Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter!
Rating: K plus. (it won't let me put the symbol there!)
A/N: I haven't been making as much progress as I'd like with my long term fics, so I decided to get some misc. ideas out by writing one-shots. This is my third one ... so that sums uphow it's going creatively at the moment. BUT, I shall be gone for a week to the beach with friends for Spring Break, so maybe everything will piece together while I'm there! Oh! And it might seem this way, but this one-shot doesn't have anything to do with 'Before the Storm', they just deal with similar subject matter.
"Today's not going to be a good one, is it?" Katie Bell said as she sat on the edge of her and her fiancé's unmade bed.
The man wanted to lie to her and tell her there was no reason it shouldn't be a good day, but he couldn't, "No, I don't think it will be, Kates."
"You haven't called me that since we were in school," Katie remembered, getting off topic for a moment, "If something happens today ... promise me you'll take care of Emma."
"Katie ..." The Scotsman buttoned up his dark blue robes.
"Oliver, please." She pled with him as she stood and wandered into her wardrobe closet, finding her own robes and magicking her wet hair dry.
"I promise I'll take care of Emma," Oliver stepped into the walk in closet behind her and hugged her from behind as she contemplated what robes to wear, "But nothing is going to happen to you. Or me." He added, quelling the next question he knew she would ask.
"Why did we ever do this in the first place?" Katie asked, her vision becoming cloudy with tears. She turned to face him, his arms still lightly around her waist. "We were young ... both when we just got out of Hogwarts. We didn't have Emma then, and now that we do, I'm scared."
"It's alright to be scared," He leaned in closer to her, "I'm scared too, you know that." H placed a light kiss on his fianceé's lips. "Now think of it as we're doing this for Emma. Her future; her safety."
"It's just hard leaving her and not knowing if we'll come back," She hugged him tightly to her and her head rested on his shoulder, "But," She began with a new assurance, "this is something more important than just us ... it's our entire world."
The green bolt of light hit the witch square in the chest. The wand that had been lifted to yell some sort of spell fell to the marble ground with a clatter that seemed to magnify in Oliver Wood's ears.
He watched in horror as the love of his life, the woman he was supposed to be marrying in a month's time, fell to the ground lifeless. He wanted to run to her, run and cradle the hollow body of his fiancée, but he knew he couldn't.
He fought on along side the many other members of the Order of the Phoenix, battling back the Death Eaters, but edging ever closer to Katie. If nothing else, he would protect her body, for her spirit was long gone.
The battle raged on, spells and curses of all colors flying from wand to wand. At last the Death Eaters fled, and Oliver slumped down next to Katie. Other witches and wizards did the same to their other lost loved ones – friends, family, and mere acquaintances.
He was immediately in tears as he held her lifeless form in his arms, rocking back and forth like a madman. He brushed her damp hair back from her face and he was shocked when he met her open, dead eyes. With shaky hands, he brushed his fingers over her eyes, closing those hazel orbs that he would never stare into again.
He lowered his head, hugging her tightly as he sobbed into the crook of her neck. His heart was breaking in his chest as the cruel reality that Katie Bell was dead hit him.
She would never be his wife.
They would never grow old together.
She wouldn't be able to watch their daughter grow up.
Emma. Their daughter's name brought another wave of shock upon him. Little Emma wasn't even a year old and now her mummy was gone.
Oliver cried and cried as he cradled Katie's body. Everyone else was grieving too, but those who knew him and Katie personally stood their distance, letting him grieve.
"Oliver," Fred Weasley, the one time jokester along with his twin, George, knelt down next to Oliver, "Oliver, we need to get out of here."
"I'm not leaving her, Fred," Oliver answered in a muffled voice as he was still holding onto Katie's body tightly.
"You don't have to, but we have to leave before more come. Before we suffer even more losses," Fred placed a comforting hand on the Scotsman's shoulder. In the previous major battle, Fred had lost his own brother, George, and his and Oliver's own mutual friend, Lee Jordan, who hadn't even been a member of the Order of the Phoenix, but just in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Oliver nodded, knowing the truth in the redhead's words. He stood, taking Katie's body with him in a cradle-like position. She was dead, but she wasn't going to be left to the mercy of Voldemort's supporters.
"Lets go, Fred," He nodded an the three of them disappeared into thin air.
At a small little funeral in Northern Wales, where Katie and Oliver had taken up house, Oliver Wood stood next to a dug up hole in the ground, looking on with his infant daughter in his arms as the casket was lowered into the ground.
"Throw 'em to mummy," Oliver whispered to Emma as he placed three little red rose petals in the child's outstretched hands.
Emma, who had taken notice of the sad environment, obeyed and threw the petals down on top of the casket. One fluttered about and got caught on the ground, not making it to the coffin, but the other two drifted downwards, falling on top of the casket.
"Good girl," Oliver kissed the side of his daughter's head and hugged her tightly. Emma laid her head on her daddy's shoulder and they stood there for a long while, Oliver subconsciously rocking the little girl.
"Oliver," Fred Weasley approached his best friend, standing at a distance from him, "The Ministry was invaded last night," He said quietly, "Lord Voldemort cleared the place out." Saying Voldemort's name was becoming less and less frightening for wizards.
Oliver nodded, "Your dad – ?" He asked out of politeness.
"He wasn't there," Fred added, slight relief in his voice.
"P-Percy?" Oliver queried, knowing that his former good mate did indeed have a job at the Ministry.
"Yeah, Ol, he was there," Fred answered sadly.
"I'm sorry for you loss," Oliver responded truthfully, the grief he felt at the news of Percy's death was nothing compared to what he still felt at the moment towards Katie's death – sadly, it never would be, even if that was unfair to Percy.
"We'd lost him a long time ago," Fred shrugged, shaking it off, "Ange said if you ever need us to help you out with Em, all you have to do is ask."
"Tell Angelina thanks, but ... I'm not letting Emma out of my sight for a long time," He turned to look at Fred, holding onto his daughter tightly, "She's all I've got left, Fred."
"I understand, but we're here for you if you need it. Just as you were there whenever we lost George," Oliver nodded at Fred's words.
George Weasley had died three months ago, leaving behind an already broken family. He had just bought Alicia a ring ... and then it happened. The inevitable battle between the Order and the Death Eaters ... small little battles that had been raging on for ages as neither Harry nor Lord Voldemort had been able to get the upper hand. George had died bravely, but even his bravery wasn't a match for the horrid Killing Curse. George was now joined by Katie in the afterlife, alongside Percy, the brother he could never really hate, despite everything that happened.
Oliver stared back at the coffin as it was lowered into the ground. Her body wasn't inside the coffin, but it was made to look that way so he and many others could feel a sense of closure. Her body had been burned, so not to be cruelly resurrected by the Dark Lord, and the ashes sat locked away in Oliver's house.
Fred walked away quietly and Oliver continued to stare there, looking as the empty coffin rested six feet in the ground. "I love you," He said more to the air than to the coffin, holding his daughter tightly. He looked at his daughter – her beautiful hazel eyes bringing him back to the brink of tears –, "I love you, too," He said to the infant, who's eyes and mouth were the mirror images of her mother's.
He smiled a small smile, remembering the last words he had said to Katie ...
"I love you, Oliver," Katie had said nervously as they stood in a dark corridor, underground in an area they knew was about to be flooded by Death Eaters.
"I love you, too, Katie," He had said, before the two kissed and the onslaught of Death Eaters overwhelmed them and their allies.
It was their final 'I love you', but it would last them a lifetime.
OK! There you go!
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