39 : THE OTHER DOE

The following days were a blur. A lot of the students that had stayed in Hogwarts over the holidays had rushed back home. James wanted nothing more to imitate them and go back to his parents, but they had once again told him to stay away and that school was safer.

Remus was in St Mungo's.

James had not been allowed to see him. Sirius either, and it drove them both crazy, in their dorm that suddenly felt too big and too empty.

Peter was gone. He wrote letters everyday, promising in all of them that he would come back soon. But you can only read a letter so many times before the words start to lose their meaning.

Nothing made sense.

Several people had lost their lives in the attack in Hogsmeade. Two witches from the village, an Auror that had tried to save them and the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. Classes had been cancelled and no one knew when they were to resume.

The castle was surrounded by this hazy fog of grief that grew thicker and thicker each day that passed. Everything was silent.

James had told the story of what had happened so many times it had begun to feel like something that happened to someone else. He had been over it with Dumbledore, the Aurors, the Investigation department of the Ministry and his friends. Like Alice had told him, no detail was too small and he had been forced to relive the worst day of his life over and over again.

Neither Snape nor Regulus had been arrested. In fact, they were still in the school and James saw them at every meal. They both had been thoroughly questioned after James' official statement, but Dumbledore had personally vouched for them and the investigation had stopped there. James had never been so furious.

"I can't take it," he said through grinned teeth one day at dinner. He had been staring across the room to the Slytherin table ever since he had sat down and had not taken one bite of his food. "I can't keep seeing him parading around with his fucked up face. Madame Pomfrey can fix worse than that in a second, he just wants to look like a victim."

On the other side of the Great Hall, hunched over his plate, Snape was turning left and right so everyone at his table could see every angle of his ravaged face. His nose was broken and he had two black eyes, both engorged with blood. James couldn't help himself but feel a pang of guilt as he watched the black bruises run down from Snape's temples to his swollen cheekbones, fractured in several places. It was hard for him to believe he had been capable of such violence. But then again, Remus was in St Mungo's. People had died. Snape deserved it.

He was not a monster for doing what he had done. He was not a monster for having been overcome by a temporary, fleeting moment of absolute rage.

Right?

"They said they were under the Imperius Curse," said Sirius in a hoarse voice. Surprised, James turned to him. Sirius had only rarely spoke since the attack, building walls around him James had not been able to talk through. Most of their conversations until this point had been extremely one-sided. "You think it's true?"

He was looking down at his untouched plate, pushing vegetables around with his fork. James hadn't seen him eat in days.

"Maybe," lied James. He couldn't conceive a world in which it was true. It was clear that Snape and Regulus had acted of their own accord, although that was something James would never admit to Sirius. "Who told you?"

"Alice."

"She didn't tell me that," said James quietly, turning back to the Slytherin table. Alice had been in and out of Hogwarts a lot these past few days, on official Auror duty. She couldn't talk about what was going on but she did give James some information here and there whenever he managed to corner her somewhere.

"He's my little brother," whispered Sirius.

James shook his head. Perfect copy of his brother at the same age, Regulus was sat between Snape and Mulciber. He looked just as skinny and sick as Sirius had been over the past few days.

"Not any more." James hated to be this brusque almost as much as he hated the depressed undertone in his friend's voice. Sirius had never been one to mope around. He was a man of action and usually the first to think about retaliation. But not this time.

Remus was in St Mungo's.

For Sirius like for James, every second was spent in anxious anticipation. Waiting for good news that never came. They just had different ways to deal with it. Sirius shut down. James became a more irritable, angrier version of himself, one that he hated.

Few were the ones who had not yet been victims of his snide comments and angry outbursts. He had slipped back into his old habit of using Silencing Charms on students who were too loud in the common areas, rendering them temporarily mute.

So far Lily had been the only one to have not been on the receiving end of James' frustration, and for a good reason. She was avoiding him.

"Don't touch me!"

Her words still rang in James' ear, sharp and icy. After Disapparating them far from the battle, Alice had left them alone for half a minute while she went back to fight. James had held his bloody hand out of Lily to help her to her feet and she had shot him a terrified glance.

"Don't touch me!"

Blood had dripped from his broken fingers onto her white skin. Snape's blood.

He didn't expect her to forgive him.

She had stopped spending time in the common room or the library and last week, she passed him a note pushing back the next few detentions.

