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The small hamlet of Hawkridge, Somerset was one of those places where nothing exciting had happened in many years. Located at the southern edge of the Exmoor, a dozen houses sat around St. Giles, an old Norman church made from rough grey stone. Due to the restrictions of the surrounding national park, the nearby land was picturesque yet barren hills covered in heath, a few fields and the odd tree. Grass and heather dominated the landscape, the nearest town twenty miles away.
One day in 1979, the old manor at the border to Devon went up in a blaze. Visible even two miles away, it had been a hellish inferno, the flames reaching high into the darkness that they seemed to spring from, yet contrasted sharply. Before the fire brigade could arrive, the entire building had been devoured and collapsed. The men were powerless to stop the blaze for almost a day, but the real excitement had arisen when the police concluded that it had been arson two weeks later. The middle-aged couple who had lived there was never seen again and presumed dead. Their son had lacked either will or funds to rebuild the manor, and had not been seen in almost two decades.
So when builders showed up at the dawn of the new millennium, the villagers were curious. Had the wayward son finally returned or had the property been sold to a rich businessman who wanted a weekend home far from London? They got even more curious once the scope of the work became apparent, and the speed left more than one villager scratching their head. It wasn't the posh manor which had been there previously, but a farmhouse which was just a tad too big and pretty to be used for agriculture, and the small army of builders was certainly beyond the means of the average farmer. Nor could one afford the decorative granite and hamstone facade. And once it became known who the new owners were, the rumours started flying from Bishop's Nympton to Minehead.
Of course, those rumours amused no one more than Fleur Delacour. Four years had passed since she had moved into Harry's new house, and the tongues had yet stopped waggling.
"Did you know that this week, we are the spies who brought down the Soviet Union before defecting? And that we are on our third fake identity?" she asked as she put down her teacup on the picnic blanket and looked for a napkin.
Around noon, the sun had finally overcome the morning mist and now shone brightly. Other than a few stubborn holdouts which looked like cotton dusted across the landscape of Devon, the fog was gone. However, at this time of the year it was not strong enough to keep the autumn at bay, leaving the pleasant smell of wet grass and an earthy note lingering in the Yeo Valley.
"Really?"
"Yes, Jeremy was quite insistent that all of Oakford now believes us to be former spies."
"Have you given up on getting the recipe from him yet?" Harry wanted to know, mildly amused by the numerous times Fleur had tried to get the recipe for his spinach pie from their favourite baker. "He would lose his best customer if he did."
"But I can be so charming, wouldn't you agree?" Fleur wanted to know and threw her head back, making her hair bounce from her shoulder.
"Well, I agreed to marry you. So maybe, you might have a point."
"Just maybe?" Fleur asked, raising her eyebrows a little.
"I might need another pie to be convinced. You are right that they are delicious," Harry said and reached into the wicker basket for another slice. They were perched below the crest of one of the rolling hills near Molland, overlooking the still foggy riverbed below. His lands, in more than one sense. Three years have passed since he left the Auror Academy, and he hadn't regretted it once. Three years where he had toiled to restore the Potter estate after two decades of abandonment.
"Of course, it does not help our reputation that you drive James Bond's car."
"I drive it? You're the one who drives it to the shops three times each week."
"You insisted on buying it," Fleur pointed out in lack of a proper reply. Truth be told neither of them really needed a car, but it helped with blending in, or at least it would if it was more subtle than an Aston Martin. Still, it made them look like eccentric rich people rather than witch and wizard.
"So we are spies?"
"Yes."
"And despite your French accent and my Surrey one, people think that we are from the Soviet Union? Wouldn't that make us a decade late?"
"Da tovarishch, ya - Damn, I don't know any more Russian."
"Sometimes I don't get people. Would a spy do this?" Harry asked and pushed Fleur backwards off their blanket, following her down. Before she could recover, he slipped his hands under her sweater and started tickling her.
"No - 'Arry - Ah - Please - "
Fleur's attempt at throwing him off ended in them rolling through the wet grass laughing. Two minutes and thirty yards downhill, she managed to pin him to the ground next to a trellis with his arms spread eagle, both of them panting heavily.
