Chương 345: Epilogue #2- The End

Cassian had written 'small reunion' in the invitation. Albus had laughed when he read it. Minerva had said, "He's lying." Pomona had said, "I hope so." Filius had asked whether small meant only one explosion, which, in hindsight, was the most sensible question any of them asked. By the time the four of them reached the Great Hall, the noise was already spilling out beneath the doors. Minerva stopped first and listened.

"That," she said, as something heavy struck wood inside and someone shouted not to let George explain it, "is either a reunion or an uprising."

"It's Cassian," said Albus.

"With him those are often the same event." Pomona smiled.

"There's music."

"There's also screaming," said Minerva.

"Happy screaming," said Filius, brightening.

"Usually a good sign." Minerva folded her arms.

"If there is a dragon in my Great Hall, I am unretiring on the spot." Albus's mouth twitched.

"Your former Great Hall."

"Mine," said Minerva.

"Mine until I die, and if the castle has any gratitude in it at all, mine for a decent stretch afterwards."

"That sounds legally binding," said Filius.

"It ought to be," said Pomona. Albus pushed the doors open. Minerva stopped dead. There was a dragon in the Hall. Ash was stretched along the far wall near the dais with the certainty of a creature who had long since decided that human architecture was, at best, a suggestion. White blossoms had been looped round one horn. One wing lay folded with care, the other with none at all. Her copper-red scales caught the lantern-light.

Charlie Weasley stood nearby with one hand resting against her shoulder, looking far too pleased with himself for a man indoors beside a dragon. Hagrid sat a little further off, beaming. Madame Maxime, beside him, had long accepted that dragons would simply continue to happen around the man she loved. The Hall itself had changed. The long house tables were gone.

In their place stood broad round ones scattered all through the room in loose, overlapping circles that made it impossible for anyone to vanish into a House corner and pretend not to know the people around them. White roots curved down from the enchanted ceiling, disappeared through the stone floor, then rose again along the walls and between the tables. Lanterns hung from them. Silver leaves drifted overhead. The enchanted ceiling showed a summer evening, though a more flattering one. And everywhere, people.

Former students. Current staff. Old friends. Older nuisances. Children under chairs. Children on chairs. Enough magic in one place to make the Ministry sit down with a damp cloth over its forehead. Near the windows, Harry and Ginny's eldest son was balancing on the back rail of a chair with the reckless confidence of a child who had inherited too much nerve from both sides of the family. His younger sister sat with one leg tucked under her, cake in hand, watching the room.

"If you let her choose the route," the girl was saying calmly to an older cousin as Yrsa tried to recruit both of them into some sort of race, "she'll make you lose on purpose." Yrsa stopped dead.

"Would not."

"You would."

"Yes," Yrsa admitted.

"But artistically." Ginny closed her eyes for a moment.

"I need less honesty from the children in this room." Harry took a drink.

"You say that every year like it's ever going to happen." Harry now had the shoulders of a Head of the DMLE. Ginny's life, on the other hand, ran on seasons, matches, and young players who thought they were frightening until she spoke to them properly. Not far from them, one of Ron and Hermione's boys had dismantled a charmed place marker just to see how it worked. Hermione was listening to decide whether this counted as brilliance or future legal trouble.

"I only wanted to see why the rune knot was arrogant," the boy was saying.

"You said that about the clock," Hermione replied.

"It was arrogant." Ron, half a tart in one hand and complete admiration in his face, said, "He gets that from me." Hermione turned very slowly.

"What part of that gets that from you?"

"The confidence." Their older daughter, who had already taken it upon herself to stop two younger cousins from pouring butterbeer into the decorative basin, looked up and said, "Mum, if I save the table twice, do I get two puddings?"

"You get my gratitude."

"That sounds like free child labour." Ron nodded solemnly.

