerfully.

"Whose party?" Snape asked suspiciously; he was almost certain that owl belonged to Potter...

"Harry's, of course," Lupin replied, confirming his suspicions. "His birthday is July 31st, remember?"

"What?!" Dylan exclaimed in surprise. He knew that Lupin had been a friend of Potter's father, but he couldn't imagine why Potter would invite the rest of them to his party.

"You must be mistaken, Lupin," Snape said, scowling at his lover. "Potter obviously wouldn't want me attending his birthday party. I'm sure the invitation is only intended for you."

"Read it yourself," Lupin said, handing the card to him.

Sure enough, the names "Remus Lupin, Severus Snape, Theodore Nott, and Dylan Rosier" were written on the card in a neat, feminine script. "This is Branwen's handwriting," Snape said, continuing to scowl. "She must have forced him to invite all of us."

"We don't have to go, do we?" a dismayed Theodore asked.

Lupin smiled slyly, his eyes sliding over to Dylan. "But I'm sure Hermione will be there, so perhaps Dylan would like to go."

"Why would Dylan want to--?" Theodore started to ask, then stared at his foster brother in shock as he blushed. A look of disbelief filled Theodore's face. "No way! You--and Granger?! You could have any girl in the school!"

"We're not going out together or anything," Dylan said, still blushing. "You know, because it would have caused problems with Malfoy, not to mention the Death Eaters. But we're friends, sort of. I mean, we used to meet secretly to study together until it got too dangerous after I was Marked."

"But...but...but..." Theodore stammered. "She's a Gryffindor! And a bookworm! And a Mud--"

"Don't go there, Theo," Dylan warned, an edge to his voice. His blush was gone and he looked up to meet his friend's eyes with a cold, silver-gray stare.

Lupin placed a hand on Theodore's shoulder. "The Gryffindors are no longer your enemies, remember?" he asked kindly.

Theodore flushed. "I know, but still..."

Lupin smiled. "Is it really any more shocking than finding out that Severus and I were a couple?"

Theodore still remembered the day Lupin had planted a kiss on Snape at the head table in front of the entire school. "No," he admitted. "I don't think anything could be more shocking than that." Snape made a snorting sound that might have been a laugh. "But still," Theodore said, turning back to Dylan, "why GRANGER?" He sounded completely bewildered.

Dylan had calmed down, and the cold look was gone from his eyes. "Because she's smart and she's brave and she does what she wants without worrying what people think of her. She didn't care when everyone made fun of her when she started S.P.E.W. She fought against the Death Eaters--twice. You've got to admit, that takes guts."

"I suppose," Theodore muttered grudgingly. {Or an appalling lack of common sense,} he added silently. {Which is typical of a Gryffindor, after all.} Facing the Death Eaters once had been more than enough for him. But he supposed he would do it again if he had to, in order to protect Blaise or Dylan or Damien. "And I suppose that she's the only girl in the school who's as smart as you are," he added, with a hint of dry humor. "But still, if you were going to pick a Gryffindor girl, I would have thought you'd go after someone like Lavender or Parvati. Merlin knows that Damien's always drooling over them."

Dylan smiled. "They're pretty, but Hermione's pretty, too, in her own way. Remember the Yule Ball?"

Theodore shrugged; having no interest in girls, he didn't pay much attention to their appearances, but he vaguely remembered that during the first Ball, Granger had undergone what the Slytherin girls had deemed a miraculous transformation. "Yeah, I guess."

"And she doesn't simper at me the way the other girls do," Dylan continued.

"Figures," Theodore said with a wry smile. "With practically every girl in the school throwing themselves at your feet, you have to go after the one that plays hard to get."

Dylan laughed, relieved that Theodore had apparently decided to give in gracefully. "She doesn't play 'hard to get'; she doesn't play games, period. I find that rather refreshing."

When he put it that way, Theodore could understand it a little better. The lives of the Slytherin families were a complicated web of intrigue and power games; he could understand why Dylan might be drawn to someone who didn't play such games, who always said what she meant, without any hidden meanings. Blaise was pretty straightforward for a Slytherin, but as a Slytherin, he still knew that there were certain things that could not be safely said out loud and certain people that it was not safe to offend. Theodore glanced over to see how Snape was taking all of this, and to his shock, he saw that his Professor looked sour and resigned, but not surprised. "Professor? You knew about all this?"

"Yes," Snape said in a grumpy voice. "I expected better of Rosier, but there's no accounting for taste."

"Indeed," Lupin agreed, smiling at him fondly. "How else do you account for you and I?" He leaned over to kiss Snape on the cheek.

"Cut that out, Lupin," Snape huffed, and Lupin grinned. "Fine. You and Dylan can go to the party, but I'll stay home. I'm sure Potter would prefer that I wasn't there, anyway." Snape smiled sardonically. "That will be my present to him."

"Then I'll stay home with the Professor," Theodore added quickly. "I'm not in love with a Gryffindor girl, after all."

Lupin sighed heavily and gazed at him with sad blue eyes. "It's your decision, of course," he said, sounding disappointed. "But I was hoping the two of you would come along. I'm sure that Dylan will feel more comfortable with you there, and I was hoping we could put an end to this feud between Gryffindor and Slytherin. I'm sure it wasn't easy for Harry to reach out to you this way--"

"It probably wasn't too difficult with Blackmore giving him that demonic glare of hers," Snape muttered under his breath.

