** Fic: The Fall of a Hero ** for katzpajamas
Title: The Fall of a Hero
Author: liliths_requiem
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Gawain Robards, Percy Weasley, Aberforth Dumbledore, Kendra
Dumbledore, Acantha Crouch
Warnings: Nostalgic and bittersweet
Notes: Katzpajamas, I really hope this is what you were looking for. I kept trying to incorporate Neville, but he just didn’t want to squeeze in.
Percy walked into The Hogs’ Head and took his regular seat at the end of the bar. This
was where he came most nights, after working with George in what used to be Weasleys’
Wizarding Wheezes, but what now still felt like a mausoleum. Three years later, and still no
one had entered Fred’s room to clean the dust off the things he’d left behind. But then, no one
seemed to b able to clean the dust off the twin he’d left behind, so maybe there was no point in
forcing George to surrender that last inch of his brother that he couldn’t seem to part with.
Three years ago, the war had ended, and with it ended everything Percy had ever known.
Dumbledore was dead, his family was broken, and the Ministry was in such terrible shambles not
even Kingsley Shacklebolt looked capable of piecing it back together. Percy was immediately
offered the job he had resigned while dueling Thicknesse, and at the time, it had looked like
a miracle. He accepted immediately, because it was something that gave him purpose and
direction, when everyone else who had fought in the war seemed terrifyingly lost. He hadn’t
known that the Ministry itself was also lost.
“Usual, Percy?” Kendra Dumbledore asked, as she made her way over to him. Kendra was a
witch just hitting her sixties, the great-granddaughter of Aberforth Dumbledore and the first
female hitwizard. She’d retired after going deaf because of a strange Irish artifact a banshee
attacked her with during Voldemort’s first Reign of Terror. Her lip-reading was impeccable,
however, and she grew quite angry if anyone slowed their speech on her behalf. Of all the things
she’d inherited from the Dumbledore side of her family, their temperament was most prominent.
Percy nodded his head and watched as she mixed two shots of Firewhiskey with a shot of
chocolate. A part of him blamed Remus Lupin for his preference in alcoholic beverages. The
man had sworn by chocolate much like others swore by Godric Gryffindor. He could remember
the way Lupin would go over and over the particulars of spells in NEWT Level Defense in order
to make sure each and every student understood each and every movement of their wand. It was
as though he were preparing them for a war he did not know that they would fight. Looking
back, Percy genuinely believed that, had it not been for Lupin, no one who graduated Hogwarts
in the last seven years would know a thing about defensive magic.
“Weasley?” a voice asked, not timid, like most were, but still unsure, as if the speaker didn’t
know if Percy was the man he was looking at. Sometimes, Percy would look in the mirror
and feel the same way, unsure about whether the man staring back at him was really who he
was. “Percy Weasley?”
Percy tilted his head to the side to ascertain who was speaking to him. When he recognized the
long, black ponytail streaked with lines of gray, the hawkish brown eyes, and the scar that traced
from the man’s right cheekbone to just below his lips, Percy quickly stood and shook Gawain
Robards’ hand. “Auror Robards,” he greeted, shaking the frustration and fatigue from his tone by
the time he spoke the second word, “I haven’t seen you since…well…then.” Robards returned
the handshake and dropped Percy’s hand, allowing the Weasley to use hand motions to elaborate
on what “Then” was referring to. Not that either one of them needed the visual explanation, they
both knew Percy was alluding to the time they spent working together beneath a puppet Minister
in a corrupt Ministry.
“I’ve been busy,” Robards answered, sitting down next to Percy without invitation. Percy didn’t
notice the intrusion. That was the way Robards had always been, how Scrimgeour had been.
They were the Heads of the Auror Department, for Merlin’s sake, who wouldn’t want those men
to sit down next to them? “Your brother graduates next week. I trust you’re proud of him?”
“I should be,” Percy acknowledged, taking a sip of the drink Kendra had placed in front of him.
Robards ordered his own “usual,” whatever that happened to be. It was strange that they had
never met each other here before, since they both frequented the bar enough to have “usual”s.
If there was one thing Percy had learned from the last three years of talking to Aberforth and
Kendra Dumbledore at one in the morning, it was things happened when the stars aligned, and
sometimes the stars liked to fuck with us.
Robards took a swig of the scotch Kendra placed in front of him, gasping slightly as the burn hit.
That surprised Percy, who had expected the Head of the Auror Department to be immune to the
burn of alcohol by his fifth year on the job. Weren’t they all supposed to be chronic alcoholics?
He looked at Percy and prompted, “But?”
“I don’t see how anything Ron learned in training can prepare him to chase the Death Eaters
he’s been fighting his entire life.” There was a trace of pride in his words, because Percy
couldn’t help but be proud of his little brother-the little brother who helped Harry Potter defeat
Voldemort. “I think the ceremony is completely ridiculous. He didn’t even go through training,
just on the job lessons about paperwork and procedure that we all know he won’t pay attention to
anyway.”
Robards looked him over, put the scotch down between them and said, “You’re a changed man,
Percy Weasley,” like he was making a divine judgment.
“It’s a changed world, Auror Robards,” Percy replied, staring into the bottom of his glass like it
held all the answers.
Robards paused for a moment, as if remembering, and said, “Oh, where have I heard that before?
I think it was Moody, right after the end of the First War. You were just a kid then, weren’t
you?” He didn’t wait for Percy’s nod before going on.
:::
I was twenty seven at the end of the War, but already I was one of the oldest men on the force.
The ones who graduated with Moody and Rufus-Minister Scrimgeour-died in battles they
thought I was too young to fight. By November, the only members left of an Auror squad that
had once been a hundred and thirty two strong were Moody, Rufus, Amy Bones, Shacklebolt-
who I guess is Minister Shacklebolt, now, but I don’t think I’ll ever stop seeing him as that spit-
fire dueler who graduated three years after me-Dawlish, Savage, Thicknesse, and Williamson-
and me, I s’pose. Six men, two women, eight broken heroes who had never planned to outlive
the War.
It was the day after the Lestrange hearings. The wife-Bellona or Bellatrix or something equally
violent-was sentenced to life and her husband and brother-in-law to fifty years each. I can’t think
of anyone who’s been sentenced to fifty years in Azkaban and made it out with even half their
mind. Azkaban is a dark place, Weasley, don’t let anyone ever dissuade you from that fact. Even
now that Shacklebolt has gotten rid of the Dementors-you stay there long enough, you’re bound
to forget your own name, your own soul, and all those you loved the most. The only defense
anyone there has is innocence, and after the First War, we only locked the guilty away.
Except for Black. I don’t think Moody ever really forgave himself for that. Rufus did, but…by
that time, Rufus could have forgiven himself anything if it served the Ministry. I don’t think he
ever realized just how far through the Looking Glass he’d gone. Maybe in those last hours. From
what we’ve gathered, he fought harder then than he had in the sixteen years that had passed since
the War. I’ve heard Ron talk about Black, in passing. Potter always laughs at Ron’s stories, but
the laughter always sounds half-strangled, like he’s biting back tears. Boy killed Voldemort,
you’d think he’d be able to talk about a dead man without crying. But then, I still get a bit lost
when someone mentions the men and women I fought with ‘til the end. So maybe there’s just
some bonds death can’t break.
Anyway, it was the day after the Lestrange hearings. Merlin that was a bad day. Rufus walked in
looking like someone just blew up Diagon Alley and Moody didn’t even both asking us security
questions-something he’d picked up after Miss Meadowes was killed because of a security
breach. Did you know about Moody and Meadowes? No? I suppose she was a bit before your
time. A right brilliant witch, that one. Moody fell head over heels in love with her the day she
walked into this bar and said, “Listen, Boys, I’ve just earned my badge and I’m looking for some
trouble.” That was back in fifty-nine. She graduated with me, four years after Moody and Amy,
two years after Rufus. Needless to say, she found trouble when she found Moody, and she held
on to him for fifteen years.
She died early in the war, 1974, in June. That was back before Voldemort became He-Who-
Must-Not-Be-Named, and we still half-hoped he would blow himself up and pass into the
anonymity that history brings to those madmen who don’t make it. Dorcas-that’s Meadowes’
given name-was a muggleborn. Perhaps the most powerful muggleborn to exist before Granger
came around. And, of course, Voldemort wanted her dead. So he sent Mulciber into one of the
first Order meetings-polyjuiced to look like Fletcher-and found out where Dorcas was hiding.
She was dead within three days of the meeting. Moody almost killed Fletcher, if I remember
correctly. We tracked Mulciber for months, but Moody was alone when he found his girl’s killer.
No one knows what happened-only that Moody lost his eye, and there was a closed coffin at the
small funeral Mulciber’s family held for him a few days later.
