A/N: So, yeah. I had writer's block on this chapter like whoaa, and I procrastinated for weeks like it was my freaking job. Then, when the words finally started coming, they came in force, so this chapter is kinda long. Sorry for the wait! My reviewers are wicked awesome – I LOVE you guys! Your words of encouragement finally snapped me out of my slump and got me writing.
Iesa: Wow, thank you! Am I JKR? I wish.
mrscribble: Don't worry, there will be plenty about the other founders. This is the last bit from Godric's POV.
chocoliciouz: Thanks for the kind words and ::cringe:: sorry again for the wait.
Foolish Fish: Aw, thanks for sticking with me!
This one's rated PG-13 for some of the content. You've been warned… :-O
Chapter One: Bold Gryffindor, From Wild Moor
Part Three
Working for Beck Wotley was not a walk in the park, Godric discovered. Beck was a demanding teacher and a tough employer. He was not widely known as a wizard; his Muggle customers regarded him as a capable but simple apothecary whose remedies worked wonders every time. Beck reckoned it was better for business this way. Some people tended to distrust magic, even in its most innocuous forms, especially these days, with rumors of increasing attacks of Dark wizards on Muggle settlements outside the city.
Godric, Beck discovered, was almost illiterate. His father had given him a few scattered lessons in reading, so he could puzzle out a few words and write his name, but that was about it. After a few weeks of tutoring in reading and writing, Beck mostly relegated to him the boring, time-consuming tasks such as grinding up ingredients and labeling bottles. Godric, who had anticipated brewing up fantastically complicated concoctions, was initially inclined to sulk about this, but Beck insisted he only learn the rudiments of potion-making until he had a better understanding of magic in general. And before he could begin learning magic, he also had to build himself a wand, which he accomplished under Beck's beady-eyed supervision with a bit of oak wood, a phoenix feather supplied by Fawkes, and a great deal of swearing. Beck performed the spell that made it functional, and magic lessons began.
Theirs were two remarkably stubborn personalities, with the result that they clashed quite a bit in their early lessons. Godric had been performing untrained magic just long enough to be a little too comfortable with his own methods; his typical approach to solving a problem was to simply throw more power into a spell and see what happened.
"NO!" Beck howled, furiously wiping splattered frog guts out of his eyes. "Control, Godric, CONTROL! Bloody HELL!"
The point of the exercise had been to levitate a feather from a table with a Levitation charm, and only a Levitation charm. No "cheating," as Beck called it when Godric fell back on his old, raw methods. When the incantation hadn't worked the first time, Godric had tried again, much more forcefully. Midway through, unfortunately, he had unconsciously reverted to his usual wandless method, with the result that the feather had not only levitated, but the table and its entire contents, complete with about twenty bottles of potions ingredients, had flown into the air and smashed into the ceiling.
Godric surveyed the destruction, his eyes wide with startled interest. "Begob," he said, his tone awed and not the least bit contrite. "Good thing it weren't the chamber pot I was levitating, hey?"
The shop did a flourishing trade with mostly unwitting Muggles, but it drew a good number of wizards and witches, too. Most of them knew Beck, and at his request, came incognito, although Godric could usually tell the magic folk from the Muggles; a furtive look, a wink, and dragonhide boots were the usual signs. Beck often invited them to stay for tea, and Godric spent many fascinating afternoons listening hungrily to stories of dragons, ghosts, and Dark magic. It was eye-opening for him; since he had first discovered his abilities, he had thought of himself as different, but every day, he was feeling more and more as though he belonged.
Weeks turned into months. Incidents like that of the errant table rapidly became a thing of the past. Godric proved an apt pupil, mastering his lessons at a rate which surprised and impressed Beck, no matter how much he tried to hide it. Godric discovered the joys of debating magical theory, insisting that his unique way of doing magic was an asset rather than a liability, and indeed, it often allowed him to perform feats that mystified Beck. He found ways to combine it with traditional spells and the results were sometimes astonishing. He created a new charm after only three months.
