Five
September 3rd 2017:
“Mcgonagall will be escorting Perseus, Abby, Damion, Landon, James, and Lorelai to the ministry.”
“Are they all in the same house?” Draco asked.
“Not James or Landon. They’re Gryffindor. The rest are Slytherin.”
“How could I be so dumb as to assume the great Saint Potter might have a child in Slytherin?” Draco mostly mumbled to himself but of course Harry heard.
“My second son was sorted into Slytherin, thank you very much.”
“How many kids do you have, Potter?”
“Three. Two boys and a girl.” Draco nodded. He looked around. Hermione was down the hallway talking with the Weaselette and Katie Bell-Weasley .
“What is she like? My daughter?” Draco asked quietly.
“A lot like her mother. Top student every year at Hogwarts. Very smart and witty.” Harry. “Slytherin, just like you. She’s a seeker on the Quidditch team. Made it as a first year too. No one could understand where her Quidditch skills came from. Anyone who knows her, knows Hermione will not pick up a broom unless she has too.” Draco smiled. “She’s a mix of the two of you. Of course if you didn’t know who her father was, she’d be described as her mother’s twin.”
“Do you think she’ll like me?” Harry was a little taken back by the question.
“She likes everyone. But you, specifically, yes. She will be very excited to meet you. She knows that I knew her father so she’d ask me about him.” A look of worry appeared on Draco’s face. “I only told her good things, don’t worry. While Hermione did lie and say you were a muggle, I tried to stay honest and true.” Draco was silent. He didn’t really know what to say. “She is one of those people who will walk into the room and everyone smiles. She has a bright smile and a great sense of humor. You’ll love her.”
“Thank you, Harry.” It felt weird for both of them. “Astoria and I didn’t have any children. I had buried the image of myself being a dad very deep down. I always told myself that if I ever was so lucky to have a child, I’d be there for them and love them. I’d be the opposite of my father. But now, I’d be starting so late. I haven’t been there for her. I wasn’t there to teach her to ride a broom. I wasn’t there when she got her Hogwarts letter or when she got her wand. I cannot wait to meet her and start experiencing those things with her, even though it’s late, I’ll make up for it.” Harry just looked at him.
“I’m sorry. For what it’s worth. As angry as we all were at you, Gin and I tried to push her to tell you. Ginny and I had been thinking about starting our family at that point and if I didn't get to see my kids grow up, I would not be as calm as you are right now.”
“It’s complicated I guess. I can see where she was coming from. I did leave her. I couldn’t have my past affect her future. I thought I did what was best for both of us. I was wrong.”
“Draco Malfoy!” The men were broken out of their, almost touching conversation, because of the voice of Theodore Nott.
“You literally saw each other three months ago. Get out of my way.” And there was Blaise.
“Please excuse me, Potter. If I don't get over there, they’ll start fighting.” Harry nodded, noticing the change back to last names.
“Zabini! Nott!” Draco yelled back and the three friends hugged.
“People are trying to work. You should keep it down.” Millicent Nott followed in with Pansy Parkinson-Zabini on her tail.
“Pansy” Draco looked at her with anger in his eyes.
“What did I do?”
“I figured all the screaming meant you all were here.” Hermione walked in, causing Pansy to look between Hermione and Draco.
“Look, before you say anything. She asked me not to and I figured it wasn’t my place to tell you.” Pansy quickly defended herself.
“You don’t get out of it that easily.”
“Wait. What is going on?’ Theo asked.
“You didn’t tell anyone why they were called in?” Draco asked Hermione.
“No. I sent a quick message.”
“Drake, what’s going on?” Blaise asked.
“Granger, take it away.” She rolled her eyes at him.
“After Draco left me for Astoria,” Hermione made sure to start with that part of the story. “I found out I was pregnant. I have a daughter.”
“And Pansy knew.”
“Wait. Wait. Wait.” Theo started. “My son is dating a Malfoy?”
“Technically yes. Even though her last name is Granger.”
“Not for much longer.” Draco mumbled.
“Oh what’s that supposed to mean?” Hermione turned to face him, arms across her chest.
“Just that she will be changing her name to Malfoy. Now that I know about her, I will be making her my official heir.”
“Yeah, how’s your wife going to feel about that?”
“Considering she’s my ex-wife. I don’t give a shit how she’ll feel.” That quieted the room.
“Ex-wife?” Hermione questioned.
“We divorced five years ago.” Malfoy stated calmly. “In pureblood marriages, if no heir is born within ten years of marriage, they can divorce. We learned in the fourth year of our loveless marriage that she was infertile. We spent the last six years of our marriage separated.” Hermione felt more awful the more and more every time he spoke.
“What does having a secret love child have to do with us?”
“And our children?” Millicent spoke up as Mcgonagall came walking towards us.
“Mom, Dad?” Abby Zabini was the first to see their parents. “Uncle Draco!” Of course the three teenagers that referred to him like that, came running. Abby and Damion Zabini had not seen their uncle for a little over a year. Perseus saw his godfather three months ago. “Why are we all here? Does this have to do with why Lyra isn’t at school?”
