#he touches upon his childhood in romania

[yourbuckies]

~30 min interview where Sebastian interviews/has a conversation with Oscar nominated director Alexander Nanau about his documentary Collective, which “follows the efforts of investigative newspaper journalists who uncover healthcare fraud and corruption at the highest levels of the Romanian government.”

#sebastian stan #this was really good #he touches upon his childhood in romania #and his mother's strength as a single mom #and being an immigrant and how it relates to the american dream #also wears his little paperboy cap #the director also says you know a lot #maybe it's a romanian thing

[ryttu3k]

A ridiculously long character sheet and history for a modern nights Ilias cel Frumos, set after his chapter in Beckett’s Jyhad Diary, using his background from the Road of Sin and Dark Ages - Tzimisce books, and made using the v20 system.

Content warnings for child abuse and implied consensual underaged sexual activity.

Name: Ilias cel Frumos (alias Elias Athanasios) Clan: Tzimisce (passing as Toreador) Generation: 4th (originally 8th) Sire: Dorinta, recreated by [Tzimisce] Demeanor: Guru Nature: Caregiver

Attributes

Physical: Strength 4, Dexterity 5, Stamina 4 Social: Charisma 5, Manipulation 4, Appearance 6 (ethereal) Mental: Perception 3, Intelligence 3, Wits 4

Abilities

Talents: Alertness 3, Athletics 3, Awareness 5, Brawl 2, Dodge 2, Empathy 5, Expression 4, Leadership 3 Skills: Animal Ken 3, Crafts 2 (Bone Crafts), Etiquette 2, Melee 2, Ride 1, Stealth 4, Survival 3 Knowledge: Hearth Wisdom 3, Koldunism 5, Linguistics 2, Medicine 4, Occult 4

Disciplines

Animalism 3 (Feral Whispers, Beckoning, Song of Serenity)

Auspex 5 (Ancestors' Vigilance, Aura Perception, The Spirit's Touch, Ancestor's Insight, Spirit Travel)

Celerity 2

Dominate 3 (Command, Mesmerize, The Forgetful Mind)

Fortitude 6 (Sensory Shield)

Koldunic Sorcery 5

Obfuscate 3 (Cloak of Shadows, Unseen Presence, Mask of a Thousand Faces)

Potence 3

Vicissitude 8 (Malleable Visage, Fleshcraft, Bonecraft, Horrid Form, Inner Mastery, Ecstatic Agony, Graft Life to Life, Cocoon)

Amalgam (Soul Decoration - Auspex 2, Obfuscate 2, Vicissitude 3)

Paths

Way of Earth 5, Way of Water 3, Way of Wind 2, Way of Fire 1, Way of Spirit 5; Transylvanian Kraina 3

Rituals

Reawakening the Dead Water, Invoke the Lesser Sign of Power, Ties That Bind

Virtues

Conviction 3, Instinct 4, Courage 3

Path of Nocturnal Redemption 7

Willpower 7

Merits & Flaws

Without a Trace (physical merit, 2pt)

Multilingual (mental merit, 2pt) - Romanian (archaic), Latin, Greek, German, Koldunic Spirit language, English

Dark Secret (mental flaw, 3pt)

Outsider (mental flaw, 1pt)

Thirst of Ages (supernatural flaw, 7pt)

History

Ilias was born in 1087 near present-day Bacău, Romania. From a small and staunchly Christian Slavic community surrounded by Turkic Cumans and Pechenegs, Ilias' family expected their eldest son to uphold the traditions of family, to learn to defend his home against invaders, to start a family, and to, always, obey the teachings of the church. Much to their dismay, Ilias grew up to be passionate and free-spirited, a burgeoning hedonist who simply loved existence and all within it. He certainly had no time for the church's brand of restriction and pentinence, and spent much of his childhood and adolescence facing physical and emotional abuse both at the hands of his father and the village priest in an attempt to reign in his free spirit. This did not work particularly well; Ilias instead became adept at rebelling against them, frequently running away and having to be bodily brought back. During one of these attempts at escape, he discovered another aspect of himself with a boy from a neighbouring village; his newfound appreciation for physical pleasure did nothing to convince his parents and priest he was on the right track.

He escaped this tormented life at sixteen, stumbling away from home, beaten, bloodied, and nearly in shock. Following the trail of blood he had left in his escape, he was approached by the Tzimisce Dorinta, who had become both fascinated and deeply concerned at Ilias' spark of rebellion, his passionate nature, and the abuse his father and priest was inflicting upon him. She helped nurse him back to health - first physical, then emotional, reassuring him that his passionate emotions were natural and something to be embraced, that he had nothing to be ashamed of, that there were those in the world who would accept and love him as he was.

Starved of affection and desperately seeking validation, Ilias swiftly became attached to the gentle Dorinta, even before agreeing to become her ghoul. Over the next year, she taught him all she could - not just about the path she followed, the Path of Pleasure, but about Cainite and Tzimisce society, the pagan faiths she followed, and the world at large. Developing an affinity for Jarilo, a deity of the spring, vegetation, and fertility, he - ironically, given his mistrust of religion and especially of priests - began his studies into becoming a witch-priest of Jarilo himself. His Embrace was lavish and celebrated widely amongst Dorinta's Koldunic community, and following it, she began to teach him the art of Koldunic sorcery as well. For a good handful of decades, Ilias thrived, enjoying his training, his Path, and the relationship he had with Dorinta (often physically intimate, as was so often common amongst followers of the Path of Pleasure, but more importantly emotionally intimate and supportive).

Things... fell apart in the middle of the twelfth century. Under attack by the increasingly aggressive Tremere, Dorinta ordered Ilias to flee and to save himself; the traumatised Ilias barely managed to escape, vowing to get his revenge on the Tremere. Seeking out other Koldun, he began to learn to apply his abilities to battle, taking part in the conflicts that would make up the earliest years of the Omen War, especially against the Gargoyles - monstrosities created by the Tremere from the bodies of the Gangrel, Nosferatu, and his own clan. Uneasy at the remnant magic that lingered in the land following each clash, Ilias took to wandering, never staying long enough in one place to become affected by those remnants, throwing himself into the Path and his faith.

It was the beginning of spring in the early years of the thirteenth century, during a celebration to Jarilo, that Ilias met Myca Vykos. A recent refugee of fallen Constantinople, Myca had begun their own studies of the Path of Pleasure entirely on their own and from a book; Ilias swiftly took it upon himself to become Myca's teacher - and, with undeniable mutual attraction between the two of them, their lover as well. It was enough to put an end to Ilias' wanderings - while he still continued his duties to Jarilo, he had found something in Myca he had only come close to before in those early years with Dorinta - a genuine contentment, attraction turning into affection, affection turning - much to his own surprise - into love. Ilias referred to Myca as his flower; Myca called Ilias their heart.

Those were good years. Politically fraught, of course - Myca's role as diplomat and ambassador saw the pair travel widely across the land. Still, the Obertus monastery near Brașov became home, along with the nearby forest shrine to Jarilo that was the centre of Ilias' domain, and until 1232, it seemed unshakable.

The delivery of the torpid body of Nikita of Sredetz threw things into disarray, with Ilias immediately and instinctively fearing the Archbishop of Nod without quite understanding why. Further adding to his discontent was the presence of the Nosferatu Malachite, a staunch Christian and former resident of Constantinople along with Myca, who had come investigating the Nikita mystery. Still, Ilias attempted to keep his spirits up, supporting the increasingly perturbed Myca to the best of his ability, attempting to cultivate a friendship with Malachite. In these, he was partially successful, able to support his lover as they began to travel across the region, doing their diplomatic duties and trying to uncover the mystery of Nikita.

Nearly two years after Nikita's arrival, their travels took them to Sarmizegetusa, home of Damek Ruthven, one of the most renowned scholars in the clan's history. There, Myca sought knowledge of Nikita's genealogy, while Ilias undertook research of his own. A little into the stay, however, Ilias experienced something much like a mental summoning, following his intuition to a moonlit temple. There, he found a stone colonnade that widened into a circle, and in that circle was an immense tree. This tree was the source of the summoning, the same sensation he had felt upon his first approach to Sarmizegetusa, and he approached it, knelt amongst its roots and fallen leaves that smelt like blood, pressing himself against the warm skin of the bole of the tree, feeling it well up inside him like sap -

- and then he was being reborn, emerging from the roots of that same tree but far underground, naked and bound to the tree with vines like an umbilical cord.

He was, he would later learn, deep beneath New York City and many centuries into the future. Still, it would be months before Ilias would venture out into 2004 New York - he was still only new, recreated and re-remembered by the Eldest itself, the godlike force he had felt in that tree in Sarmizegetusa. The Eldest, in that time, had reformed, faked its own destruction, and had been brought to New York to recover; now, it filled the underground parts of the city like mycelia, tendrils of flesh spread wide. It had created a new body for Ilias, had poured its memories of their encounter in Sarmizegetusa into its head, and brought him back. What had happened to the original Ilias, neither of them knew. Still, the Eldest had its attendants, especially the Szantovich Revenant family (now known as the Zantosa) and the unstable methuselah Lambach Ruthven; it was from them that Ilias began to learn English and to learn about the outside, modern world.

Eventually, he was able to venture out of the deep underground and into New York proper. At first alarmed at the noise, light, and technology, he spent only short bursts of time above ground (that, and his recreation had given him a need for extremely potent blood that the Eldest could certainly satisfy but humans simply could not, leading to many, many accidental diableries of the local Cainite population); eventually, he began to grow accustomed to the hustle and bustle and even start to enjoy the vibrant life all around him.

Delving into research, he learned a few notable things - first, that his name was not present in any record he could find beyond 1234 and he could only deduce that his original self had died, and second, that at some point in the late fifteenth century, his beloved Myca had become Sascha Vykos, the Angel of Caine, and - by all accounts - a monster. Ilias was heartbroken, but determined not to condemn his lover out of hand; he began to work out a way to find his way back to them.

To this end, he developed a new persona - Elias Athanasios, a Toreador from Greece (being fluent in the language). He made contact with another Cainite he was familiar with from his own time, one Katherine Weise. While 'Katherine' curiously had no memory of the exact detail of the Prometheans, she certainly understood the necessity of the fake identity, and was able to present 'Elias' as a Greek Toreador she had met on her travels. 'Elias' became a part of the New York community, opening a gallery of fascinating Cainite-created objets d'arte and artefacts, still trying to work out the best way to lure Sascha to him.

All this while, the Eldest was growing stronger, aided by its revenants, by Lambach Ruthven, and by Ilias. One evening, Ilias retreated into the sewers to find that the Antediluvian was gone, leaving behind its bogatyri guards and large parts of its body, now woven into the New York ecosystem. Ilias, much perturbed, continued to pass as 'Elias', wandering the tunnels, feeling lost and unhitched without the Eldest and suffering the effects of the fading blood bond he had developed.

Soon after the Eldest's departure, a new intruder entered the Eldest's former domain, Gangrel researcher Cuthbert Beckett. Saving Beckett from being nearly eviscerated by a rather vehemently over-protective Svyatogor (the bogatyr Ilias was closest to), he healed him from his wounds, giving him his own blood to help him heal. Peeking at Beckett's diary, he had found mentions, over and over again, of 'Vykos'; after taking Beckett somewhere safe so he could recover from the attack, he left two things with the Gangrel. The first, a ring of his own bone, engraved with the symbols of his office as Priest of Jarilo; the second, a note, requesting that the next time Beckett see Sascha, he send them Ilias' love.

Now, he waits in New York, living as 'Elias', tending to his gallery, and waiting for time to reunite him with his flower.

Description

'Ilias cel Frumos' literally translates as 'Ilias the Beautiful', and he lives up to this name. He appears to be in his late teens, with a fair, clear complexion, high cheekbones, and a narrow face, lively red-brown eyes, and long, copper-coloured curls. His skin is largely unmarked, save for his back - long whip scars marr the skin there. If at all possible, he tends to wear as little as possible (save for a weakness for jewellery), but is adept at dressing the part when the need calls for it, blending in well with the Toreador. There is something a little uncanny about his appearance, with features reflecting the era he comes from and an almost unreal air to him; he seems to not quite fit in with modern society.

#vampire the masquerade #vtm #ilias cel frumos #tzimisce #tzinnamon roll #ry writes stuff

[hpdabbles]

Kindness and Remorse Part 5

Dudley always believed that life changes the most dramatic of ways on the most original days.  This is exactly how he’s new life got thrown out the window. It started like any other day.

He slammed his hand on his alarm clock as it struck six-thirty in the morning. He glares at the metal banshee through beady sleep crusted eyes trying to will time to stop so he can get a few more minutes of sleep.

After a struggling battle of wills Dudley groans, rolling over his bed to prop onto his feet. He shivers as his feet touch the floor, the cold somehow traveling up his legs into his back.

“I’m too old for this” He groans rubbing his face.  “Childhood youth is long passed me. Just let me rest.”

Stumbling his way to the loo half asleep still the cool sheets of his bed calling his name. Trying not to make too much noise lease he wakes the whole house Dudley manages to get out of his room but he stubs his toe against the door frame of the loo, waking him completely. “Son of a bitch!”

With his foot thumping in agony, Dudley realizes with a horrible start he had all but screamed the swear. 

Quickly swinging his head up and down the hallway he breathes a sigh of relief when neither his parents or Harry’s bedroom door open. It wouldn’t do for them miss out on sleep, especially Harry now that summer break was upon them.

His cousin had only been allowed back into his room a day before, having spent three days in the cupboard.  No matter what Dudley did, his parents were determined to punish Harry for the zoo incident. Even when they didn’t have any proof that Harry had been responsible for the reptile house.

Dudley had no idea how it happened either. 

The visit to the zoo had been enjoyable up until then. One may even say forgettable.

He didn’t find as much wonder as he originally did the first time, but seeing animals and Harry's obvious enthusiasm was adorable. His parents followed them at a slower pace letting the boys rush ahead in their line of sight.

Since neither boy had friends in school this time around, it was a family event only, where the pair of cousins mapped their trip through the whole zoo in a certain order.  Dudley made sure to encourage and respond to Harry who ooh and aw at everything as long as the adults let them be.  

Dudley thinks Harry may one day want to work with animals what with the way he read every plaque out loud and had all but talked his ear off about the fun facts found in the free informational pamphlets. 

The youngest Dursley picked them up the moment he noticed Harry’s eyes lingering on them but seeing as Vernon had threatened his nephew to not ask for anything he hadn't gone to get them.

“Did you know koalas only eat certain leaves? Thier called Eucalyptus leaves!” Harry told him while the two stared at the animal hugging a tree and doing nothing else. 

“That’s really cool Harry.”

“It says here that Cheetas are the fastest animal alive, isn’t that cool Ley?” Harry reads from the plaque as down below the giant cat lays lazily in the shade, it’s gaze on the pair. 

Dudley watches it flick its tail around, feeling sort of suck in place. A distant memory of Daisy jumping up and down on her first zoo visit pops into his mind. It’s a quick stab of pain, thinking of how Josh wasn’t even born yet, not even a concept at the time. When she was five, cheetas were her favorite animal.

Daisy had spent most of the visit telling him facts about the Cat Walk (where they kept all the feline animals)  much like Harry was doing now.

It’s been years since he heard her voice. He can’t remember how it sounds anymore, along with Josh’s and Tiffiny’s. Was he forgetting them? His own family? 

Voice thick with sudden emotion he tells Harry.  “I think Cheetah’s fur is pretty.”

“Maybe Uncle Vernon will buy you a stuffed toy of a cheetah.” Harry offered as they moved on to the lion den. His cousin is the only one who doesn’t judge Dudley for his stuff animal collection. He just likes them alright?

“Maybe.”

They didn’t say much for a while. Dudley overcomes with a sudden sense of sorrow and Harry picking up on that. It’s easier to breath when they get past the Cat Walk, and he gentle nudges Harry to tell him more fun facts.

“Look! Look! Ley what is that?!” Harry asks later pointing to an animal he’s never seen before all but tripping over his feet to get a better a closer look. Somewhere behind them Vernon and Petunia were taking pictures together before the zebra habitat.  

“That’s an Okapi.”

“Wicked!” 

It’s the boy’s enthusiasm that gives Dudley the strength to push his past his pain to enjoy the day. The Reptile House was next and the birthday boy told the adults they wanted to see them instead of visiting the food section. 

Petunia warned Dudley to not leave the place while she and his father went to buy something to eat and drink. They swore they wouldn’t move. Maybe if they went earlier they could avoid the last mess of the glass disappearing. After all, Harry’s mood wasn’t negative or upset so his magic wouldn’t act up. 

