Facing Danger
Chapter 57: Meetings and Gifts (Year 6)
By Anne B. Walsh
Deep in the middle of an otherwise quiet wood, three women worked side by side, constructing what appeared to be toy houses made of sticks and mud. Behind them, a teenage boy waved his wand at one rock after another, occasionally converting them into boulders but more often melting them, changing them into trees, or vanishing them altogether. After his third successive failure, he kicked savagely at where the rock had been, then swore aloud.
"What?" asked one of the women, looking up from her work.
"Still there. Just invisible." The boy sat down on the rock and sighed. "Is this really going to work?"
Another of the women shrugged. "Who's hurt if it doesn't? Just us."
"And we don't count," the third woman said, a wealth of bitterness in her tone. "Everyone knows that."
"Funny how everyone always knows things I don't know," said a voice which belonged to none of them.
The boy leapt to his feet, pointing his wand at the interloper, as the women snatched up stones or, in one case, a good-sized tree limb. "What do you want?" demanded the oldest of them, her arm cocked to throw. "Who are you?"
"Just a traveler like yourselves." The black-haired man showed his hands empty, then lowered them to let his tattered knapsack drop to the ground. "Looking for other… travelers."
"Like us, are you?" The woman with the tree limb stepped closer, sniffing the air warily. "Who sent you?"
"No one sent me. At least, no one who wants anything from you." The man held out his arm, pulling back his sleeve to expose a collection of scratches in various stages of healing. "Do you believe me yet?"
"Which part?" The oldest woman let her stone fall to the ground, but her eyes remained hooded. "You're one of us, that much we can all tell. But how are we supposed to know if you're telling the truth?"
"Who would have sent me?" The man spread his hands. "There is no leader anymore, not since this past winter. Which I'm sure you know, since that's probably when you ran."
The boy spat on the ground. "Why shouldn't we run? What did their precious pack ever do for us? Kept us barely fed and clothed—we've done better for ourselves, and without taking orders."
"But it's getting too dangerous on full moons," the second woman took up the tale. "Too hard to keep from being found out. Even the farthest we can get from humans isn't far enough. So we decided to try something else."
"I never said you shouldn't have run, and I'm glad to hear you've done well." The stranger's voice was soothing, approving. "I may be able to help you with what you're trying, if you'll let me. And I have something else I think you'll like. But you have to trust me."
"Why should we?" The third woman eyed him with distaste. "Why should we even listen to you? How do we know you're not from the Ministry, trying to control us?"
The other two women growled under their breath, and the boy gripped his wand more tightly.
The man seated himself on a fallen log, seemingly at his ease. "If I were from the Ministry, why would I bother talking to you?" he asked, crossing his feet in front of him. "They don't generally talk to 'dangerous animals.'" His hands never moved, but the sneer quotes were audible in his tone. "Or has their policy changed since I was there last?"
The oldest woman nodded slowly. "He's right," she said, motioning her companions to stand down. "They don't talk. Or if they do, it's all orders. Snapped out the way you'd treat a dog."
"Odd how one night a month taints all the other twenty-seven in some people's eyes, isn't it?" The stranger reached over, making his movements broad and clear, and pulled his bag to his feet, opening it as he did. "Still, some of us find ways to cope." Removing a clear plastic bag of semi-globular objects, he opened that as well. "I don't suppose any of you would care for…" He trailed off as four pairs of eyes fixed themselves on the bag. "Never mind, silly question."
"Prove it's good first," the second woman snapped, swiping her hand at the corner of her mouth.
"Certainly." The man thrust his hand into the bag. "Pick the one you want me to try."
The women glanced at each other for a moment. Then the oldest nodded to the boy, who pointed. "That one, at the bottom nearest me."
The man withdrew the indicated object and bit a piece off its end. "Mmm," he said indistinctly, chewing. "Still warm. Here, catch." He tossed the bag towards the oldest woman, who snatched it out of the air and growled the boy back as he started forward. Carefully, she reached into the bag and withdrew, one at a time, three of the bread rolls it contained, handing them to her companions in order of age, then taking the last one for herself. After one more look around at one another, all four of them bit in at the same time.
If any of them had been looking, they would have seen a small smile of exultation appear on the stranger's face.
