The Girls

Lily tapped her pen against her notes quietly, staring down at a book of flowers.

She was named after a flower. Her sister was named after a flower. Her mum and her sister were named after flowers. Her grandmum was named after a flower.

Her daughters might not be...Born in quite the same way as the ‘traditional’ or ‘preferred’ way, but they would be her daughters. Now it was really just a matter of picking out names.

“What are you looking at?” Petunia asked as she sauntered into the room, paler gray-green eyes flicking to Lily and then to the large book she had open in front of her. “What’s that?”

“I was thinking of names.”

“Names?” she heard her older sister’s frown. “You’re not...You didn’t do something risky did you?” her sister asked stiffly and Lily snorted quietly.

There might be risks associated with her plans, but in terms of doing something risky...Well she was a Gryffindor after all.

“No, no,” she told her sister because she knew that while Tuney could be prickly sometimes that she did care. “Just...Thinking to the future.”

“Hmph. Move on then, budge up. We’ll need to make sure that we don’t go doing something silly like getting attached to the same name.” her sister shoved herself on the loveseat after picking up Wiggles and setting the sleepy cat on her lap where the orange tabby once more fell asleep, scooting in and Lily smiled. Tuney really wasn’t the best at being honest with her feelings but it was sort of charming in its own right. “What’s that, Gloriosa? An outlandish name if you ask me.”

They’d drifted for years but it was nice, even if the circumstances weren’t, to be able to repair her relationship with the blonde.

xXx

She panted, holding her first daughter in her arms only a few days after Christmas. She hadn’t been sure which egg had begun growing- while she could tell if the eggs were in stasis and use another charm to see if eggs were inseminated, she couldn’t control or tell which egg had which, ah, sire.

This, she knew immediately, was Severus’s daughter even though she was just a red, wrinkly little lump with a wild set of lungs on her.

“Gardenia.” she grunted. “Gardenia Eileen Evans.”

The birth was easier than she expected- supposed that’s what hiring a medi-witch midwife was about. When she’d more or less set her sister up with the service back in June when she herself had her boy, Luis, she’d also been checking the service for herself.

(Although Lily had been shocked when she first learned that her older sister, who’d been weary of anything magical, had ended up marrying a satyr.)

One out of six down. Five more to go she thought with a wince. Pregnancy wasn’t...The worst thing she’d ever gone through but the thought of doing it five more times?

...Wait, she thought to herself. She could just pull two out of stasis and then she’d have twins, two in one pregnancy. The birth really wasn’t hard or long like she’d feared it would be given her more willowy shape and slender hips, not with the midwife and her team taking care of her. How much worse, really, could twins be?

She would wait at least half a year before she went and put her body through pregnancy again though she decided.

xXx

She wiped at her eyes tearfully. Petunia’s second wedding was beautiful. As soon as she found out Venne had been cheating on her she moved back in with them (that is, their parents and Lily) with Luis. They’d been fairly concerned when she had announced that she was getting married again almost immediately after the papers were finalized but apparently she’d been pen-pals with Luca since landing in Dunkirk and joining a mixed pen-pal group that helped expats. Apparently it was popular for muggles who were family or otherwise involved with magicals to try to connect and learn about the magical side.

Luca’s family the Malveaux, by the way, had been cast off from the Malfois a handful of generations ago over a petty sibling squabble.

Petunia, who’d briefly been Petunia Dreux became Petunia Malveaux though Luis who was wholeheartedly accepted as Luca’s new son, kept his Dreux name.

Her muggle sister married a Pureblood with connections to the Malfoys, albeit stretched far and especially far in terms of ideologies even if they were Purebloods. The French status of the word unlike the English wasn’t as stringent. For example, having one Pureblood parent and one halfblood parent didn’t also make the child a halfblood but a Pureblood. A halfblood could come from two muggleborns, a muggleborn and a muggle, or a Pureblood and muggle. It allowed a greater pool for the families that maintained things like that on this side and was far more forgiving.

