Chapter 4

The egg just kept screaming at him. Literally screaming. How was anyone meant to be able to concentrate when they could barely hear their own thoughts over the nails-down-a-chalkboard, high-pitched sound emanating from the egg. It was literally driving him insane. He'd tried every single sound altering hex and charm he could find, as well as a whole host of code-breaking spells for good measure, and nothing had worked.

Maybe the point was to actually drive the champions insane, because Cedric was sure that whatever Task was intended to follow stealing an egg from a mother-fucking dragon, needed the participant to be actually crazy to attempt it.

He was going to die.

"CEDRIC! SHUT THE FUCKING EGG. I CAN'T HEAR MYSELF THINK!"

Or be murdered by his old roommates for subjecting them to the sound of this fucking egg.

Cedric snapped the egg shut. "Sorry, Matthews."

"Mate, you have got to find somewhere else to do this. I can't listen to that any longer."

"Yeah, but where. There's no where else with privacy. And I can't do it my other room, cause we all live there."

"I don't care. Give up for all I care. But if I hear that thing one more time, I'm throwing it into the fucking lake. I've got homework I need to do."

Cedric missed when Matthews had cared far less about his grades, although, that was admittedly before he barely scraped through with four OWLs, and spent the summer subjected to daily lectures on his prospects in life if his NEWT grades were similar.

"Alright, alright, I needed to take a break from it anyway." Cedric pushed the egg down to the base of the bed and flopped back to stare at the ceiling.

"Why are you so focused on it? The next Task isn't till February, right?"

"Yeah, but the last one had fucking dragons, so I'm trying to work it out so the next one doesn't actually kill me."

"Huh, fair. Regretting signing up yet?" Matthews actually looked interested in the conversation, which was rare for the boy. He got along far better with his Gryffindor mates than his fellow Hufflepuffs, so although they'd lived together for 5 and a bit years, they'd never developed a proper friendship. Maybe Matthews was just looking to settle a bet though. He wouldn't put it past the other boy.

"For the Tournament, sure. But I got some excellent spouses out of the deal, so, you know…" Cedric shrugged. He figured that if this Tournament didn't kill him, he was certainly set for the rest of his life.

"Merlin, you sure did." Matthew hesitated for a second, tapping his quill against the desk, "So, how big is Viktor Krum's dick?"

Cedric was getting real sick of being asked that question. "Bigger than yours, not that that's hard."

Matthew leered, clearly not getting the hint, "Yeah, I bet you love when it's hard."

"Considering I'm married to him, yeah sure. Not that it's any of your business."

Matthews turned to face him properly, dropping his quill on his half-finished essay. "C'mon mate. You weren't this tight-lipped when you were mooning over Cho Chang's arse."

"Yeah, but I wasn't even dating her then, let alone going to spend the rest of my life with her." At that was it, wasn't it? Cedric had no other options anymore. He had Viktor and Fleur and Harry, and that's it. They were excellent partners, and they all seemed like they brought far more to the table that Cedric did. So, if he had nothing else, he was at least going to be loyal to them. He was a Hufflepuff after all.

Speaking of being loyal, most students had stopped wearing those disgusting badges after the First task, but there were a few Hufflepuff holdouts that he had to go and talk to. Better to get it done with.

"Just, go back to your homework, Matthews, I'm never going to talk to you about my sex life alright."

Cedric stalked to the common room, cradling the egg in his arms as he did so. He was spending more time here than he'd thought he would be, but as a prefect, he had obligations to the house, and his housemates, that he wasn't going to neglect.

"Oi, Cedric, come over and help me with this fucking charm." And there was Gabriel, charming as always. He was conveniently sitting at the table next to the group he had to talk to, so he turned to go and help.

"What's the problem?" He asked, leaning over Gabriel's shoulder to tap fists with James and David.

"This, fucking… I have to use Salvio Hexium to strengthen the hardening charm on a fucking bubble, and give it to Flitwick next class, and I can barely get the hardening charm on the bubble before it pops, let alone keep in in place to fucking…" Gabriel bumped his head on the table, groaning into the wood.

