Prompt Post #1

[fantasticbeasts_kinkmeme]

 ROUND 1

FUCK IT WE'LL FIGURE OUT SPECIFICS LATER

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FILL [13/?]: Newt/other, eventual Gramander; arranged marriage, abuse, h/c, learning to trust

[(Anonymous)]

Newt stands in an arctic enclosure, kept well away from the other creatures. It’s the farthest he’s dared to push the Undetectable Extension Charm in his suitcase. He doesn’t want to be standing here- normally he tries not to think about this enclosure. The charm’s magic trembles at the edges here. Newt isn’t entirely sure if it’s because the charm has been pushed too far or…

His breath curls around his cheeks as he watches the Obscurus.

It’s agitated. (Or Newt has assigned agitation to it. He’s not sure if it still has emotions.) It thrashes in its magic preservative, swirling and collapsing in on itself. Newt almost feels like its reaching for something. He just can’t say what.

Newt leaves the enclosure, chewing on his lip, and moves on to feed the Mooncalves.

+

Helene isn’t quite sure where she is Apparated to- for security, according to Seuss. MACUSA and its various adjunct buildings were located on Manhattan, but the Americans didn’t want to risk foreign witches and wizards (with differing opinions about how much they care about and how strictly they adhere to the Statutes of Secrecy) alerting Muggles to magic by accident.

The witch who Apparates Helene to the lobby of the delegate accommodations Disapparates with barely a pause. Secretary Seuss arrives a moment later and checks that they’ve all made it in one piece. He doesn’t speak much, which is somewhat at odds with Helene’s expectations of America and Americans, but of course, they are here for what is, apparently, a near state of emergency. She is the last to be shown to her rooms, which are at the far end of the hallway on the floor reserved for the American delegation.

Seuss gives a tiny bow as he opens the door for her. “Your quarters for your stay. The service button to summon your delegation’s serving-witch is just here,” he says, gesturing to the wall to her right.

“Thank you,” Helene murmurs, stepping through. She still finds it incredibly odd that each delegation is assigned a witch or wizard because Americans don’t do house elves. They dislike creatures just that much.

Seuss touches his hat brim respectfully. “I’ll take my leave.”

“Thank you again,” she says and closes the door behind Seuss's retreating form.

Her rooms look almost exactly like what she’d seen while peeking through the open doors of the other assigned rooms. They’re surprisingly comfortable, if nowhere as ostentatious as she expected them to be. The way her fellow witches and wizards talk about America, and Americans, she’d expected quite a bit more gilt and entirely too much plaster detailing on the walls and furniture. Instead, the rooms provided to her are almost bare and it doesn’t take long to explore them.

She starts in the small entrance foyer which turns into a parlour in about three steps. The parlour is appointed with layered rugs, an overstuffed chair, a low table, and a mahogany desk and chair under a window. A silver tea set and a silver coffee pot gleam in the light from the single window. Several paintings of landscapes adorn the walls. The walls aren’t even papered- they’re painted a pink so soft it’s almost white.

There’s nothing resembling a kitchen, but there is a small kettle on a trivet for boiling water and a little cupboard with the coffee and tea canisters. The door to the right leads to a washroom with a bathtub and a water closet, and the bedroom is off to the left.

She moves into the bedroom. The window there faces the same direction as the one in the parlour, down onto the streets of New York below. A large oriental rug that runs under the wardrobe and the massive four-poster bed. Helene hasn’t ever seen a bed so big in her life. She sits gingerly on the hugely fluffy mattress and takes off her gloves, leaving them on the bedside table, and runs her hands across the soft, luxurious green silk bedspread. After a moment she sinks down into it, sighing happily and remains splayed there while she spells her effects into the wardrobe.

That done, Helene considers the massive skyscraper outside her window from her upside down perspective and wonders where she is in relation to the island of Manhattan and the wizarding community therein. The building utilizes electricity, despite American wizards shunning muggle inventions as much as possible. Perhaps they make an exception for international visitors?

Helene finally, somewhat reluctantly, sits up, leaving the bedroom and spelling the water in her kettle to boil. She levitates the tea leaves into the teapot and pours the boiling water over them. While the tea brews, she casts Muffliato on the room, just in case, and undoes the security seal on her coat pocket and removes Mr. Scamander’s letters. Even though he put them in her hand himself, she checks for security spells. There are none.

She opens the envelope Mr Scamander allowed to be seen and scans the text. Her eyebrows creep slowly up her forehead.

“Secretary Juanita Harmal, please let me introd- Isn’t she in the president’s cabinet?” she mutters to herself, flipping to the next page, “Mr. Schniderman, please let me introduce…” to the next page, “Downtown Manhattan to Central Park… Brooklyn?”

