i'm not scared {bill/fleur}
Title: I’m Not Scared (of lions & tigers & bears)
Author: raspberry_rave
Fandom: Harry Potter
Characters: Fleur Delacour, Bill Weasley
Author’s Note: Written for the Bill Weasley/Fleur Delacour Last Drabble Writer Standing contest, which I was absolute rubbish at. Case in point: I wrote only one drabble. Canon. Horror.
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I’m Not Scared (of lions & tigers & bears)
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Moonlight glances off ruined stone hallways, glistening with a liquid Fleur doesn’t want to identify as she rushes through the corridors of Hogwarts towards an indefinable feeling of horror. As her feet pick their way through fallen staircases, broken wands and bodies, each step causes a fresh wave of fear to well up inside. Something has happened, something that will change her; she can feel it.
When she enters the hospital wing, the moonlight makes the few unoccupied beds starkly white in mocking contrast to the bloodstained sheet that covers what she is now sure is her husband. She gasps, and her step falters for only an instant before she is rushing towards him, ignoring everyone’s stares and snatching a cloth from the Weasley matriarch’s hand to attend to her husband. She vents her panic with a few choice words, staccato and fierce in the face of their judging looks. That she would no longer love him - how dare they.
But when Molly Weasley offers peace in the form of a family heirloom, their grief finally binds them together. . .
Moonlight glances off the couple walking hand in hand, picking their way along a familiar path. Fleur shakes off such sad memories as Bill murmurs something and she smiles happily before lifting her face to meet his, looking whole and perfect.
“Je t’aime,” she whispers.
“And I love you,” Bill replies in a murmur, smiling.
Fleur cherishes these quiet moments with her husband, when neither of them has to face the uncaring, changing world. They are content to amble in the moonlight bath as it spills over the tops of trees to alight on their hair. By instinct now, Bill turns away from the milky glow, but some rays shine on his face, throwing into sharp relief his battle scars, old warrior’s wounds. He flinches away when Fleur lifts a hand to cup his face gently.
And then suddenly, without warning, his eyes tighten around the edges and he pushes her away to clutch his sides. Fleur’s hand flies to her mouth as she watches his face contort with terror and something foreign, something feral. And then her feet are tripping over themselves to reach him, and she extends a hand inches from his bowed head. When he looks up at her, it is with the eyes of a predator and the dilated pupils betray no hint of her husband.
“Bill?” The question is a half-strangled cry.
He snaps at her then - snaps - and she flinches, unable to stem a tide of tears as she watches her husband lose himself. . .
Moonlight glances off Fleur’s tear-stained cheek as she lies next to her husband. In her sleep, she reaches for Bill and nestles snugly into his side.