Time
You can find more of this on by SubscribeStar (dot adult slash KajaWilder), it’s posted past FwB2 Ch. 30 there. You can find the same on my new Patreon (via Discord per their ToS), under /WildErotica. The DISCORD is at https://discord.gg/N9yDASt6Cw . If you prefer direct links, go to my Discord and follow the ‘links in general’ section to find the ones you want. All of my fics are well ahead of what I post here, often 10-30 chapters ahead.
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Chap. 29: Time
Emmaline 'Emma' Granger was wide awake at three in the morning the next day, her mind churning as it had for the last several hour with the news that her husband had previously shagged their daughter. Unknowingly, drunkenly, but still...
Her daughter. Their daughter! Yes, she could understand intellectually how such a thing might happen. They did look remarkably alike, even now. A drunken Dan, when he was seeing the wife he had married? Because as close as she and Hermione were in appearance now, their daughter looked even more like she, Emma, had at twenty-two.
Yet...
Her husband's sleeping face displayed a frown it didn't normally have while he was out cold. Their talk had been brief: She'd asked him if he knew, he had said that Hermione had told him just an hour or so before she'd told Emma. That he was still trying to process it, as she no doubt was. And that, before tempers flared, they should discuss it in the morning unless it was a truly pressing need.
Emma had felt it was, in fact, a very pressing need that they discuss it... but had understood the logic of Daniel's request. They were already both frayed, exhausted from working to help care for twenty-eight adults and more than a few young adults who'd been in Harry's house over the last week or so. Hermione's revelation about that last night in Nice had been...
A lot.
So she had simply nodded, "Alright, in the morning, then. After breakfast, so we've had a bit of conscious time to think about it and process, too. No distractions, though."
Daniel had nodded, leaned in for a kiss, one that she'd returned as much out of habit than anything else, but that she didn't regret.
Kissing her husband didn't disgust her.
Hermione mentioned Lilith's 'influence'. Her aura, which makes people more sexually free and uninhibited, months ago, Emma thought to herself as she looked down at Daniel's face through the dark room they had taken as their own, at least temporarily, in Harry's house. Is that why I... am not absolutely livid? Is that why Dan is shaken, but is sleeping like a baby right now? Did Harry's pet Succubus make us like this without even trying?
... Or are they lying to us again? Is Hermione lying to us, to hide a worse truth?
Emma Granger gently lifted the blankets from her legs, and slipped from the bed. A few moments later, a house-robe covered her along with the skin-tight shorts and sports bra she frequently wore to bed in the warm summer months, and pink, floppy bunny-eared slippers adorned her feet as she padded from the room.
Up the stairs to the top floor, and to Harry's bedroom door. She knocked softly, but no one answered. After several second, Emma turned the doorknob and found it opened easily, silently.
Harry was stop the covers, his gorgeous, sexy cock standing tall despite clearly being asleep, while Lilith herself was curled, cat-like, against one side of him, and the dusky-skinned Romilda stretched out on his other, both equally nude.
No Hermione, though. Emma let her gaze linger on each of them for a moment, admiring the casual beauty, the easy nakedness of the three randy teens, or two teens and one extra-planar creature, she corrected herself, at least in their bedrooms.
So she turned, closed the door once more as quietly as she could, and crept across the upper floor a little further. To the left, past Fleur's room, which was equal to Harry's in size though without the massive bathroom and the additional 'playroom' that just glancing into had made her blush weeks ago, to where the smaller room Lilith had claimed as her own private space (which she rarely, if ever, used from what Emma had seen), which was opposite Hermione's.
This time, she didn't knock. Hermione was a light sleeper these days, and the slight noise would wake her... but it would also keep her from getting back to sleep. Thus, Emma simply turned the unlocked knob, and squeezed through the door sideways.
Hermione was alone, for once. Sometimes, Emma knew, Pansy would stay in this room when either was feeling lonely but Harry was otherwise occupied. The friendship those two had struck up in the last year boggled Emma's mind, because she knew full well how much the Slytherin had bullied her daughter for the first five years of their schooling together.
Ginny Weasley, too, frequently roomed with Hermione when she was here, though there was just one large bed.
Emma smiled. Always did sleep better with someone I trusted nearby, and like mother like daughter, I suppose. You probably enjoy your time with your lady friends quite as much as Jo and I did, too. I can't blame you, they're all stunning in their own way.
Oh, my sweet, innocent girl, where have you gone? I love the woman you have become, the woman you are becoming, but I do miss my little girl, too.
... I'll never leave you. Even when I am dead and gone, dust, I will still be here with you, Hermione, Emma thought, hoping her daughter would somehow pick up on the mental energy even as she slept. She moved closer, slippered feet just moving like a breeze through leaves as she came to the side of the huge bed, and turned to sit upon it.
