Chapter 8
Flyover Territory
In which Gabby learns her place, and Arianne learns her father's secret
Sometimes, throughout the course of a night in bed with Fleur, her more avian instincts would take over. This always happened while they slept. Somewhere in the night she would evidently grow tired of pesky arms wrapped around her and unsatisfied with the amount of exposed body her lover presented to the world. On the mornings following these nights Harry would awake, struggling to breath, with a curled up ball of Fleur sleeping on his chest.
The morning following the Bennet family's arrival was one such morning. It never failed to bring him to laughing tears, her usually pristine hair scattered and messy as she lay curled into a tight ball shivering on top of him. She was in turn always embarrassed and punished him for his laughter with forced coldness while they got ready for the day. He was long since beyond falling for her feigned anger though, and knew to just be overly affectionate until she couldn't justify trying to be mean anymore. It was a comfortable cycle of the Potter household that he cherished.
Arianne and Jean-Luc wanted to fly, Liliane was indifferent to it and Peter was a few years older than Harry's eldest and didn't want to do anything but be tortured and teenaged. The two younger split off after breakfast and Harry trailed after them because Arianne was not allowed in the air without him present.
"Did you sleep well, Luc?" Fleur asked as she dumped sugar into her second cup of coffee. She said it innocently, but she was staring at her sister, who was smirking back at her.
"Yes, he did," She answered for him and his son, still sitting at the table, groaned and pushed away to follow his brother into the yard. Luc had the decency to look embarrassed, but this wasn't about him, this was teasing between sisters, he just had to sit and take it.
"I know you did," Gabrielle said just as innocently back at Fleur "I could hear your- snores." It was at this point that Liliane bailed from the kitchen.
Her aunt just laughed at her retreat and now that there were no kids present she leaned over and pressed a kiss to Luc's cheek, a little too close to the corner of his mouth to be innocent.
"I want to go shopping today." She announced at large and Fleur brightened up, because that sounded like a marvelous idea.
"You've got some big shoes to fill, lover boy." Fleur said sympathetically, patting Luc's shoulder as she magiced the breakfast dishes to clean themselves. He shot her a confused look and she rolled her eyes. "If you think this house is expensive, you should've seen Gabby's closet when Harry's quidditch money started coming in."
Luc snorted, "Were you ever not spoiled rotten?" He asked the younger Delacour.
She hmmed, thinking about it for a second. "No."
He laughed, "Well, I did win as many world cups as Harry, the world sure forgets it but my bank account doesn't. I'm sure we can manage a trip to Paris."
-o-o-o-
Harry loved Gabby. He loved her in a way he had never loved anything before, except maybe Hedwig, but that didn't seem like a nice comparison. She was six years younger than him, putting her at an adorable nine, and just starting to figure out how to manipulate those around her when they all came home after the triwizard tournament. She was his beloved little sister, who looked up to him as the coolest, most skilled, most handsome wizard the world had to offer, and he returned that with fierce protectiveness and a desire to give her the world. She was the first taste of family he had, because even at eleven he hadn't ever been able to look at Fleur as a sister.
She was particularly good at controlling Harry, who could not say no to her to save his life, to Fleur's endless irritation. That first summer he came home to the Delacour's as a home, not as a visitor, he'd spent nearly two thousand galleons worth of muggle money on the Delacour girls in their little shopping trips before their mother realized what was happening. She did not want Harry to be taken advantage of, and also saw little point in buying designer handbags for her then seven year old youngest daughter.
Unfortunately for Elise, or fortunately for Gabby, the summer after the Triwizard Tournament Harry found his first work in the professional quidditch world. He was not drafted, he was still too young for even the most eager of talent scouts at fourteen, but he got his first sponsorship in the form of an ad campaign for Stargent brooms.
It was the coming year, his fifth at school, that would live in infamy in the pages of quidditch anthologies for years to come, but the final game of his fourth was something of a spectacle nonetheless. Some omniocular footage of the game winning catch had made its way out of the school and into the pages of a magazine targeted at young flyers and so he was approached to be featured in ads for their new racing broom targeted at the amateur market.
This was great for Harry, because no one could really tell him what to spend his hard earned money on. When it was his parents' money, his de facto parents the Delacours could sit him down and talk to him about responsibility and the like, but this was his money and he had not the vaguest concept of the value of a dollar.
He spent far more than he earned that summer. Food, clothes, toys, anything Gabby stopped to look at on the street or in a shop he was pulling off shelves or racks to buy for her, and the evil little harpy would smile and squeal and hug him and leave him smiling and wrapped around her littlest finger.
