Love is the Child of an Endless War

Percy uttered a savage and utterly un-ex-prefect/head-boy like curse. Several lousy, literally lousy, rat-infested torturous years spent in a magic-forsaken foreign hellhole, imprisoned illegally, unjustly, and down right not nicely, had the knack of adjusting a person's character and vocabulary to reflect the experience. Percy was no exception to that generalization. No length of heinous years imprisoned might have prepared him for dealing with Jasper, though. The child was a visitation on his soul.

He slammed George's mobile down on the marble counter-top so hard he thought for a moment he had shattered its plastic facing. Stupid pieces of plastic rubbish, what poor excuses for communication devices they were. Sure all you had to do was pick one up, press a few keys and you were immediately, almost magically, connected to anyone, anywhere in the whole world who held one of the ridiculous looking things. But owls were made of sterner stuff. No owl ever fell apart from being slammed into a countertop. The old Weasley family owl, Errol, could have flown beak first into a brick wall and still have been good for traveling a month or so later.

"Damn it! Bloody freaking double damn it!" Percy swore some more. It didn't accomplish anything but it sure felt good. That ring had been from his mother. The house-elf wandered by just in time to show him how to receive the call. Jasper had run away from The Burrow. Percy pounded his head on Penny and George's expensive imported Italian marble countertop, almost knocking himself out. "Ouch! Leave it to that idiot George to install countertops in his kitchen that cause frickin' migraines!"

He tried to think clearly, but all he could think of was what a nightmare this day had turned out to be and what in almighty Lady of the Loch's name was he going to tell Penny and George now? "If only I hadn't agreed to accept that job," Percy muttered, repeatedly rubbing his hands through his hair and down the back of his neck.

His day had started out so promising. Hogwarts academic year was out of session. Draco Malfoy's reign at the school had been duly documented, investigated, and castigated. Malfoy was out of there. Percy was in. Percy Weasley was appointed the new Headmaster at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Fred and George proved to be influential gazillionaire wizards with a vengeance indeed. The ease, and the speed, with which they'd managed to bribe, cajole, threaten, or otherwise suitably induce the Board of Governors to see things their way was nothing sort of astonishing, and quite frankly, completely terrifying. Penny had been absolutely right; George could do just about anything he put his mind to. It was fortuitous that Percy didn't sleep well already. Having gotten a good look at the kinds of capricious powers his twin brothers had managed to acquire for themselves would have started keeping him up at night otherwise.

The summer holiday was the perfect opportunity for a new Headmaster to survey the school and decide where to begin. Percy decided to begin with his office. Malfoy had the sensible taste to have removed all of Dumbledore's abominable talking portraits out into the corridor. Merlin's balls, but that Dumbledore had been a freaky, barmy old fellow, Percy reflected. Surrounding himself with the painted pictures of long dead folk whose oil representations continued to move, speak, and interact with live humans unto infinity; the whole thing was just plain creepy. Percy would be only too glad to give the old rulers of Hogwarts a brief wave and a how-do-you-do as he whisked by them with a cup of hot coffee in his hand to conduct business in his new office without having to endure the portraits constant bickering and incessant offering up of unasked-for advice.

Other than that bit of good common sense, Malfoy's taste in interior design was an unmitigated horror. Unless one was particularly fond of brutal torture, dark, unspeakable thoughts and the general lingering perversion of a perfidious soul, the Headmaster's office was currently a decorator's nightmare. Percy couldn't possibly accomplish any legitimate, thoughtful work there without a total re-do.

His first inclination had been to ask Louisa to go with him. She had good taste, Fred notwithstanding. Percy's first date with Louisa had been an unqualified success; their second date went even better. By the third date he'd been invited to have supper in her flat where he'd discovered that she liked to cook too, and did it rather well. She'd redecorated her two-bedroom London flat all on her own. One of her chief hobbies, he'd learned, was picking. She liked to spend her off time attending manor sales hunting for antiques. She'd furnished her five-room flat with a charming eclectic mix of post Fifth Goblin rebellion found treasure, restored with care and used lovingly. Now that she wasn't underneath Fred all of the time she had rediscovered her passion. She wasn't finding it beneath Percy. It was happening at estate sales all over the English countryside. Although her physical passion might be re-ignited someday beneath Percy, for now they were just friends, and he admired her taste, but Louisa had been swamped at work. She couldn't take the time off to go with him.

Really the entire debacle could be laid at George's feet. There was scarcely a major traumatic event in the whole of Percy's life that he couldn't somehow tie to Fred and George. It had been George's idea for Percy to take Penny and Jasper to Hogwarts with him that day. Jasper still hadn't picked up his school things. He couldn't bear to go back so long as there was the slightest possibility that Ian Og might be Keeping somewhere in the vicinity of his return. But he'd abandoned his Split-Twig 350 and desperately wanted it back. Now that Ian Og was safely departed somewhere south of The Hogwarts Express Jasper was willing to make the trip to recover his broom.

