Aberforth
There was a contest at HPFF a while back, and one of the categories was writing a story about Aberforth and his goat. I never finished my story in time, instead devoting it to another category, and never bothered to publish it up on my account there (or ff.net) either.
So, I figured that I'd put it up here. It's not terrible, and I actually like Aberforth quite a bit now.
Title: Of Bearded Goats and Men
Characters: Albus and Aberforth Dumbledore
Rating: PG
Summary:
Of Bearded Goats and Men
“…For practicing inappropriate charms on a goat,” he murmurs, scanning the letter in his hands.
I sit and glare at him.
“Hm. Very peculiar, Aberforth.”
“For practicing inappropriate charms,” I repeat, not even bothering to conceal my disgusted snort. “Lovely.”
My brother, Albus, shakes his head at me. He and I were enjoying a simple breakfast of pancakes and chocolate syrup when an owl swooped in and dropped an envelope into his lap.
I shrug lightly, noting how the corners of his lips are twitching. “Do you find this very amusing?” I ask him dryly.
“Not particularly. You have to go to trial for this, you realize.”
“I realize.” Bah. Going to trial means that I have to don itchy robes and trim my beard.
I wonder if I even own a pair of presentable robes. I don’t want to borrow Albus’s robes. His entire wardrobe consists of odd patterns and bright, shimmering colours. A very eclectic taste, if you ask me. And now I have to dress up. This entire situation is vexing.
Shoving a forkful of pancakes into my mouth, I chew dully, noting how the light, fluffy breading has no taste. It sticks in a large, dry lump in the middle of my throat. I quickly reach for a glass of milk, taking a few quick swigs to wash my breakfast down.
Nothing, absolutely nothing, beats goat milk. It has smaller fat globules and doesn’t require homogenization. In fact, it digests much more easily than bovine milk.
It also is used as a treatment for ulcers because of its buffering quality.
I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand, sighing happily.
Albus is still looking at me.
“What is it?” I ask irritably.
“Oh, nothing. I was just pondering the wide variety of charms that one would be able to practice on a goat,” he says. “Illegally, I might add.”
Funny, Albus. Really funny. I narrow my eyes at him. “…And?”
“And I must admit that I’m rather curious about what you could have done that would alert the ministry officials.”
I sit back in my chair, folding my arms across my chest. “Mmhmm.”
His eyes twinkle at me. “I suppose you’re not going to tell me?”
“No, I’m not.” I try to drown the twinkle out of his eyes with a long, cold stare.
“Well, then would you mind if I attended your hearing? I’d hate to have to rely on what the papers say about it.”
I sit up a bit straighter in my chair. “The papers?”
I can feel my heart start to beat a bit faster. Did you know that a goat’s normal heart rate is somewhere between sixty and eighty beats per minute? Under stress, the average adult’s heart rate can exceed one hundred beats per minute. Mine feels like it’s going twice as fast.
“Why on earth would the media be alerted?”
“Come now, Aberforth,” Albus says lightly. “Surely you know that they’re not going to miss an opportunity to ridicule the newly-appointed Hogwarts Headmaster’s brother.”
Damn. I hadn’t given that any consideration. “Bah,” I tell him. “I’m not afraid of those dodgy codgers.”
“Fair enough,” he ascends. I offer a small grunt.
“How is Heidi, by the way?”
Now I’m glaring at him through narrowed eyes. “Fine,” I reply shortly. I glance out the window just to make sure she is still tethered to her post.
She is. Currently, she’s chewing on the fence nearby.
Heidi is my pride and joy. She’s a Saanen dairy goat, pure white, with a smooth, shiny coat. That’s how you know she’s still healthy. Her eyes are clear and bright, and her fur isn’t fluffed. Fluffy fur is never a good sign.
Heidi, however, is perfect. She could be a model for an illustrated novel on goats or something.
Albus has a large collection of muggle books, many of them children’s books. I liked to look through them when I was young, and one day found a beautiful book with a blonde girl and a white goat standing in front of snow-capped mountains. I stared at it for ages. Albus snuck up on me, looked over my shoulder, and told me that the book was titled Heidi. Naturally, I assumed that Heidi was the pretty little goat on the front. He tells me that I’m wrong now, and that Heidi is actually the little girl. Hmph. I think the name suits a goat far better than a girl.
