Chapter 12
“Yeah, yeah…” Fred muttered. “How long’s it gonna take us to get to… Erui Crossing(?), wasn’t it?”
“Seventy plus miles? At least three days, possibly four.” Harry grumbled. “If we start early, take a break over midday and stop at sunset or later, we might be able to make it mid-afternoon day after tomorrow. But I can’t see any way of making it there any earlier than that.”
“Bollocks.” Fred grunted.
~~~
April 17th – 19th 2920
After leaving Pelargir, Harry and Fred kept on the move. Slow, steady progress towards Erui Crossing and Lavender. Neither of them thinking, for one second, that it might not be her. Not thinking or not willing to think it.
Stops were short but often, while they wanted to hurry, they also knew that short of harnessing one of the mares into the, currently shrunken, sulky and one of them racing ahead, they had to travel at the speed of the ponies. They’d talked about it, as they passed through the little villages with very wizarding sounding names, like Round Rock, Flat Hill and Frog Gully, debating on whether Harry should go ahead or stay with the wagons.
Finally, Fred convinced Harry that reaching Lavender was important, and the two came to an agreement. On the morning of the 19th, the day they would reach Erui Crossing, Harry would take Onyx and the sulky, to find and retrieve Lavender. The other thing that they’d decided, was that from Pelargir until they passed through the Druadan Forest, they would do LAD Summons each time they went through a settlement, any settlement, Harry teaching Fred how to cast the spell-chain, so that he could do the casting on 19th, while Harry was locating Lavender.
Harry held Teddy close before sliding him into his cradle, separating from the boy for any length of time was difficult, but Lavender could be in trouble and it was very possible that only he and Fred were even aware that she was there. He exchanged an understanding look with Fred and climbed into the sulky.
“See you this evening, boss.” Fred said.
They were less than twenty miles from Erui Crossing and after putting Teddy to bed the night before, they’d used the Map Maker's charms, to work out how far they were away and where, after leaving the town, they could meet up. A mile north of town there was a patch of woodland, covering a couple of hundred acres and through it ran multiple small roads. Some were little more than tracks and one of those had a tiny clearing, just butting up to it. Small enough that Harry could place privacy charms over, but easily as large as most Livery-yards. Harry would take Lavender there and Fred would meet them, hopefully before sunset.
They would camp there for a night, under the strongest protection wards that Harry knew. At least one night, maybe more depending on Lavender’s condition.
Entering Erui Crossing, Harry was surprised at how open the town was, but he paid little attention to the town itself. His attention was mainly focused on his wand. Every few hundred yards, he would re-cast the Point-me spell to locate Lavender. Through town and up the river, he followed the wand’s directions.
Eventually, the wand pointed at a large free-standing building and after a few moments of consideration, Harry slid from the sulk and told Onyx to stand. And he could easily be forgiven if he cast a slight compulsion charm on her, to only hear Harry’s voice. He slipped around the building, checking that his wand kept pointing at it. Once he was certain, he headed back to the front of the building.
He freed what he was calling his Griffin's Fangs, the odd knives that bent back over their hilts, from the magnetic harnesses that he’d made and shook his arms and shoulders. A deep breath and he shoved the building’s front door open.
Hard.
It slammed back against the wall with a great crashing noise, rendering the voices inside silent.
“Lavender!” He yelled, slightly augmenting his voice with a minor sonorous charm. “Lavender, where in Godric's name are you?!” He ignored the four Men that approached him.
“Who are you?!” One Man demanded. “What are you doing here? This is a private wedding.”
“Where is my sister?!”Harry growled.
“Sister?!” The man gasped.
“LAVENDER!”His voice filled the building.
“Harry? Harry! Help! Help me! Harry!”
“If you’ve harmed a hair on her head, so help me not even the Valar will save you.” Harry growled as he stomped towards Lavender’s screams. “Lavender!” He flung open another door and saw the sandy-haired girl struggling with a Man at the far side of a people filled room. “Lavender, Hermione and I taught you better than that, put him on the ground. Now!” Harry spat the last word out and Lavender did what everyone did, when Harry gave an order in that tone of voice.
She obeyed.
She spun in place and rammed her fist into the Man’s groin and when he bent over, she placed a hand on the back of his head and slammed it into table he’d had her pinned against.
