Author's Note: Okay, the drama is almost over, this chapter is just the aftermath. My deep thanks to everyone who reads and reviews; it is such a lift to read what you have to say. Mutt
Chapter 20:
Harder than War
Anwen POV:
I was working in my gardens again, as hard as I tried, I can not find peace anywhere else. There was something soothing about the delicate blossoms on the flowers that I was planting that could give me solace that no other person could. I would only slip out here, into the Conservatory that Sirius had designed into our new home, and work on the flower beds when I knew that Ethan would not need me.
The physical injuries that my young son had endured were not as extensive as we had believed, but any torture was more than any six year old should ever have to endure. He had been healed for a few weeks, his body bearing no marks of the depravity that both had heaped upon him. His emotional and psychological states, however, were a different matter. Although he'd only been gone for a day and a half, she had played with my son's mind, trying to convince him that his father and I did not love him. By the time that we got to him, he was confused and terrified, clinging to Harry and Bastien.
It broke my heart to see my son frightened of me, but part of me wondered if he could see into me, see what I had done to those who had hurt my sweet little boy. Did he know what a monster his Mummy had become? That was the question that haunted me day and night. I suppose it was why I preferred the flowers, they didn't have eyes that could peer into my soul.
Ethan is getting better, I reminded myself. Auror Kebe came over each day, and helped Ethan sort out what was real and what wasn't. He had quickly accepted that his Daddy loved him, but nearly two weeks out, he was still unsure of me. If I thought that the pain I felt while he was missing was unbearable, this was so much worse.
I reached into the dark soil, and dug a small hole, slipping the iris rhizome into the ground, and then covering it with dead and partially decayed matter, and then finally the dry earth. I picked up the watering can and drenched the new planting, wishing it to grow. I'd been working on the beds for days now, making a job that should have taken hours stretch on and on.
"You know, you can make it go so much faster if you'd just use your magic," I heard a voice beckon to me. I lifted my head to look at Remus, knowing he was once again here to try and pull me from stupor. I hated that he would leave again disappointed and rejected.
"No." I shook my head as I uttered the syllable. "No magic."
"Anwen, at some point you need to use magic again. This would be a good place to start," he tried to persuade me. I flatly refused, I hadn't lifted my hand to do a bit of magic since the cave.
"I can't be trusted."
He sighed at my indigence. "Anwen, you can't believe that."
"Why not, you saw them. I did that, I didn't even mean to, it just happened." I was tired of explaining this to him, to all of them. My family didn't understand why I was punishing myself if the Ministry saw no need to do so.
"It did just happen, but you were under duress. No one thinks that it could happen again," he tried to explain, but he didn't understand. It's not just what happened in the cave, it's what I said while we were in the Sitting Room, it was all of it. I had no control over anything that day, my thoughts, my emotions, my magic.
I laid the trowel that I had used down near the basket holding my plantings for today. I slid my hands from the gloves and laid them down next to the basket and stood, offering Remus my hand. If I was going to do this, I was going to do it right. "Walk with me?"
He stood and offered me his arm, and we took the few steps to the door that led from the conservatory to the back gardens, and then on to the vegetable and herb ones. A gentle crushed shell path meandered through them, but it was not a good surface for me to be walking on. It was a warm day for mid-April, my birthday would be in a few days, but I really had no desire to celebrate it.
"Anwen, I wish you'd talk with me. You know that you can tell me anything, right?" he started, as our feet crunched the pathway beneath them. My artificial leg weighed more than the real one, so my footsteps had an odd, uneven timbre to them, almost like a slow, struggling heart beat. That's probably an appropriate metaphor.
"I can't. I was...that day...Remus the things I said, the things I did...I'm horrified by them," I told him, as best as I could, hoping that he'd read between the lines.
"Anwen, do you think that we're upset at you?" he questioned me, disbelieving.
"I betrayed people's confidences and told secrets that weren't mine to tell. I called you and my daughter monsters," I whispered, horrified that I might have to remind him of what I'd done, even before I'd gotten to that damned cave.
