February 1998

The last weekend of January, he and Audrey had met Fred and George in a muggle pub for drinks. They had a good night out and had left the establishment only as last orders were called. George had caught Percy's arm as Fred distracted Audrey. The look had been enough to convey to Percy that whatever his brothers were wrapped up in was getting closer to whatever end game was planned.

George had simply said 'Soon' with a nod and left it at that.

Percy decided. He made his decision, and it was the right thing to do, for him. Not for Audrey possibly. Not as far as the magical law was concerned certainly, but for him, for them, it was the only way forward.

Percy wrote his will and lodged it with Gringotts. He asked Mills if he knew of a solicitor who could work in both the muggle and magical world. Mills did, so Percy lodged a copy with him as well. Then he converted the lump sum of his savings to muggle money and transferred it to his muggle bank account. Percy also made sure all his overtime was paid up and threw that into the muggle bank account as well. There were some advantages of being the person who authorised payments after all, and he would be damned if he went into whatever was coming with back pay from the Ministry owing. He was giving them enough, the least they could do was pay him for work he had done.

All that was left was to hope there was time to gather his courage before the tide swept him away and he possibly lost his chance. To make sure he didn't welch on his decision, he rang Audrey on his lunch break and found out when she would be home. She was free all weekend. Not ideal, he was cowardly hoping for a longer reprieve, but determined, he agreed that he'd come to hers on Friday night and maybe he'd cook. Satisfied he'd backed himself into a corner Percy shoved down any lingering doubts and carried on with his day.

Percy left work on Friday night dead on time. He wasn't going to linger and let Thickenesse drop some spurious task on his desk or an urgent task that he had been blithely ignoring. He swung past the supermarket to collect what he wanted to cook and let himself into Audrey's flat. There was no sound coming from the shop below, so Percy cast a small warning spell on the top stair outside the front door and went back inside. In the kitchen he whipped out his wand and dinner started the necessary preparations. Percy then went around the flat liberally using cleaning spells to give himself something to do. He would prefer dinner to turn out well, and his nerves were fluttering around his stomach and fracturing his concentration hence the magic. But with no dinner to prepare he had too much time on his hands to think. The cleaning spells were done in ten minutes. Percy paced in the kitchen watching the dinner preparations continue without his input.

Annoyed that he had gotten himself into this state he stomped off to the bathroom. A shower was called for and a change of clothes. That would at least kill time.

He was out of the shower and back in the kitchen before the warning spell triggered. Dinner was already in the oven and cooking, so all Percy had to cancel was the charm doing the dishes. By the time Audrey found him in the tiny kitchen, Percy had his sleeves rolled up and his hands in the sink finishing the last few things.

"Hello," Audrey said as she came through the door. "This all looks very good."

Percy wiped his hands on the tea towel and greeted her with a kiss. "Well it's been a while since I have, so I thought I'd cook. That's OK?"

"Yes," Audrey replied. "More than OK. I wasn't feeling up to it tonight. How long are we off? Do I have time for a shower? We've been sorting through the last of a house clearance, and I think there was grime from the eighteen hundreds on some of the stuff."

"About twenty minutes," Percy said eyeing the oven clock.

"Great, I'll take ten. Is there wine?"

"There is," Percy said. "Go clean-up it will be waiting for you."

"You're a star," Audrey said dropping a kiss on to Percy's cheek before spinning and heading out of the kitchen.

Audrey entered the bedroom and blinked. The bed had been changed. The usual pile of books and magazines on her bedside table were suspiciously neatly aligned in a pile. The carpet had been hoovered too. Audrey cast a glance over her shoulder back towards the kitchen. Just how long had Percy been here and what exactly was he planning?

Audrey stripped tossing her clothes in the hamper and grabbed her dressing gown before heading off to the bathroom. She stopped in the doorway. Percy's cleaning had obviously reached the bathroom. The room gleamed. Audrey knew she was guilty of performing the required cleaning in a perfunctory manner. There was no way that the tile had ever been this clean after she had done the cleaning.

