Chapter One: Hermione

Hermione Granger was rather pleased with her lot in life. She had a small but cozy flat not far from Diagon Alley. She was the senior member of the House-Elf branch of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, after having completed eight N.E.W.T.S. two years ago. And she was single and loving it.

So when she sat down to coffee and a bagel with the morning issue of the Daily Prophet and read about the latest law to be passed by the Wizengamot, she was understandably irate.

According to Statute 123.5 section A, unanimously passed by the Wizengamot on Thursday, February 10, 2001, all witches and wizards ages 21 through 50 are required to marry within three months. Henceforth, all witches and wizards must marry by their twenty-first birthday. Marriages must be consummated within three days of the wedding. Furthermore, a child must be conceived within the first year.

Divorces may not be granted until five years of marriage has been reached. Divorcees must remarry within a year, unless they have attained the age of 50. Widows and widowers will be given a year to grieve and must also remarry within two years, unless they have reached the age of 50.

The Ministry of Magic has passed this new law due to the sharp decline in birthrates of magical children. In addition, this decline has been accompanied by a marked rise in the birthrates of squibs. If these trends continue, it is estimated that the entire Wizarding population of the British Isles will die out within a century. In order to correct these trends, purebloods may only marry half-bloods and Muggle-borns, and Muggle-borns may only marry pure-bloods or half-bloods. Half-bloods may marry whom they please. Special dispensations may be given for marriages to Muggles.

Failure to comply with the law will result in a fine of 1000 galleons, as well as the loss of choice in one's spouse as it applies. Further non-compliance will result in incarceration in Azkaban prison and the loss of one's wand.

A marriage law? How could the Ministry actually pass a law requiring people to marry? Hermione fumed. If they're so concerned about birthrates, they should give incentives to voluntarily marry and have children, instead of coercing the entire community into it, she grumbled to herself. Take China, for example.

She went over to the fireplace to Floo-call Harry and Ginny. The law didn't apply to them since they had already married a year ago, but she still wanted to know what they thought. She threw a pinch of Floo powder into the fireplace, shouted "Potter Cottage", and stuck her head into the green fire that roared to life.

Hermione saw that Harry was fixing breakfast while Ginny sat at the table resting her feet. She was already five months pregnant. They hadn't wasted any time starting a family. "Morning, Ginny. Morning, Harry," she said. "Have you seen the paper yet?"

"No, not yet. Why what's up?" Ginny asked, reaching for the paper.

Hermione groaned. "I better come over. Give me a sec." She withdrew from the fireplace, ran upstairs to throw on some clothes, and dashed back to the kitchen. Once again she threw some Floo powder in the fire, shouted "Potter Cottage", and then stepped through to her friends' kitchen.

She had only been five minutes, but already Harry and Ginny had read most of the article. They looked up at her as she emerged from the fireplace, identical looks of concern on their faces.

"Well," Harry began. "It may not affect me and Ginny, but I still don't like it. How can the Ministry possibly force people to get married? It has to be illegal or something."

"Yeah, what happens if you haven't found someone you want to marry by the end of the three months?" Ginny chimed in. "Are you just supposed to pull some random Joe off the street and marry him? All to keep from being…" she glanced back down at the paper, "fined and forced into a marriage anyway?"

Hermione shrugged and scowled. "I doubt it's legal, but it'd take months to get the law repealed, and something tells me six months is not enough."

Harry looked at her concernedly. "You are going to try, though, right?"

Hermione snorted. "Of course I am. But I'm not going to get my hopes up." Hermione looked down at the paper again. "So that begs the question: how do I find someone to marry in six months? I mean, I'd at least like to like this unknown man if I'm going to have to marry him and have children with him."

Ginny stood up and went over to the counter. She pulled open a drawer and withdrew a book from it. "Well, we can start by finding out who else this ridiculous law applies to. See who's still single and who's not," she said as she began flipping through what appeared to be an old yearbook from Hogwarts. "Then maybe organize some dinner parties or something for people to get to know each other. You just worry about getting the law undone for now. Harry and I can put together a list of people."

"Right," Hermione said, her mind already focused on the task at hand. "I'd better get to the Ministry then. I'll see you two later."

