Since the start of the year, Fred and George had been juggling a lot of things which meant their time to start another passion project was limited. Selling and creating their products (complete with dramatic displays) took a little while to plan whilst having actual girlfriends and the Defence classes took a bit out of it too.

Surprisingly, N.E.W.Ts didn't factor in at all.

Still, they were good at fitting in things so they picked up old books and piece of papers as sneakily as they could with the intent of trying them when they found the time. Due to all the distractions, it was a few weeks before they actually found an evening they could dedicate to practising,

He'd spent a nice lunch with Aubrey, discussing how weird Pineapples were but when he'd invited her to join them, she politely refused. What with N.E.W.Ts, an annoying bout of homework and the horrible realisation that her parents may have committed some awful crime, she'd decided to leave the old magic to him. She'd been in somewhat of a bad mood after Umbridge deducted twenty points for looking grumpy in the corridors, especially when her parents completely ignored her last letter, forcing her to write up a very angry follow up. So, when she said she needed the evening, just to work, he left her.

That evening had been quite busy thanks to Quidditch Practice combined with a full hour of product demonstrations. So far they'd found a winning formula that people loved: one of them would take a bite out of one end of the Puking Pastille, vomit spectacularly into a bucket the other one was holding before forcing the antidote half down their throat, stopping the puking much to the crowd's amusement. It was dirty work but was earning them quite a bit so it was hard to complain. Still, it did leave them little time to head to the library that evening.

"Your throat alright?" George asked as Lee handed him the bucket, the vomit thankfully vanished out of it.

Fred nodded, even though his throat was starting to slightly burn a little, "Yeah, not bad ... you'll do it tomorrow though, right?"

"Yeah, 'course," George nodded, putting the box of Puking Pastilles back into their demonstration Skiving Snackbox. Whilst he was proud of the product, the result of two summers of hard work, the thing he was most proud of was the packaging. On the side, was a tiny little Kenny, a little homage to the events of the year before.

"You well enough to go and um ..." George shrugged, "Work on new products tonight?"

"Do you need me to distract Saskia?" Lee asked, from his seat where he sat leisurely watching them.

"Nah, Aubrey's hanging out with her tonight."

"Ah, shame," Lee shrugged, "She makes the worst puns at the best times, it's bloody brilliant. And she tells me I'm a beautiful human if I'm sad, really brings up a guy in his low moments, you get me?"

"I do, Lee, I get you."

The two bid goodbye to their friend, dashing up to the dorm to collect the papers and spells they'd accumulated over the past few weeks all leading up to tonight. Both were excited, dashing out of the dorms with distracted grins on their faces.

"Do you reckon it's easy to swap minds?" George grinned, "It's probably not but imagine that in a product - "

"GEORGE! FRED!" They both turned around to see Lexy emerging from a corridor. She gave a small wave, the two walking back a little way to meet her, "Th-thanks for walking back ... I ran!"

"And we're very proud of you."

"We can tell by your tomato red face."

The twins had very different answers to her statement (Fred's earnt him a scowl).

"Why did you run ... babe?" George asked, a questioning look on his face about the nickname which Lexy confirmed with a nod.

"Thanks for asking, babe," Lexy replied, stressing the last part as extra reassurance. It was impossible for Fred not to roll his eyes, something Lexy noticed and pounded upon, "Oh my God, Fred, Aubrey says hon every other sentence and I've heard you accidentally use it once or twice too - you do not get to take the moral fucking high ground here."

"Woah, I didn't say anything!"

"Tell that to your eyes then," She glowered, the two engaging in a semi-friendly starting match, cut short by George.

"Why did you run, babe?"

"Well, do you want the long or short story?"

"Medium," Fred teased.