Losing Dorcas Meadowes had been bad for all of us-but finding Alice and Frank Longbottom
tortured out of their minds three days after we thought we’d seen the end of the War was life
altering. Rufus couldn’t sleep for months after that, and Amy would come and sit the midnight
shift, even after she’d worked all morning. She was made Head of the Auror Department after
Crouch got demoted. I don’t think many people know that. She held the spot until she was given
the Head of the MLE position back in 1990. Nine years spent piecing the Aurors back together
after we’d lost more than ninety percent of our department. Full squadrons reduced to names on
memorials and tombstones. I still don’t really know how she managed it. For every recruit she
found, there was a dead hero she knew she would never be able to replace.
But the Longbottoms didn’t even have that. Because, you know, they weren’t dead-just
tortured to insanity by crazed Death Eaters who weren’t ready to admit the War was over. The
Prophet claimed we got there just in time-just in time to catch the Lestranges, just in
time to prevent murder, just in time to save their sweet baby. But I still think we got there too
late-too late to save their sanity, too late to kill the Lestranges and forgo the trials, too late to
protect that baby’s family.
I didn’t attend the trials. Frank was my partner, the junior Auror assigned to me back in ’75, who
worked his way through the ranks to become my equal by the time he was sent to St. Mungo’s
to live out the rest of his pitiable life. I couldn’t be in the same room as the Lestranges without
wanting to strangle all three of them. No, Moody and Rufus thought it best if I stayed behind,
and Amy made up some excuse about needing my help to read over new applications. I took
the out, because it was gift-wrapped and because I wasn’t sure I could sit in that room without
eventually going to jail for murder myself.
Moody came in the next day with his eyes shot red and his robes unkempt, obviously the same
ones he’d worn the night before. His body reeked of smoke and his breath of alcohol, but Amy
didn’t chastise him for either when he looked at her and said, “It’s a changed world, Auror
Bones, and I don’t know where I’m supposed to stand in it.”
Amy didn’t bat an eye lash, didn’t even seem to register the heavy tone of her best friend’s
words. Because that’s what they were, when all’s said and done. Best friends. “On your feet,
Alastor,” she answered, factual and exact, like most of her answers were, “Or, in your case, on a
foot and a peg, standing up tall, and ready to take it all on.”
It was not the answer any of us had been expecting, but it was the best answer any of us were
going to get.
:::
“Kenni, love,” Robards called across the bar, “Fetch us another? I fear I’ve been talking too
much.”
“You, talk too much? Bards, that’s sheer lunacy,” her tone, Percy found, was sarcastic and light,
so unlike the rough barmaid he’d always suspected Kendra Dumbledore of being. She all but
flung the glass down the bar at him, and Gawain stopped it with practiced ease.
“I’ve been coming here forever,” Gawain explained, “Kenni and I went to Hogwarts together.
She was a Ravenclaw, I was a Gryffindor, but when we were made Head Boy and Head Girl,
we became close. She was already with Ace by then, so I knew there was no chance. Besides, at
the time, the only thing that mattered to me was getting into the Aurors. My father died during
Grindelwald’s War, back in ’32, and I wanted to make it my life’s mission to avenge him.”
“Do you think you succeeded?” Percy asked, not quite sure where the question was coming
from.
Robards shrugged, “I think that if I haven’t yet, I never will. Either way, it stopped being about
him a very long time ago.”
“Storm’s getting bad,” the witch near the fireplace remarked, not bothering to turn around. It
was late, near enough to closing that Percy and Robards were the only people left in the pub.
Percy assumed that was why the witch, who he’d always thought was deaf or dumb or both, had
finally vouchsafed a few words to the patrons. “You need a place to stay tonight, Robards?”
“It would be might’ kind of you,” Gawain answered, not bothering to turn around, “Though
I think you ought to ask Ab before offering his fine establishment to vagabonds like me.” He
turned to Percy and added, “Ask if your Pa will give Percy here a room too, or at least a cot
where I usually sleep. Boy shouldn’t be apparating in this weather.”
And Percy wanted to argue that he was not a boy-he was a married man with twins on the way-
but the words fell dead when he remembered who he was speaking to. “Thank you,” he offered
instead. His words were accepted with a nod of Robards’ head.
The woman across the room stood up, her athletic blue robes falling to her feet. “You…You’re
Acantha Crouch!” Percy snapped, before he could trap the words in his mouth. Acantha Crouch
was a legend in the Department of Magical Transportation, where Percy had been reassigned
after the war. She was the one who standardized broom speeds around the world. She was also a
major player in designing the training exercises in flight for both aurors and hitwizards. If it was
possible for one to become famous in the Department of Magical Transportation-which Percy
wasn’t entirely sure it was-Acantha Crouch had done it.
“Yes, I am,” she replied, not at all affected by the accusatory tone with which Percy announced
her name. “And you’re Percival Weasley. My elder cousin spoke quite highly of you that last
time we spoke-”Percy first tried to cover his blush-“I never trust anyone my elder cousin speaks
highly of”-and then his disappointment.
“Now, Ace,” Robards intervened, “Old Barty’s not the worst judge of character. And Percy
isn’t half as tight-arsed as our honorable ex-Head made him out to be. I assure you. Why, just
last week Percy made a joke about broom lengths and men’s reputations, didn’t you, Percy?”
How Robards had learned of that inappropriate bit of sarcasm, made in a high-pressure situation
involving an ex-Death Eater, was beyond Percy, but the younger man simply nodded in
agreement.
“Mhm,” Miss Crouch replied, heading towards the stairs, “Juvenile jokes about men’s genitalia
were never really my thing.”
“True,” Robards allowed, “But you never had any qualms when they included the fairer sex.”
An eye roll and the slam of the back door effectively ended their familiar banter, which Percy
hadn’t been expecting at all. Although he knew that most wizards and witches in the United
Kingdom knew each other, he found it hard to believe that Robards was on such friendly terms
with both Kendra Dumbledore-the first female Hitwizard-and Acantha Crouch-his one idol
within his department.
“Please stop staring at my woman’s arse, young Weasley,” Kendra admonished, pulling Percy’s
focus back to the bar.
“I, er…what?”
“Acantha Crouch and I have been together for forty years, and I would appreciate it if you
did not stare at her retreating form.” She sounded so much like her great-uncle Albus in that
moment, that Percy half wanted to stand up and address her as Headmistress. He choked down
that urge, however, and simply apologized for the transgression. Kendra nodded her head and
poured him another drink. He was about to return to his conversation with Robards when the
back door opened up again, to reveal Miss Crouch and Aberforth Dumbledore.
“The loft in the barn don’t leak,” he said, addressing Robards, “You and Weasley can share
the room. I’m sure one of you can conjure up a cot. Just see that you don’t disturb the goats.”
He made to turn back around, but then looked Robards in the eye and added, “And stop telling
the young’in ghost stories, there’s no reason to scare him with tales of the First War when
he’s already lived through the Second.” Robards had the decency to look chastised, but neither
Aberforth nor Percy actually looked like they’d listen to him. Aberforth nodded anyway and
closed the door behind him.
“Best finish your drink, lad,” Robards suggested, throwing his own liquor back with a
swig, “We’ll have to do a fair bit of magic to make that barn livable.”
Percy finished his drink off quickly and then got to his feet, “Ready when you are, sir.”
“Right then,” Robards replied, standing up, “Did your brothers ever tell you about the time that
Moody almost killed his best mate, and then took over the Ministry?”
“What?” Percy asked, making his way towards the door.
“Oh yeah,” Robards replied, “I’m sure Moody recounted the story a thousand times during those
Order of the Bird meetings Dumbledore always told us about.”
“Order of the Phoenix,” Percy corrected, out of instinct. But Robards was too far gone in his
memory to hear him.
:::
They grew up together, you know, Amy and Moody? Both in the same year at Hogwarts, and
both Hufflepuffs on top of that. Yeah, everyone’s shocked upon finding out that Moody was
in Hufflepuff-but the man valued loyalty above everything, which explains why he reacted
so harshly that day. Anyway, they graduated top of their class, a one-two finish with Amy
squeaking past him only because he botched up a Potions assignment on his NEWT examination.
They were accepted into the Aurors together, and then made partners upon graduation. Between
the two of them, they filled up Azkaban singlehandedly. I don’t think anyone will ever have a
better track record than Amelia Bones-except for maybe Potter, but then, he’s the Chosen One,
isn’t he?
So Amy looked the other way during the War. When Alastor went from vigilant to paranoid, she
pretended his extra measures were necessary. And maybe they were, but that didn’t change the
facts, regardless of how many reports she had to alter in order to make her best friend look less
crazy. Crouch was in charge at the time, anyway, so almost anything was acceptable, as long as
the Death Eaters were caught. Everyone now says his methods were unorthodox, and with only
a handful of us left to defend him, I understand why people buy so easily into the belief that he
turned into the monsters he was chasing but…”
At this point, Robards and Percy had reached the barn and were opening it slowly with the
various unlocking charms both had learned whit at Hogwarts and in their respective jobs.
