Fic: Percy Weasley: Rogue Demon Hunter, Episode 4, The Long Way Back
Percy Weasley: Rogue Demon Hunter
Summary: It's the summer after OotP, and Percy Weasley is a man without a mission.
(Thanks to hermione_like for the beta, and to lizbee for the fanart. Go tell her you love it, especially if you love Kingsley.)
Episode 4, The Long Way Back
As the month of August dawned (bringing with it Day #37 of Percy's Unemployment and General Uselessness -- not, of course, that he had been keeping track), Percy had to concede that he was roughly zero for four with regard to employment prospects. He was not, it would appear, cut out to sell wands or sing torch songs. His stint as a Ministry personal assistant had been, needless to say, short and disastrous.
Nor, apparently, was he fitted to the position of a chartered accountant.
Looking around the offices of Giles, Gil and Trout Accountancy Ltd. Percy forced himself to pay attention to what his interviewer -- one Mr. Gil -- was saying.
"Can I have Jill get you some tea?"
"Oh, no thank you," Percy said, smiling politely at the rather ordinary-looking secretary hovering by the door.
The entire office was beige and bland, without so much as one piece of art on the walls. There were no windows. Even the accountants themselves seemed beige: their robes, their smiles, their voices were all bland and vaguely khaki-toned.
Gil sat down, folding his hands atop his balsa and parchment blotter. "Do you have any experience in accountancy, Mr. Weasley?"
"Well, no," Percy managed. "Not as such."
"I see. Hmm." Gil rearranged some papers on his desk, peering at them through his spectacles. "And yet Waggley, Nystram and Nystram seemed to think you fit for the position... Their opinion is not inconsiderable, to say the least." He took a long drink of coffee from a cream-colored porcelain mug emblazoned with the firm's tan logo. "I must confess, though: you're a bit on the animated side, Mr. Weasley. Compared to most of our staff... Well, thrill-seekers such as yourself often find accountancy a difficult transition to make."
Percy just stared at him, trying to decide whether it would be wildly inappropriate to begin laughing. Thrill-seeker?
"Well," Percy said, feigning a coughing fit in an attempt to recover himself, "I suppose I have to concede the point. Perhaps -- Waggley, Nystram and Nystram aside, of course -- it's not a particularly good fit for me."
He stood, and Gil followed suit.
"Thank you very much for the opportunity to come in and discuss the position with you, though." Percy extended a hand, and the two shook.
"I'll just have Jill show you out."
On the way back to the lobby, Percy walked past row after row of tweedy, beige cubicles. One of the cubicles' occupants knocked a paperclip to the floor. The impact echoed loudly in the complete silence of the office.
"Do you like working here?" Percy asked Jill the secretary, for want of anything else to say.
One side of her mouth quirked up just slightly, the first sign of animation he'd seen from anyone in the place all morning.
"What do you think, Mr. Weasley? Just be thankful you dodged this particular bullet." She opened the door for him, letting the morning sun stream into the florescent lighting and recycled air.
When he got home he was going to burn his career assessment and dance atop the ashes of the parchment.
*
Bailey the borderline alcoholic owl had taken up residence in Percy's flat. When Percy tried to return him to the owl post office, the postmistress had laughed for a full five minutes and refused to take him back.
"Always drunk, that one," she said, leveling an accusatory finger at his tiny beak. "Not worth the price of his feed. You keep him."
Not knowing quite what else to do, Percy had taken Bailey home with him. Hermes, needless to say, loathed the little owl on sight.
The two owls were staring at one another with uncomfortable intensity across Percy's kitchen table when he returned to his flat.
"None of that now," he said mildly, separating the two with a gentle but firm hand and pulling a packet of owl treats down from the cupboard. Both owls crowded in close to him as he sat, jostling slightly with their wings. Percy sighed and gave each a carefully equal portion of the treats.
"Of course," he said aloud, "if I don't find a new situation soon, I won't be able to afford to feed two owls - or myself."
Bailey's little head popped up abruptly and the owl hooted softly. Hermes looked up with an expression of cool concern.
"I'm just saying." Percy shrugged. "You two could pitch in a bit more."
As Percy was making a pot of tea, a knock came at the door. Without waiting for a response, Ginny bounced in, pink-cheeked and looking insufferably cheerful about something. She was humming. Percy put a hand to his head.
"Good morning, Percy," she said. "I've been having the best day so far. Of course, I had to sneak out of the house. Mum is being abominable after Neville's party, which was completely not my fault, as she told me I could go, unlike some people who are still blaming me for getting caught-"
"Ginny-" Percy began.
"Oh, I know," she said, helping herself to a cup and pouring milk carelessly into it. "You want to be alone with your manly man-pain, but I'm in too good a mood to let you get away with that. Plus, I brought you biscuits." She dug into her satchel and tossed him a tin of high-end lemon-ginger frosted biscuits.
Percy blinked. "Well, thank you, Ginny. That was very thoughtful of you."
Bemused, he got a plate from the sideboard and began arranging biscuits on it. Bailey fluttered over and landed on Percy's shoulder, hooting hopefully at the prospect of more food.
"Oh, what a sweet little owl!" Ginny stood and plucked him from Percy's shoulder. Bailey gazed blearily up at her and hiccupped.
"Is he drunk?" Ginny asked, wrinkling her nose.
"Very possibly."
She sat down at the table, pouring herself some tea, Bailey still cupped in her free hand.
"See here, little fellow," she said, picking up a spoon. "Everybody likes a drink or two, but it's not even mid-morning yet. That's just bad form."
Bailey just cooed and nipped at her thumb. Percy sat back down, opening a day-old copy of The Daily Prophet he'd managed to steal from Giles, Gil and Trout's lobby on his way in.
Ginny reached for the sugar, but Percy was faster. He slid it just out of her reach without bothering to look up from his paper.
"I think perhaps you've already had enough sugar for one day."
Ginny rolled her eyes and swatted at his hand, finally claiming the sugar bowl after a brief but pitched struggle. "I'm not hyper, Percy. I'm happy. I know you aren't particularly familiar with that emotional state, but most normal people are occasionally happy. Some of us are even happy a lot of the time."
"Is that meant to imply that you're normal?"
Ginny snorted and ignored the bait. "Honestly, Percy. You're going to have to get over it sometime. It's hardly as though the world's ending." She paused. "At least, not yet."
Sitting in her cupped hands, Bailey hiccupped again, looking up at her -- clearly besotted. Typical. Like just about every other male who got within ten feet of Ginny these days. Frankly, Percy was surprised their parents even let her out of the house.
Then again, it wouldn't be the first time they hadn't noticed something right in front of them.
"So," Percy said, attempting to change the subject, "since you're obviously dying to tell me, why are you happy?"
Ginny took a dramatically deep breath, and Percy was put in mind of her as a small girl. Back then she'd been chatty and excitable and a touch mischievous. That girl had been conspicuous by her absence the past few years, something Percy put down to the aftermath from Ginny's first year of school. He was, in a very private part of his heart that he would likely never share, quite happy and relieved to see glimpses of her again.
"I am going on holiday," she said, "and not one second too soon. This summer blows."
"It, er, blows?"
"Goats," Ginny confirmed, with an emphatic nod.
"There's an Aberforth Dumbledore joke in there somewhere," Percy said mildly, taking a sip of tea, "but we are in mixed company, after all."
Ginny snorted loudly, shaking her head and dumping Bailey unceremoniously onto the tabletop. "See, I knew there was a sense of humor hidden in you somewhere."
"So, where are you all going on holiday?"
"Not everyone, Percy. Just me. Dean's family is taking us to the shore." She stood, fetching the tin of biscuits and adding a few more to the plate.
"Are you sure that's such a good idea, Ginny?"
She took a step back, looking surprised. "Well, Mum and Dad haven't any problem with it, so I'm not sure why you should. Besides, I think they're just relieved to have me off with Muggles and out of direct danger for a week or two."
"But alone, with a boy-"
"Percy…" she began.
"Ginny," he said, warningly. "I simply can't believe our parents are allowing you to go off with some boy on holiday-"
"His parents are going to be there, you know."
Percy continued as though he hadn't heard her. "It is thoroughly inappropriate at your age-"
"Unlike, say, snogging your girlfriend in a disused classroom at fifteen, which is completely appropriate," she snapped, finally appearing to lose her temper.
Percy felt himself flush red. "That is totally different. You are my younger sister and a- and a-" He floundered around for the right word. "And a girl!"
"Oh, that's nice," Ginny sniffed and flounced out.
She slammed the door. She hadn't done that in over a month. It was, Percy knew, a very bad sign. But in his current mood, he didn't much care. He got up, walked to the door and slid the bolt home. That would show her.
Ten minutes later someone banged on the door, causing him to start and spill his tea all over the kitchen counter.
"Damn it all, Ginny!" he said, rubbing a towel over his hands and heading toward the door. "If you're going to behave like a child, you'd best go and do so elsewhere. I'm not in a mood to humor you!"
"Weasley?" Celia Williams' voice came from the other side of the door, and Percy cursed himself for a fool.
He opened the door. "Williams, I'm so sorry. I thought you were someone-" He stopped, catching sight of her face. "Is something wrong?"
"I need your help."
He moved aside and gestured her into the flat. "It's nothing serious, I hope? Can I get you some tea?"
"No." She shook her head and let him lead her to a seat on the sofa. "I feel so silly. It's just- I took this morning off because I needed to figure some things out. I haven't gotten anywhere, and then I thought about you and-"
Percy was completely discomfited. "Perhaps," he said slowly," you ought to start from the beginning."
She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. Her cheeks were slightly flushed, and she really did look very upset. "It's this new job of mine."
"Things aren't going well?"
"Oh, they've gone wonderfully. I've been very successful so far. They've consistently given me intriguing projects and more responsibility, the work environment is very positive, and the benefits-"
It sounded, quite frankly, like a little slice of heaven. Percy was trying very, very hard not to burst with jealousy. It was a close thing. "And the problem is?" he asked, managing somehow not to visibly salivate at the mention of the word 'benefits.'
“My gut.”
“Your gut?”
“I know it probably sounds silly, but I generally trust my instincts and right now my instincts are telling me that something is very wrong. Everything was fine until this week. We’ve taken on a new client, some American outfit - which is suspect in itself - and now there's talk about special projects, top secret stuff. I did a little digging, and these Americans… The things they’ve done and the people they generally represent, even on paper - not the even the stuff they’ve bothered to hide… Well, they make Dolores Umbridge look positively cuddly."
Percy raised an eyebrow. "I always found Madam Umbridge very polite."
"Oh, please," Williams said. "That's because you had, what? Three conversations with her, total? She was Hitler in high heels." At his skeptical look, she added, "The woman collected knickknacks: little ceramic kittens playing with yarn, adorable ragamuffin children and chubby, barefoot angels. She was straight-up evil, like the Martha Stewart, hand-knit doilies kind of evil. She made us sing carols at the Christmas party last year -- Victorian Christmas carols."
"I must have missed that," Percy mused. "I was rather drunk."
"I wish I'd been. Even now, one chorus of 'Angels We Have Heard on High' and I have to find a drink." She shook her head. “You know, there was a time when this honestly wouldn’t have bothered me that much. I would have done my job, taken the paycheck and then moved on. But now-" She looked at him and there was something in her face that he couldn’t quite read. “Now, I’m finding that my conscience is a little louder than it used to be. If this new client is mixed up in something illegal or even morally questionable, I’m not sure I can do it. But before I do anything, I want to be sure I’m not jumping to conclusions because of, well, recent events.”
“Recent events?”
She shrugged but that somehow significant look was still on her face. “We all learn our lessons in different ways, Weasley.” A pause. “I came to you because you- Well, anyway, you know people. You know better than I would who to talk to about something like this - like that Auror... Kingsley is his name, I think?” She paused. “Will you help me?"
"I'm not at all sure I'm the right person to be helping you with this. Surely there are proper channels you could go through-"
"Percy, please," she said, and he realized that it was quite possibly the first time she'd ever used his given name.