Petunia moved out almost as quickly as she’d moved back in, off now to the magical section of La Grave with her husband.

xXx

“Not doing that again.” she grumbled darkly as an enchanted rag twisted itself out before patting at her forehead. Gardenia was now an older sister to this new, fraternal set of twins. Not like a one and not-quite-half year old could really understand that concept yet but still.

Her eyes tracked back down to the new red little blobs that her body had popped out. One had pale little wisps on her head. Malfoy, she thought with certainty. The other...She stared down into a tiny squalling face. Little dark bits of hair and- ah. Her nose just changed a little bit.

Metamorphmagi. Black’s daughter, she concluded.

“This,” she croaked and then cleared her throat, “This one will be Mimosa,” given it was the only reasonably English star name that happened to also be a flower she could find, “Electra Evans. And this one,” she turned tired eyes onto the itty bitty blonde, “This one Malva Esther Evans.”

Halfway through she thought with exhaustion. Coincidentally, Petunia had her second child, her and Luca’s first only a few weeks before the twins. Little Violette had the paler white-blonde of her father’s family rather than the sandy pale blonde, her sister, their da, and Luis shared.

Her parents were still pretty shocked about Lily having children unwed and with no fathers to be found and for how quickly Petunia’s first marriage ended and her next began but it was out of a place of concern and not, thankfully, outrage.

Back home, in their dingy little neighborhood in Blighty, the single mothers and those women who married only for that marriage to quickly end were not looked upon kindly unless they were widows. And, usually, some of the poorest unfortunately.

But Lily was a steady hand at brewing and a particularly keen witch when it came to charms. Work was never a problem. Though the pregnancies did, admittedly, cut into that. Her parents watched little Gardenia when Lily was working, sometimes broken up by Petunia taking her on for the young cousins to meet and play. As much as little babies that young could play anyways. Although she’d been looking into other services with her second pregnancy. She didn’t want to load three screaming magical babies onto her parents after all.

Later in the same month (April, as it stood) she made the decision to set the fourth egg into motion, wanting to get the baby phases out quickly and giving her body virtually no rest besides the spells and potions she’d chugged down.

xXx

The third pregnancy, fourth baby was the easiest yet she had been pleased to find. It was pretty Yuze Li’s daughter she noted as the babe was settled against her chest on a beautiful January day. With the pregnancies, her breasts had swelled in size and she’d been putting on more weight at her hips and a bit of a pouch at the belly from it. Between taking care of her daughters, work and trying to squeeze in what research she can she hadn’t exactly had time to look after her figure of all things. Still, she wasn’t unreasonably out of shape or anything.

Petunia was too competitive when it came to tennis for that and when they were too pregnant to safely play that, then she was constantly offering Lily to come over and work out on the more low impact machines she had in her personal gym as they gabbed and shared gossip with eachother.

Petunia, as it was turning out, was a little bit of a health nut nowadays. She suspected it was her mother-in-law that had gotten her onto things like fruit and veg and herb smoothies and going out to public gyms given that even as young as her children are, they were pretty rambunctious and skiing was a popular pastime that needed some amount of physical ability.

Until Petunia just outright made her own home gym to enjoy. Well, at least Petunia wasn’t on that trend of being almost dangerously thin anymore with the healthier lifestyle. It made her face look less sharp, less (and excuse the somewhat mean spirited comparison here) horse-like and she soon had the same slightly long oval face as Lily and their mother now that she was filled out more and shared the same beauty thanks to not being so gaunt looking.

Tuney wasn’t having a third child quite so soon with two babes already to look after, but she knew her sister did want at least one more.

“Peony. Peony Edith Evans.”

xXx

She frowned down at the letter she’d received.

It had the Black family crest on it and she sighed wearily, casting a few spells to make sure it wasn’t cursed or something before hesitantly opening it, setting the wax seal aside. She’d keep it, she decided.

...Oh.

Oh. Oh dear.

She’d only heard of them a handful of times so forgot them completely, but some families had magically self-updating Family Trees. But, she thought suspiciously as she rested her hand on her swollen belly with daughter number five, little Mimosa was already three. She waddled her way over to her plush office chair, the little donut she’d been instructed to sit on making her sigh as she stretched her swollen ankles and turned her attention back to the letter. Wiggles leapt up onto the desk and then carefully stepped onto her very pregnant belly; it was a good thing she was such a tiny, dainty cat Lily thought as she curled up as Lily leaned back. The penmanship was sort of spidery but not quite as sharp as she remembered Severus’s being.