Regardless of how adamant Aberforth denounced any similarities between himself and his older
brother, their precautionary measures were eerily alike. Robards paused in his wandwork for a
moment and stared at Percy long and heard. It was only after Percy had paused as well and faced
Robards head on that the Auror turned back to his work and continued.
“…Things happen in war that no one can explain, even after the rubble has been rebuilt and the
survivors have almost forgotten the departed’s names. Though we never really do, it seems. It’s
been years since Benjy Fenwick died, but just the other day Savage and I were talking about how
brilliant his forensic potions skills had been. I think people leave a mark on your heart when they
mean something to you, and no matter how many times that heart gets broken, you can never
erase those marks.
Crouch did what he had to do. We needed to get those Death Eaters off the streets and into a
containment cell as quickly as possible-because they weren’t averse to killing who streets of
people without a second thought. So if you consider Crouch’s system of controlling the Auror
department wrong or extreme, I’m not going to sit here and try to dissuade you. Just know that,
had anyone else been in charge, I doubt we would have caught half the dark wizards we had in
Azkaban by the time he was demoted.
But Amy didn’t have the luxury of war, so she couldn’t claim that Moody’s means were justified
by his ends-especially not when there didn’t seem to be an end in sight. So she called Rufus
and me into her office, all pomp and circumstance, and Moody knew what was going on before
she even said a word. We watched him leave through her office window before she so much as
invited us to sit down.
“The Minister wants me to sack Moody,” she confided in us, after we refused tea. “I told him
I couldn’t do that, no matter what he threatened me with. Instead, I’m going to offer him a
teaching position. I need the two of you to support me on this.”
Rufus shook his head, his brown locks already streaked with gray by that point. They fell into his
tired eyes, even though the motion was slight. “Amy, you know he won’t take kindly to that.”
We never used her title unless we were being watched by someone. You can’t go through a
war together and then accept someone who drank and bled and killed with you forcing you into
formality. Moody used to get Amy pissed off her arse whenever they weren’t on duty. Rufus
knew what she looked like when she cried. And I’d stayed up more than a handful of nights with
her, talking about anything but the war until sunrise. I called her Amy ‘til the day she died, and
she never referred to me as anything other than Bard.
She looked tired, then. The type of tired that creeps up on you, stealing your days like galleons
and painting the skin beneath your eyes a deep bluish-gray. Her ghastly appearance didn’t help
offset the dark circles, and she looked like the hags they complain about in Ireland. I could see
Rufus wanted to offer her tea and a night of dreamless sleep, but we both know she wouldn’t
agree to that. Like Moody, she was painfully stubborn about certain things.
“I know he won’t,” she said, half to the desk she was looking down at, “But I don’t see any other
option. He’s going to get them killed out there.”
Rufus looked at me with something like a question in his eyes, though I don’t think Rufus ever
asked me a question his entire life. The man was always so sure of himself. I think many people
hated him for that, which explains why it was so easy for him to get the Minister position. No
one actually votes for someone they like-except maybe Shacklebolt. I don’t think I’ve ever met
anyone who hated Shacklebolt.
I didn’t know the answer to the question in Rufus’ eyes, but I wasn’t about to let him know that.
He needed me, in that moment, and it was such a rare thing for Rufus to need anything from
anyone. “Of course we’ll help you, Amy.” Rufus looked at me for a moment, as though I had
gone as crazy as we all though Moody had. But then he looked back at Amy and nodded his
head.
When she called Moody in, we were in the inner office, waiting for her to call for us. She wanted
it to come from her, she told us, not from the Ministry. She didn’t want to make it seem like
we were ganging up on him. Or betraying him-even though we were, in a sense. He put more
Death Eaters away then the rest of us combined, and he was trained for that purpose. That’s the
problem with men like Moody, the government trains them to kill and then kills them for their
training. We didn’t want to put him down like an old dragon too fierce for the pastures. So we
tried to make him a teacher instead.
I didn’t hear the words that were said. The plea in Amy’s voice or the sadness and anger that
flashed in Moody’s tone. I wasn’t there and I didn’t dive into the memory with Rufus when Amy
offered it to us both. All I heard was a curse thrown at the one person I never thought Moody
would attack, and then Amy putting him in a full body bind more powerful than any she’d used
on the Death Eaters. “If you ever attempt that again, Alastor Moody,” she warned, after opening
the door and revealing us as witnesses, “I’ll have you thrown in Azkaban for treason.”
He didn’t fight after that. She left him there for an hour before taking of the curse, and then he
apologized. I don’t think Moody’s apologized to anyone since then, and I’m positive he never
apologized to anyone before that moment. They didn’t talk about it, after. I still don’t know what
curse he threw at her, only that she looked even more pale when we walked out, and I was half-
afraid she was already dead.
:::
“He wouldn’t have killed her,” Percy argued, “Moody was crazy, but he wouldn’t have done
that.”
Robards shrugged and transfigured another blanket. They were finally settling into bed, although
their attempts to ignore the storm that was shaking the very foundation of their shelter were
in vain. “It was a coup, as far as Amy was concerned. And Rufus always said that if Moody
had been a second faster, Amy would have been dead and Moody would have been Minister. I
disagree. I think if Moody killed Amy, he’d have offed himself right after. He loved her like a
sister, and no matter how angry he was, nothing compared to that.”
“I understand,” Percy replied, not saying the words the hanged in his mouth like cobwebs. He
couldn’t tell this man of his attempts to end his own life after Fred died. He couldn’t tell a near
stranger how hard it was to cope with life after he all but killed his younger brother. How could
anyone possibly understand? Maybe Dumbledore could have, from what Abe has said, but
Dumbledore was inconveniently and irrevocably dead.
Robards looked as though he were going to ask, but then shook his head. “Go to sleep, kid,” he
told the younger man, “Maybe your nightmares won’t keep you up all night.”
:::
The nightmares did keep Percy up for most of the night, but he tried not to show that when he
walked into the pub the following morning, almost a full hour after he heard Robards wake up
and leave the barn. He hadn’t fallen back to sleep, although he would have liked to. Instead, he
laid on the hard ground trying to decide if Robards’ recollections shared last night had changed
anything. The world still turned around its axis much too quickly and the scars of the War still
burned against his flesh much too brightly. But something in the way Robards still felt his ghosts
lingering on the edge of his consciousness comforted Percy in a way the reconstruction of his
family couldn’t. Robards’ nostalgia made George’s need to leave Fred’s room intact, and Mum’s
inability to not set a spot for Fred seem less insane. Maybe all the survivors did this. If they did,
Percy had no idea how Abe or Doge had survived three wars-he was barely surviving one.
“Yer survived,” Aberforth greeted when Percy entered the pub, “Here I was thinkin’ Bards ate
yeh’r somethin’” The way in which Aberforth cut his words always jarred Percy, and at nine in
the morning, he almost wanted to ask the pub owner to repeat the sentence in English. Instead, he
just nodded his head and sat down. His back ached from the hard ground and his head felt heavy
from the lack of sleep.
“I’m making eggs, Weasley,” Kendra said from down the bar, “Do you have any preference on
how they’re cooked?”
Percy shook his head, “Not at all.”
“Not an eggs man, Percy?” Robards asked, “Neither am I, but Kenni here loves them. Always
makes them on Saturday mornings, like they’re bloody manna. Used to drive Crouch crazy,
when she was on patrol with some of the Aurors. He hated eggs.”
“Can we no’talk about ‘im?” Aberforth asked, sitting down at the bar. “Bartemius Crouch has
never been my favorite man.”
“I don’t think he’s ever been anyone’s favorite anything,” Acantha Crouch commented from her
seat in front of the fire. “Especially not my favorite cousin.”
“Moody used to call him Uncle Useless,” Robards divulged, smirking at the nickname, “It’s a bit
rubbish, yeah, but it never failed to make us all laugh.”
“Rufus didn’t like it very much,” Kendra corrected, serving up three plates of eggs. “Remember
how he used to yell at all of us?”
“Rufus was always a stickler for respect,” Robards allowed, pouring some pumpkin juice into his
goblet, “But even his face cracked into a smile when Moody used that nickname. You can’t deny
that, Kenni.”
Kendra shook her head, “I can’t really remember what Rufus looked like when he smiled. All of
your faces are slowly fading away. I remember the color of Amy’s hair, the lines on Josh’s face.
Ace’s breath moans are memorized behind these useless ears. I can almost see Moody’s limp
right after he got the peg leg, and if I try very hard, I remember the way your brow furrowed
when you were thinking. But Rufus-well, the only thing I remember about him was the way his
eyes were always alight with passion when we were in the middle of a fight.”
“My moans don’t look like that, now, Kenni,” Acantha admonished from across the room.
Aberforth gestured to his granddaughter to show she was being spoken to. “Amy’s hair grayed
and the lines on Josh’s face were much deeper by the time he died in ninety-six. Moody never
got rid of that limp though, despite all the spells the Healers put on it. You’d think he’d accept
the peg and walk normally, but it’s like he couldn’t tolerate the prosthetic extension. Like he was
embarrassed by it or something.”
