Facing Danger
Chapter 55: Mothers and Fathers (Year 6)
By Anne B. Walsh
Harry caught his breath gratefully as Moony pulled them out of the darkness of Apparition onto Grimmauld Place. That took longer than usual. Probably because he's Side-Alonging two, and he isn't fully recovered yet, he can't be until Danger gets home…
From overhead came the throbbing beat of wings. Draco lifted his head, peering into the sky, and Harry was about to do the same when he noticed Moony looking determinedly at the row of houses where number twelve was edging into view. "You all right?" he asked his Pack-father.
"Nothing's wrong, Harry." Moony produced a smile, but the tension around its edges belied his words. "I would rather be indoors before we get to greeting each other, that's all. It seems likely to take some time, and we're vulnerable on the street."
Translation: once he and Danger touch, they're not going to be paying attention to anything else for a while, and why give the Death Eaters a chance for a goal on the rebound? "Good idea," Harry said out loud, and started forward as the steps came into sight. Draco seemed about to bolt for the end of the street, where hoofbeats had now replaced the wings, but Harry caught his eye before he could move and flicked a hand toward the house. "They'll come to us," he mouthed. "Let's get under cover."
Bossy, bossy alpha, Draco signed, squaring his shoulders and swaggering a few steps.
You're being redundant again, Harry signed back as they climbed the stairs behind Moony, who was unlocking the door. Better get it out of your system before—
The door opened, and Moony waved them in ahead of him.
Too late. Harry stepped inside, Draco at his heels, and felt a great weight lift off his shoulders, echoed by Draco's thankful sigh.
They were home.
An instant later, the metaphorical weight was replaced by an actual one.
"Oof!"
"Surprise," said a sweet voice in Harry's ear, a pair of slender arms wrapping themselves around his chest and the matching legs twining about his waist. "Guess who?"
"Growing your hair out, Ron?" Harry tweaked a strand of ginger which had made its way across his shoulder. "Not sure if it's the best look for you."
Ginny growled and dug her elbow into his collarbone. "Not funny."
"Oh, I don't know," Draco commented over the top of Luna's head. "I thought it was pretty good."
"Boys," Ginny said in a tone of deep disgust. "Why do we keep them around again?"
"They're good for some things," Luna said without lifting her cheek from where it was pressed against Draco's breastbone. "Like kissing, and cuddling, and lifting heavy things without magic."
"Fair enough." Ginny dropped to the floor and stalked around Harry. "Well?" she demanded, hands on her hips. "Let's have it."
"If you insist." Harry hooked an arm under her shoulders and hoisted her up. "Lifting heavy things, or light things in this case—check." Bending his knees, he got his other arm under her legs and lifted her up to cradle her against his chest. "Cuddling—check. And finally…"
He lowered his face towards hers, and she wrapped her arms around his shoulders again, lifting herself in his hold to meet his lips halfway. Vaguely, in the background, he heard the door open and close again, heard excited voices and quiet shrieks of joy, and let the knowledge of who else had come safely home seep into his bones and deepen his pleasure in the kiss.
We're all back now, Pack and Pride together again. So bugger off, Voldemort.
This round goes to us.
Mare would have taken a step back, or a few dozen, right out the door and back onto the street, but she hoped she wasn't stupid enough to put herself in physical danger just because she wasn't sure of her emotional footing.
They're just people. People I know, or know of at any rate. I can handle them.
Still, after a day and night of shocks on the level she'd had (though her alternate form, besides coming in handy for quick transportation, certainly explained the name she still felt more comfortable claiming), she thought she could be forgiven for finding a quiet spot to put her back against the wall and observe.
To her left, Danger was wrapped in the arms of the slender, sandy-haired man Mare knew was Remus, though she'd seen his face only for the briefest of instants before it had been hidden behind a surfeit of brown curls. His hands moved inside the sleeves of Danger's robes, caressing and cherishing her skin, the simple touch as sensuous as though they had begun making love right there.
Then again, what else are they doing?
To her right, a tall red-headed boy with a tricolored cat snuggled against his neck watched intently as his equally ginger sister locked lips with her black-haired, bespectacled boyfriend. A dark-blonde girl smiled benevolently at them from her place against the chest of a silver-blonde young man, who seemed to be placing some kind of bet with the broad-shouldered brunet beside him.