That summer was the first time Fleur had to step in and put her little sister in her place for using her allure on her wizard. Preadolescent Veela couldn't use their allure, not really, they had a passive sort of presence that hung around them and made those close to them more malleable to their desires. Usually it manifested as unwitting fathers spoiling their daughters because they learned dad couldn't say no if they asked away from mom. Fleur didn't really mind this, because she knew that Harry was delighted to have Gabby in his life and would be doing this even if she were a human little girl.
They were sitting outside a café in the most horridly touristy part of Paris, getting looks from passing muggles because Fleur and Harry presented an impressive front. She with her vibrant bright hair and stunning looks, and he with his debonair style and casual grace. At first glance they looked like a young couple out with their daughter, until a second look revealed just how young he was.
Harry was reading a book, something about quidditch she thought, in the manner she'd shown him all those years ago. One leg crossed over the other, book held in one hand to the side of the table as he sipped coffee with the other. Gabby was chattering away to Fleur, complaining presently because their mother would not let her buy makeup, and Fleur was humming along sympathetically but noncommittally because she agreed with their mother that Gabby did not need it.
"-can we go get some Harry?" She cut away from Fleur to press the question on him, big eyes wide and hopeful. Harry, who was mid page turn and hadn't a clue what she was talking about, just said:
"Of course." She beamed at him but Fleur rolled her eyes.
"Non little chick," She told her sister sweetly, "You cannot get past maman by using Harry." Said wizard pulled his attention away from his book at her denial, finally focusing on the conversation.
"What?"
"Gabrielle is trying to get you to buy her things maman said no to." Fleur told him and he nodded, turning to let Gabby down nicely. A young Veela, just starting to experiment with mastery of her empathetic magics, was not a subtle thing. She was pouting up at Harry, and the nauseating wave of emotion she projected out hit Fleur just as strong as it did Harry. Fleur's little wizard, being a wizard who loved Gabby, went a little stupid in the eyes and smiled at her.
"Maybe just a little-" He was starting to say but Fleur steamrolled over him with rage burning in her eyes.
"Gabrielle!" Harry jumped but she ignored him, her sister was glaring up at her with narrowed eyes and a pouting lip. Fleur was unconcerned, she stood and grabbed her sister and apparated away, leaving Harry sitting alone at the table. He looked around but muggles never really looked right so no one seemed to have noticed the two girls disappear. He finished his coffee and put some bills on the table, waiting for Fleur to come back and collect him. He was a little annoyed he couldn't apparate himself, but it was a nice afternoon to be sitting in a café in Paris so he couldn't really muster too much of a bad mood.
She popped back up a few minutes later, fuming.
"That little-" Harry stood while she tried to come up with the appropriate words to defame her sister. Fleur allowed Harry to spend money on her much less often back then, especially with her Triwizard winnings sitting in her account at Gringotts but she was still full of fire and ruffled feathers at her sister and he took the opportunity to steer her down the street instead of taking them back home.
"Come on, I saw a pair of enchanter's gloves back there that I'm pretty sure I can convince you to let me buy you now."
-o-o-o-
"I don't want to go shopping!" Arianne whined, looking up at her dad with big sad eyes.
"Well you have to," Fleur told her patiently as her husband and the collective kids came in. "Papa's going and you can't fly without him."
Arianne was tugging on her father's hand, trying to slow his walk, trying to get a few more seconds of pleading in to try and turn the tides in her favor. Gabrielle swooped in and scooped her up in her arms.
"You can save your sad looks, little chick," She told her niece, carrying her up the stairs. "I wrote the book on getting what I want from your papa, and it's been too long since he bought me shoes."
Arianne gave a wordless growl of childhood frustration and wiggled around in her aunt's arms. Gabrielle just laughed.
Luc was standing at the bottom of the stairs next to Harry while Gabby got the girls ready to go, and he looked after her as she went in a way that caught Harry's attention.
"That's a dangerous look in your eye," He told his friend. "Gabby's always wanted to be a quidditch player's wife, she got a taste for it seeing her sister in the papers." It was odd, to be adopting this tone with his oldest friend, but even well into their adult lives he felt the need to at least try and be the older brother. He didn't get a complete free pass for being best mate. His efforts were slightly undermined by Fleur giving him an elbow for his comment but the look Luc sent him told him he had picked up the elder-brotherly tone in his voice, he threw a grin at him after a second though.
"You think she'll take an old retired one then?"
"Depends, you save your money better than I did?" Harry returned his grin.
"I was born into money Potter, we weren't all rags to riches you know." Harry held his hands up in mock surrender.
"Well pardon me sir."
Fleur just rolled her eyes, smirking at Luc. "Good, then you can buy her those shoes, Harry don't you dare cave to her, I don't care how bad she lays it on."
"Yes my love," He said in faux suffering.
"Who wrote the book on Harry again?" Luc asked, looking between the two.
"Gabby," Fleur said, unconcerned. "I don't make my husband do anything."
