"Dobby?" Harry exclaimed, pushing his glasses back into place from where they had slipped to the very end of his nose. "You nearly scared the life out of me! What are you doing here?"
"Why, Dobby is here to give Mr. 'Arry Potter his present, sir!" Dobby declared, a radiant smile making his comical face seem even more absurd, if that were possible.
"But you already gave us a present, Dobby," Hermione said. "You and the other house-elves prepared and served that magnificent feast, and that truly marvelous wedding cake."
"Ah, but that was before, Missy Hermione," Dobby said, as if this simple statement needed no clarification.
"Before what?" Hermione said. Dobby's bright smile retreated slightly, though his huge eyes seemed to glow brighter as if in compensation.
"Before Mr. 'Arry Potter called Dobby his friend! Dobby knew then that he must give Mr. 'Arry Potter and his bride a real present, just like everyone else!"
"But, Dobby," Harry said, "you didn't have to get us anything."
"Yes," Hermione agreed, "you should be saving your money. After all, you're only making a Galleon a week."
"Two Galleons, Missy Hermione," Dobby corrected, with what seemed to Hermione to be a definite note of displeasure. "Professor Dumbledore is forcing it on Dobby, he is." Dobby shot an accusatory glance at Dumbledore, who appeared to have developed a sudden interest in a passing butterfly and consequently took no notice of Dobby's reproval. "But Dobby is not needing gold to be giving his friends a proper gift," the elf resumed, his smile back in place as if it had never left. "Dobby is needing only magic!"
Moving quick as a flash, Dobby caught up a nearby folding chair and set it before him. He then waved his hands over the seat of the chair, and with a soft popping sound a large, domed serving platter appeared, its lustre proclaiming it to be of the finest sterling silver.
"It's beautiful, Dobby!" Hermione cried, clapping her hands together in delight. "It's...it's...oh, Dobby, thank you!"
But Harry withheld his own thanks, for he took note of a curious gleam in Dobby's enormous eyes that looked suspiciously familiar. Harry fancied that he knew Dobby as well as anyone, and better than most, in fact. He had seen that particular gleam in the house-elf's eyes before. Whatever Dobby had in store for them, it was far from over.
"Please to be removing the cover, Missy," Dobby said, his excitement suppressed only with the greatest of efforts, Harry thought. Hermione lifted the shining dome, and she cried out anew.
The serving platter was laden with steaming hot food. A succulent roast beef dominated, abetted by potatoes, gravy, peas with butter, heaps of bread...
"Hang on," Harry said, leaning closer so that the delicious aroma made his mouth water. "This is...this is what Snape was eating for lunch! I saw it clearly, in the Sorting Hat. Dobby -- did this food come from Hogwarts?"
Seeming not to have heard Harry's question, Dobby took the lid from Hermione's limp fingers, covered the roast beef dinner, then uncovered the platter again with a grand flourish.
The roast beef was gone! In its place was a huge bowl of tossed salad, with sides of croutons and dressings, as well as separate dishes of steamed asparagus, niblet corn, green beans...
"Is this...?" Hermione began, her eyes darting from the platter to Harry and back again.
Harry nodded. "This is Professor Sprout's lunch. Dobby -- this platter is linked directly to the Hogwarts kitchens, isn't it?"
Dobby laughed with unrestrained delight as he snatched up a crouton and popped it in his mouth, all but dancing with joy.
"Yes, 'Arry Potter! You is got it!"
"But -- I don't understand, Dobby. What exactly is this?"
Clearly looking as if Harry were missing something perfectly obvious, the excited house-elf said, "Dobby is knowing that both you and Missy Hermione is to be working at jobs while you is being married. This is a good thing, 'Arry Potter! To work hard is to be making the world a better place. All house-elves knows this, which is why we is all loving work so much.
"But Dobby knows that there will be days when you is both working late, and you will be coming home to a kitchen where there is no food prepared. And this made Dobby sad, sir. One of the strongest desires of a house-elf is to see that no one ever goes hungry. That is why we all likes kitchen work the most. Dobby did not want his friends to be going hungry after a long day's work. So now, when you is both too tired to prepare a meal, you is only having to touch this tray with your wand and lift the lid, and whatever food is being prepared in the Hogwarts kitchens will appear on Dobby's platter!"
"So," Harry said, "if I have this figured right, the platter will only work three times a day -- at breakfast, lunch and dinner, right?"
"Of course, 'Arry Potter!" Dobby said, looking mildly scandalized. "All other times is for working!"
Replacing the lid on the platter, Dobby looked up at Harry and Hermione, and his bat-like ears seemed to droop just a
trifle.
