Chapter Thirty-Nine
The Weasley family was stood wandering about market stalls round Diagon Alley.
Molly had bought enough oranges to trigger George's gag reflex. He still continued to refuse fruits and vegetables in a similar fashion that a Potions Master refused to allow Ashwinder eggs to thaw.
Bill had found another animal he wanted to wear, much to Charlie's delight and Arthur's chagrin.
How much did Bill really think manticore fur cost? Maybe if they sold the house, the chickens, took out every Knut in their Gringott's vault and found a bicorn to sell for three magic beans, they'd be able to buy three centimetres' worth!
Ron and Harry were mentioned every time that Molly saw a particularly nice shade of blue for a jumper for Harry or a scarlet or orange for Ron. Arthur was sure Ron and Harry had three jumpers sent to them already.
He was also sure that last time, Ron sent a letter mentioning he had a "diaper rash but on my stomach."
Percy said something akin to 'I think what Ron's complaining of is a fungus' to which Fred and George replied: 'don't think of yourself as a fungus, Perce.'
Arthur, Bill, Charlie and Ginny laughed and Molly scolded them. Now, she flat out refused to talk to them as she scurried about in search of vegetables on discount. She'd been trying to shove down aubergines and courgettes down their mouths for weeks now, claiming something about important 'nutrients' in vegetables—apparently, this was all down to her copy of Witch Weekly, which Charlie cursed every day.
Oh, and in the past two minutes, Percy had vanished into thin air, but Arthur was sure that he was lost in the heavy crowd that was focused on purchasing Christmas gifts. Given the fact that Percy might as well be a floating head considering how thin he'd gotten recently, Arthur hadn't really thought to look for him.
'Where did he go?' Ares inquired. 'He was just here three seconds ago!'
I don't know, Arthur replied in severe annoyance. Aren't you all-seeing? Don't you have an Oracle?
'What do you mean you don't know where he is? He's your son!' Ares hissed. 'And I'm not the one with the Oracle. That's Apollo and we do not speak of that cowering traitor. I did, however, borrow the Oracle in a time of desperation.'
Borrow the Oracle of Delphi? Arthur spat out in irritation.
'I'll give it back eventually,' Ares mumbled. 'Come on, Arthur. Cheer up! Are you still mad about last night?'
Last night, Arthur had wanted to do... something with his wife, but Ares had decided that it was too revolting and meaninglessly torturous for himself to even bear to witness.
'Oh shut it, old man,' Ares hissed. 'You've probably slept with her enough times to re-procreate Olympus.'
Arthur then caught sight of Percy stood beside one of the quill stalls. He was trying out a silvery quill on a piece of parchment paper, and furrowing his eyebrows at the result.
Arthur (but not Arthur) grabbed Percy by his shoulders and violently pulled him backwards, spilling (probably extremely expensive) silvery ink all over Percy's black winter robes. Percy let out a yelp of surprise, followed by an expression of confusion.
What are you—?
Before Arthur could finish that thought, he suddenly saw three large black arrows hit the wood, just right where Percy was standing there only seconds before.
Arthur was stunned and found himself panting heavily, wrapping his arms protectively around Percy and pulling him in for a rare embrace. He buried his head into Percy's hair, noticing Percy's eyes were absolutely glued to the arrows. Godric. What's just happened? Who's trying to get my son killed?
'Do you want a list?' Ares mumbled. 'Artemis is around. This is good—for me. She's never interfered with my plans before. Maybe there is something to your son that screams 'this is a vessel that can overtake Olympus'.'
"OH, THANK MERLIN!" Molly had jumped up and ran to Percy, grabbing him by his arm and pulling him to her short frame. She tried to inspect for any entry wounds, and looked relieved that he was in one piece. "Are you alright? Are you alright? Oh, Arthur! I don't know how you could've possibly known..."
Arthur's cheeks coloured in deeply. "Um..."
Molly smiled brightly at Percy. "If your father hadn't been there, Merlin himself could only guess what would've happened to you," she obviously had him entangled in a deathly grip.
"Yes..." Fred and George were looking suspicious. They had their eyebrows arched. "Funny thing that."
"What are you two going about now?" Charlie's lips were pursed tight.
"Nothing," Fred said. "It's just—"
"—funny that Dad knew the exact moment to save Percy from being a permanent resident in St Mungo's," George finished off with a look.
"Come off it, you two!" Molly exclaimed, looking insulted. "Your brother's safe and that's all that matters!"
Arthur's eyes were on Percy's traumatised expression. He was particularly silent. It wasn't everyday that you nearly got hit by an aggregate of archaic arrows now, was it?
