yes, it's been 2 weeks since my last update. i'm sorry. i do want to mention that i've started university recently, and i just wanted to let you know that updates will be less frequent. i may not update for 1-2 weeks at a time if my workload is very heavy. i'm just tucking into the workload. this story is not abandoned.

i feel so sorry for Arthur. there, i said it. he's the real victim in this fanfic. i keep on making him an arse. this chapter was supposed to go about differently, but i just felt so bad for how awful i've made Arthur (again and again... and again). i've re-written most of the scenes in this chapter (scenes that originally took me a week to write. ugh), just so Arthur appears as less of a terrible human being. at least i can tell you in the original draft, he was nice. in the second draft, he was worse than Caius Flint (yes, that abuse warning was originally intended for him). in this draft, he's somewhere in between.

this chapter took so long to write, however, that i'm not going to attempt to re-write again. i just... it's one of those chapters i don't particularly like, but has to be written. i had re-written it so that Arthur comes off as sweeter and gentler than he did first time round. it's definitely coming along.

the plot should be obvious enough at this point, especially with the 'Athena's gift' comment.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Molly Weasley was cutting chicken breast into pieces. She placed her knife down beside the cutting board and let herself sigh. She could've done it with her wand, but she didn't want to.

Charlie mentioned something about being scratched, sick dragons, quarantine and have to come home today.

The sound of a POP pulled her out of her thoughts. She turned around and felt her heart jolt up to her throat.

"CHARLIE!" Molly exclaimed. Last time he'd been here, he'd had three or four scars on his arm and seldom patches of burn tissue. Right now, there wasn't a single patch of pale tissue. His entire body was scarred down to his fingertips, and where there wasn't scar tissue, there was burn tissue. On his cheek, there were three elongated shallow cuts. "WHEN YOU WROTE TO ME, YOU SAID YOU HAD A FEW SCRATCHES! I'm going down to that reserve myself and I'm going to kill all of your pitiful, uncharitable little—"

"Mum, the new dragons are sweethearts," a haggard, dishevelled Charlie cocked his head to one side. His brown eyes were cloudy and glossy, and he couldn't stop smiling. He looked like he was one second away from falling into a coma right then on the floor. He also looked so mangled that the chicken that Molly was cutting looked to be in better condition. "They just like to bite a little... BUT they're only playing!"

Molly placed a hand on his muscled shoulder. According to Charlie's letter, most of these scars were open wounds and flowing freely only hours ago. The fact that the wounds were mended yet produced scars told Molly how bad this was. "Charlie, how much blood have you lost within the last twenty-four hours?"

Charlie laughed gaudily. "Not much, but mum..." he placed his hand onto hers, looking at her with a serious facial expression, "Mum, I need to take a blood-replenishing potion every hour so I don't go into hypovolaemic shock."

Molly stared at him with a terrified expression. "Charlie, maybe you need another healer."

"No, mummummum I don't," Charlie insisted, offering another loud laugh. Errol screeched in alert, thinking that there was going to be an attack. "I've gone to the healers in Romania already. They gave me some... something. Mum, it's the most wonderful potion in the world. I was in all sorts of pain a while ago, but this—this took it all away! I'm soaring, mum. This is like being on the Quidditch field, except—except even better! I feel like I'm in Valhalla! They should've given it to you when you were pushing Ginny out and maybe then you wouldn't have been such a—"

"Charles, I am sure that somewhere in your non-potion-addled mind, you know not to finish that sentence," Molly said in a stern voice. Her eyes were on a patch of burned skin on his upper arm. "You look like you've been mauled and chewed out by a chimera for Godric's sake—and then burned alive at stake! Are you sure that the hospital didn't give you something other than blood replenishing potions? I don't want to look at these—these things! There isn't a patch of your skin that's in one piece, Charlie!"

"Dad also looked like he was mauled out by a chimera after you gave birth to Ginny and he didn't need more than a few sips of a potion," Charlie was giggling. He shook his head. "Mum, don't forget. They gave me this brilliant pain potion. I took some last night and it warmed me up so well that I've decided to walk down the reserve in my skivvies... well, a few baby dragons thought I was an intruder, but I dodged that fire ball, you know! I did that! And—"

Molly shrieked. "CHARLIE!"

