Albus Dumbledore Part 1 - 1972

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the demons which drive me to express such unadulterated drivel in writing. At least I think I own them.

Rating: T for real this time because of swearing and references to that thing which my parents should not being doing at my age.

Warning: If you don't like inter-house unity, ridiculously unrealistic situations and running off into the sunset with rainbows and unicorns don't read any of my stories.

Arthur Weasley sighed as he stepped into the Room of Requirement. It had all the things that he needed: a squashy sofa much like the ones in the Gryffindor Common Room, a bookshelf full of every tome and magazine that had anything to do with Muggles and two large mugs of hot chocolate. Molly liked hot chocolate. Especially when she was upset. Arthur sighed again. Molly had been acting extremely strangely for the past two weeks - constantly running to the girls' bathrooms, barely touching her food one meal and attacking it like a bloodhound the next, being jumpy and nervous, not at all like her usual assertive self, as though she was doing something she shouldn't and was afraid of being caught. He had expressed this sentiment to Sirius while they were playing Quidditch in their free time but the only response he had gotten was, "Maybe the thing she's worried about doing is you." He'd given Sirius a Quaffle in the head for that one.

He was suddenly aware that he'd been sitting in silence for a while now and he checked his watch (wonderful Muggle device). Molly had said to meet him at nine o'clock and it was already quarter past. Molly Prewett was many things but late was not one of them.

Just then he heard footsteps outside. They were brisk, but so measured and exact, so regimental that they practically screamed pureblood supremacist. The footsteps came to a halt outside the door and a few extra things appeared in the room. Another sofa, though rather more ornate than Arthur's chosen one, a pair of knitting needles and yarn (of such vertigo-inducing colour that the headmaster would have been proud) and, bizarrely, a large, white peacock.

The last materialized right in Arthur's lap and he could not help letting out a yell of surprise, batting the bird away with his hands so that it flew to one side with an indignant and haughty squawk. Silence from outside. Then, slowly, the door inched open, followed by a long, thin wand and then by the tall silhouette of ...

"Malfoy!"

"Weasley!"

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING HERE?!" they both shouted at the same time.

They stared at each other in silence after that, like two territorial tigers readying for a fight. Lucius had always looked down on Arthur Weasley, and the fact that he was, at this moment, dressed in a pair of pyjamas that looked like they had survived hell and World War III did not in anyway improve this sentiment. However, it had to be admitted that, with flaming eyes and his shock of red hair, the Weasley did look rather threatening.

Arthur, on the other hand, was struggling to suppress the irresistible urge to laugh. Admittedly, Lucius was tall and intimidating but clearly worry, or maybe just sleep, did nothing good for Lucius's hair. It was sticking out at every possible angle and, on top of it all, the Malfoy heir was wearing some very fetching green and white striped pyjamas which reminded Arthur of Christmas candy.

Lucius was the first to break the stalemate. "I'm a prefect, Weasley. I can dock more points than you're going to have grandchildren and have you in detention for the rest of the year."

"I agree," Arthur shot back. "However, you can only do that if you're out on your drills which I most definitely know you are not tonight."

He was taking a stab in the dark and he knew it. However, he was fairly sure that no one, least of all a Malfoy, did their rounds in pyjamas. He was still deeply surprised when Lucius sighed and collapsed with a sort of exhausted elegance onto his chosen sofa. "Fine, Weasley," he said grimly. "You can't give me away and I can't give you away. Now tell me what, in the name of Merlin's curling toenails, are you doing here?"

"Hey, why do I have to go first?" Arthur snapped. One could not afford to give away secrets to a Malfoy without considerable leverage.

"Fine," said Lucius, "if you're going to be touchy about it I'll go first. I'm here to see a girl."

"Don't you need a bed for that?" Arthur asked snidely.

Lucius fixed him with an icy stare. "No," he said. "I need these." He held up the knitting needles. Then, at Arthur's confused look, "She likes to knit when she's aggravated."

"Well if she knows you I'm not surprised," said Arthur.

Lucius scowled at him and then said, "So, why are you here, Weasley?"

"Molly wanted to talk," Arthur told him crisply.

