To Dare

A/N: The morning after...

To Dare

Chapter Eleven

Fred woke the next morning to the smell of coffee and frying sausages and the sound of Thalassa humming in the kitchen. He didn’t recognize the tune, but she sounded happy and it made him smile to hear her. He turned his head to see George on the other side of the bed, still asleep. Fred carefully rolled out of bed so as not to wake him. He needed a bath, but he wanted to kiss Thalassa good morning first. Not bothering with clothes, he padded through the flat and quietly stepped behind her where she stood at the cooker. He slid his arms around her waist and buried his face in the curve of her neck. At least, that was his intention. She jumped the instant he touched her and smashed the back of her head against his mouth. At the same time, one of the sausages popped, splattering her arm with hot grease.

“Ow!” they cried in unison.

“Don’t sneak up on me like that,” Thalassa scolded, turning off the flame under the frying pan. She hurried to the sink to run cold water over her burn.

“Oo sblit m’ lib,” Fred complained.

“There’s a healing potion in the bathroom cabinet.” She glanced over her shoulder at him. “And go put some clothes on!” She blushed bright pink at the sight of him in all his naked glory, in the middle of her kitchen.

“What’s all the shouting about?” George wandered in, yawning. He, at least, had put his boxers back on.

“Fred thought it would be funny to sneak up on me while I was making breakfast and now he’s whinging because I accidentally hit him in the mouth.”

“Poor thing,” George said sympathetically, moving to Thalassa’s side. Did he leave tooth marks on you? And what happened here?” He took her arm and carefully dried it with a tea towel. “Have you burnt yourself again?”

“I’m all right,” Thalassa said. “See, no blisters.”

Fred made a protesting noise and she relented.

“I’m sorry, Fred. Is it bad?” She reached out and pulled his hand away from his mouth. There was a spot of blood in the centre of his swollen bottom lip. She took a step closer to him and stretched on tiptoe to kiss him gently, once, twice. She felt a movement against her front and glanced down, startled. His morning erection, which had wilted somewhat, had renewed with a vengeance. She blushed again at the evidence of his arousal. “Well, at least part of you feels better.” Oh Gods, that sounded so stupid.

Fred put his fingers under her chin and tilted her face up. “Thalassa—“

She couldn’t seem to raise her gaze any higher than his abused lip. “Shh,” she interrupted. “Go take care of that cut. I’m going to finish making breakfast.” She turned away quickly and went back to the cooker. After a heartbeat’s pause, Fred left the kitchen to do as she’d ordered.

“Are you all right?” George asked

“Yes,” she sighed.

He pushed away from the counter. “I’ll leave you to it, then.” He paused in the doorway. “Don’t let Fred bother you, it’s just the way he is.”

“George, I’ve known the two of you for half your lives. I know how Fred is.”

“Yes, well, things are different now, aren’t they?”

“I--suppose they are,” she agreed quietly.

Breakfast was an awkward and uncomfortable affair. Thalassa kept her gaze on her plate while she pushed her food around with her fork. The twins exchanged worried looks.

“More coffee?” she asked, still without looking at either of them.

“No thanks,” George answered. He covered her hand with his. “Thalassa what’s wrong? Do you regret what we did last night?”

“No.” She finally met his eyes with a startled glance. “I could never regret what we,” she flicked a look at Fred through her lashes to include him, “shared last night. I’m sorry. I don’t know how I’m supposed to act or what I’m supposed to say. I’ve made a hash of the morning-after part. I’m sorry,” she repeated.

“There’s no need to be sorry,” he soothed. “We know this is a new experience for you.”

“I should be the one apologizing,” Fred added. “I should have realized you’re not used to having naked men wander about your flat.”

“No, I’m not,” she agreed. “That was a first for me, but I suppose with the proper incentive I could get used to it.” She smiled shyly.

The twins laughed and Thalassa blushed a little at her own boldness. She also started eating her breakfast, finally. “So what are your plans for today?” she asked between bites.

“We are entirely at your disposal. You may throw us out or keep us according to your, er, desires,” George said.

She sighed and a wistful expression flitted across her face. “What I desire is for us to go back to bed and stay there all day.”