"All right, all right... Celia. I'll see what I can do." He paused for a moment, deep in thought. "Who's Martha Stewart?"
*
"I can't believe you get to go on holiday," Ron said, scuffing one foot across the bedroom floor and shoving his hands moodily into his pockets.
Ginny sighed, sweeping her hair care products from the vanity and into a knapsack. Hermione was on the far bed, reading, and Ron was leaned up against the wall near her feet.
"Let it drop, won't you?"
"Harry doesn't want you to go either," Ron said, as if Harry's name was supposed to be the magic word that would make her change her mind.
Ginny looked over at Harry, who was sitting cross-legged on her bed. He just frowned darkly and looked away, picking at the quilt with one hand.
"Well, if that's true, maybe he should tell me himself," she said, flinging a bottle of Bobble and Bubble's Magic (No, Really! It's *Magic*!) Hair Serum™ into her bag. "Not that it will change my mind. It's just that it might be nice to hear Harry say something for once instead of letting you two play puppeteer all the time."
"Let it go, Ron," Harry said, sounding distinctly put out at having to talk.
"He speaks!" Ginny said.
"You let it go, too," he replied, looking at her with an indecipherable expression on his face.
Ginny sighed again, even more heavily. "Well, I can't say I'll be too unhappy to leave the House of freaking Usher behind for a week. You guys are enough to make me want to brick myself up in the basement."
"That wasn't in The Fall of the House of Usher," Hermione said absently, not even bothering to look up from her book. "It was The Cask of Amontillado. Same author, though, and you get points for the literary reference."
"Whatever." Ginny went over to her side of the bureau and yanked out a drawer, dumping her bras and panties onto the bed in front of Harry. He recoiled just slightly, his face going pink.
"Ginny!" Ron said, scandalized.
"What are you guys? Five? Yes, I own underwear. Some of it is even sexy. Deal, or get out. I have to pack."
"You aren't taking the er- sexy underwear with you on this trip, are you?" Ron asked, looking suspicious.
"This is nothing," Ginny said, holding up a lacy but fairly tame camisole. "You should have seen what Hermione took with her to Bulgaria."
Hermione, at last, put her book down. Even Harry looked up, vaguely interested. Ron, on the other hand, was surprisingly quiet. In fact, he was biting down so hard on his lower lip that it was turning white.
How unusual.
Hermione sat up. "I did, in fact, buy a nice new set of silk pajamas for that trip, which Ginny helped me pick out. Not that it meant anything. My parents went with me, so the trip was hardly a romantic getaway."
"You went to Bulgaria?" Harry said. "Why didn't I know about this?"
Hermione looked puzzled. "I'm sure I told you." A pause. "Didn't I tell you?"
"No." Harry looked a little hurt. "You didn't tell me."
"I told Ron," she offered lamely. "That's almost the same thing."
"Sure," Harry said, with that horrible fake smile he pasted on whenever he was really cheesed off.
Ginny rolled her eyes. One of these days there was going to be serious badness, and she really, really hoped she wasn't there for it. At least she'd deflected attention away from her holiday plans, though -- which had kind of been the point. The fact that everyone she knew was repressed and evasive (and, in Harry's case at least, in need of serious psycho-therapy, STAT) was annoying as hell, but it did occasionally have its uses.
"Ginny," Hermione said in a painfully obvious attempt to change the subject, "are you going to take your black shoes with you? If you weren't, I thought I might borrow them."
"Black shoes?" Ginny echoed. While Ginny wasn't exactly able to afford as many pairs of shoes as most teenage girls, she still had a fairly impressive collection - and, frankly, she couldn't imagine Hermione in any of them.
"You know, the ones with the little buckles."
"Oh, sure." Ginny had gotten them for practically nothing at a second-hand clothing store on one of her trips to visit Percy. She fairly certain they were several years behind the current Muggle fashion, but in the wizarding world that didn't mean anything. People still wore robes and pointy hats, for heaven's sake. "Yeah, you can borrow those. I'm only taking sandals with me."
"Ginny is an amazing bargain hunter," Hermione continued, even though Ron looked bored and Harry was patently not listening. "I don't even really know much about clothes and I was impressed."
Ginny couldn't hide a smile. "Only out of necessity. I'd love to walk into Gladrags and buy the whole place."
"I think your way is more interesting. It shows your creativity."
"You know," Ginny said, feeling suddenly hugely generous, "you can borrow the skirt and tights that go with those shoes, if you'd like. They'd look nice with that little top you brought back from France."
Ron rolled his eyes. Harry still didn't say anything more, just continued to stare intently at the pattern on Ginny's quilt. But Hermione smiled, looking genuinely grateful, for the shoes and the change of topic.
*
"Here's the thing," Percy found himself saying to Kingsley over a plate of chips, "Celia thinks there's something untoward about this new place she's working. She doesn't want to involve anyone official because she hasn't much more than a hunch to go on. She wants my help but-" He sighed heavily. "I haven't the first idea where to begin."
"So you want my unofficial help?" Kingsley asked, taking a long drink of stout.
Percy was having iced tea. A week of living with Bailey had nearly put him off drink altogether.
He shrugged. "I'm not sure what I want; I'm not even sure why I said I'd help."
"Aren't you?" Kingsley said over the rim of his glass, sounding far too amused.
Percy pointedly ignored it.
"I'll see what I can do for you -- without attracting too much official attention, of course."
"Thank you," Percy said, relieved. "It's probably nothing, but it does seem important to her."
"And you just want to put her mind at ease, of course," Kingsley said, grinning again. "That's only natural."
"Remind me," Percy said frostily, "why we're friends exactly?"
"Aw, you need someone to liven things up a little for you. If not for me and Ginny, you'd probably still be lying in bed with the coverlet up over your head."
Percy very pointedly ignored that (largely because it was true), and said, "Yes, Ginny... I'm rather worried about her. We had a bit of a row yesterday."
"Over what?"
"This holiday of hers. I can't believe my parents are letting her go off by herself with some boy, even if it is Dean Thomas..." Percy trailed off at the expression on Kingsley's face.
"What holiday?" he said.
Percy swallowed. "You didn't know? She's gone off on two week's holiday with Thomas' family."
"Huh." Kingsley took a long drink. "Well, she didn't tell me."
"I did gather," Percy said, rather apologetically, "that it was a rather sudden decision."
Kingsley shrugged. "What are you so worried about, anyway? They're just kids."
"Well," Percy said, carefully, "I don't know about you, but I certainly remember what it was like to be a fifteen year old boy. Now, imagine yourself at fifteen on holiday with your girlfriend - your girlfriend in a bathing costume."
Kingsley's frown deepened. "If he tries anything, you realize, we'll have to kill him."
"Absolutely," Percy agreed.
*
The holiday turned out to be everything Ginny had hoped and then some. So, it was particularly irritating to discover that she couldn't stop thinking about Percy, or Harry, or Kingsley, or any of the rest of this mess they'd gotten themselves into.
"Is everything all right, Gin?" Dean asked. It was late afternoon and they were sprawled on the beach, making pictures out of colored sand and polished stones.
"Sure," Ginny said, blending azure and gold into the scales of the dragon Dean had just drawn.
"You've just seemed a bit distracted is all."
She smiled, propping her chin on one hand and tilting her head to look at him. "I'm sorry. Things at home… It's just difficult right now."
"I'm sorry, Ginny. I can't really imagine how that must be."
"It bites," she said succinctly. "Things are just a mess: with my brothers, with Harry, with my parents-" She shook her head. "There's nothing I can do about it, but I feel like I ought to try, you know?"
"I know," Dean said, smiling at her. "But you can't fix everything, Gin. No one expects you to."
"I just hate not being able to do anything."
"There's gotta be something," he said, reaching for a small jar of silver sand. "Even if it's just something that gets you out of the house and away from all the drama."
Ginny considered that a moment. "I've been thinking about asking Fred and George for a job. At least during the summer and on holidays, but Mum is still trying to adjust to the idea of them working there, let alone any of the rest of us."
"I haven't been to see the shop yet, but Seamus says it's wicked."
Ginny laughed. "Knowing the twins, it would almost have to be."
Dean grinned meaningfully. "They aren't the only Weasleys who are wicked."
Ginny raised an eyebrow. "Keep that up and I'll have to tell Ron you were talking about him..."
"Oh, very funny." Dean got up and offered her a hand, pulling her to her feet. "What would you say to another, uh, swim? You know, before the sun goes down?"
Ginny smiled up at him, squeezing his hand. "I'd say that sounds just about perfect."
*
Percy hadn't heard from Kingsley all week and had begun to worry that he hadn't found anything about Celia's employers.
He wasn't far wrong.
"Well, kid." Kingsley spread his hands. "I've got nothing. From all reports, Maxwell and Edison are pillars of the community - a little on the traditionalist side, but nothing radical. The client list is a little suspect, but again nothing obviously illegal, unless having distasteful opinions is against the law…"
“It’s likely only a matter of time on that front,” Percy murmured.
They were back at the same pub they'd met at before, only this time Kingsley was having iced tea, too. He'd met Bailey briefly at Percy's flat. Apparently, it had made an impression.
"Are you quite certain?” he continued. “Celia seemed so sure..."
Kingsley shrugged. "She could still be right, kid. I just can't find any proof one way or the other."
Percy sipped thoughtfully at his iced tea. "There must be some way to figure this out."
"There might be. Then again, there might not." Kingsley spread his hands. "There's no real harm in giving it a shot, but your, uh, friend may have to just resign in the end if it bothers her that much."
"I'd like to prevent that if I can," Percy said. "Being unemployed isn't pleasant, by any means."
“I know."
"The question, though," Percy said, picking idly at a relish plate on the table between them, "is how to help her?"
Kingsley grinned widely. "Well, you could always go undercover."
*
The next afternoon Percy found himself in the elegantly appointed reception area of Maxwell and Edison Political Consulting, holding a bouquet of pink daisies and asking politely whether Ms. Celia Williams was available for lunch.
"I'll check," the receptionist said. "One moment, please."
Percy took advantage of the pause to look around. The offices were housed in one of those converted loft spaces, redone in ultra-modern glass and chrome. Behind the reception desk a metal spiral staircase led to the upper loft where, he assumed, the offices were.
"Ms. Williams will be down in a moment," the receptionist said, putting an old-fashioned message container into a compressed-air tube. "Can I get you anything while you wait?"
"No, thanks," Percy said, and looked up in time to see Celia descending the spiral staircase. She'd cut her hair since he'd seen her last. It just barely grazed her shoulders, looking very sleek and professional. She wore a pair of designer glasses with gunmetal grey frames, even though Percy was fairly certain that she didn't need them to see. She looked very pretty, something Percy sternly reminded himself to stop noticing. He was here on business, after all. She also looked, he noticed, confused and not a little bit concerned.
"Percy," she said, keeping her voice very even as she came to stand beside him. "What are you doing here?"
"I thought I'd take you to lunch," Percy said, giving her a kiss on the cheek. Her face was almost as pink as the gerberas when he pulled away.
The receptionist gave Celia a knowing look, but wisely didn't say anything.
"Well, why don't you come on up to my office and we can figure out where to go. Unless you already had someplace in mind?" she asked, leading him up the stairs.
"I thought I'd let you pick." A pause. "Don't you want these?" He offered her the flowers.
Halfway up the steps, she turned back toward him and took the bouquet. Her cheeks flushed even darker.
"Come on then."
They walked through the high-ceilinged loft, threading their way through experimental office spaces and ergonomic chairs. The walls were lined with those same antique message tubes. Canisters shot through them occasionally with a soft swoosh. Celia had a small office in one corner, with glass walls that faced the rest of the office. It wasn't large, but she had a window overlooking the street and a very nice desk.
"What was that all about?" she asked once they were inside and she'd closed the door.
"I can't bring you flowers and take you out for expensive meals?" Percy asked innocently.
"You'd be more than welcome to, if you'd ever-" She stopped, folding her arms across her chest and regaining her composure with some difficulty. "What are you really here for?"
