10: Moving On

Disclaimer: This world isn't mine. I just put my own spin on it.

WARNING: There is a reference to a certain document at the end of this chapter, which will not make a single particle of sense unless you have read 'The Ring On Her Finger' (the story which introduces the character of Rose Mraz.) While it is not essential to have read any of the Fairy God-Jarvey stories to appreciate 'The Ring on Her Finger,' it IS quite necessary to read 'The Ring On Her Finger' to appreciate the Fairy God-Jarvey stories. So, if you haven't already, go and read. Reggie and company promise not to move the plot along without you.

Chapter 10: Moving On

"Severus?"

Snape tensed. The last time Hermione had called to him in that tone of voice, there had been a Kappa in their bathtub. He rushed to the kitchen, wand in hand.

Fortunately, all that met his eyes was his wide-eyed wife contemplating a letter. "Love... Have you ever heard of an old neighborhood being bought up by speculators, who update and resell everything?" she asked, the odd quaver still in her voice.

"The neighborhood is GENTRIFYING?" He couldn't keep the incredulity from his voice. "Someone actually wants to buy this...and I use the term very loosely...house?"

"Along with all the others on that street."

"How much are they offering?

"I haven't read that far yet." She scanned further down the page. Her jaw dropped. She couldn't bring herself to name the figure aloud; simply passed him the letter to read for himself.

Soon gravity also defeated Severus' hold on his own jaw. "You've got to be kidding," he finally gasped. "How quickly can we sell?"

Hermione looked at him as if he'd suggested she become an exotic dancer. "Sell? After all the work we've put into renovating it?"

"Absolutely. You won't have to commute every day, I won't have to hide from a lot of annoying Muggle neighbors all day, and we can tell the termites to unclench and let the wood chips fall where they may."

She took a deep breath. "All right... I suppose a visit to an estate agent is in order, then?"

Dealing with estate agents was bringing Severus and Hermione to the end of their rope. At this rate, it would only be a matter of time before Severus cheerfully hanged the next one from it. Diagon Alley was outrageously expensive when it came to residential space, and a magical house hidden in any Muggle part of London wasn't any more affordable.

As for decent Muggle neighborhoods... it was apparent that the ability to make something magically larger on the inside than it appeared on the outside would make a wizard in the housing business very wealthy, indeed, were it not a breach of secrecy.

They weren't about to move into the same sort of building they were intending to vacate, particularly if they only managed to get half again as close to the city as they had been. They both agreed that Knockturn Alley was not an option, and one agent's consistent efforts to steer them in that direction ended in a severing of the relationship with some unkind words and one very creative jinx.

"Well... I suppose it's time to try another agent," Hermione said with a sigh.

"After that jinx, I doubt we'll find any who are willing to deal with either of us. By the way, that was very original," Severus said, watching in appreciation as talking cotton swabs chased the retreating wizard, shrilly demanding that he clean out his ears. "Did you put a time limit on it?"

She shrugged. "If he doesn't get someone to put a 'Finite Incantatem' to it, they should give up in a day or so."

"Whereas we're giving up today, it would seem," he said, deeply disgruntled.

"Should we perhaps try... Tangent Alley?" Hermione asked hesitantly.

Severus was not impressed with the idea. In his day, Tangent Alley hadn't been much of an improvement on Knockturn Alley...it was just occupied by people convinced that they were artists instead of vagrants with paint.

"When was the last time you were there?" she persisted in asking. Admittedly, it wasn't the sort of place Hermione was inclined to visit, at least not based on the reputation. But if Severus was taking this long to answer, he certainly hadn't visited lately. "I thought so. Mightn't it have changed for the better? Why don't we take a look?"

It was shabby, but not 'Knockturn Alley shabby.' More like one part gone to seed, two parts 'lazy/artistic/bohemian/can't be bothered with tidying up.' Wizards and witches in an eclectic mixture of traditional and Muggle clothing sauntered along a narrow cobblestone street that lazed crookedly up the side of a slight incline. No one seemed to be in much of a hurry, unlike the bustling, business-like throngs in Diagon Alley. Nor did anyone seem to have any nefarious intentions, as the skulkers and loungers in Knockturn Alley. Buildings rambled skyward at an uneven variety of heights, occasionally almost or actually meeting over the narrow lane. Others tipped away from each other to admit enough sunlight so as to permit eccentricities like a small tree or flower bed growing through a gap in the cobbles.

