Title: The Last Horcrux
Chapter 4: Hope
WARNING: This chapter contains mention of non-consensual sexual activity, or in other words, rape.
…
Morning had turned into night by the time they had managed to get everything coordinated, but Chris thought that, all things considered, they had made pretty good time. What with trying to find enough large items which could be Transfigured into beds, getting all the mortal doctors and wizarding Healers organized and prepared to treat the sick in the most effective way possible, figuring out which rooms best suited the needs of which members of which safe-house, and then getting the current inhabitants of the rooms to move out to other rooms (which also needed planning), Chris was made continually aware of the disruption he was causing to life at Hogwarts. He resolved to find a way to repay the Order's kindness as soon as he could. The only plus point was that the endless traipsing up and down stairs, orbing from room to room, and poring tirelessly over copies of the Marauder's Map of Hogwarts had made him very familiar with the castle.
When everything was finally ready, and everyone was stationed at the posts he and the Order had assigned them, Chris, accompanied by Harry and Hermione at the insistence of Moody, orbed down to the Resistance Headquarters of SH 5. The two newcomers had barely a moment to gather in an impression of a carpeted floor, masses of people milling everywhere and glass doors leading into private offices which unmistakably comprised a corporate office, before a blur of auburn hair barreled past them and straight into Chris.
"Chris!" The woman shrieked, "Thank God, you're alive!" At her announcement, people from all around began thronging to the scene, exclaiming in amazement and joy upon seeing their leader alive and well. "Hey, Jennifer," Chris warmly returned his friend's embrace, who was sobbing her relief onto his shoulder. He rubbed her back soothingly, "I'm fine, Jen, really. Don't cry." She smacked him hard on the shoulder.
"Ouch! What the hell was that for?"
"Do you have any idea how worried I was?!" The woman ranted at him, her relief changing swiftly to anger, "Where the hell have you been? It's been two days!" When he did not answer immediately she pulled away from him and looked at his face closely, sensing by his guarded eyes that something was wrong. "Chris where are the Charmed Ones and the rest of your family?" She asked with growing trepidation as he tensed slightly at the question, "They managed to rescue you from Wyatt, didn't they?"
To Harry and Hermione's amazement and disbelief, Chris's expression remained completely unaltered. "They're fine," He responded evenly, shaking his head imperceptibly at Harry when the man opened his mouth to question him. He knew Jennifer would be furious with him for lying about this but he wanted this evacuation to go as smoothly as possible, and inciting a wave of panic by announcing the deaths of the most powerful beings of good magic did not strike him as a particularly effective way of doing it.
"Then how come I still can't sense them, if they're okay?" asked Michael, the white-lighter who had long been assigned to the Haliwell family, and was therefore duty-bound to worry about them. Chris cringed; if Jenny would kill him for lying about his family, it was nothing compared to what Michael would do.
"They're at this new safe-house," He invented. He motioned for Harry and Hermione to step forward. "This is Harry Potter and his friend Hermione Weasley. They're English witches who rescued us from Wyatt and brought us to their safe-house- a Magic School in Scotland. The school, Hogwarts, is cloaked against outsiders; that's why you can't sense them, but I can assure you they're all perfectly fine. Hogwarts has extended a much needed offer of assistance to us, and I've decided that relocating the Resistance there ignored it, raising his voice and spoke over the din. "We've spent the entire day preparing the place for everyone, and it's finally ready so we have to move now. I want this to go as smoothly as possible, so please cooperate with me for now and defer your questions until later."
There were exclamations of indignation and disbelief at this announcement. Harry and Hermione tensed as the entire congregation eyed them with open mistrust and apathy. "How do you know you can trust them, Chris?" asked Michael skeptically, torn between the immediate instinct to mistrust strangers and gratitude that the same strangers had, as he thought, rescued his precious charges. "I mean, I know they rescued you, but…"
The others were having none of it. "Who the hell are you to make a decision which affects all our lives without even bothering to consult us first?"
