[Fanfiction] Harry Potter - A Share of Darkness
Okay, took me long enough, but I finally got around to posting this. ^_^
Title: A Share of Darkness
AuthorArtist: celestineangel
Pairing(s)/Characters: Seamus Finnigan, Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Dean Thomas and the ghost of Antonin Dolohov... Seamus/Padma, Dolohov/Dean
Summary: The damage done when friends forget to be friends, when ghosts haunt, when pasts refuse to be the past, and when obsession takes hold.
Prompt: The weapons, that were once outside, sharpening themselves on war, are now indoors. - Margaret Atwood, "The circle game."
Rating: R-ish to NC-17 (though not due to sex)
Word Count: 4,745
Warnings: Government paranoia. Obsession of various kinds. The breaking of friendships, depression, guilt, angst. Light language.
Spoilers: Past non-con along with current conflicting feelings about it that could be very triggering, suicide.
Author/Artist's Notes: This was for hp_darkfest. HI I HAVE TOO MUCH FUN WRITING DARK!FIC. Also, I think I interpreted the prompt fairly liberally, but it's still there! Thanks to my wonderful beta, cymonie who not only betaed, but helped with the title!
A Share of Darkness
On the Hogwarts grounds there is a memorial. The statue is bland, unimpressive, depicting an elderly wizard overlooking a group of seven children at seven ages, all of whom have faces devoid of personality. The statue is not why this memorial is a revered place.
Around the statue's base scrolls a constantly changing list of names from two wars that were really one. They appear in golden light, scrawled by an unseen hand, and fade away slowly to be replaced by another. A person could watch the names appear and disappear all day and never see one repeated. These are the names of the fallen, written in stone and magic for all to remember the sacrifices that were made to keep freedom intact. More, to remember the choices that were made. Every name on the list is one who chose their path, or had their path chosen for them.
There are well known names there: James and Lily Potter, Albus Dumbledore, Alice and Frank Longbottom, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and Nymphadora Tonks-Lupin. These are some of the more venerated names; people come from countries all over the world for the opportunity to glimpse one of these names, especially the first three. Having seen them, the people go home feeling blessed.
There are other names, not so well known: Caradoc Dearborn, Edgar Bones, Benjy Fenwick, Dorcas Meadows, Marlene McKinnon, Bertha Jorkins, Charity Burbage. These names and more are known only by their friends, and family, historians, and the creator of this memorial. They were not the heroes whose names became synonymous with defeating dark magic, but all had played their part in events.
The memorial creator's name does not appear anywhere and is not known. He or she remains anonymous.
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Year One
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On the first year anniversary of Voldemort's death, people gathered to visit the Hogwarts grounds to watch as Kingsley Shacklebolt unveiled a memorial without a name. No one had been able to decide on a single wizard or witch's name to properly describe it, and the creator hadn't bothered. In the end it was left nameless, and called "the Hogwarts Memorial" by anyone who needed to reference it.
Seamus watched George Weasley stand in front of the base for hours, waiting for his brother's name to appear. Angelina stood with him, neither of them speaking. Others came and went whether or not they'd need a specific name, knowing they could always return, but George stood there until the sun went down. Finally, in the darkness, the name scrawled before his eyes in golden light. Fred Weasley. Satisfied, George took his girlfriend's hand and they walked away, up the hill and to the main castle where a feast took place in the Great Hall.
Term would begin in a week, so there were no children yet. Still, most of those in attendance were Hogwarts graduates, so the four House tables had been set out over the Great Hall floor as they would be during the school year. Seamus saw the tentative glances given from one table to another, until one former Hufflepuff rose to go to the Gryffindor table. Hannah Abbott; she sat next to Neville Longbottom and Ron Weasley, nodded briefly to Hermione, Harry and Ginny, but her eyes were on Neville.
With Hannah in the lead, others began to go to other tables, talk to people from other Houses. Seamus remembered how it had been in school; making friends in other Houses was encouraged, and happened often, but one's House was like family away from family, and in every important matter from punishment to Quidditch, one stuck with their House. For a moment it had seemed as though a year's separation had built walls between them, but Hannah's actions seemed to have renewed the old friendships.
"Seamus." Lee Jordan extended his hand to them. "Good to see you."
"You too," Seamus said as he grasped Lee's hand. "See you aren't with Angelina anymore." Lee and Angelina had flirted on and off for a while, even after she'd gone to the Yule Ball with Fred, and then dated a Ravenclaw boy for a time.
"Nah. She's with George now." Lee shrugged. "She says he needs her," he said, then moved on to greet the two in question while Seamus watched on.
George shook Lee's hand absently, and smiled in a way that seemed half-hearted at best. Lee gave him a look, then glanced at Angelina, who shrugged.
"Anyway," Lee finally said after another moment's hesitation, "almost everyone is here. Haven't seen Dean, yet, have either of you?"
"I saw him out near the memorial," offered Katie Bell, who had just entered. "He said he'd be with us in a second."
The rest of them sat, and Dean did join them, sitting quietly between Seamus and Padma Patil, who had come to sit with her sister, but after a while Parvati moved to the Hufflepuff table. Padma stayed to talk to the rest of the students she'd come to know as a member of Dumbledore's Army. She had a scar on her face from an incident during seventh year of which she would not speak, but no one asked, anyway. Many of them had scars from that year, physical and otherwise. Most of them did not want to talk about them.
Seamus noticed Dean didn't speak unless he was spoken to, but between catching up with other friends, answering questions about what he was doing with himself, and avoiding questions about his love life, somehow the time went by and Dean was gone before he could ask him anything. Later, he asked around and realized no one could remember actually holding a conversation with Dean.
Oh well, there will be time.