"I win!"
"Oh I don't know, I seem to end up in this position awfully often," Harry replied. Above him, Fleur looked like a vision, her silver hair glowing in the sun, contrasting her red cheeks and the green leaves all around. He winked at her, leaned up and stole a kiss. "Because to me it looks like I am the winner here."
"Are you complaining?"
"About having my gorgeous fiancée atop me looking like she's about to have me for dessert? Never! I'm the luckiest man on earth because I have you, you know?"
Then something dark flashed in his eyes and the playful mood vanished. Fleur let go of his hands and instead slipped her own below his back. She then carefully pulled Harry flush against her and rolled them around so that she was on her back and Harry's head on her chest.
"I - sorry, I was just lost - "
"It's okay, Harry. I'm not going anywhere," she replied soothingly, tracing small circles across his neck. Fleur looked down into his green eyes, which were glued to her own, trying to convey his love when words could not.
"I just thought how lucky I am to have you, then that I was lucky to be alive at all. Then I was back in the Great Hall, in front of the table full of - " he trailed off and rubbed his neck. It had been almost a month since he had gotten lost in memories that nightmarish night, and of course he wasn't alone when it happened. "Fuck! It still hasn't gone away. Not as bad as after the battle, but I had hoped that those bloody memories would stop one day."
"You don't have to be embarrassed about it Harry, you went through more than anyone should have to in ten lifetimes and that left marks."
"But - "
"No buts! I've known that you struggle with the horrors you had to endure. We all have scars from the war, some more visible than others. And I still proposed, did I not? Or have you forgotten - "
"I bloody well remember," Harry grumbled, but from the smile he tried to suppress, Fleur saw that she had managed to pull him back to the present. After all, mentioning her proposal was a failsafe way to tease a reaction out of him. "But it should have been me asking."
"You had your chances, but you kept waiting for the perfect moment. So I took matters into my own hands."
"And I am thankful for it, even if I had to summon my ring only to have it hit me in the eye.
"A story I shall never forget."
"Well, this day is too nice to be gloomy," Harry replied after a moment where he gathered his thoughts. He disentangled himself from Fleur and pulled her up by her hand. "Come on, let's go down to the river. By the way, have you read Luna's latest article?"
"About the Couronian Feathered Serpent?"
"No, she owed me a favour so I got her to run the Godric theory."
"God, you are the only one who finds that funny."
"But it is true that a Godric had an important position in Hawkridge after the Conquest. Important enough to be mentioned in the Domesday Book. And so I gave Luna a quote - It's not my fault anyone thought that it was Godric Gryffindor. Or that they spent a week running around Cumberland because they thought it meant that I lived near Godric's Hollow."
"Was there any truth in that article other than your favourite forester?"
"That I am looking forward to marrying you next February, and that inviting her would not count as a birthday present. And that I own five square miles of land, into which I've invested half of my money to build my dream house. I think Luna also mentioned that I had beef stew for lunch that day."
"Beef Stew? Truly the pinnacle of investigative journalism."
Half an hour later, Harry and Fleur were down at the stream, armed with linen bags.
Tall oaks and poplars dominated the riverbank, but in between a motley collection of other trees could be found, from wild apples to hawthorn. This time, they were on the hunt for walnuts, which grew near the Yeo River, although creek would describe it more accurately. The objective was simple, fill the bag, and the only rule was no magic.
There were certain areas where Harry couldn't forgo magic, like cleaning. It was just too useful to deep clean the entire house faster than he'd be able to vacuum the living room by hand. But the lesson he learnt at the Auror Academy had been that magic stopped being magical and became nothing but a tool when used like one. And he did not want to lose his retreat to monotonous tasks and paperwork. Upon his retirement, Harry made his retreat to the countryside in the hopes that, when the time came, he could raise a family as fascinated by magic as his eleven-year-old self had been.