I thought I was ready. I thought I understood. But just being able to place names with faces, to know Harry from Draco and Luna from Ginny, or to trace the connections between them as siblings, beloveds, Warriors of the Pride, it didn't prepare me for the reality. For what they are to each other, and how much that affects me, with my needs, with my power.
And I haven't even faced the worst of it yet.
Steeling herself, setting her feet, settling as strong a shield as she dared over her innermost self, she turned to look straight ahead of her.
Sirius was on his knees, the better to hold the tiny person who had flung herself into his embrace the moment they'd come through the door. His eyes were shut, tears dropping from them unashamed to soak the girl's likewise shaking shoulders. They had released each other only once, Sirius to cup a gentle hand against his daughter's face, Meghan to brush two fingers against her cheek and lay them on her father's.
All fire, that one. Passion and heart, and determination enough to save the world by herself. What is she going to do when we come face to face?
The question had the hair on the back of Mare's neck tingling and the stale taste of worry filling her mouth.
Will she hate me because I can't be what she wants, what she needs? Will she blame me for the choices I've made when she finds out they aren't the ones she wishes they were? I care for her already, I don't want to see her hurt, but I can't imagine that she won't be, not when I know what she must be hoping for and how far short the reality has to fall…
Meghan released her father and lifted her head, the sweep of eyelashes past the corner of her face showing where she blinked back the last of her tears. When she turned, Mare drew a deep breath in wonder that memory could be so faithful. If she'd had any doubts left about Sirius' story, smaller versions of his silver-gray eyes shining out of a face otherwise near-identical to her own would have put them to rest.
Stay calm. Let her make the first move. And above all, be honest with her. She may be angry at the truth, but she will forgive it eventually. She would never forgive a lie.
Trying to hold her principles in mind, Mare took one step forward, bringing her face wholly into the light, and waited.
For one second, Meghan's eyes lit up with joy. Then the shadow of a memory flitted across her face, and the light dimmed somewhat, but did not entirely fade. She started towards Mare with the gliding step of a dancer, Sirius rising to his feet behind her, blotting his cheeks with the back of his hand and watching her closely. Farther back in the hallway, Harry set Ginny on her feet and reached up to Ron's shoulders to rest a hand on Neenie's back, Draco moving behind and between them to do the same.
Within arm's length of Mare, Meghan stopped, gazing up fearlessly into her face. Slowly, giving each movement its fullest measure of expression, the girl sank into a full curtsey, bowing her head and touching her back knee to the floor. Her robes spread like blue wings to either side as she waited, wordlessly, for her acceptance of Mare as authority to be acknowledged.
Should I? Can I? I'm not her mother, not the way she wants me to be—
But she knows that. If I were her mother, if I were still Aletha, she would have jumped at me the way she did at Sirius. She didn't, which means she understands I can't give her that, not now, maybe not ever.
It would be cruel not to give her what little I can.
She laid her hand on the back of Meghan's neck for a breath, then bent to lift the girl to her feet. "I'm glad to see you," she said, and knew, as Meghan would know, that she spoke nothing less than the truth.
Where we go next is up to us, but this seems like a good place to start.
Remus slid his hands back out of Danger's sleeves and kissed her cheek one last time. Us to our duties now, I think. Being alphas, keeping the Pack in line, as much as it ever can be kept.
I can do that. Especially the part I can feel you thinking about for me. Danger reached up to finger-comb Remus' hair back into place. Yours may be harder. We didn't have time to talk much on the way out, so any clear insight you can get on what's happened to her would be very helpful…
I'd gathered as much. Remus blew her a mental kiss. We'll manage this like we do everything else. Together. Now go hug some cubs, and see if you can't tease Harry into Animagus form. We don't want him getting rusty.
Rusty wolf. Danger gave an artistic shudder. Probably smells worse than wet.
The normality of having Danger's silliness as his companion brought a smile to Remus' face, and it was with that smile he approached—I wonder what she'll prefer to be called now? Aletha, or the name the Death Eaters gave her? Mare, that was it, they called her Mare…
"Do you have a moment?" he asked, pulling her attention away from the cubs, Harry now in possession of a squealing Meghan and playing keep-away with the other boys.
"Of course." She inclined her head, regal and cool as Aletha had always been in moments of tension or uncertainty. "In private?"