"My wife is never wrong." Harry agreed.
-o-o-o-
Fleur started work at Gringotts midway through August. It was a black day. Harry had been growing steadily moodier as the summer waned on, barely mustering a smile at his birthday because by the end of July they knew the date of her departure and he was counting down.
He was not at breakfast the morning she was set to portkey across the channel, she did not begin to worry until the meal was wrapping up and he still hadn't come down. She wasn't set to leave till eleven but she wasn't about to let him spend her last day in France lurking in his room so she set off from the meal to retrieve him.
He didn't answer when she knocked, she would give him a moment and knock again, if he still refused at the very least to call out then she was going in. She raised her fist-
"He won't answer." She jumped and whirled, Harry stood behind her chuckling at having successfully spooked her. He was standing there in nothing but a towel, a towel he was holding closed at his side in one fist. His hair was a wild fray around his head from a quick dry and he was dripping onto the hall rug.
In retrospect, this was the moment that shattered the image of a skinny little English boy in a wrinkled suite with crumbs on his label. He was fifteen now, and had been running and flying and lifting weights with his team for years, she gaped at him trying not to swallow her tongue as a flush crept up her cheeks.
Worse yet, infinitely worse, as his humor at her fright faded he took in her silent blushing form and a dangerously aware look came into his eye. He smirked at her, smirked, not in joking, not in feigned arrogance, no. He had a cocky, predatory look on his face as he leaned in close enough for her to smell his shampoo and whispered:
"Excuse me, mon amour, I need to get dressed."
She bolted from in front of his door, before he could press forward any more and trap her there. He had the gall, the audacity, to laugh as she retreated. She stalked down the hall, wrangling enough composure by the end to turn and tell him off or- something- she had to retake control of this situation. He'd seized far too much power in that moment her brain had shut down at the sight of his bare abdomen. She spun to face him but he was gone, back in his room already. She squeezed her fists and dithered on the spot angrily, and then stormed to her room to collect herself.
Eventually going down and being with her family before her departure outweighed the comfort of hiding out in her room, and she drifted down stairs with all the grace and dignity of a queen. He was leaning back in his chair, quidditch boots propped on the table because he never took them off these days as per his stupid little style he and his friends pioneered. She did not deign to react to his smug grin and then Elise turned and saw his feet on her table and bounced a wooden spoon off his leg from across the room better than any chaser could've.
Fleur laughed pettily as he fell back, thrown off balance in his shock, and she blessed her mother because it was enough to shift the power dynamic back. He came up flushed from the ordeal, picking up his chair, and she just smiled at him and patted his cheek in condescending sympathy. She could see him lament the loss of his new found and short lived power to make her blush and she privately conceded that he'd have it back soon enough. Too soon.
It was difficult to go. She must've doubted herself a dozen times that morning. She was ready to take a post in mortgages in Paris, and wait for a position with their curse breakers to open, she convinced herself to do it three times before flopping back to being determined to go to England for the vacant spot.
Her father made the same attempt minutes before she was to leave.
"Why can't you stay in Paris?" He pleaded, hands on her shoulders and such a sad look in his eyes as his first daughter set off from the nest. For real this time, not for school, not to come back home for Christmas. When she came back for Christmas she'd be visiting her parents house.
"Because she can't pass up an opportunity this good." She almost choked up when Harry interjected for her. He was the better person of the two of them, she was well aware of it, he was selfless and supportive where she hated his passion with a passion of her own and wanted nothing more than for him to give it up. He never resented her for it though, and she wanted to cry as she turned to him and he gave her a smile and a shrug, not at all that devilish rouge from before that got her so flustered. He was her Harry.
"Curse breaker" He said, like he was reading the title off a marquee outside a cinema. "Who could pass up putting that on their resume?" He asked Richard rhetorically, she laughed and pulled him into the most bone crushing hug she could manage.
"Don't forget your promise," she murmured close to his ear during the hug, and then when she pulled back and saw a shadow of confusion on his face she pinched his cheeks and said louder for the rest of the room: "Win lots of games this year, big seeker man." She could see the realization of what she was referring to explode behind his eyes. She knew at that moment, even though they'd never addressed that night they'd really kissed for the first time, he remembered it and the claims he'd made before fleeing.
She said her goodbyes to Gabby and then her mother who was a wreck, equal parts heartbroken and angry at her leaving. She did not say goodbye to him again, but he was the one her eyes found as she held the little rock that would take her to her flat off Diagon Alley. He was staring at her with that hungry determination he got when he was about to walk onto the quidditch pitch and it twisted her stomach in a very different and new way before the portkey activated.