“Why Miss Hartwell, who knew such passion lurked beneath that demure and proper exterior?” Fred teased.

She set down her fork and flashed an uncertain look at him. “Is that wrong?” She slid her gaze sideways to George. “Am I somehow—not—normal?”

“What you are is delightful,” George soothed, “but you need to recuperate.”

“Oh, but—“

“No buts. We have plenty of time for all sorts of pleasurable activities. There’s no rush to do them all this weekend.”

“Here’s my suggestion, in case anyone cares,” Fred interrupted.

“Don’t be an idiot, Fred,” George said. “Nobody cares what you think. Wait,” he blinked and affected a puzzled expression. “Do you think?”

“Shame on you, George,” Thalassa reproved, her eyes twinkling. “You know it’s not nice to point out another’s shortcomings.”

“I don’t need to point out Fred’s shortcomings, he—“

“Don’t say it,” Fred warned.

“Don’t say what? Oh!” Thalassa gasped, catching the implication. “How many times have you two reminded me that you’re identical twins? Now that I’ve seen you both from head to toe, I can tell you that there’s not enough difference between you that you can get away with disparaging Fred’s-er-physical attributes, George.”

“As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted,” Fred began, folding his arms across his chest. “We could gather up the notebooks and take them into the bedroom. That way we can stay in bed all day and still get some work done.”

“That’s actually a good idea,” George nodded. He caught Thalassa’s arm and pulled her into his lap. “Working on the notebooks will provide the distraction we’ll need to keep from ravishing you,” he said, nuzzling her neck.

“Mm. If you don’t stop that, I’ll be the one needing the distraction,” she said breathlessly and George laughed. “Could you two manage the washing-up?”

“Sure,” Fred agreed.

“Good. I’ll gather up the books and all our notes.” She started to get up, but George restrained her.

“Not until I get my good morning kiss. You already kissed Fred.”

“I kissed Fred because I hit him in the mouth,” she countered.

“And a lovely apology it was, too,” Fred smiled and began clearing the table.

“If that’s what it takes to get a kiss from you, then I’d be happy to let you hit me,” George lifted his chin and closed his eyes. “Go ahead.”

“I suppose, just this once, I could let you have one for free,” she teased and bent her head to drop a light kiss on his lips.

“You call that a kiss?” he complained.

“Weren’t you just saying you needed a distraction to keep from ravishing me? How does it help if I tempt you by giving you a proper snog?” she laughed.

“Well then, I’ll have to look forward to the time when you can snog me quite properly.”


“So who was your first snog?”

The three of them were sprawled across the bed, notebooks and parchment rolls scattered about them as they tried to make sense of the coded passages. At Fred’s question, Thalassa looked up. “Not telling.” She shook her head.

“Aw, come on,” George coaxed. “We’ll tell you ours.”

“If I wanted to know, I’d have found out ages ago.” She ran her hand absently through her hair. “Actually, I could probably guess. Fred, yours was Angelina Johnson, and George,” she paused thoughtfully, “I’d have to say most likely Alicia Spinnet.”

“Wrong,” Fred smirked. “Mine was Maura Cauldwell.”

“The Hufflepuff prefect?”

“The same. She nearly caught us sneaking back to the tower after a late-night kitchen raid. She did catch me. I, ah, distracted her so George and Lee could slip past unnoticed.”

“Way to take one for the team, by the way. Don’t think I ever thanked you for that,” George remarked.

“It wasn’t so bad.” Fred shrugged. “Everyone has to start somewhere. Now, George’s first snog was Angelina.”

Thalassa turned her shocked gaze at George.

He shrugged. “Fred wanted to see if she really could tell us apart, so we swapped jumpers. You know, those ones Mum makes us every year for Christmas with our initials on them?”

“And I’m guessing she didn’t tumble to the switch.”

“Not until I actually kissed her,” George confirmed cheerfully.

“You two have no shame whatsoever,” Thalassa laughed. “Of all the idiotic stunts to pull…”

“How was I to know all the times they snuck out to the Quidditch pitch in the middle of the night they were actually playing with the Quaffle?”

