Keeping the Faith
"You all righ'?" he said gruffly.
"Yeah," said Harry.
"No, yeh're not," said Hagrid. "'Course yeh're not. But yeh will be."
They spend a lot of time around the kitchen table, for a good while after. The Weasleys and the auxiliary Weasleys, though others will drift in later.
Molly likes having them around. She hates being alone, now; the silence is filled with the echoes of the dead. Her brothers, dead these twenty years. Her friends, Remus and Tonks and Sirius-because Sirius was her friend, for all they would argue. She had maybe overstepped sometimes, had failed to overcome the need to mother the motherless, even when the motherless were functional adults. But what else could she have done, watching him spiral? And she had to protect Harry, protect her son, because Petunia Dursley had failed him. But she regrets her accidental cruelty.
Fred echoes the worst. She can hear his laugh, perhaps a bit sharper and harsher than George's. She can hear his heavy footsteps-he always walked too heavy, Fred did, she'd always tell him-
But she wouldn't be telling him anything, anymore. Molly's eyes burn with unshed tears, while Arthur looks on, tired and concerned.
Indeed, that is the sum total of what Arthur does, at first. He has taken time off work, and since most of the ministry has, no one minds. He does not fiddle in his shop, looking at muggle plugs and machinery. Instead, he sits at the kitchen table, a mug of cold tea in his hands, and looks at his family, and thinks about his children. He worries about the lost look in George's eyes, on the other side of Percy, clinging tightly to his third eldest's arm, leaving fingertip bruises that Percy does not notice. Their relationship is complex, now; George is still angry at Percy for leaving, but he has lost a brother and his best friend, and will not lose anyone else if he can help it.
Percy is desperate to return to the fold. Arthur is desperate to let him. He has apologized for what he said, for all the little failures throughout Percy's life, that cumulated in his leaving. Because that fight was not just about the ministry- it was about Percy never feeling accepted, about being different and a little bit ignored, about being mocked. Arthur wonders if Percy ever thought that his father did not love him. It makes him cold.
Bill, for the first time, feels unsure. He clings to Fleur's hand-she looks like a butterfly, but she is rock solid at need. And she is needed, now. Sometimes, Molly cannot pretend anymore, and falls into a vacant chair. She does not cry, but looks blankly at the family clock, where Fred's hand is Home. Bill does not know what she is thinking.So, it is he and Fleur that pick up the slack, making dinner, cleaning the house, and ensuring the rest of them function. They stay at the Burrow, because Molly needs to know her family are about when she wakes up in the night. Bill wishes she would cry. Then he could.
(She does, finally, when Victoire is laid in her arms. Bill will too, and Later, when Dominique and Louis come along it goes a long way in patching the pain in his heart. The three of them, along with Teddy Lupin, will then proceed to wreck so much havoc at Hogwarts that even Hagrid despairs. But that is in the future. For now, they sit, and stare, and remember.)
Charlie is back in Romania, arranging things so he can be transferred back to Britain. There is a dragon reserve in the highlands in Scotland-Professor McGonagall's nephew works there- he wants to be home. He has missed so much of his sibling's childhoods that he mourns Tonks more than his own brother, and there is something wrong in that.
He does not tell anyone, though. Charlie is very, very good at keeping his own council. But later he will become a sounding board for a mass of nieces and nephews.
Ron sits very closely to Hermione and Harry. There are bonds between those three that are barely comprehensible to the others, and only Bill and Fleur understand the guilt in his eyes. But now he has an arm around Hermione nearly always, and in the rare times the whole pack goes to Diagon Alley, he shields Harry from nosy questions with a fierce look, strangely reminiscent of Molly. And Ginny protects them all- when people make demands of the Golden Trio, it is Ginny who stands in front of them, wand ready, an unspoken threat. Ginny Weasley has commanded an army, a general in guerilla warfare; the hardness in her eyes a testament to what she has gone through.
But she has killed, and that keeps her up at night. Those four have taken to sleeping in Ron's cramped attic, an awkward configuration of camp beds, Pig, Arnold, and the ghoul. Molly allows it, because there is blood on her hands, too. Her children have become warriors, despite her best efforts.
(But there is a payoff. Brilliant, lazy Rose and hardworking, obnoxious Hugo will not fight in a war. James Sirius will perhaps get into a bit of trouble here and there, but there will be no prophecy over his head and no malice in his jokes. Albus Severus will become best friends with Scorpius Malfoy. Lily Luna will inherit both parent's quidditch talents and her "uncle" Oliver will sob with joy. But not yet.)
Months after, others drift into the Weasley kitchen. Andromeda brings Teddy, her own loss etched on the new lines of her face. Her and Molly will sit in the garden with him, his wide eyes absorbing his world. They will tell him stories about his brave, foolish parents, and Andy Tonks will fight back her bitterness. Teddy will live in his mother's old room, and when Draco Malfoy tentatively comes up to his estranged aunt in Diagon Alley, wanting something he cannot name, Teddy will tug on his long blonde hair. Andromeda will see the boy, not the Death Eater.
(Teddy and Andromeda will be at Draco's wedding, and Narcissa will be frostily polite. When he comes along, Scorpius will adore his great-aunt.)
There is Lee Jordan and Angelina Johnson, both mourning the same man but for different reasons. To Angelina, he was her friend-always ready with a joke and a laugh, and she liked to remember him with a glint in his eye and a beater's bat across his shoulders.
(Later, she will become a chaser for Wigtown, and then a wife, and then a mother to two children who are quiet and well behaved, and George will demand to know if Percy switched them with Bill's. But for now, she sits at the Burrow table, a silent reassurance.)
Lee Jordan has an emptiness in his eyes. Lee is mourning both a friend, and a man he had loved. He had never told Fred, had known Fred was looking at Verity as more than an employee-hadn't he spent a lot of time at Lee's, debating the ethics of asking out someone who worked for him? Then the war happened, and Verity had been packed off to Canada with Penelope Clearwater, and there was no time for any sort of confession. Lee does, however, become a permanent fixture at the Burrow on Sundays, and Potterwatch will somehow continue because Harry will only ever give Lee interviews. (The whole thing rather quickly disintegrates into a parenting and quidditch show. Lee will only have the one love, but he does heal, in time.)
Oliver visits. He looks in on Percy, who was his friend; on George, who was one half of his champion beater team; on Harry, the best seeker he knows. With him is Marcus Flint, of all people, and Marcus' sister Audrey. Occasionally he will coax everyone out for quidditch, and George becomes keeper in place of Ron. He will not touch a beater's bat again. Oliver is just pleased he's in the air.
Marcus had been there, at the battle. He had every reason to hate the Death Eaters, who had killed his parents and left the Flint children to be raised by a half goblin house elf, Death Eaters who would be more than willing to kill his beloved older sister for being a squib. Named for a war god, Marcus was hellbent on retribution.
He sees the look in Molly's eyes when she makes them all tea, and later asks his elf, Raxa, to make her cherry tarts. To Marcus, cherry tarts are a universal salve. Molly calls him a sweet boy, and the three Flints have an open invitation from then on.
(In a few years, that open invitation will lead to Percy shyly asking Audrey to marry him. Marcus will be so ecstatic that he will inadvertently kiss Oliver. Molly and Raxa will plan both weddings and cry in equal amounts. Raxa and Kreacher will commiserate about the whole lot while they help Molly the Elder with dinner. Fred's echo will laugh.)