Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or anything related. No money is being made and no copyright infringement intended.
AN: Inspired by Elton John's song and the version for Princess Diana.
Like a Candle in the Wind
Snow was softly falling as I opened the door. I should be glad. Travers was in Azkaban, another one of them gone. Marlene's murderer, the one who had tortured me, defeated and imprisoned.
"Blood Traitor", these were the words he had carved into my arm. The cuts had long since been healed. They didn't understand that I would have born them proudly. They had been so horrified. As if there could be nothing worse than seeing my allegiance to my blood line called into question.
I lit the fire and sat down before the fireplace. I was feeling so cold, so cold. The Dementors. I managed to keep my calm facade in front of Death Eaters and colleagues, I always did. Alone in our empty house I felt the cold and misery.
Gazing into the flames, I remembered her dancing red hair. Lily, my best friend from the first day we met after the Sorting. We had talked to each other and gotten along well right away even though she was slightly upset because her childhood friend had been sorted into Slytherin.
Oh Lily, I remember how you cried when a few weeks later, some of the older Slytherins caught up with you and cut your skin with their potion knives "to find out if they could see the dirt in your blood."
From this day in my first year onwards, I knew that I would do everything to fight against this inhuman ideology. I looked up duelling spells so I could protect you in future and protect you I did until I failed. Until you died.
Some people were talking behind our backs, about the pretty and charming and popular Muggle-born and the pure-blood who wasn't quite so pretty and "followed her around." There were quite a few who called in shameful and I heard that other term more frequently. "Blood Traitor."
You had made it or so it seemed. You were one of Slughorn's favourites, an excellent potions maker and brilliant in Charms as well. People were glad to be in your company now and the insults receded. Still, there were always people who kept using this word. "Mudblood." I remember the pain in your eyes every time you heard it as if it had been yesterday. You tried to hide it behind snide answers but at least from me, you never could.
It wasn't hard to guess why you felt that way. "Mudblood" meant so much. Dirty, worthless, subhuman, someone, something that should be exterminated.
I will never grasp how he could call himself your friend and not understand.
He was there at your funeral. I saw him, somewhere behind the bushes, keen on not being seen. I was an Auror and it was my job to see. I didn't tell anyone but I kept a close eye on him to find out if he had planned something to harm us. He had not. His regret seemed genuine.
I'm sorry, but I can't say the same about everyone who was there. They celebrated when they heard of it. They celebrated your death!
Thank God it's over, thank God he's gone.
The Mud- sorry Muggle-born has done what she was supposed to do. She has sacrificed her life for the good of the wizarding world.
Dumbledore asked us if we didn't want to join the celebrations. He seriously asked me that. "Voldemort is gone; you and your son are safe. Don't you think this is cause for celebration? I know that you are sad but never forget they've died for the greater good as you would have done if it had been you. "
Frank had humoured him but I didn't join any celebration. Someone needed to stay with Neville, Dumbledore had to understand that. I never quite grasped why he brought our son into this. The Potters had been in hiding relatively soon after Lily had found out about her pregnancy but no one ever told us why.
I only learned about Neville three months before he was born. I hadn't planned to get pregnant in the middle of the war and I hadn't watched my body as closely as I should have. A colleague sent me to Saint Mungo's when she noticed my oddly swollen belly in the changing room; she believed it was the result of a curse. The Healers told me I would be a mother soon. From this day on, I had remained in hiding as well. Someone so heavily pregnant should not fight in a war anymore.
"Did you want to follow the example of those pure-blood warrioresses of old?" Frank's aunt Callidora had asked me half-jokingly. "Fight until your child is coming, apparate from the battle, have it and return to slay your enemies?"
I had never wanted any such thing of course. I hated the term pure-blood because it implied that everyone else was impure.
Thinking of Neville made me think of poor Harry as well who had to live without his parents now. Dumbledore had given him to Petunia, Lily's sister who hated magic so much, she could be the ideal Death Eater poster Muggle.
Yes, Lily, I know. I promised you I'd look after your son as you would look after mine but Dumbledore wanted to hear nothing of it. I argued, I begged, I pleaded for him to leave him with us or some other Order family but he thought Harry would only be safe at the Dursleys. Lily, there was nothing I could do. Nothing.
