The Edge of Hope
A Gudiña. Burning, flaming ruins of tanks, trucks, troops, men. Weapons improvised and regular. Some abandoned coaching stock sat at the train station, eight tracks on a single-track main. There was a steam locomotive there, new-built, since liquid fuel was too precious for the civilian railways in the Morsmordre.
It sat, gleaming, perhaps just finished a few months before. It was untouched, whereas the town was burning. For a moment, Hermione just stared at it, like History had wended back in reverse. Then she shrugged. There were more important things to do, than worry about how the world was collapsing back to older technology, and older ways of living.
Now, there were more roads and railways together ahead toward Leon, and they pressed in. Bellatrix, jammed into the back of the command track, with her tiny size making her far too comfortable, was urgently speaking on the radio to one commander after another. A brigade was already moving north toward A Rúa to hit the enemy invading Galicia in the flank, to slow them down while the main penetration force, striking deeply into Leon to the east, would collapse the entire offensive. The rugged mountains all around were flecked with explosions, from magical and conventional means, bombs and artillery and spells.
Hermione rode with her head out of the command track, wand ready to block any attack she could see, the gunner close at hand with the 14.5mm machine gun. Things that weren't threats, like the steam locomotive, had to be quickly forgotten and put aside. Her eye sometimes flicked wearily skyward, but with the defections it was the allied air forces that ruled the skies here (even if most of the pilots had defected only two months before). The feeling of morale was inexorable. When they had descended on A Gudiña, the enemy had been clearly surprised and demoralised, Bella's ruse had worked, and they were buoyed by the knowledge that once again they were on the offensive.
The ridgeline ahead marked the border between Galicia and Leon. There, just west of the Leonese village of Las Hedradas, a battalion of enemy tanks were positioned, hull-down. They swung out to a stop at O Canizo, alongside the N-525 highway toward the ridge. The tanks and armoured vehicles in the column pressed ahead as the command laager was quickly set up. Hermione kept her wand fixed forward, magnifying the enemy position for a moment, and then joined Bellatrix was she dismounted in the afternoon shade of an east wall of an abandoned building.
Hermione swung down and brought up the handwritten notes marking the allocations of fighter-bombers and the availability of support. "One squadron of the 1244th, Fencers."
"Ah good, cluster bombs," Bellatrix nodded. "They probably rushed that battalion forward. We think it's M60s, and maybe just M47s. Older American tanks, probably attached to a motorised division, the 14th is the best intelligence estimate. If we cut through them, we'll get to Pueblo de Sanabria before the infantry can set up in the streets, and they won't put up much of a fight."
"Nobody has," Hermione murmured as she ticked off marks on one of the maps. The world felt vital, alive, and she knew well how Bellatrix always seemed to feel about these things.
"Bad commanders left at the rear, ensorcelled troops, the dregs of captured equipment from the Armies of Europe—this is all they have left to face us here. They thought an offensive could succeed… Or they just ordered one because Riddle wanted one, and there was no consideration about whether or not it would succeed," Bellatrix shrugged, flicking her eyes down.
"Riddle?"
"I'm comfortable enough at this point calling him by his real name. I assure you, there's nothing left of respect for him, even though I can't quite tell you how it was ever really possible for him to lead me, to command my respect. It seems impossible now."
Hermione smiled tightly. She saw a little bit of hesitancy in Bellatrix. Not a lie, but perhaps fear—the prospect that breaking free might not yet be done. That Voldemort's fearsome power, that he reminded the whole world of in London, might really be unbeatable. She understood it far too well. "Let's just keep pushing," she offered, and Bellatrix turned immediately back to the plan.
To her heart and soul the transformation was complete—Bellatrix was just a woman, and she was going to be her wife. And the longer they were fighting in Spain, the further away the matter of Harry and Ron was. She kept it firmly pushed to the side, and fell back into the comfortable rhythm of the staff officer on the offensive, guiding the troops in swinging out to fight yet another meeting engagement.