She blinked for a moment, skipping back and rereading one little line.

Regulus Black, a year under her, had been declared dead. She pursed her lips a little at that.

She had been avoiding most any sort of news about back home and she knew her other friends that had escaped were doing the same. But it wasn’t like she’d known Regulus at all, so the only thing she had to mourn is that people as young as he’d been were dying over some stupid, pointless civil war. She shook her head at the thought.

Even Alice’s letters had been desperately trying to seem normal and calm for her friends but her stress seeped out unintentionally in her messy scrawl or certain words. She knew her other old friends had offered rooms for her if she would just step away but Alice, it seemed, had gotten caught up in the persistent urge to ‘do the right thing’. A sort of mania that swept up a certain amount of people to fight against the rising wave of increasingly terroristic attacks and ideologies.

She frowned down at the letter she was sent from the Blacks- Walburga, the Lady Black. It was somber and not quite pleading, but it was a brief letter saying that she should keep Mimosa away from the Isles while this war is going but that if, somehow, the Dark Lord fell that the Black title would fall to her daughter despite her being a Halfblood.

Walburga, it seems, had any sort of hot air and bigotry drained out of her with one son running off and the other dead. Perhaps she opened her eyes to the damage that was befalling not just muggles and muggleborns and halfbloods, but Purebloods as well. Perhaps she was seeing that it was all meaningless and that they were dying over nothing. The Black name and a Black vault had already been set up for Mimosa’s use and she could legally take on the Black name.

This would require more looking into, but as it stood things looked grim on the other side.

“Maman!” came the panicked cry and she jolted to her feet as Wiggles leapt off in alarm, “Maman! Maman!”

“What, what is it Nena?!” she burst into the room her children were in with her parents who sat looking stunned.

“Maman! Mimi turned into a chienne!” her wan dark eyed daughter’s finger pointed at a- a puppy. Mimosa already had awakened some ability as a metamorphmagi but it seems she had the more rare natural animagi ability.

“Lily?” her father called faintly, unblinking stare down at where his granddaughter had been just a moment ago and now there was a small puppy tumbling over itself excitedly. “Is this- is this...Normal? For…”

“It’s a very rare and special gift,” she said, feeling her heart still thundering in her chest at Nena’s alarmed cries. “Usually doing something like this would have to wait until someone’s older and well versed in transfiguration. Even then, the animagus transformation can only be achieved by some and it isn’t a common skill.” she carefully knelt down, mindful of her belly and swollen ankles. “It’s alright Nena,” she soothed her daughter who tripped over to her, clutching at her dress and teary eyed. She rubbed the girl’s back, landing a kiss on darker carmine-red hair that fell pin-straight rather than the barely-there waves Lily herself had. Her oldest daughter sniffled. “Now, let’s try to get her back to being a person.” after all, while Mimi had been potty-trained she wasn’t sure she trusted a puppy form to also be potty trained. Mallie giggled as she played with her sister in her new form and Wiggles who’d come to investigate sniffed at her too.

xXx

“Silene Etta Evans.” she declared tiredly. Maybe it was how many pregnancies she’d gone through in such a short amount of time but it felt like her body, despite the nutrient and vitamin potions and extra pre-natal and post-partum potions she took, was really being worn down with each birth. There had been some minor complications with little Silene but that might’ve also been from stress according to her fussing, fretting midwife.

The war had picked up in earnest enough that it became uneasy whispers on the wixen side of France and Alice’s letters have been getting more and more inconsistent as time went on. That was besides trying to take care of four magical little girls with exceptional magical abilities and balancing a work life and personal research on top of it.

Well, she conceded. Maybe it was just the stress she’d been feeling lately or how closely together her pregnancies really were. Her potion could do a lot of things but it couldn’t change outside environments she supposed. She’d keep it on her logs anyways, just in case.

xXx

“But do you need to move so far dear?” her mother asked with a frown and Lily sighed. “I just mean that it would be easier to just stay here with us and we could watch the girls.”