"If I'd ever what?" Percy asked, somewhat bemused, picking up a framed picture from her desk. It was a black and white photo of an attractive couple at the beach. It didn't move. "Your parents?"
"Yes." She took the photo from him and replaced it on the desk next to a grumpy-looking fighting fish in an oblong crystal bowl. "You still haven't answered my question."
"What do you think I'm here for?" he asked. "You wanted my help."
"I appreciate that, Percy," she said, flopping down into the chair behind her desk. "But I did think you'd at least warn me before you showed up to play detective."
"I just wanted to see the place," he said, feeling a bit defensive. "Get a feeling for it."
"Well…" She spread her hands. "This is it."
Percy looked around. For all intents and purposes, it was an everyday office complex, filled with desks and people hunched over them.
"And what did you plan to do once you'd seen the place?"
"This is- er, as far as I'd gotten."
Celia nearly broke into a smile at that, but just then a message canister dropped into the slot behind her desk. She opened it and her eyes widened.
"Oh, dear."
"What is it?"
She shook her head. "Mr. Edison? My boss? He wants to meet you."
"Why on earth?"
She stood, straightening her skirt and running a hand over her hair. "That's the question, isn't it? Oh, hell. What have I done?"
"Calm down." Percy walked over to her and put a hand on her shoulder. "We don't know anything yet. We'll just have to play it cool."
Celia just gave him a dark look and led the way out of her office and up to the executive suites on the third floor.
Edison was waiting for them on a wide mezzanine overlooking the office below. He was middle-aged, but still handsome, with salt-and-pepper hair and a smile clearly calculated to put people at ease.
It didn't work on Percy.
"Mr. Weasley," Edison said, extending a hand. "John Edison. Very nice to meet you at last."
Perplexed, Percy took his offered hand and shook it. "Nice to meet you as well. But how did you-"
Edison smiled. "I keep abreast of politics. You and Miss Williams were fairly visible members of the previous Minister's staff. We've been keeping an eye on you. So when Nancy mentioned that you were here, naturally-"
"Naturally," Percy echoed.
"I understand that you're still in the market for a position," Edison said, and Percy began to relax a little.
If that was all this was about, so much the better. Percy glanced sidelong at Celia and a little of the tension had left her face as well.
"I am, as a matter of fact."
"Good." Edison nodded. "You haven't settled for the first thing to come along. That shows an impressive amount of character, Mr. Weasley. Are you still considering politics as a career, or would you like to move on to something else?"
Percy shifted his weight from foot to foot, considering. "I enjoyed working in government, but I'm not sure I'd want to work directly for the Ministry again."
Edison nodded again, looking at Percy approvingly. He had the distinct feeling that he'd given Edison the answer he'd wanted to hear.
"Well, very nice to have met you," Percy said, taking Celia's hand. "We're on our way to lunch."
"We were just heading to lunch ourselves. Perhaps you'd both join us?" Edison said. "If it wouldn't be disrupting your plans, of course."
Percy squeezed her fingers and nodded. Celia smiled and accepted with the appearance of perfect calm, but tiny lines of tension remained around her eyes. She also didn't pull her hand away as they walked out of the building, something Percy kept telling himself was a sign of nerves.
Edison and another highly-placed member of the firm, a stern but attractive woman in her mid-thirties, took them to a vaguely Continental bistro tucked away on a side street. It was one of those places with cuisine that could only be described as 'fusion' and no prices on the wine list.
It was also certainly the nicest restaurant Percy had seen the inside of in a long while.
"You had quite the bright future, Mr. Weasley," Edison said as white wine was being poured. "It really was a shame."
"Thank you, sir."
"You and Miss Williams are exactly the sort of young people we're in need of in these unsettled times. Dedicated, loyal, and," he added, with emphasis, "forward-thinking. That's going to be a very important skill to have, and probably sooner than later."
"I'm afraid," Percy said, "that it hasn't been without some personal cost. There are days when I wonder-"
"Nonsense. Your position was all the more impressive given your family's somewhat... eccentric loyalties."
"I disagree with my parents, but I respect their right to their opinions..." Percy began carefully.
"Of course, of course, my boy," Edison said quickly. "We should always encourage the free exchange of ideas. Though, I must point out, that in these times we live in those ideas can often be dangerous."
Percy took a thoughtful sip of wine, considering carefully before he spoke, "And what would you recommend that we do when faced with such dangerous ideas?"
Edison smiled, and this time there was nothing reassuring about it at all. "Why, we find creative and persuasive ways to disseminate our point of view, of course."
Percy didn't doubt for a second that they were very good at it.
*
The whole thing was creepy. Edison was creepy, the firm was creepy, the clients were creepy, their methods were creepy.
It was also entirely possible that they weren't wrong.
That was the bit that kept sticking with Percy. It stuck with him through lunch, through his hurried goodbye to Celia, through teatime and all the way to dinner. He lay in bed thinking about it well into the night.
The world had become, in the past year or two, a very dangerous and unpredictable place. Was this really the time for the kind of divisiveness that his parents and Albus Dumbledore advocated? There was a very good argument for solidarity, no matter how it was achieved.
Still, it left Percy a little unsettled.
It was Saturday morning and Celia was camped out in his living room under a fleece throw. She'd shown up near sunrise, pale and apologetic and claiming she couldn't sleep. Percy had sent an owl off to Kingsley for help, determined to resolve the situation as soon as possible. Then he made tea and tucked Celia in on the sofa. She didn't fall asleep, though.
Percy curled up in a large club chair across from her with a mug of his own. "Don't you think you ought to try and sleep?"
She shook her head. "I'm sorry for waking you up. You can go back to bed if you want. I just- I just didn't want to be by myself."
"No, no. I'm fine," Percy said, trying unsuccessfully to stifle a wide yawn.
"I know it's silly, but- Well, I think I’m having a crisis of conscience." There was a long pause. “It’s a first for me, Percy. I’m pretty freaked out.”
"We've hardly found them guilty of anything more distasteful than manipulating public opinion -- and that's hardly new in political circles."
"That's true," she said slowly. "But the whole thing is still pretty unsettling for me."
"Look," he said, moving over to sit next to her, "after everything that's gone on lately, we're all looking for dark wizards everywhere. Just because you or I don't agree with their political methods, doesn't mean that they're evil."
"I suppose." Celia nodded slowly. "Maybe I did overreact."
"You don't have to agree with me, you know. You've asked my opinion and I offered it, but that doesn't mean I'm right."
She looked up, as if surprised. "I trust you, Percy. I trust your judgment."
That caught him off-guard. He laughed sharply before he could stop himself.
Celia sat up, putting her cup aside, and took hold of his arm. "I mean it. Why else would I have come to you about this? I have other friends, other people in my life, but no one else is like y-"
He shook his head. "Don't be silly, Celia."
"You always do that," she said, letting go of him. "Why do you do that?"
"What on earth are you talking about?" he said, moving away from her and straightening up.
"Exactly," she muttered, then, "You know, the firm wanted me to... But I can't imagine you would-"
"What is it?"
"They wanted me to speak with you about the possibility of accepting a position. Edison seemed to think you would be interested." She paused. "Are you?"
Percy paused, considering how best to answer. "I've been out of work a long time, Celia," he began, but was cut off by a knock at the door.
"Kingsley." Percy opened the door and blinked. "I didn't mean that you had to come right away."
"I'm used to the crazy hours," he said, walking into the flat. "It's an occupational hazard."
"I never would have imposed on you at this hour if I'd thought you'd-"
"Forget it, kid." Then catching sight of Celia, he said, "Well, hello there."
"Kingsley," Percy said, warningly, and gestured toward a chair.
Kingsley sat, but couldn't quite get rid of his knowing grin. "So," he said, finally attending to the matter at hand. "What did you want to see me for? You finally want to go get the bad guys?"
"Not quite. I want proof, one way or the other. All I know for sure right now is that Celia doesn't like the way Maxwell and Edison conduct their business."
"You ever seen Maxwell?" Kingsley asked Celia.
"No. The word around the office is that he's a bit of a silent partner."
Kingsley looked thoughtful. "That's what I've been hearing, too. It makes me wonder if maybe he's the one we ought to be concentrating on."
"He keeps an office there," Percy said. "I thought we might take a look at what he keeps in it."
Kingsley looked impressed. "That's one way to get the job done. Go right to the source. I'm in. When do we go?"
"Tonight," Percy said.
"Percy, are you sure?" Celia asked. "I don't want you to put yourself in danger-"
"Aw," Kingsley said, clearly enjoying himself. "Danger is Percy's middle name."
To her credit, Celia just gave him a look.
"No one has a sense of humor in the morning." He stood. "Okay, kid, you give me details; I'll get what we need to do this right. You're sure this is how you want to do it?"
"Absolutely."
"Okay. Nice to finally meet you, by the way," he said to Celia, smiling and showing far too many teeth.
Percy cleared his throat. "If you don't mind."
Kingsley turned that grin on Percy and all but winked. "Not at all, kid. See you later."
*
Breaking in should have been hard, but apparently Kingsley was better at this sort of thing than he had any reason to be.
"I thought," Percy whispered softly, holding his lit wand close to the lock on the door to Maxwell's office, "that Aurors were supposed to be on the right side of the law."
"Desperate times, kid," Kingsley said, and the lock came open with a soft sigh.
"There's another kind?" Percy shook his head. "Besides, shouldn't you at least be saying something like, 'I can't believe you talked me into this'?"
Kingsley chuckled. "Nah. I can totally believe you talked me in to this. What I can't believe is that you came up with this plan in the first place. You must really like that girl."
Percy shot a frosty look at the back of Kingsley's head as they slipped into the office, but didn't say anything.
"You take the file cabinet. I'll try the safe," Kingsley said, closing the door quietly behind them.
Percy worked his way quickly through the first set of files, then the second, but didn't find anything. Kingsley had the safe open in record time, pulling papers out and scanning though them.
A few minutes later, Percy straightened up with a groan. "This was a spectacularly bad idea. I should have known they wouldn't be stupid enough to leave something incriminating just lying aro-"
"I think I just found something," Kingsley said, dropping a roll of parchment to the desk and leaning over it with his wand.
"What is it?" Percy joined him at the desk.
"A list of names- Oh, man. This is bad." Kingsley shook his head.
"Let me see," Percy said, reaching for the parchment, but Kingsley swept it away.
"Uh-uh, kid. Sorry, but I can't let you. These people are already compromised enough."
Percy went cold. "You don't trust me. I can't believe it."
"It's not that," Kingsley said softly, sounding genuinely sorry. "This is a fuck-up of gigantic proportions. I’m just doing some damage control. No one sees this list but Dumbledore. Let's look around, though, and see if there's anything else in here."
"Are you sure you trust me to look?" Percy bit out.
Kingsley sighed heavily. "Do not take this personally, Percy. It's not about you. It wouldn't matter who you were. I wouldn't let Ginny see it, either."
“If you say so,” Percy sniffed and began flipping through a ledger on the desk. “Well, this is odd…”
“What’s odd?”
“This…” He indicated a column in one of the ledger sheets.
“You’re going to have to be a little more specific than that.”
“I would have thought it was obvious…” Kingsley gave him a very dark look, and Percy amended, “I mean, there are two sets of numbers here. One appears to be the ‘official’ financial records, and the other the real tally. The real books have a suspicious number of outgoing payments to individuals not on the firm’s official payroll…”
“Bribes?”
“Very likely.”
Kingsley grinned at him. “Nice work, kid. I wouldn’t have picked up on that.”
Percy closed the book and picked it up to take it with them.
“Leave it here. We’re here illeg- unofficially, that is. Anything we discover tonight is useless as evidence. We’re just here to get an idea of where to start looking officially.”
“All right.” Percy returned the ledger to its place, and busied himself rummaging through Maxwell's desk drawers. At the bottom of one wide drawer he found a stack of photos with another list of names attached. Percy flipped briefly through the photos. They looked like surveillance, pictures of men and women in various offices and shops, going about their daily business. Percy scanned down the list, not recognizing any of the names until he got near the bottom. Then, one name made him stop.
