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Persistence is Key
Topic Started: Feb 10 2017, 08:15 PM (64 Views)
Emery Dixon
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Stepping in out of the cold wind, she tugged the knit cap off her head and ran an absent hand over her sandy brown hair. No matter what spells or potions she tried, her hair had always had a mind of its own. Her hazel eyes glanced around the dimly lit room.

It was not exactly the type of shop her classmates would frequent but Emery was a regular customer here. Had been since she was eleven years old.

The Spiny Serpent was a crowded, filthy little shop in Knockturn Alley that specialized in attaining the unattainable. In fact, that was the sole reason the dreadful little place hadn’t shut down years before.

Every surface of the shop was covered with an equal measure of items and dust. It was definitely a sharp contrast to the expensive shops that her mother dragged her on a regular basis. Her mother would have a stroke at the very thought of entering an establishment like The Spiny Serpent. And to find out her youngest daughter (disappointment though she was) was a regular customer? Knockturn Alley would be leveled in the apocalyptic fit of rage that would soon follow that revelation. Athena LeStrange Dixon was not a woman to be trifled with.

Emery was convinced that if her mother ever redirected her attention from shopping and entertaining to an only slightly darker focus, Marcus Reed would have to be wary. The woman was a force to be reckoned with.

The tall, thin man behind the counter was stooped so far over that in profile his silhouette could almost be mistaken for a question mark. He was intently studying a small intricate box on the grimy table in front of him. The metal gleamed a pale blue in the dreary interior of the cramped space. He didn’t so much as glance in her direction as wooden door closed with a grousing whine of the hinges behind her.

“As I’ve informed you on numerous occasions, Miss Dixon, I have no intentions of procuring the,” The man’s eyes never moved from the delicate silver object on the table in front of him. His deep voice was layered with boredom and distaste. Emery didn’t take offence. She was used to his droll attitude and had spent an embarrassing amount of time trying to make the man’s tone change. No matter what she did she couldn’t get a rise of anger or a huff of exasperation. She was beginning to think that he was a robot that was desperately in need of reprogramming. ”item you’ve been looking for.”

“Your reputation is nothing but lies, old man.” Emery decided that all of her other tactics had failed, she was going to attack his perceived reputation at this point. What else did she have to lose? He’d never tell her family for fear that her mother would eviscerate him. “I’ve been asking you to locate one single item for almost six years now and you have nothin…”

“Miss Dixon. I’ve located the item on eight different occasions in the past six years now. And have made a healthy profit from each one.”

“But, why didn’t…”

“However, you’ve neither the means to pay for such an item, nor the restraint from announcing to the world where you acquired it.” The only movement he made to even acknowledge that he was addressing her was the tiniest arch of his overgrown eyebrow.

“But Mr Mordaunt,”

“Also Ive no desire to earn the ire of both Garridan Reynolds and Athena Dixon because you want a dragon egg.” Edgar Mordaunt lifted his gaze to her face for the first time since she’d stepped into the shop. “Shut the door behind you as you leave, girl.”

“Mr Mordaunt, you don’t understand… it’s not just a dragon egg! It’s an Antipodean Opaleye. Only the most beautiful and deadly creature to ever exist!” Emery’s cheeks flushed as she began to explain how impressive and powerful the Antipodean Opaleye was. In detail (the possibility of pie charts and other graphs being pulled out in the near future was very real.)

There were very few things in this world that Emery felt passionately about, and dragons were all of them.

Dragons and Micah, she supposed. She did love that nerd too. They had practically known each other since before birth and he listened to her rant on more than one occasion about the powerful magical beasts.

The shopkeep let his gaze fall back to the silver box in front of him, showing no sign that he even heard a word she spoke. It appeared as though he’d adopted the ‘ignore the nutjob until she tires herself out and then finally leaves my damn shop’ approach.



Edited by Emery Dixon, Feb 10 2017, 08:18 PM.
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Micah Hayes
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Listening to mum was basically the same as listening to the Menacing Mermaids on repeat for more than the thirty seconds it took for the folk-opera vocals to really grate on your nerves. It’s why Micah was rushing through the warm, firelit den toward the floo; get out while you can, as they say. But, mum was chasing him with a list - not just any list, a list of things he’d need to buy in order to attend the Marcus Reed Victory Ball. Honestly, he wanted to go in his regular dress robes. Mum was having none of it.

