Percy Weasley hated using the floo. He didn't show it, of course, but he loathed it with a passion that was unequalled. His glasses always smudged, and one time they fell off altogether, and he was forced to floo-call nearly fifty fireplaces before he got them back. He frequently inhaled at the wrong time, and tended to trip over inconveniently-placed hearth rugs. The whizzing feeling made him feel queasy, too.

The day that his family were visiting Great-Aunt Muriel for her 103rd birthday was one of the strangest. Percy wished that he was old enough to apparate, but he still had one and a half years until he could get his licence.

It was early summer, and Percy was sweltering in his only nice clothes, which were hot and a bit too tight. With Muriel, everything had to be just so, as, she liked reminding his family of their less affluent nature when she spied evidence of it. Bill was wearing his work clothes, which were designed for warm weather, and Charlie couldn't make it. The twins always looked scruffy no matter what they wore, and it didn't seem to matter so much with Ron and Ginny, who weren't yet at Hogwarts, but Percy had to look smart. Going into fifth year was around the time you started to become an adult, according to Muriel, so she found it a wonderful time to henpeck everything he did.

As they lined up in front of the fireplace ready to go, Percy realised that he had forgotten his badge. He had received it in the letter from Hogwarts only three days ago, and kind of wanted to show it to Great-Aunt Muriel, so she might see that he actually was becoming an adult. Bill and Charlie had been prefects as well, and Bill had even been Head Boy, so in Percy's mind it was almost a symbol that he was one of the older children now. He had always hated being grouped with the younger ones, and it was especially annoying when they were separated by whether they were at Hogwarts or not. Bill and Charlie had graduated, Charlie the year before last. Ron and Ginny weren't old enough yet, though Ron was starting this year. That left Percy with Fred and George. Euyuch.

Clattering back up the stairs, he shouted out a "Getting my badge, Mum," which was answered with a faint "Okay, dear." He was on the third floor, next to Charlie, while Fred and George were opposite them. Percy was glad that he wasn't up on the fourth with Ron and Ginny, because the ghoul liked banging on the pipes at inopportune moments, according to them. It would probably disturb him in the middle of his reading and make him lose his place.

The badge was on his bedside table, where he had left it so that he could see it at night. Percy had found that, although it sounded crazy, looking at the gleam of the badge in the faint moonlight that came through his window helped him to go to sleep.

He picked it up carefully, and walked over to his mirror. It was full-length, and he had found it on the side of the road in the nearby muggle village. Percy had carried it home and installed it in his room, despite the jeering of the twins that he was vain. The others had teased him slightly as well, but it made his room look bigger. He did need a mirror, and the enchanted one in the bathroom had always seemed slightly overbearing. The hairline crack near the bottom of his one was barely visible, anyway.

Pinning it on his collar, Percy admired the look of it, and tugged his shirt to lie straight. He gave himself a moment to stand still and relish the calm, before heading back out of his room to clatter down the stairs two at a time.

Bill, Ron, Fred, George and their parents had gone through already. The twins each had to go along with an adult, since they were otherwise prone to somersaulting into the fireplace, and Ron would have gone with Bill. Despite his recent protests that he was old enough to go through on his own, he wasn't allowed to as he wasn't yet at Hogwarts, even though he would be going there at the end of the summer.

Ginny was waiting for Percy, tapping her fingers on the mantel and humming Celestina Warbeck's latest hit, "Romance in the air: You Cleansweep(ed) me off my feet."

"What took you so long? We'll be late, and Muriel's always a harpy about that."

Percy hurried over to her, folding his glasses into his shirt pocket. "I was getting my badge. And don't call her that- It's Great-Aunt Muriel, not just Muriel. It's disrespectful." He saw her roll her eyes, and heaved a sigh.

"Fred and George call her that."

"You're not Fred and George. I mean, you're not Fred or George. They're rude. Give me your arm."

He took a firm grip of her arm, and they stepped forward into the fireplace after Percy threw the powder in.

"Stonebeck Keep."

The world went fuzzily green around Percy, and he belatedly shut his eyes to stop the nausea-inducing spinning.

Suddenly, there was a yank to one side, and the two found themselves tumbling over each other out of a fireplace. Percy landed on top with an "Oof!" that winded him. Rolling off poor Ginny, he sat up and quickly got his glasses out of his pocket.

"Percy?"

Ginny's voice was uncharacteristically quiet.

"Hmm?" He rubbed his glasses with the cloth he always kept in his trouser pocket. "Are you alright? Sorry about squishing you like that. The floo isn't normally that jerky."

"I didn't mean to…"

"What?" He paused. "I said, are you alright?"

"I've grazed my knees. But, Percy, I didn't mean to. I just realised that I forgot a hair tie, and she doesn't like me to have my hair out like a strumpet."

Sliding his glasses on, Percy said, "What are you-" Then, "Oh."