They took Benavente in three days of hard fighting, and established a perimeter that pushed artillery out of the range of the town, on three sides, against counterattack on the open plains of Leon. Here again the terrible consequences of all the years of war were very well clear. There had not been electrical power in years, and people lived by candle-light, or went to bed with the sun. Automobiles had been converted to be drawn by horses or donkeys. Fields were ploughed with oxen.
There were many fresh graves from the last few years in the cemeteries. A town like Benavente had not been nuked, but with the food policies of the Morsmordre and the damage to the modern economy and modern state, many people had died of disease, the old and infirm, or a want of food to eat. To say it was medieval was to be precisely accurate. The world sometimes grimly made Hermione feel like she were watching the fall of the Roman Empire but in close-up; de-urbanisation was happening around them, and a town like Benavente was actually much better off than the ruins of some cities. She remembered the casual way that Oslo had adapted to the lack of basic goods, and shuddered—and Scandinavia had been one of the better places left, short of Russia or Britain.
Britain, by Voldemort's design.
Here, in a world of magic and war and nuclear holocaust, the Catholic cathedral and the market-square had reassumed the places of great importance. It left Hermione struck with the sense of just how fortunate she was, to be living under Narcissa's cool, but compassionate hand on the tiller of the ship of state. Narcissa, who even in the midst of a great retrenchment to belief and tradition driven by the war, would take the deft actions, to justify in context, and slip through laws, burning her political capital slowly for the sake of her sister's happiness.
In that moment, thinking about how fortunate Bellatrix was to have Narcissa, Hermione wished she had a sister; she supposed she was lucky that she at least had such a good friend as Larissa. And then, with that way of random probabilities coming together just right—the absurd luck of the magical world, and the old adage of 'speak of the devil'-she heard a familiar voice.
"'Mione!"
"Lara." Hermione spun around, getting up from the metal fold-down desk that she occupied in the old train station. "Gods, I was just thinking about you, and there you are." She unhesitatingly embraced her friend.
"Well, I suppose I have that talent," she grinned. "You've kept yourself busy, since coming here."
"I've just been making myself useful, you know."
"I'd never expect anything less." Larissa leaned against a column in the shade and adjusted her sunglasses. "Everything is good, 'Mione?"
"Perfectly. Bellatrix is… At her very best."
"I won't ask how I should interpret that…"
The sentence had what was presumably its desired effect; Hermione immediately blushed. "No complaints for me," she finally cleared her throat, "But if you talk about Draco in front of Bellatrix she'll probably have you twitching on the ground in a heartbeat. Aunt, favourite nephew, you know."
"Ah yes, the favourite nephew joke—when you only have one…"
"She really does dote on him," Hermione answered.
"He does appreciate it, actually," Larissa stretched. "Well, I shouldn't share too much. He's had a rough road. He only became brave after he learned how to have the courage to admit he was a coward. He would have been an insufferable prick before the war, I think. Instead he's a man I can love."
"...He was," Hermione assured her with a bemused shake of her head, her mind flashing back through a plentiful hit reel of Draco Malfoy doing everything he could to make her life a living hell. And yet he had managed to face up to the prospect of Hermione being a relative with a certain level of dignified grace. Yes, I'm pretty glad for Larissa, actually. She was in the process of killing herself doing more than one witch could to try and win this war for her country, until he showed up and forced herself to actually spend the time to heal. And that mattered, to Hermione. Still…
"I assume you're not here to listen to me spend the next few hours embarrassing Draco with tales of how he was an insufferable prick, though? Do they…" Her voice caught. "Do they want me to come back to Britain? I didn't exactly leave on good terms with the Weasleys."