"They're too young to know, mum," Charlie insisted. He then sunk to the floor, placing his head in his hands. "Mum, I'm seeing Quidditch emblems flying about. Is this normal?"

Molly sunk down to his level, placing a hand on his thigh. "Charlie? Charlie, can you hear me?"

Charlie seemed to be drifting away. "Mmhmm... I'm Charlie Weasley; my identification card is down my underpants and since your mate has my hands tied, I think you should sink your hands down there yourself."

"Charles, you are going upstairs right now and having a lie-in right now—"

"Is that the time?" Charlie looked over at the clock and then laughed brilliantly.

Before Molly could say anything, another POP sounded out and Charlie had disappeared.

ARTHUR was pulled away from his thoughts momentarily when he heard a knock on the door.

"Come in," Arthur thought that was strange. Nobody knocked on his door.

His regular Friday visitors usually barged into his office, bearing enough firewhiskey to stock The Three Broomsticks for weeks and insisting that they should all get wasted.

("Come on, Arthur, Molly wouldn't notice if you came home drunk off your arse.")

Arthur didn't expect a tall, blonde woman to walk inside. He didn't expect her hair to be longer than the (terribly extensive) sheet of parchment paper that he was given at the beginning of the week to finish. Her thick, dark blue frock looked like it was made from manticore fur. The cloak that she was wearing on top of that was a bit much. Her boots could break a dragon's jaw.

Her figure reminded him of the hourglass in a Time-Turner—full up and down with a middle that was so minute that Arthur believed that spells had to have been used to contort it that way.

Following her was Ayden Clearwater. He looked even more petite beside her. Well, it was hard for him not to look small when a schoolgirl towered over him by at least three or four inches. His long, wavy golden hair looked less Malfoy-ish than it did the past week. He looked like he hadn't slept at all this past week. The bags under his eyes were so severely pronounced that he looked like an Inferius.

"Professor—I mean, Mr Weasley... Percy's father...sir..." her cheeks coloured in.

"Bastard. You forgot bastard, Pen," Ayden piped in, offering a smirk and Arthur rolled his eyes. "Penelope's forgotten to give one of your many, many, many sons his Christmas gift, so I said that we can pop by your office when I'm done trying to convince Henry that he and I should go to the pub after this. What about you, Arthur? Do you want to come with? Do I have to use my new muggle hypnotism tricks to lure you in?"

"Ayden, there's a reason last time I went with the pub with you was in 1970. We needed both the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes and the Department of Magical Law Enforcement to sort out the muddle that we've gotten into. Molly still hammers me about it to this day," Arthur explained, shaking his head as he recalled what would forever be dubbed as the cherry blossom tree incident. Ayden looked like he was reminiscing that time with a smile. "Good luck with the pub."

"Good luck?" Ayden seemed entertained. "I know my limits, Arthur. I'm not coming home sloshed. I still have a wife and beautiful daughter to take care of."

Penelope seemed to blush at that last bit. "Dad," she said in a whining tone of voice. "Stop it."

"I mean good luck not committing a murder when someone asks you for your identification to make sure that you really are of age," Arthur snorted, only for Ayden's cheeks to colour in dramatically. Arthur looked back at Penelope with a soft expression. "What is it that you wanted to give me, love? I'll be sure to give it to Percival and let it know it's from you."

Penelope brightened up and pulled out a package. She'd charmed it to its original size, and offered it back up to Arthur with a smile so sweet that he felt like he couldn't have any of Molly's pudding tonight.

"What did you get him then?" Arthur couldn't help but be curious.

Penelope's cheeks coloured in. "Oh, it's actually a very boring gift," she placed her hand on her shoulder hesitantly. "It's a few sweatpants and those long-sleeved Quidditch shirts. I didn't know which team to get, so I went with what most of the Slytherins tended to like, which is the Falmouth Falcons and Ballycastle Bats—teams I'm sure you and the rest of your family actively loathe. I did this to save his life, because you see, he did say he was going to shop for something more causal—and knowing Percy, more causal probably meant that school short trousers and argyle sweaters. I couldn't let him do that to himself because if he does, I would fear that the blokes in our year would've beaten to death by a bunch of quills."

