WHO: Peony Parkinson and Dante Avery WHAT: A Wandless attempts to acquire Peony’s. WHEN: Today WHERE: Diagon Alley WARNINGS: Low level violence, threats.
It was too closely packed for spell work; she had to use her fist (and her handbag) in order to get away. The crowd pressed around her—whether it was Wandless trying to haul her assailant off or to grab her wand for themselves—made the air dense and heavy. But it was only when she pushed away from the fight a little, raised her hand to her lips only to have it come away with blood, that Peony struggled to breathe.
For a moment she stared dumbly at the crimson smear, then the ground pitched and rushed towards her.
Being stationed at Gringotts meant two things for the Dark Lord: try to wrestle control of Gringotts from the goblins, and keep an eye on Diagon. There was a time and a place for altercations -- a crowded Diagon Alley by himself wasn’t one of them, usually -- and he wasn’t looking for one. Unfortunately for everyone else there, someone had been. His very public arrest and subsequent escape meant that if he wasn’t disguised, people would scatter as soon as he approached. No one, Wandless or not, wanted to get in his way.
It meant he had to be a little more crafty if he wanted to catch people slip-up.
He dropped his glamour and stepped in just fast enough to prevent Peony from collapsing onto the cobblestones. He watched as the faces nearby froze like startled deer, and he bellowed, “no one leaves!” Someone in this crowd knew what had happened, besides Peony. If she wasn’t ready to talk, someone else would.
His voice was quieter in Peony’s ear. “Are you all right?”
“I-” Peony struggled for a moment to adjust to being upright again, sucking in a mouthful of air. It was only Diagon Alley air, but in that instant it was as crisp and clearing as anything on the deck of a chateau in the French alps. “I don’t scare easily, but I’m not very good with blood. I think that I have a split lip,” she explained in the preternaturally calm way of someone who was one step away from losing the plot.
Twisting around somewhat, she encountered first a bearded chin, then a familiar set of eyes above it. “Dante?”
“It’s me,” he said gently, his forehead creased with concern. His eyes flashed angry for a second as he took her appearance in and glanced at the crowd again, wondering what had gone wrong that Peony ended up bleeding.
“Hold still,” he told her, and in a second, he’d whisked the blood off her face. His healing charms were spotty at best, so out of his pocket emerged a handkerchief. It’d have to do for now. “What happened?”
They had tried to take her wand. Her wand that her mother had taken her to Ollivander’s for on her eleventh birthday, and thus less old than she was, but it had the same mother-of-pearl brooch set in the handle that had been on her great-grandmother’s wand, and several generations before that, another Parkinson matriarch. In a word, they had tampered with legacy.
And so, fear ebbing into anger, her first instinct was to lash out, to doom them all for existing. It was easy to justify in that moment, it was—exactly what her mother and Pansy would have done. Peony took a steadying breath and removed the handkerchief from her lips.
“One of them tried to take my wand,” she stated. “Only one, I can say for certain.”
“One,” he repeated, searching her face for any sort of hesitation that would mean she was hiding something, but Dante didn’t see it.
It was a serious allegation, one that would have grave consequences for whomever was responsible. Dante trusted her implicitly. She wouldn’t make something like that up. Someone else might -- someone with less grace, certainly. But between the blood on her lip and the look on her face, Dante believed her. “Do you remember what they looked like?” Already, he was thinking about what to do with the guilty party. He’d have to bring them in, to prove a point to the masses.
Not off the top of her head, Peony couldn’t, but if she saw a face, perhaps something would trigger her memory. Still, she couldn’t admit uncertainty—not here, not in front of someone she was all but certain served Him. She was about to plead a headache and request an escort to the Ministry to give a statement when someone from the clutch of Wandless huddled together called out.
“It was him.”
Dante stepped over to the accused and pulled him forward - not roughly, exactly, but he was impatient. The man protested, but Dante ignored him.
“Is this him?” he asked, because there could be a hundred reasons why one of the Wandless would accuse their own, legitimate and otherwise. They could still send a message to the masses either way, but Dante would want to be right more than he wanted to make a statement. His father was about statements. His colleagues, too. Their Lord was. But maybe… maybe there was something in making them all turn on each other, give one of them a reward for snitching, make them distrust each other… “Peony. Do you want to go to the Ministry with this?”
“No.” The bloodied handkerchief was still clutched in Peony’s fist, but her voice was steady. “That’s not him. That one is.”
Her finger fell upon the man who had cried out.
