Chapter 45: Pyriscence
A.N. This has been a heavy sixteen months. I've been writing through multiple miscarriages, a fraught pregnancy, my postpartum struggles and now, a global pandemic. This fic has been the place where my joy in Jo Rowling's world can meet my efforts to sort through sorrow, grief, and struggle. Now at a time when so many of us feel isolated, I hope we all find spaces to remind us that we're not alone. We're struggling together, we're grieving together, and together we'll find that love is enough. Survive first, then live. Expecto Patronum.
The Battle at Hogwarts is on the 2nd of May. The scenes in Rose's flat take place on the 17th of May. The final scene takes place in early June, 1998.
Harry was dead.
Rose's stomach seized as Voldemort's magically magnified voice rang out from the grounds.
"Harry Potter is dead. He was killed as he ran away, trying to save himself while you lay down your lives for him. We bring you his body as proof that your hero is gone."
The chemistry of her body changed so quickly that Rose wildly looked around her, sure she would see a return of the dementors that had tormented her by the edge of the forest. There were none. With difficulty, Rose focused her attention on Kingsley, whose face had appeared in front of her as Voldemort's voice died away.
"I can bring you with me," he said, and she nodded mutely. Madame Pomphrey's store of potions and poultices had been stretched to the breaking point by the casualties of the battle; she not yet been able to attend to Rose. At the moment of Voldemort's announcement, the matron had been bending over a whimpering Lavender Brown.
Kingsley bent down and lifted Rose easily in his arms, the way he'd lifted her from the ground outside the Forest. All around them, people were moving quickly from the Great Hall, into the Entrance Hall and to the courtyard at the front of the castle. Ron, Hermione and Ginny pushed past Kingsley, so that they were among the first to reach the door. She heard them cry out, "No!" and "Harry! HARRY!" and her heart seemed to deflate further. When she caught sight of Hagrid, bringing up the rear of Voldemort's vanguard, her mouth went dry. In his arms was a limp figure with messy black hair. Harry's body. Rose could not scream aloud, but once again the icy horror filled her body.
Her thoughts seemed to take refuge in a place in her mind that the horror could not reach. They were stilted, odd thoughts. Thank Merlin this is the last time I will feel this sensation, went one such thought. There isn't anyone else alive that I love enough for it to hurt like this again. Then she thought, This is my fault. Her fingers fiddled with the phial in her pocket. I have the memories he needed. He wouldn't have had to do this if I'd found him. For she was certain that Harry had given himself up; he could no sooner have run away from his friends than she could have run away on both her injured ankles.
It is my fault. Just like Sirius. I haunted Voldemort's dreams and made him come after me. I let Remus and Tonks' danger distract me from looking for him. If I'd found him- It was an emotion of despair so strong that out of self-preservation, a desire to live at least until the outcome of this encounter with Voledmort was known, as Hagrid lowered Harry's body onto the grass, she closed herself to emotion.
The full moon filled her mind with its cold silvery light as her emotions became vague substances swirling around it. I wonder if I will survive this-? She thought idly, though she no longer really cared. No, she answered herself. That's absurd. Remus was wrong; some pain is too strong to live through.
And yet, absurdly, she continued to draw breath as Kingsley came to a stop behind Neville Longbottom. She could feel, too, that her heart was still beating. How odd. Voldemort was saying something but she could not tell what it was. And then Ron was shouting from a few feet away from them.
"He beat you!" Ron bellowed at Voldemort, and then Neville was running forward to challenge Voldemort. The clarity Rose had attained by suppressing her emotions did not seem to allow her to do more than strain to observe the scene before her. She could barely understand the words.
"But you are a pure blood, aren't you?" Voldemort asked, in his silkily cold voice.
"So what if I am?" returned Neville defiantly. Rose only watched, gripping Kingsley's arm. As Voldemort offered Neville a place among the Death Eaters, she knew some suspense. The world was upside-down; perhaps even Gryffindor students might join Voldemort, if it kept them alive.
But Neville was as adamant as Ron had been, shouting, "I'll join you when hell freezes over. Dumbledore's army!" This was directed to the students around him, and was met with cheers. Distantly, Rose felt herself rousing a little.
Then Voldemort placed the Sorting Hat upon Neville's head. She felt fear for him, and then it was as if all her emotions had gone rogue. They all came rushing out from behind the barrier, like the voices which Voldemort could not still: dread, fear, defiance, fury, even a note of hope. When the Hat on Neville's head was caused to go up in flames, she screamed with the rest of them.
And when Neville broke through the curse, pulled from the Hat the Sword of Gryffindor, and sliced the great snake's head from its body, she felt ferocious joy.
