June 19, 1892 - Lissington home, Bartonburg

Should he feel bad about inviting a mate around to his parents house under false pretenses? Maybe… but Gus wasn’t entirely sure Endymion would have come under the pretense of what he was actually wanted for. Sure, everyone knew the redhead was always willing to jump into situations first and ask questions later, but most normal people wanted to first consider the consequences before they did anything that daft. Curse breakers seemed to make up the entire population of committing egregious acts, and Gus was hoping today was going to be one of those days.

Besides, it wasn’t a total ruse. There was a tray of sandwiches and a pitcher of lemonade set out, which most decidedly he could call lunch - Gus had just neglected to say that most of it would be enjoyed while clearing a sizable space in the room his father kept all his treasures in. He’d already moved a haphazard pile of doxy traps to one side of the room and had turned a music box where the ballerina insistently tapped her foot instead of dancing when he’d opened the lid to face the wall. She was quite rude. Between that and a pile of books that Gus had sworn had growled at him, he figured it was time to bring in the calvary.

He straightened his back when he finally heard the arrival of Endymion, figuring a house elf must have let him in and led him here. Stepping over a box of who knew what, Gus offered him an easy smile as he moved to lean against the door frame.

“I’ll hope you’ll forgive me,” Gus started off as he took a step back. “There’s lunch as promised, but I always may need your help navigating a potentially dangerous room of forgotten crap guarded by borderline illegal charms.” Shrugging as he glanced around the room, Gus couldn’t help the small laugh that escaped him. “And who better to help me than an actual curse breaker, eh? I really only need to find one thing. It’s a box, and it’ll burn your hand when you touch it. Nasty little bugger.”

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   Endymion Dempsey

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Knowing Lissington and his father, Endymion shouldn’t ever have expected anything quite as mundane as some sandwiches on a Sunday – but still, Gus greeting him by immediately asking forgiveness was clearly a dangerous beginning to the visit.

Endymion beamed.

Gus’ description didn’t dampen his enthusiasm one bit, but he reined his curiosity for a moment – stopped himself getting lost in peering around the room, or picking anything up just yet – by pulling a mock-surprised expression instead. “What a reward for all our trouble,” he remarked happily, of the nasty little hand-burning box that seemed to be the prize for this spring cleaning. Already wondering what it might do, Dymion stepped further into the room instead, gracefully dancing around the teetering pile of books and putting out a tentative hand, lest some of the nearest objects – not junk, never junk! – got any ideas about toppling.

“And here I thought you just wanted to see me,” he joked, with a melodramatic sigh and a shake of his head, “when any old cursebreaker would have done. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten how to break curses yourself already, though?” Endymion glanced at him. “You haven’t been off teaching that long.”

He still wasn’t quite sure why Lissington had left all the adventurousness of his life behind to go mark children’s homework – but perhaps he’d find out where the allure was in that today. Perhaps Gus had had enough of getting into scrapes and navigating rooms of dangerous forgotten crap?

No, of course not. That would be ridiculous.

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Gus grinned at him before he nonchalantly shrugged, as if that explained everything. “It’s the one thing I could never quite break the curse on, and it’s going to be my summer project.” More like, he was frustrated that a box had bested him consistently for months and it had winded up in this room during the shuffle of moving from Egypt to Hogwarts. He was going to get it open one way or another and see what was inside, even if it was the last thing he did, and with two whole months ahead of him with nothing planned, the opportunity couldn’t be better. Gus glanced at Dymion before he stepped over a box he’d been poking through earlier.

“Oh my dear Endymion, you are the apple of my eye and I always want to see you,” Gus pressed a hand to his chest, feigning hurtthat he thought otherwise. “Hence why of all the curse breakers I know, I chose you.” He winked before he laughed. He always did like Endymion, especially because he was less likely to ask questions about how he acquired something and more likely to ask why he didn’t share it sooner. Endymion Dempsey didn’t have a flight reaction in a flight or fight situation, which would bode well for Gus when he evidently put them in one. “If I keep calling myself an actual curse breaker, I’m afraid I’ll want to be one again and Hogwarts will lose me as professor.” Gus cocked an eyebrow at him. It was difficult to explain why he’d suddenly left something he clearly enjoyed doing, and his year at Hogwarts had been short of disastrous. 

Not that it was all bad. He and Basil Foxwood were getting reacquainted, and that was just a teeny bit better than dropping everything and returning to a life of adventure.