"And how could you just leave the Charmed Ones with complete strangers! You of all people should know better than that; I mean, there's a price on their blood…"
"You had better have a good excuse for failing to double-check with us on this one, Chris, or we'll-"
"Enough!" Chris shouted, his tone effectively cutting off all arguments. Harry watched with growing amazement and admiration as his face hardened into stone and he stepped forward with the authoritative gait of a true leader. Even his stature seemed to have grown. How, Harry wondered inanely, could someone who was as young as this boy was look like that?! "Let me remind you," Chris informed everyone through gritted teeth, "That I am your leader and will always act in your best interests, and that I would never leave my family if I thought they were in any danger," Pain and guilt flitted across his face momentarily, before it regained its usual mask of imperviousness. "This is non-negotiable," He continued firmly, "I want all the witches to gather on the west side of the safe house, all the white-lighters to stay here with me in the lobby, and all the mortals who are not sick to gather on the east side. Quickly, if you please!"
"But Chris, you have to talk to the council first! You can't just decide to-"
"Damn it, Adrian!" Chris exclaimed angrily, turning on his heel to face the Elder who had risked himself completely by turning his back on explicit orders from the Tribunal to help the Resistance's cause. The man's soul would have been recycled if Wyatt had not vanquished the Tribunal before he could have his trial; one of the only useful things his brother had done since the beginning of his reign of evil, he thought wryly. And his anxiety and frustration had made him snap at the one Elder he actually respected.
He took a deep, calming breath before speaking again. "Look, have I not proved enough times that you can trust my judgment?" The implication was clear. He had been leading them for nigh on four years and the only reason they had survived during that time was because he had been protecting them. His judgment was what had kept them alive until this point, so they had better trust it. It was not a card Chris liked to play very often, but he was growing desperate. He could feel something dimly through the bond he shared with his brother, and though he couldn't identify exactly what it was, it was filling him with a deep sense of foreboding. He needed to get everyone out of here now, at whatever cost, before it was too late.
"We're not saying we can't trust your judgment Chris," Adrian replied cautiously to his outburst, "It's just that, we need to get all the other council members together to discuss it before deciding to relocate."
"No," Chris countered, "We don't have the time for that." He paused for a moment, "I have never used my power to over-ride the council before, but if you force my hand then God forgive me, but I will." He turned to face the entire group before saying in an authoritative tone, "As the leader of the Resistance, I stand above the council, and though I rarely like to remind people of it, I will use that power over them to cross out any objections So please, do not argue, and get ready for the evacuation right now. If you insist on resisting me, then so help me, I will orb you there by force." A stunned silence followed this speech, but everyone present could tell that the Resistance leader was deadly serious. Realizing the pointlessness of arguing, they began shuffle, muttering angrily and scowling fiercely in his direction. He heaved a sigh of relief, and was about to say something to Jennifer when he felt a hand on his shoulder.
"Chris, are you sure you know what you're doing," Adrian asked, troubled and disillusioned by Chris's dictatorial behavior. In spite of the emphatic "yes" he received in reply, he still felt compelled to warn him, "If this goes wrong, it will it will be on your head."
Chris's mask of certainty and determination suddenly fell away and he looked drawn with weariness and resignation. "Isn't it always?" He replied tightly, turning away from the Elder feeling emotionally and physically exhausted. "Hey Jen," He asked his friend determinedly, "Could you get Hope for me please, before you go to the east side to join the other mortals?"
"Why? I mean, isn't she safe enough with Charlie?" Charlie was a powerful but inexperienced witch who Chris had put in charge of protecting the Resistance's young. Hope was perfectly safe with Charlie, but that wasn't why Chris wanted to see her.
"Yes, but I…" Chris wracked his brains to find a plausible explanation for his overwhelming need to see his last remaining family before giving up. "Just don't argue with me, Jen, please. I just-" His voice sank to a whisper, "I just want to hold her." Jennifer studied him for a long moment with an unreadable expression on her face, before nodding tersely and walking away.
"Who exactly is Hope?" Harry asked curiously, moving to stand beside Chris.
