A boy, no older than 16, with jet black hair and a fringe hanging in his pale blue eyes, has sat outside every night for the past fortnight looking at the stars. Just looking. Not observing anything, not searching for any answers, not wishing on the stars. His pants-clad legs dangling off the side of the astronomy tower.
Some nights, his eyes travel to the black lake, the moon glistening on the surface of the unblemished waters. Some nights, his eyes travel to the small patch of forest they had planted two months prior. Some nights, his eyes travel nowhere at all. On nights like those, he prays.
He isn't a religious boy, but he prays all the same. He prays and hopes, not for the first time, that there really is something greater than him out there. He prays and hopes he isn't as alone as he thinks he is.
The boy knows that if anything happens to him, no one will be able to protect this beautiful haven they have created. His friends are there still, sleeping peacefully in their beds, none the wiser of the danger out there. They think they are safe here.
He has tried many times to explain to them why they need wards around Hogwarts, why they need to keep certain people at arms length, but they do not listen to him. They think he is trying to play favourites. They do not understand the danger out there. Not fully.