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Year Two
------------------------------
The second year, people simply began to arrive without plan, and the school's house elves had to start working overtime just to make enough food to feed them all. Those professors who lived full time at the school, including the Headmistress, realized they should expect this for a few years at least. Perhaps until the generations who had gone through both wars had completely died out, and perhaps even after. They would bring their children, after all.
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Seamus took his time dialing Dean's home phone. It was good to have a wizarding friend who also knew how to use a telephone without extensive training and retraining and subsequent embarrassing moments. Their shared Muggle heritage made two best friends of boys who otherwise had little in common.
Dean had been difficult to reach lately. Phone calls were often left to the answering machine, and while Dean at least got back to him more times than not, conversations were short. Owls sometimes returned without response, but six months ago Seamus had visited Dean's place and managed to catch him in. Dean had shown him some paintings, dark, abstract and confused things Seamus hadn't liked much.
"Hello?" Dean's voice came through the line, muffled and groggy. Seamus wouldn't think anything of it if it hadn't been three in the afternoon.
"You all right there, Dean? Sounds like you've been knocked on your ass."
"Huh? Oh. Nngh. Bad night." On the other end of the line, sheets rustled against a moving body just loud enough for Seamus to hear.
"Guess so, if you're still in bed. Listen, I wanted to know if you want to come with me to Hogwarts tomorrow."
A pause, then a grunt. "Hogwarts tomorrow? Why?"
A really bad night from the sounds of things, if Dean couldn't even remember the date. Seamus frowned, tugging on the phone cord as he considered. "Yeah, you know. For the anniversary. Don't know if anyone else will be there but I feel it's right to go."
This time the silence on the line lasted several moments longer, until Seamus worried the connection had been cut. Just as he began to hang up, a sigh traveled through the plastic handset to his ear. "Yeah. I... I should go. You're right, it feels like the thing to do."
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Seamus knelt so he was face-to-face with the scrolling list of names. Colin Creevy. Damn, the boy had been so young. Seamus hadn't known him well, but thinking about it made his eyes sting. If anyone during that time had been a true Gryffindor, it was Colin. Seamus stood, blinking, and looked around to see several other people standing to his left, including Ron and Ginny Weasley, along with Harry and Hermione. George Weasley stood with Angelina, their hands tightly entwined. Katie leaned over to tell him George and Angelina were married only two months ago.
To his right, on the other side of Katie, Dean stood staring through the memorial to something only he could see. Seamus was worried for his friend, who hadn't said more than five words at one time since arriving. Something was wrong, but Seamus couldn't make Dean talk to him. He didn't even know how to begin.
"Seamus!" Padma Patil waved at him. He smiled at her, remembering the conversation they'd had last year after her sister abandoned her. He was no Ravenclaw, but they found some common ground in discussions of Irish history, and he looked forward to more. "Come on, several people are heading to the Great Hall. Looks like there's going to be a feast again this year."
There was, and it was less awkward than the previous year's feast. People had kept in touch, and the blurring of House lines came easier. Seamus sat with Padma, Ernie Macmillan, several Ravenclaws, and even a quiet young Slytherin man whose name he had yet to learn. As their conversation weaved topics together in a tapestry of experiences, Ginny Potter sat down across from Padma with a frown settled firmly on her face.
"Dean's left," she said, looking straight at Seamus. "Something's bothering him, but Lavender stopped me before I could go talk to him myself. Has he told you anything?" Her eyes bored him, as though she expected him to be able to bare Dean's secrets to the world.
All he could do was shrug. "We don't talk much, sorry, Ginny. I've tried. We talk on the telephone sometimes, but never for long." He hoped Harry had explained the concept of telephones to his wife. "Owls aren't likely to get a response."
Ginny looked disturbed, and Seamus knew how it felt, but there wasn't much either of them could do; if Dean wanted to talk, he'd have talked.
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Year Three
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Hands reached for him from the dark, familiar and hated hands. They touched him all over his body, stripping him of clothing and dignity, tying his arms above him. This, he knew well. This position had been normal for a long time, and returning to it was like returning home, if home were a place of humiliation.
When done with his outer flesh, the hands moved lower, breaking through his legs and every defense until his body yielded to allow them inside. Arching, crying, he could feel the other man inside, turning all his corners and settling in for a long, long stay.
"My pretty boy," the other murmured from his place curled up inside. "Lovely, lovely boy. You remember me, yes? Oh, I know you do. You remember. You love me, don't you?"
No! his mind screamed No, no, I don't, I don't!
"Yes," came from his lips like water overflowing from a river. It was the only acceptable answer, no matter what his mind said, no matter what he felt; there were times, though, when his mind did not scream. Time when the words from his mouth sounded real. "Yes, I love you."
Inside him, he felt fingers stroking, lips kissing. He couldn't see anything, but it didn't matter. The darkness around him was empty because the other man was inside him, completely inside. They might as well have shared souls for how deep they were entwined. Disgusting to even think it, but as those fingers inside stroked again, he felt his care break apart and shatter away. A traitorous moan escaped him.
I hate you. I hate you, I hate you so much. So... much... I... love you.
Hatred marked itself in waves of pleasure. Love became known in the fire of pain. Pain made him sigh and shudder, pleasure made him cry and whimper. Pain and pleasure merged until he could no longer tell them apart.
"You see?" said the voice from deep within. "You belong to me now, and you always will. Even if I die, you will still be mine. You are still mine, aren't you? Even now. Even now."
All he could do was cry without words as his desire peaked, blotting out all thought.
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The cry still sounded from his lips as he woke. Shaking, Dean stared at the ceiling, waiting for his heavy breathing to subside.
Antonin Dolohov was three years dead, but he lived in the twists of Dean's dreaming mind. Three and a half years ago, while Dean had been on the run from Death Eaters, he'd been caught, alone and vulnerable, by a single man behind a skull mask. The ensuing two months played over and over again at night, images and feelings Dean could not be free from.
