(March 5th, 2016: As of the posting of the seventh installment of this story (July 31st, 1987, Part 1) this story is on indefinite hiatus, whilst I work on some of my 'Saint Potter?' universe pieces (some of them much in need of update), post some one-shots, and perhaps push forward other incomplete stories. Time and health permitting, I do intend to come back to this story at some point, however.)

Disclaimer: I am not J.K. Rowling. I do not own Harry Potter.

Note: This story originated on an alternate history site where I post as 'Look More Closely Later'. Since it's on a part of that site which has restricted access, I've decided to cross-post some of the story to this website. This story assumes a version of the magical world in which 'betrothal arrangements' have some legal and social standing in the UK, as of the late twentieth century, and that in late 1979 James Potter entangled his (then unborn) son, Harry, in one. With a Wizarding War otherwise ongoing, as in canon, Voldemort is nonetheless assumed to have gone after the Potter family, as in canon, and to have been 'defeated' by a bouncing Killing Curse due to maternal sacrificial protection on the night Hallowe'en, 1981. Some of the circumstances surrounding this differ from canon, but with both his parents dead, Harry as in canon has been placed with the Dursleys, and has had an experience much as in canon, up until the opening of this story in the early evening of Saturday 25th of October, 1986, when a knock comes at the door of number four Privet Drive...

Further Note: The story, unless indicated otherwise in notes, at the start/end of a chapter, is from Harry's perspective. This story is rated 'T'.

"Nobody is ever going to accuse the Greengrasses of not fulfilling their legal obligations." the strange slightly haughty man said to Harry's Uncle Vernon. "I am here to collect Mr. Potter to bring him to my daughter's seventh birthday party."

It was Saturday, 25th October, 1986, and six year old Harry Potter had been drying up pots and pans – very carefully, lest he drop one and break something – in the kitchen of his aunt and uncle's house, when there had come a rat-tat-tat at the front door.

Harry's uncle had gone to answer the door, and had admitted a man in a smart black business suit, impeccably creased white shirt, and wearing over all of that a swirling black cloak.

And he had on his hands black gloves of something soft and flexible that looked a bit like leather – only not slightly shiny like all the leather gloves Harry had seen up until now were.

Harry probably shouldn't have left the kitchen, but he had been curious about what was happening; they hadn't been expecting anyone for dinner tonight, and Uncle Vernon hadn't said anything about expecting a before-dinner meeting with a business colleague.

Besides sounding haughty, the visitor had a slightly posh accent.

"What legal obligations are those?" Uncle Vernon narrowed his eyes.

The stranger responded by narrowing his own eyes – in a somewhat scarier way than his uncle had done, Harry thought.

"Don't think you can trick me by feigning ignorance. Mr. Potter is formally betrothed to my eldest daughter, Daphne Circe Greengrass. And under the way such obligations work, we are formally required to ensure Mr. Potter attends her seventh birthday unless he is detained by important Potter family business – otherwise any future dowry is increased – as Mr. Potter also is required to invite her to attend his seventh birthday, otherwise any future dowry is halved."

"Vernon. I think that they must be those kind of people." Harry's aunt said, who had in the meantime arrived on the scene, an odd look on her face.

"If you mean upper-class, wealthy, tradition-respecting pure-bloods, certainly." the stranger said.

"Ah, of course." Harry's Uncle Vernon said, adopting his 'calculating' expression. "Well of course you may take Harry away then, although for his safety we haven't told him a thing about his parents, as we were given to understand from the directions that that Chief Warlock fellow gave us that we weren't supposed to, or indeed about this arrangement with your family."

The stranger scowled.

"Albus Dumbledore is perhaps somewhat radical at times with his ideas."

Harry's head was spinning. Having been brought by magic and the stranger (who turned out to be called 'Mr. Greengrass') to this large house (which seemed to be about four times the size of number four Privet Drive), within the past half hour Harry had discovered that he was a wizard, that his parents had been a witch and wizard, and that there was a whole hidden society of witches and wizards in Britain.

He'd also discovered that he was 'betrothed' to the seven year old girl who was currently pulling faces at him across the dinner table of the Greengrass family (that family also being witches and wizards, and it in fact having been Daphne's father who had arrived to collect Harry from Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia's house). Harry didn't quite understand everything that that ('betrothed') meant, but it seemed that before Harry's father had died, he had agreed with Mr. Greengrass that basically Harry and Daphne would get married to one another when they were older, unless there were really good reasons for them not to do so.

And tomorrow Daphne was going to have a really big party, but today – her actual birthday – the Greengrasses were having a small family meal, at which Harry's presence was required.

Not that Harry was objecting to going out like this for a meal and especially not when he saw the plates for what it turned out was just the starter.

He felt a bit bad about not bringing a present, though. He knew from his cousin Dudley's parties that when someone invited you to their birthday, you were supposed to take them a present. Maybe the Greengrasses wouldn't mind because this wasn't a party, and nobody had sent him an invitation beforehand?

