InsaneJournal

Who: Bill Weasley and Fabian Prewett
What: The aftermath of talking to the Prewett parents/grandparents
When: Afternoon of Saturday, 16 May 1998
Where: Bill's room at the Leaky
Warnings: Language, talk of Death Eatery deeds, etc.



The visit to Prewett House had gone--Fabian couldn't call it well, but not exactly badly. It had been a relief to have his eldest nephew there, as it put off several discussions that, regardless of necessity, Fabian wasn't interested in having at the moment. Bill's level-headedness and his insistence on waiting to see the contents of the will, which Fabian couldn't be sure of any longer, had kept the conversation from derailing more than once. Particularly when the subject had turned to matters of the interment and the funeral arrangements, which were necessarily delayed until the DMLE confirmed the cause of Gideon's death.

All that was behind him for the moment, though, and Fabian was seated in a chair in Bill's room in the Leaky, where he was staying until he could rent a place of his own in the hot Diagon market. A flat had, of course, recently come open in the building where Fabian lived, but Fabian wasn't sure how he felt about that. Right now he wasn't sure how he felt about anything other than the burn of the alcohol from his flask, which he now passed to Bill.

"That could have gone a lot worse. Thank you for going out there with me. Without you I think my free and frank exchange of views with Mum and Dad would have been a little freer and franker than anyone needed to hear."

Bill took the flask, saluted his uncle, and took a sip. He noticeably relaxed as he savored the whiskey. “It was clever of Mum to suggest it. They hadn’t seen me since I returned, so they were going to be on best behavior, and I’m also a Weasley, which meant I could stand in for Uncle B.

“Perce and I came here after the gathering on Friday. Downstairs, really. I’m glad he found that girl he’s seeing. She’s steady where he’s high-strung.”

"Yeah, there was a reason I called Vicky in the other night. It was a bit awkward, but it also covered for other things. I knew there was no point in leaving Lee out and I wasn't leaving Gwen behind at mine." Fabian took the flask back and took another sip, because it was better than smoking up in Bill's room. "I've been trying to figure out what to do about him for a while. He needs a job to get out of the twins' shop, and she's been helping keep things from blowing up among the lot of them any more than they did. She's a keeper."

“Insert one Charlie Weasley-style quidditch joke about keepers here,” said Bill. “I told Perce I’d ask around at the Bank, but I don’t suppose he wants that either.” Bill snorted. “I’m not back a week and I’m trying to figure out how to shepherd my minions effectively. He’s the wobbly plate of the lot. And Ron, of course, but not knowing what to do with your life at 17 isn’t that novel a problem.”

“I think everyone is going to be alright. Everyone I can get a read on, that is. I’m still trying to get a handle on my uncles now that I’m not ten years old. I should’ve come back from Zurich years ago.”

"Your uncles are a surly and secretive lot. I say that as the least surly and secretive among them." Fabian managed a razor-sharp smile. "No, that's not true. Cedric's better off than I am. But you're going to have a hard time figuring out what's going on with me and Bilius because we're going to have a hard time sorting out what's going on with ourselves. Especially with Gideon gone. I have no idea what Bilius is going to want to do next, and you saw what I have coming down the pipe."

Bill laughed, but not because it was funny. “I think Grandmother Prewett has some serious re-thinking to do if she expects you to fall into line at this late stage. Does she even know you’re seeing someone?”

"Dad does, but not who. Mum won't approve. I heard she tried to set Gideon up at the dinner I missed." The thought of why he'd missed it and the straight line between that and Gideon's death set Fabian to scowling. He took another sip to cover it, aware that he probably wasn't going to be very successful at it.

Bill nodded. “I was there and that happened. That trip was when the Bank made the formal offer of the position to me.” Bill noticed Fabian’s scowl and reached for the flask, so they didn’t have to discuss that. Bill wasn’t ready to talk about Gideon’s death with Fabian, yet.

Apparently, neither was Fabian. "That seems like a fairly quick appointment, based on the admittedly little I know about Gringotts. Not that I'm complaining; I'm pleased, and relieved, to have you back. But I would have thought you were a little young, by goblin terms, for such a major position inside the bank, and--maybe because I missed that dinner--I don't remember you mentioning that you were under consideration for it." He left that hanging there as an invitation for Bill to continue, if he so wished.

