Spare
They say that words have power. He'd never believed it much himself – he was a man who always had words to spare, who talked to fill gaps and out of boredom. Now he knew just how true it was. One word had destroyed him, dug his life up by the roots and thrown it on the scrapheap.
He should never have asked. The boy had been reluctant to give it to him. He said it was dangerous, that it was a terrible memory, that it was evidence. But in the end he had handed over the silver thread of reminiscence, and there had been a tiny bit of relief in his eyes as he removed it; it had weighed heavily on his mind. Now someone else would carry the burden of the loss.
He was never really sure why he wanted it. But he had loved his son so desperately, had been filled with joy and pride throughout every hour of his too-short life. He had been present at his birth, at every birthday and Quidditch match and important occasion. How could he possibly bear to miss those final precious moments?
It hadn't been enough to hear the boy's praise of his son, or the old man's touching speech that had painted him as a hero. Cedric had been his hero, and he needed to share his last hour if he was to be whole again.
He knew how his son had died; he knew what he would be seeing. But he had faced the Nameless before in the First War; the memory of him held no terror. At least, none compared to the knowledge of his loss, filling his being like a sucking abyss. If only he could see his son once more, see him stand proud against the enemy, maybe the pain might subside, just a little.
And for a few moments, it worked. He saw Cedric's glorious mix of competitiveness and sportsmanship, his courage in the face of the unknown. As an experienced user of the Pensieve, he could read the originator's tone of mind, and the boy's glowing admiration of his elder peer was a balm to his heart. He drank in how his son had moved with so much courage, how his face barely flickered with fear at the sight of the Nameless.
And then the Evil One spoke. That high, hissing voice that wreaked so much havoc, ordered so much pain. For ten years that voice had been a remorseless portent of death, suffering following loyally in its wake. And it would be one word uttered by that voice that would destroy him completely.
"Kill the spare!"
The boy had lied; the old man had lied. His son had not died fighting. He had died as a spare; he had been killed because he was standing by pure chance between the boy and the enemy. He had not had a chance to raise his wand or show his indubitable skill at duelling. Cedric had not been sacrificed because he was brave or kind or good, or any of those talents for which in a sane world he would have grown up to receive so much acclaim.
Oh, on some distant level he realized that nothing had really changed. The story was the same; his son was still a good, loving boy who had been on the right side. But he had never thought of his son as anything but a hero, the lead player in every scene in his life, and the knowledge that it had not ended like that was his undoing. The insidious, dismissive word resonated within him, echoed in the darkest corners of his mind.
The worst part was that, deep down, he knew that he blamed his son. Blamed his beloved son for falling short of the greatness which he had always ascribed to him, for allowing himself to become background noise, disposable. If his son had been important, he would have lived, and how dare he do this? How did he dare to die and leave his parents in such pain?
He felt no regret as he swallowed the aconite six months later, the treacherous word still reverberating in his brain.