A/N: I do not own Harry Potter... Also, I would like a beta reader, so if interested, please pm me.

"Spungify!" I scream, waving my wand at Fred Weasley, who is still laughing, unaware of the falling wall. Luckily, my spell hits him just in time. As he stands up and looked around, his eyes widen. He has just escaped death. Across from me, at the other end of the corridor, stands Angelina Johnson, who also holds her wand out. She nods at me. I glance around as Fred stands up. He notices Angelina first, running up and kissing her, murmuring thank you. If it were any other moment in another other time, it would have shattered my heart, but this is war and there is no time for foolish heartbreak. Harry glances at me pityingly, but I dash away before he can say anything. It isn't important right now. We have a war to win.

As I cross the corridor, I feel a spell whiz past my head. Turning, I prepare for a duel, sighing in relief at the sight of Seamus. He gasps.

"Sorry Ella, I'm a wee bit jumpy." I grab his arm and pull him into the alcove next to us as a death eater passes by.

"It's fine Seamus." I whisper quietly.

"We need you in the great hall. Madame Pomphry is up to her knees and no one else has any medical experience."

"I'm on it."

"Good." He says, then hesitates. "Oh, and if I don't make it-"

"You'll make it."

"But if I don't, tell Padma that I love her."

"I promise." And with that, I head off to the Great Hall.

The battle is long over before I finish aiding the injured. I don't even have time to comprehend our victory until noon the next day. The Healers from Mungos had arrive shortly after the end of the battle, having been unable to enter during the actual fighting. Still, I was tending wounds and casting counter curses long after most others have taken a rest. Madame Pomphry has been absent since one a.m.

"Draco Abraxas Malfoy. You have to hold still!" I say, struggling to keep a severely injured Malfoy in his cot so that the healer can administer a nasty looking potion, which will remove the poison in his body. He had been stabbed with a cursed dagger at some point during the battle, although which side had stabbed him was unclear.

"How-Bloody hell-do you know my bloody middle name?!" Draco yells, struggling more. I don't answer him instead choosing to sit on his midsection and pin his arms above his head. "Get off me you bloody witch!" The healer takes this opportunity to pour the potion down his throat. I remove myself from his torso.

"Your code name is Abraxas, remember? I was the one who decoded your letters to the order and met with you in darkened corners of the school at unreasonable hours to relay information." I tell him. Malfoy's cheeks tinged. He had become a spy for the order as soon as his father had told him that he would receive the dark mark. He wasn't necessarily pro-either side, but screw everybody if he was going to become some minion to a man that had no nose. Draco Malfoy loved control, and being a death eater gave you no control.

"Right. Um . . . you look like you're about to drop dead." I roll my eyes at Malfoy's customary bluntness.

"Well, I have just survived a war." Malfoy roll his eyes.

"The war was over yesterday."

"I'm fine."

"No," The healer turns to me. "Mr. Malfoy is right, you appear to be suffering from severe exhaustion. Go home, go to sleep."

"Fine, are Tonks and Remus still here? I don't have the floo code." The healer checks his list and then looks at me with an unreadable expression.

"Why don't you sleep in one of the cots for now." She tells me, motioning to the empty cot next to Malfoy.


"They're what?!" I stare at Andromeda in shock and disbelief, shaking. Andromeda looks almost as bad as I do, her eyes red from crying.

"I'm sorry, they're dead." Andromeda pulls me into a hug, rubbing my back as I cry. Tonks had taken me in when I was fourteen, the summer before the tri-wizard tournament. She had found out that I was spending my summer at the leaky cauldron. It took her almost two weeks to weed the story of my parents out of my mouth. By the time she did, she liked me enough to adopt me, despite the fact that there were only ten or so years in between us.

My parents were the Muggle equivalent of Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy. They believed in the finer things and were unreasonably proud of their Scottish descent. I was to be a perfect lady, a debutante. The plan was that I would go to finishing school at the age of eleven and then proceed to marry a man of equal or higher status once I reached a suitable age. My parents had married when my mum was 17. I was the youngest of four, but I was the only daughter and they had high hopes for me. I, on the other hand, was more interested in reading books then walking with them atop my head.

