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Disclaimer: If you recognise it, surprise, I don't own it.
Chapter 123- The Red-Headed Gophers.
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"Oh my!" A large exclamation was heard in the Weasely House, a house that, while usually quite rambunctious and loud during the summers, was normally quiet and peaceful during the school year. That was on account of all the kids being at Hogwarts, well, the loud and annoying ones, but they all attend Hogwarts now. So, the summer was usually a quiet and peaceful time for Molly and Arthur Weasley, where they were able to relax and enjoy themselves without their multiple kids being around and wanting food, attention and several other things.
Which is why it was such a surprise to Arthur Weasley to hear his wife exclaim aloud, when she in fact had no reason to be shouting. Molly only ever shouted at the kids, and without them around, she was typically quiet and calm, so Arthur was presumably very concerned for his wife. He rushed down the stairs still in just his underwear, no reason to change into pyjamas and get changed, as there were none of the kids around to witness him in all his glory. He runs down several flights of stairs, bumping and pounding into the wooden landing and railing several times and hurting his flesh and bones, but his ribs were nothing compared to the safety of his wife, so he continued to bluster down the stairs, injuring his ribs.
Finally, he slams into the wall of the kitchen as he makes it down, going way too fast to catch himself and slapping his face into the wall, but he ignores the pain to find his wife. He is very much happy to find his wife is fine and healthy in the kitchen, dressed in just her nightie, which does things to Arthur as he very much has his likes, which Molly fulfils, and she is clutching a letter in her hand. "Molly wobbles. What is going on?" Arthur asks, using a hand to steady himself and work himself over to the kitchen table and take a seat.
He winces as he settles down into it, feeling himself aching and hurting all over. Still, he does not regret it, as his wife might have been in trouble, and he had learned during the war that it is better to think the worst and do your best than hope for the best and do nothing. Molly is still very stunned by whatever is in her hands, so much so that she doesn't even notice that he has come in, and so he speaks again. "Dear, what has you so shocked?" Finally, she looks up, and the shock fades from her face, and a happy smile graces her face; it might be the happiest smile he has ever seen from her.
"Gilderoy Lockhart has sent me a letter!" She exclaims, jubilation in her voice, and Arthur can't help the sting he feels in his heart when he learns that what might be the happiest smile he has ever seen is for another man, but he knows he is being stupid, and so he pushes it down and is the good husband that he is. "Wow, the Gilderoy Lockhart himself has sent you a letter?" Arthur tries to express amazement, but a tiny bit of sarcasm is there, as he does not particularly like the foppish author. It is definitely not jealousy, not at all.
"I know, it's unbelievable. I've only met the man two times. The last time I saw him was at Flurish and Blotss, the bookstore. He was signing his books there, and it was his last appearance before he went to be a Hogwarts professor. And quite a good professor, from what Ginny told me. Even Fred and George praised him, and they never liked their professors. Apparently, he made the lesson fun and violent, though that last bit is worrying. I am just glad those two are finally getting engaged with learning." Molly starts to ramble, and used to this, Arthur prevents his eyes from rolling as he knows that leads to arguments, and gets her back on track.
"The first time, dear?" Molly stops talking and then remembers her original line of thinking. "Ah, yes. The first time was before Ron's first year, and he paid for Ron's wand. Such a generous man, and then not only that, he went ahead and paid for every other student's wand that year. Amazing. It's just a shame that Ron was so careless with it and broke the thing, something Gildeory Lockhart has given him. No care, that boy. At least we still had Charlie's old wand to give him, and still that boy complained. Honestly..." Molly sighs, thinking of her youngest, her male youngest, who has admittedly caused a few problems for them in the last two years.
Not wanting to get Molly complaining about the kids to him again, as if he could do something about it and make them all into copies of Percy, he changes the topic. "Well, what does the letter say then? If it is from Gilderoy Lockhart, it must be important. Maybe it says he is coming back from his adventure to deal with Sirius Blach and capture him and lock him back up in Azkaban. I hope so." Gilderoy's office has released a statement that the man himself would not be around as he was going on an adventure, which had a lot of people excited for a new book. Unfortunately, Sirius Black has broken out at the famed adventure was already gone, not able to help in capturing the criminal.
"I don't know, this owl just delivered it, and I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw it." Molly still looks down at the letter with astonishment, and Arthur has to push her to open it. "Come on then, dear. Open it up and let's see what the man has to say." And without needing further encouragement and looking like Christmas had come, she tears open the envelope and rips out the letter, quickly unfolding it. Holding it open, she has to quickly use it to fan herself as she is flushed and overheated from excitement, but after that, she gets back to reading.
