I'm sorry this took so long, I hope it doesn't rushed.

By the time Ginny got outside, Charlie was pushing Ron with hard strikes to his chest, flanked by the rest of their brothers. Ginny rushed to get behind Ron.

"Don't you see!" Ron was shouting. "The only way you're going to be able to keep them is if you take them back! It'll make you look better than you do now!"

"We're not giving them back! Who's side are you on, anyway?" Charlie yelled back.

"Their families could get here any second—"

"We'll fight 'em!" roared Fred and George together.

"No!" Ron shouted back. "What if something happens? Do you think your girls'll forgive you if their father or brother gets hurt?"

The three foremost aggressors hesitated. At the same time, Bill and Percy came forward.

"Ron's right. I stand with Ron," said Bill.

"Agreed," said Percy.

"Are you joking?" said Fred. "You want to give them back?"

"There's no other logical way," said Percy.

Charlie and the twins glared at Ron. Satisfied, Ginny went back into the house.

"What happened?" said Hermione when she had stepped inside.

"They didn't need a referee after all," said Ginny, wearing a huge grin. "Ron stood up to them all by himself and won."

Despite herself, Hermione beamed. The five other women were crowded around the kitchen table, looking worried.

Five minutes later, the Weasleys stomped back inside. They all looked solemn, yet determined. Without a word, despite the questioning glances from the women, the men ushered their partners into the sitting room, save Ron. Hermione, Ron and Ginny were now the only ones in the kitchen.

"Er—Ginny? Could you, er—"

"Oh, yeah," said Ginny, standing hurriedly and almost running out of the room.

Alone at last, Ron turned to Hermione, who had seated herself at the kitchen table. She was gazing at him with an expression he couldn't recognize. He sat opposite her, looking down at his filthy hands. Close up, she now realized that he looked thinner than before, worn and battered. His ginger hair was sticking up in every direction; there was a hint of stubble on his jaw and what looked like a half-healed bruise around his right eye.

"So. What now?"

"We're taking the women back."

"I see."

Ron was still staring intently at his interlocked fingers. "My brothers are asking them if they want to stay one more night or leave now. Though I'm sure that if… if they feel for my brothers… the way I feel for you… they'll want to stay as long as possible."

Hermione scratched at the wooden table surface. "Bizarre."

Ron glanced up. "What?"

"No matter how weird you are or how angry you make me, I don't love you any less."

Ron traced a knot in the wood with the tip of his finger for a moment, his mouth silently repeating her words.

"Love," he breathed. Then audibly he said, "Does that mean you forgive me?"

Hermione leaned forward and took his chin in her hand.

"Probably."

Their lips met across the table momentarily before Hermione pulled back again.

"You were very brave, standing up to your older brothers like that. I've never seen Charlie so angry."

"Yeah, I swear he was a dragon tamer in a past life," said Ron, chuckling, ears still red from the kiss.

"How did you get them to agree?"

"Logical persuasion," said Ron, flashing his teeth. He offered no more explanation.

"I really am sorry for going along with their plan to kidnap the women in the first place," he said suddenly. "Fred and George bought me a Firewhiskey and things just… spun out of control. One thing I didn't tell you about that day is that I got into a little scuffle with that Harry Potter bloke."

Hermione gasped. "Really?!"

"Yeah," said Ron, looking pleased with himself. He'd won.

"You do know that's the man your sister's fallen for, right?"

Ron's blue eyes widened. "I didn't know that."

Hermione had difficulty reigning in her sudden annoyance at Ron; she didn't want to ruin the night.

"Well, she could have chosen someone better," said Ron stubbornly.

"You don't have a choice when it comes to love."

----------------

The women did indeed grudgingly choose to stay one more night. Hermione spaced everyone out evenly in the house. Ron would share his room with Bill and Percy. Charlie would move into Fred and George's while Alicia migrated to Ginny's and Angelina moved into Percy's with Penelope. Fleur, Tonks, and Hermione would stay where they were, in Bill and Charlie's and the master bedroom respectively. Ron and Hermione were the only ones who could actually fall asleep. The rest of the house stayed restlessly awake, anticipating the dawn and their separation.

But at around three o'clock, the entire house was shaken awake with a flurry of spells and shouting from outside.

