The Boy Who Lived

Acceptance and Hope

Ron watched Mione work. He couldn't help it. He knew he should give her space but he wanted to get close and hold her hand and never let her go. He was, he knew, a complete and utter plonker.

Yes, he, Ronald Bilius Weasley, was officially a crap soulmate. The crappiest of the crap.

And a bloody idiot...

He wondered for the billionth time why? Why hadn't he just quit the idea of being an Auror and followed his dream career but kept Mione by his side?

He moved another pile of books under Madame Knipping's strict instructions, snorting to himself at the irony that it should be him who'd taken charge of the organising of the books, albeit under Hebe's stern eye. Him and books. Harry and all these books. Harry and a castle and a title. It didn't seem real.

He noticed that Harry didn't acknowledge that it was a castle he'd inherited.

Denial, wondered Ron, all too familiar with the concept.

And Harry had been very clear about being addressed as just 'Harry', understandable, of course, after all that Lord You-Know-Who business. Harry never wanted to be perceived as 'grand' or 'important' but was he denying a part of his heritage, of wizarding heritage? He had said he wanted to shy away from the ceremonial crap that went with his title and that he'd attend the Wizengamot begrudgingly but Ron thought his title needed to be understood as much as Harry was beginning to understand the importance of Ancestral Magic. Admittedly, they were all learning something about Ancestral Magic; the questions and debates over dinner and lunch had been very enlightening. Though it seemed none of this was an issue for the Weasleys: the Weasleys just went on producing more Weasleys, one after another. But then, they always married their soulmates and didn't turn away from them unless they were bloody stupid idiots like one Ronald Bilius Weasley the first. Ron thought he should probably be the one at risk of going 'Boom!', not Harry, who'd never purposely acted without decency and honour, apart from when it came to Malfoy at school but that was a whole different shit-storm by itself and they both gave as good as they got.

The going 'Boom!' bit was a serious concern: turned out the Dragon-Potter had issues with rogue magic too, though not like Harry. Still, there was a debate about whether his magic had killed him or the Peruvian Black he was stalking was responsible. Hermione was inclined to believe it was the former, she said the journals showed William Potter knew exactly what he was doing when it came to dragons and was building a rapport with the dragon he was studying. The two Unspeakables were very excited about it all, claiming it to be a revolutionary field of study. Maybe they'd got bored of trying to figure out 'Love'. Fuck knows 'Love' was complicated, that's what Ron knew. Now they were excited about magic making people go 'Boom!' because they weren't doing what the Ancestral Well wanted them to do.

No, this was a different sort of denial. Harry had thrown himself into restoring and ordering Beaumont Hall but Ron wondered what would happen when Harry achieved all that. Was it really the answer to controlling his magic? Ron had a feeling Harry needed to do more than just tidy a big house. He had to know what his Ancestors meant to his name and what his name meant to future of the Potter line and all those other ancient names too. He needed to understand what Beaufort Hall meant in the middle of this. Ron had a feeling the Harry's title and the hall were as important as producing hundreds of Malfoy-Potters. Ron wondered if Harry ought to turn his focus to all this here, permanently, that he ought to relax into this new life and stop charging after criminals or whatever goal he had lined up next. Maybe Harry should take up keeping chickens or pigs or something... enjoy his life with Malfoy and Teddy and their future off-spring...

Malfoy... Malfoy the vet... now there was another can of worms to try and understand. Malfoy... but then Ron knew the pull of a soulmate and all the animosity at school made a whole load of sense now. Perhaps he wouldn't have got the whole pull of a soulmate if he hadn't fucked things with Mione but still... Malfoy...