I suppose I could have timed this better so that this chapter came up next week for Christmas, but, oh well. Lots of missions and action have been happening, so now it's time to slow down a bit, relax and heal and enjoy time at home and see if Steve can figure out what to get Peggy for Christmas.

With only two weeks left before exams and Bucky benched because of his bad arm, Phillips took the Howling Commandos off the mission roster for the rest of the term. Peggy continued to work on mission reports and intelligence gathering in her little corner of the office, and sometimes when Steve got bored, he would come and sit there in the afternoons. Usually, he was able to help with something—she always welcomed a second set of eyes going over intel—and if he got distracting, Peggy had no qualms about telling him so and kicking him out.

"What's with all the red in the Alps?" he asked, pointing to her corkboard of maps and strings and photographs that he was under no circumstances ever allowed to touch. A series of red pins poked out in a line on one of the maps, stretching from one end of the Alps to the other. They had not been there yesterday.

"A theory I'm working on," she replied. "It has to do with the Valkyrie." Steve was always impressed with her ability to keep track of so many things—the hunt for Schmidt and the Tesseract, this mysterious Valkyrie he was building, selecting missions for the Howlies and coordinating other teams, sorting through mountains of intel and reports and trying to find this spy.

"Has anyone figured out what that is yet?" he asked.

"No," she said. "But, based on reports from the factories we know about and the ones you boys have so thoughtfully been blowing to pieces, we know that whatever it is, it's absolutely massive. There's very few places to hide something so big without someone seeing something, so I'm thinking it might be underground. And, for practicality's sake, underground bases and things are easier to construct under a mountain."

"So, you think that base is in the Alps somewhere?"

"I think it's a safe bet. Unfortunately…" She waved a hand at the map. "Well, there's an awful lot of Alps to work with. I haven't really gotten very far with the idea—I just wanted to get it down so I could start thinking about it. My main concern is still this spy of ours. You heard about what happened to the 49th?"

Steve nodded. The 49th was Jim's old unit. They'd gone on what should have been a straightforward extraction mission to Marseilles: make contact with an S.S.R. informant and get them out. The area was supposed to be low risk, and recon had shown over and over again the small numbers of opposition they should have met. They'd apparated straight into the middle of an ambush—the informant had been killed, as had three members of the team, and half of them were still in the infirmary. It had been a mess, and while the prevailing theory was bad luck and bad intel, Peggy was more convinced than ever that there was a spy in their ranks. Based on what she'd told Steve she'd heard Phillips saying, he was looking into it too.

It was awful, what had happened to them, but…"Did that help you narrow down at all who it could be?"

Peggy shrugged. "A bit. That mission wasn't particularly classified, so a lot of people had access to it, but at least it's a list of names. I'm keeping lists of everyone who has access pre-mission to the ones I think were sabotaged, trying to find someone who appears on all of them. At the moment, that's far too many people."

Steve nodded, and they discussed it a little more before he left to meet Bucky in the library. It was easier to just coordinate their homework times since they shared all their textbooks. They usually worked at the same time anyway, but every now and then, Steve wished they could afford to have their own sets of books. He always chastised himself when he thought that, though. Considering how much money he knew the Barneses spent feeding him and buying him clothes—he kept growing, and he'd just hit six-one—it felt awfully ungrateful.

He arrived at the library at the same time as Bucky, and he resisted the urge to pull out his chair for him and help him unpack his school bag—his left arm was still in a sling and generally unmoving, so he was doing everything with one hand, but he got awfully tetchy if he thought Steve was babying him. "Hey, Buck," he said. He sat down and pulled out a stack of parchment, unscrewing his ink bottle and setting it in the middle of the table. "Have a nice chat with Vicki?" He and Vicki Marlowe were currently 'on' again.

"Yeah, but not much of one," Bucky said, struggling a little to get his bag off before he sat down. "They've got these pre-N.E.W.T. things they're doing during exams, so she's studying. Apparently, it's really hard to get the grades you need to go on to Healer training."

"Well, sure," Steve nodded. "You've got to be good at just about everything."

"I guess you kinda want that in a Healer," Bucky agreed. He sighed, flipping the pages of a dark green textbook. "Remind me why I decided to go on to O.W.L.-level Potions?"

"Keeping your options open," Steve reminded him. Though it was fair that Bucky should ask. This painkiller potion project was a doozy.

"Yeah, well, maybe I'll just get a non-magical job. I could be a mechanic, like Pop," Bucky said. "Nobody shoots at you, and things don't explode and melt your skin off," he added, referring to an unfortunate incident over at the Slytherin table earlier in the week.