Hermione stirred slightly, rolled to face her on her side, but didn't wake.
Emma reached out with one gentle hand and moved a lock of thick, curly hair from where it no doubt tickled Hermione's nose.
I love you so much, dear one. You are my world. And I want everything for you. Every happiness, from the fleeting to the eternal. Damn my soul for it, but I would give you the world if I could.
Then she pressed her lips down to her daughter's forehead, and moved silently back to her and Dan's room.
There, her hand coaxed an erection from her still-sleeping husband, and her pussy as it sheathed his long-familiar dick woke him. No words were said as Emma rode Daniel for another twenty, thirty minutes. None needed to be said.
That tension was still there, of course. They would definitely need to have that talk.
Now, though, at least Emma knew what she was going to say.
So, with a mutual orgasm behind them, Emma turned on the bed to lick her husband clean as he did the same with her, then she curled in beside him, much like Lilith was upstairs with Harry, and let herself finally drift to sleep. Whatever happens, we've time to decide it.
"So you're decided, then?" an older man than either of Hermione's parents asked his daughter quietly.
"I am, father," the young woman, still sixteen though she would turn seventeen and be of her majority in the following year, nodded. Old enough, he knew, to make her own decisions, at least regarding this. I've done my best to teach and guide, and her mind is very set. I can't say I'm surprised... but at least he's an honorable sort.
Cyrus Greengrass sighed as he stood up from the ornate desk in his study, and circled around to to pull Daphne out of the chair she had occupied for the last half hour, and into a tight hug. "F- Father?"
"Permit me this," he whispered into her lovely blonde hair, inherited from his mother, and hers before that. "I am... rarely able to show you and Astoria how much you mean to me. I..."
Cyrus choked, physically unable to speak for several seconds past the large lump in his throat as his perfectly good, well-behaved daughter (for all her proclivities in the not-heir-producing-way) threw her arms around him, too.
"Name me one man who can happily give his daughter away to another, and I'll show you a monster in human skin," Cyrus eventually whispered, "but at least Harry is a good one. If this is what you want, I will support you forever. I will fight against all I once held dear to do so. Such is my love for you, daughter."
"Thank you, Father," Daphne whispered back, her own brilliant, sky-blue eyes dampening the front of his robes, "I never thought I would love a man besides you, but I... with Harry, I do. Not like Tracey, but it is still love all the same."
"You and Tracey are both lucky, then," he laughed quietly, "though I do believe that's the first time you've ever admitted to me that it is Tracey who is your true love."
"I didn't think I needed to," Daphne replied, a little more like her normal controlled volume, "I assumed both you and Mother knew."
"From the start," he laughed, "at least your mother did. I deluded myself for years hoping some man would strike your fancy... then almost the month I gave up on that fool's notion, it turns out one has. I would have done this simply for our family, for your desire for children, and to carry on the Greengrass name, you know. I would have, in a heartbeat. With your beau, it is even easier. And to hear you say that you love him, well..."
Cyrus sighed once more, and released her, though only to hold Daphne at arm's length as he smiled down at her. Not far, she was nearly as tall as he was, though Cyrus was on the shorter end himself. "I do love you, you know. You and Astoria are the best things I've ever done in my entire life. And now, letting you go... I feel that, as hard as it is, it will be one more thing to add to that list."
"You aren't really letting me go though, Daddy," Daphne replied quietly, and threw her arms around him again.
He could count the number of times his proper daughter had said 'Daddy' on two fingers. Now, three. Her first words had been, in order, Mother, Father, and Story. Not Astoria, of course, for she hadn't been born yet, but as a story being read to her.
Their reverie was not to last, however.
Both stood there before his desk, unwilling to admit the tears that soaked his robes, and her silky hair, for several minutes when the door cracked open without a knock. "Dearest? Daphne? I hate to interrupt, but Astoria's back with Sirius and Orla. They have some news."
"Give- give us a few moments, we'll be there presently," Cyrus agreed, knowing his wife, at least, would not ask why he was so out-of-sorts until they had a private moment.
She nodded knowingly all the same, and disappeared.
It took but a few moments for the two to school themselves, and use their wands to dry themselves, un-smear makeup, and otherwise make themselves entirely presentable once more.
As expected, Sirius Black, Orla Cunningham, and Astoria, his youngest and second child of only two, sat on one side of the guest drawing room, while his lovely wife, Ophelia, served them tea gracefully.
As if Astoria was a guest in her own house!
Yet she'd clearly chosen to sit there deliberately, and Cyrus could only wonder why.
At least, until the pleasantries were done, tea was in hands or laps for all six present, and Sirius pulled from his robes a small envelope. "From the medical team that's treating Astoria. I haven't yet read it, as the doctor assured me it was for Astoria's parents' eyes only. But he did tell me it was good news."