“Good, girl.” Harry grinned. “Now, come over here.” Harry spun back to face the men that met him when he’d entered the building. “Which one of you was it? Which one of you paid to have a girl kidnapped? Which one of you ordered children be killed?” He snarled.
“What? No!” The first man denied. “We’re just here for the wedding.”
“If you thought Lavender was going to be the bride, forget it.”
“I paid good money…” The man on the floor moaned.
“Good money? Good money to kidnap a girl and kill children?!”Harry demanded. “Because that’s what happened when Lavender was attacked. She managed to kill three men before the rest got to her, when they did, they killed children, just to make a point. Was it you that ordered it? Was it you that paid for it? Paid to have children killed?” Harry made no effort to keep his voice down and knew that everyone in the building was listening. They all heard him, heard how children were killed and more importantly, they heard the man on the ground state that he’d paid money and they put those together and came up with answers of their own.
“Lavender, you stay behind me. We’re leaving and may Eru have mercy on anyone that tries to stop us. I will nothesitate to kill them.” Harry snarled. He knew that these people hadn’t been involved in the Hogwarts battle, but somehow, they had acquired Lavender and at the very least they were attempting to force her into an unwanted marriage.
“She’s wearing my possessions, I paid good gold for those clothes.” The man struggled up off the floor. But even he wasn’t prepared to do more than get to his feet, he knew he’d lost and lost more than just a prospective bride.
Harry let one knife re-attach itself to it’s holder and his fingers reached for the buckle on his cloak, not his invisibility cloak but a more mundane muggle-made summer cloak. He let it slide into his fingers and held it out to the girl hunched behind him.
“I know I’m pushing, Lav, but we don’t want or need anything of his. Can you strip, under that?” He knew that cloak was way too big for her, but whether she could or would strip under it, was another question.
“Merlin, yes!” She gasped and began to wriggle. A few seconds of this and two old women stood up.
“May we assist her, Master dwarf?” One asked.
“Lavender? Your decision.”
“If it will get me out of this monster’s clothes, yes. I’ll strip naked if I need to.”
“That won’t be necessary, miss.” The old woman said. “Just the skirt and bodice.”
“No.” Lavender argued. “Harry, have you got any clothes I can wear?”
“Of course I do, but you won’t get a chance to change into them for a bit. I’m not staying in this hellhole of a town, not a second longer than we need to.”
“Help me get down to draws and camisole.” Lavender ordered the two women. “I can wear them and Harry’s cloak. I’d much rather, than have anything he touched.”
“You can burn them later.” Harry huffed.
“Damn right, I can.” Lavender muttered as the one woman held the cloak and the other undid lacing and slid pieces of fabric out from under the cloak.
“I fed her and clothed her and-”
“You stole her!” Harry yelled. “You kidnapped a daughter of my house. You would have forced her into a farce of a marriage. Against her will. Without permission from her Head of House.” The man finally seemed to grasp the severity of the situation. “I should remove your head from your shoulders, for the insult you’ve done her. The insult to our House. The only reason I haven’t, is because she is uninjured. If you’d hurt her, you’d already be dead.” The last two sentences were said in the same flat, hard voice that he used when things were life-threateningly bad.
The man shrank back from it, slumping against the table, all the fight gone out of him.
“Harry, can we leave now? Please?” Lavender’s voice was trembling, but so far, she was holding her nerve.
“Stay behind me and back towards the door.”
“We shall walk with you, dwarf.” The two women said. “We knew something was wrong and we did nothing to find out what, or to help her. For that, we are sorry.” The two women walked, one on each side of Lavender as she and Harry moved back to the door at the front of the building.
“Master dwarf?” The Man who’d earlier denied being involved, spoke.
“What?” Harry voice was still hard and flat.
“Those of us here, we all gathered to watch him force her to wed. We all put up coins for them, he said that she would want to do the buying for herself, so we all put coins in. Take it.” He held up a heavy coin pouch. “He lied to us and we would have let him continue that. Take the coins, use them to buy whatever she needs. We will see to him, he won’t do this again. You have our word on that.”
Harry studied the man for a few seconds before nodding, sharply. The Man handed the pouch to one of the old women, who handed it to Lavender. She held it in hands that already clutched Harry’s cloak closed, around her trembling body.
“You three should go outside.” Harry said.
“Master dwarf?”
“I plan to lock the doors, no-one will be able to leave for an hour.” Harry said.