As his shaking slowed, he sat up, fumbling for his wand. Once found, he turned on the lights with a flick of his wrist, needing the illumination, to flood his small apartment with as much light as possible. No one stirred in the bed next to him. He rarely shared his bed, and on those occasions he did, the guy never stayed until morning. Dean wouldn't let anyone stay; the nightmares were not something he wanted to explain. They didn't happen every night, but he didn't want to risk it.
On his way to the kitchen, he turned on every light he could, letting them chase the shadows to the darkest corners. He would not sleep again tonight.
In the kitchen, at the counter, he gave a glance to the knife rack he'd covered with a dish towel. He needed knives, sometimes he cooked and needed to cut something, but the sight of them could induce panic, even a blackout on nights like these. Even without seeing them directly; just knowing they were there made the scars on his shoulders burn. Dean shuddered, and turned away from them.
"My pretty boy, what if I make you not so pretty, eh?"
Once, a lover had asked about his scars. Dean wouldn't answer, and he never called that guy again. They were not something he could talk about. What could he say about them? How could he tell how at the end of two months he'd almost forgotten himself, that he had a mind of his own, and that he may or may not have actually loved the man who had scarred him? How could he tell anyone, let alone a man he barely knew, that he still could not be certain he didn't love Antonin?
His first stop at the refrigerator filled his empty stomach, and after that Dean went to the only place that brought him some comfort. In the corner of his living area, a small place sectioned off as a studio. There he created the paintings that helped supplement his income, and some he kept. All of them shared the same style. Seamus hadn't liked them much, or had been disturbed by them, but there were people out there who enjoyed the stark lines and dark colors interrupted by swathes of blood red. Sighing, Dean took up a brush and laid it to canvas. Strokes placed paint down in a configuration to match his nightmares, a kiss of violence and a slash of pleasure.
He painted through the rest of the night and through the morning until he collapsed, exhausted.
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Year Four
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The phone rang. Seamus ignored it, putting a pillow over his head. Damn it, he'd just settled in for the night, and it was already after midnight! The Hogwarts Anniversary Feast--which had fast become a tradition, especially among the young people of Harry's generation-- had gone long into the night thanks to the so far entirely adult attendance. People would bring their kids later on, when they had them and the kids were old enough, but the majority of those who came now didn't yet have children of a proper age to attend something both so morbid and so celebratory.
The phone stopped ringing, but only long enough for Padma to hand him the receiver. "Here, Seamus, take it, I don't know what to do with the thing!"
He finally relented when she poked him in the side. Harry's voice came from the earpiece, calling "Hello? Hello?" to the air. Harry? Why would Harry be calling, especially this late?
"Yeah? Harry? It's Seamus. What the bloody he--"
"I'm at Dean's place. He's dead, Seamus.”
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Dawn broke as Seamus landed in an alley near Dean's residence. This part of town reeked of garbage and unwashed people, and he'd never understood why Dean chose to live here. Then again, other than painting, he never knew what Dean did for a living. Maybe he couldn't afford to live anywhere else. How could you not know that?
Taking out his wand, he cast spells to hide his broom where he left it and himself as he left the alley. This was not a morning to be caught flying or with a wand by Muggles. He didn't even know why Harry wanted him here, or why Harry even knew before anyone else.
"Alohomora," he muttered at the door to Dean's building, and again at the door to his actual apartment. Waiting inside for him, Harry and Ron looked up from something they'd been studying on the floor. With a sigh, Seamus saw it was a painting, not Dean's body. The two Aurors stood, glancing at each other before they looked again at Seamus, who had begun to think there was something else going on other than the death of a good friend.
"Hey," Ron said with a wave, made short by the tension in his arm, in his whole body, really.
Harry moved to shake Seamus' hand, his green eyes shuttered. This really was not a pleasure visit, it was business, and Seamus could sense none of Harry's usual warmth. "Sorry about this, but we have some questions, and you were Dean's best friend. His only friend, from what we can tell."
"I guess. Tell you the truth, I haven't really talked to him much in the past few years. Since, you know, everything happened." A glance around the room, past Harry, told him nothing. Was Dean still here, or had he even died here? Or had Harry and Ron whisked his body away with their wands?
Harry saw, and put an arm around Seamus' shoulders. Harry tugged until Seamus had no choice but to follow in the direction Harry wanted him to go, which turned out to be the studio corner. There were several paintings there, still dark, still abstract, and still unnerving.
"Look, there's no way to be sensitive about this, so I'm just going to tell you." Harry sighed, a tired sound.
Ron took over the conversation from his place several steps back, near the kitchen entrance. "We've sort of suspected Dean had some contact with Death Eaters that year, while he was running. His behavior, you know, it was off ever since then. He just wasn't himself anymore, and someone doesn't change that much for no reason. Something had to have happened."
"I guess," Seamus replied slowly, giving Harry a glance mostly so he didn't have to look at the paintings. He didn't want to look at them. Something in them made him shudder, and feel like he couldn't breathe. "Is that why you knew he was--knew about this before the Muggles found out? You were watching him?"
"Someone was, not us. Not all the time." Harry took his arm from Seamus' shoulder and ran a hand through his hair. Still couldn't use a comb worth shit. "Not just Dean, either, but a lot of people who we either know for a fact had close contact with Death Eaters, or suspect."
A jolt went through Seamus as he realized what that had to mean. "That means me too, right? And Padma, and her sister? And every single person who was a student as Hogwarts that year." It had to mean that, because Hogwarts had been crawling with Death Eaters that year. "That... that's shit."
"Listen." Harry put a hand on each of his shoulders and turned him around to look him in the eyes. Seamus wondered if Lily Potter's eyes had ever looked so intense, so on the verge of obsession. "We have to do something. After the things that happened the first time, the people who joined Voldemort and no one ever knew, we have to do something. Understand?"