George was in the midst of having the spare room done over as a nursery. Briefly he and Penny had discussed converting the mansion's attic into a combined nursery/playroom, but Penny said she didn't want to negotiate the stairs every night from their room to a separate floor. George offered to magically enchant the staircase so that it moved like an escalator. Penny reasonably suggested that he might as easily purchase an escalator and have it installed. Then at least it would come with a manufacturer's warranty. They both agreed after a short debate, with Percy's input, that Jasper and moving staircases of any sort were bound to be a receipt for disaster. George contracted with a distant cousin of Aloysious' to come and paint the spare room instead.

Since the efforts of the war had freed house-elves to do as they pleased they were having unprecedented successes in the home repair and improvement businesses. Being that it was Aloysious' cousin, however, George was sticking around the house to make sure the work was done in a timely and proper fashion. Penny couldn't handle the paint fumes, besides George thought she desperately needed an outing to take her mind off of the babies' impending birth. She was becoming undone.

Percy had agreed to let them accompany him never imagining what disaster lay ahead. Penny drove her Jag to the outskirts of Hogsmeade and they walked the rest of the way up to the castle. The school was eerily quiet and deserted, absent the bustle of young people walking the grounds, flying around the Quidditch stands, sneaking into the Forbidden Forest. They stopped by the lake to pay a visit to the Giant Squid who was a particular friend of Penny's. She floated in the shallows of the water, blinking her dinner plate sized eyeball at them in friendly fashion, and waved a welcoming tentacle. Something else the three of them shared in common was an affinity for all creatures great and small. So they hung around the lake for a while chatting up the squid. She didn't have much to say, but seemed to enjoy their company anyhow.

Jasper ran up and down the stairs and corridors like a wild thing. Yelling at the top of his lungs. He slid down the stone balustrade rail in the Great Hall. Tap-danced in Snape's dungeon. Relishing doing the things he wasn't allowed to do when school was in session. Percy and Penny didn't hamper his youthful renegade enthusiasm. They were feeling altogether companionable sharing the enjoyment of their offspring's antics.

"So, you did end up teaching him how to dance! I believe that's a Weasley first." Percy laughed, undeniably impressed when Jasper executed a perfect two-step shuffle slide with a dramatic kick-off from the top of Snape's classroom desk onto the floor complete with an open armed flourish that bespoke his uncle's grand showmanship.

"He's built like you, Percy," Penny pointed out unnecessarily. "With those long legs he's a natural. I didn't have to show him very much, truthfully. But it was fun to teach him what I did. Of course, it's not George's thing, that's why Jasper prefers Quidditch, I think."

"If he isn't Fred and George all over again," Percy said watching Jasper torment a mirthless suit of armor.

With a doubting glance she asked, "Does it terrify you?"

Looking down, Percy smiled, surprising her with a denial. "Not terribly, no. Mostly because I can tell that George realizes how much Jasper is like he and Fred. He seems to be making every effort to curb Jasper's more evil impulses. He's really a very good boy, Penny. I had no trouble from him at all on our holiday. He has a bit of an attitude sometimes. He got a little mouthy once or twice, but he minded me very well. I never had to tell him to do a thing but once."

"That's because he gets spanked when he doesn't mind," Penny declared firmly. "I hope you don't think we'd tolerate him simply flouting authority whenever he feels like it."

Percy cast her a sideways glance, "And to think you used to tell me how much you abhorred violence."

"Well, I do!" Penny protested, anxious to assure him of it. "I would never condone the sorts of brutal punishments Hogwarts has allowed to be handed out to its students over the years! Do you remember that miserable old hag Umbridge who forced the students to slice open their own hands with that sanguinary quill she kept here?"

"Don't remind me of her, please, Penny. That breakfast we had this morning isn't sitting so well as it is," Percy grumbled.

"Oh, and that awful story your mother likes to tell about the time the old caretaker caught her and your father snogging in the bushes! She giggles about the marks he left on your father's body! Now that is sick!" Penny shuddered incomprehensibly. "George and I have never touched Jasper with anything but a loving hand. Sometimes its a forcibly loving hand," she admitted, "but we've never done anything worse than warm up his bottom."

"I know that, sweetie," Percy said, taking her hand and squeezing it affectionately. "You and George have done a good job with Jasper and Phil. I don't ever want you to think I believe otherwise."

Penny heaved a sigh, "I'm so glad to hear you say that. I've tried so hard to raise them the way you would have wanted me to."

That admission surprised him a little. "You have? I mean, I guess I expected that you would, but George...."