“As you say, Master dwarf.” The Man quickly left the building, followed by Lavender, the two women and lastly, by Harry. As he cleared the doors, he pulled them closed and with his back to the others, let his wand fall into his hand and quickly cast a temporary locking charm.
“Up in the cart, Lavender.” Harry voice softened when he spoke to her. “There’s a blanket there, wrap up in that and hold it tight. Once we start it will be a while before we stop, I won’t stop in this town, not for anything.” He gestured to Onyx and the sulky.
“The further we are from here, the better.” Lavender agreed.
“Ladies, Sir? I thank you for your honesty and for your courage in standing up, today. The House of Gryffindor thanks you.” Harry gave them each a slight bow and once Lavender was up in the sulky, he quickly joined her. “Onyx, move out.” He picked up the reins, but the black mare had heard her person speak and she was already in motion, he guided her in a U-turn and clicked to her. “Pick it up, chop, chop.” Within seconds they were trotting back towards town, away from the building and its locked doors.
As they passed through the rest of town, Lavender glanced at Harry. “I died, didn’t I?” She asked. “I remember Greyback attacking me, I remember him biting me. I died, didn’t I?” She repeated.
“You did.” Harry nodded. “But you didn’t stay dead.”
“How? Why?”
“I don’t know.” Harry told her. “All I know is that you and Fred are alive and the three of us aren’t the only Hogwarts trained magicals in middle-earth.”
“Middle-earth?” Lavender asked, blinking. “My Uncle used tell us stories of a place called middle-earth. Stories about halflings?”
“Hobbits are not half of anything, Lavender. To call them halflings, is like calling Ravenclaws, know-it-alls. Not really that accurate and rather derogatory.” Harry corrected.
“Hob… His stories are true?!” Lavender exclaimed.
“I don’t know if true is the right word, but we’re in middle-earth. Whether this is real or whether it’s just our afterlife, the next big adventure like Dumbledore said? It doesn’t matter. We’re here and staying here.”
“Okay.” She blinked a few times and nodded.
“So we need to make lives for ourselves.”
“Ourselves? Who are 'we', I mean besides you and me?”
“Give me five before I start explaining, I need to know roughly where our next pick up is.”
“Pick up?”
“Yeah, like I said, there’s more than just us and I need to know roughly where they are, before we leave town.” He slowed Onyx to a walk and let his wand slide into his hands. First, he cancelled the compulsion on the mare, then let his wand sit flat on his hand. “Ad illud the nearest Hogwarts trained magical that isn’t myself, Lavender or Fred.” His wand spun and pointed perhaps ten degrees east of north. For the next few minutes he worked to narrow down the distance and to try and work out who it was.
“Right. So Colin is next and he’s somewhere in Minas Tirith and... oh crap, is he going to be hard to find in there.”
“Minas Tirith?” Lavender asked. “What’s that?”
“It’s a city, national capital of Gondor. About the same size as… I don’t know... I think it’s got about forty or fifty-thousand people living there.”
“Fify thou…” Lavender gasped. “Harry that’s as big as the entire wizarding world in Britain!”
“I know…” Harry groaned. “That’s why I said it’s going to be hard to find him.”
“Can't you send him a Patronus? I know you can cast one.”
“I could, but the problem is keeping muggles from seeing it. It could put him in a lot of danger if the wrong person sees it.” He shrugged. “I’d much rather get to the city and try and find him before resorting to a Patronus. At least that way, we’ll be there and can use magic to… maybe not hide us, but camouflage us, until we can get out of the city.”
“Okay. You seem to know what you’re doing.”
“Humph.” Harry grunted. “I’m pretty much making this up as I go along. I mean sure, I have a vague idea but… I’m not Hermione… Plans…? Mine tend to be… Well, you saw.” He jerked his head back the where they’d come from.
“It worked.”
“And for that, I am very grateful. If they’d hurt you, I’d have killed them all. You know that, right?”
“No-one hurts a Gryffindor on your watch?” Lavender asked.
“Something like that.” Harry laughed.
“Harry?”
“Yes, Lavender?”
“Where are we going? Right now?”
“Through town and to the north, Fred’s going to meet us at a camp site, that we agreed on. I have a change of clothes for you, here, and you can change as soon as we stop. But once Fred gets there, we’ll find you some more and a wand and… oh shite, there’s a lot to go over. Just let me get us there, first, okay?” Harry begged.
“Okay…” Lavender pulled the cloak closer and huddled under the blanket. “Will it take long?”