"You don't look like how I'd thought you would." Daphne Greengrass said to Harry critically. "The books don't seem to have anything right, except your eyes and the scar."

Dinner was over, and Harry had been left alone in a room with several big green leather chairs, some bookcases and a soft red carpet, with his 'betrothed'. Since the chairs were adult size, they were currently sitting on the carpet, by the big marble fireplace. Even sitting, Daphne was taller than Harry (but she was quite a bit older), and she had brown hair and brown eyes. She was wearing a dark green dress, with wide bits of frilly lace around the ends of the sleeves and around the bottom of Daphne's neck. A silvery bracelet was sometimes partly visible through the lace, around her left wrist.

Harry had gathered during dinner that he was famous amongst witches and wizards for something about how his parents had died but which he had survived. He was in books, and some books even had whole chapters about him. Talk about the topic had got somewhat awkward once Harry had made it clear that he didn't know a thing about it – never having seen, much less read, any of these books, and that his aunt and uncle really had only ever told him that his parents had died in a 'car crash'.

"Maybe they've never seen me?" Harry guessed. "I don't think I've ever seen anyone writing a book looking at me."

"They probably would have been invisible." Daphne said. "Because of the muggles." She hesitated, and Harry tried to remember if he'd been told what 'muggles' were, before she carried on: "Or maybe they just made things up. Except for the bits that are right." She furrowed her forehead. "Somebody must have seen you to know about the scar. That happened right before you got passed on to your uncle and aunt, and they're not wizards, so they can't have told anyone." She paused. "Anyone magical I mean. And they wouldn't anyway. Not since they were supposed to be keeping you safe."

Harry bit his tongue, unsure what to say. The whole evening was getting very confusing – especially since he was now wondering if somehow Dudley and his friends scaring off anyone who tried to spend too much time around Harry at school was supposed to be part of this 'keeping safe' business? He was absolutely desperate not to somehow mess up this 'betrothal' thing though, if it meant he occasionally got taken away from Privet Drive to meet these posh-but-not-nasty people, and given nice meals.

Mr. Greengrass had eventually rescued Harry from not-quite-knowing-what-to-say-to-Daphne and returned Harry to Privet Drive, where Harry discovered that he had been moved into Dudley's spare bedroom during the handful of hours of his absence. Harry's aunt looked very nervous about something, and his uncle looked very thoughtful.

Maybe Harry's aunt had been thinking about presents whilst he was away at the Greengrasses' house, and how embarrassing it must have been for Harry to go to someone's birthday meal without having one to take with him. Whilst Harry had been away, she had produced a mysterious package wrapped in pink paper from somewhere, which upon Harry's return she had said something to Mr. Greengrass about 'not having had time to wrap up', when Mr. Greengrass had arrived earlier to fetch Harry. She handed it over to Mr. Greengrass, then excused herself to 'get Harry ready for bed'.

"How exactly are we supposed to contact you to invite your girl to celebrate Harry's seventh birthday?" Harry had heard his uncle asking Mr. Greengrass as Harry was removed hurriedly by his aunt up to what was now suddenly his room.

Author Notes:

At the time of the initial writing of the story, not much is mentioned of the Greengrass family in the original seven Harry Potter books, nor in other J.K. Rowling related sources of which I'm aware. I'm taking the liberty to develop the family as I see fit, to suit the story. In this universe, Daphne, her annoying younger sister (not yet mentioned, in-story) and her parents live in a house at St. George's Hill, Surrey. Daphne's birthday is the 25th October.

Harry's 'Uncle Vernon' in this story is assumed to be relatively shrewd (in canon he is a highly placed businessman, after all) and not to have had any significant experiences of magic at all, prior to the opening of this story. His dislike of magical things (if any) is assumed up to this point to have been a matter of purely something done/said to keep his beloved wife happy, with the consequence that if given sufficient motive, he is prepared to be 'flexible' in his views.

Besides Daphne's parents (who didn't tell Daphne about the arrangement until the morning of her seventh birthday), only a very few people (most of them ex-Order of the Phoenix members) know that the betrothal arrangement exists. It certainly isn't public knowledge in either the magical or regular world. (Daphne's parents have kept quiet about it in the belief that if the knowledge became widespread it could make their family targets for things such as kidnapping attempts by those thinking it would be a way to get at or exert pressure on Harry Potter.)

Harry was a bit tongue-tied and surprised during his visit to the Greengrasses' house, and didn't really say much about himself or his up-till-then-regular 'home' situation.

Oh yes, and as indicated in the opening notes, some of the immediate circumstances pertaining to the Potter family leading up to and immediately after Hallowe'en 1981, are somewhat different from canon. For one thing, Lily was not pleased to discover that during a 'lad's night out drinking' (this was before the Potters were significant Death Eater targets), James had betrothed his unborn son without so much as consulting her about it. She put most of the blame on Sirius, and after Harry's birth insisted on a 'more responsible man' than Sirius as godfather for Harry...