The book still sits on my dresser now. Albus teases me incessantly about my infatuation with Heidi the Goat, and continually asks me why I never bother to read the story.
I tell him I don’t need to read the story to know that Heidi is my dream goat. Now I have her. I watch as she tears a long strip of wood away from the fence. I’ll have to repair that later.
“I’m glad to hear it,” Albus replies, snapping me out of my thoughts. I nod.
He looks at me expectantly, and I roll my eyes at him. “Are you going to let it go?”
“I will,” he sighs. “I was only hoping that my own brother would feel that he could confide his most dark and devious deeds to me.” The grin is twitching at his lips again.
“It’s not that big of an issue,” I tell him.
He pushes his plate away, leans his elbows on the table and steeples his fingers. “How old is Heidi, exactly?”
Anyone who knows anything about goats will be able to tell you that the average age of a goat is twelve to fourteen years. Heidi is soon approaching thirty years of age. I suspect that Albus realizes this, too.
“She looks good for her age,” I say, twitching.
“That she does,” he turns in his seat and gazes out the window at her. “Her diet must be remarkable if she’s lived this long.”
“She only eats alfalfa hay,” I say grumpily. I push back my chair and stalk over to the window. “And fences,” I add, lamely. Outside, Heidi is chewing the long strip of wood from the fence.
“And the occasional piece of liquorice,” Albus adds, grinning.
“Liquorice?” I can feel the heat in my face. “Not sweets! You could kill her!”
“On the contrary, dear Aberforth,” he interjects. “She’s quite fond of liquorice. She and I both share the unusual penchant for black liquorice.”
I wrinkle my nose and scowl. “It’s not good for her,” I reprimand him. Still, it’s satisfying to know that he’s taken with her. It softens me up some.
“Oh, all right, brother,” I relinquish. “If you must know, I was just practicing a few charms to improve her health and reverse her aging process.”
I watch as his bushy eyebrows disappear underneath his hat. “Reversing the aging process?” he says.
I nod at him. “And don’t even try to lecture me for this, Albus. I know what you have been up to with Nicolas. I’ve seen your materials left out.”
He raises his hands submissively. “I never planned on lecturing you, Aberforth. To be quite honest, I’m amazed that you’ve been able to grasp enough spellwork to be able to do so.” His eyes are reflecting the clouds rolling by, and it looks like they are dancing. He finds this amusing.
I do not. “I’m not a dolt, you know.”
“I know.”
“I didn’t think that they would find out,” I add. This is true. I should have been more careful when Newt Scamander arrived wanting to know more about Heidi. He thought she might be a half-breed, hearing about her from Albus. I let him perform a series of magical tests on her, provided that they were safe, in case he wanted to add her to his book.
Heidi would like to be famous, I think.
Newt apologized a week later, saying that there was nothing genetically different about Heidi that separated her from other goats. Now I’m almost certain he was the one who tipped the ministry off.
“Aberforth, the Ministry has strict guidelines about time. You know that we are not supposed to mess with the fates.”
I know this. I also know that doe goats are supposed to have kids. Baby goats of their own. A family. Heidi, unfortunately, has never had any kids.
I think this upsets me more than it upsets her. I have no one to carry on her legacy. I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather replace her with, however.
“I wasn’t messing with the fates, Albus. I was improving her quality of life.”
He chuckles under his breath. “Is that going to be your defence?”
“Yes,” I say, “I think so.”
His laughter grows louder, and because it’s contagious, soon we are both nearly rolling on the floor. He claps me on the back, “Come on, Abe. Let’s go pay a visit to Heidi.” He pulls out a long stick of liquorice. I give him a warning look, but he ignores me.
We walk outside, and grass smells of freshly fallen due. It smells green, if colour can actually have a smell. Our beards blow lightly in the wind, and Dumbledore taps his glasses with his wand, turning them into shades.
Heidi stops chewing on the fence and bleats at us in greeting. She pulls on her rope, now taught because the other end is tied to the pole. Bless her, I think to myself. She misses my company.