“Ten, fifteen minutes, Lav, no longer than that.” Harry assured the girl.
She nodded and hunched up, either trying to get warm or trying to make herself a smaller target.
By the time Fred reached them, Harry had a tidy little fire going and Lavender had changed into the clothes, that Harry had brought for her. They didn’t quite fit and while Harry had offered to shrink them, Lavender had decided to wait and go through what was in the wagon, before altering them. Muggle made clothes didn’t take magical charms well.
Harry had also explained to Lavender, everything that had happened since Hermione had blasted Greyback through the brickwork of an arched window. Everything. He left out nothing, not even the meltdown that he and Fred had shared, the morning after Fred had tripped into of Harry.
“So, you’re going to be a locksmith and Fred’s going to make wooden things.” Lavender said, once Harry had finished his tale. “What am I supposed to do, all I know is magic?”
“Actually, I was thinking about that and you know what? I have an idea.” Harry grinned.
“Yeah?” Lavender sat up and looked at Harry sceptically.
“Hair things. Clips and pins, things with jewels and gems. Pretty things. Made with ribbon or metal, or combinations of the two. Combs to hold your hair back. Jewellery for you hair. Not actual beads, but jewellery.”
As Harry spoke, Lavender’s eyes lit up and she began to smile.
“I’d have to learn, maybe find someone to teach me…?” She said.
“Or… Fred knows how to turn an ordinary memory, into a training memory. If we can find a jeweller, a human one, not a dwarven one, we can confundus them into giving us a memory of their apprenticeship, then Fred can change it into a training memory for you.” Harry held up a hand when Lavender opened her mouth to object. “The thing with training memories is that while you get the memory of knowing how to do something, you still have to convert that into a physical act. Take archery for example. I had accessed the memory, so I knew how to do it, but I’d never actually used a bow before, I had to constantly tell myself how to pull the string and how far to pull it, how to place the arrow and how to actually aim with it. It wasn’t like I was instantly an expert, I knew the how, in my mind, but my body still had next to no idea what to do with this thing in my hands.”
“Oh…”
“Yeah. So, a jeweller’s training memory will tell you what to do, but you still have to do it. And that’s not easy. You’ll know the what and the how, but making your body actually do it?” Harry shrugged. “Not as easy as it sounds. But it's perfect for transferring information like recipes and business details, which is how Fred and George used it.”
“Oh, okay.” Lavender bit her lip as she thought. “And you think we can get one for me?”
“There’ll be plenty of jewellers in Minas Tirith, I’m sure we can find one or two. And we have plenty of materials for you to practice with.” Harry assured her. “Fred and I have been Summoning all the lost, abandoned or discarded stuff from every town or village we go through. Lots of things. Clothes, books, gold, silver, gems, weapons, jewellery, money, locks, keys, lockboxes. All sorts of things.”
“… ooh…” Lavender leant forward. “And you have the money from the people that were going to watch him force me, to marry him.”
“I kinda wish he’d objected, I’d have liked to have beaten him up a bit.” Harry growled.
Lavender’s smile grew teeth and begam a little vicious. “We should take the rest of his money. Stop him from paying someone else, to kidnap another girl.”
Harry frowned and thought about that. “We could…”
It was at this point that Fred arrived with nine ponies, two carts, one wagon and one very unhappy baby.
“Hey, I’m sorry. I had to put a silencing charm on Teddy as we come through town, he hasn’t really settled since he woke at lunchtime.” Fred said, immediately.
“Give him here.” Harry held out his hands and Fred plucked a clearly screaming Teddy from his cradle slipping him into Harry’s arms. It took Teddy only a minute to realise that Harry had him and stop crying. Once quiet, Harry raised a brow at Fred, who quickly dismissed his charm.
“Harry Potter with a baby…” Lavender shook her head. “Who’d have ever imagined it?”
“Not me.” Fred laughed quietly.
“Or me.” Harry added. “Blame Hermione, she put him in my arms and then pushed me into the Veil.”
“Only Hermione Granger would think giving a teenage boy a baby and pushing him into the Veil of Death, is a good thing.” Lavender muttered with amusement.
“But like pretty much everything else that Hermione thinks of, it worked.” Fred added.
“True.” Lavender shrugged.
“Hi, Lavender.” Fred jumped down from the wagon and gave the girl a quick hug. “You okay? Anybody we need to kill?”
