All That Must Be Said, Charity Burbage, R
Title: All That Must Be Said
Author: shiiki
Fandom: Harry Potter
Rating: R
Warnings: Mention of possibly disturbing violence (therefore the R-rating).
Prompt: #80: I am, was, and always will be a catalyst for change. -Shirley Chisholm. Not used, except perhaps (very slightly, almost not at all) thematically.
Summary: ‘Last week Professor Burbage wrote an impassioned defence of Mudbloods in the Daily Prophet.’ (Deathly Hallows Chapter 1, pg17 UK version.) In a dangerous political climate, she still tried to bring about change. This is the story of Charity Burbage.
Notes: msmoocow deserves an enormous platter of cookies for her encouragement, reassurance, and taming of my wayward parentheses! Thanks also to kp_mushu, for all the discussion about Charity and her capture!
Anything recognisable belongs to the awesome JK Rowling. The dialogue by Voldemort at the end is quoted from chapter 1 of Deathly Hallows.
The role of a writer is not to say what we all can say, but what we are unable to say.
--Anaïs Nin
Her hands tremble as she ties the letter to the leg of the post owl. She tries to steady them, to instil bravery in herself, but it is all she can do not to snatch the letter back and rip it up into a million pieces.
At last, when the letter is securely tied and the owl on its way out of the window, Charity Burbage sinks into her seat, knowing that there’s no turning back now.
She would not be safe anyway, she reminds herself. As Muggle Studies teacher at Hogwarts, she is already a target, a blood traitor. This article, if published, can only cement her status as a marked woman. There is no place that will be safe for her, not even Hogwarts - perhaps especially not Hogwarts, when Albus Dumbledore himself was murdered there less than a week ago.
Her whole body is shaking now. She thinks of Dumbledore’s broken body lying at the foot of the Astronomy Tower and cannot repress her shudders. Dumbledore, the only wizard You-Know-Who ever feared. Champion and protector of their fellow non-magical humans. Dumbledore would have approved of her article. Dumbledore, who once recommended her to the Daily Prophet, long ago before her dream to write there soured.
It strikes her that if her editorial is published, she will have achieved her childhood dream of writing for the Prophet. The irony of it is not lost on her.
Be careful what you wish for, she thinks. It might just come true.
---
Charity loved Hogwarts. Although she was only a mediocre student, she enjoyed lessons. She had, however, no idea what she wanted to do after leaving school.
‘I wish I didn’t have to leave,’ she told Professor Sprout during her Careers Advice session. ‘I don’t know what I’ll do.’
Professor Sprout considered her very seriously. ‘You write a lot,’ she said at last. ‘You enjoy it?’
Charity thought of the countless letters she had written home over the years - not only to her parents, but also Muggle friends with whom she had never lost contact. It was against the norm for wizarding children to go to Muggle school, but Charity had always been well-behaved and reasonably well-controlled when it came to accidental magic. Her parents, keen that she should be brought up to embrace both cultures, deemed it appropriate that she attend the local primary school. When she left for Hogwarts, she continued to write to her Muggle friends - she could not, of course, divulge the secrets of magic, but she spun tales in her letters, weaving her life into fiction. It was not, she decided, a breach of the Statute of Secrecy if she pretended it wasn’t real.
She mentioned none of this to Professor Sprout, however, simply saying, ‘Yes.’
‘And your essays are always, in general, well-written,’ Professor Sprout continued thoughtfully. ‘Charity, have you ever considered a career in journalism?’
Charity could scarcely believe her ears. She, write for the papers? The Daily Prophet?
‘M-me?’ she stammered. ‘A journalist?’
‘Why not?’ said Professor Sprout. ‘Your teachers may not be literary critics, but we have noticed that your writing possesses a distinctly interesting style. Especially -’ she extracted a sheet of parchment from the stack in front of her ‘- History of Magic.’ Charity recognised her handwriting on the essay and fought to keep from blushing. She had taken to injecting her History essays with some humour, or attempting a satirical style. Professor Binns, after all, seemed unlikely to pay much attention to the choice of words surrounding the facts, given his attitude during lessons.
Evidently, she was wrong. But that turned out not to be a bad thing.
‘… Highly amusing,’ Professor Sprout was saying. ‘And you’ve undoubtedly grasped the facts. A very useful talent in reporting.’
Two years later, Charity left Hogwarts with four N.E.W.T.s and glowing references about her writing skills from Professors Sprout and Binns, and - to her great surprise - Headmaster Dumbledore.
The Daily Prophet signed her on immediately. And then Charity learnt for herself the harsh truth: she might be cut out to write for the papers, but she was not made to survive there. In a cut-throat world where parasites like Rita Skeeter thrived, there was no place for shy, sensitive Charity Burbage. So what if she could spin interesting articles from dry, bare facts? She was expected to discover those facts first, and Charity had not the ruthlessness to dig where she was not wanted, nor the dishonesty to report the false, discrediting tales that other Prophet journalists lapped up. Within a month, she quit, relinquishing her dream of writing for the paper.
---
Her editorial doesn’t appear in the next day’s Prophet, or the subsequent issue. When a week passes and she has scoured every single page each day in vain, Charity isn’t sure whether she should feel disappointed that the Prophet has disregarded her work, or relieved that no extra Death Eater attention is being drawn to her. She tucks the day’s paper under her arm as she fumbles in her pocket for the keys to her flat.