The men stormed down the stairs donning robes and jackets and pulling out their wands. The women came just behind, led by Hermione. Bill approached the door first, but before going outside, all of the men, as one, turned on their heels and shouted, "Stay here!" to the women. The latter immediately ran to the windows to watch.

The Weasleys assembled themselves into a line to face the oncoming torrent of invaders. They were all male, all had wands out, and all looked murderous. Though outnumbered two to one, the Weasleys held their ground, waiting for someone to speak.

"Where are they?" shouted someone in the back. Several other men grunted in agreement.

"Where are who?" Fred asked lazily, smirking. Inside the house, the women all groaned in exasperation with Angelina.

"Don't play dumb! We know you have them!" shouted another man.

"Let me handle this!" cried a different man, elbowing through the crowd to get to the front. He stepped over the invisible line, raising his wand, heading straight for Fred. Immediately, his brothers stepped in front of him, pointing their wands at the offender's chest. The other men stepped toward the Weasleys, faces contorted in fury.

"Men!" huffed Hermione, having seen enough and stepping outside, Ginny on her heels.

Hermione and Ginny sprinted right out into the middle of the soon-to-be brawl, Hermione facing the offensive, Ginny facing her brothers. That's when Hermione recognized the man who had attacked Fred.

"Harry?"

"Hermione?" he said, blinking. Then his face became angry again. "I'd forgotten you were the first one they kidnapped."

"They didn't kidnap me!" Hermione shouted. "If you remember, I came of my own free will!"

The rest of the women had ventured out to stand between their relations and their boyfriends. Ginny turned to stand beside Hermione.

"Harry," Ginny said softly. His attention was diverted to her, and for a moment he could only look at her.

"…Ginny?"

His wand arm sank to his side. A few of the men behind him advanced, grunting in confusion.

"Stop." Harry held out his hand, halting his comrades. Everyone was staring at Harry as he gazed at Ginny. The corners of Ginny's mouth twitched as if she was forcing herself not to smile.

Abruptly, Harry thrust his wand into a pocket and pulled Ginny into a hug. The action was met with cries of outrage from his peers.

"You're fraternizing with the enemy!"

"He's not on our side anymore, kill him!"

"Kill them all!"

Harry turned and pulled Ginny behind himself. Ron stepped in front of Hermione and held up his wand. Before anyone else could move, the women stepped forward as one, a glint of steel in each eye.

"You will not touch them," said Angelina. The other women nodded. The opposing men were rendered dumbstruck as the damsels they came to save rose against them.

"Fleur," called a man with a strong accent. "Stop 'zis nonsense and come 'ome."

"I am 'ome, Fazzur!" She retreated to stand by Bill. She reached out and took his hand.

Another man came forward to grab Penelope's upper arm. Percy was right there. "Remove your hand, sir." There were flames in his eyes.

"Craig!" Penelope said, ripping her arm out of her brother's grip.

"Fellows, please!" Harry shouted at the men.

It seemed they had come to a stalemate. The women refused to be taken away, the Weasleys refused to let them go, and the attackers refused to surrender.

Hermione carefully stepped away from Ron's protective stance in front of her, and gently nudged away the hand that had come out to hold her back. She cleared her throat and addressed the assembly.

"Can we please calmly talk about this like the adults we all are?"

The suggestion was met with silence. Harry came to her aid.

"That's a great idea, Hermione. Where shall we sit and talk?"

"I'm not putting my wand away while those animals have my daughter!" shouted a man.

"Tedd!" Tonks strode out of the women's line and at her father. Frankly, Hermione was surprised she hadn't said anything before this. Tonk's anger was menacing to behold.

"Never," she said, poking a finger into Tedd's chest, "call the Weasleys animals again. You only wish you were half the men they are."

Tedd Tonks flinched, but stood his ground against his daughter.

"If you love us," piped up Alicia, "you will respect our wishes."

Another silence followed this statement. Everyone glared at each other.

"Okay," Harry said, glancing at Hermione, the other outsider. "What if we reconvened this meeting at the Leaky Cauldron?"

"We'd leave and they would whisk the girls away again!"

"Wait," Hermione said, quieting them down again. "Only Weasleys can apparate in and out of the Burrow, so they can apparate all of us there together. No one will be left behind."