Her big brown eyes are fixated on me as I pat her head.
Albus mumbles a quiet hello and holds out the liquorice. She takes it hastily and nips at his hand. As she chews it, she fixes me with an innocent stare. I squat down and stroke her fur. “Good girl,” I whisper. She head-butts me affectionately.
I turn to Albus. I know that he realizes that this is why I can’t stand to see her die. I’m not much for human company, but I understand animals. I understand Heidi.
* * *
Man Loves Goat More than Law, states the heading of the article. Of course, I pay no attention to that, more engrossed in the picture below. It’s a very unflattering snapshot of me-I’m picking my nose and then making a rude gesture to the camera. Probably won’t get many sympathizers from that article. I turn to the next paper, featuring Headmaster’s Brother Gaga for Goat, and am horrified to find an animated comic of me and what is supposed to be Heidi. I quickly crumple the pages up and toss them into the fireplace.
“Dear me,” I hear a voice say.
Albus’s head is in the fireplace and his face covered in soot. He rubs a spot on his forehead. “Nice aim,” he adds.
“So you’ve read the articles?” I ask him, rolling my eyes towards the ceiling.
“I have. The titles aren’t very original, are they?”
“From what I hear from the neighbours, they’re not,” I agree. I pull out a chair, motioning for him to sit down. “I could have thought of a few better ones. Bleating hearts, Fleeing Fate, for example.”
He chuckles under his breath. “Very good. Very good indeed.” His eyebrow lifts as he notices a pile of letters on the table. “Fan mail?”
I snort. “If you want to call it that. I suspect that I probably have three dozen different offers to put Heidi down for me, one marriage proposal, and another dozen people wanting to know the charms I’ve used.”
I watch his eyes linger on the few remaining remnants of a howler I received. “And three howlers,” I say. “One is from a wizard representative of an animal rights group.”
“Ah,” Albus says, stroking his beard. “Is all the attention bothering you?”
“Not really,” I say, shrugging. “I’ve always got Heidi here for company.”
“Good,” he announces, settling down into a chair. “And when she’s not here anymore, I’ll gladly offer up my services.”
{Fin}
So, I figured that I'd put it up here. It's not terrible, and I actually like Aberforth quite a bit now.
Title: Of Bearded Goats and Men
Characters: Albus and Aberforth Dumbledore
Rating: PG
Summary:
Of Bearded Goats and Men
“…For practicing inappropriate charms on a goat,” he murmurs, scanning the letter in his hands.
I sit and glare at him.
“Hm. Very peculiar, Aberforth.”
“For practicing inappropriate charms,” I repeat, not even bothering to conceal my disgusted snort. “Lovely.”
My brother, Albus, shakes his head at me. He and I were enjoying a simple breakfast of pancakes and chocolate syrup when an owl swooped in and dropped an envelope into his lap.
I shrug lightly, noting how the corners of his lips are twitching. “Do you find this very amusing?” I ask him dryly.
“Not particularly. You have to go to trial for this, you realize.”
“I realize.” Bah. Going to trial means that I have to don itchy robes and trim my beard.
I wonder if I even own a pair of presentable robes. I don’t want to borrow Albus’s robes. His entire wardrobe consists of odd patterns and bright, shimmering colours. A very eclectic taste, if you ask me. And now I have to dress up. This entire situation is vexing.
Shoving a forkful of pancakes into my mouth, I chew dully, noting how the light, fluffy breading has no taste. It sticks in a large, dry lump in the middle of my throat. I quickly reach for a glass of milk, taking a few quick swigs to wash my breakfast down.
Nothing, absolutely nothing, beats goat milk. It has smaller fat globules and doesn’t require homogenization. In fact, it digests much more easily than bovine milk.
It also is used as a treatment for ulcers because of its buffering quality.
I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand, sighing happily.
Albus is still looking at me.
“What is it?” I ask irritably.
“Oh, nothing. I was just pondering the wide variety of charms that one would be able to practice on a goat,” he says. “Illegally, I might add.”
Funny, Albus. Really funny. I narrow my eyes at him. “…And?”
