Theodore Nott was sweating bullets.
He was nervous, and who in their right mind wouldn't be in his position.
He could feel traitorous drops of perspiration tracing a slow, icy path down the nape of his neck, disappearing into the collar of his stiff, formal robes. He sat at the long, polished dining table of the Greengrass estate, his posture so rigid he felt like a wooden mannequin that might snap if he breathed too deeply.
He felt like a stiff board.
'Why, why is he here'. he thought. Okay, he knew why, after all, Harry was with Daphne long before he even got together with Astoria, so it would be weird that he wouldn't be here.
Still, across from him sat Harry freaking Potter, Campione, Godslayer, the Tyrant King of Britain, and the man who currently held the fate of the magical world in his palm.
Because let's be honest, Britain was his, the entire magical Britain could go around saying the ministry was in charge or things like that, but everyone knew who was in charge. Harry just preferred to let them do as they pleased, but people knew that if he said jump, everyone would jump, no questions asked.
To make matters more surreal, this was the man who was, without a doubt, one day going to become his brother-in-law.
He glanced at the man, seeing him still looking at him, and turned ot face Astoria. He was so different from Hogwarts. So different from that small kid that the Slytherin had used to diss.
Theo's mind raced back to their first year at Hogwarts. He remembered a skinny, scrawny kid with oversized glasses and a lightning-bolt scar that everyone whispered about in the corridors.
Back then, Potter had been a curiosity, a disappointing legend that didn't live up to the hype. Like, after all the stories, all they heard growing up, looking back, it was a little bit much for them to have been expecting a dragon slaying, princess-saving 11-year-old to grace the halls of Hogwarts just like that.
The kid was not what they had grown up hearing, the defeater of the darklord was no way to be seen. despite the rumors that they heard about him facing the darklord in their first year or slaying a basilisk in their second year.
But then came their fifth year, and the "Boy-Who-Lived" was revealed as a campione, and suddenly it was like the sky was no longer blue.
It was something nobody would have ever been able to say they expected. The stories from their childhood were true, the terror told to scare them as kids turned out to be true, and for those in Slytherin, it was a whole other thing.
Being a Slytherin during Potter's ascension had been a special kind of hell. Pride had evaporated overnight.
Malfoy, once the undisputed prince of the dungeons, had become a liability, a loud-mouthed ferret whose foolishness of being enemies with Potter had threatened to drag the entire house into Potter's crosshairs.
Theo remembered the bone-deep fear that had permeated the common room. Every Slytherin had lived in terror that the Godslayer would decide to "clean house," and they knew there would be no way they could stop him if even half the stories they had heard as kids were true.
Some had come to the conclusion that the only reason they weren't all cinders was Daphne Greengrass.
Her relationship with the Tyrant was the only shield Slytherin had, a sign that Potter didn't hate them all. But that was all just what they speculated, some had even started to lessen the fear they felt, and some had once again started becoming their cocky self but that all seemed to change a while later.
After the Ministry incident and Malfoy's subsequent fall, that terror came back greater than before. Seeing what a campione could do was nothing like hearing the stories, nobody even knew what was happening until the news came the next day, sparking terror in them.
Slytherin recruitment plummeted after that. Parents were terrified to have their children associated with the house Potter liked least, and kids too seemed to beg the sorting hat not put them in Slytherin.
In Harry's final year, only seven students were sorted into the house of the serpent, and every single one of them had cried, full-on, hysterical sobbing, as the Sorting Hat called their names, fearing they were being marked for execution.
Theo had never intended to ever cross paths with the man since their fifth year, always making sure to avoid him.
He wanted a quiet life, rebuilding the Nott name from the ashes of his father's mistakes. But fate was a cruel jester. Astoria Greengrass, bright, loud, and impossibly persistent, had wormed her way into his heart.
He had tried to keep his distance at first, terrified of getting involved with the sister of the Tyrant's consort, but Astoria had a way of melting even the stoniest defenses.
That cheerfulness of hers, that bright smile that always made his heart soften. He sighed. She was just perfect.
He turned his head slightly to look at her. Astoria was laughing at something Daphne had said, her voice like a chime of bells that momentarily cut through the oppressive weight of Potter's presence he was feeling.
Her energy seemed to ground him, a small moon orbiting his darker, more silent world. He had quickly discovered that he loved her, and seeing her happy was worth the psychological torture of sitting at this table.
Potter had been distracted at their wedding, so they didn't really talk much that day, but tonight, his focus was absolutely on Theo, and the man seemed unblinking as he watched Theo.
"Relax," Harry whispered, the sound carrying a low, vibrating power that made the silver on the table hum. "I don't bite."
