Summary: One-shot. Lily Potter discovers she is pregnant around the same time she realizes they are losing the war. Neville Longbottom is determined to cling to wisps of the past even as his parents consistently fail to remember their own, hoping to carve out his own identity along the way. Both learn the importance of remembrance in the midst of two separate wars. DH Spoilers.
Author's Note: I recently found this story that I started years ago on my computer and decided to finish it…enjoy and please review! Also, please excuse any inaccuracies; I haven't read DH in a while.
Lily Potter and Alice Longbottom were not friends. If their paths crossed at Hogwarts, the most they gave was a polite smile or cursory glance for a student they only recognized through extended years at the same school. They didn't even learn each other's names until they were formally introduced when Lily Evans and James Potter joined the Order of the Phoenix.
Alice was nice enough, Lily supposed. She was a short, round faced woman with kind eyes. Entirely ordinary and yet gifted with an optimism that was running short in these difficult times. Between secret meetings and keeping up the façade of maintaining a somewhat normal life, they did not get to know each other much beneath the surface. Obligatory greetings were exchanged when they ran into each other at Diagon Alley, but they were nothing more to each other than teammates. In the early years of the Order they were a ragtag group of rebels united solely by purpose and Albus Dumbledore's personal invitation.
Sure, there were those they knew, those they recognized. And of course, with the Marauders, Lily, and several of their schoolmates, they had friends, but that wasn't really why they were there, was it?
It wasn't until their first casualty, Chelsea Greysmith, a young secretary who had been passing along information she'd gathered from Fudge's office, that they really began to work in sync with each other. Once the first of them had fallen, and half of them hadn't even been able to connect a face with the name, they finally understood the importance of remembrance.
Frank Longbottom's wife was an Auror, along with himself. So when Alice announced to the Order that she was pregnant, Lily congratulated her but privately shook her head at the bad timing. Certainly they hadn't planned it, Alice and Frank; still, although Alice's face still beamed with joy despite the dark times, it just wasn't wise. Lily and James wanted kids too, but during that murky space in the future they simply called "after."
There was always a very real possibility that there would be no after, that all they had was now –snapshots of friends' howling laughter and a sister's rejected letters. Lily often looked around her home's beige walls, the moving pictures that depicted innocent times and the still shots that predated magic and knowledge of blood prejudice. Smiling with Petunia, her little freckled arms held tightly around her big sister's shoulders, her green eyes sparkled.
Even Petunia, who she had a tendency to associate with frowns and scorn, was smiling in the photo. Thin wisps of straight brown hair framed her elder sister's face, the ends lost and tangled in the edges of the picture with Lily's lively red. A hint of fire, life, shone in Petunia's young face, even as she affected the deliberate impatience of an older sibling.
Ironic how an unmoving picture, so strange to her now, could coax tears with its frozen image while magical pictures, with their genuine, ever changing expressions, failed time and time again to do anything but remind. She doesn't feel anger reddening her cheeks or pain hitch in her chest when her fifth year self screams at her teenaged husband as he ruins a group photo with her roommates in the Common Room. Like a movie, it feels familiar and yet so far away.
Then again, she has no greater regret than losing her sister to magic.
She has no more family –none that has any interest in having her in their lives, anyway. Neither does James, except three mischievous boys who grew up into three brave men. Those who had been so vexing at school –I'm looking at you, Sirius–now endeared themselves to her. Not with their charm, but with their kindness, willingness to help, and a mutual sense of loss.
So when Lily discovered that she was pregnant –we're too young, too selfish, too endangered– her first action was to sit alone in their silent living room, looking at James's sweater draped casually over a chair, a mountain of dishes in the sink he had yet to clean even with magic. She loved him, god knows why, but they were so, so achingly young –she of all people should know that people change.
To James, marrying Lily in a world on the brink of war hadn't even been an option –it just was. In his traditional pureblood world, no one batted an eye at a young married couple, since many tie the knot straight out of Hogwarts. Lily was the more practical and realistic of the two, and she was scared. Scared shitless of the danger, the uncertainty. Scared of the green skulls littering the skies that reminded her of pirate movies, bad teeth and broken planks. Very, very real pirate movies, where Avada Kedavra leaves no trace of its use except the terror stuck, forever still, in the victim's eyes.
Stillness is the most frightening, the most devastating part about death. Because no matter how vibrant a person had been in life, dead they fail to become more than just a corpse.
Empty.
So when Lily found the bodies of the Prewett brothers some weeks ago, who she hadn't known that well, she screamed. Screamed and screamed until Remus Lupin shook her hard, and helped her transport the bodies so they could be properly buried.
They avoided running into their sister, Molly, so that she would not remember them so limp, so still.
James was not still. He was always fidgeting, itching to take action. Even at dinner, he was constantly trying to play footsie, twisting noodles between his fork's prongs, tapping his fingers on their table. He'd been self-righteous in school, never understanding that his actions sometimes hurt people, and though that's dialed down since the war started now that he has something real and worthwhile to fight for, he's always remained restless.
She wasn't sure how he'd react to her news.
"Hey babe," he said as he Apparated into their living room. With a loud sigh, he shed his winter robes, threw them on the worn armchair, and collapsed on the couch. Lily joined him, curling her legs behind her as she sank into the couch delicately.
