Love is the Child of an Endless War

The cheer of Christmas pervaded Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes. Its young owners hearts filled fairly to bursting with the joy of the yuletide season. Business was booming, as always, but this particular year's sales had been especially profitable. Fred and George were beginning to divest their massive earnings into some speculative ventures. They'd made a killing on the patented "Silent Pop", which was the trick to Apparating making only the faintest audible noise. During the apex of the war a fortune in military contracts had been awarded to them to train Wizarding warriors in its effective use. Allowing them to sneak up on enemy forces en masse, without warning. They didn't like to brag about it, but Fred and George believed that without the aide of the "Silent Pop" Voldemort might never have been defeated. That invention became their gateway for starting the Innovative Magic Development division of their company.

Major progress had been made on their new ion transference spell. Once completed it would splinter magical connectivity along wavelengths to allow for the operation of electronic devices in conjunction with the use of magic. The financial world was buzzing with rumors about their projected finish date. They'd lined up gazillion galleon, trillion dollar, and million pound investors by the hundreds who were interested in implementing their latest magic trick.

As a result of their good fortune the Weasley twins were passing out the cash like it grew on trees, which for them, sometimes, it really seemed to do. They worked hard, but they invariably achieved results beyond even their dreams, and they had dreamed quite a lot. On Christmas Eve day they opened their little shop in Diagon Alley, the headquarters of W.W. Wheezes still, for a half day and allowed underprivileged children to come in by the hundreds to take what they liked off the shelves.

"This is really great, Fred," George observed. Grinning at his brother, while they leaned against the wall behind the counter to enjoy the festivities in identical positions of relaxed ease, arms crossed at the chest, right over left, legs crossed at the knee, left over right. Fred mirrored George's grin and shouted over the melee, "It is, isn't it? I have a good feeling about the coming New Year, George. I think things are looking up."

"Yeah, you know what? I'm actually looking forward to Christmas this year. It just hasn't felt right to me since Dad died, and then when Percy..." they both lowered their heads two-tenths of a fraction of an inch, and flickered silent frowns at the floor, then George continued, "but it's going to be good this year, I have a good gut feeling."

"Me too," Fred agreed, which he always did, almost always, with the occasional Jasper related exception. "We're all going to be together tomorrow for the first time in I don't know how long. That'll be nice. Mum is delirious with holiday fever. I haven't seen her this excited about Christmas in years."

"Penny and I offered up the guest house to anyone who wanted it, " George replied loudly to cover the din. "Believe it, or not, everyone actually wants to stay with Mum in The Burrow."

Fred laughed, "Remember when none of us could wait to get the heck out of that place? Now, it's like nostalgia, or something."

"It's a much nicer place to be these days," George reminded him. "Mum's got her life back and it's made all the difference." Lifting his arm he checked his watch, and was, as ever, grateful for non-communicative timepieces. "It's already almost eleven o'clock. I wonder where Penny and the children are? I wanted Jasper and Phillipa to come to the shop today and help us deliver food baskets."

Fred sniggered, "Yes, I think it's very high minded of you to expose your children to poverty once a year, George. Then the spoiled little buggers really appreciate everything you've done for them."

George flushed. "Shut up, Fred. Wait until you have kids, you'll want to spoil yours, too." A furtive buzzing in his pocket alerted him to a message, and he yelled to Fred, "I think Jasper's buzzing me now. I'm going to go into my office and take it."

Fred nodded his assent, and George disappeared into the wall, causing the shop full of caretakers and children to shout out in astonishment. Nifty little invention, the camouflaged staircase, it looked exactly like a seamless section of the wall but it cleverly concealed the side staircase that led to their private quarters. Out of the crowd, George pulled his mirror out, and flicked it open, surprised to see Penny's frantic looking face, instead of Jasper's anxious one. "What's going on, Pen? Where are you?"

"I'm still at home, George. I can't find the children."

George tilted his head quizzically. "You can't find the children? Has Jasper been vanishing things again? I told him he isn't allowed to do any more magic on holiday since he tried transfiguring Rufus into a reindeer."

"I don't know what he's done!" Penny bit out sharply in her panic. "I can't find him, or Phillipa! I told them to start getting ready to go. I thought they'd gone out to the car, but they aren't there. I've looked all over the house. Aloysious has been over the cellar. I just finished checking the garden, the garage, and the broom shed." She was verging on hyperventilation, so George said, "All right, I'll be home in a few minutes to help you look for them."

"Gotta go," he shouted to Fred a moment later. "Penny says the children have gone missing."

Fred's eyebrows lifted. "Missing? I'd better come with you."

"I don't think you need to, Fred. One of us should stay here and finish up with this. I think Jasper is just up to tricks."

"Allow me a moment to get over the shock," said Fred, casting dry aspersions on his nephew.

George's flush grew deeper. "Hey, he's getting better. I haven't been summoned to the school since I got him a dog."

"I hate to be the one to burst your bubble of parental confidence, George. But I'd be neglecting my brotherly duty if I failed to tell you that with Hogwarts out on holiday, you spending so much time at work during the rush, and Penny so busy getting ready for Christmas, that Jasper is a disaster waiting to happen. On the good chance that he has transferred himself into another dimension, or possibly opened up another wormhole in the fabric of reality, I'm going to turn the distribution of this stuff over to Louisa and come along. You go on ahead, I'll be right behind you," Fred insisted.