Once inside the damp and darken building, Harry had stopped before a Boa constrictor insisting it winked at him but being mildly offended about this.  Apparently, due to the information he had in his hands the winking was wrong. “Snakes don’t have eyelids, Ley! How can it wink if it doesn’t have eyelids? Simple that’s a robot.”

“I don’t think the zoo put a robot in there Harry. Maybe you are mistaking and thought you saw it wink.”

“I am not! I know what I saw!” Harry leans closer to the glass with narrow eyes. The Boa seems to be bored of the humans gaping at it, lowering its head with a soft hiss, to curl into its folds. 

Dudley was about to tell Harry to let it go and see what else there was, like the snakes brought from India, a sure fired way to get Harry interested.

Not knowing where Uncle James is from that country didn’t mean Dudley couldn’t crack open a book in the school and public library about the country and its culture.

All the books were impersonal, more logical studies of the society and race really, but Harry’s look of wonder when Dudley managed to trick his mother into admitting Uncle James was Desi and being able to introduce his cousin to it was worth all the hours he spent in between bookshelves.

Before Petunia worked, Dudley’s main plan of action for limiting her influence and contact with Harry was to demand after school book club and a public library card. The two spent half their childhood in the liberties where Dudley always dumped a book of India onto his cousin’s lap. 

Hopefully, it gave Harry a sense of being closer to his heritage. Not only that but Dudley also learn many things, such that he had been wrong about where the word gypsy came from and who it is referred to.

The librarian had looked like she swallowed a lemon when she overheard him telling Harry that his father wasn’t what Vernon said and rushed over with the proper books.  “No. No. No. Gypsy is the Roma people. Romania is a country who have their fair share of Roma population but so do many other countries. Honestly, boy, don’t teach if you don’t know the subject!”

Dudley spent three days feeling humiliated. Another thing he’s been wrong about, and here he thought he had gotten better at being tolerant and open-minded. It was like a back-handed slap to remind Dudley he had a lot to learn still.

It also reminded him, what he’s been trying not to think about. No matter how hard he tried, Dudley couldn’t prepare Harry for life because he lacks so much knowledge. Not just the magical world apparently, but also the regular one. What use could he possibly be to the Boy-Who-Lived? 

Suddenly his cousin starting hissing, still leaning close to the glass which brought Dudley back to the present instead of the reference books, Ms.smith, the librarian had forced him to read.  Actually hissing back at the snake, not a human imitation but the noise which sounded like it was being dragged out of an animal. 

The snake’s head slowly went up turning to Harry who seemed just as surprised. After a quick rush of breath from his cousin’s lips, the Boa nodded. Then it hisses, which Harry copied and on it went. 

Was...Harry talking to it? What the fuck?

Besides the boys, a group of people had pause to stare at where his cousin who seemed to be lost in a very intriguing conversation. Harry always talks with his hands nowadays, which wasn’t...making the most pleasant image to see a wild hair boy hissing and waving his hands with a very large and terrifying snake practically dancing as it sways back and forth when hissing. 

“Is he summoning a demon?” A woman whispered horrified. Dudley would have glared at her but honestly, it sort of did sound like that’s what Harry was doing. The group surrounding her all seemed nervous at the thought and were soon clearing out with mumbles of prayers. 

The Reptile House was clear of everyone but the two young relatives and the glass cages. Thinking this had gone on long enough he tried to get his cousin’s attention.

“Harry?”

“hissss hisss hissss”

“Harry.”

“Hisss hiiiiiiissssssss” 

“Harry!”

Jerking away from the glass Harry turns to him looking mildly surprised by the volume in which Dudley had yelled his name. It’s not common for his cousin to raise his voice against him after all. “Yeah?”

“We need to leave.”  

“What why? I’m having fun talking to Jose.”

“Jose? Did you name the Boa?” 

Harry actually had the nerve to look like it was Dudley being the odd one. “No, he said it a while ago. Didn’t you hear him?”

What does one even say to that? 

“Harry, all I heard was hissing. Both of you were just hissing” He tried wondering if this had something to with magic he didn’t know about. Didn’t Daisy once say wizards and witches had familiars? Could it be that magical people could speak to the animals that they were to bond with? Or was it that magical people could turn into animals? 

“No, I wasn’t?” The young Potter argues sounding confused. “I was talking normally. Jose is the one that speaks English.” 

A quick hiss has Harry looking at...Jose the Boa who apparently has a real name. The snake then spent a long time hissing something before it seemed to almost laugh.

Dudley will say it for the rest of life, the magical world was full of such bull shit sometimes.  

“Oh.”  Harry gasped, blinking wide green eyes as Jose winks at them both. Dudley felt a shiver go up  his spine at the action. Note to self snakes winking is creepy.

“What? What he say?” Dudley just wants to leave now. He feels uncomfortable especially with the way the boa was staring at him, flickering it tongue out ever so often. It seems like Jose was getting ready to devour him.

“He said you’re right....I’m the one speaking snake.” His cousin stammered, looking like someone had dumped him into a pool without warning.  “He said there are speakers like me around the world. His mother meets one in Brazil.”

“Brazil?”

“It’s where his family is from. He was born in the zoo but he’s always wanted to go. He speaks Portuguese and English, but snakes have something called..er Common? which lets them talked to each other even if they are from different countries.” Harry suddenly looks conflicted. Almost as if he was both happy and unsure “He said there was an Ajagar next to his cage once. Her name was Ridhi and she said there are a lot of humans who are Common speakers from her homeland.”

“...What’s an Ajagar?” Is all Dudley can ask since he’s mind is trying to process this.

“It’s Hindi. It means Python. She was an Indian Rock Python. Dudely, talking to snakes is something, my people can do.”  Harry breaths look close to tears.  “It’s something we can do. My dad...my dad may have been able to do it too. Jose say it’s possible.” 

Oh. Well okay, in that case, he can handle this new bullshit.  “That’s wonderful Harry! And crazy wicked too!”

His cousin smiled through his tears making something in Dudley’s heart ache, twisting in pain for the unfairness of the world because why is it always Harry that suffers? Why can’t someone just tell him these things!? Why did it take a lifetime to learn something about his family? If uncle James was able to speak to snakes then it must be a magical thing.  

Dudley felt both hurt that Harry didn’t know and the terrible ugly feeling of being left behind. Jealous that Harry was moving on without him as ridiculous as that thought was. He stomped down on it. 

He would not allow them to be the next generation of mother and Auntie Lily. He wouldn’t damn it all.

Suddenly all the glass around them just disappeared. There was a moment of shock silence before Jose leaped out hissing as he made for a get away.

“Um..you’re welcome? Have a good trip, I hope you make it to Brazil!” Harry called after him as all other snakes suddenly pour out of their habits. Dudley is not ashamed to say he screamed like a little girl, high pitch and all as he was surrounded by the reptiles who were all hissing near his feet.

Harry quickly started hissing loudly, having all the snakes turn to him. He’s cousin waves his hands around desperately. After a tense few minutes, he grabbed Dudley’s shoulder. “Don’t worry they won’t hurt you.”

A quick hiss form a black snake had the hand on his shoulder tightening.

“Unless they decided to hurt you.”

“What!?” Oh no oh no oh no. A trash can near them explode 

 “We should leave before one of them makes up their mind,” Harry suggested before running out of the building. The Dursleys couple had found them outside where people had started to scream. The zookeepers rushed to recapture the escaped animals and the family left the zoo as quickly as they could.

Vernon and Petunia were convinced it was Harry’s fault which...yeah it kinda was.

Or at least that’s what Dudley thought until he woke up this day. But he didn’t know that yet. No instead he had finished his business in the loo, after stubbing his toe and gone down to make Harry some chocolate chip drop stones. It seemed like today would be a good day to spoil the lad.  

After all, dark small spaces have rapidly become Harry’s new fear and after three days of that, it’s best to help him feel better.

While he cooked he noticed the mailman through the kitchen window at Ms. Figg’s house making him put aside the food from the stove to go out and retrieve the post. 

“Morning.” He called to the man, who waved his hand back while flipping through the letters that he was to deliver at the next house. He never answered back but Dudley didn’t take offense. The man most likely had to wake earlier then he did to get his job done and that gave him passed. 

Pulling the cards out of the box, he flips through them. Bypassing anything with bills or advertisement he pauses at the sight of an odd envelope. After Daisy’s first year, all her Hogwarts school supplies letters came through the post normally which allowed him to recognize what this was. All muggle-born or muggle raise children got them this way as to not risk the Statute of Secrecy.

Written in elegant green ink it read:

Mr. H Potter,

The smallest Bedroom,

4 Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey

Harry’s letter had finally arrived.

Dudley felt bittersweet at it. He knew this was coming, but now that the day was here he felt sad it had come so soon. The innocent light in Harry’s eyes would soon die as the war break across the secret side of Britain. 

Standing out there in the morning air he was holding the very thing that would sent him to the front wars but keeping from him would also mean Harry would know nothing about his parents. 

Dudley blinked away tears telling himself to stop being an idiot. As he rubbed his eye with the back of his arm he noticed a second letter, wondering if this was a copy of the same letter since he remembered the overflow of letters once upon a time, he pulled it out from behind the first one and nearly dropped it.

Written in elegant green ink the second one read:

Mr. D Dursley

The Second Biggest Bedroom

4 Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey.

“Well, fuck me”  Is all he can say. He stands there wondering if he stares hard enough at the letters they will change. But they don’t and Dudley is still holding his Hogwarts acceptance letter ten minutes later.

Eventually, he makes his way back inside, mind buzzing with wild thoughts. This can’t be right. There has to be a mistake. I don’t have magic!

He wanders back into the kitchen but can’t bring himself to finish the breakfast staring at the two unopen letters in his hand He can’t be magic, he never was. If he had been...shouldn’t he had noticed some kind of accidental magic? Shouldn't he have shown signs? And why was his letter being brought through the post instead of someone like Professor Longbottom coming to talk to his parents to explain their son being a wizard?

What was going on!?

“Morning Ley” A drowsy voice surprises him so badly that he flips the pan and the food flops to the floor. 

“Harry! Hi, good morning, how are you?” He says swinging around with a nervous smile, hiding the letters behind his back.

“...Fine?”

“That’s good. So good.”

“Are you okay Ley?” 

“Yes. Perfectly. Why do you ask?” 

Harry gestures to the ground with a frown.  “You just dropped your food and didn’t swear once.” 

A fleeting thought that he needs to put a lid on his colorful language passes his mind before he takes a big breath. He needs to tell Harry about his magic before his parents can wake but Dudley doesn’t want him to know about his letter just yet. 

Not until he can figure out what he’s going to do about the fact he’s a wizard now too. Making a quick decision he stuffs his own letter in his back pocket, then tells Harry in a very calm voice. “We need to talk. This came for you in the post”

He holds it out the one that says Mr. H Potter while dragging his shirt to cover his back pockets. 

Harry’s green eyes blink confusedly.  “I never get mail.”

“Yes. But this is important. Least clean this up and go together somewhere today, we’ll tell mother and father we’re going to the library by public bus.”

“But we’re not are we?”

Dudley’s lips twist into a strained smile  “No. We’re going somewhere else. We’re going to London.”

“What? Why?”

“Just trust me. You trust me, don’t you?”  His baby cousin didn’t hesitate even for a second as he nods his head, staring at him with such trust that his stomach turns in guilt for not saying anything sooner. “Harry, open your letter.”

Crouching down Dudley begins to clean up the mess, listening to Harry do as he is told. Unable to see the official moment Harry will now leave him, he tries to force all his attention on cleaning. Oh no, Oh no, his eyes are watering. He’s suddenly feeling so sad like love one really is going off to war.

 Over the years he started to see Harry as a little brother, one he needed to protect from the world and his own destiny. This is harder then he thought possible. 

 It’s right when he’s wiping away the floor that Harry speaks.

“It says I’m a wizard. I think someone’s pranking-”

“Thier not. Harry, you’re a wizard.” Dudley chokes against his pain but makes eye contact with his cousin anyway. The boy’s eyes widen upon seeing his expression clamping his mouth from what must have been a denial or argument against it. 

Thinking quickly Dudley blurts out a lie he’s worked years on, after finding a letter in the old stuff his grandmother had left behind from her death. He thinks Petunia wasn’t aware of what’s in it since his mother could never bring herself to look at her deceased mom’s stuff for too long without crying.

If she knew it was a letter between Grandma and Auntie Lily, where she talked about her magical finance James and the pureblood customs she was learning for their wedding then she would have burned it. Dudley has kept it safe in his room ever since he found it this time around while cleaning the attic. 

“Harry you’re a wizard, just like you wizard dad and you’re witch mom. I’ve known since we were seven, and I have a letter from your mom to prove it. That’s why I know about your accidental magic. It’s in the letter. The books I read just help explain more about it” 

“You..You have a letter from my mom and you never gave it to me!?” There is betrayal in Harry’s voice that feels like a blade cutting at Dudley. His green eyes are all but glowing in furry.  “Why!? Why didn’t you give it to me!?”

“Because I didn’t know how.” It’s a weak excuse despite it being true. “Because I didn't want you to leave me behind”

“How can you say that? So you just kept a letter from my mom even though you know I barely know anything about her!? I just know here name is Lily and she was Aunt Petunia's sister! But you didn’t think that matter since you didn’t want me to leave you behind!? That’s a lie! You kept her from me because you’re selfish and a coward!” Harry spat rage rolling off him in waves. He looked like something wild, hair standing up, with his green eyes glowing slightly and his hands curved at his side shaking a little. 

 suddenly the dishes started to shake around them.

Eyeing them warily, Dudley tried to keep the situation from getting worse as he raises his hands “Harry please calm down and let me explain-”

“Don’t tell me to calm down! You think you’re so mature and that you know everything but you don’t! Not about this!”

“Harry I understand you’re upset but-”

 You don’t know anything, your parents actually love you! They aren’t dead and they love you! Every day you know just where you came from, and where you’re going with people never looking at you the way they do me. You can’t possibly understand how I feel!” The dishes shatter in bright red sparkles and Dudley freezes. Red. Harry’s magic is red. 

But the random strong bursts of accidental magic have all been silver. How did his magic change? The letter in his back pocket shifts and he realizes- oh. No, it didn’t change, did it? Those silver sparkles had all been Dudley when he had gotten upset or distress. 

Dudley really was magic.

“My parents won’t love me for long.” He chokes paling at the realization. Harry’s anger cools a little in confusion but he still seems upset, so the apparent muggle-born shakes his head. This isn’t about him. It never was. 

All that mattered was Harry.  He realizes he hadn't been completely honest tying to make Harry’s life better. Not really. Because Harry is right, he should have told him a long time ago about Uncle James and Auntie Lily but hadn’t due to his selfishness and cowardliness. 

Had Harry not suffered the first time because of an Evans not wanting the other to go to the magical world and being left behind? He really was Petunia Evans's son, wasn’t he?

“You’re right. I’m sorry I implied I know what you feel but please believe me when I say I never wanted to hurt you.”

Harry says nothing. 

“I-I’ll bring down the letter and then we can go out to buy your school supplies in London.” Dudley’s voice breaks a little  “If you don’t want to talk to me ever again, I’ll understand but please, Harry, let me help you figure all this out. You need to know about your magical heritage.”

There is a tense silence and Dudley wonders how they ended up in this position. In the kitchen surrounded by broken dishes with Harry standing in the light of the kitchen and Dudley in the shadows, ironically a reflection of their souls. 

“Fine.” Harry bites out. 

Dudley offers him a watery smile, unashamed to admit there are tears rolling down his face.  “Okay. After you eat-”

“I’m not hungry.”

“...Okay. I’ll bring down the letter so you can read it while I clean up these dishes.” For the first time, his cousin seems aware of the broken white pieces face taking a hint of guilt. Dudley continues  “Then we can leave. We have-have to send your response a positive response to Hogwarts about your acceptance.”

And send his negative response. 

Dudley knows he doesn’t deserve the magic in his body, just like he knows he doesn’t deserve to be a Hogwarts student. Harry will go to the magical world without him where everyone will know his name and be amazed by the wonderfully kind person Harry is. 

No one will ever know about his magic stealing and selfish cousin.

It’s for the best.

Dudley Dursley just didn’t belong in that world.  