"Busy day?"
"Dumbledore had me tracking Mulcibir. For a big bloke like him, he's awful hard to follow."
Lily grimaced sympathetically. "Had the same problem with Avery. I made a spell, though, one that marks an 'X' above his head that only I could see so that I wouldn't lose track of him."
James whistled. "Why didn't you teach me that?"
"Been a long time in the making, and I only recently finished it! Still has some kinks to work out, you know."
"Like what?"
"Like the 'X' not moving if he made a sharp turn. There goes Avery, and I lost the bugger because the stupid mark was just hanging out in mid hair like a flapping tongue where his head used to be –don't laugh James!"
His eyes crinkled behind his glasses. "It's pretty funny."
Lily sighed, relieved that their banter was slowly quelling the nerves in her gut. Her hand casually snaked up her husband's neck, fingers rubbing the tight knot in reassurance. Suddenly things didn't seem so bad, now as their laughter rang through their home. Suddenly, the sheer responsibility of welcoming another human being into a war torn world didn't seem so dreadful.
"James?" Her fingers paused. "Do you love it?"
"Stalking Death Eaters?"
"Fighting. We do it because we have to…because –well, you know. Responsibility and all. But this thrill of barely escaping, of cheating death, could you give it up?"
James stilled. With her free hand, Lily nervously smoothed out her shirt before rubbing her sweaty hands on her Muggle jeans, an old ragged pair that her mother had bought for her. She'd thought they were hideous, which had been par for the course considering her mother's fashion sense, but now she wore them like a security blanket, hugged tight to her body. How she wished she could share a cup of earl grey with her mother, sitting in her parents' quaint living room with an eclectic mix of noodle art and fine china. But that's impossible now, and she can't even take comfort in seeing her mother's understanding in Petunia's eyes, because Petunia is not their mum, will not make her tea steaming because she likes it lukewarm, will most likely turn her away at hearing that she's carrying the child of the "black haired hooligan."
She could only imagine what James was thinking about. Perhaps that his friends, especially Remus, were undertaking extremely dangerous missions for the sake of freedom. To prevent darkness from swallowing them whole, Remus had entered the hateful wolf den, full of people who were the antithesis of himself. Sirius had his own darkness to combat, as well as the darkness of those he once –and perhaps still does, deep down– consider family. Peter? He could have scurried away, but he fought with his friends with equal bravery.
Perhaps he was thinking of the future, how he always wanted to do his Auror parents proud and yet grow old and wrinkly with Lily. A perhaps naïve fantasy considering the times they lived in, but a nice one nevertheless. In peace time, he could have done both, but now things were much too uncertain.
His eyes slid over to hers with an intensity that rivaled his concentration in battle. In school, she'd always assumed Remus had been the brains behind the Marauders, but they were all clever and shrewd in their own ways.
"What's wrong?" he said finally.
She couldn't help but feel disappointed. All that meditation, all that anger, sorrow, hope flickering in his eyes, and he wouldn't answer her. But he's disappointed her before, it's nothing new, so she braced herself to convey her news as eloquently as she possibly could, so that he understood –
"I'm pregnant," she blurted.
He blinked. "Huh?"
Irritation curved her lips into a scowl as she watched his eyes blink rapidly, running his hand through his hair nervously. Though she had sprung it on him, though it was ridiculous to assume he, the restless James Potter, would quickly accept fact as truth, her fists clenched as she registered his lack of reaction. She wanted reassurance that everything was going to be okay, that they were solid, but all she got was –
"Oh."
"That's it?" she snapped. "That's all you have to say?"
"Are –are you sure? Not saying you're not thorough or anything, but it's just that sometimes with these things –"
"I'm sure."
"Oh. Okay."
Her fingernail dug into his neck; ignoring his small wince, she looked back again at the pictures, frozen and alive, irrationally angry that the one person she had counted on was unable to make this okay. She could almost taste the earl grey, steaming.
Why couldn't he just tell her that they're going to be fine? That they're not being foolishly reckless by having a baby now, when they've met and escaped Voldemort three times and thus made themselves a target? Why can't he tell her that beneath the wonder, the worry, the shock and the joy, she can feel something bad in her bones? That she's been having awful nightmares of collapsing bridges, kidnappings and murders?
War takes its toll, she wore that cliché well, but she just can't shake it.
"It's okay," James said softly. "Unless you're secretly a Seer, most times dreams are just dreams."
Her hand had somehow found James's, wrapping around his fingers tight.
"How will we be remembered, James? As fools or heroes?"
"Neither, I should think. Just some stubborn buggers who refused to quit. Like smoggers."
Lily stared, fighting a smile. "Smugglers?"
"No, those who use that stick to puff that nasty –"
"Smokers? There are chain smoking wizards, James!"
He grimaced. "All right, so my jokes have gotten worse since we lost having a school wide audience –I admit it. Hey, it's not like I've had a ton of material to work with, right?"
"I dunno, Sirius getting plastered after the fight in Edinburgh and declaring his love for you was pretty hilarious. You two make such a handsome couple, you know."
"Didn't Peter levitate a bow onto his head?"
Lily snorted.
"Good old Pete. Speaking of couples…"
"Oh no, don't even suggest it James Potter. Sirius repulses me even more than you!"
"Oy!"