It wasn't until the middle of July, however, that their plans for me disappeared into smoke. My great-aunt had come over to babysit me for the weekend as my parents attended a charity in Sussex, and my brothers were off hunting with a family friend. It was just Great-Aunt Tabitha and I. Great-Aunt Tabitha was the youngest. My mother considered her the black sheep of the family and it wasn't often I saw her. She had an unusual style, and wore a strange looking stick in her hair; she used odd words, and did not understand simple technology, such as the microwave. Still, she was my favorite relative, and she told the most amazing stories.

Tonight was a story she had told me many times. It always started in a dark and dangerous land not to far away, but eleven long years ago, when an evil wizard had power over all the land and was putting those who were not pure wizards into a permanent sleep. Then one day, he dared to venture to the house where two of the bravest people who had ever dared to defy him lived. He put them to sleep, but just as he cast a spell to out their baby son to sleep as well, the curse, which always worked, failed. Instead, the evil wizard was put to permanent sleep. Unfortunately, the sleeping spell was permanent, and the boy would grow up in a world without his parents, and like me, in a world without magic.

We had just finished the story when my great-aunt Tabitha told me to retrieve the mail while she started dinner. There was rarely any mail addressed to me, so I was surprised to find a letter at the bottom of the pile. It read clearly, in green ink:

Fenella Flora Hamilton

3213 Green Gall Avenue, Endnbrough, Scotland

First room on the third corridor in the west wing

I had rushed to the kitchen with the letter, waving it in my hands. Excitedly. My Great-Aunt had given it a brief glance, before she turned back to the stove. A second later she froze and turned around again, abandoning dinner in favor of looking at the letter I held.

"Fenella, remind me darling, when's your birthday?" She asked hesitantly

"August first, why?" I had responded, confused. Aunt Tabitha had just sighed.

"Open the letter darling." I tore open the letter, and read it as fast as I possibly could. When I was done, I looked up at my Aunt, who had taken a seat at the table. "I didn't think you would be a witch, Fenella. None of your brothers are. And yet here you are, standing with your Hogwarts letter just the same way I did when I was your age."
" But there's no such thing as witches or wizards." Aunt Tabitha pulled the stick out of her hair.

"Yes there is." She told me softly. "Expecto Patronom." Out of her wand came a bunny hopping along. I reached out to tough it, but it disappeared. The rest of the weekend was spent talking about witches, wizards, and Hogwarts. Suddenly the stories she had told me weren't just stories. They were a secret history to a world I'd never known.

We agreed to tell my parents I was offered a spot at prestigious boarding school. They were so thrilled that Aunt Tabitha was able to convince them to let her take me shopping.

Great-Aunt Tabitha passed away my second year. Eventually, I had cracked and told my parents that I was a witch. I had tricked myself into believing that they would accept my world and welcome it with open arms. They didn't. I was disowned, given a meager inheritance and tossed onto the street. Luckily I remembered the story Harry had told about the Knight bus, and summoned the courage to stick my wand out.

Tonks had been patrolling Diagon Alley after the incident at the Quidditch World Cup. After weeks of lying to her about my parents, she had sat me down and forced me to spill. Then she offered me a home with her. It happened at the perfect time. I was running out of money and Tonks had an extra bedroom. A month later, she legally adopted me and I became Fenella Tonks, better known as Ella.

By May, Great-Aunt Tabitha's evil wizard had awoken from his endless sleep.

It had been Tonks's last name that had protected me throughout the Wizarding war. Her last name allowed me to return to Hogwarts. I had been her witness for the wedding and the first to know she was pregnant with teddy.

Teddy. God. I wanted to puke. I had been so wrapped up in my pity that I had forgotten about Teddy. Teddy, who was now an orphan. A new wave of tears washed over me.

"I know, I know." Andie whispered soothingly. I hugged her tighter. She lost a daughter. Teddy and I lost a mother. Now more than ever, I wished that my Great-Aunt's stories been just that: stories.