Order of the Phoenix headquarters was brighter than Kevin had ever seen it. Someone had wrestled Christmas decorations onto every available surface, and the enchanted ceiling dropped a slow, steady shimmer of false snowflakes that caught the lamplight and glittered on their way down. The small tree in the corner was already half-buried in parcels.
"Merry Christmas!"
Glasses were raised. The toast went around the table in a ripple of warm voices.
"Wait —" Hermione caught something mid-sentence and turned to Tonks, leaning forward. "You and Professor Lupin are married?"
Tonks scratched her cheek, pink-faced. She and Remus had been together long enough that the secrecy had become habit, and being directly asked still caught her slightly off-guard.
Sirius, across the table, had absolutely no such problem. He slung his arm around Lupin's shoulders with the glee of a man who'd been waiting for this moment.
"Oh, ages. No wedding though — Moony keeps pushing it back. 'After Voldemort, Sirius. Not the right time, Sirius.' I've heard it approximately forty times."
Lupin gazed at his plate with the serenity of a man who had fully dissociated from the conversation.
"Sirius," Tonks said, in the tone she used when she was two sentences from hexing him.
"He's not wrong," Sirius said, entirely unrepentant.
"Don't take a lecture from someone who's never managed to ask anyone out."
The table turned. Sirius had been one of Hogwarts' great romantic legends once — or so the legend went, anyway. He straightened in his chair, affronted.
"My standards are simply exceptional."
"Your standards," Tonks said sweetly, "are imaginary."
The table erupted.
Sirius recovered with dignity. He turned back to Lupin, who had given up pretending to be elsewhere, and clapped him on the shoulder with theatrical warmth. "When you have a girl, I'm godfather."
"What if it's a boy?"
"Then you'll need to find someone else. I want a goddaughter."
"You're impossible," Lupin said, but he was smiling.
Hermione had stopped listening. She'd caught a detail — the way Tonks had touched her stomach without thinking about it, the small unconscious gesture of early habit.
"Are you —?"
Tonks nodded, and her cheeks went so pink she was nearly matching her hair.
Hermione made a sound that was somewhere between a gasp and a squeal. Ginny did the same, exactly simultaneously, and then they were both hugging Tonks, who was laughing and protest-waving and going pinker by the second.
Something about new life coming into the world — especially here, in the middle of a war that had ground on for years — hit everyone differently. Even the older Order members who'd seen too much to be easily moved seemed lighter for a few minutes.
Mrs. Weasley was already planning a wedding. Harry and Ron had volunteered themselves as best men. Kevin sat back and watched his friends talk over each other in their enthusiasm and thought — not for the first time — that this was the part Voldemort would never understand, and never be able to take.
Then Tonks smiled at him from across the table with the expression of someone who had spotted an opportunity.
"Kevin. Speaking of happy occasions — you and Hermione are practically living together now. Her parents have given their blessing, haven't they? Any plans to make it official?"
Every head at the table swivelled.
Hermione made a noise Kevin had never heard from her before. It was small and strangled and somehow both horrified and not entirely unhappy.
"We're still young," Kevin said, quite evenly. "There are proper conversations to be had first."
He hadn't hesitated, which Tonks noted. She pressed further.
"Well, when the time comes — don't drag it out. She's too good for a half-hearted proposal."
"Of course," Kevin said, still completely even.
Hermione had stopped making sounds. She was staring at the table with the expression of someone who had discovered that the floor of their feelings was significantly further down than they'd previously measured.
She reached over and grabbed Kevin's sleeve without looking at him.
Tonks took pity on her. She turned her smile toward Harry, who had been watching the proceedings with the expression of a man enjoying himself greatly, entirely unaware that the same expression was about to be pointed at him.
The colour drained from Harry's face.
[The Ministry of Magic Strongly Condemns Gringotts for Misappropriation of Wizard Vault Assets!]
[Gringotts Responds: Goblins Never Break Their Contracts!]
The headlines were all over the Daily Prophet a few days after Christmas. The Ministry had gone to seize a dead prisoner's vault by proper legal process, and Gringotts had told them — politely, then less politely — that there was nothing left to seize.
Each side held its position. The Ministry accused the goblins of looting the vault after Bellatrix's death. The goblins stated that the vault had been closed by its owner personally, a month prior, and that they had the records to prove it. Both parties knew neither could force the issue without setting off a diplomatic incident that would hurt everyone.
Gringotts' final statement was characteristically serene: We are happy to continue banking with the wizarding community. We have also been happy without their business before. The choice, as always, is theirs.
Arthur Weasley explained over the remnants of Boxing Day dinner that this kind of thing happened more often than people realised. When a vault owner died without airtight paperwork, goblins occasionally helped themselves. They honoured genuine contracts. They did not honour chaos.
The Order read the headlines, noted them, and filed them away.
This story don't stop here, y'all. It never did, not once. More chapters breathing and waiting right beyond this page like a river that just keeps on running. Don't you leave curiosity unanswered, folks. That ain't right.