"It's rather cute and friendly, actually," Hermione said, cautiously impressed. Intriguing strains of jazz music and the sound of someone evidently taking sitar lessons tickled her ears agreeably.

"It's a neighborhood, not a kitten," Severus scoffed. However, he found himself salivating at the exceedingly tempting smells wafting from a little bakery with pretenses of being French. The coffee house didn't smell too poorly, either.

"Ooooh," they sighed in unison as they rounded a corner. Occupying an entire four-story building was...

"Arbor Librae," Severus breathed the name on the sign reverently.

"An entire building full of used books," Hermione whispered, and their hands tightened together convulsively. "Let's go, luv," she said, drifting towards the front door as if mesmerized.

"Are you daft, woman? We need to find a place to live as close to this wonder as is humanly possible!"

Hermione shook herself free of the spell of bound printed matter. "Of course, darling, what was I thinking? Somewhere in this paradise of fresh coffee and old book aroma, there must be a place for us!"

An hour later, Severus and Hermione were on the verge of a not insignificant row. It had devolved to the point where he was muttering about her 'Gryffindor optimism'...always a sign his less than mature side was making a surly appearance...and she was reminding him tartly that he had been the one to insist they needed to find a place to live on the street, immediately if not sooner. His annoying inner pedant was a breath away from saying something as disastrous as 'I told you so.' The sad fact was that most buildings were either entirely devoted to commercial endeavors or were subdivided into an infinity of little flats to accommodate artists (who, if not starving, were at least eating very economically).

"This is useless. Let's go home and try to come up with an actual plan," Severus said, devoting substantial effort to deferring a fit of spectacularly bad humor.

Hermione had her stubborn face on. "We're almost to the end of the street. Planning hasn't availed us much in our life together so far, so humor me. Let's push our luck once more, okay?"

Severus made a gesture of surrender and followed. He was so focused on his internal grumbling that he very nearly stumbled over Hermione when she stopped short, just the other side of a bend in the street. He caught at her and she clutched his arm in turn, and they found themselves wrapped around each other in front of a very vacant building.

It was similar to most others on the street...three decidedly rambling stories, an octagonal window promising some sort of attic and windows at ground level hinting at a musty cellar, with a storefront occupying most of the ground floor. It was located on a slope, forcing the building next to it to lean slightly away, leaving a walking space between the two. They followed their curiosity to find a small backyard on two levels...one accessed by a door opening into the rooms behind the shop, the other reached by a sort of step-down from a porch/balcony hybrid. A squatty oak and a rowan hedge separated the two yards, both of which ran down to the little willow-lined trickle of water that was the open drainage ditch dividing them from Muggle London.

"Come to enjoy the view of Clearwater Stream?" They looked up to find the owner of the voice to be as elderly as he sounded.

"That's an overly optimistic designation if I ever heard one," Severus said. Hermione elbowed him slightly...byplay which did not escape the old wizard's notice.

"How long have you been married?" he asked, knowing amusement lacing his voice.

Much to her surprise, Hermione blushed slightly. "Almost a month," she said, feeling proud and uncharacteristically shy. Severus tightened his arm around her, without thinking about it.

This drew a full, slightly wistful smile from their interrogator. "I expect you have a place to live, then."

"Actually, our current living arrangements leave much to be desired. We were hoping to find something around here."

"Ah, but it's all flats not big enough to swing a Kneazle in, hereabouts. Not really fit places to raise a family." He knocked imaginary ashes from the bowl of his pipe, but refrained from lighting it, much to both Severus and Hermione's relief.

"No, not really," Hermione said.

The man turned the pipe over in his hands. "Except for this building, of course."

"Sorry?"

Hermione knew she was blinking stupidly, and his tone of voice told her Severus was as well.

"I'm not sure how to make it clearer. This building is available...but only for a family, though a business would be welcome on the ground floor. It was in my family for ages, and I'll see it subdivided over my dead body. I won't move in with my granddaughter and great-grandchildren until I'm sure this place will be taken care of. Sad to say, they aren't the least bit interested in it...at least, not on my terms."

