(no subject)
Who? Harry Potter, Hermione Weasley, and Ron Weasley
What? While out for a walk on the school grounds, Harry spots a gift left by Bellatrix.
Why? Because Bella is back and ready to play her games.
When?Saturday night
Title: Come Undone
Rating: Pg 14 or so for images of death and so forth.
With Padfoot standing guard over Remus, Harry decided it was time to take a walk around the castle grounds just to check on everything. The paranoia was starting to consume him. He wasn't worried though. You needed to be paranoid in a war. It was the only way to stay on top of your game.
Seeing Remus hurt so badly while Teddy was still in the infirmary was fucking with his head. His dad had been in there not that long ago. His son and Hermione before that. Albus as well. Severus...right he didn't want to think about Severus right now. Or ever. Not thinking about him ever again worked just find with him thank you very much.
He swore that when he passed the great hall he saw bodies on the table. A trick of the light of course. An old memory attempting to merge with current reality. He wasn't crazy. He was just tired and stressed out. So stressed out.
Ginny was being supportive as always. They were throwing themselves into taking care of the two little ones they had adopted. He was trying to focus on the positive instead of the negative. Remus had been close to death, but he had survived. Fenrir was gone. Harry and Ginny had two more beautiful children. More people from the original order were returning than Death Eaters seemed to be appearing. They'd changed the master of the elder wand. Things weren't all bad right?
So why did he feel like he was crawling out of his skin? Things felt too quiet on their end. Where was the retribution for Fenrir? Where was Bella's payback for what had been done to her? Where the fuck was Voldemort and why wasn't he targeting Harry? Hadn't that always been his game? Why were things different this time? Harry needed to go back to basics. He wanted to be able to understand what he was fighting.
Making his way around the grounds, he lost himself in theories, and tried to work out why he was feeling so uneasy. Could he be cracking under the stress of another war? Was he going to turn into what they had said he was during the last one? Too much stress, too much magic used against him, unable to be of use to those he had been raised to protect? He refused to believe that as a possibility.
He checked the edges of the apparation boundaries for any signs that someone had been close enough to watch. Was it paranoia really if you knew people were out to get you? How many attacks on the school would Hogwarts endure before parents stopped trusting in the professors to protect their children?
Did someone have the stone? Were they bringing people back to use as distractions while they continued to hunt for the other hallows? Merlin, he wasn't ready to accept that theory yet. They couldn't be all back from the stone. Harry couldn't send them back if they were. He didn't care if that made him weak. He just didn't have it in him to do it.
On the edge of the apparation barrier nearest the forest, something caught his eye as he tightened his grip on his wand. There was something moving in the woods. Then he heard it. The laughter.
Her laughter.
Was she really there or was he hearing things? There was something moving in the woods though. It appeared to be white and cotton, like a dress. Slowly he approached and immediately felt his stomach lurch. Propped against a tree, holding hands, were two children who looked eerily like his niece and nephew. Their eyes were open and they appeared to have been caught by surprise. Most people caught by the death curse were. He felt sick as he approached slowly and saw the note pinned to the older girl's nightdress.
"Next time I'll only settle for the real thing."
One look into the lifeless face of the eleven year old girl and her eight year old brother and Harry unraveled. He literally felt himself crumble as he stepped back to get back to the safety of the apparation barrier so he could cast his patronus to Ron and Hermione.
He was shaking as he cast the stag to give them the message: "Bellatrix left a gift just outside the apparation barrier. Come quickly."
Once it was cast, he dropped to his knees and lost the contents of his stomach.
The children. He couldn't handle anymore death. Especially the death of children. He was responsible for this. He'd traded her for his godson and this was the price.
This was just the beginning of the price. She had made the warning loud and clear. Bellatrix was coming after Rose and Hugo.
What? While out for a walk on the school grounds, Harry spots a gift left by Bellatrix.
Why? Because Bella is back and ready to play her games.
When?Saturday night
Title: Come Undone
Rating: Pg 14 or so for images of death and so forth.
With Padfoot standing guard over Remus, Harry decided it was time to take a walk around the castle grounds just to check on everything. The paranoia was starting to consume him. He wasn't worried though. You needed to be paranoid in a war. It was the only way to stay on top of your game.
Seeing Remus hurt so badly while Teddy was still in the infirmary was fucking with his head. His dad had been in there not that long ago. His son and Hermione before that. Albus as well. Severus...right he didn't want to think about Severus right now. Or ever. Not thinking about him ever again worked just find with him thank you very much.
He swore that when he passed the great hall he saw bodies on the table. A trick of the light of course. An old memory attempting to merge with current reality. He wasn't crazy. He was just tired and stressed out. So stressed out.
Ginny was being supportive as always. They were throwing themselves into taking care of the two little ones they had adopted. He was trying to focus on the positive instead of the negative. Remus had been close to death, but he had survived. Fenrir was gone. Harry and Ginny had two more beautiful children. More people from the original order were returning than Death Eaters seemed to be appearing. They'd changed the master of the elder wand. Things weren't all bad right?
So why did he feel like he was crawling out of his skin? Things felt too quiet on their end. Where was the retribution for Fenrir? Where was Bella's payback for what had been done to her? Where the fuck was Voldemort and why wasn't he targeting Harry? Hadn't that always been his game? Why were things different this time? Harry needed to go back to basics. He wanted to be able to understand what he was fighting.
Making his way around the grounds, he lost himself in theories, and tried to work out why he was feeling so uneasy. Could he be cracking under the stress of another war? Was he going to turn into what they had said he was during the last one? Too much stress, too much magic used against him, unable to be of use to those he had been raised to protect? He refused to believe that as a possibility.
He checked the edges of the apparation boundaries for any signs that someone had been close enough to watch. Was it paranoia really if you knew people were out to get you? How many attacks on the school would Hogwarts endure before parents stopped trusting in the professors to protect their children?
Did someone have the stone? Were they bringing people back to use as distractions while they continued to hunt for the other hallows? Merlin, he wasn't ready to accept that theory yet. They couldn't be all back from the stone. Harry couldn't send them back if they were. He didn't care if that made him weak. He just didn't have it in him to do it.
On the edge of the apparation barrier nearest the forest, something caught his eye as he tightened his grip on his wand. There was something moving in the woods. Then he heard it. The laughter.
Her laughter.
Was she really there or was he hearing things? There was something moving in the woods though. It appeared to be white and cotton, like a dress. Slowly he approached and immediately felt his stomach lurch. Propped against a tree, holding hands, were two children who looked eerily like his niece and nephew. Their eyes were open and they appeared to have been caught by surprise. Most people caught by the death curse were. He felt sick as he approached slowly and saw the note pinned to the older girl's nightdress.
"Next time I'll only settle for the real thing."
One look into the lifeless face of the eleven year old girl and her eight year old brother and Harry unraveled. He literally felt himself crumble as he stepped back to get back to the safety of the apparation barrier so he could cast his patronus to Ron and Hermione.
He was shaking as he cast the stag to give them the message: "Bellatrix left a gift just outside the apparation barrier. Come quickly."
Once it was cast, he dropped to his knees and lost the contents of his stomach.
The children. He couldn't handle anymore death. Especially the death of children. He was responsible for this. He'd traded her for his godson and this was the price.
This was just the beginning of the price. She had made the warning loud and clear. Bellatrix was coming after Rose and Hugo.