“Mum,” she began again, “I’ve got five whole daughters. When they start getting older they won’t want to be on top of eachother.”

“But can’t you find something a little more...Local?” she tried to coax as she showed Lily how to work with textured hair on a wig for when Silene started getting older. Her old gig as a home-hair-stylist had given her a broad experience of how to work with different types of hairs over the years. Mum did enjoy playing with her grandchildren’s hair, and had enjoyed the challenge that Luis’s horns presented in styling his.

“Now now, darling.” da piped in, “Our girls need to spread their wings. It’s hardly like we’ll never see them again.”

“Right,” Lily latched on, “You’ve already got Floo set up here for Tuney, it’ll be even easier to add one for whichever house I end up with. And I’m still really only looking.”

“See there? Not even a five minute trip to see them no matter where they go.”

“Oh, I suppose.” her mother sighed. “Now, this serum had been diluted but it’s excellent for the sort of kinky curls I see little Leni has growing.” she help up a spray bottle to show Lily. “I’ll give you a pot later, once you’ve gotten comfortable with the other products.”

xXx

She frowned, disoriented and dizzy as the midwives around her swarmed in a flurry and unlike her other daughters, her child wasn’t cleaned with a spell and settled against her. “What-?” she slurred.

It was an early birth. She knew that. Some Lestranges who lived in the U.K. had gotten in under the guise of seeking refuge with the French Lestranges and led an attack on one of the larger magical markets and Lily- Lily was just so thankful that her daughters hadn’t been there. But she’d been hit by a bludgeoning curse and even if it wasn’t on her belly, her water had burst.

“Hush,” came an older witch’s soft reprimand. “You rest. Child lives.” she said in heavily accented English.

xXx

Itty bitty little Wisteria Ethel Evans couldn’t come home when she was born. She needed specialized care and it was frankly practically a miracle she had lived through the shock of Lily getting hit by that curse and her early birth anyhow.

Lily was devastated and if it weren’t for her other daughters and parents, her sister and her children, Lily might have drowned in despair.

Rabastan, she thought with a burning hate building in her chest where a discolored patch of skin lay from the Dark magic that hit her. Rabastan Lestrange had been the one to use that spell on a clearly heavily pregnant woman. They’d escaped, the two brothers and the one’s wife who looked alarmingly familiar.

The local Lestranges had very willingly given up any and all information that had on their distant cousins across the way, offering endless apologies and consolation money and gifts for those affected, going so far as to personally pay for any treatments needed from the attack.

The borders between the Isles that had been her old home and her new home shuttered tightly after that and refugees and families looking to flee had to be heavily screened.

The Lestrange family had been the one to offer otherwise exorbitantly expensive care for her youngest daughter, the private company one they personally used and thank goodness for that because while the Evans family was comfortable enough, there was no way they’d have been able to cover the expenses regardless of the pristine healthcare France boasted.

She sat, staring down at logs and years of research and then at the logs and documentation she got from the mediwitch team taking care of Wisteria and she cried.

xXx

“Albania?” she asked nervously when Wisteria wasn’t quite one yet. The head mediwitch nodded firmly.

“We believe that the regimen suggested in that coven might be able to have Wisteria home safely by the time she’s six.”

Lily’s breath hitched and Tuney’s hand tightened on hers, her father’s hand on her shoulder a grounding feeling. Her mother and family-in-law were watching the girls while she, da and Petunia attended this appointment. An appointment that might eventually lead to finally, finally bringing her daughter home- even if at the moment it was still with her parents as they repaired and renovated the château Lily had found. Hopefully by the time Wisteria was six they’d have safely moved into the new residence.

In the end, Wisteria did get to come home after Albania and at just barely three instead of the projected six. But only after she’d been smuggled out of the secure medical facility by another patient who’d been in the curse-afflicted ward and into a forest and been found with a huge, hulking corpse of a snake with gleaming white scales and a strange scar that had been hemmed and hawed over in the shape of a sowilo like lightning bolt.