“And I must admit that I’m rather curious about what you could have done that would alert the ministry officials.”
I sit back in my chair, folding my arms across my chest. “Mmhmm.”
His eyes twinkle at me. “I suppose you’re not going to tell me?”
“No, I’m not.” I try to drown the twinkle out of his eyes with a long, cold stare.
“Well, then would you mind if I attended your hearing? I’d hate to have to rely on what the papers say about it.”
I sit up a bit straighter in my chair. “The papers?”
I can feel my heart start to beat a bit faster. Did you know that a goat’s normal heart rate is somewhere between sixty and eighty beats per minute? Under stress, the average adult’s heart rate can exceed one hundred beats per minute. Mine feels like it’s going twice as fast.
“Why on earth would the media be alerted?”
“Come now, Aberforth,” Albus says lightly. “Surely you know that they’re not going to miss an opportunity to ridicule the newly-appointed Hogwarts Headmaster’s brother.”
Damn. I hadn’t given that any consideration. “Bah,” I tell him. “I’m not afraid of those dodgy codgers.”
“Fair enough,” he ascends. I offer a small grunt.
“How is Heidi, by the way?”
Now I’m glaring at him through narrowed eyes. “Fine,” I reply shortly. I glance out the window just to make sure she is still tethered to her post.
She is. Currently, she’s chewing on the fence nearby.
Heidi is my pride and joy. She’s a Saanen dairy goat, pure white, with a smooth, shiny coat. That’s how you know she’s still healthy. Her eyes are clear and bright, and her fur isn’t fluffed. Fluffy fur is never a good sign.
Heidi, however, is perfect. She could be a model for an illustrated novel on goats or something.
Albus has a large collection of muggle books, many of them children’s books. I liked to look through them when I was young, and one day found a beautiful book with a blonde girl and a white goat standing in front of snow-capped mountains. I stared at it for ages. Albus snuck up on me, looked over my shoulder, and told me that the book was titled Heidi. Naturally, I assumed that Heidi was the pretty little goat on the front. He tells me that I’m wrong now, and that Heidi is actually the little girl. Hmph. I think the name suits a goat far better than a girl.
The book still sits on my dresser now. Albus teases me incessantly about my infatuation with Heidi the Goat, and continually asks me why I never bother to read the story.
I tell him I don’t need to read the story to know that Heidi is my dream goat. Now I have her. I watch as she tears a long strip of wood away from the fence. I’ll have to repair that later.
“I’m glad to hear it,” Albus replies, snapping me out of my thoughts. I nod.
He looks at me expectantly, and I roll my eyes at him. “Are you going to let it go?”
“I will,” he sighs. “I was only hoping that my own brother would feel that he could confide his most dark and devious deeds to me.” The grin is twitching at his lips again.
“It’s not that big of an issue,” I tell him.
He pushes his plate away, leans his elbows on the table and steeples his fingers. “How old is Heidi, exactly?”
Anyone who knows anything about goats will be able to tell you that the average age of a goat is twelve to fourteen years. Heidi is soon approaching thirty years of age. I suspect that Albus realizes this, too.
“She looks good for her age,” I say, twitching.
“That she does,” he turns in his seat and gazes out the window at her. “Her diet must be remarkable if she’s lived this long.”
“She only eats alfalfa hay,” I say grumpily. I push back my chair and stalk over to the window. “And fences,” I add, lamely. Outside, Heidi is chewing the long strip of wood from the fence.
“And the occasional piece of liquorice,” Albus adds, grinning.
“Liquorice?” I can feel the heat in my face. “Not sweets! You could kill her!”
“On the contrary, dear Aberforth,” he interjects. “She’s quite fond of liquorice. She and I both share the unusual penchant for black liquorice.”
I wrinkle my nose and scowl. “It’s not good for her,” I reprimand him. Still, it’s satisfying to know that he’s taken with her. It softens me up some.
“Oh, all right, brother,” I relinquish. “If you must know, I was just practicing a few charms to improve her health and reverse her aging process.”
I watch as his bushy eyebrows disappear underneath his hat. “Reversing the aging process?” he says.