"It's your country and I discourage voluntary exile from it over your own choices, but I understand that you want to be with Bellatrix," Larissa answered. "However, we were continuing to do research on the matter of the Water of Death, and Master Flyorov would like to speak with you and Bellatrix now. He is in Britain, and could come here, if there was a reasonably secure location to meet, so I volunteered to go on ahead, since it's all information restricted to couriers, none of it can be sent by wire or owl or Floo or anything else, and scout out the present situation with the two of you for him."
"We've pushed the enemy back far enough that Benavente isn't under artillery fire," Hermione answered immediately, going for one of her maps, feeling comfortable in that when her psyche otherwise recoiled from the prospect of talking more about Harry. She'd very nearly managed to forget the entire plan for nearly a week between Bellatrix and a war in Spain. "So. Yes, tonight, with dinner. The front is stable for the moment, the enemy is retreating and redeploying after we cut half their supply lines, they can't send enough ammunition, food and fuel through the other half to keep an army moving forward in Galicia."
"General Black certainly does deliver."
"Mmmn." Two good play this game. And, it was another distraction. "In more way than one."
"Hermione!"
Unfortunately, it didn't change the fact that the very same night they'd be moving forward with the plan. She turned back to her work, but paused. "Lara, they really aren't upset with me?"
"Narcissa and Andromeda and Draco and Luna? Certainly not. You were officially on leave, after all, you had every right to travel. And you're legally still attracted to Bellatrix's headquarters group, so barring other orders if you were reactivated you should just be here, anyway." Larissa slung down her pack and rifled through it, pulling out a set of rations. Kasha, meat stew, everything familiar. "Lunch. I know there's essentially a famine here, so you're living on dry rations—so I stuffed my pack with them when I came."
"Yeah," Hermione agreed. "Unfortunately. In Galicia, the situation was better, because it was favoured by the Morsmordre, to be blunt. Here, they're barely above starvation levels." She paused for a moment. "I'm fairly sure I've burned a fair number of other friendships, Lara."
"Probably. But that isn't going to change your career or your life, at this point. I mean, I'm not going to try and stop you from marrying into the same family that I'm marrying into, 'Mione, that would be ridiculous. I came to the conclusion a while ago that your love for Bellatrix was an unstoppable force. Standing in front of it will just make everyone miserable for nothing. But some of your friends had to stand in front of it anyway, to be true to themselves. You can't change that, either."
"You're right. I'm not really worried about it. I have Bella. Well, that's not true; I was worried about Andromeda or Narcissa being upset that I might have caused drama, not really about anyone else. I know how serious it was that Bellatrix keyed me into the family wards, even before we formally proposed."
"We?"
"I think it was fairly mutual, even if I started it." A sly grin. "Does that answer the question?" She couldn't help it, thinking about being married to Bellatrix made Hermione happy.
"...yes, thank you." A pause, and perfectly deadpan: "Just to be absolutely clear, I proposed to Draco."
"...I wouldn't expect anything else, actually, Lara."
"Good."
A pause, chewing through a mouthful of food. The shadows through the windows stretched a bit longer. "What about Tonks?"
"Keeping herself busy. Probably for the best. You know that she is torn about this, she has to be. Her mentor, her teacher; and her husband, and her father, all dead. But her mother has reconciled with Bellatrix, and she's been welcomed as part of the House of Black, and she needs the help of her mother and aunt Narcissa to raise little Teddy."
"Harry was supposed to be his Godfather," Hermione nodded quietly, pausing and then determinedly chewing again. "It would be good for Draco…"
"Oh don't worry, he dotes on the little lad."
"Our families are bound together now. Sirius made Harry the Lord Black, by law. It reverted to the women of the house only by his death. I am not sure how the family magic will respond to the royal decrees," Hermione mused. "It should. Royal authority is a powerful, ancient magic of its own, even if a very subtle one."
"I would think that, nonetheless, Narcissa is counting on you to represent a reconciliation between what Harry represents, and between what she represents."
