FIC: Prophecies and Pumpkin Cider [Sybill/Aberforth]

[hp_drizzle]

Title: Prophecies and Pumpkin Cider
Author/Artist: nuclearpolymer
Prompt: #169 by plaidphoenix
Pairing(s): Sybill Trelawney/Aberforth Dumbledore
Word Count: 2300
Rating: G
Warning(s): Alcohol consumption & buttocks injury
Disclaimer: Harry Potter characters are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No profit is being made, and no copyright infringement is intended.
Notes: Thanks to G. for the beta!
Summary: Sybill Trelawney's first job didn’t turn out as well as she'd hoped, but at least she got something out of it.

"Merlin's earlobes! If it's not one dang thing it's another."

Aberforth Dumbledore stomped into the goat shed. Buttercup wrinkled her nose and gave him the side-eye. She could tell this wasn't a good time to beg for an apple.

"I was planning to thin out the pumpkins today, but that hail storm last night squashed the heck out of the vines. I would've rigged up some shelters for my giant pumpkin vines if I'd been expecting hail." Buttercup flicked her ears, dismissing his complaint.

"What we need around here is a good weather witch. That Ministry put the kibosh on anyone diddling with the weather, but that doesn't mean we can't be forecasting weather coming around the bend."

Aberforth was not the only farmer in the greater Godric's Hollow area who'd suffered losses in the last hail storm, and the regional farming council soon agreed to hire a weather witch. An advertisement in The Daily Prophet's Help Wanted section attracted several inquiries, but when the applicants found out that their annual salary would be paid in pumpkin cider, wool, and goat cheese, interest dwindled. The farming council was left with just one candidate.

"Knock knock knock. Anyone home?" Sybill Trelawney swept into Aberforth's pumpkin patch, stumbling over a vine and dropping her straw satchel. Buttercup sidled over to nibble the handles of her bag.

"Who are you, and what do you want?"

"I am Sybill Trelawney, great-great-granddaughter of the great Seer Cassandra Trelawney. I've come to Godric's Hollow to use my Gift of Sight to help the farmers with their weather woes."

"But why are you in MY pumpkin patch?"

"The Rambling Rose Inn was full of visitors for the annual garden tours, but the proprietress suggested that I inquire about renting a room from Aberforth Dumbledore. Do I have the honor of addressing Master Dumbledore himself?"

Aberforth sighed. The proprietor of the Rambling Rose Inn was an incorrigible matchmaker. A bit of extra income from a lodger was welcome, but this witch looked like the type to be fussy about goat hair on the sofa or flies in the kitchen. "Call me Aberforth. You best pick up your luggage before Buttercup gets through with it."

At breakfast the next day, Sybill brewed the tea while Aberforth set out some bread, pickles, and cheese. He looked suspiciously at Sybill and asked, "You're not a haruspex, are you? The farming council isn't going to be able to supply sacrificial rams, and you can't have any of my goats, either."

She drew herself up indignantly. "Certainly not! Though the Sight has been passed down in my family for generations, I am well-versed in the methods of modern predictive arts. Dream interpretation, reading tea leaves, crystal gazing..."

"That all sounds fine," Aberforth said hastily. "The farming council meets Thursdays after dinner. You can give them a weekly weather prediction, and they'll post a notice in the town hall and pass the word around. You can come with me to the meeting tonight, if you'll have your prediction finished in time. Dunno how long it takes; I was never much for Divinations."

Sybill got right to work, swirling the cup with the dregs of her breakfast tea and dumping it upside-down. Aberforth didn't seem to mind the mess.

"Ah, most interesting..." she said. "It's lucky that I checked the signs this morning. I can see the distinct shape of a drum in the tea leaves. A terrible storm is headed this way. Thunder, lightning, torrential rain -- the very heavens will be rent with the sound and fury."

"Will that be tomorrow, or this weekend?" Aberforth asked.

Sybill shook her head. "It will be a cloud of darkest black, arriving tomorrow afternoon and hanging over us for three full days. Only the waning of the moon will cause the celestial percussion to ebb."

"Then the farmers will be wanting to get our livestock into barns before the storm. Thunder and lightning can spook horses pretty bad. Well, forewarned is forearmed, as long as you're right about this," said Aberforth.