Long past noon, the sun had finally driven off the last, tenacious wafts of mist. The warm western wind drove rags of clouds across the blue sky, but summer's end was obvious to anyone who bothered to look. The fields had been harvested, the leaves were starting to turn golden and nice days were becoming rarer.
"I win!" Fleur shouted suddenly and after a look at his half-full bag, Harry knew that this time, there was no sense in contesting that. She had not even wandered far in the search for walnuts, merely found a better tree.
"Stupid bird heritage and its evolutionary perfection of seeing small things from high above."
"It is less than an inch," she replied and pulled Harry into a hug. But when she tried to pat his head, he resorted to tickling her again. Fleur jumped back with a shrike, her superior smirk replaced with a softer grin. "And you've found more chestnuts yesterday."
"Those were horse chestnuts," Harry grumbled with a smile tugging on his lips.
"Teddy still loved them."
"Teddy loves everything we give him, no matter if he can eat it or not."
"He didn't like the pears."
"Ok, he likes everything as long as it is not pear-shaped," Fleur chuckled at her own joke. "And even horse chestnuts are good decorations."
"Because heavens forbid if there are no seasonal decorations in our home."
"Are you complaining?"
"No, but I find it amusing."
"Says the boy who had to buy a larger car than what his relatives owned before they went to prison."
"You have to admit, I was pretty reasonable when I chose the smaller engine."
"You still paid ninety thousand pounds," she pointed out and tapped his nose for emphasis.
"Sirius would have approved, spending his family's money on a luxury car."
"From what you have told me he would approve of anything irresponsible."
"It is not irresponsible if you have enough money. And you know that it took redesigning and rebuilding Potter Manor - from scratch, might I add - to put a dent into those accounts."
"I am not complaining, merely amused," Fleur echoed his earlier words and Harry's heart soared at the big smile on her lips. Truth be told, despite the magically enhanced features, it had been her smile and the way it made her icy-blue eyes shine which made him fall for her. Most people only got to experience her frosty aloofness, but the first time he had managed to coax that special smile out of her was akin to the sun breaking through after a rainy day.
It could make him forget everything else while he got lost in -
"Harry?"
Just like that.
"Sorry, you are just way too attractive. That should be illegal!"
"Oh really? That would mean that you would not get to see me either."
"I'd break the law for you. And you like bad boys - "
"I should not have told you about the Belfast Blender," Fleur groaned at the memory of Padma's 22nd birthday.
"You spent half the night and two bottles of whiskey getting Hermione and Lavender to admit their feelings for each other. A story which they love to tell - Padma as well come to think of it. And you can't tell that story without mentioning your contributions to that night."
"You really need to get out more," Fleur grumbled good-natured. "And maybe have your own embarrassing story."
"With who? Ever since Seamus and Katie got together, they've been joined at the hip. Hermione and Lavender aren't any better right now. Which leaves me with Mel," Harry said, his voice cracking in the attempt to sound nonchalant. Sure, hanging out with Demelza was fun, but he missed his other friends. He could handle Katie with her boyfriend, but two couples in the madly-in-love stage were a bit much.
"There has to be someone else you can drag down to the pub."
"Well, Ron or George would be perfect, but we are Persona non grata with the Weasleys - "
"They hate me, not you."
"Which doesn't make a difference to me. I know that I would probably spend the whole night wanting to punch them for bad-mouthing you," Harry pointed out and rubbed his nose. This was a conversation for the sitting room and a good bottle of wine, not a meadow and some tea from a thermos cup. While the Weasleys were not a taboo, they were rarely the subject of conversation and relations were frosty, to say the least. Well, other than with Ginny but she spent most of the year abroad playing for the Lisbon Linnets. "They never forgave you for leaving Bill and - "
"Forgive me?" Fleur snarled and reminded Harry why it was best not to bring up the Weasleys around his fiancée. "They should be apologising. Even Hermione had the decency to do so - after three years and a bottle of rum."
"I know, but that means it really comes down to Mel if I don't want to be the third wheel."
"You could do something with Andromeda."
