A/N: This update's a week late. Again. So from now on I'm changing the deadline to Wednesday. Let's see if I can keep to it :) I wanted this chapter to be longer, but since I also wanted to update sometime this year, it's a lot shorter than it was supposed to be.

Thanks to everyone who reviewed! I really appreciate all the reviews this story has gotten, even the critical ones. A small request, though: if you write a critical review, please tell me what it is that you don't like or think needs improvement. It'd be very helpful if you did.

I'll probably skim over second year, so expect the next few chapters to contain a few time skips.

Chapter 32: Narcissa the Matchmaker

It was foolish, it was wrong, to take so active a part in bringing any two people together. – Jane Austen, Emma

Harry had thought it was utterly impossible Quirrell look competent. He was wrong. The new DADA teacher, one Gilderoy Lockhart, was doing precisely that. After the Slytherin second years had their first lesson of the year with him, most of them gathered in the common room to complain.

Well, the ones who weren't blinded by his good looks gathered to complain.

"But he must be a good teacher!" Millie insisted for the umpteenth time. "He's written all those books about his adventures!"

"You do know most of the things in those books are impossible?" Theo said, thoroughly bored. "Especially what he wrote about vampires. I should know; my great-aunt married a vampire, and he hasn't got even one detail right."

Draco nodded in agreement. "He's a liar, an idiot, and if I have to answer one more question along the lines of 'What is Gilderoy Lockhart's favourite food?' I'll murder him."

Harry had spent most of his holidays around Sirius, Remus and the twins, all of whom were pranksters (even if Remus was trying to be a responsible adult now). An idea all of them would have been proud of popped into his mind. He grinned. "Why murder him? You'd get in too much trouble. Why not ask the house elves to take all his hair care products so we can donate them to the merfolk?"

"You're imagining it, Lockhart," Minerva snapped at dinner a few days later. "Why in Merlin's name would anyone steal whatever vile mixtures you put in your hair? How could they even get into your quarters?"

"It's the Slytherins, I know it!" Lockhart insisted. "They laughed as soon as they saw me today!"

"I don't think there's anything odd about that," Pomona said with uncharacteristic sarcasm. "I feel like either laughing or crying every time you open your mouth."

Lockhart hadn't the intelligence to notice the insult. "Why, thank you, Pomona. Women have often told me-"

Severus spared them the agony of having to listen to his incessant prattling by casting a Silencing spell on him. He didn't even notice.

The other teachers heaved a sigh of relief.

"If anyone did steal those concoctions of his, they're either more vain than he is or trying to make an even bigger fool of him than he makes of himself," Minerva grumbled. "If it's the former, Merlin help us. If it's the latter, I commend them. But frankly, I think he's simply forgotten where he put them or something. He's stupid enough."

Severus said nothing, but he gave the Slytherin table – and the group of second years who wore grins that would put the Cheshire Cat to shame – an approving nod.

Sirius and Riddle spent the next few months dancing around each other with a skill that would put many a professional dancer to shame. Their only interactions were when Sirius brought Riddle its food, and neither spoke a word to each other the entire time. It was starting to get on Sirius's nerves. He'd thought the Horcrux Hunt would be over and done with in a month at the most, but Dumbledore hadn't even told him what their next move was yet, and it was looking increasingly like Riddle was here to stay.

The same thought seemed to have occurred to Riddle.

"If I am to be here for the term of my natural life, could you at least give me a book?" it asked him one morning when he brought it breakfast.

Sirius blinked, taken aback. This was the first time they'd spoken since the Horcrux's escape attempt.

"…A book?" he repeated.

Riddle nodded. "Haven't you don't you know what a book is? I'll define it for you, then: book, noun, lines of words printed on sheets of paper bound together. I would like one so I have something to read."

"I know what a book is," Sirius retorted, nettled. "You won't trick me into giving you books of Dark Magic, so you might as well give up."

"I wasn't trying to trick you."

Sirius thought of the books in the house. As far as he knew every single one of them was either about Dark Magic or a description of outrageous pranks. He didn't want either of those falling into Riddle's hands, so the Horcrux would simply have to come with being bored.

Then an idea struck him. He grinned. "I'll get you an entire library if you want."

Riddle looked very suspicious at his sudden change of heart.

"Here are those books you wanted!" Sirius said brightly, setting a large pile of books down on the floor.

Riddle eyed them dubiously. "What are they about?"

"You'll have to read them to find out."

As Sirius left and locked the door, Riddle picked up the first book in the pile (which had the cheerful, not in the slightest bit depressing title of Bleak House. Extremely fitting, given his surroundings) and flicked through it. A minute later there was an outraged shout.

"These are Muggle books!"

It was less than two weeks into second year, and Harry couldn't stand it anymore. Everywhere he went he was followed by an annoying Gryffindor brat who insisted on taking photos of him despite his protests. When he tried to escape said Gryffindor brat, he usually ran into Gilderoy Lockhart, who seemed convinced that Harry needed his help "coping with fame". It was enough to make him want to run away screaming.

That was how he came to be hiding behind a shelf in the library.

"Hello," a voice said behind him.

Spending his holidays around a group of notorious pranksters had done what a term in Slytherin couldn't do. It had made him paranoid. He drew his wand and spun round, jabbing it towards the intruder.

