Enternity Chapter 13, part One
Author’s Note: For those of you that are familiar with the history of the Welsh Language, you will notice that something that is said in here can’t possibly be correct given the time period Welsh was invented. I am well aware of this fact and I am claiming Artistic License. If that annoys you, I am sorry. I’m also taking artistic license with the character Merlin and one of the two men he is based off of.
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Arthur was in a state of shock. His wife was sobbing brokenly into a handkerchief next to him, her despair rolling off in almost tangible waves. The few Order members around them were grim.
“Molly, perhaps it would benefit you to go back to headquarters? We can deal with things here without you.” Kingsley spoke softly, his hands gently touching Molly’s shoulders. She shook her head, a broken sob issuing from her throat. She took a deep breath, standing straight and attempting to physically hold herself together by sheer force of will.
“You’ll need me to help with the… the c-cleanup.” Kingsley squeezed her shoulder once more before walking off towards the ruined fountain. The scene was familiar to him, something he had seen during the First War.
Heads - woman, men, children, even animals - were impaled on sticks which protruded out of the circular base; they had no hair and no eyes. Hands and feet were displayed in a grotesque field of flowers around it. The torsos, arms and legs still attached bar the hands and feet, were piled together like rocks piled over a grave. The fountain, which was cracked and had pieces strewn about, appeared as though it was bleeding.
The rest of the village wasn’t much better; where buildings once stood, there now only remained ash and dust. Hair and eyes were scattered about haphazardly, if one did not watch where one stepped, fragile parts could easily be crushed. And above them, high in the sky as if mocking them, the Dark Mark lay.
“Molly, we’ll need your help now. Can you manage?” Albus sounded so tired, so ancient. A few of the younger members gave him concerned glances, praying he wasn’t getting too old for this. Molly’s tears dried and she nodded, once, and got her wand out.
Molly was needed to remove the Dark Mark from the sky. The mark was like fabric, just waiting to be unraveled. Thread by thread was pulled out from it, until there was nothing left of the abomination; it took at least an hour and it was an exhausting job. While Molly worked on removing the Dark Mark, everyone else gathered the bodies and cleansed them by fire - if they were buried the Dark Magic still in the corpses would contaminate the ground, leaving the earth barren save for the stench of rotting plant life.
Just as they set about cleaning up the remains, Daily Prophet reporters descended upon them like vultures to a battleground.
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Eleanor tried to pretend she was asleep. She desperately hoped she was a good actress or that they just didn’t notice her. No one ever noticed her before Harry, and right now she hoped against hope that they weren’t as sharp-witted as he was.
“The Dark Lord does not care about what was supposed to happen, he cares about what did happen! You utter idiot! Have you any idea how this is going to look? He’ll kill you, you pathetic child! He’ll kill you! You said you’d be able to lure Potter into a false sense of security and you haven’t even talked to him! What are you going to tell him?” The boy sounded harsh. Eleanor could hear the other girl he was talking to crying.
‘Why can’t they leave? Leave, please leave!’ Eleanor didn’t know how much longer she could hold her shaking inside. She was terrified, but she couldn’t start shaking, they’d discover she was there!
“Please, you have to help me. If I don’t meet him this weekend, he’ll kill my little sister! She’s only eight! Please, you have to help me, Warren.” She pleaded with the boy, Warren.
“I can’t help you, Marietta. You said you could do it, so you should have done it.” Warren walked away, right by the couch Eleanor was.
She had to tell Harry, she had to; he’d know what to do. As Marietta walked past her, Eleanor held her breath. She had to tell Harry.
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Draco stared into the fire as if in a trance. He was in Severus’ office, waiting for a chance to talk to his father. With Yule so close, Lucius had come to see Severus and both men retreated into Severus’ room about an hour ago.
Held in his hands were the dolls Harry had made for the two currently absent men.
There was a small girl crying against Aife’s chest; the older girl holding her close with a pained expression - it was obvious Aife thought of this child as hers. The little ten year old clutched at her, hoping that she could hold Aife there, that she wouldn’t have to go to Hogwarts and leave her for a year.
“Diamond, Diamond, calm down. Here, I’ll give you this, so you can have a bit of me while you wait to see me again.” The little girl looked up and Aife presented a small rag doll.