"I don't think I would survive another night like that. The woman is 50 now and still dances until last call. And Neville - well he's the perfect example for why waiting a few years to have children is a good idea. I haven't seen the poor chap for 5 months now because his brood keeps him busy."
"His brood?"
"How else would you describe it?" Harry wanted to know. "First the twins, then fourteen months later the triplets."
"I know we want children eventually, but I am the first to admit that 5 within two years would be too much."
"A bit? How are you supposed to spoil your children if there's five of them? Not to mention that the kids completely destroyed his social life."
"Speaking of which - We should get everyone together one last time before the wedding madness," Fleur suggested. "We can watch a movie and get drunk - or just get drunk without the preface."
"You know we don't have to jump through all those fancy hoops just because your grandmother says so. We could always just elope."
"Tempting," Fleur admitted with a grin and bit her lower lip. "Very tempting."
"Just say the word and I will book us on tomorrow's Concorde to New York and from there to Vegas - "
"Las Vegas? Really?" Fleur laughed and lobbed a walnut at Harry.
"Well, it is the go-to for eloping. But if you really can't wait that long, we could be at Gretna Green in a minute. Think about it, just one apparition and no more hours going over matching dresses with your extended family, no more juggling what one hundred people want to eat, no more shouting matches with your aunt when she insists that the seating order has to be changed," he outlined and pressed kisses along her jaw. Truth be told, they had not even begun the detailed wedding preparations and he felt like strangling Fleur's family more than once. Other than Gabrielle, their mission seemed to be making his fiancée miserable. Which led to him preparing a plan should Fleur just throw in the towel because they kept pestering her as if it was their celebration.
"My family would disown me. And our friends would not forgive us either."
"We could take them along with us, especially to Gretna. Grabbing Gabby might take an hour, but that just means we have to get her first."
"What about my dress? I can't get married in a sweater."
"You have that white summer dress which looks absolutely stunning on you."
"And the reception?"
"I'm sure that we could find a nice hotel lounge for ten people. As long as we stay away from Diagon, we won't have to deal with admirers or the press. Or we could try Edinburgh lassie," Harry said in a poor imitation of a Scottish accent and got another walnut thrown against his chest.
"You really thought this through, didn't you?"
"Yes. I saw how miserable the preparations made you."
"It's not that I don't want to get married, but the whole Veela thing is driving me insane. My family treats it as some sort of sacred blessing, but to me it never felt like special. Or does the ability to throw flames make me less of a person?" Fleur asked and the crack in her voice betrayed that the question wasn't just rhetoric. "Is it really so bad that I don't care about Imbolc or the alignment of Venus and Saturn but just want to get married? That nightfires are the only part of the traditional wedding I actually want because they sound romantic while everything else is just old, boring customs."
"Of course not, you are perfect just the way you are," Harry said and drew her into a kiss, which quickly became heated and ended with Fleur pushed against the nearest tree. "You know, we could have a small wedding just with your sister and a few friends. That way we can get the ceremony we want and afterwards we endure the big Veela ritual."
"How many people would you invite?"
"Gaby and Andromeda, Leo and Nina, do you want to invite Jeremy?"
"He can be a menace at times, but he's a good friend."
"So him and Padma. I'd like to invite Hermione, Katie, Mel and Seamus, and Hermione will want to bring Lavender with her. That's three, seven, eleven people."
"That does not sound like a small group," Fleur pointed out with a musical laugh. "And it would mean a lot of coordination."
"We could surprise them with the wedding. We just invite them, maybe with a remark about suiting up, and they only find out about our plan after we take them to the location."
"Ohh, that's evil. I love it!"
"So are we really doing this?" Harry asked and there was a pregnant pause while Fleur bit her lip, deep in thought.
"Why not? We get everyone together, we have a fun evening and, as a - cherry - on top, we get married without anyone meddling."
The gleam in Fleur's blue eyes made his heart flutter and him grin like a loon. Even after four years, she could make him feel like one of those stupidly blissful new couples with a single gaze. Looking past her up the hill, Harry couldn't stop his smile from growing even wider. She followed his eyes and groaned.