“I didn’t mention it, then. They made me Director of Asset Protection. Last December, somebody killed two witches on the front steps of Gringotts. Goblins were, to put it mildly, agitated. The more agitated amongst them were sure it was a declaration of the long-expected wizard-goblin apocalypse.

“The calmer heads wanted someone to make sure the problems didn’t spill over and affect Gringotts. The Managing Director decided that I was the right wizard to make sure that happened.

“So, I have an ulterior motive when I try to find out what’s happening around here. It’s my job.”

Fabian kicked off first one low boot and then the other, and stretched out his legs so he could rest his feet on the bed. It hyperextended his knees a little; he'd regret it later, probably. He didn't care. "The goblins may be right to worry about spillover, but I expect this is a thoroughly human apocalypse. I feared--well, let's just say I there were things I feared that have not come to pass, and now I believe will not. But even a chit with a purist bent armed with nothing more than the usual curses and grudges can make a lot of trouble."

Bill left his boots on, for now. “There’s another human director, but she’s in finance. I am their liaison with the Wizarding World, no matter what the Ministry thinks it does.” Bill shrugged. “And they want me to keep them safe, or at least uninvolved, in wizarding feuds.”

“You shut down my reasonably normal ‘do we know what happened?’ questions pretty fast at The Burrow, which was fair. There were bystanders there and people who probably don’t want or need to know. Now that we’re alone, I would like to know. I can’t keep my patrons or my family safe without knowing, and it seems like you are the right person to ask. I want to be involved, because I have to investigate, and it’s better if I don’t have to do it alone.”

Fabian sat up a little, but not so much that his feet slid off the foot of the bed. "You're going to have to promise me that you're not going to go off and do something stupid on your own before I tell you anything. Because, frankly, that's what got your uncle killed. Looking for revenge."

Bill nodded. “That was one of my guesses, of course. Which means it’ll be other people's guess as well. I’m not interested in revenge. I want my brother to be able to fall for a muggleborn and not worry that someone will kill them both for it. I want my surly and secretive uncles to avoid further jail time. I want the Ministry to quietly rescind its unforgivable forgiveness programme. And most importantly, I want to prevent further funerals.

“Which is to say, yes, I’m not going to go off and do something stupid on my own. I want to do something stupid as part of a team and in the smartest way possible.”

"Yeah, I'd like all that too, but I'm settling for what I can get." Fabian shifted in the chair again, settling back into it as he answered. "Gideon went after Alecto Carrow because she was the one who'd attacked Bilius while he was being drunk and stupid on Valentine's Day." Bill might not be quite old enough to remember what that was the anniversary of, but he was certainly old enough to remember that Bilius had vanished for the better part of a decade. "Bilius had told me, by the way, that he was going to Rio. But instead he was in the wrong place at the wrong time and Carrow got her hands on him instead."

This next bit was the tricky part, and Fabian approached it with a solicitor's narrow view of the facts. "Gideon came to a point where he had reason to believe that Carrow might be vulnerable. His plan wasn't terrible, but he failed to count on her having allies, and apparently one of them got him. That was when he went missing. We--" for values of we that Fabian wasn't inclined to describe at this point, so he didn't "--were contacted by Lady Noir last week. She said she had Gideon and offered sufficient proof that we were willing to--" again he hesitated momentarily, his expression hardening "--exchange something that we had that she wanted for Gideon. The exchange went off without a hitch but it was obvious to me that something was wrong. By the time I got back to the farm, Gideon was already gone. I don't need to see the autopsy results to know that she poisoned him. I just want to know what it was.

"Lady Noir won't receive any good of her end of the bargain either. So you needn't be concerned about that."

Bill didn’t look concerned about Lady Noir. “In war there are advances and setbacks. I’d be surprised if there were never any setbacks. Four days ago, Dad told me things weren’t as bad as there were back in 1980. I can’t say that I agree with him, not now. It may not be the same scale, but it is the same problem. And beyond this ‘Lady Noir’, there are Death Eaters who’ve been at least quiet since then are seeing opportunities now. They’d suppress themselves if she was taken out of the picture.”

