Chapter Text
Looking from the outside in, Madame Delacourt seemed to be a woman who prided herself on her unshakeable pragmatism and dedication to acheiving whatever goals she set for herself.
Or so the carefully constructed façade of her life would suggest.
From the time she was old enough to express her own wants, she had forged ahead with the creation of a legacy that was to become a mosaic of meticulously calculated risks in return for much, much reward.
Each move she'd made upon the chess board of her life had been a precise cultivation of both the privilege and the power that she had been born into as a noblewoman and, specifically, as the daughter of a duke. Which, naturally, she had taken advantage of to carve herself into the very image of a Grande sorcière through the advantages that her legacy had afforded her. Even if there had been a few bumps along the way.
Once, when she was still in the first flush of her youth, she’d willingly, and somewhat bull-headedly, made the sacrifice of stepping back from her established position within the glittering, rigid hierarchy she'd been raised in amongst France’s magical nobility to take on the challenge of turning herself into a Prima Ballerina. A Moldus Prima Ballerina, at that.
She had pursued that singular ambition-a novelty within the court of La Reine if not the entirety of magical society itself-with a ruthless, almost terrifying determination. Which, whilst most of her peers had scorned her, had made the world outside the polished floors, grueling discipline and strenuous, constant practice of ballet fade away until she managed to work her way towards her one true goal: That of joining the prestigious École de danse de l'Opéra national de Paris in the Moldus world.
If achieving such lofty heights meant defying her parents’ wishes in the process and enduring their icy disapproval as she traded in the tradition of her family’s attendance at Beauxbatons School for Wixen for the discreet instruction of magical homeschooling instead, then so be it. The bitter rift she was forced to endure with her parents thereafter was a price she had paid willingly, and it stood today as a quiet testament to her own endurance in the face of any adversity that would ever come between her and her own aspirations for success.
Such was the monumental strength of her purpose and her will to succeed against, and ultimately conquer, not only the suffocating expectations foisted upon her since birth as an heir to a great house with royal lineage, but also to challenge the constant and all-pervading political machinations orchestrated by her dear, dear Papa. A man of whom had spent more time at the ICW seeking to bolster the Delacourt name and their family's influence on the behalf of La Reine’s royal court than he had at home with either her or her Maman.
The Madame had, of course, refused to be a party to his games when she was younger as she did not see the need to kowtow to her father's desires over her own. Though, in some ways, she would come to regret that. For her abandonment of tradition had led to her family’s loss of influence domestically and internationally as a direct result of her choices, thus making them a laughingstock within the halls of the Ministère as much as within the royal court itself.
Her cousins from the northern Delacour family had, predictably, become rather more frigid towards her House from then on. For when they had discovered her-in their words-'pedestrianly Moldus ambitions’ they had used it to bolster their own position within France’s magical elite at the noted expense of the Royal and Most Noble Patronage of House Delacourt through making a mockery of her parents' ability to raise their own children. But as the Delacour’s were a mere minor offshoot of her own ancient family line, it had not mattered so much to her as it perhaps should have done when such blatant in-fighting between their two branches was taking place.
Because while the Delacourt family continued to hold the coveted title of their duchy and the ancestral estate, alongside the verification of their Royal lineage as recognised by Her Majesty's Suite De La Noblesse which was directly administered by the French Magical Monarchy, the northern Delacours maintained a permanent hold upon her family's seat within the Ministère des Affaires Magiques de la France as established after the revolution.
Sir Martine Delacour had supported the revolutionaries before the Civil War broke out in 1789 where he had encouraged the Delacour’s as a whole to renounce their oaths and betray the monarchy in return for their current position and standing as a part of the bourgeoisie in exchange for permanent control of the Delacourt duchy's seat within the French Ministry’s legislature. Which had done much to bolster the Delacour's reach over her own family’s whose domestic political power had been sliced to ribbons as a result.
Much to the fury of the Duc de Delacourt’s of the past who, in contrast, had been and still remained stark Royalists and had declared a blood feud on their own dependent family line. Something that had never before, or since, been done in France.
This meant, regrettably, that her scandalous choice to become what her critics sneeringly called a 'Moldus-touched dancer girl' had immediately placed her and her parents at a considerable political disadvantage within France as a whole after generations of Delacourt's clawing their way back up to their previous glory.
To swiftly rectify this once she had gotten older and the repercussions of her actions became too notable to ignore and as a means to restore the standing of both of her beloved parents in society, she had re-branded her passion for ballet as a charming, youthful folly rather than the deep-seated passion it had truly been. Thus, she had plunged headlong into the rigorous world of magical academia to soothe the hurts she had inflicted and she had attended university where she had been instructed in Higher Magics, specialising in the rarefied fields of spell-crafting and warding as a means of garnering the respect of her peers.
However, as Madame Delacourt discovered soon after and somewhat unintentionally, she had excelled a little too well at both for France’s political factions.
Which is precisely why, after the world tours with her troupe had slowed to a halt and she had begun to age out of the demanding role of a Prima, the time and intense effort that she had poured into her academic papers saw her quickly become recognised for her brilliance. Which had ensured she was lauded as revolutionary(a tense, often dangerous word in France, even at the best of times, and this was certainly not the best of times) for her treatise upon a new branch of magic that utilised runes and spellwork in tandem. The narrative of her 'dangerous' innovation had been picked up by the vicious tongues of the French Press but specifically by the Ministry-endorsed Le Cri de la Gargouille, who had gone on to ridicule her noted, globally peer-reviewed publications and had been scalding in their own assessment of her ability. Which, naturally, they had found both lacking and, somehow, insultingly daring.