Cyrus nodded and leaned forward to accept the small parcel.
Inside were a half-dozen sheets of paper, filled with immaculate writing. "Is this from one of those muggle... right-typers? It's flawless."
"A computer actually," Astoria answered the question, which hadn't been directed at anyone in particular. "Even better than a typewriter, from what I understand."
"Fascinating," Cyrus replied, leafing through them quickly, "Though I'm afraid these charts mean little to me."
Orla, for all that she was a relative stranger, offered, "I can tell you what they mean, if you want. My mother's a nurse, and I've seen some medical charts in my life. I used to help over the summers at the hospital she works at in the 'States."
Cyrus glanced at Ophelia, who gave a near-imperceptible nod. He trusted Orla, because he had come to trust Sirius. But she had always been better at reading body language than he had. "Very well. Please, tell us this good news."
She looked through the papers quickly, scanning all six. "A white blood cell count, an anemia test- that's the red blood cells, and sickle-shaped ones, it's run in the same lab. That's a blood test. She's near normal there, a little low, but nothing a slightly higher red meat diet couldn't help. Hm... this one is a radiological test, and a chemical test, an ink test, and a new ultraviolet light test. You know the Heal- er, the Doctors, said that she has Acute Meylogenous Leukemia, or AML, correct?"
Cyrus and Ophelia both nodded, "Yes, though I'm not sure what that means aside from being a type of cancer," his wife replied, her voice soft, nervous. "I'm honestly still shocked muggle doctors were able to find anything at all related to the magical curse."
"Because the Blood Malediction causes the cancer, but the cancer itself is literally in the blood, but is a muggle disease," Orla clarified, "Which is one of the reasons magic was not able to cure it. Magical research into cancers is very far behind muggles'. You know the word, the idea behind it, but most people don't even know what it does, only that it's lethal most of the time. At least, if untreated."
Cyrus nodded. At Orla's and Astoria's request, he had at least read a few pamphlets on the subject, including two on the very type of cancer Astoria had been diagnosed with. The one that had killed his sister, and his aunt, and her aunt, and hers, for generations.
His younger daughter had been slated for that fate, too. Cyrus swallowed down the old, long-familiar but no-less-injurious pain.
"She is not yet cancer-free," Orla said as she perused the last page, which was a typed-up letter. "But she is responding well to the treatments. Doctor Orbonne reminds you that most children, if caught early, have a ninety-percent remission rate, and never show symptoms again. He also reminds you that Astoria was not caught early, but not particularly late, either. That decreases her chances, and makes it slightly more likely that if treatment is ultimately successful, she will eventually have symptoms reoccur. He still believes the prognosis is good, however. This page, the second to last one? It showed her previous marrow myeloblast level at twenty-two percent. That means that nearly a quarter of her bone marrow was producing cancerous white blood cells. Now, it's down to twelve percent, and has been dropping steadily under the chemo-radiation therapy."
"I... I see," Cyrus whispered.
Astoria grinned, "He also wants to know how I stayed looking healthy and still have all my hair... Sirius almost told him Orla taught me how to magic it back."
He...
Cyrus Greengrass was not a man known to crying.
Yet half an hour ago, he had been crying with his near-adult daughter.
Now, he did so openly, in front of two relative strangers.
He had lost so much in his life, because of that Blood Malediction. His whole family had, ever since they were first cursed.
Now...
Now his younger daughter would grow to adulthood.
At least, he hoped she would.
Grow to Daphne's age, and not be bedridden, near unable to move or speak, constantly ill and getting worse.
Grow to have a family of her own, perhaps. A lover. Friends beyond the few she had now.
A family.
She would simply have... well, time, for all of that.
The Blood Malediction had been stealing lives for generations, but mostly what it had stolen from people was time. No more, he thought, as he sobbed great, salty tears filled with the most profound happiness and relief he could have imagined.
No, that wasn't right. Cyrus Greengrass could not ever have imagined he could be this happy, to know that his daughters would both have time to live their lives fully.
Whole dimensional barriers and universes away from that happy place where the Greengrass family had gotten some very good news, and the Granger family was going through what might be the greatest crisis they would ever face, a different family (of sorts) was doing a bit of soul-searching of their own.
"I don't want you to go, it's as simple as that," Ron Weasley pronounced. His tall form, muscular, scarred, those very same marks of battle and death present and visible for the shorts and black tank-top in the style of the muggle military that had given them to him, where he'd earned them, and the muscle too, made both of the young women present desire him all the more.
"It's her decision though, Ron," Hermione, one-eyed, scarred herself, a little leaner but still beautiful in Iris Marie Potter's eyes, said quietly. "It's always been her decision. I don't like it, either, but... what are you going to do? Throw her in Azkaban? Again?"