#hpdabbles #Harry Potter #Kindness and Remorse Au #Part 5 #accidental magic #unreliable narrator #Wizard!dudley #Harry and Dudley get into a fight

[the-singing-songbird1]

Countess Dracula

Part 4

20 years later

As Elisabeth progressed with her learning of the modern world so to did, she progressed with remembering her past as well, remembering little things like her childhood and hobbies she had but the one thing that brought her the most joy was remembering her home land. “Have you ever been to Romania Bufford? Its mountains are magnificent during winter.” Elisabeth recalls as she laid in her bed talking to the guard. “I can’t say I have Ma’am.” He replied as he adjusted his stance. “Oh, what a pity.” She said softly as she slowly sat up. “I wonder what is talking Juliet so long, she is never this late.” Elisabeth started to get concerned with the lateness of Juliet. “Maybe she is in traffic Ma’am.” Bufford said in a calm manner as Elisabeth began to pace back and forth before looking over to him with a tempered look before resuming pacing until Juliet rushed in with an excited aura around her. “I have the best news Elisabeth!” Juliet exclaimed as she pulled out an envelope and opened it revealing an ultra sound. “What is that?...” Elisabeth asked soft. “It’s a ultrasound Elisabeth! Marcus and I are pregnant!” Juliet exclaimed excitedly as Elisabeth stared to tear up. “You are with child?... That is amazing Juliet!” Elisabeth said excitingly as she rushed to the glass to see the ultrasound. “and that is the child yes?”  Elisabeth asked as she smiled brightly at the picture before she heard the doors open causing her eyes to widen when she saw the door open. “I believe you have proven yourself sable enough to come out of that box.” Juliet said softly as she walked to the door way as Elisabeth followed her till they were a metre away from each other before Elisabeth lunged at Juliet, pulling her into a tight hug. “Oh god that feels good.” Elisabeth said with tears in her eyes as it had been too long since she felt touch of another being as Juliet laughed softly. “Well would you like to go outside?” Elisabeth nodded excitedly as she rushed to the door with a gust of wind following her causing Juliet to chuckle as she walked to the door and walked with Elisabeth outside to a forest. “It looks like home..” She said with bloody tears running down her cheek as she deeply inhaled to smell the pine forest around them and the sweet smell of wild flowers. “Elisabeth, we have a place fore you when you are ready to come with me.” Juliet spoke up as she walked to Elisabeth’s side. “In a moment, I just want to feel the warm night air just a little longer.” She said softly as she closed her eyes, Juliet nodded as she walked to the car parked close by while Elisabeth looks up to the sky. “How has the world changed so much but you stay the same?” She asked the sky before walking to the car and got in. After an hour of driving they made it to a small town that looked old and weathered which made Elisabeth smile at it’s old world charm. “What is this town called?” She asked softly while Juliet drove. “Iken, It is a lovely town close to the coast of Slaughden coast and Aldeburgh Beach.” She said softly as she drove before turning into a street to a long driveway. “Elisabeth Tepes welcome to house Van Helsing.” Juliet said as they drove to a two story cottage house. “How lovely.” Elisabeth said as they stopped while Marcus, Juliet’s husband walked out with a goofy smile on his face as he saw Juliet’s face but then his face turned into a confused gaze as he looked upon Elisabeth. “Hello there! you must be Marcus.” Elisabeth said with  smirk as she held her hand out. “I am Elisabeth Tepes and I am a vampire.”

(I hope you are liking the story so far! If you have any suggestions please don’t be afraid to message me!

#dracula 2020 #dracula #countess

[aceattorneyutterson]

Gabriel Utterson

Full name: Gabriel John Utterson

Nickname(s) or Alias: Gabe, John

Gender: Male

Species: Human

Age: 40

Birthday: March 20th, 1846

Sexuality: Bisexual

Nationality: British

Religion: Orthodox Christian

City or town of birth: London, England

Currently lives: London, Englad

Languages spoken: English, Latin, conversational Romanian

Native language: English

Relationship Status: Married

PHYSICAL APPEARANCE

Height: 6'4

Weight: 111.584 kg (246 lb)

Figure/build: Tall and stocky, combination muscular with little "pudgy" areas around the stomach and thighs

Hair colour: Salt and pepper/black and grey

Hairstyle: Coily, kinky curls

Facial Hairstyle: Sideburns and scruffy beard, matching the color of his hair

Eye colour: Dark brown

Skin/fur/etc colour: Dark bronze

Tattoos: N/A

Piercings: N/A

Scars/distinguishing marks: Scars hidden on his back

Preferred style of clothing: Business formal; black suit with a dark blue vest over a white button up, often wears a top hat with a blue brim.

Frequently worn jewellery/accessories: Wedding ring; made of an obsidian band with a tiny sapphire crystal

Smoker? N/A

Drinker? Occasionally, often seen as a "light weight"

Recreational Drug User? Which? N/A

Addictions: N/A

Allergies: N/A

Any physical ailments/illnesses/disabilities: Mild depressive symptoms

Any medication regularly taken: N/A

Personality: Around strangers, he is polite and very quick to the point, often very business-like in his interaction. Can often be seen as kind of stoaic, sometimes too serious. Around friends and family, he is a little more lighthearted and casual, smiles more often, but can still be reserved.

Likes: Theatre, Gin, work, reading, research, baking, family time, being a father, baths, his wife, and helping others.

Dislikes: Lying, disrespectfulness, past treatment, discrimination of any sort, and Mr. Hyde.

Fears/phobias: Losing his family, being alone, failing those he cares about, not being enough, and his past.

Favourite colour: Blue

Hobbies: Working, reading, baking, and playing with his children

Taste in music: Classical and cabernet

SKILLS

Talents/skills: Really good at debating, well trained in self-defense, and good with children.

Ability to drive a car? Operate any other vehicles? Drives a car

EATING HABITS

Omnivore/Carnivore/Herbivore (Vegetarian): Omnivore

Favourite food(s): Confections of any sort, beef stew, sausage rolls, steak, and shepherd's pie

Favourite drink(s): Water, gin, and black coffee

Disliked food(s): Any pickled foods, sauerkraut or sea food

Disliked drink(s): Ale, soda

HOUSE AND HOME

Describe the character's house/home: Two stories, classic Victorian layout with six bedrooms and four bathrooms. Outside panels are white with blue trim. Additional attic and basement.

Do they share their home with anyone? Who? His wife, Lavina, and their four children.

Significant/special belongings: Collection of the supernatural by Abraham Van Helsing, a silver sword, and a leather hunting suit.

CAREER

Level of education: Graduated from law school

Qualifications: PhD in law

Current job title and description: Personal lawyer, can argue any case but often does personal dispute and injury.

Name of employer: Himself

COMBAT

Peaceful or aggressive attitude? A mix, varying in situations

Fighting skills/techniques: Swordsmanship, hand-to-hand combat

Special skills/magical powers/etc: N/A

Weapon of choice (if any): Silver sword

Weaknesses in combat: His own humanity

Strengths in combat: Levelheadedness

FAMILY, FRIENDS AND FOES

Parents names: John Utterson (father) and Josphine Utterson (mother)

Are parents alive or dead? Dead

Is the character still in contact with their parents? No

Siblings? Relationship with siblings? Mackenzie Utterson, (little sister) deceased

Other Important Relatives: 

Partner/Spouse: Lavina Utterson (wife)

Children: Mackenzie, Samuel, Anastasia, and Douglas

Best Friend: Robert Lanyon

Other Important Friends: Henry Jekyll, Lisa Jekyll, Charlotte Enfield, and Francis Poole

Acquaintances: Raoul de Changy, Erik, Marlowe, Lucy Harris (formerly), Victoria Frankenstein

Pets: N/A

Enemies? Why are they enemies? Edward Hyde because he goes against everything Gabriel stands for. Richard Enfield because he was abusive towards his wife and conspired against his own family. Simon Stride for abusing women in his brothel. Dr. Moreau for kidnapping and torturing his wife and best friend

BACKSTORY

Describe their childhood (newborn - age 10): Born into the weathly Utterson family where John Utterson had high expectations from the beginning. He was raised under a strict code and taught to obey rules. His life relaxed and became a bit more fun when he turned 8 and his little sister, Mackenzie, was born.

Describe their  teenage years (11 - 19): Was sent off to a boarding school for his early schooling years, but often stayed in touch with his little sister via letters. He was accepted into Oxford University's law school at 17-years-old and rekindled relationships with his childhood friends Robert and Henry.

Describe their  adult years (20+): Graduated University at age 21 and began an apprenticeship with a variety of different lawyers. At 23, he and his sister took a trip to the Netherlands, enjoying the time away from his family, however, one night on their trip, Mackenzie Utterson is murdered by an unknown suspect who drained his sister dry of blood. Upon seeing this, Gabriel's heart shattered and for the next 5 years, disappeared to train as a vampire hunter under the Van Helsing family. When he returns to London at 28, he opens his own law firm and during the night, he hunts for vampires. One year later, on another trip to Amsterdam, Holland, he meets a vampire woman named Lavina Dalca, who initially attacks and changes Robert Lanyon. When she follows him to London, he is apprehensive at first, but soon welcomes her company and falls in love. Seven years later, his first daughter, Mackenzie, is born. However, the happiness only last two years, as Lavina returns home to Romania and soon vanishes. During her absence, all he has is Mackenzie, but thankfully Henry has developed a small serum taken with the smallest ounce of vampirism, that slows the aging process immensely. Sadly, his family separates even more after Henry's daughter, Emma, is born and sent to the Americas to hide from the wars raging in Europe, Gabriel sends Mackenzie away. For the next 94 years, Gabriel is alone until his "niece" Charlotte, returns to London with Emma and Mackenzie and a month later, Lavina returns as well. Finally marrying, Samuel Utterson is born shortly after, and years later, his twins, Anastasia and Douglas.

(While my version of Utterson ties in heavily with the fanstory that I and @queen-of-nerds1026 and I have created, he still does and can coincide with current TGS canon)

#the glass scientists #tgs oc #gabriel utterson #the strange case of dr. jekyll and mr. hyde #jekyll and hyde #opened an rp blog for my boy #bio might get adjusted a bit later but for now this is my starting point 👌🏻 #but ye here’s my boy #tgs rp

[abscencefelt-arch]

i  know  that  being  dash  only  for  now  means  that  people  can’t  as  easily   pop  around  my  blog  to  gain  insight  into  my characterization ,     so  i wanted  to  pop  a  few  factoids  about  my  portrayal  into  a  post

-  charlie  is  demiromantic  asexual .   he  feels  no  sexual  attraction  to  anyone  ever�� regardless  of  gender  or  anything  else.    for  a  very  long  time ,     i  played  him  as  aromantic  as  well ,    but  then  he  developed  a  crush  one  one ( 1 )     individual  after  a  lot  of  plotting  and  threading ,     so  i  don’t  think  it’s  fair  to  call  him  aro  anymore .       

-  on  the  above  note ,   yes ,   i  played  charlie  before ------  three  years  ago !   

-   this  is  the  timeline  that  i  have  constructed  and  generally  stick  to  :

1972 - 1984 : his  years  growing  up  at  the  burrow 1984 - 1991 :  his  hogwarts  years  with  a  focus  on  his  fifth  through  seventh  years  during  which  he  was a  prefect  and  gryffindor  team  captain .     1991 - 1994 :   his  years  working  at  the  romanian  dragon  sanctuary  before  the  start  of  the  second  war . 1995 - 1998 :    his  years  working  at  the  romanian  dragon  sanctuary  during  the  second  war ,    which  includes  recruiting  foreign  wizards  during  his  time  off .     he  is  a  part  of  the  order ,    but  is  pretty  disconnected  from  their  general  ongoings . 1998 - 1999 :   the  year  of  reconstruction  of  he  wizarding  world ;    charlie  moves  back  home  to  the  burrow  for  one  year  to  aid  everyone  in  rebuilding  their  lives  2000 -  onwards :   charlie  returns  to  romania  initially  to  resume  work  at  the  sanctuary .     he  is  then  promoted  to  an  international  consultant  and  travels  the  world  aiding  wherever  he  is  needed  working  towards  better  dragon  care  and  preservation .

-   charlie  is  deeply  and  fundamentally  shaped  by  being  raised  during  wartime .    i’ll write  about  it  more  extensively  later ,  but  charlie’s  entire  childhood  was  shaped  by  death .    death  and  loss  were  normalized  for  him  far  too  early .

-    charlie  and  his  hogwarts  quidditch  career  really  were  the  stuff  of  legends .    his  position  was  seeker  and  he  helped  bring  the  team  to  cup  victory  in  just  his  second  year .      he  was  also  captain  and ,    although  they  did  not  win  the  cup  under  his  leadership ,    they   pulled  off  some  fantastic  matches .     upon  graduation ,    he  was  offered  positions  on  the  reserve  teams  of  both  puddlemere  united  and  the  tutshill  tornados ,     but  turned  them  down  in  favor  of   taking  his  position  at  the  dragon   sanctuary .

-    CANON :    charlie  failed  his  apparation  test  on  his  first  try ,    landed  five  miles  south  of  his  destination  on  top  of  an  old  lady .      ME :   charlie  hates  apparating   as  he  hates  few  other  things  in  the  world .     he  doesn’t  see  any  real  appeal  to  it  other  than  speed ,    and  will  rather  fly  somewhere  on  his  broom or  drive  his  muggle  car  rather  than  apparate .

-   charlie  loves  fleur  and  the  fact  that  bill  married  her .       he  lost  respect  for  some  of  the  members  of  his  family  for  being  anything  other  than  extremely  welcoming  to  her .

-    speaking  of  bill -------  charlie  loves  bill  more  than  anyone  else  in  the  world .    he’d  do  anything  bill  needed    without  hesitation .     this  needs its  whole  own  post  tbh .

-    charlie  loves  his  whole  family ,    but  often  grew  up  feeling  like  a  black  sheep .     there  were  always  little  things ------  like  the  way  his  brothers  talked  about  girls  they  had  crushes  on  or  the  way  his  mother  and  father  always  seemed  to  love  the  little  house  that  gave  him  claustrophobia  ------  that  just  made  him  knew  he  was  different .    even  come  the  second  war ,   the  ways  that  he  comes  to  contribute  to  the  order  are  vastly  different ,    and  he  suspects  he  is  judged  by  some  for  not  being  more  involved .

-    charlie  has  really  bad  sensory  processing  problems ,    especially  as  pertains  to  noise  and  textures .   this  plays  into  him  not  liking  confined  spaces ----  lots  of  little  noises  happening  at  the  same  time .    also ,   the  sweaters  his  mom  makes  for  christmas ????    he  has  to  wear  a  shirt  underneath  them  just  to  stop  himself  from  crawling  out  of  his  own  skin .

-  in  terms  of  schooling ------  ya  boy  excelled  at  care  of  magical  creatures ,  obvs .   he  was  also  very  strong  at  charms  and  could  probably  have  become  an  accomplished  duelist  if  he  had  wanted  to  go  that  route .     his  strength  lies  in  how  quick - thinking  he  is  in  terms  of  spellwork ,   as  well  as  the  fact  that  nonverbal  magic  comes  easily  to  him .     he  managed  decently  in  transfiguration  because  of  his ,   but  the  theoretical  portions  bored  him .   he  always  did  decently  in  astronomy ,   dada ,   and  history  of  magic  because  he  liked  listening  to  lectures ,   but  he  rarely  did  the  assigned  homework  to  accompany .    herbology  was  great  because  he  got  to  be  outside .    potions  can  suck  his  dick   (  but  not  really  bc  he’s  ace ,    remember !  )

-  a  big  motif  in  charlie’s  life  is  absence  -----  hence  the  url  of  this  blog .    i've  sort  of  touched  on  it  throughout  this  whole  thing ,   but  having  people  in  his  life  go  missing  and  having  aspects  of  his  personality  differ  from  people  around  him  and  being  physically  separated  from  the  traditional  experiences  of  war .  .  .     charlie  always  feels  like  there’s  this  hole .    maybe  it’s  inside  of  him  or  maybe  he’s  inside  of  it ,    but  it  exists .     there’s  a  void  somewhere -------------------  do  not  get  me  wrong ,    charlie  is  a  happy  and  whole  person ,    but  he  doesn’t  always  feel  like  it .     there  is  an  absence  there  that’s  largely  undefined .    

IDK  THERE’S  PROBABLY  MORE  BUT  I  HOPE  THIS  GIVES  YOU   A   BASELINE !  

[dailynewswebsite]

Folk devils and fear: QAnon feeds into a culture of moral panic

Folks show Qanon messages on cardboards throughout a political rally in Bucharest, Romania on Aug. 10, 2020. (Shutterstock)

Utilizing conspiracy theories that embrace baby intercourse traffickers and eating places serving human flesh, QAnon has unleashed a modern-day ethical panic.