I nod at him. “And don’t even try to lecture me for this, Albus. I know what you have been up to with Nicolas. I’ve seen your materials left out.”
He raises his hands submissively. “I never planned on lecturing you, Aberforth. To be quite honest, I’m amazed that you’ve been able to grasp enough spellwork to be able to do so.” His eyes are reflecting the clouds rolling by, and it looks like they are dancing. He finds this amusing.
I do not. “I’m not a dolt, you know.”
“I know.”
“I didn’t think that they would find out,” I add. This is true. I should have been more careful when Newt Scamander arrived wanting to know more about Heidi. He thought she might be a half-breed, hearing about her from Albus. I let him perform a series of magical tests on her, provided that they were safe, in case he wanted to add her to his book.
Heidi would like to be famous, I think.
Newt apologized a week later, saying that there was nothing genetically different about Heidi that separated her from other goats. Now I’m almost certain he was the one who tipped the ministry off.
“Aberforth, the Ministry has strict guidelines about time. You know that we are not supposed to mess with the fates.”
I know this. I also know that doe goats are supposed to have kids. Baby goats of their own. A family. Heidi, unfortunately, has never had any kids.
I think this upsets me more than it upsets her. I have no one to carry on her legacy. I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather replace her with, however.
“I wasn’t messing with the fates, Albus. I was improving her quality of life.”
He chuckles under his breath. “Is that going to be your defence?”
“Yes,” I say, “I think so.”
His laughter grows louder, and because it’s contagious, soon we are both nearly rolling on the floor. He claps me on the back, “Come on, Abe. Let’s go pay a visit to Heidi.” He pulls out a long stick of liquorice. I give him a warning look, but he ignores me.
We walk outside, and grass smells of freshly fallen due. It smells green, if colour can actually have a smell. Our beards blow lightly in the wind, and Dumbledore taps his glasses with his wand, turning them into shades.
Heidi stops chewing on the fence and bleats at us in greeting. She pulls on her rope, now taught because the other end is tied to the pole. Bless her, I think to myself. She misses my company.
Her big brown eyes are fixated on me as I pat her head.
Albus mumbles a quiet hello and holds out the liquorice. She takes it hastily and nips at his hand. As she chews it, she fixes me with an innocent stare. I squat down and stroke her fur. “Good girl,” I whisper. She head-butts me affectionately.
I turn to Albus. I know that he realizes that this is why I can’t stand to see her die. I’m not much for human company, but I understand animals. I understand Heidi.
* * *
Man Loves Goat More than Law, states the heading of the article. Of course, I pay no attention to that, more engrossed in the picture below. It’s a very unflattering snapshot of me-I’m picking my nose and then making a rude gesture to the camera. Probably won’t get many sympathizers from that article. I turn to the next paper, featuring Headmaster’s Brother Gaga for Goat, and am horrified to find an animated comic of me and what is supposed to be Heidi. I quickly crumple the pages up and toss them into the fireplace.
“Dear me,” I hear a voice say.
Albus’s head is in the fireplace and his face covered in soot. He rubs a spot on his forehead. “Nice aim,” he adds.
“So you’ve read the articles?” I ask him, rolling my eyes towards the ceiling.
“I have. The titles aren’t very original, are they?”
“From what I hear from the neighbours, they’re not,” I agree. I pull out a chair, motioning for him to sit down. “I could have thought of a few better ones. Bleating hearts, Fleeing Fate, for example.”
He chuckles under his breath. “Very good. Very good indeed.” His eyebrow lifts as he notices a pile of letters on the table. “Fan mail?”
I snort. “If you want to call it that. I suspect that I probably have three dozen different offers to put Heidi down for me, one marriage proposal, and another dozen people wanting to know the charms I’ve used.”
I watch his eyes linger on the few remaining remnants of a howler I received. “And three howlers,” I say. “One is from a wizard representative of an animal rights group.”
“Ah,” Albus says, stroking his beard. “Is all the attention bothering you?”
“Not really,” I say, shrugging. “I’ve always got Heidi here for company.”
“Good,” he announces, settling down into a chair. “And when she’s not here anymore, I’ll gladly offer up my services.”
{Fin}