Another chapter, sorry it took so long to update… I'll be gone for one week – starting tomorrow with no internet and no computer so please be patient…also my homesickness isn't helping with writing...I'm currently stress-eating cocoa powder (out of chocolate - oh the joys of poor student's life)...
Hope you'll like this one. Thank you for the reviews!
Enjoy
Ron and Percy run right into the Leaky Cauldron, sneaking past a man with long blond hair, who was wearing knee high dragon hide boots and long heavy velvet winter coat. He was standing at the entrance of the pub, talking angrily to someone inside.
Jade was about to sneak inside too, looking forward to the inviting warmth of the room, filled with scent of dried-pea soup, but the man turned around swiftly, and she would have run into him, if Fred and George didn't pull her back by her shoulders.
"Another mudblood getting in my way! This place is losing credibility!" he exclaimed angrily, throwing another frown at the bartender who was still looking at him from the other side of the room.
The man looked down on Jade who slipped on the icy pavement and landed on the ground in a heap of winter jacket, mittens and hat which fell down from her head.
"Even worse, I see. One of the Weasley brats, didn't have enough mouths to feed, had to get another one I see." The man offered his elbow to a woman who walked up behind him, and helped her step over Jade, bringing a splash of dirty London snow mixed with salt to her pants.
"Hey!" exclaimed Fred and George at the same time, pulling Jade up and glaring at the man.
"There's apparently too many of you, occupying every free space so decent wizards can't even walk out of the door properly, without stepping over at least one Weasley." Commented the man coldly.
"Do we have some problem here?" asked familiar voice and when Jade looked around, she saw Bill standing at the door.
"Let's go. Fred, George?" said Bill, catching Jade's arm as she almost lost balance on the ice again.
"Good bye Mr. Malfloy." He said coldly, looking at the man who was still standing at the street looking disgusted by the encounter.
"Good bye Mr. Malfloy." Echoed twins in ironic tone and run inside past their brother, who shut the door behind them, leaving Mr. Malfloy standing outside in disbelief.
"Bill! Charlie!" Jade exclaimed hugging her brothers excitedly, together with Fred and George.
Ron was already standing by his Father, who was putting on his winter hat and picking up their purchases.
"We should go, mom's waiting for us." He said, looking tired and quite happy the day was over.
They get into line for floo, as both fireplaces were busy with families going home after a day of Christmas shopping.
Jade wend right before Charlie and Bill, so she stayed behind in the kitchen a bit, instead of running up to her room to change from wet clothes, to see Molly greet her two oldest sons.
It was heart-warming scene. Molly had tears in her eyes and flushed pink cheeks from baking, wearing her old blue apron, but she looked beautiful, happiness shining from her face.
She pulled Charlie into a hug the very same second he landed, not caring about ashes and dust. Bill didn't take long and landed just seconds after his brother.
Molly hugged them both, not willing to let go, even though it was a bit uncomfortable for boys, who had to bend their backs to hug mom properly, they stood there for good ten minutes, before Charlie whispered "Eh, mom, my neck's starting to hurt." And so Molly let them go, still looking at them while they helped dad with all the packages and dusted off the ashes from their travel cloaks.
"Did you have nice journey?" Jade heard Molly ask in the kitchen as she made her was upstairs to change into some sweats and dry socks.
"Lunch's ready!" Ron exclaimed running down the stairs, closely followed by Ginny, who already felt better.
And it was the most delicious lunch Jade had in a long time. After hours outside in the cold, small kitchen in Burrow looked like the most luxurious place on earth.
Air was pleasantly warm and filled with scent of roasted chicken and creamy mashed potatoes. They had blackcurrant jelly for desert and after that, they listened to Charlie's stories about dragons and Bill's tales from Egypt, while munching on the broken or misshaped cookies which Molly didn't want to keep for proper holiday serving.
"Can we go outside and build snow dragon? Just like the one Charlie helped to cure?" asked Ron, jumping up from the floor pillow where he was sitting contently for the last hour.
And so they put on their warm long underwear and wool socks to keep them warm if their jeans got wet. The air was chilly outside. It wasn't sunny anymore and grey clouds were hanging low, with a promise of fresh snow for the next day.
Jade's mittens were caked with icy lumps of snow and she stopped feeling her toes an hour ago, but their masterpiece was well worth it.
Large dragon with long tail, curling around Molly's petunias (which were buried under the snow).
Charlie run inside without saying a word, just to come out only a minute later with the spray-bottle which Arthur brought home once. Muggle invention, which they apparently used to spray water on plants. Fred and George used to chase Ginny around in summer, spraying her with ice-cold water.
Charlie filled it with water and added a bit of green food coloring. He started to spray the dragon lightly, covering it with layer of greenish water. It looked beautiful, but the sun was setting down and they couldn't really see the rich color.
Ginny, who was permitted to go out, if she wouldn't get too exhausted (as she was still recovering from the sickness) suddenly stopped dancing around the dragon and looked down on her shoes.
"My toes hurt." She announced and bent down to try and holds her feet through the shoes.
And so they went inside. Kitchen windows were casting bright light on the snow and sky was turning ink blue. Ginny's toes needed a quick warming charm, but she was left on the sofa scratching her itchy toes as they were defrosting.
"Alright everyone, I was invited for a cup of tea over to the Lovegoods. I should be back for dinner, but if I don't come back, there's casserole in the big red pot, dad will heat it up for you." Said Molly, tying her scarf tightly around her neck.
"Can I go with you and visit Luna mommy?" asked Ginny sweetly.
"No honey, we have something to discuss with Luna's mom and you have to stay here and defrost your toes. I'll take you with me next time.