Much later that night, a woman stood on the front stoop of a small, nondescript house, anxiously looking down the street, first one way, then another. A loud pop beside her, like the explosion of a balloon, made her squeak and whirl to confront the man who had met with the four in the forest. "Brian! You startled me, don't do that!"
"Don't come home to you? Well, if you insist, I'll go…" Brian Li started to descend the steps.
"That is not what I meant and you know it." Corona Gamp's small hand closed firmly on his shoulder. "And I was going to ask how things went, but you wouldn't be joking like that unless they'd gone very well indeed."
"And very well they went." Brian turned his head and kissed Corona's fingers, then followed her into the house. "As I expected from the descriptions we got, this is another little splinter group from Greyback's pack. More of the camp followers, those who were there because they were given no other choice. One of them is actually a Muggle, or was—she had the idea that they might be able to survive better on the edges of that society, since werewolves are only a children's scare-story to them…"
"And so they would, if it weren't for full moons," Corona finished for him. "Or if they had the money to build some sort of safe room, and to patch themselves up afterwards."
"They were working on the safe rooms." Brian described the little huts the women had been building, and their intention to have their one wanded member enlarge them to a usable size. "As for patching themselves up, they'd intended to stay where they were until they recovered, then move on to the next village down the road. As long as they didn't get the name of being thieves or running out on the work they'd promised to do, it would work." He smiled smugly. "Of course, with what I was able to give them, it will work much better. "
"Which will mean they might be able to stay in one place and not have to move on all the time." Corona nodded, tapping her wand against the teapot to warm it, then measuring out three spoonfuls of tea leaves into it. "They'll become established there, find permanent work, even start to make friends."
"Which will, in its turn, ease their transformations and make them quicker to recover." Brian sat down in a kitchen chair with a sigh of relief and reached for one of the biscuits on the plate in the center of the table. "Positive feedback, rather than negative."
"Speaking of settling in one place, I assume we won't be going anywhere for the next few days?" Corona levitated the kettle under the tap and turned the water on with her free hand. "We're cutting it rather close for the full moon as it is."
"This is our base until three days after," Brian assured her. "At which point I think we're due for a check-in. We'll swing south and west to look in on the groups I spoke with last month, but once we've done that, we should go back to Headquarters for a few days."
Setting the teakettle on the stove, Corona swirled her wand around it twice, bringing it to the boil. "Sometimes I still can't believe I am where I am," she said, pouring the steaming water into the teapot. "Fighting against everything I ever knew, in the company of someone from whom I would once have run screaming." She set the teapot on the table, then returned to the stove to claim the two mugs she had left on the counter beside it. "And happier than I ever thought I could be."
"No more cages?" Brian accepted the first mug she poured out.
"Only the ones I build for myself." Corona sat down beside him and blew on her own tea, taking a biscuit and dunking it. "And those are to keep the rest of the world out, not to keep me in."
Brian leaned closer. "Do I count as the rest of the world?" he murmured.
Corona's answer, though not in words, still managed to indicate a definite no.
Neville sat at the table in the library, the parts of his potion piece spread out on a strip of waterproofed cloth. "All the artillerists have to learn how to disassemble and reassemble their pieces," he said, cleaning the part in his left hand with his wand. "That way, if anything goes wrong with them, we can do field repairs."
"Good sense." Mare, on the other side of the table, reached for an already-cleaned part but stopped with her hand halfway there. "May I?"
"Go ahead." Neville nodded to Meghan, who was perched on the edge of the table watching. "Pearl can show you her piece and you can see where the parts fit in."
Meghan, nothing loathe, drew her piece and laid her hand across the top of its barrel, verifying that no vibration hummed through it. "Safed piece," she murmured, and set it down.
"More sense, if you're going to carry as deadly of potions as you do." Mare compared the part in her hand with the piece lying complete on the table. "I seem to remember, back at Hogwarts, wand safety wasn't much taught. The professors must have thought the lessons would sink in better if they were experiential."
Neville shot a firm look at Meghan, cautioning her to stillness. She quivered with indignation but subsided from her momentary excitement.