Robards put down his fork, but he didn’t wait to finish chewing before he jumped to Moody’s
defense. “He wasn’t bloody embarrassed of his leg, Ace. He was proud of that wound just like he
was all the others.”
“Then why couldn’t he walk with it?” Acantha asked, turning around to face the bar.
“Because it was a daily reminder of Fabian’s death. You know how much he adored that kid.”
Robards swiveled around to look Acantha in the eye. “His junior partner, murdered right in front
of his eyes, and all Moody could do was lie there helpless and watch dark magic eat away half of
his leg.”
“We’ve all had to watch the people we loved die,” Acantha answered, “We all got used to it.”
“If you’ve gotten used to them being dead, then you never really loved them,” Robards didn’t
break eye contact from Acantha as he said those words, even though Percy could feel how much
they hurt.
Acantha’s face fell into a scowl, “How dare you, Gawain Robards?”
“Because I broke the day they told me Amy died, and I shattered when I found out about
Moody’s death, and Rufus dying damn near killed me. And every night I’m followed by their
ghosts and haunted by the cracks along the fault lines of my memory. So how you can sit there
and tell me that their faces don’t linger in your peripheral vision and their words don’t echo
in your dreams is beyond my understanding.” For the first time since Percy met him, Robards
looked human.
“I,” Acantha began, and then stopped herself. She let the scowl fall away from her face and her
eyes grow large with pain. “Yes, Gawain, I do think you have a point. I can remember each of
them quite clearly, but it would be so nice to forget.”
Robards shook his head, “I don’t think I’ll ever want to forget them, Ace. Hell, I still remember
everything. Especially the last thing each of the said to me. Amy’s was, If I don’t see you
in the morning, Bards, know you were never my favorite, but I think I may have loved you the
greatest. Rufus’ was something painfully simple: We’ll just keep fighting, then. Good
night, Gawain. And Moody’s…well, Moody’s requires a bit of explaining.”
:::
We knew where he was going, if you want the truth. Not specifically-Moody never talked to me
or Rufus about The Order and we never asked him about it. We didn’t want to know. The Order
of the Phoenix was just further proof that the Ministry was failing, and failure was something
Rufus had never been able to accept. But we knew there was something dangerous going on,
because Moody bought us dinner, and while that wasn’t a strange occurrence in and of itself, he
bought Thai take out, which he hated and Rufus and I both loved.
“Busy night, Al?” Rufus asked, opening up the carton after Moody got back from the muggle
place up the road. Security was tight at this point, only a few days before the Ministry fell. We
didn’t leave to go home, we didn’t leave through the front doors, hell-we barely left our offices.
But food was a necessity, and the house elves were told to ration everything, so muggle takeout
really was our only choice.
Moody had shrugged, in that quick way he always did. People thought it was a nervous tick
when we were young, and that it was a sign of age and war as we got older. “Just thought you’d
be hungry,” he replied. After Amy died, Moody took over her role-making sure we were fed and
slept at least two hours a night-trying to get us to shower and play a game of chess if there was
time. He was a paranoid, nasty old prick who took everyone for granted and worked himself to
the bone-but he was a good man. I’ll never let anyone tell me Alastor Moody wasn’t a good man.
We talked about the newest Death Eater recruits as we ate. Voldemort was taking kids at that
time, fifth, even fourth years, who wouldn’t graduate Hogwarts for a while. He was planning
for the future, and that was a scary thing. Men don’t plan for futures unless they’re bloody sure
they’re going to have one. Rufus had files scattered along the desk in front of us, and Moody had
one eye on those scrolls even while he was making eye contact with us.
“You prepared for the coup, Scrimgeour?” Moody had asked, as he was emptying the last carton
of food.
Rufus paused mid bite and looked at his old mentor. Really sized Moody up, you know? Like he
was expecting a bark of the man’s maniacal laughter and a roll of that mad eye. But instead he
was greeted with a steady gaze, the question evident in both eyes.
“What makes you so sure there’ll be a coup, Moody?” Rufus replied. I thought, well. In that
moment I thought maybe they’d duel. There was so much tension between them. Maybe Rufus
thought Moody didn’t think he could hack it as the new Minister. Maybe Moody’s paranoia had
rubbed off and Rufus was starting not to trust anyone. Maybe this was the end of the world, and I
was sitting speechless watching it unfurl.
Whatever it was, Moody ended it with quite the anticlimactic smirk. “He’s strong enough to take
over now,” the words sounded so certain coming out of his mouth, “And he’s never been the
type of man to wait.”
“Neither have you,” Rufus replied, but he relaxed a bit. Moody didn’t know something we
didn’t. He was just being the political mastermind he’d always been. Rufus finished his bite.
I got in the middle of it then, because most of my life was spent getting in the middle of Rufus’
fights. “Where are you going tonight, Al?” I asked, knowing I would not get an answer. Moody
was the most elusive man I’ve ever met, and I’ve spent time with Unspeakables.
He stood up without answering me and grabbed his cloak. “Out,” he said, moving towards
Rufus. “Come here and shake my hand, Rufus,” he commanded. And Rufus did what he had
always done-what all of Moody’s friends would have done-he obeyed. The two man stood in
front of each other, like a general saluting his finest soldier. “Fight, Rufus, even if you’re the
only one left standing. Fight until there’s no blood left to bleed, no curses left to scream, no hope
left in sight. Because you may be our final chance.”
I don’t know if Rufus was crying then, but I was. They’d always laughed at me for being the
most emotional. It was as though we were sending him to his death, and we didn’t even know
what was happening. This was not the first time Moody had said goodbye to us, thinking he was
going to die. How were we supposed to know it was going to be the last?
They shook hands, and then Rufus pulled Moody into a one-armed hug. When he let go, Moody
looked half-annoyed and half-please with himself. Then he turned to me. I got up, slow like,
because I didn’t know if the moment could shatter with too much pressure. Moments like that,
where soldiers bear their hearts to each other, they’re rare.
“I don’t like you Robards,” he said, straight-faced. It was a truth neither one of us had ever tried
to deny. He didn’t like that I could keep my head up even in the worst of times. I didn’t like that
he treated everyone around him like they were beneath him. “But if there’s anyone I’d trust to
stay with Rufus until the end-it’s you. Don’t let him go in alone. Because if he falls-you’ll be the
only one left. And Merlin knows I don’t trust you to save us.”
I thought that was it, so I nodded my head and extended my hand. But then he did something that
still shocks me, still haunts me every day of my life. He looked me square in the eye and he said:
“When we’re all dead, and you’re still breathing, don’t let them forget what we did. You’ll
remember us, Gawain, because you’ll be the only one who can.”
He knew, I think. He knew I’d be the last one standing. He knew that was my burden to bear.
I’d have to watch all my friends die, have to stand back because there was no way to save them.
Suicide missions were a part of our everyday lives. There are no foxholes in the Wizarding
world, and even with all of our magic, there are no second chances.
“Goodnight, Al,” I whispered into his shoulder, as he pulled me in for a hug. I think that’s the
only time in my entire life I hugged that man. He let go, turned around, and walked out the door.
It was goodbye in a way goodbye had never been said, and I had to swallow the lump in my
throat before I turned to Rufus and said, “He’s going to end up dead.”
Rufus just nodded. “He’ll die fighting, Gawain. That’s the most any of us can ask for.”
Three days later, they were both dead. And here I am telling their story.
:::
“You think he knew for sure?” Percy asked, as Robards bit back a tear. No one mentioned the
redness of the man’s eyes or the tear stains on his cheeks. Kenni had tears in her eyes and Ace
was staring straight ahead, not quite in the same room as the rest of them.
Aberforth was the one who answered him. “Alastor Moody always knew wha’ was gointa
happen next,” he said, cleaning a glass with a dirty rag, “And tha’s why he was so good at his
job.”
Robards took a drink of his pumpkin juice and said, “I think he was just like the rest of the
world, making it all up as he went along, and hoping to Merlin it worked out in the end.”
“Well, Harry survived and won the war,” Percy replied, trying to break the maudlin tension that
had descended upon the room.
“Yes,” Robards replied, pushing away from the bar. He walked to the door, grabbed his cloak
and said, “Your war has been one, your future’s been saved, but all I have left is my past, and all
my old friends are dead.”
He left the bar with a wave to Kenni and a smile thrown Ace’s way. It was a sad, sullen smile,
that replaced the tears he was biting back in such a perfect way. Percy watched him leave,
wondering if another war would take place in twenty years, so that the ghosts from this one
haunted him, and he, too, lost everything.
“Not everyone’s story ends like that,” Ace told him, turning away from the wall, “Bards is just
lonely man.”
Percy nodded his head and paid for their meals. He thought of the years he lost with his family,
the brother buried up the hill, and the fact that he’d be going back to a haunted shop, again.
Robards was a man Percy could respect.
