The house was still full, though all who were left were members of the Order. To Dea, it felt like something from a history bookâsending off the chosen warriors to fight a battle for them all.
She wanted them all to leave.
She was exhausted from the evening's magics, exhausted from the evening's emotions. More than anything, she was scared for the three men, one hardly old enough to be termed such, who had left Grimmauld Place with little more than wands and memories.
So when she walked into the front rooms of the Black house to see the Weasley twins performing tricks on each other, Tonks and Mundungus arguing about something, and several older wizards playing a game of Wizards Chess, her patience was running thin. Overwhelmed and underprepared to see the groups of people going about daily routines, she leaned on the door jamb, fingers wrapping tightly around it.
She felt him before she heard him, the reassuring radiance of him that she'd come to recognize, and in her own recognition, fear. She feared dependence.
"Tell me they have somewhere else to crash," she said in a broken voice. "Tell me they have somewhere else to go."
Remus jerked a little; he hadn't realized she knew he was behind her. But he stepped forward, starting to stroke a hand down her hair and thinking better of it as voices tangled in his head.
This is messed up, her voice, both amused and strained, afraid and assured.
Do you really fancy yourself in love with her? The man who had gone bravely to face those whom he had betrayed spoke in his brain, snide for reasons Remus could entirely understand.
Then she turned, her eyes wide and dark, full of emotion and focused on his, the question still echoing in them.
"Yes," he said. "They all have places to go. They don't have to stay here."
She couldn't stop the desperate relief that flooded through her, but she shook her head. "I'm sorry. It's selfish of me to ask that of you. Of them."
"There's nothing they can do," he said. "Their presence here does nothing but heighten anxiety." So saying, he looked up at the people gathered. And as he began to speak, Dea slipped upstairs, feeling the weight bearing down on her shoulders.
If they failed, it was on her head. It had been her idea, and they had gone.
If they failed, their blood would be on her hands, on the brain she'd used with hubris.
If they failed, how much good would she be in the ensuing battle?
~~~
When everyone was finally gone after offering advice, apologies, comfort for things that had not yet happened, conversation, and speculation, he went looking for her.
He heard her before he saw her, the sobs just loud enough to be heard, and his heart twisted in his chest as he thought of a young woman nearly running down a Hogwarts hallway, her trunk dragging behind her as she cried.
He found her in the room she'd awoke in, Great Aunt Dora gazing down at her with pity evident in her painted eyes, clucking her tongue loudly as she shook her head from side to side. She lay on her side, facing the wall, hands pressed to her forehead.
"Amadea, it's all right." She didn't look up at his voice, but took in a hiss of air between her teeth, silencing her own misery. He sat down beside her, finally giving in to the urge he'd had earlier, and stroked his hand over her hair, letting his fingers trace the bright white streak that inevitably drew the eye.
She turned her head so that his palm lay along her cheek. "I sent them to their deaths," she said, her voice slightly hollow. "Why did you all let me do this?"
"We let you go to Malfoy," he reminded her. "And this was bound to happen, Amadea, sooner or later, whether it had been your idea or not."
She turned away from him again, hating the pity in those large, expressive eyes, hating the understanding. Hating the patience she saw in his eyes that she didn't even have for herself. "It was my idea, and an idea I'm too weak, magically, to even take part in."
"You need rest," he said insistently, noting the slight bruises that had appeared under her eyes. How hard had it been on her, to send away a mentor, a child, and the man she had once loved?
Or still loves, he told himself cynically. Who's to say she doesn't?
She stayed turned away from him, but she raised a hand to tangle with his, still resting gently on her hair. Squeezing her eyes shut and feeling the tears slide down toward the pillow, she pulled on his hand until his was forced to lean down.
"Stay, okay?" she asked, letting out a hitching sigh. "At least until I sleep."
She'd sent away two of the few people left from her past, and she wouldn't push away the last one who remained. She cradled his hand close to her, and when she felt his weight press evenly along the mattress, taller than her, longer than her, she let herself drift off.