The intruder was a small, blonde Ravenclaw girl who gave him a vague sort of smile. She didn't seem to notice that he had his wand aimed between her eyes. "Are you looking for the Mously Crinders? I've noticed they tend to prefer the Arithmancy shelves."

"Er," said Harry eloquently. What on Earth was a Mously Crinder and why would he be looking for one?

The girl didn't look at all fazed by his inability to reply. "You're Harry Potter, aren't you? I'm Luna Lovegood."

"Pleased to meet you," Harry said politely. Odd though this girl was, she hadn't done anything to warrant him being rude to her.

"Don't worry about it; they'll stop chasing you when they realise you're really very ordinary," Luna said as if they were old friends in the middle of a conversation that had been interrupted, and she was returning to the original subject. "Or when the Nargles lose interest in them."

Harry smiled and nodded, and gave up hope of having an intelligible conversation with her.

Sirius finally found an opportunity of confronting Narcissa about her matrimonial plans for Draco and Harry. He received an invitation to a party at the Ministry of Magic in honour of Cornelius Fudge. He knew it was the sort of invitation people sent out to be polite, not because they wanted the invited person to come. He accepted anyway, because he knew the Malfoys would be there and this would give him a chance to dissuade them from matchmaking.

This left him with the problem of what to do with Riddle.

The Horcrux had caused remarkably little trouble lately. He'd made good on his promise to give it an entire library, and now he couldn't take a step into the room without knocking over a pile of books – all Muggle books, of course. As much as Riddle grumbled and made sarcastic remarks about this, several of the previously brand new books now showed signs of having been read several times. Apparently the Horcrux had developed a liking for Muggle horror novels. This should not have surprised him as much as it did.

But even though Riddle had its books to occupy it, Sirius felt that leaving it on its own in Grimmauld Place would be a recipe for disaster. So, he owled a letter to Remus. "Letter" might be stretching it a bit, since this was all it said:

Moony,

Would you mind house-sitting for me?

Remus replied quickly.

Padfoot,

Why do you need a house-sitter? Are you running away from an angry girlfriend again?

Moony,

That only happened once!

Padfoot,

Actually, at Hogwarts alone it happened twenty-seven times. But we've gotten distracted. Why do you need a house-sitter?

Sirius had to put some thought into his reply. As far as he knew Dumbledore hadn't told Remus about Riddle, so although the thought of lying to his best friend left a bitter taste in his mouth, he'd no choice.

Moony,

Someone Dumbledore knows is staying at my house for a few days. I'm going to a party and need someone to watch him.

Padfoot,

I know you're lying.

Moony,

I'm sorry. I'll tell you everything soon, I promise.

Sirius regretted his decision to accept the invitation less than a minute after arriving. The Malfoys were there, all right, and so were at least fifty other people who should be arrested for Dark magic, supporting You-Know-Who, blood prejudice, or just being intolerable bores. That meant that the vast majority of people in the room were people he loathed. He'd never envied Remus, who he had left sitting in the living room of Grimmauld Place and doing a crossword puzzle, more than he did now. But it was too late to get out of it now. He gritted his teeth and tried to make himself as inconspicuous as possible while finding some way of speaking to Narcissa.

She saved him a lot of trouble by approaching him almost as soon as she saw him.

"How good to see you, cousin," she said with patent insincerity after casting a privacy spell. "I hope you've recovered from your ordeal."

Sirius muttered something incomprehensible. Which ordeal was she talking about? he wondered. Having to live with Riddle or having to let his godson go back to Hogwarts while a certain rat was scurrying somewhere around Britain? She couldn't be referring to Azkaban; not even Narcissa, who like all well-bred pureblood women was queen of the understatement, could call that an "ordeal". Luckily she didn't seem to want a response. She continued talking, and he waited impatiently for an opportunity to bring up the subject of Harry and Draco.

He didn't have to. She brought it up without any prompting.

"I believe you know that Lucius and I have a daughter?"

"Harry's mentioned her," Sirius said, which was perfectly true. There had been at least one day during the holidays when Harry had talked for hours about nothing but what Draco had done or said. Everyone within hearing range had been well and truly sick of hearing about Draco by the time he moved onto another subject.

Narcissa nodded as if she'd expected as much. "She is much the same age as Harry, and they are in the same year. They must spend a great deal of time around each other."

"Stop right there, Narcissa," Sirius warned. "I know where this is going. You want Harry to marry your daughter."

"Not to marry her – yet," Narcissa corrected. "But to become engaged to her, and to marry her when they're seventeen or so."

"No."

She raised an eyebrow. "And what reason do you have for refusing to even consider the idea?"

"One: they're twelve. They're too young to be engaged. Two: you haven't considered what they think about it. Three: why did you even think of it in the first place? I don't think your Death Eater friends would like it if your daughter married a half-blood, especially a half-blood who defeated You-Know-Who?"

"They aren't too young to be engaged. You've spent too much time around," she shuddered as if the word left a bad taste in her mouth, "Muggleborns. I'm sure they'll both come round to the idea in time. And to address your third point, if Draco became engaged to the saviour of the Wizarding world, the Malfoys would regain the respect we lost. Now, if you'll excuse me, cousin, Lucius will be wondering where I am."

She cancelled the privacy spell and swept away before Sirius could even formulate a response. He glared after her.

Never let it be said that a Marauder gave up easily. Sirius would dissuade Narcissa from her matchmaking attempts if it was the last thing he did.