"HARRY- WHERE'S HARRY?" Hagrid bawled through the tumult, and Rose looked over to see that Harry's body was no longer on the grass. He will be able to return, Severus' strangely fervent face when he said it, was in Rose's mind. Harry had returned, as Severus had said. But to where-?
And then they were all fighting, pursuing Death Eaters into the castle with vengeance. Kingsley shifted Rose to one arm so that he could shoot Stunning and Incarcerous spells with his wand arm. Rose, who found herself thrown over Kingsley's broad shoulder, began firing spells from her new position, protecting his back. They made their way to the Great Hall, fighting as they went, and she felt the battle-calm returning to her. A train of house-elves knocked into Kingsley at once point, but he kept his balance and his grip on her. There were centaurs in the Entrance Hall, adding to the chaos, but also adding to their effectiveness in subduing the Death Eaters or driving them into the Great Hall.
When they entered the room, Voldemort himself was visible in the corner of the room. Minerva McGonagall, her gray hair wildly tumbling down her back and her face livid, was fighting him. Horace Slughorn come pelting past them as they'd entered, and he joined Minerva in fighting Voldemort.
"Put me down, Kingsley," Rose told him. "I can fight from the floor."
He did as she requested. When he had placed her on her knees on the marble floor, Kingsley ran off to join the assault on Voldemort's now isolated form. Rose was only able to throw one Stunning Spell at Fenrir Greyback before Ron and Neville moved in on him. The members of Dumbledore's Army and the Order of the Phoenix made quick work of the other Death Eaters who had come into the castle, and soon there were only two fights raging in the room: Voldemort, who still fought Kingsley, Minerva and Horace, and Bellatrix's increasingly frantic dual with Hermione and Ginny.
Rose cried out and tried to crawl toward them when she saw Voldemort about to curse Ginny, but her efforts were unnecessary. With a cry of, "NOT MY DAUGHTER, YOU BITCH!" Molly Weasley threw off her cloak and rolled up her sleeves. "OUT OF MY WAY!" she roared, and suddenly her wand was firing curses at Bellatrix with an eloquence that drew first astonishment and then admiration from Rose. She had not thought it possible to feel joy after she had seen Harry's body, but joy alighted on her when Molly bested Bellatrix and hit her square in the chest with a deadly curse. Sirius' killer, and Remus', and Tonks' too, fell to the ground amid cheers. Rose cried out in joy, cursing in English for the first time that she could recall, "HA! Take that, you murdering bitch!"
And she turned to set her sights on Voldemort, thinking to wring one more moment of joy out of watching his downfall. And then she heard it.
"PROTEGO!"
Harry's voice, beyond doubt. Her mind reeled as her neck craned. There he stood, the Invisibility Cloak cast to the ground beside him, his dirty face alive with focused energy, eyes blazing. Alive.
"I don't want anybody to try to help," Harry ordered, and everyone went silent. Rose could not have spoken if she'd wanted to.
"It's got to be like this. It's got to be me," Harry continued.
"Who are you going to use as a shield today, Potter?" Voldemort jeered. He and Harry were circling each other like lions. Malice glinted in Voldemort's red eyes, but Harry looked back at him with bold confidence that made Rose draw in her breath. He was no longer the boy who had returned from the graveyard with the Triwizard Cup in one hand and Cedric Diggory's body in the other. This Harry was a man, and he answered his enemy's taunts with calm certainty.
"You won't be killing anyone else tonight," he told the irate Voldemort. "I was ready to die to stop you from hurting these people."
"But you did not," Voldemort threw back at him.
"I meant to," Harry replied, "And that's what did it." All around her, the Great Hall was lined with Hogwarts defenders who were dirty, exhausted, but hanging on every word of the conversation between Harry and his enemy. Rose, still kneeling on the marble floor, did not feel the pain in her knees. She was mesmerized.
When Harry offered to tell the pale figure who circled with him of the things he had learned, Rose listened intently. Part of her wondered, even as Harry's words carried revelation after revelation, what the contents of the glass phial, still in her sleeve, might have added to his knowledge. But Harry seemed to know enough to astonish both Voldemort and the whole Hall of listeners. Every step which they took as they circled each other was audible in the charged silence.
They watched and listened as Voldemort struggled to regain the upper hand. "Dumbledore is dead!" he cried, and later, "I killed Severus Snape three hours ago!" and though this second declaration was a dull blow to Rose, Harry looked unimpressed by anything Voldemort lobbed at him.
"Before you try to kill me," he said conversationally, "I'd advise you to think about what you've done. Think, and try for some remorse, Riddle."
With those words, Rose's eyes filled with tears and for a moment she could no longer see either Harry or Voldemort. She had been right; Harry wanted even his enemy to have this chance. The year of dream-walking had not been a waste or a needless risk. If Harry lived through this, her efforts would surely buy him some measure of peace.