Severus was wary, as usual. "And what would your terms be?"

"I think that's something best discussed over tea. Please, come in."

As they ascended the rickety back steps, Severus whispered to Hermione, "Incredible good fortune, and not a pink tutu in sight."

Hermione kept quiet. If Severus hadn't noticed the damp little footprints trailing after them, she wasn't going to point them out.

Severus tried to ignore the knots in his stomach as he and Hermione looked over their financial records, trying to see if they could actually meet Mr. Russell's terms. He had planned on abstaining from optimism, but this was looking incredibly promising. "I can see one problem: what are we going to do about the shop on the ground floor? Even with the insane amount of money they're offering for our fleatrap, we can't afford to buy the building outright. It would be nice to have the rent to help with the monthly payments." He would rather not mention or use Narcissa's gift yet, if he could help it... but it was comforting to have it, just in case.

Hermione fiddled with her quill. "I was thinking you could have your own apothecary shop."

"Hermione, love...think about that for a moment. Please, by all means, strain your impressive brain and try to picture me as a shopkeeper."

"Well, we could hire someone to run it."

"And thus consume what meager profits we may or may not make. We've been through this. My image isn't that rehabilitated. It likely never will be. The Galleons would come in much more certainly each month if we were to rent it to a successful endeavor."

"I suppose we could advertise in the Daily Prophet for something quiet to move in down there."

Snape was on the verge of agreeing with her when another thought occurred to him. "Actually, I can think of a business that might possibly wish to relocate."

Rose Mraz checked the wards on the front of the store one more time before retreating to the back room to feed Duke. With Granddad finally resting in peace and Mum gone off to marry that silver-tongued Welsh jeweler, the old Oriental Bay-Owl was the only other living thing in the shop. Rose had taken to discussing her day with the creature. She wished she'd thought to ask Granddad why he'd chosen such an exotic species of owl for his familiar. She loved the soft, musical whistling it made in response to her words. It made their conversations seem less one-sided.

"Dobru noc, Dukchek. Not much point in keeping the shop open any longer today."

She could have added that there wasn't much point in keeping the shop open any longer, period. Without Granddad, Mum hadn't been able to stand Knockturn Alley. Without Mum, Rose wasn't sure she could mind the store and create new inventory as well. Mum and her new man were sure she couldn't, which was why they had invited her to come to his shop in Wales. She'd sooner have accepted an invitation to guard Azkaban. Moore and Mraz was Granddad and Otecko's legacy. She wouldn't abandon it that easily.

"You're lucky, Dukcheck. If people look at your face and mistake you for a barn owl, there's no harm done," she said bitterly.

Duke whistled mournfully, as if he understood her reference to Otecko's death. Those were dark days, when Aurors were hexing first and asking questions later...especially when it came to anyone with a Slavic accent.

She considered advertising for an apprentice, but she had to weigh the costs against the potential for results. There just weren't a lot of good apprentice candidates these days, what with custom metal charming and transfiguration replacing the age-old art of coaxing the natural magic of stones and metals to yield to the artisan's will. Any potential apprentice would likely be put off by the address of their shop, assuming that there were any really decent wizards who wanted to be artisans these days instead of getting a fancy education at some Wizarding school.

Wizarding schools. Durmstrang. That was the only thing Otecko and Granddad had ever fought over, to her knowledge. Otecko wanted her to have a 'classical' education to back up her practical training. Granddad had thrown six kinds of fit over a perfectly good artisan wasting her valuable time learning 'fancy magic.' By the time she had returned home at the end of her fifth year, she knew she wouldn't be going back. She'd come to her own conclusions about formal education, deciding that dueling was about all the 'classical' magic she could stand, though she'd acquitted herself honorably in all her classes. Otecko would have objected, except that she also had the excellent argument that she wasn't keen to continue at a school where the Headmaster was on the run from You-Know-Who.

Duke seemed uninterested in owl treats. Just as well... they hadn't may left, and she was loathe to leave the store unattended while she shopped, even warded as heavily as she knew how to ward it. "Do you want to hunt tonight, Dukchek? I worry about you when you're out there, little friend." Duke gave a reassuring trill.