Loneliness was something he could understand.
Author: liliths_requiem
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Gawain Robards, Percy Weasley, Aberforth Dumbledore, Kendra
Dumbledore, Acantha Crouch
Warnings: Nostalgic and bittersweet
Notes: Katzpajamas, I really hope this is what you were looking for. I kept trying to incorporate Neville, but he just didn’t want to squeeze in.
Percy walked into The Hogs’ Head and took his regular seat at the end of the bar. This
was where he came most nights, after working with George in what used to be Weasleys’
Wizarding Wheezes, but what now still felt like a mausoleum. Three years later, and still no
one had entered Fred’s room to clean the dust off the things he’d left behind. But then, no one
seemed to b able to clean the dust off the twin he’d left behind, so maybe there was no point in
forcing George to surrender that last inch of his brother that he couldn’t seem to part with.
Three years ago, the war had ended, and with it ended everything Percy had ever known.
Dumbledore was dead, his family was broken, and the Ministry was in such terrible shambles not
even Kingsley Shacklebolt looked capable of piecing it back together. Percy was immediately
offered the job he had resigned while dueling Thicknesse, and at the time, it had looked like
a miracle. He accepted immediately, because it was something that gave him purpose and
direction, when everyone else who had fought in the war seemed terrifyingly lost. He hadn’t
known that the Ministry itself was also lost.
“Usual, Percy?” Kendra Dumbledore asked, as she made her way over to him. Kendra was a
witch just hitting her sixties, the great-granddaughter of Aberforth Dumbledore and the first
female hitwizard. She’d retired after going deaf because of a strange Irish artifact a banshee
attacked her with during Voldemort’s first Reign of Terror. Her lip-reading was impeccable,
however, and she grew quite angry if anyone slowed their speech on her behalf. Of all the things
she’d inherited from the Dumbledore side of her family, their temperament was most prominent.
Percy nodded his head and watched as she mixed two shots of Firewhiskey with a shot of
chocolate. A part of him blamed Remus Lupin for his preference in alcoholic beverages. The
man had sworn by chocolate much like others swore by Godric Gryffindor. He could remember
the way Lupin would go over and over the particulars of spells in NEWT Level Defense in order
to make sure each and every student understood each and every movement of their wand. It was
as though he were preparing them for a war he did not know that they would fight. Looking
back, Percy genuinely believed that, had it not been for Lupin, no one who graduated Hogwarts
in the last seven years would know a thing about defensive magic.
“Weasley?” a voice asked, not timid, like most were, but still unsure, as if the speaker didn’t
know if Percy was the man he was looking at. Sometimes, Percy would look in the mirror
and feel the same way, unsure about whether the man staring back at him was really who he
was. “Percy Weasley?”
Percy tilted his head to the side to ascertain who was speaking to him. When he recognized the
long, black ponytail streaked with lines of gray, the hawkish brown eyes, and the scar that traced
from the man’s right cheekbone to just below his lips, Percy quickly stood and shook Gawain
Robards’ hand. “Auror Robards,” he greeted, shaking the frustration and fatigue from his tone by
the time he spoke the second word, “I haven’t seen you since…well…then.” Robards returned
the handshake and dropped Percy’s hand, allowing the Weasley to use hand motions to elaborate
on what “Then” was referring to. Not that either one of them needed the visual explanation, they
both knew Percy was alluding to the time they spent working together beneath a puppet Minister
in a corrupt Ministry.
“I’ve been busy,” Robards answered, sitting down next to Percy without invitation. Percy didn’t
notice the intrusion. That was the way Robards had always been, how Scrimgeour had been.
They were the Heads of the Auror Department, for Merlin’s sake, who wouldn’t want those men
to sit down next to them? “Your brother graduates next week. I trust you’re proud of him?”
“I should be,” Percy acknowledged, taking a sip of the drink Kendra had placed in front of him.
Robards ordered his own “usual,” whatever that happened to be. It was strange that they had
never met each other here before, since they both frequented the bar enough to have “usual”s.
If there was one thing Percy had learned from the last three years of talking to Aberforth and
Kendra Dumbledore at one in the morning, it was things happened when the stars aligned, and
sometimes the stars liked to fuck with us.
Robards took a swig of the scotch Kendra placed in front of him, gasping slightly as the burn hit.
That surprised Percy, who had expected the Head of the Auror Department to be immune to the
burn of alcohol by his fifth year on the job. Weren’t they all supposed to be chronic alcoholics?
He looked at Percy and prompted, “But?”
“I don’t see how anything Ron learned in training can prepare him to chase the Death Eaters
he’s been fighting his entire life.” There was a trace of pride in his words, because Percy
couldn’t help but be proud of his little brother-the little brother who helped Harry Potter defeat
Voldemort. “I think the ceremony is completely ridiculous. He didn’t even go through training,
just on the job lessons about paperwork and procedure that we all know he won’t pay attention to
anyway.”
Robards looked him over, put the scotch down between them and said, “You’re a changed man,
Percy Weasley,” like he was making a divine judgment.
“It’s a changed world, Auror Robards,” Percy replied, staring into the bottom of his glass like it
held all the answers.
Robards paused for a moment, as if remembering, and said, “Oh, where have I heard that before?
I think it was Moody, right after the end of the First War. You were just a kid then, weren’t
you?” He didn’t wait for Percy’s nod before going on.
:::
I was twenty seven at the end of the War, but already I was one of the oldest men on the force.
The ones who graduated with Moody and Rufus-Minister Scrimgeour-died in battles they
thought I was too young to fight. By November, the only members left of an Auror squad that
had once been a hundred and thirty two strong were Moody, Rufus, Amy Bones, Shacklebolt-
who I guess is Minister Shacklebolt, now, but I don’t think I’ll ever stop seeing him as that spit-
fire dueler who graduated three years after me-Dawlish, Savage, Thicknesse, and Williamson-
and me, I s’pose. Six men, two women, eight broken heroes who had never planned to outlive
the War.
It was the day after the Lestrange hearings. The wife-Bellona or Bellatrix or something equally
violent-was sentenced to life and her husband and brother-in-law to fifty years each. I can’t think
of anyone who’s been sentenced to fifty years in Azkaban and made it out with even half their
mind. Azkaban is a dark place, Weasley, don’t let anyone ever dissuade you from that fact. Even
now that Shacklebolt has gotten rid of the Dementors-you stay there long enough, you’re bound
to forget your own name, your own soul, and all those you loved the most. The only defense
anyone there has is innocence, and after the First War, we only locked the guilty away.
Except for Black. I don’t think Moody ever really forgave himself for that. Rufus did, but…by
that time, Rufus could have forgiven himself anything if it served the Ministry. I don’t think he
ever realized just how far through the Looking Glass he’d gone. Maybe in those last hours. From
what we’ve gathered, he fought harder then than he had in the sixteen years that had passed since
the War. I’ve heard Ron talk about Black, in passing. Potter always laughs at Ron’s stories, but
the laughter always sounds half-strangled, like he’s biting back tears. Boy killed Voldemort,
you’d think he’d be able to talk about a dead man without crying. But then, I still get a bit lost
when someone mentions the men and women I fought with ‘til the end. So maybe there’s just
some bonds death can’t break.
Anyway, it was the day after the Lestrange hearings. Merlin that was a bad day. Rufus walked in
looking like someone just blew up Diagon Alley and Moody didn’t even both asking us security
questions-something he’d picked up after Miss Meadowes was killed because of a security
breach. Did you know about Moody and Meadowes? No? I suppose she was a bit before your
time. A right brilliant witch, that one. Moody fell head over heels in love with her the day she
walked into this bar and said, “Listen, Boys, I’ve just earned my badge and I’m looking for some
trouble.” That was back in fifty-nine. She graduated with me, four years after Moody and Amy,
two years after Rufus. Needless to say, she found trouble when she found Moody, and she held
on to him for fifteen years.
She died early in the war, 1974, in June. That was back before Voldemort became He-Who-
Must-Not-Be-Named, and we still half-hoped he would blow himself up and pass into the
anonymity that history brings to those madmen who don’t make it. Dorcas-that’s Meadowes’
given name-was a muggleborn. Perhaps the most powerful muggleborn to exist before Granger
came around. And, of course, Voldemort wanted her dead. So he sent Mulciber into one of the
first Order meetings-polyjuiced to look like Fletcher-and found out where Dorcas was hiding.
She was dead within three days of the meeting. Moody almost killed Fletcher, if I remember
correctly. We tracked Mulciber for months, but Moody was alone when he found his girl’s killer.
No one knows what happened-only that Moody lost his eye, and there was a closed coffin at the
small funeral Mulciber’s family held for him a few days later.