"Yeah," Seamus whispered. "Yeah, I understand." Peter Pettigrew would be who Harry meant. The guy's reputation had been trashed after his death in order to clear Sirius Black's name publicly. So yeah, he understood. "You've got to make sure none of us were tainted by Death Eater cooties, I get it. But Dean didn't go to Hogwarts that year. He ran, he never got caught. He told me himself he didn't get caught."
"So why did he suddenly go quiet?" Ron asked, voice subdued. He was different too, Seamus realized. Less excitable, maybe. More mature. Every inch the Auror, just like Harry. "Why did he drop off the face of the planet as far as so many of his friends were concerned? No one ever saw him except for maybe an hour once a year at the Hogwarts Memorial, and this year he wasn't there at all. That's why we checked. And why did he kill himself?"
Seamus stared at Ron over Harry's shoulder. He'd suspected suicide, but this was confirmation. "Okay, whatever, why did you call me? Why am I here?" Watching the two of them, Seamus couldn't believe they would call him just to tell him his best friend was dead, or want him there to give him a chance to say goodbye.
Again, Harry turned him about using his shoulders, and turned him back to face the paintings. "Like we said, you knew him better than anyone, and we have questions. Mostly about these. They're not just paintings, they have magic. Ron and I have tried every spell we know, but whatever messages may be there are for one person only."
"You think it's me?" Seamus stared at the wall above the paintings. "Why me? Just a best friend here, not a boyfriend or anything."
"Dean trusted you more than anyone," Harry said. "Look at them. Just look, tell us what you see. If you don't see anything, you can leave."
Even with that promise, Seamus couldn't bring himself to look for several moments, and when he finally did he let out a sigh. "There's nothing. It's just lines on canvas, just darkness and blood--" Words failed when he realized what he'd said, and that it was true. Like wizarding photos, the paintings began to move, become solid, to show more discernable shapes. Each showed a single horror among many. From painting to painting unfolded a story Dean had otherwise kept silent, imprinted here for Seamus' eyes only. He didn't know why. Perhaps he thought only Seamus would understand. "Oh fuck."
Seamus broke Harry's hold on him, unable to watch more. "Burn them. They've told what they had to tell, just fucking burn them, okay?"
"What did you see?" This time it was Ron who looked him in the eyes. At least Seamus could see concern there, instead of Harry's burning obsession. Apparently, only Seamus had seen the paintings move, and the full images.
"Listen, you were right, okay?" He looked from Ron to Harry, and back. "He did get caught, but he... it's not what you think. It was Dolohov, and... he didn't want anyone to know. This wasn't a confession, it was a suicide note. He wanted me to know why, and I don't fucking blame him." His eyes stung, but Seamus held back in front of these two Aurors who bore little resemblance to the boys he'd known and trusted in school. "Just trust me, there was no secret initiation. He wasn't a secret Death Eater. He wasn't under the Imperius Curse, he had no intentions of becoming the next Dark Lord. He'd been through hell, and he was hurting, and no one noticed."
Harry and Ron glanced at each other, and Seamus knew that if he refused to tell them the details, he could expect to be watched and possibly harassed by Aurors for years. Perhaps the rest of his life, if the compassion showing in Ron’s eyes couldn’t convince Harry otherwise.
With a deep breath, Seamus chose. "Can I go now?"
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Year Five
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Padma held his hand, her other perched on top of her rounded belly. It was supposed to be a boy, but Padma insisted it was a girl, and had gone so far as to paint the nursery yellow and pink. Some old Indian magic, she said, but Seamus could already see having to repaint the nursery.
He could sense the Aurors nearby, but he didn't acknowledge them. Doing so would only cause them to start asking questions he wouldn't answer. He had told only one person the answers to those questions, and she agreed without hesitation that he did the right thing, that sharing Dean's pain with anyone who wouldn't understand would be a violation of his trust. Seamus knew he loved her for a reason, but at that moment he couldn't imagine loving her more.
They stood in front of the memorial statue, watching the names scrolling in gold. Five years, and they were just as bright as always. Whoever the artist was had created a lasting piece of art. A shudder went through him as he thought of another collection of lasting art, one with a darker beauty but far less comfort. Padma squeezed his hand, sending him a glance. He smiled to ease the line between her eyebrows, but the chill didn't leave him completely. It never would; he dreamed sometimes about those paintings, and wondered if they had made a home in his mind. Had Dean dreamed like this, had he somehow transferred his nightmares to Seamus through the paintings? If so, had he meant to, or was it only a side effect?
"Seamus," Padma whispered, and nudged him. Her eyes were wide, hand extended to point at the statue's base. "Look."
A new name blazed across a blank area of stone, one that hadn't been there before. Dean Thomas. For a moment the new name burned brighter than any of the others, then it faded to match and then dimmed away completely.
He squeezed his wife's hand again, harder this time. This memorial counted the names of those fallen victim to the wizarding war driven by Voldemort. Dean counted as a victim of this conflict, of course he did, driven to suicide the way he'd been by memories of what one of Voldemort's followers did to him.
Seamus wondered at the identity of the memorial's artist for the first time.
"They're still watching," Padma murmured. "Come on, let's go to the feast. At least there we'll have our friends to talk to, and they won't be able to loom over us directly."
Nodding, Seamus followed, but her words struck him. Their friends. Except Dean. Dean would be missing from these feasts every year from now on and how much of that was Seamus' fault? Gripping Padma's hand, he tried not to allow the images of Dean's torture to go through his mind again, but he couldn't stop them. Merlin, he hadn't been a very good friend. He'd known something was wrong, known Dean wasn't himself, but hadn't bothered to try to go deeper. The first time Dean gave him the opportunity to find out, Seamus turned away, not wanting to see the paintings Dean showed him or the story underneath. This is my fault, really, he thought as Padma pulled him inside the Hogwarts castle.
Another voice, not his own but familiar anyway, drove without warning through his thoughts.