George wanted to deny Fred's not-so-joking innuendo, but he couldn't manage it. Deep down he thought Fred might be right. With a heavy exhalation of air he agreed, "Okay, I'll see you at home in a few. But I doubt it will be anything too serious. I've already had a long talk with him this week about misusing his magic."

Even though he'd been doing it almost daily for the past six years, seeing George Apparate onto the front lawn of his house always freaked out the neighbors. The Duke and Duchess were standing on their veranda shaking their silvered heads with what he presumed to be shock. Waving a reassuring hand to them, and their cavalcade of grandchildren visiting for the holiday, he considered that despite the fact that it was safe for magical persons to come out of the closet in this part of the world, it was still much simpler in a Muggle neighborhood to get into the car and drive off. Despite Penny's protests he was taking over the use of the old Volvo and she was getting a new Jaguar convertible for Christmas. If Jasper so much as looked at it sideways he would be dismembered and slowly roasted on a spit over glowing hot coals.

George paused on the veranda long enough to pat the nose of the gorgeous roan colored mule tied to the posts. He stepped through the front door and grievous sobbing alerted him to Penny's presence in the kitchen. With a sudden sick feeling in his gut he charged through the corridor to see her sitting at the table. She had her curly dark head buried on her folded arms, and she was crying as though she were beyond consolation. Which she occasionally had been at some points in their relationship, but not at anytime recently.

"Penny, whatever is the matter?" Hearing her cry like this always made him think the worst, the clenching in his gut became almost unbearable, but he tried to remain calm. "Come on now, pull yourself together and tell me what's happened." Sitting down on the chair at her side, he put his arm around her shoulders, becoming more concerned by the minute.

"I am the most terribly awful mother," she sobbed. "I despise my own son. And that is just not natural."

"He's not natural, you mean," George said with presentiment. "What's he gotten up to this time? And when did we get a mule?"

"She's a donkey, and she's Phillipa!" Penny replied tearfully disgusted, throwing her hands into the air. "He's gone and Transfigured her as a Christmas gift to the neighbors! They brought her back over right after I got off the mirror with you. I think we'll have to take her into St. Mungo's. I can't change her back; Jasper can't change her back, he doesn't even know which spell model he used to transfigure her with."

"Where is he?" George asked with a menacing squint that boded ill for Jasper's backside.

"I absolutely beat his trousers off with the wooden kitchen spoon and sent him to bed," Penny confessed, trying to pull herself together. She wiped her eyes with her sleeve. George offered her a tissue to blow her nose. "Why does he always have to pull this nonsense right before a major family event? How am I to explain to my parents that we'll either be spending Christmas Eve in the emergency room, or they'll need to find a bucket of oats to feed to their granddaughter for Christmas dinner?"

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Jasper built a blanket cave on his bed. There wasn't anything else to do in his room. Penny had come up with the perplexing notion some time ago that bedrooms should be places of rest and quiet contemplation. It boiled down to having no toys, no video games, and no magic in his room. It was boring in there, is what it was. Besides, he thought that his mother and his uncle sometimes contemplated one another rather too loudly in their own room. She was making him stay in here to torture him further. Now he was missing out on all hell breaking loose downstairs.

He was trying hard to listen in. That sounded like Mummy crying. There was Uncle George. Based on the tone of his voice Jasper rather thought he might be feeling a bit grim. He swallowed hard. Uncle Fred popped in, and their voices intermingled, but he couldn't make out all of the words. There was Mummy wavering between hysteria and aberrant calmness. Uncle Fred, sounding very nearly amused, but trying hard not to let show. Uh, oh, Uncle George really sounded angry. That was a bad sign. They were trying twins' magic to un-transfigure Phil now. Jasper quivered in hopeful anticipation. Phillipa was headed for the hospital if his uncles couldn't bust that donkey charm; a decently done bit of magic, he'd thought, but unfortunately difficult to reverse. And his mother was going to be more annoyed with him than ever.

"Mummy wouldn't even let me explain anything to her!" Jasper fumed, feeling absolutely persecuted. She'd spanked him so hard he could still feel his rear end glowing. Sprawling beneath his blankets on his belly he rubbed it ruefully. "This is so unfair! She never listens to me!" He'd only meant to make the neighbors a favor. They were missing a donkey from their Christmas crèche' play; Phil had been up for it. It wasn't supposed to have been this big of a deal. He figured that Phil could trot next door, play her part, he'd change her back, and they'd make it to W.W. Wheezes in no time.

Oh, no, this was not good. Uncle Fred had given up. He was advising Mummy to try a teleportation spell to transport Phil all the way to St. Mungo's because she wouldn't fit into the Volvo. Those spells were chancy, but it was that, or borrowing the neighbor's horse cart. Jasper cringed, biting his lip until he tasted blood. Rufus snuffled his wet, black, nose under the covers to stare at him with shaggy sympathy. "You're my only friend, boy." Jasper heaved a misunderstood sigh.

There was a loud snapping noise. Gold and red sparks showered brightly like fireworks, high outside of his window, disappearing into the gray cloud covered sky. Phil whinnied shrilly; then it got very quiet. It sounded as though they had all gone. Jasper peeked his head out from underneath the covers, rolled over and sat up gingerly on the edge of his bed. He was all set to be half relieved when the heavy tread of fate sounded on the stairs. Those were not Mummy's footsteps.