"You shouldn't underestimate George's good influence on him." Penny rushed to fill him in. "Jasper complains that we're too strict with him. Sometimes, I think your mother agrees with him. George is much more strict with him than Molly and Arthur ever were with all of you. Oh, but if I only had a galleon for every time I heard her shrieking at Fred and George to behave themselves and then saw them just laughing at her behind her back." Penny shook her head. "Really, it is a miracle they both managed to grow up in once piece. Jasper gets awfully upset with us for spanking him, but I'll tell you what Percy, when George and I tell him to behave himself, he doesn't laugh at us."

"I know he respects you and George," Percy conceded. "I agree with you about the punishments here, though, Penny. I promised you that if I took this job I would change things and I mean to do it. If parents want to send their children away to be disciplined they can send them someplace else. It sickens me to think my parents paid good money to send us to a place that almost had their sons flogged!"

"Hogwarts has a whole different appearance now that you're a parent with a child here, doesn't it?" Penny asked him.

"It certainly does." Percy was forced to agree. "George told me he had to come up here last autumn because Jasper deliberately jumped into that vanishing cabinet on the third floor and ended up stuck in the sewer pipe! Now tell me, after that incident that happened years ago, when the Slytherin kid disappeared for weeks and wound up in a toilet, why didn't they rid the school of the damned thing? And the killer mosquitoes in the swamp are out of here. Plus, I'm sealing up that stupid Chamber of Secrets. No, better yet, I'm having it filled in with concrete!"

Smiling joyously and linking her arm through his, Penny said, "What did I tell you? I knew you were the perfect person for this job!"

So the morning began happily and uneventfully. Penny accompanied Percy up to the Headmaster's office after giving Jasper explicit instructions to remain inside of the castle. She didn't have much decorating sense, really, she confided to Percy. He and George had much better taste, she thought. George had gallantly asked her opinion about everything when he renovated their manor house, but most of the decisions he'd made she'd agreed with. Of course, at the time she hadn't been quite certain exactly what it was they were even doing. It had seemed a lot like just playing at house until they'd become lovers and moved into the finished manor together. That's when the new house and her relationship with George had solidified into something more tangible than a fuzzy pseudo-reality, but she didn't divulge that realization to Percy.

Percy had phenomenal taste. One of things she missed the most about him was his fashion sense. She rarely ever went shopping for clothing without him when they were together. He had an unerring eye for what colors and styles looked exactly right on her. George never paid any attention to what she wore. Unless she left the house wearing her pajamas Penny doubted he'd ever take any notice. He vindicated himself by telling her she looked nice all of the time. Percy didn't need much help with decorating his office, just a sounding board. Penny wandered around the office with him. Taking measurements, noting the displacement and replacement of this or that thing. Advised him to re-enchant the ceiling before he had an argument with anyone in his office. Delighted in his burning of Malfoy's sadistic clock o' torture in the fireplace. By noon she was tired and hungry, and they hadn't seen hide or hair of Jasper for a few hours. Percy agreed to take a break and they'd started combing the castle for him.

Over an hour later they met at the top of the big staircase. "I can't find him," Penny wailed breathless and very near exhausted. She was huffing and puffing from the effort of waddling rapidly about the castle lugging the burden of two restive babies in her bulging belly.

"Sit down," Percy advised, waving his wand and conjuring a rocking chair. "Take a deep breath, Penny. This is a big castle; he's in here somewhere."

"He had better be," Penny said fretfully. "You just don't know Jasper the way that I do. You'd be amazed at the trouble he can get himself into! And just when I think he's maturing a little and doesn't need to be watched like a hawk he goes off and does something incredibly stupid! Like transfiguring his sister into a mule!"

Percy scratched his head thoughtfully. "Don't forget who my little brothers are, Pen. I have a lifetime's experience ferreting out the whereabouts of troublemakers behind me. You just sit here and rest for a bit; I'll keep looking for him."

Percy knew the castle very well. Not as well as Fred and George did maybe, but he'd been prefect and head-boy at Hogwarts. The school didn't have many secrets he wasn't aware of. However, at the end of another hour of fruitless searching for his son he came to the rapid conclusion that either there were places in the castle that Jasper might have gotten to that he didn't know about, or he had deliberately disobeyed his mother and left the castle. Neither possibility thrilled him.

Penny was frantically worrying, and clutching her belly in an alarming fashion. He returned with the news that he'd had no luck searching for Jasper and her welfare became another of his concerns. "Penny, are you having pains?" he asked, dreading an affirmative response.

"Of course I'm having pain!" she cried irritably. "I'm seven months pregnant with twins! I've been in constant pain for weeks! Don't worry about me! We have to contact George and get some help searching the castle and the grounds."

"Do you really suppose he's gone outside the castle?" Percy queried looking out the casement windows in hopes of spotting a wayward curly black head. "And here we were just speaking of how well he minds."