"Anwen, stop," he commanded, and then stood in front of me, taking my face in his hands. I looked up at my dear friend's face, frightened of his eyes. "Look at me, please."
I tried to look away, stare at his hair or his nose, looking off into the distance, rather than really look into his eyes, but he knew, and he would not relent. He continued to hold my face, watching as I struggled to not connect with him. Of all of the people who I had hurt that night, I felt the worst about hurting him. He was my closest friend, my confidant and my touchstone. More than Sirius, hurting Remus was unforgivable. I had mocked the thing that caused him the most pain, for no reason other than I didn't have control. I finally relented, barely able to make his eyes out through the tears that had collected at the bottoms of my own. "No one is upset at you, if anything, we're upset at ourselves."
"Why?" I uttered, bemused. What on earth would my family have to be sorry for? They weren't the ones who couldn't control themselves, they didn't blurt everything out like hot lava, flowing and streaming from them, desecrating and burning the landscape around them. That was all me.
"Anwen, for years we had each taken what you were willing to give, never thinking about the cost to you. We'd forgotten that you were holding pain for all of us, you had your own memories as well as everyone else's. How you made it this long without losing it, none of us were sure. We knew that we'd done you a disservice."
I couldn't believe what he was saying. My family wasn't humiliated by my actions that day?
"We have been trying to tell you that, but you've secluded yourself so. Anwen, please, talk to me." I nodded at him and pointed over to the swinging arbor covered bench, where the wisteria was just beginning to sprout new leaves. It was one of my favorite places to sit and think. Remus maneuvered us over and once we were sitting, I used my left leg to start the gentle back and forth motion. His arm was draped over the back of the swing, trying to protect me like he did when we were kids, and Sirius had done something to upset me again. He waited patiently for me to begin.
"It's been a year, but it feels like the war only ended days ago for me," I confessed. You haven't told anyone about this, Anwen, are you sure that you want to? I paused to gauge my friend's reaction. He only nodded. "When things ended, I was in a fight for my life, and then the brutal recovery. I...we moved from crisis to crisis, and I figured if I just kept moving, just kept doing all of the things that people wanted from me I would eventually feel normal again, but I don't."
That's the first time that you've said this out loud. You haven't even told your husband yet. What if they don't understand? What if they think that you're crazy because you can't seem to know what to do next?
Remus didn't say anything, he just nodded, and took over propelling the swing. "Remus, I don't know how to do this. I don't know how to wake up in the morning, and think about a wide open future."
"No one tells you that life after war is harder than the war itself." The comment took me aback, and I looked at my dear friend intently. Does he understand this? Is he feeling the same way too?
"W..Wh...What?"
"Anwen, our family was preparing and then fighting a battle for twenty years, you were sixteen when you took that mantle on, when I stop to think about it...we were all at least of age. You're entire adult life has been spent this way, it's no surprise that you're having a hard time. Do you even know what you want, now that you don't have to be protecting anyone?" He asked the question that I'd been ruminating in my head for weeks.
"There are three things that I can say for certain. I want to be with my husband and my children. I...I love them so, I can't even begin to describe how badly I just want to be with them," I explained and I saw that gentle smile that he reserved for his wife emerge on his face.
"That I understand," he confided. "There are times that I wonder how I had fought against Tee and Teddy."
"Told you," I remarked, gladly taking the moment to remind him that I had pushed him into his relationship with his wife and to embrace the wonder of his son.
"Yes, Anwen. Gloating doesn't look good on you." The retort lightened the mood, and I felt confident in going on.
"Second, I'm tired of fighting. I don't want to be an Auror, I don't want to teach Aurors, I'm not even sure that I want to be part of the legal system anymore. The conflict, all of the physical and verbal sparring, it's left me..." I didn't even have a word to describe the exhaustion. "I just don't want it anymore."
Remus nodded, as if he understood what the prolonged discord had done to my heart and soul. I was just tired, drained of anything good and wholesome, and instead left with scars and broken battlements.