Perhaps she couldn't bear to look at him any more and James couldn't blame her. He couldn't look at himself either. Some days it felt like Snape's blood had sunk so deep into his hands they would never be clean again.

At the opposite end of the Gryffindor table, Lily was resting her head on Marlene's shoulder and staring into nothing. Mary had gone back to her parents the day after the attack. Marlene and Lily were the only girls left in the Gryffindor tower. Their dorm room must have been feeling just as empty as the boys'.

James exhaled shakily and wiped his sweaty palms on his robes. He had not yet been able to forget how Lily's arms had wrapped around him. He had not been able to forget she had stayed in the heat of the battle and fought off Death-Eaters, for him. To find him. Sometimes it felt like a daydream. Sometimes it was a nightmare than left his heart racing as he stood upright on his bed. He would never be able to unsee the image his brain had created in the dead of night, of her crimson curls resting in the snow and of her lifeless emerald eyes staring at him without seeing him.

She could have died because of him. No wonder she now stayed away.

James tore his eyes from her reluctantly. She haunted his nights and days, yet he never got tired of looking at her. She was entrancing.

He was so caught up in her he didn't notice McGonagall had stood up over at the staff table. Dumbledore had rarely been seen since the attack, so it was very naturally that McGonagall had assumed the responsibilities of the headmaster in his absence. She cleared her throat and a respectful silence settled in the already quiet hall.

"Students," she started. "Although we are all in great pain after the events of Hogsmeade, I, along with the school board and the majority of the professors, believe it is our duty to grow from what happened. As you know, at Hogwarts, your education and safety are our priorities, and this is why the Auror Department in the Ministry has decided to organize extra-curricular classes specialized in early Auror training. They will take place everyday in the Transfiguration classroom until classes resume."

As she sat back down, James turned to Sirius.

"What do you think?"

"I think you want to go." His friend had a sad smile, the first one in days.

"You're damn right I do."

James squeezed Sirius' hand under the table. Everything was shit, everything. But they would find even the tiniest of things to hold on to and they would call it hope. And then maybe they would be alright after all.

When they arrived in the Transfiguration classroom the next morning, it was to find all the tables pushed back against the walls and the room enlarged by an Extension Charm, as it was twice as wide as James remembered.

Lily and Marlene were already there, along with the thirty other students that had remained at Hogwarts. Lily was sat on a table with her back against the wall, braiding Marlene's blond hair. She had dark circles under her eyes and James wondered for a second if she had been having the same nightmares as him.

Neither of the girls looked up when he passed them. He walked for a few more feet and sat on a nearby table, close enough to them so no one would get in between, but far enough that they wouldn't feel obligated to talk to him. Sirius and him waited there in silence, leaning back on the wall. There was still no news concerning Remus.

The silence reigning in the crowded classroom was deafening.

Together, they held their breath as the door to McGonagall's office opened, revealing a dishevelled and exhausted looking Alice. James smiled in spite of himself. The day had just gotten significantly better.

"Hi everyone," she said in a loud voice, clapping her hands together like she always did before a big speech. "Let's get started, shall we?"

She motioned for all of them to get on their feet and walked to the centre of the room.

"We're not going to practice offensive spells just yet," she warned, with a side eye look at James. "We're going to start with the most useful spell you will ever learn. The Patronus Charm is usually not taught in regular classes because of its complexity, but I can guarantee you it will come in handy, in those trouble times we're living in."

"I can't see why," said James loudly, and his deep voice filled the room. "Dementors work with the Ministry in Azkaban. It's very unlikely we would need to fight them any time soon."

Alice turned to him and for a second James thought he was going to get told off (it was Alice's preferred method of communication after all) but her eyes softened when she looked at him. She must have been remembering how James had been lured into the Forbidden Forest, just a few days back. The doe was on James' mind too.

"The Ord- the Ministry uses the Patronus Charm to carry messages," she answered in a quiet voice. "If anyone at Hogsmeade had known how to use the spell to call the Aurors, we could have been there much more rapidly. A lot of damage could have been avoided," she added, and her eyes trailed to James' hands, which he hid self-consciously behind his back. His bruises had healed rapidly and Madam Pomfrey had mended his broken fingers. Yet the pain still resonated in his veins like a faint echo, reminding him at all times of his weakness, of his overpowering anger.

Alice smiled at him gently and James saw pity in her eyes. He averted his gaze without smiling back and wished he would never have to see someone look at him like that again.