"For that you're getting long, you dick. Just because you're going out with my best friend doesn't give you a free pass, Fred," Lexy chided, clearly a bit pissed off from having to exercise, "Well, Aubrey was stressed and I suggested she take another break off from her mystery and hang out with you. She said she'd be even more stressed if she didn't do work because now she's questioning everything, including future employment with Ollivanders it seems. Then she said you two were busy investigating old magic and obviously I'd rather spend time with you than an angry badger and Saskia who I switch from liking to being terrified of in a matter of minutes. Plus I've wanted to look into this for weeks as I have stuff to add ... does that answer your question?"

After a moment they nodded, "Yep, come join us."

It felt odd going to the Arithmancy classroom without Aubrey, especially when they were forced to use a secret passage to get there and avoid being seen. It felt even odder to be the third wheel for once.

George and Lexy were clearly getting used to being an actual couple due to all the awkward hand holding and taking the piss out of him which seemed to be their favourite past time. Right about now, Fred was starting to wish his Hufflepuff girlfriend wasn't quite so hardworking and stressed at the moment, so he could be equally sassy with her. Perhaps, she'd come join him if he turned up in the Hufflepuff common room, dressed as a sexy book on the history of the Umbridge family. He eventually decided against it mainly because a) old magic experiments sounded fun even if he was a third wheel and b) He didn't want to face the repercussions of his cushion theft nor the humiliation of dressing up.

"Here we are," George said, opening the door for the other two, "Ladies first."

"Fred," Lexy grinned, "Go on."

"You know I was a lady for a bit so ... jokes on you," Fred replied, hoping his comebacks were still on top form despite the awkwardness, "Okay, we were thinking of starting off small, mind swapping and stuff."

Lexy raised an eyebrow, "Oh my god, mind swapping is small to you? Fred, it basically ruined your year, it's pretty massive."

"I dunno," George shrugged, "We met you guys, got to watch the Triwizard Tournament and caught the bad guy."

"I think you're being a bit ahead of yourselves though," Lexy grinned, "Moody ... I mean, Barty was older than us and well ... crazy powerful. Ang told me a little bit about it, he was in Auror training under his Dad's instruction but he was top of the class before um ... shit went down. I say we start smaller, see if we can actually do it at all."

"Like what?" George asked.

"Saskia's conjuring," Lexy replied, looking between them gleefully, clearly wanting them to get something. Although George nodded, it was clearly neither of them got her telepathic communication.

"Are you saying Saskia's using old magic?" George asked at last, "Because she could just be doing it wandlessly - "

"But she's not!" Lexy was clearly excited, a bright gleam in her blue eyes just like when she'd figured out Aubrey was not Aubrey, "Okay, okay, listen, I've done research on this, it's not normal magic and do you want to know why? Oh god, should I make you guess!? No, I'll just tell you ..." She took a deep breath, evidently to calm herself down, "Okay, there's this thing called Gimp's Law, right? There are certain things that can't be conjured by anyone, not even the most skilled witch or Wizard but Aubrey said she reckons the old rules don't really apply anymore, right?"

"Right," Fred confirmed, feeling a little bit of give and take was necessary for any revelation.

Lexy continued, "Now most people know Gimp's Law at least on a vague basis. You can't conjure food, clothes and money out of nowhere, it's a well-known fact - there aren't even spells for it so nobody tries it. But let's say the rules don't apply anymore and nobody else knows that they don't, surely someone would be surprised to conjure food or something out of nowhere, right?"

Both Fred and George leant forwards out of curiosity, "Right."

"I only noticed it a few weeks ago but Saskia ... Saskia breaks Gimp's Law all the bloody time," She was practically bouncing out of her seat now, "And the weirdest part is she doesn't even look surprised. This is coming from a girl who gets shocked by red hair and legs ... yet pulls a whole Roast Chicken out of her cloak when Aubrey says she needs a snack without a second though. Chances are she's probably practised... but that's not what we're here for, right? Aubrey's fascinated by her backstory but to be frank, I don't care. I care about MAKING ROAST CHICKENS COME OUT OF MY CLOAKS!"

She seemed to be panting, looking to the wide-eyed twins for some sort of reaction, "Well."