"If you don't mind. We can go into the front room, just here." Remus motioned for her to precede him through the curtained archway. Once inside, they both took seats, and Remus sealed the arch with a Privacy Spell, glancing at his companion as he did so. She was following his every motion with narrowed eyes, as though comparing it to a standard.
"So," he said, tucking his wand away again. "Shall we start with, I'm very pleased to meet you, and thank you for saving my life? Not to mention several others I'm fond of?"
It surprised a laugh out of her. "You're welcome. I'm fond of some of them myself, though I suppose I ought to be more than that…"
Her eyes acquired a haunted tinge Remus didn't care for. "Ought to?" He edged the words with alpha disapproval, the same tone he might have used on one of the cubs in a self-pitying mood. "The last time I looked, your feelings are entirely up to you. And while we're on the subject, may I ask what you'd prefer we call you?"
She gave him a sharp look, which slowly softened. "I wasn't expecting that," she said. "Though now that I think of it, I probably should have been. This is why the—the Pack survived, isn't it." She pronounced it like a foreign word, or a term she wasn't sure she had in its proper context. "Because you didn't bother with what ought to be and just went ahead with what was. If it's all the same to you, I'd rather stay with Mare for the time being. Though I can think of some it won't all be the same to."
"Then they'll learn to deal with it not being the same." Remus loaded this tone with certainty. Sirius, he knew, would indeed learn, far more quickly than he would give himself credit for, and Meghan had been bracing for this possibility since the start. "So. Mare. You seem to know our stories, but I only know bits and pieces of yours, what Danger was able to gather from the things you said and did on your way out of the Death Eaters' hideaway…"
"And you want to know more." Mare settled back into her chair, toying with the edge of her robes. "I can't blame you. I wish I knew more myself. But I'll tell you what I can." She paused, her hand sliding inside her robes to rest for a moment on the grip of a wand Remus knew almost as well as his own.
"Aletha was a smart woman," she began finally, tapping each finger of her right hand on the wand's back end in turn. "She thought well on her feet, and she knew her husband. She knew him inside and out, and that's how she knew she would have to do the thinking for them both in front of Voldemort, because they had put Sirius' back to the wall and the only thing he knows how to do in that situation is fight. Not that that's bad, but it isn't always the answer, and she knew it wasn't that day."
Remus watched, fascinated, as the traces of emotion flickered across Mare's features. Fear, longing, hatred, love, but always, under it all, intense and lightning-quick thought.
"She knew, if they gave in this one time, if they bent and allowed Voldemort his little game, there would still be a chance for them. Magic can be regained, memories can be restored, but no power on earth can reverse death. And even if they didn't die, even if Voldemort only—only—put the Imperius Curse over Sirius and forced him into erasing her memories, they would still be worse off, because Voldemort had no reason to be precise or careful with her mind, and Sirius did. So she told him to do it, to do what he'd been told, and she gave him a clue as to the way she hoped it could someday be fixed."
"Yes, the colors song from Joseph." Remus nodded. "Danger's told me, and I have an idea what the clue means. 'Blue'—did you, did Aletha, mean a blue one of these?" He lifted his pendants out of his robes, displaying the gems. "Is that what she used, to store her memories?"
"You are good." Mare smiled. "That's exactly what she did. It's why she danced around the floor while she was humming it, too. To give her memories time to copy themselves over, to settle into place, so that she wouldn't lose anything." Her face grew shadowed again. "But it didn't work quite the way she was hoping it would. And it may be wrong of me, but I'm grateful it didn't, because if it had…"
"If it had, you would have been wiped out of existence," Remus finished, feeling a pang of mingled sympathy and worry at her slow nod. "It was very brave of you to activate the jewel in any case, knowing that might happen."
Mare dismissed this with a short, jerky laugh. "We weren't getting out of there without someone else who could use a wand, and it was the only way I could think of to get that knowledge quickly. I'd be no more dead being erased to make way for her than I would if we were caught, and having her back would make Sirius happy, so it wasn't all that much of a risk. But it didn't work that way. Her memories did come back, they're all here inside my head, I can see every one of them if I try, but they're not mine." She smiled. "I understand you have some experience with that."