Arthur nodded his head. "Now, the only thing you have to worry about is Ron trying not to beat Percival to death with a bunch of quills." Ron loathed both of those teams more than he loathed Percy—which Percy had once decided was absolutely impossible.

Penelope rolled her eyes. "I'm sure that Hermione would restrain him. Getting that much blood on his hands would expel him after all," she shuddered at the last thought.

Arthur watched them both walk away. He tucked the package under his arms, and turned to leave the building. He still had quite a bit to do, but there was nothing that he couldn't wrap up by a very productive Monday morning. Arthur sighed deeply to himself, wondering what on Earth he was supposed to buy Percy now for Christmas. He had enough books to start a library (literally). Penelope seemed to think of an absolutely perfect gift for him without much thought to it—seemingly. Arthur might need to consult Rowena Ravenclaw just to find a gift as good or as interesting. And Percy? He might as well be a riddle in its entirety! Three years ago, he demanded to be given birthday gifts to cover all the birthdays that they'd managed to forget (this, of course, made Molly cry and apologise and Arthur dangerously homicidal because it wasn't like they purposely forgot his birthday) and this year, no matter what in Godric's name they did, Percy refused gifts. And seemed to be just fine that they'd forgotten his birthday again.

Merlin, when was his birthday again? It was close to Ginny's but—

The last thing he recalled was gathering up some of his paperwork to put into a desk before he blacked out.

FRED and George had many, many tales of horror to tell Ginny this Christmas (similarly to what it was when they first discovered how expensive nose-biting teacups really were when you wanted to buy twenty of them) as they made it down to Bill, Ginny—...and Charlie?

Why was Charlie there and how could one have burns on their burns? Merlin.

"What did mum say when she saw those?" Fred couldn't believe that Charlie even bothered to come back home without doing some kind of Romanian skin therapy to restore his skin to its full youthfulness (maybe they said that Charlie didn't have enough wrinkles and that the creases from the dragon fire didn't count as a serious, legitimate have-to-fix-it-now problem.)

"These little things?" Charlie said, gesturing from head to toe. "Just a few scraps is all. Don't worry. If I get burned in the same place a third time, I'm guaranteed to have lost the pain receptors in that part of my skin."

Bill glared over at Charlie, whom just shrugged and muttered,'it is going to happen again.'

Fred didn't understand how Charlie could be just fine and dandy with a few dragons ripping apart his skin and making him look more like one of their mum's patchwork blankets but he just about tore the house apart when they decided to put dungbombs in his closet? Fred did actually feel like they should be taking the fact that Charlie looked like he'd been flambéed alive more seriously, but Charlie was happier now than he'd been when he'd won that ruddy House Cup.

"Where's Percy?" Ginny asked, pulling Fred out of his thoughts. She was looking round as if she'd missed a six foot bloke with bright red hair the first time round.

"Percy? Oh, you don't want to know where Percy is," Fred stated solemnly. "He's mad—"

"—not Lovegood mad," George nodded his head. "Snape after O.W.L's and N.E.W.T's week mad—"

"—and he was going to kill us," Fred ended the sentence. "But now, he's having a kip somewhere on a bench. We've managed to slow him down and give him enough Draught of Sleep to knock him out."

"We should be given an Order of Merlin," George said. "Prevented a serious murder from happening."

Bill and Charlie only raised their eyebrows over at Fred and George.

"What did you do that made Percy turn into a homicidal psychopath exactly?" Charlie asked with a raised eyebrow and his head cocked to one side.

"We said we were sorry!" Fred and George immediately defended themselves. "Plus, Lee did it! Not us!"

"See, Lee thought it was funny how—you know how sometimes, Percy's dodgy leg starts to get really big and swollen and it's obvious? Well, Lee reckoned to try something. We didn't know what he wanted to do, but we were on board and he tried to see what would happen if he tried to Engorgio Percy's dodgy leg when it was all swollen," Fred explained the situation and then closed his eyes. "And, um..."

"Percy's trousers ripped," George nodded his head. "And Penelope let him borrow something of hers."

"I told him all the pink matched his complexion," Fred said. "And then he chased us down the train with our Beater's bats. Honestly, Charlie, you should've seen the way he was swinging!"

George was now fully grinning. "Our little Percy has it in him to be a Beater."

"Where is he?" was all that an exasperated Bill replied.

