Chapter Text

Chapter 11: A Comfortable Truce

Harry:

(Friday Morning, November 10th, 2000)

Harry was used to the rough-and-tumble violence of Apparition and the gut-wrenching hook behind the navel of typical portkeys. The custom portkey that Daphne had ordered was different. A cool sensation washed over him, almost as if he had stepped into a gentle waterfall, and then for a long moment he felt as though he were gliding smoothly along an invisible factory conveyor belt.

Their feet touched down with barely a jolt on a soft, plush Aubusson rug in the center of the magnificent, sun-drenched lobby of Hôtel Le Corbeau d’Argent. Daphne, as if anticipating his notorious lack of grace, had a firm grip on his arm, steadying him before he could stumble, though Harry felt that with the gentleness of this portkey, he would have been fine.

The air smelled of the heady perfume of the literal thousands of fresh flowers arranged in massive, shining porcelain vases that dotted the edge of the lobby and were mounted to the walls. Sunlight streamed through tall windows, glinting off gilded mirrors and polished marble floors. It was an opulent luxury the likes of which Harry had never seen. Bellhops in silver uniforms floated luggage through the air with silent charms, and well-dressed patrons conversed in melodic French at small tables.

A concierge with an impeccably waxed moustache glided towards them, his shoes making no sound on the thick rug. “Bienvenue, Lord et Lady Black,” he said with a respectful bow. “Votre suite est prête.”

Daphne replied in flawless, aristocratic French. Harry didn’t understand a word and found himself wishing that translation charms were a thing that existed outside of fiction.

Someone led them to their suite, which was easily larger than the entirety of the Dursleys' house, including the garden. A sitting room was furnished with antique velvet chairs and an ornate curved sofa. An ample dining area was dominated by a polished table already set for two. Beyond that, an archway led to a luxurious bedroom. A bottle of champagne was chilling in a silver bucket on a table, a gift from the management. Harry looked around in surprise, his eyes wide with a disbelief he couldn't quite conceal. He turned and found Daphne examining him.

“We must prepare for the meeting,” she said, her tone all business. “And there are some facts that I must drill into you so that you do not embarrass us.”

“I thought you would be handling the meeting.” He responded weakly. He really didn’t want to deal with anything concerning it. 

“I will be, primarily,” she said with a sigh. “However, your presence is not merely decorative. You are the Lord of the House, and your presence will be expected. It is important that you do not say the wrong thing out of turn from ignorance. Unfortunately, the letter I wrote to you had a list of resources I had wished for you to reference, but alas, we shall work with what we have.”

She then began to drill him on the finer points of magical business etiquette. The entire thing made his head spin. He had no familiarity with the subject, and the intricate rules of address, the subtle posturing, and the complex laws governing inter-family land leases were a world away from Quidditch and Defense magic. He could tell Daphne was growing frustrated at his inability to answer the questions she role-played to a degree that satisfied her impeccable standards.

Finally, he held his hands up in a gesture of disarming surrender. “I’m trying here, dear wife, I promise. It’s just a lot, and I’m not used to this stuff.”

His apology seemed to lessen her aggression. She gave one final sigh, then had him dress in various different robes to find which cut suited his features the best for the upcoming meeting.

He had no idea what her standard was; half of the robes he tried on looked the same to him, but he entertained her without complaint, standing patiently as she adjusted his collar and smoothed his sleeves. When she had finally found him decent enough to her standards, they still had a little time before they had to leave.

Bored, Harry decided to make some small talk. “I’m surprised you chose here,” he said, for no particular reason other than a vague memory of his Aunt Petunia and her gaggle of friends that weren’t actually friends gushing over how Paris was the most lovely city in the world. “From the education you’ve given me, I know Dubois has offices in Paris as well.”

To his surprise, Daphne looked moderately offended by the statement. She tilted her chin up. “I would never deign to willingly go to Paris if I can choose to avoid doing so.”

Harry chuckled at that, sensing a story. “Why is that, dear wife?”