"Definitely yours." Hermione ignored that. Most of her days were spent arguing with three departments at once so that children she had never met would have better books, and Ron had developed the invaluable skill of making ministry corridors bearable by refusing to treat any of them as sacred. Further in, one of Neville and Daphne's girls was crouched by a pale root with a little notebook, sketching something ungodly, while her sister was eating pudding with a spade. Neville looked delighted by both children.

Daphne looked immaculate enough to cancel out most of his existence by force of will. Neville lived in the greenhouses often enough that the castle would probably have accepted roots under his office without complaint. Draco and Pansy's daughter sat perfectly straight, quietly demolishing a lemon tart while managing to pester Theo's daughter at the same time. Theo's daughter, who had clearly inherited her father's patience for other people's nonsense, answered each question with something more ominous than refusal.

Tracey let it continue for a few seconds, then turned the girl's chin back toward her own plate with one finger.

"Interrogate your own household," she said with a sigh. Cedric and Cho's son was helping a smaller child carry a goblet twice too large for him because he had evidently inherited Cedric's fatal instinct to be useful. Gods help him. Blaise and Millicent's eldest sat like minor royalty, one boot on the rung of his chair, discussing dragon-hide tariffs with complete seriousness. And through all of it, Hogwarts looked pleased.

As if this, rather than silence, had always been the point of building something large enough to hold generations. Kenneth Fowler stood with two cats circling his boots. Amara stood beside him in gold, one hand resting lightly at the back of his neck. She was watching the Hall with amusement, taking in the chaos like she approved. Kenneth said something. Amara laughed and leaned closer to answer. He lit up at once like he'd been given a private miracle.

"You brought cats," said Lee Jordan as he passed. Kenneth looked down as though only just noticing them.

"They followed me." Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work! Amara smiled.

"He still believes animals simply appear wherever he is loved enough."

"That sounds right, actually." Their girl was crouched a few feet away with both hands out, coaxing a nervous kneazle closer in the solemn voice of a child clearly raised around creatures and never taught that fear ought to come first. Pomona laughed aloud. Filius clapped a hand over his own mouth, delighted.

"Oh, that's marvellous." Minerva's eyes were no longer on Kenneth and Amara. She had found Yrsa, but too late. The younger Rosier child was on the dais with both hands wrapped round the back of the headmaster's chair, one ribbon already loose. The moment she spotted the four retirees in the doorway, she shouted, "Grandpa Albus and Fili! Gran Minerva and Pampam!" and launched herself off the dais at a pace no one had taught her and no one could now unteach.

Cassian made a useless grab for her from across the platform.

"That one," he called, "is entirely Bathsheda's doing." Yrsa hit the floor and tore across the Hall. Albus bent just in time to catch her before she wrapped herself round his knees.

"You're late," she informed him.

"I'm relieved to hear my reputation survives."

"You missed the swans." Minerva narrowed her eyes.

"What swans?"

"Ask Aunty Tonks," Yrsa said darkly, as though delivering a warning. Bathael reached them a moment later, carrying a plate of sugared figs with an expression that made adults trust him on sight.

"Sorry," he said.

"She's been timing people." Yrsa swung round.

"You helped."

"I held the timer." Cassian arrived behind them, sleeves rolled, collar wild, and the face of a headmaster who had long since given up pretending this evening could be managed into dignity. He took one look at the four retired professors framed in the doorway and grinned.

"Well," he said, "look what the castle dragged in. Everyone mind your drinks. Minerva's come to inspect." Minerva folded her arms.

"There is a dragon in my Hall."

"Ours," said Cassian.

"I'm sure there is a u somewhere in mine," said Minerva. Cassian put a hand to his heart.

"That was lovely. Don't worry, Ash is house-trained." Ash chose that moment to yawn, a ribbon of smoke slipping across the floor and singeing the edge of a flower garland. Minerva pointed with raised eyebrows. Cassian winced.