"And she couldn't do it in the Common Room like a normal witch?" said Lucius with a raised eyebrow.

"And I suppose Miss Black can't find yarn and knitting needles in the whole of the Wizarding World?" Arthur shot back.

Lucius narrowed his eyes at that. "What would make you think it was one of the Black sisters?" he asked warily.

"Oh, come off it, Malfoy! Everyone knows you and the youngest have been dating since the beginning of her fourth year!"

"Everyone?" Lucius asked, looking so mortified that Arthur felt sorry for him.

"I'll say it again. Come off it, Malfoy! It can't be that bad. If everyone knows that means that somewhere, in that frozen, glacial wasteland that is your heart, there is a little patch of affection and warmth. Isn't that good?"

"No," said Lucius, after taking a few minutes to recover from Arthur's speech.

Arthur rolled his eyes. "Of course. I forgot. Malfoy Rule Number 15: Malfoys must never show any sign of warmth or affection to anyone."

Lucius, who had been staring with a look of concentration at the peacock, spun around and said, "How did you know? Well, it's Rule Number 13 but how did you know?"

"Lucky guess," said Arthur with a shrug. "Besides. It's no problem. I'm sure even Malfoys are allowed to have girlfriends."

"Yes," said Lucius grimly. "But only if they're the same girl as you're supposed to marry."

Arthur's eyebrows leapt up at that. "'Supposed to marry'? What is this - the Middle Ages? It's the twentieth century for Godric's sake!" When Lucius did not respond he let curiosity get the better of him and asked, "So ... who are you 'supposed to marry'?"

"Bellatrix Black," said Lucius shortly.

"What?" Arthur was genuinely shocked. "But you can't marry her. She's crazy! She'll bite your lip off on your wedding day, you'll see! She's off her rocker!"

"Oh, you noticed did you," said Lucius sarcastically. Then, "Are you drinking that?" he asked, pointing his wand at the hot chocolate next to Arthur.

"No, no," said Arthur distractedly. "Drink up." Lucius levitated the cup over to his sofa and took a swig, looking as though he wished it was something rather more alcoholic. "Surely you can fight your father on it?" Arthur asked, wondering why in hell he was concerned with the well-being of Malfoy of all people.

"I tried," said Lucius bitterly, equally bewildered as to why he was having this conversation with Weasley. "Once."

"I take it that particular conversation didn't end well," Arthur observed.

Lucius snorted with laughter. "I would hardly call it a conversation, Weasley. After the first sentence I barely got a word in edgewise."

"But it can't matter that much," said Arthur. "I mean, Bellatrix and Narcissa are part of the same family. Either way your father gets the great privilege of marrying into the Black family. And everybody's happy."

"I don't think he sees it that way," said Lucius. "Sometimes I think he's like a horse." Then, seeing Arthur's confused expression. "You know, with the blinkers on and everything."

It was Arthur's turn to snort with laughter but they both soon fell into thought, Lucius moodily swirling his hot chocolate around. "You know," said Arthur, "I know you're probably not going to listen to me on this and I haven't a clue why in Merlin's name I care but you should try fighting your father on this one, Malfoy. You're not going to have to fight for many things in your life. You may as well fight for this."

"Cheers," Lucius drawled, but there was a thoughtful look in his eyes. "So," he said, in a lighter tone, "does your venerable father know about you and Prewett?"

"Not yet," said Arthur, shifting uncomfortably. "But I think he'd be chuffed. He'd love the fact that we both have the same colour hair."

Lucius let out a short bark of laughter at that. "I wish my father was so easily impressed by such simple things as hair colour!"

"Tell me about it!" exclaimed Arthur. "You and Narcissa would be a perfect couple to him then!"

After that, the conversation rapidly derailed to the point where they were talking as though they had been friends for years. Complaining about homework, discussing Quidditch and, of course, making fun of each other's houses. It was a great while before Arthur finally asked the burning question. "Malfoy, why, by Merlin's nostril hairs, is there a white peacock in the room?"