The atmosphere between them had been different recently. Still fragile, still awkward, but it was not the arctic frost of her original ‘separate spheres’ nonsense. He didn’t want to get his hopes up, but he felt things were shifting, and he was looking forward to actually spending time with her, to see if he could break through some of her admittedly ridiculous, but also sometimes naively cute walls.

He was coming to learn that Daphne, it seemed, was not actually a bad person. Granted, he didn't necessarily think she was a good person yet, either. But in the rare glimpses he saw of her true self under the layers of her conditioning, what he had seen was not bad. 

Daphne considered his words, and he could see her weighing what to tell him. “My mother’s family is native to Paris,” she finally said. “If we were to go there, it would be considered most rude if we did not stay with them. I would much rather we avoid the experience of meeting them together for as long as we can.”

Harry arched an eyebrow. “Oh?” he probed gently. “Are you embarrassed by me?” He was mostly joking, believing the answer was almost definitely yes, and he regretted the words the moment they left his mouth, fearing they would be seen as argumentative and that he had just shattered the fragile peace between them.

But Daphne’s voice held surprisingly no derision. “While you do, at times, leave some things to be desired, Husband, you are learning at an appreciable rate. I cannot say that I am embarrassed by you, although you do sometimes act in a very uncouth manner, ill-befitting of your station. Thankfully, you have thus far only done so in private.”

Harry was genuinely surprised by her statement.

“However,” she continued, “if we were to attend to my maternal family, we would be expected to maintain a very particular, very rigid form of etiquette. I would prefer for the relations between you and me to continue progressing as they are now, without such… constraints of formality.”

If Harry was surprised before, he was actually stunned by her new statement. It was an informal acknowledgment that there was something between them, something progressing. It was a slight rejection of what he believed to be her entire worldview. The little ember of hope in his chest fanned into a small flame.

He wasn’t sure how to respond, not wanting to be overly forward for fear of spooking her, of fracturing her burgeoning confidence. He settled on a happy smile. “That might just be the nicest thing I have ever heard you say, my dear wife.”

He closed the distance between them and embraced her in a hug. She stiffened for a moment, as she always did, before she hugged him back for the first time, her arms wrapping around his waist. The moment was brief before she predictably pulled away, her face tinged with a blush.

“We must leave now,” she said, her voice all business once more, though it lacked its usual icy edge. “So that we can arrive appropriately for our meeting.”

Daphne:

(Friday Afternoon, November 10th, 2000)

The offices of Dubois Vintners were located in a charming, half-timbered building in the heart of magical Strasbourg, a district of winding cobbled streets and leaning houses. The air here was different from London's. Cleaner mostly. 

They were met by Monsieur Dubois himself, a portly man with a florid face, a charming smile, and eyes as sharp as little beads.

“Lord Potter-Black!” he boomed, shaking Harry’s hand with a little too much force, his grip lingering a little too long. “An honour! A great honour! And the new Lady Black! Enchanté, madame.” He took her gloved hand and kissed the air above it with a theatrical flourish that was just a little too deep and a little too long, his eyes crinkling in a way that was meant to be charming but felt predatory.

He escorted them to a lavishly appointed office overlooking a magical canal where small enchanted boats glided languidly downstream. He offered them wine, a supposedly fruity and crisp vintage from the very vineyard their land supported, and spoke in English for Harry’s benefit. Dubois’s tone, however, was one of a man speaking placatingly to a particularly volatile child he suspected might throw a tantrum at any moment.

It aggrieved her immensely.

Daphne, desiring no more pleasantries than what social grace required, decided to cut straight to the heart of the matter.

“Monsieur Dubois,” she began, her voice as cool and crisp as the wine in her glass, “while we appreciate your warm welcome, we must attend to the matter of business. Upon review of the Black family accounts, I could not help but notice that the rent for the vineyard has not been paid for nearly a decade. I am sure we can come to terms rectifying this oversight.” She ended the statement with a razor-thin smile that held no warmth at all.

