The rest of February had been as cold as ever, but most of the snow was gone and instead replaced with periods of freezing rain around the house. The skies were as grey as ever and Milena was still stuck at the house, watching as the weather continued to downpour.
She still hadn't given up on the potions yet, working on them to keep herself distracted. She had even now moved Muriel's little radio into the kitchen and would always try to catch Potterwatch as she worked and though sometimes she did miss it because she couldn't find the correct channel, she did manage to find it occasionally. Each time she would listen in, she would pay close attention to everything, hoping that the list of people found dead was minimal - it never was.
She hadn't heard a name she recognized in a while, but everyday it seemed like more and more muggles and muggle borns were turning up dead with the dark mark looming over their homes. Sometimes it was hard to listen to Potterwatch.
"Oh would you turn that off?" Muriel groaned as she shuffled into the kitchen. "That stuff is no good to be listening to."
Milena frowned at Muriel as she turned her back and began restlessly tidying the kitchen. She rolled her eyes and turned back to the radio, they were wrapping up anyways so she waited just long enough to hear the password for next week's show and shut it off.
"How much longer will you be with all of this?" Muriel asked, gesturing to Milena's experimental potions and supplies everywhere. "I need to get things ready for dinner soon."
"I'm pretty much done." Milena said flatly. "Let me just bottle this and I'll clean up."
"Don't take too long, Godric knows I already let you use my kitchen too much." Muriel demanded as she began pushing some things aside.
Milena gave the potion she was working on one more stir clockwise and waited a moment. All she needed was for the potion to turn a dark purple, almost like a cauldron full of grape juice. The potion was a deep shade of blue, something like a midnight sky, then as she finished the last stir, it faded into a dark purple.
"Yes!" She cheered, startling Muriel. "Oh... sorry."
Muriel just tutted at her and continued to tidy up the counters. Milena grabbed her vials and bottled up as much of the potion as she could, then vanished the remnants left at the bottom of the cauldron. She took a minute to label each of the bottles as "Potion Test #14 - Skele-Gro Improved" then stored them away and cleaned up the rest of her supplies.
Muriel finally shooed her out of the kitchen as she finished and Milena left in a hurry, trying to avoid being given anymore chores. She left for her room with her vials and wrote down the last of her notes on them in her notebook she would have normally left in the kitchen. The only issue she had now was testing it. She wasn't exactly partial to the idea of vanishing her own bones or breaking them to see if her potion worked and she also didn't love the idea of getting someone else to try it for her. So, she stored them away in a drawer and left them for now.
Every other test she had done so far had basically gone flat, turning most of her potions into nothing more than tasteless drinks - if you could even call them drinks. One of them had just turned into an acidic liquid with a weird yellow colour that left burn marks along the inside of the cauldron, she still wasn't entirely sure how she had done that.
By the time dinner was ready that night, everyone had come home from another meeting. Fred and George had helped Lee with Potterwatch again and both seemed less cheery than before each time they did it. Milena supposed that reading that much horrible news all the time would do that.
At dinner, Milena sat across from Fred. Everyone at the table seemed pretty quiet as Muriel went on and on, complaining about whatever she could come up with. She didn't seem to notice that not a single person was paying attention as she babbled on.
Every so often, Fred would adjust himself in his seat, no one seemed to notice this but Milena. She couldn't tell if he was uncomfortable or antsy to leave the table, but then he moved a little to his right and she noticed him wince again. The same winces he made after that day in January.
He shuffled around one more time and winced again, this time looking up a little and catching Milena's eye. He immediately looked back to his almost empty dinner plate and Milena frowned. He wasn't uncomfortable or just wanting to leave the table, he was in pain again.
He took a few more bites from his food, then quickly excused himself from the table, leaving for his bedroom. Milena shoveled the last of her food into her mouth, then excused herself as well, following behind him. When she reached his room, she didn't bother to knock, knowing he'd only tell her to leave him alone.
He was laying on his bed, his hand pressing down on the left side of his torso over his ribcage. He was breathing heavily with his eyes closed and seemed like he was trying to control his breaths. With every breath he let out, he winced a little until he finally opened his eyes from the pain and noticed Milena as she closed the door.
