Daphne watched her father being put in the ground with very little emotion. She was satisfied that finally, Harry was truly safe. Harry had a support network now, powerful allies who would protect him from any future threat. He could finish Hogwarts without worrying about men trying to kill him.
The three Greengrass women walked away from the small gathering and towards the apparition point that would take them to the Three Broomsticks, and further back to Hogwarts.
"Are you sure you wouldn't like to come home for a few days?"
Daphne sighed. "I probably should, but I'm not sure it would do any good. I think the best thing to do is keep busy. What about you Stori, maybe you should…"
Astoria shook her head. "No, I want to be near you, Daph."
Daphne nodded. "Ok."
After returning to Hogwarts, the two girls walked back to the Slytherin dorm together. Astoria appeared pensive, something Daphne noticed. "Stori, what's on your mind?"
"Promise you won't get angry?"
"Of course," Daphne replied.
"Do you… do you think Mum had anything to do with why Dad died?"
Daphne paused, knowing full well Isabella had everything to do with their father's death. She locked all those thoughts behind her Occlumency and shook her head. "No, dad died of a heart attack. He worked himself to death, that's the beginning and end of it."
Astoria nodded. "Ok, thank you. I thought you might get upset because I accused mum…"
"I can't deny I'm a bit annoyed. But lots of people are asking questions, there's a lot of gossip flying around. I might be more surprised if you hadn't asked me."
"Ok, I love you sis."
Daphne smiled. "I love you too, Stori."
The two began walking and Astoria grinned. "So, when are you going to say that to Harry?"
"Stori!"
"Come on, I've seen the way you talk about him. Your eyes light up and you start blushing, Tracey has noticed it too. You're in love with Harry Potter."
Daphne's shoulders sagged. "Yes, ok, I am, but he has Granger."
"And? I've seen the way you look at her too, that's not friendship, that's lust," Astoria said giggling.
Daphne's face lit up with a bright red blush. "I-I-I, hadn't realised you'd noticed…"
"Well, I have. What are you going to do about it?" Astoria asked.
"I'm… not sure. I suppose I need to talk to them about it, I have no idea whether they'd be even interested. Hermione Granger is a bit possessive of her boyfriend, I don't know if you've noticed."
"I noticed, but the way she looks at you, I don't think that's something you have to worry about," Astoria said with a knowing grin.
"More of your observation skills?" Daphne asked, to which Astoria nodded. "I didn't know you were paying so much attention to my love life."
"I've been worried about you, you've seemed so stressed recently. Being around Harry and Hermione seems to make you happy."
"You don't object? They're Gryffindor's?"
"They could be Hufflepuff's for all I care, as long as they make you happy."
Daphne wrapped an arm around Astoria's shoulders. "I love you, Stori."
"You said that already."
"It's worth saying again."
Daphne stopped at the entrance to the Great Hall when she saw Harry approaching. In the few days since the funeral, Daphne had been keeping to herself, and had forgone joining her two Gryffindor friends for meals. Despite Astoria's assurances, she was worried any advances would destroy her friendship with them. Unfortunately she couldn't put it off any longer.
"Hey, can we talk after classes, you, me and Hermione?" Harry asked, before she even had time to ask.
"Yes, should we talk in the room?"
"That would be easiest for everyone," Harry agreed.
"Ok."
When Daphne arrived after class, she found Harry and Hermione waiting for her. A chair appeared in front of the sofa and Daphne dutifully sat down.
"How are you feeling?" Hermione asked, leaning forward, her eyes full of concern.
"I'm better now that it's over, thank you."
"I'm glad, ready?" Hermione said, looking at Harry.
Harry nodded, "I think so."
"You're fine facing a monster in battle, but you're scared of a girl?" Hermione asked, with a tinge of amusement in her voice.
"Daphne is scarier," Harry replied, and he believed it. Voldemort could only torture and kill him, Daphne could break his heart.
"While I appreciate the sentiment, I'm not sure what this is about," Daphne said, she wanted to get this out of the way so she could tell them her feelings for them. If they were going to reject her, she wanted to get it done quickly.
Harry let out a long breath, looking at the floor. "So, yeah… um, Hermione and I have been talking and thinking. Daphne, I, we like you a lot, you're a smart and beautiful woman and I've valued the time we've spent together. We'd like it to be more than that, the three of us together in a relationship."