Lily wagged her finger at him. "Now that you're gonna be a father, your hair's going to have to be flattened and your shoes have to shine, and –"
Her husband groaned, taking a battered throw pillow and holding it up like a shield. "Anything but the list!"
"It's your own fault, mister, for forcing me to create a list of things you needed to do before I would even consider dating you after you bombarded me with all those love letters fourth year."
Expecting a guilty grin from her husband, she was surprised to see him puff his chest out with pride. "You remembered!"
"Those obnoxious letters are nothing to be proud about."
"They were brilliant!"
"Let me be the judge of that," Lily said, ignoring her husband's childish pout. "You know how much parchment you wasted? A letter every morning for the half the year, honestly –"
Lily watched warily as he scooted closer to her, rubbing his thumb under her sticky palm, tracing her lifeline all the way to the smooth surface, pausing for a moment at the small scar she'd obtained during a particularly nasty duel until he stopped at her simple gold wedding band.
"We'll manage," he said. "This is a good thing."
"And I'll do what?" Lily said bitterly. "Cook dinner –you know from experience what a bad idea that is– and wait daintily for you to come home while you lot risk your lives? No thanks."
She didn't want to be negative, didn't want to point out the flaws in his vague plan even if his calm demeanor and soothing voice did manage to comfort her. But sometimes James was too naïve, too determined to fly around with his head in the clouds. One of them had to be grounded in reality.
"Money's not an issue." When she opened her mouth to accuse him of changing the subject, he raised a hand up. "And you can still help. That's what you're worried about, yeah? You're decent at healing spells, and you're brilliant with charms and potions. People will need someone to brew Disillusionment Potions, make wards, all that stuff. Now you'll have time to do all that, to prevent mass murders of families like the McKinnon's from happening again."
"Or Muggles," Lily whispered, thinking of Petunia and the childhood friends she'd lost touch with since discovering magic.
"Them too."
"This has got to end sometime, right?" she said with a small smile.
Something dark and unfathomable passed through James's eyes, if only for an instant. "Everything ends."
But then he lightly pecked her on the cheek, letting his lips linger, for comfort, for affection. "As long I don't forget to put down the toilet seat, I think we'll be okay."
It was an empty prediction, because they both knew they were losing. Caught between a government in denial, a ruthless enemy and neutrals too comfortable with their privileged pureblood lifestyle to even consider giving it up, they were more like guerillas than a full blown rebellion.
Lily found it sad, almost disheartening. The Dark Lord was the invader, they the castle holding the ancient stones together, and yet they felt so small, so temporary if their world could be ripped out from underneath them so easily. All it took were intimidating masks and acts of terrorism to create the dotted lines leading to the treasure inside.
The heavy body count on their side and the significantly smaller number on the other proved that they were losing, or at the very least collecting a hell of a lot of collateral damage.
They were the Order, the Ministry, the Aurors, the innocents and the Muggles. More to lose; shouldn't that mean they would have gained more ground by now, if only out of sheer desperation?
Everything was a question, a maybe. Who knew what Voldemort was plotting, if the plans they deterred were the truly important ones? She thinks back on debating philosophy with her mother, their laughter spreading to the tips of their toes when Petunia had raised an eyebrow and asked whether their discussion would beat its wings and cause a hurricane in China. She'd always been the skeptical one, but there had always been a humorous glimmer in her eyes despite her scorn, which has since vacated her since their parents' deaths, leaving nothing left but cobwebs of disdain.
If only she'd known. What would Lily have done? Spent more time with her sister while she was still speaking with her? Stopped her parents from getting into the car that day, before a semi truck crushed their bodies and stained her father's beloved leather seats red? At least Avada Kedavra leaves no trace.
But they didn't know, they were –for now– blissfully unaware of anything the future might hold for them. Because of this one last innocence, two lovers and soon-to-be parents were able to sit quietly side by side, not thinking about the promises of the future but the promises of now.
Leaning her head on her husband's shoulder, letting her hair drape over his chest, Lily promised herself that she would defend her baby, at any cost. There had been too much cost, already, too much to bear, and she knew that this was the one thing she could never give up.
On the other hand, James –once a mischievous prankster and proud Marauder– had learned as the son of Aurors that nothing was absolute. But as a twenty-year-old who grew up too fast, someone who after one laser eyed glance from Moody frequently regressed to being three, he began to think these lessons were wrong. Because he absolutely loved Lily and their child, already, was absolutely loyal and trusting of his age old friends, who he felt he'd known the equivalent of several lifetimes, and absolutely hated Lord Voldemort for ravaging his world.
He didn't know yet that one of his absolutes would be proven wrong, broken by him when he suspects an innocent werewolf and finds that the quietest of them all has betrayed him so violently. He doesn't know that his family has so little time left, but that was preferable to knowing. Because now they are full of aspiring promise, an unspoken wish yet to be fulfilled as they vow to each other that they'll make it when they have no way to guarantee their survival.
What they can promise is that they will remember, that they'll try to ward off that gaping green skull in the sky and make it five minutes early to the next birthday party.
Lily used to joke that James needed a Rememberall to keep up with all of his responsibilities, but he didn't need one for this.
They'd remember. After all, they promised.