"I do, though it's different in certain ways." Remus contemplated the place in his mind which had been so achingly, terrifyingly empty for those few confused moments he had spent battling his demons alone. "Harry might actually understand it better. He has a particular moment in his life he had to lose, one he treasured very much, and though he got the memory back, it wasn't the same—it was like watching a film, he said, or hearing a story. He'd lost the scents, the feelings, the little things that put him into the moment. Does that sound right?"
"Exactly right." Mare's fingers knotted and unknotted themselves. "I'm not Aletha, but I know her, know her better than she knew herself. She never knew she had this, for one thing." She held up a hand, blue light shimmering around it. "Or if she did—" Her eyes went wide. "Her mother. Merlin's robes, her mother."
"Easy." Remus crossed the space between them in two steps and put his arms around her, holding her as she began to shake. "I'm here. You're not alone. Tell me about her mother."
"The power came down that way." Mare spoke in a monotone, staring at her shimmering fingers. "From her mother's side, and her mother before her, probably all the way down from Ravenclaw's daughter, from Margaret. But Margaret was a Squib, and all her descendants were Muggles, so none of them could use the power." Her hand closed into a fist. "But that didn't stop Teresa from trying. And that was what killed her, what killed her and destroyed their family."
"I thought Aletha's mother died from cancer." Remus kept his voice calm, but his mind was racing. "And that her father felt Aletha ought to have done something about it, even though they waited too long to tell her for even magical healing to help, so he broke off contact with her."
"That was the surface of things." The light pooled in Mare's palm and formed into a ball, shedding layers like an onion. "But the cancer wouldn't have started so soon or spread so fast if Teresa hadn't drained her own life trying to heal the birds she worked with. Trying to use a magical power, without any magic other than life itself. And when she was dying, she made Aletha promise, made her swear that she would never try to heal that way, because she didn't know that magic would make the difference. She thought it would destroy her daughter the way it had her. So Aletha promised, and that's why no one ever knew she was the Heir of Ravenclaw."
"We know it now, thanks to you." Remus extended a cautious finger towards the ball of light, and Mare nodded slightly, letting him know it was safe to touch. He dipped into it and came up with little glimmers of blue highlighting his skin, alternately warming and cooling as they slid down into his palm. "What about her father? Was there anything about him?"
"N—" Mare broke off with her mouth open for the O. "Yes. Yes, there was, but this is my memory, not hers. It's the first one I have, before even waking up in my little kitchen, and I didn't realize what it was until this very moment, until you mentioned her father…"
Remus called up a long ribbon of blue fire and wound it around his own hand. "Can it be shared?"
"Y-yes." Mare shifted restlessly, her shoulders rising in instinctive distaste. "Voldemort was testing me. Making sure Sirius hadn't cheated and left me any of Aletha's memories. He showed me a memory of his own, one that would have put Aletha into a killing rage. And I'm not sure it isn't going to do the same for me now that I know what it is." She turned to catch and hold Remus' eyes. "He murdered her father."
The fire around Remus' hand flared briefly as his emotions spiked, but he pulled it, and them, back under control and nodded in understanding. "Go on."
"It was a long time ago. Shortly after William Freeman disappeared. He looks almost exactly the same as he does in Aletha's last memories of him." Mare dipped her fingers into Remus' fire, as he had done with her healing light, and twined it around her hands as she went on. "Voldemort corners him in some little alley somewhere. Plays a bit of cat-and-mouse, and makes him give something up. A brooch, the one thing he must have taken to remember his wife by, because Aletha remembered her mother wearing it, and very hazily her grandmother. Shaped like a stylized eagle, blue enamel on bronze…"
Remus added a line of bronze fire beside the blue. "Show me?"
Mare shaped the blue fire she was already holding into the form of a palm-sized heraldic bird of prey, beak open, talons extended, then surrounded it with a thin line of bronze. "Like this. About this size too. Probably a cloak-pin originally."
"I would agree." Remus started to call up a memory of his own, then stopped. Speculation could wait on known facts. "What happened after Voldemort got the brooch?"
"I'm not sure, exactly." Mare frowned at the fiery likeness of the pin. "Voldemort kills him, William, but after that… a complicated spell, one I don't recognize, either from myself or from Aletha. All I know for sure is, he Vanishes William's body when he's done, and tucks the brooch into an inside pocket of his robes with a smile like he's just heard his rich uncle is dead. And that's the last thing I remember until I woke up to Lucius Malfoy's boot in my side." She grinned. "I am glad Sirius got to punch him. Not that I would have minded doing it myself, but I'm positive Sirius enjoyed it more…"
"Are you going to flirt with my husband all day, or may I have him back now?" Danger inquired from the doorway.