It is when she slides her key into the lock that she realises something is wrong. The door has already been unlocked, and judging from the unturned state of the lock, it hasn’t been done by key.
Before she can properly absorb this, her door opens from inside. To her bemusement, her elderly Muggle neighbour is standing in the doorway, staring at her blankly. He steps back to let her in, and she instinctively follows, asking, ‘Mr Simons, what’s happen-’
The door slams mid-sentence.
‘Professor Burbage,’ says a sneering voice, and Charity freezes, her inside turning to ice as she looks up to see a face that has haunted her nightmares since appearing in the Daily Prophet two years ago.
With a flick of his wand, hers flies out of her robes, gone before it can even be drawn. Charity takes a step back, her heart pounding in her chest. As Dolohov grins, she knows that this time, there’s no escape.
---
After she left the Prophet, Charity had simply no idea what to do. She managed to find odd jobs in Diagon Alley - as a salesgirl in Flourish and Blotts; waitressing in the Leaky Cauldron - but none of these gave her any satisfaction.
Fortunately, Charity still maintained contact with several Muggle friends, one of whom spoke glowingly of her university courses.
The wizarding world, Charity mused, ought to have institutes for further magical studies.
And then the idea came to her: just because university was not an option in the wizarding world, it didn’t mean that venue was closed to her.
The speed at which her decision was made scared her a little. Yet she knew instinctively that it was the right choice. With her N.E.W.T. results transfigured into an A levels certificate, she submitted her application to the Arts faculty of the University of Leeds. She was happy to find that she had been right; she thoroughly enjoyed her course, and the temporary jobs she held in her spare hours became much more bearable. Her mood greatly improved with compliments from her classmates and professors: ‘I read your Modern History essay, Charity, it was amazing!’; ‘Excellent work, Miss Burbage, you’ve really understood the underlying meanings in this play.’
Slowly, she became more and more entrenched in the Muggle world. The first war against He Who Must Not Be Named escalated throughout her time at university. Her parents, in the thick of it due to their jobs at St Mungo’s and the Ministry, were killed early on. After their funerals, Charity quit her jobs in the wizarding world and retreated from it.
It was easier than she imagined; with her parents gone, she had few links to the wizarding world left, as her friends from school had either fled the country, gone into hiding, or were keeping their heads down and not contacting anyone outside their immediate family. When people were disappearing without reason left and right all over the country, hardly anyone cared about one more gone.
Galleons being a great deal stronger than Muggle currency, her inheritance was more than enough for her to survive without a steady source of income. And when she needed a little extra, work as a teaching assistant gave her more pleasure than bar-tending or making sales pitches ever had.
Most importantly, she thought, she was safe in a world where the greatest worry was passing exams and political discussion centred on Margaret Thatcher’s election to prime minister.
The bubble of security she had grown around herself was burst the day she graduated. Halfway through convocation, there was an explosion.
It was pandemonium, as everyone present screamed and rushed for the exits, believing it was the notorious Irish Republican Army mounting a terrorist attack. Charity knew better; IRA activists wouldn’t wear robes with their masks. No, there was no doubt that these were Death Eaters.
They sealed the exits with easy flicks of their wands and proceeded to commit atrocities the like of which Charity had never before experienced. The Muggles who had died in the first blast or by a random Avada Kedavra were the lucky ones. Those who remained were subjected to Cruciatus - in no time at all, the air was full of tortured screams - or worse. Charity watched as friends were felled left and right: choked by an Asphyxiation Curse; insides sliced open with spells she had never even dreamed existed; bled dry by yet more horrifying jinxes.
There was nothing she could do. She must have attempted Finite Incantatem a million times, but it seemed that short of the precise counter-curse, which she knew not, nothing worked.
And the Death Eaters were laughing. Laughing, as though it was all a joke. One of them had removed his mask, evidently believing that no witnesses would be left alive to identify him. His face, twisted in its cruelty, turned towards Charity as she vomited in a corner, her stomach finally rebelling.
‘And what shall I do to you, lovely?’ he sneered, tapping his wand against his palm. ‘Do you prefer disfiguration, dismembering, or shall I just take my pick?’
As he advanced upon her, Charity reached for her wand, having dropped it a minute ago to be sick. The Death Eater advanced on her, taking his time. Obviously, he assumed she was a Muggle, with no means of escape.
She forced her mind to concentrate. Her last view of the auditorium included the Death Eater’s shocked face as he raised his wand in a belated attempt to stop her Disapparition.
---
There is one other person being held with her. She can hear him moaning, dry coughs escaping from his throat periodically. Fumbling in the darkness, she crawls towards the sound.
‘Who’s there?’ His voice is frail and weak, barely more than a croak.
‘Charity Burbage,’ she whispers back.
‘Ch-charity Burbage,’ he repeats, and then there is silence, punctuated only by low, rasping breathing. Finally, the man speaks again.
‘Elm … and … ph-phoenix feather, twelve inches.’
And she knows who she has been shut up with: the most celebrated wandmaker in the British Isles, a man declared missing for a year. The thought brings her despair - will she be trapped here for as long - or longer? Or will she even live that long?
‘Why have they captured you?’ Ollivander rasps.
‘I don’t know,’ says Charity, and then she is crying, sobbing into her hands like a small child.
All too soon, however, she discovers the reason for her capture. She is hauled up the stairs by a squat man who thrusts quill and parchment into her hands.
‘Sign it,’ he orders, in a wheezy voice.
