Relations, Revelations

The chapter you\'ve all so anxiously been waiting for: What\'s up with Ron and his dream? Again, sorry for delays. Life happens. My mom\'s just taken my dog to the vet to be put to sleep, so I\'m a bit of a wreck. But I\'m still writing, and I\'ll try to post at least once a week. Struggling with the next few chapters that I\'m writing. Wild guess says there\'s maybe 8 or 9 chapters left after this one, and I\'m currently writing 30. So yeah, I\'ll leave you to your reading.

AND WILL YOU GUYS REVIEW ALREADY!?!?! I know Carmen\'s not the only person reading this!!!! *ehhem* (im not as angry as i sound :-D)

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Chapter 26 – Uncovered

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Some time after two in the morning, Harry and Ginny had crept up to her room to sleep in a more decent position. Harry had settled into the fold-away that Mrs. Weasley had set out for Hermione, and Ginny curled up in her bed beside his, clutching Harry’s hand as she fell asleep.

They stumbled down to the kitchen around ten that morning, hand in hand, and greeted Mrs. Weasley with a kiss on the cheek.

“Ginny dear, are your brothers still asleep?”

“Yes mum. I think Ron’s asleep with Sephera on the couch in the sitting room.”

“If you’ll wake them, I’ll just go check on Hermione and the twins.”

Mrs. Weasley made her way up the staircases to her children’s bedrooms. She entered Ginny’s room first, expecting to wake Hermione. The bed linens of the fold-away were rumpled, but the bed was otherwise empty. She proceeded to Ron’s room, thinking perhaps Hermione had slept in the unoccupied room. She found Fred out-cold still dressed in his robes from the previous day on Ron’s bed. Shrugging, she went to the twins’ room. She opened the door just enough to stick her head in. There lay Hermione and George, cuddled up together, Hermione wearing one of George’s old t-shirts, and George tucked safely in his flannel pajamas.

She smiled. No matter how devious her twin sons were, no matter how many pranks they pulled at school, no matter how often they wasted their limitless talents on creating senseless pranks, they were still gentlemen. She approached the bed, brushed a strand of hair back from Hermione’s face, and gently shook George awake. He cracked his eyes open, squinting into the morning light and rubbing the sand from them. He sat bolt upright.

“Mum! It’s not what…”

“Shhh! George, don’t worry your little head.” She ruffled his hair. “I just wanted to let you know breakfast is ready.”

By this time, Hermione was sitting beside George looking positively disheveled and slightly grumpy. “Morning, Mrs. Weasley.”

“Good morning, dear. Breakfast is waiting for you downstairs. I’m sure you can borrow Ginny’s dressing gown if you’d like.”

When George and Hermione finally got downstairs, Ron, Sephera, Harry, and Ginny were already tucking into their breakfasts. Mr. Weasley sat at the head of the table, Daily Prophet held up to conceal his nervous expression. The two additions took their seats and filled their plates.

“Ron, have you finished eating?”

“Yeah dad. What’s up?”

“Would you mind joining me in my office for a moment?”

“Eh, yeah, I suppose so.”

Mr. Weasley and Ron stood and walked up the stairs to what had once been Percy’s bedroom. Mr. Weasley had converted it to a lovely office shortly after Percy’s… departure. It had proven itself to be a valuable asset since he became Minister. He’d spent long nights chatting with various heads of departments over the floo, toiling over paperwork, reading up on foreign laws and restrictions to see where England could improve, and stumbled in night after night after late meetings at the Ministry, only to collapse on the couch. Molly would find him there some mornings and greet him with a steaming hot cup of coffee and a kiss on the cheek.

Sometimes he wondered how she’d put up with the new strain on their marriage, but then he’d remember that she raised seven children and stretched their meager budget to its very limits time and time again. But now he was making decent amounts of money. They were planning on renovating the house, taking a few more trips abroad, and… well, having money was so new to him that he really didn’t know what they’d do with it now. He turned the knob and opened the door, letting his youngest son into his office before him. Ron collapsed on the couch in the graceless way that he always did, and Arthur sat down in his leather desk chair. Ron picked up a model muggle airplane and idly twirled the propeller in his fingers.

“So, what’s up dad?”

“Ron, tell me about the dream you had last night.”

“Well I’ve had it a few times before, really. Fudge gets kidnapped, gets the Dementor’s kiss, his body is left in his office, and Percy kills him.” Ron waved his hand as if to show his dad that it was really no big deal “How’d you know I had that dream?”

“Just as I was getting into bed I heard you screaming downstairs, so I listened in.” His father gave him a distinctly paternal, very concerned look.

“Oh.”

“Have you ever had dreams like that before?” Arthur hunched forward, looking his squasquare in the eye, fingers steepled downward between his knees.

“Like violent ones or something?”

“Let me phrase that another way. How clear are your dreams usually?”

“Pretty crisp. I can always hear what’s going on and know exactly who’s who and what’s what.”