Rose sighed. If she was going to let him out the front door, it wouldn't do to look as defeated as she felt. Knockturn Alley was no place to appear weak. She rolled her sleeves down and smoothed them, then glanced in the mirror Mum had always kept by the door from the workroom to the display area. The owl... the mirror, for last-minute primping... the meticulous files in the basement... little reminders of the family that would never grace the inside of this store again.

She raised a shaky hand to push her hair out of her eyes. "Bozemoj... gray hair. I thought I was too young for gray hair. Aren't I only thirty-one?" Duke climbed from his perch to her shoulder, preening the mousy hairs framing her face.

"Silly owl," she murmured affectionately. Duke gave a sharp squeak at the same moment that Rose noticed the dark shape outlined in front of the partially closed blinds. Even before the silhouette against the windows registered in her conscious mind, she'd shaken her wand from its dueling holster into her hand. Stepping behind the counter, she cancelled the wards on the door and hoped it was a legitimate customer.

The door opened, and she relaxed. He was a repeat customer, and not one of those cheating bastards shopping for toys for his mistress. "Good evening, Mr. Snape. Can I help you?"

"Possibly." He glanced around the shop. "Tell me, Miss Mraz...have you ever considered relocating?"

Arithmeus Tinker, alias Abner Trapp (former accountant for the formerly wealthiest family in the wizarding world), was indulging in his second favorite hobby...casino hopping. This did not preclude him from indulging in his favorite hobby, congratulating himself on having had the daring and skill to pull off one of the largest embezzlements in the wizarding world.

Had he any sense of restraint, he would have stopped there. But someone with the audacity to double-cross Lucius Malfoy wasn't about to shy away from parleying his increased socioeconomic status into a marriage with a wealthy heiress. Who cared that she was plain, and a Muggle? She was susceptible to his charms, easy to ignore, and gullible enough to believe that he was going on trips in the name of some invented charity when he was actually jaunting off to one of his favorite high-roller suites.

Of course, for all his gall, Trapp was occasionally a very nervous man. He'd covered his tracks brilliantly, it was true, but there was always the chance that... well, chance was a gambler's best friend and worst enemy, wasn't it? Speaking of which, gambling was thirsty work. The wares of the frozen Margarita vendors on the street were irresistible on a day like this. Just as he was sucking down an icy mouthful, he made the fatal mistake of looking across the street...right into a familiar pale face.

It had become something of a ritual for Draco and Ginny... popping back to Las Vegas, just for an evening, to stroll under the millions of light bulbs. They had a bit of curiosity to satisfy with regards to the place; after all, they couldn't have described much of Squibtown after their original visit other than the color of their bed sheets. Still, there were certain things that passed under their mutual radar... in particular, the faces of passers-by, even a face that should have been familiar to one of them. The ambulance fighting its way through traffic towards the area they had just passed might as well have been a part of the light show.

It was just as well. Karma prefers to work with a minimum of witnesses.

"I'm terribly sorry, Mrs. Trapp," the officer said. "The autopsy determined that the aspirated ice was incidental. Mr. Trapp actually died of a heart attack, cause undetermined."

He was very kind about giving her information on claiming her husband's body and whatnot. Leocadia Slade Trapp thanked the nice young man, showed him out the door, and all the while revealed no trace of shock at discovering where her late husband had actually been and what he had been doing. Then, she strode purposefully over to the fireplace, lit a fire, and tossed in a handful of powder from a hidden drawer in the mantle.

"Dewey, Cheatham, and Howe, Solicitors," she announced clearly into the flames. She was quite proud of the steadiness of her voice.

"Mrs. Trapp! How may I help you?"

"I'd like to speak to Mr. Dewey, if he's available. Here."

"Certainly, ma'am."

A distinguished older gentleman passed through the flames. They exchanged pleasantries briefly before Leocadia cut to the chase. "Abner passed on yesterday. I know he didn't have a will, so I would like you to handle the legalities."

"So sorry to hear it, Mrs. Trapp." Dewey was the picture of lawyerly sympathy.

"Don't worry about me...you know very well I'll be quite comfortable. But see to it that every cent of his goes to this organization." She presented Mr. Dewey with a small booklet.