You need Sally’s Sculpting Tonic for that mop atop your head and Mafalda’s Mad Rags for Men will look far more dashing than those tattered pieces of string you call dress robes and don’t you bloody look at me like that you ungrateful cur; you will use Saxon’s Shaving Salve on that hideous furry mess upon your face.

As she chased him from his bedroom, to the living room, through the kitchen, and into the den, she shouted various products at him and waived the list in the air above her head. You’d think her shorter legs and thicker body would slow her down at least a bloody smidgen, but no. His mum was scorned, and Hell hath no fury like it.

In fact, the only reason he was able to shake her from heading into Diagon Alley without him was because Emery would be with him, and for some unfathomable reason, his mum trusted her judgment more than his. Really, the girl who once dressed him in silver robes his mum trusted. Implicitly.

“Don’t you dare floo out of here without this bit of parchment, Micah Horatius Haye. I will curse your face from the tapestry, so help me Merlin.”

“Bloody hell, mum.” Micah spun on his heel and came chest to face with the pest of a woman, her mousy brown hair scratching at his chin. “Ems will be there, and she’ll bloody look after the details, alright? Just… chill.”

He knew the mistake as soon as the word left his mouth. The woman had zero chill. And she loathed that word. Curse like a sailor on a deserted isle in the middle of the north Pacific after being mutinied upon - fine. Tell the woman currently gripping her wand in the dangerous, threatening fashion to chill out - beg for mercy.

“What I mean to say is that Ems is already a Mafalda’s picking out matching robes to wear, to honor Reed.” His voice was soft, gentle, as if coaxing an angry panther into a cage. “I’ll take the parchment” He plucked it from her mid-flailing hand. “But I’m sure you have every faith in my girlfriend to make me look like a normal, sophisticated member of society.”

Girlfriend. It was too weird, really. Of course, if he was going to be betrothed to anyone by the force of ancient wizarding traditions, Micah was glad it was to Emery Dixon; best friend and make-his-parents-chill-the-fuck-out aficionado.

Mum seemed to lull into a sense of calm then. Thank Merlin for minor miracles. She backed up, placed her hands on his biceps and squeezed in what was probably supposed to be an emotionally-charged sort of loving way (turned out mum didn’t know her own strength and the blood flow paused at her death grip), and looked up at him with that familiar ‘I don’t know what we’d do without Emery’ look.

He wanted to roll his eyes. But he also wanted to avoid Wizarding War Twelve.

He dipped his head and planted a soft, sweet kiss on the woman’s plump cheek.

“It’ll be fine. Ems’ll have it sorted before the ball tonight,” he promised with sparkling blue eyes. Puppy dog eyes. Innocent eyes. Merlin-don’t-let-her-find-out-Em’s-in-Knockturn-Alley eyes.

The grip on his upper arms loosened and his mum finally gave him a smile. She really was very lovely in the rare instances that she wore a smile.

“Give her my love, darling.” Ugh. She totally would have taken Ems for a daughter instead of having a goof of a boy like Micah for a son. Couldn’t even shop for himself, let alone attend a fancy ball with a wand because ‘Merlin forbid you actually use it and embarrass the family with one of your not-as-funny-as-you-think-it-is pranks in front of Marcus Reed.’

“Yes, mum,” he acquiesced smoothly before turning around to floo away.

Since he knew his overbearing and overprotective mum would check the floo network immediately to ensure he was going to Diagon Alley (hey, he’d only been caught a dozen times out of the hundreds he lied), Micah threw the powder into the grate and called out for Diagon Alley. He’d just apparate to the Spiny Serpent from there.

And when he did, he was going to absolutely murder Ems for dragging him into another one of her dragon-caper escapades. The beautiful best friend of his really didn’t know when it was and wasn’t appropriate to go on a dragon egg hunt - middle of the day, the day of the Victory Ball, while his mum was home and hell-bent on him looking like a bloody gentleman for the evening. Ems should know better. They’d only known each other since their very first breaths or whatever.

But, no. He had to wake up to the sound of her obnoxious, and really ugly, evil-looking owl tapping on his bedroom window at six in the bloody morning, holding a small scroll of parchment that read: I’m going to get the thing from the place.