She thus found herself, without seeking it by any means, collecting the intense attention of the French elite from both extremes of the political spectrum during a time period when their reignited and centuries-long power struggle was holding the entire country in a vicegrip of brewing turmoil. This was, as one might imagine, far from ideal circumstances for a woman only newly trying to re-establish herself within society and not at all what she had intended. Consequently, her position as the Duc de Delacourt's heir began to be ruthlessly exploited to further the subtle machinations of La Reine's court, and cause, by her own papa who considered all press good press. Especially when he held the purse strings of several other newspapers wrapped around his iron fist.
So it was that in a desperate, determined bid to escape this brewing reignition of war that she found herself considering England, of all places, as a means of escape.
Her husband, Nathaniel, had suggested his homeland after one passionate morning of love-making when a particularly virulent article about herself had been published in the Gargouille. Desperately, he had begged for her to leave France so that he may bring her to his foggy isle beyond the Channel in order that he may proudly present her to his parents at long last where, he hoped, he and his family's name may protect her from the worst of the press while she licked her wounds and thought out a plan of action with her Papa(The parallels of this that she saw in her queen's own way of life were not lost to her, and left a somewhat sour note on her tongue.)
Nathaniel, however, was too pleased by her acceptance to dwell overlong upon his wife’s discomfort. Extolling her beauty and her extraordinary achievements to both of his parents, they had agreed to help find them both a place to live as he had painted them a pretty picture of their future plans to finally settle down and start a family of their own. It was a novel idea to use such a means to get them on side, but it was also as flattering as it was terrifying a prospect for a woman who had spent the vast majority of her life bathed in the limelight of the stage and terrified of what a pregnancy would mean for her career. The idea of sudden domestic bliss was… a lot to contemplate and digest.
Compounding her fears and anxiety both were the relentless voices of the nobility and the public pressure being applied to her husband, too. Her continued vilification at the hands of the Ministère and the unceasing issues with her fair cousins assassinating both their reputations in the press had also contributed to her dear, sweet Nathaniel's endless amounts of stress and worry on both their behalfs. Something of which her Papa’s constant needling for their statements and photos to appear in newspapers and magazines as retaliation to their critics certainly didn’t help her to quell. Her precious husband wasn’t built for such things, after all. He was a preblood, certainly. But one well-removed from the responsibilities of nobility or potential governance.
There wasn't much of a choice left in the end but England if she wanted to keep her well-coiffed head upon her shoulders for a bit longer or, more importantly, if she wanted to keep Nathaniel safe.
But now, with her Nathaniel cruelly taken from her and struck down by the sudden rupture of a heart defect no one had detected or even thought to look for, she had been left profoundly alone not six months after her move to a strange country that she still did not quite understand while their own war had broken out. Leaving her within a house that echoed with his absence and that felt far too vast for just her and her two faithful hounds. Especially with the Death Eaters seemingly at the gates.
She was as yet only forty-six years of age, but with the rest of her life stretching barren and desolate before her weary eyes, she found herself consumed by a quiet, desperate loneliness that for the life of her she could not shake,no matter how many times she ventured forth to make new friends or build connections within a land she still wished to live in if only to be close to her Nathaniel’s parents and to see the shadows of him in every nook and cranny of her house so that she may remember him, and not let his memory fade.
And it is a truth universally acknowledged that lonely people are often prone to making the oddest of choices.
For instance, on this cool, crisp October morning, the Madame awoke early (or would that be late?) to the alarming sound of her own wildly thudding heart, which hammered an unsteady beat against her sternum. She had dreamt of her beloved again, standing by the shores of Saint-Roux with his trouser legs rolled up to his knees as he stood in the waves and searched for sea-shells to plait into her hair.
Rising from the soft confines of her bed, she made to get up. But instead of her usual routine of preparing a soothing lavender tea to calm her soul and loosen the strangling grip of grief upon her neck- as she might have done in a different place, at a different time- while she let the tear tracks dry upon her cheeks, she decided instead to take a shower.
Letting the hot water loosen her muscles, she cried as she sat on the shower floor for as long as she was able to excuse it.
When ready, she got up and dried herself before she dressed in her lush October furs, applied a little makeup to restore some life and colour to her cheeks, and then spelled her hair into her signature, elegant chignon. More out of habit than from any actual need to make herself look presentable at 2 or so in the morning. It was like a kiss of tradition from her ballet days, a nod to the ruthless routine she had maintained for years during her youth. Taking a slow moment to breathe, she gathered her dogs' leads before calmly calling to them, her beloved pups and only companions, as a mother would her children.
First came Joux, her golden beauty, padding into the room with an almost stately prance, tail wagging and tongue lolling as she stretched and rubbed her enormous head into Delacourt’s palm. Rex followed soon after, with his immense, hulking frame barely able to fit through the bedroom door. A veritable mass of muscle that befitted any Great Dane from Petitcrieu stock, Rex did not so much walk towards her as powerfully lope.
Both were magical beasts of some description, and though Joux’s specific breed could not be accurately told, the Madame had always believed she was a fae-hound of some distant stock from the Seelie Court that had been mixed in with perhaps a Golden Retriever or a Kyon Khryseos of Greece, both of which would explain the spectacular, almost blindingly golden hue of her fur when struck by pure sunlight.