Weasley, Arthur
He flipped to the bottom of the stack of photos until he found them: pictures of The Burrow, of his mother, of Ginny...
"Oh my God," Percy said, dropping the file back into the drawer.
"What?" Kingsley was at his elbow in an instant. He snatched up the photos and began looking through them.
"Does that mean what I think it means?" Percy asked.
"No," Kingsley said firmly. "We don't know what it means. We don't know whether there's any real danger-"
"Except for the people who've been stalking my family, of course," Percy snapped, moving toward the door and pulling his wand from his belt.
Kingsley looked up sharply. "Now, don't run off and do something stu-"
But Percy was already gone.
*
The fact that he managed to make it to the Burrow without leaving pieces of himself in Maxwell's office was nothing short of a miracle.
He stumbled through to the kitchen in the dark. There was no fire in the hearth, no light anywhere.
The house was empty, deserted. Dead.
Abruptly Percy found that he couldn't breathe. "Mum! Dad!" He ran through the kitchen and up the back stairs. "Ginny!"
But Ginny wouldn't have been here, he told himself. She was on holiday with her boyfriend. Maybe the others were gone as well. He needed to calm down. But the house didn't just feel empty; it felt abandoned. The air was stale and heavy with dust. It felt as though its occupants were never coming back and everything in the house knew it, including him.
His hands began to shake. He sat down on the landing, pressed his knees together and tried to catch his breath.
"Think, think, think," he murmured. He had to go about this logically.
The funny thing about logic, though, was that it did very little to stop him from panicking. Because logic very clearly indicated that his family was gone, vanished into the night like a story from Percy's childhood, and he was too late to do anyone any good, as usual.
Ginny was going to be so disappointed in him. How on earth was he going to tell her?
He walked numbly back down to the kitchen and sat at the table, dropping his head to his hands.
"They aren't here," a familiar voice came from the doorway. Kingsley walked over and sat beside him at the table. "I could have told you that if you'd stuck around and listened to me instead of running off half-cocked."
"Where are they then?" At Kingsley's words, a little of the feeling began to come back in to Percy's limbs.
"I can't tell you that, kid. They're safe where they are, though."
"Did they know they were being watched? Is that why they left?"
Kingsley shook his head. "Nah, but something like this wasn't entirely unexpected either." He paused. "We're going to have to warn the other people on that list, though."
"Why didn't you tell me they weren't here?"
"I said, you left so quickly-"
Percy cut him off. "Before that. Why didn't anyone tell me?"
Kingsley sighed deeply. "Are you sure you want the honest answer to that?"
Percy flushed and opened his mouth to retort, but Kingsley was speaking again.
"Besides, kid, it wasn't my secret to tell - very literally. I could tell you that your family left the Burrow, but not where they went. Almost no one could tell you that."
"Almost no one?"
"One person, really. But that doesn't matter much now." Kingsley folded his hands on the table in front of him. "You may not like it, Percy, but you're going to have to prove yourself. You're going to have to be better and more honest than anyone else if you want your family to trust you again."
"It's not as though I betrayed them to Voldemort, you know," Percy snapped. "I hardly think it's the same thing."
"No, it isn't, and that's why you and I are sitting here. That's why I helped Ginny drag your sorry drunk carcass home two months ago instead of letting you drown yourself in a whiskey bottle. You're a good kid and you just picked the wrong people to trust. You certainly aren't the first." He paused. "But all the same, your family can't trust you. You're going to have to work at it if you want them to. You can't, Percy, take the easy way out on this one."
"What if I don't care whether they trust me again?"
"If that's true, then why are you here?"
"Wanting them to be safe isn't the same as wanting them in my life again."
"Well, yeah. Okay, that's true. But you care, kid, and that does mean something."
"Of course it does. It just might not mean what you think it does."
Kingsley watched him for a long moment, considering. "There is something you want, though. You'd better figure out what it is, kid, and quick. You may be running out of time."
*
On Monday, Ginny turned up Percy's flat, looking very tanned, very relaxed and demanding jam doughnuts.
"And proper coffee," she said, standing in the doorway and crossing her arms. "Not that weak-willed white swill you try to pass off as the real thing. Get your wallet, I'm starving to death while you sit there like a moron."
Percy did as she said without a word.
He didn't actually speak until they were seated in the bakery, a tray of warm, fresh doughnuts between them while Ginny inhaled her coffee with almost pornographic glee. She'd prattled the entire way down the block, chatting gaily about her swimming holiday and how wonderful Dean was, how wonderful his parents were and how wonderful the entire world was. Their row from the week before, apparently, had been conveniently forgotten thanks to a week of sun and saltwater and getting her own way.
She stopped, just long enough to take a deep swallow of coffee and said, "What is the matter with you, Percy? I've seen corpses livelier than you are today." She paused, then grinned. "Then again, I suppose you have, too."
Percy ignored the joke. "Did you ever plan on telling me that the family had left home?"
"What?"
"You've left The Burrow. I know you have, because I went there."
Ginny dropped her coffee cup to the table with a dull thunk. "Oh." Her eyes widened. "Oh. You went there? Why on earth?"
"That hardly matters now. I just- Everything was empty and-" He took a breath. "I thought..."
Ginny went very pale. "Oh, Percy… No. We're just...staying somewhere else."
"Ah, I see."
"It's only temporary. I didn't mean to-" She faltered, looking upset. "If I could have told you... No, that's a lie. I wouldn't have told you." She shook her head. "All I can say is, I'm sorry."
"Of course," he said coldly.
"Stop that! Don't act like that!" She looked down into her empty cup for a long moment. "You were really worried about us?"
"Yes, Ginny, I was. Not that it matters now."
"Of course it matters. Honestly, you can be such a tool sometimes." She bit viciously into a doughnut, jam squirting everywhere. She blinked rapidly, and if he hadn't known better he'd have sworn she was on the verge of tears.
"Ginny," he said, softening. "I didn't mean-"
"I am sorry," she said, reaching out and squeezing his hand for just a moment.
"So am I," he replied, and bought her another cup of coffee.
*
Celia showed up at his flat the next morning and Percy began to suspect that he would never be allowed to sleep in again.
"Well, I've given notice. I'm back in the ranks of the unemployed." She flung herself onto the sofa. "Not a moment too soon; there's to be an official inquiry into the firm’s financial dealings. I don't suppose you know anything about that?"
"Kingsley may have mentioned something."
"Well, hell." She pulled the fleece blanket - which she’d apparently claimed for her own at some point - up over her legs and said, "My gut was right. I guess should be pleased, but-"
"I know, Celia," Percy said, padding over to the sofa in his robe and slippers to bring her a cup of strong tea. "It's difficult."
She looked up at him and managed a shaky smile. "We did the right thing, I know we did." She paused and took an uneven breath. "It still sucks."
Bailey the Moral Object Lesson on the Dangers of Alcohol hooted sympathetically from his perch.
Celia craned her head around to look at him. "Where did this little fellow come from? He's precious!"
"He's a friend of Bill W.," Percy muttered.
"What?"
"He's a post owl," Percy said. "Or at least, he was. He got the sack the same as you and I. I guess I felt a bit sorry for him."
"That is incredibly sweet. I never would have imagined you had it in you."
Percy was trying to decide just how to take that, when Bailey sailed over and deposited himself in Celia's lap.
"Oh, what a darling. He's perfect, Percy. I've always wanted one of these."
"You don't have an owl?" Percy asked, surprised that he'd never noticed before.
"My mother is, shall we say, less than fond of animals. I've never had so much as a toad."
"That's awful," Percy said, grabbing his own cup of tea and joining her. "Hermes was the best thing that could have happened to me at Hogwarts. Owls are very useful and incredibly loyal."
Bailey cuddled up against Celia's elbow, cooing contentedly.
"I think he prefers women," Percy observed. "He likes Ginny a lot, too." An idea struck him. "If you haven't got an owl already, why don't you take Bailey?"
"Really?" Celia said. "You wouldn't mind?"
"Not at all. I already have Hermes, and I really only took Bailey because no one else wanted him-"
Bailey's little head popped up and he made an indignant sound.
"It's true and you know it," Percy said. "Just be glad I took pity on you." He paused for a moment. "There is one thing, though."
Celia looked up questioningly.
"He has… Er, that is to say, he's a bit of a…" Percy swallowed hard. "He hits the sauce a bit, I'm afraid. That's what got him bounced out of the owl post."
Celia laughed suddenly. "Really? A drunk owl? I've never heard of such a thing."
"He's rather fond of Tuaca, if he can get it," Percy continued seriously. "Any of the sweeter liqueurs, really. Though not crème de banane, for some reason."
Celia laughed again, looking at Percy like he'd just given her a diamond or some equally expensive and impressive present.
"Perhaps he just doesn't like bananas?" She patted Bailey on the head. "What do you say, Monsieur Bailey? Do you not fancy the syrup of the banana? It is very good for the digestion, you know."
Percy just shook his head.
There was an extended pause. Percy looked up to find Celia watching him; Bailey nestled in the crook of one arm. She smiled when their eyes met.
"What is it?"
"You're-" She paused and smiled again. His breath caught. "You're very surprising sometimes, Percy."
"It's just an owl-"
"Nonsense. It's a lovely gesture. Thank you."
She looked down at the top of Bailey's head, and suddenly Percy found that he couldn't look away. But, he reminded himself, swallowing around the bitter lump that had suddenly lodged itself in his throat, she thought he was a good person. She said she trusted him, of all the ridiculous things for her to do... He wasn't trustworthy and he wasn't good, and the sooner she realized it, the better.
"You're looking at me funny," she said, looking up after a moment.
"Was I?" He paused, took a breath and said, "Celia, I think you should know- I considered that offer from Edison. Seriously."
"I know you did." She seemed utterly unconcerned by the fact. "I would have been surprised if you hadn't."
"And it doesn't bother you?"
She just shrugged.
"You told me the other day- You said you trusted me. Does knowing this change that?"
"No. Would you expect it to?" She leaned in and put her free hand on his knee. "Percy, you don't owe me anything, certainly not an explanation. You may not always be right, but you're honest. You don't lie."
"I suppose I don't."
"You don't," she said, pushing the blanket aside and standing up. "You'd be terrible at it. You're honest to a fault." Bailey hopped onto her outstretched arm and scrabbled his way up to her shoulder. "I'm not surprised that you considered the offer. I would have been very surprised if you'd accepted, though. You're cautious and pragmatic. You're also ambitious, but not to the point where you would sacrifice your principles."
"Perhaps not," Percy said, not entirely convinced himself.
"You wouldn't," Celia said firmly. "I don't have nearly that kind of conviction. Sometimes I wish I did."
"Only sometimes?" Percy said, smiling slightly and attempting to change the subject.
"Only sometimes," she agreed seriously. "If it were me, I'd never have stood up to my family the way you did."
Percy paused for a long moment. "What if it was the wrong thing to do? What if I was wrong, and I did it anyway?"
"Did you think it was wrong at the time?"
"No."
"Then at least you know that you followed your conscience."
"For selfish reasons."
Celia snorted. "Doesn't everyone? Deep down? It's all selfish on some level." She leaned down to him again. "Stop punishing yourself, Percy. Did you mess up? Maybe. The real question is, have you learned from it?"
She kissed him softly on the cheek and headed for the door.
"Celia-"
She stopped, but didn't turn around.
"Thank you."
"No problem," she said, and shut the door behind her.
Continued in Episode 5, Somewhere in Between
Next time on Percy Weasley: Rogue Demon Hunter...
"And what exactly makes you think that Adelaide Longbottom will have any interest in helping me?"
Kingsley grinned. "Call it a hunch."
"You'll have to forgive me if I don't put much faith in hunches anymore," Percy said huffily, turning away.
Kingsley brought one massive hand down on his shoulder. "She'll help you, kid. She's in thick with Dumbledore."
"And this was his idea?"
Kingsley shrugged noncommittally.
Percy folded his arms across his chest. "I don't appreciate being manipulated, Kingsley."
"Yeah, well, welcome to the side of good. It's all vague pronouncements and half-baked prophecies and ask questions later. None of us are operating with full disclosure."