Daphne sat stunned into silence, for a rare moment, she was speechless. Then like the sun emerging from behind a cloud, Daphne began smiling brightly, crossing the distance between herself and Harry in a single leap, landing in his lap and pressing her lips firmly against his. When she broke the kiss, Harry noticed the small tears running down her cheeks.
Harry gently brushed the tears away with his thumb. "You're crying, why?"
"I'm happy, I dreamt about you saying that for years, and it finally came true. I love you Harry, I've loved you for so long… I didn't think I'd end up falling in love with Hermione too."
Hermione's face lit up. "Really?"
Daphne leaned in and kissed Hermione on the lips, she let her hand wander down to stroke her side before returning it to Hermione's face, pulling back gently. "Does that convince you?"
Hermione grinned. "Yep."
Daphne leaned back and rested herself against Harry, closing her eyes. "Can stay here, like this for a while."
Harry smiled and nodded, as Hermione cuddled into his side. "Of course."
Hermione, Harry, and Daphne were sitting together at breakfast. It had been a couple of months since the three had begun publically dating. This had infuriated elements of the Hogwarts student body, but the purebloods who'd had their noses out of joint knew not to cross Sirius. And the Muggles born students knew enough not to cross the boy-who-lived.
"Oh shit…" Harry swore.
Hermione looked up and followed Harry's eyeline to the doors of the Great Hall. There, standing with his mother, was Ron Weasley. "Oh."
"Well, he had to return eventually," Daphne commented.
"I suppose…" Harry replied. Despite being friends before he got sick, Harry wasn't excited to see Ron return. His life had changed so much since the redhead disappeared from their lives. It had gotten significantly better, and Harry didn't want or need Ron dragging him back into the inter-house rivalries that were responsible for so much death and destruction.
He now had friends in all four houses, he'd even managed to become friends with Cho, it had been awkward at first but she was now part of their study group. Daphne and Hermione were taking full advantage of being able to pick the brain of a seventh year.
Ron's eyes wandered around the room, seemingly taking it in before he was led over to the Gryffindor table by Molly. They stopped in front of the three, Molly's eyes showing disdain for the Slytherin girl. "I'll leave the three of you to catch up for a moment." Molly said before walking away.
"Um, hi, I'm Ron," He said, timidly, sticking out his hand for Harry to shake.
"Hi, I'm Harry," He replied.
"Um, yeah, mum said we were friends before I got sick. I don't… I don't really remember. Mum said my memory is really garbled and the doctors said they don't think it's ever coming back."
"Oh, that's terrible," Hermione said, just about hiding her thoughts about how she thought it was actually wonderful.
"O-oh, you're Hermione, mum said we were friends, but you're dating Harry. He's lucky, you're really pretty," Ron said with a smile, he gave her an appreciative glance, but it held none of the vulgar overtones he would have displayed previously.
"You're right, I'm lucky to have two beautiful girlfriends. This is Daphne, my other girlfriend," Harry explained.
"Wow…" Ron said, in genuine awe. "It's um, nice to meet you."
"It's nice to meet you too," Daphne replied, a solid wall of Occlumency hiding her true feelings about Ron.
"Ron, we should go meet your new classmates," Molly said.
"New classmates?" Hermione inquired.
"Yeah, I've forgotten all the stuff I learned, so I need to start again as a first year. Maybe I'll do better than last time," Ron said, sounding genuinely hopeful.
"Good luck, Ron," Harry said.
"Thanks."
The three watched as Ron walked away and into a new life and they returned to theirs.
Harry sat in the Hogwarts Quidditch locker room with a towel over his head. He'd played his last game of Hogwarts Quidditch, Gryffindor's third title in a row, his only championship as captain. He should be out celebrating with the team, he knew a wild party was liable to be kicking off in the common room.
However he was sitting alone, primarily because of a meeting he'd had earlier in the week. A meeting that, ironically, had brought back a lot of memories. Specifically memories from the fantasy world future Hermione had created after being manipulated by Voldemort during his fifth year.
A lot had happened since then, Sirius and Isabella Greengrass had gotten married after a year long engagement. Dumbledore had retired from all of his public roles and decided to travel the world to learn and share lessons in magic. Tiberius Ogden became Chief Warlock, Amelia Bones was now Minister for Magic, and Filius Flitwick was Hogwarts Headmaster, after McGonagall declined the position and had stepped down as deputy headmistress, happy to return to being a simple teacher.