Neville Longbottom always thought that he'd be the one to kill the bitch. Bellatrix Lestrange, with her hooded eyes and wicked smile, was responsible for torturing his parents to insanity. Because of her, he's been deprived of Christmas dinners that didn't include Grams commenting on such matters as his father's perfect table manners. Because of Lestrange, he's been forced to fail in everything –there's no possible way he could ever surpass such recollected perfection.
Perhaps it was easier, to think of them as the great Frank and Alice Longbottom, Aurors who always fought with glory blazing in their eyes, brilliant wizards whose potential had been cut short. They'd wanted a big family, Grams had told him, but all they'd gotten was Neville. Little, blundering Neville, who stuttered, crashed his broom and was better at charming a Devil's Snare than a girl. His parents were perfect, they could do no wrong, because they lack the capacity to make mistakes anymore. Blunders they'd made in the past were glossed over; though they were not nearly as famous as the Potters, they had gained a certain notoriety as well liked martyrs. Neville would like to think that, had they the choice, they would have returned to him and lived, perfectly unknown, rather than living as shells while their awards of valor and sacrifice shone brightly in the sun.
As it were, they weren't dead, but they may as well be. He hated Bellatrix Lestrange, hated her with all his might because –because it's her fault that his heart registered a blip of joy every time his vacant eyed mother handed him a bubble gum wrapper, as if it was a sign of pride. He'd like to think that they would be fine with his proficiency in Herbology, that they'd accept him with warm embraces as often as Alice handed over thin pieces of plastic. The wrappers often still smelled strongly of cherry, her favorite flavor. That was about one of the few things he knew for sure about her, one of the few intimate details of who she was that he could claim. But those were few and far between, and her warm, cherub cheeks in all the photos he's seen has been replaced with a gaunt frame and thinning hair.
He knew Grams loved him. Really, he did. Didn't mean she was necessarily proud of him though; he knows that even if he were a more competent wizard, still would always be lacking compared to his father in some way or another.
Let's face it –impressing Grams was a lost cause.
He was fine with his life now. Yeah. Besides, there wasn't much room for selfishness, not when the school's being run by your currently evil, previously morally ambiguous Potions Master and his fellow Death Eaters.
Having gone to school with Harry, Hermione and Ron for six years and witnessing or hearing about their triumphs, both awe inspiring and just plain ridiculous, it had been hard to imagine what Hogwarts would have been like without them.
Now he knows. Instead of grandly battling a Basilisk, surviving Voldemort and fighting with Neville, Luna and Ginny, they hid in the shadows attempting to operate almost blindly. They once shone with victory but now they only glimmer, a distant hope.
However, from the first time Hermione performed Petrificus Totalis on him first year to meeting Bellatrix Lestrange face to face and hearing her screeching taunts, Harry has taught him that he can't just do nothing. Victory is earned.
Neville may not be extraordinary, but he'll be damned if he just sits here while the Death Eaters destroyed his beloved school. That's ninety-nine percent why he's doing this, taking part in a school rebellion. The other percent, the remaining fragment of what he needs to remember to keep going every day, driving his teeth to grit shut at every Death Eater's slur, every cackled laugh, is his mother.
One of the healers who worked in his mother and father's ward once told him that while they may not recognize him, bringing a nice gift like flowers or music might soothe them, coax their shattered minds into a dopey calm.
Eager to latch onto this advice, Neville began bringing flowers during his visits. After all, he can't give them anything, not good grades, not even love because if they can't recognize it, recognize him, it's all empty air, really, empty hopes.
But every time he brought flowers –different kinds each time– including a Lullalicptus plant known for its soothing scent, his mother would smile genuinely and say "How nice."
Every time she would acknowledge his gift, even though it wasn't the same as remembering him, his heart would leap with affirmation. As his gaze followed his father's beaming smile and his mother's fingers gently stroking the petals, he was recognized.
Recognized as a nice stranger who had brought them pretty flowers, sure, but a specific person nonetheless, one with a connection to them.
"Are you the healer?"
"Get away, get away, you Death Eating bastard!"
"Oh, have you got the wrong room?"
"You remind me so much of someone…"
That was the worst.
His last visit before boarding the Hogwarts Express to begin his seventh year was particularly peculiar, and particularly painful.
When he entered the room, his father was just finishing up his daily ritual of brushing his mother's fragile hair, some of it separating from her head as easily as memories slipped her mind. The victim of the Cruicatus Curse and seventeen years of not caring about appearance, her hair appeared lifeless.
Neville stood by the door quietly, clutching his bouquet as his father planted a loud, wet kiss on Alice Longbottom's lips.
"Frank," his mother giggled. "Oh, Frank, what would your mother say about such public displays of –"
"Sod Mother. She'd chuck her vulture hat into the Great Lake, I'd expect."
"And the Giant Squid would make a bonnet out of it!" Alice laughed, delighted, as they beamed at each other, completely unaware of their visitor.
Neville coughed.
"Oh dear, it seems –I'm sorry. I don't know you."
"Are you the postman?" Frank asked. "I've heard rumors about such a person. Or perhaps you are a –a –" He fell silent, eyebrows furrowed.
This happened often. They'd forget words, or places, or make something up entirely. But one thing remained constant, never wavering –they always forgot him.
"My baby! My beautiful boy!"