Shrugging at how odd Percy could sometimes be she stepped under the spray and let it trouble her no more. If Percy wanted to do the housework she had no problem with that. Showered, dressed, and hair partly dried Audrey went to find Percy.

"How long have you been here?" she asked accepting the wine he proffered as she approached.

"Not long," Percy answered.

"Not long, but long enough to clean the bedroom and the bathroom?" Her eye landed on the coffee table, and she pointed wordlessly to the neat stacks with nary a speck of dust to be seen. Percy squirmed. Audrey stepped over to give him a one-armed hug. "I'm not complaining I'm just wondering why."

Percy hugged her back, and she rested against him enjoying the comfort of the embrace. "I had things on my mind. Tell you about it after dinner?"

"OK. What is for dinner? It smells great."

"Beef casserole. My mum's recipe."

Dinner was as good as it smelled and Audrey complimented Percy on his cooking. Percy was quiet, and she let it pass telling him instead of her day and the things they had found during the house clearance.

After they had finished Percy stood up taking her hand. Audrey indicated the dinner plates. "I should at least wash up, you did all the cooking."

"Leave it," Percy said tugging her hand gently. "I'll help you later."

Audrey followed the tugging, bringing her wine glass with her. Percy sat on the sofa inviting her to sit next to him. Suddenly wary she did, but rather than lean into him as she would usually when they settled on the sofa for the night, she sat up straight, body angling towards him but far enough away that they didn't touch.

"Percy?" she asked at his serious face. Her train of thought stopped as Percy's hand came out his pocket holding a small box. She knew what it was. He didn't have to open it and ask, she already knew. Tears filled her eyes, and she pressed her fingertips to her lips trying to stem them. She hadn't ever wanted to cry at this point.

Percy was watching her and slowly opened the box turning it to face her. "Audrey, I love you. Would you do me the very great honour of becoming my wife?"

Audrey nodded, unable to swallow the enormous lump that was in her throat. Her smile was killing her cheeks, but she couldn't stop it any more than she could squeeze any words out of her throat.

Percy smiled in what was clear relief as he handed over the box to her. Audrey lifted it up to look at the oblong emerald flanked by the two round diamonds. She couldn't help the analytical part of her brain that recognised that the ring was probably made somewhere in the early nineteen hundreds, but she did manage to shut it up before she assigned it a likely value.

"Audrey, I, I need to tell you some things. Some things about me that I haven't told you."

Audrey's attention immediately left the sparkly ring and latched on to Percy's face. The worry visible there sent the lump in her throat plummeting through the bottom of her stomach. "About your childhood?" she hazarded her voice hoarse.

Percy nodded. "About that and about me."

Audrey took a deep breath and looked down at the ring box in her hand. He'd asked, she'd accepted. Now it seemed the terms and conditions would be laid out. Audrey pulled the ring from the box and held it out towards Percy. "Put it on" she requested.

Percy hesitated.

"Put it on," she said again determined. "You want to marry me, I want to marry you. We want a home, a family. All those things we've talked about. I wanted to marry you five minutes ago. I'll want to marry you in ten. Unless. You aren't already married, are you?"

"No."

"Ever been married?"

"No."

"You've not got any children already have you?"

"No."

"Right then, so put it on."

Percy took the ring from her with fingers that shook slightly, and Audrey clenched her free hand into a fist where he wouldn't see, to stop herself from shaking. She was engaged. The ring flashed as it settled on her fingers and her smile grew wide again. She looked up at Percy who was still holding her hand staring at the ring.

"Percy?"

"Right," Percy said. "Right. OK. Do you believe in magic?"

"What? I don't understand."

"I know," Percy said. "Just bear with me, OK."

Audrey nodded and held on to Percy's hand a little tighter. She would listen, she would do her best to understand, and if that meant she had to answer very odd sounding questions well then, she'd do that too. "I, I don't think I believe in magic per se," she said slowly. "I mean, I don't believe in little green men, although the idea that there is intelligent life out in the universe somewhere is something I can accept. I think I believe in possibility." She said trying the words out, weighing them as she heard her voice speak them. "I mean to the Vikings, a cruise liner would be magic. To a Victorian, a mobile phone would be magic, yet all these things are real. They were possible, and they achieved that possibility to be real. I think things are possible we just haven't figured them out yet, and until we do somethings will always be only in the realm of magic and fantasy. Does that answer your question?"

