Trigger Warning: Blitzkrieg
September went by in a barrage of letters. Mum did most of the writing, as papa had re-enlisted.
She stopped trying to jolly Tommy along with promises that they'd be safe after her very first letter. Tommy'd tried to send a vitriolic missive, felt terrible, ripped it up and sent only a single word in response:
"Liar"
"I imagine they'll start controlling mail soon. You're quite lucky to be all the way in Scotland. There's been talk about evacuating large cities, and as you're well away from civilization we might not have you home for Christmas," mum wrote.
At least mum was honest the next time. Papa never wrote at all, usually signing in a post-script: "With all my love, mijito gatito".
Tommy sighed as Alfie ate his way through a box of peppermint toads. Alfie had bought them as a Christmas present to himself. He'd offered some to Tommy, of course, but Tom had a feeling the offer was superficial.
They were on the Hogwarts Express home for the holidays. Tommy'd stopped getting letters a month before, right after sending papa a birthday card. He'd spent the remainder of the semester fretting.
"I'm going to petition Professor Slughorn to install a wireless in the common room," Tommy said. Alfie swallowed the last toad whole and scooted closer.
"You know old Dippett wouldn't touch any muggle thingy with a ten foot broomstick," Alfie said. He rubbed his chin in thought before adding, "mind, I'd love to learn how to dance. You're always banging on about sock mops and malt shops and hot swings."
"Hot jazz," Tommy said. The Daily Prophet was always at least a month behind the muggle news, so it didn't surprise Tommy to find an article about "War in Europe, Muggles Fleeing Nasties". He ripped the article up in disgust.
"Wish they'd talk about what's happening to the rest of the world," Tommy said. Alfie scoffed and tossed his curls.
"They reported when the Polish wizards came seeking asylum," he said, already lost in a quidditch article. "And those ruddy Germans are refusing to play in the World Cup while the countries are at war!"
"Well, I rather think there's a war on, moron," Tommy said, echoing something he'd heard other muggle-borns chanting.
"Don't call me that! You'll tell me what happens, won't you?" Alfie said.
Tommy'd made certain to pack the two-way mirror.
"I will. But I doubt we'll be going to the cinema, what with the war on—"
"—Moron."
It was a miserable Christmas, the worst Tommy'd ever had. Liz and Alec were both still in training in Scotland somewhere, Uncle Stig was in the Home Guard and too tired to come and papa had to oversee the medical supplies at the local depot.
Mum and Grandmother couldn't pretend they weren't worried in person. Aunt Marie spent most of Christmas Day crying or recounting stories about her girlhood in Belgium, before the Germans drove the family out.
Tommy ended up spending all of the holidays but his birthday in his room, doing homework or reading about famous ancient Parselmouths. Alfie wasn't often around. He was probably having his own posh Christmas in London.
They didn't have a cake for Tommy's birthday. Instead, mum opened a bottle of champagne, sent from the DeLacys.
"With our compliments, for Thomas, who's now a proper young gentleman. Drink to an early end to the war", mum read the card aloud and threw it aside. "Really, drinking at your age."
"May I taste it?" Tommy tried wheedling. After frowning, mum relented.
"I suppose so. You've gotten so tall, Tommyknocker. You're as tall as papa," mum said. She had to reach up to ruffle Tommy's hair now. Tommy let her. He missed it even if he never told her.
They sipped champagne and listened to a patriotic broadcast. Tommy couldn't decide if he liked the taste of champagne. He hated the bubbles, but as he sipped he grew used to it. Grandmother fell asleep at the radio and didn't rouse even after papa came in at midnight.
"Happy New Year and Happy Birthday, my gatito. You're a young man now," papa said, kissing Tommy's forehead before taking off his snowy great coat.
"Thank you, papa," Tommy said.
Tommy spent the rest of winter semester buried in research. He camped long hours in the library, behind a fortress of books, hiding from Malfoy and his cohorts.