Losing Dorcas Meadowes had been bad for all of us-but finding Alice and Frank Longbottom
tortured out of their minds three days after we thought we’d seen the end of the War was life
altering. Rufus couldn’t sleep for months after that, and Amy would come and sit the midnight
shift, even after she’d worked all morning. She was made Head of the Auror Department after
Crouch got demoted. I don’t think many people know that. She held the spot until she was given
the Head of the MLE position back in 1990. Nine years spent piecing the Aurors back together
after we’d lost more than ninety percent of our department. Full squadrons reduced to names on
memorials and tombstones. I still don’t really know how she managed it. For every recruit she
found, there was a dead hero she knew she would never be able to replace.
But the Longbottoms didn’t even have that. Because, you know, they weren’t dead-just
tortured to insanity by crazed Death Eaters who weren’t ready to admit the War was over. The
Prophet claimed we got there just in time-just in time to catch the Lestranges, just in
time to prevent murder, just in time to save their sweet baby. But I still think we got there too
late-too late to save their sanity, too late to kill the Lestranges and forgo the trials, too late to
protect that baby’s family.
I didn’t attend the trials. Frank was my partner, the junior Auror assigned to me back in ’75, who
worked his way through the ranks to become my equal by the time he was sent to St. Mungo’s
to live out the rest of his pitiable life. I couldn’t be in the same room as the Lestranges without
wanting to strangle all three of them. No, Moody and Rufus thought it best if I stayed behind,
and Amy made up some excuse about needing my help to read over new applications. I took
the out, because it was gift-wrapped and because I wasn’t sure I could sit in that room without
eventually going to jail for murder myself.
Moody came in the next day with his eyes shot red and his robes unkempt, obviously the same
ones he’d worn the night before. His body reeked of smoke and his breath of alcohol, but Amy
didn’t chastise him for either when he looked at her and said, “It’s a changed world, Auror
Bones, and I don’t know where I’m supposed to stand in it.”
Amy didn’t bat an eye lash, didn’t even seem to register the heavy tone of her best friend’s
words. Because that’s what they were, when all’s said and done. Best friends. “On your feet,
Alastor,” she answered, factual and exact, like most of her answers were, “Or, in your case, on a
foot and a peg, standing up tall, and ready to take it all on.”
It was not the answer any of us had been expecting, but it was the best answer any of us were
going to get.
:::
“Kenni, love,” Robards called across the bar, “Fetch us another? I fear I’ve been talking too
much.”
“You, talk too much? Bards, that’s sheer lunacy,” her tone, Percy found, was sarcastic and light,
so unlike the rough barmaid he’d always suspected Kendra Dumbledore of being. She all but
flung the glass down the bar at him, and Gawain stopped it with practiced ease.
“I’ve been coming here forever,” Gawain explained, “Kenni and I went to Hogwarts together.
She was a Ravenclaw, I was a Gryffindor, but when we were made Head Boy and Head Girl,
we became close. She was already with Ace by then, so I knew there was no chance. Besides, at
the time, the only thing that mattered to me was getting into the Aurors. My father died during
Grindelwald’s War, back in ’32, and I wanted to make it my life’s mission to avenge him.”
“Do you think you succeeded?” Percy asked, not quite sure where the question was coming
from.
Robards shrugged, “I think that if I haven’t yet, I never will. Either way, it stopped being about
him a very long time ago.”
“Storm’s getting bad,” the witch near the fireplace remarked, not bothering to turn around. It
was late, near enough to closing that Percy and Robards were the only people left in the pub.
Percy assumed that was why the witch, who he’d always thought was deaf or dumb or both, had
finally vouchsafed a few words to the patrons. “You need a place to stay tonight, Robards?”
“It would be might’ kind of you,” Gawain answered, not bothering to turn around, “Though
I think you ought to ask Ab before offering his fine establishment to vagabonds like me.” He
turned to Percy and added, “Ask if your Pa will give Percy here a room too, or at least a cot
where I usually sleep. Boy shouldn’t be apparating in this weather.”
And Percy wanted to argue that he was not a boy-he was a married man with twins on the way-
but the words fell dead when he remembered who he was speaking to. “Thank you,” he offered
instead. His words were accepted with a nod of Robards’ head.
The woman across the room stood up, her athletic blue robes falling to her feet. “You…You’re
Acantha Crouch!” Percy snapped, before he could trap the words in his mouth. Acantha Crouch
was a legend in the Department of Magical Transportation, where Percy had been reassigned
after the war. She was the one who standardized broom speeds around the world. She was also a
major player in designing the training exercises in flight for both aurors and hitwizards. If it was
possible for one to become famous in the Department of Magical Transportation-which Percy
wasn’t entirely sure it was-Acantha Crouch had done it.
“Yes, I am,” she replied, not at all affected by the accusatory tone with which Percy announced
her name. “And you’re Percival Weasley. My elder cousin spoke quite highly of you that last
time we spoke-”Percy first tried to cover his blush-“I never trust anyone my elder cousin speaks
highly of”-and then his disappointment.
“Now, Ace,” Robards intervened, “Old Barty’s not the worst judge of character. And Percy
isn’t half as tight-arsed as our honorable ex-Head made him out to be. I assure you. Why, just
last week Percy made a joke about broom lengths and men’s reputations, didn’t you, Percy?”
How Robards had learned of that inappropriate bit of sarcasm, made in a high-pressure situation
involving an ex-Death Eater, was beyond Percy, but the younger man simply nodded in
agreement.
“Mhm,” Miss Crouch replied, heading towards the stairs, “Juvenile jokes about men’s genitalia
were never really my thing.”
“True,” Robards allowed, “But you never had any qualms when they included the fairer sex.”
An eye roll and the slam of the back door effectively ended their familiar banter, which Percy
hadn’t been expecting at all. Although he knew that most wizards and witches in the United
Kingdom knew each other, he found it hard to believe that Robards was on such friendly terms
with both Kendra Dumbledore-the first female Hitwizard-and Acantha Crouch-his one idol
within his department.
“Please stop staring at my woman’s arse, young Weasley,” Kendra admonished, pulling Percy’s
focus back to the bar.
“I, er…what?”
“Acantha Crouch and I have been together for forty years, and I would appreciate it if you
did not stare at her retreating form.” She sounded so much like her great-uncle Albus in that
moment, that Percy half wanted to stand up and address her as Headmistress. He choked down
that urge, however, and simply apologized for the transgression. Kendra nodded her head and
poured him another drink. He was about to return to his conversation with Robards when the
back door opened up again, to reveal Miss Crouch and Aberforth Dumbledore.
“The loft in the barn don’t leak,” he said, addressing Robards, “You and Weasley can share
the room. I’m sure one of you can conjure up a cot. Just see that you don’t disturb the goats.”
He made to turn back around, but then looked Robards in the eye and added, “And stop telling
the young’in ghost stories, there’s no reason to scare him with tales of the First War when
he’s already lived through the Second.” Robards had the decency to look chastised, but neither
Aberforth nor Percy actually looked like they’d listen to him. Aberforth nodded anyway and
closed the door behind him.
“Best finish your drink, lad,” Robards suggested, throwing his own liquor back with a
swig, “We’ll have to do a fair bit of magic to make that barn livable.”
Percy finished his drink off quickly and then got to his feet, “Ready when you are, sir.”
“Right then,” Robards replied, standing up, “Did your brothers ever tell you about the time that
Moody almost killed his best mate, and then took over the Ministry?”
“What?” Percy asked, making his way towards the door.
“Oh yeah,” Robards replied, “I’m sure Moody recounted the story a thousand times during those
Order of the Bird meetings Dumbledore always told us about.”
“Order of the Phoenix,” Percy corrected, out of instinct. But Robards was too far gone in his
memory to hear him.
:::
They grew up together, you know, Amy and Moody? Both in the same year at Hogwarts, and
both Hufflepuffs on top of that. Yeah, everyone’s shocked upon finding out that Moody was
in Hufflepuff-but the man valued loyalty above everything, which explains why he reacted
so harshly that day. Anyway, they graduated top of their class, a one-two finish with Amy
squeaking past him only because he botched up a Potions assignment on his NEWT examination.
They were accepted into the Aurors together, and then made partners upon graduation. Between
the two of them, they filled up Azkaban singlehandedly. I don’t think anyone will ever have a
better track record than Amelia Bones-except for maybe Potter, but then, he’s the Chosen One,
isn’t he?
So Amy looked the other way during the War. When Alastor went from vigilant to paranoid, she
pretended his extra measures were necessary. And maybe they were, but that didn’t change the
facts, regardless of how many reports she had to alter in order to make her best friend look less
crazy. Crouch was in charge at the time, anyway, so almost anything was acceptable, as long as
the Death Eaters were caught. Everyone now says his methods were unorthodox, and with only
a handful of us left to defend him, I understand why people buy so easily into the belief that he
turned into the monsters he was chasing but…”
At this point, Robards and Percy had reached the barn and were opening it slowly with the
various unlocking charms both had learned whit at Hogwarts and in their respective jobs.