"I completely forgot about that! Did you really have to make the sign that big?"
"Of course, it's not a proper vineyard without ten-foot letters spelling its name. And obviously, they must be illuminated at night! You are just jealous that you didn't come up with it."
"Fleur de Yeo would be a bit pretentious coming from me."
"It's a shame that the first bottles won't be ready for another 5 years. It would be the perfect thing to serve for our wedding."
"You have a lot of confidence in a wine you won't make for four more years."
"I've read the books and I've helped your parents' neighbours with the harvest and pressing. Three times! I'm practically an expert," Harry said in his best Malfoy imitation. It had been their first visit to Fleur's childhood home when he fell in love with winemaking, and it had hatched the idea of owning his own Vineyard. Granted, the Yeo Valley wasn't as picturesque as the Moselle in Lorraine, but in a few years it would be a decent contender, and with 30 acres planted he still had plenty of hillside left to expand.
"And Jean called you mad for planting wine in North Devon."
"She doesn't know that I have a few magic tricks in my sleeve."
"Up your sleeve?" Fleur asked and fell into step with her fiancé as they slowly, hand-in-hand, walked along the oaks and willows which lined the small river. "Did you come up with the idea yourself this time or was it Neville?"
"Neville lost interest when he found out that I haven't planted magical grapes. If the plant doesn't try to strangle, eat, crush or otherwise murder you, he doesn't care," Harry said but he felt Fleur's gaze on him until he relented. "Alright, so maybe Professor Slughorn helped me with the recipe for the fertiliser, but I brewed it myself. I'm still surprised that I actually like potions."
"Really? I remember you cursing the discipline to the deepest circle of hell and back."
"No, I cursed the Fluxweed. Potions are enjoyable if the instructor isn't a bitter cunt," Harry said and shook his head. "I still don't know how Hermione managed to cut that when she was 13."
"Because she has the patience we both lack?"
"I am patient - "
"You threatened to extinct a plant because you used the wrong knife and kept sliding off. And to travel back through time to erase it from history," Fleur pointed out. "So that potion, that is your mighty magic trick? The fruits of two months of your research and labour?"
"Well, the limestone wasn't magical and you already know about the pest wards since you put them up. You also helped me with the slate before I even planted a single vine."
"Because you were being stupid. I get your desire not to use magic for everything, but you wanted to mix the earth with six-hundred tons of slate by hand. Which you bought at the other side of Devon."
"I was struggling to find the right balance - "
"By moving one and a half million pounds of rock without magic?"
" - And might have made a miscalculation or two along the way."
"You're an idiot," Fleur said fondly and Harry couldn't help himself but to grin.
"Your idiot."
"My idiot, but I think you wanted to say something before we established your idiocy."
"Ah yes, the potion. It took so long because it is based on the mother soil and therefore needed a lot of Arithmancy and NEWT Astronomy knowledge. It's bonkers how many magical properties a bit of dirt can have. So I had to read the books first, and then ask Professor Sinistra because I couldn't make heads or tails from these planetary alignment charts. It was a few days of work, but way more fun than just buying fertiliser from a garden centre."
"We still need apples for the pie," Fleur pointed out since they were nearly back at the road running through the valley.
"Oh really?"
"I can hardly make apple pie without them."
"Well, that should not be a problem," Harry said and gestured at the orchard around them. It might have been abandoned for twenty years and in need of a proper cutback, but there were still plenty of apples hanging on the trees all around them. Oaks and walnuts lined the riverbank, but the flat between the Yeo and hills was overgrown with fruit trees, some of them planted long ago while others had grown wild over the years.
In a way, it was the perfect metaphor for his life. If someone had told him about his future while still at Hogwarts, that he would need a break from the wonderful world of magic, that, after defeating Voldemort and achieving his dream, he would leave the Auror academy only to grow wine in the West Country, he would have sent them to have their heads examined. But like the apple tree in front of him, his life had grown in unexpected directions, yet it bore the sweetest fruits.