Her eyes travel quickly across the words on the parchment.
It’s a resignation letter.
They want her to resign from her post as Muggle Studies teacher.
What will happen to the class then? Will it simply disappear - who would dare take on the post now? Her thoughts turn to her predecessor, Professor Hitchens, who stayed with her post well into old age, determined not to leave until she found a suitable substitute.
Her voice is unsteady, but she manages to ask, ‘And what if I don’t?’
‘Then we’ll kill you, won’t we?’
Images that have haunted her for decades now - gory, painful murders, the agony of Cruciatus - flicker through her mind. She turns the quill over in her shaking hands.
‘Sign it!’ barks the wheezy Death Eater. ‘Or Greyback will be happy to have you, I’m sure,’ he threatens, and her heart nearly stops. Fenrir Greyback. She saw what happened to Bill Weasley.
It takes incredible effort to steady her hands enough to sign her name. She hates herself for doing it, but she reasons that if she doesn’t, they’ll just kill her to vacate her post. She doesn’t want to die.
Still, she weeps as she is thrown back into the cellar. Forgive me, she thinks, hoping that old Professor Hitchens happens not to be watching from above.
---
She Splinched in her attempt to Apparate without a fully-formed destination. Her mind fixed solely on getting to somewhere she would be safe, she squeezed through that horrible, compressing nothingness and felt her feet touch ground.
Then - pain, searing through her left side. She hobbled her way to the wall of the nearest building and sank against it, trying to staunch her bleeding, but her legs were drenched in the wet, sticky redness and she couldn’t seem to find the source of all her blood, and her head was swimming.
From a great distance away, she heard voices. She could not tell if they were friend or foe, but her hand was too weak to raise her wand anyway …
'Expecto Patronum!' was the last thing she heard before darkness enveloped her.
Later on, when she finally regained sufficient consciousness to realise that she was in the hospital wing at Hogwarts, they told her she had lost so much blood by the time she reached the infirmary that she was completely delirious. Charity recalled snippets of nightmares - running through the night, the twisted, leering face of the Death Eater chasing after her.
‘How did I get here?’ she asked Madam Pomfrey.
‘You ended up in Hogsmeade - horrible Splinching, dear, whatever were you thinking? One of the villagers sent word to Professor Dumbledore, and he fetched you here himself right away.’
Dumbledore himself came to see her several days later. Forestalling her thanks by holding up his hand, he said urgently, ‘Miss Burbage, I’m sorry to trouble you, but I need to know the circumstances that led to your hurried Apparition to Hogsmeade.’
It was difficult to push back the panic that rose in her again as she recalled the events of her nightmare graduation. She did her best to recount them for Dumbledore, painful as it was to remember, and then she broke down right at the end, seeing the Death Eater’s face swimming before her again.
When she had dried her eyes on the sheets and composed herself again, Dumbledore was holding several photographs out to her.
‘Would you be able to identify the wizard you saw?’ he asked.
Trembling, she took the photographs. She didn’t need to say anything. The picture, captioned Antonin Dolohov, slipped from her fingers the moment she set eyes on it. Her recoil was enough for Dumbledore to understand.
‘Thank you, Miss Burbage,’ he said, taking back the pictures. ‘You have been of great assistance. I’m sorry to leave now, but much is at stake here.’
She buried her face in her hands when he left, her whole body shaking as she tried to erase from memory the images of Dolohov, his brutal murders, and the paralysing fear she had felt when she knew she was next. It was a while before she realised that she was not alone in the room. A white-haired witch with startling green eyes was sitting by her bed, watching her.
‘Wipe your eyes, child,’ said the witch. ‘You have suffered, but you must be strong.’
Charity accepted the handkerchief offered to her. ‘Who are you?’
‘Professor Hitchens. I daresay you will not know me, since you were never in any of my classes.’
‘What -?’ began Charity.
‘Muggle Studies. I confess myself very curious, Charity. You are pure-blood, and you were never a student of mine, yet you are the only Hogwarts student in my knowledge to attend a Muggle university after leaving school. It’s a very interesting decision. What prompted it?’
Charity told her about her failure at the Prophet, and the idea that had taken root shortly after she’d met with her Muggle friends. Professor Hitchens listened, nodding frequently.
‘And what do you plan to do with your degree in English Literature, now that you have it?’
‘I … I don’t know. I thought I might like to teach … in a Muggle school, maybe. I had an offer … but I thought it’d be safe! I thought if I just didn’t get involved with the war …’
Professor Hitchens sighed. ‘We are all involved, whether we like it or not.’ For a moment, she seemed lost in thought, then she shook herself. ‘I wanted to ask you, Charity, if you would consider becoming my assistant.’
‘Your …’ Stunned, Charity could only gape at Professor Hitchens. But she was already getting up to leave.
‘Think about it.’
Charity agreed, because as assistant to the Muggle Studies teacher, she could stay at Hogwarts, where it was safe. At first, the offer puzzled her. Muggle Studies was not a popular choice, especially not in the current political climate. Surely Professor Hitchens needed no extra help? But she didn’t complain, because aside from the sense of security the job gave her, Charity was warming to teaching.
As a girl, she had learnt the lessons of equality at her mother’s knee; now, she had the chance to teach others to accept their non-magical kin, the way she always had. She was able to put her university-gained knowledge to use, as Professor Hitchens encouraged her to engage the students, few though they were, in discussion about Muggle literature, believing it to be a useful understanding of the Muggle world. It turned out to be a popular lesson among them, and it delighted her when she had her fifth-years coming to her with questions on Dickens and Twain.