She needs to stay calm or she's going to wear herself out. "I seem to remember" is just how Mare says she's looking into Mrs. Letha's memories. It doesn't mean Mrs. Letha has magically come back.
Personally, Neville wasn't sure that would ever happen, but he wasn't about to say so to Meghan. She did better when she had something, no matter how remote, to hope for.
"There is one thing I've been meaning to discuss with both of you," Mare said absently, picking up another part of Neville's piece and fitting the two together. "This business of being Heirs, and the Founders' Castle. How exactly would one go about visiting there? Is there some ritual, or do you simply show up?"
Meghan giggled behind her hand. "Do you mean what we're supposed to do, or what we do?" she asked, indicating herself and Neville with a shoulder.
"Both, please." Mare continued her experimentation. "In that order, if you don't mind."
"There is a ritual for it, words you're supposed to say to ask permission to come there," Neville began at Meghan's nod in his direction. "I don't know it very well, because we've never used it ourselves, but I can find it out."
"And you've never used it because…" The cartridge assembly taking shape in Mare's fingers appeared to amuse her greatly.
"Because we were little and didn't know any better," Meghan said with a sigh. "The Founders must have thought we were cute, just turning up like we did, or they'd have thrown us out a hundred times."
"So you can go there without special preparations if you don't know any better?" Mare flipped the completed assembly over several times, inspecting it. "Fall asleep willing yourself to go there, and wake up there?"
"Something like that." Neville set aside the yellow cartridge he'd just cleaned for refilling. "I always wanted to…" The words tried to stick in his throat, but he swallowed once or twice and eased them out. "To take Dad there. He would have… would have loved it."
"Are you so sure he never went on his own?" Mare's eyes remained on her work, but her voice carried clearly to Neville's ears. "He might have thought it was just a pretty dream, but I have a feeling all true Heirs of the Founders find their way there once or twice, whether they know it or not."
"They said to say hi to him," Neville whispered, staring at the table to try and defeat the tears. "Adam and Helga. They told me to say hi to him for them."
"So they did know him." A handkerchief floated into Neville's line of sight. "Or at the very least, they knew of him, and considered him worth their notice. Considered him a true Heir."
A quiet thump and a slight patter of feet heralded Meghan's arrival in the chair beside Neville's, where she curled up into one of her disconcertingly small Pearl-balls and busied herself with a bit of string. Neville was grateful for her apparent unconcern and Mare's continued concentration on his half-assembled piece, as it gave him a chance to blot his eyes without being stared at.
If I'm going to be a true Heir of Hufflepuff, the way Dad would have wanted, I have to let go of anger and focus on what has to be done. And right now, what has to be done is to win this war, to make sure other kids get more than just a couple years with their dads. He stole a glance at Meghan, who had her string tangled in a series of knots similar to those he'd seen Harry undo with one pull and was muttering under her breath. To give my kids a lot more than just that couple years, someday.
But I don't think anyone would mind if I made very sure Bellatrix Lestrange doesn't hurt anyone else along the way.
He made a mental note to ask Mr. Padfoot a question or two about that particular dark star of the Blacks.
It never hurt to be prepared.
A delightful pair of children, certainly. Mare folded up her notes from the day, sliding them between the pages of one of the books she planned to take to her room tonight, and mused on Neville and Meghan, who had left a few minutes before in response to a call from upstairs. Strong beyond their years, and devoted to one another and to their Pride. But even more than that, fountains of information when they are with an adult they trust…
"Which they shouldn't," she said aloud, shutting the book with more force than necessary. "Trust me, that is. How do they know I am what I say? How do they know I wasn't secretly turned, or planted with an Imperius Curse that only activates when it's wanted? How do they know I'm not about to kill them all in their sleep?"
More to the point, how do I know that?
"These are good people." Mare pushed her chair back and stood, anger rising in tandem with fear. "They may not be my people, I haven't made up my mind about that yet, but they are good people with a good cause and I will not cause them any harm if I can help it." She whirled and began to pace, her hands clenching and unclenching restlessly. "Do you hear me, whatever you might be out there? I have already hurt these people enough just by existing, and I refuse, I absolutely refuse to hurt them more!"
"I'm glad to hear it," said a woman's voice behind her.