He just had to remind himself he didn’t miss it. Gus took another look around the room - there was a lot of stuff in here, but he supposed that was what happened when both he and his father tended to be hoarders. He pushed a box toward Dempsey with his foot. Something inside rattled and he peered down and waited for something to jump out, relieved when nothing did. “And, if you see anything you’re absolutely dying to have, I’m sure da won’t mind if a few things walk.” His grin widened.

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Endymion Dempsey

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A summer project! Fair enough – Endymion nodded to express that he understood the motivation perfectly – but he couldn’t resist throwing in a daft pun. “As long as you don’t burn yourself out,” he quipped. Because of the box, ha!

“Well, I’m touched,” he added with eye-crinkling smile, always easily mollified just the same, whether the sentiment was sincere or in jest. (And Dymion tended not to bother asking questions he didn’t want the answers to, so Gus had probably picked well for this little hunt.) “Good to know,” he said, to the offer of making a thing or two disappear if he fancied it. Now that he was based at Gringotts and not at a foreign treasure site, the likelihood of putting anything precious in his pocket and walking away with it was null, not in plain sight of the goblins; he’d have lost his job before he was out of the building.

He peered down at the box Gus had nudged for a moment, waiting for the rattling to subside, but keeping it in the corner of his vision as he dug out his wand and focused upon a dusty sheet covering some indeterminate objects – Endymion cast a levitating charm on it and averted his gaze as the cloud of dust dispersed into the air, and the sheet billowed out above them like a child’s version of a ghost. “So,” Dymion asked, mind eventually catching up on one of Lissington’s last remarks, “you’re really planning on going back to Hogwarts for another year, then?” He hadn’t been fired, as far as he’d heard, so it made sense if he was – he just hadn’t understood it in the first place.

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Gus’ grin widened at the pun, although he merely shrugged in response. He knew he could trust Endymion with this little project - between himself and his father, they had quite the assortment of items they’d walked away with. One day he’d take the time to organize the room, give away what he didn’t want and maybe put all the items worth something in Gringotts; he’d have two vaults: valuables, and items like the box that would be challenging to break the curses. He had to keep up his skills one day.

He watched the sheet billow like a ghost, his nose wrinkling from the dust, and Gus laughed quietly as he shook his head before he bent down to poke around in the box by his foot. His fingers wrapped around a parrot made of crystal, and as he pulled it free to peer at it closer, the bird squawked loudly; it fumbled from his hands as he nearly dropped it, managing to catch it by the tail before it could hit the ground.

He heard Dempsey ask him about Hogwarts. “Yeah…” Trailing off, he licked his lips and stared down at the parrot in his hand. It had gone still again, staring at him with beady eyes, as if waiting to catch him off guard again. Gus plopped it back into the box and moved on toward the next object before he cast a sideways glance at Dempsey. “I’m still not sure if it’s for me, so when you see me sitting next to you at Gringotts in a few months, guess I made my decision.” He shrugged.

This time his fingers wrapped a handle of a cloth bag, a bucket shaped head adorned with a crown and a wide smile painted across the front of it. Gus frowned at it. It had been enchanted as a portkey the first time he'd picked it up but every time he or his partner had touched it, they had found themselves somewhere new. He really didn't want to open it, so instead he wrinkled his nose and set it aside. “I missed a lot. My sister eloped and I had no idea.” Surely Endymion could relate to missing family things, being out of pocket and coming back to surprises. “So I’m home without being… smothered.” Flicking his gaze toward the other for a moment, he shot him an easy grin.

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Endymion Dempsey

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There was so much to look at in this room full of treasure-slash-junk, crystal parrots and all, that it was hard to focus fully on anything – but Endymion tore his attentions away from the object he was currently looking at to listen to an answer he really rather wanted to hear.

“I was just saying to Foxwood the other week that it’s a proper toss up between having to supervise a castleful of children and having to work under supervision by the Gringotts goblins,” he admitted, with a laugh – both had their downsides. “So don’t be too quick to choose.”

And both had their upsides, Lissington was right: it was nice to be based back in the country again finally. “But that makes sense,” he agreed, with an easy sigh in return. “My sister got cursed by a Pictish comb the last time I was gone.” He rolled his eyes as if to say typical, getting into cursebreaker problems when he was jaunting halfway across the world. Merlin, he wished one of his sisters had eloped. He had only wanted to live at the Dempsey estate until he was engaged to be married and found his own house, but unless he or one of his sisters married soon, Endymion rather thought he’d be in danger of being smothered soon. “Nice of your sister not to tell you. Family, eh?”