Beck was uncle, mentor, teacher, and friend. The old man's eyes were sharp, but at times they shone with wry warmth and good humor. He was hot-tempered and gruff, yet his leathery face could change from irascible to mischievous in the blink of an eye. He had a biting, sardonic sense of humor, and Godric loved egging him on. He was not loose with compliments, but sometimes he let slip a word of praise which made Godric glow inwardly because it was so hard-won. Naturally, it was nearly always followed by a sarcastic comment, but that was just Beck's way. They could, and often did, spend hours happily taking the mickey out of one another.
Old Beck didn't mince words when his protégé did something stupid, either, but he kept these rebukes for the classroom, taking care not to attempt to take the place of the father Godric had lost. He never pried into Godric's past, but Godric told him his story one day a few months after being taken in. How raiders had killed his family, leaving him with no one but his twin sister. How they had come to the City together, and how he had knocked on door after door begging for help, Robyn growing steadily sicker as the winter passed. How every door had been closed to him, and how in his desperation he had broken into a doctor's house in search of medication and been thrown in jail for his efforts. How he had pleaded with the soldiers and screamed that they had to let him go, because his sister needed him, and how he had escaped just in time to be at her side as she slipped away along with the winter.
His life was too full now to dwell very much on the past; no longer having to spend every moment of his life focused on surviving another day, he was beginning to appreciate what Manceastre had to offer. The city really came alive at night, its taverns lit up with festive cheer and delightfully drunken song. He relished the rowdy atmosphere and good-natured ragging among the revelers, and on one memorable night in late autumn, he and a few other young apprentices washed dishes for a time in exchange for a little too much ale. Far from being angry, Beck still took unholy delight in reminding him about that night. He himself couldn't recall very much, but he had the most unpleasant feeling that it had somehow involved a table and dancing a jig.
During the winter, he discovered the delights of theater and took to hanging out backstage in the traveling shows and open-air theaters with the players and the playwrights. He was an imaginative boy, and the adventurous nature of many of the plays appealed to him. He passed many happy afternoons with his friends, fencing with sticks and fighting pitched battles with the other young ragtag gangs of the city. Come spring, they swam the river and climbed up to the rooftops to laugh and dry off in the sun. Beck never fussed about where Godric went, so long as his work was done, and that suited him fine. He was having the time of his life.
Consistent meals were doing wonders for his scrawny, undersized frame. He shot up in a truly astonishing growth spurt and, by the end of a year, had outgrown his cot in the loft. If not particularly tall for his age, he was no longer the undersized pinprick he had been, and his easy grin, quick wit, and natural athleticism had earned him no shortage of female admirers. Which was fortunate, as it was not long after his fourteenth birthday that he discovered girls.
Godric had always been fairly indifferent to the female species. They were relatively uninteresting, often annoying people with long hair and strange ways he didn't pretend to understand. He was amazed by how completely wrong he had been. Girls were fascinating! Brilliant, really! Why hadn't he ever noticed it before?
Soon he was sneaking backstage during shows to steal kisses with Elizabeth Mason, the comely daughter of one of the actors. It wasn't long, however, before Godric realized that Elizabeth's intellectual depth was about on par with gravel and regretfully ended it. Next, he took a young witch named Rosalie Wynderham up on a romantic starlit broomstick ride – or at least, that was how it was supposed to go. He hadn't reckoned on her screaming and flipping the broomstick over just as they flew over the Mersey River. Once he had fished her out, drenched and sobbing, Rosalie shrieked that she never wanted to see or speak to him again and stormed home. Ah, young love.
Even aside from his tangled love life, he was busier than ever. His lessons were becoming quite a bit more complex, and he was now doing real work in the apothecary. And then, one night in early fall, they had a visitor whose brief stay made Godric's world a bigger and much more complicated place.