The revelations continued to emerge as Harry and Voldemort continued to lob words at one another. "I stole the wand from its last master's tomb!" Voldemort shrieked at one point. "I removed it against its last master's wishes! It's power is mine!"
Harry had an answer for this, too. "You still don't get it, Riddle, do you? Possessing the wand isn't enough!" Patiently he explained, as a teacher to an erring student, that the wand they were speaking of had changed allegiance. "The true master of the Elder Wand," Harry said as he came to the end of his logic proof, "was Draco Malfoy."
And over Voldemort's attempts to dismiss this revelation Harry continued. "I overpowered Draco Malfoy weeks ago." The listeners were so intent on his words that, moments later when his voice dropped to a whisper, not a word was lost. "I am the true master of the Elder Wand."
As the Hall's enchanted sky, reflecting the conditions without, burst into a brilliant sunrise, Harry and Voldemort both raised their wands.
Normally, when a witch or wizard cast a spell, there was an accompanying flash of light. Rose did not even notice the light which accompanied most spells; it was just a sort of side effect, like popping sound made by Apparition. But the light that appeared with Harry's and Voldemort's spells, Harry's "Expelliarmus!" and Voldemort's "Avada Kedavra!" had the quality of gold fire. It burned between their jets of red and green light, and there was a momentary struggle within its flames. Then, the green light was driven back rapidly and, when it arrived back at the wand which had cast it, the wand was thrown from his hand, high into the air.
No one breathed as it arched through the air away from Voldemort, who collapsed as if the air had been let out of him. And Harry threw up his hand and caught the wand.
For a second Harry stood, gripping the Elder Wand in the hand that was not holding Draco Malfoy's wand, and exhaled. Tom Riddle did not move. But everyone else did.
The crowd converged on Harry, then. Hermione and Ron reached him first, and Rose, tears pouring down her cheeks, watched them throw themselves into an ecstatic three-way embrace. She longed to run to him too, to exclaim over him. He was alive! Death, which had taken so much from her, had given him back.
She was sobbing, but she knew her injuries would not allow her to reach him. So instead, she watched Molly Weasley kiss him through her tears, and Hagrid muss his hair clumsily (throwing Harry momentarily off-balance with the force of the gesture) and Ginny kiss him full on the mouth, to his apparent enjoyment. Everyone was talking to him, cuffing him about the shoulder, gripping his arm, and she knew he must be uncomfortable with it all. But he seemed to understand that they needed him, for he showed no sign of wanting them to stop.
Rose just watched him, and that was enough. Kingsley came to her side and asked if she wanted him to carry her to Harry, but just then, Harry looked directly at her. His smile, which was beginning to look rather fatigued, became wide and incredulous. He made straight for her, despite the press of people around him. When he got to her, he crouched down so that he was looking directly at her.
"You're alive," was all he said, and she threw her arms around him. He lost his balance, and they fell to the floor in a laughing heap.
"I told you," she said in his ear, hugging him fiercely for a moment. "Didn't I? I told you you would win. Two years ago, I told you."
"I didn't believe you," he answered as he extracted himself from her and sat up on his heels. He was grinning and tears glinted in his eyes too.
"Well, you should listen to your Auntie!" she told him, swiping at his arm, and they both laughed again.
"You're hurt?" he asked, as she gingerly put her feet under her again. She clambered back onto her knees and swayed. Kingsley put a hand down to steady her.
Rose shrugged and wiped more tears away. "I don't feel it, Harry."
"What was the matter, before?" he wanted to know, but she shook her head.
"That's a story for another day. Nothing that you haven't fixed, anyway." She leaned in closer to him and added, in a lower voice, "Come and visit me when this-" she motioned at the noisy press of people around them, "-is over. You can rest. We can tell our stories then. That is," she hesitated suddenly, her old self-doubt rising up suddenly, "that is, if you want to."
Harry answered in an equally low voice. "That sounds brilliant right now. Will there be food?"
"Loads of it," she told him. "Mostly takeout. But perhaps we'll learn to cook together."
They shared one more grin, and then Harry stood and the crowd swallowed him up.
"Would you like to sit on a bench, until Madame Pomphrey can see you?" Kingsley had now crouched down next to Rose, and impulsively, she hugged him too. He returned the pressure, smiling in a slightly surprised sort of way.
"That would be lovely, thank you," she told him.
Harry slept for nearly thirty-six hours after the battle was concluded. Ron and Hermione, who slept for twenty-four before hunger brought them to the Great Hall for breakfast, told Rose that they hadn't slept in days.