It mattered not in any case, for she loved them both dearly regardless of their lineage.
Her Joux for her sweet and gentle disposition, which always helped to calm the storm that raged inside Madame at the darkest moments during the night when she would awake with cold sweat clinging to her skin with only Joux’s warm, spicy breath and rough tongue upon her hand to comfort her. Her Rex, though, she adored for his constant, watchful protectiveness that reminded her so dearly of her sweet choux of a husband, and the very reason why Nathaniel had chosen Rex as her companion familiar in the first place.
"To protect you, my love, whenever I'm not able," he had said, with that teasing, crooked smile she loved so much playing at the corners of his lips.
‘Had loved’, she reminded herself bitterly, biting upon her bottom lip as though to stem the pain in her heart with the salty tang of blood in her mouth. Though, she expected that Nathaniel probably hadn't ever thought there would come a day where he would never be there for her himself. But then, neither had she. Such was the power and constant thrum of love within their bond since their marriage vows had been made.
Breathing deeply in through her nose, Madame Delacourt blinked rapidly as she stared upwards towards the ceiling of her bedroom in a desperate bid to stem the flow of tears that bit into her like poison. Hoping against hope that they would simply sink back into her as though they had never been there at all, Delacourt blinked as rapidly as she could to not let a single one drop. Then, to distract herself, she let the intense warmth of her two, precious dogs soak into her as they gently nudged her sides in a bid to comfort her, even if they only did so more for the reciprocation of careful scritches and whispered words of love than any true understanding of her pain.
It still helped.
Letting her clip their leads onto their collars, Joux and Rex pulled her gently- ever so gently- to get her moving and out of her own head. They guided her through the spacious halls of her 'modest' domain (That's what Nathaniel had called it, more as a joke about the fact that she had been raised in a palais than any actual modesty of their home. Her home, now.), seemingly aware that she was unable to do so herself. With wagging tails and gentle whuffs of breath, their enormous heads swivelled around to check she was following sedately behind them, allowing her only a brief pause on the landing above the foyer for a moment when she caught on to the smooth wood of a bannister, needing to use something to keep her upright before she fell to her knees and wept without end once again.
After what seemed like an age but could have been no more than half a minute, they walked her through the giant carved mahogany doors of her Manse, and out into the garden paradise Nathaniel had helped her to create that, Madame Delacourt felt, was well-suited to a street named Magnolia Grove. Or was it a crescent? She could never remember the difference.
With flowerbeds overflowing with lush, vibrant plant life and some of the most gorgeous magical and muggle flowers alike, it was a haven of bountiful greenery that was almost tropical in its warmth and vibrancy even as winter approached. It was a well-needed warmth for her, nestled as she was within a city and a country otherwise choked with pollution, smog, and chill so unlike her beloved Saint-Roux on the Southern Coast of France, that she had called her home.
The Madame let her eyes rest briefly upon a few of the statues that sat in gorgeous contrast to the gardens. Pillars of delicate marble amongst the verdant greenery where bursts of bright yellows, blues, reds, pinks and oranges sprouted over a lawn not so much landscaped as curated, and here and there amongst them towered water features that Nathaniel had imported for her from the very best of magical stonemason ateliers in France, Spain and Greece that trickled out crystal-clear waters that smelled of honeysuckle and freesia, to fall almost lovingly into basins that tinkled with a sound akin to the laughter of fairies, or the harpsong of Tranquility herself.
Taking a moment to let the sights, scents and sounds wash over her, Madame Delacourt sighed before walking down her front steps and on to the winding path that would let her out beyond the bounds of her home.
Tension melting from her shoulders with every measured step over cobbles, Delacourt moved past her gardens to the front gate with its little chipped handle where Nathaniel had accidentally tripped into it with her trunk when she had first moved in. The thought made her smile and her hand lovingly caressed that chip like a kiss before she moved through it and out onto the pavement beyond as if every step she took away from home, from Nathaniel, didn't make her ache.
She was never quite sure why exactly Nathaniel had chosen an area called Little Whinging of all things. Considering how blandly uniform and sterile the place seemed to be beyond their home, she thought it to be an odd choice of dwelling at first, as it was as though the entire area wished to live up to its name in some capacity. Magnolia Grove, however, had turned out to be a little oasis so removed from such crushing mundanity as was possible so she didn’t overly begrudge the choice in the end. Especially now.
It was a gated magical community, home to many wealthy or otherwise affluent families within British magical society that were not so old as to be considered Nobility but not yet so young as to be considered a part of the nouveau riche. With a hodgepodge of pureblood households sat squarely and comfortably next to a dozen or so half-blood ones as if the divide between them was not so great inside the Grove as it was beyond, it was as good a place as any, she supposed. And more than comfortable enough for a woman of her position.
Even if that did mean it was a potential target for attack in these dark and uncertain times where Death Eaters scouted the country for yet more targets for their brutality. The thought made her grimace and pull her furs tighter around herself with a wary eye.
Though, oddly, it could perhaps be considered a safer option to live in the Grove than in most other areas in Britain for all the powerful protections that had been erected upon the surrounding houses, both individually and on the wider area of Magnolia Grove itself. Ironically, despite being filled to bursting with Muggleborns seeking refuge and protection, that meant it was a safer choice than somewhere like, say, Vertic Alley that was ostensibly under the protection of the British Ministry of Magic but had been breached multiple times in raids which had left hundreds dead and thousands more injured over the past few months.