"Shoreline Home for Children with Special Needs?"

"It's an orphanage, Mr. Dewey...for Muggle-born wizards and witches abandoned by their families at an early age because of their oddities. And while you're at it, see if they have any hard-to-place children that need to be adopted. Abner was disinclined to be a parent, but I believe I have something to offer a child who is alone in our world. Even if I am but a Squib."

Madam Mab was feeling miserable. She had been running the day-to-day operations of the International Fellowship of Fairy Godmothers and Related Do-Gooding Beings for the past two centuries, essentially with absolute power over everything, and the strain was taking its toll. Only the Special Council of Three, who intervened when requested, and Oberon, who was so ancient he hadn't left Elysia to visit Headquarters in at least a century, were technically above her in the hierarchy. But for all intents and purposes, the buck stopped with Mab.

Recruitment was down (as usual), Gizzywiggle had lost another important file, and worst of all, the Fletcher beast (a disgrace to the tutu if there ever was one, in Mab's opinion) had gone on some sort of rogue mission that resulted in no less than four collateral instances of happily-ever-after. As if all that weren't bad enough, the outlandish swamp monster that was Fletcher's Apprentice had actually been provisionally promoted to Journeyman, Third Class, as a result of his role in the debacle. (Some utter rot about non-violently neutralizing a potentially lethal threat.)

That thing is 'poofing' into people's homes and granting heart's desires at this very moment, she thought, and that musing was enough to send Mab into Migraine Land.

She winced at the knock at the door. "This had better be important! And if you're Fletcher, get the hell away from that door before I make you into an ink blotter!"

"I assure you it is important, Madam Mab."

Good old Pip, Mab thought fondly. Files had never gone missing when he was her intern. "Come in, Pip, my boy. What's the news?"

"The Council of Three has a new decree for the Fellowship, and the Union approved it in an emergency meeting last night."

"Emergency meeting?"

"Yes, you were sent a memo. See, there it is." Pip fished a scrap of gold parchment out of the disaster area that was her desk.

Damn Gizzywiggle! "What decree is that?"

"The Updating Act."

"Updating? Pip, speak English."

"It's quite simple, Mab. Any Fairy God-Creature who has been out of the field for between fifty and one hundred years needs to take refresher courses to reacquaint themselves with the basic principles of fieldwork. Henceforth, they will have to take at least one field assignment per decade in order to remain active in the fellowship."

"ME? Take classes again? That's outrageous! I was one of the first members of the Fairy Godmother's Club! However reluctantly, I helped supervise the transition to the current fellowship! The idea of me sitting in a classroom again is laughable."

"Oh, you won't be taking classes, Mab. You fall under the second provision of the Act, whereby any Fairy God-Creature who hasn't taken a field assignment in over a century will be obliged to retire, so as to allow those more in tune with current affairs to run day-to-day operations. They will, of course, have special status as occasional advisors, in light of their long service and tremendous experience."

Mab's tiny jaw dropped, and her eyes bugged out behind her glasses. "You can't retire me!"

"How many centuries has it been since you've been in the field, Mab?" Pip asked gently.

Her gossamer wings shivered and drooped. "But... but... I was the one who got Shakespeare through his writer's block! I was the one..."

"Of course you were," Pip soothed her. "All the more reason for you to have a nice rest. There's a lovely little castle being built in the Elysian Glade as we speak, and provisions have been made for retirees to teach occasional classes of new recruits. You know... pass the old traditions on to the next generation and all."

At the mention of the Glade, Mab grew a little misty-eyed. "The Elysian Glade? I haven't been there in... in..."

"One hundred fifty years. It's in your personnel file." Pip indicated the pertinent passage helpfully.

"But who will be in charge? The Fellowship can't do without me!" she squeaked frantically.

"The Council has already appointed an interim Supervisor, who can be confirmed in as little as a month if all goes well." Pip gently took her by the elbow. "We're going now, take your wand. After all, they're going to need someone to help manage things at the new castle. Some of those retirees are as bad as Gizzywiggle."

Dazed, Mab allowed Pip to guide her from the office.

An hour later, Pip returned to find Motoyoshi industriously sorting memos from personnel files from case files, with Fletcher advising and frequently zapping coffee stains from the maltreated parchments with judicious flicks of her tail.

