Delicate Delacour. That's what they always called you in school. It seems like a distant memory now, all these years removed, but back then you certainly were as delicate as a flower. You always dressed as if you were set to meet the Prime Minister. Each strand of your golden hair always hung perfectly in place and your nails were always filed into dainty ovals. You were fragile, but you were spectacular in that fragility.
Being beautiful never made you many friends. Most of the girls in your school whispered behind your back, but you weren't bothered by it. In fact, you thrived on their jealousy. It validated you in a way that nothing else could.
Several years have passed since then and that girl is only a distant memory. War and pain have jaded her. You still appear dainty on the outside, but at your core you are hardened.
The death of a boy you hardly knew shattered all of your silly fantasies. You still remember the way he looked when Harry dragged him out of the maze. His eyes were glazed over and all the color was gone from his skin. He was a mere shell of what he'd been in life. To this day, his father's horrified screams occasionally haunt your dreams.
But that is the past as well.
Currently, you stand in the hospital wing of Hogwarts, once more weighed down by tragedy, but this time it's much more personal. Your soon-to-be husband lays before you, his handsome face mangled. Your hands are covered in his blood and your cheeks stained with a thousand tears. An icy chill spreads through your veins and you begin to shiver. Reaching out, you take your husband's hand, hoping that it will give him even the slightest bit of comfort.
"Bill. I'm here," you whisper to him, praying that he can hear your words.
Minutes tick by at an agonizing pace and you worry that he has been forgotten in all of the chaos. As blood continues to ooze from his wounds, you fear that he might bleed out. You are just about to begin shouting for help when Madame Pomfrey rushes in. She gasps when she sees the shredded pile of flesh that is your husband's face and it fills the pit of your stomach with dread.
Silently, you watch as the old witch casts spell after spell over your husband. The bleeding lessens, but doesn't stop entirely and you can tell that that concerns her. Her eyebrows furrow and the wrinkles on her forehead deepen. She tries another spell. Still nothing. She spreads a thick coating of salve over each of his wounds and finally, the bleeding stops.
"Mrs. Weasley," she says as she turns to face you. "Your husband is lucky to be alive. I've done my best to treat his injuries, but due to the nature of how he received them, they cannot be healed by spells. We will have to let them heal on their own. I suspect that there will be a large amount of scarring and some aspects of his personality may be changed. We won't really know what the full effect will be until he's recovered some."
You try to speak, but you can't seem to find the words, so you nod your head instead.
"I don't think he will be a werewolf since Greyback wasn't transformed, but I've never had a case like this before, so I can't say with certainty."
"But he will live?" you finally manage to choke out.
"Yes," she says with a sympathetic smile.
"Then zat is all zat matters," you say and you mean it.
Hi there!
This story was originally posted on HPFF for the Up For Grabs Challenge. The prompt for the challenge was to pick a banner from the Up For Grabs section at TDA and write a story around it. I was lucky enough to find a beautiful banner by Quixotic titled Delicate Delacour. As soon as I saw it, I knew what I wanted to write and the words just really began to flow!
I hope you enjoyed this story and if you have a moment, I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comment box below!
Thank you for reading!
~Kaitlin/TreacleTart