The sheer amount of wardstones, spellwards, and resonance crystals around Magnolia Grove had taken her breath away when she and Nathaniel had first moved in, the awe of it making her giddy to dig her hands into the threads of the wards and pluck them to see what made them tick.
Naturally, her own work had been included into the network after a time and once trust had been established. Though, if she had also snuck in a few secret additions of her own crafting to ensure none attempted to negatively impact the wards, or that any alterations made in good faith that could inadvertently provide a weak point any outsiders could exploit would see her notified almost immediately… then no one had to know. She would not have any living beside her who feared for their safety, nor would she allow anyone to leave those who did feel vulnerable open to attack. That simply could not be borne.
The shadow of the war with Vol De Mort- which she refused to say any other way than the French, because surely that was the only proper way to say it- lay heavily over Magnolia Grove in both the community's design and its current function. Nathaniel had once told her that the reason it was so well-protected in the first place was because during the peak of violence, death, and corruption that had swept the country at the start of the war with Vol De Mort and while his reign was still barely in its infancy or established as a threat, some families here had seen the signs for what they were and had begun operations for the protection and amnesty of Muggleborns and their families as far and wide as they could reach. Together they had transformed a large old church into a veritable fortress with almost a hundred bedrooms, several large kitchens, living areas and recreation rooms. All of which the people here, half-blood and pureblood alike, had made available as the fighting began to escalate. The inside of the church had been expanded with magic as more and more people were rescued discreetly and, alongside the help of House Elves who tried to keep on top of everything, the running of the Church was left up to the Mugleborns and their families to manage.
A noble endeavor, to be sure, and one Madame Delacourt valued highly for its selfless act of service to those less fortunate or unable to do so themselves. Noblesse Oblige was a cornerstone of all civilized people, after all.
Nathaniel had thought it a wonderful endeavour, though as time went on and there seemed to be no end to the war within the British isles, and the rumblings of one beginning in France reached them, he had grown ever more anxious that some great ill was about to befall her.
‘He always did try to protect me from any and all ills’ Delacourt thought tenderly as, lost in her in musings, she turned down a street she believed was called Privet Drive, heedless of the irony that despite her appreciation for the desperate need of protection for others and the worries of her late husband, she had chosen to leave the safety of Magnolia Grove to walk her dogs, of all things.
And it was at that very moment when Madame Delacourt, who had wandered for the better part of an hour and had let her dogs lead her as they willed, heard a soft cry.
It was a pitiful thing, no more than a chilled whimper, really.
But she had heard it, and so had Rex and Joux.
Their noses sniffed loudly in the silence of the early morning, bristling as they did so, until as one her dearest companions turned their heads to the right and huffed their lumbering bodies closer towards a single house in what she could only assume was… curiosity? An odd thing, in truth, as both were usually quite aloof. But as their bodies turned, and their eyes swiveled to the right, so did hers.
And there, right there, abandoned upon a doorstep leading to a house with a heavy golden '4' right above its knocker was a swaddled bundle of white, puffy as clouds.
Momentarily not understanding what she was seeing, Delacourt paused.
Until, yet again, that distressed, sleepy mewling came to her and her hounds tugged her eagerly forward towards both the house and the bundle.
Taking in a moment, she looked up and down the street but could see no retreating back, nor any breath of warmth in the air to suggest any were nearby, magical or otherwise, but a faint whiff of scent reached her as she scanned the street. ‘Is that… lemons?’ she wondered, before shaking her head and tying her pups' leads with a loose, perfunctory knot to the pickets of the fence before her.
Quietly opening the latched gate, - which seemed much too white and much too clean for the house to be lived in, surely?- Madame Delacourt turned to her hounds and ordered them to “Stay!" in a quiet voice powerful with command and watched as they moved to be sat firmly down upon their haunches while keeping their ears cocked and attentive as they turned their enormous heads ever so slightly to and fro with their noses twitching to catch the ghost of a scent she herself could not correctly name. Delacourt was glad too that her hounds were so protective and so aware at all times.
Because as heedless of her own safety she may have been before that precise moment- in such a way as was distinctly out-of-character for herself, she admitted ruefully with frustration and annoyance- she was not so lost to her grief or reason as to forget there was a war raging on around her. Which, as a person helping to protect muggle borns and their loved ones, she would most certainly be a target of. Pureblood Nobility with Royal lineage or not.
Pulling out her wand, the Madame cautiously approached what she knew, in her gut, to be a child. It could be nothing else, she was quite certain. No creature, magical or otherwise, would be swaddled in quite such a way as that.
Taking her wand firmly in hand, she cast a quick succession of spells to scan the child, but became increasingly frustrated as few of them seemed to work. As a last resort she waved it in a complicated twirl of loops and flicks, settling on a spell of her own design and leaning into magic more robust than what she had previously been attempting which amounted to little more than a medics quick screening.
It was a diagnostic spell she had thought to create for greater accuracy with less need for multiple subject-specific spells usually relied upon by mediwizards, mediwitches and Healers in situations where the cause of an ailment might not be readily apparent. The only issue was it was a particularly tricky piece of wandwork, and couldn't be performed wandlessly, which was considered a drawback in magical medicine. A stupid point of view to her mind, but reasonable enough when taking into account the importance of diagnostics in a time of crisis, she supposed.