"Ravenclaw's ghost only knows what temptation has lured him outside," Penny moaned. "I hope he hasn't gone back to play with squid! She likes to play rough, and he's not that great of a swimmer!"

"I've changed my mind about the first thing I'm going to do at this back-water institution," Percy declared. "Before I finish re-doing my office I'm having a phone line installed into Hogsmeade! This castle is completely deserted; even the caretaker and the groundskeeper are on holiday at this time of year! An owl will take too long to get help. I don't want to Floo myself away and leave you here alone."

"I'll be fine!" Penny panted. "Just go into town and send someone for help!" She clutched at her abdomen with her lips sealed into a smiling grimace.

"I think your labor might be starting," Percy worried. "You grimaced exactly like that at me before Jasper was born!"

"Don't be ridiculous!" she snapped, secretly thinking he might be right. "It's nothing to worry about. I have nearly two full months to go! Just go, Percy, will you please? Before it gets dark!"

Reluctantly Percy agreed to abandon her to search for his son, but he had a very bad feeling about the whole situation.

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

Jasper really did try to make a habit out of minding his parents. Uncle George had pointed out to him once that he might try considering that there were actually reasons for the rules they made, and expected him to follow, that went beyond the simple joy they took in managing his life and bossing him around all of the time. Jasper did consider it. He knew their rules were meant to keep him safe, but some rules it was okay to break if he had a good reason. His uncle was open-minded about things that way, his mother quite a lot less so.

Like most boys, though, Jasper always thought he had a good reason for breaking the rules. Millicent was the best reason he knew of. He saw the figure of a woman; Milli was every bit a woman in his eyes, slipping furtively across the lawn into greenhouse five. He could only make her out from a distance, but from the glimpse he got of long, swishy, blonde hair he had a notion it might be her. And he had missed Milli a lot. Figuring that his mother and his father would be boringly occupied for hours up in that stuffy old office, Jasper decided he wouldn't be missed for the moment or two it took him to run out to the greenhouse to see if it really was Milli.

Darting out the double doors he virtually skipped with happiness across the lawn to Herbology greenhouse five. It was a restricted area; only N.E.W.T. level students ever entered the building due to the nature of the extremely hazardous plants that were housed there. At this time of year, however, the plants were contained in the growing areas. They wouldn't be in the main lab, so Jasper wasn't afraid, even though he was well aware of the fact that some magical plants had extremely lethal properties. His mother had told him once about a patient in St. Mungo's who had been murdered by Devil's Snare. Very nasty death, Devil's Snare was not a nice plant.

It was stiflingly inside the greenhouse, outdoors was a mild June afternoon, but the temperature in the greenhouse soared to tropical clime levels in the early summer sunshine. It didn't take long for Jasper's curls to start clinging to his moist forehead. He was over warm in his jean dungarees and t-shirt. What in the world could Milli need out here in this steam bath at this time of year?

"Milli, is that you?" he called for her, but the only thing he heard back was his voice echoing off of the empty tile floors and the vapor covered glass walls. For a fleeting sick moment he wondered if Milli had come here to meet Toby. That wouldn't be good. Jasper thought he would really hate that quite a lot. But he was fairly certain that Toby had a summer job as a camp counselor somewhere in America, which meant that he probably wasn't the reason Milli was here. Maybe she'd forgotten a homework project? Some of the older students were required to conduct experiments and research investigations for their classes that lasted a whole summer holiday.

She wasn't in the main lab, but there was only the one way out. Jasper figured it couldn't hurt to take a look around. He wouldn't go into the growing areas. If his mother caught him doing that, it would be a very bad thing. He would hate having to tell Milli so. It made him seem like such a baby compared to her. He hated being so much younger than she was. Mostly, though, he hated the fact that he still had to worry about getting spanked for not doing what he was told. If Milli ever found out about that, he would drown himself in the icy lake with the Giant Squid. That would show Mummy. Then again, the Squid was partial to Mummy. She might just toss him right back out of the lake as a favor to her.

Jasper peered through the closed door of the Mars Man-Trap house. One of the Man-Traps violently thudded its vines against the glass at him. Gaping its great saw-toothed maw threateningly; making Jasper jump back in a hurry with a startled squeak. This maybe had not been such a good idea. It maybe was not such a good idea for Milli to be alone in here, either. He was about ready to go back to the castle and bring his father back out with him to look for Milli when he spotted her.

She was bending over a snip of a tiny plant Jasper didn't recognize in the growing room. It was very foggy inside the growing areas; swirls of mist were piling up around the windowpane. Jasper tapped on the window. "Milli!" he shouted, "It's me, Jasper! What are you doing out here?"

She whirled in surprise to see him, and Jasper backed away in shock. She wasn't Milli. She was a much older lady, older than Mummy even. Even though she still wore her hair loose and long like a young girl's. Up close Jasper could see that her blonde was threaded with quite a bit of gray. She didn't look like a very nice lady, either. The skin of her face stretched unpleasantly over the bones of her skull, and the wrinkles around her eyes and her mouth looked like they had been carved there with a sharp blade. He spun on his heel in a hurry to exit the greenhouse.

