For the QLFC, Round 13.
Kenmare Kestrels, Chaser 2.
Bishop: Write about a 'dark' character acting moral.
Chessboard, 'what makes you so sure it was me', nosebleed nougat
Word Count: 1260
For Em.
Percy Weasley snapped his briefcase shut, irritated. His janitor had him left sweets again. Four squares of fudge, each the size of his fist, arranged in a pyramid on the filing cabinet.
He picked up the plate, walked out into the hallway, and left it beside his door. Anything else would be inappropriate.
He didn't think he was a good person. But he didn't want to be a mean one.
She always left the gifts when he was out. Which he often was.
He'd use ten different curses to lock the door, only to find he'd forgotten to actually turn the key.
Fred would have remembered.
One day it was gingerbread cookies. Percy supposed it was almost Christmas. He'd go to the Burrow, of course, and try to give Mum some form of comfort.
Partly for his guilt, and mostly because he loved her. He'd already cost her one son.
His office was simple. Two large filing cabinets stood in the corner, as grey as the London skies that winter. A small table was placed near the door, surrounded by plain brown armchairs. His desk chair was even more austere – wooden and straight-backed. Determined to avoid spills he stored even his ink bottles in his drawers, meaning that the desktop was bare except for the day's notes.
The day's notes and seven other objects. A single pearl, for a pretty Ravenclaw girl who never wrote back. A Gwenog Jones figurine, for his sister. A chessboard, for his youngest brother. A charmed brooch and a dragon hide cup, for his older brothers. A broken coil, for his father. And a single strand of pink yarn, for his mother.
Anything more would be too painful.
Normally it didn't enrage him. It was annoying, yes, the unwanted gifts. He felt guilty about it. But it wasn't enraging.
Then he returned from a long meeting to find a plate of sugar cookies sitting beside his chessboard.
He grasped the side of his desk, trying to swallow the feeling of violation. The bishop glared, as if mocking him.
"I've made it more than clear that my desk is my personal space."
His janitor didn't glare back. If anything, she didn't seem to care at all. She placed her hands on her hips, fingers creasing her plain brown robes, and she watched him. "What makes you so sure it was me?"
Percy considered that. Early on he'd caught her leaving lemon drops, but had he actually seen her after that? "It was though. Wasn't it?"
She nodded. She still looked unconcerned, but upon second glance Percy realized it was something far from nonchalance. She looked - broken. He saw those empty eyes in the mirror.
"Okay. But why?"
"You wouldn't eat them otherwise."
The plate still rested where she had left it. The cookies had small silver sprinkles. He hadn't eaten it - but he hadn't thrown it away either. "It would be inappropriate for me to accept gifts like this on a daily basis. From any subordinate, much less…"
"...from someone like me," she finished. For the first time her green eyes held a glint of something other than pain.
She had him.
"Try one." Picking one up, she stepped closer to him, then placed it in his mouth.
The gifts returned to the filing cabinet.
He would take exactly one bite. He didn't want to be rude, after all.
He knew what that felt like.
He looked up her file after a particularly delicious treacle tart.
Pansy Parkinson.
Known to have aided Amycus and Alecto Carrow…
Underage during aforementioned crimes…probationary work...
Trial set for…
He'd known her name, of course. How else could he have looked her up?
An imagine floated into his mind; an image of a desperate, malicious girl in green and silver. A girl shouting to give up Harry Potter.
A traitor.
She'd had the same broken eyes she did now.
The next day she kissed him. He bit into her pumpkin pasty, determined to finish the plate this time.
He didn't despise her. He despised himself, and everyone knew it. He - pitied her, with an empathy he could never give himself.
He kissed her back.
He spent the night furious with himself. But the next morning she was sitting on his desk, eerily like a stray cat. "You fancy me."
For the first time, he saw the malice. "I suppose I sympathize."
"You're the secretary and I'm the janitor." She crossed her legs. "Because you're a Weasley and I'm a Parkinson."
She had him again. "I suppose we do have some things in common. Now if you would leave my desk?"
She ignored him. "Penelope doesn't write back, does she?"
"I prefer not to discuss my personal life in the workplace."
She cackled at that. Percy tightened his fingers around his briefcase. His nails dug into his palms. "Feel lucky you still have a personal life. Percy Weasley." She leaned forward. "The man who left his family."
She stepped towards him, leaning forward, pulling at her robes. Her hair was still pretty, glossy and black. "I see how they look at you, Percy. They judge you. They hate you." She wrapped her arms around him. He was barely aware of his briefcase falling to the floor. "You don't belong anywhere, Percy." She leaned forward, her breath hot on his face. "But I understand, Percy. I -"
"NO!" He jumped away from her, still trying to keep her from hitting the ground. "I'm sorry, Pansy. But I can't help you."
She knelt on the floor, shock evident in her eyes. For a moment he worried he'd hurt her, but then she slowly stood, trembling.
"You killed your brother. You killed Fred. I never killed anyone."
Spitting those last words, she left.
He didn't fire her, because he also believed it.
He hated her, yet he almost loved her.
There were no more desserts.
The others glared at him in the hall, and he sat doing his Ministry job. The Weasley who sells his family is still a Weasley.
She cried during her trial. Months later, Kingsley Shacklebolt would ban dementors from Ministry use, brand them as Dark and Dangerous Creatures.
But they hovered over the children of Death Eaters.
Nobody came to help her. None of the other Slytherins had truly cared for her.
She'd tortured Demelza Robins into three days of convulsions and laughed. She'd cut Neville more than Amycus himself. She'd been considered Alecto's own protege. She -
She was another dead child.
"Minister, I propose we extend the same educationally-based policy we've been offering to all who were enrolled as students. The gravity of her crimes irrespective, her youth entitles her to merciful treatment."
Beside Kingsley, Harry nodded. Hermione beamed at him. She did that a lot, lately.
"Why?"
Pansy didn't enter. Her robes were a little nicer, Percy noticed. She'd gotten them re-hemmed.
"You were underage. Harry would have made the case if I hadn't."
She didn't move.
"It doesn't mean I think you're a good person."
She left the department. Maybe she'd left magic. Percy never knew, and he didn't care, either.
Years later, he found a small chest on his desk. He recognized it as a Skiving Snackbox by the mahogany wood and red clasps, even before he saw the "WWW" insignia. They'd long since discontinued that first line.
Inside was a single piece of Nosebleed Nougat, along with a scrap of parchment. Blinking back tears, he unravelled it.
You are a good person.
He smiled softly. Maybe, wherever she was, she was being a good person too.
Another piece very different from what I normally write. Em wanted "PansyPercy, something dark and political" - soooo, another step outside my comfort zone!
Thanks for reading. Hope everyone enjoyed it.