You love me, don't you?
Title: A Share of Darkness
AuthorArtist: celestineangel
Pairing(s)/Characters: Seamus Finnigan, Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Dean Thomas and the ghost of Antonin Dolohov... Seamus/Padma, Dolohov/Dean
Summary: The damage done when friends forget to be friends, when ghosts haunt, when pasts refuse to be the past, and when obsession takes hold.
Prompt: The weapons, that were once outside, sharpening themselves on war, are now indoors. - Margaret Atwood, "The circle game."
Rating: R-ish to NC-17 (though not due to sex)
Word Count: 4,745
Warnings: Government paranoia. Obsession of various kinds. The breaking of friendships, depression, guilt, angst. Light language.
Spoilers: Past non-con along with current conflicting feelings about it that could be very triggering, suicide.
Author/Artist's Notes: This was for hp_darkfest. HI I HAVE TOO MUCH FUN WRITING DARK!FIC. Also, I think I interpreted the prompt fairly liberally, but it's still there! Thanks to my wonderful beta, cymonie who not only betaed, but helped with the title!
A Share of Darkness
On the Hogwarts grounds there is a memorial. The statue is bland, unimpressive, depicting an elderly wizard overlooking a group of seven children at seven ages, all of whom have faces devoid of personality. The statue is not why this memorial is a revered place.
Around the statue's base scrolls a constantly changing list of names from two wars that were really one. They appear in golden light, scrawled by an unseen hand, and fade away slowly to be replaced by another. A person could watch the names appear and disappear all day and never see one repeated. These are the names of the fallen, written in stone and magic for all to remember the sacrifices that were made to keep freedom intact. More, to remember the choices that were made. Every name on the list is one who chose their path, or had their path chosen for them.
There are well known names there: James and Lily Potter, Albus Dumbledore, Alice and Frank Longbottom, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and Nymphadora Tonks-Lupin. These are some of the more venerated names; people come from countries all over the world for the opportunity to glimpse one of these names, especially the first three. Having seen them, the people go home feeling blessed.
There are other names, not so well known: Caradoc Dearborn, Edgar Bones, Benjy Fenwick, Dorcas Meadows, Marlene McKinnon, Bertha Jorkins, Charity Burbage. These names and more are known only by their friends, and family, historians, and the creator of this memorial. They were not the heroes whose names became synonymous with defeating dark magic, but all had played their part in events.
The memorial creator's name does not appear anywhere and is not known. He or she remains anonymous.
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Year One
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On the first year anniversary of Voldemort's death, people gathered to visit the Hogwarts grounds to watch as Kingsley Shacklebolt unveiled a memorial without a name. No one had been able to decide on a single wizard or witch's name to properly describe it, and the creator hadn't bothered. In the end it was left nameless, and called "the Hogwarts Memorial" by anyone who needed to reference it.
Seamus watched George Weasley stand in front of the base for hours, waiting for his brother's name to appear. Angelina stood with him, neither of them speaking. Others came and went whether or not they'd need a specific name, knowing they could always return, but George stood there until the sun went down. Finally, in the darkness, the name scrawled before his eyes in golden light. Fred Weasley. Satisfied, George took his girlfriend's hand and they walked away, up the hill and to the main castle where a feast took place in the Great Hall.
Term would begin in a week, so there were no children yet. Still, most of those in attendance were Hogwarts graduates, so the four House tables had been set out over the Great Hall floor as they would be during the school year. Seamus saw the tentative glances given from one table to another, until one former Hufflepuff rose to go to the Gryffindor table. Hannah Abbott; she sat next to Neville Longbottom and Ron Weasley, nodded briefly to Hermione, Harry and Ginny, but her eyes were on Neville.
With Hannah in the lead, others began to go to other tables, talk to people from other Houses. Seamus remembered how it had been in school; making friends in other Houses was encouraged, and happened often, but one's House was like family away from family, and in every important matter from punishment to Quidditch, one stuck with their House. For a moment it had seemed as though a year's separation had built walls between them, but Hannah's actions seemed to have renewed the old friendships.
"Seamus." Lee Jordan extended his hand to them. "Good to see you."
"You too," Seamus said as he grasped Lee's hand. "See you aren't with Angelina anymore." Lee and Angelina had flirted on and off for a while, even after she'd gone to the Yule Ball with Fred, and then dated a Ravenclaw boy for a time.
"Nah. She's with George now." Lee shrugged. "She says he needs her," he said, then moved on to greet the two in question while Seamus watched on.
George shook Lee's hand absently, and smiled in a way that seemed half-hearted at best. Lee gave him a look, then glanced at Angelina, who shrugged.
"Anyway," Lee finally said after another moment's hesitation, "almost everyone is here. Haven't seen Dean, yet, have either of you?"
"I saw him out near the memorial," offered Katie Bell, who had just entered. "He said he'd be with us in a second."
The rest of them sat, and Dean did join them, sitting quietly between Seamus and Padma Patil, who had come to sit with her sister, but after a while Parvati moved to the Hufflepuff table. Padma stayed to talk to the rest of the students she'd come to know as a member of Dumbledore's Army. She had a scar on her face from an incident during seventh year of which she would not speak, but no one asked, anyway. Many of them had scars from that year, physical and otherwise. Most of them did not want to talk about them.
Seamus noticed Dean didn't speak unless he was spoken to, but between catching up with other friends, answering questions about what he was doing with himself, and avoiding questions about his love life, somehow the time went by and Dean was gone before he could ask him anything. Later, he asked around and realized no one could remember actually holding a conversation with Dean.
Oh well, there will be time.
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Year Two
------------------------------
The second year, people simply began to arrive without plan, and the school's house elves had to start working overtime just to make enough food to feed them all. Those professors who lived full time at the school, including the Headmistress, realized they should expect this for a few years at least. Perhaps until the generations who had gone through both wars had completely died out, and perhaps even after. They would bring their children, after all.