Charlie, on the other hand, raised an eyebrow and asked, "How good are we talking?"

Ginny was obviously very interested in hearing that too. Fred and George made lucid comparisons using famous Quidditch players as they wandered over towards one of the benches. Speaking of lucid Quidditch comparisons, Percy's exceedingly bright vibrant pink trousers made him look like part of the Quiberon Quafflepunchers. It was a miracle that Percy hadn't attracted any Fwoopers as of yet. Bill slowly attempted to unsuccessfully wake Percy up, and sighed before pulling him to his feet. That was when Bill accidentally let go of Percy and Percy's face met the pavement. Needless to say, that definitely woke Percy up.

He sat up and then looked up at a blushing Bill whom was grinning sheepishly. Percy's glare could've turned no doubt turned Bill into stone.

"I am in a foul mood," Percy said. It was like saying the sky was blue, or that the Chudley Canons couldn't win a Quidditch match if they'd bathed in Felix Felicis the night before and the rest of the players of every other team got sloshed to sickness. "If anyone attempts to talk to me, I will get Hermes to eat them. Do not doubt me. I've put him on a diet. He's only had an owl treat today and..."

Fred snorted and noticed how Bill's eyes were furrowing.

"...three custard creams, the smallest bite of Adrian Pucey's chocolate frog... maybe one snail or two..."

'ARTHUR, Arthur, Arthur,' a voice said as soon as Arthur was conscious of where he was, but he wasn't. He was walking in the absolute downpour. His tattered Ministry of Magic cloak was completely soaked. The suit that he was wearing underneath looked even more mangled than it did this morning (anymore and the threads would dissociate and he'd be stood naked). The package that Penelope had given him was still dry which meant that it was charmed not to become wet. His too-big-for-him boots were flooded with rain. He could vaguely hear Molly tell Ron not to go out in the rain because no matter how hard he tried, it did not qualify as a quick bath. 'You should really spruce up this place every once in a while. I've been in many bodies, but I haven't had a meat suit as sad, pathetic and scraggy as yours in a while. Do some Quidditch, old man. Put on a few stones. I've seen birds sacrificed to Zeus that have more meat than you do.'

Who are you? Arthur's head felt heavy. He was walking, but he had no idea where he was going. He tried to stop walking and found himself completely unable to. Was this how being under the Imperius felt like? He shuddered at the thought and the cold rainy weather. Get out of my head.

The next two minutes ensured Arthur calling the voice as many colourful insults as he could.

'Are you done talking, Arthur? My, my, the things you've called me. It's made me wonder what you'd do to yourself if your children come to you sprouting this sort of language. You best behave yourself. Your frail mortal soul cannot defeat me. You cannot weasel out of this, Weasley.' The voice was reminiscent of Lucius Malfoy when he had one over on him. He doubted Malfoy would call him a 'mortal soul', no matter how big his ego grew (nowadays, it was large enough to have its own Ministry of Magic.) 'Oh please spare me your imprudent thoughts. If I wanted to be a man with elf hair, I would look for your eldest son.'

Bill? Arthur had lost sight of where he was. He was thinking too much to notice where this man was taking him. He was stood by a lamppost. Don't you dare go near any of my children.

'Yes, yes, because you're going to stop me with the power of your dangerous mind! You'll show me memories of your wife naked until I beg Hera to save me!' that comment made Arthur's blood boil, but at the same, his spine tingled. He felt more than a little chilly and was soggy enough that he supposed he'd just get dragon pox and die before he made it home—if he made it to the Burrow. 'Oh, being in your thoughts is excruciating. Do you know that all you subconsciously think about is your wife and children? If I wanted to hear this rubbish, I'd talk to Aphrodite.'

Hera? Aphrodite? A dazed Arthur inquired.

'Are you mortals really this dense? Yes, Hera. My mother—and aunt. Aphrodite. The Greek Goddess of love—who opened her legs up for anyone that promised her eternal joy. Had enough children that Zeus insisted on banishing half of them. The first children he tried to banish had to be mine on the basis that my sons are the personifications of dread and fear. At least my daughter is literally inescapable. I have other children of course, but I'd rather spend my whole existence being punished than admit that those foul things that preach love and harmony are my children. Talk about disappointments.'