Lucius glowered at the bird, which had been strutting imperiously around the room while they talked and, sensing that it had finally obtained their full attention, spread its feathers majestically. "Well," said Lucius grimly, but with a faint gleam in his eyes, "a couple of days ago, Cissa got rather fed up with me. She thought I'd called her fat though really I said nothing of the sort and when I tried to defend myself she turned me into a white peacock. I guess the thought must have been fresh in my mind because I definitely do not require the daft bird."

"Strange, that," said Arthur, "Narcissa doesn't strike me as the 'turn her boyfriend into a bird' type."

"She isn't," said Lucius. "Well, usually. But this last week or so she's been acting really strangely. Changes mood at the click of your fingers. Doesn't seem able to concentrate in class. And she's suddenly started eating a lot of peaches. I can't quite understand what's going on and at this point I'm too scared to ask."

"Strange," said Arthur, "Molly's been the same way. Well, not quite the same. But she's been acting strangely as well. She actually hit me last week. She is the 'turn her boyfriend into a bird' type but she isn't the 'hit her boyfriend' type."

They were both silent for a while, pondering, as all boys do at some point in their lives, how strange girls are. Finally Lucius said, "Speaking of girlfriends, where are they? Cissa and I were supposed to meet at nine."

"Molly and me too," said Arthur. He checked his watch and exclaimed, "Blimey! It's ten o'clock! Where are they?"

"Maybe they've been caught out," Lucius said, getting to his feet.

"Well then we'd better find them quickly!" said Arthur.

"I know," said Lucius. "I'm not sure whether any of our teachers would suit the bird look."

oo0oo

Narcissa had left the Slytherin Common Room in perfect time to meet Lucius. Unfortunately, while on the way up a particularly long flight of stairs, she had been overpowered by the urge to vomit. Thus she found herself in the girls' bathrooms, hurling the contents of her stomach into the same toilet that a Gryffindor had tried to shove her head in back in first year. The Gryffindor had regretted it.

When she had finally emptied her stomach of its contents she remained crouched over the toilet, trying to breath and generally hating life. What was wrong with her? Everything had been fine until last Monday when she had felt suddenly and unreasonably sick. Suddenly peaches, a fruit which she had never borne a particular attachment to, were the most wonderful things imaginable. And on top of that, her mood seemed to change at the flip of a button. One moment she was fine, the next she wanted to set the world alight, the next she felt like lying on the floor and crying and the next she just wanted to eat. She couldn't understand it. Narcissa Black had always been in control. Apart from that time Bellatrix tried to hex her in third year but that was about it. She sighed, trying to pick herself up, legs shaking and arms weak. It was then that she heard these words.

"Damn you to hell, Arthur Billius Weasley!"

Narcissa frowned. She had heard that voice somewhere. Steadying herself against the stall wall she straightened her dark green dressing gown, redid her ponytail and stepped out.

Standing - or rather leaning - against one of the sinks was Molly Prewett, one hand clasped over her mouth and the other holding some narrow, white instrument which Narcissa had never seen. She looked as though she was crying.

"Are you alright?" Narcissa asked, wondering why, in the name of Merlin's burnt pancakes she cared.

Molly jumped a foot in the air and hid the white thing behind her back. "I ... I'm perfectly fine ... I just ..."

"You look as if you're going to be sick," Narcissa observed, wondering when she had become so blunt.

"How observant of you," said Molly, before running into the nearest stall.

Normally now would have been the time that Narcissa made a run for it. But her curiosity and ... some other emotion that she couldn't name, got the better of her. She followed Molly into the stall and sat down next to her, daring to lay one hand on her should and waiting for her stomach to empty.

Finally, Molly's face emerged, pale, with red-rimmed eyes. Narcissa wondered if she looked just as awful. "I just want to kill something," Molly groaned, rubbing her eyes.

Narcissa offered her a small smile and said, "So, what's the little white object you're trying to hide from me?"

"What object?" Molly asked, with obviously faked innocence.

Narcissa raised an eyebrow and, grabbing Molly by the elbows, helped her to her feet. "You aren't very good at being mysterious, Prewett. You've got it in your hand right now, I can see it."

Molly gave up at that. "Fine," she said, "it's a Muggle device for testing whether you're pregnant or not."

