Mary's Confrontation

The day ended with no more surprises, both managed to get into their work and forget, for those few hours, their family troubles.

Now sitting at the living room table, with their stomach full and ready for sleep to take them, the duo were in accordance that it was time to share what happened in those meetings at the beginning of the day.

Since Mary was too angry the last time, Susan decided to go first. She willed her ring to show up and inching her hand toward Mary said, "This is what I got, this means that I am the new Head of House Rosier."

Mary didn't disappoint and showed a big look of surprise, she also took her friend's hand and moved it closer to her eyes.

"Wow, this is so pretty, how did they even manage to make the jewel like that?" she said while staring at the ring.

With a small smile and retrieving back her hand, Susan responded, "I don't know, magic maybe, there were some people who said that Merlin made some of the house's rings, perhaps he made this one."

"Anyway, that's it? Just, the ring is pretty? Nothing more? I'm rich now, I have so much money that I don't even know how to deal with it. What do I do?" Susan continued while looking for comfort in her friend's face.

She got it in the form of a big teeth smile, "Only you to worry about like that, of course you'll be fine, you've been practicing for this ever since you received money to expand when we were in Hogwarts. You were always the one who had enough to help out in case someone needed something. Just continue doing what you were doing." Mary said, reminiscing the days at school.

*Sigh* "Only you would not take this seriously, anyhow what about your meeting?" Susan asked, bringing the mood down a bit.

With a helpless smile Mary answered, "Like I said, my father was there with the family manager, he ordered the goblin to read a letter, in it said that I was back into the family and that my cousin was disinherited."

"Oh, that's good no? It'll be easier for you to rise at the Ministry now that you're back at being a proper pureblood witch." Susan said, the sarcasm could be felt at the end of her sentence.

Mary gave a little nod and continued, "Yeah, but what got me angry was the fact that my father did just that, order the goblin to read, he didn't even say it, didn't comment about it, he just said 'me and your mother are waiting for you at the manor'. Can you believe that? The nerve on that man."

Susan didn't know how to help her friend in this situation, she knew that Mary still held feelings for her father, after all she always called him 'father', and she could see that this was what hurt her the most.

"I think you should go, maybe even tomorrow, it'll be good for you." Susan finally said, hoping that her friend wouldn't explode on her for her suggestion.

There was a small look of betrayal at Mary's face upon hearing those words, but she steeled herself and said, "Yeah, I know it will, but it feels like I'm still just some sort of puppet that he can order around and I'll be happy to comply."

Susan grabbed her friend's hand and said, "You're not, you'll go there and you'll tell him how you feel. He's your father, he'll listen to you. It's the least he could do, and if anything bad happens you'll always be welcomed at my house."

With that Mary's smile was back and while giving her friend's hand a squeeze she said, "And what about that? Now that you're a head of a house, are you going to move from here?"

"Yeah, I think it'll be best, Rob will have more space to move, he'll be able to meet his ancestors through their paintings, and I was thinking of inviting you and Mr. and Mrs. Black to come live with us. What do you think?" was the answer to Mary's question.

With a smile on her face, Mary said, "I'll think about it, maybe after I talk with my parents, we'll see."

And with that discussion over, they were exhausted, Mary decided to go straight to bed, while Susan still had to write a letter to Arcturus and Melania telling them about her new position and inviting them to move in with her.

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During the next morning, their owl returned with a positive answer from the couple. Mary gave him a few owl treats and a letter to be sent to her parents saying that she would go have dinner with them that night. Thus, they went their way.

Mary arrived on time that day, she was having a normal work day when Mrs. Prickle requested her presence in her office.

The call was sudden, there hadn't been any recent major reports done or that were needed to be done, so the reasoning was a mystery.

Gethsemane's door was open, thereby Mary got permission to enter as soon as she stepped in front of it. The office was decorated simply, with a few moving pictures and framed newspapers on the walls, the main attention was the bigger than normal table that sat right across the door.

"Close the door and have a seat, Ms. Travers." was what Mary heard upon entering the room. "Do you want tea, coffee, water?" Mrs. Prickle continued when the young woman took a seat.

Mary, with a small smile answered, "No thank you, Mrs. Prickle. I'd just like to know why you'd call me."

"Yes, quite unusual for calls like this, right?" started the Department's Head. "You don't have to worry, this should be a good meeting for you." she continued.

"You see Mary, today I saw a name at the Daily Prophet, one pertaining to a familiar of yours. As you know this person was very insistent in blocking your way in the chain of command, but now that he's gone, I believe that we could move with an idea that I've been holding off for a few months." Gethsemane while moving a contract across the table.

Mary took a look at the document and froze, right there in front of her was a contract for the position of Head of Department's secretary.