“And the people are usually real? Not mythical or made up?”

“For the most part. They’ve all got names and such. Most aren’t people I know though. I just get this feeling that they’re real people.”

“Can you tell me about one of them?”

“Well I had this one,” Ron laughed, “where Bill went to receive the House Cup from Dumbledore when he was Head Boy. He went up the steps to the professors’ table, tripped on his robes, ripped them clear in two up the back, then split his pants and fell flat on his face. I’ll tell you, the look on McGonagall’s face was classic, not to mention the laughter in the Great Hall…”

“Thank you Ron, that’s quite enough. You mentioned violent ones?”

“Yeah, I’ve got one where some guys named Jugson and Mulciber have this young girl tied up and she’s screaming. They’re about to start torturing her, when Professor Dumbledore’s brother and Professor Lupin come in, stupefy Jugson and Mulciber, rescue the girl, and leave. The next thing I know they’re at the Ministry talking to Dumbledore and Mrs. Bones, you know, Susan’s aunt. That’s the end of it really.”

“What I’m trying to get at, Ron, is that all of those things actually happened.”

Ron looked at his father in confusion.

“Bill actually did rip his robes and split his pants at the Leaving Feast. Charlie and Percy heckled him for it for years. ‘Have a ‘ripping’ good time, Bill!’ and ‘Have a nice ‘trip’ to Egypt?’ Didn’t you ever catch the scowl on his face when they’d pick on him?”

“Well now you mention it… But what about Fudge and the Dementors? And the girl?”

“The girl was Athena Dumbledore, the Professor’s niece. She was kidnapped by Death Eaters shortly after she graduated from Hogwarts, and her father and Romulus Lupin rescued her. That wasn’t Remus you saw. It was his twin brother.”

“I think I saw her at the party the other night. Now what about Fudge?”

“What you dreamed actually happened. Fudge was kidnapped by Death Eaters, taken to the Dementors, and Percy killed him. There’s a huge cover-up about it in the Ministry right now. Only about six people know about it, so you’ll understand when I say that it’s imperative that you tell absolutely no one else.”

“I still don’t understand why Percy killed Fudge. All I saw was him finding Fudge slumped over in his desk and looking all weird, then Percy picks up a letter, reads it, then casts the killing curse on him.”

“A letter? Ron, Fudge’s office was searched, but nobody ever found a letter. Do you know what it said?”

“No, I always wake up right when Percy kills Fudge. Maybe he did something to it after that?”

“Perhaps. I’ll have to drop in on Percy some time this week and ask him about it. The Ministry’s put him under strict supervision of a psychiatrist since then, but he’s been begging to go on with business as usual. I’ll never understand that man. He’s been trying so desperately to make amends with everyone since that – incident – a few years back. Then he goes and kills Fudge. It doesn’t fail to baffle me.”

“Percy’s mental. He always was and he always will be. That’s the only explanation.”

“I think you’re right.” Arthur smirked at his son. “Ron, do you think it would benefit you if Harry taught you Occlumency? Would that block the visions?”

“Dunno. Couldn’t hurt, could it? I didn’t think Harry was advanced enough though.”

“Well after Remus took it upon himself to teach him Occlumency last summer, Harry learned it quite quickly. Dumbledore recommended he move on to Legilimency, and he’s fairly decent at that too. Not to Professor Snape’s level, but he’s decent.”

Ron looked rather surprised, and almost a bit hurt that Harry hadn’t told him about his new skills. Then he got a bit worried and wondered if Harry had ever read his mind.

“So, do you lot have anything planned for the day?” Arthur broke his son’s chain of thoughts.

“We thought about going back to Diagon Alley since Harry missed out yesterday.”

“What’s all this about the shop being ransacked?”

“Oh. That. Apparently Lucius Malfoy broke in overnight and demolished the place. Took us all of yesterday to clear up the mess.”

“Any idea of the financial loss?”

“You’ll have to talk to Fred and George about that one. You coming back down?”

“No. Would you mind sending them up here after you?”

“Sure.” Ron stepped out of the office and closed the door behind him quietly. His mind was still reeling from the information his dad had given him. Did that mean he was a seer or something? He’d always scoffed at Trelawney’s skills, but damn, now he was seeing the past the same way she saw the future. And Harry could read minds? Bloody hell. He hadn’t even noticed he’d arrived in the living room he’d been thinking so much about all the dreams he’d had in the past, but everyone else noticed the glassy look in his eyes.

“Oy, Ronnie. You sleepwalkin’?” Fred prodded his brother in the ribs when he approached the table.

“Naw, fine. Dad wants to see you two in his office.”

“OoooOooh…” Hermione and Ginny mocked in unison.

“No no, he just wants to know what happened at Three W.” The twins stood and stalked from the room.

Ron grabbed the remaining sausage from Fred’s plate and took his seat beside Sephera again.