-o-o-o-
Arriane was not having a good time. She didn't like shopping. She didn't care about clothes, much to her mother and aunt's dismay, she honestly didn't even have too great an interest in toys. She lived for the rush of air and the thrill of flight. Being in a crowded bookstore as students came to buy their school lists was about as far from flying as one could be.
She trudged after her sister, who was sticking to Jean-Luc in an annoying way. Arianne didn't like it, because Jean Luc was her friend, they always flew together, and Liliane never paid any attention to him until they started going to school together. But she followed them down the shelves morosely nonetheless, because the alternative was staying with the adults being couple-y.
"Look Ari," Liliane said, stopping suddenly to pull a book from the shelf above her head. It was not too big, with a light blue cover embossed with silver.
An Alternative to Conventional Enchanting
She looked up at her sister in disbelief, completely baffled as to why she would hand her this book. Liliane rolled her eyes and tapped the bottom of the front cover saying. "It's the advanced enchanting textbook they use for sixth and seventh years." Arianne looked down to where her sister was pointing.
Fleur Potter
"Mom wrote the textbook on enchanting." She said proudly, and Arianne stared at the book now in wonder, it was a beautiful book.
"And!" Jean Luc cut in, having wandered off when they stopped and newly returned. "This." He had an even smaller book, it looked distinctly dated and had a flimsy paper cover. It wasn't as thick as the enchanting book, and had an unillustrated, unembossed face.
Snitch Manipulation and Modern Predictive Flight Patterns
Arianne didn't fully understand what the title meant, but it was quidditch, so she found herself immediately drawn to it even as her sister took back their mothers book with an exasperated look at Jean-Luc.
"Your dad wrote the textbook on quidditch." He told Arianne, who gasped to see H J Potter printed on the spine. "It's legendary at school. They make you read it if you make it out of the reserve teams to actually play. Most read it beforehand anyway, he wrote it when he was eighteen." Jean-Luc worshiped Harry Potter almost as much as his own father.
"Showing the little chicks the banned book list?" Gabrielle observed brightly, coming up behind Arianne. Jean-Luc looked bashful, Arianne frowned up at her aunt.
"What's wrong with it?" She clutched her dad's quidditch book to her chest defensively.
"They don't allow it at Beauxbatons," Gabrielle told her, "Because too many stupid boys in my school days read it and decided to try copying your papa. No one flies like him, when little boys try they end up hurt." She laughed. Arianne's eyebrows drew together, she felt like her aunt was making fun of her dad's book and she was not going to have any of it, but Gabrielle just plucked the book from her hands.
"If your mother ever saw you with this book," She whistled and then made a little explosion sound. "She would absolutely lose it, so, hide it well." And she tucked the little book in between two of her own to be purchased.
-o-o-o-
Harry spent the last two weeks of summer after Fleur's departure in the air. Almost literally from dawn till dusk. He woke with the sun, and ran laps around the Delacour's property line before breakfast, then he was in the air working on complex maneuvers. As a seeker his greatest challenges in the sky came from the dual need to move very fast and be able to change directions faster. The two concepts were inversely related of course, and finding the balance between them is what separated the good from the great. It was that simple, no innate quidditch-ness or superior intellect required. It was broom control and Newtonian mechanics.
He had the best broom, the Firebolt was a meticulously crafted machine of maneuvering and speed, but no broom could compare to a snitch on that front and so it was up to him to perfect himself.
This was the general state of his mind for most of the following year, he had taken two of his exams at the end of the last year, and one more over the summer. Three classes down all he had to do was sit three more exams, and dominate the tournament this year, and he was on course for that sparkling opulent palace filled with little silver feathered chicks.
While that image drove him forward, pushed him toward fame and fortune, he was also very good at flying and found joy in few things as much as being in the air. After seeing Krum in the world cup, and then spending a year recreating and perfecting the Irish tactics to massive success in his own league, his mind was turning to new horizons. He'd mastered the Wronski Feint, Sloth Grip Roll, and Transylvanian . He wanted something of his own. He wanted to hear them calling out his name when other players studied his play book and stole from it.
There would be many, but out in the fields around the Delacour home as that summer died, if they'd been trying to see what he was doing his parents could've watched the birth of his most daring, stupid, and iconic move. One that changed the way quidditch was played, many would say for the worse, and almost led to the end of his career multiple times at the hands of a furious wife. The Potter Passover.
AN Cute bro/sis moments, this one got its name because its like Ohio, a flyover state. It was alright, but the chapter before, and the chapter after are more exciting :hehehe: HEY! If you don't know what that :hehehe: means, it probably means you found it pretty cringey. Don't get me wrong, it is, but you don't get it because you're not in the Flowerpot discord server! Don't fret friend, I've got you covered! discord . gg / uqEeHRhTk7 just remove the spaces and come on over to say hi, I'm there, and I love talking about my work :smug:
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