Cedric grinned over at James and David, both of whom were outright laughing at Gabriel. "That's what you get for not doing your homework three classes in a row. You know Flitwick is a hard arse." Cedric dropped the egg on the table, and drew their Charms textbook across the table, to flick through to the right page. "You can't harden a bubble. So that's your first mistake. Flitwick was checking if you've read any of the assigned reading from the last month, and you showed him you haven't." He pulled Gabriel's head up to show him the page he needed to read.

"Ah fuck. Why didn't any of you tell me, you filthy traitors?"

"Not our fault you showed yourself to be fucking illiterate." James rolled his eyes. "Just write the essay you now know Flitwick actually wants, then sit down and do the readings."

David just flicked his eyes dismissively at Gabriel's imploring eyes and kicked his bookbag closer, under the table, similarly showing that he wouldn't be helping.

"Yes, alright, you wankers. I see how far house pride extends, now."

"Oh shut up. You're just embarrassing yourself now." Cedric rolled the egg back and forth on the table, amused by his friends' wary eyes. They'd all heard the screeching enough for the reaction to be justified. "Speaking of house pride though." He turned and sat on the edge of the table, to face the seventh years sitting at the table across.

He knew they were holding out on the badge wearing out of stubbornness now, having seen the results of them being pranked by the Weasley twins. Those two had been retaliating against everyone wearing the badges since they had first appeared. "Hey, Stevens, what's with the badges? I know I asked you to stop wearing them weeks ago."

She studiously ignored him, feigning checking through her textbook for an appropriate quote.

"Oi, Stevens, I'm talking to you. I know you can hear me. Maybe you'd prefer to hear my golden egg again though?"

He heard a quiet "What the fuck, Cedric, I'm trying to study" from behind him, but knew his friends would stick up for him.

And it got Stevens to look up at him, as she, like the rest of Hufflepuff, had heard the deafening screech at least once by now, and in the case of most of them, a couple of times. "I just didn't think it was appropriate for you to be commenting on my attire is all?" She replied, sweetly.

"Sure, except when you've got my name printed across your chest, I think it becomes my problem, no?"

"I think I can wear what I want."

"Well, I don't fucking care what you think, Stevens." He pushed off his friends table to go and stand over her. "You guys are the only Hufflepuffs still wearing them, and I don't care what your damage with Harry is, at this point you're doing more to support Draco Malfoy than me."

"I'm not supporting that little snot." She shot back, outraged. "I just clearly care more about house pride than you."

"I literally compete in Hufflepuff col- look, sure, thanks for trying, but I'm asking you to stop. You're embarrassing the house by continuing to wear something that only Slytherins still wear."

"I'm not embarrassing anyone."

"Uh, you kinda are, Steven's hate to break it to you." Came Gabriel's voice from behind him, and while Cedric appreciated the support, this wouldn't be particularly useful.

"Oh go back to popping bubbles, you loser." Stevens snapped. "Look Diggory, I'm wearing it to put Potter in his place, lord knows the little twerp needs it."

"What the fuck do you have against a fourteen-year-old. When have you ever talked to him?" Cedric asked baffled. "No, you know what, I don't even care. Just stop wearing the fucking badge, before Harry's lawyer sues you or something."

Cedric turned away from Stevens, slapping Gabriel on the back and collecting his egg into his arms again, before leaving the common room. He knew that the rest of the house would force Stevens and her little posse to ditch the badges. Cedric was better liked than any of them, and Champion to boot. Now it would just be Slytherins wearing them, and even then, it was less than half of them too.

He didn't know how Harry dealt with it.

Fleur had been looking forward to having her friends come visit her in the castle, both for the chance to chat to them in relative privacy, as well as give them all a chance to get away from the cramped conditions of the carriage.

Unfortunately, it seemed that her hopes for the visit had been in vain, as her friends spent more time looking around for Viktor or Harry to come into their common room, rather than properly talking to her.