A corner of Dante’s mouth quirked upwards, though whether it was because of how little effort they’d needed to see the Wandless betray each other or because he was proud of Peony’s resilience, it wasn’t clear. “Very well.” He bound the suspect’s hands and pulled him forward while he released the first man accused, a more apologetic smile on his face. “Assault is a very serious crime,” he explained, “can’t be too careful. I might watch your back if I were you. Someone’s trying to get you in quite a bit of trouble.”
To Peony, then, “let me contact the Ministry. They’ll sort the rest out. Pressing charges and the like.”
“Thank you.” A contemplative look was in her green eyes at just how—well, gently— Dante had dealt with the falsely accused Wandless. Most of their ilk would put a boot in their middle simply for existing. His reaction was, she supposed, somewhat unusual.
Then the look was veiled as she turned to the man in Dante’s custody, something more akin to her mother’s sharp expression on her face. “Not only are you a would-be thief, but you’re a coward too,” she declared coolly.
“I’m sorry,” the man tried. “I don’t know what-”
“Don’t know what you were thinking?” Dante interrupted. While Peony had confronted the man who’d gone after her, Dante had taken a moment to send a message ahead about what had happened and to request assistance. He scoffed. “Save your excuses for the DMLE. I’m sure they’ll love to hear what you planned to do with her wand if you got ahold of it.”
Somewhere in the back of his mind, Dante thought that this was desperation speaking and that the situation here was bound to get worse, the longer they left it go the way it was. How many others would be faced with the same thing Peony did, or worse? Was it wise to leave them all free to congregate, to discuss amongst themselves? Dante pursed his lips. “Maybe we should bring them all in for not helping you out,” he suggested, smiling as he looked at Peony. “Or maybe I’m expecting too much out of thieves.”
She stood corrected. Amidst the cries of dismay at Dante’s declaration, the pleading, she pressed the handkerchief to her lips once more, taking a moment to weigh her words. “I - well, I’m not an officer of the law - but they too have been discouraged from interacting with us, or so I understand?” she began eventually, and her tentative tone was far from a put-on. While she was not about to defend any of them—still, punishing every single one seemed a shade too barbaric. Beyond what they should be, as two members of Sacred 28 families. “Perhaps they were afraid that they would be mistaken as collaborators, if they had tried to assist me. I would have likely assumed they were.”
“Please,” she added, beseeching green eyes fixed upon Dante’s. “I just want to go home.” She wanted to go to Rosier’s, more accurately, and have Angelus patch her up and banter her out of her heightened nerves before her mother could exclaim over her appearance, but that didn’t have the same plaintive appeal.
It was kind of funny, to hear everyone start defending themselves. Dante didn’t really want to get them all in trouble; in all honesty, he saw the entire situation of the Wandless as a huge waste of resources. They could be put to work somewhere, instead of just cluttering everything up and becoming so desperate that they tried to actually steal. But he remembered what Rosier said about getting a rise out of people.
“You’re right,” he conceded after a moment, feeling a little bad that he was forcing her to deal with it longer than she really had to. “I’m sure they were afraid. If one of them could attack you, who knows what they might do to anyone.” And there was the pesky little bit about why they’d been put there in the first place, and how that didn’t really lend itself to feelings of cooperation. “I’ll take you home after we talk to the DMLE. All right? Unless…” His sentence trailed off, but he was sure she knew what he was thinking. Unless she wanted to be generous, unless she wanted to forget it happened at all.
Peony had been generous enough for one day, she felt. A lesser witch would have doomed them all; instead she had done what she could to limit the retribution. That was quite sufficient, considering that one had assaulted her, after all. As ludicrous as their supposed crimes were, they couldn’t simply be permitted to run amok. And her position was such that she couldn’t afford anything further that could be construed as sympathy.
“Unless I need a lie-down first?” she suggested, forcing a flash of amusement even as the movement made her split lips smart. “I’m quite able to give a statement now, though thank you for your consideration.” She stepped closer to him, offering her elbow.
“Oh, well,” that hadn’t been exactly what was on his mind, but at least she wasn’t angry, “of course you’re able. Just concerned about you.” Dante took the offered arm in his own. He was afraid of what their mothers might say if word got back to them -- and he had no doubt it would -- but for the time being, it was all right, to be a gentleman, to look after her. Not that he thought she couldn’t take care of herself, but most people needed a little looking after now and then, no matter who they were.
It was good for his image, too.
“They won’t be long now. And then we’ll go right home. You have my word.” Then the pair vanished, leaving a street empty apart from some stunned Muggleborns wondering just how much worse it would all become for them.