Arthur blinked, confused. It was dark. What had woken him up?
He fumbled for his wand. "Lumos," he said.
The light revealed him, his wife, his bed, books, various disassembled Muggle devices. Nothing that might make a noise.
Dong.
At the second stroke, Molly sat bolt upright and began fumbling for her robe, grateful that her husband had lit up the room.
"Molly?" Arthur asked. "What is it?"
"Chimes," she said. "The last time I heard that, it was at Christmas." She pulled the door open and stepped out into the hall, listening. Two chimes, so far. She hoped desperately that it would stop there. That would be bad enough.
She hurried down the hallway to the stairs. Had to get downstairs. Had to find out what had happened. Or at least, to whom.
Dong.
When he had moved back to London, Bill Weasley had refused to move back in with his parents. He had his own job at Gringotts, and he had no dependents; he could afford his own one-person flat.
Or, rather, half of a two-person flat.
He leaned over and kissed Fleur gently on the top of her head. She mumbled and cuddled closer. He smiled into the darkness, grateful for the tournament that had brought her to England, grateful that she'd liked him, grateful, in fact, for this moment in his life. Tomorrow would be more deadly serious work for the order, but now, in the night, he was safe and happy.
Dong.
A continent away, Bill's eldest brother was feeling anything but happy and content. Charlie, unlike his older brother, did have dependents. Several dozen winged, scaled, taloned monsters, in fact. And at the moment, one of them was ill.
It took a lot to get a dragon's attention. Even more to make it sick enough to incapacitate it. The only think harder than hurting a dragon, in Charlie's opinion, was making it cooperate with the treatment enough to heal it.
So at three in the morning, he was awake with a bowl of meat paste laced with curative potion, carefully spooning it into Norbert's mouth. Every four hours for the next week. He sighed, and rubbed his eyes. At this rate, he was going to be useless during the day.
Dong.
Percy had decided, long ago, that the best way to get ahead in the Ministry was to broadcast his loyalty, never shirk any task, and-most of all-work harder and longer than anyone else in his department. Or any other, if he could. Certainly harder and longer than Arthur Weasley ever had.
He swallowed a burst of resentment. He hated swallowing his words-and the entire Ministry had had to do a lot of that lately. He drew the line at kowtowing to his family the way the twins seemed to want him to; luckily his mother was grateful, at least, that he was willing to talk to his relatives again.
He bent his head lower over his reports, his quill scratching away. He studiously ignored the office gossip. It must be something impressive, and recent, to get anyone's attention at two in the morning. But it was none of his business. He had to get through the paperwork assigned to him, not gossip about break-ins at Azkaban, after all.
Dong. Dong.
"Did that one work?" George asked.
Fred shook his head. "You'd think it would be simple," he complained. "Instant nosebleed? Instant puke? Instant Ton-tongue? Instant reversal of any of the above? Portable swamp? Fireworks that ignore vanishing charms? We did all that. I refuse to believe that we-Fred and George Weasley-will fail when it comes to a spell to turn someone's hair green!"
George yawned. "Well, we'll just have to try another combination," he said. "Pass me the chameleon skin, will you?"
Dong.
"Mum?" Ron asked, confused, as he slipped out of his room. "Is that-"
"Ron!" Molly said, crying. "Are you all right-are you safe-"
"I think so," he said. "Mum-is that the clock-"
"Yes," she whispered.
Ron pushed past his mother and ran downstairs. He stared at the clock, shocked.
Dong.
