With the sound hastily resuming, Cassiopeia impatiently glances around and says, "Who exactly are we still waiting for? I do believe everyone that can be here is here!"
Dorea glances at her great-niece, now, Narcissa Malfoy and her husband, Lucius Malfoy, who are taking a direct seat across from them. "Well, I do believe that we are still waiting for our cousin's daughter, Lucretia, and her husband, Ignatius Prewett. But she absolutely hates being late. It is rather strange of her," Dorea muttered out loud.
Many voices can suddenly be heard in the front hallway as Cassiopeia furrows her brows and says, "Did Walburga invite other guests?"
"No, our niece said that she'd only invited the family," Dorea muttered in reply.
Dorea and the rest of the family turn their heads before blinking in surprise. There standing right behind the dark, silver-streaked Lucretia, and her large-nosed husband, Ignatius Prewett is a family of redheads. A pin could be heard dropped in the abrupt silence. Various mouths were flopped open in shock unable to comprehend the unbelievable scene before them.
An elderly, thin man with freckles nods at them and says, "It has been many years since I have stood before the Black's."
"Septimius Weasley!" Arcturus thundered as he rose to his feet. "What is a blood traitor like you doing here?!"
"Because I invited him," Walburga sternly said at Arcturus, her father-in-law, (and admittedly Uncle). She was the hostess and he would not embarrass her before her guests!
Arcturus unwilling takes a seat as Walburga says, "For too long we have not accepted the children of our Aunt Cedrella Black. And whether we accept her choice of a spouse or not, her three sons, Bilius, Ronell, and Arthur do not bare her sins. They shall be reinstated on the Black Family tapestry."
Arcturus huffs and accusingly turns to look at his cousin, Pollux, who in turn says, "I presume that you have carefully considered this Walburga?"
"The Prince head, Reginald Prince accepted his half-blood grandchildren and was rewarded by doing so in discovering that the children were in fact possessors to three of the founder lines," Walburga explained. "I do not believe we stand to lose anything by accepting our own. They are still purebloods, and their youngest son has wed a Prewett. An excellent pureblood family name to be tied too."
Pollux slowly nods his head and says, "Then you will hear no arguments from me. Who else will speak against my daughter's claim?"
Arcturus merely snarls in anger but remains silent. The Blacks were rather pragmatic at times and knew a good deal when they saw one. Not that they had to like it, but they knew when to tie themselves to another family for power.
Nodding to the head of the Weasley family, Walburga says, "Head of this Weasley branch, Septimius Weasley, please introduce and present the children of our dearly departed Aunt Cedrella Black before us."
The elderly wizard who greatly resembled his youngest son, Arthur, clears his throat. Septimius Weasley points to his eldest a freckled, red hair jolly-looking man roughly the age of Walburga and Orion. "Bilius Weasley, my eldest."
The Black's nod to Bilius and says, "Welcome."
Pointing at his second born, a dark-haired man with gray eyes some seven years younger than his firstborn. Out of the three brothers, he was the one who resembled the Black side of things the most. "Ronell Weasley," Septimius proudly declared.
Once more the Blacks greeted him with a, "Welcome."
Pointing to his youngest son, born many years after his two eldest, Septimius says, "I present my third son, and youngest child, Arthur Weasley. At his side is his wife, Molly Weasley. And their two sons, Bill, and Charlie Weasley."
"Welcome," the Blacks said as they could suddenly feel traces of bloodline magic swirling in the room.
Back at the Black Family home, the tapestry suddenly began to shine as names that had been blacked out suddenly became clear. Tree branches suddenly began to appear as names were restored to the Black Family Tapestry and grew. Included was the restoration of Andromeda and her husband as a tiny branch underneath appeared beneath them with the name of their daughter, Nymphadora.
The swirl of magic quickly dispersed as Walburga says, "Not let us sit and eat. We are family."
Without further ado, Walburga and Orion sit at the head of the table as Lucretia and Ignatius Prewett sat next to their niece via marriage, Molly Weasley. Molly holds the still two-year-old squirming little redhead boy in her arms. Humming to Charlie, she smooths the two-year-old, who babbles at the two-year-old Dora sitting across from him, who excitedly babbles back.
The room is filled with happy squeals as Arthur Weasley firmly keeps his four-year-old, Bill on his lap. Thankfully, Bill is much calmer than his younger brother. Bill softly whispers to dad as he stares around the table. "They are our family too?"
"Yes, son," Arthur admitted. "They are your grandma's family and ours too."
Septimius sitting at his son's sighs and sniffs as his eldest, Bilius flashes his father a cheerful grin. Ronell merely sighs and mutters under his breath, "As usual, I'll be stuck making the apologies."