“You might have asked him before you kissed his girlfriend.”

“Actually, it was because of that snog that she became my girlfriend,” Fred said. “She wanted to see if we kissed alike as well. Apparently, we don’t.”

“It was a damn fine snog, though,” George smiled. “You had good taste in women, Fred. Still do.”

“Thank you. So do you.” He gently ran the knuckles of one hand lightly down the back of Thalassa’s arm.

“Now you have to tell us, Thalassa,” George nudged her.

“No I don’t.” She didn’t look up from the notebook in front of her. “And don’t think that subtle compliment will change my mind.”

“’No more evasions and half truths,’ remember?” Fred teased, but she remained stubbornly silent. “No? Then we’ll just have to guess,” he said, rolling over on his back. “It was George, wasn’t it?”

“No.” She reached for another notebook, hoping they’d get the hint and drop the subject. “I never kissed George at school.”

“So it was at school.” Fred turned his head to look at her.

She opened and shut her mouth without saying anything, chagrined at how easily she’d been tricked into giving them a clue.

“Hmm, let’s see,” George began thoughtfully. “Did you manage to corner Oliver Wood?”

She turned pink. “No.”

They started listing all the male Quidditch players from their years at school, firing guesses at her like Bludgers. To each name she answered with a negative response, though when Fred guessed Harry Potter, she reached over and cuffed his shoulder.

“I’m not a cradle robber, thank you very much,” she said tartly.

“Three or four years isn’t that much of a difference,” Fred protested.

“It is when the girl in question is seventeen and the boy is thirteen.”

“Aha!” George swooped down on the scrap of information she’d let fall. “You were seventeen, so it wasn’t anyone that left school before your sixth year.”

“And now we know it wasn’t anyone else from Ron and Harry’s year,” Fred added, “or younger.”

Thalassa began to feel as though she was fighting a losing battle. She pushed away the notebook she’d been pretending to read and rubbed a hand across her eyes.

“Not younger, but what about older?” Fred continued. “Perhaps much older. Was it Snape?”

“Eurgh, Fred. He was my professor. That’s disgusting. And in poor taste, considering.”

“All right, all right,” he laughed. “So it wasn’t a professor.”

“Was it one of the Slytherins you tutored?” George asked.

“No.”

“Ooh, was it Katie Bell?” Fred grinned wickedly.

“No.” She shot him an annoyed glance. “Katie was very nice to me, but we weren’t that close.”

“So it was another girl. See, I told you, George. They practiced snogging each other up in their dormitory at night.”

“You know, I’m tempted to say my first snog was Angelina, just to see the look on your faces, but no, it wasn’t another girl. And yes, some girls do practice on each other. It doesn’t necessarily mean anything.”

“Did you ever snog Angelina?” Fred asked.

“Tell you what, Fred. You just believe whatever will make you happier. If it turns you on to think of me snogging Angelina, then fly with it.”

“I don’t know about him, but it turns me on,” George said, sliding his hand up under her shirt.

“I give up!” She pushed George’s hand away. “If I tell you, may we please drop this and move on?”

“Oh sure, just as it was beginning to get interesting,” George complained.

“Go on then, tell us. Unless,” Fred stared at her, a look of horror spreading across his features, “it wasn’t Percy, was it?”

“No, it wasn’t Percy,” she snapped, exasperated.

“Oh good,” George heaved a sigh of relief. “Because the thought of you snogging Percy wasn’t turning me on at all.”

She laid her forehead on her folded hands and began to count to ten under her breath.

“Just tell us!” they both shouted, laughing.

“It was Lee Jordan.”

She opened her eyes and lifted her head to see identical expressions of shock on their faces.

“That sneaky git,” George said.

“He never breathed a word.” Fred was awed.

“Well, no, he wouldn’t have. It was after Gryffindor won the Quidditch Cup. He overheard me make an idiot of myself trying to chat up Oliver Wood. After Oliver oh, so politely crushed my hopes, Lee was sympathetic and very sweet to me. He said, ‘You know what you do when you confess your feelings for the person you fancy and they let you down? You go snog someone else.’ He took me down to the secret passage that leads into the cellar of Honeydukes and—“ she shrugged. “It was nice. The snog, not that manky tunnel.”