"Mostly house-trained." Bathsheda appeared at his side then, which likely saved him from immediate disciplinary action. She caught Yrsa's escaping ribbon in two fingers and retied it before the child had even noticed. Dark blue robes, silver at the cuffs, the same contained steadiness she always carried into chaos.

"You made it," she said. She kissed Pomona's cheek first, then Filius's, then Minerva's and Albus's in turn. Albus smiled at her.

"You look well."

"I am," she said simply. Cassian glanced sideways at her.

"Show-off." She ignored him.

"Small reunion," said Minerva, taking in the Hall again. Cassian spread a hand.

"This is small."

"Compared to what?"

"The last apocalypse." That got a laugh from three different tables. Tonks crossed the middle of the Hall at that exact moment with six white swans gliding through the air behind her. They had once been napkins. They now had bad tempers and a clear bias against George Weasley.

"That one keeps biting me," George complained.

"You offended it," said Tonks.

"It was a napkin ten seconds ago. How can a napkin get offended?"

"It has a rich inner life now." Tonks still looked as if she had wandered into faculty robes by accident on the way to something more exciting. Her hair was auburn tonight, her sleeves rolled, and three current students were trailing her like ducklings while she showed them how to turn folded linen into moving things without making them ugly first.

"You're overthinking the neck," she told one of them.

"If it looks too much like maths, it stops being a swan and starts being a personal cry for help."

"That," said Minerva, "is not remotely instructional."

"It is in her classroom," said Cassian. Tonks made Transfiguration feel like a dare and a promise at once. Half the reason the castle adored her for it.

"It works," said a nearby fifth-year, with the loyalty of someone already converted. Pomona made straight for Neville and Daphne.

"Neville," she said, already smiling, "have you let the greenhouses out again?" Neville lit up the instant he saw her.

"Professor Sprout." She hugged him before he could brace for it, then stepped back to examine the nearest vine.

"It steals cake from rude people," he said.

"Good." Daphne lifted a brow.

"You say that as if it's reassuring."

"It is," said Pomona.

"It shows character." Not far from them, Luna had developed her own weather system near the Ravenclaw side. Three spoons and a sugar bowl hovered around her shoulders while a ring of students, current and former, watched with the look of people who had realised too late that charmwork was a much larger subject than anyone had bothered to tell them. Luna herself stood in the middle of it all in faculty robes. She had turned charmwork into something stranger and clearer at the same time.

"You don't need to order the kettle about," she was saying.

"It already knows it's a kettle. Ask a better question." Filius made a tiny noise of delight. Luna saw them and smiled.

"Professor Flitwick. Good. The soup tureens are feeling more confident." And just like that, Filius was gone after her, radiating joy so openly it nearly lit the floor. A little way off, Sirius had one leg hooked round a chair and was telling a story with wild and wide gestures that made people at nearby tables lean away in self-defence, which was ironic.

Aurora sat beside him with an expression that said she had long ago accepted that half her marriage involved public performance and the other half involved cleaning up after it. Harry had moved over to them, and Ginny was standing at his shoulder, listening with deep suspicion. Ginny looked at Harry.

"And you wondered why I said he wasn't allowed to babysit." At the next table Remus and Septima had their heads bent over some arithmantic disagreement that looked scholarly until one noticed how close they were leaning in. Their boy was stacking sugar cubes. The Hall shifted as evening deepened. A fiddle started somewhere near the fire. Dean and Seamus had reached the stage of an argument where neither of them needed the original subject anymore.

Lavender and Parvati were discussing decorations with more seriousness than most ministries gave treaties. Padma had one elbow on the table and a running debate going with two Ravenclaw researchers young enough to think they had invented complexity. Fred and George's children were already organising something inadvisable with sparklers. One of them ran past with the look of a child carrying a perfect plan and no supervision. Angelina saw the expression and stood up before it was too late.