Gasping, Mare spun to confront this stranger in the room—but the room was gone, the bookshelves and walls replaced with a panorama of mountains and forest and lake, and the white-haired woman, robed in blue, sat atop a tall rock, smiling gravely down at her—
"Lady Ravenclaw, I presume?" Mare was unable to keep all the sarcasm out of her tone, but thought a certain dollop of it might be appropriate. People certainly do like dragging me off to new places without my consent these days.
"I am. And you are Mare." Rowena Ravenclaw slid down from her perch and dipped a slight curtsey. "I understand what troubles you, so let me put your mind at ease on one thing, and perhaps another as well." Her eyes drifted out of focus, then came back together, as though she were looking at a point beyond Mare's shoulder.
Or straight through me, like I'm not even there… Mare held back a shiver and redirected that energy towards trying to think of the other person she had seen perform a similar maneuver lately.
"Luna Lovegood has something of this power, by virtue of her honorary Heirship," Rowena said without adjusting her gaze. "It was strengthened by other circumstances of which I'm sure you're aware, so it acts… oddly at times."
Mare sat down on another handy rock, rubbing a finger in circles on it to get a feel for its grain. "I thought the Ravenclaw power was Healing."
"It is. But once upon a time, we had a lesser power as well, what is called clairvoyance, the gift of Sight." Rowena blinked her eyes back to normal. "It was seldom strong and sometimes an annoyance, so in my great-granddaughters' time the family agreed to subject it fully to the Healing power and thereby strengthen the latter. Ravenclaw Heirs such as you and young Meghan can therefore See what relates to the Healing of the body or mind, but nothing else. I, however, retain the power which once was mine, and thus can answer the question you were asking, or rather implying, a few moments ago."
"I…" Mare tightened her grip on the rock until her palms ached from the grit. "I would be grateful for that answer."
Rowena smiled. "Then receive it with joy. You are only what you seem. No Death Eaters' hooks remain in you, and the only harm you can do to the Pack now is to leave them."
"Are you so sure about that?" Mare shot back, her relief turning her waspish in the perverse way her mind adored working lately. "Won't it hurt them more to have me always around but never the person they want me to be? The living reminder of just how bad it can get?"
"And yet you are alive." Rowena seated herself on a rock across from Mare's. "Your mind functions, as does your magic, and your heart—to your sorrow, I think. You wonder sometimes about the way you care for Sirius?"
"That's—" Mare bit off none of your business, because if it wasn't her own many-times-great-grandmother's business, whose was it? "Sometimes I do," she admitted. "Is it real, or is it left over from Aletha?"
"Can it not be both?" Rowena lifted a stone from the ground beside her and skipped it across the surface of the lake, achieving five bounces before it sank. "You and Aletha have a great deal in common. You share a body, a personality, a wand and the magic it commands. You like and dislike a great many of the same things. Is it so unthinkable that you could fall in love with the same man? Especially when he has been courting you almost since the day you met?"
"Sirius? Courting me?" Mare laughed. "That's absurd, he—" She stopped, thinking back, seeing some of the things Sirius had said and done, even in the days when he had been only "Prince" to her, in a different light.
"He performed the spell which brought you to life," murmured Rowena. "Did you truly think he would turn away from you after that?"
"I thought he would hate me for not being Aletha," Mare answered frankly, too stunned by this new way of thinking to do anything else. "And himself for making me not be her."
"Ah, but he has long practice in placing blame for evil deeds where it belongs and not where it doesn't." Rowena skipped another stone, getting six bounces with this one. "And in all the ways he cares for most, in your strength, your courage, your refusal to give up and your compassion for those who suffer, you are Aletha. He has loved her through many changes in their lives. Is it such a stretch that he could continue to love her even when she has become you?"
"I—I'll have to think about that." Mare stood up, fighting the urge to feel at her head and see if it was still spinning. "Thank you for the reassurance, it means a lot to me, but I think I should go now."
"Of course." Rowena reached into her pocket and withdrew a wand, which started to rise to point at Mare—
"Wait. Please," Mare added quickly, realizing how rude she'd sounded. "I don't mean to be a bother, but I've just thought—if the Ravenclaw line had a lesser gift, what about the other three?"