"Wait!" the lady called after him. "Don't run away!"

Jasper paused, but only for a minute, "I'm not allowed to talk to strangers," he said as the lady opened the growing room door to speak. "I'm not a stranger," she laughed in a way that was meant to be friendly but was not. "I know who you are."

"You do?" Jasper queried, not wanting to appear stupid by running away from someone he'd met before. He'd met a lot of people. He couldn't possibly remember them all. His uncles had business partners all over the world. Uncle George hosted business parties at their house even. Maybe she was one of his customers. Jasper still felt uneasy about her.

"Yes, of course, there's no mistaking a Weasley."

Jasper sighed with relief. She knew his name; this was someone he'd met before he just didn't recognize her.

"I--I thought you were somebody I know," he said hesitantly. "I thought you were a girl who goes to school here."

"I did go to school here," the woman answered still mimicking a friendly fashion. Jasper couldn't figure out why she seemed to be trying so hard, but it was creepy. "That was many years ago. Well before your time, child. Before your father's time even."

"You know my father?" Jasper was confused. He'd thought this lady maybe knew his uncles. He didn't run into many people who had known his father.

"Yes," the woman nodded silkily, "I know your father. I know your whole family. Your name is Jasper, isn't it?"

Jasper nodded, and took a few more steps back towards the door. "I have to go now. My mummy will be looking for me." He turned to dart out of the greenhouse, and the door to outdoors slammed shut in his face, locking him in. Jasper whirled around to stare at the lady. She had taken out her wand. His had been confiscated weeks ago over the Custom Conflagration incident in the barn.

"No hurries, now," she said advancing on him slowly. "Why run away so quickly? I just want to talk."

"I don't want to talk to you," Jasper said, edging his way away from along the glass wall. He was starting to hope that his mother really was looking for him. This lady was too spooky.

"Well, that's not very nice is it?" she asked, with an evil leer. "Somebody should have taught you better manners. Although Weasleys never have been known for having particularly nice manners. They're more inclined to cause trouble until they have what they want, aren't they?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Jasper said, still moving out of her reach, but not making any sudden movements.

"Don't you?" She threw back her head and cackled. "Tell me, little boy, doesn't your uncle give you everything you want? Don't you live in a fine house? Hasn't he made your father the new headmaster here at Hogwarts?"

"What's it to you!" Jasper spat starting to feel panicky. He was watching her closely, too closely. He didn't see the stool behind him, and he tripped over it falling onto his behind. She was on him in an instant and Jasper screamed bloody murder.

She covered his mouth with one hand, grabbing a fistful of his curls with the other, yanking them back tightly and hurting his head. She's dropped her wand. Jasper thought, kicking out wildly with his feet in the hopes of knocking it out of her reach, wherever it was. One of his flailing ankles caught her hard in the shin. She gasped in pain, removing the hand on his mouth long enough to backhand him with it. Jasper's teeth bit into his lip, making him taste blood. Too bad it's not her blood.

"Weasley spawn!" she snarled at him giving his hair a brutal jerk that brought tears to his eyes. "The devil's very own, that's what you are! You and your whole disgusting rodent family!"

This woman was nuts. He had to get away from her, had to get back to the castle and warn Mummy and Father. Whatever she was doing out here in the greenhouse, it was something bad. The problem was that she was quite a bit larger than Jasper. She had him pinned securely, plus she had a death grip on his hair that was so uncomfortable he was having trouble thinking clearly.

She rose to her feet pulling him by the hair along with her. He tried to struggle way, but she yanked him tightly, wrapping her other arm around his whole body; securing his arms to his side. She had an unnatural strength, Jasper realized, strength born out of madness. He was no wimpy, ninety-pound, weakling, even if he did only weight ninety-pounds. Jasper was a speedy terror on the Quidditch pitch. He took hits from opponents twice his size and still managed to block them from scoring. Wriggling with a fury he twisted and turned trying to unlock the hold she had on him, but somehow she'd managed to pick up her wand again and was holding it to his head.

"Stop your squirming!" she demanded twisting his hair cruelly.

"Who are you?" Jasper demanded in his turn, but the threat of her wand to his head kept him still. "What do you want with me?"

"Well, I do think it's time that we met," she replied with sick sounding satisfaction. "I'm Mrs. Malfoy, Headmaster Malfoy's mother."

"Are you the one responsible for turning him into such a twisted, evil git?" Jasper spat out unwisely.

Mrs. Malfoy shrugged her shoulders behind him. "No," she said declining responsibility. "That was his father's job. Naturally the torment he's suffered from you and previous generations of your malfeasant family haven't done much for his sanity. But even I don't blame you entirely."