In all honesty, she felt the spell was somewhat of an overkill in this particular instance, but if it worked where the others had failed? All the better.
Almost instantly upon its completion, a flash of warning pulsed towards her and a veritable miasma of afterburn from the darkest and most unholy magic known to wizardkind made itself known to her, making her hiss with displeasure.
The child had been cursed, or perhaps a ritual of dark magnitude had been performed upon him. To have that much dark magical residue? It was… unheard of and deeply concerning.
Madame Delacourt scanned the rest of the results that spilled forth from the conjured piece of parchment that laid out all was wrong with the child that it could detect with graphs of nutritional needs and figures such as height, weight and the last time he’d eaten spilling forth alongside the current condition of his magical core. Which seemed stable, thank Morgana.
The babe was cold, frightfully so, half-starved after nearly twenty-four hours without food and barely just fifteen months old. The quiet, keening mewls that had spilled forth from his lips, even whilst in the grips of a magically-induced slumber were ones of desperate need and deep discomfort.
The poor thing was in pain and no wonder. His fragile young body was oozing from some kind of parasitic magic the likes of which she had never come across in all her years. Which was... unusual, to say the least and definitely a future concern that would need to be addressed, alongside the nature of a cursed remnant that lingered upon him, according to her scan.
Reaching out to take the child into her arms, she cast a quick warming charm upon him and cradled him as tightly as she dared while chanting a quick spell of mild purification, which she hoped would ease off at least some of the dark magic that pulsed virulently from him. She wasn't the least bit surprised when it didn't appear to work, however. Whatever had been done to the child- a babe in arms, Mon dieu!- wasn’t likely to be easy to erase from him. He was warm now, though, and with that problem at least temporarily taken care of she moved some of the swaddling out of his face and peeked at the babe before letting out a shocked, but delighted, little gasp.
He was beautiful. All cherubic cheeks made rosy from the warming charm, with sweeping black lashes thicker and more dense than any doll's she’d ever seen and hair as dark as the wings of a starling against skin the colour of cinnamon-spiced milk.
Even the jagged, split-lightning scar that pulled down from the right side of his forehead in vividly fresh pink and angry lines couldn't mar the sheer unadulterated sweetness of the boy she cradled within her arms.
She cooed, involuntarily.
Which brought her up short, because until right that moment Delacourt had always thought she was rather ambivalent to children. Or, at least, she thought she was.
But after seeing that sweep of lashes, those puckered pink lips, and that tiny curling hand clasped upon her finger for comfort as soon as she brought it towards his tiny, perfect fist with its opal-like nails, she rather fancied that it was the idea of pregnancy that had so raised her ire. As, surely, if she had been so unmoved by children before, then seeing this one in her arms wouldn’t have caused such a swelling of maternal, protective instincts as now beat within her breast.
How could such a sweet little angel have ever earned anyone’s ire? Much less to have been deserving of whatever wickedness had been forced upon him before being dropped on the doorstep of a muggle home like a bottle of milk.
All of a sudden, a bubble of rage made itself known within her. Children were precious in the magical world. So much so that harming a child to such a degree as might impede their growth or force their magical core to heal themselves or, worse, maim or deform them-her eyes skittered quickly to the twisted miasma of dark magic upon his brow with barely-repressed fury- often accompanied a death sentence in France, though she wasn’t sure if the same thing could be said about Britain. If she were ever to find the person who had attempted to harm this innocent, or the one who had sought to leave him here upon a doorstep without warmth or sustenance, then neither would be spared her wrath.
Delicately, Delacourt weakened the sleeping spell cast over the child with utmost care, not wanting to disrupt him too much and fully aware that he could be suffering quite badly under the effects of the spell he had been subjected to before the spelling spell took hold, and waking him completely might make him more aware of whatever pain he might be in and she was in no position to be able to help ease that.
She was going to have to do several cleansing rituals on the child, that much was certain. The dark magic that clung to him could not be allowed to affect his magical core, or his growth or else he might find himself with many health issues as he grew older. Not least of which would be malnutrition from his magic’s need to fuel the containment of the magic in his scar.
Adding to that the fact that introducing too much foreign magic of her own into his system could be a risky endeavour without the help of an expert pediatric healer to watch over him and ensure his stability during any true cleansing or healing meant that she really only had a couple of options to seek out aid for him as matters currently stood. St. Mungo’s wouldn’t be a bad choice, but what with the overflowing beds and the constant casualties of war being brought to their wards while being under constant surveillance by the Auror Corps, that was altogether a different kind of risk.
Perhaps she could call in one of her favors from Thornfang?
The Goblin did owe her and her family quite a bit, after all, with her father’s Goblin Rights initiative. And surely that would be enough for her to bargain for some Goblin healing and rituals for the babe if it was deemed so required by their own brand of healers.
Lost in her thoughts, she allowed her gaze to drift, meeting the child's eyes with her own as he woke with his discomfort.
She had never, in all of her life, seen eyes so damnably green.
They were like darkest, purest jade or emeralds held up towards a setting sun at twilight. They shone glossy with unshed tears, which only seemed to make them even greener, damn them, as the whites of his eyes turned to red and made his lashes wet. Much to her chagrin, because if she hadn't already begun to adore the child, she'd have fallen in love completely right then. As it was, he already had her wrapped around her finger, and she knew she would deny him nothing but the very best care she could get her hands on, if only to make him smile.