Rowena chuckled. "I was hoping you'd ask that…"
"So each Founder's line had two gifts, not one," Remus said later that evening, reaching for another piece of the flatbread Danger had toasted to go with the bowl of sweetened cottage cheese in the middle of the table. "Are they things we would recognize? Now that I think of it, I have seen Meghan using her powers that way, to See what's wrong with someone."
"I believe so." Mare chose a piece of flatbread for herself and sprinkled cinnamon on it before dipping it into the cheese. "Gryffindor's lesser gift is for crafting magical artifacts, binding magic into things so powerfully that they remain magic nearly forever."
"Ike uh or-ing ahh," Sirius said with his mouth full, dodging Danger's smack and swallowing at the same time. "Sorry. I meant like the Sorting Hat. That was his once, wasn't it?"
"And the sword Harry pulled out of it." Danger nodded. "Even Hogwarts itself must have been charmed by someone with that gift, or how has it stayed so powerful a place for that thousand years?"
"And in our own time, we have the Marauder's Map." Remus snapped a piece of bread in half. "It worries me now that we were ever so young and full of ourselves that we couldn't see the obvious fallacy in commanding this piece of parchment to 'never lie' about the castle and believing that we would be obeyed."
"Come on, Moony, it could've been like kids with wandless magic." Sirius loaded his own piece of bread with a towering heap of the cheese. "They don't know they shouldn’t be able to do it, so they do it anyway, right?"
"We ought to have been old enough by then to know what magic can and can't do." Remus crumbled one of the pieces between his fingers. "But we went ahead with our own plans and ideas, never bothering to investigate what we had in our hands, and if we had…"
"Don't," Mare said sharply, bringing Remus' head up to focus on her. "You're falling into a trap. Don't speculate on what might have been when we still have plenty to do with what is. When this war is over and done with will be quite soon enough to wallow in self-pity for your teenage mistakes."
Sirius snickered around his mouthful. "Give it up, Moony," he advised, taking the time to swallow first. "She's got you dead to rights."
Danger smiled and drew a tally mark on the surface of the cheese with her flatbread.
"Do be sure to tell me when I am permitted to wallow," Remus said, a bit sourly, and nipped Danger's bread out of her fingers. "And I believe I got us onto a tangent. We've covered Gryffindor's lesser power and Ravenclaw's. What about Hufflepuff?"
"Oh, I know, I know, I know!" Danger bounced in her seat, raising her hand like Hermione when she desperately wanted to answer a question.
Which is almost all the time in class, from what I hear.
"Tell us, please," said Sirius, sweeping Danger an elegant seated bow.
"It's Neville's little…" Danger wiggled her fingers in front of her face. "Disappearing trick. The way he can make you look around him, not see him unless you know he's there and you look in just the right spot."
"Full marks to you." Mare tossed Danger another piece of bread as a prize. "Which brings us to the final puzzle of the evening. When I asked Madam Rowena about the Slytherins' lesser gift, she informed me that we already know about it. Can any of you think of some power other than Parseltongue that supposedly marks the Slytherin line?"
Three heads shook back and forth. "And you'd think we would have heard, with all the pride Count Dorkula takes in his lineage," said Sirius with a scowl.
Remus emitted a stifled cough as Danger burst into giggles.
"One of these days you're going to run out of disrespectful nicknames for him," Mare said mock-scoldingly, swallowing against the flutter in her throat when Sirius' scowl became a grin. I am not sixteen years old, there is no reason a man's smile should do this to me…
"Sure I will," Sirius retorted. "The day after we win the war."
"Remus'll make some room in his wallow for you," said Danger, getting her voice under control. "You can wallow because your inventiveness on one subject has run out after almost twenty years when there's no more need for it, and he can wallow because he had poor judgment as a teenage boy. And then Mare and I will come along and throw buckets of cold water on you both, and you can clean up the mess."
"What? No fair!" Sirius could do quite a fair imitation of Meghan in a pouting mood when he wanted to. "Why should we have to clean it up?"
Danger glanced at Mare and silently beat one, two, three in the air.
"Because we said so," they chorused.
The peals of laughter were audible up two flights of stairs and through a closed door.