The war ended at last, You-Know-Who defeated by little Harry Potter, and Antonin Dolohov was apprehended and sent to Azkaban. Charity felt a huge sense of relief - she could venture out into the world without fear again, if she wished.
But she chose to stay at Hogwarts. Professor Hitchens was retiring, and she had promised to recommend Charity as her successor for the job.
‘Thank you,’ said Charity, when Professor Hitchens told her. ‘Not just for recommending me - you helped to keep me safe all this while, and given me so much …’
‘I’m a hundred and six,’ said Professor Hitchens. ‘I should have gone a long time ago, but I didn’t want to go until I could be sure someone would come along who would do the job properly. Who would understand that Muggles aren’t just a fascinating breed of creature to study, but instil in students the idea that we are all equals. You’re doing me a favour just as much as I’ve done you one, Charity.’
---
Her time in the cellar blends into a never-ending day of stale darkness. Ollivander is hauled out several times, returning in a broken state, and Charity tends to him as best as she can without wand or magic. He is tortured - physically, but also mentally - by the fact that he has given away information under duress.
‘It’s not your fault,’ she whispers, but she’s trying to convince herself as well. ‘They’d’ve killed you otherwise.’
Her turn finally arrives one day - she isn’t sure how long it’s been since she was last dragged out of the cellar. Rough hands push her up the stairs, hitting her when she stumbles in the darkness. She is thrust into an elaborately-decorated room, where a fire burns in the hearth. After such a long time in the dark, even the dim firelight is blinding. It takes a while for her eyes to adjust, and when they do, she wishes they hadn’t.
You-Know-Who himself is seated before her, observing her through terrifying red eyes, slitted like the ones of the enormous snake by his feet. Charity cannot help the whimper that escapes her.
‘Charity Burbage,’ says You-Know-Who, his voice silky and thoughtful. He twirls his wand in a long-fingered hand; the other holds a folded newspaper. ‘You are, I believe, pure-blood.’
She is too frightened to let out anything more than a squeak. You-Know-Who does not seem to expect an answer, however, because he continues as though she hadn’t made a sound.
‘And yet, you persist in advocating the polluting of magical blood, the infecting of our world with one which is diseased.’ His voice is loathing, full of disgust. ‘Rowle,’ he says, addressing the Death Eater who brought her in. The spell hits her in the back and she falls forward into nothingness.
It was not a Killing Curse, because she awakens, her head heavy. She is upside down, and it feels as though ropes are holding her there, although she can see no bindings. Struggling, she strains at the enchantments, to no avail.
‘… our guest, Severus?’ The high, cold voice of You-Know-Who penetrates her consciousness, and she realises that she is revolving, upside down, in the centre of a room full of Death Eaters. She catches sight of a familiar hooked nose and pale face, and in her terror, it is a plea for help that escapes her lips.
He barely acknowledges her. ‘Ah, yes,’ he says, in response to You-Know-Who, his face impassive. But he has recognised her. Charity hopes he will say something - anything - to save her.
You-Know-Who and his Death Eaters taunt her now. They hiss and cackle as he speaks of her job as Muggle Studies teacher. The slow turn brings her round to face Snape again; he remains expressionless, one of the few Death Eaters who do not jeer or laugh at her pitiful state. This gives her hope.
‘Severus … please … please …’ She begs him to show some compassion.
But then she is silenced, You-Know-Who taking her voice with a lazy flick of his wand.
‘Not content with corrupting and polluting the minds of wizarding children, last week Professor Burbage wrote an impassioned defence of Mudbloods in the Daily Prophet,' ’ he says, fury in his voice.
So the article was published. Fear grips her stronger than ever now. Tears pour out of her eyes, falling absurdly to her forehead, into her hair.
‘Wizards, she says,’ You-Know-Who continues, ‘must accept those thieves of their knowledge and magic. The dwindling of the purebloods is, says Professor Burbage, a most desirable circumstance . . . She would have us all mate with Muggles … or, no doubt, werewolves …’
For a third time, she faces Snape again, and her eyes are pierced by his cold, black ones. She wants to beg again, but already she has the sinking feeling that even if she had her voice, it would be no use; there is not a glimmer of emotion in those eyes.
She is moments from death, and she has never been more frightened.
---
The end was quicker than she had imagined. Two words, a jet of light she didn’t even see, and all was gone.
---
She flies through the past, watching it reel like a Muggle film. She sees herself as a girl, telling stories of dragons and fairies to an entranced group of Muggle friends. As a teen on a date with Arthur Weasley, amused and disconcerted by his never-ending talk about ‘eckeltricity’. She watches herself studying at the University of Leeds, raising her hand in class to talk about the concept of magic in Muggle fiction.
Then she is face-down on a stage, her nose brushing velvet. Charity pushes herself to her feet and recognises the auditorium of her old university - exactly as it looked the day she graduated, before Dolohov and the Death Eaters threw it into disarray and destroyed it forever. Alone, she walks across the stage, unsure why or where she will be when she reaches the end. With every step she takes, she feels surer of herself. Fear, worry, guilt - all is washed away, replaced with confidence, hope, and love.
It is no surprise that at the other end of the stage, when she arrives there, the welcoming arms of her parents and Professor Hitchens are waiting for her. She steps into them, safe at last.