"Shush," She purred, in a voice only slightly accented with French, "It is alright, mon chéri, you are safe now. I promise."
The sniffs and gentle cries that had only just begun to rise in volume gentled as the babe rocked contentedly back and forth within her grasp. That surprised her, as she would have assumed his pain would be too great to ignore even with a sleeping spell only partially taken off of him. But, oddly, he seemed rather… content? If not obviously hungry.
For a moment, she was tempted to just... leave. To take the child with her immediately and damn the consequences.
‘No one has seen you,’ an insidious voice in her head whispered, ‘it would be nothing to just walk away and act like you were never there.’
The temptation to listen to the more viciously callous side of her conscience was strong. She had half-turned to leave when something-her better mind, perhaps- tugged her back. She would do the right thing, even if it, somehow, felt wrong.
‘How novel.’ her inner-voice scoffed.
She couldn’t help but agree as she ignored it and rang the doorbell.
Once. Twice. Three times, and then finally a long press of it until a light was switched on and shortly after a woman, thin as a stick and long of face like a horse, opened the door with a disgruntled, beady eye peering up at Delacourt with suspicion and annoyance. She was only just in the middle of wrapping a salmon-pink dressing gown around her wiry frame as the door swung wider, and a spidery hand moved up to adjust the rollers in her hair.
"Yes?" She asked in an unpleasantly nasal voice that made Delacourt wrinkle her nose just so. "Who are you, and what do you want?"
Her eyes flashed down, almost contemptuously, to the child, and then the woman sniffed. Again, similarly to a horse. It could almost be considered amusing.
"We've nothing for beggars, and if you've rung at my door at almost three in the morning to-"
"Pardonne-moi," Madame interrupted, somewhat incredulously as it wasn’t as though she’d been dressed in rags, "I was walking my dogs and came across this precious bundle upon your doorstep, crying out into the night," she watched as the woman's eyes followed the motion of her bejewelled hand to where Joux and Rex still sat at attention, their heads swivelling to and fro as they sniffed the air and occasionally glanced to where their master stood. Seeing their size, the woman appeared as though she might balk at any moment, so Delacour rushed on.
"I thought perhaps you ought to know a child had been left out here, in the cold."
Eyes narrowing again to angry slits, the woman glanced at the boy and then frowned. Her voice turned shrill.
"Well it's certainly not mine! My son is upstairs sleeping, and I resent the implicat-"
"Forgive me, madame, but I did not believe you to have left your own child outside," she gave the woman a bland, unimpressed look which seemed to make her thin lips thinner with displeasure at being interrupted. "I simply wished to make you aware of him. There is a letter in his swaddlings."
With a gentle movement, Delacourt produced from the folds of the cherub's blanket a thick envelope that she pressed forward towards the other woman with dignified insistence.
Again, the woman's eyes lingered on the diamonds and sapphires that glittered on her fingers and braceleted-wrists, but she tore her greedy, beady eyes away to scowl at the paper not a moment later taking the letter with a harsh, ungrateful snatch of her long, blunt fingers.
It was an ugly look upon an even uglier woman and without knowing how, Madame Delacourt was certain that this house was not safe for the babe. Nor, she imagined, for herself to suggest anything in terms of his welfare, which she had planned to let slip by pretending she was a muggle nurse or doctor. Looking at the other woman now, though? There'd be no point, and she wouldn't listen anyway. That much was clear from her arrogant demeanour and the dour look upon her face.
The letter was torn roughly from its sheath without care, the envelope discarded thoughtlessly while she poured over the contents of it with a furrowed brow. As the woman read, she at first went deathly pale with beads of sweat gathering on her upper lip, and then just as quickly she began to turn a rather awful shade of puce.
Her bony hands shook, her fingers digging into the parchment with such force that Madame Delacourt was almost surprised it didn't rip into pieces right there and then. Her breathing became ragged, her eyes wet.
‘Grief, then’ Delacour decided, not without some sympathy. After all, loss was a beast she knew well.
"May I come in? You look like you need to sit down," The Madame offered gently, but the woman's head snapped up immediately at her tone with a glower.
"Are you one of them?" She demanded, wild and accusatory in a way that confused Delacourt with its hatred. Visceral and rough with complete disdain.
She blinked. "One of whom, madame?"
"Those freaks that killed my sister and her husband!" The woman spat, the vitriol in her words no doubt fuelled by the grief she seemed stricken with, and the impotent rage of one left behind if the shaking and the beginnings of tears leaking from the corners of her eyes were anything to go by.
"You look like them! With your freakish clothes and that thing hanging from your neck! Lily used to have books with symbols like those all over them. You can't lie to me, either! I know your kind when I see them!" Madame Delacourt's hand came up to gently finger at the pendant around her neck. It was shaped like one of the runes of love, gebo and ehwaz, but it was not a precise blending. It was unique to her and Nathaniel and he'd had it made for her himself then gifted it to her for their first anniversary. The implications of such a precious keepsake being considered a 'thing' worthy of disrespect almost made The Madame snap. Instead she forced herself to focus on the issue.
"Wixen, you mean?"
The beady eyes narrowed at her ever further while the sneer deepened and the shaking grew yet more violent.