Jasper suffered a flashback. It was an overly warm, mid-summer's day on his previous summer's holiday, The Day of the Jaguar. Muggle fire trucks had come streaming up the drive with sirens blaring in response to the neighbor's panicked calls that there was a car fire. Mummy's new sports car was torched on the bottom, the smell of burning rubber filled the air. When the fire had been put out, she'd sent Jasper to bed with a dire warning that she'd be up to deal with him later. He'd watched her from his window while she conversed with the neighbors. She offered to replace everything, even update their electric fencing system, so long as they didn't press any charges.

He'd seen Uncle George talking with the animal control officials. That had been an unforeseen circumstance. Jasper hadn't considered what would happen to all of the cows once they were loose of that electric restraint system. Unfortunately some of them had managed to leak out onto a Muggle airport runway. Uncle George bribed the constable not to file an official report that would alert the media. Jasper hadn't thought about that, either. Bad press was bad for business; he'd heard Uncle Fred repeat that idiom frequently enough.

Phil had risked getting herself into trouble by speaking to him while he was in disgrace. She'd peeked her head around the corner of his doorway to say that he had given Mummy the sick headache that made her see spots and throw up. Uncle George was putting her to bed, and she'd overheard him tell Mummy not to worry, that he would deal with Jasper. Jasper felt pretty badly that he'd given Mummy the sick headache. He hadn't meant to destroy her new car, or to cause so much trouble. But, it wasn't all bad news, because Mummy's headache meant that George was going to deal with him instead. And his uncle was an affable and easy-going person who did not automatically reach for the kitchen spoon at the first sign of misbehavior. Jasper figured it wouldn't be so bad this time. He had been mistaken about that. It had turned out to be that Uncle George carried a streak of uncharacteristically nasty temper, and he'd had no compunction that day about exercising it thoroughly on Jasper's rear end.

The flashback ended on a poor note when George flung open the door to Jasper's bedroom without bothering to knock. His face was white hot with rage, cursed Jaguar white. "What?" Jasper cried out in response to his uncle's furious expression. Scrambling up out of bed and backing hastily away towards the wall, he entreated, "I'm sorry! Uncle George, don't look at me that way! Mummy's already beaten the hell out of me with the kitchen spoon!"

George stopped just inside the doorway, considered his position, closed his eyes, clenched his fists and counted to ten. Then to twenty, decided rapidly to have a go at thirty, but didn't stop counting until he hit fifty-five, and opened his eyes again. "What could you possibly have been thinking? It's Christmas Eve, Jasper! We're supposed to be having a nice family dinner at your Nana Sophie's house in four hours and you've gone and made your sister into a mule!"

"She's a donkey, actually," Jasper corrected, and then flung his hands up in surrender when George advanced on him. "I thought I could change her back! She wanted me to do it, as a gift for the neighbors. We were being charitable, like you said we should be, you know giving without receiving and all of that."

"But you couldn't change her back," George said with a certain terrifyingly vindictive calmness.

"I can't change her back, either. Fred and I working together can't change her back. Why do you suppose that is, Jasper? Well, I'll tell you what I think. I think it's because that's very advanced magic you're using, and you don't even know what in hell you're doing with it. As I mentioned to you earlier in the week, when you tried to give your dog antlers; you're too young to be working these kinds of spells! You haven't been properly trained to use them! And you are so incredibly fortunate that your mother got to you first today."

"I don't know about that," Jasper contradicted wrathfully, holding back tears of outrage in response to this new travesty of misplaced justice. "She doesn't even listen to me! She is like a crazy woman when she gets that kitchen spoon into her hand and there's no sense trying to reason with her!"

George's Christmas spirit had evaporated right along with his wife and their mulish girl child. He set Jasper down in one glorious rush of his rare temper. "Well, by all means, Jasper, let's reason out her reaction!" He started ticking off the consequences of Jasper's transgressions on one hand.

"Let's see, your mother's entire holiday evening will be spent in the emergency waiting room of St. Mungo's hospital! Your sister is going to miss out on all of the Christmas Eve festivities that normal little girls, without hooves, typically engage in. I will not be spending any time with my wife and my daughter on Christmas Eve. Your grandparents will miss out on their chance to spend the holiday with them as well, and depending on just how badly you've messed up that spell, an indefinite period into the future might still see your sister bearing long ears and a tail!"

He paused to draw a furious breath. Jasper cringed under the onslaught of his anger, but George wasn't mincing any words. "If you think for one moment that I feel the least bit sorry for you at the moment, you are horribly mistaken! Don't you give me that look, Jasper George Arthur Weasley! If you so much as put another toe out of line during the rest of your holiday, I am going to find a permanent place for you in St. Brutus' Secure Center for Incurably Criminal Boys!"

Later in life George would still claim that particular Christmas Eve was something similar to having died and gone to hell. He and Jasper made the trek in the Volvo, bearing a load of Penny's hard shopped for, carefully hand wrapped gifts. Gifts that she wouldn't be around to see opened and enjoyed, to the Clearwater family home in Godric's Hollow.

Richard Clearwater came from an old Wizarding family. Penny's father was an acclaimed Wizard historian who specialized in the study of magic in the ancient world. The news that his precious granddaughter had been turned into a donkey just in time for Christmas didn't seem to put him out overly much. But then George reckoned that Richard lived off in his own dry, dusty, ancient magic filled world and was never overly put out by anything. It irritated the hell out of him that Richard occasionally still referred to him as Percy.