"D-Dobby hopes you is both liking his gift. Dobby got special permission from Professor Dumbledore to enchant it.
House-elves is very good with food magic, and...and..." Dobby's voice trembled ever so slightly now. "It
was the only thing Dobby could think of..."
"Are you kidding, Dobby?" Harry said without hesitation. "This is the best present we've got all day!"
"Oh, yes!" Hermione echoed. "Nothing else even comes close! And certainly no one but you could have come up with something so useful! There's not a day that will go by when we don't see this platter and think of you, Dobby. Thank you so much!"
"Yeah, thanks, Dobby," Harry said.
Almost instantly, Dobby's tennis ball-sized eyes began to overflow with tears. Harry feared that the elf would burst out in a full chorus of wailing at any moment. But even as he wracked his brain for some way to prevent the inevitable, the calm, resonant voice of Dumbledore addressed the situation in a manner Solomon would have envied.
"Dobby," the Headmaster said with his typical air of benevolent authority, "the Hogwarts Express will be pulling into Hogsmeade in a very few hours. It will be filled to bursting with hundreds of students, all of whom will be in need of a hot, nourishing meal after their long journey. I'm sure the other elves are all working diligently at this very moment, but you do know, I trust, how much I value you among all the elves at Hogwarts. Nothing puts my mind quite so at ease as knowing that you are on the job, for not only I, but everyone at school knows that Dobby is never one to shirk when there is work to be done."
Dobby's formerly dismal features erupted into a coruscation of ecstasy, enhanced with the unmistakable stamp of elvish pride.
"Oh, yes!" Dobby cried. "Dobby must go now! Dobby has been away far too long! There is much work to be done, and Dobby must not let others do his share!"
Dobby spun about and looked up at Harry and Hermione, apologetic tears in the corners of his eyes.
"Mr. 'Arry, Missy Hermione, Dobby must go now. But Dobby wishes you much happiness always! Dobby does not know when he will see his friends again. The school year begins anew, and Dobby has much work to do, oh, yes, so much work! But Dobby will always be grateful that he was permitted to share this very special day. Dobby thanks you very much."
"Thank you for coming, Dobby," Hermione said warmly.
"Thanks, Dobby," Harry said. "And remember, our door is always open to our friends. Of course, we haven't actually got a door yet," he chuckled. "But quick as we get one, we'll expect you to come visit us on one of your days off, okay?"
Tears began to cloud Dobby's eyes again. With a mournful sob, the house-elf vanished before their eyes with a loud crack.
"What a nutter," Ron said with a shake of his head.
"I think he's very sweet," Ginny said reproachfully.
Ron merely rolled his eyes in reply.
As Hermione set Dobby's serving tray aside, Harry made to remove the folding chair on which it had sat. But he had no sooner set hands upon it when a voice called out, "Don't bother, Harry. I think that will do nicely."
Arthur Weasley was approaching, with Molly and the Grangers in tow. The latter stared with ill-disguised amazement as Arthur pointed his wand at what appeared to be the last parcel remaining on the lawn and levitated it onto the folding chair in front of Harry and Hermione. In both size and shape it was nearly identical to the box which had held Dumbledore's Pensieve. Like that box, this one was topped by a removable lid. Smiling at Hermione, Harry did what was evidently expected of him and lifted the lid. The sides of the box did not fall away this time, and Harry and Hermione leaned forward to peer into the box, only to be stopped by Arthur's upraised hand.
"Allow me," Arthur said. He twirled his wand, and an object rose from the box, its polished surface gleaming luxuriently in the bright sunlight.
"A mantel clock!" Hermione exclaimed. "It's lovely!" Turning to Harry, she said, "We can put it right in front of the Hearthstone brick. It will be perfect!"
Exchanging a smile and a wink with Molly, Arthur tapped the finished wood surmounting the clock face. The whole began to rise, changing Hermione's thrilled expression to one of astonishment -- and Harry's to absolute delight.
It was nothing less than a full-sized grandfather clock, slowly but steadily emerging from a box undoubtedly Charmed by Arthur in the same manner as he had enchanted the insides of his long departed Ford Anglia. The Grangers did their best to look nonchalant as they watched an object the size of a full-grown man emanate from a box which common sense told them could scarcely have contained the Christmas goose which habitually graced their table every December. Magic, they decided, (not for the first time), was something best accepted without explanation.