"Are you serious Mrs. Prickle? This is a huge promotion." asked Mary not believing the paper that was now in her hands.

With a small frown adorning her face Gethsemane responded, "Yes girl, this is real. Now if you'll accept it, sign it and get started, we have a lot to do and very little time for it."

Mary promptly signed the contract and looked at her boss expectantly. "Good, take these and start reading them, you have until lunch break to tell what you think about them." Mrs. Prickle said while handing her a big pile of parchment which looked to be formed fully of reports.

And that was how her work day went, buried in reports that she had to read, and correct when necessary, while answering calls and managing who entered Mrs. Prickle's office.

It was so tiring that she almost lost the motivation to confront her father. Almost.

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The time has come, her shift has ended and her boss ordered her to go home and rest. Going to the worker's Floo, she took a bit of the powder and threw it at the fireplace while saying, "Travers' Manor!" and took a step in.

She stepped out at a big living room, with three sofas surrounding its middle, there was a big chandelier, illuminated with glowing yellow stones, sitting at the very center of the room, portraits of family members and works depicting gorgeous sceneries adorned the walls.

Her presence gathered the attention of the ones present in the room, a couple, the man looked to be in his late 50s, with his lightly greyed hair and his slightly wrinkled face, he stood tall and proud looking at the new person in the room.

Locking arms with him was a beautiful lady who looked to be no more than 40, she had honey blonde colored hair and large honey colored eyes. Her appearance was very similar to the young woman who just showed up.

"Mary! My baby girl, it's so good to have you back home." the woman said while taking the girl in her arms.

"Hello mother, I missed you too." Mary said while reciprocating the hug.

They separated themselves after a few more seconds and the older woman took a look at her daughter, "Look at you, all grown up, so pretty. I think your father will have trouble choosing a contract for you with how many we'll receive after we go to a proper party."

"Helen the dinner is served, let's not waste time with this." came the voice from the man who had been in silence until that moment.

This prompted her to take the young woman's arm and guide her towards the table where food had already started to appear.

"I made sure to tell Wippy to make your favorites, eat as much as you'd like, you are at home after all." Helen said after the three were seated.

With a small nod of her head Mary started to eat the food. It was really good, Wippy had always been good at cooking, especially her favorites. The dinner was quiet, the only sound heard was that of the cutlery hitting the plates as the three ate.

Mary used this time to harden her resolve, and to think through everything she wanted to say to both of them. When the last piece of desert was eaten she began, "Ok, let's begin by you telling me why you decided to go back in your words about never allowing me in the family again."

"So we're finally at this discussion, very well." Tristan started, and after taking a sip from his wine glass continued, "Our family is old, we're also one of the Sacred Twenty-Eight, I couldn't have my own daughter going against my words while in the presence of the other influential members of our society, that's why I disinherited you."

Mary started to get angry, but continued, "Then it was only to make you look better for your Death Eater friends, weren't you who said that family comes first? Or that we shouldn't care for the thoughts of those beneath us?"

"Don't throw my words at me girl, I'm the head of this family and you'll address me with respect!" the man said, losing his cool.

"Please father, we all know that the only reason you are the Head is because grandfather was the one before you. You didn't do anything worthy of respect, all you ever did was give the family's money away to a madman, so he could use it to kill innocent people." the daughter answered in a cold tone.

Mr. Travers was getting red from the anger by this point, thus with a hard hit on the table, he stood up and started shouting, "I won't have this insult towards me in my house, leave, I knew this was a mistake, I knew you were too far gone for this family."

Mary paled at the man's outburst, she couldn't believe what she heard. Then anger started surging up on her, but it all went away when she heard the icy cold tone from the last member of the conversation.

"Shut up and sit down Tristan, I didn't tire myself out just for your insignificant ego to ruin my plans of having my child back." Helen said with a murderous stare at her husband.

Now with a sweet smile she turned to Mary and said, "Sweety please don't listen to your father, he has had too much to drink and is not thinking straight."

"Wippy please take my husband to his bed, he clearly isn't well enough for the rest of the night." she continued going back to stare at her husband.

After the man was escorted out of the room the two women sat there in silence looking at each other.

"Now let me explain to you why this really happened." Helen broke the silence first, and after taking a sip of her glass continued, "Your father was right, we are a very prestigious family, especially with the more conservative families. So when this Dark Lord showed up and all of those families raced to see who would be best to serve him, your father was one of the main competitors, he gave away more than half of the family money to try and get in the man's best side."

With a sigh and a small tightening of her hold on the cup she continued, "I was the one to hold this family, if I didn't step up your father would probably be dead by now. I saw how it didn't make sense to follow the madman, he was preaching the pureblood superiority while killing those same pureblood families."