"Dad, how did you know that someone was trying to make meat skewers out of Percy?" Ginny asked.
Arthur (not Arthur) explained. "I saw a wizard with a bow and arrow on top of that building right over there," he pointed his finger towards the direction of a very large building where Arthur assumed Ares did see Artemis in, "well... I actually saw him reflected in Percy's glasses."
"Wow," Charlie decided, grinning coyly. "Those glasses are useful for something after all! Huh, Perce?"
"Besides, enabling me to see you mean?" Percy inquired quietly.
Percy turned around to walk away and was directly pulled by a black-haired grey-eyed bloke that looked most definitely had troll blood in him. The smell of him! Arthur's eyes bulged out of his sockets when a slew of arrows hit the ground at the same time, forming a perfect straight line.
"Marcus?" Percy sounded surprised, and then noticed the arrows before paling significantly.
'Apollo,' Ares hissed darkly. 'That self-righteous bastard took that deplorable part-troll as his meat suit?'
'Marcus is not at all deplorable! Ridiculously intelligent actually, and—I asked before I took my meat suit!' Apollo replied in a scornful tone. 'Only lowly Gods have to take their meat suits by force! And give me back my Oracle!'
Apollo—or Marcus—suddenly grabbed an arrow that was racing towards them, flipped it around and sent it soaring back. His hand was bleeding vigorously from where the arrow accidentally slipped into it.
'You're not a warrior, Apollo,' Ares mumbled. 'This is not your fight. Go back to eating dittanies and poppies.'
Arthur finally managed to take a hold of Percy, whom immediately ran into his arms. Godric, he was so scared and pallid he looked no better than the ghoul.
"I think we've got all we need," Arthur immediately stated hastily. "I'll meet you all back at the Burrow!"
He grabbed Ginny too before apparating them to the Burrow. Ginny and Percy succumbed to the ground, sharing a bin. Needless to say, they weren't used to apparating.
It didn't take long until the rest of the family showed up, with looks of worry etched on Molly's face.
"Is everyone alright?" Molly called out, looking incredibly peaky.
"I'm not the one who nearly got stabbed by arrows today," Bill mumbled, looking over at Percy, whom was slouched over the bin, vomiting up the crumpet and apricot jam he'd had that morning. "Thrice."
"I think I'll be in my room for the remainder of the day," Percy wiped off the remaining vomit from his sleeve, something he wouldn't have done in a million years if not for the fact that he was so frazzled and timid that his hair had come undone, back to its natural state of curly disarray and his eyes were watery.
"Sleep well, Perce," George managed to say, genuinely meaning it from the looks of things.
"Thank you, George," Percy said as he ascended upstairs.
"At least," Charlie said, leaning back the Weasley family clock, which Arthur had just noticed had Percy and Arthur's hands pointing at Mortal Peril, not that anyone seemed to notice. "We've come home before mum's done her vegetable haul."
"SOMEONE wants to kill Percy," Fred concluded in a matter-of-fact voice, cocking his head to one side.
"But why?" George inquired, raising an eyebrow. He'd folded over the Marauder's map, and placed it into his rucksack. Fred knew that they were going to... do something. Neither of them knew what yet, but whatever it was they were going to do, they were well prepared for it!
Fred shrugged, pulling up a ratty rucksack over his shoulders. "I don't know, but Flint seemed to know."
"Where does Flint live?" George asked, and then curled up his lip in concentration. "Do you think we could ask Bill to apparate us? He didn't look that keen on Dad's excuse."
"He's doubting Dad too," Fred nodded his head. "You know it has been twenty-four hours since we've heard him go on about some muggle invention he just learned about... that's like twenty-four hours without Charlie mentioning that he'd once been bitten thirty-four times in ten minutes by a baby Chinese Fireball, and has the bodily evidence to prove it—or twenty-four hours without you eating a sweet bun."
George cracked a smile at the last bit. "Last night, I ate a normal one, Forge."
"The one that you've scoffed down with enough honey to attract an army of glumbumbles?" Fred snorted, only for George to beam. "Plenty sweet to me, Gred."
Fred still couldn't believe their father's story about Percy. They didn't know how this muggle physics worked, but he was sure that Percy's glasses couldn't reflect something that was that far off. Sure, Percy's glasses were bigger than house elf ears, but it didn't mean that it was possible—besides, they'd seen Arthur Weasley play Quidditch before. That bloke couldn't react quick enough to save his glasses from being smashed repeatedly and often had Bludgers to the head even before the game began. Sure, he loved the game, but Percy was better on a broom than he was and that said something.
How was Fred supposed to believe that overnight, he'd regained Zeus'-lightning-fast reflexes?