Of course, the thing was a dragon egg, and the place was in the middle of a dingy store in Knockturn Alley during a fucking war.

As Micah’s thin frame pulled itself from the public floo in Diagon Alley, he sighed and shook his head. Didn’t even bother to dust off the excess powder from himself. He’d looked more hobo before; this was nothing new. Ems would just be pleased he wasn’t in his Wasps jammas, because they’d had that heated conversation about ‘at least trying to look like she was making a difference in his personal appearance’.

Once the sidewalk was free from gaggles of shopping women, Micah took a careful step forward and filled the alley with a resounding crack. The Spiny Serpent was in front of him instantly, in all its hole-in-the-wall-how-is-this-place-still-standing glory.

Through the window, he could see her dark, wavy hair hanging over her shoulders, and her shoulders set in a perfect line. She was agitated. And he didn’t even think twice about the fact that he knew exactly what she was feeling just by looking at the back of her body. It was natural, like breathing or cursing, or wearing Thursday socks on a Monday.

He entered the shop, hoping he could calm her down, but as soon as the door chimed above the door he knew it was a lost cause; she didn’t even turn to see him enter. She didn’t pause at all in her emphatic spiel.

“Mr Mordaunt, you don’t understand… it’s not just a dragon egg! It’s an Antipodean Opaleye. Only the most beautiful and deadly creature to ever exist!”

Oh, for fuck’s sake, no. Not going to happen. He shook his head vehemently, making sure the shopkeeper saw the silent command. When their eyes met, Micah raised a slim finger to his throat and dragged it across in the most threatening, dark-eyed way possible.

He was satisfied with the shopkeeper’s visible gulp.

Ems and dragon eggs were a bad combination. She got attached, and then they were duds, and then she’d cry, and then his mum would blame him, and somehow or another he’d end up cleaning the bloody loo without magic like a fucking house elf.

Hard nope.

She tensed, like she was getting ready to pull out her charts and graphs at any second. Oh, Merlin, no. The shopkeeper would be done for. Just couldn’t argue with a good pareto chart.

“Ems!” Micah approached her swiftly, arms circling around her waist. He pulled her against his torso and dropped his lips to her ear. “Time to stop harassing Mr. Mordaunt.”

She made to pull away, but he wasn’t having it. Instead, he gripped her tighter and lifted his chin to the tall man behind the counter, and smiled genially.

“We’ll take the opal necklace from the display,” Micah informed the man, trying to soothe a struggling Ems in his clutches. “And if you have a matching hair pin, please…”

Mr. Mordaunt peered at him with suspicious, narrowed eyes, and after a full minute of intense eye contact, he turned from the pair to gather their purchases.

Micah spun Ems around then, and held her at a distance. He found himself having to maintain a distance with her lately. Being her fake boyfriend was starting to make him feel… things. It was disturbing.

“You’re too direct, Ems,” he informed her quietly. His arm reached behind her, searching for something on the glass cabinet behind them. “You scared the poor bloke.”

His fingers found the clasp on the sought object, and flicked it upward to unlock it. He watched the back of the shopkeeper carefully as his fist wrapped around the box’s contents. He scooped the oval object up and tucked it quickly into his pocket. Even Ems didn't notice. Stealth win. Micah closed the box quietly and snapped the clasp closed. No one had to be the wiser, until they were safe and away.

"Twenty galleons for the necklace, five for the hairpin," Mordaunt informed him as he stuck out the black box for Micah to take. "And take her out of here with you. I'll have no more about dragons from her. I'll call her mother."

"Whatever you say, sir," Micah agreed. In a hurry to leave, he added to Ems, "Time to go, my love."

He grabbed the goods, threw galleons on the table, and grabbed Ems' hand, and spun on the spot out of the little shop and back into a shady alcove in the alley. As they planted themselves, Micah placed that much needed distance between them again. He smiled at his best friend and handed her the black box with the necklace and hairpin.

"By the way," he began matter-of-factly, fighting a smirk on the corners of his lips. He pulled the piece of parchment from his pocket that his mum entrusted him with and handed it over to Ems. "Mum says you're responsible for my appearance tonight at Reed's ball. I have a list."
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