A Prophecy of Two Boys

Chapter 51

Chapter 51

Harry's Point of View

The evening passed in a series of mugs of hot chocolate, tales of school (both present from us younglings and past from James and Sirius – who had joined us shortly after lunch) and games. Wizarding chess had been a brilliant hit until Ron beat everyone. Then we moved onto monopoly – a muggle board game Lily enjoyed, which went on for several hours, leaving Fred and George (who had paired up as a team) as the winners after bankrupting all of us.

Leo and we were drowsy as we tumbled into bed at nearing midnight, but happily so, and more than willing to yield to the siren call of sleep.

Then next morning I was woken by both Leo and Charles jumping on our bed, with a sleepy but amused Ron watching on. Ginny stood awkwardly in the doorway, taking in the painted walls of out room with interest. Everyone was (in typical Christmas tradition) still in their pyjamas and sporting ruffled bed-hair.

Percy groaned as Leo threw the glass of water that we kept on our bedside table over us, providing us with a shot of energy. I didn't even bother fighting Percy as he grabbed control, grabbing both Leo and Charles' wrists and pulling them out of the room with him, running up to Lily and James' room to wake them up. I was excited, yes. But not quite that much.

Breakfast was a rowdy affair, with ten of us all wrestling for food. Lily put her foot down when food actually began being thrown at each other ("Sirius started it!") and put an end to it before any real mess could be made ("If you make a mess you can skip present opening to clear it up – without magic, mind!"). Yep. Lily was a pro at threat making.

Present giving wasn't delayed for any of us, however, and soon brightly wrapped parcels were flying thickly through the air. We received (between all our school friends) almost a new wardrobe of robes, a phone that could run on magic from Leo (and the rest of the Hephaestus cabin), "A guide to Archery for Dummies" courtesy of the Apollo Cabin, a lock-picking set from the Hermes cabin, a book on advanced potions from our godfather, and a broom-care kit from Charles. Lily and James gave us a fifty galleon gift-voucher for Flourish and Blots (correctly guessing we'd prefer to choose our own books) as well as a series of smaller presents such as new potion ingredients, a leather bracelet with five silver enchanted charms for protection, and a set of paints and brushes for our work on our room.

In return, we sent several gifts back to camp – sketches of plans copied from textbooks that the inventor never managed to complete for the Hephaestus cabin, or a warded chest filled to the brim with wizarding sweets for the Hermes cabin, and acromantula silk (the strongest material on earth) to the Apollo cabin to create bow strings out of. We had swapped for the silk with Hagrid, offering him an orphaned fae egg we'd found in the forest in return. Leo received a kit of bolts, screws, paperclips, rubber bands, tools and scrap metal along with a tonne more random objects to tinker away with. Severus was given a celestial bronze cauldron, forged by us (with Leo's help, supervised by Beckendorf over Iris Message), to experiment with the metal's effect on his potions. For Charles we had managed to purchase an all season ticket for the Chudley Cannon's matches in this year's League. James received a season ticket too, as Charles was only twelve still. Lily we gave a new recipe book we'd seen her admiring in Diagon Alley in the summer.

The rest of the day passed swiftly, without note really. Christmas dinner was a very quiet affair, with many of the Weasley's giving Severus strange looks as he sat and ate his meal next to us. Surprisingly no pranks were pulled, and we fell into bed feeling rather happy.

It was a couple of days when we found ourselves unable to sleep, and so had decided to walk around the corridors that we found a black leather bound book, lying innocently on a window seat. Percy picked it up, noting the faded gold lettering on the back reading "Tom Marvolo Riddle" before flipping through it. But the pages were blank. It rang a bell in our memory, and Percy pulled up the image of Lucius Malfoy slipping a battered black book not unlike this one into Ginny Weasley's cauldron last summer. Presumably they were in fact the one and same.