Helene sighs and spells her teacup to her hand. She sips and casts a spell to reveal hidden text. Nothing. She levitates the letters to the desk, frowning a little. Mr. Scamander had apparently not been joking when he said he’d written her letters of introduction and a sightseeing tip sheet on New York. She contemplates the envelope Mr. Scamander had made sure to hide against her palm. There’s nothing written on this one, but it is sealed with wax that will not peel but melts away only she presses her thumb to it. She spreads them out and uses her wand to iron out the folds.

Ms. Carteret,

I must extend to you my apologies first. I fear I may be involving you in affairs that are largely personal. Please believe me when I say I'd like to be taking care of them myself.

I have two quandaries, you see, and both involve America and my brother.

Helene almost incinerates the letter in frustration. She'd been so sure Mr. Scamander had a real purpose for her to serve here- a purpose that wasn’t playing minder to some runaway, scandal-mongering social oddity. She satisfies herself with sipping her tea angrily. The hot tea on her tongue refocuses her.

First: My brother is likely on his way to the Americas. He was commissioned to write a textbook, and for the past year he has been abroad doing his research for it. At last contact, Newton was in Egypt, but that was months ago and I can’t be sure he won’t turn up in North America next. He does know something of American magical law, but he also has, at the very least, a nundu in his company.

“A what?!” Helene yelps. Everybody knows that a nundu is one of the most deadly- !

Yes, I know the look on your face.

Helen schools her face, which has locked up in a mild disgust, to neutrality. A beat later she feels guilt well up uncomfortably in her chest.

I’m sure you’ve heard the gossip. I know my brother has acquired a reputation, however undeserved it truly is, since his expulsion. Most take care not to talk about him directly in front of me now, but I am well aware of their supposedly private opinions. We are not such an old family that society doesn’t see it as their responsibility to make sure I don’t seek airs and graces above myself. It is not for me to write out the details, so I will tell you only that his marriages were ended by inappropriate actions against his person.

Abuse. Helene can read that code well enough. Her face pinches in horror and sympathy. Abuse that caused a divorce with no trial, if she remembers rightly. It certainly explains why Newton would prefer to work in the most understaffed department in the Ministry, regardless of his strange ideas about creatures.

More importantly, you should know that Newton is currently engaged to be married to Percival Graves of the American Department of Magical Law Enforcement in a year’s time.

Helene chokes on her tea. She valiantly keeps from spitting it all over the parchment. Mr. Scamander has never spoken of this marriage to anyone- gossip circulating the Ministry for months has been variations on the theme that Newton intends to remain a spinster after two failed attempts at marriage. Helene has tried to ignore it, in deference to her boss, but it’s persisted at every tea counter and snack trolley. Mr. Graves certainly hadn’t made an announcement in the American papers that Mr. Scamander insists on subscribing to.

Based on his reputation, Helene can’t imagine someone like Mr. Graves agreeing to marry someone like Mr. Scamander’s brother. It must be a testament to his and Mr. Scamander’s relationship that they even reached an agreement.

Second, as you already know, I believe Percival Graves has been compromised. Percival is my friend as much as my counterpart in magical security- we’ve traded information and tips for years. He has always been vigilant and careful, but if he has been captured, or put under the Imperius curse, or worse, we must consider the whole of the American DMLE compromised. Without being there myself, I can’t confirm my suspicions either way, but Percival has done nothing recently to allay them.

I’ve tried to reach Newton in order to warn him, but as of writing this, I don’t know if he’s received my letter. Worse, I don’t know what he’ll do if he does receive it. We did not part under the best terms.

Helene wonders idly if the engagement to Mr. Graves had caused the row.

You must watch Percival carefully, Ms. Carteret. Make every excuse you can to be professionally in his company- attend all the meetings I would and let nobody stop you. Tell me who he speaks to, and if his requests seem unusual to his staff or if they are taking his word as law. Find out if he has anything to do with these reports of a magical creature attacking New York.

I don't know anybody else in MACUSA nearly as well or whom I would have trusted the way I did Percival, but I have referenced you to Secretary Harmal of the President’s cabinet. We worked together briefly, long ago. If you can reach her, she may be our best chance of inside help. I trust she is too high profile to have been targeted the way Percival was but be wary.

And if Newton does reach New York, please try to get him through the city and far, far away. I don’t want MACUSA getting their hands on him and I don’t want him meeting Percival while so much is so uncertain.

Burn this as soon as you can, hm?

Yours sincerely,
Theseus Scamander

Helene stands and places the letter into the coffee pot, pointing her wand down into it. She whispers a brief, fierce “Incendio”.

The parchment catches fire. Helene watches it burn to ash and waits for the flames to sputter out. Just to be certain, she banishes the ash into the water closet and flushes it away.