Of course, they were doing it in a typically French manner, acting as if they were too good for the room they were in, let alone the possibility of meeting someone famous, but Fleur was French herself, and could see past their façade.

The girls had left without a sighting of either of her famous husbands, as Fleur had told them both to stay away in advance of the visit. She had no desire to validate her class mates' selfish hopes. If anything, she figured they should be doing their best to make nice with Fleur herself, as that would ensure they could continue to meet her husbands, rather than hope for an autograph, or in the case of a few, a one-off fling behind her back.

How offensively enraging.

If they had no pride for themselves, one would hope they would at least have pride for their school's reputation. Beauxbatons' girls were considered sluts throughout Europe, and it was embarrassing for her friends to be perpetuating that reputation.

Fuck, she couldn't wait until she could leave for university. It would be at least a year until Cedric could follow her, and Viktor wasn't going to give up Quidditch any time soon. She knew she'd need a break after this catastrophe of a year.

"They're gone?" Speaking of, Viktor's voice came from the entryway.

"They 'ave. Finally."

Viktor dropped his bag on his desk and came over to sit in the couch next to her. "… was it good to see them?"

"Eugh. No. Beauxbatons has no Boy-Who-Lived or recent Quidditch champion, so they don't know how to act around fame."

Viktor slung his arm over the back of the couch, drawing her in to lean against him. "Didn't the Italian Minister's son just start there a couple years ago."

"He is not famous 'imself though, it is 'is father. How do you know that though?" Fleur was surprised as not many people cared to know what the children of politicians were doing.

"They hosted the Bulgarian team before a friendly last year. The Minister is very proud of his son."

"Hm. He shouldn't be."

Viktor snorted. "I wouldn't know. We didn't see him at the dinner. Not surprising, if he doesn't quite live up to reputation."

"He is fine. Parents are always happy to brag about their children, anyway. It's not a bad thing."

"I'm sure your parents do the same for you."

"Yes, but I'm worthy of being bragged about." She flicked her hair over her shoulder, before shooting Viktor a cheeky smirk. "Won't you be telling your teammates all about me?"

"I don't know. I think Harry is more worth of being bragged about, isn't he?"

"I am part Veela, the representative of your country. You had better be proud of me." Fleur was almost offended or would have been if Viktor hadn't bodily picked her up and placed her on his lap.

"Слънчице, I will be telling everyone I meet about my gorgeous Veela wife. My team is going to be sick of hearing about you after a month."

And well, what could Fleur do but kiss him. He wasn't the most attractive of her new husbands, that went to golden-haired Cedric, but he was strong, and fit, and gods did he know what he was doing.

He had one hand in her hair, another smoothing over her arse, hiking her closer to him, and, well, she could spare an hour out of her afternoon.

Viktor's good at it, is the thing. Cedric has barely dated anyone, Harry is, well, Harry, and Fleur talks big, but she has little to no experience herself. She knows what people think of Beauxbatons' girls, and she just doesn't need to help that stereotype be applied to herself as well. With the added disadvantage of most boys just wanting to sleep with a Veela – only part-Veela, or not - well, university was meant to be her escape, for a number of reasons.

But Viktor has clearly never had to face these worries, or has, but decided that taking advantage of his fame, and sleeping around wasn't a problem for him or his reputation.

So, yes, Viktor knows what he's doing, one hand down the front of her panties, edging into her cunt, the other around her bare breast, pushing it into his mouth. He's forceful, clearly considering what he wants over anything else, but, a part of Fleur seems to like that.

Or she just likes the feeling of thick fingers pushing into her. "Oh, oh! Mmm, what can I do?"

"Hm?" Viktor grunts, pulling back from her nipple to peer up at her. His mouth is wet, and slightly swollen, and really, sex-flushed is a good look on him.

"What, er, what can I do for you?"

"Nothing. Or, just, let me enjoy this."

And Fleur, she doesn't want to be one of those girls who does nothing, she's never heard good things about them, but Viktor did ask her to. So, she grinds down on the two fingers he has in her cunt and pulls her hands up to rest on his broad shoulders for balance.

