this is a disclaimer.

of samothrace

This is Victoire Weasley on a Bad Day: viciously sharp-tongued and hair an utter mess, the kind of day that sees her getting into fights with her mother and screaming matches with her sister, filling the house with tension. Vic has Personality, and no one can tell if it's Delacour or Weasley, but the mere fact that they ask the question makes her angrier than ever because wherever it came from it's hers now and that ought to be all that matters.

They live in Egypt on and off, every few years, and it always does Dad good; his scars do not mark him here so clearly as a Veteran of the War. Here they are unusual, but they just are. Ahmed, Amina, Ziva know next to nothing of Voldemort or Death Eaters, words as strange to them as Arabic is to Vic. They teach her their tongue but she never teaches them that part of hers.

When they come home seeing Teddy again is like a slap in the face. Oh, wow. He grew up gorgeous.

When they come back to England the world is askew: every colour Vic sees is brighter, deeper, more, and of all the colours of the rainbow the one she sees the most is green.

She asks once: why not Beauxbatons, maman? Why not your old school?

Maman is silent for a long while. I love it, she says and strokes Vic's hair. But I want you to know what we fought for. I want you to understand.

Victoire is a Gryffindor, because
(her father was)
(all Weasleys are)
(she's brave)
(she's talented)
(she loyal and she loves)
she wants to be. Vic Weasley does not believe in being afraid. Vic Weasley says that's just another word for ignorance.

Special talent Transfiguration, and this makes her feel strangely close to those two dead boys of long ago who made themselves Marauders for their dearest friend. She could do it too, if she wanted. It's dangerous in more ways than one; Vic might die, she'd certainly expose herself in a way she cannot put into words, except perhaps to the ghosts of two men she never knew and has no relation to. Like turning yourself inside out, like wearing your heart on your sleeve, like painting your organs on your skin, like speaking aloud your innermost thoughts, permanently, indeliably. Who am I: let me show you. Let me make it crystal clear. Let me write it across my body by changing my body.

Perhaps it's no wonder they were Gryffindors. Perhaps it's no wonder she is.

(You don't have to be either of them, she tells their namesake. Just be you. Be - be Jim.)

Vic is eldest, but that means less than nothing; too many subdivisions.

Granma Weasley wants things for her Victoire can't quite articulate, and finds Aunt Ginny understands though maman does not. Daughters are differently dangerous, says Aunt Ginny and cools her cry-flushed cheeks with cold callused hands. Mum wants safe, and home, and - I don't mean she wants ladylike and embroidery. I'm not sure what she does want. I don't think she always does, either. Except perhaps a vague idea that however otherwise competent girls may be, they don't take the lead in climbing oak trees and subsequently bouncing back down them.

I don't see why I cannot be both.

Aunt Ginny smiles. Nor do I.

Besides, says Vic defiantly, I liked it.

The climbing or the falling?

Vic considers this. Both.

It disappoints everyone, she thinks, that she doesn't play Quidditch, but oh the first time she stretches her wings, the first time she flies, the first time she sees the world from up here entirely unaided and nothing but her own strength and skill between her and the fall, the ground: that, she tells them all, is better than Quidditch.

But I want you to know what we fought for. I want you to understand.

She doesn't understand when she goes to school and she doesn't think she understands when she leaves it, but she knows she does when Harry comes to see Amelie for the first time and he says, awestruck, another Marauder, and Teddy starts to cry, the silly fool.

Mais naturellement, zat boy! Idiot, says maman. Alors - 'Arry, m'ami, zat baby is mine. 'And 'er over. I invite you to acquire your own. Your son is downstairs shamelessly flirting with Viktor's daughter, I do not think you will find it difficult.