Percy said nothing and Audrey could glean nothing from his face, so she sat waiting.

"Magic is real," Percy said softly but firmly.

"Real," Audrey repeated trying to understand where Percy was going.

Percy nodded.

"Magic? You mean stage magic?" Audrey asked.

"No, real magic. The old stuff. I'm a wizard, Audrey, I don't mean a performer, I mean a genuine proper wizard. Magic is real, and I can use it."

"What?" Audrey said confused. Percy looked serious, there was no lurking twinkle in his eye to say he was pulled her leg. If anything, he looked really worried.

"I'm a wizard," Percy said again softly.

"You're a wizard?" Audrey let her spine slump against the back of the sofa as she tried to understand what Percy was saying and where this fit in their lives.

"Yes"

"So, you don't mean Paul Daniels, do you? You're thinking more, Gandalf?" Audrey clarified.

"Well no, but OK yes. Yes. More Gandalf."

Audrey lifted a hand to rub her forehead. Her eyes fell on the wine glass, and she decided that now was a very good time to be drinking wine. She took a sip letting it trickle down her throat. "Right. So, magic is real?"

"Yes."

"And you can do magic?"

"Yes. I can show you?"

"You can? Oh, I suppose, OK then." Audrey placed the glass back down wondering what Percy would do. She had half decided that he was setting her up for some elaborate joke. She really didn't think it should have followed a proposal, and she really wanted this to be done with so they could get back to the part of the evening that made sense.

Percy pulled a stick from his pocket slowly and carefully as if expecting her to react to it. "What's that?" Audrey asked half hoping that she wouldn't get the answer that was likely coming.

"My wand."

"Wand? You have a magic wand?" Audrey said deadpan.

"Yes."

"Gandalf doesn't have a wand. Paul does, but its black with a white tip and probably made of plastic." Audrey pointed out taking another sip of her wine.

"Mine is made from wood and has a dragon heartstring as a core."

"Oh, does that mean something?" Audrey decided she might as well humour Percy. So far, he had seemed like a perfectly sane bloke. She'd never seen this coming. It was a little left field, but she didn't think being a closet wizard was something that needed to follow a proposal like it was some huge deal. She'd wondered about the commune and considered asking Percy to take her there, but now she was less sure. It wasn't as if hobbies were bad things, had they frowned upon it or something? It was a little nerdy, but then she was into antiques. How many twenty-somethings thought George the Third sideboards were something to get excited about?

"Yes, both the wood and core have certain characteristics."

"Right, so magic?" Audrey encouraged.

"Umm OK," Percy said he glanced at her once more, perhaps to make sure she was watching and waved his wand.

Percy's empty wine glass shot from the table to his hand. Audrey raised her eyebrows, she hadn't expected that. Percy had said it wasn't stage magic, but his wand had made her think that perhaps 'wizards' were snippy about categorisation.

Percy waved his wand again, and the glass floated over to her and hovered just in front of her. Audrey reached out and plucked it from the air. Placing her own glass down she turned it over in her hands. It was the same glass that Percy had been drinking from at dinner. It felt the same as her glass in her hand but to make it levitate it would need some force to do so.

Percy reached out carefully and pushed her hand holding the glass down until the glass was lying in her lap aligned between her thighs, then when she glanced up at him, he waved his wand again. Audrey's eyes were on the glass as the glass morphed, grew blurry, and the weight in her lap shifted. The insignificant weight of the glass grew and spread. Once the shifting stopped there was a rabbit sat in her lap. A brown rabbit. Audrey gaped. Her hand hesitantly touched the rabbit. At the contact of fur she let out a small scream. Her hands clapped to her mouth to stifle the sound, but it squeaked out around them.

The rabbit much like most of its kind ignored the noise and remained placidly in her lap. Its feet shifted slightly gaining better purchase on her jeans. Audrey's hand once again made the descent down to the rabbit's back, running gently over the fur.