It’s now greater than 30 years since sociologists proposed ethical panic as a technique to perceive the incitement of concern round a perceived enemy. Within the opening paragraph of his canonical examine of well-liked media from 1972, Folks Devils and Ethical Panics, sociologist Stanley Cohen outlined his fundamental thesis:

Societies look like topic, from time to time, to durations of ethical panic. A situation, episode, individual or group of individuals emerges to develop into outlined as a risk to societal values and pursuits.

In President Donald Trump’s America, these individuals are queers, racial minorities and Jews.

On the time Cohen was writing, his focus was on well-liked media and the manipulation of mods and rockers as ethical degenerates. He argued that these in positions of authority used sensationalized headlines to implement what they noticed as threats to social order.

We discover ourselves in the same place in the present day. The media in query is social, however the targets are as outdated as journalism itself.

Rights and recognition

When Trump refused to name out QAnon in his Oct. 15 city corridor, preferring to indicate sympathy for its purported combat in opposition to pedophilia, he tapped into an ethical panic with deep historic roots. The hazard that QAnon poses will not be that it’s endorsed by the president. It’s the way in which it speaks to long-festering hatreds that transcend political affiliation.

Throughout a information convention on Aug. 20, 2020, Trump responds to a journalist asking him to touch upon QAnon.

QAnon was born digital within the age of “platformed antagonism,” the place social media breathes new life into racist stereotypes. However its enchantment owes to an extended historical past of animosity in the direction of sexual and racial minorities at vital factors of their quest for rights and recognition. It does this by means of the usage of the modern-day blood libel accusation.

Homicide, matzo and mayhem

Costs of formality homicide have been ceaselessly waged in opposition to Europe’s Jewish populations as an effort to strengthen the exclusionary logic of ethnic nationalism. Jews have been accused of kidnapping and murdering gentile youngsters in order to boil their blood and make matzo. Ritual homicide accusations may lead to mob violence, because it was in 1901 within the case of a neighborhood Jewish butcher within the West Prussian city of Koenitz.

Jews have been additionally slandered for his or her function within the so-called white slave commerce, the luring of younger white girls into prostitution. This mixture of sexual extra and ritualistic fervour went hand-in-hand with Jewish emancipation, visibility and new-found claims to equal citizenship.

Each the Pizzagate and Cannibal Membership conspiracies in QAnon share roots with the blood libel accusation.

Ideas that Hillary Clinton and financier George Soros have been a part of a world intercourse ring have lengthy permeated social media networks. In 2018, these claims morphed in a brand new course: youngsters weren’t simply being lured right into a sexual underground, they have been thought-about sources of adrenochrome, a chemical with hallucinogenic qualities harvested for satanic rituals. A cabal of elites didn’t simply harvest youngsters’s blood, they consumed the flesh itself: as proof, conspiracy theorists pointed to an internet site that falsely claimed that Raven Chan — Mark Zuckerberg’s sister-in-law — was concerned with a faux restaurant referred to as the Cannibal Membership.

Though the story has since been debunked, it’s alive and effectively on social media, surfacing most lately within the hashtags utilized by Twitterers within the wake of the Trump city corridor, linking Hollywood to human sacrifice, secret societies and pedophilia.

Panic on the actions

Related ethical panics accompanied the pursuit of equality by gays and lesbians, with fears across the seduction of minors ceaselessly used as an argument in opposition to legal justice reform. The brand new-found visibility of the Homosexual Liberation Entrance and lesbian, feminist and Black energy actions unleashed a preoccupation with adolescence, childhood sexuality and age of consent.

Whereas the Diagnostic and Statistical Guide of Psychological Issues — used to outline and classify psychological problems — eliminated homosexuality from its listing of paraphilias in 1973, conservatives lamented the legalization of same-sex sexuality for what they noticed as a sea change in societal values. Anti-gay rights activist Anita Bryant’s “Defend America’s Youngsters” marketing campaign gave this ethical panic a celeb face.

The AIDS epidemic, scandals inside the Catholic Church, trans rights and, most lately, the Jeffrey Epstein assaults have all forged renewed consideration on the historical past of adjusting social and sexual mores led to by the sexual revolution.

At its core, the preoccupation with pedophilia and childhood sexuality is an try to guard the heterosexual household because the bedrock of society, a salve in opposition to degeneration and extra. There are too many examples to listing, from Pope Benedict blaming gay “cliques” for the overall collapse of morality within the late 20th century to opponents of the 2015 Obergefell resolution legalizing homosexual marriage, a trigger célèbre within the conservative media linking homosexual, lesbian, and trans rights with pedophilia as a leftist plot in opposition to the household.

Even Dr. Anthony Fauci — a member of the White Home Coronavirus Activity Power — was not immune from conspiracy theorists who falsely linked his spouse to Epstein handler Ghislaine Maxwell.

The QAnon conspiracy idea attracts collectively anti-Semitism, sexual extra, homophobia and race-baiting in a modern-day ethical panic. They resonate as a result of they’ve a spot within the up to date zeitgeist as merchandise of long-standing animosity in opposition to change.

De-platforming QAnon will not be sufficient. For whereas Trump is proving himself to be conspiracist-in-chief, the tradition of people devils and concern is of our personal making.

Jennifer Evans receives funding from the Social Science Humanities Analysis Council of Canada and the Social Science Analysis Council.

from Growth News https://growthnews.in/folk-devils-and-fear-qanon-feeds-into-a-culture-of-moral-panic/ via https://growthnews.in

#Growth News

[dxywalker-a]

slides a five times kissed w/ a $20 bill @ u.... gimmie them platonic smooches...

send me ‘five times kissed’ for a thing

One

It’s the first time he’s stayed over. The young vampire had visited her during the night, as he often did - they would play video games together, or board games, or read - and had stayed during the day, protected from the sun by the thick curtains in her house. Leah enjoys his company, more than she had expected to upon first meeting him. He reminds her of Benjamin in some ways, and she can’t help but mother him. They’re lying together on the sofa, a movie playing in front of them. Her legs arefolded under her and his head is in her lap, her hands running through his red hair absentmindedly. “You better not be making a mess of my hair.” He mumbles, and Leah laughs softly, mussing his hair with both hands before pressing a gentle kiss to his brow, “I would never dream of it.”

Two

He arrives at her door, bloody and injured, and nearly gives the daywalker heart attack. Leah is quick to help him through to the kitchen, where she cleans his injuries with gentle hands, her eyebrows creased in worry. He tries to smile, and play it off as nothing, but Leah can see right through his lies, especially as he winces every time she touches him. He’s healing, of course, but she suspects the weapons his assailants used had been blessed with Holy Water, inhibiting his normal healing processes. So she offers him her own wrist. The mixture of human and vampire that runs through her veins will flush away toxins in his body and kick start his healing process again. He’s hesitant at first, but Leah isn’t one to take no for an answer. She places her other hand on his shoulder as he bites gently into her wrist, and when he pulls away a few moments later she smiles down at him. She rests a hand on his cheek, thumb brushing his cheekbone as she presses a kiss to the top of his head, grateful that he’s going to be okay.

Three

She promised that she would take him to see the world, and that’s exactly what she has done. Leah often wonders at why people underestimate the wealth of the Dracul family, they were never fools with their money, she supposes they never show it off much either. The look on Hayden’s face when he had seen their private jet had been priceless, the sheer excitement had warmed her heart. They visit Romania first, Leah having promised to introduce her father to Hayden. The young fledgling is nervous, and she isn’t surprised, most vampires are nervous before meeting the Vampire King. Leah assures him that her father is friendly, and will adore him. She takes his hands in her own, and presses a kiss to his knuckles on each of them before squeezing them gently, “You will be fine.” She promises.

Four 

They’re in France, Paris to be exact. Leah having insisted he see the manor in which she spent much of her childhood. Her family still owns it, and herself or her father will often stay there while visiting France. So that’s where she and Hayden stay. It is the grandest of all their residences, and she would live there permanently were it not for her mother’s grave in the back gardens. But she refuses to let grief weigh down on her, not now that she is with Hayden, showing him all the things she was never able to show Benjamin. They’re perusing the streets one night, thecity buzzing with life around them, Hayden’s arm linked with her own. Every now and then something will catch his interest and he will drag her to look at it with him, not that she ever complains, but it is her that drags him to the photo booth and pushes him inside. It’s cramped inside the little booth, and they are all arms and legs over each other, erupting into laughs at the results of the pictures. At one stage, Leah puts her arm around Hayden’s shoulders and presses her lips to his cheek. She keeps that particular photo in her purse, with her at all times.

Five

It’s only been a few weeks since they’ve returned from their travels. Hayden has been spending some time reconnecting with his sire, so she hasn’t seen as much of him as she would normally. That is until she returns from dinner with a friend one night and finds her front door unlocked. Immediately on her guard she steps inside, only to be greeted by the sound of soft sobbing. Hayden. She had given him a key to her house long ago. She slowly makes her way to the living room where she finds him, back pressed against the wall, head in his hands. As soon as he realises she’s there he moves to make an explanation but she holds up a hand. He doesn’t have to explain anything to her, not yet. Instead she moves to sit beside him, pulling him to her as he folds his taller body up in order to curl into her smaller frame. One arm is over his back, the other gently cradles his cheek as he sobs into to crook of her neck. Leah turns her head slightly, pressing her lips to his forehead and squeezing her eyes shut, wishing she could take away all his pain.

@progeniium

#progeniium #|| fratior || (hayden) #|| familia de sânge || (hayden and leah) #♕– — you're a walking tragedy and you wear it so well | main verse

[coeurdastronaute]

Essays in Existentialism: Gryffindor

Previously on Slytherin

In second year, Hogwarts celebrated the ten year anniversary of the Battle. As the sun rose on that late spring day, the feeling of something solemn and ominous rested heavy in the air. Dignitaries from all across the world arrived, stately and somber, to dedicate the memorial. Survivors and fighters appeared, adults that looked oddly shaken upon their return, while many declined the invitation, instead electing to spend the day as far from the school as possible.

To her credit, Clarke could understand that, the avoiding. She wanted nothing more than to be far away from the glitz and photos and eulogies and speeches that came with the dedication of the new memorial. But she was stuck, with nowhere else to go, and so she shuffled along with her friends as the entire dismal circus filled up the yard outside, that once was filled with rubble and effaced so thoroughly that they were still rebuilding sections of the ancient castle.

The new wall that stretched lazily down the side of the countryside, that stretched out into the expanse, that was filled with new protections, did not look any different than the old cobblestone wall that had been there since the fields were nothing more than grazing lands centuries and centuries and centuries before the hint of the first kind of magi. Upon closer inspection, however, the names of all those lost to the War were etched elegantly upon each different misshapen stone, composing one unified front one final time.

When it calmed down, when the speeches were finished up and the day had descended into somber celebrations, Clarke slipped away from her friends and made her way down the path beside the beautiful stretch of wall. She was in love with its simplicity, grateful that a giant monstrosity like the one downtown by the Ministry, didn’t mar the landscape of the bucolic school grounds.

The sun was out and sinking beneath fluffy clouds, and the world was as idyllic as she could ever remember seeing it, and for a moment, she fell just as much in love with the grounds again. Her first arrival at Hogwarts had been interrupted by this deep, heavy feeling in her stomach, that she was stepping into a history, that she’d been chasing a kind of memory she would never have. Instead, she fell in love with the school, and she fell in love with her name.

There were stories she heard, about her parents. She grew up her entire life hearing about their bravery and hard work. About her mother healing people on the front line, how she braved violence and persecution to marry her father fresh out of Hogwarts, how they fought against her own parents. How she was the first on the scene and ran into the fire and flames of the Battle of Hogwarts, even with a new toddler sleeping soundly at home. Her mother, the Slytherin healer who married a Gryffindor chaser. Her mother, the pureblood heir who threw it away for a small set of chambers at Hogwarts with her half-blood husband and saved twenty-nine people on that night, carrying some on her own back, setting bones, defending spells.

When Clarke saw her name there on the stone, looking out at the lake, immortalized and strong and beside her father’s, she tentatively held out a hand before retracting it and shoving it in her pockets. It was a lot to think about, to be born from their myth.

Awkwardly, Clarke looked around at the others milling about, finding names, remembering. She looked back at her father’s name, oddly afraid someone would tell her she didn’t belong, that it’d all been a joke.

There was not a single memory she had of either of them, but their names were there, deep in the rocks that were nestled together. She had pictures, a few gathering dust in her grandmother’s home. They were far and few between. The muggle prints remained still and unchanging. Her family said she took after her father, but she thought there had to be parts that she didn’t know about that was her mother.

They were brave. They fought in many battles, her mother losing her fight at Hogwarts, her father falling three months earlier in Romania. Now, they were together, and it made Clarke feel a little better.

It took a few moments for her to move, for the thoughts to not attack her as much, to allow her muscles to contemplate moving once again. But she finally did, finally pushed her palm against her mother’s name, just the fingertips at first, followed by her whole hand. She watched as the other hand did the same with her father’s.

“I’d recognize her anywhere,” a voice murmured, though Clarke did not take much notice.

“It can’t be...”

“Mom,” an annoyed voice squeaked.

“Clarke?” a warm voice finally penetrated the thoughts of the second-year who was now woefully aware that she was touching the wall, and hopped back, eyes wide at herself. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“Hm? No. I’m. Not. Yes. Sorry.” So many words attempted to come out of her mouth that not one complete sentence could be found in the bunch.

She found herself distracted by a couple in elegant robes. A bit of brown braids was by their sides, contemplating hiding behind her mother and ready to die of embarrassment. Clarke recognized her and them immediately. How could she not? Lexa Woods was the smartest witch of their year, possibly of the few years above them as well. Her name carried more than that. Her name had been worn by some of the most important spies and members of the Order, their aid coming to light as they were on trial, only to be recognized for their bravery. Their name was ancient and respected through the scandal of the Dark Period, despite defecting witches and wizards who gave in to the allure of certain pureblood promises.

“I can’t believe it,” the woman smiled and held her hands over her face. “You look just like your father.”

“You have your mother’s nose, which is a good thing, I promise,” the man mentioned with a wry grin.

Both stood and gawked at her as much as she gawked back at them. She had no idea what to say, and suddenly, neither did they. So many ghosts. Too many, in her own opinion.

“I’m sorry, we’re just... It is amazing to see you,” he grinned. “I’m Cadmus, and this is--”

“Lina Woods,” Clarke finished. “Thank you for your service,” she offered mechanically, shaking their hands. It was a nicety she offered so much it felt meaningless, ineffectual, and not nearly enough.

Regal and notably elegant, the couple was everything their pictures showed in the textbooks. Clarke tried not to, but her eyes wandered to the cane that the tall gentleman leaned against. The head of it depicted the three-headed dog that adorned the family coat of arms. Jet black hair slicked to the side, trimmed stubble covering his pointed chin, a scar ran across his nose and cheek, interrupting the beard. Despite the trappings of a villain, his green eyes danced and he smiled quite warmly.

“Thank you for your sacrifice,” Cadmus stopped her, held her hand a little longer. Still they stared at her as if she were growing an extra ear.

“I didn’t do anything... I was just a baby.”

“Your mother saved my life,” he explained. “She was hit while tending to me. All that I got was this bum leg, but she... She shielded me from a rather nasty spell.”

“I was in your mother’s class,” his wife put her hand on his shoulder to help steady him as the memories came back. “The only reason I passed charms.”

“You... you knew my parents?”

“I was the one who took you to your grandmother's,” Lina explained. “Your mother didn’t want you to go to her family, and Jake was absolutely so in love with you, he made all kinds of arrangements.”

“You knew my parents?”

“Lexa tells me you are twice as good of a chaser as your father was.”

“I try.”

Her cheeks flushed as the news was processed, suddenly aware of this new tie to her family. So nonchalantly did they mention that they knew her parents, while Clarke died to sift their memories and greedily take whatever they got, to steal away the time with them that this couple had and she would never get.

“We didn’t mean to bombard you, sweetie,” Lina smiled softly, sadly. “I just couldn’t leave without paying my respects. Abby was...”

Slightly awkward and unsure of how to handle the most famous spies in the Wizarding world giving her compliments, Clarke gulped and met Lexa’s eyes finally. She never realized how much like her father she looked, while still retaining the innate nobility her mother owned.

Their interactions were few and far between, and in fact usually ended with the Slytherin calling the Gryffindor a meathead for liking sports over something productive, but there was never malice more than childhood laced with the words. Clarke remembered first year when Lexa was the only one brave enough to reach her hand out to the hippogriff. That was what she knew of her.