Neville's neck burned sharply with the sudden movement of looking up, clutching his flowers tightly. He couldn't stop staring as his mother slowly made her way towards him, her eyes sparkling with life. He wanted to cry as she looked at him for the first time, and then almost did as she swerved away and to the ragged doll sitting placidly, evilly, on the floor by his foot.
The doll wasn't even male, its dirty lace dress hanging limply from its stitched body, threads of hair dangling precariously from its head.
But to Alice Longbottom, she could breathe in an infant's skin and lavender soap, see sleepy eyes blinking back up at her instead of cold glass orbs. To Alice Longbottom, the inanimate doll was more real than her own son, standing two feet away from her, and backing up slowly.
Embarrassingly aware of every squelch his sneakers made on the surgically clean floor, Neville hastily placed his gift in the corner, with his others, ignoring some of the smashed pots. "I'll go."
Shoulders hunched, he couldn't resist sneaking one last glance at his mother, humming off-key and stroking her fingers through the doll's hair. The doorknob was cold against his fingers as he closed the door on his parents and their oblivion.
"So no post for us, then?"
The fire crackled ominously in the Hogwarts Headmaster's office. The long, spindly fingers that gripped his chair only made Neville fidget more while desperately attempting to stay deathly still.
"So, Mr. Longbottom," the headmaster drawled. "Vying to succeed Potter as the infamous troublemaker, are you?"
"No –no, sir." Neville cringed, wishing it could have been anyone but Snape –hell, he'd take Lestrange. At least he could summon hatred for her instead of pathetic, cowardly fear.
"Dumbledore is no longer in charge." His pale fingers tightened their grip and popped veins from underneath the sallow flesh. "I will not show as much leniency for foolishness."
Palms sweating, Neville briefly entertained a horrible image of being tossed into the fireplace and crisped. He stuck his hands in his pocket and heard the crinkle of the bubble gum wrapper, feeling his mother's delicate fingertips as they passed his inheritance to him.
Sitting up a little straighter, Neville stared hard into the Potion Master's eyes, noting how his eyebrows rose curiously of the sudden harshness in his bumbling student's jaw line.
"Now, where's that gelatin spine I always see in class?"
"S –some things are worth fighting for…sir."
Another eyebrow arched. "Fighting for, surely. Dying for, losing one's mind –now you of all people should know how messy fighting with purpose can be."
Neville grit his teeth. He shouldn't even have said that much, he'd practically confirmed that he was up to something. Nothing that the sneering headmaster didn't already know, apparently. So why were all his bodily functions intact? Snape had always been liberal in threatening to curse Neville into a toad, thus granting his "blasted amphibian" a playmate.
Every night this school year, since he's seen Bellatrix Lestrange teaching students, he's woken in a cold sweat of nightmares and groped the nightstand blindly, making sure Trevor was there.
The dorm had felt empty all year with so many of his friends gone.
"Mr. Longbottom, if I didn't know that dumb, blank gaze was typical from someone of your intelligence, I would have thought you weren't paying attention!"
He tried really, really hard not to squirm in his chair as Snape shoved his hooked nose into his face, black eyes burning with barely contained anger. "You are nothing, do you understand that, Mr. Longbottom? You've always been a bumbling fool tripping over yourself to please Potter and friends, stretching all the way back to your first miserable year here. Do explain how someone as subtle and cunning as yourself has managed to expose his ill conceived plan to take over the school to Bellatrix Lestrange. Hmm? The only reason why you are not being hung by your ankles on the dungeon ceiling is because –well?"
Neville sat rigidly still, afraid any movement would cause the beast to rear and attack, something Harry had told him once.
"What is the answer, Mr. Longbottom?"
His fingers crinkled the bubble gum wrapper in his pocket.
"Because I am nothing."
"I can't believe Snape didn't punish you."
Neville sighed. "Getting his big, greasy nose in my face was punishment enough."
His partner in crime stilled, clutching her potions book close to her chest. "It could have been worse," Hannah Abbot said darkly. Neville had always thought of her as a sweet bubbly girl, but that was before. Ever since, he'd never realized how terrified he could be of a blonde girl with pigtails when she had a scowl on her face.
"Let's check on the oleander," Neville said hastily. The potion bubbled with menace, black as tar compared to the opaque white mixture in the cauldron beside it. Sniffing cautiously, the sickly sweet oleander overwhelmed his senses. "It's almost ready to be mixed in."
This was their chance, their last chance. Rumor was that Voldemort himself was going to drop a visit to Hogwarts soon, and those in the rebellion knew there was no way in hell they could pull this off under the Dark Lord's nose. If they didn't do the deed tonight, then their friends will continue to rot away in the dungeon, just as Hannah had seen when she snuck back into the castle three months ago. Neville still remembered her expression as she relayed their condition to him, the way her eyelids drooped slightly as she spoke, as if resisting the urge to block the images from her sight.
Before her mother was murdered by Death Eaters and she was taken out of school, Hannah had been quiet and kind, much like many of her fellow Hufflepuffs. Now, after hiding like a shadow within the walls of her former school, operating in the dark as she managed to avoid detection by their so-called professors, Neville barely recognized her. They had to be thankful for Hogwarts' many nooks and crannies at least, as well as the helpful portraits, professors, and House Elves who provided various places for her to shuffle around every day. Her eyes were constantly rimmed with red, black bags underneath them betraying her sleeplessness. It is for Neville perhaps the saddest physical reminder of how everything has changed since first year. There's always been some sort of danger or another, but this girl's pigtails has always been a signal of innocence. Now they're a practical means of keeping her hair out of her face, a leftover habit from more carefree times. Neville never asked what had transpired at home to make her return to Hogwarts instead of fleeing the country, to safety; she never offered an explanation.