"It's real."

"Yes," Percy said.

"You changed a glass into a rabbit!" Audrey said accusingly.

"Yes." Percy still looked nervous, and Audrey was most certainly sure he had good reason to be. She looked at the rabbit in her lap. "Shit" she swore. "It's a rabbit! Fuck. Fuck I thought, god I don't know! I figured you were winding me up or something. Shit. You're serious. Fuck."

"I can change it back," Percy offered nervously.

"You can?" Audrey asked staring at him then the rabbit.

Percy waved his wand again, and the rabbit morphed back into a glass laying in Audrey's lap.

Audrey picked the glass up, examining it before putting it gingerly back on the table. "I'm not drugged, am I?"

"No," Percy said.

"Right. Dreaming?"

"No."

"This would have been much easier if you had just been a closeted stage magician or something, you know. I'm not sure I was ready to find out magic is real." Audrey's elbows rested on her knees, her upraised hands sinking into her hair as her eyes remained fixed on the glass on the table.

"I know it's a lot, I am sorry."

"Is this why you grew up in a commune because you can do this?"

Percy flicked his wand again, and the bottle of wine came over from the table. Audrey watched in startled awe as it floated across the room at the command of Percy's wand.

He picked up the glass from the table, but Audrey's hand shot out. "Don't, I'll get you a clean one. That one was a rabbit!"

Percy stared at her, and a smile crept on to his lips.

"What?" Audrey said. "You turned it into a rabbit. You don't want to drink out of it, do you?"

"Audrey, love, I'm a wizard." Percy flicked his wand at the glass, and the glass went from used with fingerprints smears and a ring in the bottom where the red wine they were drinking had settled to sparkling clean in an eye blink. Percy leant over and picked up the glass from the table handing it to her.

Audrey turned it over in her hands, her head spinning with what she was seeing. It didn't make any sense yet here was her fiancé flicking this stick about, and glasses were changing into rabbits and back again. Things were levitating to him, and cleaning took no more effort than a wave of a wand.

Something about that thought struck her. "You did the same thing to the flat, didn't you? You weren't here that long before I turned up." She gazed around the flat again taking it in. "You didn't clean it, magic did. Oh hell, did it need a spoonful of sugar!" Audrey started to smile then giggle.

Percy looked confused but waited until she had the giggles under control.

"Mary Poppins! It's a kid's film about a woman, she's a magical nanny. She sings this song and the tidying up does itself." Audrey explained.

"I used a spell my mum taught me," Percy said. "She has a book of them."

"Your mum?" Audrey said the humour vanishing from her face. "Your family? Fred? George? They can all do this?"

"Yes," Percy said.

Suddenly it wasn't funny anymore, and her head was back to hurting.

Percy seemed to understand as he settled himself back on the sofa. Audrey copied him and accepted the glass of wine that had poured its self and floated over to her.

Percy took a sip and started talking. "There has always been magical people in Britain as far back as history goes. But, in sixteen eighty-nine the Statute of Secrecy was established. It became law in sixteen ninety-two, and all wizards and witches vanished. The problem was that the muggles, the people without magic were hunting us. The witch hunts, they were real. The magical population is small, we would have been eradicated if we had done nothing. So, we hid. Went underground. A separate government was set up, and we became a society apart. We became stories and legends, and we were forgotten. When I said, I was brought up in a commune that's not true. I grew up in a house. A magical house in Devon near a village called Ottery St Catchpole. It's a real village, my parents' house is about a mile from the main high street, but muggles can't see it. I was home-schooled with my brothers. My mum taught us to read, write, and do maths until, when we were eleven, we went to the school. We didn't spend any time outside our own community though, we had nothing to do with the village or the towns close by, we only dealt with other magical folk."

"Can I learn it?" Audrey asked curiously.

"Magic? No. You're either born with it, or you aren't."

"How do you know if you have it?"

"Well, it manifests when you're a child, and obviously, magical parents are more likely to have magical children. Some non-magical people can have a magical child though."

"So, if we had children?" Audrey asked carefully.

