Dear Mr Albus Severus Potter,
Being that you are within the stipulated age range you have been selected for compliance to Ministry Article 203: Matrimonium Legem.....
Tap tap tap. Heels hit methodically, almost rhythmically against the cold stone slabs, echoing hollowly. Towards the periphery, huddled in chilly alcoves and wrapped in business robes, people glanced furtively and whispered.
Be advised that the match the Ministry has selected for you is, indeed, the best that you can be provided with in terms of both superficial and physical attributes.....
Albus snorted. Best indeed. Towards the side of the ministry corridor, one grey haired lady in plum robes startled at the sound and twitched away, inching towards her office door non- subtly ; almost as if heresy was contagious and handcuffs would immediately be sprung on her for being within snorting distance of one Albus Severus Potter. The article had not been well received and now standing in pure Ministry territory; Albus had never felt more..... there.
Your match has been selected based on mirrored criteria that the Ministry required you to provide for us. We believe that you have the best match possible in your future spouse and let us be the first to wish you a very long, happy, fruitful marriage.......
Best match possible. Best match possible. For one single, traitorous second, Albus's mind had flitted back to her. Imagined for a fatal moment what would happen if she, replete with frumpy clothes, muddy sneakers and brilliant red hair was actually sitting behind that door; his assigned match.
There was nothing to imagine. For one, her highly dramatic appearance in funeral garb (god, that incorrigible, frustrating idiot ) in the Minister's Office had created quite a good wave of gossip. She had met her match already. For another, if she had been sitting behind that door, looking up at him with that pale face which looked so bloody vulnerable but had no compunctions whatsoever in calmly shattering whatever they had between them ; then Albus would have turned round and walked out of the door and nothing would compel him to turn back.
Now, we understand that it is important for you to first get to know your spouse. That is why the Ministry is allotting you fourteen days in which to get to know your future spouse and then another fourteen in which to actually marry.....
It was surreal really, walking along the corridors of the Ministry, straight back, sure step, walking under the spotlight. The very same boy who had crept through the hallways of Hogwarts like a shadow too ephemeral to be noticed. Who smiled politely and talked politely and was too mediocre to be anything other than the middle Potter sprog. Now after..... this.... and her.... and everything else, knocking on the Minister's door...... his fears until a week before seemed laughable. Nothing could compare now. Nothing.
However, before any of that we must first establish that you and your prospective spouse are fertile...
One potion. One potion, ordered from the catalogue of a little known Chinese potioneer, and any fertility test conducted on Albus would turn so false that a ninety year old Muggle would prove to be more virile than him. One deceptive little potion. After that, Matrimonium Legem was pretty much nullified. He would appear to be completely useless for the purpose. However, if today by any chance his deception was discovered, then....handing himself off to Azkaban custody was better done publicly, to gain maximum impact.
An even stranger, uneasier sense of wonder flicked past his mind; politics was coming too easy to him.
He knocked briefly and stepped inside.
The woman inside was an ex-Slytherin like him, a year below him if he wasn't mistaken. He saw her white face, her carved features; and felt nothing. He inclined his head, "Miss Anderson. So I am to be your partner in this joke of a legislation." Almost absently, he wondered when he had started finding blondes bland.
Another, sharper smile to the woman behind the desk. "Madam Levski." Smoothing out his forest-green, dark enough to be black, cloak over his black shirt and blacker, tailored trousers; Albus settled back into the leather chair before the desk and leaned his neck, stretching out kinks. The hand crafted silver cufflinks on his shirt gleamed off the viridian surface of his eyes. "No offence naturally, but how does it feel to ruin lives on a daily basis?"