"That's it, sweetheart. I've got my gorgeous Veela wife mostly naked in my lap. What more do I need?"

They were lying on the couch after, Fleur barely caring enough to pull her panties back up over her arse, when it occurred to her, although she hesitated before asking, not particularly wanting to show weakness in this instance. "Have you worked out the egg?"

"Yeah." Viktor replied. "Karkaroff didn't even give me a chance to try. Told me to put it in water straight after the task."

Fleur sits up, pushing Viktor's arm off her shoulder. "Put it in water?! I've been casting charms on that egg all week, and all I need to do is drop it into water? What!?"

She pulls the egg off her desk and stomps over to the bathroom, dropping her egg in and turning both taps for the bath. She watches it for a couple seconds and turns to Viktor when nothing changes. "Now what?"

He smiles at her, from where he is leaning on the doorjamb, "Open it."

She eyes him warily. She has spent too much time in the last couple of weeks listening to that awful screech to just trust him on this one. "You'll have to listen to it too, if it starts screaming, you know."

"Yes, yes, put that pretty head of yours under the water and listen to it."

Fleur sighs, reaches under the water, and drops one of her ears into the water, doing her best to prevent her hair from getting wet, or ruining her make up.

'Come seek us where our voices sound,

We cannot sing above the ground,

And while you're searching, ponder this:

We've taken what you'll sorely miss,

An hour long you'll have to look,

And to recover what we took,

But past an hour – the prospect's black

Too late, it's gone, it won't come back.'

Mermish. She should have known. And now she has to spend an hour underwater. In February. She truly does hate this country.

"What are you both doing in there?" She hears Cedric from the main room and contemplates for a minute hiding what she had been doing, but there's no point really.

"Listening to the egg."

Cedric laughs. "Are you sure? I can't hear any infernal screaming."

"Apparently, you just need to put it in water for that to stop. It's Mermish."

Cedric knocks his head against Viktor's shoulder blade a couple of times, from where he is standing behind him. "Fucking Mermish. Of course. And we need to go in the lake I assume?"

Viktor draws Cedric around in front of him, and Fleur appreciates the image they make in front of her, while Cedric blinks at her, and Fleur realises she was still barely dressed, flushing at the view she must have given Viktor when she bent over the bath. "For an hour, yes."

"Ugh. Alright then. Dibs on telling Harry I guess." Cedric, looks over at her egg, still lighting up bath and bathroom with the pretty blue light it gave off. "Do you mind if I take a listen?"

Fleur moves out of the way, over to sit in front of the mirror pulling on a bathrobe, to check she hadn't ruined her appearance too much. "Feel free."

Unlike her, Cedric takes zero care, and just dunks his whole head into the water, surfacing about a minute later. "So, what do you figure they're going to take?"

"Well Viktor's broomstick for sure, although for the rest of us, I'm not sure." Fleur smirks at Viktor in the mirror.

"I didn't hear you complaining about my broomstick earlier." And, Merlin, Fleur is going to have to get better at this. She has a reputation to uphold.

Meeting Bagman had been an experience, because the man had been one of the greats when he was younger. Viktor himself had always looked up to seekers more, but any player in the English league was always going to have more media attention than other players, and when one was a quidditch fan being caught up in the excitement was easy.

Although, Viktor did hope that he managed to age better than Bagman, because the man was currently a mess. He was also gambling and drinking his fortune away and looked it.

Viktor knew Fleur planned on pursuing her studies beyond graduation and assumed that Diggory would follow her for lack of something better to do. Perhaps it would be best for him to actually plan to do something when his career came to an end, which he hadn't thought he'd need to do at eighteen.

Although he'd be pushing Cedric, and Harry for that matter, to learn another language first. Whether they chose Bulgarian or French was up to them, but that they both only knew English was… well, expected, but frustrating. He would like to be able to speak his native language in his own home and would not give that hope up in the face of English snobbery.