Jasper quirked his head at the sound of a funny noise, it was almost like the sound of corn popping. First it was only one or two pops then they came more rapidly one after another.

"What is that?" Mrs. Malfoy asked uneasily, glancing all over the greenhouse. Before Jasper could reply there was an enormous implosion of glass and the entire front of greenhouse number five shattered into a million pieces to reveal Penny Weasley standing on the other side; staring in at them in a towering, murderous rage.

"Mummy!" Jasper gasped. "Look out! She's crazy!"

Jasper had never seen his mother looking quite as angry as this before, and she could look pretty scary sometimes. For example, the time he'd set her Jaguar on fire the look on her face had quite terrified him. But even then she hadn't looked as dangerously furious as she did looking at Mrs. Malfoy now. The curls on her head were whipping wildly about her face and neck as though set in motion by the current of a strong wind, but there wasn't so much as the hint of a breeze outdoors. Even the fabric of her skirt and jersey blew about, tugging and pulling at her swollen abdomen then blowing back again. Little sparks seemed to be shooting out of her eyes. She looked utterly creepy and Jasper gulped. He almost felt like telling Mrs. Malfoy to run for her life. Penny pointed her wand at Mrs. Malfoy.

"Let go of my son," she threatened low. "Do it now, Malfoy. Drop the wand, and back away from him slowly. If one hair on his head has been harmed there won't be a vermin hole on the face of the planet big enough for you and Draco to hide in."

Mrs. Malfoy laughed unpleasantly. She didn't appear to be nearly as frightened as Jasper thought she ought to be. "After what you've done to my son, you and your influential in-laws, my dear, you'll have to give me a better reason than that not to boil this boy's brains out."

"If he comes to harm at your hands I won't kill you or your son," Penny answered calmly and quietly. Her demeanor amazed Jasper. She enunciated every word so clearly they sparkled in the air like perfect, cold, crystals. That's how he knew them for the truth. "I'll torture your son into drooling madness instead, and I'll make you watch while I do it. Then I'll do the same for you. Now drop the wand and let him go. You don't want me to ask you again."

Mrs. Malfoy sneered in her turn. "Your threats don't frighten me, you swollen cow! More breeding Weasleys! Will you over run the planet before you're finished with your spawning? You Weasleys think you can get away with anything these days. You think you run the Wizarding world, already. Don't you? Your husband thinks he's so clever. I'll give you some credit, mud-blood whore though you are, for having the sense to drop the tight-ass in favor of the gazillionaire. You at least understand where the power lies, and you aren't afraid to use it."

This was just the unreasonable sort of attitude and behavior that angered Jasper about the Malfoy family. How dare this wretched old hag speak badly about his family? Who did she think she was insulting his mother! With a great wrench of his slim body, Jasper twisted around in Malfoy's grasp, lifting his leg and hooking it behind her knee, while at the same time giving her a sharp, bony, uppercut elbow under the jaw. "It's not about having power! She is in love with my uncle!" Jasper shouted into her wrinkled, crazy-eyed, face, "And my mother is not a cow, you evil-minded old bitch!"

Wavering, her arms whirling in the air for one awful second, Mrs. Malfoy struggled for her balance. Jasper lunged for her wand but he wasn't quick enough. She cast off a curse that went wild. In Penny's advanced condition she wasn't agile enough to move out of the way in time. An angry purple blaze streaked past her temple. Jasper watched with horrified eyes as his mother crumpled to the ground. Pouncing on Mrs. Malfoy in a brutal rage that he hadn't even realized he was capable of Jasper pummeled her bony old body with both fists and his feet, everywhere he could reach.

Loping up the hill, returning from Hogsmeade where he had requested a medi-wizard transport van for Penny, Percy was convinced that her labor was starting. Even though she refused to admit it. He'd sent an owl for Fred to come help him look for Jasper at the school. Percy planned on sending Penny home to George. He reasoned that if he and Fred couldn't find Jasper on Hogwart's grounds, nobody could. The unmistakable noise of violence being perpetuated on somebody reached his ears before he hit the castle. Veering to the west he headed in the direction of the greenhouses.

"Jasper!" Percy commanded, whipping out his wand. "Stand back!" Taking in the scene at a glance let him in on everything he needed to know. The entire face wall of the greenhouse glistened in shards in the bright summer sun. Penny lay lifeless outside in a pile of broken glass, stunned, unconscious, or dead. Percy rather assumed the latter since their son was still inside fighting for his life. Jasper, reacting to the tone of his father's voice, didn't need to be told twice. Panting, scratched, and bleeding he bounced off of Mrs. Malfoy. Scrambling back against the door to the Mars Man-eater room. 'She killed Mummy!" he bellowed at Percy. "Kill her! Broil her guts out!" Percy's wand arced. Spewing a flame of red and gold cinders into the air that hit Malfoy with a crack like lightning. Her body started to twitch on the floor of the greenhouse. A roasting flesh smell pervaded the air. Jasper and Percy both recoiled from the sickening stench of burnt meat. Tossing his wand down to the ground Percy raced over to Jasper. Grabbing him by the arm and flinging him through the open wall to lie quivering in the dust next to his mother's still form.