"Thank you, Master Fletcher, Journeyman Motoyoshi," he said formally. "You can fetch Gizzywiggle now. I think my first act as Interim Supervisor will be to give him an ultimatum: learn to file or go back to janitorial work."

"Hey, don't mention it, jefe. You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours, verdad?"

Pip grimaced as Fletcher and her former Apprentice exited the office. His office. "That was a mental image I didn't need."

Hermione 'Reducio'd the final crate of books and stuffed it into her pocket. "We're going to like Tangent Alley." Her words had a distinct edge.

"You make that sound almost like a threat," Severus said, quirking an eyebrow at her in amusement.

"No, it's a promise. There is no way on earth I'm ever going to pack all these books again."

"What a pleasant surprise... once again, we're on the same page with regards to the situation."

"Yes, especially since we couldn't agree on having anyone actually help us move. I know, I know...we don't need to have the argument again," she said, forestalling his intended interjection with an exasperated glare.

"But they were such excellent arguments," he said, a teasing smirk in full evidence. There really was something amusing about the fact that neither of them could agree on who to ask for help moving...because neither of them was able to agree on a friend or friends who could be relied upon not to break anything or splinch in the process... and who was not terminally annoying to one of them.

Actually, Severus had grudgingly admitted that Ginny fit the bill. But since the only way to separate Draco from her these days was with a surprise blow from a Bludger, they'd opted to go it alone. Hermione still found Draco terminally annoying, and Severus had to admit that dealing with Hermione seemed to cause Draco to splinch more often than chance would account for.

"I'm not arguing with you just to have make-up sex," she scolded him. Then she grinned slightly. "You'll just have to follow me home and try to convince me to initiate one of the rooms of our new house." She checked her pockets for thoroughness' sake and Disapparated.

It seemed somehow hasty and disrespectful to simply vanish from within the house, leaving it empty inside all at once. Feeling it was a foolish, superstitious thing to do, yet unwilling to forgo the idea since there was no one present to witness it, Severus patted his own pockets and headed out the front door. He could just as well walk around and Disapparate from the shrubs at the end of the street.

He took one last look back into the dark entryway. His eyes caught a glimmer of light on a spider web, its occupant resting from its intricate labors as it awaited the arrival of an unwary insect. He remembered how, as a child, he'd thought spiders were the 'spinners' for which the dismal little street was named.

"Well, try to manage through the renovation process," he murmured. Saying farewell to an arachnid was even sillier than feeling consideration for the house, so he hastily made his way out and locked the door before he could do anything truly absurd and possibly maudlin. With a supreme effort, he refrained from warding the door out of reflex. Then he walked away without looking back.

In the garden of the house at Spinner's End, formerly residence of one Severus Snape and Hermione Granger-Snape, a meeting was being held.

The Pygmy Puff Lord surveyed his minions from a lofty dais consisting of the heel of a discarded boot. His human minions would pay for not informing him sooner of the acquisition of this last vital piece of land; he had long coveted this particular house at Spinner's End as the idea place to plot, plan, and hold rallies. It would only be a matter of time, now. He and his fuzzy children had escaped the identical idiots who had dared to try to harness his powers for their own inane purposes. Soon he would avenge himself upon them and all their kind.

"What are we going to do tonight, My Lord?" Pinky Puff asked reverently.

"What we do every night, my child. Prepare to take over the world."

The spider clan was deeply disgruntled. It had been quite some time since they'd seen the wizard they considered their master...the Protector of Hatchlings and Keeper of the Ley Line of the Web Spinners...for more generations of arachnids than they could count. Now, these ugly little puffs of fluff were massing under the bushes outside the Master's web, and the matriarch of the clan strongly suspected they had something to do with his disappearance.

"Give us the word, Mother, and it shall be done." Thousands of glittering eyes belonging to hundreds of eager spiders focused on their Matriarch, legs twitching and crossing, caressing the filaments of their webs in anticipation.

The Matriarch thought about it a moment, then flickered her eight glossy eyes approvingly. "Go, then, my children. Take the largish one that sits upraised on the piece of man-chitin. Drain that one dry. I suspect the others will be helpless without it, and we will have avenged the Master."