Mare looked around Remus and raised an eyebrow. "Do you have any room for him with all those passengers?"
Remus turned to have a look. "I don't mind them," he said, smiling at the cat in Danger's arms, the fox sprawled around her shoulders, and the wolf pressed against her leg. "We'll make room for them somehow."
"And I would rather stay here for a little while, if you don't mind." Mare pressed Remus' hand. "Thank you for listening, and for understanding."
"It's what I do." Remus got to his feet. "We'll likely be somewhere on the ground floor if you want us, or you can go straight to bed if you're tired."
"Dobby's made up one of the guest rooms on the first floor for you by now," Danger added. "It'll be the one with the light on."
"You're much too good." Mare smiled again, but the corner of her mouth had begun to tremble. "Thank you."
"You're welcome," Remus said, bowing. "Good night."
A mental nudge to Danger got her moving quickly, Wolf beside her. Neenie jumped down outside the Privacy Spell and retransformed, as Fox did the same on Danger's other side. "I missed you all so much," Hermione murmured, leaning against Remus but sparing one hand to hold Draco's. "It wasn't quite so bad once Ron got up, but it still wasn't like having the Pack here properly…"
"It might never be that way again." Harry stood up out of Wolf's form. "Not the way we were used to it. What's the matter with Letha?"
Remus shook his head. "It's probably best to go through it as few times as possible. Have you seen Sirius and Meghan?"
"They're up in our den," Draco said, nodding towards the stairs. "They said for the rest of us to come up whenever we wanted. Now sounds good to me." He gave Neenie his sweetest smile. "I can always carry you if you're out of the habit of walking places on your own…"
Neenie reached up and flicked his ear. "Keep teasing me about it and I'll tell him you volunteered to be his eyes when I get tired."
Draco turned the color of a boiled prawn and pressed his lips firmly together.
The little group reached the second floor without further incident, and Meghan hurled herself at Danger, giving Sirius a chance to pull Remus aside. "When you get a minute," he said quietly, "ask Danger where she went on our way out of there. We nearly ran out of time on those green jewels before she got back, and she wouldn't say a word to me or Letha about it, but I don't need to be in her head to know whatever happened upset her."
"Noted." Remus scooped Meghan up, slung her over one shoulder, and tickled her for a moment before dropping her to the padded floor. "Where did Ron and the rest of them get to, by the way?"
"Went to bed," Harry answered from between Remus' feet. "Said they'd seen we were alive and that was enough for tonight, we can always talk in the morning." He squirmed out of his self-imposed confinement and sat up. "So what is the matter with Letha?"
"That's what I'd like to know." Sirius took a seat beside Harry, bumping shoulders with his godson, then scratching Wolf's ears when that canine crawled into his lap. "She knew my whole name and how to reverse the breaking of the vow, but she wasn't acting like herself at all."
"Probably because she isn't exactly herself." Remus sat down and let his hand rest, almost carelessly, against Draco's side where his Pack-son was curled up in a heap of pillows. Danger had both Hermione and Meghan snuggled against her, one on each side. "She's requested, for the time being, that we call her Mare, because she doesn't feel like Aletha…"
Sirius' face tightened as Remus explained what he had learned from his talk with Mare. "So I did kill her after all," he said bitterly when Remus was done. "Just left us with a living reminder of it, one we get to see and talk to every day."
Danger nodded to Hermione. Hermione reached over and slapped Sirius on the back of the head.
"Go on, hit me all you want to, it doesn't change anything." Sirius rubbed the point of impact, scowling. "I destroyed her. Left us with nothing but her shell with someone else living inside it, and a bunch of old records of her that this new person doesn't want around…"
"And you wouldn't be so bitter about it if you hadn't fallen in love with the new Aletha just as fast as you did with the old one," Danger put in. "Don't try lying to me, I know it as well as you knew about Evanie. She hasn't really changed, Sirius. She seems like someone else to us because she's starting from a different point, she doesn't have all the memories that shaped the Aletha we knew, but her heart and her soul are the same, and she knew they would be. It's why she told you to do it the way that she did, so there could still be this chance for a new beginning for you both."