“Jake was a good man. Always smiling. We talked about running away to America, playing quidditch, forgetting this war that was brewing,” Cadmus remembered. “Abby was kind and smart. Told us we’d never make it.” He wrapped his arm around his wife’s shoulder as she rolled into him and sighed weakly.

“People only tell me war stories,” Clarke finally found a voice. “Thank you for something else.”

“I grew up next door to Abby,” Lina murmured. “She was always going to put people ahead of herself. She was born selfless and smart.”

“Anytime you want stories, please,” Cadmus offered. “It is the least we could do.”

“Thank you.”

With a hopeful smile, the father conjured a wreath of silver and yellow roses and placed it stop the wall where the two names were forever slumbering.

“If I find some pictures would it be alright if I sent them to you, Clarke?” Lina asked after a moment of quiet raged between them.

“It really would be amazing.”

“I’ll do my best,” she promised.

“It was an honor to meet you once again, Clarke,” Cadmus extended his hand, leaning heavily on the cane with the other. “A true honor. If you ever need anything, please, do not hesitate to remember the friends who are still alive because of your parents.”

“Yes, sir, thank you.”

It was hard, her eyes were glassy and she wanted to cry, but she couldn’t. Her whole body wanted to, and yet something mechanically stopped her from showing that, from feeling enough to do it. She looked at Lexa and remembered her setting her jaw and stepping up to the giant beast, and maybe this was her own. It didn’t help that Lexa’s mother swallowed her up in a hug and it was enough to make her heart hop into her throat. She hugged her back just as tight, though neither said anything else on the subject.

“Come on, Lexa, let’s give her some time.”

“Give me one second?” the second-year lingered, though Clarke was unsure why.

She waited until her parents were a few steps down the path, intercepted by some adoring fans and curious students. Clarke watched her kick the dirt before taking a deep breath and tilting her chin up.

“I’m sorry about them. I didn’t think you’d be out here. This is the only part of the wall they had to come to, and they wanted to come pay-”

“You never told me that your parents knew my parents.”

“I didn’t know how. Your name is said with reverence in my house. How do I say your mom died saving my father’s life?”

“I don’t know, but you do,” Clarke muttered, crossing her arms.

“I’m sorry.”

“They’re nice.”

“It’s a lot to live up to,” Lexa sighed and looked back at her parents.

“Yeah, I get it,” Clarke agreed, looking at the names once again.

“I’m not as good as my father, but,” she paused and moved her wand slightly. “If anyone owes a debt to you, it’s me.”

“You don’t.”

“I have a father because you don’t,” Lexa swallowed and concentrated before three stems started to form, followed by the bloom of blue daisies. She offered them to the girl with eyes that were still bluer, despite her best efforts.

“I know it doesn’t mean much, but I grew up idolizing your parents just as much as mine. Maybe more. I never take that sacrifice for granted, Clarke.”

Green eyes bore into hers and Clarke thought they might have been the kindest words ever spoken to her. She knew Lexa to be quiet and aloof, intense and prominent in her house, but this was different, this was honest and genuine and passionate.

“Thank you, Lexa. From a meathead to an egghead.”

“Mockery is not the product of a strong mind,” she snorted.

“There you go, calling me a dumb quidditch player again,” Clarke chuckled as she flustered the girl with forests for eyes.

“And think, if you put this much effort into your studies, you might come close to my scores.”

“We both know that’s not possible.”

Lexa smiled and nodded before turning slightly to meet her parents once again. Clarke smiled and looked back at the wreath and flowers before looking again at the ones in her hand.

The library was nearly empty so close to curfew, but still, the lingering third-years fought against time as best they could, soaking up the hours. One studied something she already mastered, while the other toiled with her help. They worked well together because it was easier now, when they had such an important first meeting to start.

There was an awkwardness at first. Clarke saw Lexa in the hall and waved across the lawn, earning only a duck of a head and averted eyes. Flustered, the Slytherin did not know how to handle it.

And then one afternoon, coming out of Herbology, Clarke caught a certain sight of chestnut hair sitting on a ledge, nose buried deep in a large book, big round glasses slipping down the bridge of her nose. And she told her that she appreciated her father’s letter and pictures. And she told her she missed her calling as a Ravenclaw, earning a begrudging smile as she pushed up the glasses for her. It was a short meeting, and Clarke was pulled away, but Lexa sat there and watched her leave as a slow kind of blush crept up her own cheeks.

And when Lexa saw Clarke again, she made conversation and walked her to class. Until some of those Gryffindors interrupted and mocked her, and she skulked away with a glare and rebuttal, catching Clarke’s apologetic glances.

And then Clarke walked up beside her a few days later and apologized emphatically, before pulling her into a conversation about her day, and Lexa was unsure how it happened so easily. At the entrance to the Slytherin Common Room, Clarke apologized again and promised it wouldn’t happen again, despite Lexa’s assurance that it would. Not without her standing up for her, Clarke promised. And when Lexa snarled slightly and said she could take care of herself, Clarke just laughed, unperturbed by the display.

There were a few notes exchanged during the summer. More than a few, if they were being honest. Busy as she was in her own world, Clarke waited for Lexa’s hawk to tap at her window, bringing notes about all of the places she dreamt of traveling and Lexa was seeing. From far away lands, she would watch the goshawk glide through the air, and tired as he was, she would take as long as she could to respond to give him a break. It was never more than a day.

It’d been tentative, the friendship after that. It was eased with the fact that Clarke needed tutoring, or at least said she did, and Lexa didn’t question it too much. Any reason to be of use, to pay back a debt she thought she owed, to spend time with those eyes and that smile.

“What are you doing for Christmas break?” Lexa interrupted the self-imposed quiet as their quills scratched notes on the parchment for the history midterm awaiting them in the morning.

“The whole family gets together at my uncle’s house, and then we have dinner, play games, all of that,” Clarke muttered, squinting at Lexa’s notes and making a face as she scratched out something on her own.

“For Christmas Eve, right?”

“Yes.”

“Do you think you’d want to come over sometime?”

The scratching of the quill stopped, though Clarke didn’t raise her head. Instead, she just stared at the words and tried to think about anything she’d just been thinking. Everything was suddenly very loud in her brain. She felt her cheeks blush slightly.

“I mean,” Lexa cleared her throat and adjusted slightly. “My parents told me to ask you over sometime. If you wanted.”

“Did they?”

“I might have told them I already invited you,” Lexa shrugged and gave her partner that mischievous kind of grin. “They liked having you over during the summer.”

Most people didn’t get that grin. Most people didn’t get the Lexa that was dry and funny and confused, and Clarke was learning these things.

“Your dad doesn’t have anymore tickets does he?”

“Is this the only way you’ll come visit?”

“The company is rotten,” Clarke smiled at her as well before ducking her head and blushing again. She hated the little flutter her lungs gave when Lexa gave her a smile like that.

“It’s Holyhead and Montrose.”

“You should have opened with that, Woods,” the chaser leaned back in her chair and nodded.

“Come on, Clarke. We’re heading back to the common room,” Bellamy interrupted. Octavia and Lincoln stood beside him.

Without a thought, she gathered her things to join her friends, while Lexa remained stoic and impassable, chin stiffening against the additions. Even though her parents were hailed as heroes, much of her name remained dark and tied to less than favorable wizards. Many of her classmates lost family members to someone in the Woods’ clan. She wore that often.

“You can just say you wanted me to come, you know,” Clarke paused as she shouldered her bag. “You don’t have to say your parents invited me. We’re friends.”

“I know... I just. They asked, and-- we’re friends?”

“I’d love to come visit. If you’ll agree to come spend some time in Muggle Dublin.”

“I’m not good at that.”

“I know. It’s fun to watch.”

“Fine,” Lexa relented, earning a smile.

“We’re going to be late!” Octavia called as Clarke lingered.

“I better go. Thanks for the help.”

“Anytime,” Lexa breathed, watching her disappear with her friends.

She earned a look over her shoulder, and that was all. Like a sad little puppy, eager for even that much attention, she ate it up and resigned herself to that kind of look forever as being enough motivation to be Clarke’s friend.

“School just started,” Clarke sighed, holding a cold wet bit of her shirt to Lexa’s knuckles. “How in the world did you get into a fight?”

“Ouch,” the patient hissed.

Sitting out by the lake, they were alone as could be, not a sound, the school lost somewhere behind them. The dark clouds of an impending storm slunk over the mountains with a small complaint of thunder deep in its belly.

“Baby,” the fourth-year Gryffindor teased, dipping the scarf back into the chilled water and placing it once again on the swollen knuckles.

The bruising seemed so out of character for the pristinely kept youngest member of the Woods family. Normally so precise and hardly susceptible to an outburst, Clarke was amazed to find her pacing and flexing her hand on her way back from quidditch practice, but when she did, she shooed off her friends and tried to calm down the beast she encountered.

So rare was the moment, that even Lexa took a second to find herself before the air about her changed, and she was in control once again, her emotions firmly in their proper places and augmented for the situation.

“It’s nothing,” she winced again.

“This is about four or five punches worth of nothing,” Clarke surmised, surveying the damage. “Come on, Lex. You can tell me.”

“It was nothing.”

“I thought we were friends.”

“We are. Just. I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Fine. But you should get it looked at.”

“It’s fine.”

It only took until dinner for Clarke to figure out where she imagined Lexa’s fist went to become so discolored. Sitting at the other end of the Slytherin table, the team beater, Quint nursed a rather disgusting and poorly healed black eye and bruised nose, with what looked like a split lip for good measure. Sulking into his plate, he didn’t bother eating.

From her seat across the Great Hall, Clarke watched Lexa listen to her friends, ignoring the inevitable pain in her hand while they all spoke to each other and cast glances at the terrible sixth-year bully, rallying behind their chose leader.

It took some maneuvering, but Clarke made her way to follow Lexa as she stood when she finished eating. Excusing herself without touching her food, she promised to catch up with her housemates as soon as she could, and chased after Lexa as best she could, weaving through the halls and students.

“What did he say?” Clarke called as Lexa flexed her hand and made her way to her favorite room in the entire castle, the library.

The sound of the words make Lexa falter in her steps. She shouldered her bag protectively.

“What? Who?”

“Quint.”

Lexa froze and turned slowly until she met the Gryffindor with eyes that were distracting at best, and something to obsess over at worst. She was struck with the fork in the road she now faced, to lie or to confess. But with eyes like that it wasn’t much of a choice.

Hands on her hips, Clarke waited impatiently for an answer.

“I took care of it, as is our way.”

“What do you mean?”

Scornfully, Lexa lifted her chin proudly and did her best to fight against the words that ran steadily up her throat and threw themselves against her teeth. Her nostrils flared and she crossed her arms, as if that would help.

And then Clarke cocked her eyebrow warning her of something, though neither knew what or how or why that worked.

“I don’t know what decade he thinks it is, but if he thinks he can run his mouth--” she ranted, suddenly mad at herself for having to explain why she did what she did. She did not explain herself. She did not like that she felt that she had to.

“Lexa.”

“I didn’t want to, but I couldn’t take hearing it. And then he said, he said that I-- It was stupid, and I--”

“Lex.”

“What was I supposed to do?” Lexa finally stopped rambling and avoiding Clarke’s eyes. “He called you... that word. That terrible word, and then he said I was a traitor for... he said I was a shame to the community of purebloods. For...” she swallowed and closed her eyes. “Looking at a mudblood like how I look at you.”

Clarke watched Lexa’s shoulders expand with the big breath she held in her lungs against her own nerves. It was a lot of information encoded in the ramble. A handful of first years passed them as they stood to the side of the hall, but neither focused much on anything else.

The word slapped Clarke roughly, though she didn’t want it to have that power. Then the rest of the words caught up to her ears.

“How do you look at me?” she asked weakly. Lexa ran her hand up her neck and blushed in the dim candle light.

“Come on, Clarke,” she sighed.

She knew the truth, but she’d been afraid to allow herself to see it. To see it would change so much, and yet, she couldn’t do it any longer.

Lexa watched all of it pass across Clarke’s face. The anger, the fear, the confusion, the wrath, the donning of the truth, the warmth at the suggestion, the blush and the way her eyes searched her own face. Anxiously she shuffled and clenched her fist in her pocket because the pain was grounding.

It happened slowly, unlike what she always imagined happened in the movies. But Lexa watched Clarke lean forward, causing her to lean back, away from the inevitable onslaught of curses for behaving so recklessly.

“Just....” Clarke furrowed and tugged Lexa’s robes slightly. “Stand still.”

A second later, her lips were on Lexa’s, and Lexa was stuck standing stark still and stunned. Eyes wide and muscles tense, she felt her body relax slightly after a few seconds. As far as kisses were concerned, it was one hell of a doozy. She leaned forward and kissed her back as her eyes closed and she let herself enjoy it.

She felt Clarke’s fists knit into her robes and she wanted to move her hand to touch her, to push the hair from her forehead like she’d dreamt of doing a thousand times, but couldn’t, because it was

bruised and currently stuck in her pocket. Instead, she let her books drop with the other and she touched Clarke’s hip. Giddy at the boldness.

It took three faux coughs for them to recognize someone else was standing just outside of their bubble.

“Ms. Woods, Ms. Griffin,” the Headmistress cleared her throat once more and stood, amused at the display so blatant and in the open. “As happy as I am to see such house camaraderie, I must ask that you refrain from such displays in front of the impressionable younger students. This is a school, after all, and not a brothel.”

“Yes ma’am,” Lexa pulled back and blushed furiously.

“Apologies,” Clarke smiled, proud of herself and brazen about it, rakish to the very end.

For the life of her, the Headmistress could not imagine a more farfetched pair, until she thought of Abigail Warburton and Jake Griffin, and chuckled to herself.

The summer before fifth year was good to Clarke, Lexa learned right before school started back up. Owls flew back and forth multiple times per day until it got to be too much, and she was invited to spend time at her home. For too long, she put off spending time in muggle cities. Something about not knowing everything was unnerving.

But then she saw Clarke waiting at the station, filled out and beautiful, and doing all kinds of things to her heart, and she forgot all else. The only fear that existed was her fear of never seeing her again. That and the fear of telling her parents that she was never coming back, and she would set up shop wherever a girl that looked like that, was.

“Long time no see, Woods,” Clarke smiled, wrapping her arms around the new Slytherin prefect.

Like chocolate left in the heat, Lexa melted into her arms and hugged her back just as tight, letting it linger longer than friendly. It was sunshine and saltwater in her hair, and she inhaled it greedily, deeper than she thought her lungs would allow.

“You look amazing,” Lexa finally sighed as Clarke pulled away.

Still surprised by the act, and not expecting it despite how much she hoped, the Gryffindor chaser leaned forward and kissed her chastely, making sure to hold her hand as well. They were friends, Lexa thought, and hoped. And now they were something in between, but she didn’t care at all because it meant kisses from lips like those. Shocked and delighted, all she could do was follow limply.

The summer had been kind to Lexa, Clarke realized, earning a blush and flustering her completely with the kiss. Skin tan and little freckles appearing across her nose after a trip to Egypt with her parents to see relatives and conduct some business, her face thinned, her eyes were brighter, her legs sprouted what felt like two feet. She grew into her father’s angles and her mother’s looks. Gone

were the glasses, though Clarke missed them terribly, and hoped they would make another appearance, while unobstructed green eyes came through clearer and the messy braids of her hair done a little tighter and better.

“Not so bad yourself. Are you ready?”

“Very. Nervous, but ready.”

“My Nan doesn’t bite.”

“That’s something, I suppose,” Lexa nodded, preparing herself.

Still, Clarke held her hand as they moved through the terminal. Lexa held on just as tight until they made it outside. Summer hung around and the smell of a passing storm wrangled through the street as the sun appeared behind the drifting clouds.

It wasn’t louder or much warmer, except that it was different than Montrose. Lexa was accustomed to the Wizardly type of activity, and she was intimately aware of how it was still hubbub, but not the same type of hubbub. Eyes wide, she took it all in eagerly.

“So how did the trip go?” Clarke ventured, hoping to put her guest at ease as they dodged busy passersby in the street.

“Really well. We got another breeding female for our griffins, and got two new hippogriffs. There’s an order for well-trained griffins coming from Gringotts,” Lexa rattled off. “And Mum convinced Dad to get a pair of mating Augureys. They’re young, but so beautiful.”

“I can’t believe you run a farm of magical creatures.”

“I don’t think Dad likes specializing in the guard type animals. He’s moving away from bigger mammals. He’s more about the harvesting. The hippogriffs were nice. They’re yearlings.”