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Gus just laughed and shook his head at him. “Well, children at least bring me sweets when they’re reminded of me.” He had the biggest sweet tooth and was never one to shy away from consuming his weight in eating them. Last year Miss Dashwood had given him almost an entire box of sweets near the end of the year because she couldn’t eat all of it - Gus couldn’t fathom not being able to finish anything chocolate. “Although I do miss trying to get a cranky goblin to laugh. I never did accomplish that life goal.” He chuckled again and shook his head. What a shame. Maybe he’d have the chance to work on that again sometime soon. 

Although, if they sat him next to Endymion Gus wasn’t sure either of them would get any work done. He’d spend a lot of time trying to make his friend laugh, too.

“Sisters, right? If you’re going to do something daft, at least make sure I’m somewhere nearby so I can help you.” Gus shook his head again as he leaned down to root through another box. “She got hit with one of those amorentia envelopes and decided to ‘give the marriage a shot.’ Even adopted some dog named Seamus -” Who the dimwitted Gus hadn’t actually realized was his living, breathing nephew and the sole reason for the elopement to begin with. “And I swear she’s obsessed with him. Haven’t met him yet, but I’m not too keen on meeting a spoiled dog.”

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Endymion Dempsey

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   Endymion Dempsey

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“Well if that’s so, just let me know when the Charms position frees up, and I’ll be there at once,” Dymion declared, at this new knowledge about the possibility of children bringing one sweets. “Or maybe I should be bringing the goblins sweets.” (Obviously a joke: he could picture Ugnot’s unamused expression already, right before Endymion got banished into one of Gringotts’ cursed vault doors for a decade.)

“Well, at least she’s made the most of it –” Endymion added with a relieved-if-bemused sigh when it came to the unfortunate developments with Lissington’s sister. (Because one could certainly be worse off, no matter the rest, if one didn’t have an adorable pet dog.) “Impressive, though. If Amortentia worked that well every time, I fancy I’d try a dose of it tomorrow,” he said, only partly joking. If it worked out for the best, it sounded almost like a fairytale. Faster than the usual methods, too.

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“Endymion!” Gus laughed as he picked up some object near him - a plush doll with eyes that were sewn shut, but her mouth was still twisted into a rather terrifying grin, as if she'd been caught between a laugh and a sneeze. “Do not joke like that. I would love for you to join me as a professor, although I’m sure Headmaster Black would give us both detention for the antics that we would cause. Professor Detention.” He laughed as he shook his head. “We’d both wind up in the Forbidden Forest, although I can only imagine the caves that haven’t been explored.” It went without saying that the next adventure Gus was going to kindly ask (read as: was going to drag) Dempsey to go on was tromping through the forest looking for dark places that may contain things that might eat them.

No one ever said Gus had survival instincts.

“Do goblins even like sweets?” He finally asked, shrugging. He doubted it.

His head snapped up at the next comment and Gus took a large step toward his friend. “Are you trying to woo someone, Dempsey? Because I swear I can be the best wingman in the game.” Gus arched an eyebrow at him; he was in a sense, only because they would never fight over girls.

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   Endymion Dempsey

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“Whoever said I was joking?” Endymion threw back, just as merrily – of course, he had been, at least until he’d said it. A passing thought; a whim blown in like the wind; the prospect of children offering him free sweets, that was all. Still, he let the idea drift around his head awhile, turning it over in his mind like Gus was that (frankly unsettling) doll over there. He tried to properly picture himself a professor, and couldn’t quite do it. Of course, he hadn’t been able to imagine Lissington one either, and now here he was, and – whatever Dym said to his face – he did think it rather suited him.

But Lissington was right, the pair of them at Hogwarts together would be a disaster waiting to happen. “Professor detention! Worth it, just for that!” he exclaimed in a raucous echo of the idea, leaning forwards in a bout of overwhelming laughter that induced a stitch to rip straight up his sides – and, almost simultaneously, caused him to trip over something metallic tucked across the floor that may or may not be a decorative sword.

Ah well. He kept his balance, but only just. Shaking his head at the likelihood of goblins even liking sweets – for some inexplicable reason, he rather suspected sweets would make them ill; and made a mental note to inquire about this sometime with his knobbly-kneed Gringotts colleagues – Endymion dusted off a box in the hopes that it was the box, and shot a grin at Gus.

It wasn’t the box. It had snapped at his fingers when he’d tried to open it, but no burning. Huh.