"Finally, I need to really understand my magic," I confessed. What happened in the cave had frightened me, shook me to my very foundations. I had not intended to hurt them, but I did. "When it was discovered what I was, my mentors began prepping me for war. I have been a warrior my entire magical life, but," my breath caught in my throat and the air around me suddenly felt tight and heavy. I was afraid to breathe it in, for it felt like it weighed too much, wasn't right for my lungs. Remus put a hand on my back, the spot between my shoulder blades that I could never reach on my own, but yet when it was touched I felt so comforted. His simple act seemed to help me calm myself.
"No one bothered to tell me what to do when I wasn't fighting anymore. My magic scares me, I'm afraid that I'll hurt someone with it, Sirius or one of the children," I confessed. I hadn't said that aloud to anyone.
"Anwen, what you did in the cave, to Umbridge and Greyback..."
"I didn't mean to." I cut him off. "A fleeting thought passed through my brain as I went to immobilize them that I wished that they would have to remember the atrocities that they had heaped upon others, and because what's in my mind can be in my magic as well, it came true. I…" The words weren't there, not for a long moment while I tried to find a word to describe the despicable nature that was me. "They're both trapped that way, no one can pull them out of the perpetual loop of their crimes, playing over and over in their minds. I made that happen," I spat the last few words out, repulsed by myself and my abilities.
"Anwen, you were...your child had been taken, you've lived through more than any of us have, what happened could have happened to anyone in that situation. If it had been me in that cave, neither of them would be alive," he remarked with brutal honesty.
"I wanted to kill them," I finally confessed. "I wanted them dead, I wanted to know that the last thing they would ever see was the rage in my face at the pain they had caused my child. But I couldn't do it. What the hell is wrong with me?" The words tumbled out of me as the tears cascaded from my eyes. You can't even get vengeance right, Anwen. Remus jolted me to the present when he started laughing. I couldn't even speak, I was so surprised by his reaction.
"Only you, Anwen, could think that there was something wrong with you because you couldn't kill someone," he told me, and I sat there, looking at my best friend, wondering if he'd lost his mind. "Anwen, the rest of us would have gone in there, curses flaring and worried about the damage later. Your soul kept you from killing them, and even with what you did, you exacted justice -- a really creative and unique form of it, but it was justice nonetheless."
"What do you mean?"
"Don't you see, every child that Greyback ever bit, every life he ruined or took, it will be remembered by the one person who doesn't want to remember. They will live on in the most powerful way that they can. Umbridge will need to see every cut, every injury, every time she stepped out of line in her pursuit of power. There is justice in what you did." I needed to think about what he said, take in what he was telling me. I was still struggling with the idea that my family didn't loathe me for betraying them so. Using that horrifying magic on them to be seen as only evil was too much for me.
We sat there in silence for a long while, neither of us feeling the need to say another word. In the distance I could hear the sounds of my children's laughter as they played on the climber and swings on the other side of the house. Remus kept the swing moving in it's gentle oscillations, and at some point my body fell into his, leaning against him while I worked out not only what my confessions meant, but also his responses to them.
"You know, what I did to them, I always believed that was what hell was like, having to relive the worst moments of your life, when you were selfish and hurtful to other people," I finally uttered.
"If that's hell my friend," Remus replied, "then what is heaven?"
"God telling you that you are still worthy of being loved, even with everything that you've done." I answered. There was another digestive silence after that revelation as well.
"You are, you know, worthy of being loved," he finally told me, but I shook my head at him. "That's really what this is about isn't it? You think because you were human and had very normal emotions, you're not worthy of being loved?" Hearing him say it out loud was heartbreaking for me, and I realized that all of the pain that I had carried within me for years was still there, raw and angry and only below the surface.
How could I make him understand, all of them, any of them? I wasn't the pillar of strength that they believed me to be, I was weak and fragile.
He didn't respond to me, and I was afraid to look into his eyes and see what was really there. We rocked along in silence.