"I know, I know, I know!" Sirius slapped his hand against Wolf's side harder on every repetition, until before the third one could connect Harry rolled away human and got to his feet. The other cubs came to his side at his hasty beckoning, and Remus conjured another Privacy Spell between them and the adults just in time, as Sirius bent over and buried his face in his hands.
It would hurt him more than it already does to have them see this, and they know it.
Danger slid up beside Sirius and hugged him once around the shoulders, then laid a handkerchief delicately on his knee and withdrew to sit beside him. Remus scooted closer but refrained from touching. Unlike Danger, he was a legitimate target should Sirius' pain take the form of needing to punch something.
Here's hoping he took all that out on Malfoy.
The thought of the Pack's old nemesis, and what Danger had been able to tell him about the man, started a new train of thought in Remus' mind.
"She didn't forget everything, you know," he said when Sirius' harsh sobbing had died down somewhat. "She knew enough to talk to you, and not to be surprised when you answered. She responded to a few of the lures Danger threw out in her dream—subtly, but she did respond. And she remembered Draco."
"How d'you reckon?" Sirius asked, picking up Danger's handkerchief.
"She healed Malfoy," answered Danger in Remus' stead, using her wand to sketch two pictures on the air, one of a hideously scarred face, the other smooth and sneeringly handsome. "You might not have noticed, being bent on smashing up his face again, but she fixed it for him. Took away all his werewolf scars except one. See it?"
Sirius peered at the picture, then snorted. "Right under the eye. Just where he marked Fox and Neenie to twin them."
"Exactly." Danger dismissed the pictures and the Privacy Spell in one broad swoop. "She wouldn't have done that if she didn't remember us somewhere deep in her mind. And she took a big risk with her magic, balancing me and Remus at a distance like that and reestablishing our bond without us being together. She may not think she cares about us, but she does, or she wouldn't put herself in harm's way for us like that."
"I made a memory box for her," Meghan added, sitting next to Remus this time, as Hermione dropped down beside Sirius and Harry and Draco converged on Danger. "Things she likes or cares about, things that are important to her. Maybe it will help her feel like the memories are really hers, and she'll see she doesn't have to be either all Mare or all my Mama Letha—she can be both."
"I'd say wait until she gets a bit more established here for that one, but it's a good idea." Danger stroked Draco's hair with one hand and Wolf's back with the other. "What she wants most right now, it sounds like to me, is to be treated like herself. Like a new member of the Order, a friend of ours who we'd like to get to know better, and someone to whom we owe a great debt of gratitude. Not some selfish imaginary person who's taken over our Letha's body and should be evicted whether she wants to go or not."
"We wouldn't treat her like that," Hermione objected, leaning into the curve of Sirius' arm. "It isn't even true! She is Letha, just Letha without her memories!"
"That's right, and we all know that, but she doesn't realize that we do." Danger chuckled absently as Wolf rolled over and exposed his belly for scratching. "So we'll have to show her, and the best way I know to do that is just to be a friend to her. You four, pretend she's the new Defense professor if you can't think of anything else. You've certainly seen enough of them come and go, and you always manage to be civil to them one way or another."
"We're going to have another new one, aren't we?" Draco asked. "Neville's mum won't want to come back after what happened to his dad at Diagon Alley."
Meghan nodded. "She told Professor Dumbledore that she resigned last week," she said. "I don't think he's having a lot of luck finding anybody to take her place."
"I would almost think the post was cursed, the way everyone says it is," Hermione said thoughtfully, "except who'd curse a teaching po—oh—" A huge yawn interrupted the word. "I must be tireder than I'd thought."
No, Danger said as she caught Remus considering whether or not to reveal what Dumbledore had once told him. Not tonight. Not when we've just got them wound down enough to sleep. You can tell them in the morning if you want that the post really is cursed, or you might have thought better of it by then, but you're not telling them about it tonight.
Yes dear. Remus kissed the top of Meghan's head and nudged her towards Sirius for similar attentions. You've missed ordering me around these last two weeks, haven't you?
You mean it shows? Danger tossed him a mental grin. We can always sneak off to our room for a little while before we come back here to sleep, you know…
The sneaking off had been brought to a highly satisfactory mutual conclusion, and Danger was just considering whether or not she ought to rouse Remus before he fell asleep on her when she felt him rouse himself. Looking for seconds, are we? she sent with a chuckle. Give me a few minutes to catch my breath and I'll be happy to oblige.