"Not since we left Shell Cottage," was Hermione's answer when Rose asked her when they had last slept. "And I don't know about you, Ron-" (Ron was engaged in trying to fit three biscuits into his mouth at once, but he snapped to attention when Hermione said his name) "-but I didn't sleep much that last night before we left. One doesn't, you know, when one is contemplating becoming Bellatrix LeStrange in the morning."
"I'd imagine not," Rose replied, half-amused and half-astonished. Both injuries, the Acromantuala bite and the sprain, had been well healed by Madame Pomphrey after the Battle's conclusion. Having slept sixteen hours herself, Rose was now out of physical pain and able to hear as much of Ron and Hermione's stories of their doings as they were able to tell.
Her heart was a strange mixture of sensations, when at times she prodded it. It was intensely painful in places, wounded by so many deaths: Remus', Tonks', and Fred Weasley's had given the greatest wounds. And yet, the miraculous restoration of Harry seemed to cause her heart to thrum with life and hope, even as the losses throbbed. Ever since Neville had challenged Voldemort and struck down the snake, the full moon had not been able to hold back the flood of feeling within her. Grief and joy, devastation and love streamed through her whole being as they went about the business of rebuilding the castle, and even more so as they mourned the dead in a succession of funerals.
After his marathon sleep in Gryffindor Tower, Harry emerged, freshly showered and ravenous. For the first day after he woke he seemed to be in a daze. He spoke little, but ate and listened to others' talk and assisted with the repairs to the castle that were underway all around them. Everyone went to bed early during their stay in the castle, and many (the young people especially) rose late, but during the day they were all very busy.
Rose saw the weariness, grief, and shock rolling over Harry and his friends as they sat together for meals. They seemed to prefer each others' company most of the time, and the majority of those who remained in the castle understood and left them to themselves. Molly was one exception to this. And, Rose observed Harry and Ginny taking a number of short walks around the grounds by themselves, from which they always seemed reluctant to return.
After six days at Hogwarts, and five at the Burrow (encompassing Fred's funeral), Harry packed his trunk, which Hermione had magically condensed to be the size of a suitcase, and Apparated to a certain alleyway in Dalston. He was knocking on Rose's door within minutes.
He had hardly finished the act of knocking when Rose opened the door, smiling broadly.
"Not going to ask me a security question?" Harry joked as he stepped over the threshold and put down his suitcase-sized trunk.
"No, but I was thinking about turning you in for a reward," she replied in the same tone. "Ten thousand galleons would buy me a lot of beautiful shoes."
"I hate to disappoint you, but I'm no longer Undesirable. That offer's expired," Harry said, laughing, though his face was tired and drawn-looking. He put his trunk in the guest room, took off his trainers, then returned to the kitchen and sighed.
"How are the Weasleys?" Rose wanted to know. She had come to Fred's funeral, and had stayed to offer her condolences, but sensing that the more guests there were at the Burrow, the more Molly would feel compelled to be cooking rather than grieving, she had returned to her flat by evening. That had been two days before.
"They're coping," Harry replied. "Well. George won't come out of his room. But aside from that…" he shrugged.
Rose frowned, clucking sympathetically. "Is Hermione staying with them?" she asked.
"Yes. I mean, until she goes to Australia to get her parents back, she hasn't really got anywhere else to go."
"I'm sure Ron doesn't mind," Rose suggested, turning and tending to the teapot, which was beginning to whistle.
"Nope," was all Harry said in answer, but with a meaningful small smile.
"Talking of, is Ginny doing well?"
"She's- she's great," Harry's smile changed in its quality and for a moment his eyes were far away. "She wasn't too chuffed about my coming here, but she understands. I need a rest."
"You can write her. Use Lis; she's still in good flying form. I'm sorry that I'm not yet connected to the Floo."
"You haven't got a fireplace to connect," Harry observed, peering around the kitchen wall to the small living room.
"You know these Muggles don't always feel the need to put them in newer buildings," she sighed. "It is a problem. I am researching a way to correct it. But it's not easy, making such a dramatic change to the building without the neighbors noticing. And they are such lovely neighbors; I wouldn't want to have to Confund any of them." She looked at him again and noticed the glassy cast to his eyes and the paleness of his face. "But I think you're right. You need a solid rest."
He nodded, and stretched his arms above his head, looking out of the window as he yawned. "Is there a word in French for this level of exhaustion?" he asked her.
"Crevé." She began to put the tea things on the little kitchen table. "And you'll want to practice that! I'm having a visitor in a few weeks that I'd love for you to meet. I've just gotten a letter this morning from my old school mate, Astou."
"Je suis crevé," Harry said, experimentally, watching her open a packet of biscuits with glassy eyes.
"Then sit down, won't you?" she chided.