It was late. Beck had gone to bed and was snoring in the far corner, but Godric had stayed up to finish a particularly nasty potion that required stirring at very specific intervals to ensure its potency. He stifled a yawn, rubbed his tired eyes, and blinked at the tiny hourglass, which was just about to run out.
The last grain of sand filtered through, and Godric, with the practiced air of someone who had performed this exact motion hundreds of times, flipped it over, waited a beat, and stirred three times counterclockwise before settling back to wait for five more minutes to elapse. The only sound in the room was the soft bubbling of the potion and the crackle of the flames.
A loud knock on the door made Fawkes screech loudly and flare his wings; Godric started and knocked over the hourglass. He cursed loudly, hurriedly picked it up, and looked toward the corner where Beck had awoken with a grunt.
"Whassat?" Beck mumbled groggily.
"Dunno," Godric said, rising to head toward the door. "Go back to sleep, I'll get it." It wasn't that unusual to have visitors this late at night; likely it was someone whose baby had the croup and needed a remedy urgently.
But when the door creaked open, no distraught mother met his eyes; standing there, or rather, slumped heavily against the doorframe, was a short, sturdily built man with an aquiline nose and bushy black eyebrows.
Godric recognized him. He was a wizard, name of Archer, who came to visit Beck every few weeks, and on these occasions, they invariably went into the back room and spoke in hushed voices for hours on end. Godric never knew the reason for these visits; he knew by now a charm that would have let him eavesdrop had he chosen to do so, but he had as much respect for Beck's privacy as the latter had for his, and in any case, he'd never been particularly curious about it. He had quite enough going on in his own life to spare much thought for what Beck got up to when he wasn't teaching.
Normally, the wizard greeted Godric with an affable little nod, but not today. As the door swung fully open and the light from within illuminated the man's face, Godric felt an unpleasant shock. The entire right side of Archer's face was covered in blood, and his bristly beard was clotted with it. A breeze wafted into the room, and Godric's nose was assaulted by the acrid odor of burned flesh. Archer's eyes were closed, his breathing shallow.
"Blimey," Godric breathed, then shouted, "Beck! It's Archer – come quick!"
Archer's eyes opened and he stared at Godric glassily.
"Well, 'ello there, Miss Kensington," he said dreamily. "That's a lovely dress you're wearing."
Beck materialized next to Godric, his eyes widening as he took in the miserable state of his friend. "Bloody 'ell," he muttered. "Archer, can you 'ear me?"
Archer regarded him solemnly. "Why yes, madam, would you know, I am a bit of a gardener myself."
"Delirious," Beck grunted. "Clear the table, lad, I'm going to levitate him in."
Godric hurriedly moved an assortment of bottles and pieces of parchment to a nearby chair as Beck lowered Archer's prostrate form gently down. He had barely settled when his eyes opened wide very suddenly and he came upright with a jerk, his formerly vacant expression now one of urgency.
"Beck!" he exclaimed hoarsely, clutching at Beck's arm with feverish fingers.
"Archer! What in the name of Merlin 'appened?"
"Havin' a meetin' in the old Marl chapel… they found out somehow… must've been twenty of 'em… I think Henry's dead, Beck, and I don't know if Bessie made it out or not."
Godric, nonplussed, stared at Beck, whose leathery face was pale and grim. "Where are the others?"
"We scattered. My guess is most of 'em headed for Drover's, but I can't remember much after I was hit. This is bad, Beck, this is very bad. We were so careful… Damn them! They must be organizing! The attacks are just so deliberate…"
"Never mind that now," Beck said firmly. "'ow bad are you 'urt?"
Archer touched his face gingerly. "Dunno… why, 'ow bad does it look?"
"Let's just say you en't a sight for sore eyes just now. What else did they 'it you with?"
Archer didn't respond. His eyes had slid out of focus while Beck was talking, and he began to mutter something about daisies.