Lissington’s excitement at his offhand remark distracted him from it for the moment, though. “Only in the abstract,” Dymion admitted freely, because he didn’t yet know who this someone was. He gave a deep sigh. He wouldn’t have needed Amortentia to woo anyone, if he had fallen in love already. “I’ll be sure to call on you when I need a hand, though,” he assured him, thinking that roping Gus into something like that would be fair payback for today’s activities, and also – “but at the moment my trying to find someone to marry is going much like this.” Hunting amongst a haystack, a jumble of oddities and debutantes, turning up all manner of fascinating things but never quite the right one.

But someone would turn up in time, he had to have that much hope. Pausing in the hunt here, Endymion mimicked the eyebrow arch back at Lissington. “And you? Back home, settled in a career... is marriage next on your list too?” It would rather make sense for it to be, he thought.

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“What would you even teach?” He asked, as he turned the doll over in his hands. Then he shuddered, swearing that it smiled at him for a moment before its mouth morphed back; why his father decided to keep this was confusing because even Fig would have gone running for the hills if she was ever presented with it as a child. He tossed it into a box. “They’d make you sit through etiquette class all over again.” Although it was a fact that he'd be sitting right there beside him. Gus had been dodging the professor since he’d come aboard, although the old bag was retiring – now he was going to have to figure out the new hire’s schedule and dodge them while making it look like it wasn’t on purpose.

(He’d walked straight into a wall last time when he’d abruptly turned around to avoid making eye contact.)

“Oh, Dempsey! I swore I saw a chimera in the Forbidden Forest while I was overseeing detention one night. How cool would that to be find?” He laughed; if anyone would be willing to come face to face with a creature that might kill them, it would be Endymion. (It was probably a good thing they didn't work together anymore, mostly for their safety.) Spinning around, Gus watched just in time to watch his friend almost impale himself on a sword; well, having a good friend as a ghost would be pretty awesome and then he’d have to come to Hogwarts with him – it was either fate or karma trying to tell Endymion the same thing. He couldn’t help but laugh at the thought, loud and jovial as he moved on to the next box.

Lifting the cover, Gus nearly choked on all the dust that shot into his face, causing him to cover his mouth and wheeze. He patted his chest before he glanced back up at Endymion, nodding. “I have faith you’ll find someone perfect, and soon.” Even if it took a few more years, which Gus wouldn't count as soon, but he wasn't about tell his friend that. Of course Dym always been a romantic at heart, looking for someone Gus wasn’t even sure was real, but then again he had no room to talk – he was in love with someone who was unobtainable; still, he’d be happy to assist the man in his happily ever after because at least one of them deserved it. (Even if it appeared at the moment both their love lives were crashing and burning.)

Gus rooted through the box, his fingers wrapping around a smooth box that he brought close to his face and blew on it; the damn thing sent it straight back into his face, along with the dust that had collected on top of it causing him to cough. His fingers froze and he suddenly found all his attention on the box before he was forcing out a rather odd sounding laugh.

“Me? Oh god, no. I don’t even have a place to live yet, outside of Hogwarts. I did give a ring to a friend though –” Only because he’d conveniently had it in his pocket after buying it from another friend the day before. “But not as an engagement ring. More as a, you can say we’re together if you need to, ring.” His face contorted as he glanced back at Endymion. “I hope that doesn’t mean we are engaged, by some weird societal rule.” Winnie had been skeptical to receive it and understood what it meant – plus she knew about his preferences, and it certainly wasn’t her.

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“Speak for yourself, I was a dream in Etiquette,” Endymion shot back primly, which wasn’t too much of an exaggeration. “I could teach Etiquette.” (This was an exaggeration.)

But he was altogether more interested in the idea of meeting a chimaera, and Lissington full well knew it: it was like he was trying to tempt him to Hogwarts, proven disaster that they’d be there together. Dymion narrowed his eyes to suggest that Gus was more-than-likely making this fact up to mess with him – to get him gullibly over-excited – because what on earth would a chimaera be doing in the forests of Scotland?

Well, if he was kidding, at least Gus had gotten a faceful of dust for it. Endymion laughed, though he did cast another, more curious look his way at the sudden way he’d gone still, and all the jovialness drained out of his laugh.