~~~
They did not speak as they walked in the night air, each of them preoccupied with their own thoughts, each of them preoccupied with their most precious memories, the ones they'd each held in reserve.
Harry thought of his mother, the dim flashes he'd been granted in photographs, split memories, other people's descriptions.
Severus thought of Dea as she had been, vivacious and completely uncaring of the reputation he'd had, the chip on his shoulder.
Dumbledore thought of his own mother, a woman so formidable none dared cross her path. She was a Squib, but she was far from powerless. He remembered a woman with long knitting needles and a longer store of patience, the woman who had knitted socks for her son year after year as he outgrew them.
He had never outgrown his love for her.
"Stop." Severus's voice was insistent, and he stood with his eyes turned to the sky.
"We haven't even been walking for an hour," Harry said, trying hard to keep the petulance out of his voice. With every step he took, the fear grew deeper and deeper, and with it, his moods swung wildly.
"This is true," Dumbledore said, looking up at the sky, as well. "But Harry, distances here are not always as distances in the Muggle world. Many places, like Hogwarts, are bewitched in certain ways, changed in ways we cannot see. Severus is leading us to Voldemort, and he says we shall stop for the evening."
With a flick of his wand, he withdrew a small square of cloth from his robe. When he let it go, it sprung into a large tent that blended into the woods behind it.
"Perfect spot," Dumbledore said. "Excellent choice, Severus." And with that, he stepped inside and left the student and professor eyeing each other warily outside the tent.
~~~
She slept fitfully, which was unusual for her. She dreamt of what could happen, and dreamt that it already had. She dreamt of the past, the future, and what she feared was the present. She talked in her sleep, cried out and just plain cried.
She woke the man who had fallen asleep holding her.
Remus eased out of the spoon position they'd been nestled in, feeling his cheeks burning in the dark. Gripping her shoulder gently, he rolled her to her back and brushed her hair back from his face.
"Wake up, Amadea, it's just a dream." But was it, really? It seemed she had so many bad memories she could relive. He whispered her name once more and, thinking of any quick way to comfort, pressed a chaste kiss on her forehead.
Her eyes flew open, unreadable inky pools in the dark, and she shot a hand up to touch his face. She traced her fingers over the lines at the corners of his eyes, then let her hand slip back to touch the featherweight of his hair. Finally, she settled for laying her palm along the hollow of his cheek, looking at the angles of his face in the moonlight. It suited him perfectly, the bluish-white lunar light lending mystery to melancholy.
"This is messed up," she whispered, and suddenly she was desperate for human contact, desperate for what she'd been unable to handle earlier. She levered herself, up, bringing their faces close, and slid her lips over his, keeping her eyes open to watch the expression in his eyes.
They widened first, then drooped a bit as he kissed her back, pain shooting through him at the contact. It had been so long, so long since anyone had bothered to touch him, and he feared the worst from Amadea. He feared she'd sent her affections away and left only a woman with hunger, a woman with itches to be scratched.
But then she leaned back, breaking the kiss, and trailed her hands over the side of his face, his cheek and his nose. "You were bleeding," she whispered. "Bleeding over all that beautiful fur." She pressed her lips to the spot and spoke, her lips moving against his skin. "And you frightened me."
He trapped her hand in his, feeling his fingers trembling violently. Not here, not now, this isn't the way to be doing this, he told himself firmly. You're both upset. The rational man may have been correct, but in a world of magic, rationale rarely ever had a place anyway. "Do I frighten you now, Amadea?"
She hesitated only for a moment, then nodded. "I'm scared of everything right now, Remus." So she leaned up again, kissed him more firmly, and threaded her hands through his hair, gripping it hard enough to make him wince.
She slid her lips down to cover the pulse in his neck, and as heat raced through them, unsuited to the situation, to the time and place, Remus's eyes clouded and he looked out the window at the half-moon in the sky.