He was happy to live somewhere in Britain for the next couple of years, while Harry finished his schooling at Hogwarts, especially as he'd be spending a part of the year working with one of the many English Quidditch League teams that were looking to hire him. But long term, he wanted to travel, and not be bound to this miserable damp country.

He also wanted to get laid, but it seemed like that wasn't happening any time soon.

Harry had pulled further back with what he was okay with doing, and now they were down to kissing, and occasional topless groping. The other two seemed content with what they had done so far, but Viktor just really wanted to get his dick wet. He missed it. Although he was building up a fair amount of dexterity in both his hands, what with all the fingering he was doing.

What was the point of being famous if he wasn't getting laid. And to look at Bagman, it seemed like he'd run out of options from being famous at some point in the future too. Merlin, he needed a drink.

If Dimitri wasn't around, he'd head back up to Hogwarts and see if Fleur wanted to crack some of the champagne she kept stacked on her shelf.

He knocked on Dimitri's room, but was told by his roommate that Dimitri had been out for a few hours, and no, he didn't know when he would be back, so Viktor wandered by his room to collect some booze and headed up to the castle.

He wouldn't give his time at Durmstrang up for anything, but goodness the view Hogwarts made at night, spilling golden light out of hundreds of windows, was beautiful. Durmstrang had its own charms, but really nothing that lived up to Hogwarts.

Fleur was in the bathroom when he arrived, part way through taking off her make-up, and he knew she'd be in there for a while, so he popped open the bottle and poured a glass for both of them before wandering in to watch her go through her routine.

"Thanks, cherie."

"Of course." He watched her retie her hair to properly pull the strands out of her face. "Why do you bother? With make-up?"

"Hmm? What do you mean?"

"You're beautiful, obviously. And Veela. Why do you even need make-up?" Of course, he didn't mind, he loved the smears of lipstick up his cock while she was giving him head, but, well, he knew Veelas didn't bother.

"I like it. Obviously. And a French woman can't be seen to be not trying." She leaned in close to the mirror, slowly charming her eyebrow hairs darker, then flicking her wand a couple times to pluck a few stray hairs. "It's fun to do, and it looks good. Does it have to mean more than that?"

"No, sure. Cheers to that, I guess." He leaned over to clink their glasses together before drinking.

"Do you want a refill?" She nodded, so he walked out to the common room to collect the bottle, seeing Harry sitting on the couch with a book open in front of him. "Hello, Harry. Come join us?"

Harry shook his head. "Oh, Siri says I'm not allowed to drink."

"You don't need to drink. And we can help you with your homework." Harry tilted his head, obviously wondering what they were doing in the bathroom, before acquiescing.

"Look who rolled in." He called into the bathroom, drawing his wand and charming another armchair, this one with space for Harry to rest his book and parchment.

"Oh, hello Harry, how are you?"

"Good, Fleur, and you?" English manners were such a trial, and he was thankful his spouses had given up on engaging him in those kinds of pleasantries.

"I'm fine. Today was somewhat stressful. My parents dropped by for lunch, asked if I knew how much Viktor made in a year, so, that was lovely."

"Seriously?" Viktor interjected. "Why do they care?"

"They don't want the allowance they give me to fall short? They know they can't match whatever Black throws at Harry, here, but they hope to get close to what you bring to the table. Of course, I don't know how much you earn, so please consider this me asking."

Viktor rolled his eyes. "If your parents care so much, they can write my accountant. I have no idea. More than I need." Viktor knew exactly how much he was worth, as well as the broken down value of his various contracts, but if they didn't have the balls to write his parents he wasn't going to make it easy for M. and Mme. Delacour. They didn't need to know his financial situation.

"Harry, what are you learning about today?"

Harry popped his head out from behind the book he was buried in, "I've got to write two feet of parchment on Cross-Species Transfiguration. So, like, animals into different animals. Siri talked to me a bit about it, but I don't know if I can write about the problems."

Viktor drew his wand and walked Harry's chair over next to his. "Luckily for you, I'm focussing on that for the next Task, although, there are differences between animal to human and animal to animal. What's the problem?"