"So while your father was running around raping and killing muggles, I was here, making sure that the family didn't break itself, so that you could have a future, so that if you didn't end up like that idiot you'd be able to take control from me and make it so your children could have a family." she said, taking bigger sips from her wine that kept replenishing itself.

Now with a small satisfied smile she said looking at her daughter, "You can't imagine my happiness when we found you knew better than to follow those idiots who idolized the ground that Voldemort walked on. Your father was furious, but at that point I was already ignoring his opinion."

"So I knew that you wouldn't give away our fortune, all I had to do was make you good enough to take my spot when I died or got too old. I knew the Rosiers were a good family, even with them following that man, I was friends with Susan's mother, she was a really smart woman, so I knew that her child would be one too." she continued undisturbed by the changing facial expressions of her daughter.

It seemed as if Mary realised what her mother was implying for her expression returned to the slightly red it was from before.

"I can see you understand, yes I did talk with her, to make sure that you and Susan would become friends, I hoped that she'd be a good influence on you, and I was right. Look at where you are now, the new secretary for the head of her department, with only a little more than one year of experience." she said before Mary could interrupt her.

Mary couldn't resist anymore, now really angry at her mother she said, "So that's it, I was always just a piece for you to control and make sure that your plans didn't fail? You'd just use your own child to make it so this family wouldn't fall while you were controlling it."

"No! You misunderstood me, my goal was alway to give you an easier life, I might have manipulated your life a bit too much but it was all thinking that what I was doing was for the betterment of your future." Helen rapidly said with a bit of panic in her voice.

"You were the reason that I stayed with that idiot for so long, I couldn't simply run away, his family gave him too many connections and I feared losing you. Now we're like this, you don't desire to stay in the family anymore, but you're safe. I'm glad for that at least." she completed.

The young woman took a few breaths to calm down and asked, "If it was you who controlled the family, why did you let father disinherit me?"

Seeing as her daughter had calmed down, Helen answered her, "At that time I was pretty sure that the Death Eaters wouldn't win, they were using too much resources, and their opposition seemed to only be getting stronger. Thus I decided to get you out of the possible mess that this family would become."

"It was your father's idea to remove you from the family, but it was I who drafted the papers so I could get you back when all this mess ended, and if somehow Voldemort had won, I'd have just said that you were doing some undercover operation, I had plenty information on the good guys that I could give you credit for in order to save you from them." she finished.

Mary was surprised with how much her mother thought about this, and it clearly showed on her face, as proven by the words that her mother said, "You wouldn't think too much of me, right? Just a pretty little thing, sitting there, seemingly supporting her husband. I had to learn early about manipulation, it wasn't easy to live in the family that I had when I was your age. So I learned that the more innocent you look the easier it is to get what you want, that is, if you know how to get it."

"Then what now? I just forget everything and become the little perfect daughter?" Mary asked not sure what to say anymore.

"If you want to, you're an adult now, you can make your own decisions, I just want you to know that I'll handle your father and any threat that he can throw at you. I wish for you to live your life the way you want, I tried guiding you but, I lost some of your love for me in doing so. Now I'll take a supporting role for you, that is if you'll let me." Helen said, finishing with a barely audible voice.

Mary didn't know how to answer that, she didn't know if this was another plot from her mother, but deep down she knew, she didn't want to lose her family. So she took a risk and said, "Fine, I won't cut you out, but you'll promise me that you'll never do things that affect my life without telling me first, that includes both good and bad things."

"If you want me to trust you again, that's the minimum that you'll have to do." she finished.

With a big satisfied smile on her face, Helen got up and embraced her daughter, "I'm sorry for manipulating you, I'm sorry for making you feel undesired by your family, but I'm not sorry for keeping you safe." she said while squeezing Mary.

"Now if you want to, why don't you tell me how these past two years were?" she said after ending the hug.

Mary had a small smile on her face and said, "Not now mother, maybe another time." and proceeded to the living room, where the fireplace was located so she could go back to her flat.

"I guess I still have some ways to go." were the words uttered by her mother while she followed her to see her off.

Standing in front of the fireplace, Mary turned around and said, "Yes you do, goodbye Mom." and she threw the Floo powder while saying "Leaky Cauldron" and stepping in it.

"Goodbye my sweety." were the last words that she heard before finding herself in the fairly full pub.

She made quick work of getting back home, it had been a tiring day and all she wanted was to get to her bed.

Upon getting home, she noticed that Susan was still up, waiting for her at the table while reading a book on healing spells. "You're back, how was it?" her friend said when she heard the door open.

"It was fine, I'm too tired, can we talk about it tomorrow?" was the answer that Mary managed to utter.

With that Susan got up with her book in hand and said, "Sure, have a good night. If you need anything just tell me, ok?"

With a nod of her head both went to their respective bedrooms in order to finish the day.