Monsieur Dubois’s placating expression didn’t falter. He chuckled richly. “But of course, of course, my Lady,” he said smoothly. “And for that, I am in complete agreement. I offer my most sincere apologies. It's simply because the House of Black was without its Lord for so many years, I was without knowledge of whom to pay, so I prudently kept the monies in escrow, for safekeeping, you see. And then, with that terrible business when Sirius Black escaped Azkaban, I was too afraid to make any payments, for fear that I would be unknowingly financing criminal activities. One must be so careful in these uncertain times to avoid scandal.”

Daphne arched a single eyebrow, her expression unmoved by his tale of woe. “And when my husband took the Headship of House Black nearly two years ago, Monsieur Dubois? Was that not a clear enough indication of where the funds should be directed?”

“Ah, yes,” Dubois said, waving a dismissive hand as if swatting away a fly. “A tragic oversight on my part. I tried, my Lady, I assure you. However, I believe that due to his immense popularity, the international owl post was having great difficulties reaching him. So many owls, you understand. It is the price of fame, non? And then there was that awful business with the regrettable Franc-to-Galleon exchange rate that followed He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named’s brief reign. It was a most unstable time for business. I thought I was merely protecting the Black family’s assets from a volatile market.”

She found it intensely irritating how he was treating ten years of blatant theft as a minor misunderstanding between old family friends. She could see, out of the corner of her eye, Harry growing irate beside her, and she knew his temper was beginning to simmer. He did not believe the worthless platitudes Dubois was trying to feed them, and she was learning his patience for such things was remarkably thin. She placed her hand lightly on his leg under the table and gave a warning squeeze: Let me handle this.

He glanced at her, but she did not look back, keeping her face a mask of polite interest, her posture relaxed, as if she were merely listening to a mildly interesting story.

“Monsieur Dubois,” she began again, her voice losing its pleasantness, replaced by a cool edge. “I am afraid I do not agree with the reasoning you have thus far provided. The agreement between the Black Family and Dubois Vintners, signed in 1682, clearly states that all payments are to be made directly into the Black Primary account at Gringotts, London. You were able to make the payments in the past, and the Black family accounts have not changed. Regardless of your personal beliefs concerning the temporary loss of headship or Sirius Black, that does not abdicate Dubois Vintners from the responsibility of ensuring the accounts are made payable.”

Dubois’s face was stiffening, the polite smile now plastered on like a cheap mask.

Daphne continued uncaringly. “Furthermore, you will find, if you consult Article Seven, Paragraph Three of the agreement signed in 1682, that any failure to remit payment for a period exceeding one year results in a penalty of twelve percent annual interest, compounded quarterly. As of this morning, your outstanding debt to the House of Black is not the ten years of back-rent, but a sum roughly three times that amount.”

Dubois’s smile finally faltered, a panic entering his cold eyes. “I… I am not familiar with such an archaic clause. Surely, as a gesture of goodwill… a lady of your grace would not hold to such an unforgiving term?”

She cut him off, her tone now imperious, “Monsieur, your familiarity with the contract is not my concern. Your compliance is. You will agree to a Gringotts-certified payment plan for the full, interest-included sum, to be paid in full within the next sixty days. Or, the House of Black shall utilize every method at its disposal to reclaim this lost revenue, and I assure you, the outcome of that course of action will be significantly worse for you.” She paused, her voice becoming as casual as an executioner’s. “You will find, all things considered, that this is a significant gesture of goodwill, given the stain on the image of our House your defaulting of payments has caused.”

The colour drained from Dubois’s face. The charming smile was gone, replaced by a look of sweating desperation. He was a fish on a hook, and Daphne was slowly, inexorably, reeling him in.

In a last, desperate attempt to find a weak link, he turned to Harry, his expression pleading, switching back to English as if seeking refuge. “Lord Black, surely we can come to a more gentlemanly arrangement. A lady, even one as brilliant as your wife, cannot be expected to understand the complexities of business. These numbers, these clauses, they are matters for men to discuss.”