When she was only fifteen months old.

They suspected it was a curse-scar of some sort, that the escaped patient had been eaten but while trying to protect herself against the giant snake nicked Wisteria in the process but that the scar itself was perplexing. But, they assured, not harmful. Lily had almost withdrawn her daughter from the facility but it was the best hope she had for actually getting to bring her daughter home.

In the huge bundle of stress and relief at the time of Wisteria’s kidnapping and subsequent rescue, hearing that the war had ended in the homeland. and the Dark Lord supposedly disappeared entirely while on a secret trip somewhere out of the U.K., only barely held any of Lily’s attention.

xXx

“Saluki,” Lily read a handful of weeks after finally bringing her last daughter home, “A sighthound breed and among some of the oldest dog breeds.” she raised her brows as her daughters and niece and nephew sat around her in a circle, Mimi in said dog form. “A hunting hound for kings, and athletic and fast.”

“So she’s like a chienne royale?” Nena blinked up at her with slightly downturned eyes before turning to her furry sister. “She doesn’t really act like a princesse.” she said with a familiar frown. More and more, Lily thought to herself, she looked like her father. Of course, not as scraggly and thin as he’d been when he was that young she amended.

“I think she has jolie l’oreilles!” Lenie said brightly, playing with said ears. Mimi panted happily. With a mostly black coat, she still had a patch of white on her chest. Besides her fluffy ears and tail, her fur was short and her frame slender and with long legs as expected of the Saluki if the pictures meant anything. Compared to her cute but admittedly pudgy Mimi, it was strange to see her transformation into such a slim dog.

“Elle est jolie.” Peony nodded, patting her older sister’s wagging tail.

“Elle est mignonne.” Petunia reached down to ruffle her ears fondly.

“Will we get to be cute animals too?” Mallie asked her then and several sets of expectant eyes looked to her.

“Oh, er…” she blinked down at them. “If you study very hard when you get bigger you might be able to.” she decided on. Tuney raised her brows at her and she shook her head, just slightly.

“Yay!”

“Aw, how come we have to wait?”

“Well, it’ll be a fun surprise when you find out which animal you can be.” Lily soothed, rubbing Wisteria’s back as she dozed against her on her lap. Wiggles briefly lifted her head from where was was also on Lily’s lap, closely cuddled up to little Wisteria.

“Hein? Does that mean we don’t get to pick what we want to be?”

“Mimi very well didn’t get to choose, quoi?” Tuney pointed out, her own third and final child clinging to her pressed cigarette-trousers. Dureau was only a month older than Wisteria given she was early born in July and the most babied of her sister’s children so far.

Not that Lily could talk much there but sweet Teary-deary was a special case.

“...I guess.” came the grumble.

“Can we turn into animals maman?” Luis asked and Violette perked up, turning to Tuney who froze for a moment.

“I suppose you’d have to ask your papa.” she said gently. “But I’m not sure…” she frowned a little.

“You’ve already got fur though!” Leni pointed out, “None of us got fur or a tail.”

“But Mimi has fur right now?” Luis pointed out.

“Yeah but she only has it sometimes when she’s chienne.” Mallie frowned thoughtfully. “And we don’t have wicked horns either. You get to look chouette!”

Thank goodness for easily distracted children, Lily thought, sharing a glance with her sister. At least her oldest nephew seemed pleased anyways.

xXx

“Holy-” Crystal slapped her hand over her own mouth to keep from cussing in front of the children. “When you said you had kids, Lils, I didn’t think you’d meant a whole half a dozen of them! They could fill out a dorm-room all themselves!”

Well Lily had mentioned in her letters that she’d had children to her friends, given Alice was godmother to Nena and Tiff to Leni. Never uh...How many or much in way of specifics. Next to Crystal and her wife Bibi, Crystal’s step-daughter was looking at them curiously. Around Nena’s age and the spitting image of her mother Bibi with a broader face than she would have seen back in Britain but with a fluff of blonde hair and eyes that reminded her of cinnamon, she’d heard of Isa only through letter before. The same with all of her friends’ children to be honest, though all five women had sent letters through the years, that correspondence not slowing down besides during the worst of the war on Alice’s side. She knew Vera and Crystal had still physically met up over the years too, sometimes with Tiffany too. And, when Crystal returned to the Isles she spent a lot of time with Alice again. Lily would feel a little lonely, but things had been so busy that there just was never any time.