"Don't use that word!" The scarecrow snarled, throwing the letter towards Delacour as if it would act like Holy water and cast her out. "Freaks and sinners is what you and your kind are, nothing more! I won't have my sister's devil-spawn in my house! I don’t care what happens to it!"
At that, Madame Delacour felt her palm begin to itch with the distinct need to smack the woman across her ugly, hate-fuelled mouth. But before she could do more than twitch, there was a rumble from above.
"Petunia, pet, is everything all right?" A man's voice sounded from above, the tone both concerned and agitated, and when Delacourt looked up she was shocked to see Mr. Walrus from Alice in Wonderland appearing right before her eyes. She blinked, stunned by his girth. It seemed a miracle to her that the steps supported his weight, let alone were wide enough to fit his flabby expanse.
‘Sweet Morgana’, she gaped, ‘He's huge’.
"Everything is fine, Vernon," Petunia snapped, her voice rising into a screech the longer she spoke. "It’s only that my foolish twit of a sister and her vile husband have got themselves both blown up by one of their own kind in their stupid war! And some fool of an old man wants us to raise her son in our house! Around our Dudley! And this is another one of their freaks, bringing him here as though we don’t have a choice!" She was pointing now, deranged and panting and trying not to cry or outright scream. Or both. "And here she is knocking on our door in the middle of the night trying to make us the brat in, but I say, No! No! You can take him for all I care, but I will not have that Godless abomination in my HOUSE!"
Delacourt brought the precious bundle in her arms closer to her chest, shushing him as he began to cry and rocking him gently while she tried to cover his ears as much as possible to shield him from poison he did not deserve and glaring with all her might at Petunia, whose red neck and redder eyes laid bare the depth of her hatred towards the boy and all things magic.
Delacourt seethed. There was no way in, in Mother Magic's name that she was leaving the infant boy here, aunt or no!
"Then I suppose," she gritted out from behind clenched teeth, her smile as fixed as it was cold, "I'll just have to take him, because clearly leaving him with you would be a terrible injustice for all involved. Most of all for an innocent child!” her wand was in her palm in a blink. Petunia and Vernon had barely a second to register her lifted hand, and their own panic, before Delacour snarled at them both.
“Obliviate!" and then, for good measure, “Recordati componere!”
It wouldn't do for anyone snooping around to find blank spaces in their memories, after all.
Their eyes misting over, Petunia and Vernon stood confused for a moment before, as if coming out of a dream, they blinked.
"Petunia?" Vernon called, as though for the first time, "Is everything alright, Pet?"
"Ye-Yes," Petunia whispered, raising a hand to rub at her temple. She felt... heated for a reason she didn't quite understand, but even as she wondered as to why, the emotion slipped from her mind like sand through a sieve. "Yes, I'm fine, Vernon. I thought I heard something but it was just a cat. Go back to bed. Everything's alright, now."
Madame Delacourt waited for a few moments outside the door, listening until the lights switched off and the trundling rumble of Vernon's steps were followed by the quiet pit-pat of Petunia's.
Taking a deep breath, her heart racing from not only their confrontation but also the severity of the crime she had just committed, Madame Delacourt reached down to retrieve the letter and gave it a thorough once-over.
The contents of it, if anything, only reignited her anger. Her heart began beating out an unsteady tattoo against her sternum, but she pushed it down before she disturbed the child anymore than he already had been.
Lord James and Lady Lily, dead. Murdered by Vol De Mort.
Their house, destroyed. Their legacy, one of duty, sacrifice, and loss personified by their own tragic ending.
Their son, a survivor of not only the attack itself, but also of a Killing Curse! Which was impossible. Or should have been impossible! Nothing she had ever encountered could explain that, either. Another mystery to add alongside that strange, magical parasite she could still feel, somehow. She suddenly began to feel almost afraid. For herself, maybe, but for the boy most of all.
Forcing herself to calm down with deep, slow breaths she counted backwards from 100 while she hugged the bundle before her even tighter and placed a gentle kiss upon his brow.
"I am so sorry, mon chéri, for the burden and the loss you now must bear."
Her heart wept for the murders of Lily and James Potter, for whilst she did not know them- she was much older than them both, after all- she did know of them.
The Daily Prophet had run stories of their philanthropy during the war, highlighting how their galleons had funded relief efforts and the rebuilding of homes while they had encouraged others in a position to do so themselves to open their vaults and hearts to the innocent victims of a blood-purity war none of them had seen coming. Something of which rarely ever happened when it came to the wealthy of magical society, and yet the Potters had been so charming in their entreaties and their own contributions so large that thousands began to help in whatever ways they could the longer the war ran on.
Their voices were ever raised in favor of equality, equity, and parity. Their Wizengamot seats were something they'd used to protect the innocent and champion the weak no matter how large the target on their back became.
They were people of integrity, which was rare enough in and of itself, but they were also deeply selfless. Though Delcour did have to admit to herself that she was not a fan of all their beliefs, particularly their stance on Christianity and its being catered to within their society, as she felt the Abrahamic religions should never be allowed to dictate the traditions of Wizarding kind or replace Wixen holidays just to make Muggleborns more comfortable. Especially when Wixen traditions were so deeply important to one's connection to Mère de la Magie and the healthy, unfettered growth of young people's magical cores.
Still, Lily and James were people Madame could willingly admit she otherwise admired.