'Oh, I doubt that,' he thought, but didn't say it out loud. Harry smiled at him, and that only seemed to make it worse as those sharp fangs of his showed in his mouth, making Theo gulp.
The joke did nothing to soothe Theo's nerves. Those intense, emerald eyes, glowing with a predatory fire, seemed to be reading his very soul.
"Anyway, Theo," Harry started, his voice casual yet commanding as he leaned back. "I believe this would be our first actual talk, yes? Not including the blur of the wedding."
Theo managed a stiff nod. "Yes. We never really spoke at Hogwarts. Different houses, the whole Gryffindor-Slytherin rivalry… it didn't leave much room for social calls."
"Fair point," Harry said, locking his fingers together and resting his chin on them. He leaned forward, his gaze pinning Theo to the spot like a specimen under a microscope. "Well then, why don't you tell us about yourself? What is Theodore Nott doing with his life these days?"
It was a blatant interrogation. Before Theo could stammer out a response, Daphne reached over and sharply slapped Harry's shoulder.
"Stop that," she scolded, her voice firm. She knew exactly what Harry was doing, he was amusing himself by testing the boy's mettle, and she wouldn't have her sister's husband bullied at her own family dinner. "You're not Astoria's father, and I'm sure father already gave him the shovel talk," she said.
Daphne turned to Theo with a reassuring nod. She had always liked Theo, he was one of the few in their year who was smart, quiet, and remarkably driven.
He wasn't a silver-spooned brat like Draco, he was a hard worker, and it showed. Since taking over the Nott estate, he had moved away from the old, dark-money investments and into magical infrastructure and trade.
He was making House Nott respectable again, prosperous, stable, and untainted. He was the perfect anchor for Astoria's flighty nature.
Harry let out a genuine laugh, the edge softening instantly as he looked at Daphne. "My apologies, Theo. I forget my 'intensity' can be a bit much for those not used to it."
He says that, yet that smile showed that he hadn't forgotten at all.
The tension in the room broke as the Greengrass parents began to lead the conversation. Lady Greengrass, Cecilia, reminisced with a bittersweet smile about how quickly her daughters had grown.
She spoke of them as toddlers, causing Daphne to flush with a rare bit of embarrassment. Astoria, ever the center of attention, launched into a frantic story about a recent shopping trip where she and her friends had accidentally caused a minor riot over a limited-edition dress.
Theo was frequently dragged into the conversation by Astoria, who would grab his arm or nudge his shoulder to keep him from retreating into his shell.
Harry watched the dynamic closely. He noticed how Theo subtly grounded Astoria's manic energy, and how Astoria brought a spark of life to Theo's shadowed demeanor.
They seemed to complement each other well.
The house-elves served a magnificent dinner, roasted pheasant with enchanted herbs and a wine that tasted of summer sun. As they ate, Cyrus Greengrass tried, with his usual lack of subtlety, to steer the conversation toward "mutually beneficial business ventures." He dropped hints about trade routes and Ministry contracts, hoping Harry would lend his name to a few deals.
Harry dodged every attempt with a polite, cold indifference. He knew exactly what Cyrus wanted, a Campione's backing.
To have Harry's name on a contract was the ultimate form of intimidation, no business rival would dare negotiate fairly with a man backed by a Godslayer. Harry refused to be used as a political bludgeon, but he tolerated the attempts for Daphne's sake. The man was, after all, her father, and it would do no good to be on bad terms with him.
The meal finished, and a comfortable, post-dinner silence settled over the table as they sipped their drinks. It was then that Harry saw the shift.
Daphne turned to him, her posture straightening, and gave him a nearly imperceptible nod. She set her crystal goblet down on the table with a soft clink that sounded like a gunshot in the quiet room. She cleared her throat, drawing the attention of everyone.
"Harry and I are getting married," she said.
No preamble, no soft lead-in, just a blunt delivery that one would have come to expect from the ice queen.
The reaction was instantaneous and absolute. Lady Greengrass froze mid-sip, a drop of wine falling onto her silk dress. Cyrus's mouth fell open, his brain likely short-circuiting as he calculated the astronomical shift in his family's social standing. Theo, who had finally stopped sweating, looked like his brain had simply suffered a critical system failure.
Then came the noise.
"WHAT—!?"
Astoria shrieked. She launched herself across the table with the grace of a caffeinated cat, narrowly avoiding a tureen of gravy, and wrapped her arms around Daphne's neck with enough force to nearly topple the chair. "YOU'RE SERIOUS?! OH MY GOD, DAPHNE! FINALLY! WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME?!"
"I'm telling you now, aren't I?" Daphne said bluntly.
Harry couldn't help it. He burst out laughing.
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