For the first two days they did almost nothing at all except sleep and eat. Harry outdid Rose heroically at both of these occupations, sleeping till nearly noon each day and wolfing down all the food Rose could order. "You don't want to go outside?" Rose asked him during the second lazy afternoon in front of the television.
"I spent the better part of the last nine months camping," he answered, his face half buried in a pillow. "I've really been outside enough."
"At least let me cut your hair," she pleaded. "And anyway, you were going to tell me about your adventures!"
"I don't have the energy," he complained, though he followed her into the kitchen and sat dutifully on the chair she indicated. "You're not going to do it by magic?"
"Some things are better done the slow way," she replied, rummaging through her drawer and taking out her sharp shears. In truth, she only wanted to drag the process out so as to get him away from the television the longer. "Why don't you tell me just one story. Tell me about robbing Gringotts. It sounded positively swashbuckling!"
From then on, Harry told Rose one story each day, starting with the Gringotts robbery and continuing the next day with the events at Godric's Hollow, and describing his discovery of the Deathly Hallows lore on the day after that. Rose thought it best to abandon chronology in the telling. "Just tell me a story you can bear to tell," she told him when they'd gotten back from a walk to the market on the fifth day of Harry's visit. They had been taking some easy outings for the past few days as Harry's initial exhaustion had begun to ease.
"And when are you going to tell me what was wrong with you during the Battle?" he returned. "And about what you did?"
"When the time comes," she said, elusively. The truth was, in this new mode of hers in which emotions flowed so easily and with such intensity, she was not eager to revisit the Battle. She knew she would not be able to tell it without crying.
They went to bed early that night. Harry kept dozing off during the nine o'clock news. "Do you want to change the channel?" Rose asked, her own voice drowsy. "Red Dwarf is on BBC-2. You might like that."
"I don't think I'd be able to stay awake for that either," Harry admitted, getting to his feet. "I'm going to turn in, ok?"
"Good idea," she said. "I'll probably make it an early night too."
And she did, putting the Colette novel Remus had given her, which she had been fruitlessly trying to read, back on her nightstand and extinguishing her wand just after ten o'clock. She sank instantly into sleep. But it was only two hours later that she was reaching for her wand again.
"Lumos."
The dream she had been having had been so compellingly real. When it started, she had been at the beach at Ravenscar, chasing Remus over the rocks.
She was begging him to come home to Teddy, who needed him. Remus eluded her, nimbly leaping over rock and behind cliffs, until he turned and looked at her with a face full of sadness, illuminated by the setting sun.
"I can't," he told her. "But you can." He turned away again and began to walk out into the ocean, the waves already up to his hips. "Tell Harry!" he called, as the scene faded and she found herself on the front stoop at Grimmauld Place. She could see through the front window that Tonks and Sirius were playing cards in the drawing room. But though they occasionally ceased their laughing over the game to wave merrily at her, Rose could not open the door.
And then she was running down Privet Drive, where a baby with a scar and vivid turquoise hair was waiting in a basket on a doorstep, and she had to get to the door before it opened and the residents took the baby inside their house. And the baby was crying out, short staccato cries. "No!" the baby cried, "Don't hurt them!"
"No," the voice shouted again, and Rose's eyes were opened now. "No-" with such misery it made her almost sick, "-No! Not them too!" Her wand lit, Rose put her feet into her slippers and made her way into the guest bedroom.
Harry was shaking and whimpering in his bed, still in the throes of his own nightmare. "Nooo," he moaned, and Rose wiped away her own tears before putting her hand on his arm.
"Harry," she said, and hesitated. It was on her lips to say, "It's all right," but she knew that it wasn't. To have lost Sirius and Remus and Tonks and Fred and so many others was not a situation which one could describe as "all right." Nor did she feel right saying, "It's not real," or many of the other comforting phrases one said after a nightmare. For the nightmare had been real. Harry had seen death, so much death, and it had been only too real for them all. Finally she settled on something she felt she could say with truth.
"It's over," she told him, giving his shoulders a little shake. "Harry, it's over. It's over. Wake up." As she did so, she felt a twinge of deja vu. It seemed she was fated to be the one who would wake both Sirius and Harry from their dark nightmares.
Unlike Sirius, Harry woke immediately. "No!" he shouted one more time, and then his eyes flew open. He breathed rapidly for a moment, straining to focus on her face, then began fumbling for his glasses. Rose handed them to him, then fetched the small chair from the little guest desk and dragged it over to the side of his bed. She sat down and looked at him.
"Nightmare," Harry managed to say when he'd caught his breath. "Sorry."
"Don't be," she answered. "I was having one of my own. About Remus, and Tonks and Teddy Lupin. What were yours about?"