Who better to raise their son if not her, then? A woman already deeply in love with their child- seemingly against her will and against all reason- who would protect, treasure, and value him beyond any status of 'saviour' foisted upon him by an old man who would no doubt try to groom him in his own image for his own ends.
For that's what Dumbledore would do, she knew that for certain.
The man was famous for his power-hungry ways within the corridors of the ICW, after all. Her father himself had mentioned how... difficult the man could be.
With all his schemes and backroom deals it seemed everyone was just a second too late to counter. Some had begun to unflatteringly name him 'The Runespoor' for the many faces he wore and the discord he sowed to further his own ends both internationally and domestically. Dumbledore was not the kind of man to leave the fate of Britain in the Minister’s hands, after all, if he could force international law to maintain the man’s compliance to his own worldview.
So, If nothing was done, then this innocent babe would be used as a pawn to consolidate Dumbledore's grip on both the ICW and the British Wizengamot if he was allowed to sink his greedy old hands on him. Delacourt was sure of it.
By keeping him in the dark about who he is and the line he comes from whilst being raised by Muggles who hate him and controlling not only his access to information about himself and the world, he could be priming Harry for manipulation by making the circumstances of his home as difficult as possible so the need for a seemingly stable and reliable mentor or, perhaps, grandfather-figure for guidance would endear Dumbledore to him.
Which sounded very much like something her own father might concoct given half the chance, now that she thought about it. Though she wasn’t willing to indulge that thought overmuch as it was unflattering to the essential goodness her father held within him, for all his many dirty ways.
Reading the letter again, she didn't miss the way Dumbledore pointedly asked Petunia to put her feud with Lily and her hatred of magic aside to raise her little Cherub as he would be ‘watching’.
He knew, then, that the woman would be an unfit guardian, and yet placed the boy there anyway, using the excuse of blood wards.
Which wouldn't even work the way he described it. It requires... well, blood for blood wards. Not a blood connection without any further tangible ritual or casting circle or binding spell. Magic doesn’t transfer like that!
Yes, Dumbledore was definitely a threat to Harry. That much was clear from this letter alone, much less adding in his knowledge of who the Dursley’s are.
Looking down at her charge, the anxious, though determined, expression on her face melted into something much softer against her will.
"Hello, Harry," she whispered, brushing his curling black strands out of his sleepy eyes, which caused him to gurgle and give her a smile with a flash of his little baby teeth. "My name is Antoinette Marie-Celeste Delacourt, but you, my darling, you may call me Maman."
Leaning down slightly, Antoinette moved to show Joux and Rex the newest member of their little family as she walked back towards them instructing them as she did so that they must take very, very good care of him at all times.
Moving out onto the road and grabbing up their leashes, she closed the front gate of No. 4 Privet Drive behind her with a soft snick.
Her hounds, ever curious and loving, sniffed and gently nudged their enormous faces softly, oh so softly, against Harry's cheeks which made the little angel gurgle and giggle in a way that only babies can. It brought warmth to her heart and seemed to relieve some of tension in her shoulders.
Together, in the dark of the very early morning, their strange little quartet made their way back to Magnolia Grove.
Madame Delacourt kept her gaze alert to make sure they were all careful enough not to be seen by any muggles who may remember their passing while Antoinette began to scheme and make a few plans of her own.
She'd have to make a quick trip to Joist Alley once she'd gotten Harry home and transfigured him a bassinet to sleep in, at the very least.
She would need baby toys and food, too, and quickly. None of the shops of Joifa Alley would be closed at this hour despite the time, and he'd be safe with Joux and Rex for twenty minutes.
Then after that? Perhaps she would write a quick letter to great-aunt Perenelle. She was a mother many times over, and not a fan of Dumbledore's, if Delacourt remembered correctly. She’d be excellent help, and might even begin to pave the way for her as her father’s successor and as the mother of the young boy who vanquished a dark lord before he could talk.
Harry would need all the love, care, and protections he could get, after all. And Perenelle knew babies in a way Delacourt did not. The advice, and the company, would be sorely needed.
And maybe, just maybe, Great Aunt Perie could help Antoinette convince her Papa that the Delacourt line should be expanded, too. Antoinette was sure Lily and James wouldn't mind, wherever their souls now resided. He'd get a beautiful home, and grandparents who would adore him without reservation, especially if her father agreed to a blood adoption.
Which, seeing as he would become French magical royalty would only increase his protections ten-fold, and place him at 6th in line for the Throne after herself, her father and La Reine’s own children.
Her parents had always wanted grandchildren, too, for their own sake. They would have no objections, she imagined, about a legal adoption if not a blood one, no matter where the child had come from or who he had once been. It would be better to ask them both in any case what their preference was but… Antoinette was quite sure that she would end up the third blood-parent of Harrison James Potter, regardless.
She had never been very good at taking ‘no’ for an answer, after all.
Deciding there and then exactly what Antoinette would do, and who she would enlist as allies and confidants to raise her newly claimed son, she was so lost in racing thoughts and kindly-whispered words to the boy in her arms that she did not feel the soft blanket of fate begin to unwrap itself from her shoulders.
In a different life and in a different time, Antoinette would have withered away in obscurity behind her wards as she tended to her garden and grieved her lost husband, hardly to be seen again.
In this one, however, the choice of a moonlit walk and the act of comforting a babe, crying out for love even as he slept, had changed everything.