He had seen the carpet. The blue carpet.

They definitely weren't at Stonebeck Keep, traditional home of the Prewetts, a draughty stone building that Great-Aunt Muriel insisted on rattling around in with only an ancient house-elf to keep her company.

First things first.

"Ginny, you are not a strumpet even if you do wear your hair out."

Ginny smiled slightly at that, and stood up off the carpet, which was not the traditional Prewett red and white, but rather a deep, rich blue.

"Though you shouldn't have jerked us about like that, trying to go back. Mum can always conjure a hair tie for you, you know."

Brushing off her skirt, Ginny replied, "She always does them in pink. It clashes with my hair."

Percy rolled his eyes.

They were in what was probably a receiving room, judging by the formality of the furniture and the way it simply looked unused. At the Burrow, the couches and chairs were well-worn and comfy, but the furniture here was not visibly worn.

It was the house of somebody rich, Percy decided. No-one who wasn't rich would have three ornate fireplaces for guests to floo into, or a slightly dusty chandelier hanging from the ceiling.

"Do you have any more floo powder, Percy?" Ginny wasn't allowed to touch it at home, and this rule was reinforced by the fact that the shelf it was kept on was too high for her to reach.

Shaking his head, Percy replied with a no.

By mutual unspoken assent, the pair headed towards the large window that was at the end of the room opposite the door. They each took one side of the half-open curtains and pulled them aside a bit further to see more of the view.

"Oh."

"Oh, indeed."

All they could see out the window was fields and fields of wildflowers. Percy supposed that they were probably weeds, as they didn't look like they'd been organised, but they looked pretty all the same.

"I think that we had better try to make our way out of here, Ginny. It looks like this is the second story, so all we have to do is go down."

Ginny's "Right," was rather drawn-out and sarcastic.

The door opened with a loud creak, and the two of them hesitated. It had seemed inordinately loud to them in the static silence of the house. However, after a minute or two had gone by and no-one came, they relaxed.

They walked down the dim corridor, rather closely together. There were unlit lamps at intervals, and the only light came from the rather small window at one end. Thankfully they could see that the stairs must be the way they were going, because there was no other way for them to go. The stairs wouldn't be inside a room, would they?

Percy was sure they looked like owls, swivelling their heads round to take in every detail, but he couldn't help himself. It was just so creepy, being alone in someone's house without knowing whose it was.

They turned a corner, and with relief Percy noted the stairs. They weren't quite there when Ginny tugged his arm.

"Listen, Percy."

They stood still near the stairwell, and to Percy's surprise, faint music was drifting up it.

It had a rather melancholy tone to it, and it made Percy feel slightly strange and off-balance. He began to breath in time with the slow winding beat, and it seemed to resonate in his body.

"It's piano, isn't it?" Ginny breathed. "It's beautiful."

It was.

After a minute or two of listening, Ginny shook her head as if she were trying to get water out of her ears.

"What was that? You look as if you just got dunked in the duck-pond." Percy kept his voice hushed, not wanting to disturb the sheer solemnity and aching sad beauty of the music.

Ginny's slim fingers reached up and turned his chin to look at her. "It's enchanted."

"What?" He met her eyes. There was a shift, and then everything felt more normal. "Enchanted… Yeah, I can feel that now. But-"

"Don't worry, it's harmless. You can feel it though, can't you? It makes everything more, somehow. But I don't feel like staying here forever and wasting away, so it's not enchanted in a bad way."

"You're right, I think." Percy knew, now. It had made him feel a quivering of energy, of fragility and hope and despair, of simple aliveness. It was full of soul, and it made him feel as if there was some part of him missing, an aching empty space in his heart. "We had better go downstairs, quietly, and try to find a way out."

"Percy, what will we do after that?"

Percy considered. The Statute of Secrecy meant he couldn't do underage magic, except in an emergency, but surely this counted. He had looked up the by-laws the year after the twins had started at Hogwarts, because he had felt an inkling suspicion that they wouldn't think much of the laws. An emergency situation where there was no qualified adult around. This counted, yes. Lucky he always kept his wand with him. He did it so that the twins wouldn't hide it, and just because it felt like a part of him.

"I can send a message to Mum and Dad. You remember the inter-departmental memos at Dad's work?"

Ginny nodded. They had all gone along occasionally, when Mum needed a break.

"I can use another spell to find our coordinates, and then send those along with a message. They can apparate here and I 'spose they can then apparate us to Stonebeck."

"What are coordinates?"

Of course. Ginny wouldn't have done that yet.

"You use them to describe a specific point. Do you know about longitude and latitude? It's how we know how to apparate somewhere you haven't been before. Though you do need to be careful not to go into a tree or a building, 'cause you can get sort of, well, smooshed into a wall."

"Okay, that makes sense. Down the stairs, then?"

"Down the stairs it is."