Harry had mostly finished his essay, with Viktor's help, when they heard Cedric come through the entrance way, and then walk over to the bathroom.

"Is this going to be a recurring thing, finding you all in here?" He asked, with a cheeky grin.

Viktor barely looked up from where he was checking Harry's most recent paragraph, ensuring that what he was saying didn't come across too… Durmstrang. "It would seem so, yes."

Cedric hardly seemed to care, drawing his wand, and conjuring up a soft squishy chair. "Have you heard, there's going to be a ball over break, and we are all expected to attend."

"Of course there is. Were you not told at the start of the year?" Fleur asked, from where she was draped over a couch with her own bottle of champagne.

"Huh, no way. Dumbledore doesn't like just telling us things. No wonder we were told to bring dress robes though." Harry muttered, from where he was curled under Viktor's arm, reading his annotations as he made them.

Fleur sat up abruptly, snapping her fingers to draw their attention. "We're expected to go together, of course, but if you all already have robes, how are we going to match?"

"I'm wearing the Durmstrang dress uniform. So, if we are to match, you'll have to match me." Viktor interjected, before anyone could start planning anything. This was going to be a problem for the rest of their lives, whenever they a formal event to go to. Even if spouses were no longer expected to match completely, Viktor knew enough about fashion know that four people dressing themselves could looks ridiculous if there wasn't some kind of theme behind their outfits. But Viktor had been happy wearing his uniform for every event he'd been to in the last couple of years. Perhaps they should hire a stylist?

"And then he was all like, 'Have you tried taking a bath? You know mulling it over in the water', like, what? It was, just, the worst attempt at giving at hint."

Ron and Hermione just laughed at him. Ron managing to recover first. "Yeah, but it helped, didn't it? Now you just need to find a way to breathe underwater for an hour. Easy right?"

"Ugh, no, not easy. Where am I meant to find the time?"

All of Harry's partners had decided that Harry's abilities were fine for a fourteen-year-old, but not for a Triwizard champion, and so he needed to be taught skills that were generally left to NEWT students. They'd tried to have all three of them teaching him at the same time, but that had not gone well, firstly because they all wanted to be the one to teach, and also because apparently different schools taught different methods to do the same thing. Hogwarts was a theory first school, Durmstrang was much more focussed on practical, and Beauxbatons was a mix between the two depending on the subject.

Harry had found he preferred Viktor's approach for his wanded classes, Fleur, of course, for Herbology and Divination because she was the only one to take it, and Cedric for Care and Potions, because no one else quite understood Snape's specific type of vindictive teaching style.

He did spend some time going through work from the intervening years between them, but also a fair amount of time was spent just going through their homework with them, and asking questions as he came across them, or joining any of them when they had the spare time to do additional preparation for the next task.

It had become a nice opportunity to just spend time with each of his partners without any pressure, and he'd continue to do so until the opportunity was removed.

"After all the fuss they put up after the last Task, aren't they going to help you with this one?" Ron asked,

"Well both Fleur and Cedric are doing the bubble-head charm, but they can actually swim, so that's fine for them, and Viktor is turning into a shark apparently. So, none of that helps me." Harry sighed. "On my own for this one again. Siri said he'd look into it."

"Well they aren't going to let you die, so I'm sure something will turn up." Hermione replied, biting into her toast primly. They're out at the lakeside, where they have most of their meals together. Harry had gotten sick of all the stares and comments and fucking badges from before the First Task, and they just, hadn't got around to moving back to eating inside. Instead they'd gotten better at warming charms and carrying around jars of fire like they had been since First Year, although they could all charm them now, not just Hermione.

"Yeah, I hope so. I'm more worried about the Yule Ball right now, though. Apparently, we have to open the whole thing with a dance."

"Seriously?" Ron snorted. "It's like two weeks until the Ball, why weren't you told this months ago?"

"Because Dumbledore hates us, I don't know. Although none of us knew, so I think everyone just forgot until they were putting everything together." Harry answered.