And now the Dark Lord himself was coming. Generally, Neville didn't place too much stock in rumor –they had been grossly incorrect enough times that they had stopped holding power for him. But coming face to face with the monster that started it all? He can't risk it, not when his friends and schoolmates are in danger.
As a precaution, only he and Hannah were allowed near the brew. For anyone else who was nearby if someone made a mistake –a powerful concoction like this could lead to disaster. He'd never been particularly fond of this plan, but he'd thought those Death Eater bastards deserved it. After all, most of them should be having their souls, their lives, sucked out of them right now. Let them eat death in retaliation of how much they had caused it.
Besides, they were getting desperate and he had to think about how he'd feel knowing he could have saved the school he loved –or at least tried– and did nothing as they spread shadows on the walls and gleefully thrown black ink onto the portraits.
Many of his nightmares consisted of current horrors: Colin Creevy's burned hands and the angry welts on far too many of the students' backs. Recently, his dreams have been consumed of premonitions about Harry's anger, McGonagall's disappointment, Hannah's tears, Grams' expectance of failure, the walls of St. Mungo's crashing around his oblivious parents. And to be honest, these past few months he's acquired a perverse sense of justice knowing that he could pay Snape back for all those years of taunting him about his lackluster potion skills.
At the time, Neville had thought he was doing the right thing, brewing this potion, but as he mixed the two concoctions, the thick solution turned greenish-gray. The ladle suddenly felt heavy in his hands. The element spinning in the muck under his ministrations was death, forever. No coming back. The potion will become clear and thin soon, making it nearly impossible to detect when the House Elves slip it into the Death Eaters' pumpkin juice. For Snape, his greasy nose would hit the table before he even detected a hint of foul play in his whiskey.
Bile suddenly rose from the deepest pit of his stomach, where he thought he'd buried all hints of doubt. Would his mother have done this?
"Neville, why'd you stop?" Hannah said nervously. "You know how meticulous the recipe is."
His hand slowly unstuck itself from the ladle, his instrument of death. "Hannah…we can't do this."
Her eyes narrowed into laser blue slits as her entire body stilled. "Why do you mean, 'we can't?' This is our only chance to save Hogwarts!"
"No," Neville said with sudden clarity. "This is revenge."
"Of course."
"We'll find another way," he insisted. "This, this feels wrong."
He wanted to tell her everything, about the glass eyed doll his mother's tattered mind had chosen over him, how much he wished Harry could be here to lead, to save the day like he always did. Harry always managed, somehow. Neville wished he had half that bravery.
He wished he were brave enough to do more than just stare down Snape, trying not to quiver in fear, or tell Hannah how pretty she looked when she let her golden hair fall from those braids, if only to see a rare smile. But he knew he was ordinary, mediocre, not rich or powerful or special or chosen in any way. Maybe if he was, maybe he could save his friends in a brilliant stroke of wizardry, or at least warrant enough importance for his parents to remember him.
Before he could summon any of those sentiments on his tongue to the girl he'd plotted with and protected for the past few months, he found a wand at his throat.
"How dare you," Hannah snarled, baring her straight white teeth. "I did not risk my life sneaking back here for this. Not when my Mum –I could have been hidden safe, but I came back for you, you reckless Gryffindors and your plans to save the people I care about."
Neville warily eyed her wand, the tip throbbing red as if matching her heartbeat. "We'll find another way."
"Months, Neville, months! They've waited in the dungeon for us to save them, and if we wait any longer…"
"Carrow won't get away with this, especially after –"
She jabbed her wand deeper into his skin. "Keep stirring."
Neville swallowed, remembering how Hermione had petrified him in his ducky pajamas first year. And he'd thought that was dangerous. "No."
"You coward!" Hannah screamed. "You saw what they did! Some Gryffindor you are –your parents were tortured into insanity, what do you think they're doing to our friends now? 'Re-education, silencing dissent.' You sit here in your little corner and you can't even summon the courage to fight back in the dark?"
"Hannah, they'll hear you –"
"I don't care!" Messy tears streamed down her face, her wand hand shaking. She's a Hufflepuff; her House has generally never been good at fighting. Their strengths were their pleasant demeanors, the peaceable agreement as they went with the flow. Until, that is, Cedric Diggory, the first casualty to shake the foundations of their beloved school. But Hannah looked as scary as an old Slytherin, every stray piece of blonde hair illuminated in the dim light. For a second, the frizzy locks reminded him of Medusa's coiling snakes from his childhood picture books.
"Don't talk about my parents." He wished he could reach into his pocket, feel the reassuring cherry tree wood of his wand and the plastic crinkle of his mother's gift.
"You coward," she hissed again, but she seemed drained, her blue eyes dulling as the anger left her body with a sag of her shoulders. "Why are you doing this? We're not supposed to be saving them."
"We're better than them." Neville gestured to the bubbling potion and sickly sweet scent wafting over the vapors. "Better than cooking up dark magic in a corner of the castle."