Sophie was a disagreeable bitch, as usual. She'd already fallen in love with that intellectual stick, Richard, begun a passionate affair with him, and found herself pregnant with Penny, before he casually happened to drop into conversation one day that he was a Wizard who really belonged mostly in a concealed magical world that she hadn't even realized existed. That unexpected introduction to the magical aspect of things had given her a bad taste of it, and she'd never grown fond of the idea. She'd remained with Richard; more or less, for thirty-four years and still seemed to be rather fond of him, but she had little liking for the trappings of magic. The anti-physical world concept that Jasper could turn Phillipa into a mule was met with her deep disapproval. To say nothing of the fact that he did actually do it.

As a biological chemist with several advanced degrees, Sophie was much sought after the world over to share the results of her research with Muggle hospitals and universities, but she was a scientist possessed of very little imagination. The one thing that George did appreciate about Sophie was the fact that she liked him better than she had liked Percy. Which by no means equated to approval of him as a proper life-mate for her daughter. Penny's weakness for tall, red headed men was regrettably understandable, Sophie had said, but why couldn't she find one that didn't wave a wand around? George's redeeming qualities in Sophie's eyes were the facts that he was incredibly wealthy, and he had never had anything at all to do with the old fascist dictatorship of a Ministry of Magic that had caused so many troubles for the world.

George respected Sophie's affection and concern for Penny and the children. He admired Richard's dedication to preserving the historical knowledge that interbreeding between Wizards and Muggles is what had kept the magic alive. He did not appreciate Richard lecturing Jasper on the importance of carefully recording his spell work in order to prevent the sort of unfortunate circumstance that results in eating Christmas Eve dinner minus half of your family, nor did he appreciate Sophie's interference when she would not leave off pestering Jasper to eat his Christmas Eve dinner.

Anybody who bothered to take a good look at the boy might have seen that he had already been punished and was upset enough. Stung into contrition after hearing George's uncharacteristically harsh rebuke, Jasper sat absolutely silent in his chair at the dining table. His slim features were contorted into the unmistakable pinch lipped expression of distressed persecution that is the exclusive mask of a child who is struggling manfully not to cry. George, recognizing the look on his face, realized that Jasper bordered on losing it if anybody else so much as looked at him crosswise that night. Sophie was so ruthlessly insensitive he thought she had the emotional cognition of a hippogriff. George spent the evening running interference for Jasper with his grandparents and they both verged on nervous collapse by the time Penny finally showed up after ten o'clock with a restored Phillipa.

Phil was gleeful she'd been made into a mule. Now she was obsessed with horses and wanted to trade her Snorkack in for a pony. She wore two blue children's hospital gowns, both decorated with little golden snitches, one tied in the back, and one tied in the front, rather than the expensive, red, velvet holiday dress with white silk bows that Penny had purchased for her to wear when they were in Versailles the previous winter. In the frantic midst of trying to figure out a way to transport them both to St. Mungo's neither George, nor Penny, had considered what Phil would wear home from the hospital when she was done being a donkey. Sitting on George's lap she proudly pointed out to everyone all twenty-seven "I've Been Magically Healed Today" stickers plastering her little body from head to toe.

When Penny insisted that Jasper apologize to his sister; he found his voice long enough to complain that Phil had wanted him to transfigure her, so why wasn't she being punished, too? This was clearly a case of partisan parenting. George scrambled hastily to intervene, but Penny yanked Jasper by the scruff into the kitchen, scolding him loudly enough for the neighbors to hear that he was almost twelve and Phil was only seven. He should have damn well known better than to pull such a stupid stunt and she hadn't. Where upon Jasper fled his grandparent's home in a streak of misunderstood emotions to sulk tearfully in the freezing mud beneath the car for the remainder of the happy holiday visit, which mercifully did not last very much longer.

George drove home because Penny said her head was pounding so hard she felt as though somebody had stuck a fork into her eyeball. Phil fell asleep, occasionally neighing softly, and Penny said that was a temporary side effect of the spell that would go away in a few days. George sincerely hoped that she was right about that. He had a splintering crystal vision of Phil's next slumber party wherein she became a societal outcast in the fairyland of little girls that would not tolerate a princess who literally snored like a mule.

Jasper, having been summarily coaxed and threatened out from beneath the car, had been installed into the back seat with his sister, where he sat with his face pressed to the window, occasionally sniffing pitifully, and refused to speak to any of them.

When they arrived home George carried Phil up to bed, returning downstairs to the kitchen to find Penny with her head collapsed on the table. Looking much the same as she had earlier, minus the sobbing, which she was now too exhausted to engage in. "Where's Jasper?" he asked the back of her head.

"He won't come out of the car," she replied in the very tired far away voice of a parent run right into the ground after a full day spent wrangling with her child. Lifting her head she focused on George with beautiful blue blood-shot eyes, and said, "And now I've begun to feel quite wretched that it's Christmas and I haven't done a single thing with him all day except for spanking him and scolding him and making him feel bad." She sighed heavily; dropping her face back into her arms mumbling, "I just don't know what to do with him."

"You make us a pot of tea. We've got a long night yet ahead. I'll go out there and get Jasper," George offered kindly giving her a reassuring pat on the shoulder, and for the thousandth, or the ten thousandth, maybe even the millionth time in her life Penny was grateful to him. He was so good to her, and she loved him so dearly for it, that she couldn't even begin to count all of the thank-yous stored in her soul with George's name written on them.