It was Harry’s moment. They had not discussed this contingency, and a sliver of dread pierced Daphne’s poise. His response could undo everything. He could agree with the man, defer to his own judgment, and in doing so, strip her of all authority and make her look like a fool. The contract would bind her to his decision, and they would lose a significant amount of capital.

She watched as he leaned forward, his expression no longer bored, but cold and hard as granite. His magic filled the room with a pressure that made the wine in their glasses tremble. “You will address my wife,” Harry demanded of the man. “And you will give her the respect she is due.”

Daphne felt a powerful wave of relief, followed by a surge of something she could only identify as appreciation. Ill-educated and often uncouth, he may be, but he had just protected her, validated her role not merely with words, but with the full force of his considerable power.

She had always been taught by her mother to hope for the best, but always expect the worst and assume her future husband would always overrule her, choosing his own judgment over hers simply because he was the man. Harry had not. He had deferred to her expertise, and he had treated her as a partner.

The power dynamic in the room shifted instantly. Dubois looked from Harry’s cold, green eyes to Daphne’s triumphant, icy stare and seemed to shrink in his chair.

The rest of the negotiation was a formality.

An hour later, they left the office with a new Gringotts-guaranteed payment plan for the full, interest-included sum, and a case of Dubois’s finest, rarest vintage as a personal apology.

Harry: 

(Friday Afternoon, November 10th, 2000)

Harry hadn't liked Dubois, hadn't liked the way the man had tried to feed them a huge, steaming pile of hippogriff shite with a charming smile.

However, he was impressed with the way Daphne had handled the situation. While he was confident he could have eventually forced the issue, it would have been a messy and angry affair, likely involving some level of threatening and a new tenant to find. It would not have been the dismantling Daphne had so effortlessly performed. She had been a duelist, wielding clauses and precedents like a finely honed blade, and he had been happy to be her second.

She had taken his arm of her own volition after they had exited the building in a proprietary gesture that had not gone unnoticed by him, and had him Apparate them directly back to their suite.

“I don’t know about you, but I’m hungry,” he announced, loosening the collar of his robes. “That meeting dragged on longer than I expected. Fancy getting some lunch?”

Daphne sniffed, a snooty, aristocratic sound that Harry was beginning to find rather cute. “Our current attire is hardly suitable for a public luncheon,” she informed him.

Harry thought their robes were perfectly functional, if anything, a bit overdressed for a casual meal, but he said nothing and merely complied. After their successful partnership this afternoon, he was willing to cede to her judgment in these matters. He was learning that her world had a different set of rules, and for today at least, he was content to play by them.

He moved towards the bedroom, intending to change so they could finally eat, but he found himself brought up short. Daphne, who was still holding his arm, had not moved, her grip holding him fast. He looked at her curiously. Her face was as blank as an arctic plain.

He had a bad feeling about this.

Slowly, but seriously, she asked, “When Monsieur Dubois asked to come to a more ‘gentlemanly agreement,’ why did you tell him what you said?”

Harry was a little confused by the intensity of the question. “I thought that’s what you wanted,” he said with a disarming shrug. “You had him on the ropes. It would have been stupid for me to interfere. And besides, you’re much better at all that business stuff than I am, clearly. It made sense for you to be the one leading the charge, so to speak.”

She let go of his arm. A little concerned he had somehow messed up, he asked, “Why? Was that not what I was supposed to do?”

Daphne looked at him in silence for a moment that felt entirely too long for Harry's comfort, her expression a conflicting mess of emotions he couldn’t begin to decipher. Then, to his complete shock, she reached out and gently patted his cheek with her gloved hand.

“I am most pleased with you at the moment, husband,” she said warmly.

She stepped very close to him, so that the fronts of their robes were almost touching, and looked up at him with that same inscrutable gaze. Harry, still not entirely certain what he had done right, but more than willing to take advantage of her good mood, wrapped his arms around her waist, his hands resting on the small of her back. He lowered his head towards hers, intending to try and kiss her.