"Looks like a botched Confundus," Beck grunted. "Ruddy amateur spell-casting… sniveling, untrained little bastards…"
There was a flutter of golden and red at the corner of Godric's vision; Fawkes had flown over to the table. He perched on Archer's chest and tilted his head over the insensible man's burned face. Thick, milky tears began to drip onto the blistering wound. In a moment, nothing but a waxy scar remained.
Beck began to rummage through shelves of bottles, still muttering to himself; Godric, staring at his back, wondered just how much he really knew about Beck Wotley.
Godric stared at the dark ceiling, his hands behind his head as he lay prone on his cot, waiting.
Beck had healed Archer as best he could, and now the injured man was in a potion-induced sleep in the back room. As soon as he felt it was safe to leave his friend, Beck had grabbed his jacket and cap and dashed out the door with a promise to explain everything later.
That was nearly four hours ago now. Godric had been sorely tempted to follow Beck, but he'd reluctantly realized that someone ought to stay with Archer. He scowled at the rafters and strained his ears, listening for Beck's return.
A moment later, he heard Beck's brisk footsteps approaching on the cobblestones outside. He was up in a flash, slid down the ladder from the loft, and opened the door just as Beck was reaching for the handle.
"Where on earth 'ave you been, young man?" Godric inquired innocently. "Your mother an' I've been worried sick."
"Sod off, you little arse-wipe. I've 'ad a rough night." Beck made as if to walk inside, but Godric stayed where he was, his arms crossed.
"Are you going to explain what that was all about?" he asked evenly.
"Yes," Beck grunted. "Now get the 'ell out o' me way."
Godric stepped aside, and Beck sank into a chair with a sigh, his long legs outstretched as he propped up his boots on the table.
"Well?" Godric prompted, plunking down in the opposite chair.
Beck leaned his head back and closed his eyes. "So, aye, lad, seems I forgot to mention that I'm part of a secret society dedicated to resistin' the Dark arts, protectin' the innocent, and generally wipin' the evil scum off the face o' the earth. Bloody awful memory I 'ave, I know. Sorry."
Godric didn't know what to say. Beck's brief, wry words had brought a whole host of painful memories spinning to the front of his mind.
"Protectin' the innocent…"
As though it had happened yesterday, Godric remembered the overwhelming grief, anger, and helplessness he had felt, and later, the towering fury that had almost overpowered his anguish when Robyn died. The power of his own rage had almost frightened him as he knelt by his sister's lifeless body, swearing to himself that his family's murderers would not go unpunished. Mere survival, however, had to come before revenge, and as time passed, he'd come to accept the reality that vengeance was nothing but a fool's hope. And from the day Beck had taken him in, his life had been too full and happy for him to dwell much on the past. He realized, with a sickening jolt of guilt, that he hadn't thought of his parents or his brothers and sisters for a long time.
I am forsworn, he thought bleakly.
All those rumors of villages being attacked by Dark wizards… he'd done his best to shut them out, and all the while, Beck had been working to stop it from happening to any more innocent people. Merlin, he'd been selfish.
There would be no revenge on the marauders who had destroyed his village; he accepted that. An anonymous band of brigands would be impossible to track down three and a half years later. But at the very least, there was something he could do to see that his family had not died in vain.
He realized that Beck had opened one eye and was watching him a little apprehensively to gauge his reaction.
"Aye, I figured as much," Godric said huskily. "Can I join?"
Life as a member of the Wart Knights, as the society playfully called themselves, seemed oddly familiar to Godric. Originally it had been called the White Knights, but before long, the nickname had been deemed more fitting for their ragtag group and stuck – no one could really tell him who had come up with it, but Godric rather suspected it was Beck. In any case, it was almost unsettling how quickly and easily Godric took to watching covertly to see if he was being followed, delivering secret messages and packages to people in disguise, and discussing things on a need-to-know basis.