What continued to tip Fred on was the clock. Arthur's and Percy's were both pointed towards Mortal Peril, because that wasn't suspicious at all. Charlie tried to remind them that they were this close to being slashed by arrows. Fred knew that the clock didn't work that way. It didn't rely on post event; it relied on during the event in question! Something was happening right now and everyone's senses had been stolen by nargles!
Fred and George plopped downstairs. It was one in the morning, but Bill would be awake.
Bill had an aversion to sleep, much preferring to down any potion that kept him staying awake—and then, because his twelve O.W.L's reflected how much of sane, intelligent individual Bill was, he'd drink liquor with his mates like it was water to a grindylow. Usually, this resulted in his body melting down at the end of the week and him being found near comatose state for a day and a half. Molly would scold him for this routine, and then next week, he would do it again, and again, and he probably did it in Egypt. Fred could imagine Bill at the end of the week, he'd have fallen asleep inside a tomb by accident.
"Bill!" the twins exclaimed when they saw him sat on the couch with a complicated looking map on the ground. They didn't expect to see Charlie on the opposite end, having a read of a copy of Which Broomstick. "We need you to take us to the Flint manor to—"
"No," Bill said, staring back at the map before he picked up a quill and drew an x towards one of the points.
"How's Percy?" Fred suddenly asked. They'd been locked in their room all day with their prototype of Skiving Snackboxes. Last time they'd attempted to try their 'flawlessly' designed Snackboxes was in the summer—one end made George sick and the other end sent him to St Mungo's for three weeks.
Charlie looked back up from his copy, which was decidedly the only time that Fred had ever seen Charlie break concentration from a magazine. "He's in complete ruins. Mum's been trying to talk to him for ages. Hasn't come down for dinner—again. Mum said he can't get round with skipping dinner anymore. We can't even find him when he's wearing his bulky winter robes anymore because he's so bloody little."
George's smile dropped. "Come on, Bill."
Bill rolled up his map, and Fred felt a swelling in his chest. Success to say the least. When he had walked into his bedroom to set his map aside, George had explained that he wanted them to go to Flint's mansion.
Bill paused momentarily, nearly dropping his map. "You think that half-breed knows something."
George's cheeks coloured in deeply. He looked funny when he was blushing. He had that same face whenever any of the girls from the Quidditch team came round their table. "Well, we—"
"You should've said something before!" Bill cut George off. "You think the Flint's are up at this time? It's nearly two in the morning! Oh well, I don't care. I'll wake that smarmy kid up from his bed if there's even a fragment of a chance he knows anything about why some bastard was trying to kill my brother."
Fred only grinned. It seemed that the nargles had forgotten to take Bill's head with them. Maybe it was too heavy after getting twelve O.W.L's.
APPARATING to the Flint manor, thirteen-year-old Fred Weasley spent five minutes trying to keep his insides... inside. George was less successful. Fred thought it was probably because he'd nicked Percy's pudding that night ("he won't eat it!" George huffed, as he sunk his teeth into Percy's flapjack. "He doesn't eat anything! Besides, if you're coming off not eating after a few days, you probably shouldn't be having this much delicious food in one setting. Perce might have a deadly orgasm!" flash forward to Fred nearly choking on his pumpkin juice at the thought of Percy having any kind of orgasm, deadly or not.)
Before Fred was going to knock on the door, Bill grabbed his wrist and pointed towards a piece of parchment paper that was spello-taped to the door. 'This is no longer the Flint residence. Stop asking me about any one of these sods. I don't know them. Here's the reference address if you want to contact them and no, I do not know if they use the Floo network or not. Pop down for a chat and most important, leave me alone! I don't care about your broken bones.'
Bill seemed to memorise the address in a split second before grabbing George and Fred's shoulder again and they apparated again. This time by the time that they'd hit the ground, both of them were vomiting. Flashbacks of testing the Skiving Snackboxes swirled in Fred's head. He looked up to see Bill standing there with his hands in pockets, looking to be in deep dismay.
"This is their house?" Bill shook his head. "Bloody hell."
Fred looked up and was surprised to see a tiny little house that was smack in the middle of nowhere. He was suddenly hesitant to talk to anyone, but had knocked on the door anyway. They continued to knock incessantly until three black-haired girls opened the door. One had curls that were so tightly coiled that each one resembled a Knut. Another one beside had hair that was reminiscent of a rabid three-headed dog named Fluffy (if such a thing even existed). The third one had hair so straight that there was no questioning its sexuality. The curly-haired one immediately pulled out her wand and pressed it up against Bill with a look of darkness.