“You’ll have to show me,” Clarke smiled.

Lexa looked down at their hands and smiled, satisfied with herself.

“You will have to stop by before school.”

“I mostly want to meet the famed three-headed dogs.”

“Aries is getting up there in age,” Lexa shrugged as they paused on the street. Cars zoomed past without noticing at all, the dumbfounded look on her face. “Dottie is expecting sometime around spring.”

“I like when you talk shop. You’re so passionate about it. Normally I can’t get you to talk, and with this, you can’t stop.”

“Sorry. Was I being annoying?”

“No,” Clarke chuckled. “I like it. Maybe simplify it a bit for my grandma. She tries, but your story about baby dragons might kill her.”

The walk through the city was wonderful. Clarke took her time introducing Lexa to her world, buying her coffee and sweets before snagging street food and eating it in the park where they watched people live their lives. Lexa inundated her with questions, the natural bookish curiosity getting the best of her despite her own nerves. Deep down, Clarke was certain there’d been a mistake in her sorting. But then she would think about Lexa in her group of friends, and remember how innate her leadership and cunning ran. She would keep this part to herself.

She had plans to take her to a soccer game, to shower her some sport and see if that was more appealing to her. She had plans to take her to the museum where the paintings didn’t move. She had plans for swimming and bands playing and dinner and friends, and she had a lot to get done in just three days of visiting.

But something about sitting beside this amazed girl on the bench in the park, laughing and arguing, was honestly the only way she ever wanted to spend her time.

Lexa put her arm over Clarke’s shoulder as they made their way through her neighborhood finally with the promise of a fresh cooked dinner waiting.

“It’s so nice to finally meet you, Lexa,” Clarke’s grandmother smiled and hugged her tightly as they entered the cute little house that sat back from the white picket gate.

A little garden rested out front, full of flowers blooming in the summer evening, and Lexa was infatuated with how cozy and much like Clarke it felt. It was a long day for her, traveling and exploring, and yet there awoke a new set of nerves when they arrived.

“Thank you for having me, Ms. Griffin,” she offered with a polite nod.

“Please, come get settled. I made some lemonade,” the woman tottered through the house, pulling Lexa with her. The smells filled the place despite the open windows and fans. “Clarke, honey, could you get the glasses from the top shelf please? I can’t reach a thing. I need you to do one of those things to make my house shrink with me,” she chuckled to herself.

“Your home is lovely,” Lexa offered as she took a seat and dug through her bag. Her parents may have rejected their society, but something about the genetic composition within them did not dismiss the breeding that they then naturally imparted upon their daughter.

“She’s sweet.”

“I told you,” Clarke shook her head behind her grandmother’s back.

Strong and sturdy, with thick shoulders and glasses that hung from her neck, the dirty blonde of her hair had grown dark grey, but Lexa could see an obscene amount of life in her eyes, almost the same kind of blue that Clarke had, though a little darker. Evie Griffin was what Lexa would have imagined a grandmother should have been like, being as her two examples were far from welcoming

or kind or sweet or made lemonade, but rather played cards and word dresses with stiff collars, an apt metaphor for their personalities, she always reckoned.

“Clarke tells me you were traveling with your family?” the grandmother asked, moving through the kitchen as Clarke handed Lexa a glass. “Egypt it was?”

“Yes ma’am. We are in the... livestock business?” Lexa chanced a look to see if that was alright with Clarke who chuckled and nodded.

“Lexa’s family has been breeding animals for centuries,” Clarke helped. “They train and sell different species.”

“My parents sent along this, to thank you for having me,” the guest offered, pulling out a tin from her bag. “It’s black tea from Egypt. Clarke said you were a fan of good tea. This is one of our favorites. We order it by the barrel.”

“Now this is lovely,” Evie smiled, sitting herself at the head of the table to peruse, lifting her glasses to peer at the script. She opened it and smelled, closing her eyes as she enjoyed it. “Spectacular.”

Clarke beamed at Lexa, balancing her chin in her palm as she stared at the charming girl who was absolutely perfect. She felt herself fall right there, and for once didn’t hold back as she’d done for the past few years. The dam finally broke.

“There’s also this,” Lexa cleared her throat. “Clarke told you that my parents knew your son.” An envelope appeared, and with shaky hands, the grandmother opened it. “My mother found this a few weeks ago when she was cleaning our basement, or trying to, at least. There is a lot of artifacts from the Order... from the... from school,” Lexa tried, furrowing. “We’re not supposed to share these, but she hates rules, and actively tries to disobey them.”

“Oh my word,” she whispered, hand over her mouth. Slowly, she tilted it to share with her granddaughter. Clarke grinned at the picture she’d already seen framed in Lexa’s father’s study.

Four friends held up their mugs of ale and smiled wide and proud, so young and so full of life. Her father winked at the camera on a loop.

For a long while, the grandmother stared at the picture, and anxiously, Lexa watched and waited. It took a bit, but she held it to her heart as she stood before leaning over and taking Lexa’s cheek in her hands, she kissed the top of her head.

“Thank you, so much.”

“I’m just the messenger,” Lexa shrugged it off with a blush and cough that cleared her throat.

When the grandmother turned around to put the image on the fridge, Clarke gave her a smile that didn’t help, though she knew it was meant to be supportive. It just flustered her more. For the first time in her life, Lexa was certain this was how she died. Spontaneously combusting from feelings right there at a kitchen table before dinner.

“There is a lot I did not know about my son’s life, but a mother can always understand that he was happy, and that is all I needed.”

“If we find more, I’ll have my mother owl-- send them.”

“I know how the owl works,” Evie laughed finally, hoping to shed some of the forlornness that seeped into her words. She wiped a cheek and smiled back at the table. “Why you haven’t figured out telephones is beyond me.”

“That’s the thing with the pictures? The box that makes noises?” Lexa furrowed.

“Isn’t she cute?” Clarke laughed with her grandmother at the description.

“That too though.”

Mildly embarrassed though eager to have that on her instead of the sadness of an old woman, Lexa blushed and let them ask her more muggle questions, just to hear her answers. She was a specimen for the grandmother, and that was fine by her because she wanted to make a good impression, and so far she thought she was riding a thin line.

“That was spectacular,” Lexa raved, finishing her second plate. “I’ll have to tell our house elv-- Ouch!” she groaned as a foot met her shin. Clarke gave her a look. “I’ll have to tell our chef about it.”

“You don’t spend much time around us, huh?” the grandmother grinned, sipping her wine.

“That obvious?”

“You’re going to have a black and blue shin with how many times Clarke has kicked you.”

“I’m a slow learner.”

“That’s not what I hear.”

There it was. The look. The stare that betrayed the fact that Clarke’s grandmother had fought many of her own battles, as well as losing a son. Mother to six strapping boys, she lost her husband to disease, and worked when bombs were being dropped on the city. She was not just a cuddly grandmother with fresh lemonade, and Lexa knew it because of the way Clarke spoke with reverence and awe about her. Her parents were war heroes, but Clarke grew up with a living legend, and Lexa could smell it a mile away.

“Lexa is top of our class,” Clarke interjected. “Tutors this old meathead as best she can.”

“From what I understand, my granddaughter and my son are good athletes in a sport that is, and let me get this as close to accurate as I can, Clarke,” she held her hand up to stop interruption. “Soccer and baseball and basketball, but flying through the air on brooms.”

“I don’t know those sports, but I suspect that’s close,” Lexa nodded.

“And you have professional teams, same as us for soccer.”

“Yes ma’am.”

“And Clarke could be a professional?”

“It’s to early to think of that, Nan,” Clarke shook her head. “I just want to pass my classes at this point.”

“Without a doubt,” Lexa nodded. “My father said your son was the greatest chaser he’d ever seen. And my father adores the sport. And then he saw Clarke play, and he said she is ten times better. She has more points scored in one game than anyone in school history. And she’ll end her career with the most points more than likely,” she explained passionately.

Clarke was unsure why she never thought Lexa would follow her stats, or know anything about her sport considering the distinct lack of interest she expressed when her father brought it up, but then again, Lexa knew all and was too smart for her own good. It still made Clarke blush and smile so hard her cheeks might break.

“I wish I could see you play,” the grandmother smiled fondly at her granddaughter.

“Maybe one day,” Clarke offered. “You’d probably never let me play again when you saw how dangerous it is.”

“That’s true,” she chuckled. “Now do you play, Lexa?”

“No ma’am, not to my father’s displeasure. Now he hounds Clarke though, so I’m not that bothered anymore.”

“Your family is... what was it, Clarke? Pureblood?”

“Yes ma’am.”

“But your parents were spies that helped the other side?”

“Something like that.”

“An entire war fought, with hundreds of casualties, and no one here knows any different,” the grandmother shook her head.

Clarke shared a look with Lexa across the table, unsure of what to do. The mingling of the two worlds was harder than she imagined.

“Lexa’s family is the only family that breeds unicorns,” Clarke blurted.

“Goodness gracious,” she shook her head, staring wide-eyed at Lexa. “And she doesn’t even know how to call collect.”

When the evening finally wound down, Clarke helped Lexa excuse themselves from the grandmother who hugged them both before ushering them to bed. Lexa accepted a hug and a pat on her cheek and she assumed that was a good sign.

Unfailingly, she followed Clarke upstairs, shouldering her bag until she was directed into a guest room.

“She liked you a lot.”

“Unicorns usually help with that,” Lexa shrugged, dropping her bag on the bed.

“Thank you for the picture. And the things you said. You’re not half bad, you know that, Woods?”

As soon as she turned, arms moved to wrap around her shoulders, bracing themselves around her neck. Clarke’s body, her new, beautifully grown into and wonderfully perfect body, was pushed closer against Lexa, and on accident her hands moved to hips, the new hips, the pronounced hips that went with that figure that would now distract her in excruciating ways the entire year.

“It’s easy when you tell the truth,” she smiled slightly and stared at those eyes. For an instant, she let her eyes dart to lips and back.

“I’m glad you came. This is going to be fun.”

“Lots of hands on experience for advanced Muggle Sciences this year.”

“Just wait until I show you the grocery store.”

“I like your grandmother. I never had one. Yours seems good.”

She would have said more, but fingertips moved along the back of her neck in a soothing kind of way that sent chills down her spine.

“I like you,” Clarke confessed.

“Yeah?” Lexa asked dumbly.

“Yeah,” she nodded, kissing her slowly, holding her in place as best she could. It was deliberate and kind and excruciating, but Lexa kissed her back with no fear of a Headmistresses interrupting.

The thought made Lexa remember the grandmother though, which was not conducive to more kissing.

“It’s going to be one hell of a year,” Lexa realized out loud, earning a laugh.

Clarke let her hands slide down her chest where her palms rested on her collarbones. The warmth radiated from there and Lexa felt suddenly bigger, more powerful.

“I’m ready if you are.”

“Definitely.”

The arrival of winter led to an undercurrent of excitement on the campus. The crisp hung in the air and crinkled up leaves that littered the grounds, and the clouds in the sky were long stretches of undistinguishable grey days.

It was Lexa’s favorite time of year, the few weeks where all of the leaves were gone, and the world was bursting with orange and brown and gold and reds, when the sun was hidden and the rain lingered, where days stretched and the hint of snow could be found in the frozen morning grass, but nothing more, just an abstract concept that could come any second. She lived for the first snow of winter.

“I’m sorry I’m late,” Lexa let out a breath as she made it to the spot-- their spot-- by the big, ancient elm halfway between the school and the pitch.

“And how is the newest Prefect enjoying her responsibilities?” Clarke asked, squinting up at the figure who stood above her, letting the charcoal pencil rest against the paper.

“Three second years decided to conduct some extracurricular studies in the bathrooms by the headmistress’ office,” she sighed, dropping her bag and taking a seat. “Turned it into a rainforest.”

“If only you’d followed my lead and just maintained average grades and social standing, then you wouldn’t have to worry about that.”

“You’re funny,” she rolled her eyes. “Can I see?”

“It’s just a sketch, a start,” Clarke shrugged, quickly sobered by the idea of someone see her little hobby.

Hands covered in charcoal, she tried to shut the book with the page tucked inside, but failed as Lexa sat beside her and pulled it out. It was simple and not specific, but the image of a thunderbird from Lexa’s letters stuck out in her head, and Clarke let her hands go on their own to follow her daydream while she waited. Now she was nervous.

As much as she didn’t want to, inevitably it was necessary, and she looked over at Lexa and watched her look at the page before deciding it was too much and worrying herself with the smudges on her hands.

“This is really good. I didn’t know you could do this,” Lexa whispered, not tearing her eyes away from the sketch.

“Just a little doodle.”

“Can I have it?”

“What?”

“I like it. I want to keep it,” she murmured genuinely, surprising the girl beside her at the base of the tree. “If you don’t want it.”

“You can have it,” Clarke offered quickly.

Proud of herself and amazed at the image, Lexa stared at it a little longer before nodding contentedly. That was all it took. Clarke leaned over and kissed her cheek.

“What was that for?” Lexa grinned, slowly forming and tugging at her lips in the amazed kind of way.

“Just being you.”

“Well, I didn’t think it had those kind of perks, but I’ll take it.”

The blush from the kiss ran up to her ears and hung around, burning the tips of it violently. It took Lexa a second to catch up to her swirling thoughts. The cold didn’t help, that was what she decided, hoping to hide it away from her own thoughts.

“Nan wanted to know if you were going to stop by for winter break?” Clarke ventured after clearing her throat.

Lexa’s shoulder leaned against her own as they sat comfortably beneath the tree despite the cold. They couldn’t go anywhere else, couldn’t risk anyone seeing, because for some reason they felt as if they were betraying someone, no matter how they rolled it around in their heads. It was a truce, of sorts, where neither pushed the other, neither brought up anyone else. They just stole moments.

“I think I could be persuaded. My father has meetings in London. New regulations they’re trying to pass.”

“We’re having a party.”

“And you want me to come?”

“I have a sweater picked out.”

“If I come I will bring my own clothes,” Lexa snorted.

“I doubt you have anything festive.”

“Festive?”

“Very festive,” Clarke promised, almost evilly in Lexa’s opinion. “Red and green, maybe a snowman or reindeer on it. Own anything like that?” The disgust on her face was enough of an answer, making Clarke laugh a little bit more. “See?”

“I don’t think I can make it.”

“She’s going to make those cookies you like.” Clarke watched her resolve crumble, her sweet tooth coming through violently. “You’re such an easy mark.”

“I am not,” Lexa argued, grumping slightly.

She earned another kiss and Clarke’s arms around her ribs, her chin on her shoulder. There beneath the tree, Lexa melted and she sighed because she knew she was going to give in to whatever the chaser wanted. This part of the making her earn it was nice though.

“It’s cold out here,” the Prefect mumbled.

“Should we take it inside? Maybe hang out in your Common Room?” Clarke chuckled.

“Yeah, we should,” Lexa nodded, looking down at the blonde on her shoulder. It was quieter than she would have liked, but she enjoyed getting kissed, and if she were being honest, she wanted to kiss more and harder and somewhere where her hands weren’t in gloves.

“I like us, now. It’s going to get complicated...”

“Times have changed. It’s not going to be a problem.”

“You punched someone for calling me names,” Clarke reminded her. “And your... I love your parents... but our names... Our last names and the myths and stories around them...”

“Can’t have a Griffin, the couple that could, the couple that stood tall and fought and saved people and loved despite it costing their lives, seen anywhere with a murderous, evil Woods, huh?”

“That’s not what I think. Just... we can make it until we’re out of here. Out in the world--”

“Not surrounded by kids my family orphaned or tortured part of their’s,” Lexa nodded and swallowed roughly.

“That’s not you.”

“I know.”

“I like you. I think I’ve made it pretty clear,” Clarke let her arms drop slightly. “I got you a Christmas sweater.”

“Sometimes I just think... what does any of it matter? Why can’t I sit beside you at dinner. Octavia and Lincoln are in different houses.”

“You know why.”

“Yeah,” Lexa agreed.

This time she kissed Clarke’s forehead and watched the lake out in the distance. The sun was hiding behind the clouds, hiding again behind the horizon.

They made it back to campus, and Clarke gave Lexa a smile and promised to see her in the library before the went their own ways. The words weighed heavy on Clarke’s mind and heart though when she walked back to her friends. Quietly, she rejoined her group and couldn’t find much in her to join them on whatever topic they had. The girl with green eyes and precise handwriting distracted her.