Hermione thought about that for a moment. What does Narcissa represent? Traditionalism, Celtic High Culture expressed tastefully enough that no Englishman would be uncomfortable with it, paternal conservatism that seemed just a little out of focus because she was motivated by the values and ethics of a pagan Witch, a real pagan, an old pagan, not some modern recreationist, and not the values of a High Anglican. The integration of the Magical and Muggle worlds on the basis of traditional orders. Different sorts of people, with different courts and privileges, who could nonetheless be loyal to the same country, same King, same ideal. She was a Slytherin and she was certainly ruthless. There was no smiling Albus Dumbledore to be the Supreme Warlock here. There was a Prime Minister's office, with all the weight of the tradition and bureaucracy of a country of sixty millions behind it, not the insular world of less than a hundred thousand witches and wizards governed by the British Ministry of Magic.
What did Harry represent? A fantasy world for Witches and Wizards, really, that was what Dumbledore had been devoted to perpetuating ever since his break with Grindelwald. A world where the changing technology of humanity wouldn't ever break through to threaten a place of chocolate frogs and lemon drops, where every wizard was a silly eccentric at heart and magic was used principally for silly things only secondarily for serious things.
In a way, Narcissa represented Grindelwald's vision, just in the very polite, composed, respectable version made possible by the flexibility of British constitutionalism. She had seized the nettle tightly, deciding that a Witch in a prominent leadership position would need to very visibly uphold the constitutional order and deliver on a vast array of promises to provide 'the Good life' to the average British muggle. Anything else would lead to the destruction of her people, now that the veil between the two worlds was broken.
And Hermione agreed with her completely. Personally, she would do some things differently, but not in objective, not in the basic plan. That was impeccable. So where did Harry fit in? The support of the Boy Who Lived would be … Lemon drops, to help the medicine go down sweetly with the light side, the resistance that had been fighting Voldemort long enough, or opposing him in their hearts and minds long enough, to remember when Narcissa had been quite visibly on his side.
That was it.
And Hermione was okay with that.
A man with a guitar was strumming out the lyrics to – when Master Flyorov arrived. He exchanged a few worlds in English with the group of soldiers, who pointed them on his way. The little song they sang was as old as time, with a few changes to fit the campaign:
Was it only yesterday
That we comrades marched away?
Now they're covered up with clay.
Seven glasses used to be
Called for six good mates and me -
Now we only call for three.
Little crosses neat and white,
Looking lonely every night,
Tell of comrades killed in fight.
Hearty fellows they have been,
And no more we'll see 'em,
Drinking wine in good ole' Santiago
Strong and quick lads were they,
Marching on their way -
Was it only yesterday?
Flyorov quickly shook his head, and ducked inside. Dinner was set out, from rations, but with a bottle of wine from Galicia, that Bellatrix had brought along—rank hath its privileges. "Lady Black," he offered in English, with quiet dignity.
"Vasily Gregorovich," Bellatrix offered, looking up from her wine, as the two younger witches, on the other hand, greeted him as Master Flyorov. She poured out a cup of wine.
"Thank you," he took it with a pleasant smile, and looked over the food. "I admit, it's quite a change from the table you set in Georgia, Lady Black."
"I don't mind sharing with my soldiers," Bellatrix replied. "There are more important things than food, sometimes; especially now. And anything tastes good, at this point in my life."
"Every time that I might want to hate you, the world reminds me it is just a little bit more complex than that," Flyorov remarked, allowing a touch of humour, and bemusement. It made Bellatrix laugh.
"Better if people your age, or best still, my age, fought wars," he continued, "and not young men, and young women like Ladies Larissa and Hermione, here. Still, here we all are. I suppose a round of congratulations for all the impending weddings is in order?"
Larissa shook her head. "Oh please, Master Flyorov. After the war, only. I think for all of us."
"Still, I'll make arrangements for suitable gifts." A glance, back to Bellatrix. "You have very good wine at your table."
"Thank you. I do owe you something for taking care of Delphini when I was conducting the Crimean Operation."