--Fin--
Author: shiiki
Fandom: Harry Potter
Rating: R
Warnings: Mention of possibly disturbing violence (therefore the R-rating).
Prompt: #80: I am, was, and always will be a catalyst for change. -Shirley Chisholm. Not used, except perhaps (very slightly, almost not at all) thematically.
Summary: ‘Last week Professor Burbage wrote an impassioned defence of Mudbloods in the Daily Prophet.’ (Deathly Hallows Chapter 1, pg17 UK version.) In a dangerous political climate, she still tried to bring about change. This is the story of Charity Burbage.
Notes: msmoocow deserves an enormous platter of cookies for her encouragement, reassurance, and taming of my wayward parentheses! Thanks also to kp_mushu, for all the discussion about Charity and her capture!
Anything recognisable belongs to the awesome JK Rowling. The dialogue by Voldemort at the end is quoted from chapter 1 of Deathly Hallows.
The role of a writer is not to say what we all can say, but what we are unable to say.
--Anaïs Nin
Her hands tremble as she ties the letter to the leg of the post owl. She tries to steady them, to instil bravery in herself, but it is all she can do not to snatch the letter back and rip it up into a million pieces.
At last, when the letter is securely tied and the owl on its way out of the window, Charity Burbage sinks into her seat, knowing that there’s no turning back now.
She would not be safe anyway, she reminds herself. As Muggle Studies teacher at Hogwarts, she is already a target, a blood traitor. This article, if published, can only cement her status as a marked woman. There is no place that will be safe for her, not even Hogwarts - perhaps especially not Hogwarts, when Albus Dumbledore himself was murdered there less than a week ago.
Her whole body is shaking now. She thinks of Dumbledore’s broken body lying at the foot of the Astronomy Tower and cannot repress her shudders. Dumbledore, the only wizard You-Know-Who ever feared. Champion and protector of their fellow non-magical humans. Dumbledore would have approved of her article. Dumbledore, who once recommended her to the Daily Prophet, long ago before her dream to write there soured.
It strikes her that if her editorial is published, she will have achieved her childhood dream of writing for the Prophet. The irony of it is not lost on her.
Be careful what you wish for, she thinks. It might just come true.
---
Charity loved Hogwarts. Although she was only a mediocre student, she enjoyed lessons. She had, however, no idea what she wanted to do after leaving school.
‘I wish I didn’t have to leave,’ she told Professor Sprout during her Careers Advice session. ‘I don’t know what I’ll do.’
Professor Sprout considered her very seriously. ‘You write a lot,’ she said at last. ‘You enjoy it?’
Charity thought of the countless letters she had written home over the years - not only to her parents, but also Muggle friends with whom she had never lost contact. It was against the norm for wizarding children to go to Muggle school, but Charity had always been well-behaved and reasonably well-controlled when it came to accidental magic. Her parents, keen that she should be brought up to embrace both cultures, deemed it appropriate that she attend the local primary school. When she left for Hogwarts, she continued to write to her Muggle friends - she could not, of course, divulge the secrets of magic, but she spun tales in her letters, weaving her life into fiction. It was not, she decided, a breach of the Statute of Secrecy if she pretended it wasn’t real.
She mentioned none of this to Professor Sprout, however, simply saying, ‘Yes.’
‘And your essays are always, in general, well-written,’ Professor Sprout continued thoughtfully. ‘Charity, have you ever considered a career in journalism?’
Charity could scarcely believe her ears. She, write for the papers? The Daily Prophet?
‘M-me?’ she stammered. ‘A journalist?’
‘Why not?’ said Professor Sprout. ‘Your teachers may not be literary critics, but we have noticed that your writing possesses a distinctly interesting style. Especially -’ she extracted a sheet of parchment from the stack in front of her ‘- History of Magic.’ Charity recognised her handwriting on the essay and fought to keep from blushing. She had taken to injecting her History essays with some humour, or attempting a satirical style. Professor Binns, after all, seemed unlikely to pay much attention to the choice of words surrounding the facts, given his attitude during lessons.
Evidently, she was wrong. But that turned out not to be a bad thing.
‘… Highly amusing,’ Professor Sprout was saying. ‘And you’ve undoubtedly grasped the facts. A very useful talent in reporting.’
Two years later, Charity left Hogwarts with four N.E.W.T.s and glowing references about her writing skills from Professors Sprout and Binns, and - to her great surprise - Headmaster Dumbledore.
The Daily Prophet signed her on immediately. And then Charity learnt for herself the harsh truth: she might be cut out to write for the papers, but she was not made to survive there. In a cut-throat world where parasites like Rita Skeeter thrived, there was no place for shy, sensitive Charity Burbage. So what if she could spin interesting articles from dry, bare facts? She was expected to discover those facts first, and Charity had not the ruthlessness to dig where she was not wanted, nor the dishonesty to report the false, discrediting tales that other Prophet journalists lapped up. Within a month, she quit, relinquishing her dream of writing for the paper.
---
Her editorial doesn’t appear in the next day’s Prophet, or the subsequent issue. When a week passes and she has scoured every single page each day in vain, Charity isn’t sure whether she should feel disappointed that the Prophet has disregarded her work, or relieved that no extra Death Eater attention is being drawn to her. She tucks the day’s paper under her arm as she fumbles in her pocket for the keys to her flat.