Draco remembered that his Other had always been good at making the dolls ever since - ever since… something. Someone taught his Other how to make them, once, a long time ago. He couldn’t remember who or even what gender his Other had been then.
‘How long have we been together? How long have we been living and dying? Harry remembers things - was it always like that?’ Draco didn’t know if he could bear having Harry remembering everything, even things he didn’t want to remember. Did he remember them dying, just as vividly as Draco did? Did he ache when he thought of people long gone? Had Harry always remembered him, even when he and Draco fought? Did he ache all those times Draco had said he hated him, or even implied it? Did it still hurt to see Albus sometimes, because the man looked so much like…so much like… Who?
It was a name on the tip of his tongue, on the tip of his memory. This had been happening a lot lately; Draco remembered his last life, but it was obvious that there were even more behind it. He watched the flames dance together and thought of nothing in hopes that he’d remember things on his own.
He remembered the first time he met Tom Riddle. The boy was just like every other first year - nervous and apprehensive. He remembered seeing Diamond next to him, and the threads that tied the two of them together. Aife was alternately happy and distressed, the bond those two shared was not a bond to be trifled with; it was one of the most dangerous bonds of love out there. And it had led to horrible things occurring in the past… Wars and entire civilizations vanishing overnight. Of course, that was only the really extreme cases, and who knew if it really had to do with the bond or if it was just the circumstances. Still, it was too much of a coincidence to actually be one.
He remembered that Tom had been a typical orphaned child - he had his bouts of loneliness, moments of unhappiness and cruelty. But, he had been intelligent, clever, and not without a heart. His heart may have been guarded with barbed wire and cut glass, but he still had one. The child and young man he remembered had very little in common with the Lord Voldemort he had become.
Their only similarity seemed to be their power and intellect. The love and compassion Tom had shown a select few was gone. The utter disgust at massacres and people drunk on power had vanished, and in its place there was bloodlust and a thirst for power. What had happened to the child he remembered? What had happened to the young man who had been so frightened that Aife would not let him date the woman of his dreams? What had happened to the man that was close to hyperventilation on his wedding day? Draco smiled as he remembered that day.
As a to-be-brother-in-law, Aiden looked on in amusement as Tom paced in his room. The poor man was practically hyperventilating, he was so nervous.
“What if I mess up? What if she says no? What if someone objects? Oh God, what if she doesn’t show up and Aife is the one who appears to hand me a letter? What if Aife kills me for marrying her little sister? What if -?” Aiden started laughing. Still chuckling, he placed his hands on Tom’s shoulders.
“You’ll be fine. Aife wouldn’t have given you permission to marry Diamond if she didn’t want you two to marry. I know that you and Aife sometimes have your days, more of them now after that business with Myrtle, but she wouldn’t have granted you permission if she didn’t want you two to marry.” Tom stared at him, clearly still terrified, but nodded.
And later, as Aiden watched Tom’s eyes sparkle the second they landed on Diamond, he remembered just why he liked this kid so much.
Draco frowned. It was hard to believe that things had changed so drastically. He could only imagine how hard it was for Harry. After all, not only was Voldemort the same person he once saw as a younger brother, but he was also Salazar Slytherin’s heir. Draco knew that must cut at Harry, because Salazar was… Salazar was... What? He was what?
“This is getting fucking annoying.” The fire sparked as if in agreement. He wanted someone to talk to - someone who wasn’t Harry because whenever he was around Harry, everything seemed to be contradictory and confusing. Someone who wasn’t his father, because as much as Lucius was a great father, they weren’t really all that close any more - it just came with growing up - and he couldn’t talk to his Godfather about this for the same reasons. With a start, Draco realized who he wanted to talk to: Narcissa.
God, how he missed his mother. He could talk to her about anything and it seemed that she had a patented answer. She always knew what to say and how to say it - but she was dead, and there wasn’t anything he could do about that. He sighed, standing to place the dolls Harry had made for his father and godfather back where he found them. He’d talk to his father tomorrow; it was getting late and he was getting tired.
