A/n: You guys remember Chapter 14, where I said it contained enough fluff to stuff all the puppies in the world? Well, let's just say that if you kill all the kittens in the world, this chapter would give a taxidermist business for a long time. FLUFF ALERT!
Warning of DOOM:If you do not take a gander at Chapters 9-11 and 15-17, a lot of this chapter won't make much sense. AT ALL. So if you've forgotten or haven't read them, go check them out. Especially Chapter 11.
That being said, this chapter is dedicated to my newest reviewer, AvatarTwilightObsession, who celebrated a birthday a few days ago. Happy (belated) birthday!
The Tales of Weasley the Father
By dieselwriter
Chapter 18: The Tale of Fears
A flash of silver, a haunting, wailing cry, followed by a blinding light and Ron's eyes snapped open. He was in a cold sweat and breathing heavily, and for a moment he assumed he had awoken from his nightmare because of the echoes of a distant pain in his hands. But as he rolled over, fully intent on falling back asleep, he heard the real reason he had woken up:
"Daddy?"
Ron opened his eyes owlishly and found his son beside his bed, staring at him nervously.
"What's wrong, Hugo?" he asked sleepily.
"I had a bad dream," came the reply, and Ron heard the faint whimper in the child's voice.
"Wanna get in?"
Ron opened up the covers to his son invitingly and Hugo immediately accepted as he crawled into the bed, snuggling up against in his father's chest. Hermione, for her part, took no notice; she merely continued to sleep, far used to sleeping through storms and crying and Ron's snores to wake up for something as quiet as this.
"You wanna talk about it?" Ron spoke in a warm whisper into his son's hair.
"Not really."
A sniffle, a sigh. Ron held his son comfortingly and said nothing. After a few minutes, Ron thought the child has fallen asleep before he piped up again.
"Do you ever get scared, Dad?"
When Ron snorted at the idea, Hugo amended: "Other than spiders. They don't count."
"Why not?" Ron asked with a soft laugh.
"Because spiders are scary."
Ron smiled in the darkness, feeling a little guilty at having passed on his childhood phobia to both his children.
"I get scared all the time, Hugo. And not just because of spiders."
"Like when?"
"Well…" Ron said, contemplating. "Rosie's last Quidditch match, whenever she fell off her broom? Scared me witless."
"Dad, she wasn't even a metre off the ground when she fell. She got right back up and whacked the other team's Seeker with a Bludger."
"Still, it was frightening. I never want you or your sister to get hurt. That scares me."
Hugo hugged him tighter; apparently that fear hit close to home.
"Do you have to go back to work tomorrow, Dad?"
"I do."
"Why?"
It wasn't a whine or a complaint; rather, the question had a saddened finality to it.
"Because I can't stay at home all the time; you and Rose would get sick of me real fast."
"No we wouldn't!" Hugo objected immediately, looking up at his father, finding his eyes in the darkness. "We could play chess all day!"
"All day?"
"Every day!"
"Every day?"
Hugo nodded emphatically, his wide brown eyes unwavering from their stare.
"And we could go play Quidditch and Gobstones and Exploding Snap, and I could teach you to play football and you could read to me—"
"Slow down!" Ron said with a slight chuckle. "We've done all that stuff over the past week, haven't we? You'd get bored of it soon."
It was true; Ron had gotten out of hospital only that afternoon, but every day during his week stay at St. Mungo's, his children had come and they had played all sorts of games.
"We didn't get to play Quidditch or football, though," Hugo said smartly.
"You can teach me football this weekend."
"Can I teach you tomorrow instead?"
"Absolutely."
But Hugo caught the implication.
"After work?"
Ron smiled and nodded.
"Why do you have to go to work?"
Again, it wasn't asked in a childish whine, but was asked as a serious, if not depressed, inquiry.
"There's someone out there trying to hurt people, Hugo. I need to go stop them."
"There's someone out there trying to hurt you," Hugo amended, his eyes downcast again. "Can't you just stay here where it's safe?"
"If I stay here, that man could hurt someone else. If I hadn't been there to stop him Christmas Eve he could've hurt Uncle George."
"I wouldn't want Uncle George to get hurt," Hugo conceded, hugging his father tightly again. "But it's not fair that you get hurt instead."
"No, I suppose it's not," Ron conceded as well, resting his head atop the small child. "But Uncle Harry'll be working right by my side. He'll be looking out for me, and I'll look out for him. How's that?"
Hugo seemed to contemplate this thought for a long moment, and again Ron thought he might have fallen asleep before he said:
"You'll be careful?"