Ares? Arthur managed to connect the dots. At least that was what he concluded based on the information that he was given. Did he really think that he had his mind taken over by a Greek God? No.

'Why are you all the same? Demanding proof. Percival is the same. Always 'prove it that you're the God of war'. What happened to taking my word for it?' Arthur was stood alone in the rain and he pulled up his wand to his head.

Percy? was his last thought. It hadn't even percolated to his head why he'd had his wand to Arthur's head.

"Avada Kedavra," came out of his mouth and... Nothing happened. This was followed by a "Crucio."

Arthur felt nothing but a numbness in his fingertips and a sickness in his stomach. He was alive, and he was not in the worst pain in his life.

'Greek Gods don't die because of a little green light, Arthur,' Ares mentioned in a honeyed voice. 'As long as I'm in this body, you're just about as immortal as I am. Good for you, but I'm only staying here for a little while. Do you want to hear about my dangerous and dark plans?'

Arthur didn't think he had a choice. He started walking again, but his mind wasn't on where he was going.

'I want to ascend back to Olympus with Percival's body, kill my father—with the help of other Gods, of course. I'm not that overconfident that I think I could kill allegedly the most powerful God in Olympus—then I'll start a war! A good one for old time's sake. Give gifts to those I promised to give gifts to. Then, by that time, the Oracle told me your second war will be done. Considering I love watching wars as much as I love starting them, I won't interfere until Harry bloody Potter saves the world once again. I would've done this much earlier, Arthur, but I blame Athena. Always trying to give the vessels I choose to ascend with a gift.'

Arthur could barely digest any of the information he was told

Percy... Arthur thought. Why do you want Percy?

There was a second wizarding war to be happening in the near future and Harry was going to save them again? This despicable God wanted to use his son's body to ascend to Olympus for some unknown reason? Why couldn't he have just done now? Instead of taking Arthur's body. He seemed to have no qualms about putting Arthur on his holy version of the Imperius curse. And Athena?

Leave my children alone, Arthur sounded out. A gift? What gift? ATHENA gave Percy a gift?

Arthur was sure if the Goddess of wisdom gave Percy a gift... Arthur would know about it!

'Yes, a gift. Your son's epilepsy is Athena's gift to him. Supposedly, it's to help him. I'm sure the answer to how it's supposed to help him is masked by enough riddles to makes a Sphinx vomit,' Ares continued, sighing in deep displeasure and irritation. 'I thought it was because she was attempting to tarnish the vessel to prevent my ascent to Olympus. However, I have ascended with epileptic vessels before. In fact, all the vessels that I have my eyes on end up developing 'wizarding epilepsy'—which should be renamed as Athena's gift... or curse. They normally die off much before I could even make it through the gates. Weak foul little creatures. Athena, however, is not the kind to allow others to be sacrificed. She actually cares about these pitiful mortal lives. She is more likely to plant seeds and wait for them to grow, and not intervene when they're being torn. I bet she could destroy the Garden of Alcinous in less than a day.'

Arthur couldn't even his mouth to reply. He had never been under the Imperius before, so he didn't know if this was how it felt like. It was the only thing he could akin this experience to. He'd spent a good ten minutes in the beginning, attempting to break free... Arthur bet he would find it easier to apparate within Hogwarts, or one day, find himself stood as the Minister of Magic a year from now!

My son's fits are a gift? Arthur's head was throbbing. I thought you were Greek. Why do you sound British?

'That's your big question?' Ares laughed and Arthur shuddered. 'I've been living here for the past few centuries ever since a row I've had with Zeus. It's hard not to get one of those horrid accents in the time being.'

He looked up. He noticed that he was home. The Burrow seemed more vibrant than he'd ever remembered—he could nearly smell the wood it was made out of from where he was standing. The rain stopped. Arthur didn't know how he'd gotten here. He could smell his wife's supper. He could hear the sound of Ginny's laughter even standing this far off. His clothes, once wet, were now dry. The parcel that Penelope had given him was tucked safely under his arm.

'Do you know what I'm going to do to Percival, Arthur?' Ares asked, chuffed. 'I'm going to turn him into me. I'll make you proud of him. I'll make you proud of how he could tear the universe in less than a week. I promise.'

My son, Arthur began, his voice clear and concise, will never become like you.