Thanks, but not just yet. Remus pulled back far enough to look her in the eye by the light of the waxing moon, gleaming in through their open curtains. Danger, where did you go while you and Sirius and Letha were trying to get away? The way Sirius put it, you were gone for long enough to nearly get all of you caught again, and you wouldn't tell him why…
Oh. Danger shut her eyes, striving for patience, for calm. That.
Yes, that. If it's something I should know about, something you found or found out—
No, no, it's nothing like that. It's just… Danger shook her head, impatient with words as she rarely was. How about I show you. Will that do?
Perfectly.
Hand in mental hand, they plunged into Danger's memories.
Remus grinned when Sirius Stunned Voldemort, as Danger had known he would, which was why she had chosen to start the memory at that moment. They followed as Sirius activated his green gems and half-carried Aletha upwards through the wall with Danger supporting her other side, as the three emerged in an upper hallway, as they started for the direction Sirius thought was most likely to bring them to daylight soonest—
The memory-Danger stopped dead as they passed the entrance to a large hall, walking halfway in and halfway out of the wall so as to be able to duck entirely into it and stay hidden if Death Eaters should suddenly round a corner. "Did you see that?"
"See what?" Sirius poked his head out of the wall. "Oh, that. Danger, not to be callous, but dead Muggles are nothing new around here—"
"I don't think they're—" Danger cut herself off. "You know what, you stay here. Stay hidden, give Letha a minute or two to recharge, and I'll be right back—"
"Danger—" Sirius lunged for her and missed as she darted across the corridor, and had to step back into the wall, cursing under his breath, as a trio of Death Eaters hurtled down the corridor seconds too late to see her. Still hand in hand, Remus and the real Danger followed Danger's memory-figure into the semi-darkness of the hall, past the unmoving corpse of a large Muggle man, to the smaller body she knelt beside—
Remus exhaled a breath of sudden understanding, and Danger's worry lest he not understand evaporated.
Memory-Danger held tight to the hand of a battered, bloodied Petunia Dursley.
"I'm so sorry," she whispered, laying her other hand gently against Petunia's bruised face. "You didn't deserve this, no matter what you'd done."
"My baby," Petunia breathed, the words barely audible. "I loved him… why…"
"I wish I knew." Tears brimmed in memory-Danger's eyes. "I wish we had been able to help you."
Petunia's lips trembled into the slightest of smiles. "Not alone… helps." Her eyes fluttered open, tried to focus on Danger. "Harry?"
"He's all right. My husband is going to get him, to take him home."
"Good." Petunia closed her eyes again. "Tell him… sorry…"
The final sound of the word trailed off into nothingness, and the hand in Danger's grasp went limp.
The real Danger turned away, burying her face in Remus' chest, as her memory-figure bent double, fighting down her tears.
"You did right," Remus murmured to her, holding her close. "No one should have to die alone."
They slipped out of the memory and back to their bodies, and gave each other comfort once more before returning to the den room, to sleep among their Pack and wake to a new day together.
In a comfortable guest room on the first floor, Mare slept restlessly, her hands making tiny movements to each side, as if she were constantly reaching for something which was never there.
She dreamed of a white-haired woman in blue, who smiled at her and called her daughter, and whose cloak was fastened at the front by a stylized eagle wrought in bronze.
So we're closer to back-to-normal than we were, but not there yet, and it may still be a while. Hope you'll stay with me for the journey!
In slightly off-topic news, I have decided that rather than blather on in my author notes, it would be good to have a central place to communicate with my readers, and that if I'm going to be a contemporary writer, I need to have a presence in the center of social media. Yes, that's right…
I made a Facebook page.
It's at facebook (dot) com (slash) annebwalsh (dot) page and you can like it, get to know some of your fellow fans through it, and read my status updates and the notes I plan to post about my original work. Don't try to friend me, though—I'm not doing that this time around. That's how my old Facebook got so out of control that I swore off the site entirely…
But in any case, I'm back on the weekly schedule and plan to stay that way as long as I can. Thank you in advance for your reviews, and don't forget to follow me on Facebook! (I can't believe I just said that…)