"Did your mummy tell you that on your last visit?"
Neville looked away, balling his fingers into fists. Was that really it? Was he simply following the teachings he thought two people unstuck from reality would have passed onto him, acting like the son he thought they would want him to be? Perhaps he was reacting to Grams' pessimism, determined to make something of his mediocre magical power and intelligence. Perhaps he was still hero worshipping Harry Potter, having spent his childhood hearing about the miraculous boy with the scar, grown up in the same dorm with someone who even as a child had seemed larger than life.
His feet shifted so that he was facing Hannah, his gaze locked on her red rimmed eyes.
"No," he said. "This is just me."
Wand still gripped tightly between her fingers, Hannah simply stared at him, her eyes giving away nothing. A few mere year ago, her cheeks had dimpled when she smiled, her eyes clear with happiness. There was a general stereotype that Hufflepuffs were the worker bees happily filling reports, the reliable but not particularly remarkable bunch who could always be counted on to bring a smile to people's faces. No wonder they had loved Cedric Diggory so, the kind boy who they once thought could prove everyone's assumptions, their collective remembrances of Hufflepuff House, wrong.
"We haven't thought this through, Hannah, not really. We wanted to badly to pay them back…what do you think Voldemort will do to us when he finds out we've killed his Death Eaters? They have a connection, he'd know when they died. Instead of saving our friends, we could have killed us all. But I know what we can do," he said finally, picking at a piece of lint on his robes. "But I'm rubbish at Potions –will you help me?"
Had Hannah blinked yet? He didn't know, but he couldn't help but think he was more frightened of this woman in blonde pigtails that he had been of Snape. At least with his greasy professor he had known what to expect.
She let out a shaky breath, exhaling what remained of her pent up rage and helplessness. Neville could see it now, in her shining eyes and hint of a dimple on her right cheek –she trusted him. An alien lightness rose in his chest, made him stand just a tad straighter.
"What do you have in mind?"
The Death Eaters were cackling like the fiends Muggles seemed to think witches were, based on their storybook fairytales. The real professors sat on the fringe, uncomfortably sipping their pumpkin juice and occasionally glancing furtively at their tense students. Snape sat at the head, in the golden chair Dumbledore used to occupy, grunting occasionally in response to someone's comment but otherwise saying nothing. He seemed isolated among the cacophony of his peers, silently tossing back gulps of whiskey.
Neville watched them surreptitiously from the thinned out Gryffindor table. Now, with so many of their housemates imprisoned, dead, or fled, students who would never have sat together before clustered into a meager block, letting elbows knock and sneakers scrape against each other. If they could, the Gryffindors, Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs would all dine together, with Slytherins and Voldemort sympathizers on the other side. But they couldn't. That would incite rebellion.
We'll show you rebellion, Neville thought.
He wished Hannah could be here with him, a Hufflepuff with a murdered mother sitting at the Gryffindor table. But she was currently executing her part of the plan in the shadows of Hogwarts' hidden corridors. They'd been silent as they modified their original potion into something useable, something the oleander allows them to manipulate. Only after Hannah had gripped the bag of vials tightly in her palms had it hit Neville that this could be it. The last time he saw her, or anyone. Because after this, there would certainly be no doubt that it was Neville who'd utilized the deadly poison in the plant for a toxic distraction.
"Come with me," Hannah had whispered to the symphony of clinking glass.
"I can't." Feeling brave, he'd gently taken a strand of her blonde hair between his fingers. "It has to be me."
So here he sat, tense, as his fellow Gryffindors chatted nervously around him in the Great Hall. The House Elves popped up to refill the professors' goblets before the nightly toast, a couple of them quickly skittering out of the way as impatient Death Eaters tried to swat them like flies. Alecto Carrow was the toaster this time, standing up and beaming crooked teeth at her frightened students. "Tonight, we salute the Dark Lord and his noble cause, the eradication of the lesser breed, the thickening of true, magical blood, and the pursuit of the real magical arts. A toast!"
Neville closed his eyes, waiting for the tell-tale scream after the professors slurp down their poison. Toxins come in many forms, after all.
Neville watched with a special sort of calm as all hell broke loose. Lestrange suddenly threw herself on the ground, pleading to an unseen specter not to give her the kiss of oblivion. "Expecto Patronum!" she kept shrieking, producing nothing in her terror. Similar scenes erupted around the head table, with the true Hogwarts professors quickly flocking to their students, ushering them away from any potential harm. In the chaos, Neville saw Professor McGonagall send a fearful glance his way, a sharp intelligence in her eyes as she tried to figure out a way to save her student from repercussions. Neville knew better not to hope for none.
Curiously, the only Death Eater not raging or screaming or crying at the nightmares in their minds was Snape, who'd merely slumped in the Headmaster's chair. Looking oddly small in the ornate seat, he held his head in his hands and seemed to be whispering something over and over again, eyes blinking rapidly. Before Professor Sprout shoved him out of the Great Hall, Neville could have sworn he saw the Potions Master's lips mouthing I killed you, I killed you all…
"Who was responsible for this?" Snape spoke with his usual calm menace, but with a rumbling undercurrent of anger. His eyes were rimmed red and the black bags under them were much more apparent on his sallow skin. Flanked by his Death Eating cronies, he barely had to start articulating his threats before Neville stepped forward.