The meeting left him feeling pensive, he was worried what Hermione and Daphne would say. He hadn't brought it up yet, he hadn't even mentioned it to Sirius, despite him and Isabella being in the castle all day.
"Harry?" Hermione called from the doorway.
"Hey," Harry said, keeping the towel over his head.
"Everyone is looking for you, are you ok?" Hermione asked, entering the locker room, with Daphne trailing in behind her.
"Yeah, I mean, why wouldn't I be? We won," Harry said, trying to sound happy.
"Harry, you've been pensive since you were dragged into that secret meeting you didn't tell us about. What have you been worried about telling us?" Daphne asked, sitting down on Harry's other side.
Harry pulled the towel off his head and let out a long breath. "That meeting was an offer to join the Montrose Magpies as a reserve seeker next season."
Hermione's eyes widened as a smile grew on her face. "Harry, that's great! Isn't it?"
"It is, but only if you're both ok with it?" Harry said. "I love you both, and I know that playing Quidditch scares the hell out of you both. And professional Quidditch is another level of rough. I don't want to do this if I don't have your support."
"Harry, what do you want to do?" Daphne asked. "Put aside how we might feel for a moment, what does Harry Potter want to do?"
Harry thought for a moment. "I love flying, I want to keep flying. I don't want to get tied down to an office job or hunt dark wizards as an Auror. I have two passions, my family and flying. I want to be able to enjoy both."
"Harry, you're right, watching you play Quidditch scares the hell out of us sometimes. But you love it, and we love you. We're not going to stand in the way of your dreams, anymore than you'd stand in the way of ours. We'll do this together, as a team." Hermione said, interlacing her fingers with Harry's, she also reached out for Daphne, who obliged and did the same.
Harry smiled and gazed upon his beautiful girlfriends with gratitude and admiration. "Thank you, I love you both so much."
"We love you too, Harry, come on, everyone is waiting to see you," Daphne replied as the two girls dragged him out of the locker room.
"I really wish you'd reconsider retirement, Harry," The owner of the Montrose Magpies said, sitting in Harry's office at Pottermore. It had taken a few years to rebuild, especially given Daphne's high standards, but they'd gotten there in the end.
"Gunther, what else is there for me to do?" Harry asked, waving a hand towards his trophy cabinet. "We've won the English/Irish league multiple times, European cup, I've captained England to World Cup glory… there's nothing left. I'd rather retire now, while I'm at my peak than wait until my talents deteriorate to the point people are wistfully talking about when I was great."
"But Harry, you've got years before anyone starts thinking that… the club still needs you," Gunther pleaded.
Harry smiled and shook his head. "You spent a good deal of money luring Ginny Weasley over from the Harpies to be reserve seeker, you don't need me. The team will win just as many champions with Ginny as they would with me. Besides, think about all the coverage the team will get with the hot and fit Ginny Weasley displayed on the cover of Quidditch Pro. Plenty of teenage boys will be lining up for that autograph."
"Yes, well, plenty of young women line up for yours," Gunther pointed out.
"Ah yes, they do, unfortunately for them, I'm happily married twice over with several beautiful children. Ginny is still playing the field," Harry replied, knowing Ginny was making the most of being young, hot and famous. "If you're worried about me trying to get out of my contract to go to another team, or to Europe or America, I'm not. My life is here in the UK, with my family. I plan to fully enjoy my retirement, maybe I'll pick up some work doing punditry for the Wizarding Wireless, other than that, I don't plan to fly again professionally."
Gunther's shoulders slumped. "There's nothing I can do to convince you?"
"Nothing," Harry assured him.
Gunther rose from his chair and stuck his hand out. "I'm disappointed, but I can't begrudge you wanting to spend more time with your family. You will always be welcome at the Magpies, Harry. Please don't be a stranger."
Harry shook Gunther's hand and smiled. "Don't worry, we won't be."
Once Harry had seen Gunther out, he walked into the living area where Daphne and Hermione were sitting, sipping tea. The two looked up and smiled at him, the children were at school, so it was only the three of them in the house.
"How did it go?" Hermione asked.
"He's disappointed, but he'll get over when the season starts and he sees how spectacular Ginny is as Seeker."
"He'll probably get over it when he sees her in his bed," Daphne muttered.
"You could continue, Harry, you have plenty of time left in your career," Hermione said.
"Yeah, but I want to spend my prime years with the two of you and the kids. Not chasing a little golden ball. I've done it all, it's time for the rest of my life to begin."
The end