George walked out to the Volvo he'd parked in the garage, shivering without his jacket, and hunched against the increasing cold. It was really dark out doors, almost pitch black, with no Christmas moon, no city lights, and the stars all covered with snow clouds. Jasper wasn't crazy about the dark; the fact that he was sitting all alone in it spoke volumes about his mood. Sliding into the back seat with him, George propped his long legs up on the back of the front seat, folded his hands across his stomach, and waited.

"What are you doing out here?" Jasper inevitably queried after a few minutes spent listening to one another's teeth chattering. Plainly he was annoyed by the blatant, unwelcome, interruption of his pre-adolescent angst.

"What are you doing out here?" George returned. "You should be in bed. It will be a miracle if Father Christmas shows up at our house this year, everyone but Phil is still out of bed."

Jasper was disgusted by this ploy, as if they hadn't humiliated and degraded him enough for one night. He felt woefully close to tears and did not want to break down in front of George, because he was not a baby. The black cover of night hid his reddened eyes, for which he was grateful, and he thought he quite controlled the tremble in his voice when he replied dryly, "I don't believe in Father Christmas, anymore, Uncle George. Give me a break already, will you? I'll be twelve tomorrow."

George, who hadn't spent the past eight years of his life raising Jasper for nothing, definitely caught onto to the tremble. He shared a pang of Penny's bad conscience, feeling quite wretched that Jasper was alone out here in the cold and the dark, too ashamed to come into the house because he felt like crying. Tomorrow would be Christmas and his birthday. George had hardly forgotten the collusion of those two important days. He hadn't ever forgotten, and never could, but in the heat of the recent Jasper-instigated family crisis, and it's ensuing hassle, maybe he'd lost the importance of them for a while, especially to a boy almost twelve. A few years ago he might have pulled Jasper onto his lap and let the close physical contact ease the tension between them, but things weren't ever fixed that simply anymore. Regrettably, twelve-year-olds didn't cuddle with their uncles, at least not very often. Growing numb in the cold, George struggled to think back to the time of his own mischievous pre-adolescent self, searching for soothing words to aide the pre-teen afflicted.

"Don't you believe in Christmas miracles?" George asked after a minute of seeming to be surprised. "Well, I think that's too bad, Jasper. You're far too intelligent to have stopped believing in miracles. And just to show you that I'm right, I'll tell you that your mother is waiting for you inside and she wants to make amends. After the way you've behaved today, if that isn't a miracle, I don't know what is."

Jasper could barely see the corner of George's mouth turn up in a wry smile. He wasn't joking, but he didn't sound angry anymore, either. Jasper felt a little bit better, but not too much. Then George put his arm around him, not too tight at first. He gave Jasper room enough to pull away if he wanted, but he didn't. So George pulled him closer and held him for a minute. It was almost a hug, but it was a manly hug. It made Jasper feel better still, and George added, "I'll also tell you that grown-ups have bad days and make mistakes sometimes, too. I made one today when I told you that I would send you away to St. Brutus's for misbehaving. I think you know already that I love you too well and that I would never send you away for any reason, but if you don't know it, I am telling you so now."

Far from happy, but reasonably consoled, Jasper grudgingly agreed then to come into the house. Blinking his tear brightened eyes, squinting in the blazing lights of the kitchen, he stood uncomplaining while Penny jumped up out of her chair to pet him, and kiss him. Reassuring him that he was loved. He also permitted her to tuck him into bed, scarcely grumbling about it because he was so drained from the effort of keeping his composure all night in front of his grandparents. Rufus jumped onto the bed beside him with a mighty pounce that jangled the bedsprings beneath the weight of his enormous frame. Dwarfing the mound that was a tucked-in Jasper he emitted comforting doggy snuffles and soothed Jasper rapidly to sleep with steadfast canine bulk.

George and Penny played Father Christmas, tired enough to bounce into the walls and off of one another as they rushed around the house in the early morning hours making sure everything was set for the dawn before collapsing onto their bed, over exhausted and too wound up to fall asleep.

"And to think we get to do it all over again with your family tomorrow," Penny pointed out with mocking cheerfulness, and a yawn.

"I can hardly wait," George replied stretching his sore muscles. "And to think I used to like Christmas. I never realized it involved so much work when I was younger. Now, I think I'd rather it came every other year."

"This has been one of the worst Christmas Eves of my entire life, George," Penny admitted turning her head to look at him in the dark. "I don't know what I would have done tonight without you. Thank you."

"Only one of the worst?" George asked teasingly, tilting himself up one elbow. "Are you certain? Because I was ready to go ahead and give it the very worst rating."

"Oh, I had a terrible Christmas Eve once with Percy. Quite a lot worse than this even. Remember when your father was attacked by the giant snake in the Ministry of Magic?"

"Not likely to ever forget that, am I?' he responded suddenly serious.

"And Percy refused to go and visit him in hospital. I thought he'd completely lost his mind, gone right over the edge. He wouldn't tell me what was wrong. He wouldn't say why he was quarreling with your father. I was just beside myself. I came home from working my shift at the hospital the night he was attacked and I had to scrape Percy off of the kitchen floor. He stayed on the floor, propped up against the kitchen sink, crying for half the night, and would not tell me why. We quarreled bitterly about it all on Christmas Eve after we'd left my parent's house. I was all but set to walk out on him; your father is the one who convinced me to go back home and talk it out with him."

"I did not know that," George replied quietly.