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Draco stood in an open courtyard, surrounded by grand and elegant buildings. In front of him was a building with two floors and what looked like a smaller structure on the roof, all with grand, open archways. Great pillars rose up in front of the building, seeming to separate the open courtyard from a street without the use of an actual wall.
Next to the structure was a temple, just as decorated as the building next to it. And, as he stepped closer to look at these magnificent buildings, a familiar symbol caught his eye: the Malfoy crest etched into the side of one of the pillars he was standing in front of. His mind went through a quick whirlwind of deduction. He knew just about every architectural project his family had ever been involved in; it was something he had been taught from a young age. The Malfoy family didn’t work on many architectural projects; typically the family was more political then masonry in nature. But, every now and then, a Malfoy would be born with an architectural flair. They had helped with bits and pieces of Hogwarts, a few of their own Manors, small public buildings here and there, and more than a few of the Roman forums and ancient temples.
With that in mind, Draco stared back at the building with its huge arches. He took a few steps back, looking at it, trying to see if he could recognize the structure. After a few seconds, it clicked. This was the Basilica Aemilia in its full glory. The muggles saw this, and all of the Roman Forum, as naught but a ruin. But, it still stood, it was still used today by Wizards; it simply appeared older - more weathered down. The paint on the stones had washed mostly away, and the figurines in the Roman Forum had lost their luster and magnificence.
But, as he took in his surroundings, this forum did not look old and weathered. It looked new; empty and barren, but new. The engravings on the floor and stairs still stood out, none of the Latin seemed warped or garbled as it did now.
“Is anything wrong?” The voice came so suddenly that Draco jumped and whirled around, hand going for his wand before he realized that he recognized the voice. His eyes landed on Harry, and the other boy looked at him in bewilderment.
“We’re in the Roman Forum.”
“Yes, we are in its’ shadow. We’re dreaming.”
“Dreaming? But… you’re not in Limbo.”
“I don’t have to be. I told you, I was there because I had to be; you were there because you wanted to be.”
“So, what? I want to be here? I see you everyday… why would I want to see you here too?” Harry looked somewhat hurt by the words and Draco quickly replayed them in his head. ‘That wasn’t what I meant…’
“I know that wasn’t what you meant… it just sounded… not so nice.”
Draco reached out, touching Harry’s face gently - it almost felt like a physical wound in his chest, the thought that he had hurt Harry.
“I do want to see you… just not in a dream.” Draco swayed forward, as if to kiss the other boy in front of him, but thought better of it and retreated back.
“Why are we in the Roman Forum? Why does it look like this?”
“It looks the way it looks.”
“No, it looks the way it looked once, long ago. I’ve been to this place, here and now, in this lifetime, and it doesn’t look this nice anymore.”
“Age does that to things.”
Draco looked at Harry carefully, trying to piece together what Harry was trying to tell him. He looked back to the ground, the engravings that showed perfectly, the look of the new paint. How could Harry possibly know enough about this place to construct an exact replica…?
“The idea is right there, Draco…I know you’re thinking of it, in the back of your mind…”
“You were here. When this was built…” Draco looked around. Sometimes, he would give speeches from that podium, he remembered doing so…He closed his eyes as an almost painful longing for this place overcame him.
“And so was I. This is where it started, isn’t it?” He closed his eyes. Snippets of events came to him: children playing in these streets, betting in the Circus Maximus. Colors, and sounds flew by, and a strange buzz dominated his hearing. He could feel the start of a migraine coming and it felt as if something was slipping…
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Draco woke with a start. He was in his bedroom, down in the dungeons. Habitually, he checked his wards to see if they were sound; they were. His head throbbed, and as he become more aware of his surroundings, he had the sense to try and figure out what time it was.
One o’clock. In the morning.
He groaned as he flopped back onto his bed. Now he was never going to get back to sleep!
A prickling sensation caused him to sit up, wand drawn and mind alert. He was no longer alone, but his wards were undamaged.
“It’s just me. I wanted to see if you had a horrible headache.” Harry came out from the shadows of some corner. Draco stretched his magic across to him, trying to see Harry’s signature to ensure it was really him.
It was, and gods did his head hurt.
Harry came and sat next to him, his hands easing Draco back onto his bed, fingers massaging his temples.