“I’m… Harry stopped it before anything happened and we’re thinking of ruining the monster that drugged me and was going to force me to marry him.” Lavender said quietly.
“Drugged?” Harry spun around. “You didn’t say anything about him drugging you.” He growled. “I should have cut his head off, when I had the chance.”
“Which one?” Fred laughed bitterly.
“Both of them.” Harry snarled.
“Which is why I didn’t say anything. I don’t want you to go to jail for me, I’d much rather ruin him and take all his money. Call it compensation.” Lavender said.
“Yes, we can do that.” Harry nodded sharply. “But not until morning. We don’t want it connected to us. Let him think that the locals have done it. After all, they promised that he wouldn’t get the chance to do it again.”
“Yes, please.” Lavender smiled.
“We’re going to need another wagon, anyway.” Harry added.
“We are? Why” Fred asked.
“Because it’s not proper that Lavender has to bunk in with us guys, not in the long run. She needs her privacy.” Harry said.
“You’re not thinking something big are you, Harry?” Lavender asked. “I don’t want big.”
“I was thinking something about the same size as the big wagon, but divide it in half. You get the front half and Colin gets the back half.”
“Colin?” Fred asked.
“He’s in Minas Tirith.” Harry replied.
“Oh, that’s going to be a pain.” Fred groaned.
“Yeah…” Harry agreed. “But that’s tomorrow. Right now, let’s get Lavender some clothes that fit and a wand. Then, Fred’ll see to dinner while Lav and I try and sort out a bed for her. She can have the wagon, for now, Fred and I will sleep out here.”
“Good thing it’s not cold, huh?” Fred grinned and started pulling kitchen things out of the wagon.
“Do I have to wear skirts?” Lavender looked almost scared at the idea.
“Of course, not.” Harry said. “The dwarrowdams that I’ve met, were fairly evenly split between wearing skirts and trousers. Here, come on up into the wagon and I’ll walk you through what we have and what I saw of the dwarrowdams’ clothing, okay?”
“Yes, please.” They waited until Fred had a table up and was sorting out food, before Harry showed Lavender the inside of the wagon.
“So, half a sec.” Harry swished and flicked and boards moved, followed by a small trunk that morphed into a large trunk. “Let’s start from the inside and work our way out, okay? From what I understand, ladies and mens’ drawers are much the same, only ladies prefer the longer ones under skirts, but they still wear the shorter ones under trousers. And while I think you should look through everything and pick out a few dresses, trousers are more practical for travelling.”
“Okay.” Lavender nodded.
“Next is… tops, corsets, bra replacements.” Harry didn’t even flush, he’d lived in a tent with Hermione and no privacy for nearly ten months, he knew more about women’s clothing and bodily functions than he ever wanted to. “I don’t know what the human women here wear, but the dwarrowdams wear a camisole, with a shirt under a bodice and stays. The bodice laces up in the front with the stays under the lacing, not like the corset that you were wearing earlier. Some dwarrowdams leave the shirt off, if it’s hot or just don’t like them. It’s personal choice. Trousers are slightly more shaped for dwarrowdams than for dwarves, it makes them stay on your hips better. They tend to be longer than what we’re used to and bunch up on the top of your boots.”
“Okay.” Lavender repeated, carefully listening to everything Harry was saying. Clothes were important to her, alright?
“Some dwarrowdams wear pretty jerkins, this vest-thing.” Harry gave the bottom of his, a pull, so she knew what he meant. “Sometimes in leather and sometimes in fabric, usually with embroidery, leather-lace or beads sewn onto them. Boots for dwarves are heavier than for the dwarrowdams, I think I’ve got a couple of pair in there, but I’ve no idea whether they’d fit you or not. Them, we can shrink or enlarge until we can get a new pair made for you. Cloaks are everyday wear here, not just winter. Robes, not so much, but some of the formal stuff looks a little like formal robes.”
“And their dresses?”
“Two pieces, the top half is much the same, but with matching skirts. A little more formal, with lots of braid and lace and fancy trims, some even have jewels sewn onto them, others prefer to have the jewels in their hair or their beards.”
“Beards?” Lavender exclaimed.
“Yes, beards, the dwarrowdams often have beards.” Harry grinned. “Sorry, but you’ve already got wispy bits here.” He reached out and fingered the pale hair in front of her ears. “As you get older that will grow, maybe not into a full beard, but enough to wear jewellery in it.”