Harry was learning how to waltz with his spouses, and they were considering somehow switching dance partners mid-dance, although, considering Cedric had never attended a Ball before, and Harry had never learned to dance, that was looking unlikely. As it was, Cedric would be dancing with Fleur and Harry would be dancing with Viktor, ensuring that no one would embarrass themselves too much. "Fleur's all in a tizzy about our robes, because none of them match. She's ordered new ones for Cedric and I, and a dress for her, and is hoping that they arrive before the day."

"Ooh really? Do you know how they are going to look? And wait, why not anything for Viktor?" Hermione turned away from the book she was flicking through to ask him.

"Viktor'll be wearing his schools dress uniform, apparently, so we'll all be matching him in red, or um burgundy, Fleur said, so we don't all look like we are wearing the Durmstrang uniform. My original robes we're green, right, so Fleur was worried about us looking too much like Muggle Christmas."

"It'd be appropriate wouldn't it, for the Yule ball?" Hermione asked dryly.

"I think my new parents-in-law might actually try to kill me if we tried something so plebeian, so I'm going to be doing exactly what I'm told for this, I think." Harry replied.

"Honestly, mate, I want you lot to draw as much attention as possible, so that no one is looking at me and my awful dress robes."

Ron always knew how to cheer Harry up, and that reminded Harry of what he had been considering bringing up all week. "Or, you could just have my robes, as Fleur will be buying me new ones anyway. How about it?"

Hermione snorted. "And with his hair, he'll be able to keep the Christmas theme going too."

Ron grimaced, "Honestly, anything is better than what I've currently got."

"Oh don't be silly Ronald, when Harry gives you his robes, bring them to me, and we'll charm them to be another colour, okay?"

"Thanks 'Mione"

Siri had told Harry that he needed to get to know his various parents-in-law better, and he was sure all his spouses had been told the same thing by their own parents, and so he had been engaging in correspondence with the Delacours, the Krums and the Diggorys for the last month, trying to send a letter to each of them once a week.

Both the Krums and the Delacours were sending letters back in their own language, which Harry had been sure was to force him to show the letters to their children for help translating, but he had instead gone to Hermione, who had showed him a useful translation charm, which had taken him some time to learn, but had proven very useful.

But now he had to work out how to reply to the newest round of letters, considering that he was pretty sure his new parents-in-law either greatly disliked him or thought he was an idiot. He knew that Sirius was happily antagonising all three of the other sets of parents, not caring one whit for their opinions of himself or their future relationship. Unfortunately, Harry, was the one who would need to keep meeting them at various dinners and events for the rest of his life, and so was resolved to at least do his best to make a good impression, so that there was nothing anyone could say against him.

"Er, Cedric, any chance you'd be able to help me with this?" Harry waved his half-written letter at where Cedric was lounging on their coach on the other side of the living room.

"Hm? With what?"

"I'm writing your parents. What do they like to do? I figure if I put in one more question then I'll have a decent letter."

"Er? Making money? Meeting famous people, I dunno?"

Harry rolled his eyes. "Right, thanks. Does your mum play cards or anything?"

"Nah, but she meets the local ladies once a week for an embroidery club. She's always been the one to make my winter cloaks."

"Seriously?" Fleur asked, from where she was reading at her desk. "That's beautiful work. I might have to start a correspondence with her too."

Harry wrote his last question, that that Cedric had mentioned her embroidery, and he was wondering how Mrs. Diggory had started doing it, before charming the ink dry, and folding up the letter to sit with the other two he had already completed for Viktor and Fleur's parents, to send off in the morning.

"So, ah, does any one know if we are doing something all together for Yule?" Cedric asked.

"Yes, my parents will be inviting you all to our house between Yule and the New Year, for you to meet my sister. There will be an official invitation sent out this weekend."

"Great. Looks like we need to brush up on our French then, hey Harry?"

AN: Haven't died yet lol, but now posting exclusively on ao3, so find me over there if you wanna keep track of me

a fucking huge thanks to everyone who has kept reading, commeting, reviewing etc on this fic, despite there being no content in forever. hope this lived up to your hopes

much love

whitsie xxxxx