"Of course, Hugo."
"You'll stay safe?"
"I'll do my best."
"You'll let me teach you football tomorrow?"
"As soon as I get home."
There was a pause before he asked, in hardly more than a whisper:
"You'll come back?"
It nearly tore Ron's heart in two.
"There's no place I'd rather be."
Satisfied, Hugo snuggled further into his chest.
"You'll get me a new broom?"
"I—what? No!"
"Thought you might say yes…I was on a roll," Hugo said with a grin.
Ron tickled his sides lightly, and Hugo laughed a bit, grasping his father's sides tightly.
"There was one other time I was afraid," Ron said, suddenly remembering. Hugo groaned tiredly as his father's hands began stroking his soft hair. Ron laughed, trying to picture the memory of a night many years ago.
He was mad. He had to have gone mad. There was no way Harry Potter-- his best, previously sane, friend-- would ask him to climb onto the back of a blind dragon if he hadn't've gone mad.
"Harry—Harry—what are you doing?" Hermione sounded terrified, something Ron could currently easily relate to.
"Get up, climb up, come on—"
He was mad. Harry had somehow gotten onto the back of the dragon and was now motioning for them to do the same.
Hermione grabbed onto Harry's outstretched arm and was hoisting herself up, and that was when Ron realized that they were both nutters. There was absolutely no way in hell he'd get up there. They'd have to leave without him.
Hermione looked back at him, her eyes wide as saucers, and Ron found—grudgingly, unhappily, but true all the same—that he could not bring himself to be separated from those brown orbs.
Not again.
She pleaded silently with him for only a second and that was what tipped him over; he couldn't stand to see her fearful tears again. He walked inexplicably forward to her, finding a foothold in the dragon's hind leg as he scrambled up right behind her.
The dragon, seemingly only just now to realize that it was free of its bindings, gave a deafening roar as it reared. Ron closed his eyes and lay flat on its back as it flapped its wings and soared into the cavernous air.
A night he had been trying to forget forced itself back into Ron's consciousness, a broom ride that had scarred him since; a dark, starry night; a hot, putrid breath at his neck; and complete nothingness as he fell forever, awaiting an end that hadn't come in the form he had expected.
Hermione was screaming something and the dragon was making its own deafening crashes. Ron tried to block it all out, concentrating on not falling off, on not being ill, on not reliving that nightmare again—
"Defodio!"
Hermione's desperate incantation made Ron open his eyes to the situation around him. The passageway they were attempting to escape was too narrow; Hermione had been trying to help the dragon out by enlarging the ceiling as a means to escape. Harry joined in with his own carving spell, and it was then Ron realized that it was a wand grasped so tightly in his fist, that it was a means to help his friends escape—
"Defodio!"
Ron only had eyes for the falling rock around him, aiming his wand and trying to clear a space for them to escape. Falling off wouldn't be a problem, after all, if they couldn't even escape the caverns of Gringotts.
The dragon kept clawing and breathing fire, and Harry, Hermione, and Ron kept magicking chunks of ceiling away until, finally, they reached the marble hallway of Gringotts. Sensing fresh, cool air right outside the entrance, the blind dragon stretched its wings again and took off, fighting its way into Diagon Alley and into the sky.
And now it was official. Ron had gone mad as well. Only a mad man would willingly climb onto the back of a blind dragon.
Not having to worry about blasting ceiling out of the way anymore, Ron had nothing to concentrate on now but the nausea steadily creeping into his stomach.
"SHIT!" Ron shouted at the top of his lungs, clinging to the scales, his only means of support. That would not be the case, however, if the dragon decided to roll over or turn sharply. "SHIT!"
He had only tried flying once after that night, that night that now felt like a lifetime ago. His friendly flight with Harry had been brought back to earth rather abruptly, however, seeing as how Ron had completely chickened out.
Chickening out was looking like a good option right about now, though.
"DAMMIT!"
The wind was whipping at his hair and robes, and the dragon dipped for only the briefest of seconds, but it gave Ron an exhilarating thrill right in his gut. He thought for a moment he really was going to be sick, but as he finally opened his eyes and found Hermione sobbing in front of him, desperately clinging onto the beast's back, he realized that this was the heady feeling he used to get when he saved a goal during a Quidditch match, or splattered an apple with his Beater's bat all over Fred when apple chunking, or when Hermione kissed him on the cheek….
"SHIT!"
His eyes were watering as a result of the wind, but he smiled broadly, giving a breathless laugh, before swearing even more.