"You'll see," He replied, a soft smile transforming his features briefly until he snapped back to his leader mode. "All white-lighters of SH 5 in the lobby immediately, please!" He called out, closing his eyes and sending out his summons, "I want you to leave whatever it is you're doing and get your butts down here right now! I mean it, people!" A moment later, swirls of blue and white lights were exploding in every corner as a number of white-lighters orbed into the long passage. Chris didn't even acknowledge the exclamations of relief and joy which greeted his appearance before beginning to bark out his orders. "Mark, Carter, Sandy, Lucas, Haylie, and Steven, I need you to orb down to the sanatorium right now. And do not ask any questions; just wait there until I catch up with you. The rest of you, I need you to break up into teams of five people each."
He waited until everyone had done as he had ordered, before turning to the group closest to him and declaring, "We are commencing an emergency evacuation operation. I'm going to orb this team to a place, and don't worry, guys, it's completely safe. I'll give you a minute or two to memorize your surroundings and then call you back, but don't return until you're sure you'll be able to orb back there again later. Clear?" He waited only to see that they had understood before he waved his hand and orbed them to the Ravenclaw Common Room back at Hogwarts.
He waited for a minute before calling them back, and he, Harry and Hermione felt both somewhat vindicated when they say how impressed they seemed. "Damn, Chris, where the heck did you find that place?" Carly, the first to rematerialize, exclaimed enthusiastically. "It's awesome!" The others murmured in agreement.
Chris looked pointedly at Adrian who was looking, if not completely at ease, a little mollified at the very least. He turned to the whitelighters who had just returned, and told them, "You guys will be orbing all the witches in this safe-house to that place you just saw. I need you to keep count of everyone and make sure you orb only the witches. I told them to gather on the west side but you may need to round up a few of them. Don't orb more than two at a time and when you're done, report back to me for further instructions. I'll be sending you some back up shortly. Okay?" He received no reply as they were all already heading in the direction he had mentioned. He turned to the other teams who were looking at him with both curiosity as well as a reluctant anticipation.
"I'm going to orb ten more teams to the place I just sent those guys. Stay long enough to memorize your surroundings and then start orbing all the witches and other magical beings there. After you're done, report back to me." He waved his hand seven times in rapid succession before turning back to the remaining teams. "I'm going to orb five more teams to another room in that same safe-house. Same thing applies; stay long enough to concentrate on your surroundings, and then start orbing all the mortals from this safe-house who aren't sick to that room. They're supposed to be gathered on the east side. Tell them they'll be in quarantine for a while so they can't leave that room until we're sure they're completely healthy, but assure them they'll be well cared for." He made a sweeping motion with both his hands, and orbed all five teams to a large room which had been prepared for the purpose. Then he turned to few remaining teams and assigned some of them to orbing people's personal belongings and luggage to their rooms, and the rest to orbing all the books on magic they had managed to salvage to the expansive Hogwarts library.
At last, when there was no one left in the room but Adrian, Harry, Hermione and himself, and he heaved a sigh of relief, making as if to sink into a chair before a cry from the other side of the room interrupted him. He was striding across the room in an instant, a soft smile gracing his lips as he beheld the twelve month old infant in Jennifer's arms.
"Hey sweetie," He said softly, reverently, his eyes shining with adoration. He held his arms out to Jennifer who promptly orbed into them with a delighted coo. Chris smiled tremulously and closed his eyes as he kissed Hope on top of the head. "How has she been?" He asked his friend quietly, as the child immediately settled back into what must have been an interrupted slumber now that she was safe and secure in his arms.
"Charlie says she's missed you and hasn't been sleeping well since you left," Jenny replied, in a blatantly bitter tone which Chris equally blatantly ignored.
"I wish I didn't have to leave her so often," He sighed, more to himself than to her as he smiled down at the blonde head of hair snuggled against his chest.
Jennifer snorted with a hint of derision. "Chris you never leave her for more than two days at a time. Besides, it's understandable, I mean your position-"
"I refuse to use being a leader as an excuse for not seeing my own daughter," Chris cut in harshly, the excuse reeking too much of the ones Leo used to give for missing his birthdays when he was young.
