Unfortunately for everyone sitting near the far end of the Gryffindor table that morning, Errol delivered the family post.

On the bright side, he's always been rather easy to spot.

Flying through the open windows high above, Errol swooped in, giving a sound halfway between a screech and a hoot as he tumbled down like a feather in the wind. A few Gryffindors ducked as he barreled through, knocking over dishes and a goblet of pumpkin juice all over a second-year girl as he raced towards me. The girl scowled in my direction.

"Sorry about that," I told her with a wave, snatching the letter in Errol's mouth and letting him take off before he did any more damage. "He's a bit of the overexcited type. Or the mad type."

The girl's scowl only deepened as she turned away, wiping the front of her now-soaked robes.

"Cheers," George mumbled beside me as the girl got up in a huff. "Who's the letter from? Ludo?"

I scoffed. "No, the bugger's still avoiding us. That's what happens when you're a cheat who doesn't make good on your bets." I turned the envelope over in my hands, recognizing the slant of the handwriting. "Looks like this one's from Mum. Hope it's not another letter trying to convince us to join Percy at the Ministry."

George scoffed as I tore the envelope open to retrieve the letter tucked inside. "Hope it's not another letter mentioning Percy at all."

I made a hum of agreement as my eyes scanned over the letter, my mother's slanting handwriting now filling the page in front of me. Percy had recently taken a job at the Ministry of Magic working in the Department of Magical Cooperation, and although Mum and Dad were thrilled, George and I found it to be just about the most exasperating thing in recent history. Percy's always been sanctimonious about his duties, but at least when he was just a prefect, George and I could tease him about it. Now, he's completely insufferable — always going on about Mr. Crouch this and Mr. Crouch that. Any more of it and I was planning on owling some Ton-Tongue Toffees his way, which worked wonders on Harry's cousin.

While Percy was busy professing his love for Mr. Crouch all summer, me and George had been hard at work, inventing new items for our future joke shop and accepting orders forms by owl. Mum hadn't been very pleased with George and I when we told her we didn't want to work in the Ministry like Percy, we wanted to start a joke shop instead.

By 'hadn't been very pleased' I mean more along the line of burning all of our order forms and screaming at us just as we were departing for the Quidditch World Cup.

Of course, that hadn't stopped us. We made new order forms and kept going back to the drawing board. Canary Creams, joke wands, and Puking Pastilles were just a few fruits of our labor. But just inventing the products wasn't enough.

We needed gold. Lots of it.

Now that we were back at school, George and I were planning on making the most of our year. We needed test subjects, customers; anyone willing to give Weasley's Wizard Wheezes a shot. That was the only way to make our plan come true. To open a real joke shop — or any shop for that matter — you have to be rolling in the Galleons. Which we were not.

Hopefully, it wouldn't stay that way for much longer.

George read over my shoulder as I made my way through Mum's letter. It didn't begin with a reprimand, so that was a rather good start.

I still wish you both had gotten more O.W.L.s, she had written halfway through the letter. You know you would both succeed if you applied yourself to more than just your magic toffees.

I felt George roll his eyes at the same point I did.

Dad has been coming home later and later, Mum continued. Percy as well, of course.

Another eye roll and a joint sigh as Percy's name inevitably popped up.

Lately, he's been coming home and not talking to either of us, especially not Dad. Neither of them will tell me what's going on. Percy never listens to anyone when he gets like this, but perhaps one of you can talk some sense into him.

"Fat chance," George snorted.

Anyway, could you please ask Ginny to owl her old robes so I can take them in to Madam Malkins'? And if either of you have any old robes, please send them to me. I need to have them sold by next week. Dad isn't going to take a promotion if it hit him over the head with a broom, and Percy's been reclusive all month.

Do well on your schoolwork, please. Don't give me another reason to tell you off again. Love to you both.

Mum

X

George sat back in his seat, absent-mindedly stroking his fingers through his flaming-red hair, identical to my own. "Tell Ginny to give Mum her old robes? What's all that about?"

I narrowed my eyes at the letter, re-reading the lines. "Money's probably tighter at home if she's asking us to do that."

George and I exchanged a tight-lipped glance. When I alluded to the fact that we weren't rolling in the Galleons, it was just an indirect way of saying we were stone broke.

Mum and Dad always made sure we had enough for food and schoolbooks and robes, even if they were hand-me-downs, but all of us knew they struggled even to do just that. I remember Ron telling me about his first meeting with Harry, at him goggling at Harry's pocket full of Galleons. He had hardly seen that much money in his life.

Still, asking our younger sister to send her old robes by owl post was something she'd never resorted to before, and it made something in my stomach clench.

See, that was the thing about the joke shop. I never wanted to follow Percy the Prat's footsteps in anything. Charlie had fun with dragons, and Bill was a proper tomb raider, but the joke shop was something that was mine and George's alone. Our idea, our creations; everything we had done was to let our imagination and creativity run wild. But there was another side of it, another side that Mum's letter and my family's financial situation painfully reminded me of.

The gold wasn't just for me. It was for them.

And like it or not, if I wanted to lighten the load on my mum and dad, if I wanted to stop seeing the worry lines on my mum's face when she saw all of us off to school; if I wanted to stop my dad from working his fingers to the bone just to put food on the table, I had to work harder and faster than ever.

And with that, I get an idea.

I turned to George, who looked at me expectantly. "Are we really going to ask Ginny to send Mum her mangy old robes?"

I shook my head adamantly, stuffing the letter into my robe pocket as I stood up, looking directly ahead, to the front of the Great Hall, where a strange, almost eerie object rested. George got up, too, twisting to look at the giant goblet dominating the room, metal handles twisting like serpents cradling the main body, into which indiscernible inscriptions and symbols were carved which vaguely reminded one of dark magic. A strange aura oozed out of it, making it hard to look away, but despite its sinister presence, nothing but determination surged through me as I stared at it, my hands tightening their grip around the letter they held.

"I think it's time we talked about how we're going to enter the Triwizard Tournament."

hi again! just popping in to mention that fred's pov is going to be less frequent that arianna's in this first part of the story, but not to worry - we'll see plenty more of him later on!

hope you're enjoying it so far! drop a comment & let me know what you think! <3