“You’ve certainly been busy.” Tiffany muttered with raised brows, her own sons Leon and Elias practically gawking at the gaggle of children Lily and Petunia’s children made. Her husband sent them an admonishing look and they reined in their expressions at least. “And...Lily, I don’t mean to alarm you but I think some of your children look awfully like-” she started and was swiftly interrupted by a pointed throat clearing. Lily sent a thankful look over to Vera, whose daughter Maja was half hidden behind her meekly.

“All we’re missing now is Alice.” her old friend peered around.

It had been years and years since they’d actually been able to meet eachother like this as a group. A pretty big occasion actually.

Crystal had returned to the U.K. after the war had been officially over and the worst of the Death Eaters locked away but Pearl hadn’t. It was on a visit to her sister that she had met and quickly fallen in love with Bibi, a single mother manning her family’s potions’ shop. Their marriage was swift and from the last letter she’d gotten, Crystal and Bibi were still considering which school to send Isa to. Lily had already had that concern but Petunia had blithely told her that all three of her children would be going to Beauxbaton, her husband’s alma mater.

Which had been strange to hear because in Hogwarts, the only people she knew of that hadn’t been human (or at least so heavily diluted with human that there was nothing in the last few generations besides humans) had been the groundskeeper Hagrid who was half-giant and the Ravenclaw Head of House, Professor Flitwick who was partially goblin. She hadn’t heard of any others but she had heard that vampires, werewolves, other creatures and beings had to get their education from smaller establishments because they were typically barred entry from Hogwarts.

That wasn’t the case for Beauxbaton at all. She didn’t want Gardenia to potentially fall down the same path as Severus had and knew her daughter would either be Sorted Slytherin or Ravenclaw if she did go to Hogwarts. Even if the war had been ended, that didn’t mean the sentiments that had built up to cause a war were gone. Besides, the thought of sending one of her daughters to the Isles after the state it had been when she and her family had fled…

Gardenia, her Nena, would be attending Beauxbaton when the letter came the oncoming summer since, being a December baby, she had missed the age cut-off this year for schooling unlike Luis. Most if not all of her daughters probably would end up in Beauxbaton.

Tiffany had remained in Germany where she had married and had Leon who was of an age with the twins and Elias, who was about Silene’s age. Her brother on the other hand while he married a German woman had returned to Britain with her- his own daughter, Romilda, was two years older than her Teary and his only child, reportedly very spoiled should anyone ask Tiff. Her own boys would likely end up in Durmstrang, her husband’s school.

Vera, with Maja who was Peony’s age. Had unfortunately lost her husband to a potions accident only a handful of years ago and had wavered between returning to the U.K. but had so far been living with his family in Poland yet. And honestly, would probably stay there. She was hardly going to uproot her daughter off and away from her family just so Vera could go to a place she had left because of blood tensions after all. The Huang family wasn’t a huge Pureblood name in the U.K. anyways, so it wasn’t like she was expected to continue the noble line on English soil or something.

“Oh, I see Frank!” Crystal called to her friends. Ah yes, the bulky figure that burly Frank Longbottom made was easily caught and beside him, his far more petite wife and their three children. Neville, who had been born the same unfortunate day Wisteria was born (though he was ‘on time’ so to speak), Norman who came about two years after him, and Cecilia the youngest only just born named, Lily knew, for Alice’s grandmother.

“I- who’re all these then?” Frank asked as they got closer.

“Half them seem to be Lily’s.” Crystal snorted and her wife lightly hit her shoulder with the arm not wrapped around hers. “You can’t tell me that’s not a lot of kids!”

“Lily had six kids.” Tiffany shared with the Longbottoms and Alice turned to Lily incredulously.

