FRED MERLIN WEASLEY II ;
twenty-three, he/him
halfblood, order member
potioneer
– keith powers
Only George Weasley would brave naming his child after Merlin. When he told his brothers and sister, they all laughed themselves so hard that it made George grin even wider. Ginny asked if he lost a bet with Angelina, and he sat on her. When he told his parents, Molly had let out an ‘Oh, George”. His father beamed at him. When he told Angelina, she had essentially thought he was kidding. Fred was a name never even up for discussion; they’d both known that their first son would be named Fred, without really talking about. But Angelina only agreed to Merlin after hearing George go on about how it would be the greatest middle name ever. Fred’s used to people’s eyes widening when they find out, and he laughs along, making stories of the ones he was named after. Creating happy endings for people are his speciality.
Fred’s utterly devoted to the people he loves; to his parents, to his little sister Roxanne, to his overgrowing family, to his friends. To his cousin Molly, who is probably his favourite person on the planet. He’d sell his soul away to keep anyone from harm, to make sure these people were happy, and wouldn’t even think twice about it. It’s just who he is. Scorners look on and say, “He’ll be the first to break.” And their logic isn’t wrong, is it? A boy who has too big of a heart? A boy willing to lay his life down for anyone? A boy that could be straddling the lines of Death but refuse to kill? First to break, first to break, but innocence makes him stronger.
His huge family was his foundation in life, and Hogwarts was another building block. Fred works well with people, surrounding himself with them. With the Weasleys, there was hardly a shortage of that. And people generally like Fred, it’s hard not to. Easy-going attitude, mesmerising tendency to always just help. It wasn’t a particularly hard obstacle to overcome, finding friends. Put him in front of the Giant Squid, and he probably found a way to make it laugh. Magic-wise, he could hold his own. Despite Grandma Weasley’s constant tutting over his father’s lack of OWLs, George Weasley was a clever man. Passing down the genes, Fred was reasonably all right. Not the top of the class, surely, but didn’t find himself struggling with any particular subject. His true passion lies in Potions, effortlessly able to maintain a top spot in his class. But it wasn’t just the grades he was interested in for the subject; no, he found a certain joy in experimenting with it. There was something fascination about the way things like this worked, in the way the formulas were meant to be precise.
Being a Potioneer meant he set his own hours. Unlike most other Order members who were restricted by their jobs, Fred’s able to take on as many missions for the Order that he so much as wished. Sure, working with Potions is his dream job. Sure, he would prefer to spend as much time as he could with it. But this war is much more important. Protecting and helping people is much more important. He’s not going to begrudge anything that. He doesn’t need a reason to be angry.