Raising himself to his hands and knees Jasper crawled to his mother's side grasping her wrist and feeling frantically for a pulse. Percy came out scant few seconds later to kneel down next to him. Pushing Jasper away he felt for Penny's pulse himself. "She's not dead," he said, sitting back on his heels gasping for breath. Reaching out one long arm he pulled Jasper close. Resting his cheek on his head. "It's all right, Jasper. She's not dead."

"M..M...Mrs. Malfoy is," Jasper stuttered out fearfully.

"Oh, yes, she definitely is," Percy assured him, hanging onto his battle wits. This was no time to panic. But he had some quick thinking to do. Lightly tapping Penny's cheeks he was grateful to see that her eyelids fluttered immediately. Helping her to a sitting position he directed Jasper to fetch some water. Jasper returned with a dipperful in his shaking hand, and Percy splashed some onto her face. Penny came around slowly, too slowly for his needs at the moment. "Penny!" Percy said shaking her urgently. "Come on! I need you to get up on your feet! Fast!" He started hoisting her up with one arm around her shoulder and Jasper hastened to the other side. They walked her halfway to the castle that way, before she groaned loudly. Her knees buckled her back down to the earth.

"Great bloody Merlin's codpiece!" Percy spat out angrily, crouching to the ground with her. "How far apart are they?"

Penny, clutching her stomach, couldn't respond for a moment. Trying to inhale breath through her clenched teeth, she gritted out, "I don't know."

"How far apart are what?" Jasper asked, casting a frantic look around the grounds. Were there more, crazy Weasley-hating Death Eaters lurking around the castle?

"Your mother has been having pains," Percy started to explain, but Penny cut him off, "Percy, don't! You'll frighten him!"

"Mummy," Jasper said with some asperity, sinking down to the ground next to her as well. "Just tell me! I won't be scared; I am not a baby anymore! I do hope once you've had these new babies you'll at least begin to recognize a baby when you see one!"

Penny, laughing weakly, reached out to pat his hand. "I don't want you to hold out too much hope for me, Jasper. You're always going to be Mummy's baby. No matter how many I have, or how big you get."

Percy eyeing his wristwatch continually glanced over his shoulder at the road behind him. Jasper noticed he had one palm firmly placed low across his mother's belly. He seemed to be waiting for something. Sudden understanding dawned in Jasper's eyes. "The babies! Oh, no, Mummy! You aren't having them now? Don't do that!"

"I will try not to, darling," Penny promised him struggling to stand up, but Percy pushed her back down. "Hold still!" he ordered her, and to Jasper's great amazement she minded his father. Jasper understood what he was waiting for when his mother arched her back and groaned loudly again a few minutes later.

"Twelve minutes," Percy stated, helping her to stand up again. "I've sent for a medi-wizard van, Penny. You're going home in it, now. Don't say anything to anybody about what's happened here today, do you understand?"

"Certainly I understand," Penny answered attempting a glare through her grimace of pain. "But I couldn't say much to anyone in any case. What the hell did happen here today?" Looking at Jasper she gave his curls a fond caress. "You were a very brave boy, Jasper. Where is that old hag?" She glanced up towards Percy, "Do you have her "Incarcioed" somewhere?"

Percy shook his head. He hadn't tried to kill Narcissa Malfoy, but she was undeniably dead. A stunning spell, or a leg-locker jinx he could manage to cast without making a sound. But he couldn't curse some one to death without using the words. And he hadn't said anything. Jasper, however, had distinctly stated a desire to see the Malfoy hag's guts roasted. Strangely enough, she was dead all right, cooked from the inside out. Eyeing Jasper studiously, Percy ordered him,

"Jasper, I want you to go up to the castle right now. Floo yourself to Gran's house. You'll have to change over once in the Leaky Cauldron. Can you do that?"

"Yes, but---," Jasper protested.

"No, buts," Percy said with a severe look. "For once today, you'll do as you're told! And the same goes for you, no talking to anyone about what happened here. Tell Gran and Remus that Narcissa Malfoy attacked you and Mummy, and you fought her off, okay? But no more than that, Jasper, will you promise me?"

"Okay," Jasper agreed, beginning to feel sick with apprehension.

"Percy," Penny protested. "Why can't he come home with me in the van?"

"I'm riding with you in the van, Penny," Percy told her. "And I want Jasper out of here before any investigators come to the scene. No more arguments. Listen to me. I don't have time to explain everything now. It's important that you do exactly as I say."