It is when she slides her key into the lock that she realises something is wrong. The door has already been unlocked, and judging from the unturned state of the lock, it hasn’t been done by key.
Before she can properly absorb this, her door opens from inside. To her bemusement, her elderly Muggle neighbour is standing in the doorway, staring at her blankly. He steps back to let her in, and she instinctively follows, asking, ‘Mr Simons, what’s happen-’
The door slams mid-sentence.
‘Professor Burbage,’ says a sneering voice, and Charity freezes, her inside turning to ice as she looks up to see a face that has haunted her nightmares since appearing in the Daily Prophet two years ago.
With a flick of his wand, hers flies out of her robes, gone before it can even be drawn. Charity takes a step back, her heart pounding in her chest. As Dolohov grins, she knows that this time, there’s no escape.
---
After she left the Prophet, Charity had simply no idea what to do. She managed to find odd jobs in Diagon Alley - as a salesgirl in Flourish and Blotts; waitressing in the Leaky Cauldron - but none of these gave her any satisfaction.
Fortunately, Charity still maintained contact with several Muggle friends, one of whom spoke glowingly of her university courses.
The wizarding world, Charity mused, ought to have institutes for further magical studies.
And then the idea came to her: just because university was not an option in the wizarding world, it didn’t mean that venue was closed to her.
The speed at which her decision was made scared her a little. Yet she knew instinctively that it was the right choice. With her N.E.W.T. results transfigured into an A levels certificate, she submitted her application to the Arts faculty of the University of Leeds. She was happy to find that she had been right; she thoroughly enjoyed her course, and the temporary jobs she held in her spare hours became much more bearable. Her mood greatly improved with compliments from her classmates and professors: ‘I read your Modern History essay, Charity, it was amazing!’; ‘Excellent work, Miss Burbage, you’ve really understood the underlying meanings in this play.’
Slowly, she became more and more entrenched in the Muggle world. The first war against He Who Must Not Be Named escalated throughout her time at university. Her parents, in the thick of it due to their jobs at St Mungo’s and the Ministry, were killed early on. After their funerals, Charity quit her jobs in the wizarding world and retreated from it.
It was easier than she imagined; with her parents gone, she had few links to the wizarding world left, as her friends from school had either fled the country, gone into hiding, or were keeping their heads down and not contacting anyone outside their immediate family. When people were disappearing without reason left and right all over the country, hardly anyone cared about one more gone.
Galleons being a great deal stronger than Muggle currency, her inheritance was more than enough for her to survive without a steady source of income. And when she needed a little extra, work as a teaching assistant gave her more pleasure than bar-tending or making sales pitches ever had.
Most importantly, she thought, she was safe in a world where the greatest worry was passing exams and political discussion centred on Margaret Thatcher’s election to prime minister.
The bubble of security she had grown around herself was burst the day she graduated. Halfway through convocation, there was an explosion.
It was pandemonium, as everyone present screamed and rushed for the exits, believing it was the notorious Irish Republican Army mounting a terrorist attack. Charity knew better; IRA activists wouldn’t wear robes with their masks. No, there was no doubt that these were Death Eaters.
They sealed the exits with easy flicks of their wands and proceeded to commit atrocities the like of which Charity had never before experienced. The Muggles who had died in the first blast or by a random Avada Kedavra were the lucky ones. Those who remained were subjected to Cruciatus - in no time at all, the air was full of tortured screams - or worse. Charity watched as friends were felled left and right: choked by an Asphyxiation Curse; insides sliced open with spells she had never even dreamed existed; bled dry by yet more horrifying jinxes.
There was nothing she could do. She must have attempted Finite Incantatem a million times, but it seemed that short of the precise counter-curse, which she knew not, nothing worked.
And the Death Eaters were laughing. Laughing, as though it was all a joke. One of them had removed his mask, evidently believing that no witnesses would be left alive to identify him. His face, twisted in its cruelty, turned towards Charity as she vomited in a corner, her stomach finally rebelling.
‘And what shall I do to you, lovely?’ he sneered, tapping his wand against his palm. ‘Do you prefer disfiguration, dismembering, or shall I just take my pick?’
As he advanced upon her, Charity reached for her wand, having dropped it a minute ago to be sick. The Death Eater advanced on her, taking his time. Obviously, he assumed she was a Muggle, with no means of escape.
She forced her mind to concentrate. Her last view of the auditorium included the Death Eater’s shocked face as he raised his wand in a belated attempt to stop her Disapparition.
---
There is one other person being held with her. She can hear him moaning, dry coughs escaping from his throat periodically. Fumbling in the darkness, she crawls towards the sound.
‘Who’s there?’ His voice is frail and weak, barely more than a croak.
‘Charity Burbage,’ she whispers back.
‘Ch-charity Burbage,’ he repeats, and then there is silence, punctuated only by low, rasping breathing. Finally, the man speaks again.
‘Elm … and … ph-phoenix feather, twelve inches.’
And she knows who she has been shut up with: the most celebrated wandmaker in the British Isles, a man declared missing for a year. The thought brings her despair - will she be trapped here for as long - or longer? Or will she even live that long?
‘Why have they captured you?’ Ollivander rasps.
‘I don’t know,’ says Charity, and then she is crying, sobbing into her hands like a small child.
All too soon, however, she discovers the reason for her capture. She is hauled up the stairs by a squat man who thrusts quill and parchment into her hands.
‘Sign it,’ he orders, in a wheezy voice.
Her eyes travel quickly across the words on the parchment.