Narcissa stared at her for a moment, as though not comprehending. "They can do that?" she asked, incredulous. Molly nodded. Well, maybe Muggles were smarter than she had initially thought. "Where did you get it?"

"From Lily," said Molly. Then, upon seeing Narcissa's blank expression. "Evans. The Muggle-Born. She and I are in the same dorm room."

"Oh," said Narcissa. "And? What does it say?"

"You haven't guessed yet?" said Molly bitterly. But nonetheless, she held it out, resting her finger next to the important piece of information. A little, innocent pink plus.

"That's positive, right?" said Narcissa.

"You bet," said Molly.

"What's positive about being pregnant at sixteen?" Narcissa asked.

Molly shrugged. "As far as I've seen, nothing. Although I don't think your parents are going to be chuffed about you either. How old are you?"

"Sixteen," said Narcissa. "I'm one of the oldest people in my year. What do you mean my parents won't be ..." Suddenly it hit her. As if struck by a physical blow, Narcissa sat down on the toilet, completely overcome by shock. "Oh, Merlin no." Then, suddenly overcome by anger, "Go to hell, Lucius Abraxas Malfoy!"

"It's his?" Now it was Molly's turn to sit down but, since the toilet was taken, she was forced to sit on the floor.

"Who else's is it going to be?" Narcissa asked, budging over on the seat so that there was room for Molly. "He is my boyfriend."

"Yes," said Molly, taking the proffered seat, "I just didn't think that he would be the sort who ... you know ... did that?"

Narcissa couldn't help one corner of her mouth from quirking up into a half smile. "He'd have to 'do that' as you put it if he ever wanted an heir."

"Well I'm pretty sure he didn't want an heir before either you or he are out of school. You're doing OWLs this year for Godric's sake!"

"And you're doing NEWTs next year," put in Narcissa gloomily.

There was silence after that, followed by both saying at the same time, "Bloody boys!"

A few giggles followed this and then Molly turned to Narcissa and said, "Are you hungry?"

"Now that you mention it, yes, I'm starving," said Narcissa. "Where are we going to get food?"

"Where do you think?" exclaimed Molly, suddenly cheerful. "The kitchens!"

oo0oo

"So, how did you and Prewett end up doing the unmentionable?" asked Lucius conversationally, as the two climbed the seemingly endless steps down to the Slytherin Common Room. They had already searched all the classrooms, the Gryffindor Common Room, argued over whether it was ethical to freeze the staircase to the girls' dormitory, narrowly avoided breaking legs when Lucius's jinx didn't last long enough, thoroughly confused Lily Evans, Alice Lendon, Niamh McMalin and Pandora Bolger by waking them from their sleep and demanding to know where Molly was and were now heading down to the Slytherin Common Room to repeat the process with Narcissa's roommates.

"I don't know, just happened," Arthur mumbled.

Lucius laughed at that. "Come on, Weasley. I'll tell you if you tell me. That way we've both got dirt on each other. Actually it'll mean you've got more dirt on me since I'm not supposed to be sleeping with my future sister-in-law but go on."

"Well, I mean. She'd been sleeping in my bed for a while. Just sleeping. Stop looking at me like that, Malfoy! Just because you're dirty-minded doesn't mean we all do! And we were celebrating winning the Quidditch match against Hufflepuff."

"That was a tough one," Lucius agreed. "Damned Snitch didn't know where it was supposed to go."

"So she took me to one side and said that she'd got a little surprise for me and, well, I guess it just ... happened. Alright, now you tell!" said Arthur, thoroughly embarrassed.

"But I didn't get any details!" exclaimed Lucius with fake ire. "Mudblood scum," he said. Then, to Arthur's horrified face. "It's just the password!"

Though it really isn't just the password is it.

"Anyway," said Lucius, leading Arthur through the Common Room, "the fact is: it wasn't my idea. She put me up to it ... she said she had a swimming costume on but I shouldn't have been fooled ..."

oo0oo

"And I'm supposed to marry Rodolphus Lestrange, you know," Narcissa said, around a mouthful of peach crumble.

"What?" exclaimed Molly, spraying juice over Narcissa's pyjamas.