"Freddie, you're in pain again." Milena stated as she walked over to his left side.
"Yeah thanks, worked that one out for myself."
"Oi! Don't get snippy with me!" Milena shot back. "Move your hand, let me see."
Fred reluctantly dropped his hand and Milena lifted his shirt to look at the spot he had been holding. His skin was badly bruised over his left ribs, turning a blackish purple. Milena held back a gasp when she saw it.
"I thought you said Molly had healed you." Milena said.
"She did. It didn't last." Fred let out a groan as Milena moved his shirt up a little more.
"Try your best to stay still, I need to see what's happening. If it's cursed, I need to know."
Milena pulled out her wand and slowly waved it back and forth above the bruised area. The magic began to make the bones beneath his skin glow, showing her the state of them. Where the bruise was it was clear as day what the issue was. Three of his ribs were cracked and while they were holding in place, they hadn't healed.
"You still have three broken ribs." Milena told him.
"I thought mum healed them?" Fred raised an eyebrow.
"She did... well she set them back in place, but something's stopping them from healing... Another curse most likely." She explained.
"Great... So how do we fix this?"
"Wanna try Skele-Gro?"
Fred gave her a disgusted look.
"Not the usual Skele-Gro, my Skele-Gro."
If there was ever a moment she could test her potion, now was the time. Fred and George had used her to test enough potions and products over the years, it only seemed fair that he tried hers. She knew that the worst that would happen is nothing changed and it tasted bad, there wasn't any danger she could think of happening. Of course, if he didn't want to use it, she wouldn't make him, but Fred rarely said no to testing unknown substances and Milena was often the one telling him to stop.
"What do you mean by that?" Fred asked hesitantly.
"As you know, I've been experimenting with potions and I've been working to make an improved version of Skele-Gro." Milena explained eagerly. "It should work faster, be far less painful, and taste much better in theory."
"In theory?" Fred questioned. "Meaning you haven't tested it?"
"Not yet, no... But it did what it was supposed to when I brewed it so I'm fairly confident it worked." Milena stood from where she had been crouched beside Fred. "And if it does what it's supposed to do, it may be able to work past some curses."
"Bloody hell, Mills! Will it actually?" Fred asked, now a little more intrigued.
"That's the hope."
"Fine. I'll try it, but if anything goes wrong, you better be able to reverse it."
Milena nodded eagerly then hurried off to her room where she had stored the vials of the potion and yanked open the drawer they were in. She grabbed one out along with her notebook so she could jot down anything important then as she shut the drawer, she heard a thud come from down the hall and hurried back to Fred's room at once.
Fred had tried to stand himself up in the one minute that Milena was gone and had tried to reach the door. What for? Milena had no idea. He was laying on the floor halfway between his bed and the door, his hand clamped over the broken ribs and his breathing growing choppy and mixed with wheezes. His eyes were closed tightly as he let out a shaky breath. When Milena shut the door again, he opened his eyes and glanced over looking weary.
"Where the hell are you trying to go?" Milena scolded, helping him back up and onto his bed.
"Just... trying... to get... water..." He wheezed. "But I left... my wand downstairs."
She pointed her wand at an empty glass on his nightstand and said "aguamenti" as it filled with crystal clear water and handed it to him.
"Next time, wait for me please." Milena said softly. "Now..."
Milena stood next to his bruised rib cage again and popped the cork off of the vial. Fred began to reach for it before she pulled it away.
"Two things before you drink this." She said, "Number one, you have to drink the entire vial for it to work and number two, if anything happens that's not supposed to, the way of reversing it is not the most pleasant, but it will work."
"How do you reverse it...?" He asked hesitantly, dropping his eyebrows.
"We make you sick." Milena replied.
"Gross."
"Yep."
"Well then, is that all?"
Milena nodded her head and handed the vial to Fred. The dark purple liquid swirled in the vial and had a bit of a shine to it. It was definitely much prettier than usual Skele-Gro. Fred took a second to watch the liquid as it swirled around then raised it to his lips, sighed, and threw the potion back as fast as he could. When the vial was empty he held it out for Milena to take then let his head fall back onto his pillow.