They'd taken it upon themselves to hex any muggle-born into silence, especially if the students took up the "War on, Moron" chant. They'd even cursed Maisie Gardner so that her witch's cap stuck to her head, flashing "Moron" at people.
"Find anything interesting, Davies?" someone said, one blustery March afternoon. No one, not even Alfie, ever interrupted Tommy during his reading. Tommy peered up from his tome on the life and deeds of Saint Patrick of Ireland, rubbing the bridge of his nose. Professor Dumbledore came into focus.
"Professor?" Tommy said. He didn't want to be rude, but he wished he could tell instructors when to nose around elsewhere.
"Now really, Davies, we mustn't be so rude. Being cooped up in the library at all hours has made you forget your manners," Dumbledore said, very much as though he'd heard every unkind thing Tommy'd thought.
"Sir, my apologies," Tommy said, doing his best not to sound prickly. Dumbledore shrugged, a mild false smile playing around his face.
"Well, an insincere apology is better than none at all." Tommy bristled at this, but bit his tongue. Dumbledore continued without comment, "I've heard from Horace that you're distantly related to the Gaunts. I was under the impression you were a muggle-born."
"I am, sir. I mean that I grew up outside the wizarding world," Tommy said. He decided on the spot he'd have to invest in another batch of crystallized pineapple.
"You're adopted. After I heard that Horace made some inquiries about your registration, I did some checking on my own. You see, I remember Marvolo Gaunt."
Tommy'd been ready to sneak out his two-way mirror, but he hesitated. Dumbledore, making his own investigation? That simply would not stand!
"Sir, it's a private matter. I don't think it's any of your business," Tommy said at once, standing so he had some height. Dumbledore looked mildly annoyed.
"I was under the impression that you wanted help finding Marvolo Gaunt. I can tell you with certainty that he's no longer alive," Dumbledore said.
It was just like meeting that wall of nausea back in the sea cave. Tommy lurched on the spot, a thick, sickly sweetness in his mouth.
"He's dead? But how do you know that?" Tommy asked.
Dumbledore patted Tommy's shoulder, but Tommy pushed him away. This time Dumbledore made a huff of impatience.
"I was making unrelated inquiries many years ago, and learned that Marvolo and his son had been arrested for attacking muggles. Marvolo was a violent-tempered man. He did not go quietly and I believe he sustained serious injury in Azkaban. When he was released, he returned home and passed away. His son followed him a few years later."
Tommy shuddered and stopped himself.
"What kind of inquiries?" Tommy said.
Dumbledore's infuriating little smile jabbed like a pinprick.
"As you yourself said, they were personal and confidential. I happened to come across the arrest record in the course of them, and it struck me as just the sort of unfortunate end Marvolo might come to. To be frank, Davies, you are lucky you escaped his clutches. He was never fond of muggles."
"Right, well, I'm glad then I have mum and papa to go home to," Tommy said, angry at Dumbledore and thus keen to show his muggle-born pride. "Wait. Would Marvolo have come back as a ghost?"
Dumbledore had taken up one of Tommy's library books. Tommy grabbed it back and fixed Dumbledore with the glare he'd learned from mum. Dumbledore sized him up a moment before saying,
"That was very rude. Five points from Slytherin. No, I don't think Marvolo is a ghost, or if he is, he never made himself known. In the future, Davies, I would advise you to keep your private things private."
Dumbledore left Tommy fuming, The Deeds of Saint Patrick: Holy Parselmouth clenched in his hand, wand in the other.
"Dead? Dead! Well, I suppose that was expected. You said the Sorting Hat barely recognised you," Alfie said, the moment Tommy'd shared his encounter with him.
In two weeks, they were supposed to be going home, but Professor Dippett planned an Assembly for that afternoon. Tommy'd been kept informed by Maisie and other muggle-borns' papers. Mum's letters were being magically censored so much they were as good as useless. No matter how many spells Tommy tried, he couldn't Vanish the long black rectangles blotting his mum's artistic script. The only good news was that Liz had been stationed at an airfield within an hour's walk from Hogsmeade.