“And their hair?”
“Beads are used as a form of identification and to recognise your Craft and what level you are, in the Craft. The dwarrowdams also wear jewels in their hair, not always day-to-day, but on formal occasions? Definitely.” Harry went on to explain how Family beads were placed and how Craft beads were earned and worn.
“So, we can permanently transfigure me some beads for Family beads, but for Craft beads, I need to… trial?” The girl asked.
“Pretty much.” Harry agreed. “I think we should wait on that. Let us get further north. But we’ll get Family beads done for you, before we leave here.”
“Once we have Colin, we can tell people that our parents are gone, let them think we mean dead, and that as you’re the new head of our house, we came to you for protection.” Lavender suggested. “Talking of that… why are you head of Gryffindor and not Weasley? He’s older.”
“I don’t do well alone.” Fred had his arms folded on the top of the wagon’s ladder. “George was the one to make most of the decisions, I just made whatever he decided on, happen. It’s better for me, if Harry’s the boss. Also he’s got experience leading people. From the D.A, from being quidditch captain and from the war.”
“Huh…” Lavender made a pretty little noise. “Okay, that makes sense.”
“Also, dinner’s ready.” Fred told them. “I put the stew together when I stopped for lunch and cast a low-grade heating charm on it, once I had it to boiling.
“Oh, Merlin, I’m so hungry.” Lavender moaned. “They only ate plainest food, no spices or flavouring, at all.”
“Well, come eat, then.” Fred laughed. “I made mum’s curried mince stew with all the vegies.”
Lavender just moaned and made grabby hands.
After dinner the three magicals sat around the fire and talked.
“So, how far are we from Minas Tirith, then?” Fred asked.
“From what I can work out, we’re about twelve miles from the edge of the city’s wall, but we’re eighteen from the gates.” Harry pushed his wand into the ground and cast the Map Making charm, Lavender watching in amazement as the dust shimmered and moved and lines began to appear. Then Harry gestured with one hand as he spoke. “To get there, we have to go through Harlond, it’s the only southern access into the Pelennor Fields, which encircle the city and are the last level of protections before reaching the city walls.”
“And where do we stay? What about the ponies?” Fred asked.
“Livery yards are immediately to the north, inside the first wall.” Harry pointed. “As we’ve ten ponies, one wagon, two carts and are looking to buy another wagon, a cart and possibly some more ponies, in which case we’ll probably have to trade the feed cart on something larger... Anyway, as we have all that, according to Fundin, we’ll probably be given one corner of the yards, all to ourselves. It kind of depends on how busy it is, when we arrive.”
“And when do you think we’ll get there? What time?” Lavender asked.
“I’d say… early afternoon…? Eighteen miles… Yeah, six or seven hours and we should be in the yards.” Harry was fairly certain he had that right.
“Harry?”
“Fred?”
“Instead of trading the feed cart, can I have it and we just buy a larger dray for feed?” Fred asked. “We’d still need to get a wagon for Lav and Colin, but I can modify the feed cart for myself…”
“…ooh…” Harry grinned and leant forward. “No, we trade the feed cart, get you a wagon like mine, you get Flora, Iris, Pearl and Feather. We buy a wagon for Lav and Colin. They can have Hazel and Willow and we get two more ponies for them. A larger feed dray and we get four mountain ponies just to pull that. Plus, two more for my wagon. And we’ll be set.”
“And what about Dancer and Delilah, they’re not exactly heavy enough for a wagon, Harry.”
Harry nodded his agreement. “No, they’re not, buy they will be perfect for the sulky if we need it. Onyx, Ebony, Iris and Feather are almost too big for it. And Flora and Iris don’t like working alone, neither do Hazel and Willow. But Dancer and Delilah don’t mind.”
“Okay, so…Four for Lavender, four for me, four for the feed dray and six for you. That’s eighteen ponies, Harry. Can we manage that many?”
“Once we pick up Colin?” Harry answered. “Yeah, I think the four of us can do that. I mean that’s what? Four each for you and six for me? I managed ten, until Fred fell over in front of me. With a baby.”
“True.” Fred nodded and Lavender laughed.
“You’re never going to let go of that baby, are you?” The girl added.
“Not unless it’s to his parents, no.” Harry grinned.
“I wonder what Colin will make of having ponies?” Fred asked.
“We’ll find out tomorrow.” Lavender laughed.
~~~