Regardless of how adamant Aberforth denounced any similarities between himself and his older
brother, their precautionary measures were eerily alike. Robards paused in his wandwork for a
moment and stared at Percy long and heard. It was only after Percy had paused as well and faced
Robards head on that the Auror turned back to his work and continued.
“…Things happen in war that no one can explain, even after the rubble has been rebuilt and the
survivors have almost forgotten the departed’s names. Though we never really do, it seems. It’s
been years since Benjy Fenwick died, but just the other day Savage and I were talking about how
brilliant his forensic potions skills had been. I think people leave a mark on your heart when they
mean something to you, and no matter how many times that heart gets broken, you can never
erase those marks.
Crouch did what he had to do. We needed to get those Death Eaters off the streets and into a
containment cell as quickly as possible-because they weren’t averse to killing who streets of
people without a second thought. So if you consider Crouch’s system of controlling the Auror
department wrong or extreme, I’m not going to sit here and try to dissuade you. Just know that,
had anyone else been in charge, I doubt we would have caught half the dark wizards we had in
Azkaban by the time he was demoted.
But Amy didn’t have the luxury of war, so she couldn’t claim that Moody’s means were justified
by his ends-especially not when there didn’t seem to be an end in sight. So she called Rufus
and me into her office, all pomp and circumstance, and Moody knew what was going on before
she even said a word. We watched him leave through her office window before she so much as
invited us to sit down.
“The Minister wants me to sack Moody,” she confided in us, after we refused tea. “I told him
I couldn’t do that, no matter what he threatened me with. Instead, I’m going to offer him a
teaching position. I need the two of you to support me on this.”
Rufus shook his head, his brown locks already streaked with gray by that point. They fell into his
tired eyes, even though the motion was slight. “Amy, you know he won’t take kindly to that.”
We never used her title unless we were being watched by someone. You can’t go through a
war together and then accept someone who drank and bled and killed with you forcing you into
formality. Moody used to get Amy pissed off her arse whenever they weren’t on duty. Rufus
knew what she looked like when she cried. And I’d stayed up more than a handful of nights with
her, talking about anything but the war until sunrise. I called her Amy ‘til the day she died, and
she never referred to me as anything other than Bard.
She looked tired, then. The type of tired that creeps up on you, stealing your days like galleons
and painting the skin beneath your eyes a deep bluish-gray. Her ghastly appearance didn’t help
offset the dark circles, and she looked like the hags they complain about in Ireland. I could see
Rufus wanted to offer her tea and a night of dreamless sleep, but we both know she wouldn’t
agree to that. Like Moody, she was painfully stubborn about certain things.
“I know he won’t,” she said, half to the desk she was looking down at, “But I don’t see any other
option. He’s going to get them killed out there.”
Rufus looked at me with something like a question in his eyes, though I don’t think Rufus ever
asked me a question his entire life. The man was always so sure of himself. I think many people
hated him for that, which explains why it was so easy for him to get the Minister position. No
one actually votes for someone they like-except maybe Shacklebolt. I don’t think I’ve ever met
anyone who hated Shacklebolt.
I didn’t know the answer to the question in Rufus’ eyes, but I wasn’t about to let him know that.
He needed me, in that moment, and it was such a rare thing for Rufus to need anything from
anyone. “Of course we’ll help you, Amy.” Rufus looked at me for a moment, as though I had
gone as crazy as we all though Moody had. But then he looked back at Amy and nodded his
head.
When she called Moody in, we were in the inner office, waiting for her to call for us. She wanted
it to come from her, she told us, not from the Ministry. She didn’t want to make it seem like
we were ganging up on him. Or betraying him-even though we were, in a sense. He put more
Death Eaters away then the rest of us combined, and he was trained for that purpose. That’s the
problem with men like Moody, the government trains them to kill and then kills them for their
training. We didn’t want to put him down like an old dragon too fierce for the pastures. So we
tried to make him a teacher instead.
I didn’t hear the words that were said. The plea in Amy’s voice or the sadness and anger that
flashed in Moody’s tone. I wasn’t there and I didn’t dive into the memory with Rufus when Amy
offered it to us both. All I heard was a curse thrown at the one person I never thought Moody
would attack, and then Amy putting him in a full body bind more powerful than any she’d used
on the Death Eaters. “If you ever attempt that again, Alastor Moody,” she warned, after opening
the door and revealing us as witnesses, “I’ll have you thrown in Azkaban for treason.”
He didn’t fight after that. She left him there for an hour before taking of the curse, and then he
apologized. I don’t think Moody’s apologized to anyone since then, and I’m positive he never
apologized to anyone before that moment. They didn’t talk about it, after. I still don’t know what
curse he threw at her, only that she looked even more pale when we walked out, and I was half-
afraid she was already dead.
:::
“He wouldn’t have killed her,” Percy argued, “Moody was crazy, but he wouldn’t have done
that.”
Robards shrugged and transfigured another blanket. They were finally settling into bed, although
their attempts to ignore the storm that was shaking the very foundation of their shelter were
in vain. “It was a coup, as far as Amy was concerned. And Rufus always said that if Moody
had been a second faster, Amy would have been dead and Moody would have been Minister. I
disagree. I think if Moody killed Amy, he’d have offed himself right after. He loved her like a
sister, and no matter how angry he was, nothing compared to that.”
“I understand,” Percy replied, not saying the words the hanged in his mouth like cobwebs. He
couldn’t tell this man of his attempts to end his own life after Fred died. He couldn’t tell a near
stranger how hard it was to cope with life after he all but killed his younger brother. How could
anyone possibly understand? Maybe Dumbledore could have, from what Abe has said, but
Dumbledore was inconveniently and irrevocably dead.
Robards looked as though he were going to ask, but then shook his head. “Go to sleep, kid,” he
told the younger man, “Maybe your nightmares won’t keep you up all night.”
:::
The nightmares did keep Percy up for most of the night, but he tried not to show that when he
walked into the pub the following morning, almost a full hour after he heard Robards wake up
and leave the barn. He hadn’t fallen back to sleep, although he would have liked to. Instead, he
laid on the hard ground trying to decide if Robards’ recollections shared last night had changed
anything. The world still turned around its axis much too quickly and the scars of the War still
burned against his flesh much too brightly. But something in the way Robards still felt his ghosts
lingering on the edge of his consciousness comforted Percy in a way the reconstruction of his
family couldn’t. Robards’ nostalgia made George’s need to leave Fred’s room intact, and Mum’s
inability to not set a spot for Fred seem less insane. Maybe all the survivors did this. If they did,
Percy had no idea how Abe or Doge had survived three wars-he was barely surviving one.
“Yer survived,” Aberforth greeted when Percy entered the pub, “Here I was thinkin’ Bards ate
yeh’r somethin’” The way in which Aberforth cut his words always jarred Percy, and at nine in
the morning, he almost wanted to ask the pub owner to repeat the sentence in English. Instead, he
just nodded his head and sat down. His back ached from the hard ground and his head felt heavy
from the lack of sleep.
“I’m making eggs, Weasley,” Kendra said from down the bar, “Do you have any preference on
how they’re cooked?”
Percy shook his head, “Not at all.”
“Not an eggs man, Percy?” Robards asked, “Neither am I, but Kenni here loves them. Always
makes them on Saturday mornings, like they’re bloody manna. Used to drive Crouch crazy,
when she was on patrol with some of the Aurors. He hated eggs.”
“Can we no’talk about ‘im?” Aberforth asked, sitting down at the bar. “Bartemius Crouch has
never been my favorite man.”
“I don’t think he’s ever been anyone’s favorite anything,” Acantha Crouch commented from her
seat in front of the fire. “Especially not my favorite cousin.”
“Moody used to call him Uncle Useless,” Robards divulged, smirking at the nickname, “It’s a bit
rubbish, yeah, but it never failed to make us all laugh.”
“Rufus didn’t like it very much,” Kendra corrected, serving up three plates of eggs. “Remember
how he used to yell at all of us?”
“Rufus was always a stickler for respect,” Robards allowed, pouring some pumpkin juice into his
goblet, “But even his face cracked into a smile when Moody used that nickname. You can’t deny
that, Kenni.”
Kendra shook her head, “I can’t really remember what Rufus looked like when he smiled. All of
your faces are slowly fading away. I remember the color of Amy’s hair, the lines on Josh’s face.
Ace’s breath moans are memorized behind these useless ears. I can almost see Moody’s limp
right after he got the peg leg, and if I try very hard, I remember the way your brow furrowed
when you were thinking. But Rufus-well, the only thing I remember about him was the way his
eyes were always alight with passion when we were in the middle of a fight.”
“My moans don’t look like that, now, Kenni,” Acantha admonished from across the room.
Aberforth gestured to his granddaughter to show she was being spoken to. “Amy’s hair grayed
and the lines on Josh’s face were much deeper by the time he died in ninety-six. Moody never
got rid of that limp though, despite all the spells the Healers put on it. You’d think he’d accept
the peg and walk normally, but it’s like he couldn’t tolerate the prosthetic extension. Like he was
embarrassed by it or something.”