To his surprise, she didn’t pull away, instead rising on her toes to meet him in the middle, her lips meeting his in reciprocation.

The kiss broke, then happened again, each subsequent kiss becoming slightly more passionate, more involved than the last. A heady warmth began spreading through Harry’s chest, a warmth he hadn't felt since before his life had been turned upside down.

He broke the kiss, scooped her lithe frame into his arms, and carried her towards the bedroom. She let out a scandalized gasp, her eyes wide with a mixture of shock and something else that looked a lot like excitement. Her hands, which had been resting lightly on his shoulders, instinctively wrapped around his neck.

He sat on the edge of the bed, holding her in his lap. Her face was a bright red, and she wouldn't meet his eyes. “Is this okay, my wife?”

She gave a shy nod.

He began to kiss her again, first her lips, then her neck, and soon the opulent room was filled with the soft sounds of passion. It felt like the natural continuation from the tentative explorations of their mornings and the surprising kindness of their nights. There was a new energy forming between them.

Later, as they lay basking from actions that had been performed with a surprising lack of duty, but a great deal of enthusiasm, instead of rolling to their respective sides of the bed as was their custom, Harry lay next to Daphne and pulled her into his arms, her back pressed against his chest.

He could feel a reflexive stiffening as her body remembered a lifetime of conditioning, of rules about propriety and distance, but with a contented sigh, she melted into the hold, her head finding a comfortable spot on his shoulder as she snuggled closer.

Harry was unsure of what any of this meant for the future.

They were being intimate outside the requirements of the contract with what was becoming a surprising regularity. He didn't understand her, not really. But as he held her, listening to the rhythm of her breathing, he found that he didn't need to.

If nothing else, if it continued in this way, he thought, at least he could have this.

This small, warm, unexpected island of happiness in the cold sea of his new life.

Daphne:

(Friday Evening, November 10th, 2000)

After some time spent dozing in the warmth of their shared embrace, a rumbling growl from Harry’s stomach broke the peaceful air between them. The afternoon of business negotiations had drained both of them, and the activities that followed had left them in a state of pleasant lethargy.

Daphne found, to her great surprise, that she quite enjoyed being held like this in his arms. The thought brought a furiously strong and equally traitorous blush to her face.

For a lifetime, she had been taught that marriage was a thing to be endured, not enjoyed.

This was comfortable.

This was warm.

As if fighting a long war against the standards of propriety by which she had been raised, she felt her body, unbiddened, relinquish itself further into his warmth, her head fitting neatly in the crook of his shoulder.

She found herself considering the words Tracey had said so conspiratorially: “Do you think you’re falling for him?”

The thought made her feel as though her very body was in open rebellion. Her heart gave a great swooping lurch in her chest, a feeling that was both terrifying and exhilarating. Suddenly, she was much too warm; the propriety or impropriety of their embrace the furthest thing from her mind.

She wiggled out of his arms, the movement clumsy and flustered. “I must take a shower after these activities,” she announced to the room, her voice a little too loud. “And so shall you. I will have some robes laid out for you, appropriate for the venue we shall visit.”

Harry’s voice was a warm, sleepy murmur from the bed. “Wake me once you get out of the shower. I’m going to take a small nap.”

Daphne entered the luxurious marble bathroom and performed her rituals. Today, she alternated the water from hot to cold and back again, the drastic temperature changes a welcome method to regain her mental composure and get her traitorous body back under control.

She performed the rest of her ablutions and applied a subtle layer of makeup. It took her longer than usual without Tracey’s assistance. While she was adequate at the task, Tracey was a near master, her hands deft in comparison to Daphne’s own.

Daphne finished and returned to the bedroom, wrapped in a fluffy towel. She chose a simple, elegant white silk blouse and a dark green pleated skirt that reached down to her calves, topped with a set of formal dark green robes. She was becoming quite fond of the colour green.