They flew on and on, and Ron's throat hurt after a while so he stopped cursing, instead concentrating his efforts on where exactly they were going.
"What do you reckon it's looking for?" he yelled at Harry, noting that Hermione still seemed to be crying and was therefore probably unable to answer questions.
"No idea," was Harry's bellowed response.
The sun was dipping lower in the sky; twilight was fast approaching as they flew over cities and towns. The tiny lights from homes and streetlamps twinkled serenely from the darkening valleys, looking like little stars, beckoning him to a home back on the ground.
As if in answer to the call, the lights seemed to be getting larger, and it felt as if the wind had changed direction. But it was hard to tell; he had been staring at the lights for a long time, and his face was so numb he could've made up the change in wind.
"Is it my imagination," he yelled out, seeking agreement, "or are we losing height?"
Hermione did not bother looking up but Harry seemed to be looking at the surroundings, trying to confirm Ron's thoughts.
But Ron didn't need the confirmation; it was soon obvious they were lowering when the dragon flew in great spiraling circles, aiming for one of the smaller lakes below them.
"I say we jump when it gets low enough! Straight into the water before it realizes we're here!"
Ron knew without a doubt now: Harry Potter was absolutely, undeniably insane. Clamber onto a blind dragon? Sure! Fly on its back while it goes wherever the hell it wants? Why not! But there was no way—not again, not another fall—he couldn't, he wouldn't—
"Okay," Hermione called out faintly, still not looking up.
Ron gawked at her, surprised; she had just been sobbing, and now she was willing to follow Harry right into the dark abyss below?
She turned to look at him, her eyes still glistening with tears, and he knew his answer.
"Okay!"
"NOW!"
He hadn't expected it so soon; Harry fell over the side and plummeted feet-first toward the surface of the dark lake below them. Hermione's fear stricken eyes were still on his; he grabbed her hand without thinking and together they jumped, following their best friend.
They had had time to turn back. They'd be there for Harry and for each other, no matter what happened—even if it meant going completely barmy in the process.
"You know, I was bloody terrified of jumping, but when your mum looked at me like that, I knew I had to jump with her. If it weren't for her, I'd probably still be on the back of that dra—"
Ron frowned as a soft snore interrupted him. Glancing down he realized Hugo was fast asleep, a shadow of a smile on his face.
"Oh perfect, I'm talking to myself," Ron mumbled with a small grin, leaning forward to kiss his son goodnight on the forehead.
He closed his eyes and turned his face into the pillow, but not feeling exceptionally tired after recounting such an exciting adventure. After fifteen minutes, though, he could finally feel the warm, inviting tendrils of sleep enclose him, ready to take him off to a new dream, when someone shook his arm, calling out to him.
"Daddy?"
Ron cracked his eyes open again, focusing on the new figure at the side of the bed.
"C'mon, join the party," Ron said and Rosie smiled as she clambered into the bed with her father, mother, and brother.
Hermione kept her eyes closed and smiled, feeling exceptionally warm. Not having Ron next to her the past week made her realize how lonesome and cold it felt when waking up alone. Remembering the dream she'd just woken up from, she reached out her hand blindly for his.
She frowned when her hand captured a hand much smaller than her husband's.
Hermione opened her eyes to find her son next to her, mouth hanging open and snoring softly. Leaning over this visage of morning beauty was her daughter snuggled into the depths of her father's long, lanky arms. Rosie sported a bit of drool at the corner of her open mouth, but Hermione was concerned for her husband, who had his head buried somewhere in her daughter's tangled mane of auburn hair and could very well have suffocated during the night. It was only the loud snores coming from his end of the bed that let her know he was still alive.
The alarm clock on the bedside table let her know she had another hour before they had to get up to start the day, but Hermione found she couldn't fall back asleep.
She just wanted to stay like this forever: warm and together and oblivious to the rest of the world.
Rosie let out a surprisingly loud grunt of a snore, and Ron and Hugo followed suit in some kind of comical snoring duet.
Hermione hugged her son to herself, smiling peacefully.
Warm and together with her beautiful, barmy family.
A/n: I almost hate myself a little after writing this chapter. But, considering the heaviness of the last three chapters, I thought you all deserved a nice, light, fluff-tastic chapter. So here ya go!
Sorry about the belatedness of this one; college = stoopid, and any college student knows what I'm on about.
Thanks as always to all my reviewers! And if you would like to be included in the 'List of People that are TEH AWESOME', click on that cute ickle green button right below and review! All comments are appreciated!
~dieselwriter