Written for a 10 letters live journal challenge where 10 prompts are followed to write 10 different letters. The prompt for this letter to reject. I love feedback. ^_^ The next letter should be up within the week.

Dear Victor,

I hope this letter finds you well and healthy. I realise that with the tournament your fame will have increased even more. More than you could have expected it to. I'm sure you can cope with the increase in fan girls Victor, you have before and you will in the future though your dismay makes me laugh. My heart felt congratulations on your latest championship. Thank you for the pictures, the trophy really is a lovely piece of craftsmanship though I'm sure that means little to you. Try not to drink too much champagne.

I have written before and I hope that one day I will again but this letter, this letter that caused my heart to ache just so as I wrote it, may have to be my loving last for some time.

In Bulgaria I realise that you may be somewhat shielded from the horrors that develop a little more every day in Britain. I fear that mere words cannot convey what we face each day. As you know the Dark Lord has returned and he grows stronger each day, no matter how much people try to deny it. We take little comfort from our new Minister and the government's changes in policies. They have come too little too late and many of us fear that it is only a matter of time before the government collapses entirely.

I have seen the bloodshed of war Victor. It is not how they portray it in the stories. The headmaster is dead and I fear the hope of thousands dies with him. Darkness loom over Britain and it grows darker every day. People are dying and disappearing, everyone who remembers says it is just like before.

I cannot stand aside and let this happen Victor as I am sure you understand. To read every morning about women and children being murdered by this monster while I am safe in my bed just kills me. I have to do something and I am sure you can figure out who I will follow until the end, no matter the outcome. This moment was what we spend our lives training for, the moment where we can use our magic to make a difference. I remember you speaking of your family and the losses you suffered and I know you will understand.

I would be a liar if I told you I was not afraid because in truth I am terrified. I am terrified I will go to sleep one evening and never wake up, I am terrified that one of my friends faces will be the one on the front page of the paper during the summer and I am terrified that we could lose this war.

I try to be optimistic but really, where can we find optimism? We were victorious before yet here we are again, preparing to face the same monster. Once again grown wizards fear their own shadows and children can no longer play in the street. The funeral broke my heart Victor, truly it did because there were people there that knew the headmaster but didn't truly know the headmaster. They did not love him, they loved the idea of him and it makes a person wonder, what do we truly leave behind when we are gone?

I have so many thoughts running through my head that they hardly make sense. This letter hardly makes sense, the world doesn't make any sense and I hate it. There is no book for this, there are no answers in the library and I fear that out there, out there in the real world, I won't cope. That when I am faced with real foes that I won't know how to cope because they won't follow the rules Victor, they will just try to kill me and nothing about books or cleverness will save me then. Luck, nothing more and nothing less saved me when I faced them last year and still we lost one of our own, this year, literally luck saved us and we lost the greatest of us all. It doesn't make our situation look any better. I can't see the silver lining in all of this.

Society is cruel my friend. One minute they will love you and the next they will hate you. Last year they wanted to burn Harry at the stake for what they saw as his crimes and now, now they expect him to save them, save the world and when you look at what this life has given him, you wonder why he would want to. What has it ever given him? I confess to you and you alone that if it were me, I don't know if I would have the nobility to fight for them. I fear I would run and hide and prey I was never found.

Is that wrong?

Does that make me an evil person? Am I no better than those I fight to stop?

I don't know the answer to that either and that scares me more. I have read books, more books than I could name from people who walked this earth hundreds of years ago, books about strategy, planning and duelling and still I feel no confidence. I cannot write of what I will have to learn of to end this war but it makes me sick and causes me to doubt the human race. What we are capable of could turn your stomach though attending your school, I am sure you are fully aware.

The final point to this letter, and that which I should have make clear at the beginning is this. I cannot write to you any longer. If I survive this war it could be years before I can write again. Rumour says you could be at the Weasley wedding and if so, I hope I see you there but this letter must be written in either case, before it is too late.

I am going to war Victor, I stare my own mortality in the face each time I wake up and I know I will be a target until I am either victorious or dead. I write to you to tell you not to wait for me. Do not deny that a part of you still holds hope. I know you care for me and that truly means the world but I cannot ask you to wait for something that can never happen. You will always hold a special place in my heart but this, this must be the end. The end of what we had, what we have and what can never be ours.

I can only ask one thing of you and that is that you move on and you live. Go out after your games, chat up women, drink too must fire whiskey and go home at silly hours of the morning.

Live now, because I cannot.

I hope that we will one day meet again and that in some way, whatever we may be to each other, you will one day show me the wonders of Bulgaria. I have read all about it's history and it sounds like a truly fascinating place.

Until then, I wish you all the best.

All my love,

Hermione

xxx

Sincerely