I'm glad somebody's happy. Hermione laid an Imperturbable Charm on the door of the girls' bedroom and returned to contemplating the blank scroll open in front of her. I don't know why this upsets me—it's getting us something we need, and letting me see an old friend again…
Setting down her wand hastily, she rubbed her hands up and down her arms. "Have to get Danger to check the temperature charms in here tomorrow," she muttered, shivering. "It gets so blasted cold all of a sudden."
Picking up her quill instead of her wand, she dipped it into the ink and began to write.
Dear Viktor…
"Maybe it's because I remember how happy I was when I first knew him," she murmured as the opening of a polite, thanks-for-your-letter note filled the top of her scroll. "Before the third task, before Voldemort, before the war, and I know I'll never be happy like that again."
Or maybe it's something else, her mind whispered. Maybe it's something worse…
Hermione ignored the whispers with the skill of seven months' practice subduing the nasty mouthings of her werewolf curse and continued writing.
Unfortunately, as you know, we're under fairly strict security here, but I can meet you at my family's home sometime next week to pick up the books you've said you'll lend me. Please owl back to let me know what days and times are best for you, and I will let you know when I can come…
"Thank you for coming." Percy turned from his contemplation of a dingy gray wall to shake hands with Roger Davies and Selena Moon. "And how is your newest arrival? A boy, I hear?"
"Yes, Zachary Cedric." Selena reached into her pocket, then paused. "Unless you mean the other newest arrival…"
"No, I was referring to the baby," Percy said hastily. "I know perfectly well what your other arrival looks like."
"Yes, and why they had to dump him on Selena's family I don't understand," Roger grumbled. "There must have been other people who would be willing to take him."
"Yes, willing." Selena removed the photograph she had been reaching for and elbowed Roger in the side in the process of handing it to Percy. "For their own reasons, most of them. Try to show a little sense, will you? They wanted to keep him alive, and with us he'll stay alive. He may drive me mad, or the Greengrasses might, but we won't die."
"Not before our time, in any case," Percy murmured, studying the picture of a red-faced, dubiously blinking baby. "Quite a handsome child. Congratulations. Now, I believe Lee and Maya have explained the basic premise we'll be working with?"
"Some of it." Roger accepted the photograph back. "I'm not sure I understand it, though. What's the point of all the fancy-dress and symbols and code names?"
"To fight fire with fire." Percy drew his wand and illustrated this literally, showing two streams of flame shooting at one another, the impact point marked by showers of sparks going in every direction. "While the water slips in from underneath, unnoticed." A wave arose and swamped one of the fires, putting it out with no trace.
"Still don't follow," said Selena, shaking her head.
"The Death Eaters have their own fancy-dress and their own symbol and their own names for themselves and their master." Percy vanished his illustration and holstered his wand. "Therefore, when they see an opponent arise who also has all of these things, they will think of this opponent, of us, as real competition. They will put all their strength and all their cunning towards destroying us. And meanwhile, Harry and the DA, and Professor Dumbledore and the Order of the Phoenix, will be able to get on with the real work of destroying Voldemort."
"So you're just going to be window-dressing?" Roger looked disappointed. "No offense, but I'm not sure I'm up for play-acting without any real work involved."
"It'll be work, though," Selena said, watching Percy's face. "Like the skirmishers with the DA. Luring the Death Eaters into ambushes, or losing them when they're on your trail. Right?"
"Exactly." Percy inclined his head to Selena. "And our work will also have a second facet. Had you planned yet on who might be tasked with bringing the Muggle relations of wizards to your Sanctuary, if the wizards themselves are unable to do it?"
"No, that hasn't come up." Roger perked up again. "Are you thinking your group—the Red Shepherds, was it?—do you think they could do that?"
"It would be our pleasure." Percy smiled. "And if, as I have heard posited, the Death Eaters have spies within the Ministry, perhaps even in positions of power, where they can cause Muggles or Muggleborns to be harassed in ways which may be immoral but are not exactly illegal…"
"You'd know about it." Selena nodded. "Or your dad would. Everybody knows him, goes to him for help, tells him things they know."