“Six?! When did you have time to have-” she shook her head then actually looked at the girls circled around Lily. She blinked a few times as though to try to understand what she was seeing. She sent Lily a confused look and Lily sent her a look via her eyebrows and a twitch of her mouth. Alice narrowed her eyes but sighed. The conversation she’d have with her friends later probably wouldn’t be pleasant. But that wasn’t the goal here.

“I’ve told you all about my sister Tuney,” Lily instead turned her attention to her taller sister. “Petunia,” she clarified just in case, “Her husband Luca and her kids, Luis,Violette and Dureau. Luis will be attending Beauxbaton this autumn.” she waved to the family of five and murmurs of congratulations were given though Luca was eyed for familiar white-blond hair, very pale skin and a heart shaped face that ended in pointy chin. All the same, they didn’t have the same brow, lips, and he had Tuney’s gray-green eyes or- feel, Lily supposed, as the Malfoys. Luca’s hair bounced around at chin length and was left to fall freely, and his smile was bright and friendly. Gardenia very valiantly did not make a sullen face like she’d been making when she was reminded that she’d missed the age cut-off but Luis hadn’t. “Tuney, these are my old dormmates and their families. Crystal?”

“Crystal Douglas.” she greeted with a curt nod, sleek brown bob being pushed back behind her ears. “My lovely, amazing wife Bibi,” she said and the blonde giggled as they shared gooey eyes, “And our cute little girl Isa.”

“Oh, I’m Tiffany, Koch that is, pardon- this is my husband Egon and our boys Leon and Elias.” her curly haired brunette friend beamed proudly, lacing her fingers with her brick wall of a husband. His hair was also curly, but looser curls that their boys seemed to inherit in a dark sandy blond color like his as well but with her warm hazel eyes.

“Vera Bystroń and my daughter Maja.” her friend nodded down to her daughter who poked her head out from behind her to offer a shy nod before hiding again. “She’s a little shy.” Vera smiled with a shrug.

“I’ll be Alice Longbottom. We did, uh...Briefly meet before.” Alice said a little nervously. Yes, Tuney happened to meet Alice one year during summer hols. She hadn’t been mean per se but neither had she made herself particularly friendly. “Anyway, this is my husband Frank, our boys Neville and Norman and our baby girl, Cecilia.”

“I’ve heard about you all.” Tuney told them. “A lot.” she cut a look to her sister who smiled sheepishly. “I’m sure you must’ve heard of me as well in her letters.”

“I’ve mostly heard about an impressive home gym to be honest.” Crystal said.

“You mean that’s the only part you paid attention to.” her wife teased and Crystal grinned at her, nuzzling noses.

“Alright, alright, let’s hear the names of Lily’s girls now.”

“Right then. The eldest, Gardenia.” she pulled the girl forward. Already she was tall, with her straight carmine-red hair darker than Lily’s and with soft down-turned black eyes and a nose that wasn’t as hooked as Severus’s had been but still hooked. Her face seemed a little longer, more like Severus’s had been, though she did have Lily’s bow shaped lips rather than the thinner more dour looking lips Severus had. “The twins, Mimosa,” her second oldest notably curly haired daughter was next to be presented, a girl with Lily’s round eyes but in a more grayish shade of green and with her lips as well. The shape of her face, even with the cherubic chub, was very clearly going to be her father’s diamond shape, a common enough shape for the Blacks in general. “And Malva,” she pulled her blonde daughter next to her twin. Her hair wasn’t quite the white-blond of the Malfoys (or Malfois) but still fine and pale blonde. Almost a platinum that was just a little, tiny bit warmer than their hair. She was the palest of all her daughters (and needed stronger sunscreen salves and wide brimmed hats and even parasols when she stood still long enough to hold one) but had Lily’s bottle green eyes that looked a little darker against her paler visage. She had sharper deep-set eyes but Lily’s bow-shaped lips, and though she had a heart shaped face with the Malfoy pointy chin (almost but not quite like her cousin and uncle Luca, actually), but there was something distinctly...Androgynous about it? Besides the normal childhood androgyny. Then again, the first time she saw Lucius she had briefly thought he might’ve been a tall if flat-chested woman just as well as he could have been a man. Something in the face, perhaps. Maybe the neck? Probably all of it.