The Warts were an unlikely army. The leaders were not dashing and charismatic, delivering pulse-pounding speeches, but rather shabbily dressed, with a penchant for droll sarcasm. They were few in number; only thirty-two members remained after the fateful night when a group of Dark wizards had broken into their meeting, leaving three dead and causing a terrible blow to morale. Recruitment was a difficult process, as anti-Muggle sentiment was currently spreading like a stain throughout the magic community, and it was hard to accurately gauge loyalties and motives. Even among those with a more enlightened view of non-magic folk, indifference was pervasive, and sympathy was useless when accompanied by apathy. Eager for some new, young blood, they readily accepted Godric into their ranks. A jovial witch by the name of Gwen Prewett immediately dubbed the eager stripling the "Cub."
"Cub?" Godric repeated, not entirely sure how he felt about this new nickname.
"Aye," Madam Prewett affirmed, crinkly eyes twinkling from behind a mass of flyaway black hair. "The heart of a lion's beatin' in that chest o' yours, lad, no doubt about that, but you're green as a leaf when it comes to bein' a Wart. In a couple o' months maybe we'll see about elevatin' you to Big Cat."
It seemed that not only had Dark attacks on Muggles, Muggle-borns, and half-bloods increased significantly, but that these attacks were showing an alarming consistency. For years, wizards and Muggles alike had comforted themselves with the reassuring thought that pracitioners of the Dark arts were few and disjointed, but in recent months their coordination and regularity seemed to indicate that they had united, and the Knights feared that a strong, dynamic leader was the cause. So far, though, information had been hard to come by. Godric suspected that a few of the Warts were trying to infiltrate the ranks of Dark witches and wizards, but that wasn't something the leaders were likely to discuss with someone still so wet behind the ears.
Essentially, the Warts' mission was to find out when and where the attacks would take place and either warn the intended victims or stave off the attack. So far, though. their success had been limited. For every person they'd evacuated in time or successfully defended, there were several more who would never again see the light of day.
The time and location of meetings changed constantly, and the members alternated attendance. There were always a few who were off scouting and in any case, it was too dangerous for more than a third of the membership to be together at any given time. They couldn't risk putting all their eggs in one basket in case they were discovered again.
The meetings consisted mostly of combat training. Though Godric had only a year of real magic training under his belt, he picked it up quickly and found to his delight that with this kind of magic, at least, power was preferable to finesse. The first time he dueled with a fellow Wart, the man was flat on his back on the floor before he knew what had hit him. The unfortunate wizard, a big, strapping fellow with a bristling red beard by the name of Remington, had to put up with a good deal of good-natured ribbing ("Any Cubs make a meal out o' ye lately, mate?") before people began to realize the Cub's success was no fluke, and began inventing excuses to avoid being named his partner.
Most of his work, particularly at first, was tedious and fruitless. As the newest Wart, the responsibilities delegated to him mostly consisted of following people suspected of being involved in the attacks and attempting to glean information from them in an innocuous manner (alcohol was often useful). Very rarely did these leads ever amount to anything. It was easy to get discouraged, but he kept reminding himself that he was doing important work, and there were actually a few times when he was able to learn something of value, which helped add to their tally of success stories.
Finally, after about four months, he saw his first bit of action. He had been tailing a rather slimy-looking bloke for a week in various disguises, and the man's contacts had Godric feeling more and more confident that this one was a genuinely nasty piece of work. He finally saw his chance in a vacant stool in a pub tucked away in the foulest corner of Manceastre.
He sidled up to the bar and took the empty stool beside said slimy bloke grunted in greeting, and ordered a pint of ale. Confident in his disguise, he pushed his stringy yellow hair out of his face, rubbed at his bloodshot eyes, his face scratchy with stubble under his hand, and scowled darkly at the table with a mouth full of blackened teeth.
"Bloody Muggles," he muttered under his breath, just loud enough for the man to hear.