Turning her back to him, Alice began to explain how a Patronus was conjured and just how intricate the spell was. His arms crossed against his chest, Sirius was listening attentively, while James brooded next to him.

He knew how to cast a Patronus already. At least he knew the technical aspect of it. He had never actually done it, but he was certain he could. He was the second best student in Charms after all, only Lily ever surpassed him in that field.

James twisted his wand between his fingers. At his request, his parents had sent him a new one straight from Ollivander. It was made out of the same wood and it had the same core but it just wasn't the same. It wasn't the wand he had desperately clung to when he had first set foot in Hogwarts. It wasn't the wand Lily had confiscated so many times since fifth year. It was a wand, but it wasn't his.

It did work though, James had tested it the night after his parent's owl had delivered it, making everything in their dorm room levitate until Sirius yelled at him to stop.

James turned his head slightly to look at his friend. Sirius' cheekbones were highlighted by the hollowness in his face, carved out by the days spent worrying, not eating. His usually luscious hair had lost its shine and fell flat on both sides of his head. He looked so much older than he was. Like all the fight and energy had been sapped out of him.

It was the ghost of a man standing next to James. Not his brother.

James looked away and tried to focus on listening to Alice.

"Think about your happiest memory. Whatever thought makes your heart do that thing where it flutters. It can be anything, your family, your first kiss, your first Quidditch game... Just focus on your happiness and let it wash over you."

Everywhere around the room, students had their eyes shut and looks of intense concentration on their faces. Alice winked at James when he looked at her. Purely out of spite, he closed his eyes and imitated the others. He regretted it immediately, feeling idiotic with his eyes closed in a room full of people.

He didn't even know what his happiest memory was. His entire childhood was a blur of excitement mixed with the thrilling feeling of freedom and love. Every memory from back then was so bright and happy none of them stood out.

He tried to focus on the feeling rather than a particular memory, but instinctively his thoughts circled back to Lily. Like they always did. Thinking of her made his heart swell. The freckles on her pale skin and the mischievous light in her eyes and her hair that was fire and warmth, everything about her use to make his body vibrate with passion.

But now, those images were tainted with grief. He couldn't think about her eyes without thinking about the tears he made her cry and how terrified she had looked when he had held his hand out to her. He couldn't think about her voice without remembering how heart-wrenching her screams had been when she had called his name in the heat of battle. When she had begged him to stop pounding Snape's face with his fists.

He couldn't think about her without his heart breaking and the certitude that she wanted nothing to do with him.

He tried to think of his friends, but Peter was gone and Sirius wasn't Sirius any more.

And Remus was in St Mungo's.

Jaw clenched to fight back his tears, he opened his eyes to find that the classroom was filled with thin wisps of silver smoke. Everywhere around him, his classmates made managed to at least conjure some sort of vapour, an incorporeal magic filling the air with energy.

Everyone but him had produced something. Everyone but him and Sirius, who hadn't even drawn out his wand and was staring at the opposite side of the classroom, arms crossed over his chest. James followed his gaze and gave up on ever feeling happy again.

Snape was here. Smirking confidently.

He was trying to catch Lily's eye, sticking out his skinny chest in his dark hand-me-down robes. He was probably here to show off just how perfect of a Patronus he could conjure, and James felt every cell in his body being replaced with absolute hatred.

He would give everything he had to never have to see that ravaged face again.

Suddenly, a warm, calming presence seemed to materialize next to him and something nudged his hand. Looking down, he saw the exact thing he feared he would. The doe's gorgeous eyes were fixated on him, and reflected a feeling too pure for James to comprehend. He didn't even try. Anything coming from Snape would just be a blight in disguise.

Before his mind could register what he was doing, his body reacted and a visceral instinct kicked in, sending his clenched fist directly to the animal, which dissipated into a cloud of silver smoke.

"James!" Lily's outraged voice raised from behind him. "What the fuck?"

James spun around to see she was clasping her wand, still directed at the exact place the Patronus had stood. Lily's red curls tumbled around her shoulders like an angel of fire. She looked furious. James had never seen such concentrated rage.

"The doe was yours?" The question fell from his lips in spite of his better judgement. He didn't want to know.

"Who else's would it be?"