“Yes it does.” Draco answered. “Lrya is my daughter.” Perseus froze. Abby’s eyes widened along with her brothers. James Potter and Landon Mclaggen looked at each other. Loreli was wishing she was anywhere else besides here. “You are all here so we can ask you questions about her disappearance.”
“Except we can’t start until all of your parents are here.” Hermione added.
“While we are waiting, Pansy, you wanna come with me?”
“Not really. I know what you're going to say. ‘How could you betray me like this?’ because you were an idiot and I never agreed with your decision to leave Hermione. This is as much your fault as it is hers. Yes she should have told her about your daughter, but take a second to think about how she was feeling.”
“You think I haven’t? I am in a whirlwind of emotions right now.”
“So don’t you dare try to channel any of it onto me. I did nothing wrong. It wasn’t my place to tell you. Not to mention you were off living your sad life and never came to visit us. I haven’t seen you in two years.” Draco was silent. “That’s what I thought”
“Hold on. Are you telling me I am dating my godfather’s daughter?” Perseus snapped out of the shock he was in.
“Yes.”
“Oh merlin.” Perseus put his hand to his forehead. “My girlfriend’s father gave me advice on how to have sex with my girlfriend.”
“You went to Draco instead of your father?!” Theo yelled
“I did not need to hear that.” Millicent mumbled.
“You encouraged them to have sex?” Hermione yelled at Draco
“I didn’t know who he was dating!”
“Well, you knew her name.” Perseus said quietly.
“I didn’t know she was my daughter!” Draco ran his hand over his face. “Oh god, I know too many details about my daughter’s sex life. I’m going to be sick.”
“Everyone needs to shut up!” Ginny yelled into the room. “The whole ministry can hear you shouting about sex in here.”
“Now seems like a good time to announce that Cormac Mclaggen, Daphne, and Lavender have just arrived. Katie entered the room, along with the previously mentioned adults.
“Draco. It’s good to see you.” Daphne went over and hugged Draco,
“Hi Daph. How have you been?”
“Well my mum and dad reached out about Loreli’s sixteenth birthday so, a little better than past years.”
“I’m glad they are finally starting to come around.”
“Me too.” Draco always had a soft spot for his ex-sister-in-law. They’d been friends growing up at Hogwarts, and Draco was the first one who knew Daphne liked girls.
“So why are we all here?” Mclaggen was standing by his son.
“Let’s move to a more private room.” Harry announced and they all followed him.
Perseus, Abby, Damion, Landon, James, and Lorelai were on one side of the room, while Pansy, Blaise, Theo, Millicent, Ginny, Mclaggen, Lavender, and Daphne were on the other side. Draco stood across from Hermione, who had Harry and Ron by her side. Katie was sitting at her desk outside the minister’s office to make sure no one interrupted them.
“The reason you are all here is because my daughter has been taken. We believe she was taken because of who her father is.” Hermione paused, “Which is Draco Malfoy.”
“Wait, what?” Mclaggen asked. “You had a secret child with a death eater?”
“He was pardoned. It was found, by the wizengamot court, that he should be pardoned. Do not call him a death eater.” Harry defended before anyone else could say anything.
“My apologies, Malfoy.”
“Don’t worry about it Mclaggen, you’ve just proven a point for me.”
“You cannot base everything you’ve said off this example.” Hermione scoffed from across the room.
“But it does prove me correct. If we had stayed together, people would have been saying things like that to you for the past sixteen years. Not to mention you wouldn’t have been Minister.”
“But our child would not have gotten sucked into the crossfires. We would have been together through it all. Dealing with it together.”
“This is not the time or the place for this conversion.” Ginny reminded them.
“You’re right.” Hermione regained her composure before continuing. “Everyone is in this room, is anyone who is close to Lyra or knows the truth about who her father was. We have Auror’s assigned to the case to give an outside perspective. With permission from the adults, we wish to ask Lyra’s friends if they saw or heard anything from her on September 1st.”
“Garret, come in.” Harry called in for the Aurors who were assigned the case. “Auror Garret will be conducting the interviews.”
“Katie has the forms for the parents to sign to give consent to their children to be interviewed.” Everyone agreed to let the kids be interviewed. No one knew if anything they found would be helpful, but Harry seemed to believe it would help.
“Now we wait for anything to be helpful.” Ginny told her.
“How do we know that we even have time for all this?” Hermione asked. “She’s been gone three days now. Who knows what’s happened to her.”
“Hermione,” Ginny started but was cut off.
“I got this Weaslette.”
“Ferret.” Ginny mumbled before leaving Draco and Hermione alone.
“What if I never see her again?” Hermione asked and then choked back a sob. “What if you never get to meet her? Oh merlin. I hate this. I hate that I made this decision. I was young and broken-hearted and scared. Please don’t hate me.” Draco took Hermione into his arms and placed his chin on top of her head.
“I could never hate you, Granger.” He soothed her. “We’ll find her. It will be okay.”
Ginny and Harry looked at the two.
“I never actually saw them together. Is this what it was like?” Harry asked his wife.
“It was. He has to be strong for himself and his mother for a very long time. Hermione always made him soft.”