Iris snorted in amusement as she knelt before the graves of her parents in the small church graveyard of Godric's Hollow. They never do give it a rest, do they? Here in front of my parents, and all they can do is argue with each other. Over me, no less. I know you'd love them both, Mum, Dad. Like I do.
It was not the first time Iris had visited her parent's grave, not by a long shot. The first had been three years earlier, and had resulted in her incarceration in Azkaban for a few months at the behest of Voldemort's servants. More recently, things had been more peaceful. Since his downfall, Iris and her friends had mostly been left alone, at her request.
It seemed that some elements of the new Ministry at least respected her wish for privacy, even if she had gone from "Undesirable Number One," to, "The Greatest Dark Lady in six centuries," and from there straight to, "The Wizarding World's Scarred Savior."
Hah... Screw them all, Iris thought pitiably. None of them stood up. None of them really fought. At least in Harry's world people are trying, instead of leaving it to a child and her friends to save them. I did it for Ron, for Hermione, the Weasleys, for Mum, Dad, and the time we never had. I did it for me.
If I'd known the cost would be so high... I might well have let the world burn.
"I'm going," Iris said quietly, firmly, "So stop arguing about it. I made up my mind months ago. As soon as I figure out a way."
"How, though?" Ron asked, throwing his hands into the air. He knew from long experience that Iris would never change her mind when she took that tone, even if he hated it. "And then what? What about Hermione, me, my family? We'd miss you terribly."
That didn't mean he wouldn't continue trying, of course.
"How is up for debate," Iris replied, "but we already know it can be done, at least temporarily. Remember, when Harry came here, I was there. In his body, he in mine, but our minds were there. If a mind can be moved, a soul can be moved. If a soul can be moved, then all it needs is a new body. The problem of infinite energy is insurmountable... but I don't have to solve it. I just have to go around it."
"Then, what?" Hermione asked quietly. Iris didn't need to look to know that her arms were folded under her chest. "You're going to live in some machine? A robot? An animal?"
"No," Iris shook her head, "None of those would work. If I inhabited a robot, I'd be little better than a Horcrux. An animal, I'd be possessing them like Voldemort did with snakes when he was stuck in Albania. No, that's near-useless. I need something sturdier, something more like a human body. If I could manufacture something like Lilith's, which can change shape like I can, that'd be ideal. No idea of I'd still be a metamorph on that side of things. Probably not, since it's tied to my biology, and the body would be new."
"That doesn't answer the question of how, though? I know you've dabbled in a lot of really, well, arcane shite, Iris, but throwing your soul into a whole other dimension? That's beyond the pale, even for you. I know it's possible, since you've done it, but... on purpose? And coming back?"
"I don't know if I am coming back," Iris whispered, voicing that thought for the first time.
"Wh- What?" Ron hissed.
She couldn't look at them. Couldn't face them.
"Ron, Hermione," Iris said quietly, "I'm dying. This body is dying. It's... unstable. And that's using a kind term for it. I can, maybe, come back. Maybe. I don't know. If I can build a body there, it's possible I can build a new one here. But this me, the Iris you've... loved... for years... it's not going to be around in six months. A year. I'll still be me of course, but this... this shell will be gone."
"Wh- Why?" Hermione asked.
Always gets to the heart of things, that one, Iris thought ruefully, never lets me just sit in silence when I want to... Gods, I love them both. "A muggle disease I caught... when I was at the Dursleys. You're both protected, so I never told you. There's treatments, now, but they don't work very well. And they don't work on me at all. I've done too much to myself, magically. It's what killed Vernon."
"Did he give it to you?" Hermione asked incisively.
She shook her head, "No... I gave it to him. One of my... clients. They gave it to me."
Both of them swore, and Iris heard Ron stalk off through the graveyard, no doubt going to look for something to his or hex that wouldn't bring her ire.
Iris felt like doing that too, had ever since she'd learned of the disease present in her body, when she was fourteen. Too young for all of it. But it happened. At least... at least in Harry's world I might have time. Time to come to grips. To heal. To be whole, just a girl, again. A fresh start, in a way. If I can build a body, of course, and if I can shunt my soul across untold ribbons and fathoms and folds of reality. Hermione's right, this will be ridiculously complex.
But I've done complex things before. I just have to... I have to keep up hope. Hope that I have enough time.
When Iris, Ron, and Hermione left the graveyard in Godric's Hollow that evening, her friends were far more calm. Adjusted to the idea, perhaps. Or, perhaps as well, a lifetime of trauma similar to her own had left them task- and goal-oriented enough that even the more volatile of the trio, Ron, had committed to helping. If only so that she could, in his words, "live, damn it, even if it's not with us!"
Maybe, just maybe, with the three of them working together, there'd be enough...
After all, they'd worked miracles before.