"All of them," he whispered dully. "Fred, and Sirius, and Remus. Peter Pettigrew, strangling himself. There was nothing I could do."
"No, there wasn't," she agreed gently. "And not one of them was your fault."
His breath stopped a moment. When he spoke again, his voice was choked. "What difference does it make whose fault it is? They're gone." He took a deep breath to try to steady himself. "There's been so much death."
"But there is still a great deal of life," she answered, feeling as if she were telling it to herself as much as to him. "Ginny. Hermione. Ron. You and I, we're alive. Teddy Lupin is alive," she added, blinking back more tears, "and he has us."
"Remus," Harry whispered. "Tonks…" and he began to sob quietly. And Rose could no longer keep back her own tears either. She put her arms around him, and he held onto her as if she were a lifeline.
"There's still life. There's still life," Rose insisted. For a time they clung to each other, like shipwrecked children.
Harry let go first. He sat back in a slump, and Rose imagined that he was embarrassed by his breakdown. Then he said in a bleak monotone, "I don't know how to live now."
He didn't elaborate, but Rose knew what he meant. After considering it for a moment, she said, "First, we survive. Then, we live."
"But," he seemed to be struggling to put his thoughts into words, "Will it- I don't see how it's going to feel like living. I don't see how to get over it."
"Oh, we won't get over it."
He shook his head. "No." He was no longer crying, now, but his voice was listless. "I know we won. And I died; I came back. But it doesn't feel like winning, and I don't know that it ever will. I don't know how you can be sure that we'll ever-"
"Expecto Patronum."
Her words, which she spoke with as much conviction as a shout, surprised her by coming out as a whisper. But Rose's hand on her wand was steady, and likewise her gaze at Harry. The feeling she had summoned, the miracle of seeing him alive in the Great Hall, against all odds, that joy filled her limbs as the great snowy owl erupted from her wand again.
"What- you-" Harry's mouth had fallen open. He swallowed. "Hedwig," he said, staring at the Patronus in shock. The silvery bird soared around the little guest room, illuminating it with silvery light. Rose felt herself smiling as the same sense of exhilaration she had felt the last time she had cast a Patronus filled her again.
Harry seemed similarly affected. There was a light in his eyes and slight smile playing at his lips as he asked, "So…. you can cast a Patronus now?"
Rose nodded at him, still smiling. "I did it for the first time during the Battle. Our mutual friend, Tom, sent some Dementors after me when he became too distracted to pursue me himself."
Their eyes both followed the progress of the silvery owl through the room. It landed briefly on Harry's trunk before lifting into the air again to circle the bed. The room seemed to fill with a drowsy peace as they watched.
"Someday," Harry told her, in a voice closer to his usual tone than it had yet been that night, "I'm going to need to know what you did that made Voldemort come after you."
"I'll tell you tomorrow," she promised. "Some stories don't pair well with darkness. But suffice to say, he hadn't banked on my being able to defend myself against Dementors. Someone must have told him I couldn't cast a Patronus. Anyway, do you want to know what I thought about, when I cast one the first time?"
He raised his eyebrows.
"You. I thought about you. And the fact that you were still alive." His eyes darted at her, then looked away again just as quickly. "When she had chased away the Dementors," Rose continued, nodding at the bird flying past them, "I sent her to find you. Did she find you?"
Harry's mouth fell open, and he gave a short, startled laugh. Then, he shook his head. "Yeah. She found me," he said. "Only, when I saw her… I thought she was Hedwig." In response to Rose's questioning look, he went on, "I was walking with… I guess they were like ghosts, but they were more solid than ghosts. It was what came out of the Resurrection Stone when I used it. Sirius. Remus. My dad, and… Mum."
"You saw Lily?" Rose whispered. The owl flickered where it flew, but Rose looked at Harry and took a deep breath. The Patronus became solid again.
Harry nodded. "They were all with me, keeping me company… you know, before I…" he trailed off.
"Before you allowed Voldemort to kill you. Or, to try to kill you," she supplied, and he nodded again. Rose lifted her wand slightly and spoke to the bird. "Venez ici,"1 she told it, and it flew obediently to alight next to Harry on the guest bed.
He reached for it rather longingly. It held still, but his fingers still passed through its luminous head. "It looks just like her."
They sat for another silent minute, bathing in its silvery light. Then Rose spoke. "Anyway, that's how I know."
"How you know…?" Harry frowned, looking at her questioningly.
"How I know that we will be able to live again and not just survive. Because I was able to live after we lost Sirius. And, when I cast my Patronus for the first time, I had just seen Tonks and Remus dead. But I thought about you, and found happiness." Rose sat up straighter and played with her wand thoughtfully as she spoke. "It doesn't seem to make sense. I couldn't cast a Patronus even when Sirius was alive and I was happy with him, but now that we've lost so many people, I can. It doesn't make sense." She gave a small laugh. "Did you know that there are flowers growing at Chernobyl?"