As silently as only spiders can, the throngs of her children descended their silken ropes and focused on making a meal of the largest fuzzy one.

For once, it was Harry who woke in the middle of the night to find the other side of the bed empty.

"Luna?" He squinted into the moonlit room, just able to make out her rounded form silhouetted against the window.

"Harry." Her voice had a smile in it.

"Is everything okay?" He found his glasses and studied her, to verify that she actually was smiling.

"Oh, more than okay. In fact, I think I wouldn't mind having one of those mobile phones you're always trying to get for me." She waddled back from the window, haloed in faint moonlight and pure serenity, and snuggled up beside him. He carefully arranged a pillow under the bulge of her tummy.

"I'm glad you've finally decided that it would be a good precaution," he said, unable to keep the relief from his voice. Hedwig had been good enough to indulge Harry by staying near Luna all day in case she went into labor early, but it was a strain on the aging owl. The mobile phone would be an easier...and faster...option for everyone.

"Oh, it's not that, dear. The Pygmy Puff Lord finally got sorted."

Harry sighed. He kissed Luna's lips. He kissed the swelling that marked the location of their unborn child. He reflected that he would never entirely understand what she was about. Then he fell asleep.

The shop in Knockturn Alley was nearly empty; tools had gone first, followed by inventory and shop furniture. Rose had moved as many of her personal items as would fit into the living space behind the new shop, and was now contemplating whether Otecko's ancient files had any place in Moore and Mraz's shiny new location.

She decided to move all of the files after all. A little judiciously applied 'Reducio' and they could fit handily under her bed. Before she did, however, she remembered a little mystery from those files... one her new landlord might just be able to solve. It was easy enough to locate the curious stub and set it aside for later.

'Later' ended up being several months into the future, after the shop was all in order and Rose's days had settled into a good working routine. She might never had remembered if the morning chill hadn't obliged her to don the coat she'd last worn during the move, on the exact morning her landlord arrived to collect the rent.

"This was in my files, Mr. Snape. It's the pawn record for the piece of jewelry from which the sapphire in your wife's ring was taken. I don't mean to pry, but is there any chance that it means anything to you?"

He took the stub and skimmed it quickly. His calm, slightly bored expression seemed to freeze, and she could have sworn he was holding his breath. His eyes finally began to move again, this time slowly, as if devouring each meager word on the slip of parchment, one letter at a time.

Without a word, he tucked the parchment into his pocket and pulled out a receipt book. Summoning a quill, he scratched something on it and tore the page out, thrusting it into her hands before he abruptly spun, his coat whirling behind him, and stalked out the front door. The bag of coins remained untouched on the counter.

Rose finally became aware that she was watching the closed door with her mouth hanging open. In utter amazement, she looked down at the parchment in her hands for answers.

In spiky, cramped, slightly shaky letters, he had written 'May rent...paid in full. Thank you. S. Snape.'

It was all the answer she would ever receive from her landlord about the initials 'E.P.S.' on the pawn ticket.

Author's Notes:

Rose's Slovak Vocabulary:

Dubro Noc: Good night

Dukchek: Little Duke

Otecko: Daddy

Bozemoj: My God

Reggie's Spanish Vocabulary:

Jefe: boss

Verdad: true (literal); used in the sense of, 'isn't that right?'

British Ground Floor=American First Floor

British First floor=American Second Floor

And so on...

The bit with Harry, Luna, and the evil Pygmy Puffs will not make the least bit of sense unless you've read, 'Return of the Fairy God-Jarvey.' It would help to have a passing familiarity with the cartoon 'Pinky and the Brain' as well.

Yes, I admit that the bit about the fate of the embezzled Malfoy money and the embezzler was utter fluffy (if slightly vindictive) sappiness. And I'm not about to apologize. Though I think it would be capital fun to track down Lucius in Argentina and tell him Muggle-born orphans are living off his money, and there's not a damned thing he can do about it. And yes, I stole Messrs. Dewey, Cheatham, and Howe most boldly and shamelessly from the Three Stooges.

The epilogue is next...I promise, I'm not going to let this thing sit on a sunny windowsill and grow any more chapters, Tempest!