But perhaps he’d just found the box. Endymion might’ve asked what he had, but Lissington threw him off-kilter with another unexpected answer there. “A say we’re together if you need to ring?” Dym repeated, perplexed by that possibility – who just went around giving rings to people? Surely someone would get the wrong idea? “Well, as an expert in social etiquette –” Endymion began in an affected tone, shooting him a warning look to say you’re in trouble, mate; she’ll probably think you are. He trailed off to attest that he was only joking, but in spite of his smile, he did quirk a brow at Gus in pursuit of some more explanation there. “I hope it wasn’t a cursed ring, at least? Then you’ll really be in trouble.”

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Gus rolled his eyes, albeit affectionately because he couldn’t imagine Dymion teaching etiquette of all things. He couldn't help but chuckle at the meet thought of him trying to the teach boys to be hopeless romantics like he was, and the girls… oh, they’d be disappointed when they found out not everyone was like him. The standards would be set and Maybe it’d be better if the man stayed far away from Hogwarts. (Not that it mattered to Gus because steered as far away from Season things as he possibly could.)

Then he grinned at him, a wide shit-eating one because it had been caught in a ruse. Although he had seen something out in the Forbidden Forest, but that sounded like something for another time. Instead he awkwardly cleared his throat. “I mean, she knows what it means because I don’t like her like that.” Gus rubbed the back of his head as he laughed nervously, wishing he could step back in time for a few minutes to keep himself from ever saying it. Endy’s look made him nervous even if Winnie wouldn’t ever bring up marriage to him, unless it was to save his hind for doing something daft. “She’s wonderful, of course, but we’re both in love with other people.” Oh shit, oh shit. He hadn't meant to say that allowed. Foot meet mouth, please.

The next set of words came out in a fluster because boy was he ready to move on from this. “It’s a charmed ring.” He replied, and then quickly pointed to the man’s hand. “Your hand mate, looks like it’s on fire. Think you might’ve just found my box.” At least he was assuming that it was smoke he was seeing and not crying from the dust in his eyes or the fact that his mouth started running faster than his brain could keep up.

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   Endymion Dempsey

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The hunt for the box had paled, in Endymion’s eyes, against this story about gifting out rings that didn’t mean the usual thing at all – and even that mystery deepened when Gus added but we’re both in love with other people.

His eyes widened before he could help himself, brow furrowed in surprise. Hadn’t he just asked Gus if he were thinking of marrying, and hadn’t Gus just laughed that off? And now he was in love with someone? Everything in Endymion was itching to air the new questions on the tip of his tongue, which were obviously you’re in love? and with whom?, but he could tell Gus hadn’t meant to say it, and had already been uncomfortable with the topic – he had heard it in his laugh – and although this new mystery was already maddening to him, Gus did have another, er, point there.

Endymion’s hand was burning. “Oh, right, the box,” Endymion exclaimed, his mind taking a moment or two to catch up with all this, while his hand sizzled against the lid of it – he tossed it, instinctively, in a gentle arc so that it landed with a clatter on the floor between them, and shook his blistering hand about. The burning was still less of a priority than imagining what had kept Gus and whoever he loved apart, if he couldn’t even think of marrying them – but Endymion let it go, at least for the moment and laughed in surrender. “Well,” he agreed with a grin, bearing the box no ill-will for its attempts to barbecue off his palm, “it does look that way.” (A mystery for Gus to solve this summer – and, indeed, a new mystery for him to muse on.)

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There was relief that Endymion didn’t ask questions despite the amount of he could see flickering across his face. It wasn’t like he was embarrassed of being in love with Basil, it was just… complicated. Complicated that he knew the man didn’t return it, complicated that he had told Gus it was impossible for another man to love another, and complicated that he didn’t want to trust anyone in his life with this secret. (But Basil never realized that Gus lived to defy the impossible.) It was just easier for everyone for him to pretend that yes, maybe one day he’d take a wife when in reality he’d rather live in a hole than ever live with a woman who expected to share his bed.

Gross.

Another high pitched laugh escaped him as he raked his fingers through his hair, his eyes tracking the box as it clattered to the ground. It was bellowing some smoke, although as he stepped forward to nudge it with the tip of his shoe, the smoke dissipated Ah, his summer project. Gus was thrilled to have something keep his mind occupied (and the chance to redeem himself because how dare a stupid box outwit him for so many years), and he grinned at Endy. “Thanks. I really owe you.” One favor, if his friend ever needed it, but it wasn’t like Gus wouldn’t do something; if Endy asked he'd be there. “Let’s get your hand healed because I will not be responsible for it falling off.” Then food; he’d promised him lunch, and Gus didn’t like to be a liar.

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Wrapped?

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   Elias Grimstone

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