Prologue – (Introductory Music)
A/N: This is the prologue for the (almost) finished fic I've been working on for about a year. (9 months on the drawing board and 3 months writing and editing.) This isn't my normal genre fic, but it's a story I felt compelled to write.
Also, this is rated T, for innuendo and harsh language only. For those who are sensitive to crime stories, you might want to avoid this first chapter, since it was some triggering elements necessary to the plot. This is a smut-free fic, for those who are accustomed to my regular writing. But as the plot advances, I hope everyone sees how erotica would detract from the plotline.
Finally, my thanks to the incredible and extremely talented Coyotelaughingsoftly for doing a beta for this, for inspiration and bouncing story ideas off of for weeks on end. My thanks also to the incredible Rongasm for her assistnce. Their polishing skills are better than mine, and have a way of seeing deeper in people than I do. - DG
The dishes were in the sink, being scrubbed clean by the enchanted bristle brush. Pans were still cooling from the cooker while the oven was baking bread for dinner. The tea kettle was silent, having dispensed the hot water for the tea for the couple still living at home. It would be used later when another son finally woke after coming in after midnight.
Molly followed her husband to the fireplace, handing him a parcel for his lunch. After the kids moved out, she started cooking his favorites for his lunch. Today was roasted chicken on wholemeal loaf, with mustard and tomatoes. She threw in some apples too, now that most of the kids weren't eating all of them before dinner every day.
Arthur put on his heavy cloak, one that Harry and Ginny bought for him last year. Molly checked the poppers and buttons to make sure he was comfortable. He would leave via Floo to go into the office, but come home via apparition after stopping in at the store to see George. He was due back later today after his trip from Pakistan to purchase raw materials.
"So when will you be home?" Molly inquired while folding over the collar on his robes.
"Oh, maybe half four or so, unless someone gets ahold of George's pranks and releases them on the Muggles again. I don't see being any later than half five, though."
Molly offered her small smile. "Oh I hope not. I'd hoped to snuggle on the couch with you."
"I know. I don't want to have to deal with that clean-up again." Arthur picked up his dragon skin satchel and tucked the sandwiches in the bag. He still couldn't believe the gift, from Charlie, of all people. But then George probably gave him the galleons to pay for it, along with the import duties from Rumania.
Molly stepped up and kissed her husband on the cheek. "I'll have dinner waiting when you get home. I'm going over to the market to get a few things for us tonight, and things for brunch on Sunday."
"If you keep cooking for him like you do, he'll be miserable with camp food once he returns to work."
"Of course I am. I don't know when I'll see him again." Molly stepped up and wrapped her arms around her husband. Maybe it was the cold January morning that made her act out some, hugging him and feeling a need of comfort on such a chilly morning.
"It's not like he doesn't write often." He kissed her forehead and looked at the brown eyes he'd loved for going on 35 years. "And he does come home as often as he can. You know how expensive international Portkeys are, especially on his salary."
Molly stepped back from her husband's warm embrace. "I know. I just wish he was working closer, where he could come home more."
"Now Molly, you know he's a man of his own choices. He loves his Dragons and since there hasn't been an opening at the Welch Preserve in ten years, he can't come home yet. At some point, he will, and we'll be sick of him, eating us out of house and home and you complaining of washing his trousers." He gave her a small peck on her nose. "It's not like we'll ever see him married, I reckon. He's going on 30 and hasn't brought anyone home in years."
Molly smiled at Arthur. He was the only one who could help her see the bright side of bad situations.
"You're right. I would, 'cause he'd be here every chance he got to eat my cooking. Since he has only his dragons for company, it's not like they will cook for him."
Arthur wrapped the scarf around his neck. "And that's what I'm looking forward to once I get home this evening."
"Save your appetite. I'll roast a chicken, along with buttered peas, gingered carrots and maybe some steamed cabbage."
Arthur leaned over and kissed Molly on the nose. "Are you trying to fatten me up?"
"I think that's a lost cause. I've been trying for 30 years now and you're still too thin."
Arthur reached into the decanter for the Floo powder. "That's not what you said last night." He winked at her.
Molly blushed at his cheeky comment. He'd been forcing her to blush for 35 years and it was still a beautiful sight to behold.
He stepped into their fireplace and spoke in a clear voice, Ministry of Magic. He disappeared in a swirl of green flames, leaving Molly Weasley standing in their den with a deep red hue to her cheeks.
"Oh, that man, I swear," she grumped under her breath before returning to the kitchen to get her things ready to go into Ottery St. Catchpole for her shopping. Charlie could manage until she returned home with some provisions for lunch.
She'd only be gone an hour, at most.
"That'll be eight galleons, 10 sickles, Molly."
She handed over the coins to the shop keeper who put each of the items she purchased into brown butcher paper. "How many are coming over for lunch Sunday?"
"Oh, I think everyone will be there. Charlie's leaving for Rumania on Monday morning. He has to get back to work."
"I miss your kids coming in, getting chocolate frogs and ginger newts and other various sweets when they had a knut to their name. Your youngest son was the best, always saving his knuts to get a chocolate Frog. Bet he's got so many now that he keeps a constant tummy ache."
Molly grinned. "They've all turned out pretty well, I reckon. It's a rare wonder when Ginny has a day off to stop by and visit. The team and practice keeps her so busy. And Ron's so busy with the Aurors, I barely see him or Hermione anymore." She grinned. "And he does, really. Every time he's over with the grandkids, he is giving them a chocolate frog from his pocket. You'd think he was conjuring them for Teddy and Victorie, way he gives them out to the kids."
"And the rest?"
"George and Percy come around every week. I think they get hungry for real food instead of the takeaway they get in London. How anyone can survive on that rubbish baffles me."