Hesitant to leave his mother's side, Jasper acknowledged that his father had an iron will that would not be defied. He made his anxious way back towards the castle thinking miserably that it was too soon for Mummy to have the babies. If something happened to her, or to them, it would all be his fault. She and Uncle George had waited so long to have a baby his uncle would just never forgive him if something bad happened to them now. And why didn't Father want him to talk about what happened here today, even to Remus and Gran? He wasn't sorry that Malfoy's evil old mum was dead; she'd been hurting him. She might have killed Mummy. But Father wanted them to keep quiet about it. Was it because he killed her? They wouldn't send him to prison for that, would they? He'd only been protecting his family. Jasper felt the beginnings of an awful stomachache rumbling in his gut.

Engaged in rapid-fire decision-making, because that's what he did best, Percy's foremost goal at the moment was to get Penny and Jasper far away from the scene of carnage at Hogwarts. He'd have to contact Aurors and report Malfoy's body in the greenhouse. Aurors were still employed to investigate crimes that involved any person, or persons, under suspicion of having been associated once with Lord Thingy, but he didn't want them pestering Jasper or Penny with too many questions just yet. They had to get their stories straight first, and with Penny's labor progressing as rapidly as it was there wasn't going to be any time for a family confab soon.

Percy planned on taking Penny home to George, where he would fill George in on as little as possible for the moment. George would have enough to worry about, because Percy was pretty sure that Penny was about to give birth nearly a full two months early, and that could have any number of terrible ramifications. He knew that because his mother had given birth too early to Ginny. He remembered his sister's delicate life hanging precariously in the balance and his parents dangling on the precipice of nervous collapse waiting for her to thrive. He felt as though he were back on the battlefield. Issuing orders and expecting them to be followed without question, that's what Percy did best.

On the way back to George and Penny's house in the Medi-van he began to have suspicions that Penny seriously preferred George's company to his own when she was in labor. His suspicions were confirmed quickly upon arriving on the front lawn of their house. Penny was so desperate for the reassurances of her reliably calm and good-natured spouse that she clung to George like a limpet when he came running out to see why in hell a red Medi-wizard van had just dropped out of the sky onto his front lawn. There wasn't any time to talk. George escorted Penny into the house and upstairs to their room. Percy Floo'd Phil and Rufus over to The Burrow.

After shoving Rufus into the fireplace, Percy sat down heavily on a library chair. What to do next? He'd better let Fred know not to show up at Hogwarts. He was about to Apparate himself into Wheezes, believing he'd catch him with plenty of time since he'd only sent the owl two hours ago. George caught him just as he was about to pop away.

"Percy, have you been scolding my wife?" George accused him mildly, digging into his pocket for his mobile.

"I have not," Percy denied hotly. Then reconsidered admitting, "Well, maybe I have been a little bit. It's been a very stressful day, and she's picked a horrendous time to go into labor."

"I've removed all of the blunt objects from around her bedside,' George advised him, "but she's still feeling cross with you. I wouldn't go up there to visit anytime soon, if I were you. I just zapped her with my very best cheering charm and I'm calling the maternity witch now."

When George got off the phone Percy gave him a short version of the day's events. Deliberately leaving out the fact that he thought Jasper had something to do with toasting Narcissa Malfoy alive. He also brushed over the part of Jasper's deliberate disobedience, but George picked right up on it anyway.

"The little fiend!" George pronounced in irritation. "If he wasn't over at Mum's right now I'd give him an earful!"

"He's feeling badly about it, George," Percy offered as consolation. "He looked pretty desolate when I sent him up to the castle."

They both started abruptly at a sharp cry from upstairs and tore out of the room together, making for the staircase, racing down the corridor and banging into one another at the doorway to the bedroom where Penny was panting and moaning with fervency. "I guess my Cheering charm didn't work too well, did it, love?" George asked concerned, approaching the bed, and taking his wife's hand. "The maternity wizard is on his way. Hold on, Penny."

"I'm getting out of here before she starts throwing things," Percy muttered. "I have to get hold of Fred before he goes up to the castle, and I need to report the...incident today."

George waved him away, "Go ahead, Percy. She's all right with me, now."

Percy Apparated himself to Wheezes and called off Fred. Then he reported himself to the Auror's office in London. Filled out all of the paperwork, ensuring the investigating offices that he would be available for questioning anytime. He was staying at his brother's house. Yes, that brother, the Weasley gazillonaire who owned the mansion out on River Otter Avenue. There would undoubtedly be increased security there soon, but Percy would let the security people know that investigators might be expected.

When he finally returned to his gazillionaire brother's house several hours later it was still filled with the sound of Penny's screaming. Shuddering, Percy thought dismally that the day could not possibly get any worse. That is, until the phone rang.