"Dear Molly, one of my biggest fans- did you hear that, Arthur? He remembers me, and as one of his biggest fans!" Molly gushes before quickly diving back into the letter, eager to read more. "How are you? Well, I hope. I am well, Gilderoy, thank you for asking." Molly responds to the letter as if the man could actually hear it, though with magic, that might actually be possible, if anyone could be bothered enough to figure out how to do it. That actually goes for anything, something Arthur had learnt from the muggles as he examined all of their necktology. Amazing inventions that boggle the mind, all without magic.
"As much as I would love for this letter to be one simply connecting with a great fan, I am afraid that is unfortunately not the truth. In actual fact, I need your help. He needs my help, Arthur. Mine! I don't know what I could possibly do, but I'll try." Molly seems to be even more excited since she is needed, and Arthur has no doubt that she is happier with this situation than if Gilderoy Lockhart were simply trying to connect with a fan. It is no secret that Molly has a great need to be needed, which is why they have so many children and she has become a surrogate mother to Harry Potter. Now, a famous adventurer like Gileroy Lockhart needs her help; she would drop everything to help him.
"I cannot reveal anything, as you must understand my current predicament is not one that can be explained simply in a letter. Information is dangerous, and I dread to think what might happen to you and your family if you were knowledgeable about my current situation." Molly audibly gasps here, hand to her chest. "Merlin, he must be in a very dangerous situation if he can't even talk about it in a letter." Arthur nods his head in agreement, but if he were truthful, it seemed more like a threat to him, what with it saying his whole family would be in danger and all.
"If I recall correctly, I remember you saying you had a son who had chosen a career as a dragon handler, Charlie, if memory serves correctly. Am I right?" Molly's face is a bit confused before a megawatt grin takes its place. "I don't remember talking about any of my children to him, but if he says I did, then he must be correct. But what could he want with Charlie?" Shedding off some of the enthusiastic fan in her now that her children are involved, Molly gets a bit more serious, something Arthur is happy to see.
"I am in urgent need of dragon's blood. Copious amounts of it, and which dragons the blood comes from, does not matter; I just need a lot of it. Something I hope you can help me get through your son, Molly." Molly becomes silent here, and Arthur takes the opportunity to speak up and insert his opinion; he doesn't often get a chance to do that. "Mollywobbles, dragon blood is... well, it's not illegal as it is used in a lot of potions and the like, but it is very expensive and I am pretty sure that it is a resource that is kept track of," Arthur says, aware of the inner working of the British ministry, and so the ministries of other countries should be similar.
"I am aware, Arthur. I am not sure what laws Romania has in place in regards to this, but honestly, a good man is asking for our help. So, isn't it fine that we ask Charlie what can be done? Look here, it even says he will pay for the dragon blood, we just have to ask his assistant... Andromeda Black." She finishes in surprise, unexpectedly hearing an old friend's name out of nowhere. Well, not an old friend, more like an acquaintance, but still.
"Andromeda? She works for Gilderoy Lockhart? Since when? Surely we would have heard some gossip about this. Andromeda Black is an infamous person in our community. It's surprising that we never heard of her association with Gilderoy Lockhart." Arthur states, remembering the black sheep of the Black family. The last thing he remembers hearing about her is about her daughter who their Charlie had a crush on, but the boy was so upset at being rejected that he ran away to Romania. That's what he thinks, at least, but he has never brought it up.
"It doesn't matter. Gilderoy Lockhart is clearly in a spot of bother, and he has asked me for help, so I can ask my son for help. The man is willing to pay, so if Charlie can facilitate the sale of dragon blood through his position at the dragon sanctuary, then it is fine. All we have to do is send a letter, and look, Gilderoy Lockhart is already thanking us for our help in the letter." She exclaims, pointing at the letter which Arthur can't see as his whole hand is in the way. Either way, he doesn't argue, the wife has spoken and what she says goes, he learnt that a long time ago, the hard way.
"Let me go fetch some parchment and my ink and quill. I'll write to Charlie immediately." And with that, Molly shuffles out of the kitchen, and Arthur sits there holding his bruised side, looking forlornly at the ingredients for breakfast that Molly had not got around to cooking as his stomach grumbles.
Oh well, he will just have to wait until lunchtime.
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"So, you can turn into a hawk, huh?" I ask the man sitting on the opposite side of me, who has his head fully in a book and is reading it with the attention of a hawk. Heh. "Hnngh." He grunts back. "I've always been interested in becoming an Animagus, but I've never really had the time, what with all my adventuring and writing. I lead quite the busy life, so I just never got the chance to sit down and look into it." I trail off, and he just responds with another grunt. This guy has Uchiha syndrome, huh? Well, at least Sasuke talks; this guy only spoke when he was reporting, and other than that, he hasn't said a word.