“Twins?”

“Fraternal, obviously.” Lily said easily, smoothly moving on before it could be questioned more given that neither had red hair but still had different hair and features, “Next is Peony,” she pulled her forward. Her Chinese heritage was blatant in her phoenix shaped eyes and cute buttony nose, and with her father’s soft pink round lips and the silky texture of her dark hair that Lily’s mum adored working with though she often lamented that it never wanted to hold waves or curls. Her eyes, though they were dark, sparkled with green in the light. “And then comes Silene,” who looked blatantly like her father with her round face and dimpled grin and warm rich brown lighter than his skin but there was a more reddish brown hue to her hair than Hugo’s had. Lily learned from her mum how to work with her daughter’s textured hair besides salon trips or when her mum came to play with the girls’ hair but there were plenty of beauty charms and spells just the same for any other kind of hair. Silene had his smile shape but with more defined and smaller lips and her wide round eyes were also more like Lily’s. “And my youngest, Wisteria.” she bounced the three year old on her hip gently to get the girl to blink awake from the drowsy way she’d been hiding her face in Lily’s shoulder. Tiny hands scrubbed at eyes paler than Lily’s own that seemed to almost glow like jadeite against wheatish brown skin and unruly black hair that made Lily realize why a Potter had created Sleekeazy’s hair products. Nothing else made her hair behave, at all. She had upturned cat-like eyes and from what she could see so far, had smaller but fuller heart shaped lips. That scar on her face started high on the right side of her forehead just touching her hairline, cragged into the bolt shape and then trailed down to end just under her eye. Lucky, the mediwixen team had told her, that it hadn’t taken her eye completely. Interestingly, where the scar touched her lashline a few of the lashes, upper and lower, were stark white and so was the few eyebrow hairs around the thin line through her brow. It also made a distinct little stripe of her hair the same white.

“Oh dear.” Alice murmured, eyes on the scar and not just her eyes. Given that it was still a curse scar, it was still a bit red but more or less entirely healed otherwise. “Is she the one…”

“Yes.” Lily nodded solemnly. She had been a wreck after Wisteria’s early birth and health complications and had, for a time, ignored any and all letters. Eventually she did write her friends with a somewhat curt explanation that there had been an attack and she’d gone into labor early, and that her child was in special care and likely would be for some time.

Alice had eventually told her that those same people, Lestrange brothers Rodolphus and Rabastan and Rodolphus’s wife Bellatrix (as in Bellatrix Black) had been captured while trying to break into the Longbottom estate towards the abrupt ending of the war. All three were in Azkaban now.

But those were all terrible things and not fit to linger on when it was their first time seeing eachother in years and years.

“And that’ll be my girls.” she finished with a purposefully light and cheery tone.

They’d be going to see a funfair. On the magical side she meant, not the muggle and magical fairgrounds were...Typically far more grandiose than the muggle fare. Now, whether the Pavillons de Bercy had inspired the much larger magical park or it was the other way around, it seemed there was conflicting stories but the grandeur of Epoque, Rococo and Baroque designs and beauty for leisure and pleasure had thrilled her and Tuney’s children every time they got to go so it had been decided that would be the activity they’d be doing altogether. Something lighthearted and fun.

Well, mostly. Nena had come to hate mazes, and especially mirror mazes. On the other hand Leni had quickly come to absolutely love mazes.

That might have more to do with Nena having gotten horribly lost because Mallie, who inherently was seemingly impervious to things like mazes and illusions (which Lily suspected was from the Dames Blanches) had left her behind and Mimi, who’d also been in the small group of the oldest daughters, had been able to sniff her way out as a dog and had run off as well. That incident had inspired the little tracking charm baubles the girls had on their tiny persons that came with a little ‘emergency’ button. Looking back, Lily had no clue why she hadn’t thought to tag her daughters before something like that had happened at all. Hindsight she supposed.

Leni on the other hand, was delighted when she genuinely got lost in a maze and if they weren’t careful could lose the girl for hours at a time.

Either way, there were plenty of attractions and rides to distract the children.

Distract them and undoubtedly, leave Lily to uncomfortable questions.