Narcissa honestly couldn't care. Both girls had stolen cushions and blankets from their Common Rooms and were seated by the kitchen fire, surrounded by a bewildering array of food, discussing all that was wrong with their lives.

"Exactly!" said Narcissa, pouring another ladleful of cream over her crumble. "I mean, he's good-looking enough but he's so serious. He never laughs at anything and barely opens his mouth to do so much as talk. And he's brutal! You've seen him on the Quidditch pitch. I've no great liking for Gryffindor or anything but I do believe that smashing Potter's glasses constitutes as a foul. The boy had cuts all over his face from that."

"I know," said Molly. "I thought Sirius and Remus were going to kill him for that. It took all Arthur and my brothers could do to stop them from hexing him. Oh look, chocolate cake! Want some?"

"Nah, I've gone off it. What are your brothers going to think about you being pregnant?" Narcissa asked. She had eaten more than her fill and was now burrowing deeper into her blankets.

"Oh, they're going to kill Arthur," said Molly grimly. "I bet they'll corner him in the dungeons and make him swear an oath that he'll never so much as look at me again."

Narcissa laughed at that. "That's nothing compared to what Bellatrix would do to Lucius. I don't think she'd mind so much that Lucius was my boyfriend - I don't think she's into his type. She's always had a thing for older pale men with strange voices. But she would loath him for doing anything so horrible as kiss me let alone ... have relations."

"What a wonderful way to put it," said Molly drily, digging into the chocolate cake with what appeared to be a soup spoon.

There was silence for a while as Molly devoured the cake and Narcissa stared up at the ceiling, her expression slowly becoming more and more agitated. Finally she asked, despair creeping into her voice, the question that Blacks are never supposed to ask, especially not to Muggle-lovers. "What should I do?"

Molly took a moment to take in the meaning of the question and then scooted over to sit next to the youngest Black and put an arm around her. "I think that you should do whatever you think best. But whatever you do, I think you should engineer it so that you end up with the man you want."

"But how?" Narcissa asked.

"I don't know," Molly sighed. "I'm a simple Prewett. You're a Black. Your lot have spent their lives hexing and lying and back-stabbing each other and everyone else."

"Thanks," said Narcissa sarcastically.

"You are most gracefully welcome."

"You don't strike me as the graceful type, Prewett."

"You don't strike me as the gorging-yourself-on-peaches type, Black."

"Touche."

oo0oo

Pomona Sprout was not, by nature, an early riser. On the contrary, she was the kind of person who would cheerfully sleep to midday and have breakfast in bed. But today she woke up at the crisp and alien hour of six o'clock in the morning and headed down to the kitchens for a nice cup of strong, black coffee, cursing Minerva for challenging her to the bet. Gryffindors and their winning complexes! As she arrived she was greeted by a cheerful, "Good morning, Pomona!"

Turning, she saw Horace Slughorn, head of Slytherin House, seated at a table by the fire and surrounded by a gaggle of House Elves who he appeared to be teaching the finer points of brewing Liquid Luck. "Min still not up yet?" Pomona asked. Horace had said that the potion tended not to work sometimes and she was still worried. Ten galleons was a lot.

"No," said Horace with a grin, pushing a mug of already made coffee towards her. "Still snoozing away. Met Albus on his walk round the lake and he told me."

"Oh dear, is he worried?" Pomona asked, instantly concerned.

"Not at all," said Horace, grinning even more broadly. "He finds it rather amusing actually." The man found everything amusing. "He told me to 'Give my best regards to Pomona'."

"Oh, but that means he knows!" exclaimed Pomona.

"Of course he knows. Everyone from here down to London knows that Minerva will wake up at five o'clock in the morning the day the world ends. Not before, not after. What, Pomona?" The Head of Hufflepuff House was looking with great concentration behind him. "What is it, Pomona? Do I have something on my back?"

"No," said Pomona, looking somewhat confused, "it's just that ... did you notice anything strange when you came in here?"

"No," said Horace. "Why?"

"You might want to get your eyes checked, Horace," said Pomona, getting up from her seat and walking over to the fire.