Congratulating themselves on their wisdom for employing a weather witch, everyone went home from the farming council meeting to prepare for the epic thunderstorm. For the next four days, the increasingly impatient witches and wizards of Godric's Hollow kept their chickens, sheep, horses, and goats in their barns. By Tuesday morning, the livestock were raising more of a ruckus than the loudest thunderstorm. Each day, the sky had been clear and the air balmy, with no clouds to be seen.

"Forecast or no, Sybill, the goats are going out today. Your Gift of Sight might need glasses," said Aberforth.

"I Saw what I Saw, and that is all I can tell you," she replied.

That afternoon, an intense summer thunderstorm broke over Godric's Hallow. A half dozen hens went missing in the commotion, and a prize yearling jumped his fence. A team of tracking wizards had to chase the horse nearly five miles across the fields.

The townspeople chalked it all up as a typical weather prediction error and went about their business until next Thursday. At the end of the farming council, Sybill delivered her weekly weather report.

"I have had several dreams with doves this week. This recurring motif suggests calm weather for the near future."

"It's about time for the first cutting of hay. Should we go ahead and cut it this weekend? It'll need a few days of good weather to dry properly in the fields before we bale it up."

Sybill gestured broadly. "I really wouldn't know if it's time to cut your hay, but the signs point to clear skies for the week."

Friday was hot. Even with harvesting charms and bewitched hay mowing blades, the farmers were exhausted by the time they finished. At first, the rain felt good as it fell on their faces. But as soon as everyone realized that it was more than a quick shower, tempers flared. It rained steadily for hours, soaking the newly cut hay in the fields.

At dinner, Aberforth watched as owl after owl dropped off Howlers.

"My hay is ruined! Get a new crystal ball or get out of town!"

"You and your stupid dreams! Do you call yourself a weather witch?! Your great-great-grandmother would be ashamed!"

Sybill winced as each Howler exploded. "The public is never satisfied, I suppose."

"Better try something else this week," Aberforth warned. "But not goat entrails. Get out your crystal ball or something."

Determined to get it right, Sybill carefully drew up a schedule of auspicious times for crystal gazing. She made complex charts and diagrams of the positions of the planets, cross-referenced against the images from her crystal ball.

"Aberforth, this is dire news!" she proclaimed. "We can't wait until Thursday. The people of Godric's Hallow must come together to ward off a dreadful disaster."

"Let me guess," he said. "A volcanic eruption? Or another ice age?"

"This is no joking matter. A plague of locusts will emerge, and if the townspeople do not set up a pestilence shielding charm over the east side of Godric's Hallow, the locusts will leave nothing but devastation in their wake."

Aberforth looked at Buttercup, who shook her head. "Sounds a bit far-fetched to me," he said.

"No one wishes to hear the horrors that the fates have in store," she said. "But Godric's Hallow will rue the day they ignored the warning of their Seer."

"All right, all right. I'll call a special meeting of the farming council."

Though many of the council members were skeptical, no one wanted to take the risk of being known as the witch or wizard who had foolishly ignored a prophecy and let the town be ravaged by locusts. Everyone in town was put to work either building a small symbolic fence across the creek at the town's eastern border or practicing the pestilence shielding charm that the group would collectively cast on the fence. At noon, the time of day Sybill had identified as having the proper astral tides for such work, everyone stood shoulder-to-shoulder and cast the charm.

"Repellario Insectum!"

A glittering wave settled onto the symbolic fence. It was strung together from oak branches and undyed sheep's wool yarn, and staked across most of the creek.

"I don't see any locusts," muttered Aberforth.

"If the repelling charm is strong enough, the locust horde will sense it from afar, and will never come near Godric's Hollow," Sybill assured him. "You may not see so much as a single grasshopper come this way."

Suddenly, the sky turned a sickly yellow gray. Several witches lost their hats as a burst of wind came out of nowhere.

"Get under cover! Looks like a tornado!" Aberforth shouted. "My cellar's closest. Come on!"

Several dozen townspeople crowded into Aberforth's cellar. He passed around a tankard. "I've only got the one cup down here, but there's a whole barrel of pumpkin cider. Might as well make it a party."