"I know that," Jennifer replied evenly, "But Chris, you have to remember, she's not-"
"Don't even say it," Chris interjected, his eyes blazing with sudden fire. Two days ago, he would not have crossed Jennifer on this; he would not even have expressed as much love as he already had for the girl in her presence knowing that she looked upon his attachment with her with a brand of disapproval he could never quite fathom. But now, when he had lost his entire family in the course of one night, and she was all that he had, he could no longer hide his fierce paternal love for the girl, and no longer felt he needed to. She was, after all, the only family she had left.
"But Chris- she's very clearly your niece. I mean you have to accept-"
"I don't have to accept anything," Chris cut in curtly, "She is my daughter, in every way that counts, because I'm the one who has been there for her since day one, not that monster." The last word was spat out in such contempt that it hit Jennifer like a slap on the face.
She hissed in a tone of unmistakable anger, "Monster? Since when have you felt that way, Chris? When the hell did you decide that he can no longer be saved? When the hell did you give up on him?!"
Last night, Chris replied silently, when he tortured and killed my family for a goddamn book. He turned abruptly away from Jennifer as an excess of emotions, and found himself staring into Harry's compassion filled eyes. The sight was unexpectedly steadying, and he closed his eyes briefly, drew a shaky breath, and then forced himself to tune back into Jennifer's rant.
"…because someday, we will find a way to save him, and he will want to reclaim Hope as his own, and like it or not, you will have to accept that! You can't just get so attached to her that-"
"Yes, I can!" Chris exclaimed angrily, turning back around to face her, "For God's sake, Jennifer, she is my daughter! My girlfriend gave birth to her! And for you to even suggest-"
"She has blonde hair and blue eyes, Chris! She can heal!"
"So what?" He shot back in an angry whisper, "That could have been inherited from Leo!"
"She is the splitting image of Wyatt! Her facial structure, the shape of her eyebrows, the breadth of her forehead- there is no way that came from Leo!"
"Hope is not any less my daughter just because Wyatt raped my girlfriend!"
There was a sharp intake of breath from Adrian and Jennifer paled dramatically at the words, her hands flying to her mouth and her eyes widening in horrified realization. Chris closed his eyes in guilt and shame as he realized what he'd just said. He had sworn to protect her from that knowledge.
"Oh, God, Jen," He said, his voice rent with emotion, "I'm so-"
"Don't," She replied; hurt, betrayal and devastation filling her eyes and spilling onto her cheeks. "You and Emma…you lied to me. You lied to me! How could you lie about that, about him!" Her voice rose, jerking Hope from her peaceful slumber and causing her to wail in distress.
"Jen! Would you keep it down, please!"
"No, I will not keep it down!" Jennifer shouted, her eyes flashing with rage. Hope screamed in distress and Chris stepped back in alarm, stunned by his friend's behavior. Jennifer continued to shout, oblivious to Hope, "You told me he was in love with her! You told me they got drunk and slept together! You said the fact that he was still capable of love was proof that he was not too far gone down the path of evil!"
"Jennifer, you're scaring Hope!" Chris exclaimed frantically, simultaneously raising one hand to placate his friend and at the same time trying to calm the baby in his arms by bouncing slightly on the tips of his toes. It would have been a funny sight had the circumstances been different.
Completely unaffected by his efforts, Jennifer screamed her conclusion in an even higher pitch than her previous outbursts. "You led me to believe he could still be saved!"
"Jen, look, I'm-"
"No," Jennifer breathed over Hope's cries, thankfully no longer shouting but still seething, "Just- just, stay away from me, Chris." She turned on her heel and stormed out of the room, leaving a stunned silence in her wake.
Stricken, Chris slumped down into a chair, all the while whispering soothingly to Hope and rubbing her back to quiet her wails.
"Chris," Adrian asked in a tone of quiet reproach, "Why didn't you tell us?"
"Oh, I don't know," Chris muttered sarcastically, glaring up at the Elder defiantly, "Because I wanted the entire Resistance to know that my daughter- and she is my daughter, Adrian- was brought to life in the worst way possible? Or no, was it because I wanted to reduce everyone's non-existent morale and break the heart of his best friend by announcing that my brother, the Twice Blessed, the wielder of Excalibur, went from being simply a being of good subverted to evil to being capable of committing rape? And on the love of his own brother's life?! Or do you not remember what things were like last year; how they still are, for that matter!" He shook his head and continued in a softer tone, "You would have done exactly the same in my place."