------------------------------
Seamus took his time dialing Dean's home phone. It was good to have a wizarding friend who also knew how to use a telephone without extensive training and retraining and subsequent embarrassing moments. Their shared Muggle heritage made two best friends of boys who otherwise had little in common.
Dean had been difficult to reach lately. Phone calls were often left to the answering machine, and while Dean at least got back to him more times than not, conversations were short. Owls sometimes returned without response, but six months ago Seamus had visited Dean's place and managed to catch him in. Dean had shown him some paintings, dark, abstract and confused things Seamus hadn't liked much.
"Hello?" Dean's voice came through the line, muffled and groggy. Seamus wouldn't think anything of it if it hadn't been three in the afternoon.
"You all right there, Dean? Sounds like you've been knocked on your ass."
"Huh? Oh. Nngh. Bad night." On the other end of the line, sheets rustled against a moving body just loud enough for Seamus to hear.
"Guess so, if you're still in bed. Listen, I wanted to know if you want to come with me to Hogwarts tomorrow."
A pause, then a grunt. "Hogwarts tomorrow? Why?"
A really bad night from the sounds of things, if Dean couldn't even remember the date. Seamus frowned, tugging on the phone cord as he considered. "Yeah, you know. For the anniversary. Don't know if anyone else will be there but I feel it's right to go."
This time the silence on the line lasted several moments longer, until Seamus worried the connection had been cut. Just as he began to hang up, a sigh traveled through the plastic handset to his ear. "Yeah. I... I should go. You're right, it feels like the thing to do."
------------------------------
Seamus knelt so he was face-to-face with the scrolling list of names. Colin Creevy. Damn, the boy had been so young. Seamus hadn't known him well, but thinking about it made his eyes sting. If anyone during that time had been a true Gryffindor, it was Colin. Seamus stood, blinking, and looked around to see several other people standing to his left, including Ron and Ginny Weasley, along with Harry and Hermione. George Weasley stood with Angelina, their hands tightly entwined. Katie leaned over to tell him George and Angelina were married only two months ago.
To his right, on the other side of Katie, Dean stood staring through the memorial to something only he could see. Seamus was worried for his friend, who hadn't said more than five words at one time since arriving. Something was wrong, but Seamus couldn't make Dean talk to him. He didn't even know how to begin.
"Seamus!" Padma Patil waved at him. He smiled at her, remembering the conversation they'd had last year after her sister abandoned her. He was no Ravenclaw, but they found some common ground in discussions of Irish history, and he looked forward to more. "Come on, several people are heading to the Great Hall. Looks like there's going to be a feast again this year."
There was, and it was less awkward than the previous year's feast. People had kept in touch, and the blurring of House lines came easier. Seamus sat with Padma, Ernie Macmillan, several Ravenclaws, and even a quiet young Slytherin man whose name he had yet to learn. As their conversation weaved topics together in a tapestry of experiences, Ginny Potter sat down across from Padma with a frown settled firmly on her face.
"Dean's left," she said, looking straight at Seamus. "Something's bothering him, but Lavender stopped me before I could go talk to him myself. Has he told you anything?" Her eyes bored him, as though she expected him to be able to bare Dean's secrets to the world.
All he could do was shrug. "We don't talk much, sorry, Ginny. I've tried. We talk on the telephone sometimes, but never for long." He hoped Harry had explained the concept of telephones to his wife. "Owls aren't likely to get a response."
Ginny looked disturbed, and Seamus knew how it felt, but there wasn't much either of them could do; if Dean wanted to talk, he'd have talked.
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Year Three
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Hands reached for him from the dark, familiar and hated hands. They touched him all over his body, stripping him of clothing and dignity, tying his arms above him. This, he knew well. This position had been normal for a long time, and returning to it was like returning home, if home were a place of humiliation.
When done with his outer flesh, the hands moved lower, breaking through his legs and every defense until his body yielded to allow them inside. Arching, crying, he could feel the other man inside, turning all his corners and settling in for a long, long stay.
"My pretty boy," the other murmured from his place curled up inside. "Lovely, lovely boy. You remember me, yes? Oh, I know you do. You remember. You love me, don't you?"
No! his mind screamed No, no, I don't, I don't!
"Yes," came from his lips like water overflowing from a river. It was the only acceptable answer, no matter what his mind said, no matter what he felt; there were times, though, when his mind did not scream. Time when the words from his mouth sounded real. "Yes, I love you."
Inside him, he felt fingers stroking, lips kissing. He couldn't see anything, but it didn't matter. The darkness around him was empty because the other man was inside him, completely inside. They might as well have shared souls for how deep they were entwined. Disgusting to even think it, but as those fingers inside stroked again, he felt his care break apart and shatter away. A traitorous moan escaped him.
I hate you. I hate you, I hate you so much. So... much... I... love you.
Hatred marked itself in waves of pleasure. Love became known in the fire of pain. Pain made him sigh and shudder, pleasure made him cry and whimper. Pain and pleasure merged until he could no longer tell them apart.
"You see?" said the voice from deep within. "You belong to me now, and you always will. Even if I die, you will still be mine. You are still mine, aren't you? Even now. Even now."
All he could do was cry without words as his desire peaked, blotting out all thought.
------------------------------
The cry still sounded from his lips as he woke. Shaking, Dean stared at the ceiling, waiting for his heavy breathing to subside.
Antonin Dolohov was three years dead, but he lived in the twists of Dean's dreaming mind. Three and a half years ago, while Dean had been on the run from Death Eaters, he'd been caught, alone and vulnerable, by a single man behind a skull mask. The ensuing two months played over and over again at night, images and feelings Dean could not be free from.