For a solid moment, he didn't move or make a sound. Milena swore she didn't blink once as she intently watched Fred. Her heart was pounding when he suddenly jerked his head and his eyes shot open.
"AH!" He shouted, his face all screwed up and his body tensed. Then, his shoulders dropped and his face relaxed. "Hm."
Milena had been so focused on his face that at first she hadn't noticed his bruise, but when she finally thought to look at it, she realized it was noticeably fading away. She watched it as it continued to fade. The colour looked as though it was receding back as if something inside of him was pulling it away.
His breathing had become steadier too, less wheezing and less pained. He looked far more comfortable than he had before.
"How do you feel?" Milena quietly asked.
Fred took a second to answer.
"Better, much better." He smiled at her. "The first few seconds still hurt, I think that was my bones just setting themselves properly, then there was a bit of a burn which I assume was the potion trying to get rid of the remnants of the curse and then my whole body cooled down and the pain was basically gone."
Milena wrote down every word he said, eagerly scribbling everything down.
"Lay back for me for a second," Milena requested to which Fred gave her a smirk. "I need to check your ribs again, ya git." She laughed.
Fred laid back again and once more, Milena waved her wand over his ribs where the bruise had nearly faded and waited a moment, holding her breath. The bones gave off a glow again and his three broken ribs from before were completely intact with no visible sign of any other damage.
She let out a sigh of relief seeing that there was no damage and no sign of anything being made worse. Then, her excitement hit her as she realized that she had successfully improved the potion.
"So? Am I still in pieces?" Fred asked as he stared up at the ceiling.
Milena waved her wand again and the glow quickly faded away. She pulled her notebook back to her again and scribbled a few more notes down.
"It seems like you are back in one piece!" Milena said with a giddy smile.
"Brilliant! So, it actually worked then?"
"Seems so. I would like to keep you under observation for the night though, just to be sure there's no late coming after effects."
Fred nodded as he sat himself up in his bed again.
"From what I can tell though, I think it may have healed you and even removed what was left of the curse." Milena explained.
"This is bloody brilliant, Love! You know for someone who doesn't always want to be the healer, you do seem to have a knack for it." Fred said. "How did you figure this out anyways?"
"A lot of trial and error and hoping nothing exploded in my face," Milena joked, "but I just took elements from other simple healing potions, figured out what can and can't mix and just mixed things together, narrowing it down until the potion settled how it was supposed to."
"It's bloody brilliant, Mills."
"Yeah, you mentioned that."
"Well, you're bloody brilliant."
For the rest of the night, Milena was checking in on Fred as he rested and slept through the night. She had told George that she had to re-heal his broken ribs and that she'd be in and out through the night, but she'd do her best to not to wake him up and that he should get her if anything happened. He didn't seem all too surprised that Fred's ribs hadn't been healed, but hadn't said anything because of how stubborn his brother could be. Nonetheless, he was grateful for whatever Milena had done to heal him.
She didn't mention the experimental potion to George because she was worried she'd get his hopes up about getting his ear back that had been cursed off. She had no idea if the potion would be able to fix something like that though.
Throughout the night, nothing seemed to change and the bruise that had been on his skin was virtually gone now, just leaving behind some redness from the irritated area. Fred seemed to sleep well through the night and fell asleep without his shirt on which made checking on him much easier for Milena. She kept up her notes as well, writing any changes or observations she noticed each hour and so far it was all positive.
The next morning, when Fred woke up, Milena hadn't so much as even rested her eyes, yet she was ready to check in on him almost immediately.
He had barely sat up in his bed and let out a yawn as he stretched when Milena was back at his side to check on him.
"Sleep well?" Milena asked.
"It could have been better." He sighed.
"What? Why? Are you in pain again? Was there a change?" Milena quickly asked, rushing to see his side again.
"Oh no, I feel great!" He assured her with a grin. "I just didn't have you in here with me."
Milena let out a sigh of relief and rolled her eyes, unable to hide her smile.
"You're an idiot, Weasley."
"Just an idiot in love."
"Oi! Some people are still trying to sleep!" George shouted from the other side of the room, making Fred laugh.