"Growing at where?"
She shook her head. "Never mind. Anyway, it seems to me now that life isn't a conflict between good feelings and bad feelings, with the stronger feeling winning somehow. It's more of a decision between feeling and not feeling. If you make up your mind to open yourself up to feeling, then even when pain almost destroys you, you're still alive. And then you can feel happiness too, when it comes to you. And love."
"Dumbledore said something like that," Harry mused.
"Well, that proves it then. If Dumbledore and I both agree on something, it's bound to be true," she said, sitting up straight and giving her head a little toss.
He sniffed a silent chuckle. Then, he lay back down on his bed. "I'm all right. You don't need to sit up all night. I'm sorry I woke you."
Rose smiled a bit sadly, remembering. "Don't feel sorry for that," she said, repeating the words she had once said to Sirius. Then, she looked at the Patronus. "Pouvez-vous rester avec lui un certain temps?"2 she asked it softly. It inclined its luminous head, and arranged itself at the foot of the bed where it sat, regally, with eyes half closed, glowing like a living night-light.
"Good night, Harry."
"Good night, Rose. Hey, Rose?"
She had stood and was halfway to the door, but she stopped and looked back at him.
"Let's go downtown again tomorrow."
"Yes, let's," she said, and smiled. "It's going to be sunny tomorrow. I'll see you in the morning."
"See you," came his drowsy voice, and Rose passed back into the hallway into her own room. She had no further dreams that night.
"There you are, Harry. Just- yes, support his head like that. Perfect," Andromeda declared, taking a step back and looking at them in approval.
Harry had gone utterly stiff. There was pleasure on his face, but the rest of his body was motionless as the tiny baby squirmed in his arms. "Hullo, Teddy," he whispered. The child stretched its limbs as far as they would go, then relaxed. His face found the source of Harry's voice and his mouth formed a perfect "o" as they locked eyes. Harry let out his breath in an astonished laugh.
"He sees me. Look, he's looking right at me!"
"He's six weeks old," Andromeda told him, hiding an amused smile. "He can see farther than that, now."
"Well, yeah, but he's really looking at me," Harry said, seemingly unable to tear his eyes from the small face in the crook of his arm. "Teddy. Hullo. I'm Harry. I'm your godfather."
A tiny "ah" came from the baby's pursed lips, and then he suddenly screwed up his face.
"Don't cry, Teddy!" Harry said, looking up at Andromeda helplessly. "What did I do?" he asked her, but she shook her head and nodded toward the baby.
"Look at him."
Teddy's downy hair, which had been turquoise when Harry took him, had turned black, and was now sticking out from its owner's tiny head at all angles. The baby continued to stare fixedly at Harry, but then he flinched. Harry had let out a loud guffaw.
"Poor bloke thinks he wants to look like me! Ha!" he chortled. "You'll find looking like this isn't all it's cracked up to be, mate," he said confidentially, allowing the baby to grip his finger.
"He could do worse," said Rose, who was sitting to Harry's left and beaming. "I happen to think rather a lot of both of you." She turned to Andromeda, who had seated herself in a chair opposite them. "So, is this all right, can we visit weekly?"
"You can visit as often as you like," Andromeda told her. She wore an impeccable set of deep purple dress robes and her hair was swept up in its usual elegant coif; however, there were deep shadows of grief under her eyes. Probably exhaustion too, Rose speculated.
"Does he wake often at night?" Rose asked her gently.
Andromeda smiled stoically. "On some nights, yes. On other nights, I owe my sleeplessness to no one but myself."
Rose sighed. "Yes. I'm afraid I know the feeling. Remus always used to say that you have to take care of your body in times of grief. But sometimes, the body doesn't cooperate."
They locked eyes a moment, Rose's green eyes looking into Andromeda's silvery grey. So like Sirius', she thought, catching her breath. "Come and visit anytime," Andromeda repeated, a little more softly.
"Perhaps I will come a bit more often than Harry," Rose suggested, to which Andromeda gave one grave nod.
Teddy had begun to squirm and whimper, and his breathing accelerated. He looked very much like crying. Harry looked up at Andromeda again.
She looked perfectly calm. "Try standing up and walking him around. Give it a bit of a jostle. Often that calms him."
Harry looked nervous, but stood with the baby in his arms, appearing to concentrate on this small concert of movements as intensely if it were an especially challenging Quidditch maneuver. Cautiously, he began to stride around the room, jiggling the baby very slightly in his arms as he did so. Teddy quieted almost immediately.