As his shaking slowed, he sat up, fumbling for his wand. Once found, he turned on the lights with a flick of his wrist, needing the illumination, to flood his small apartment with as much light as possible. No one stirred in the bed next to him. He rarely shared his bed, and on those occasions he did, the guy never stayed until morning. Dean wouldn't let anyone stay; the nightmares were not something he wanted to explain. They didn't happen every night, but he didn't want to risk it.
On his way to the kitchen, he turned on every light he could, letting them chase the shadows to the darkest corners. He would not sleep again tonight.
In the kitchen, at the counter, he gave a glance to the knife rack he'd covered with a dish towel. He needed knives, sometimes he cooked and needed to cut something, but the sight of them could induce panic, even a blackout on nights like these. Even without seeing them directly; just knowing they were there made the scars on his shoulders burn. Dean shuddered, and turned away from them.
"My pretty boy, what if I make you not so pretty, eh?"
Once, a lover had asked about his scars. Dean wouldn't answer, and he never called that guy again. They were not something he could talk about. What could he say about them? How could he tell how at the end of two months he'd almost forgotten himself, that he had a mind of his own, and that he may or may not have actually loved the man who had scarred him? How could he tell anyone, let alone a man he barely knew, that he still could not be certain he didn't love Antonin?
His first stop at the refrigerator filled his empty stomach, and after that Dean went to the only place that brought him some comfort. In the corner of his living area, a small place sectioned off as a studio. There he created the paintings that helped supplement his income, and some he kept. All of them shared the same style. Seamus hadn't liked them much, or had been disturbed by them, but there were people out there who enjoyed the stark lines and dark colors interrupted by swathes of blood red. Sighing, Dean took up a brush and laid it to canvas. Strokes placed paint down in a configuration to match his nightmares, a kiss of violence and a slash of pleasure.
He painted through the rest of the night and through the morning until he collapsed, exhausted.
------------------------------
Year Four
------------------------------
The phone rang. Seamus ignored it, putting a pillow over his head. Damn it, he'd just settled in for the night, and it was already after midnight! The Hogwarts Anniversary Feast--which had fast become a tradition, especially among the young people of Harry's generation-- had gone long into the night thanks to the so far entirely adult attendance. People would bring their kids later on, when they had them and the kids were old enough, but the majority of those who came now didn't yet have children of a proper age to attend something both so morbid and so celebratory.
The phone stopped ringing, but only long enough for Padma to hand him the receiver. "Here, Seamus, take it, I don't know what to do with the thing!"
He finally relented when she poked him in the side. Harry's voice came from the earpiece, calling "Hello? Hello?" to the air. Harry? Why would Harry be calling, especially this late?
"Yeah? Harry? It's Seamus. What the bloody he--"
"I'm at Dean's place. He's dead, Seamus.”
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Dawn broke as Seamus landed in an alley near Dean's residence. This part of town reeked of garbage and unwashed people, and he'd never understood why Dean chose to live here. Then again, other than painting, he never knew what Dean did for a living. Maybe he couldn't afford to live anywhere else. How could you not know that?
Taking out his wand, he cast spells to hide his broom where he left it and himself as he left the alley. This was not a morning to be caught flying or with a wand by Muggles. He didn't even know why Harry wanted him here, or why Harry even knew before anyone else.
"Alohomora," he muttered at the door to Dean's building, and again at the door to his actual apartment. Waiting inside for him, Harry and Ron looked up from something they'd been studying on the floor. With a sigh, Seamus saw it was a painting, not Dean's body. The two Aurors stood, glancing at each other before they looked again at Seamus, who had begun to think there was something else going on other than the death of a good friend.
"Hey," Ron said with a wave, made short by the tension in his arm, in his whole body, really.
Harry moved to shake Seamus' hand, his green eyes shuttered. This really was not a pleasure visit, it was business, and Seamus could sense none of Harry's usual warmth. "Sorry about this, but we have some questions, and you were Dean's best friend. His only friend, from what we can tell."
"I guess. Tell you the truth, I haven't really talked to him much in the past few years. Since, you know, everything happened." A glance around the room, past Harry, told him nothing. Was Dean still here, or had he even died here? Or had Harry and Ron whisked his body away with their wands?
Harry saw, and put an arm around Seamus' shoulders. Harry tugged until Seamus had no choice but to follow in the direction Harry wanted him to go, which turned out to be the studio corner. There were several paintings there, still dark, still abstract, and still unnerving.
"Look, there's no way to be sensitive about this, so I'm just going to tell you." Harry sighed, a tired sound.
Ron took over the conversation from his place several steps back, near the kitchen entrance. "We've sort of suspected Dean had some contact with Death Eaters that year, while he was running. His behavior, you know, it was off ever since then. He just wasn't himself anymore, and someone doesn't change that much for no reason. Something had to have happened."
"I guess," Seamus replied slowly, giving Harry a glance mostly so he didn't have to look at the paintings. He didn't want to look at them. Something in them made him shudder, and feel like he couldn't breathe. "Is that why you knew he was--knew about this before the Muggles found out? You were watching him?"
"Someone was, not us. Not all the time." Harry took his arm from Seamus' shoulder and ran a hand through his hair. Still couldn't use a comb worth shit. "Not just Dean, either, but a lot of people who we either know for a fact had close contact with Death Eaters, or suspect."
A jolt went through Seamus as he realized what that had to mean. "That means me too, right? And Padma, and her sister? And every single person who was a student as Hogwarts that year." It had to mean that, because Hogwarts had been crawling with Death Eaters that year. "That... that's shit."
"Listen." Harry put a hand on each of his shoulders and turned him around to look him in the eyes. Seamus wondered if Lily Potter's eyes had ever looked so intense, so on the verge of obsession. "We have to do something. After the things that happened the first time, the people who joined Voldemort and no one ever knew, we have to do something. Understand?"