Alicia followed without a word. Neither Fred nor George pretended innocence with enough conviction to fool anyone. Yrsa never walked anywhere she could charge. She moved through the Hall like she had every right to be greeted, fed, applauded, and consulted, and to Cassian's great private pride, she was very often correct. She flung herself at people she loved, stole sugar from trays she wasn't meant to touch, and made alliances at speed. Bathael drifted through the Hall as if he had nowhere urgent to be.

He was always where the conversation was best and the adults were paying the least attention. He carried plates for people without being asked. He answered questions with perfect manners. He looked like the kind of child one praised publicly and worried about later. Cassian caught him by the shoulder at one point as the boy glided past.

"What have you done?" Bathael looked up.

"Nothing."

"That answer has a family history." Yrsa, appearing immediately because she could smell accusation at a distance, said, "He told the Hufflepuffs Professor Snape used to award pudding for corridor duelling." Bathael drew himself up.

"I said he may have, under special circumstances." Snape, from across the Hall and without needing any of the hearing the gods had seen fit to deny ordinary men, said, "I heard that." Bathael bowed his head with saintly regret.

"Then perhaps the source was unreliable." Bathsheda, shrugging like this wasn't half of her fault, said to Cassian, "I told you."

"Yes."

"He's subtle."

"He's smug."

"He's yours."

"That is slander."

"Well," Pamona said, smiling despite herself, "I can see how Yrsa became a menace. You've raised her like she ought to own the moon. What I don't understand is how Bathael turned out so well-behaved." Three people within earshot rolled their eyes so hard it nearly became a chorus. Cassian put a hand over his heart.

"Pomona, I'd like it noted that I raise both children with fairness, dignity, and complete absence of favouritism." Bathsheda looked at him.

"You told Yrsa last week that if anyone challenged her authority in the nursery, she should stare them down until they apologised."

"That was sound leadership advice."

"That was over paint."

"Governance begins somewhere." Bathael lowered his gaze in the manner of a child who never needed to defend himself because the room usually did it for him. Pomona looked at him more closely now. Bathael met her eye and offered her the plate he was carrying.

"Fig, Professor?" She took one, still smiling.

"Thank you, dear." Minerva watched this exchange and muttered, "That one is going to get away with murder."

"Not murder," said Cassian.

"Something worse." Bathael smiled faintly and said nothing at all. That, more than anything else all evening, made Albus laugh. By the time lantern-light had fully taken over from the sunset beyond the windows, the younger children had begun to slow in waves. One of Fred and Angelina's boys had fallen asleep under his chair with a paper crown still on. George and Alicia's daughter was stubbornly awake on principle and asking Luna whether clouds had dreams.

Bathael, still fully awake, had informed any children who listened that the roots moved after midnight if one listened properly. Cassian heard that from three feet away and said, "Absolutely not." Bathael looked up.

"I only said they might." Yrsa, already half-asleep against Bathsheda, mumbled, "He said they gossip." Luna brightened.

"They do gossip."

"That," said Minerva, "is not helping." No one paid her the respect of pretending otherwise. At last the noise softened just enough for Cassian to stand still in the middle of it and take the room in properly. The roots overhead had taken on a pale silver edge. The leaves drifted more slowly. The old students, no, not students, not anymore, filled the Hall as adults with children, work, scars, marriages, habits, responsibilities. Bathsheda came to stand beside him with tea in her hands.

"You've not eaten," she said.

"I have."

"Saw you steal half a fig off Yrsa's plate. That's not food."

"It was a very large fig." She took a sip of her own tea and looked out over the Hall with him. She leaned lightly into his shoulder, sliding her fingers through his. Above them, the roots glittered softly in the lantern-light. The End. -- Here we are. The final chapter. 313 days. 335 chapters. Not a single day skipped. Thank you for reading. Thank you for staying. Thank you for the comments, the theories and the support all the way through. I really couldn't have done this without you.

I am working on new projects, and I'll probably post a teaser or two when I can. It may take a little while, though. Life's been a bit busy lately, and I want to prepare enough chapters before I start publishing. But for now, thank you. For all the support.