"I haven't seen this much red since the first wizarding war," Curly decided, raising an eyebrow. "What do you want? And be very careful about your choice of wording, Weasel, before you answer that question. I'll have you know I'm a fully qualified and trained Auror and I—"
Rabid Dog Hair only offered a bright grin. "Come on, Marceline. They're harmless. They look closer to admitting themselves into St Mungo's for severe apparition sickness than they are to attack."
"Shut up, Morgan," Curly... err, Marceline said. "Well? Answer me!"
Fred didn't know what to find more surprising – the fact that these girls were probably going to be up for a while, the fact that they thought that they were there to ambush them (if they did, they wouldn't be knocking on doors) or the fact that Flint's parents had children before they had him.
Weeding through the trio was Marcus, whom looked particularly short next to his sisters. He was covered in enough mud to stimulate Molly's I'm a mother with seven children. Step back. I know enough cleaning charms that by the time that I'm done with him, his hair would whiter than Dumbledore's reflex. Apparently, Marceline had this reflex because she pulled out her wand and assaulted Marcus with every cleaning charm known to mankind. Fred realised the outcome smelled like Arthur Weasley's terrifying, never-speak-of-ever-again attempt at making a cottage pie mixed with a potion from Madam Primpernelle's Beautifying Potions. Fred supposed this was as clean and as pleasant-smelling as part-trolls could get.
"Are you looking for flobberworms to put into mum's hair again?" Straight Hair said, shaking her head.
"She started it," Marcus mumbled, eyes locked on the Weasley brothers. "What do you want?"
"First you're fraternising with Gryffindor's and now, you have them coming to visit you at three in the bloody morning?" Marceline spat out in distaste. "I don't know what to fucking say. Should I scold you for bringing these prats into our house, or say 'at least it's not Oliver bloody Wood'?"
"Leave Wood out of this," Marcus hissed, walking out of the house and gesturing for them to follow him.
Bill, Fred and George followed soundlessly, as Marcus walked towards a tree and then planted his arse over there. He grabbed a twig and started to push round rocks to look for flobberworms.
"You won't believe me," was all that Marcus said.
Bill raised an eyebrow. "We didn't even—"
"You aren't here to ask about my well-being. I'm not that stupid," Marcus huffed bitterly, putting his twig aside. "You're here to ask about Percy, and how I knew that someone wanted a few arrows impaled through his big fat head—and I'm telling you that you won't believe me."
"Flint, you don't get to decide whether or not we'll believe something," George reminded him.
Marcus pulled out a piece of parchment paper and handed it over to Bill.
Bill looked to be invested into reading this, and Fred and George peeked. They were quicker to read than Bill (they had to be to be able to pull off some of the pranks that they did) and as the information sunk into Fred's brain. Ares? Apollo? Artemis? All other Greek Gods that started with an A? This was some kind of a bloody joke. Maybe Flint thought to brush up on his Greek history and couldn't get past the A section!
Fred couldn't help but laugh. He looked down and noticed that Marcus was looking completely serious, as he snuck a few flobberworms into the pocket of his oversized dragonhide jacket.
"The truth, Flint," Bill threatened, his eyes dark.
"That is the truth," Marcus mumbled, poking at the grass with his dirty, long twig.
"We're supposed to believe that Apollo borrowed your body this morning? And that Dad is being controlled by Ares, whom is actually after Percy? Oh, and Ares wants to ascend to Olympus using Percy as a vessel? Percy crawls up stairs sometimes because he can't stand up! He still uses a nightlight because he's scared of the dark!" Bill sounded incredibly incredulous. "What a load of rubbish! I'm more likely to believe that Percy's somehow angered a heliopath and it was trying to kill him!"
"Flint, we're not as stupid as you are," George mumbled. "Wait... Percy still sleeps with a nightlight?"
"I feel like I've just had tea at the Lovegood's," Fred was rubbing his temple.
Every time he'd been invited in for a bit of tea, he'd ended up leaving the house feeling his head throb because of all the bollocks that the Lovegood's tried to shove in all at once. He, too, felt this way when he and George decided to binge-read copies of The Quibbler just for the sake of it.
"I told you that you wouldn't believe me," Marcus reminded.
"Yes, because what you're saying makes about as much sense as a Rita Skeeter article,'' Fred expressed, tossing a look back over at Bill, whom was silent for the most part. "Come on, Bill. Let's go home."
APPARATING back home wasn't as painful as Fred thought it would be. On a feeling of impulsiveness, Fred grabbed the Marauder's map out of George's rucksack. He hadn't really used it for weeks, but a thought was nagging at him. Fred had unrolled the map, and had a proper look before poking at George's shoulder. George lost all rosiness to his cheeks as he took it in...
According to the map, the bloke lying down beside his mum was indeed Ares.