"It was nothing—I'm a grandfather, I like hosting children. Hopefully you don't think I spoiled her."
"I don't, in fact." Bellatrix smiled, Hermione thought it very genuine. "So," she continued, "You have come to my headquarters, right very close to the front line, to discuss something specifically with myself and Hermione. I understand that this may in fact be related to the … Latest plan to win the war, which has so taken everyone in Britain."
"It's related to a young man who never got a chance to have a life," Flyorov countered, but his voice was gentle. He meant those words. "I understand you have your own plan that you prefer, and I admit, it is not a bad one."
"It proceeds from the belief that most prophecies are so much garbage," Bellatrix answered. "As I tried to encounter the Dark Lord to think on several occasions. In fact, we now know what Potter's power was, where it came from, why the Dark Lord couldn't hurt him. Now that Harry is dead, the Dark Lord's own protection is gone. His only safeguard is Nagini, and Nagini is loyal to Riddle because she is a sapient human woman who is forever trapped in the body of a snake, and Riddle knows Parseltongue. Heal Nagini of her curse, and she has no reason to follow him, assuming that her re-transformation into a human won't outright disrupt the horcrux, because her fundamental essence will have changed." She leaned back in her chair over a half-empty plate, and refilled her glass of wine. "In magic as in all things, you need to understand why things work, not just how."
"But it may not," Flyorov countered. "And if it doesn't, will – Miss Nagini – be able to do anything to hurt the Dark Lord? We don't know enough about horcruxes to be truly sure. I might say that my own belief is that the answer is no—we'd have a living horcrux on our side, but that does not stop Voldemort from reaching the Gate of a Billion Stars, in the depths of Ararat."
Bellatrix closed her eyes. Sighed. "Well. I suppose that's true. But how are you going to find the Water of Death? It's not like you can just walk up to the Hut on Chicken Legs and ask for it in any random forest in Russia."
"You're right, you can't," Flyorov smiled, very faintly. Bellatrix's eyes blinked open, and then narrowed. Hermione frozen. Larissa softly sucked in her breath. There was something in his expression, something deeply significant.
It was Bellatrix who understood it first. Of course it was. "You know. You've seen her," she whispered, she hissed. "You've seen the Baba Yaga."
"Oh yes, albeit, very briefly. She is not a companionable witch—or if you prefer, Goddess. Where one begins and the other one ends is sometimes not at all very clear," Flyorov's eyes glinted, so intensely. This man taught dark arts, Hermione reminded herself. For all that he was so charming and genteel, now they saw something else…
"You yourself have contributed much to the theory of magic. I've been reading every report from Hermione and Larissa that I could on electric magic. You know, your advances in that field are linked to another fundamental problem…"
"The lack of influence of magical healing on radiation damage?"
"Excellent, your mind is still formidable, Lady Black. Yes. And some progress was made in this matter, but it's wrapped up in… A moment in my life when I lost many friends, when the whole world was threatened with destruction, something that happened, quite appropriately, near the great black swamps where old things linger."
"Chernobyl," Larissa hissed, and her former teacher nodded once.
"You see, ladies, there was a MinKol response to the Chernobyl disaster. And that was the first time that I looked Death in the eye—and that was when I met the Baba Yaga."
Notes:
The lyrics of the British soldier's song were modified from this one, to be more "modern":
AFTER LOOS
(Cafe Pierre le Blanc, Nouex les Mines, Michaelmas Eve, 1915)
WAS it only yesterday
Lusty comrades marched away ?
Now they're covered up with clay.
Seven glasses used to be
Called for six good mates and me -
Now we only call for three.
Little crosses neat and white,
Looking lonely every night,
Tell of comrades killed in fight.
Hearty fellows they have been,
And no more will they be seen
Drinking wine in Nouex les Mines.
Lithe and supple lads were they,
Marching merrily away -
Was it only yesterday?