And with that she turned around and Flooed away.

Three days later, Hermione was despairing of ever succeeding in abolishing the Marriage Law. There was no precedent anywhere in the Ministry records for this law, but there was nothing in the bylaws that forbade it either. She had obtained a copy of the law to see if she could find any loopholes, but so far had turned up nothing. The law was ironclad. She had to hand it to the Ministry, they knew what they were about when they wrote this law.

Unlike their usual law writing abilities, Hermione thought to herself.

She grabbed a quill out of her unruly hair and reached for a stack of papers on her desk. Her work had been piling up around her while she investigated the Marriage Law, and if she didn't get some of it done soon, the head of her department, Amos Diggory, would not be pleased. Further work on the Marriage Law was just going to have to wait.

She sat there for several hours sorting out which house-elves would go to which families on the waiting list—making sure that the families in question had been determined as good families who wouldn't abuse the house-elves—and working on her proposal for house-elf rights that she hoped to submit to the Wizengamot early the next year. Normally, one of her two junior assistants, Jack Sloper and Louise Thompson, would handle the sorting while the other one would pull research for her. However, they were both on their honeymoon, as they had fallen in love and married just two weeks previously. Lucky them.

Just as she was finishing up her second stack of work and about to leave for the evening, Harry came walking into her office.

"Hey, Hermione, how's it going?" he asked.

"I'm okay, Harry. But this Marriage Law is going to be a tough one to crack. They covered everything when they wrote it."

"Great. Well, Ginny and I were wondering if you wanted to come to dinner tonight? You can tell us what you've found out, and we'll tell you what we've been up to."

"Sure," she said, piling some papers and books into her bag. "Dinner would be great."

They walked to the elevators and took them back to the main floor, where they got in line with the other Ministry employees that were queuing for the Floos. In no time at all, they had reached the Floo and arrived in the kitchen at Potter Cottage.

Ginny was stirring a pot at the stove. She looked up and smiled, "Oh, good. You came, Hermione." She walked over and kissed Harry, then hugged Hermione. "Dinner's almost ready if you two want to wash up real quick. I've just got to set everything on the table."

The conversation over dinner was mostly focused on what Hermione had found out regarding the Marriage Law. After she brought them up to date on her current findings, she sighed in frustration. "I'm not ready to give up yet, but I have to say, it's not looking good. In three days of research, I haven't found a single thing to help. That has never happened in all my researches." She slumped back in her chair with a frown on her face.

Ginny cleared her throat. "Well, for now, at least, it looks like you should start considering potential husbands. And on that note, I have good news and bad news for you."

"The good news," Harry said, "is that there are still several people from our year group or close to it who are single."

"The bad news is that most of them are Slytherins," Ginny finished. "Although there are still a few Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws that haven't paired off, and one or two Gryffindors, it seems that there are a lot more single guys than single girls, so you're not going to have much competition to even find a guy close in age to you. If they all pair off, you'll have to start looking for older men, but surely it won't come to that."

Hermione warily asked, "How much older are we talking here?"

"We're talking about men your parents' age," she replied hesitantly.

Ew, Hermione thought, then took a deep breath. "Okay, well, let's not get ahead of ourselves here. Who knows, my soul mate may still be out there and available," she joked feebly. "Show me this list."

Ginny produced a length of parchment with multiple names on it. As Hermione scanned the list, she could feel her heart sinking. She saw a few names she recognized, of boys ranging from a couple years older than her to just having finished Hogwarts. But Ginny was right, most of them were Slytherins. Within her own year group, the only ones still available were Ernie Macmillan from Hufflepuff, Chris Rivers, Michael corner, and Stephen Cornfoot—all Ravenclaws, Ron was the only Gryffindor, and from Slytherin there was Draco Malfoy, Theodore Nott, and Blaise Zabini.

Hermione grimaced as she read the Slytherin names. There were more than twice as many single Slytherins as everyone else put together. She would not marry a Slytherin. Not unless there was no other choice. Surely one of these other guys would be willing to marry her…

She looked back up at Ginny. "Well, start planning, I guess. I have a husband to find." She gave Ginny a fierce look. "But don't invite any Slytherins. I'm not that desperate." Yet, she thought to herself.