Bill smiled. “Part of what I’ve been doing since April is reading everything Gringotts has on this matter. It’s not the same as being here, but they didn’t want me to come in blind.”

Bill flicked a strand of hair out of his eyes, the way he’d done ever since he’d left The Burrow and stopped cutting his hair. “So, having promised not to be a solo vigilante, I’m looking to bring what I’ve got to whoever is actually doing something about this. You know quite a bit about what I can do, and also what I can do with Gringotts' backing.

“I’m not going to get anything useful from the Ministry. Pretty much my best hope is to tie my efforts to whoever is planning direct action. By my reckoning, that means I need to talk to you.”

Fabian resigned himself to having a discussion he suspected he'd be having again. "First of all, if I were once again involved in the sort of vigilante activity that got me thrown into Azkaban for life, I'd be very quiet about it. Second of all, anyone who was involving themselves in vigilante business at this late date would surely have learned from the Pettigrew debacle and taken measures to protect themselves against betrayal." Fabian made the locked lips gesture that Bill had to be familiar with from bank work that signified enforced confidentiality. "So whoever it was might not be able to talk about it.

"And that's before you get into the possibility of ending up dead like Gideon or in Azkaban the way a number of us did last time. But," and here Fabian huffed out a sigh, "if I knew anyone who was involved in direct action against Lady Noir, I could certainly put in a word with them."

Bill nodded and took a sip from the flask. “I’d hope so, for everyone’s protection. Such a matter would need more than just an expressed desire in order to come about. But let’s say that any cursebreaking or other items I or the bank can help with would be considered part of my portfolio and an investment in trust and goodwill.”

Bill put the flask back on the table. “On another subject, have you or Dedalus made any more progress with the journals? The bank is interested in the security they’re using, and we might be thinking of banking products based on them.”

Fabian shook his head. "He's seen my notes, particularly the ones relevant to the sort of thing he and I do, but that's our project. He and I have a different project list." Much of which had gone by the wayside with the Order, and the rest was undoubtedly being devoured by the surveillance project Dedalus and the twins were in theory working on. "What kind of banking products are they considering that would make use of journal-style security? Bearer bonds with personal recognition? Because I certainly know enough about journal security and personalised spell bonding to make that kind of thing work.”

Bill nodded. “The first thought from the finance product side was unforgeable cheques, but they can’t figure out how to rip them out of the cheque book without the signature disappearing. We can talk about it later, when I’ve got fewer Special Projects on my plate. I might bring you in as a security consultant.”

He looked at his uncle, and then at the clock on the wall. “One thing about this family, there are lots of people who will volunteer to help you when you need it. Or when you don’t. I’m about to pass out, Uncle F. Been a lot of long nights recently. Are you good to get home? You can stay here if you’re legless.”

"Gwen will be looking for me. My legs aren't so far gone I can't walk a few blocks." The truth was, Fabian had a lot of things to walk off. Reluctantly, he took his feet off the bed and switched his boots back on. "And I'll talk to Dedalus about security consulting. I'm interested, as long as it doesn't involve the kind of planning where the planner ends up buried inside the vault."

While he didn't need to use the arms of the chair to lever himself to his feet, Fabian did it anyway. "You can keep the flask if you need a sleep aid. Thanks, Bill. I appreciate not having to deal with Mum and Dad alone."

Bill saw his Uncle to the door, making sure he was steady enough to make it home. “Speaking ex-officio for Gringotts and the bank’s predecessor companies, we haven’t intentionally buried an employee inside a pyramid in at least four thousand years. You’re probably safe. Probably.

”Thanks for letting me come along. It was nice to have something concrete to do that could be crossed off the list.”

Fabian gave Bill a parting hug with enough strength in it to prove he could, in fact, make it back to his flat under his own steam. "Don't I know it. I'll see you tomorrow or Monday. And Bill? Be safe." And before Bill could turn the instruction round on him, Fabian added, "And so will I."