"Arthur, try not to make a huge mess in the kitchen, I cleaned it this afternoon. And there's a couple of baking sheets which could use some scrubbing if you find time. They could use some serious cleaning, I'm afraid no cleaning charm is strong enough for that burned caramel." She kissed him quickly, before putting on her gloves.
"I'll be back in few hours." She added while Arthur turned the collar of her coat up, to protect her from the wind.
"Don't worry, we'll be fine. Say hello to the Lovegoods and take your time, you could use a free evening for yourself after all that baking." He kissed her one more time and gently pushed her out of the door, standing on the doorstep in his worn out slippers, watching Molly walk to the gate where they had the apparition spot.
He closed the door and turned around. "Who wants some more cookies and fresh milk?" he asked walking to the kitchen, followed by an army of kids craving more chocolate and gingerbread.
When they were back in the living-room with big glasses of cold raw milk and big plate of chocolate covered nutty cookies, freshly baked today, Jade sneaked upstairs to bring down her knitting.
She has decided to knit the washcloths in combination of red and yellow.
Sitting down on the sofa, she pulled her legs up, covering her lap with one of the blankets which were hanging over the armrest.
The pattern was easy enough to remember and soon Jade was knitting mindlessly, while watching Ron with Arthur play chess.
She was finishing the last quarter of the washcloth (half of which was red and half yellow) when they heard Molly coming in through the back door.
Jade quickly covered the knitting with the blanket and looked innocently at Molly who was standing at the doors, looking at her kids.
Arthur looked at Jade, knowing she was hiding a last-minute present.
"Molly, dear, we've waited for you with dinner, why don't you go upstairs and change into something comfortable and we can eat." He suggested rushing his wife out of the living-room.
"Well, I see you've ate half of the walnut cookies I've baked today, I'm not sure you deserve some dinner at all." She teased him before kissing his cheek with cold lips.
Dinner was lovely, Molly brought back a paper ornament from Luna and promised Ginny that she can send one back to the Lovegoods tomorrow.
Molly sent them to bed early, saying they need to rest, because the Christmas tree must be picked out tomorrow morning, and they will have to walk all the way to the forest and everyone needed sleep for that.
The truth was that there was still one Christmas sweater on Molly's needles, which could use few more rounds before casting off and Arthur was supposed to pack the rest of the presents, which was impossible to do with so many kids hanging around the house.
Percy and Ron protested loudly, while Ginny kissed her mom on the cheek and hugged daddy, clearly exhausted for the long day and her recent illness. Jade didn't feel like sleeping, but being sent to bed early worked nicely with her last-minute present for Molly so she did as she was told.
Charlie and Bill knew what this was about and so they helped to get their younger siblings up to bed before they lounged on the floor in Charlie's room to talk a bit more, happy to see each other after such long time.
Jade pulled out her knitting but she didn't even finish first row when Fred and George sneaked in, closing the door behind them.
"So, let's plan the big back to school after Christmas prank!" George whispered loudly, jumping on Jade's bed.
She pulled the bag with her left over cotton yearn to her pillow, making place for Fred to sit as well.
"Back to school after Christmas prank?" she asked, trying hard not to laugh as she counted the stitches.
"Well, we need to work on that name, sure, but you get the idea." Said Fred, climbing over Jade to sit in the free spot close to the wall.
"And what do you propose?" asked Jade, still knitting. She didn't have time to spare, Christmas was almost here and she didn't even finish the first washcloth yet.
"Something extravagant…" started Fred.
"Epic, unforgettable…" continued George but was interrupted by his twin again.
"the thing is, we were kind of neglecting our duties, you see…"
"With all the Quidditch practices…"
"But we'll do better in summer term, that's why we want you to help us." Finished Fred and both boys looked at Jade expectantly.
She put away the knitting and looked at them seriously.
"Gryffindor's rusty sword! Don't do that! You look exactly like mom when she knows we're up to no good!" exclaimed George, almost falling off the bed.
"Pssst, be quiet." Fred slapped his hand over his brother's mouth and listened for a while, making sure that none of their parents was coming from downstairs.
"Alright, I'm in." smiled Jade without hesitating. She missed the adventurous outings for mischief and pranks now and then, but mostly she missed the feeling of being part of twins' plans.
"Awesome!" whisper-yelled Fred and hugged Jade who didn't expect it and so they both fell back to between the pillows.
"Sorry", he chuckled as George pulled him back up while Jade blushed a bit.
"The plan is to …prolong Christmas, kind of." Explained George looking at them strangely, but he soon snapped out of it.
"Christmas lights, postcards and decorations around the castle."
"… Christmas pudding, and gingerbread as one of the options for dessert…" Fred continued.
"Sounds fun. What about Christmas trees?" asked Jade, already thinking about all the Christmas-y things they could do.
"Definitely…but just small ones, which we could easily carry around and sneak into the teachers' offices and classrooms." Agreed George.
"Oh, and mistletoe!" exclaimed Fred.
They spent the last hour talking and scheming all aspects of their prank, because good prank is well planned prank as George said.
"Oh, and by the way, we thought about calling ourselves Marauders revived...but just Marauders - shortly " Fred stuck his head back into Jade's room when they were sneaking back upstairs to their room. "You know, after the first Marauders."
"Cool." Smiled Jade, although she had no idea who Marauders were, but she could always ask later.
"Oh…and good night. I hope you won't have any… nightmares." Fred smiled softly and closed the door behind himself.
Jade heard them whispering excitedly as they climbed the stairs and she was 100% positive that Molly and Arthur could hear them too, but no one came upstairs so she resumed her knitting and didn't stop until she had the first washcloth neatly cast off the needles and safely tucked in the bottom drawer behind the socks.