"You're a natural, Harry," Rose told him. Harry snorted, but looked pleased with himself all the same. Looking back at Andromeda, she said, "Why don't you lie down a while? I know you could use a rest. And Harry and I can manage Teddy together, can't we Harry?" Harry looked decidedly nervous at this. Rose ignored him.
Andromeda only hesitated a moment. "There's another bottle in the kitchen, under a Cooling Spell. If he gets hungry, just-"
"Use a Warming Charm, until it's around 38 C," Rose finished for her. "I remember. It can't be as hard as Wolfsbane."
Apparently satisfied in Rose's competence, Andromeda climbed the stairs to her bedroom, leaving Harry and Rose alone with the baby, who had begun to snore delicately in Harry's arms.
"I'm afraid to sit down," he confessed, as he paced the floor.
"Just wait until he's been asleep a few minutes," Rose advised. "Make sure he's thoroughly asleep." She stretched her arms above her head, then smiled contentedly at her nephew and godson. "How many children does Ginny want?" she teased.
Harry pulled a face. "Ginny wants to play Chaser for the Harpies," he told her firmly.
Rose hummed a little. "Well, as time shall try," she observed. And then, "When we were walking to the Apparition point, you asked what I had planned for the summer. I don't really have firm plans for anything yet, beyond Astou's visit next week. Why?"
"Oh," he said, tearing his eyes from the sleeping face of his godson, whose hair had turned pink as he dreamed. "Yeah. So, how'd you feel going to Australia? Say, in two weeks?" When she raised her eyebrows but said nothing, he continued, "Hermione reckons she'll be ready to go find her parents about then. She's traced them as far as Melbourne, though she's not sure if they're still living there. Can we get there by Floo?"
"You can, though not directly," Rose told him. "You'll need to Floo to some hub on the continent, maybe Paris or Berlin, then you can choose to go the eastern route or the southern route. Of course, it might be simpler to fly, though more time-consuming." She was sitting up straight now, suddenly verbose in her enthusiasm for the subject of travel.
"That's what I said, but Ron refuses to get near an aeroplane. Calls them Muggle Death Tubes. Says he'd rather fly on broomstick." Harry shrugged.
"You might tell him that, all told, it might be cheaper to fly than to pay all those tariffs in each country to Floo," Rose said.
Harry seemed to decide that Teddy was thoroughly asleep, now. He eased himself into a chair. "Yes, well, this is the sort of thing we don't really know about," he went on. "Hermione can research- and she has, believe me- but we've none of us done anything like the amount of travel you have. Interested in coming along?"
Rose looked out of Andromeda's large bay windows thoughtfully. "Do you know, I've been to nearly every continent, even Africa. But somehow I never made it to Australia."
"It'd be great if you could," he said, emphatically. "Mrs. Weasley's been threatening to send Percy with us. She might call him off if you came."
"Well, we can't subject the poor Australian Muggles to that," Rose agreed. "I think I can do that," she said after another moment of consideration. "It will be lovely; I've missed travel."
"Brilliant," he replied. With one hand, he stroked the baby's softly curling pink hair and smiled. "You're going to be a lot better off than I was, mate," he told the sleeping infant. "Andromeda's going to be leagues better than the Dursleys." Teddy stretched in his sleep, and began to make a tiny rhythmic moaning sound with each snore. "And I'll come and see you," Harry went on, allowing the baby to grip his finger again. "And when I've my own place, you can come and stay with me sometimes, and beat your godmother at Motor Toon Grand Prix. That shouldn't be hard." He raised his eyebrows at Rose as he said this, grinning.
"Only because you're holding my godson, I'll let you get away with that," she told him, twirling her wand in her fingers with a mock-threatening gesture.
Harry looked back down at the baby, still grinning. "Come to The Burrow on Friday? We were going to plan the trip this weekend." He addressed Rose, though he still gazed at Teddy.
"Mmm, can't do Friday," Rose answered him, still looking out of the window.
"Have you got a date, then?" Harry teased. When she didn't answer, he looked up at her. "You have got a date," he accused, his mouth opening.
"It's hardly a date," she answered, coloring a little. "It's only dinner. We're just sort of- getting to know one another."
"Who's this bloke, then?" Harry demanded, half smiling, half gaping. "Do I know him?"
Rose continued to fidget with her wand and smiled slowly. "Supposing I told you he had to meet Friday, because his duties as Minister of Magic are going to keep him busy all weekend?" When she saw his expression, she laughed.
"Don't worry," she assured him. "I'll tell Kingsley not to expect another dinner for a month at least. I've got a new continent to visit with my nephew!"
1 "Come here."
2 "Could you stay with him a while?"