Robards put down his fork, but he didn’t wait to finish chewing before he jumped to Moody’s
defense. “He wasn’t bloody embarrassed of his leg, Ace. He was proud of that wound just like he
was all the others.”
“Then why couldn’t he walk with it?” Acantha asked, turning around to face the bar.
“Because it was a daily reminder of Fabian’s death. You know how much he adored that kid.”
Robards swiveled around to look Acantha in the eye. “His junior partner, murdered right in front
of his eyes, and all Moody could do was lie there helpless and watch dark magic eat away half of
his leg.”
“We’ve all had to watch the people we loved die,” Acantha answered, “We all got used to it.”
“If you’ve gotten used to them being dead, then you never really loved them,” Robards didn’t
break eye contact from Acantha as he said those words, even though Percy could feel how much
they hurt.
Acantha’s face fell into a scowl, “How dare you, Gawain Robards?”
“Because I broke the day they told me Amy died, and I shattered when I found out about
Moody’s death, and Rufus dying damn near killed me. And every night I’m followed by their
ghosts and haunted by the cracks along the fault lines of my memory. So how you can sit there
and tell me that their faces don’t linger in your peripheral vision and their words don’t echo
in your dreams is beyond my understanding.” For the first time since Percy met him, Robards
looked human.
“I,” Acantha began, and then stopped herself. She let the scowl fall away from her face and her
eyes grow large with pain. “Yes, Gawain, I do think you have a point. I can remember each of
them quite clearly, but it would be so nice to forget.”
Robards shook his head, “I don’t think I’ll ever want to forget them, Ace. Hell, I still remember
everything. Especially the last thing each of the said to me. Amy’s was, If I don’t see you
in the morning, Bards, know you were never my favorite, but I think I may have loved you the
greatest. Rufus’ was something painfully simple: We’ll just keep fighting, then. Good
night, Gawain. And Moody’s…well, Moody’s requires a bit of explaining.”
:::
We knew where he was going, if you want the truth. Not specifically-Moody never talked to me
or Rufus about The Order and we never asked him about it. We didn’t want to know. The Order
of the Phoenix was just further proof that the Ministry was failing, and failure was something
Rufus had never been able to accept. But we knew there was something dangerous going on,
because Moody bought us dinner, and while that wasn’t a strange occurrence in and of itself, he
bought Thai take out, which he hated and Rufus and I both loved.
“Busy night, Al?” Rufus asked, opening up the carton after Moody got back from the muggle
place up the road. Security was tight at this point, only a few days before the Ministry fell. We
didn’t leave to go home, we didn’t leave through the front doors, hell-we barely left our offices.
But food was a necessity, and the house elves were told to ration everything, so muggle takeout
really was our only choice.
Moody had shrugged, in that quick way he always did. People thought it was a nervous tick
when we were young, and that it was a sign of age and war as we got older. “Just thought you’d
be hungry,” he replied. After Amy died, Moody took over her role-making sure we were fed and
slept at least two hours a night-trying to get us to shower and play a game of chess if there was
time. He was a paranoid, nasty old prick who took everyone for granted and worked himself to
the bone-but he was a good man. I’ll never let anyone tell me Alastor Moody wasn’t a good man.
We talked about the newest Death Eater recruits as we ate. Voldemort was taking kids at that
time, fifth, even fourth years, who wouldn’t graduate Hogwarts for a while. He was planning
for the future, and that was a scary thing. Men don’t plan for futures unless they’re bloody sure
they’re going to have one. Rufus had files scattered along the desk in front of us, and Moody had
one eye on those scrolls even while he was making eye contact with us.
“You prepared for the coup, Scrimgeour?” Moody had asked, as he was emptying the last carton
of food.
Rufus paused mid bite and looked at his old mentor. Really sized Moody up, you know? Like he
was expecting a bark of the man’s maniacal laughter and a roll of that mad eye. But instead he
was greeted with a steady gaze, the question evident in both eyes.
“What makes you so sure there’ll be a coup, Moody?” Rufus replied. I thought, well. In that
moment I thought maybe they’d duel. There was so much tension between them. Maybe Rufus
thought Moody didn’t think he could hack it as the new Minister. Maybe Moody’s paranoia had
rubbed off and Rufus was starting not to trust anyone. Maybe this was the end of the world, and I
was sitting speechless watching it unfurl.
Whatever it was, Moody ended it with quite the anticlimactic smirk. “He’s strong enough to take
over now,” the words sounded so certain coming out of his mouth, “And he’s never been the
type of man to wait.”
“Neither have you,” Rufus replied, but he relaxed a bit. Moody didn’t know something we
didn’t. He was just being the political mastermind he’d always been. Rufus finished his bite.
I got in the middle of it then, because most of my life was spent getting in the middle of Rufus’
fights. “Where are you going tonight, Al?” I asked, knowing I would not get an answer. Moody
was the most elusive man I’ve ever met, and I’ve spent time with Unspeakables.
He stood up without answering me and grabbed his cloak. “Out,” he said, moving towards
Rufus. “Come here and shake my hand, Rufus,” he commanded. And Rufus did what he had
always done-what all of Moody’s friends would have done-he obeyed. The two man stood in
front of each other, like a general saluting his finest soldier. “Fight, Rufus, even if you’re the
only one left standing. Fight until there’s no blood left to bleed, no curses left to scream, no hope
left in sight. Because you may be our final chance.”
I don’t know if Rufus was crying then, but I was. They’d always laughed at me for being the
most emotional. It was as though we were sending him to his death, and we didn’t even know
what was happening. This was not the first time Moody had said goodbye to us, thinking he was
going to die. How were we supposed to know it was going to be the last?
They shook hands, and then Rufus pulled Moody into a one-armed hug. When he let go, Moody
looked half-annoyed and half-please with himself. Then he turned to me. I got up, slow like,
because I didn’t know if the moment could shatter with too much pressure. Moments like that,
where soldiers bear their hearts to each other, they’re rare.
“I don’t like you Robards,” he said, straight-faced. It was a truth neither one of us had ever tried
to deny. He didn’t like that I could keep my head up even in the worst of times. I didn’t like that
he treated everyone around him like they were beneath him. “But if there’s anyone I’d trust to
stay with Rufus until the end-it’s you. Don’t let him go in alone. Because if he falls-you’ll be the
only one left. And Merlin knows I don’t trust you to save us.”
I thought that was it, so I nodded my head and extended my hand. But then he did something that
still shocks me, still haunts me every day of my life. He looked me square in the eye and he said:
“When we’re all dead, and you’re still breathing, don’t let them forget what we did. You’ll
remember us, Gawain, because you’ll be the only one who can.”
He knew, I think. He knew I’d be the last one standing. He knew that was my burden to bear.
I’d have to watch all my friends die, have to stand back because there was no way to save them.
Suicide missions were a part of our everyday lives. There are no foxholes in the Wizarding
world, and even with all of our magic, there are no second chances.
“Goodnight, Al,” I whispered into his shoulder, as he pulled me in for a hug. I think that’s the
only time in my entire life I hugged that man. He let go, turned around, and walked out the door.
It was goodbye in a way goodbye had never been said, and I had to swallow the lump in my
throat before I turned to Rufus and said, “He’s going to end up dead.”
Rufus just nodded. “He’ll die fighting, Gawain. That’s the most any of us can ask for.”
Three days later, they were both dead. And here I am telling their story.
:::
“You think he knew for sure?” Percy asked, as Robards bit back a tear. No one mentioned the
redness of the man’s eyes or the tear stains on his cheeks. Kenni had tears in her eyes and Ace
was staring straight ahead, not quite in the same room as the rest of them.
Aberforth was the one who answered him. “Alastor Moody always knew wha’ was gointa
happen next,” he said, cleaning a glass with a dirty rag, “And tha’s why he was so good at his
job.”
Robards took a drink of his pumpkin juice and said, “I think he was just like the rest of the
world, making it all up as he went along, and hoping to Merlin it worked out in the end.”
“Well, Harry survived and won the war,” Percy replied, trying to break the maudlin tension that
had descended upon the room.
“Yes,” Robards replied, pushing away from the bar. He walked to the door, grabbed his cloak
and said, “Your war has been one, your future’s been saved, but all I have left is my past, and all
my old friends are dead.”
He left the bar with a wave to Kenni and a smile thrown Ace’s way. It was a sad, sullen smile,
that replaced the tears he was biting back in such a perfect way. Percy watched him leave,
wondering if another war would take place in twenty years, so that the ghosts from this one
haunted him, and he, too, lost everything.
“Not everyone’s story ends like that,” Ace told him, turning away from the wall, “Bards is just
lonely man.”
Percy nodded his head and paid for their meals. He thought of the years he lost with his family,
the brother buried up the hill, and the fact that he’d be going back to a haunted shop, again.
Robards was a man Percy could respect.
Loneliness was something he could understand.