“They’re traitors and cheats,” Bellamy complained, slamming his book down at the table, making Clarke jump as she tried to not so covertly sneak glances at a certain Slytherin who avoided her like the plague.

“What?”

“Quint, that elitist piece of shit. The whole fucking lot of them.”

“What are you on about?” Clarke groaned.

“Did you hear about the healer Jackson’s father killed last week?”

“Smeared ‘mudblood’ on the walls of his cell.”

“That’s just gossip,” Clarke chided the group as they complained together.

“And then their kids take over, and the money stays in the same families.”

“I can see them poisoning Octavia--”

“They are traitors who should have never been allowed--”

The conversation was one she’d heard before, one she had quietly inhaled and hated and ignored, until it was just too much. With the words ringing in her ears, Clarke stood up, unsure as to why her body moved before her thoughts ahd caught up to it.

The eyes of her friends snapped at her and she furrowed at what was happening. Still and stuck, she waited for something else to happen. When nothing did, she grabbed her bag and walked away from the questions and confusion of her friends.

“Hey,” Clarke blurted, standing behind Lexa and feeling many eyes on her as she waited and adjusted her bag on her shoulder nervously.

“You lost?” Murphy asked, cold and calculated and from a tilted, superior chin. He caught Lexa’s glare and sat up a bit straighter, the smirk gone without a word.

“Can I talk to you?” she asked the unofficial leader.

There was almost a debate, but the mouths that opened to protest were silenced by Lexa’s look and a wave of her hand. A second later, and another hard look, the dissolved into the background, sliding down to new seats or leaving altogether with a few words muttered under their breaths about the Gryffindor.

“You were right,” Clarke began, wringing her fingers and looking around before focusing on Lexa. “What does it matter?”

“What do you...?”

“Is this seat taken?”

From across the hall, Bellamy and Wells watched Clarke take a seat beside their greatest enemy. They grumbled with the rest of their group while a gaggle of Slytherins watched from on end of the table at the spectacle in the middle.

With a smile, Lexa passed a plate and a bowl of food while Clarke let her bag fall to the ground. It was a new set of nerves between them, crackling in the air, but both ignored and smiled too much at each other, breathing a little easier and a little more anxiously.

On the way back to their dorms, Lexa slipped her hand into Clarke’s and pulled her outside, breathing deep. The first snow came down in fat flakes, and she kissed her right there.

Spring came with rain and fog and a whole troop of spirit and stretching legs after the long winter. There were whispers and rumors and definitely a lot of gossip about the two daughters of famous veterans.

Seen walking through the snow along the lake, having breakfast with each other at each other’s tables, kissing too much in a dark hall when they thought no one was looking, studying in the library, holding hands through weekend getaways into town. It was a surprise and a spectacle to all, though they did their best to not pay attention to it.

Anya watched Lexa change slightly. She saw a few sketches appear beside her bed, taped above the pillows. And she watched her younger cousin seem actually happy, which was almost new, because although she was happy, it always seemed tempered. No longer was there a dulling of it.

Spring brought a relatively new addition of weight to the relationship, as the final game of the year approached between the two houses at the top of the rankings for the House Cup. The entire week leading up to it added a fervor to the student body, one which Lexa almost did not notice, and would not have cared much for if it hadn’t been felt by a certain chaser who liked to pull her into closets and keep her out after hours.

“Another late practice?” Lexa asked, rubbing her hand along the back of the athlete with her head down on the breakfast table, exhausted from the course of drills that lasted much too long the night before. The shoulders moved with a response that was too muffled to understand. “Have some toast.”

“I missed our date last night,” Clarke turned her head and caught sight of her girlfriend who made her a plate, who sat down at a foreign table just to spend time with her despite whispers and looks still.

“I’ll be glad when this nonsense is over. You’re dead tired.”

“I’m sorry I missed it.”

“I heard you’re going to need all the help you can get,” Lexa teased lightly, licking her thumb as she passed off the jelly-slathered bread.

“What does that mean?” Clarke sat up slightly, furrowing deeply.

“That you’re going down, Griffin,” she shrugged. “I’ve been assured we’re getting a win.”

“What?”

“You really are tired,” Lexa chuckled. “Eat up. I’ll help you catch up on Arithmancy notes.”

“You don’t think we’re going to win?”

“I honestly don’t know.”

“You’re not going to root for me?” Clarke balked at the thought, not touching the breakfast that’d been created for her.

“I think we’ve put everyone through enough of a shock the past few months. Me in your colors, in your section, well that might be a bit too much for their little hearts.”

“Oh,” the chaser nodded and pushed herself up from the bench slightly.

“Hey, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I just... I hadn’t thought... you... huh.”

“Clarke.”

“No, right. I should go. I forgot my book in the room,” she stood.

“At least take--” she leaned down and grabbed a slice and nodded a thanks. “See you later.”

Left alone at the table, Lexa watched Clarke leave, oddly distracted with the movement, confused by her girlfriend’s quick shift in mood. Often, she was certain Clarke thought it was amusing that she didn’t follow quidditch too closely. In truth, Lexa never got excited by it, much to her father’s exasperation. And yet, it always worked. And she began to like game day weekends because it led to parties in common room sand empty towers and sneaky hands in sneaky beds and those were always spectacular. The game itself was irrelevant, and she did like watching Clarke play. That was about the only thing that caught her interest.

The rest of her classes followed along as they usually did, though the undercurrent of excitement over the following day’s activities upended any tangible progress made in their studies.

“This game has her acting weird,” Lexa complained to her cousin as she adjusted large books in her arms. “I’ve never seen her so agitated. She’s very laid back and happy, but this was different.”

“Sometimes, I forget how dense you are for someone who has read every book ever,” Anya rolled her eyes and shook her head.

The family moved its way down the hall toward the common room where a game of chess inevitably waited them deep into the night. Lexa idolized her cousin, for she was always cooler and calmer and tougher and smarter, and it was a lot to want to live up to, but it was good and genuine and enough.

“She’s nervous,” Anya supplied as Lexa waited expectantly. “She has a lot of expectations, and a lot of visitors are coming to watch the game, plus the whole rivalry you’re sex life is singlehandedly trying to mute, but can’t, no matter how good it might be.”

“We’re not... it’s... we haven’t... there’s no way two people... we aren’t. We. Not yet. Maybe eventual-- what I mean. I mean.” Lexa’s cheeks bloomed quickly and she shook her head, working herself into a tizzy trying to escape some conversation that she was having with herself.

“I’m just saying. She’s a ball of nerves who is working herself to the bone to win, and I guess it’d be hard to not even have the one person you want rooting for you, to care if you win or lose.”

“Well that’s stupid,” she snorted, finding herself once again. “I honestly don’t care. I want her to do well. I thought trash talk would be fun.”

“So naive. So cute,” her cousin teased once again, leaving Lexa pondering her words without enough brainpower to offer a rebuttal.

The Prefect tried to think about everything, about how to fix it, but by the end of the night she was no closer to finding an answer. And so after finding nothing but a grumpy girlfriend who ignored her at dinner, Lexa let sleeping dogs lie, and went back to her room, where she laid in her bed and stared at the ceiling, calculating as best she could. Lexa prided herself on being a thinker, cunning enough to get herself out of any problem.

“Hey,” Lexa grabbed at Clarke’s sleeve, tugging her away from her team as they walked toward the Great Hall.

Clad in her garnet and gold, hair pulled up and already sporting a certain game face, Clarke let herself be sidetracked, because as hard as she worked at maintaining the front, the nerves were eating her up and the fact that this weird stalemate with Lexa was not conducive to her brain being able to focus on anything very long.

“Hey,” Clarke sighed when they were alone. With no warning at all, Lexa slid into her arms, hugging her tightly, digging her nose into shoulder. “I’m sorry, what was that?” she asked to the mumbling that went into her sweater.

“I misjudged your anxiety about the game yesterday.”

“I don’t have any--”

“I was trying to be into one of your hobbies,” Lexa interrupted her, “and I think it came out wrong.”

“No I get it. You’re rooting for your house, and that means you want me to lose.”

“I want you to do well.”

“They’re not mutually exclusive ideas,” Clarke reminded her.

“I know, but I can want both. We haven’t won a Cup in over a decade, and this is the closest we’ve been. I got caught up in it.”

“I just... you rooted for me every other game,” the chaser shook her head slightly. “I don’t know.”

“I always root for you, Griffin.”

“I know. This is just different.”

“You know, we didn’t get to set a wager. I was going to make a bet that I’m pretty sure you’ll find very appealing.”

“A wager so you’ll bet against me?”

“I think we’ll both win,” Lexa smiled, wrapping her arms around Clarke’s neck and keeping the sulking, nervous player close despite her inability to stand still or meet her eyes.

“What’s that?”

Despite her tension, Clarke melted with Lexa’s arms and body pressed against her own. It was the best kind of drug imaginable.

“Just... win. No matter what, I’m rooting for you. And I’ll have a special night for us at the afterparty.”

“Yeah?” Clarke grinned, despite herself. She didn’t want to, she wanted to focus, but Lexa kissed her and that was about all she needed to distract her.

“I have one of your old practice jerseys,” Lexa whispered. “I sleep in it.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. And I like watching you play. You smell terrible, but when you’re all sweaty and stuff after. It’s not terrible.”

“That’s the smell of preparedness,” Clarke reminded her with a low kind of growl.

“Go get’em, Griffin.”

“I’ll see you after.”

“Only if you win. I don’t think losers are very cute.”

The grin came, the cockiness and the bulk to her shoulders. Lexa watched her inflate somehow and she loved it because it was how she loved Clarke the most, alive and real and infallible.

“Like I said, I’ll see you after.”

“I’ll be the one in the green.”

“Not for long,” the chaser promised.

The Woods Estate, the ancestral home, the one that was built centuries ago, was long since gone, torn up from the very roots and demolished at the hands of Lexa’s father, something he took pride in, donating the lands and ridding themselves of that association and curse. It was enough to wear the name, let alone reside where such secrecy and anguish now seemed permanent residents.

Lexa never knew that house. In fact, many would be surprised to see the home now, out on the edge of the small hamlet they took up as their own. While they had once been removed from their operation, now they enjoyed their estate on the farm in the country.

Clarke fell in love with it the first time she visited. A dusting of snow, lights on the trees, a herd of thestrals peaking out from the treeline, every light on in the house so that it cast off this warmth no one would mistake to be part of the Woods. It was very much removed from the show of Lexa that existed at the school. Very hidden. Very wonderful.

“Wake up,” Lexa whispered, leaning over the bed to the mess of blonde hair. Dawn was still a long way off, but they had a different schedule at the farm. Gently, she tucked a bit of Clarke’s hair behind her ear as a nose scrunched up and dug into the pillow.

“It’s time,” she tried, kissing cheek.

“It’s cold out there,” Clarke protested. “Come back to bed.”

Lexa chuckled, certain it was no secret that they shared a bed though her parents feigned setting up one of the guest suites for the visitor. It had been hard enough extracting herself from the covers earlier, and she pulled away before she was sucked back in.

“Get dressed,” Lexa roused her again. “The baby is coming.”

For as poised and proper as the Woods looked when they were out and about, still fulfilling their duties to their status, Clarke learned that they were all terrible, huge, outrageous nerds who loved their work. Growing up, Cadmus spent so much time avoiding his family, that he spent more time with the trainers than at the mansion. Now he was more involved than ever. Squiring away money to double their net worth without wasting it on the airs of their fellow purebloods, while simultaneously doubling his donations to charities since the war.

From the main house, Clarke trudged, wrapping Lexa’s old sweater tighter around her hands, tugging the ridiculous hat lower over her ears as they made their way to the stable.

If her grandmother had visited, she’d mistake the property for an actual farm, until she looked harder and saw the creatures that lived there.

“They couldn’t wait until afternoon?” Clarke asked as Lexa hurried them along the path.

The family of winged-horses was one of Lexa’s favorite parts of being home. The other parts of the family business were of much less interest than the training of the chariot horses, a new venture she began herself. While her father focused on the bigger picture, the harvesting of supplies from well kept animals, the training of guards, healing of humans, and charming of creatures, Lexa spent much of her time dreaming of the flying creatures. It was her who picked the first one on a family trip to Argentina, and her father gave in, because as her mother pointed out, she was a kid who truly did never ask for anything.

And so that was how a gentle, painted yearling ended up in the stable. And that was how Lexa learned to ride, a summer in Argentina, absorbing everything she could. And that was how, a year later, another yearling was bought from an Irish family that did not let their bloodlines go un-checked for anything, who prided themselves for their greatness. A big, hulking, broad-shouldered colt with thick feet and the darkest silver imaginable joined Lexa’s collection. And now she was welcoming the first of her own line.

“This is exciting,” Clarke nudged her girlfriend’s elbow as they leaned against the edge of the large stall.

Lexa smiled and nodded, eyes not able to leave the sight in front of her. The chill of the holiday break was outside, daring not to enter the overwhelming heat of the stable. The entire family, pulled from the slumber, along with a few hands, paced like it was a maternity ward and they were men chomping cigars.

With just two days left in the break, she was certain they were going to miss it. Being woken after just falling asleep an hour before was well worth it.

“What are you going to do with it?” Clarke asked, hiding a yawn.

“They are the start of the line. Large, broad work horses with the grace and speed of their mother,” she smiled. “They’ll be at least two hands taller. I already talked to Walsh and there’s a female we’re going to buy in the spring. This one will mate with that one’s hopefully, and so on.”

“You’re going to have a herd of flying horses.”

“Yeah,” Lexa smiled dreamily.

Across the property, the aviary was quiet save for the gentle hooting of a few lonesome owls as the caretakers let them out for the evening to roam the countryside. The others slept soundly while a few soared as well. Down by the lake, the sights of spouts of water turning into mist as they were blown

out could be seen as the small pod of bake-kujira, the white skeleton whales, could be seen playing in the moonlight. A dreamy, quiet night for such things as entering the world.

Clarke let her cheek rest on Lexa’s arm as they watched, her eyes heavy in the warmth despite the agitated horse.

“Here it comes,” one of the hands motioned, exciting the group even further.

“Come on,” Lexa grit her teeth, and Clarke was certain she’ never seen anything so adorable.

The sac dropped and the mother did what she was known to do, cleaning the knock-kneed foal. Clarke held her breath and was awake suddenly, mesmerized by the activity happening, an experience she couldn’t imagine ever forgetting.

Still unable to stand, the foal whined after its mother who paced still, upset and distracted. A second foal dropped just as the older one stood for the first time.

“Twins,” Lexa breathed, shaking her head in disbelief, slowly to each side, unsure of the turn her day just took.

“I love them already,” Clarke decided, eyes wide as the youngest was cleaned by the mother. The oldest distracted her as well as it hobbled uneasily across towards the family.

Grey, save for splotches of white across its chest and splattered on its wings that now fluttered despite himself, it seemed larger than the one that didn’t get up just yet. It seemed healthy.

“It’s a boy,” Lexa realized. “They’re both boys.”

“Congratulations,” her father offered, squeezing her shoulders and kissing her head. “I’m so proud of you.”

The same, yet inverted, the second foal stood up with the aid of its mother’s nose under his ribs. Only then did they see the deformity, the way the one wing tucked and did not stretch or move. Smaller than his brother, the colt now stood and tried to practice walking.

“Poor little guy must have gotten hurt in the womb,” Lexa sighed, chin on the railing as she watched the new family.

“He’s still magnificent.”

They watched the little ones wobble and the mother clean them, nudge them, help them. It was a sight to see, it was a feeling to hold. The cold outside was relegated to the warmth of the room.

“I want to know what happened.”

“You will. Tomorrow. For now, you let them rest. It takes a lot of effort to be born, I think. I don’t remember much.”

“I want to hang out with them a little more,” Lexa whispered as Clarke kissed her temple. “Go to bed.”

“I’ll hang out a little bit more.”

Sitting on the edge of a bale, Clarke watched Lexa pull herself over the gate and let the little baby sniff at her hands. The group lingered and dispersed, knowing full well that they would be awake in just a few hours.

Gently, Lexa ran her hand against the weak wing of the younger brother. He shook his mane.

“Castor, seems very fitting for you,” she rubbed its forehead. “Pollux,” she chuckled as the other nudged her hip. “You did so good,” Lexa ran her hand along the mother’s neck, pulling stray strands of hay from it.

Clarke pulled her legs up under her and watched her girlfriend focus on her hands and her work. Quiet and passionate, focused and intense, it was the image she could never quite explain to anyone else who wondered why they were together.

With a yawn, Clarke hid her hands in the sleeves and bundled herself up, the warmth of the room and the quiet lulling her to sleep again.