"And with a group that's not in school anymore, you have more freedom of movement." Roger had started to shape the air with his hands as he talked. "I mean, some of us have other responsibilities, but we can still get away more quickly than Hogwarts students, even ones who're in with the house-elves. And we can't be Traced, which may not be a problem after the year's finished but it won't be finished for… well, a year, or near enough one, and the war isn't exactly going to wait. I think you've got something here, Weasley. Is that offer still open?"
"Of course." Percy extended his hand, and he and Roger shook on it. "Welcome to the Red Shepherds."
"Glad to be part of it." Roger looked around him. "So is this where you're going to set up? It's a bit dusty."
"It won't be for long." Percy glanced at Selena. "Is there any basis in fact for the rather touching story I've been hearing regarding your houseguest and his house-elf?"
"Strip it of the flourishes and it's probably all true," Selena said with a sigh. "He didn't kiss her, she didn't cry, and he didn't threaten to drown her in the nearest loo, but he did free her and she did promise to take service under him as soon as he's left Hogwarts. Why?"
"Because if he'd care to suggest that she might come to help us here, we would be grateful." Percy gestured vaguely around the space. "Diagon Alley's newest restaurant shouldn't look like this."
"Restaurant?" Roger frowned. "Aren't those a lot of work?"
"I have an expert on my side." Percy chuckled briefly. "It seems George's lady friend may work in a paper shop now, but she didn't always. Her first job, at the advanced age of fourteen, was in a pub, where she learned within the space of two years to do everything except tend bar, and quite possibly a bit of that when the owner wasn't looking. With her to guide us, I think we should do well enough to pass."
"Do you have a name for it yet?" Selena asked.
"Yes, it was named almost as soon as we stepped inside." Percy regarded the dirty walls with a smile. "Welcome to the Pepper Pot."
Roger left first, Selena lingering a moment on the pretense of straightening her robes, which had become smeared with grime during their brief tour. She gave Percy a sideways look as she brushed herself off. "Well done, the way you let him argue himself around. I've seldom heard better."
"Thank you."
"So why aren't you a Slytherin?"
"Tradition." Percy paused, as though recalling something. "And perseverance. I believe Professor McGonagall would tell you that my Sorting was one of the longest ones she has ever witnessed."
Selena pressed her lips together firmly, nodded in comprehension, and hurried out with a quick parting wave.
Percy counted to three and smiled as he heard the expected burst of laughter from outside the door.
Yes, we are embroiled in a war. We have already taken losses. The vision of Penny rose before his inner eyes, making him press his fingers against the corners of his outer ones. But that is all the more reason we should try to find joy where we can.
I have a feeling we'll need it badly before we're through.
Humming "Happy Birthday" to herself, Ginny played hopscotch on the tiles of the main floor hallway. She had been peremptorily banished from the kitchen but didn't mind. This kind of banishment usually led to gifts, cake, and parties.
And parties with the Pack and Pride involved usually lead to—what was that?
A scrabbling thud on the front door sent her into the shadow of the stairs, hand on her wand. No one should be able to find us here, we're under the Fidelius, but "should be" isn't always "is"…
The doorknob turned, and a disheveled man stumbled forward into the house, a breathless woman supporting him. Ginny took one look, slammed the door with her wand, and dashed down the basement stairs, the woman's four shouted words ringing in her ears.
"Oi, you're not allowed—" Harry began as she burst through the swinging doors at the bottom.
"Brian and Corona are back," Ginny interrupted him. "They're hurt and Corona says they've found where the Death Eaters are hiding their giants. And judging by the way they came running in here, the giants might be after them n—"
The ceiling shuddered.
"I hate being right," Ginny muttered.
Author Notes:
Giants in London, just what we need.
I apologize for the long wait between chapters. I could blame it on my back going sproing (who knew making the bed was so dangerous?) or on the continuing insanity at work or on any number of things, but instead I'll just say I'm working on making sure that it doesn't happen again.
On that note, you can help! The more people who like my Facebook page, facebook (dot) com (slash) annebwalsh (dot) page, the more comfortable with original writing I feel, and the more writing of all kinds I am able to do! So ensure yourself a steady supply of Dangerverse—support my original writing efforts on Facebook (if you are able) today! If not, just send me your support via review and I will take that the same way. Until next time, all!