The shop keeper finished wrapping the last of the ham which was going to be part of the Sunday brunch. "And the oldest one, the one I can never remember his name."
"You mean Bill? He's leaving the country in two weeks for somewhere in South America. His job keeps him so busy."
"You mean like your husband whom I never see?" The shopkeeper cheeked. "Then again I do see Arthur on occasion at the pub down the lane."
"Well, there was an incident a couple of weeks ago. Someone enchanted a supply of stocking hats and when you put them on, you couldn't get them off 'til you said Celestina Warbeck is the best singer." Molly shook her head. "We asked George first but he said that was too cruel even for his joke lines."
The shopkeeper roared in laughter. "Poor Arthur. I know he was busy trying to track down that problem, I reckon."
Molly shook her head even harder. "He, along with a few people from the Law enforcement service tracked it down to some shady guy who sold a case of it to Gladrags. He stole it off a shipping container in Portsmouth and charmed it." Molly frowned while trying to remember all the details Arthur shared with her that night. "The bloke in question screwed it up right. He got the charms wrong and it was Celestina Warbeck and not the Banshee screaming he was intending." She snorted in disgust. "'Course since he was connected to someone else in the Ministry, he got 30 days suspended and had to pay restitution. Blasted Wizengamot went light on him even though he tried to hurt other people."
"Well, you can't chuck them all into Azkaban for any little thing. We already had that and that was too high of a price. You know that there should be some discretion in the law."
Molly picked up the parcel from the counter. "I know, but it still bothers me when it's only incompetence that protects others from harm. It makes absolutely no sense."
The butcher wiped his hands on the charmed towel around his waist. The grime from his work was banished away. "See you next week, Molly."
"Thanks Peter."
Molly stepped outside the butcher shop and adjusted the sack in her arms. Wood smoke floated over the lane of shops as well as the crisp wind of the chilly January winter. She strode up the lane to the apparition point – a concealed area in a small alley between the pub and the Apothecary. She'd apparate home, prepare lunch, followed with cooking the chicken for dinner, along with the parsnips and peas and salt the ham for Sunday. Charlie would be downstairs later and help her with the wash in the scullery as well as checking the posts of the fence on the other side of the orchard.
Once Charlie returned to Rumania, she'd get her other sons to help with the chores around the house, as often as possible. Arthur was getting up there in years and wasn't able to scale the rooftops to repair the wood shingles or mend the fence posts or other things that required a strong back or better eyes. No, Ron and Harry would help as much as possible, and so would Percy. All she had to do was ask.
Molly turned the corner and made her way into the apparition zone, feeling the hum of magic wash over her as she walked through the concealment charm. Any muggles who might have seen her would assume she'd stepped into the pub for lunch, or into the side door for the chemist . The Ministry had been rather wise to set up a potent notice-me-not charm and Muggle repelling charms on this particular alleyway.
Molly felt magic for a split second before she froze, dropping the parcel on the ground and spilling the contents.
"Hello, little Molly. Fancy meeting you're here," she heard the haggard voice hiss in her ear. She couldn't fight the hand that wrapped around her arm or the wand that was shoved harshly into the side of her neck. "You can't scream, but if you could, you'd be long gone before help arrived."
An ugly face stepped in front of her and grinned malevolently. "Now come along. As long as you cooperate, I won't hurt you. But I can't get that sodding bastard of a husband to come to me if you're not there with me." She watched the wizard in front of her wield his wand in front of her face and around her neck. "Can't have you running off the second we land, can we? Oh no, no, you are going to stay with me 'til that asshole of a husband shows up and dies a pathetic death, courtesy of my wand."
He finished the wordless incantation but Molly felt the bile in her throat burn when she recognized the ancient Pureblood spell he inflicted on her. Only a few families remaining regarded such odious magic as a requirement. Arthur refused his family's demands for such a spell, so many years ago. He would never compel her to be submissive. He said it was like chaining a dragon – abhorrent.
The wizard released the binding spell on her and she gasped. She felt the conflicting magic dance over her skin and wind it's way across her throat. She wanted to throw off the spell and had no clue how she could do it.
"Oh, you can fight it all you want, little Molly." She tried to step back from the fiend in front of her and couldn't move through the wall behind her back. "No, you're at my command until I release you from the spell you're now under. Until I release it, you'll do my bidding."
She tried to speak and no words came out.
"Did you really think I'd let you talk, witch? Oh no, like a proper Pureblood witch, you will be silent unless I tell you to speak. Understand?"
She shifted her hip and slapped him as hard as she could muster. The pain in her palm was a welcome respite from the constraining magical bonds wrapping tendrils around her mind and her magic. She glared with as much hate as she could muster at the tall unkempt man in front of her.
He rubbed the side of his face before grabbing her throat and shoving her back into the wall behind her. Stars exploded before her eyes, a result of bouncing her head off of the bricks behind her. Rage crossed the man's face, culminating in a nasty snarl.
"Don't you ever raise a hand to me again, or you will regret it." He released her throat and she glared even harder. "Come along, Prewett. I have an Owl to dispatch to your husband at the Ministry before the end of the day. I can't have him dithering when I've been waiting years for my revenge."
She crossed her arms in a façade of bravado.
"I said come along, Mrs. Weasley." He grabbed her arm in a vice. "I'll introduce myself once we are away from prying eyes and other odious inferior people."
She refused to budge an inch, no matter how hard he tried to pry her from that spot.
"Oh, how rude of me. You don't know who I am, do you? Maybe I should introduce myself." He stepped up even closer, forcing her back into the stone and brick behind her. "Now like you'd remember me, not when you were entirely too busy that night at Hogwarts. No, you'd not remember my face. It has been some time. But you won't ever forget it again, will you?"
He grabbed her arm harshly and they spun from the alley in Ottery St. Catchpole, leaving behind the torn parcel of provisions.