Lexa bonded with the foals, helping to clean up, while at the same time shushing and touching them as much as possible. When they tired and could not stand any longer, she retired from the pen, smiling widely at the idea of them.

She found a sleeping girl on the hay and tugged an old blanket atop her, sitting beside her and feeling her heart burst a bit at so much happiness.

[smellofparchment-blog]

By Moonlight and Sunrises: Chapter 10 - Sunrises

Story Title - By Moonlight and Sunrises (ffn link)

Story Description - There was no awkwardness. No need to fill the empty space with words because the space wasn’t empty. There was something - inaudible, invisible, of course, but there was something there anyways. “How can I possibly want to kiss a woman whose name I don’t even know?” Percy finally asked, breaking the silence.

Story Rating - teen (T)

Story Characters - Percy Weasley, Audrey Shacklebolt, George Weasley, Keegan Shacklebolt (OMC), Sabina Kopitar (OFC), Oliver Wood, Kingsely Shacklebolt, Zhara Shacklebolt (OFC), Kristopher Shacklebolt (OMC), Kelsey Rowle (OFC), Thorfinn Rowle, Molly Weasley I, Arthur Weasley

Story Pairings - Percy/Audrey

Chapter - 10) Sunrises

12 September 1999

"Hey - Prophet owl's here!"

As George opened the window, a small tawny owl swooped into the kitchen and dropped the rolled up newspaper in the middle of the dining table, which was covered in dishes and cutlery leftover from the large breakfast. The week following the attack at the Shacklebolt Estate had been a hectic one. Percy, Audrey, and the whole Shacklebolt family had constantly been in and out of the Wizengamot giving testimonies and journalists were all over the place. However, Kingsley was doing everything in his power to get the trial expedited and over with as soon as possible.

In the midst of testimonies, however, many Order secrets had begun to come out to the public - namely, Percy's involvement. It was unavoidable once Percy was sitting in the Wizengamot and being asked whether he had had any previous encounters with the accused, and the onslaught of questions that had followed had been a nightmare. Fortunately, though, Audrey had been by his side the whole time, just like when he had told his family.

Still, when Percy had received the letter from Rita Skeeter requesting an interview, he had been reluctant. That is, until Audrey made a good point: he could control his story, or he could let the old bag gab away however she wanted. Now, as the Burrow was filled with silence, the headline ominously stared back at him.

FORMER ORDER SPY SPILLS ALL: DRAMA, INTRIGUE, AND HEARTACHE

"Well, she certainly embellished," Percy declared, breaking the silence.

"Could be worse," Audrey said optimistically. She nodded towards the newspaper and added, "Do the honours, Perce."

Everyone in the small kitchen - Molly, Arthur, George, Ron, and Hermione - intently stared at Percy, then back at the newspaper in anticipation. With a deep breath, Percy reached forward and unrolled the paper.

"'Once upon a time, the name Percy Weasley would have meant less than nothing to all households of the wizarding world - ' wow, really, that's how she's going to start?" Percy began to read.

"Keep goin', you need to be brought down a couple pegs," George urged jokingly.

With a sigh, Percy continued, "' - but today I have the honour of introducing you to the Order of the Phoenix's bravest hero. Here follow the tales of a man that has given up more than most for the sake of doing the good thing for all magical kind.' And then it just goes on about some missions I did."

"Perce," Ron started with a serious tone, "for twenty-three years, you have been nothing but a pompous prat, but now - now - you act modest. What bloody missions?"

"Well the first one she talks about is the one where I stopped that last decree Umbridge wanted to get passed, back when she was Headmistress," Percy explained. "It was the one allowing physical punishment of students but Fudge never got it because, uh, I may have replaced it with a rather embarrassing letter bearing Umbridge's forged signature."

"Perfect, prudish Percival Weasley, did you just confess to damaging Ministry property and forging an official's signature?" George exclaimed sarcastically.

"Settle down, would you?" Percy grumbled. "Then it goes on about how I smuggled a muggle-born and his family out of the Ministry."

"The McConnells," Audrey intervened. "Keegan and I received them on the other end of the portkey."

"Wait - really?" Percy asked as he turned to look at Audrey in shock. "Blimey, we had a lot of close calls," he added observantly.

"You mean Gregor McConnell?" Arthur asked. "He... he pushed me out of the way of a blast when we were at Hogwarts."

Audrey glanced at Percy and smiled when she saw the look on his face. She could tell he was trying to down-play the article, but he seemed proud. He had a glint in his eye that she hadn't seen before. When he glanced her way, he didn't hesitate to return her smile.

"The, uh, last part actually talks about the mission that Audrey and her brother did, and how she saved my bloody neck," Percy continued, looking back down at the newspaper in his hands, a wide grin still on his face. "And then it ends with, 'While the war may be over, the list of heroes we must thank for their sacrifices continues to grow. Today, you can add Percy Weasley to that list: a perfect example of selflessness and bravery. Tune in - ' Oh, bloody hell."

"What's wrong?" Audrey asked curiously. She leaned in to get a better look at the article and rolled her eyes as she got a glimpse of the words.

Percy rolled his eyes and continued, "'Tune in next week for the hot gossip on his hero belle, Audrey Shacklebolt. There is more to this pureblood princess and her hero spy than meets the eye.'"

"Ugh, she even bloody rhymed it," Ron said with disgust, "Classic Rita Skeeter, ladies and gentlemen."

"Well, we'll cross that bridge when we get to it," Audrey declared tiredly. "For now, enjoy being a hero, Percy. You earned it."

"Skeeter or not," Molly started, leaning across the table to grab the newspaper from Percy, "this is getting framed and put in the living room."

"Nestled right alongside all of Percy's other awards," George teased as Molly promptly left the kitchen with Arthur following closely behind. "I call it 'The Shrine of Humongous Bighead.'"

As everyone else began to disperse and leave the kitchen, Percy leaned in towards Audrey, a mild look of annoyance on his face, and explained, "He means Head Boy."

"Oh, I know," Audrey replied with a smirk, "Him and Fred pretended like they didn't know who I was talking about if I didn't use that nickname for all of our fifth year. So - "

"So you're familiar," Percy interrupted with a sigh. Although he sounded annoyed, Audrey could see a small smile cracking his glare.

Leaning in closer, Audrey whispered, "You know, if you still have that badge, I think it would still look rather good on you."

"You want to me to wear my Hogwarts uniform?" Percy asked in confusion.

"I meant just the badge."

"I like where your head's at."

31 December 1999

Percy cleaned his glasses for possibly the tenth time in the last half hour, then gently perched them on his face again as he looked in the mirror in his old childhood bedroom. He had managed to tame his curly red hair for the night, and had put on his best set of dress robes. Deciding that this would be his final inspection, Percy gave himself a satisfied nod before opening the door to enter the chaos that was filling the rest of the Burrow.

Almost instantly, Percy was surrounded by the shouting and noise of his family attempting to get ready for the big New Year's Eve party that the Shacklebolts were hosting. He was nervous for the event, although not because it meant he would be facing Audrey's whole family. After Kelsey had been taken care of and things had settled down, Percy had actually regularly kept in touch with Audrey's parents. By all accounts, it seemed that he had made a good impression on them, and he couldn't be any happier.

When Percy's eyes found Ginny and George in the living room playing Exploding Snap, however, his happiness did fall a few steps.

"Hey! You two!" he exclaimed, storming towards his siblings. "You're not even dressed!"

"Ah yes, thank you, Captain Obvious," George bit back with a smirk. "Don't get your knickers in a twist - we'll go change now."

"This was a task for an hour ago!" Percy shouted as George and Ginny rolled their eyes at him and trudged their way upstairs.

Looking around rather frantically, Percy called out, "Ron! Harry!"

"I've got them!" Hermione shouted back. Deciding that she was probably the only other responsible person in the whole house, Percy considered that handled and went into the kitchen to join his older brothers.

Bill and Fleur stood by the window, seemingly calm in the midst of the loud house. Fleur was now sporting a visible baby bump, which had resulted in Molly being even more overbearing than usual; however, for the first time ever, Fleur seemed to be enjoying the attention her mother-in-law was giving her. Sitting at the dining table, Charlie was deep in conversation with his new girlfriend, a witch that he worked with in Romania by the name of Raluca. Admittedly, Charlie not showing up alone for the first Christmas ever had been the highlight of everyone's holidays.

For now, anyways.

Feeling a strong hand on his shoulder, Percy turned his head to see Arthur standing beside him. "How're you feeling, Perce?" his father asked with a grin.

"Nervous - definitely nervous," Percy replied, "but excited."

"That's a good sign," Arthur said reassuringly.

Percy nodded as his father left to extract Molly from Fleur's side. Looking down at his watch, the panic set in again. "People! We're already running late!" Percy shouted.

"Oi, relax," George grumbled as he entered the kitchen, fully dressed, "Haven't seen you this worked up since you graduated."

Percy only rolled his eyes at George, but he felt the smile spreading across his face as the rest of his family filled the small kitchen of the Burrow. The last time he remembered his whole family, Harry and Hermione included, crowded together in the Burrow like this had been Fred's funeral. Now, for the first time in a while, it was for a happy reason.

"All right, be clear when you're in the Floo: Shacklebolt Estate, Hornsea."

Audrey instinctively turned her head as she heard the roar of the Floo, considerably softer when covered up by the loud music playing in the main hall. She excused herself from her father's side as she made her way out of the hall and started to head towards the study.

She quickly stopped by her old bedroom, giving herself one final look-over in the mirror. She had left her hair down, wavy and swaying with every movement. Her gown was a deep burgundy colour and form-fitting. The sleeves were simple lace of the same colour and the dress left her back entirely bare all the way down to her waist. Except for the healed scar running diagonally across her back, she looked exactly how she had looked that night seven months ago.

The night her and Percy had first kissed.

With a satisfied nod, Audrey made her way to the study once more. As soon as she entered, she found the room full with the whole Weasley family. Audrey met Percy's eyes and he started heading towards her, the room growing quiet. She could see the surprise on his face as he recognized the dress. The grin he was sporting was contagious.

"This is... you look beautiful," Percy finally said.

"Thank you," Audrey replied with a proud smile, "you're looking rather dapper yourself."

"People are in the room!" George piped in as he popped up behind Percy and gave his older brother a much too strong pat on the back.

Percy rolled his eyes at George's outburst but Audrey only laughed and took hold of Percy's hand. "Well in that case, follow me," she declared.

With Percy by her side, Audrey led everyone back to the main hall, the sounds of music and conversation getting louder with each step. Everyone was visibly filled with awe as they entered the hall. The ceiling was covered in garlands of silver flowers. Large wreaths hung on the wall and beautiful glass vases of poinsettias were at the centre of each table. A Charmed mistletoe was zooming around the room, coming to an abrupt stop over its next pair of victims: Keegan and Daphne. Dramatic as always, Keegan dipped her down as if dancing before kissing her, earning a loud chorus of 'whoop's from his co-workers.

"Welcome to the Shacklebolts' New Year's Eve party!" Audrey introduced as she turned to face the rest of the Weasley family. "Make yourself at home."

One by one, everyone began to disperse as they recognized old friends or simply felt like joining in on the dancing. Soon enough, only Percy and Audrey were left standing together.

"This is amazing," Percy said as he looked around the room.

"You don't want to know how stressful it was to be around my mum this last month," Audrey replied, "but it looks like it paid off."

"Ah, just who I was looking for!"

Audrey and Percy turned around at the sound of Lucinda's voice. Of course, Audrey should have known that her grandmother wouldn't be one to wait around for Audrey to come to her - rather, Lucinda was a fan of taking matters into her own hands.

"Well, Audrey, please introduce us," the older woman said pointedly.

"Percy, meet my grandmother, Lucinda. Gran, this is Percy, my boyfriend," Audrey introduced with a smile.

"Pleased to finally meet you dear," Lucinda said as she shook Percy's hand. "Kris speaks of you very highly."

"I am truly happy to hear that," Percy replied politely.

"So polite," Lucinda noted as she looked Audrey's way, as if that would mean Percy was out of earshot. Taking a step back and looking at the couple with a proud smile, she added, "Now go enjoy yourselves!"

Hooking her arm with Percy's, Audrey chuckled at her grandmother and led him into the party. With a wave of her wand, two glasses of champagne floated towards her and Percy and they each took a glass as they continued walking. "Gran can be a lot, but she means well," Audrey said with a shrug.

"If you think that's a lot, wait 'til you meet Muriel," Percy replied with a shake of his head. "Besides, I kind of like that my biggest worry is being bombarded by your grandmother."

"Well, when you put it that way, we've definitely fried bigger fish," Audrey admitted. It really was nice, for the first time ever, to not feel like she had to watch her back at every turn.

As the couple made their way around the large room, they stopped a few times to talk to several people they both recognized from work. It felt so natural to be by Percy's side even for the simplest conversations, and Audrey found herself enjoying introducing him to the rest of her family. Soon enough, Audrey spotted Sabina and made her way over to her best friend with Percy in tow.

"Sab! I'm so glad you're here," Audrey said as she went to hug her friend.

"Aye, glad to be here. Nice to see you again, too, Percy," she greeted, looking around rather frantically.

"Likewise," Percy replied slowly. "You all right?"

Sabina sighed heavily and met Audrey's eyes. "I've got a situation," she declared. "Your dad told my dad to feel free to bring the team."

Audrey frowned in confusion at her friend. Every year her parents had held this party, her father had always extended an invitation to the Quidditch team that Sab's father coached, Puddlemere United. "Like he always does," Audrey said slowly.

"Merlin's crotchless thong, I need to be more hammered," Sabina muttered, quickly downing her champagne right after and summoning another glass.

"Oh, look - I didn't know Oliver would be here," Percy said as he spotted his friend just entering the hall. He moved to wave him over but Sabina quickly smacked his arm down.

"Are you mad?" she hissed. Shaking her head, she added, "Jebemti, I need to get out of here."

Without another word, Sabina disappeared into the crowd of the party. "Well, it's never good when she starts swearing in Slovenian," Audrey declared as she looked up at Percy.

"What was that all about?" he asked curiously.

"I have a feeling we'll find out eventually," Audrey replied as she watched Sabina disappear into the crowd. "Still wanna go say hi to Oliver?" she asked.

"Actually... I was thinking we could get some fresh air," Percy said, feeling a surge of courage run through him.

"I'd like that," Audrey replied with a smile.

The couple made their way towards the double doors leading out onto a large balcony that overlooked the sea. The area was sealed with Heating Charms to keep out the cold winter breeze, but the view was still breathtaking. A starry sky hung over the strong sea waves rolling onto the beach. Audrey set her champagne glass down on the stone ledge of the balcony as she looked out at the seaside, a small smile of contentment on her face. She felt calm and happy. These were the moments she wished would never end.

"Remember the last time we were alone on a balcony together?" Audrey asked, the smile on her face widening as she continued looking out at the view.

"That's actually exactly what I was thinking about."

Turning to look at Percy, Audrey frowned in confusion when she didn't immediately see him next to her. When she turned around and her eyes finally landed on him, her jaw dropped slightly and her eyes widened in surprise. She felt her breath hitch as she looked down at Percy, down on one knee in front of her with an open ring box in his hand and an incredibly wide grin on his face.

"Audrey Shacklebolt, I want to stargaze with you for the rest of my life, wherever we are," Percy started. "Will you marry me?"

"Will I - ? Yes! Yes!" Audrey replied excitedly, smiling uncontrollably.

Percy quickly got up and put the engagement ring on Audrey's finger then, without a moment's hesitation, wrapped his arm around her waist to bring her close and kiss her. Audrey quickly kissed him back, hands grabbing at his dress robes to pull him even closer. This was a moment that would last forever.

1 January 2000

"Look at that - made it to sunrise."

Audrey blinked rapidly in the hopes that it would make her feel more awake as she took in the first sign of light between the clouds. After the excitement of their engagement and the thrill of the countdown, Audrey and Percy had decided to stay up to see the first sunrise of the year. They had situated themselves on a bench in the gardens, with plenty of blankets, coffee, hot chocolate, and some strong Heating Charms. Overall, Percy was much better at dealing with sleep deprivation than she was.

"First sunrise of the year," Audrey said with a smile. "First sunrise as your fiancée."

With his arm around her waist, Percy gave her a light squeeze and a kiss on the cheek. "I like the sound of that," he said.

"You know what else sounds nice?" Audrey started as she looked over at Percy. "Audrey Weasley sounds pretty nice."

Percy returned Audrey's wide smile. "It sounds perfect," he said quietly.

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