"Even so, Slughorn's been blabbing about it all over the place, like it isn't a secret. We still don't know how much of a Gaunt I am!" Tommy said.
Alfie shrugged this off with the usual dimpled grin.
"Still hoping we're kissing cousins?" he whispered.
"Oh shove off," Tommy said, giving Alfie a good-natured push. They jostled each other all the way into the Great Hall.
Professor Dippett, though tiny and old, still had enough pep to climb up in front of the school and give incredibly long lectures. His speeches were the stuff of legend among the students: Cuthbert Crabbe swore that you could fall asleep faster at the Leaving Feast than any one of Professor Binns' courses.
"May I have your attention, please?" Dippett said. He had to. No one would give it otherwise. Alfie leaned across the table at Tommy, whispering,
"Wonder if he's canceling exams because there's a war on, mor—"
"—Due to the muggle war on the Continent, we will be ending term a week early. This is to ensure that our muggle-born students can be with their families, and perhaps make alternative arrangements should they become necessary. The school governors are considering remaining open over the holidays, for any student who requires such accommodations."
The rest of the speech disappeared into the urgent whispers up and down the tables.
Malfoy and Greengrass rolled their eyes at Tommy. Alfie looked stricken. Tommy craned around to look for Maisie Gardner. She'd put her head together with a few other Hufflepuffs.
On the train home, Tommy ignored the rumours Alfie swapped with Cuthbert and Ivor. The landscape outside looked much the same as when he'd travelled last September the first. One year into the war, and all that seemed to change was the lack of road signs. When they reached the London city limits, it was a different story.
Tommy spotted what looked like silver dirigibles. When they left Platform 9 3/4s, Tommy stared at the other trains. The windows had been painted black and covered in a wiry mesh.
"You staying with your muggle family?" Walburga Black said, stalking past him, dragging Alfie and Cyggy with her. Maisie followed them with her mother and a woman who might be an auntie.
"Tommy? Is it alright if I give you my telephone number? You have one at home, don't you?" Maisie said, without preamble.
"We do. My papa's a doctor," Tommy said.
"Mine's an engineer. We're here in London, Tommy. If I can, I'll ring you. I don't know if we'll be coming back…" she trailed off and smiled grimly. Her mother seized her and dragged her away, with only a wave for Tommy.
Mum waited for him in the main concourse. Like all the women around her, she had a smart suit on, plain gloves and hat. She also had a Red Cross patch sewn over her heart.
"Tommy, sweetheart," mum said, seizing him in a brief but fierce hug. She looked pinched. "Darling, I'm all of a dither. We had such a telling off from the air raid warden last night, and Grandmother organizing a ward at Crossfields," mum paused to draw breath, while Tommy flinched at the harshness of it, "Darling we won't be going anywhere this summer. Your father and I almost had second thoughts about bringing you home."
"What? Why?"
"Darling, we'll talk on the train," mum said.
They hurried to catch the train into Cardiff, stopping along the way to verify their citizenship, their destination, their loyalty to the British Crown and their lack of German ancestry. There must have been ten checkpoints for each city block.
"Has it really been like this?" Tommy shuddered as a pair of Home Guardsmen menaced them with old-fashioned bayonets.
"Darling, Tommyknocker, there's been talk about an invasion. We're all to knuckle under and keep safe," mum whispered as the Home Guardsmen strolled passed.
"They wouldn't invade us, would they? We're going to beat them, aren't we?"
Mum patted him sadly. The train to Cardiff wasn't nearly as crowded as Tommy'd expected. Mum was quiet, while Tommy watched a changed landscape fly past. None of the railway crossings had signs. He spotted distant squadrons of airplanes patrolling the skies.
"Liz is in one of those," Tommy said, pointing at the distant planes. Mum didn't look proud now.