The greasy wizard pricked up his ears. When Godric did not elaborate, the man muttered, "Amen to that. Bleedin' vermin, they are. For a Sickle I'd wipe 'em all off the face of the earth, I would." Apparently this was one of his favorite topics of conversation. He continued to wax eloquent. "Mudbloods, too. Can't stand 'em. They're unnatural, like."
"Cheers," Godric responded, and they clinked glasses and drank to the poor health of Muggles and half-bloods the world over.
An hour and several pints later, Dooley, as the man had introduced himself, or Slimy Git, as Godric still thought of him, was charmingly sloshed. "Y'see," he slurred, squinting at Godric and leaning close to emphasize his point, "me brother thinks we should leave 'em well enough alone. Says we oughter feel sorry for the buggers. I says to 'im, I says, 'No! Wipe th' buggers out!'" His fist smashed down and missed the table, with the result that he very nearly lost his balance and spilled half his tankard down his front.
"Kill the buggers!" Godric averred, nodding fervently. "Wipe 'em all OUT!" He pretended to take a swig of his pint and discreetly spilled some onto the floor. "Y'know, m' friend," he mumbled, clapping his hand on Dooley's shoulder, "less go kill us some Muddles… Mumbles…" His face slackened, his head drooped down onto the bar and he began to drool for effect.
Slimy Git bellowed with laughter. "Mumbles!" he gasped, tears leaking from his eyes as he shook with mirth. "What're ye goin' ta do, friend, piss 'em to death?"
"I en't too pissed t' get 'em!" Godric protested, lurching back upright. "Lessee YOU get a Mumble… I mean, Mungle… I mean…"
Dooley was still wheezing with laughter. "Don't 'ave to," he chortled. "T'night the world'll be short a few more Mungles, anyhow." He slapped his knee and roared in glee.
Godric went perfectly still. "To- t'night?" he asked, almost forgetting to slur his words. He hiccupped. "Why – wassappenin' t'night?" His heart thudded.
"Coupla friends o' mine're goin' ta do that fambly over on the corner o' Market and Church – y'know the one, the witch bitch and her Mudblood brats and Muggle husband." He frowned suddenly. "Acourse, I en't s'posed ta tell ye that – don't tell nobody, hear? Thass top secret, that is."
"Not a soul," Godric vowed, and promptly fell off his stool. "I'm all right," he shouted from the floor.
Dooley helped him to his feet, heaving with fresh laughter. "P'raps you oughter be 'eading home, mate."
Godric righted himself and stood there, weaving on his feet. "Mr. Dooley," he announced solemnly, "it 'as been a pleasure." He executed an unsteady about-face and staggered out the door.
Once outside, he broke into a run, lifting his disguise as soon as he was safely away and mentally cursing Beck for his insistence that he wasn't ready for Apparition yet. A fluting note of bird song quelled his rising panic a little, and Fawkes settled on his shoulder as he ran.
"Go to Beck," he panted. "Bring as many of the others as you can, right away, to the intersection of Church and Market." He had no idea when the attack was scheduled to take place, but as Fawkes lifted off, the sky was already blazing the brilliant orange of an autumn sunset, and he was a mile and a half from where he needed to be. There was nothing else for it; he was going to have to steal a horse.
He spied one down the next street tied up outside a building that fairly screamed "brothel." It was a bit old and fat, but it would have to do. He leaped onto its back, burned through the rope in an instant with his wand, and was off.
The route to the intersection of Market Street and Church Street was labyrinthine, and the orange sky had deepened to purple before he reined in his very grumpy horse. His eyes swept the nearby houses along both streets frantically – he did not know precisely where the family lived, and there was no sign of any of the Wart Knights.
A muffled scream caused his heart to leap into his throat and his head to snap to the left, toward the two closest buildings on Church Street. Which one, which one! A flicker of red light in one of the windows was enough. There was no time to wait for backup; he leaped down from the horse's back and dashed toward the house, trying hard not to think about the wisdom, or lack thereof, of barging in completely alone.