"No wonder evil kicks your arse so often, then."
Summary: It's the summer after OotP, and Percy Weasley is a man without a mission.
(Thanks to hermione_like for the beta, and to lizbee for the fanart. Go tell her you love it, especially if you love Kingsley.)
Episode 4, The Long Way Back
As the month of August dawned (bringing with it Day #37 of Percy's Unemployment and General Uselessness -- not, of course, that he had been keeping track), Percy had to concede that he was roughly zero for four with regard to employment prospects. He was not, it would appear, cut out to sell wands or sing torch songs. His stint as a Ministry personal assistant had been, needless to say, short and disastrous.
Nor, apparently, was he fitted to the position of a chartered accountant.
Looking around the offices of Giles, Gil and Trout Accountancy Ltd. Percy forced himself to pay attention to what his interviewer -- one Mr. Gil -- was saying.
"Can I have Jill get you some tea?"
"Oh, no thank you," Percy said, smiling politely at the rather ordinary-looking secretary hovering by the door.
The entire office was beige and bland, without so much as one piece of art on the walls. There were no windows. Even the accountants themselves seemed beige: their robes, their smiles, their voices were all bland and vaguely khaki-toned.
Gil sat down, folding his hands atop his balsa and parchment blotter. "Do you have any experience in accountancy, Mr. Weasley?"
"Well, no," Percy managed. "Not as such."
"I see. Hmm." Gil rearranged some papers on his desk, peering at them through his spectacles. "And yet Waggley, Nystram and Nystram seemed to think you fit for the position... Their opinion is not inconsiderable, to say the least." He took a long drink of coffee from a cream-colored porcelain mug emblazoned with the firm's tan logo. "I must confess, though: you're a bit on the animated side, Mr. Weasley. Compared to most of our staff... Well, thrill-seekers such as yourself often find accountancy a difficult transition to make."
Percy just stared at him, trying to decide whether it would be wildly inappropriate to begin laughing. Thrill-seeker?
"Well," Percy said, feigning a coughing fit in an attempt to recover himself, "I suppose I have to concede the point. Perhaps -- Waggley, Nystram and Nystram aside, of course -- it's not a particularly good fit for me."
He stood, and Gil followed suit.
"Thank you very much for the opportunity to come in and discuss the position with you, though." Percy extended a hand, and the two shook.
"I'll just have Jill show you out."
On the way back to the lobby, Percy walked past row after row of tweedy, beige cubicles. One of the cubicles' occupants knocked a paperclip to the floor. The impact echoed loudly in the complete silence of the office.
"Do you like working here?" Percy asked Jill the secretary, for want of anything else to say.
One side of her mouth quirked up just slightly, the first sign of animation he'd seen from anyone in the place all morning.
"What do you think, Mr. Weasley? Just be thankful you dodged this particular bullet." She opened the door for him, letting the morning sun stream into the florescent lighting and recycled air.
When he got home he was going to burn his career assessment and dance atop the ashes of the parchment.
*
Bailey the borderline alcoholic owl had taken up residence in Percy's flat. When Percy tried to return him to the owl post office, the postmistress had laughed for a full five minutes and refused to take him back.
"Always drunk, that one," she said, leveling an accusatory finger at his tiny beak. "Not worth the price of his feed. You keep him."
Not knowing quite what else to do, Percy had taken Bailey home with him. Hermes, needless to say, loathed the little owl on sight.
The two owls were staring at one another with uncomfortable intensity across Percy's kitchen table when he returned to his flat.
"None of that now," he said mildly, separating the two with a gentle but firm hand and pulling a packet of owl treats down from the cupboard. Both owls crowded in close to him as he sat, jostling slightly with their wings. Percy sighed and gave each a carefully equal portion of the treats.
"Of course," he said aloud, "if I don't find a new situation soon, I won't be able to afford to feed two owls - or myself."
Bailey's little head popped up abruptly and the owl hooted softly. Hermes looked up with an expression of cool concern.
"I'm just saying." Percy shrugged. "You two could pitch in a bit more."
As Percy was making a pot of tea, a knock came at the door. Without waiting for a response, Ginny bounced in, pink-cheeked and looking insufferably cheerful about something. She was humming. Percy put a hand to his head.
"Good morning, Percy," she said. "I've been having the best day so far. Of course, I had to sneak out of the house. Mum is being abominable after Neville's party, which was completely not my fault, as she told me I could go, unlike some people who are still blaming me for getting caught-"
"Ginny-" Percy began.
"Oh, I know," she said, helping herself to a cup and pouring milk carelessly into it. "You want to be alone with your manly man-pain, but I'm in too good a mood to let you get away with that. Plus, I brought you biscuits." She dug into her satchel and tossed him a tin of high-end lemon-ginger frosted biscuits.
Percy blinked. "Well, thank you, Ginny. That was very thoughtful of you."
Bemused, he got a plate from the sideboard and began arranging biscuits on it. Bailey fluttered over and landed on Percy's shoulder, hooting hopefully at the prospect of more food.
"Oh, what a sweet little owl!" Ginny stood and plucked him from Percy's shoulder. Bailey gazed blearily up at her and hiccupped.
"Is he drunk?" Ginny asked, wrinkling her nose.
"Very possibly."
She sat down at the table, pouring herself some tea, Bailey still cupped in her free hand.
"See here, little fellow," she said, picking up a spoon. "Everybody likes a drink or two, but it's not even mid-morning yet. That's just bad form."
Bailey just cooed and nipped at her thumb. Percy sat back down, opening a day-old copy of The Daily Prophet he'd managed to steal from Giles, Gil and Trout's lobby on his way in.
Ginny reached for the sugar, but Percy was faster. He slid it just out of her reach without bothering to look up from his paper.
"I think perhaps you've already had enough sugar for one day."
Ginny rolled her eyes and swatted at his hand, finally claiming the sugar bowl after a brief but pitched struggle. "I'm not hyper, Percy. I'm happy. I know you aren't particularly familiar with that emotional state, but most normal people are occasionally happy. Some of us are even happy a lot of the time."
"Is that meant to imply that you're normal?"
Ginny snorted and ignored the bait. "Honestly, Percy. You're going to have to get over it sometime. It's hardly as though the world's ending." She paused. "At least, not yet."
Sitting in her cupped hands, Bailey hiccupped again, looking up at her -- clearly besotted. Typical. Like just about every other male who got within ten feet of Ginny these days. Frankly, Percy was surprised their parents even let her out of the house.
Then again, it wouldn't be the first time they hadn't noticed something right in front of them.
"So," Percy said, attempting to change the subject, "since you're obviously dying to tell me, why are you happy?"
Ginny took a dramatically deep breath, and Percy was put in mind of her as a small girl. Back then she'd been chatty and excitable and a touch mischievous. That girl had been conspicuous by her absence the past few years, something Percy put down to the aftermath from Ginny's first year of school. He was, in a very private part of his heart that he would likely never share, quite happy and relieved to see glimpses of her again.
"I am going on holiday," she said, "and not one second too soon. This summer blows."
"It, er, blows?"
"Goats," Ginny confirmed, with an emphatic nod.
"There's an Aberforth Dumbledore joke in there somewhere," Percy said mildly, taking a sip of tea, "but we are in mixed company, after all."
Ginny snorted loudly, shaking her head and dumping Bailey unceremoniously onto the tabletop. "See, I knew there was a sense of humor hidden in you somewhere."
"So, where are you all going on holiday?"
"Not everyone, Percy. Just me. Dean's family is taking us to the shore." She stood, fetching the tin of biscuits and adding a few more to the plate.
"Are you sure that's such a good idea, Ginny?"
She took a step back, looking surprised. "Well, Mum and Dad haven't any problem with it, so I'm not sure why you should. Besides, I think they're just relieved to have me off with Muggles and out of direct danger for a week or two."
"But alone, with a boy-"
"Percy…" she began.
"Ginny," he said, warningly. "I simply can't believe our parents are allowing you to go off with some boy on holiday-"
"His parents are going to be there, you know."
Percy continued as though he hadn't heard her. "It is thoroughly inappropriate at your age-"
"Unlike, say, snogging your girlfriend in a disused classroom at fifteen, which is completely appropriate," she snapped, finally appearing to lose her temper.
Percy felt himself flush red. "That is totally different. You are my younger sister and a- and a-" He floundered around for the right word. "And a girl!"
"Oh, that's nice," Ginny sniffed and flounced out.
She slammed the door. She hadn't done that in over a month. It was, Percy knew, a very bad sign. But in his current mood, he didn't much care. He got up, walked to the door and slid the bolt home. That would show her.
Ten minutes later someone banged on the door, causing him to start and spill his tea all over the kitchen counter.
"Damn it all, Ginny!" he said, rubbing a towel over his hands and heading toward the door. "If you're going to behave like a child, you'd best go and do so elsewhere. I'm not in a mood to humor you!"
"Weasley?" Celia Williams' voice came from the other side of the door, and Percy cursed himself for a fool.
He opened the door. "Williams, I'm so sorry. I thought you were someone-" He stopped, catching sight of her face. "Is something wrong?"
"I need your help."
He moved aside and gestured her into the flat. "It's nothing serious, I hope? Can I get you some tea?"
"No." She shook her head and let him lead her to a seat on the sofa. "I feel so silly. It's just- I took this morning off because I needed to figure some things out. I haven't gotten anywhere, and then I thought about you and-"
Percy was completely discomfited. "Perhaps," he said slowly," you ought to start from the beginning."
She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. Her cheeks were slightly flushed, and she really did look very upset. "It's this new job of mine."
"Things aren't going well?"
"Oh, they've gone wonderfully. I've been very successful so far. They've consistently given me intriguing projects and more responsibility, the work environment is very positive, and the benefits-"
It sounded, quite frankly, like a little slice of heaven. Percy was trying very, very hard not to burst with jealousy. It was a close thing. "And the problem is?" he asked, managing somehow not to visibly salivate at the mention of the word 'benefits.'
“My gut.”
“Your gut?”
“I know it probably sounds silly, but I generally trust my instincts and right now my instincts are telling me that something is very wrong. Everything was fine until this week. We’ve taken on a new client, some American outfit - which is suspect in itself - and now there's talk about special projects, top secret stuff. I did a little digging, and these Americans… The things they’ve done and the people they generally represent, even on paper - not the even the stuff they’ve bothered to hide… Well, they make Dolores Umbridge look positively cuddly."
Percy raised an eyebrow. "I always found Madam Umbridge very polite."
"Oh, please," Williams said. "That's because you had, what? Three conversations with her, total? She was Hitler in high heels." At his skeptical look, she added, "The woman collected knickknacks: little ceramic kittens playing with yarn, adorable ragamuffin children and chubby, barefoot angels. She was straight-up evil, like the Martha Stewart, hand-knit doilies kind of evil. She made us sing carols at the Christmas party last year -- Victorian Christmas carols."
"I must have missed that," Percy mused. "I was rather drunk."
"I wish I'd been. Even now, one chorus of 'Angels We Have Heard on High' and I have to find a drink." She shook her head. “You know, there was a time when this honestly wouldn’t have bothered me that much. I would have done my job, taken the paycheck and then moved on. But now-" She looked at him and there was something in her face that he couldn’t quite read. “Now, I’m finding that my conscience is a little louder than it used to be. If this new client is mixed up in something illegal or even morally questionable, I’m not sure I can do it. But before I do anything, I want to be sure I’m not jumping to conclusions because of, well, recent events.”
“Recent events?”
She shrugged but that somehow significant look was still on her face. “We all learn our lessons in different ways, Weasley.” A pause. “I came to you because you- Well, anyway, you know people. You know better than I would who to talk to about something like this - like that Auror... Kingsley is his name, I think?” She paused. “Will you help me?"
"I'm not at all sure I'm the right person to be helping you with this. Surely there are proper channels you could go through-"
"Percy, please," she said, and he realized that it was quite possibly the first time she'd ever used his given name.
"All right, all right... Celia. I'll see what I can do." He paused for a moment, deep in thought. "Who's Martha Stewart?"