"They might be magical," Percy admitted

"All of them?"

"It's possible. It's possible they might not be, or only some of them are. It's not very well understood how it all happens."

"And this is it. You're a wizard, there's no other revelation your waiting to spring on me?" Audrey asked leaning back on the sofa.

"This is it," Percy answered. "I didn't want to lie to you. If you still want to get married, I didn't want to live a lie."

"Don't they have a pamphlet or something to explain all this?" Audrey asked.

"Well yes, but non-magical people aren't supposed to know about our world unless they have a magical child. Then, when the child turns eleven, and they get their Hogwarts letter, the parents are told so the magical child can attend the school to learn how to control their magic."

"Wait, you aren't supposed to have told me?" That made her sit up again and look at Percy.

"No. No, I'm not, it breaks the Statute of Secrecy."

Audrey thought about that. "So, when you said you work for the Ministry and your job as classified, I take it now, that you didn't mean the British Ministry and your job has something to do with magic?"

"It's the British Ministry of Magic I work for, yes. And they are an entirely separate system of governance to the one that you are familiar with. Although the Minister for Magic does liaise with the British Prime Minister, and if the need arises the wizarding police are occasionally leant to the Muggle Prime Minister. And I am honestly not supposed to tell you about magic."

"Muggle? You keep using that word."

"That's what non-magical people are referred to by magical people."

"Why Muggle?"

"I don't know."

Audrey let that go as unimportant. "So, what happens if they find out you've told me?"

"I go to prison for the rest of my life, and a team will come and wipe your memory."

"Oh my god."

"If you don't think this is something you can accept…"

"What?" Audrey asked in alarm.

"Well, I can…"

"Wipe my memory?!"

"It's standard protocol."

"Holy shit. Hang on, if you wiped my memory of magic would we not get married?" Audrey asked her eyes narrowing as she glared at Percy.

Percy rubbed his face with both hands. "I've thought about this. It's all I've thought about for so long. The only thing I can come up with is if it were too much I'd wipe your memory of magic and of me asking you to marry me, and then I'd break things off."

"What?!" Audrey cried outraged.

"Audrey, I don't want to live a lie. If I took away your knowledge of magic and we got married, and we had children. How would you feel about finding out about magic when your child turned eleven? To find out then that I had lied to you from the very first day we met? I have been a wizard since I was born Audrey, I can't stop being a wizard. I have lied to you for these last nearly three years, and it's not easy. I couldn't betray you by not telling you the truth and giving you a choice. You have the right to make an informed choice even if you might not remember it."

"And you'd do that? You'd walk away?" Audrey felt the tears well again.

"Yes," Percy said miserably.

Audrey shifted herself over to Percy and curled into his side. His arm lifted and settled around her.

"It's a lot. It is an awful lot. But I love you, Percy. If you are willing to risk going to prison for telling me, then I am willing to risk marrying the man I love who happens to be a wizard."

"Thank you," Percy said quietly. Audrey felt his arm tighten and they let the silence cover the room. Audrey gave up trying to wrap her head around what Percy had told her. She didn't think that she'd be able to tonight. She would take it a day at a time, at least now she knew.

"Percy, why are your family not speaking to you?" Audrey asked breaking the silence.

"It's political, not because of us. They umm, well obviously Fred and George know about you, but I haven't told the others, or Mum and Dad."

"What do you mean political?"

"Well, I wasn't exactly lying about the cult leader. Only it's not a cult per se, but he's the headmaster of the boarding school we attended."

"So, you did go to boarding school?"

Yes, in Scotland. Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Headmaster Dumbledore is a powerful wizard and is quite influential. He is the head of a group called the Order of the Phoenix which was, until recently, a vigilante group. But it managed to get government backing to become official. The rest of what I told you is true, I couldn't follow him blindly, and my family and I fell out over it."

"So, wizards and witches just live in the world around us, and we don't even notice?"

