Be Careful
96: What Thoughts You Think
By Anne B. Walsh
Andromeda rocked her sleeping grandson in her arms and listened to the rapid-fire, six- or seven-way conversation taking place in the next room. Little of it was intelligible to her, since it was being conducted in magical jargon and house-elf as well as the Queen's English, but she could follow the general gist of it.
I must say I find it amusing that Kreacher and Dobby feel the need to compete for Harry Potter's attention. And it was surprisingly pleasant to see Kreacher happy and content once more. But it is most annoying that Severus Snape has found a way to seal off the school from—not house-elves coming and going, otherwise these two could never have come at Harry's call, but house-elves coming and going with passengers.
"Kreacher is ashamed that it was his own action that did remind Headmaster Snape of what he was overlooking," the aged house-elf had said, his hand creeping up to his nose as if to twist it. "Headmaster Snape, he found out how Kreacher had taken Miss Weasley out of the school to safety, and he placed the new wards on the very next day."
"It's not your fault, Kreacher," Harry had reassured the elf. "No punishing yourself. You probably saved Ginny's life that day. We'll find some other way in..."
"But there are still a way in, Harry Potter sir!" Dobby had piped up, his ears twitching with glee. "Dobby knows where it is and Dobby can take Harry Potter and his friends there! With Kreacher's help," he had added quickly as the older elf looked murderous. "There are too many for one elf to take on one trip and we is needing all the speed we can gets."
Most of the talk now was down to where and what this way in entailed (Dobby seemed to feel the need to be mysterious about it) and who, exactly, was going with the elves tomorrow. Harry and his three companions from the forest would surely go, Hermione having learned to handle a wand with her left hand well enough to cast a shield while she screamed for help, and Luna had got herself included by whispering a few brief words to Dobby. Andromeda had caught only the barest hint of them, something about reverse psychology and someone winking, but Dobby had been walking on air ever since.
Perhaps it was some secret the Malfoys forced him to keep, that Draco now has released him from. But what compulsion would survive his freeing? I will ask her if I truly want to know, but for the moment I can live without it. What matters is that Dobby would now take Luna to the moon if she asked to go. Hogsmeade will not present a problem.
Remus and Nymphadora, for their part, were both arguing well, but Andromeda suspected that even if they purportedly won their arguments and Harry agreed they could come along, he would have a quiet word with the house-elves and her daughter and son-in-law would find themselves left behind.
He feels, and I agree, that unless it comes to all-out battle their first responsibility is to their son. Andromeda looked down tenderly at the tiny face, recovered from this morning's phase of blue blotches. And if this war were not so terrible, they would feel the same themselves, but when they have both suffered so much already, I cannot fault them too badly for being willing to risk their own lives to end it before it hurts their child as well.
Though I can imagine little that would hurt him more than losing one or both parents.
Briefly, she thought of her nephew, orphaned now in spirit if not in body, and wished she could have given him more than a few words of sympathy about Narcissa and a silent blessing.
Still, he is safe enough at Hogwarts for the time being. And when the fighting begins, I have no doubt he will find a way to get into the ranks of those with whom he now sympathizes. Andromeda kissed Teddy on the forehead, smiling as the shape of her lips outlined itself in crimson on his skin for a moment before fading. Perhaps, when this war is over, we can find a way to rebuild what is left of the once-noble House of Black.
If the war does not claim the rest of our lives in the process of ending it.
"Oh my God!"
"Is he still alive?"
"Turn him over, let him breathe—"
"No, don't touch him, you'll hurt him more!"
The voices came from far away, from behind him in the darkness. He was curious about the speakers, but not curious enough to return and look. The pain was back there, and he couldn't deal with the pain again.
"Merlin's bloody beard, did he do all this by himself?"
"Must have. Unless they missed in the dark."
"He probably made them miss. Dodged around and let them take each other out."
"They must have been using Unforgivables. This one's dead."
Had he killed a person? He hoped not. Some scrap of memory seemed to tell him that killing was a bad thing to do. But the person the voices were talking about had been killed with a wand, and he didn't have a wand. So he couldn't have killed anyone. That was a relief.
Maybe he was the person who had been killed, instead.
"Come on, let's hurry. Get something under him."
"Don't move too fast. Dropping him would be worse than leaving him here."
"Better not levitate him, either. Blokes to the fore."
"Ready, one, two, three, lift—"
Was this being dead, then? This nothingness with just a thread of hearing to link you to life and other people? He'd thought there was more to it than this. The stories had all claimed there was more.
But it wouldn't be the first time stories had lied.
"I still don't believe he did this for them."
"It seems so unlike him."
"I guess we never knew as much about him as we thought we did."
"I guess not. Not if he could be a hero like that."
He winced away from the wonder and reverence in their voices. "It wasn't being a hero!" he wished he could shout at them. "It wasn't! It was just what had to be done!"