The men did not like this idea, especially the Weasleys. Hermione glanced at Ron; he nodded at her. She could tell he didn't want to speak because the offenders did not want to hear anything coming from a Weasley.

"Okay, everyone grab onto a Weasley then," said Harry with bravado. He made a show of wrapping his arm around Ginny's waist and pinning her to his side. When this nearly made the men growl, Harry chuckled nervously but didn't let her go.

"Only the men can apparate out of here," hissed Ginny.

"Oh," said Harry, quickly letting her go.

Tonks led her father over to Charlie. The redhead reluctantly held out his arm for them to take hold of. After a sharp look from his daughter, Tedd took Charlie's arm and with a crack the three were gone.

"How do we know that they've gone to the Leaky Cauldron?" said Craig Clearwater. Wasting no time, Penelope dragged him over to Percy. "Let's see, shall we?" A crack and they were gone.

Fleur brought Bill to her father and the three of them disapperated. Alicia and Angelina did the same with their brother and father respectively.

The ones left, who were neither family members nor friends, who had just wanted to come along and confront the socially feared and hated Weasley clan, were told where to go so that they were out of the Burrow boundary and could freely apparate themselves to the pub.

Finally, only Ginny, Harry, Hermione, and Ron were left.

"We should go, before they start a fight and tear up Tom's place," Harry said, looking at Ron.

"Do you think you can apparate all four of us?" Hermione asked him.

"Yes. Are you ready?"

Harry and Ginny both took an arm, and Hermione embraced him from behind. With effort, he turned on his heel and they all felt the sensation of apparation.

They arrived outside the Leaky Cauldron. Quickly, and with great trepidation, Hermione pushed open the door and entered.

It was dead silent. Hermione didn't think she had ever heard the place so quiet. The Weasleys were sitting on one side of a long table in the center of the room, staring across at the family members on the other side. The women were standing just behind the Weasleys. Bill stood when they entered.

"We've come to an agreement."

"What?" said Ron. "We just got here!"

"While you lot were lollygaging around, we came to a decision," said Fred, also standing.

The four who had just arrived looked to the women, then the family members for confirmation. They all nodded. There was no hint of a lie in their faces.

"What happened?"

But just then, the rest of the Weasley-hunting party showed up, barging in through the door of the pub. They brought with them a large amount of noise. Bill moved closer, talking over the racket.

"Let's just say, that barman is one fine negotiator."

Hermione looked over to the bar and spotted Tom slowly cleaning a glass. He grinned toothily at her when he saw she was looking. She smiled back, pleased that he had helped. She turned back to Bill.

"So, what's the verdict?"

Fred and Bill exchanged glances.

"We're all getting married!"

Hermione gasped as all the Weasleys' solemn faces cracked into huge smiles and the women ran over to her and hugged her, jumping up and down. The family members stood slowly and walked over to the other disbelieving men.

Once Hermione had been released from the women's clutches, Ron approached her. Not taking his eyes off of hers, he kneeled.

"Hermione Granger," he said, "Will you marry me?"

"Yes!" Hermione flung her arms around him before he could get all the way off of the floor. She looked over his shoulder at Tom, resolving to wheedle the whole story of his role in this out of him one day.

"You do realize this is where we first met," Ron breathed into her ear. Unable to reply coherently, Hermione squeezed him harder. Before her vision was completely obscured with tears of joy, Hermione let go of Ron and turned back to her future siblings-in-law.

The mass wedding took place in the yard of the Burrow. Hermione had to enlarge it to accommodate the amount of guests for seven couples. The women walked down the aisle in order of groom age; that is, Fleur went to Bill first, then Tonks to Charlie, Penelope to Percy, Angelina to Fred, Alicia to George, Hermione to Ron, and Ginny to Harry. Harry was the only one on the altar without red Weasley hair. It made Hermione giggle.

Once the vows had been taken, and the men were leaning in for the kiss, Hermione thought about how lucky she was to have met this incredibly bizarre and lovely family of redheaded Weasleys. She thought of her new sisters-in-law and all the fun they would all have together. And finally, as their lips met, she thought of how glad she was that Ronald Weasley had come looking for an amah in the Leaky Cauldron that day.