As the great clock settled to the ground before them at the direction of Arthur's wand, it was Harry's emotions which bade to spill forth rather than Hermione's. It was true that Hermione had visited the Burrow nearly as often as Harry in the past few years, and her abiding fondness for the tumbledown house -- and for the family living there -- was no secret. But in the end, those visits were little more than a pleasant escape from the sameness of the loving but familar home she had known all her life. To Harry, however, the Burrow was not a home away from home; in every sense of the word, the Burrow was home to him. It was, in fact, the only home he had truly known -- moreso, he was ashamed to admit in the presence of Sirius, even than the house he had shared with his godfather in the months following Sirius' full exoneration by the Ministry.
It wasn't the house itself that stirred these feelings in the core of his soul. Rather, it was the sense of family that so endeared Harry to the Weasleys' home. And nothing had quite defined that spirit to Harry more than the great clock standing in the hallway adjoining the Weasleys' living room.
It wasn't a clock for telling time. Instead, the clock face bore hands representing each member of the Weasley family, the direction of which revealed that person's location or state of being. There was an indicator marked "School," others indicating that someone was "Home" or "Traveling." And at the very top, in the place where a number 12 would have been on an ordinary clock, was the designation "Mortal Peril." Not a few hands had swung suddenly and heart-stoppingly into the upright position during the final battle with Voldemort. When the last hand had finally dropped down to a safe location on the clock face following the culmination of that terrible ordeal, Molly's relief had very nearly been tangible enough to register on a Muggle seismograph.
Hermione saw Harry tremble slightly as these memories flowed through him. She was instantly at his side, her arm around him. Harry held his wife tightly with his left arm while his right hand slid under his glasses to swipe at his eyes, which were clouding with wetness.
"My dears," Molly said now, her own eyes not far from tears as they embraced the newlyweds with motherly tenderness, "with the passing of the years I have come to think of you almost as my own children. But today you are children no longer. You are young adults, preparing to go out into the world to find your place in the Great Plan in which we all play our respective parts. You have done great things already, and I foresee that even greater accomplishments still await you. But through it all, you must never forget the importance of home. Home is the anchor which keeps us grounded in times of uncertainty. It is the one true sanctuary, without which life's sweetest delights are naught but bitter ashes on the tongue.
"You have both brought much joy to our home. It is our wish -- myself, Arthur, all of us -- that your own home will be an unfailing haven of love and happiness. You deserve nothing less. In furtherance of that hope, we felt that nothing could so express that sense of hearth and home more than this."
Molly turned, wand in hand, and addressed the grand clock. Its polished wood gleamed richly in the sun, its clean lines radiating strength and steadfastness. It was only now that Harry noticed that the clock face was entirely featureless. It did bear two hands, labeled "Harry" and "Hermione," but they were skewed off in random directions; there was not a single point of designation toward which they might direct themselves. But Molly made short work of that state of affairs. She touched her wand to the place where a number 9 would be on an ordinary clock. Immediately the two hands swung around and pointed themselves at this spot as if drawn by a magnet. Harry and Hermione leaned closer, and their faces lit up as one as they appeared to share a single smile between them. For they saw the two clock hands pointing to the words, "The Burrow."
"I expect those hands to be pointing to that spot often in future," Molly said forcefully. "Never forget that you will always have a home away from home here at the Burrow."
Hermione sprang forward into an enveloping hug from Molly, which Harry joined a moment later. When a tearful Molly finally released the newlyweds, Arthur caught their attention and directed their eyes toward a space just below the clock face. At a tap of his wand, a narrow drawer slid outward. Harry and Hermione both looked, the latter stretching to her full height to do so. The shallow drawer was piled from front to back with extra clock hands of every imaginable shape, length and color.
"Feel free to add as many as you like," Arthur said. It took a moment for the meaning of Arthur's words to sink in, whereupon Harry and Hermione both blushed so deeply that they could have passed for outright members of the Weasley family.
As Arthur used his wand to levitate the clock off to the side with the other presents, Molly stood back so that the Grangers could stand before their daughter and her new husband.
"Mum..." Harry smiled, "...Dad."
Hermione could not suppress a muted sob of joy at hearing Harry address her parents in this manner. For his part, Harry found the words came easily. Not once in his eighteen years had he ever uttered those words in other than abstract form. The closest he had ever come to employing them as an address was when he had seen his parents in the Mirror of Erised in his first year of school, and then three years later, during his first face-to-face battle with Lord Voldemort, when the ghostly echoes of his parents had emerged from his enemy's wand to lend him their strength in his moment of direst need. Now, at last, the words were being used as they were intended. If Hermione were now spiritually the "flesh of his flesh," so, too, were her parents. From this day on, they were his parents as well. Harry could not quite define the feeling which this realization gave him. But it needed no definition. It simply was. That was enough, and more.