"Anwen, I need you to listen to me. We, all of us, we never stopped to think about how hard it must be on you, but we love you. I think that we might love you more now that we understand what you've been carrying all these years." I continued to shake my head at him. He didn't push me, we simply sat, him propelling the swing back and forth. The sun was beginning to dip below the tree line, and a cool breeze was picking up, but I wasn't ready to move yet.
"Winnie, I forgive you, but only on one condition," Remus said and I turned my head to look at him. His eyes were red, but bright as well. "You have to forgive yourself."
"I can't until I know that Sirius has," I told him, plainly.
"Anwen, Sirius doesn't see that he needs to forgive you."
"He must," I started. I had been avoiding my husband because of the things that I felt around him. He was so ashamed of me, disgusted by my lack of control. "I can feel it when he looks at me. I've let him down so."
Remus removed his wand, and flourished it, sending a blue-white streak away. I couldn't imagine who he was sending a Patronus to, or why, but when he was done, he stowed the wand back in its holster.
"Anwen, you've read his emotions the right way, but the wellspring you have incorrect. He is ashamed and disgusted, but not at you, never at you. He feels that he failed you," Remus explained and I looked at him, horrified.
"Sirius has never failed me, even when he couldn't remember me he never failed me."
I felt desecrated inside, that my dear husband would try to take this onto himself. He's always been there, loved me passionately, and now, because of my shortcomings, he's punishing himself. I shouldn't have pulled away from him, but I just couldn't bear to have him see what a miserable excuse for a woman I really was.
"Winnie, what's the one word that you'd use to describe Sirius while we were at school?" Remus asked me gently. I thought about it for a moment, thinking back to those first days, my first impression of my husband was so strong.
"Protector," I whispered, understanding where his guilt had come from. "But he didn't fail me, he never did. He's always been the one thing that was firm in my life, how could he?" I was weeping for the pain that my love was feeling. "How could he blame himself?" I muttered, falling into Remus, unable to keep the grief from seeping out of me.
"Because, I didn't keep you or Ethan safe. I failed the people I love the most," I heard a different voice reply, and through my wet veil, I saw him. He had walked the same path and stood a few feet away, hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched forward, looking small and broken.
"No, never," I stuttered. Remus sat me up, unwrapped his arm from me and got up from the swing, Sirius taking his place. My hands went to my husbands hair, caressing his head and face. "You did not fail me. I am the one that failed."
"Anwen, please, stop. The only person that feels that way is you. Ethan is home and he's getting better, please, please stop torturing yourself." He was begging, crying, shaking all at once. I pulled him to me, wrapping my arms around his neck and shoulders as he grabbed my waist. It was awkward and uncomfortable, but so very necessary. We eventually shifted so that we were lying on the bench, Sirius cradling my body to his, casting a warming charm on us.
"I'm so sorry that I disappointed you," I finally whispered.
"That's what you're afraid of, that you disappointed me? Anwen, I am in awe of you. James finally told me what really happened when he was in that hovel they were keeping him in. How did you keep that, for all this time, and never tell anyone?" He asked and I thought on it for a moment.
"I didn't have a choice. Who would I tell without breaking his confidence? It's why I've kept all of it."
"Yes, well, there are no more secrets." Silence settled over us again, but it wasn't maddening, it had become comfortable and welcomed.
"What about the cave? You couldn't be proud of what I did there?"
"No, proud wouldn't be the right word," he confessed. "However, you showed greater restraint than any of us would have, and that was commendable."
"Remus told me the same thing."
"He's a smart man. I have only ever been concerned about your actions there because I knew what it was going to do to you. I knew, from the moment that I felt your rage, that you were going to persecute yourself over your actions; and I wasn't going to be able to stop you."
"You mean, you're not..." his fingers went to my lips, stopping me from speaking.
"I'm nothing but worried, because you won't use magic. I don't want my badass witch being afraid of her own skills," he comforted me, and I really contemplated what had been said to me this afternoon.
The sun went down, and the garden was dark, but the stars and the moon lit the sky like fairy lights. I didn't want to leave this place, I simply wanted to lie in the arms of my dearest love, and try to believe what he was telling me. It wasn't until I heard his stomach rumble, that I felt any compulsion to move.