They remained silent before Fred slowly began clapping, George quickly jumping up to give his girlfriend a kiss on the cheek.

"You should be a detective after Hogwarts," Fred suggested, "Call it Sher-lex Holmes... that was a muggle reference ... you heard me right."

"You can solve the case of how you um ... stole my heart," George said to which Fred groaned, "Bloody hell, Fred, grow up. I'm sappy and like puns, this is me."

"Sorry!" He held his hands up, "Aubrey's not here so nobody's keeping me in check."

Lexy giggled as George kissed her cheek, "George, stop, you're embarrassing me in front of your brother."

After George's reaction last time, Fred tried to be a bit more understanding, "No, it's fine ... um, Fred ... I mean, me ... doesn't care ... in fact, you two have a snog or whatever, I'll start trying to conjure roast chickens out of my cloak."

He didn't expect them to actually take him up on his offer but clearly, the thrill of a new relationship was too much for them. With a thankfully unseen eye roll, Fred trudged over to his corner/ self-imposed exile with only his books for company to start trying. It was a little hard to work with George and Lexy in the background but Fred managed ... somehow.

The books turned out to be no help so he began to try from memory, remembering the times Saskia had conjured stuff out of thin air. She made it look so effortless yet when Fred tried to summon a chicken into his palm, all that happened was he went bright red in the face - not a good look. This embarrasing process continued for a good half an hour before George and Lexy came over with dishevelled robes. Fred didn't want to ask what his silencing charm had masked.

"Any luck, Fred?" Lexy asked, "Sorry about that, you know how passions get early on in relationships."

"Not really," Fred admitted, "Aubrey doesn't really do intense passion unless it's for Umbridge and books."

"Not sure that came out right," George said, a dazed grin on his face, "Any luck?"

"No," Fred stropped, slamming his hand into the ground, a move he instantly regretted, "The books are useless, bloody things only tell me what I can't do and not what I can! Saskia makes it look so easy ... " He suddenly trailed off, "Saskia."

"Said that already," George grinned.

"No ... why don't we just ask her?" Fred asked.

Lexy shook her head, "No, Aubs tried to get her to open it and got turned down."

"Yeah but Aubrey isn't the most subtle at times," Fred replied which made Lexy nod in agreement, "Plus, we won't be prying in that way ... we'll be asking her for help and you know how much she loves to help - "

"Aubrey. She loves to help Aubrey," Lexy corrected, "She couldn't give two figs about us I reckon."

"And she is quite good at evading questions..." George added.

"Well, you two are forgetting two things," Fred pointed at himself, "Me - "

"That's one thing."

"George, I am getting to the two things," Fred snapped, feeling slightly outnumbered by the new power relationships had given the other two, "One, I can be incredibly persuasive, just ask Aubrey - "

"I have," Lexy turned to George, both giggling as she turned back to Fred, "You're not."

"Well, that's a lie because the other day at supper, I convinced her to try a piece of my fig tart and she did. Bet you feel pretty silly now, Lexy. Anyway, I get you two are hopped up on thrills but I'm making a point here," Fred pouted, "Anyway, I can be incredibly persuasive - "

"I can vouch for that," George admitted kindly.

" - and two, she wants to help Aubrey and I, Fred Weasley, used to be Aubrey... trust me, guys, this will be a piece of cake."

"Yeah, cake with gravel in."

"Less of the pessimism, please, Lexy!"

• • •

This chapter was a little different (Blame Gexy) but I had a lot of fun writing it and I miss the lighter parts of the first book as Aubrey's storyline gets heavy and leads to a bigger plot that will stay throughout the next few books. Plus I wanted Fred to be doing something as I don't think it's fitting of his character to get too fixated on a mystery - that's Aubs domain. 

Anyway, this should lead to some new dynamics I haven't explored before as much which think so far it's Lexy/Fred/George and Aubrey/Angela (and Fred helps but I can see Angela getting more into, she and Aubrey are more similar). Saskia plays into both and then they should converge more - E x