I couldn't stop the tears from falling now. What kind of friend was I? Not even able to uphold this one last promise we had made to each other. If someone happens to you, I'd look after Harry, if something happens to me, you'll look after Neville.
I buried my face in my hand. Why, Lily, Why?
You've been a light in these dark times. Like a candle that flickered under the onslaught of demeaning remarks and actions but never stopped illuminating the way for others. You offered comfort when no one else could see the good in life anymore. You helped wherever you could, be it with potions and charms or with your kindness alone. Lily, you've had more of a healing heart than many of those who have taken the vows and the training.
Rodolphus, turned traitor.
Sirius, turned traitor. Sirius! How could he? And I thought I knew him. Selling out his best friend and wife and child to Voldemort. In so many battles, we fought side to side, so many evenings we had spent together, joked together, laughed together. Sirius, how could this be possible? I would have sworn by my life that he was on our side.
What was it that Voldemort had to offer to those young men whose blood had been touched by darkness? What did he have to offer that made them forget everything that had mattered to them before?
In front of my inner eye, I saw him laughing, playing with Harry. Had he already known that he was going to bring about the death of this family? How could anyone be so spurious? He was in Azkaban now, killed Peter and twelve Muggles before my colleagues caught him. Three of his friends were dead because of him. I couldn't conceive it, I simply couldn't.
On some of those evenings, we had discussed how we would want to die if it came to that. "I want it to be in a battle, still laughing at my opponents' folly when it hits me before I know anything," Sirius had said. In hindsight, there was something sinister about the laughing part. He had laughed after killing all those people...
Many of the others hoped for the same death he hoped for. I wanted to die from the Killing curse. There's probably a dark sorceress in every fighting witch, anyway something made me quite intrigued by this curse and its brilliant green light. The last thing I wanted to see was green. Green that reminded me of my plants and of Lily's eyes.
The green light had not come for me but for all the others. Marlene McKinnon, my mentor and greatest inspiration. Oh, what would I give to have her by my side now calmly offering me her comfort? Marlene, you'd be needed so badly at the Ministry. Finally the chance to put your great plans into action. Azkaban without Dementors, a more humane treatment of prisoners that befit the light side, you had had great dreams and I used to dream them with you.
By now, I wasn't sure if the humane treatment of prisoners was a great concern to me anymore. The Death Eaters deserved to be punished for their crimes. The Ministry had turned way to lenient already. Malfoy, Nott, the Lestranges, Avery, the Carrows, Macnair and so many others had walked free under dubious rulings.
Dorcas, my fierce colleague, fallen to Voldemort's own killing curse.
The Prewett brothers, died in a fight against five Death Eaters. The war had turned Gideon so cruel and he had never had a chance to reconsider.
Edgar Bones, like Marlene full of great dreams murdered by a group of Death Eaters with his entire family, not even the children had been spared.
I missed them all so much and sometimes I wondered why I was still around. So many of my sisters and brothers in arms were gone but I was still there.
The green curse hadn't come for me.
And Frank was far away, searching for Voldemort. I couldn't bear the thought of losing him too. Sometimes I wished they would have sent me instead. Another chance for a real fight, another chance to achieve something or fall doing what is right.
I knew that each and every one of them would be shocked if they caught me thinking like that and I could almost hear them speak to me.
"There are still dark wizards to catch and wrongs to be righted," Marlene seemed to tell me. "You never gave up during the war, why now when you're so much safer?"
"We're dead but the children are still there," I heard Lily say. "Harry and Neville will go to Hogwarts together like we did. They will grow up in peace and safety and you can still look after him then now that Dumbledore has made this decision. It won't be too late."
I took a deep breath. They were right. Everything was not over. I had a son who needed me and I wouldn't leave him with his grandmother any longer. I made sure to wipe the tears away first though. Augusta didn't think highly of tears. I didn't want to imagine what she would say if she saw me talking to dead people in front of the fireplace like a madwoman.
There was a drawer full of chocolate bars in the kitchen, meant for the times when we came home from Azkaban. I took one of them, bittersweet chocolate. As I tasted the chocolate, I could think that life would go on once more but I would never stop missing them.
You've died for something worthwhile but you will be missed, forever. You were so much more than just the mother of the Chosen One, Lily. We will never forget you.
These were the last words I said to them before I extinguished the fire and left for Augusta's.