"Merlin's earmuffs!" exclaimed Horace, jaw dropping.

Two girls were curled up next to the fire, one short and a little plump with a thick braid of red hair, wrapped in a Gryffindor blanket while the other was tall and pale, her face distorted by a sheet of golden-blonde and swathed in a Slytherin blanket. Pomona leaned down and gave each of them a gentle shake.

The Slytherin girl opened one ocean blue eye and said, "Go away," very crisply, before closing it again.

The Gryffindor girl grumbled something along the lines of, "Alright, getting up," and then rolled over into a deeper sleep.

"Well," said Horace Slughorn, "looks like giving Min a sleeping draught wasn't such a good idea after all."

oo0oo

Rolanda Hooch, on the other hand, was an early riser, though not as quite an early cat as Minerva, rising somewhere between quarter to six and half past seven. Today she leaned more towards the six o'clock end of the scale but Rolanda really hadn't a clue, the clock was all a blur in the mornings, like everything else. As usual, she flew around the Quidditch pitch, letting the cold air wash over her and whip the strands of her hair (she was thinking of getting it cut, much more practical). However, today, her hawk-sharp eyes (Albus's jinx had proved to be irremovable) caught a few strange things. Various bits of Quidditch uniform were littered around the pitch. A Quaffle rolled mournfully along the ground. A Bludger narrowly missed her head. There was no sign of the Snitch in sight but then that was normal, even when it was actually there.

It was as she circled nearer the ground that she found them. The two boys were leaning against the middle goal post looking totally exhausted. The one was tall, broad and in a Slytherin Keeper's robes, lying prostrate on the ground and obviously exhausted but still gripping his broom. The other was almost as tall, rather skinnier and in a Gyffindor Beater's robes leaning in a rather more upright pose against the box but drooling slightly and his broom lying at his feet. Between them, tied by numerous multiply knotted strings to both their thumbs, was the Snitch, still struggling to get free.

Rolanda Hooch, also unlike Pomona, was not so gentle in her attempts to wake them up. Muttering, "Sonorus," she stood before them and, with her amplified voice, bellowed, "GET UP!"

Both Lucius and Arthur leapt to their feet as though the fiends of hell were after them, tried to run in different directions and promptly fell backwards due to the multiple (and now hopelessly tangled) strings which linked them both to the Snitch.

"What," Rolanda asked, trying to keep the amusement from her voice, "did you two do last night?"

"I didn't do anyone," said Lucius blearily. "How about you, Weasley?"

"Numph," muttered Arthur, for whom talking at this time in the morning was impossible.

Other teachers might have blushed at this frank exchange but Rolanda Hooch was not one of them. "I said what, Malfoy and Weasley, not who. Now explain, why are you on my Quidditch pitch at this ungodly time of the morning?"

"That explains why you're awake at this time," said Lucius. "I always wondered."

Rolanda stared at him for a moment, wondering whether he was being purposefully insulting or whether sleep destroyed his filter. Deciding to take it as a complement, Rolanda said, "Indeed Malfoy, now explain how you became attached to Weasley?"

"Well," said Lucius, with the air of one beginning a long and complicated story, "I went into the Room of Requirement and there's Weasley with a white peacock, can you believe it -"

"No, I can't, Malfoy," said Rolanda. "You either need coffee or brain surgery. Weasley, explain."

"Played Quidditch," said Arthur shortly, before his head sunk back onto his chest and he began to slouch to the ground again. "Snitch got away. Caught it. Over and out." And just like that he was asleep again.

And by now a lot of you will be saying that the odds of the Weasleys and the Malfoys getting on is in the minus digits. What can I say? I'm a Hufflepuff with the idiocy of a Gryffindor, the curiosity of a Ravenclaw and the evil intentions of a Slytherin, meaning that I'm all for house unity. Also, if you think about it, the Weasleys and the Malfoys are essentially mirror images of each other - they aren't that different.

Once again, I have no idea how much damage I have done to the timeline, all that I can guess is that I've made Harry's parents a lot older. Or maybe I've made Lucius and Narcissa younger? Oh well.

Part 2 will be up soon and I hope you all enjoy it. :)