It’s a resignation letter.
They want her to resign from her post as Muggle Studies teacher.
What will happen to the class then? Will it simply disappear - who would dare take on the post now? Her thoughts turn to her predecessor, Professor Hitchens, who stayed with her post well into old age, determined not to leave until she found a suitable substitute.
Her voice is unsteady, but she manages to ask, ‘And what if I don’t?’
‘Then we’ll kill you, won’t we?’
Images that have haunted her for decades now - gory, painful murders, the agony of Cruciatus - flicker through her mind. She turns the quill over in her shaking hands.
‘Sign it!’ barks the wheezy Death Eater. ‘Or Greyback will be happy to have you, I’m sure,’ he threatens, and her heart nearly stops. Fenrir Greyback. She saw what happened to Bill Weasley.
It takes incredible effort to steady her hands enough to sign her name. She hates herself for doing it, but she reasons that if she doesn’t, they’ll just kill her to vacate her post. She doesn’t want to die.
Still, she weeps as she is thrown back into the cellar. Forgive me, she thinks, hoping that old Professor Hitchens happens not to be watching from above.
---
She Splinched in her attempt to Apparate without a fully-formed destination. Her mind fixed solely on getting to somewhere she would be safe, she squeezed through that horrible, compressing nothingness and felt her feet touch ground.
Then - pain, searing through her left side. She hobbled her way to the wall of the nearest building and sank against it, trying to staunch her bleeding, but her legs were drenched in the wet, sticky redness and she couldn’t seem to find the source of all her blood, and her head was swimming.
From a great distance away, she heard voices. She could not tell if they were friend or foe, but her hand was too weak to raise her wand anyway …
'Expecto Patronum!' was the last thing she heard before darkness enveloped her.
Later on, when she finally regained sufficient consciousness to realise that she was in the hospital wing at Hogwarts, they told her she had lost so much blood by the time she reached the infirmary that she was completely delirious. Charity recalled snippets of nightmares - running through the night, the twisted, leering face of the Death Eater chasing after her.
‘How did I get here?’ she asked Madam Pomfrey.
‘You ended up in Hogsmeade - horrible Splinching, dear, whatever were you thinking? One of the villagers sent word to Professor Dumbledore, and he fetched you here himself right away.’
Dumbledore himself came to see her several days later. Forestalling her thanks by holding up his hand, he said urgently, ‘Miss Burbage, I’m sorry to trouble you, but I need to know the circumstances that led to your hurried Apparition to Hogsmeade.’
It was difficult to push back the panic that rose in her again as she recalled the events of her nightmare graduation. She did her best to recount them for Dumbledore, painful as it was to remember, and then she broke down right at the end, seeing the Death Eater’s face swimming before her again.
When she had dried her eyes on the sheets and composed herself again, Dumbledore was holding several photographs out to her.
‘Would you be able to identify the wizard you saw?’ he asked.
Trembling, she took the photographs. She didn’t need to say anything. The picture, captioned Antonin Dolohov, slipped from her fingers the moment she set eyes on it. Her recoil was enough for Dumbledore to understand.
‘Thank you, Miss Burbage,’ he said, taking back the pictures. ‘You have been of great assistance. I’m sorry to leave now, but much is at stake here.’
She buried her face in her hands when he left, her whole body shaking as she tried to erase from memory the images of Dolohov, his brutal murders, and the paralysing fear she had felt when she knew she was next. It was a while before she realised that she was not alone in the room. A white-haired witch with startling green eyes was sitting by her bed, watching her.
‘Wipe your eyes, child,’ said the witch. ‘You have suffered, but you must be strong.’
Charity accepted the handkerchief offered to her. ‘Who are you?’
‘Professor Hitchens. I daresay you will not know me, since you were never in any of my classes.’
‘What -?’ began Charity.
‘Muggle Studies. I confess myself very curious, Charity. You are pure-blood, and you were never a student of mine, yet you are the only Hogwarts student in my knowledge to attend a Muggle university after leaving school. It’s a very interesting decision. What prompted it?’
Charity told her about her failure at the Prophet, and the idea that had taken root shortly after she’d met with her Muggle friends. Professor Hitchens listened, nodding frequently.
‘And what do you plan to do with your degree in English Literature, now that you have it?’
‘I … I don’t know. I thought I might like to teach … in a Muggle school, maybe. I had an offer … but I thought it’d be safe! I thought if I just didn’t get involved with the war …’
Professor Hitchens sighed. ‘We are all involved, whether we like it or not.’ For a moment, she seemed lost in thought, then she shook herself. ‘I wanted to ask you, Charity, if you would consider becoming my assistant.’
‘Your …’ Stunned, Charity could only gape at Professor Hitchens. But she was already getting up to leave.
‘Think about it.’
Charity agreed, because as assistant to the Muggle Studies teacher, she could stay at Hogwarts, where it was safe. At first, the offer puzzled her. Muggle Studies was not a popular choice, especially not in the current political climate. Surely Professor Hitchens needed no extra help? But she didn’t complain, because aside from the sense of security the job gave her, Charity was warming to teaching.
As a girl, she had learnt the lessons of equality at her mother’s knee; now, she had the chance to teach others to accept their non-magical kin, the way she always had. She was able to put her university-gained knowledge to use, as Professor Hitchens encouraged her to engage the students, few though they were, in discussion about Muggle literature, believing it to be a useful understanding of the Muggle world. It turned out to be a popular lesson among them, and it delighted her when she had her fifth-years coming to her with questions on Dickens and Twain.