"No, you weren't supposed to know it. He was trying so hard to protect everyone that...." Penny swallowed hard, unable to finish. George reached across the bed, threading their fingers together in silent understanding, and they stared up at the ceiling thinking about all of the people they'd lost, that should have been there with them that Christmas and weren't.

After a couple hours fitful, restless sleep, George rose to light a fire in the bedroom fireplace. Nudging the miniscule fairies curled up and asleep in the dark evergreen branches of their bedroom Christmas tree awake with a flick of his little finger. He smiled when they stretched, hissing at him and arching their tiny backs before reluctantly lighting up the room. Giving it a festive, and romantic, holiday glow. He returned to Penny, wanting to make love to her with an uneasy sense of urgency that probably sprung from the fact that their bed would soon be bombarded with overexcited children and a large dog.

The faintest glimmer of a gray Christmas dawn shimmered on the horizon, but the room was effused with golden holiday light that almost erased the tired shadows under their eyes, and eased the ache of their bloodshot eyeballs. Their pajamas came off, descending around the edges of their enormous bed in a flurry of flannel. Penny had basically given up on lacy lingerie for the practicality of comfort after Percy's death. George preferred her naked anyway. The lingerie came off so fast it was hardly worth the bother of putting it on. Usually he liked to play for a while. He liked to tease and nuzzle, making Penny giggle. His incredible sense of humor was such a gift Penny thought, a saving grace for their relationship on countless occasions. Beginning with the very first few times they'd made love and he'd made her laugh at all the awkward and uncomfortable moments.

That morning found him serious, though, and intense. So intense she was absolutely caught up in the sensation of his touch. In the half-light of a Christmas Eve induced Christmas morning hangover she just wanted to lose herself in the moment, but he wouldn't let her go. "Look at me, Penny," he whispered urgently. "Open your eyes." It was a frequent request. Stemming back to their earliest encounters. He did not want her mistaking whose hands were on her body or the man who was moving inside her. Penny never confused them, not then in their intimate moments, not ever actually, but she opened her eyes for him anyway and locked on to his gaze. And held it while their bodies grew sleek, moving together in timeless, perfect, rhythm.

He made her come twice and she started to cry, which only confused him. George was not a person who suffered from moods, or mercurial grief, the way that she and Jasper did, the way that Percy sometimes had. Percy would have understood better how deeply she could be touched when he was inside of her, but Percy had been a soul mate. George was a heart mate who had almost lost her once to sadness, and her grief terrified him. "Penny, I'm hurting you," he said looking stricken. Unable to reassure him with words she simply pulled his head down to kiss him, still moving to encourage his release before the children crashed their private celebration.

"Are you all right?" he asked rolling off of her to the side and wiping the traces of a tear off of her cheek.

"I'm better than all right," she said reaching over to hold him close. "You're so good for me, George. Happy Christmas."

He smiled then, relieved to know that it was one of those weepy women things and not something he had done wrong. He'd tried so hard to make it right for her. For some reason that morning he'd been overcome with a desperate desire to take her, to mark her as his own. Almost as though he was being urged on some unseen force. Like the old wives' tale of a witch riding his back, or maybe it was a wizard. He couldn't think it through clearly now. He was feeling too sated, too content in the moment. Enjoying holding her close and thinking that she and her children were the very best gifts he'd ever gotten. He never needed or wanted anything else. "Happy Christmas, Pen," he wished her in return before reluctantly letting her go.

"I don't know what you've gotten me this year," she smiled sleepily at him as they threw their pajamas back on in the still chilly room and straightened out the rumpled bed, "but I'll tell you what I'd like." George glanced at her warily, thinking, "Please don't say a Land Rover."

"I'd like get into a big, comfortable bed with you. A bed someplace that doesn't allow children or dogs, and not get back out of it for any reason for just a couple of days." They climbed back under the covers together, snuggling close to get warm again while waiting for Phil and Jasper to wake-up. George, considering her proposition, was a little bit shocked to realize that they had never once done anything like that. In all these years they had never gone away and spent time alone apart from the children.

Phillipa woke up disappointed that Father Christmas neglected to bring her a real pony. It seemed to her that she really hadn't given him all that short of a notice. She sat with George while he explained to her that because Weasley came at the very end of the alphabet Father Christmas had run out of ponies before getting to their house. Penny found herself being plenty impressed that Father Christmas had managed to conjure a plush pony at the end of Phillipa's bed last night, one that was almost as big as Rufus and looked amazingly like a roan colored mule.

Jasper, sullen and still feeling too injured to indulge much in family conviviality, sat cross-legged at the foot of their bed perusing a veritable library of books that all had something to do either with Quidditch, or the care and feeding of extremely large dogs. Rufus lay stretched out between Penny and George gnawing on a red rubber ball roughly the same size as Phillipa's head, one that Penny had been ensured was indestructible. It had even been tested out on baby dragons before hitting the pet store shelves.

At nine o' clock in the morning they all reluctantly dragged themselves out of the family bed to get dressed and go downstairs into the kitchen where Aloysious, already feeling joyous after helping himself to the eggnog, was making the traditional Christmas breakfast of toasted cheese sandwiches and eggs for the children. He brewed a pot of strong French pressed coffee for Penny while she went out to the garage with George to pay homage to her new Jaguar. "She's happier about the gift of the car than I expected," George realized when she knocked him into the hood ornament while covering his face with kisses.