"Things sometimes explode in a mechanic shop," Steve pointed out, craning his neck to see what page Bucky was on.

"Only if things go very, very wrong," Bucky argued. "Right here," he said, tapping the open page. "Solanaceae." He smirked. "Belladonna and tomatoes."

Steve felt his cheeks getting warm, but he just shook his head and started writing.

After the O.W.L.'s last year, end of term exams seemed like a breeze. Steve didn't even stay up so late studying that he fell asleep in the common room. "Good thing, too," Bucky told him as they were packing up to go home. "Not that I could carry you to bed anyway, but I doubt I could even drag you with this arm." His arm was healing—it was even healing up a little bit ahead of the schedule Nurse Rains had predicted—but it was taking time and he still had very little motion he could manage with it.

"I still think you're making that up," Steve protested, rolling his clean socks together.

"Deny it all you like, Stevie, but you used to pass out face down in your textbooks and I would peel you up out of a puddle of drool and carry your tiny little butt to bed. Ask Winston if you don't believe me."

Steve snorted.

The train ride home was long as usual, and Bucky's shoulder was stiff and sore by the time they disembarked. He was inclined to be in a bad mood about it, but he smiled when they got into the car and Steve asked, "So, Mrs. Barnes, did Becky tell you about her new boyfriend?", dragging out the word 'boy' in a singsong voice.

"Ste-eve!" Becky whined.

"Becky and Matthew, sittin' in a tree…" Bucky started singing, grinning broadly.

"Jay! Stop it!" She slapped his leg.

"Hey, don't hit me, I'm wounded," Bucky told her, poking her in the side.

"I hit you in the leg; you didn't get bit there."

Steve clicked his tongue in disapproval. "What would your new boyfriend say if he saw how you treated your brother?"

"Mama, make them stop!" Becky pleaded, turning to the front seat for help.

"Now, I seem to recall earlier this year the tables being turned," Mrs. Barnes said serenely.

"And wasn't there something similar last year with a girl named Helen?" Mr. Barnes put in. "Or was it Vicki?"

"That's right, let's not forget about them," Mrs. Barnes agreed. "I think this might only be fair."

"Mama!" Becky whined.

Steve laughed and Bucky cackled gleefully. "That's called payback, Munchkin," he laughed, poking her again. "That's one of my other jobs as your big brother."

"Do you want to tell us about this Matthew, Rebecca?" Mrs. Barnes asked.

"No," Becky pouted.

"Alright. How about your Quidditch club instead?" Official school sports were still on hold, what with the bulk of the older players being in fighting units and the field having been converted into a physical training ground, but the younger students had put about a dozen informal teams together and played games on a complicated rotating schedule down by the lake where there was a large flat area. Becky eagerly latched on to the change of topic and started talking about her last game—she was Keeper for her team. Esther was Seeker and Captain.

Bucky couldn't do much to help out around the house until his shoulder was better, though he did try. Whenever he did, his ma would tell him to stop it and smack him on the head—he was very nearly six feet tall now, and she had to stretch up quite a bit to do it. She made quite a fuss over him and his shoulder, and Bucky oscillated between enjoying the attention and being embarrassed by it.

Steve stepped in to do Bucky's share of the chores until he had full mobility again, and he was happy to help. He didn't feel like he had to earn his right to stay here anymore, like he had when he first moved in—he felt very much at home here now, and that seemed like all the more reason to keep things running smoothly. (He did try to chip in for groceries and things with the money he was being paid for his S.S.R. work, but the Barneses seldom let him, telling him he should put it into savings for when he got out of school.) That being said, he would complain dramatically and at length when he had to do things like change Bucky's sheets on laundry day or fold his clothes for him, just because it made Bucky laugh, and it reminded him that him not being able to do it for himself was temporary.

"Well," Becky said one evening while they were sitting around listening to the radio. "At least now you've got an excuse for your 'squares' to look as bad as they do." She was craning her neck to look over at her brother's ongoing attempt to master knitting. It was better than it used to be. It slanted too much to be called a square, but it was in the ballpark. Maybe a rhombus?

"Once I get this thing done, I'm going to give it to you," Bucky said, dropping the needle from his left hand for the seventh time that evening. It rolled under the couch and Becky picked it up and handed it back. "And you're going to wear it."

She snorted.

"Then I'll make another one and give it to Matthew, and you can wear them together and match," he continued.

"Yeah, I don't know if we'll still be going out in Sixth Year," Becky said.