"--and it would be nice of you to meet his gesture halfway," Lupin continued, ignoring Snape.

"It's a birthday party, not a bloody peace treaty, Lupin!" Snape snapped.

"In a way, it is a peace offering, Severus," Lupin said solemnly. "When was the last time a Gryffindor invited a Slytherin to a birthday party? When was the last time a Gryffindor and a Slytherin attempted to be friends with each other?"

"Probably about twenty years ago," Snape mumbled, remembering how his tentative relationship with Lupin had been destroyed when Black sent him to the Shrieking Shack.

"Isn't it time to let go of all that hatred and animosity?" Lupin asked quietly. When Snape and Theodore remained silent, he continued, "I would really like it if you two would come to the party with us," his blue eyes wide and hopeful. As his two reluctant family members continued to hesitate, Lupin sighed again and said sadly, "But if you honestly feel that you're not up to it..."

"All right!" Theodore said, unable to stand the look in Lupin's eyes any longer. "I'll come!"

"Severus?" Lupin asked.

"Oh, all right," Snape growled.

Lupin smiled, the mournful look on his face instantly replaced by his usual look of good cheer. "Good! Then I'll go R.S.V.P. right now! Do you mind if I borrow Blodwen, Dylan?"

"Not at all, Remus."

Lupin ran off to his room to write a reply, and Theodore said helplessly, "How does he do that?!"

"Do what?" Dylan asked.

"Make you agree to do something that you would otherwise absolutely refuse to do!"

"He's a manipulative little bastard," Snape said sourly. "Sometimes I think he should have been a Slytherin after all. He looks at you with those big blue eyes and uses that tone of voice that says he's so disappointed in you and if you would only be reasonable and do this one little thing, it would make him so happy, but if you refuse to do it of course he'll understand and suffer miserably in silence. Very dramatic silence, mind you..."

"Guilt trip," Dylan said, more succinctly, if less colorfully.

"You mean he does it to you, too?" Theodore asked Snape.

"All the time," Snape sighed. "When the werewolf has his mind set on something, it's usually easier to just give in."

Dylan made a choking noise as he tried to repress his laughter at the way the dreaded Potions Master sounded like nothing more than a henpecked husband.

"Are you feeling all right, Mr. Rosier?" Snape asked in an icy voice as his foster son began coughing uncontrollably. "You seem to have developed a nasty cough; perhaps I should brew you a tonic."

"No thank you, sir," Dylan said, trying to get himself under control. "I just--ahem--seem to have breathed in a little dust or something. I'm fine now."

"Don't you have any chores to do, Mr. Rosier?" Snape continued in that icy voice. "Perhaps you should go gather firewood or work in the garden; I'm sure the fresh air will do that cough of yours good."

"Yes, sir," Dylan said meekly, and he and Theodore ran out of the cottage.

Snape watched them leave, then grumbled to no one in particular, "That stupid werewolf is ruining my reputation!"

Safely out of Snape's earshot, Theodore said accusingly, "I can't believe you've been carrying a torch for Granger all this time and never told us! And after I told you guys about me and Blaise!"

"Only after Damien and I walked in on the two of you," Dylan reminded him dryly, and Theodore flushed. "Besides, I didn't know how you'd react, and I couldn't take the chance that you'd tell Malfoy or..."

His voice trailed off, but Theodore could fill in the blanks on his own. "Or the Death Eaters," he finished quietly. "You knew that my father was a Death Eater and that I was one of Malfoy's cronies, and you didn't know how deeply I might be involved with them." Dylan gave him an apologetic look, and Theodore laughed bitterly. "The irony of it is, I didn't trust you, either, for the same reasons. I thought you wanted to be a Death Eater like your father, and when I saw you nearly grab your arm that night, I was sure the Dark Lord had put his Mark on you..."

"I'm sorry, Theo," Dylan said. "I began to suspect that you didn't really want to become a Death Eater when you said you wished your dad would stay in prison. And then I was sure of it, when I returned after being summoned the first time, and you pulled me aside and told me not to get Blaise and Damien involved. I wanted to tell you the truth, but Snape said it would be too dangerous, for you as well as me."

"I understand," Theodore said. "It's funny, all this time we were on the same side, but we didn't trust each other." Then he sighed and said, sounding as if he were trying to resign himself to the fact, "You and Granger. Malfoy is going to flip when he hears about this."

Dylan laughed. "Well, it doesn't really matter anymore what Draco thinks, does it? He'll just have to live with it. It's none of his business, anyway."

"I still don't see why I have to hang out with Potter and his buddies just so you can make time with one of his friends," Theodore complained.

"You're not doing it for my sake," Dylan reminded him. "I don't really care if you come or not. You're doing it to make Lupin happy."

"Yeah, yeah, I know," Theodore muttered, then added petulantly, "I suppose Lupin's going to make us buy him a present, too..."

Right on cue, Lupin emerged from the cottage and called out cheerfully, "Dylan? Theo? I thought we'd go to Diagon Alley today; we need to go shopping for birthday presents."

Theodore groaned out loud as Dylan burst into laughter.

Part 17