Before conversations could ensue, delicious food began to appear on the table. Some of it is the usual fare, but more than half of the food is from new recipes. The elder Black's like Arcturus and Pollux suspiciously eye the new food and gingerly serve themselves a tiny spoonful. To their delight, the food was most excellent and literally made their taste buds dance in delight.
Quickly the dining hall is filled with chatter and the sound of clinking silverware. Thankfully, Charlie is rather happy as Molly feeds her two-year-old tiny bites. In between, Molly does her best to eat until at last Aunt Lucretia takes Charlie away from her. With a grateful smile, Molly happily finishes eating the delicious food making a note to look up said recipes for the meal to later try out herself in her the privacy of her own home.
Once dinner is over the men and youths retire to the study, while the women and children sit in the drawing-room though Arthur had taken Bill with him. The women politely chatter over safe subjects like the children. With ill-hidden smiles on their faces, they watch Charlie and Dora babble and play with each other. Charlie especially squeals in delight when he sees Dora turn her hair red to match his. Thinking he had gotten a new sibling; Charlie happily hugs the little girl and clumsily pets her hair.
Keeping one eye on the children, Cassiopeia is the first one to ask the question on everyone's mind. "Well, Narcissa are you with child yet?"
Dorea flashes her older sister a chiding look as Cassiopeia easily shrugs it off. She was a spinster. Who else was she supposed to live vicariously through?
Narcissa's lovely face flushes with embarrassment as she says, "Yes, three months now, I've only just begun to show." She gently pats her barely rounding stomach. "But the magic conception spell tells me it will be a girl."
The Black women gasp in delight and nod in satisfaction. Druella consoles her daughter by saying, "No matter, it proves that you can bear children. You are still young and have plenty of time to have a son. And the Malfoy's have not had a daughter in centuries. I'm sure that Lucius will be delighted."
Narcissa bashfully smiles at them as Andromeda beams at her younger sister. "Have you thought of any names yet?"
"I was thinking of Venus or Cassandra," Narcissa admitted.
"Venus will only ensure that she ends up as a whore," Cassiopeia muttered. "Cassandra is much better."
"Really, Cassiopeia, hold your tongue!" Dorea said in exasperation.
Cassiopeia sniffs resembling Sirius far too much. But then again, they were related. "I didn't say anything that isn't true," Cassiopeia arrogantly huffed not feeling the least bit bad about her rude remark.
Dorea merely sighs in frustration as Molly clears her throat and says, "But Cassandra is not exactly a cheerful name either. We all can recall the Greek tales and know the seer's tragic ending. Perhaps, something like Titania or Aurora would be for the best."
The room is sober for a moment as Druella pats her youngest daughter's hand. "We still have plenty of time to go over other names. And I do rather like the name Aurora."
Narcissa is a bit in shock clearly not having expected the vehement protest to the name choosing. But she didn't disagree either after thinking about the names really. "Aurora," Narcissa privately thought to herself. "It was not bad sounding at all."
Glancing over at Molly, Narcissa nods her thanks. The redhead woman after all was originally a Prewett. There would be nothing wrong with becoming further friends with her.
The topics quickly diverge again as they discuss plans and ongoing at present in the wizarding world. By the end of the evening, the women are on much better terms now. But interesting enough, Molly and Andromeda had bonded rather well. As a result, by default Narcissa would become rather close to Molly given that she already had a better impression of her. Much to the utter horror of Lucius, who found that he got on with a WEASLEY. But that is a story for another time.
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Please allow me to point out several things. Sirius and Regulus Black would have been first-cousins with Narcissa, Bellatrix, Andromeda, Barty Crouch Sr., Charlus Potter, and Arthur Weasly and his brothers (excluding the children of Marius and the line of Blacks in France). The second cousin's that would have been related are that of Barty Crouch Jr., all the Weasley children, Dora Tonks, and Draco. In retrospect, Ron and Draco are third cousins.....
Now, we know that Arthur for certain has two brothers, Bilius, and a brother that is not named. And every single Weasly children is named after someone, Bill after Bilius, Percy's after Ignatius Prewett the uncle of Molly, Fred, and George for Fabian and Gideon, that just leaves Charlie and Ronald. I am fairly certain that Charlie is named after Charlus Potter, and as such Ron is probably named after Arthur's other brother, so I went with Ronell.
And lastly, it would have been a very big deal to accept the Weasley's, because the Weasley's are seen as blood traitors for siding with muggles vs. their own kind wizards. There is no reason as to why. One possibility is that they were saved by a muggle in the past, or they were in fact religious. The reason I mention this is that the Weasley's only celebrate muggle holidays. There is a possibility that the ancestor of the Weasley's believed in their cause even if they were magical themselves. Sadly, some of the times the biggest hypocrites are individuals professing to have said beliefs. Either way, the purebloods do not like them.