"Darling, there's something we want to tell you. Your papa and I."
A cold stone settled in Tommy's belly, but he ignored it.
"What's happened? What's wrong?"
Mum clasped his hands and smiled. For the first time, Tommy noticed grey streaks in mum's dark hair.
"Darling, we have evacuees. Grandmother's been put in charge of the local movements, and your papa and I got Martin and Daniel Plaskett. They were evacuated from London. You're away at school, so we offered them a home."
Tommy blinked while mum clutched his hands. Behind the wrinkles and grey hairs, behind even the worry over him, Tommy read something else. Mum wanted him to have brothers. She'd always wanted him to have family.
"It's alright, mum, it's fine. It'll be wizard, just like having brothers," Tommy said, entirely too hearty for his own liking. It made mum smile, which was the most important thing. "They can have my Meccano set," he added.
"Oh, they've taken to it, they have."
Tommy smirked as mum giggled.
Martin and Daniel were waiting for them when they reached home. Like the trains and all the other buildings Tommy studied, mum and papa had put up blackout curtains. The entrance hall was downright gloomy with the curtains part-way drawn.
Martin seemed to be the older one. He shoved Daniel aside and thrust his hand out for Tommy.
"I'm Marty. Your mum's really wizard! Our mum works in a bomb factory, she doesn't have time to watch us. Now we're here, she can only ring us."
Tommy took the two boys in. They had the pinkish cheeks and tidy hair of two boys who'd been ordered to "make themselves smart".
"Do you like listening to The Shadow?" Daniel whispered.
"Mum let's you listen to the wireless that late?" Tommy said, grinning first at Daniel and then raising an eyebrow at mum.
She ignored him by shunting them into the dining room.
"Since we're all so many to lunch these days, and with three growing boys, we're eating in here. I'll just get tea on. You three can get to chatting," mum said. She retreated gracefully to the kitchens, winking at Tommy as she did.
"I've got a few comics too, did mum show you?" Tommy asked them both.
The boys whispered, before Martin said,
"Hope you don't mind. Your mum let us borrow your toys and books. We don't have so many at home, we couldn't pack them for the evacuation."
Tommy shrugged.
"It's better they get used," he said.
"Especially the model planes! We brought one each, but you've got more!" Daniel said. He had cabbage-leaf ears and scraggly teeth and reminded Tommy of a photograph he'd seen of Uncle Stig. Before the gas burns.
"That really is wizard. Did you meet Lizzy McGillicuddy? She's my god sister and an aircraft woman."
"We have. She's pretty. Her old man isn't," Martin said.
Tommy didn't want to talk about that war any more than he wanted to talk about Gaunts or magical sea caves.
"Uncle Stig's alright," Tommy said.
They spent all of tea and most of the afternoon comparing model planes and comics. Martin and Daniel both knew a lot about bombers and gunners, since their mother worked in a factory. Daniel was only eight, but Martin was eleven. Tommy wondered what it would be like to see him at Hogwarts.
Their tea was much poorer now that rationing had been imposed, but mum had brought out Grandmother's preserves to sweeten the dull bread.
Papa and Uncle Stig both joined them once Uncle Stig's Home Guard duties were over. Uncle Stig had sweets and comics for the little boys, and news for Tommy.
"Tommyknocker, old man. Alec Montgomery says he's wondering if he can't visit you up at your school. Says he's training there now. You like that pillock, Tom?" Uncle Stig said.
They were supposed to be listening to the wireless, but Martin and Daniel were bickering over which program to chose. Uncle Stig and Tommy had the perfect cover to discuss Liz's undesirable romance.
"Why don't you?" Tommy said. Uncle Stig, unlike mum, didn't know this game. He frowned, his eyes two smoldering embers.
"Hated his old man. They're all the same. Conceited. Pigs," he said.
Tommy thought of the ghost of Alec's father. He'd been handsome, like Alec, but miserable and cold. Maybe being a ghost had nothing to do with it.