"I think that we should go and find you something to eat," I muttered, shifting myself so that I could stand.
"Anwen, are we all right?"
"I think, for the first time in a very long time, we might be more than all right. Come on, lets go and eat something, I need to tell you about the things that I want now, what I want to do now that we're not at war. I need to see my children as well."
"Good," he said as he stood, offering me his hand, which I gladly accepted. "They're missing their Mummy."
Sirius POV:
"Hey, you can't steal the Quaffle from your Daddy!" I yelled at Ethan. We were playing a modified pick up match on the school grounds. Ethan, John, Lilyan, Jamie, Harry, Ginny, Bastien, Ron and I were in the air, Anwen, Patty and Hermione were on the ground with the youngest two. Edmund was quite upset that he wasn't flying, but Anwen had caught him flying in the hallways of the school, and had taken his broom away. Today was the one year anniversary of the end of the war, and I thought it ironic that some of the most important people in making it happen were avoiding the celebrations and parties, and just playing a quiet game with their family. Minerva was simply having a feast tonight for the students, nothing more. We were all trying to move on, and the last things that Anwen needed was a reminder of a year ago. She didn't even want to spend time with the extended family, the kids were enough.
"Yes, I can, Daddy. You weren't paying attention," he yelled back, while tossing the ball to his older brother. Bastien easily scored against Ron. The bond between the two boys had grown stronger, and I was relieved when Bastien had agreed to live indefinitely in the apartment that I had built for him over the garage at Fairer Garden. Because of this, we would also be getting another house guest when we moved in at the end of term. Bastien's long term girlfriend, Laure D'Autry would be moving in as well. She had been accepted at the Healer School at St. Mungo's and would be starting her training there in the fall. Bastien had explained that he intended to ask her to marry him, once she was moved to England with him. He would also be starting at the Healer School in the fall, but instead of general medicine, he was becoming a Memories Expert. His exposure to memory extraction and cataloging for most of his life had spurred an interest, and he thought this would be the most productive way for him to pursue it. He would learn to help people recovery memories that they had lost, usually due to trauma.
We flew around more, I generally stayed out of the way of the eight younger ones, watching the ease with which my children flew and the amazing speed and grace of Ginny's flying. She had done well at the tryouts for the Holyhead Harpies, and had accepted their offer to play for them. In a move that was rarely done, she wasn't placed as of yet, instead, she would go to training camp being guaranteed a salary, and they would then decide if she would be on the reserve team or, in an unheard of idea for new recruits, begin playing on the competition squad.
Anwen and I had let Minerva know that we wouldn't be returning to teaching, and Anwen had resigned her position at the Ministry, effective June 1st. I would continue on the Council and Wizengamot, but Anwen was done with the law. There were only one or two known Death Eaters still on the loose, and with the entire Auror department on the hunt for them, it wasn't going to be long before they were all in the new prison. Several of the international Wizards had agreed to stay on to teach in the Auror school, and Anwen had said that she was willing to consult on the curriculum. Anwen had another idea of what she wanted to do, something that she'd never have considered a year ago, but now was a dream that she was willing to entertain.
Anwen still wasn't using magic, except when she was working with Jagjit on ways to control it. It wasn't a problem while she was teaching, her students were practicing for their examinations when they were with her, and she could correct and refine their spell casting without doing so herself. She'd confided that she was fearful of her own power, and wasn't sure that she would ever feel comfortable with it again. It saddened me that Anwen couldn't trust herself, but I recognized that this was a journey she was on, and she had to make her amends with what happened that night.
I watched Madame Pomfrey briskly walk into the pitch, and stop to talk with Anwen. My wife quickly stood, nodding at her, and I flew down and dismounted, listening to what was going on.
"...there are just too many babies being born at once, and they can't move Mrs. Weasley. Please, Mrs. Potter just flooed, asking if you could come and help."
"Of course, I don't know what I can do, but I guess after giving birth four times, I have some knowledge here," Anwen answered and the school nurse started back toward the castle.