The moment he burst in the door, a bolt of white light nearly took his head off. Without even bothering to form it into a complete spell, he sent a blast of power toward his attacker, a squat witch who flew backward into the wall with enough force that the wooden paneling cracked. She crumpled to the floor without a sound.
Sobs and pleading filtered down from the upper floor, and Godric took the stairs three at a time. When he looked in the doorway at the top, the sight made him want to throw up.
One man held a weeping woman down on a bed while another spread her legs, administering the ultimate shame before they killed her. Across the room, a third man laughingly forced her struggling husband to helplessly watch. Two little girls clung together in the corner, wailing.
"Get AWAY from her, you SON OF A BITCH!"
Before the startled wizards could begin to react, two of them were unconscious on the floor. The third collected himself and managed to get off a rather scattered hex, winging Godric slightly in the shoulder, before he was bleeding outside on the cobblestones, fifteen feet below the window.
His breathing loud and harsh in his ears, Godric lowered his wand and rushed over to the distraught witch.
"Are you all right, ma'am?" he asked anxiously.
She looked at him, dazed, and nodded tremulously, and a second later her husband had engulfed her in his arms with a cry of "Marian!"
Godric stood there awkwardly as she sobbed into her husband's shoulder. She was saying something, but her words were muffled. A moment later, he could make it out.
"I'm so sorry for what I am… I'm so sorry…"
The incident gave Godric a renewed faith in what they were doing, a greater confidence in himself, and his first battle scar. Instead of treating him like a kid brother, the others began speaking to him as they would to an equal. The general consensus was that he was mildly deranged, but in their line of work, insanity when accompanied by a healthy amount of nerve could be a good thing. They were a jolly, courageous lot, and Godric felt honored to be counted as a true comrade. Never again was the Cub left out of the important assignments.
They questioned the attackers with Veritaserum, but they had very little information to give, which strengthened the Warts' conviction that their enemies were well-organized and led by someone who know exactly what they were doing.
Now that he was more privy to what they were doing, however, he began to look at the Warts more critically and develop his own ideas about how to handle certain situations. Some of their methods frustrated him, and more than once, he came home from a meeting grumbling about something Colin or Ainsley, the unofficial commanders, had said.
"We know the exact bloody location of two key members o' the evil gits, and what are we goin' to do about it? NOTHING!" he exploded one day to Beck. "It's about ruddy time we started taking the fight to them, it is, instead of waitin' around for them to attack us! It's bollocks!"
Beck looked up from his cauldron, a sympathetic look on his face for once. "We 'aven't got the resources yet," he said patiently. "That's summat to consider in the future, but right now –"
"Like 'ell we don't 'ave the resources," Godric fumed. "Use their tactics against 'em! Surprise raid at night – four or five people – we can take 'em alive and give 'em Veritaserum, find out 'oo their leader is –"
"Not everyone is as willing to risk what you are, lad," Beck said gently. "They 'ave families, jobs – there's a lot they stand to lose. Can't afford to be reckless, now, can we? If summat 'appened to the Warts, then where'd the people we defend be? Out in the cold, that's where. We're their last line o' defense."
Godric grudgingly conceded that there was some logic in this, but that didn't stop him from feeling a restless pang of frustration every once in a while during meetings, when rhetoric was a little too plentiful and his mind screamed for action.
He had much less free time on his hands these days, what with his Knightly responsibilities and his lessons, but somewhere between working the booth in the apothecary, making potions, learning intermediate level magic, attending top secret meetings, and flying to nearby Muggle settlements in the dark of night to thwart attacks by malevolent villains, he managed to find a little time for girls.
And so passed another year.
"Oi! Beck!"
Godric bounded through the door one bright afternoon, brimming with news. He was the sort of fifteen-year-old boy who never made a quiet entrance.
"I did it!' he announced triumphantly, dropping his bag and jacket on the floor and crashing into a chair as Fawkes flew up to his usual roost up in the rafters. "Finally beat Bridie at the draw! Oh, it was beautiful, it was – you should've seen the look on 'er face, she couldn't believe it."