After a minute, George asked suggestively, “So, how far did you go with Lee?”

“About a dozen feet down the passage. There! That’s all of that game I’m going to play.” She pushed herself up, crawled over Fred’s legs, and went to feed her owl.

The twins exchanged a surprised look and after a few minutes, Fred followed her. She was standing in front of the fireplace, looking at the photograph on the mantel.

“All right, there?”

She didn’t answer, apparently lost in thought.

He laid a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Are you angry with us?”

“No,” she said quickly. “Well, yes, some,” she then admitted.

“Why?”

She gestured to the photo. “Remember this?” It was a picture of the Gryffindor Quidditch team right after they’d won the Cup in Fred and George’s fifth year.

“Of course,” he replied, wondering what that had to do with anything.

“I was so proud of all of you, so proud to be a Gryffindor. Then, afterwards, telling Oliver how I felt about him, well, that took more courage than anything I’d ever done before. It was exhilarating, for all that he didn’t follow the script I’d prepared in my mind.” She sighed and turned to face Fred. “I really did not want to tell the two of you about Lee and me. I just wasn’t ready to share that.”

He pulled her into his arms. “I’m sorry,” he murmured into her hair.

She nuzzled his neck. “No, I’m being silly. After last night, I shouldn’t be shy with you and George. It’s just that keeping my secrets is a deeply ingrained habit with me. I need to learn to be more trusting.” She was quiet a moment, and then continued. “I’ll always be grateful to Lee. Just when I’d taken a huge blow to my confidence, he made me feel special. Oh, not because we had any deep feelings for one another. I got the impression that he’d rather have been with someone else. It was more that he was a good enough friend to console me in a way that didn’t belittle my hurt feelings. That, and the fact that he showed me the secret passage. How many people know about it, anyway?”

“Hmm, well, Lee, George and I, Ron, Harry, and Hermione, apparently Remus Lupin, you, possibly Ginny. McGonagall, probably. I’m not sure who else.”

“Not many, though. He trusted me to keep the secret.” She giggled. “I had a hell of a time squeezing through the opening, but I did it.”

“Determined, were you?” he growled.

She tilted her head back to look at him. “Are you jealous?”

“No,” he lied, his ears turning red.

“You only have yourself to blame,” she teased. “You wanted to know.”

He glanced down at her, a dangerous glint in his eye. He slid his hand up to cup the back of her head and brought his mouth down on hers. There was no subtlety in his kiss. It was intended to stake his claim in no uncertain terms. After a muffled squeak of surprise, she kissed him back, matching his intensity with a passion of her own.

“I think I’ve figured it out—oh, are we starting again?” George stood next to the armoire, a notebook in one hand and a sheet of parchment in the other.

Thalassa and Fred broke apart. Both were flushed and breathing unsteadily. She cleared her throat. “No. Fred was just attempting to Obliviate my memory of snogging Lee.”

George made a tsking sound. “That’s not how you cast a memory charm, Fred,” he mocked.

Fred groaned and shoved his hands into his pockets.

“That doesn’t really help, mate,” George smirked with a pointed glance at the front of Fred’s trousers.

“Stop it, George,” Thalassa chided. “What did you figure out?”

“The code. I think I’ve cracked it. Come have a look.”

She hurried over to him, Fred following more slowly.

“You know how you wondered why there was a common potion at the start of each book? That’s the key to the code. You take the measurements of the components and count off that many characters.”

Thalassa looked where he was pointing in the book.

“See: eight, five, one, three, two, three, six.” George then turned to one of the coded passages later in the book. “Eight, that’s ‘a,’ five, ‘p,’ one, ‘o’ three, ‘t,’ two, ‘i,’ three, ‘o,’ six, ‘n.’”

“’A potion,’” she started scanning ahead, “’to ren--render a wizard power—less.’ Great Circe, George, I think you’ve done it,” she breathed. She whirled away to pick up another notebook. She flipped back and forth between the potion on the first page and a later, coded section. “’A potion to increase magical power,’” she read. She glanced up, an awed expression on her face. Fred was just as impressed as she was. George smiled smugly. She shut the book with a snap and began clearing off the bed. Notebooks and parchments she stacked on her trunk at the foot of the bed. Quills and inkpots went on the vanity.