"Liz likes Alec. Alec likes her. She's old enough to know what she's doing," Tommy said. Uncle Stig laughed, but his laughter sounded tired and feeble.
"Right, old man. It'll be different if you have a daughter and she steps out with a self-absorbed egotist."
Tommy laughed.
"Maybe I won't have a daughter," he said.
This time, when Uncle Stig laughed, it sounded genuine.
"That's right. You could be one of those bachelor professors your papa and I had at school. Or you could have sons. Or you might run off with that Alfred."
"Alfie's just a friend," Tommy said, shocking himself that such a thing needed stating. Uncle Stig's grin didn't shift.
"Right. And I'm a monkey's uncle," he said.
Tommy let Uncle Stig playfully punch him, but the teasing stopped when papa brought out a liquor that smelled medicinal. He and Uncle Stig retreated to a dark corner to smoke and talk of war.
Tommy hovered in the middle ground. Mum was shepherding Martin and Daniel to bed. Papa and Uncle Stig were ignoring him.
Tommy slipped outside into the back garden. He could see many more stars than usual with the blackout in effect. In the distance, he heard an air raid warden's whistle. Now was the only time to speak to Alfie.
"Psst."
"Psst yourself, Tommy Davies-Maldonado," Alfie whispered back. Tommy could barely make out Alfie's face, only his glittering eyes.
"Are you alright?" Tommy whispered.
"Been better. Mother and Father are going batty about this war business. The neighbours have dug a bomb shelter. A bomb shelter! They're so stupid, they actually think it'll protect them!"
"Shh! It can't hurt if there's an invasion!" Tommy said.
"It'd be impossible for muggles to blow our house up. We've got spells on it. You should come stay here for the summer. You could stay in my room!" Alfie said.
"Where, in your closet? Don't be a prat, I couldn't go to London! They're evacuating cities!"
Tommy was certain that Alfie had rolled his eyes.
"But that's just it, you wouldn't have to evacuate. No one's left Diagon and Knockturn alley yet, you'd think they would," Alfie said.
Tommy heard mum chivying the little boys up the stairs.
"I should go. See you in September."
"Fine. No talkies?"
Tommy slammed the mirror's case closed.
The sound of distant fireworks woke him. Down the hallway, he heard Daniel whimpering for his mother.
"Mum? Papa?" Tommy said. He slipped out of bed and into his dressing gown.
"Shh, Tommy darling, go back to sleep," mum said.
Tommy met mum in the doorway. She had only a small candle lit.
"But, what is it? Are there fireworks?" Tommy said. Who'd have fireworks during a war?
Mum grabbed his face in both her hands and almost squeezed the breath out of him.
"Tommy! Those are bombs! They're dropping bombs on Cardiff, the Germans!"
Daniel's whimpering grew to a keen.
"Mu~u~ummy!"
Tommy and mum both crashed through the doorway into the guest room the little boys shared.
"No, Daniel, sweetie, your mother is in London," mum said. She sat down beside the little boy and made soothing noises as she stroked his face.
Martin watched through a slit in the blackout curtains. Tommy joined him. He could just make out the reflections of fires in the distance.
"They're dropping them bombs all over England. Over London, where mum lives," Martin said.
Tommy wanted to be sick, but he was older and thus supposed to be a role model.
"She'll be alright. Everything will be fine when the war's over."
"You're whistling past the graveyard if you think that," Martin muttered.
Tommy had nothing to counter this. The fires in the distance grew, and the distant popping explosions. It seemed ages later when they heard the whine of RAF planes hurtling in to engage.
"You think Liz will ever fight Gerry?" Martin whispered. The explosions were cut with the intermittent patter of machine gunfire.
"If she could, she would," Tommy replied.
Mum eventually made them return to bed. She tucked the two little boys into the guest bed and gave Daniel many hugs. She wouldn't let Tommy go to bed without an extra long bear hug.