When Myths Meet Magic || 6

11|| Piper

Christmas eve came and Mrs. Weasley seemed hell-bent on having her house packed with twice as many people as it could physically hold.

"Well, now!" she said as they shadow-travelled to the spot where their tents had been pitched in the summer. "It's so lovely seeing you all again."

Nico fell face down in the snow.

"Oh, come in, come in," said Mrs. Weasley with the alarm of someone who definitely wasn't used to Nico's frequent collapsing.

They'd expected to stay at Hogwarts for the Holidays until she'd sent a motherly howler to the common room, demanding to know what-Harry-and-Ron-could-possibly-mean-by-they-weren't-coming-home-for-Christmas-she-was-wondering-why-they-still-hadn't-arrived-and-then-she'd-asked-Ron-and—

The Burrow was packed with all the Weasleys (well, the bearable ones anyway, thought Piper as she noticed Percy Weasley's distinct absence), as well as Fleur and Lupin. A wailing voice blasted from a radio, the volume pitched at its highest as if desperate to drown out all other noise.

"HELLO!" shouted a voice, and suddenly a small elf-like creature flung himself from the stairs and towards the mass of demigods at the door.

They all simultaneously parted and Leo crashed to the ground.

"Ow," he groaned.

"Oh come on, now," said Ginny, looking at the bodies on the floor that now numbered two. "You've crushed the angels."

Indeed, as Leo stood up, there was a row of once-proud paper angels that now looked more like Piper's attempts at making waffles.

"Has it occurred to you, Harry," came Mr. Weasley from the table, "that Snape was simply pretending—"

"Pretending to offer help so that he could find out what Malfoy was up to?" said Harry quickly and irritatedly (which seemed to be his permanent manner of speaking). "Yeah, it has."

"Snape?" said Jason. He was ignored.

"But how do we know?" continued Harry, talking over Jason urgently.

"It isn't our business to know," said Lupin. "It's Dumbledore's business. Dumbledore trusts Severus, and that ought to be good enough for all of us."

"But," said Harry, "just say — just say Dumbledore's wrong about Snape —"

"About what?" asked Hazel.

"People have said it, many times. It comes down to whether or not you trust Dumbledore's judgment. I do; therefore, I trust Severus."

"What did Snape do?" Nico demanded.

They all looked at him.

"He was being a prat," said Ginny. "Come on, let's talk about something else, and I'm sure Harry will explain later..."

"No, wait," said Harry, his eyes fixating on Piper, and Jason protectively put his arm around her.

"What?" said Piper.

"You oughta know what Malfoy's up to," he said. "Have you—"

"Really," said Mrs. Weasley fiercely. "It's Christmas. Let's not discuss this right now."

And she cranked up the radio.

Harry looked like he wanted to continue, but he bit his lip.

The topic was not brought up again until Christmas had safely passed. As she had every year, Mrs. Weasley gave her family and Harry their traditional Christmas sweaters and each of the demigods socks or gloves or a hat or scarf. Piper looked at her white and light gold-and-brown patterned beanie. Amazingly enough, Mrs. Weasley had nailed her personality every time. No gift she got was ever the usual fuschia pink the Camp Half Blood demigods commonly pinned her with.