The war ended at last, You-Know-Who defeated by little Harry Potter, and Antonin Dolohov was apprehended and sent to Azkaban. Charity felt a huge sense of relief - she could venture out into the world without fear again, if she wished.
But she chose to stay at Hogwarts. Professor Hitchens was retiring, and she had promised to recommend Charity as her successor for the job.
‘Thank you,’ said Charity, when Professor Hitchens told her. ‘Not just for recommending me - you helped to keep me safe all this while, and given me so much …’
‘I’m a hundred and six,’ said Professor Hitchens. ‘I should have gone a long time ago, but I didn’t want to go until I could be sure someone would come along who would do the job properly. Who would understand that Muggles aren’t just a fascinating breed of creature to study, but instil in students the idea that we are all equals. You’re doing me a favour just as much as I’ve done you one, Charity.’
---
Her time in the cellar blends into a never-ending day of stale darkness. Ollivander is hauled out several times, returning in a broken state, and Charity tends to him as best as she can without wand or magic. He is tortured - physically, but also mentally - by the fact that he has given away information under duress.
‘It’s not your fault,’ she whispers, but she’s trying to convince herself as well. ‘They’d’ve killed you otherwise.’
Her turn finally arrives one day - she isn’t sure how long it’s been since she was last dragged out of the cellar. Rough hands push her up the stairs, hitting her when she stumbles in the darkness. She is thrust into an elaborately-decorated room, where a fire burns in the hearth. After such a long time in the dark, even the dim firelight is blinding. It takes a while for her eyes to adjust, and when they do, she wishes they hadn’t.
You-Know-Who himself is seated before her, observing her through terrifying red eyes, slitted like the ones of the enormous snake by his feet. Charity cannot help the whimper that escapes her.
‘Charity Burbage,’ says You-Know-Who, his voice silky and thoughtful. He twirls his wand in a long-fingered hand; the other holds a folded newspaper. ‘You are, I believe, pure-blood.’
She is too frightened to let out anything more than a squeak. You-Know-Who does not seem to expect an answer, however, because he continues as though she hadn’t made a sound.
‘And yet, you persist in advocating the polluting of magical blood, the infecting of our world with one which is diseased.’ His voice is loathing, full of disgust. ‘Rowle,’ he says, addressing the Death Eater who brought her in. The spell hits her in the back and she falls forward into nothingness.
It was not a Killing Curse, because she awakens, her head heavy. She is upside down, and it feels as though ropes are holding her there, although she can see no bindings. Struggling, she strains at the enchantments, to no avail.
‘… our guest, Severus?’ The high, cold voice of You-Know-Who penetrates her consciousness, and she realises that she is revolving, upside down, in the centre of a room full of Death Eaters. She catches sight of a familiar hooked nose and pale face, and in her terror, it is a plea for help that escapes her lips.
He barely acknowledges her. ‘Ah, yes,’ he says, in response to You-Know-Who, his face impassive. But he has recognised her. Charity hopes he will say something - anything - to save her.
You-Know-Who and his Death Eaters taunt her now. They hiss and cackle as he speaks of her job as Muggle Studies teacher. The slow turn brings her round to face Snape again; he remains expressionless, one of the few Death Eaters who do not jeer or laugh at her pitiful state. This gives her hope.
‘Severus … please … please …’ She begs him to show some compassion.
But then she is silenced, You-Know-Who taking her voice with a lazy flick of his wand.
‘Not content with corrupting and polluting the minds of wizarding children, last week Professor Burbage wrote an impassioned defence of Mudbloods in the Daily Prophet,' ’ he says, fury in his voice.
So the article was published. Fear grips her stronger than ever now. Tears pour out of her eyes, falling absurdly to her forehead, into her hair.
‘Wizards, she says,’ You-Know-Who continues, ‘must accept those thieves of their knowledge and magic. The dwindling of the purebloods is, says Professor Burbage, a most desirable circumstance . . . She would have us all mate with Muggles … or, no doubt, werewolves …’
For a third time, she faces Snape again, and her eyes are pierced by his cold, black ones. She wants to beg again, but already she has the sinking feeling that even if she had her voice, it would be no use; there is not a glimmer of emotion in those eyes.
She is moments from death, and she has never been more frightened.
---
The end was quicker than she had imagined. Two words, a jet of light she didn’t even see, and all was gone.
---
She flies through the past, watching it reel like a Muggle film. She sees herself as a girl, telling stories of dragons and fairies to an entranced group of Muggle friends. As a teen on a date with Arthur Weasley, amused and disconcerted by his never-ending talk about ‘eckeltricity’. She watches herself studying at the University of Leeds, raising her hand in class to talk about the concept of magic in Muggle fiction.
Then she is face-down on a stage, her nose brushing velvet. Charity pushes herself to her feet and recognises the auditorium of her old university - exactly as it looked the day she graduated, before Dolohov and the Death Eaters threw it into disarray and destroyed it forever. Alone, she walks across the stage, unsure why or where she will be when she reaches the end. With every step she takes, she feels surer of herself. Fear, worry, guilt - all is washed away, replaced with confidence, hope, and love.
It is no surprise that at the other end of the stage, when she arrives there, the welcoming arms of her parents and Professor Hitchens are waiting for her. She steps into them, safe at last.
--Fin--