Damaged But Not Broken
School: Beauxbatons
Year: 4
Grammar School Challenge
Word Count: 900
The war was over. Voldemort was dead. His army defeated. The side of light had won. But there was no joy to the victory, only relief and a numbness that sat heavily on everyone's shoulders.
Harry sat outside, beneath an old tree by the lake, hidden from view by his Invisibility Cloak. He could not keep himself from wondering if the price of victory had been too high.
Hours had passed since Voldemort's fall and already people were trying to rebuild. Aurors had swarmed the castle apprehending all of the Death Eaters and Snatchers who hadn't had the sense to run. Kingsley Shacklebolt had left for London, both to announce the victory to the Muggle Prime Minister and to deal with whatever chaos the Ministry of Magic had fallen into. A small army of Healers had trooped into the school to tend to the wounded and to tally the dead. The Hogwarts professors had busied themselves by cleaning up the Great Hall so that the families of the fallen had somewhere comfortable to grieve.
Hogwarts had been a hive of activity all morning, but the afternoon sun had brought with it a lull. It had been easy to forget while everything was so hectic, but certain things could not be ignored forever and as the bustling had died down, the reality of what they'd been through had hit them all like a collective punch to the gut. The reactions to this were varied: some cried for their losses, others screamed at the injustice. Then there were those, so overwhelmed by the onslaught of emotions that they were left dazed and numb, balancing precariously on a ledge that was not only narrow but also crumbling beneath their feet. That was where Harry was now; poised over an abyss so dark and so deep that it may as well have been bottomless.
He couldn't let his mind wander because none of his thoughts were safe and the wrong one could send him tipping over the edge. He couldn't think about his friends without remembering the ones he'd lost: Fred, Lupin, Tonks, Dobby, Sirius… all gone, taken before their time. He couldn't let himself consider his future because he wasn't sure what to do with himself anymore. His entire upbringing had been orchestrated to prepare him for his role in Voldemort's defeat, and now that that had come to pass and that Harry had survived against all odds, there was nothing left for him to do. No goal, no path, no mission.
He felt lost and empty. He was drowning, the weight of the water crushing him, gasping for air as his lungs burned, desperately fighting the current, praying that he was swimming toward the surface but everything was so dark that he couldn't be sure.
As his mind scrambled, his eyes caught on Hogwarts. His lifeline since he was eleven years old. The only home he could remember ever caring about.
Its exterior was stained with scorch marks and blood. Some of its walls had crumbled, and he knew that certain ceilings had caved in. Many of the courtyards were little more than rubble and ruin; broken statues and suits of armour littered the grounds. The air smelled of fire and death, and it cloyed his throat and left a bad taste in his mouth. Everywhere he looked, evidence of the war and the destruction it had entailed soiled his school, tainting every fond memory he had of the place… But that wasn't all he saw.
He also noticed a group of kids splashing around in the shallows of the lake, waving at the giant squid as it lazily bobbed close to the surface. He spotted a witch helping a one-legged suit of armour hobble back up to the castle. He caught sight of Professor Flitwick repairing a shattered window with a nimble flick of his wand. He witnessed the first steps of the rebuild, the first signs that no matter how it might feel now, things were not so damaged that they were broken beyond repair.
The school would never be the same again. None of them would. But damaged did not mean irreparable and different was not the same as broken. The castle may be covered in large, ugly scars, but its foundation was intact because Hogwarts' core lay with its people, not in its walls, and so long as those people were still around, still fighting and breathing, Hogwarts would never crumble.
Harry stood and pulled off the Invisibility Cloak as he started the trek up to the castle. He felt older and heavier; there was a weariness setting into his bones and a pile of ash within him where before there had been only fire. He was not okay, and he didn't expect himself to be. But he knew that the pain was only temporary and that time and effort would serve to dull the sharp ache now branded into his soul.
Years from now, the traces of the war will have faded from these castle walls, but the scars would remain as a relic of what had been lost and the price that had been paid, and Harry's own scars, whether they be physical or mental, would serve the same purpose. They would be a constant reminder of the forces in this world that seek only to destroy and of Harry's duty to keep those evils at bay.
Peace was a responsibility, one he would gladly take on.
Many thanks to AnneAquilla for beta'ing!