“What are you doing?” George asked.

“I think this calls for a celebration,” she replied with a smouldering look. She reached for the wand on the nightstand and held it out. “Curse me, please.”

Fred took his wand, pointed it at her lower abdomen and performed the Temporary Infertility Curse. “Sure you want to do this? I mean, you’ve got to be sore.”

She grinned. “I put a healing potion in my bath this morning.”


Much later, Thalassa lay with her head pillowed on Fred’s chest. George slept cuddled up against her back, his quiet snores purring aainst her shoulder.

“Fred?” she whispered. “Are you still awake?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Were you really jealous of Lee? Because there’s no reason to be.”

His only response was a deep sigh.

After a minute she asked, “How is it you weren’t jealous of George for snogging Angelina, but you’re jealous of Lee for snogging me?”

“It’s completely different,” he said, shifting uncomfortably, not wanting to admit to her that he had been--and still was--jealous of George, though over different situations. “For one thing, it was my idea for George to pretend to be me with her.”

George stirred behind her, his arm tightening around her waist. “Can’t a bloke get some peace around here?” he complained sleepily.

Thalassa gave his arm a pinch. “You already had a piece,” she retorted with a giggle, using a phrase she’d learned from one of her Muggle movies.

Fred sucked in a surprised breath. “That’s some mouth you’ve got on you, Hartwell. Anyone’d think you were raised in a brothel.”

“You weren’t complaining about my mouth earlier, Weasley,” she teased.

George snickered. “Thalassa, m’love, you are a delight.” He kissed the back of her neck, making her shiver.

“If you plan on getting any sleep at all, you’d better not do that,” she warned.

“Do what? This?” and he kissed her again.


When Thalassa’s alarm went off in the morning, Fred and George groaned in unison.

“Don’t grumble,” she chided. “You knew we’d have to get up early today.” She leaned over George and stretched to reach the clock. He took the opportunity to kiss whatever parts of her anatomy he could reach: neck, collarbone, breast. Fred slid his hand up the inside of her thigh and slipped his fingers in between her legs to stoke her there. “Hey!” she protested with a surprised laugh. “We don’t have time for this.”

“Sure we do,” argued Fred. “You wanted to go to Gringott’s this morning. They won’t open until nine. That gives us at least two hours.”

“But I mmph—“

George stopped her words quite effectively. Then he and Fred proceeded to show her all the delights their time would allow.

They made it to Gringott’s just as the bank opened for the day, though Thalassa was a bit flustered. An adventure, she reminded herself. It’s an adventure. She ignored the little voice saying the necessary element that made an adventure was danger.

Thalassa went to the goblin in charge of the vaults. “I’d like to see Roff, please.” In less than a minute, the wizened creature hobbled out to greet her.

“How may I assist today, Miss Hartwell?”

Thalassa knew goblins valued brevity and directness, so she got immediately to the point. “I need a high-security vault with three keys. Three different keys that all have to be used to open the vault.” She didn’t even ask if that was possible. When it came to Gringott’s and security, anything was possible.

There were forms to fill out, in triplicate, of course. Then Roff ushered them into a rather rickety cart. One very unsettling ride later, the goblin announced, “Vault twenty-four-oh-five,” and handed Thalassa, Fred, and George each a key.

Thalassa’s key was tiny and silver, shaped like the key to a wind-up toy. It fit a keyhole in the centre of the door. Fred’s key was blued-steel and shaped rather like the ignition key to a Range Rover. It fit a padlock-shaped protrusion on the right side of the vault door. George’s was a brass skeleton key that fit in the eye socket of the sphinx on a tarnished crest high on the left side of the door. They inserted their keys and all turned them at the same instant. The door opened to reveal a small room with a stone table in the centre. Fred and George stepped forward and hefted the two rucksacks full of notebooks up onto the table. No one said a word until they were all back aboveground,

“I wish you’d let us help pay the fee for the vault,” George frowned.

