Rob and Kenny
The next day, everyone gathered outside, shortly before noon, facing the pathway that Arthur was on when he first arrived at Merlon Manor a little over two years ago.
The atmosphere among the Merlons, Arthur, Chrys and Mike was one of excitement. It was just infectious considering how much they're looking forward to having Rob and Kenny arrive.
Arthur was among the most antsy for their arrival, tapping his foot on the ground non stop as the minutes counted down to twelve o'clock.
Eventually, the minutes that dragged finally passed and the two eldest Merlon siblings finally arrived.
The two were to arrive by means of Apparition, which he was told can be very difficult when going from one continent to another, but was told that both Rob and Kenny were extremely skilled enough wizards to attempt it.
Right when it turned twelve o'clock, two sudden small pops cut through the air and two figures suddenly appeared before them all, both of whom looked very different as they each had trunks with them.
The one to the left was the tallest of the two, even taller than Sam and the twins. He wore a white button up shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows. Over it was a brown waistcoat that was unbuttoned. Both looked a bit dirty and worn. Arthur noticed that he had long silver hair that was tied into a ponytail. He must be Rob.
Then there was the one to the right, who Arthur immediately knew was Kenny. The big giveaway was that he wore a long sleeve shirt with the sleeves pulled up to the elbows and Arthur noticed burn scars on his forearms. He also had a buzz cut with his silver hair and a fang earring.
Arthur, Chrys and Mike let the Merlons greet them first and watched them be ecstatic.
After Mary was the last to greet them, hugging Rob the longest, Rob and Kenny now moved onto both Chrys and Mike before eventually greeting Arthur at long last.
"So, this is the one who apparently is much better than me at being a Seeker." Kenny retorted with a smirk and arms crossed.
"You must be good if I'm compared to you." Arthur retorted back, making Kenny laugh his ass off.
"Fair point. Nice to finally meet you, Arthur, I'm Kenny." They now shook hands, Arthur feeling the blisters and calluses in his large hand.
"Yeah, the burns give away who you are." Arthur pointed out.
"True."
"Hello, Arthur, I'm Rob. Everyone's told me all about you." Rob now shook hands with Arthur, not sounding pompous at all, if anything he sounded very casual, which is a contrast to all the accolades and top marks he got when he was at Hogwarts, like being the first Head Boy at Hogwarts in the family. And he recognised that his waistcoat was made of dragonhide.
"Nice to finally meet you, magical Indiana Jones." Arthur jokes, referring to a series of films he liked about an archaeologist.
"Who?" Rob questioned, clearly unaware of who Indiana Jones was.
"I'll tell you some other time."
"Come on, why don't you settle in as we set up dinner." Martha said, leading everyone back into the manor.
While both Martha and Ben continued into the kitchen and prepared dinner, which will be in the courtyard, everyone else hung out in the garden, enjoying the weather.
Rob and Kenny proved to be a lot of fun to talk to, with their cool stories from when they were at Hogwarts and from their careers. And considering that it took several hours to prepare dinner, their stories made the time fly by.
Eventually, during that time, Sam had to go back to his room and finish off something for work.
Chrys' bandy legged, ginger cat Crookshanks joined them and rested on his owner's lap. His usual routine at the manor was to chase the various gnomes that were around the manor.
At one point, Arthur was able to set Kenny away from everyone else and decided to ask him something that has been on his mind for a bit.
"I need to know, how's Norbert?" he asked. He was referring to the Norwegian Ridgeback that Hagrid got illegally during Arthur's first year at Hogwarts. He and Chrys gave the dragon to some of Kenny's friends to take him to Romania, where he worked.
The question made Kenny smirk knowingly.
"Norberta is doing fine." He replied, making Arthur's jaw drop.
"No…. You're telling me that he's actually a female? How can you tell?"
"Let's just say that the females are more aggressive than the males." Kenny pointed out as he rubbed a noticeable burn on his right forearm.
Eventually, Martha entered the garden with an apron on and looked a bit sweaty.
"Dinner's ready. Rob, Kenny, can you help bring the tables out to the courtyard? Everyone else, you can help bring the food out."
And so everyone came back inside and did their roles.
Arthur was carrying plates of chips and chicken as he walked back out to the courtyard, which had stone walkways and was surrounded by structures that provided shade and had stone benches on them as well.
Everyone watched both Rob and Kenny use their wands to fly two long wooden tables high above the grass and stone walkways and fly them in place right up against each other, end to end.
Once done, Rob conjured up tablecloths and Kenny handled the chairs.
In a few minutes, at seven o'clock, of setting up the dishes and plates, making the tables groan, all twelve current occupants of Merlon Manor sat together under the clear, deep blue sky.