By noon they had arrived safely in the front yard of the Burrow, although it had been a near thing driving through Ottery St. Catchpole when Penny swerved quickly to narrowly avoid crashing her new, silver Jag into some crazy Muggle lady taxi driver. The newly renovated and enlarged Burrow was still bursting at the seams; no matter how big Molly made it there were always more Weasleys on the way to fill it back up.

Bill had no children to date; although he'd been married twice, both relationships had ended in disaster. Fred sniped quietly to George that Bill was making up for the lack of offspring by dating women who were young enough to be his offspring. Giselle was his latest fling, and if she was a day over eighteen, Hermione had to permanent wave her hair.

Hermione and Ron, who lived in the States, where Ron coached Quidditch at a private Wizarding Institution in the desert, had numerous children already and one on the way. Penny could not recall a time since leaving Hogwarts that Hermione was not about to pop out a Weasley.

Ginny had been allowed to get out of bed for the day on the condition she remained on the sofa at her mother's house. She had two months to go and wasn't taking any chances; if she felt inclined to take chances, Harry sat on her feet.

Charlie had a nearly grown daughter, in her late teens that was his love child from a Hogwarts fling that had lasted for most of his final year there. She'd been raised by her mother and her mother's current husband, whoever it happened to be at the time, but Charlie had supported her and seen her at least a few times a year, even if some of those years he'd kept her existence a secret from his family. She typically didn't attend family gatherings as a result of that neglect. Mo and Charlie, as a couple together, remained childless; as did Fred, and if anybody had done an anonymous poll in the family undoubtedly they would have all pretty much agreed that it wasn't a bad thing.

Which left George and Penny, who had Jasper and Phillipa, and who obviously desperately wanted more. Fred walking past them standing under the mistletoe remarked, rather snidely again, "Oh, for cripes sake! Will you two stop goggling at one another like that! It makes me want to heave."

Phillipa jumped up and down yanking on George's sleeve demanding loudly, "Give me a pony back ride, Uncle George! Please, will you, please, huh, please? Uncle Harry fell over on the rug already and said there isn't any point in beating a dead horse. Please, Uncle George, come on!"

"Hush, Phillipa!" George ordered her. "Mummy and I are enjoying the mistletoe. Go harass Fred."

Fred ambled by on all fours with Phillipa on his back a short while later to inform George that he believed he would not be able to stand back up again, and would George kindly stop snogging with his wife long enough to play relief mount? Besides Ron and Hermione had been waiting half an hour for the mistletoe, then Remus and Mum wanted it for a while.

"Ron and Hermione do not need the mistletoe," George objected, "and I will have nightmares this night about Mum and Remus. Go away, Fred." Then returned his lips to his wife.

Finally Molly cut them off to ask about Jasper, who had plopped himself into the wing chair in the fireplace corner when he first walked in and had not moved from it or spoken to anyone since. Penny and George had sworn a sacred oath to one another that morning while getting dressed that the mule incident would not be brought up on Christmas Day. Jasper had barely managed to choke down his scrambled eggs at breakfast. A glance at their still forlorn child inspired George and Penny to give up on the merry Christmas lip-fest and they joined Jasper in his corner, sitting on the chair arms at either side of him and soothing his jagged mood.

Fred, picking up on their cue, told Jasper an absolutely rude joke when his mother wasn't listening in. Ginny coaxed him over to sit by her on the sofa and hinted with a whisper in his ear that his belated birthday gift would be the new version of "Troll Invasion: Mutinous Mountain Hunt" as soon as it became available later in the New Year. Harry told everyone at dinner that Jasper's "Expelliarmus" technique was absolutely the finest he'd ever seen, and that if he continued to stay out of trouble at school he was thinking about asking him to tutor the younger students in defense. Remus offered him an enormous piece of the Mexican chocolate that Charlie and Mo had gifted him with for Christmas. Jasper started to feel quite a bit less wounded, and felt better still when Phil whispered to him that being a mule was the best fun she'd ever had in her whole life. He felt the best of all when his uncles all promised an after dinner Quidditch match and George promised to Beat for Jasper's team.

Despite the fact that Jasper really did love his family, he disliked having Christmas with them, and it wasn't just his humiliation over the mule incident that inspired his distaste for it. The actual concept of the holiday was really all right, but the day itself was never very enjoyable for him. Because it was his birthday and so invariably everyone was busy Happy Christmasing all over the place, and seldom bothered to Happy Birthday, Jasper. Not only that, but his birthday gifts were always wrapped in reindeer paper, or elf paper, or some other nonsensical Christmas related consumerist propaganda paper. Would it kill someone to wrap his gift with paper covered in Quaffles? He'd settle for Snitches. And neither of those things bothered him so much as the fact he was always getting combination birthday/Christmas gifts, everybody else got gifts twice a year.

He assiduously avoided ever mentioning these plaints anymore because it always resulted in what he liked to call "The Discussion." "The Discussion" consisted of Mummy and Uncle George lecturing him brainless about being thankful for what it was that he had, and not dwelling so much on what he did not have, while he sat there quietly encouraged not to speak. Then there was the plum pudding issue. He didn't care for it, it didn't hold up the candles well, but no one wanted cake for Christmas desert so they always had pudding. Jasper would have settled for pie. He would have settled for a ginger snap, anything but that revolting brown jiggly pudding.

