Written for the HPFC Genre Competition.
Prompts: Fleur Delacour, friendship
Genre: Heartache/solace.
Victory
It was sunnier than they expected; the anniversary of the battle, sunlight drenching the castle, windows glinting like winking eyes above. They gathered in silence, shrouded in black cloaks like bowed-headed crows, tips of their pointed hats bent forward in respect to the dead.
It was strange, Fleur thought. She had fought these battles beside these people, watched them suffer and suffered with them herself, yet she had never felt truly at home in the great school straddling the mountains that so many of her new friends still thought of as home. Her new family stood out easily in the crowd: dashes of fire amongst the ash, flamed-hair curling in the collars of their robes. Two years of living with them had taught her enough to know the single thought in each of their minds. She almost fancied she could see his face burning through the broken-glass memories in them.
Molly Weasley's shoulders were shaking; head bent down so low her trembling chin must have been touching her chest. Even George, whose face was always bright and grinning on her visits, was downcast, eyes dead and hollow as they gazed forward, barely seeing the service before him.
Her rounded stomach curdled beneath her hand, a bite of nausea which had nothing to do with morning sickness. Even her husband had retreated into quietness, his mind travelling back through his memories to a place she could not possibly follow. These were memories she did not and could never share, memories of bygone days, of childhood games and childish dreams. Her own childhood was not a close match. She did not have a brother and Fred Weasley had just been another name to remember in the lengthy family tree Bill had drawn for her the week before had come to meet them. She had spoken to him briefly, watched with vague amusement as he and George had deknomed the garden which soon turned to disgust when he had tried to get her to join in. But these were not memories that she could cherish, not memories which would measure up to the crushing pillars of affection the rest of the family had. No. In the bright daylight she was the only blonde in a sea of red and the only dry eye.
Fleur felt Bill shudder through his shoulder pressed against hers. She doubted it was from the cold. A glance towards him showed his lips downturned, his eyes glassed over, lost far away from her in his past. His hands hung loosely at his side, purposelessly. She would not be there if not for Bill, Fleur knew. She had no dead to remember, no scars to grieve. But there had come a moment shortly after the battle where her love for him had transcended into something greater, something deeper than mere affection. A mutual understanding, a shared experience had brought them even further together in a way she could not fully comprehend. It was not love. Love was constantly shifting, moving from passion to affection to adoration. It was only recently that she had begun to acknowledge that what they had reached was in fact the deepest throes of friendship. And it was more that than any sort of love that made her heart wrench for him and moved her hand to wrap around his, holding it tightly.
Like a breath of wind to blow away the dust, his eyes cleared, his mind snapping back to the present. The ghosts left his thoughts, the warm hand pressed against his own a fire to push away the cold dead feeling he had allowed himself to sink into.
His wife smiled, a small smile but a smile nonetheless. A twinkle in the eye, a squeeze of pressure on his hand. Her other hand rested over her swollen belly. Without thinking, his own lips flickered in a smile.
Not a word passed between them, no communication to mark a shift in the air around them. But it was enough.
When Fleur finally spoke they were walking away from the service, hushed, reverent chatter breaking up the silence around them. "I 'av an idea for ze name," she told him simply. There was no need to ask what name she meant.
"Yes?"
Fleur smiled, a strangely warm smile that seemed incongruent in the midst of the black-clad mourners around them.
"Victoire." Victory. In the end, that was what it was. And while the living may mourn it, Bill had no doubt the ghosts would be in celebration.