A snort came from the easy chair that sounded suspiciously like Mr. Barnes, but he was calmly reading the newspaper when they looked over.

"I'm going to finish this thing and then tie you to the porch with it," Bucky warned. He finished a few more stitches then set the needles down, rolling his shoulder with a groan. "But not tonight."

"You need your shoulder stuff?" Steve asked. Nurse Rains had sent him home with a jar of salve that smelled very strongly of menthol that he was supposed to rub into the wound on his shoulder twice a day. It was rebuilding the damaged muscle and skin, and it numbed the pain for a while too. The show ending on the radio would indicate that it was about time for the evening application.

"I'll get it!" Becky declared, bouncing off the couch and dashing to the bathroom. She raced back and hopped onto the couch, nudging Bucky with her foot until he slipped off and sat on the floor in front of her. "Come on, get your shirt down," she said, nudging him with her foot again.

"Working on it," Bucky told her. It was a little tough, getting the top two buttons of his pajama top undone one-handed, but he finally got it and tugged the collar over to expose his shoulder. "Quit poking me with your gross feet."

"I had a shower already, my feet are clean. They smell like lavender soap, see?" she said, thrusting one leg off of the couch and waggling her toes in his face.

"You know what? I'm gonna have Steve do it," Bucky said, smacking her foot and starting to move across the floor.

"Oh, quit being a baby and sit down," she said, pulling her foot back and grinning. She unscrewed the lid of the jar and scooped a hand down into the cool blue gel inside. Bucky tugged his shirt down again and she started rubbing it carefully across his shoulder. It looked a lot better than it did at first—the skin was all back to its normal color, and the muscle had knitted together so that there was no longer anything missing. The skin was growing over it nicely, but it was still knotted and scarred, jagged lines of pink stretching out in angry lines. Nurse Rains had said that most of the scarring should clear up by the time it was done, but it had been a deep bite, and she couldn't promise that it wouldn't leave any marks.

It was a rainy winter, and the power ended up going out a lot in the evenings the week leading up to Christmas. Steve finished the books he'd brought from the library, so Bucky offered to teach him how to knit. "Hey, I'm not great at it, but that doesn't mean I don't know what I'm doing. Besides, what else are you gonna do in the dark?"

"I could draw."

"Not by candlelight. It's not good for your eyes. Here." Bucky slapped a pair of knitting needles into his hand. "Pick some yarn."

Steve picked a nice, cheerful red and watched carefully as Bucky showed him how to hold his hands. Becky was watching skeptically from over the top of her book in the chair by the Christmas tree, but she made no comment. Steve took that to mean Bucky was doing this part right.

It turned out Bucky was pretty good at the theoretical side of knitting. He knew the holds and stitches and everything, he just couldn't always get his hands to do it. He was a much better teacher than he was a knitter, and Steve managed to get two squares done that looked like squares by the end of the night.

"See?" Bucky said, patting his shoulder. "Told you I knew what I was doing."

"Then why can't you do it?" Becky asked.

"Those who can't do, teach," he replied calmly.

Steve continued working on his knitting project for the rest of the week. An idea had struck him, and he wanted to get it done by Christmas. He hid the completed parts of it from Bucky, acting like he was still working on the squares and getting Becky to show him how to attach everything. He had second thoughts as he placed the finished project under the tree, but as it was Christmas Eve, he had no other options for gifts. He watched a little nervously as Bucky carefully peeled the tape from off his gift, watching his eyebrows furrow in confusion as he tried to figure out what it was, then smiling in relief as Bucky pulled his gift out of the paper and laughed happily.

"Steve, this is fantastic," he said, examining the length of red, white and blue squares. "My very own Captain America scarf." He wrapped it happily around his neck, giving the end a vigorous toss with his no-longer-injured arm. "You make this whole thing yourself?"

Steve blushed a little, but smiled and nodded. "Had a good teacher."

Bucky laughed. "See, Munchkin? I'm not so bad at this knitting thing after all."

Later that day, they had their traditional Christmas dinner, which was just as crowded as usual, if a little noisier and more chaotic. The Kowalski triplets had turned six and started school, and they were still very excited about it and were chattier than usual. They'd also started showing signs of having magic, and though they knew better than to talk about it in front of the Garcias, Aleksy had a cold, and every time he sneezed, the dishes and silverware would rattle up and down the table.

Steve and Bucky were trying to cover for him by shifting around and 'accidentally' kicking the table legs whenever he sneezed, but Steve wasn't sure how well it was working. He chuckled when it happened again and Mrs. O'Brien's fork jumped four inches in the air and flew off the table. "Remember that time we were playing a game and your magic did something weird and I fell through the couch?" he said quietly to Bucky. He was pretty sure they'd been five then.