“I’m not ready to start splitting bills just yet.”

“Not ready to start splitting Bill’s what?” Fred joked.

“Smart-arse,” Thalassa murmured with a smile. “See you tonight?”

“Definitely,” George answered for himself and Fred. “We’ll meet you at your shop after closing.”

They parted with no more physical demonstration than quick handclasps, but Thalassa’s fingertips and spine tingled for hours afterward. When she was finally able to bolt the door behind her last customer of the day, she breathed a sigh of relief. She’d gone through her day feeling as if a detailed description of her weekend was printed on her forehead. Humming a little to herself, Thalassa whisked through her after-close cleaning. Then she took a contraceptive potion from the shelf and slipped it into her bag. No sense taking chances.

For once, Fred and George weren’t late. Cooking dinner for the three of them became a test of Thalassa’s determination, as the twins took every opportunity to steal a kiss or a quick cuddle. Afterwards, she brought out the potion she’d taken from her shop.

“Is that what I think it is?” Fred asked, eyeing the brown glass bottle.

“It is if you think it’s a contraceptive potion. Cheers.” She uncorked the bottle and tipped it up. The thick, slimy potion made her gag, but somehow she managed to choke it down. “That,” she said with a grimace and a shudder, “is undoubtedly the most horrid thing I’ve ever put in my mouth.”

“Well, take comfort in the fact that you won’t have to take it for another six months,” George said sympathetically.

“Ugh. Small comfort.”

“At least this way we won’t have to worry about remembering to do the Infertility Curse every time,” Fred pointed out, wrapping his arms around her waist. He bent his head to kiss her, but she turned her face away. “What is it?”

“Sorry,” she said shortly. “All of a sudden, I don’t feel—“ her eyes widened and her face drained of colour. She clamped her hand over her mouth and spun away, dashing for the loo.

Fred and George heard the unmistakable sounds of retching and hurried after her. George pulled her hair back and held it out of the way so she wouldn’t get sick on it.

“What happened?” Fred was as close to panic as George had ever seen him.

“Obviously, the potion makes her sick, you humongous prat.” George rubbed Thalassa’s back with his free hand. “And you had no idea, did you love?”

Unable to answer in any other way, she shook her head slightly.

“Had it gone off or something?”

“Use a little sense, Fred. She brought it home from her shop. She wouldn’t let anything sit around long enough to ‘go off.’”

“Nobody ever told me the potion could make them sick. I mean—“ Fred floundered.

George sighed. “It’s rare, this severe a reaction. Some women, it makes them a little queasy is all.”

Thalassa wanted to tell them to shut up, but she couldn’t spare the breath.

“Make yourself useful and get her a wet flannel,” George snapped at his twin.

Fred complied, but it was several long minutes before Thalassa could take it from him to wipe her mouth. Even after she’d brought up everything in her stomach, she’d continued to gag and choke. Finally, she leaned back against George’s shoulder, sobbing weakly.

“Shh. It’s over now,” he told her. “You’ll be back to normal in the morning.”

“But tonight is ruined,” she said miserably.

Fred took the flannel from her, folded it over to a clean side, and gently wiped away her tears. “Nothing’s been ruined. We got to spend time with you.”

“And there’s always tomorrow night,” George added.

They helped her to her feet so she could rinse her mouth and brush her teeth. After she’d put her toothbrush back in its holder, she leaned on her hands against the counter.

“Feeling sick again?” Fred asked.

“No I—“ She sighed. “I don’t want to be alone, but I don’t feel up to making love. It doesn’t seem fair to ask you to stay,” she looked up, meeting first George’s eyes, then Fred’s in the mirror, “but would you?”

“Of course we’ll stay,” George said.

“We were hoping you wouldn’t ask us to leave,” Fred continued. “We would’ve understood if you wanted to be alone, but—“

“We’re glad you’d rather have us about,” George finished. “Go change into your nightgown. We’ll clean up in here.”

She smiled tiredly. “It must be love if you’re willing to clean up my sick.”

“Couple of rough-and-tumble Quidditch players? A little sick won’t bother us,” Fred said easily.

“And yes,” George added gently, “it is love.”