Harry saw that the Grangers were still putting on a gallant front, though their unease was apparent even to passing scrutiny. Watching so much magic from such close proximity, culminating with Arthur Weasley levitating a ten stone clock as if it were fluff from a dandelion (both had expected the flimsy folding chair to collapse at any moment), was testing their mettle to its limits. But their love for their daughter -- and, Harry sincerely hoped, for their new son-in-law -- seemed to outweigh all other considerations. Nevertheless, it was with what Harry judged to be equal portions of embarrassment and apology that Mr. Granger plunged his hand into his wizard robes and withdrew an ordinary envelope and held it before him. He hesitated, as if engaged in some inner conflict. Then, perhaps as a gesture of welcome to the new addition to his family, he extended the envelope to Harry, who took it with a grateful smile.
Hermione was clinging to Harry's arm as she looked on curiously. The envelope was quite ordinary, unmarked and unsealed. With a glance at his wife, Harry opened it and extracted its contents.
At first Harry wasn't certain what he was holding. But Hermione did not share his doubts. With an explosive squeal she jerked the two strips of paper from his hand, her eyes wide as those of a house-elf.
"Oh, my gosh, Harry! Do you know what these are?"
Straining to read the fine printing from a less than ideal point of vantage, Harry said casually, "Tickets, unless I miss my guess. Now, if you'll move your thumb so I can read -- "
"A CRUISE!" Hermione shrieked. "I can't believe it! All my life I've wanted to go on a cruise to the Caribbean! Oh, my gosh! Oh, my GOSH!"
With an impish grin on his face that could have been pinched directly from Fred or George, Harry looked up and said, "Um, I think she likes your gift, Dad. What do you think, Mum?"
Suddenly Hermione was crushing her husband's windpipe with a strangling hug as she continued to squeal, "We're going on a CRUISE! We're going on a CRUISE!"
"You really like it, Princess?" Mr. Granger said, his trepidation abating, if slowly. "We were afraid it wouldn't be...I don't know...magical enough."
"Magic comes in many forms," Dumbledore said with warmth and sincerity, his eyes glowing softly behind the lenses of his half-moon spectacles. "And in my experience, there is none greater than love. I daresay there was magic and to spare in the Granger house long before Hermione's Hogwarts letter arrived."
Sobbing like a child, Hermione ran to her parents and wrapped them in a fierce hug, the two tickets still clutched ferociously in her fist. Harry approached at a more leisurely pace to join them.
"I've already arranged things with the Ministry," Arthur put in. "The ship leaves Southampton on the fourth. A week to cross the Atlantic, a fortnight of island-hopping, then back in England on October first."
"A one-month Caribbean honeymoon," Parvati sighed dreamily. "It's just so romantic!"
"Especially if Hermione remembers to pack your present," Lavender said with a blushing giggle.
"Oh, she will!" Harry said emphatically. "She will! I'll pack it myself, and put an unbreakable Locking Charm on the case!"
There followed a round of good-natured laughter, and not a few encouraging hoots and thumbs-up gestures(these from the Gryffindor boys). But Harry and Hermione were oblivious to everything but each other. His new bride was sobbing happily onto Harry's shoulder, clinging to him with the ferocity of Devil's Snare.
"it's all so perfect, Harry," she said in a trembling whisper. "I just know I'm going to wake up and it will all be a dream."
"This is our dream," Harry breathed into his wife's ear, controlling his voice with an effort. "Yours and mine. And when we finally wake, it will be to find that our dream has come true. You'd better get used to the thought of waking up next to me, Hermione Granger Potter. If I have anything to say about it, you're going to be doing it for a long, long time!"
"I love you so much, Harry," Hermione said in a hush so faint as to barely register on her husband's ears. But Harry was listening with more than his ears alone. He was listening with his heart; and the echo of his wife's declaration reverberating in his bosom could, he was quite certain, have rung every bell in Westminster Cathedral from now until St. Swithin's Day.
Author's Note: Thanks for the contest alert, gal-texter. With luck, the last chapter will be up well before the 31st. I can't post the remaining chapters together because they still need a lot of work, which must be done in my free time. But I'm flattered beyond words at being nominated. I've been so busy, I wouldn't have known had you not mentioned it.
If, like Santa, you are all "checking your list," you'll have seen that only a few gifters remain. The
big question remaining is, who am I saving for last? If you were writing this, who would YOU choose? The list gets
halved next time, so be back next week to see who elbows his way into line next (yes, that's a hint). Thanks for
reading.