Bucky laughed. "Oh, man, I was freaking out because you'd just disappeared, and then you started crying because you didn't know where you were, and I could hear you crying, and that made me start crying…"

Steve smiled and shook his head. "Then ma came in and she was trying to calm you down and figure out where I'd gone. I don't think you guys worked it out until the dust under the couch made me start sneezing."

Bucky laughed again. "Dude, you were a mess. Covered in dust from being down there, snot all over your face from crying, and you were missing a chunk of hair that got caught in the couch springs."

"I remember we got Jell-O out of it, though," Steve recalled, still smiling. "Remember? Ma had made some for something at the church, but we were both so upset, she gave us each a bowl." Steve remembered that he'd still been kind of scared, so Bucky had been scooping Jell-O up onto his spoon and making weird noises while he wiggled it around to make Steve laugh.

"Oh, yeah. We didn't get Jell-O when you set my sleeve on fire when we were ten, though."

"No, just a smack on the head," Steve agreed. He'd been mad at something—not at Bucky, but Bucky had been closest, so the flare of magic caught him. "The beginning of my long streak of unintentional combustion."

Bucky chuckled. "Told you you'd grow out of it eventually. Although, can you imagine little unexpected fires just catching all over the place when we're fighting? As long as they caught the Hydra guys and not us, it might come in handy."

Fortunately, Aleksy's accidental magic seemed to be limiting itself to shaking things that shouldn't shake, not inadvertently setting people on fire, and the damage at the end of the day was limited to a broken plate.

There was music and dancing after dessert, though they had to take turns to fit in the living room. Becky convinced Steve to dance a couple with her, and she was very gracious about the way he kept stepping on her feet.

"It's better than dancing with Elian," she told him after he apologized again. "He goes too fast and kicks me in the shins." She looked around Steve's arm then back up at him. "Will you dance the next one with me too? He's looking at me like he's waiting to ask me."

Steve laughed, shooting a look back over his shoulder. Elian was watching them hopefully. He felt a little bad for the kid, but he danced the next one with Becky, then they sat down for a while and let the adults take a turn in the space.

"Whatcha getting Peggy for Christmas?" Bucky asked later that night when they were getting ready for bed.

Steve paused. "I don't know. I guess since we're going out now, I should get her something. I haven't been able to think of anything, though."

"Yes, since you're going out, you should get her something," Bucky confirmed. "Hmm…" he mused. "Jewelry? You guys that serious yet?"

"How serious is jewelry serious?" Steve asked. Another thought occurred to him. "And I don't know if I could afford it anyway. Isn't jewelry pretty expensive?"

"The nice stuff usually is," Bucky said.

"Well, let's say no jewelry, then," Steve said. "I wouldn't want to get her something that looks cheap."

"Good thinking. She like candy? She showed you what all that British magic candy was, you could take her something American."

Steve inclined his head thoughtfully. That was a possibility.

"Ooh, wait!" Bucky exclaimed, snapping his fingers. "How fast can you knit?"

"Huh?"

"Is there enough time between now and school starting that you could make her a scarf? That would be good."

"Really?"

"Oh, yeah. You're pretty good at it, and something you made especially for her? She'd love it," Bucky said confidently.

Steve considered. "I could do that. I might have to work on it a lot during the day, but I think I could get it done in time. You really think she'd like it?"

"Totally," Bucky said. "The stores open back up tomorrow; we'll go out and find you some nice yarn."

After a great deal of debate at the sewing store, Steve finally decided on a warm amber color that would look really nice with her eyes and a soft charcoal as an accent that would keep the brightness of the amber from being too overpowering. He also bought his own pair of knitting needles so he didn't have to keep using Becky's.

It took him the rest of the week, but on the very last night it was ready to be packed along with the rest of his stuff. He didn't realize until they were heading for the train station that he'd forgotten to wrap it, but he supposed he could just give it to her. When they arrived in Hogsmeade, he asked her to wait a minute and he pulled it out of his trunk before they got off and headed for the carriages.

"I, uh, I made you something for Christmas," he told her, feeling his cheeks going warm as he handed it over.

"You did?" she asked curiously, unfolding the neatly folded scarf.

"Yeah. I mean, if you don't like it, you don't have to wear it and stuff, I—"

"Steve, it's lovely," she cut him off. "Thank you." Then she kissed him, and he supposed she must have really liked it after all.

Merry early Christmas, everybody! See you Friday!