She gently shook Harry awake. He groaned, stretching languidly before moving sleepily towards the shower. As he walked away from her, his back bare, she allowed her gaze to admire his physique. Thankfully, she mused, the suite was large, allowing for a deliciously long time for her to discreetly watch him.

She turned her attention to his wardrobe, selecting a set of dark, almost black, formal robes, a crisp white linen shirt, and dark trousers. When he emerged from the bathroom, steam curling around him, she waited patiently for him to dress before she began to fix his attire.

He was good at submitting to her attentions, standing still as she corrected the obvious errors in his dressing that would no doubt be noted and commented upon by the upper echelons of society. Even though she could tell he was hungry, he was managing his baser instincts quite well as she finished her ministrations.

They exited their suite, and Harry offered her his arm at the door. It was not a gesture required by etiquette in such a private space, nor one she had instructed him on, but she accepted it. She found herself pleased that he had made the consideration for her on his own.

They maneuvered through the opulent hotel and onto the streets of magical Strasbourg. She quickly found an exclusive-looking restaurant after they had walked for a short while, its entrance discreet and its windows charmed to obscure the patrons within.

Neither of them had made any small talk during the walk, and while there was a slight awkwardness around them, there was also a casualness that Daphne found appreciable, as long as it remained appropriately private.

Once they were seated at a secluded table, Harry, who of course did not know a word of French, had her order for him. He had stated, with a slight grimace, that he did not enjoy the French food he had tried at Hogwarts during the Triwizard Tournament and thus requested something "simple and appropriate for his uncultured tastes".

She had only felt the need to sniff at him twice during their meal: once when he had the audacity to pick up his soup spoon for the fish course, and then again when he reached for his dessert fork for the main entrée. He had looked at her questioningly, and she had discreetly tapped the side of her own table, indicating the appropriate piece of cutlery to use.

He had the gall to ask, with a disarmingly charming smile, "Are we playing some sort of secret game? You could just tell me which fork to use, you know."

It had aggrieved her a little, but the smile he had when he said it had removed any real anger she would have had from his social gaffe. She had kept the conversation they had strictly on business and matters of the House, where his education was lacking. He had tried to bring up more casual discourse, but she had redirected the conversation to appropriate topics for the venue, and with a warning look from her, he had seemingly understood.

Later, they had gone shopping, with her insisting that she finally fix his horrific wardrobe. She quite enjoyed having him as her personal model, a living doll she could dress and critique. He was remarkably patient as she had him try on countless robes. He did vex her when he asked, with childish curiosity, "What does it matter if the robes are made from Acromantula silk versus Chinese Shadow Worm silk?" It was basic knowledge, and terribly ironic that he of all people was unaware of considering that it was Voldemort himself who made Chinese Shadow Worm move from a niche material to a popular one.

Thankfully, when such ignorance truly showed, no one else was around. She was truly scandalized when he asked why they needed to get different colours of robes. "Why can't we just use powerful colouring charms for whatever event we attend?" he had asked, a question so socially debaucherous that she did not deign to answer it, instead imperiously telling him to kindly never mention such a thing in her presence again.

She must have subjected him to too much, for his patience had clearly failed at such questioning, and seemingly his judgment was beginning to falter too. Consequently, the shopping trip was ended, to which Harry was visibly relieved, and Daphne was happy because miraculously they would not be appearing in any fashion journals being mockingly quoted.

That evening, fatigued from the events of the day, she had ordered a private dinner to their suite. She had Harry open one of the rare vintages they had received as an ‘apology’ from Dubois and pour them both glasses.

Harry had swirled the deep red liquid in his glass, sniffed it with a thoughtful expression, and declared, "Much better than the house red at the Leaky Cauldron."

The statement made Daphne die a little on the inside.

Later, as they had performed their duty for the third time that day, Daphne had decided it was not only her body that was mutinous, but also her mind. As he lay back down at the culmination of their union, she found herself moving into his embrace before he had even had a chance to initiate it, an unconscious surrender to the new and confusing comfort she was beginning to crave.