James turned his head to look at Snape, who had a shit-eating grin plastered across his face. Lily followed his gaze and her eyebrows furrowed at the sight of the sallow boy and the terrible bruises covering his face. He took a step forward, getting closer to them, and with a simple flick of his wand conjured an identical copy of Lily's Patronus. His doe looked just as delicate and elegant. There was no telling them apart. James thought he might have been sick if his stomach hadn't turned into a bottomless pit.

"Oh," said Lily simply. Although all trace of anger seemed to have left her, she looked the furtherest thing from happy. She lowered her wand and let her arm fall at her side in a defeated gesture.

"Yeah," said James, and he hated the way he spat out the word, like venom, meant to hurt. "Guess you two truly do have a connection, huh."

Lily shook her head, incredulous. Her slightly parted lips moved like she wanted to say something and James waited, desperate for an explanation. Surely it didn't mean anything. Surely it was all one big, terrible practical joke. Surely it wasn't real.

"James- I..." Lily started, but she didn't seem to be able to finish her thought. She closed her mouth and looked at James with a pleading look in her eyes.

James left the room without looking back, slamming the door on his way out. The only person he wanted to talk to was Remus. Remus who knew so much about magic and how it worked, and would without a doubt be able to explain the phenomenon. Remus who helped him every step of the way when it came to his relationship with Lily, if you could even call it that.

Remus who was in St Mungo's.

Furious, James stuck his hand into his hair. It wasn't fair. It just wasn't fair.

He ran all the way to his dorm room and kicked the door shut when he arrived, hurting his foot in the process. He thought about collapsing on his bed, but suddenly the oh so simple movement felt like to much effort. Besides, what would he do then but be forced to listen to his thoughts spiraling down another dark tunnel? He didn't want to lay down, he wanted to scream.

His heart was hammering inside his hollow chest. He felt empty, standing there all alone without a purpose, after a pointless run through the castle.

Precipitated footsteps echoed in the stairs behind the door and for an instant James thought Lily was chasing after him. But it was Sirius' hand that landed on his shoulder and it was Sirius who pulled him in to a tight hug. And somehow that was much better.

Neither of them said anything, because they didn't need to. But they put all their suffering into that embrace, all the unsaid prayers, choked back tears and resentment from their endless wait. They didn't talk but James squeezed Sirius tight and held on to him like he was his last thread of hope, the only thing keeping him alive.

Because in a way he was.

Sirius was the one thing he wouldn't allow himself to lose. He had already lost so much. But he wouldn't let his brother lose himself and the very energy that made him him.

A small knock resonated in the room and Sirius let go of James, who turned to the window. A white snow owl was politely taping the glass with its beak, and the two boys had one look at each other before they rushed to let in in. In their franticness, they struggled to untie the letter off of its claw for a few endless seconds.

Finally, Sirius unfolded the parchment with shaky hands and James felt tears swell up in his eyes as he recognized the familiar hand-writing.

Dear Padfoot, Prongs and Wormtail,

I'm coming back.

Love,

Your perfectly healthy Moony.

Alight with happiness, James crashed against the small desk by the window and grabbed a blank piece of parchment and a quill. There was so much he wanted to write but his hands were shaking and his vision was blurry with the joyous tears he was holding back.

"Owls are nowhere near fast enough to say what we want to say." Sirius' voice elevated from behind him. "Just try it again."

"Try what?" James turned and felt his heart burst with relief in front of the wide grin plastered on Sirius' face. His friend was finally back.

"Try it," repeated Sirius, and suddenly James understood what he meant, because there was no feeling comparable to the absolute boyish glee he felt in this instant. His heart felt a thousand times lighter than it had for the past few days, and he was quite certain that if he wanted to, he wouldn't have needed a broom to fly.

So what if Lily's Patronus was exactly the same as Snape's? He couldn't change it, couldn't erase the connection between them, their shared history. They were bounded, probably more than James would ever know. It was a truth he could do nothing about but in that moment he didn't care.

Remus was coming home. He was okay and he was coming home and nothing else mattered. James was happy. Deliriously, incredibly happy.

"Expecto Patronum."

The light that erupted from his wand was so bright he was temporarily blinded, and when his vision returned, the first thing he saw was mesmerizing silver eyes and a pair of antlers so tall they reached the ceiling.

"Oh," said James simply.

The tears he had been trying so hard to contain fell from his eyes and rolled on his cheeks.

"Tell Moony we love him," he whispered to the animal, which bowed its magnificent antlers low to the ground before disappearing out the window.

Like Lily's doe, the stag was nothing short of dazzling.

It felt meant to be.