"You know, I would have tried to do it if I had all the information, and I would have tried to get all the information if you didn't have to register afterwards. What's the point of being able to become an animal if everyone knows what animal you can turn into, am I right?" He remains silent, so I continue on. "I mean, that's the whole point of being an animagus, right? Being able to disappear if you need to, hiding as an animal and being discreet. That kind of goes out of the window if the animal you can turn to can be easily found out by checking the ministry records." The ministry is such bullshit when you don't run it or take advantage of it.
"And don't get me started on-" Talbot Winger chooses this moment to speak up and stop me from continuing to talk. Just keep rambling and gnawing their ears off, and they'll give you what you want; it always works. "What can I help you with, Mr Lockhart, sir?" The voice that comes out is not the loud and firm one he spoke with earlier when giving his report, but low and reserved, and do I detect a hint of admiration underneath the massive amount of exasperation? "Right, well, straight to the point, I guess. Though you should know, everybody likes a bit of foreplay." He blushes bright red at that, and then I understand that he is a shy guy, and that's why he's quiet. Either that, or he's gay, in which case I will stop making remarks like that and keep my distance because the blush is bright red.
"I want to know everything there is to know about becoming an Animagus, and also being an Animagus. Side effects, things it doesn't say on the label. That, and, well... like I was saying, I would rather my supposed status as an Animagus wasn't in the records, or if it was, it was done discreetly, so I want to know how the process goes. Please, I am all ears." And with that, Talbot was eager to explain, forgetting his shy self and getting carried away with explaining all the intricacies. Things that I would never have thought of or believed, if it wasn't verified right in front of me. Truly, magic to become an Animagus was much more complicated than I originally believed.
It turns out that when you turn into your animagus form, you actually change everything on your person or that you are in contact with into your animal form as well. That is why Professor McGonagall's cat form has those glasses fur marks; it isn't an expression of personality or some nonsense, it is actually her glasses that have been transfigured into her cat form along with herself. Which makes a lot of sense. After all, where does your wand go when you transform along with your clothes? Obviously, it doesn't stop existing; the law of the conservation of mass still applies. I think that is what it is called, where nothing can stop existing; it just transforms into something else. Or is that energy? Eh, tomato, potato.
Anyway, if I remember correctly, Peter Pettigrew, Wormtail, was the one who had Voldemort's wand on him after the dude got obliterated. And he must have had it transformed into his rat body and stayed that way for around ten years with the Weasleys. Just think of what else you can transform into your animagus form. Say you have a beetle form like Rita Skeeter, and you transform with a six-shooter on you, and then you fly in, transform right behind your target, shoot them in the hand, then transform and escape. That's a scary thought, and maybe a tool I would like to have in my arsenal. Unless I get an animal like a horse, in which case I will have a different moral quandary on my hands, given new appendages and certain new opportunities to experience. Well, I'll cross that road if I ever get to it.
Holy shit, I completely forgot about the rat when I could have dealt with him while teaching at Hogwarts. Oh well, he'll be the kids' problem this year, maybe Sirius will actually eat him. Anyway, back on topic, there are a few more tricks with Animagus forms as well, such as choosing what you want to transfigure with you. It takes some control as you already got a shortcut to transform into an animal without doing it manually through transifguration, which is incredibly difficult. Anyone who does it the manual way has to learn everything about the animal to transform, so a zoologist or whatever would be able to do it if they had magic, so Victor Crumb was actually very talented to be able to transform halfway into a shark.
But yeah, transfiguring things with you. I remember in the third movie Peter Pettigrew transformed back into a rat in the shrieking shack, and he shrank into his clothes so those after him wouldn't be able to hit him with a spell, and then he scurried away in the confusion. They definitely didn't want to hit him with the spell to make him human again, as he would be coming back naked, which is probably why he got rid of his clothes as well. Talbot Winger was a fountain of information that I was eager to drink up. I just really hope I don't end up with the donkey transformation he told me one guy got. My train of thought is interrupted when someone opens the door that is behind me.
"Lockhart! You've got mail!" Ooh, present time. I hope it is the dragon blood I ordered off of Weasleys'R'Us.
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How are you all? I'm okay. Got a two-week holiday from Uni and I am gone to another couch since my living situation is a bit up in the air right now. But I'm hanging in there, still trying to go to the gym and get fitter.Stayed motivated, you guys.
Upcoming Chapters:
Hero: Chapter 124- Where My Weasleys At!?
Super: Chapter 126- Betrayal on The Bed.
Legendary: Chapter 128- Screw Italy.
Galactic: Chapter 132- Have At Her!
Mythic: Chapter 135- Magical Manhunter.
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That is all for now. I hope you enjoyed the chapter. I will see you in the next one!
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