For Percy, that's what that winter is -- moonlight and snow and the terror of the basilisk night after night, the feel of Tom's cock inside him and Tom's fingers in his mouth and Tom's laughter in his ears. When Penny told him she wasn't interested anymore, when his marks started to slip a bit, and when Professor Vector told him she was disappointed in his work and when Puddlemere showed up to watch Oliver's game and Oliver wasn't even anywhere close to being a seventh year. . That winter may have had snow and Christmas and family visits, but the only thing that Percy remembers is Tom, Tom, Tom, and the feel of Tom's ghostly fingers holding him together.

Tom even followed him home, and Percy had been so nervous when he watched Tom climb onto the Hogwarts train. "Ghosts aren't supposed to wander very far from their point of origin," Percy said as he settled into the compartment. Tom had been standing by the window then -- it was strange, sometimes, remember how not-alive he was. When the train lurched into motion, Tom hadn't lurched with it, though he certainly moved at the same speed as the train. Didn't end up knee-deep in the upholstery like Percy was half expecting, and Tom smiled, then, and patted the cock feathers he had in his pocket.

"Don't worry, Percy," Tom had said as Hogwarts blurred into brown hills and white snow. "I'll be fine. This might be an profitable vacation -- I've always wanted to meet your family." He brought his fingers, then, to the glass and let his fingertips meld with the glass.

Tom is the first person that Percy's ever taken home to meet his parents.

Not Penny, not any of his classmates who live too far away to go home easily, not Ollie -- Tom, who came out of the bookshelves in the middle of the night, Tom who carries cock feathers when his hair is as black as a raven's and has the habit of melting into books and chairs if he's not careful. Especially books.

Tom with black hair, Tom who is just on the other, tantalizing side of real. He can pick things up and manipulate them, and Percy will never forget the night in the library when Tom made Percy get down on his knees. The library had been dark and still, and Percy had leaned over the edge of the table and put his wand in Tom's hand.

Percy had licked and sucked while Tom gasped and shivered as if it really were his cock that Percy were holding in his mouth and sliding under his tongue -- the wand had been cool and hard and nine and a half inches, and Tom had eventually angled the wand so far down Percy's throat that Percy was terrified that he would be ill all over himself.

"Hold still," Tom had said, touching Percy's cheek. "Keep your mouth open. I've taken larger."

Percy isn't used to going to bed at ten like the rest of his family does -- prefects keep late hours, not only because they've got rounds but because they've got to keep their grades up, which is how he met Tom, and his insomnia's only gotten worse since then. One o'clock finds Percy standing in the upstairs hallway of the Burrow with Tom leaning against his shoulders, a vaguely cool mist through his pyjamas.

The house is so full of people that the walls almost sigh and move with sleeping breaths, and Percy shows Tom about the rooms. "Mum and Dad's room," he says. "Bill and Charlie slept in the attic, and the twins are down there." A creak distracts Percy, makes him look over his shoulder, and Tom slips into the only room with door ajar.

"Hullo," Tom says, bending down low, speaking softly. "I don't think I've met you before."

"My only sister," Percy says, softly, following Tom into the room. He barely moving his lips in order for Tom to hear him -- he's found that Tom can hear him when he does that, and when Tom replies, he moves his mouth, but even though there are other people in the room, Percy is the only one who hears, and it's like a whisper in his ear, as if Tom is kissing him on the jaw. "She'll be a first-year at Hogwarts this fall."

"She's a pretty girl. Rather unusual too -- I like her. What's her name?" Tom asks, standing by the head of the bed.

Percy shifts a little, crosses his arms. "Ginny," he says, clearly and loudly enough that she shifts in her sleep. She rolls to her side and draws one knee up almost to her chest.

"Ginny," Tom repeat and touches his fingers to that soft cheek.

"Short for Virginia."

Tom looks up then, eyes somehow blue in silver moonlight. "Tell me, Percy," he says. "Do you have your wand on you?"