*
"I can't believe you get to go on holiday," Ron said, scuffing one foot across the bedroom floor and shoving his hands moodily into his pockets.
Ginny sighed, sweeping her hair care products from the vanity and into a knapsack. Hermione was on the far bed, reading, and Ron was leaned up against the wall near her feet.
"Let it drop, won't you?"
"Harry doesn't want you to go either," Ron said, as if Harry's name was supposed to be the magic word that would make her change her mind.
Ginny looked over at Harry, who was sitting cross-legged on her bed. He just frowned darkly and looked away, picking at the quilt with one hand.
"Well, if that's true, maybe he should tell me himself," she said, flinging a bottle of Bobble and Bubble's Magic (No, Really! It's *Magic*!) Hair Serum™ into her bag. "Not that it will change my mind. It's just that it might be nice to hear Harry say something for once instead of letting you two play puppeteer all the time."
"Let it go, Ron," Harry said, sounding distinctly put out at having to talk.
"He speaks!" Ginny said.
"You let it go, too," he replied, looking at her with an indecipherable expression on his face.
Ginny sighed again, even more heavily. "Well, I can't say I'll be too unhappy to leave the House of freaking Usher behind for a week. You guys are enough to make me want to brick myself up in the basement."
"That wasn't in The Fall of the House of Usher," Hermione said absently, not even bothering to look up from her book. "It was The Cask of Amontillado. Same author, though, and you get points for the literary reference."
"Whatever." Ginny went over to her side of the bureau and yanked out a drawer, dumping her bras and panties onto the bed in front of Harry. He recoiled just slightly, his face going pink.
"Ginny!" Ron said, scandalized.
"What are you guys? Five? Yes, I own underwear. Some of it is even sexy. Deal, or get out. I have to pack."
"You aren't taking the er- sexy underwear with you on this trip, are you?" Ron asked, looking suspicious.
"This is nothing," Ginny said, holding up a lacy but fairly tame camisole. "You should have seen what Hermione took with her to Bulgaria."
Hermione, at last, put her book down. Even Harry looked up, vaguely interested. Ron, on the other hand, was surprisingly quiet. In fact, he was biting down so hard on his lower lip that it was turning white.
How unusual.
Hermione sat up. "I did, in fact, buy a nice new set of silk pajamas for that trip, which Ginny helped me pick out. Not that it meant anything. My parents went with me, so the trip was hardly a romantic getaway."
"You went to Bulgaria?" Harry said. "Why didn't I know about this?"
Hermione looked puzzled. "I'm sure I told you." A pause. "Didn't I tell you?"
"No." Harry looked a little hurt. "You didn't tell me."
"I told Ron," she offered lamely. "That's almost the same thing."
"Sure," Harry said, with that horrible fake smile he pasted on whenever he was really cheesed off.
Ginny rolled her eyes. One of these days there was going to be serious badness, and she really, really hoped she wasn't there for it. At least she'd deflected attention away from her holiday plans, though -- which had kind of been the point. The fact that everyone she knew was repressed and evasive (and, in Harry's case at least, in need of serious psycho-therapy, STAT) was annoying as hell, but it did occasionally have its uses.
"Ginny," Hermione said in a painfully obvious attempt to change the subject, "are you going to take your black shoes with you? If you weren't, I thought I might borrow them."
"Black shoes?" Ginny echoed. While Ginny wasn't exactly able to afford as many pairs of shoes as most teenage girls, she still had a fairly impressive collection - and, frankly, she couldn't imagine Hermione in any of them.
"You know, the ones with the little buckles."
"Oh, sure." Ginny had gotten them for practically nothing at a second-hand clothing store on one of her trips to visit Percy. She fairly certain they were several years behind the current Muggle fashion, but in the wizarding world that didn't mean anything. People still wore robes and pointy hats, for heaven's sake. "Yeah, you can borrow those. I'm only taking sandals with me."
"Ginny is an amazing bargain hunter," Hermione continued, even though Ron looked bored and Harry was patently not listening. "I don't even really know much about clothes and I was impressed."
Ginny couldn't hide a smile. "Only out of necessity. I'd love to walk into Gladrags and buy the whole place."
"I think your way is more interesting. It shows your creativity."
"You know," Ginny said, feeling suddenly hugely generous, "you can borrow the skirt and tights that go with those shoes, if you'd like. They'd look nice with that little top you brought back from France."
Ron rolled his eyes. Harry still didn't say anything more, just continued to stare intently at the pattern on Ginny's quilt. But Hermione smiled, looking genuinely grateful, for the shoes and the change of topic.
*
"Here's the thing," Percy found himself saying to Kingsley over a plate of chips, "Celia thinks there's something untoward about this new place she's working. She doesn't want to involve anyone official because she hasn't much more than a hunch to go on. She wants my help but-" He sighed heavily. "I haven't the first idea where to begin."
"So you want my unofficial help?" Kingsley asked, taking a long drink of stout.
Percy was having iced tea. A week of living with Bailey had nearly put him off drink altogether.
He shrugged. "I'm not sure what I want; I'm not even sure why I said I'd help."
"Aren't you?" Kingsley said over the rim of his glass, sounding far too amused.
Percy pointedly ignored it.
"I'll see what I can do for you -- without attracting too much official attention, of course."
"Thank you," Percy said, relieved. "It's probably nothing, but it does seem important to her."
"And you just want to put her mind at ease, of course," Kingsley said, grinning again. "That's only natural."
"Remind me," Percy said frostily, "why we're friends exactly?"
"Aw, you need someone to liven things up a little for you. If not for me and Ginny, you'd probably still be lying in bed with the coverlet up over your head."
Percy very pointedly ignored that (largely because it was true), and said, "Yes, Ginny... I'm rather worried about her. We had a bit of a row yesterday."
"Over what?"
"This holiday of hers. I can't believe my parents are letting her go off by herself with some boy, even if it is Dean Thomas..." Percy trailed off at the expression on Kingsley's face.
"What holiday?" he said.
Percy swallowed. "You didn't know? She's gone off on two week's holiday with Thomas' family."
"Huh." Kingsley took a long drink. "Well, she didn't tell me."
"I did gather," Percy said, rather apologetically, "that it was a rather sudden decision."
Kingsley shrugged. "What are you so worried about, anyway? They're just kids."
"Well," Percy said, carefully, "I don't know about you, but I certainly remember what it was like to be a fifteen year old boy. Now, imagine yourself at fifteen on holiday with your girlfriend - your girlfriend in a bathing costume."
Kingsley's frown deepened. "If he tries anything, you realize, we'll have to kill him."
"Absolutely," Percy agreed.
*
The holiday turned out to be everything Ginny had hoped and then some. So, it was particularly irritating to discover that she couldn't stop thinking about Percy, or Harry, or Kingsley, or any of the rest of this mess they'd gotten themselves into.
"Is everything all right, Gin?" Dean asked. It was late afternoon and they were sprawled on the beach, making pictures out of colored sand and polished stones.
"Sure," Ginny said, blending azure and gold into the scales of the dragon Dean had just drawn.
"You've just seemed a bit distracted is all."
She smiled, propping her chin on one hand and tilting her head to look at him. "I'm sorry. Things at home… It's just difficult right now."
"I'm sorry, Ginny. I can't really imagine how that must be."
"It bites," she said succinctly. "Things are just a mess: with my brothers, with Harry, with my parents-" She shook her head. "There's nothing I can do about it, but I feel like I ought to try, you know?"
"I know," Dean said, smiling at her. "But you can't fix everything, Gin. No one expects you to."
"I just hate not being able to do anything."
"There's gotta be something," he said, reaching for a small jar of silver sand. "Even if it's just something that gets you out of the house and away from all the drama."
Ginny considered that a moment. "I've been thinking about asking Fred and George for a job. At least during the summer and on holidays, but Mum is still trying to adjust to the idea of them working there, let alone any of the rest of us."
"I haven't been to see the shop yet, but Seamus says it's wicked."
Ginny laughed. "Knowing the twins, it would almost have to be."
Dean grinned meaningfully. "They aren't the only Weasleys who are wicked."
Ginny raised an eyebrow. "Keep that up and I'll have to tell Ron you were talking about him..."
"Oh, very funny." Dean got up and offered her a hand, pulling her to her feet. "What would you say to another, uh, swim? You know, before the sun goes down?"
Ginny smiled up at him, squeezing his hand. "I'd say that sounds just about perfect."
*
Percy hadn't heard from Kingsley all week and had begun to worry that he hadn't found anything about Celia's employers.
He wasn't far wrong.
"Well, kid." Kingsley spread his hands. "I've got nothing. From all reports, Maxwell and Edison are pillars of the community - a little on the traditionalist side, but nothing radical. The client list is a little suspect, but again nothing obviously illegal, unless having distasteful opinions is against the law…"
“It’s likely only a matter of time on that front,” Percy murmured.
They were back at the same pub they'd met at before, only this time Kingsley was having iced tea, too. He'd met Bailey briefly at Percy's flat. Apparently, it had made an impression.
"Are you quite certain?” he continued. “Celia seemed so sure..."
Kingsley shrugged. "She could still be right, kid. I just can't find any proof one way or the other."
Percy sipped thoughtfully at his iced tea. "There must be some way to figure this out."
"There might be. Then again, there might not." Kingsley spread his hands. "There's no real harm in giving it a shot, but your, uh, friend may have to just resign in the end if it bothers her that much."
"I'd like to prevent that if I can," Percy said. "Being unemployed isn't pleasant, by any means."
“I know."
"The question, though," Percy said, picking idly at a relish plate on the table between them, "is how to help her?"
Kingsley grinned widely. "Well, you could always go undercover."
*
The next afternoon Percy found himself in the elegantly appointed reception area of Maxwell and Edison Political Consulting, holding a bouquet of pink daisies and asking politely whether Ms. Celia Williams was available for lunch.
"I'll check," the receptionist said. "One moment, please."
Percy took advantage of the pause to look around. The offices were housed in one of those converted loft spaces, redone in ultra-modern glass and chrome. Behind the reception desk a metal spiral staircase led to the upper loft where, he assumed, the offices were.
"Ms. Williams will be down in a moment," the receptionist said, putting an old-fashioned message container into a compressed-air tube. "Can I get you anything while you wait?"
"No, thanks," Percy said, and looked up in time to see Celia descending the spiral staircase. She'd cut her hair since he'd seen her last. It just barely grazed her shoulders, looking very sleek and professional. She wore a pair of designer glasses with gunmetal grey frames, even though Percy was fairly certain that she didn't need them to see. She looked very pretty, something Percy sternly reminded himself to stop noticing. He was here on business, after all. She also looked, he noticed, confused and not a little bit concerned.
"Percy," she said, keeping her voice very even as she came to stand beside him. "What are you doing here?"
"I thought I'd take you to lunch," Percy said, giving her a kiss on the cheek. Her face was almost as pink as the gerberas when he pulled away.
The receptionist gave Celia a knowing look, but wisely didn't say anything.
"Well, why don't you come on up to my office and we can figure out where to go. Unless you already had someplace in mind?" she asked, leading him up the stairs.
"I thought I'd let you pick." A pause. "Don't you want these?" He offered her the flowers.
Halfway up the steps, she turned back toward him and took the bouquet. Her cheeks flushed even darker.
"Come on then."
They walked through the high-ceilinged loft, threading their way through experimental office spaces and ergonomic chairs. The walls were lined with those same antique message tubes. Canisters shot through them occasionally with a soft swoosh. Celia had a small office in one corner, with glass walls that faced the rest of the office. It wasn't large, but she had a window overlooking the street and a very nice desk.
"What was that all about?" she asked once they were inside and she'd closed the door.
"I can't bring you flowers and take you out for expensive meals?" Percy asked innocently.
"You'd be more than welcome to, if you'd ever-" She stopped, folding her arms across her chest and regaining her composure with some difficulty. "What are you really here for?"
"If I'd ever what?" Percy asked, somewhat bemused, picking up a framed picture from her desk. It was a black and white photo of an attractive couple at the beach. It didn't move. "Your parents?"