Everyone was now talking amongst themselves as they ate the delicious food.
Over at the far end of the table was Sam, who told his father about his report on cauldron bottoms, sounding a bit annoyed.
"I've told Mr Crouch that I'll have it done by Tuesday, which was sooner than he expected, though I'd rather have things done as soon as possible. Of course, things are really busy in our department at the moment, with all the arrangements for the World Cup. If only we had the support needed from the Department of Magical Games and Sports. Ludo Bagman -"
"I like him." Ben said, looking more cheerful. "He helped get us the tickets we got for the Cup. I helped him out with a favour because his brother, Otto, got into some trouble with a rather questionable bloke."
"Same here, at least he's an entertaining Head of Department compared to Mr Crouch, honestly, you can't even make a joke with him to ease all tension." Sam said with a groan. "Also, how Crouch isn't even bothering to figure out what happened to a member of the department is honestly sickening. Bertha Jorkins has been missing for over a month since she went on holiday in Albania."
Arthur frowned upon hearing this. He remembered when Dumbledore said that it's believed that Voldemort was in Albania and he now remembered that the murder Voldemort mentioned in the dream was that of Bertha Jorkins."
"And that's where Dumbledore said that Voldemort was hiding." Ben frowned as well.
"But there's no way Bertha could come across him, right?" Sam said, not wanting to believe that Voldemort could've possibly got to her. "She's apparently been shunted from one department to another, causing so much trouble, I just hope that Bagman tries to find her. Mr Crouch has been very interested, she previously worked in our department once. He's probably fond of her, though I doubt it. Thing is, though, Bagman constantly laughs that she's most likely misread the map and ended up in Australia and not Albania." He then took a break from the grim subject with a sip of elderflower wine. "Though, we already have enough to deal with at the Department of International Magical Cooperation without trying to find members of other departments too. Especially considering the next big event we're trying to organise right after the World Cup."
He then looked over at the others, in particular where Arthur, David, Chrys and Mike were sitting.
"The top secret one."
"I just wished he could tell us whatever it is instead of just hinting at it." David whispered to Arthur, Chrys and Mike.
"But considering that it's combining both departments, it must be something just as big as the Quidditch World Cup." Mike pointed out.
In the middle of the table, Martha was arguing with Rob about his hair.
"Honestly… how can you handle the desert heat with your hair that long? Can't I just trim it a bit?"
"Hey, there's nothing wrong with my hair." Rob countered against her, sounding offended.
"Besides, I like it." Mary added, sitting next to Rob. "Honestly, mum, you can be so old fashioned. Plus, it's not even close to being as long as Dumbledore's."
Next to them, close to the trio and Mike were the twins and Kenny, who talked spiritedly about the upcoming World Cup match.
"Ireland is going to win, without question." Kenny said through a mouthful of mashed potatoes. "They were able to flatten Peru in the semi finals with ease."
"But Bulgaria has Viktor Krum." Jack argued back.
Arthur listened very closely as he knew of Krum, being the Seeker for Bulgaria. But he was also aware of the quality of each team.
"Guys, need I remind you that Bulgaria's only good player is Krum, whereas Ireland has nothing but good players. So I think it'll be the case where Krum gets the Snitch, but Ireland wins the match." He told the twins with his logic.
"Thank you, Arthur! At least someone else other than me knows what the outcome of the match will be." Kenny looked grateful before he sighed in disappointment. "If only England got through. Talk about embarrassment."
Arthur, David and Mike all sighed with disappointment as well. This was because the English team went down to Transylvania with the score of three hundred and ninety to ten. It was such a shocking performance. And what added salt to the wound was that Wales had lost to Uganda and Scotland was slaughtered by Luxembourg.
Ben had then conjured up candles to light the darkening courtyard before they all had pudding, which was homemade vanilla and strawberry ice cream with pancakes.
By the time they all finished eating, moths started fluttering low over the table and the warm air was now perfumed with the scent of grass and honeysuckle.
Arthur felt so full and well fed as he watched various gnomes sprinting through the rose bushes and laughed himself to tears when he watched them being pursued by Crookshanks.
Eventually, he turned over to David, who was closest to him.
"I sent a letter to Sirius yesterday, it links to what I want to tell you and Chrys at a later date." He whispered and David nodded back.
"Oh, look at the time." Martha said, looking at her wrist watch. "You lot need to go to bed because you need to be up at the crack of dawn to get to the Cup. Make sure to leave your school lists out so that I can get your things tomorrow in Diagon Alley."
And so everyone went to bed, all eager for the next day, even Arthur, despite his recent worries about his dream and Voldemort.
I felt it would be appropriate for Arthur to learn that Norbert is indeed a female.