"Yeah," Seamus whispered. "Yeah, I understand." Peter Pettigrew would be who Harry meant. The guy's reputation had been trashed after his death in order to clear Sirius Black's name publicly. So yeah, he understood. "You've got to make sure none of us were tainted by Death Eater cooties, I get it. But Dean didn't go to Hogwarts that year. He ran, he never got caught. He told me himself he didn't get caught."
"So why did he suddenly go quiet?" Ron asked, voice subdued. He was different too, Seamus realized. Less excitable, maybe. More mature. Every inch the Auror, just like Harry. "Why did he drop off the face of the planet as far as so many of his friends were concerned? No one ever saw him except for maybe an hour once a year at the Hogwarts Memorial, and this year he wasn't there at all. That's why we checked. And why did he kill himself?"
Seamus stared at Ron over Harry's shoulder. He'd suspected suicide, but this was confirmation. "Okay, whatever, why did you call me? Why am I here?" Watching the two of them, Seamus couldn't believe they would call him just to tell him his best friend was dead, or want him there to give him a chance to say goodbye.
Again, Harry turned him about using his shoulders, and turned him back to face the paintings. "Like we said, you knew him better than anyone, and we have questions. Mostly about these. They're not just paintings, they have magic. Ron and I have tried every spell we know, but whatever messages may be there are for one person only."
"You think it's me?" Seamus stared at the wall above the paintings. "Why me? Just a best friend here, not a boyfriend or anything."
"Dean trusted you more than anyone," Harry said. "Look at them. Just look, tell us what you see. If you don't see anything, you can leave."
Even with that promise, Seamus couldn't bring himself to look for several moments, and when he finally did he let out a sigh. "There's nothing. It's just lines on canvas, just darkness and blood--" Words failed when he realized what he'd said, and that it was true. Like wizarding photos, the paintings began to move, become solid, to show more discernable shapes. Each showed a single horror among many. From painting to painting unfolded a story Dean had otherwise kept silent, imprinted here for Seamus' eyes only. He didn't know why. Perhaps he thought only Seamus would understand. "Oh fuck."
Seamus broke Harry's hold on him, unable to watch more. "Burn them. They've told what they had to tell, just fucking burn them, okay?"
"What did you see?" This time it was Ron who looked him in the eyes. At least Seamus could see concern there, instead of Harry's burning obsession. Apparently, only Seamus had seen the paintings move, and the full images.
"Listen, you were right, okay?" He looked from Ron to Harry, and back. "He did get caught, but he... it's not what you think. It was Dolohov, and... he didn't want anyone to know. This wasn't a confession, it was a suicide note. He wanted me to know why, and I don't fucking blame him." His eyes stung, but Seamus held back in front of these two Aurors who bore little resemblance to the boys he'd known and trusted in school. "Just trust me, there was no secret initiation. He wasn't a secret Death Eater. He wasn't under the Imperius Curse, he had no intentions of becoming the next Dark Lord. He'd been through hell, and he was hurting, and no one noticed."
Harry and Ron glanced at each other, and Seamus knew that if he refused to tell them the details, he could expect to be watched and possibly harassed by Aurors for years. Perhaps the rest of his life, if the compassion showing in Ron’s eyes couldn’t convince Harry otherwise.
With a deep breath, Seamus chose. "Can I go now?"
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Year Five
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Padma held his hand, her other perched on top of her rounded belly. It was supposed to be a boy, but Padma insisted it was a girl, and had gone so far as to paint the nursery yellow and pink. Some old Indian magic, she said, but Seamus could already see having to repaint the nursery.
He could sense the Aurors nearby, but he didn't acknowledge them. Doing so would only cause them to start asking questions he wouldn't answer. He had told only one person the answers to those questions, and she agreed without hesitation that he did the right thing, that sharing Dean's pain with anyone who wouldn't understand would be a violation of his trust. Seamus knew he loved her for a reason, but at that moment he couldn't imagine loving her more.
They stood in front of the memorial statue, watching the names scrolling in gold. Five years, and they were just as bright as always. Whoever the artist was had created a lasting piece of art. A shudder went through him as he thought of another collection of lasting art, one with a darker beauty but far less comfort. Padma squeezed his hand, sending him a glance. He smiled to ease the line between her eyebrows, but the chill didn't leave him completely. It never would; he dreamed sometimes about those paintings, and wondered if they had made a home in his mind. Had Dean dreamed like this, had he somehow transferred his nightmares to Seamus through the paintings? If so, had he meant to, or was it only a side effect?
"Seamus," Padma whispered, and nudged him. Her eyes were wide, hand extended to point at the statue's base. "Look."
A new name blazed across a blank area of stone, one that hadn't been there before. Dean Thomas. For a moment the new name burned brighter than any of the others, then it faded to match and then dimmed away completely.
He squeezed his wife's hand again, harder this time. This memorial counted the names of those fallen victim to the wizarding war driven by Voldemort. Dean counted as a victim of this conflict, of course he did, driven to suicide the way he'd been by memories of what one of Voldemort's followers did to him.
Seamus wondered at the identity of the memorial's artist for the first time.
"They're still watching," Padma murmured. "Come on, let's go to the feast. At least there we'll have our friends to talk to, and they won't be able to loom over us directly."
Nodding, Seamus followed, but her words struck him. Their friends. Except Dean. Dean would be missing from these feasts every year from now on and how much of that was Seamus' fault? Gripping Padma's hand, he tried not to allow the images of Dean's torture to go through his mind again, but he couldn't stop them. Merlin, he hadn't been a very good friend. He'd known something was wrong, known Dean wasn't himself, but hadn't bothered to try to go deeper. The first time Dean gave him the opportunity to find out, Seamus turned away, not wanting to see the paintings Dean showed him or the story underneath. This is my fault, really, he thought as Padma pulled him inside the Hogwarts castle.
Another voice, not his own but familiar anyway, drove without warning through his thoughts.
You love me, don't you?