"Fleur went into labor, but she's having extreme pain and bleeding and Molly is afraid to try and move her to St. Mungo's. They've called for a Healer, but there are too many women in labor at the same time to send someone out. Lily is there helping her, and they asked if I can go," she explained to me.
"Go on, Aunt Winnie. Ginny and I can take care of the kids. We don't want Ron anywhere near that, he...well he wouldn't handle it well. Fire call when the baby is born, please?" Hermione said and Anwen nodded.
"I'll come with you, dear. Bill might need someone to talk to," I added and Anwen and I walked rapidly to our quarters to floo to Shell Cottage.
On arriving we were met by Lily who wasn't masking her concern well. When Anwen and I stepped from the floo, Lily went and pulled Winnie to the side of the small sitting room.
"Anwen, Fleur isn't doing well. Her pulse is thready and...I'm worried about the baby. Anwen, we need to get it out of her, and we need to do it now." Lily said, point blank. We could hear Fleur's distressed cries from upstairs.
"Fine, but what am I supposed to do? I don't know half as much about healing as you do," Anwen replied.
"Winnie, I need you to visualize the baby out of Fleur's body," Lily said slowly and deliberately and Anwen started shaking her head.
"No, I will not...I'm not using my magic, not like that..." she protested.
"Anwen, we need you to. They can't get a Healer out here to us anytime soon, and we could lose them both." Anwen continued to shake her head. "Would you let them die because you're afraid?"
Anwen stopped her movement, but stared at her girlfriend, anger hardening her eyes and mouth.
"I know that what happened in the cave has upset you, and that you think that you can't control your magic, but we need to do this. I need you to do this, you have to help them," Lily pleaded.
"But, what if I fail?" Anwen whimpered.
"You won't love," I promised her as I put my arms around her. "You can do this, you alone can do this. I'll be with you, keep you grounded, but you can do this."
Anwen stood still for a moment, but when we heard another cry from the second floor, this one with greater agony, Anwen nodded and we climbed the stairs.
Fleur was thrashing on the bed, and there was a light sheet thrown over top of her, stained with bright red blood. Bill was at one side of her head, sitting on the edge of the bed while Molly was busying herself by sponging off her daughter-in-law's head. Both Weasleys seemed relieved at the sight of my wife.
Anwen took a deep breath and didn't say anything, she just reached for my hand and then waved the other one over Fleur's abdomen. She closed her eyes, and was silent for not more than a moment, and then opened them again.
"Give me a blanket or something, please?" Molly got her a large fluffy towel, and Anwen spread it wide in her arms. My wife closed her eyes again, and took a deep breath and then, there was a beautiful little girl lying in the towel. Molly and Bill cheered, while Lily breathed a sigh of relief before going to begin healing Fleur. I put my one arm around Anwen's waist, while she wrapped the little girl in the towel, before handing her over to her father. When the baby was out of Anwen's arms, she leaned her body back against me.
There were words of thanks, but I could see from Anwen's face that she wasn't really hearing them. She needed to sit down and process what was happening. We went downstairs, and Arthur was in the sitting room, waiting patiently for news. I don't remember seeing him when we got here, but that doesn't mean much. We told him that his first granddaughter had arrived, and he got up and hugged us both before taking off for the room upstairs. When we were alone, Anwen and I sat down, and I held her to me, feeling her wonderment that she'd been able to do what she'd just done.
After a while, Arthur, Bill and Lily came downstairs, carrying the little girl.
"Fleur fell asleep, she's doing better, but I would still like us to move her to St. Mungo's when she awakes, just to have them check her out," Lily explained. "Molly is staying with her right now."
"I wanted you to meet our daughter, Victoire Belle," Bill said, laying the little girl in Anwen's arms. She stared down at her, and then her breath caught and she looked up at him in surprise. "We need to have the name of the woman who helped her into this world stay with her." I knew that Anwen's name meant beautiful, as did Belle in French, it was their way of honoring my wife. Anwen held the little girl, smiling at her, crying gently.
"Thank you."