"It was me," Neville said, proud that his voice never wavered. "Sir."
Lestrange howled in rage as she sprang forward and struck him hard across the face before he could react. It was all Neville could do to stay on his feet, refusing to be cowed. Snape simply watched the proceedings with growing intensity, his eyes seeming to stare right through him, nearly making Neville buckle under the weight of their scrutiny. Why did it have to be Snape?
Before he knew it, Snape had grabbed him by the scruff of his neck and thrown him out into the hall. "I will deal with this newt…personally." After slamming the door behind him, Snape resumed his manhandling until they reached the dungeon. Neville gulped at the chains and various instruments on the walls, but couldn't help but exhale in relief at the empty room.
Neville cringed, expecting the worst as it dawned on Snape that all the prisoners were gone. What he got was a loud sigh that still somehow managed to send a chill down his spine.
"You arrogant little fool." Snape lifted his gangly limbs off the ground as easily as a potato sack. "Didn't you listen to a word I said?"
"Y –you said that it was worth it, to fight. Sometimes."
Snape's pupils expanded. "Yes. Sometimes. Taking the fall for your friends in the Order, Longbottom? How very noble."
"I'm not working with the Order," Neville said weakly. "I just wanted to help my friends."
"And humble too," Snape sneered. "Otherwise incompetent as you may be, Longbottom, I suppose even the dumbest of my students must produce a good idea at some point. Unfortunately for you, it only takes once to incur punishment under the new administration."
When Neville reported the extent and results of his plans later to the Order later, under the sympathetic –and, if he wasn't mistaken, proud– scrutiny of Professor McGonagall, he simply said that he blacked out soon after this, and could not remember anything else.
His room. Familiar four poster bed, creased red sheets and moving Quidditch posters. If he's honest, he never thought he'd see this place again. Trevor croaked pitifully at him as Neville collapsed face first into his bed, immediately realizing his mistake as his ribs loudly protested. Any other day, he would have been sent to Madame Pomfrey, but after "graciously" granting him basic first aid Snape had sent him off to learn a lesson from his aches and pains.
Only after Trevor leaped onto his back, croaking insistently, did Neville finally rise to feed him. He hadn't thought of a contingency plan for Trevor, had he? So wrapped up in his potential fate, he never thought about what would happen to his first friend at Hogwarts…
Neville jumped as his door slammed, grasping his forehead to look for a concussion as he recognized his visitor. "What are you doing, Hannah?" he hissed. "You should be gone by now."
Hannah shrugged, not the least bit contrite. "Aberforth has got them; he's sending them one by one to safety through the Order's channels. I told him I was going back where I could help."
"You shouldn't have," Neville said crossly.
"You stayed." Hannah was suddenly much closer, eyebrows furrowing at the physical signs of abuse on Neville's body. Her fingers lightly touched the burn mark on his cheek.
He flinched. "I got lucky. They won't take me seriously, not even after this. It was just a parlor trick. I mean, they live and breathe that darkness, I suppose it really was nothing but a distraction."
Hannah's other hand tightly gripped Neville's shoulder. "I can't believe they let you go."
Staring intently at her hand, Neville smiled ruefully. "Haven't you heard? I'm a coward."
Blue eyes flickered to his, forcing him to hold their pensive gaze. Hannah's lips parted to speak, but smoothed back into a thin line once she thought better of it. Neville watched her with what Snape had called his typical blankness, his mind cleared of all but the sound of her soft breathing, the haggard heaves of his hard working lungs. He didn't want to think about what had just transpired a half-hour ago, or the repercussions of the future. Even as a non-threat, he knew there would be hell to pay.
So focused on the heaviness in his chest, Neville almost didn't notice Hannah tilting her head slightly as she drew closer. Not until she appeared to lose her nerve and landed her lips on the corner of his mouth, right where Lestrange had struck him, did Neville surface back to the present.
"Ow." He exhaled softly at the twinge of pain. Hannah jerked her head back.
"Did that hurt? Sorry."
"It's okay," Neville muttered. His breath probably smelled horrible anyway. He sighed; this is why he was no Harry Potter. Then again, he mused as Hannah cautiously inspected the inflamed skin on his hands, Snape would never have let Harry go, not as the sworn enemy of Lord Voldemort. While Neville can operate relatively under the radar, bolstered by his well-known reputation as a bumbling fool, with the rebellion right in front of the Death Eaters' noses, it's a necessity for Harry to be protected by radio silence. And now he knows what he's wondered in his most morbid moments –would he be able to withstand torture? This certainly doesn't hold a candle to what his parents -and most others– have gone through, but Neville knows now what it's like to do the right thing, at personal cost, and survive it.
Not like his parents. Not like the Potters. They'd given everything, and lost.
Didn't they?
Neville felt his shoulders relax at the intense concentration on Hannah's face as she worked to heal the burns, nervously explaining how her mother had taught her intermediate healing spells just in case. They were here, weren't they? Carrying on. Maybe it isn't really losing until they wave that white flag of defeat, until Death Eaters become a permanent installation at Hogwarts. Until then, they'll plod forward with ghosts at their backs, doing what they can.
"There," Hannah whispered, her hand still gripping his. "That should feel better."
Neville smiled. "It does."