But looking back over what he'd done, he could see clearly how they could mistake it for heroism, even though each step had a perfectly good reason for it. Going to rescue the two little ringleaders? They knew things about him that shouldn't be revealed yet. Giving up the Hand of Glory? It only worked for its owner, and he couldn't very well lead the way, not when they'd be chased. Handing over his wand? He still had to win that duel with his rival, the one who'd beaten him time after time, and the only advantage he could possibly bring to it was to fight with his own weapon, since the other had to borrow his girlfriend's. Taking on the eight pursuers singlehanded, even aided by darkness, a smaller form than they were expecting, and a keen nose that told him where they all were? Well...
There, he had to admit, they might have him. But there had been kids in trouble, kids no older than his own godsiblings and their friends, and he hadn't seen any other way to keep their enemies from getting them.
Better I die than they do.
There, he'd thought it straight out. He was dying, or maybe already dead. It was over, and he'd failed the people he cared about the most in a stupid, desperate ploy to save a bunch of babies.
But if it's stupid and it works...
In this case, it's still stupid.
"Lay him down over here. Careful, don't jostle—"
"Do you think there's anything we can do?"
"I wouldn't even know where to start!"
"All right, everybody out. Crowding around won't help." This voice had a sound of quiet authority to it. "You wouldn't want people staring at you if you were him. Give him some peace. Let him rest."
He would have laughed, if he'd had anything to laugh with. I must be dead. Rest in peace, isn't that what they always put on gravestones? I'm dead, and I just don't know it yet.
The thought should have inspired fear, or horror, or despair, or something besides tired acceptance, but that was all he could find.
I did my best, and it wasn't good enough. I should have known it wouldn't be. I wasn't born to be a hero.
At least I did a few good things with my life.
Even if I was right about not living to be eighteen.
The voice with the quiet authority spoke one word, so softly that he almost missed it.
"Dormio."
Then there was silence.
Neville put his wand away and slipped out of the curtained-off alcove the Room of Requirement had created for the battered, bleeding wreck that had been—no, that was Draco Malfoy. The Slytherin wasn't dead yet, though why Neville couldn't be sure. His Housemates had certainly tried their hardest.
He dodged at least one Killing Curse, if Crabbe's any indication. And some of the others had gashes and broken bones like they were hitting us with near the end. He probably used his mongoose form to confuse them, but he'd have to be human part of the time or risk being stepped on, and then they'd get their hands on him...
Above his head, cloth rippled, and Neville looked up. He was standing under the three bright banners of the Hogwarts Houses, Gryffindor farthest to the left, Ravenclaw next to it, Hufflepuff on the end. Now the banners were inching over, flapping in the breeze they were creating, the sound clearly audible in the dead silence that had fallen over the Room.
If this means what I think it does—
Unfurling from nothing in the way Neville had seen twice before, once when Padma Patil joined her twin in safety, once when Ernie Macmillan ushered in his little group, a green banner emblazoned with Slytherin's silver serpent unrolled beside Hufflepuff's yellow and black. The tiny bunch of Slytherins clustered by themselves near the door stared at it, as did the rest of the Room's inhabitants.
Hannah Abbott broke the hush. "That's much better," she said. "It never seemed right, not to have them all."
And as matter-of-factly as she did everything else, she crossed the no-man's-land between the DA and the Slytherins, and pulled out a handkerchief to wipe the face of a first year girl who was trying to blot up her tears with her sleeve.
Neville sat down on his hammock, trying to hide his relief as the rest of the DA awkwardly followed Hannah's lead. He knew he ought to have made some official announcement that the Slytherins were welcome, told the DA he wouldn't stand for them being bullied or pushed around because of what their Housemates had done, but his knees were still feeling weak from the risk he was taking with—
Call him Reflection. Easier to think of him that way.
Reflection, then, had let a few things slip in their quiet, shadowy talks. He made jokes about "sleeping on it" and "seeing it in my dreams," the latter being the way he claimed he always knew where Harry was. Once or twice, he said he'd "dreamed up" spells to heal the wounds Neville and his friends still bore from the Carrows' ill-treatment, spells that, when Neville tried them on himself, always worked.
So it's just possible that sending him to sleep might help him heal himself somehow.
And if it doesn't, at least it's a peaceful way to die.
He pushed his feet off the floor and lay down, staring at the underside of the wooden balcony.
I don't want to think about ways people die. I don't want to think about healing wounds or hiding from my enemies. I want to think about growing plants, and laughing with my friends, and thinking up ways to make Hannah Abbott like me.
But the world doesn't ask you what you want. It just dumps whatever it wants on top of you.
He closed his eyes, letting the quiet chatter of voices act as a soporific. Hurry back, Harry, he willed. We've never needed you more.
Little does he know... but you do, so I won't get into it. Sorry for the delays. Life resumes its regular schedule tomorrow, which means updates should be more frequent, for which I'm sure you'll thank me in the traditional manner. Remember, the sooner I finish this, the sooner I can get back to (and feel confident about finishing) FD...