Beck didn't answer, and Godric looked over his shoulder to see his old teacher asleep on his cot. He heaved an aggravated sigh. "Fine, then, sleep the day away, you old fart." He stood, stretched, and walked toward the back room to get some mixing bowls, throwing a pillow at Beck on the way for good measure.
Beck didn't stir.
Godric stopped. "Beck?" he said uncertainly. His heart clenching with inexplicable dread, he walked over to shake Beck's shoulder. A moment later, he yanked back his hand as though it had been burned.
Beck was cold. His eyes were half-open and blank. Fawkes fluttered down and perched on the old man's wrinkled hand, keening softly.
"No," Godric said dumbly.
"No. No. No. NO!" His anguished denial grew louder and louder, finishing as a grief-stricken wail.
The world began to sway weirdly. He actually felt the blood drain from his face, leaving his skin numb and tingling. He felt as though he'd been struck over the head.
"You en't – Beck, no! You can't be dead!" Godric gripped his hair and spun away, feeling himself about to fly apart. He turned back, his eyes stinging.
"Not you, too, Beck," he choked, his face screwed up against the sob fighting to get out of him. "Don't you dare leave me, too, you bastard!" He seized Beck's still form by the collar and shook him, crying, "Wake up, you son of a bitch! Wake up, you old codger, I need you!" He sank to his knees by his teacher's bed, his eyes too blurred now to see the lined, leathery, wry, wonderful face he knew so well. "Wake up, you piece of horse shite," he whispered, and laid down his curly head and sobbed, calling his old teacher every name he could think of through the tears.
The room was serene and undisturbed; the same earthy smell that had greeted him when he first set foot inside more than two years ago still lingered. There had been no malicious attack. An old man had simply slipped away.
The Wart Knights buried him a little way outside the city on a grassy, windblown stretch of moor. The others, sensing that Godric wanted some time alone, offered a few bracing words, clapped him on the back sympathetically, and left him there to say good-bye.
The grave was marked by a simple stone with the name "B. Wotley" engraved into its surface. Godric gazed at it, his hands shoved into his pockets and his cap pulled down low over his eyes. His throat was tight as he heard Beck's voice in his mind.
"Not everyone is as willing to risk what you are, lad. They 'ave families, jobs – there's a lot they stand to lose…"
At the time, he had let the matter drop, Godric now realized, because he'd had something to lose, too. Now that something was gone, and there was nothing to hold him back.
Beck, he silently told the man who had given him a new life, I'm taking the fight to them now. Sleep well.
Fawkes watched from his perch on a nearby tree as Godric took out his wand and Summoned the knapsack he had packed.
"Well, Fawkes," Godric said, slinging the bag over one shoulder as the phoenix settled on the other, cocking his scarlet head attentively, "it's just you and me again."
And he walked off into the deepening twilight of the moors.
~ * ~
As the hoofbeats of the centaurs faded into the distance, Godric looked at Fawkes.
"So," he said wryly. "What now?"
Fawkes gave a soft, heartening squawk, nipped Godric's ear lightly, and took off for the castle.
Godric blew out his cheeks. "I'm comin'," he said, picked up the reins, and clicked his tongue to Lion, who began trotting back toward Hogwarts. Godric urged him up to a canter, suddenly impatient to be back. He needed to talk to Rowena.
~ * ~
A/N: Whew! That ended up being way longer than I'd originally planned. I was thinking at first that I'd have Beck murdered by Dark wizards, but I changed my mind at the last minute because I figured I had heaped enough misery on Godric as it was. Didn't want to go overboard with all the pain and anguish. Besides, I like Beck. He deserves a more peaceful end.
To everyone who took the time to read this, I am eternally grateful. The review button is just down there!
Stay tuned for the first installment of Chapter Two: Fair Ravenclaw, From Glen
~ST