"Lying to Jennifer only hurt her more in the end," Adrian disagreed, "She may have been Wyatt's best friend, but she's yours as well. You-"
"I did not hurt Jennifer," Chris cut in, indignation giving way to weariness halfway through the sentence, "Wyatt did. And as for Jenny being my friend as much as his, that's bullshit. She is one of my closest friends, but I can never replace Wyatt for her. She and Wyatt- when we were growing up, they were always together; getting into trouble, doing homework, walking to school, drinking underage, experimenting with weed…they always did everything together. She lived right next door, but you would never have known it from all the time she spent at the manor. I remember when I was five or six, there was a phase when I was actually jealous of her because of the relationship she shared with my brother. They told each other everything. You don't know the kind of hell she went through when he turned. I spent a full year trying to convince her that Wyatt was evil, and she only accepted it he attacked her when she tried to confront him. She was so devastated; I don't think she's ever been the same since." He shook his head and sighed, "These last several I've protected her from the knowledge of how bad he really is, and it wasn't that hard because she's a mortal and never gets to go above ground. She doesn't even know what San Francisco is like; none of the mortals do. I wanted her to hold onto the hope that there's still a chance of saving him, that there's still some hint of the old Wyatt in his soul, but-"
"The last I checked, you still believed your brother could be saved," Adrian cut in, surprised and shocked Chris had given up on Wyatt. Adrian himself had long since done so, but he wasn't the man's brother.
Chris bowed his head, his entire demeanor the very picture of misery. "I did," He whispered. "Before-" He stopped and stood up abruptly, his expression so tortured that Harry's heart clenched on his behalf.
"Before what, Chris?" Adrian asked slowly.
The Resistance leader's face hardened instantly into its customary mask as he realized they were heading into dangerous territory. "Before nothing. You'll find out soon enough, Adrian. For now, I need you to take Hope to Hogwarts and guard her with your life. Which isn't much to ask for because you're already dead."
"I thought you said it was safe?" The Elder asked, although he compliantly held out his arms to accept the little girl.
"It is," Chris replied, deciding this was not a good time to mention the fact that any demon or whitelighter could orb or shimmer in and out of there with no trouble at all. "But it pays to be careful. I'm orbing you to- where is Mrs. Potter stationed, Mrs. Weasley?"
Hermione consulted the list in her hands, "Prefect's Common Room."
"Right. I'm orbing you both to the Prefect's Common Room. Mrs. Ginny Potter, that's Mr. Potter wife, will answer any questions you have, and if Hope needs anything you just have to ask her to call upon her house-elf- do not ask; you'll regret it, trust me-, and he'll get you anything you need. That is acceptable to you, right?" He asked Harry somewhat belatedly.
"Yes, of course," Harry replied.
"Keep her safe," Chris told Adrian, "And if you need help, just holler."
"I will," Adrian replied before Chris waved his hand and orbed the two away.
"Why did you lie about your family?" Hermione demanded the minute they were alone.
"Because I didn't want everyone to panic and disrupt the evacuation," Chris replied evenly, "My family was made up of very powerful magical beings and their enchantments over this place are what protected it from Wyatt. Now, I think we'd better get to the sick area before the other whitelighters get bored of waiting decide to orb out. Are you still sure you can conjure up enough stretchers between you?"
"Yes, Chris." He had only asked them that question a million times.
Chris's face set with determination. "Then let's do this."
…
TBC…
I know there was a lot of detail given to the process of relocation which some of you may have thought boring, but evacuating eight thousand people is hardly a cakewalk, and I wanted my readers to appreciate the difficulties that would be involved.
What do you think of the Jennifer/Wyatt/Chris/Emma/Hope equation? (Oh, by the way, in case you didn't figure it out, Emma was Chris's girlfriend before Bianca. There will be more details about that later in the story). And in particular, what did you think of Jennifer? Must dash! Please review as soon as you can!