"Well, most don't live amongst Muggles the way I do. Some do, but most live in wizarding properties that are purpose-built by wizards, or in property that's in the family as it were. Magic interferes with electricity you see. To be honest, there isn't a lot of difference between the way we live. I mean yes magic can do a lot of things, but we still live in houses, eat three meals a day, and go to work. Perhaps we don't have to do the dishes or the housework, and we can fix things that get broken or damaged rather than having to replace them, but it's not wildly different." Percy stood up. "Hang on a minute, there's something at my flat I want to show you."

"Percy no, it's late, can't it keep?" Audrey protested.

Percy grinned, raised his wand and vanished.

"Percy?" Audrey called out. She stood up and began to walk to the kitchen as a crack sounded behind her making her jump. Percy was stood by the door. "Percy? You left?"

"Yes, I wanted to get something from my flat."

"You can teleport?"

"Err, we call it apparition. But yes, teleportation is the same thing. I think."

"So that's why you're never late!" Audrey said in sudden realisation.

"Pardon?"

"You're never late. It's one of the things that made me get Rose to ask around about you." Audrey said waving him off as they retook their seats on the sofa.

"What? Really?" Percy said in amused shock

"What?" Audrey huffed defensively. "You've just told me magic is real. I think being suspicious about your punctuality is looking a lot less crazy by the second."

"Are you… Are you OK with this?"

"I, I don't know. I mean I'm not happy about your supposed alternative. I love you Percy and to separate us, to make me give up on us, that would take something colossal. I don't like to think of what you'd have had to do."

Percy held her a bit tighter, and she was grateful for it.

"So, what did you have to go get?" Audrey asked wanting to change the topic of conversation.

Percy held out a photograph frame.

"A photo?" Audrey asked.

"Magical photos are different to muggle ones," Percy explained. Gesturing with the photo.

Audrey looked a little closer. She recognised the picture, it had been taken while they were in France. Percy had set the timers on both hers and his cameras, while they were on the beach. They were sat in the sand, arms slung around each other smiling at the camera, the blue sky bright behind. The wind had caught Audrey's hair, and she had been worried that she'd spoilt the photo when she'd reached up to restrain it behind her ear. The photograph had captured them just before the wind had caught her hair however and turned out well. Percy whispered something too softly for Audrey to hear but as she watched, the picture he was holding in front of them both started to move.

The wind picked up her hair the same as it had on the day on the beach. Her hand came up to tuck it behind her ear the same as she had that day on the beach. Then her face turned to Percy with a rueful smile. Percy had smiled back and kissed her.

The actions played out before her eyes. The kiss broke, and the cycle repeated.

"What is this?" she said.

"Magical photographs don't capture a moment. Or they do, but it's a longer one. And they show it all."

Audrey watched enraptured as the photograph played over and over again. "Can I have this?"

"I'll have a copy made," Percy said. "But you can't let anyone see it. Anyone non-magical. I can put a charm on it so it will revert to the same image mine has been when you come over."

"Yes," Audrey said. "Yes please."

Percy nodded as Audrey put the picture frame on the coffee table watching as the images went around again. Her ring flashed in the light drawing her attention to it. Her smile came again. It wasn't as wide as it had been earlier, but she took it as a good sign that the sight of her engagement ring made her smile. Magic was real. Well, who knew? She caught sight of the dishes they had left on the table. "So, since you have this nifty magic and it knows cleaning spells. Fancy showing off for me?"

Percy raised an eyebrow at her. Audrey indicated the table with a hand.

Percy ruefully smiled back and flicked his wand at the dishes. They neatly stacked themselves up and floated off to the kitchen. Audrey stood up to follow them as the tablecloth fluttered past her making her jump slightly. In the kitchen, the tablecloth shook itself out over the bin then shivered as the small stains from the meal vanished. It folded itself up and floated over to the drawer in which it lived. The dishes were piled by the sink which was filling with soapy water. Audrey watched amazed as the dishes began to wash themselves around her, her smile breaking forth. "This is amazing really. It is."

Percy was leaning on the doorframe watching her watch the dishes. His familiar lean frame, his broad shoulders and his warm eyes that made her feel so very loved made her cross the space and wrap herself around him. "It will be OK, won't it?" she asked quietly.

"Yes," Percy said holding her close to him. "Yes of course."