Sybill stood in the corner with her arms crossed. No one asked her why she hadn't predicted the tornado. No one passed her the cider either. Aberforth noticed but he didn’t say anything.

When the wind died down, the town was glad to find that none of the barns or buildings were damaged. Another half dozen chickens were lost, and the pestilence repelling fence was piled up in a heap in the middle of the creek. No one seemed eager to go fish it out or repair it.

Sybill announced her fourth weekly weather prediction at the farming council meeting --- this weekend would bring a record heat wave. Aberforth resolved to ignore the prophecy, since Sybill was zero for three with her weather predictions so far.

That weekend, Aberforth weeded his pumpkin patch, which had mostly recovered from the spring hail damage. The sun blazed, but he persevered, unwilling to listen to Sybill's entreaties to come inside and save the chore for a cooler day.

"Between you and me, Buttercup, it is getting hot as Hades out here," he said, before keeling over. Buttercup bleated and nudged the man. When he didn't respond, she butted and rolled him right down the banks and into the creek. Aberforth landed with a splash and a shout.

"Merlin's earlobes! Why am I in the creek! Dang, I sat on that danged fence we made for the locusts!" Dripping water, bruised from the rolling, and bleeding from locating the sharp end of a stick with his rear end, Aberforth limped into his house. He ignored Sybill's exclamations over his injuries, glaring and growling as he went up to his room and slammed the door.

Over the next few weeks, Aberforth continued to give Sybill the silent treatment. Meals were awkward, as he read the paper and talked to Buttercup while pointedly ignoring the witch's half-hearted efforts at small talk. She didn't have much to say about the crops or homebrewing, and she wisely avoided mentioning the weather, so there weren't a lot of topics for conversation left.

One night, Aberforth got out a keg of pumpkin cider and cleared his throat. "Here’s the cider part of your salary for the season. This batch came out pretty nicely, so I hope you’ll like it."

Sybill was eager to keep the man talking, now that he’d started. “Everyone in town says you make the best cider. Do you change the recipe each year? If you have time, maybe we could do a little tasting tonight, and you could tell me about how you got all the different flavors into this batch?”

“Dunno if it’ll give you prophetic dreams, but I’ll tell you about my homebrewing tips. No secret recipes here. It’s all about picking the best pumpkins and being patient.”

Tasting soon turned to quaffing, and she matched him drink for drink until they were both four sheets to the wind. Sybill hiccupped. “My mother went to her grave still berating me for failing the family tradition. Not enough Sight. Not pretty enough to make up for it, either.”

“Between worrying about my sister and bragging about my brother, I don’t know that my mother noticed me much at all. I still miss her, though. They’re all gone, except Albus now.”

“And you’ve got Buttercup. And a deft touch with cider. I’m rattling around alone and muddling up this job that I only got because no one else wanted to work for cheese and cider.”

“If they can’t appreciate cheese and cider, we don’t need ’em around here.”

The taciturn wizard and the carefully dignified witch stayed up drinking all night, getting more talkative and less careful as dawn approached.

The farming council had settled into a pattern of calling on Sybill to give her weekly weather report at the end of their meetings. Though no one was taking her advice anymore, they'd already signed a contract to pay her for these reports and saw no reason to let her off doing the work even if her predictions were useless. But when Sybill announced that the town could expect a hail storm because Jupiter's alignment with the moon echoed her recent dreams about juggling jesters, Aberforth could barely contain himself until they were back at his house.

"You call that a weather forecast? My left buttock could do a better job then you. In fact, ever since I sat on that danged pestilence repelling fence, I've got a weather predicting scar on my rear end. You may as well move onto your next position because we won't be needing a weather witch now that I've calibrated my prophetic buttock."

"Perhaps weather forecasting is not my forte," Sybill admitted. "The pressure of producing a prophecy on a schedule is not very compatible with the way the Sight works."

"I've got just the situation for you," Aberforth promised. "I've already written to my brother and recommended you to teach Divination at Hogwarts."

"That sounds perfect! But, do you visit your brother much?"

"Not that often now, but I may be moving to Hogsmeade in the fall. Thought I'd do more ciders and ales. There's a pub there that needs a brewmaster."

"If Godric's Hollow can get along without your, err, prophetic buttock?"

"They'll manage."

She smiled. "Then I'll see you in the fall."