Yet even joining all of those things together did not equal what he truly hated the most about Christmas. While the birthday greetings were neglected, the purchase of two gifts avoided, and the cake left unbaked, it never stopped everyone from remembering his birthday. His actual birthday, the moment of his actual birth, which had taken place in this house, on Christmas Day, twelve years ago. Once the gifts had been opened, the dinner swallowed, the Quidditch played, the pudding lit, the kitchen cleaned, and the grown-ups were all comfortably half-smacked on wassail, wine, or fire whiskey the reminiscing began, and they were at it again.

"I could barely stand-up on my own," Penny told everyone, swigging her wassail. "He was two weeks overdue if he was a day. Jasper did not want to come out." This then would recall to Jasper that he had once been inside. Inside of his mother's body, and he truly preferred not to think about that. "I don't know what to tell you, Jasper." Uncle George explained patiently whenever Jasper expressed his dislike of the details. "These are the facts of life, get used to talking about it."

"I remember Percy was purely evil," Fred interjected topping off Penny's wassail and then his own.

"Well, I think that might be because I was purely evil." Penny defended her dead husband. "Neither one of us slept a wink that final week. Remember, though, Fred, he couldn't thank you enough for bringing those fireworks that went off accidentally by themselves in the kitchen." And she offered Fred a silent toast of gratitude.

"Arthur and I were much less pleased about those," Gran Weasley kicked in. "It cost us two thousand Galleons to fix the brickwork on the fireplace alone."

"We offered to pay for that," Fred and George responded together with the air of the long persecuted.

"But it did start Penny's labor," Ginny offered up, carefully considering that option as a way to jump start her own labor, and catching Harry's eye, who slowly shook his head in a "No way in hell are you doing that to me" fashion.

"It took Ron and I half an hour to mop up the kitchen floor after your water broke," Hermione claimed. "I've never seen anything like it since and I have five myself now. Back then, of course, we were only sixteen and it was all Ron could do not to throw up."

"Ginny did throw up as soon as Penny started screaming," Harry reflected. "Do you remember I had to take you out to the barn so you couldn't hear her?" He turned to his wife, insensitively reminding her of the impending horror in her future.

"Percy about came unglued," Bill smirked.

"You might have too, Bill," Ron said quietly. "You don't know what that's like."

Molly waved her hand, "Oh, nonsense, I gave birth to everyone of you here in my own bed in The Burrow. Your father never got anything but pale."

"I think you've forgotten what transpired when Fred and George were born," Charlie pointed out. "I recall it quite clearly, Mum. You were hollering fit to kill. Dad came stumbling out of the bedroom, tripped on Bill's broomstick and knocked himself unconscious on the banister rail. The maternity witch came out to say it was twins and Percy started to cry and demanded that you send them back immediately. Bill went to fetch the neighbors, and I put an ice pack on Dad's head."

Molly sniffed. Her memory wasn't quite what it used to be; besides she'd been fairly spiffed up on one heck of a powerful Cheering charm at the time. Maybe it had actually been worse than she remembered.

"Dad, Bill and I were popping around the countryside like Christmas corn," Fred recalled, leaving his own entrance into the world and going back to Jasper's. "We could not find that damned maternity witch anywhere."

"I do remember that," Molly insisted. "Penny was laid out on our bed, Percy was alternately begging and ordering her not to push until the maternity witch arrived. She whacked him over the head with my best pewter candlestick."

"I still feel just awful about that." Penny cringed. "But I couldn't wait anymore, and you know how bossy he always was. He was talking about it as though I could help myself...thank heaven for George."

George blushed, and shrugged his shoulders. "What else could I do? Percy was out cold. Mum was having an anxiety attack and I happened to be standing out in the corridor when Penny called for help." "Happened to be" like hell; he'd been every bit as sickened and fearful for her as Percy had been. It was all he could stand to stay out in the corridor on the other side of the closed door listening to her crying in pain. Not being able to do so much as go in there to hold her hand without giving it all up, giving his true feelings away.

So Jasper knew that it was his Uncle George that ended up seeing him into the world, he'd caught his head, pinched the cord closed with his own fingers, and severed it with his wand. When the maternity witch was finally located and brought to the scene she'd walked into the big bedroom to see one extremely shaken, white-faced teenaged boy tending to three patients. Jasper's father had become conscious, but wore a knot on his head the size of an egg and was lying in the bed next to his wife looking almost as pale as she was. His Gran was having heart palpitations, too overcome with anxiety to be of much assistance, and his mother was sitting up in bed nursing a healthy baby boy. That was the reason Percy had called him Jasper George Arthur Weasley.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Percy stood on the train station platform with his hands shoved into the pockets of an ancient denim jacket he'd taken off of a dead body in Transylvania. He'd have never come this far dressed in a prison uniform. When your freedom is on the line you tend to be a whole lot less picky about where you find your wardrobe. That was an unexpected come down for a man who prided himself on his impeccable taste and appearance.

None of that mattered to him anymore, all the things that he used to value so highly in his old world, pride in his appearance, reputation, standing in the community, striving for excellence, always trying to do what was right, he'd built his life on a load of rubbish. Two things mattered, only two, Penny and Jasper. Whatever he needed to do to get back to the two things that mattered, he'd been prepared to do.

He was on the last leg of his journey starting today, Christmas Day. Little Jasper was turning twelve today. He'd missed out on so much; it wasn't fair. It wasn't supposed to have happened this way. Lifting up his determined chin, Percy checked the station guide. With any luck he'd find a way to get to King's Crossing Station before the New Year. Then he would see what was left of his old world.