Christmas
With only grief to accompany them, Christmas soon rolled around. It felt vastly different without Molly ringing a bell in front of everyone's door to wake them up. The adults instantly felt her absent having not woken up to the smell of delicious breakfast. The kids however, woke up to the familiar smell of mince pies and cinnamon. The adults, Draco and Delphini included, (they insisted they helped) had distributed the work amongst themselves the previous night so that the kids would have another splendid holiday even without their grandmother. Of course it wouldn't be as cheery but at least they gave it all they had. Draco and Delphini had helped with the decorations; Fleur, Bill and Harry had decorated a tree; George and Charlie had baked and cooked for their Christmas Breakfast (They ran short on supplies to accommodate for the extra people, Draco had insisted that he ran to get the supplies and wouldn't spend the Weasley's money on any of it. Ron began to think that maybe Malfoy had changed) and Ginny and Angelina had knitted everyone jumpers.
Victoire was the first to come down and Aquila last. Everyone had received their jumpers (unwrapped but they didn't care). Aquila was surprised when she was handed a bright red jumper with white 'A' (a bit wobbly) knitted on. She looked up and saw Draco, Scorpius and Delphini with similar expression. Draco's sweater was a Slytherin green with a yellow 'D', Delphini's was the same green but with a white 'D' and Scorpius's was yellow (similar to Fleur's) but with a red 'S'. "Merry Christmas," someone whispered behind Aquila. She turned around pulling on the hem of her sweater as she had just put it on over her thin shirt. Albus was smiling at her sheepishly. He had an oversized green sweater hanging over is body with the same white 'A' as Aquila. The green wasn't like Draco's green sweater but more of a forest green. "Merry Christmas," Aquila whispered back, her stomach fluttering and her heart beating wildly in her chest. Albus looked like a cute, dorky, Greek God. How could one look cute and hot at the same time? Aquila wouldn't admit it to herself though.
Little did she know Albus's insides were squirming. He had just plucked up enough courage to say 'Merry Christmas', now what? He hadn't thought of a full blown conversation yet. His heart started beating faster (Albus thought that had been impossible before) as Aquila reached out her hand and grazed her finger over the corner of his lips. He felt small crumbs roll of his cheek, "Pie crumbs," Aquila quickly explained her actions. He was sure dark pink dust had settled on his cheeks. Had he really been talking to her with crumbs all over his mouth? He ran his hand across his face, trying to remove any more crumbs that might have been on his face. Something wet and cold hit the side of his face. He looked up and spotted Roxanne with a snowball in her hand. He noticed his cousins, Scorpius, Delphini and Aquila dressed in woolen warm clothes. "ANUAL SNOWBALL FIGHT!" She shouted. Albus picked up a bit of snow and crunched it into a ball. He launched it at nothing in particular and it hit Delphini's face. She gasped and glared at him. The fight had begun. They ended up playing in undecided teams. The match was mainly between Delphini and Albus. Aquila, Victoire, and Scorpius were on Delphini's team and Fred Roxanne, Rose and James were on Albus's team. After hours of playing the bunch came back soaked from head to toe, all of their cheeks flushed. "Look at you lot," Charlie said tutting. He chuckled and cast a drying and warming spell over the bunch. Delphini sat on the sofa and Victoire immediately sat on her lap. The others were at the dinning table. Bill instinctively sat beside the couple and an awkward silence ensued on the three of them. Victoire had dozed off from exhaustion leave Delphini to fend for herself. "So," Delphini spoke, trying to break the silence. "You love her?" Bill said with a heavy voice. Delphini nodded almost immediately. His voice had been that heavy since Molly's funeral. She had been buried along with the other 'fallen heroes', right next to a grave that had 'Edward Remus "Teddy" Lupin, April 1998 to June 2001.'
"I guess us Blacks have a thing for Weasleys," Delphini chuckled looking at the dining table. Bill followed her gaze and spotted James and Scorpius sneaking glances at each other, both oblivious to the other one's stares; and Albus and Aquila were sitting next to each other, both had light pink cheeks and both were laughing. Bill chuckled as well and stroked his daughter's hair, "Maybe."
"Shit!" they heard Aquila yelp. Delphini was about to shout 'language' when she noticed Aquila's ring glow red. Delphini's eyes went wide and she quickly handed Victoire to her father before rushing to her sister. Aquila had removed her ring and placed it on the dining table. "What happened?" Ginny asked, scurrying into the room. Ring went from glowing red to a snake like green and the small silver snake on the ring began hissing in a voice, all too familiar for Harry.
"Where are the four of you?" it hissed. 'Parceltongue,' Harry thought. He could understand every word though which surprised him. He thought he lost that ability when Voldemort killed him. Delphini quickly opened her mouth and hissed back, "St. Mungo's. I though Rodolphus had informed you of the incident." "Clearly not! What happened?" Delphini rolled her eyes. Her father only cared because his future heirs were in trouble. "Albus and his crew were attacking Aquila and Scorpius and Draco got caught in the cross fire trying to defend them. They are all resting now but they'll be fine. They wont recover until the end of break though." "They deserve punishments for hurting their future ruler's family," the voice hissed angrily. "They already got it. Crutiatic curses. Forgot how many I gave them," Delphini said a bit smugly. The ring hissed one more time before he glow faded. "What was that?" Albus said meekly. "A ring Voldemort gave us. It help his communicate with us from wherever we are," Aquila explained. "I forgot to tell him where we were," Delphini whispered, smacking her head on the table. Scorpius rushed to stop her. "Have you thought of any new location for our living," Harry hissed, surprising everyone. Delphini remained calm. She knew Harry had had a piece of Voldemort inside him since he was a kid. A scar is always left behind, even if it is a horcrux. "Bill Weasley's place is so far the safest place I could find. I can help build a few extra floors to it," Delphini hissed back.