"Yes." She took the photo from him and replaced it on the desk next to a grumpy-looking fighting fish in an oblong crystal bowl. "You still haven't answered my question."
"What do you think I'm here for?" he asked. "You wanted my help."
"I appreciate that, Percy," she said, flopping down into the chair behind her desk. "But I did think you'd at least warn me before you showed up to play detective."
"I just wanted to see the place," he said, feeling a bit defensive. "Get a feeling for it."
"Well…" She spread her hands. "This is it."
Percy looked around. For all intents and purposes, it was an everyday office complex, filled with desks and people hunched over them.
"And what did you plan to do once you'd seen the place?"
"This is- er, as far as I'd gotten."
Celia nearly broke into a smile at that, but just then a message canister dropped into the slot behind her desk. She opened it and her eyes widened.
"Oh, dear."
"What is it?"
She shook her head. "Mr. Edison? My boss? He wants to meet you."
"Why on earth?"
She stood, straightening her skirt and running a hand over her hair. "That's the question, isn't it? Oh, hell. What have I done?"
"Calm down." Percy walked over to her and put a hand on her shoulder. "We don't know anything yet. We'll just have to play it cool."
Celia just gave him a dark look and led the way out of her office and up to the executive suites on the third floor.
Edison was waiting for them on a wide mezzanine overlooking the office below. He was middle-aged, but still handsome, with salt-and-pepper hair and a smile clearly calculated to put people at ease.
It didn't work on Percy.
"Mr. Weasley," Edison said, extending a hand. "John Edison. Very nice to meet you at last."
Perplexed, Percy took his offered hand and shook it. "Nice to meet you as well. But how did you-"
Edison smiled. "I keep abreast of politics. You and Miss Williams were fairly visible members of the previous Minister's staff. We've been keeping an eye on you. So when Nancy mentioned that you were here, naturally-"
"Naturally," Percy echoed.
"I understand that you're still in the market for a position," Edison said, and Percy began to relax a little.
If that was all this was about, so much the better. Percy glanced sidelong at Celia and a little of the tension had left her face as well.
"I am, as a matter of fact."
"Good." Edison nodded. "You haven't settled for the first thing to come along. That shows an impressive amount of character, Mr. Weasley. Are you still considering politics as a career, or would you like to move on to something else?"
Percy shifted his weight from foot to foot, considering. "I enjoyed working in government, but I'm not sure I'd want to work directly for the Ministry again."
Edison nodded again, looking at Percy approvingly. He had the distinct feeling that he'd given Edison the answer he'd wanted to hear.
"Well, very nice to have met you," Percy said, taking Celia's hand. "We're on our way to lunch."
"We were just heading to lunch ourselves. Perhaps you'd both join us?" Edison said. "If it wouldn't be disrupting your plans, of course."
Percy squeezed her fingers and nodded. Celia smiled and accepted with the appearance of perfect calm, but tiny lines of tension remained around her eyes. She also didn't pull her hand away as they walked out of the building, something Percy kept telling himself was a sign of nerves.
Edison and another highly-placed member of the firm, a stern but attractive woman in her mid-thirties, took them to a vaguely Continental bistro tucked away on a side street. It was one of those places with cuisine that could only be described as 'fusion' and no prices on the wine list.
It was also certainly the nicest restaurant Percy had seen the inside of in a long while.
"You had quite the bright future, Mr. Weasley," Edison said as white wine was being poured. "It really was a shame."
"Thank you, sir."
"You and Miss Williams are exactly the sort of young people we're in need of in these unsettled times. Dedicated, loyal, and," he added, with emphasis, "forward-thinking. That's going to be a very important skill to have, and probably sooner than later."
"I'm afraid," Percy said, "that it hasn't been without some personal cost. There are days when I wonder-"
"Nonsense. Your position was all the more impressive given your family's somewhat... eccentric loyalties."
"I disagree with my parents, but I respect their right to their opinions..." Percy began carefully.
"Of course, of course, my boy," Edison said quickly. "We should always encourage the free exchange of ideas. Though, I must point out, that in these times we live in those ideas can often be dangerous."
Percy took a thoughtful sip of wine, considering carefully before he spoke, "And what would you recommend that we do when faced with such dangerous ideas?"
Edison smiled, and this time there was nothing reassuring about it at all. "Why, we find creative and persuasive ways to disseminate our point of view, of course."
Percy didn't doubt for a second that they were very good at it.
*
The whole thing was creepy. Edison was creepy, the firm was creepy, the clients were creepy, their methods were creepy.
It was also entirely possible that they weren't wrong.
That was the bit that kept sticking with Percy. It stuck with him through lunch, through his hurried goodbye to Celia, through teatime and all the way to dinner. He lay in bed thinking about it well into the night.
The world had become, in the past year or two, a very dangerous and unpredictable place. Was this really the time for the kind of divisiveness that his parents and Albus Dumbledore advocated? There was a very good argument for solidarity, no matter how it was achieved.
Still, it left Percy a little unsettled.
It was Saturday morning and Celia was camped out in his living room under a fleece throw. She'd shown up near sunrise, pale and apologetic and claiming she couldn't sleep. Percy had sent an owl off to Kingsley for help, determined to resolve the situation as soon as possible. Then he made tea and tucked Celia in on the sofa. She didn't fall asleep, though.
Percy curled up in a large club chair across from her with a mug of his own. "Don't you think you ought to try and sleep?"
She shook her head. "I'm sorry for waking you up. You can go back to bed if you want. I just- I just didn't want to be by myself."
"No, no. I'm fine," Percy said, trying unsuccessfully to stifle a wide yawn.
"I know it's silly, but- Well, I think I’m having a crisis of conscience." There was a long pause. “It’s a first for me, Percy. I’m pretty freaked out.”
"We've hardly found them guilty of anything more distasteful than manipulating public opinion -- and that's hardly new in political circles."
"That's true," she said slowly. "But the whole thing is still pretty unsettling for me."
"Look," he said, moving over to sit next to her, "after everything that's gone on lately, we're all looking for dark wizards everywhere. Just because you or I don't agree with their political methods, doesn't mean that they're evil."
"I suppose." Celia nodded slowly. "Maybe I did overreact."
"You don't have to agree with me, you know. You've asked my opinion and I offered it, but that doesn't mean I'm right."
She looked up, as if surprised. "I trust you, Percy. I trust your judgment."
That caught him off-guard. He laughed sharply before he could stop himself.
Celia sat up, putting her cup aside, and took hold of his arm. "I mean it. Why else would I have come to you about this? I have other friends, other people in my life, but no one else is like y-"
He shook his head. "Don't be silly, Celia."
"You always do that," she said, letting go of him. "Why do you do that?"
"What on earth are you talking about?" he said, moving away from her and straightening up.
"Exactly," she muttered, then, "You know, the firm wanted me to... But I can't imagine you would-"
"What is it?"
"They wanted me to speak with you about the possibility of accepting a position. Edison seemed to think you would be interested." She paused. "Are you?"
Percy paused, considering how best to answer. "I've been out of work a long time, Celia," he began, but was cut off by a knock at the door.
"Kingsley." Percy opened the door and blinked. "I didn't mean that you had to come right away."
"I'm used to the crazy hours," he said, walking into the flat. "It's an occupational hazard."
"I never would have imposed on you at this hour if I'd thought you'd-"
"Forget it, kid." Then catching sight of Celia, he said, "Well, hello there."
"Kingsley," Percy said, warningly, and gestured toward a chair.
Kingsley sat, but couldn't quite get rid of his knowing grin. "So," he said, finally attending to the matter at hand. "What did you want to see me for? You finally want to go get the bad guys?"
"Not quite. I want proof, one way or the other. All I know for sure right now is that Celia doesn't like the way Maxwell and Edison conduct their business."
"You ever seen Maxwell?" Kingsley asked Celia.
"No. The word around the office is that he's a bit of a silent partner."
Kingsley looked thoughtful. "That's what I've been hearing, too. It makes me wonder if maybe he's the one we ought to be concentrating on."
"He keeps an office there," Percy said. "I thought we might take a look at what he keeps in it."
Kingsley looked impressed. "That's one way to get the job done. Go right to the source. I'm in. When do we go?"
"Tonight," Percy said.
"Percy, are you sure?" Celia asked. "I don't want you to put yourself in danger-"
"Aw," Kingsley said, clearly enjoying himself. "Danger is Percy's middle name."
To her credit, Celia just gave him a look.
"No one has a sense of humor in the morning." He stood. "Okay, kid, you give me details; I'll get what we need to do this right. You're sure this is how you want to do it?"
"Absolutely."
"Okay. Nice to finally meet you, by the way," he said to Celia, smiling and showing far too many teeth.
Percy cleared his throat. "If you don't mind."
Kingsley turned that grin on Percy and all but winked. "Not at all, kid. See you later."
*
Breaking in should have been hard, but apparently Kingsley was better at this sort of thing than he had any reason to be.
"I thought," Percy whispered softly, holding his lit wand close to the lock on the door to Maxwell's office, "that Aurors were supposed to be on the right side of the law."
"Desperate times, kid," Kingsley said, and the lock came open with a soft sigh.
"There's another kind?" Percy shook his head. "Besides, shouldn't you at least be saying something like, 'I can't believe you talked me into this'?"
Kingsley chuckled. "Nah. I can totally believe you talked me in to this. What I can't believe is that you came up with this plan in the first place. You must really like that girl."
Percy shot a frosty look at the back of Kingsley's head as they slipped into the office, but didn't say anything.
"You take the file cabinet. I'll try the safe," Kingsley said, closing the door quietly behind them.
Percy worked his way quickly through the first set of files, then the second, but didn't find anything. Kingsley had the safe open in record time, pulling papers out and scanning though them.
A few minutes later, Percy straightened up with a groan. "This was a spectacularly bad idea. I should have known they wouldn't be stupid enough to leave something incriminating just lying aro-"
"I think I just found something," Kingsley said, dropping a roll of parchment to the desk and leaning over it with his wand.
"What is it?" Percy joined him at the desk.
"A list of names- Oh, man. This is bad." Kingsley shook his head.
"Let me see," Percy said, reaching for the parchment, but Kingsley swept it away.
"Uh-uh, kid. Sorry, but I can't let you. These people are already compromised enough."
Percy went cold. "You don't trust me. I can't believe it."
"It's not that," Kingsley said softly, sounding genuinely sorry. "This is a fuck-up of gigantic proportions. I’m just doing some damage control. No one sees this list but Dumbledore. Let's look around, though, and see if there's anything else in here."
"Are you sure you trust me to look?" Percy bit out.
Kingsley sighed heavily. "Do not take this personally, Percy. It's not about you. It wouldn't matter who you were. I wouldn't let Ginny see it, either."
“If you say so,” Percy sniffed and began flipping through a ledger on the desk. “Well, this is odd…”
“What’s odd?”
“This…” He indicated a column in one of the ledger sheets.
“You’re going to have to be a little more specific than that.”
“I would have thought it was obvious…” Kingsley gave him a very dark look, and Percy amended, “I mean, there are two sets of numbers here. One appears to be the ‘official’ financial records, and the other the real tally. The real books have a suspicious number of outgoing payments to individuals not on the firm’s official payroll…”
“Bribes?”
“Very likely.”
Kingsley grinned at him. “Nice work, kid. I wouldn’t have picked up on that.”
Percy closed the book and picked it up to take it with them.
“Leave it here. We’re here illeg- unofficially, that is. Anything we discover tonight is useless as evidence. We’re just here to get an idea of where to start looking officially.”
“All right.” Percy returned the ledger to its place, and busied himself rummaging through Maxwell's desk drawers. At the bottom of one wide drawer he found a stack of photos with another list of names attached. Percy flipped briefly through the photos. They looked like surveillance, pictures of men and women in various offices and shops, going about their daily business. Percy scanned down the list, not recognizing any of the names until he got near the bottom. Then, one name made him stop.
Weasley, Arthur
He flipped to the bottom of the stack of photos until he found them: pictures of The Burrow, of his mother, of Ginny...
"Oh my God," Percy said, dropping the file back into the drawer.
"What?" Kingsley was at his elbow in an instant. He snatched up the photos and began looking through them.
"Does that mean what I think it means?" Percy asked.
"No," Kingsley said firmly. "We don't know what it means. We don't know whether there's any real danger-"
"Except for the people who've been stalking my family, of course," Percy snapped, moving toward the door and pulling his wand from his belt.
Kingsley looked up sharply. "Now, don't run off and do something stu-"
But Percy was already gone.
*
The fact that he managed to make it to the Burrow without leaving pieces of himself in Maxwell's office was nothing short of a miracle.
He stumbled through to the kitchen in the dark. There was no fire in the hearth, no light anywhere.
The house was empty, deserted. Dead.
Abruptly Percy found that he couldn't breathe. "Mum! Dad!" He ran through the kitchen and up the back stairs. "Ginny!"
But Ginny wouldn't have been here, he told himself. She was on holiday with her boyfriend. Maybe the others were gone as well. He needed to calm down. But the house didn't just feel empty; it felt abandoned. The air was stale and heavy with dust. It felt as though its occupants were never coming back and everything in the house knew it, including him.
His hands began to shake. He sat down on the landing, pressed his knees together and tried to catch his breath.
"Think, think, think," he murmured. He had to go about this logically.
The funny thing about logic, though, was that it did very little to stop him from panicking. Because logic very clearly indicated that his family was gone, vanished into the night like a story from Percy's childhood, and he was too late to do anyone any good, as usual.
Ginny was going to be so disappointed in him. How on earth was he going to tell her?
He walked numbly back down to the kitchen and sat at the table, dropping his head to his hands.
"They aren't here," a familiar voice came from the doorway. Kingsley walked over and sat beside him at the table. "I could have told you that if you'd stuck around and listened to me instead of running off half-cocked."
"Where are they then?" At Kingsley's words, a little of the feeling began to come back in to Percy's limbs.
"I can't tell you that, kid. They're safe where they are, though."
"Did they know they were being watched? Is that why they left?"
Kingsley shook his head. "Nah, but something like this wasn't entirely unexpected either." He paused. "We're going to have to warn the other people on that list, though."
"Why didn't you tell me they weren't here?"
"I said, you left so quickly-"
Percy cut him off. "Before that. Why didn't anyone tell me?"
Kingsley sighed deeply. "Are you sure you want the honest answer to that?"
Percy flushed and opened his mouth to retort, but Kingsley was speaking again.
"Besides, kid, it wasn't my secret to tell - very literally. I could tell you that your family left the Burrow, but not where they went. Almost no one could tell you that."
"Almost no one?"
"One person, really. But that doesn't matter much now." Kingsley folded his hands on the table in front of him. "You may not like it, Percy, but you're going to have to prove yourself. You're going to have to be better and more honest than anyone else if you want your family to trust you again."
"It's not as though I betrayed them to Voldemort, you know," Percy snapped. "I hardly think it's the same thing."
"No, it isn't, and that's why you and I are sitting here. That's why I helped Ginny drag your sorry drunk carcass home two months ago instead of letting you drown yourself in a whiskey bottle. You're a good kid and you just picked the wrong people to trust. You certainly aren't the first." He paused. "But all the same, your family can't trust you. You're going to have to work at it if you want them to. You can't, Percy, take the easy way out on this one."
"What if I don't care whether they trust me again?"
"If that's true, then why are you here?"
"Wanting them to be safe isn't the same as wanting them in my life again."
"Well, yeah. Okay, that's true. But you care, kid, and that does mean something."
"Of course it does. It just might not mean what you think it does."
Kingsley watched him for a long moment, considering. "There is something you want, though. You'd better figure out what it is, kid, and quick. You may be running out of time."
*
On Monday, Ginny turned up Percy's flat, looking very tanned, very relaxed and demanding jam doughnuts.
"And proper coffee," she said, standing in the doorway and crossing her arms. "Not that weak-willed white swill you try to pass off as the real thing. Get your wallet, I'm starving to death while you sit there like a moron."
Percy did as she said without a word.
He didn't actually speak until they were seated in the bakery, a tray of warm, fresh doughnuts between them while Ginny inhaled her coffee with almost pornographic glee. She'd prattled the entire way down the block, chatting gaily about her swimming holiday and how wonderful Dean was, how wonderful his parents were and how wonderful the entire world was. Their row from the week before, apparently, had been conveniently forgotten thanks to a week of sun and saltwater and getting her own way.
She stopped, just long enough to take a deep swallow of coffee and said, "What is the matter with you, Percy? I've seen corpses livelier than you are today." She paused, then grinned. "Then again, I suppose you have, too."
Percy ignored the joke. "Did you ever plan on telling me that the family had left home?"
"What?"
"You've left The Burrow. I know you have, because I went there."
Ginny dropped her coffee cup to the table with a dull thunk. "Oh." Her eyes widened. "Oh. You went there? Why on earth?"
"That hardly matters now. I just- Everything was empty and-" He took a breath. "I thought..."
Ginny went very pale. "Oh, Percy… No. We're just...staying somewhere else."
"Ah, I see."
"It's only temporary. I didn't mean to-" She faltered, looking upset. "If I could have told you... No, that's a lie. I wouldn't have told you." She shook her head. "All I can say is, I'm sorry."
"Of course," he said coldly.
"Stop that! Don't act like that!" She looked down into her empty cup for a long moment. "You were really worried about us?"
"Yes, Ginny, I was. Not that it matters now."
"Of course it matters. Honestly, you can be such a tool sometimes." She bit viciously into a doughnut, jam squirting everywhere. She blinked rapidly, and if he hadn't known better he'd have sworn she was on the verge of tears.
"Ginny," he said, softening. "I didn't mean-"
"I am sorry," she said, reaching out and squeezing his hand for just a moment.
"So am I," he replied, and bought her another cup of coffee.
*
Celia showed up at his flat the next morning and Percy began to suspect that he would never be allowed to sleep in again.
"Well, I've given notice. I'm back in the ranks of the unemployed." She flung herself onto the sofa. "Not a moment too soon; there's to be an official inquiry into the firm’s financial dealings. I don't suppose you know anything about that?"
"Kingsley may have mentioned something."
"Well, hell." She pulled the fleece blanket - which she’d apparently claimed for her own at some point - up over her legs and said, "My gut was right. I guess should be pleased, but-"
"I know, Celia," Percy said, padding over to the sofa in his robe and slippers to bring her a cup of strong tea. "It's difficult."
She looked up at him and managed a shaky smile. "We did the right thing, I know we did." She paused and took an uneven breath. "It still sucks."
Bailey the Moral Object Lesson on the Dangers of Alcohol hooted sympathetically from his perch.
Celia craned her head around to look at him. "Where did this little fellow come from? He's precious!"
"He's a friend of Bill W.," Percy muttered.
"What?"
"He's a post owl," Percy said. "Or at least, he was. He got the sack the same as you and I. I guess I felt a bit sorry for him."
"That is incredibly sweet. I never would have imagined you had it in you."
Percy was trying to decide just how to take that, when Bailey sailed over and deposited himself in Celia's lap.
"Oh, what a darling. He's perfect, Percy. I've always wanted one of these."
"You don't have an owl?" Percy asked, surprised that he'd never noticed before.
"My mother is, shall we say, less than fond of animals. I've never had so much as a toad."
"That's awful," Percy said, grabbing his own cup of tea and joining her. "Hermes was the best thing that could have happened to me at Hogwarts. Owls are very useful and incredibly loyal."
Bailey cuddled up against Celia's elbow, cooing contentedly.
"I think he prefers women," Percy observed. "He likes Ginny a lot, too." An idea struck him. "If you haven't got an owl already, why don't you take Bailey?"
"Really?" Celia said. "You wouldn't mind?"
"Not at all. I already have Hermes, and I really only took Bailey because no one else wanted him-"
Bailey's little head popped up and he made an indignant sound.
"It's true and you know it," Percy said. "Just be glad I took pity on you." He paused for a moment. "There is one thing, though."
Celia looked up questioningly.
"He has… Er, that is to say, he's a bit of a…" Percy swallowed hard. "He hits the sauce a bit, I'm afraid. That's what got him bounced out of the owl post."
Celia laughed suddenly. "Really? A drunk owl? I've never heard of such a thing."
"He's rather fond of Tuaca, if he can get it," Percy continued seriously. "Any of the sweeter liqueurs, really. Though not crème de banane, for some reason."
Celia laughed again, looking at Percy like he'd just given her a diamond or some equally expensive and impressive present.
"Perhaps he just doesn't like bananas?" She patted Bailey on the head. "What do you say, Monsieur Bailey? Do you not fancy the syrup of the banana? It is very good for the digestion, you know."
Percy just shook his head.
There was an extended pause. Percy looked up to find Celia watching him; Bailey nestled in the crook of one arm. She smiled when their eyes met.
"What is it?"
"You're-" She paused and smiled again. His breath caught. "You're very surprising sometimes, Percy."
"It's just an owl-"
"Nonsense. It's a lovely gesture. Thank you."
She looked down at the top of Bailey's head, and suddenly Percy found that he couldn't look away. But, he reminded himself, swallowing around the bitter lump that had suddenly lodged itself in his throat, she thought he was a good person. She said she trusted him, of all the ridiculous things for her to do... He wasn't trustworthy and he wasn't good, and the sooner she realized it, the better.
"You're looking at me funny," she said, looking up after a moment.
"Was I?" He paused, took a breath and said, "Celia, I think you should know- I considered that offer from Edison. Seriously."
"I know you did." She seemed utterly unconcerned by the fact. "I would have been surprised if you hadn't."
"And it doesn't bother you?"
She just shrugged.
"You told me the other day- You said you trusted me. Does knowing this change that?"
"No. Would you expect it to?" She leaned in and put her free hand on his knee. "Percy, you don't owe me anything, certainly not an explanation. You may not always be right, but you're honest. You don't lie."
"I suppose I don't."
"You don't," she said, pushing the blanket aside and standing up. "You'd be terrible at it. You're honest to a fault." Bailey hopped onto her outstretched arm and scrabbled his way up to her shoulder. "I'm not surprised that you considered the offer. I would have been very surprised if you'd accepted, though. You're cautious and pragmatic. You're also ambitious, but not to the point where you would sacrifice your principles."
"Perhaps not," Percy said, not entirely convinced himself.
"You wouldn't," Celia said firmly. "I don't have nearly that kind of conviction. Sometimes I wish I did."
"Only sometimes?" Percy said, smiling slightly and attempting to change the subject.
"Only sometimes," she agreed seriously. "If it were me, I'd never have stood up to my family the way you did."
Percy paused for a long moment. "What if it was the wrong thing to do? What if I was wrong, and I did it anyway?"
"Did you think it was wrong at the time?"
"No."
"Then at least you know that you followed your conscience."
"For selfish reasons."
Celia snorted. "Doesn't everyone? Deep down? It's all selfish on some level." She leaned down to him again. "Stop punishing yourself, Percy. Did you mess up? Maybe. The real question is, have you learned from it?"
She kissed him softly on the cheek and headed for the door.
"Celia-"
She stopped, but didn't turn around.
"Thank you."
"No problem," she said, and shut the door behind her.
Continued in Episode 5, Somewhere in Between
Next time on Percy Weasley: Rogue Demon Hunter...
"And what exactly makes you think that Adelaide Longbottom will have any interest in helping me?"
Kingsley grinned. "Call it a hunch."
"You'll have to forgive me if I don't put much faith in hunches anymore," Percy said huffily, turning away.
Kingsley brought one massive hand down on his shoulder. "She'll help you, kid. She's in thick with Dumbledore."
"And this was his idea?"
Kingsley shrugged noncommittally.
Percy folded his arms across his chest. "I don't appreciate being manipulated, Kingsley."
"Yeah, well, welcome to the side of good. It's all vague pronouncements and half-baked prophecies and ask questions later. None of us are operating with full disclosure."
"No wonder evil kicks your arse so often, then."