Chapter 4 - Elphias Doge

In Loving Memory of Albus Dumbledore by Elphias Doge

Most appraise my friend, Albus, as the greatest wizard of his time. That, I believe, is a fair assessment, unfair only in the sense that it wholly dehumanizes him and his periods of great adversity.

Albus was the oldest of three siblings. I met Albus in our first year at Hogwarts, both of us proud young Gryffindors, and I watched him excel in absolutely everything. He had an incorrigible curiosity for the deepest layers of magic and magical theory, a fascination with history and uses of magic beyond scopes most can comprehend. He left school as head boy, top of his year, top of his entire generation, with the expectation from everyone that he would achieve absolute greatness.

Following his departure from school, we hoped to travel abroad, but tragedy struck another fatal blow to his family, when years after his father was imprisoned, his mother died and orphaned him, his younger brother Aberforth, and his little sister, Ariana. Albus returned home to Godric's Hollow as head of his household to take care of his sister, who had long been deemed ill and frail, but lost her not long after. The rift between the brothers in the wake of her death was irreparable. This period of his life haunted him through every major accomplishment from the twelve uses of dragons' blood, the notorious duel with Gellert Grindewald, his ascension to Chief Warlock, and later professor and eventually headmaster of Hogwarts School.

There wasn't much he cared about more than his students, and he was fervently determined to fight evils that sought to destroy the fabric of our world. His legacy will echo through eternity...

Lizzie tore off this section of the Prophet and folded it up in her bag. Godric's Hollow, his dead sister and lost family... he had always been quiet about his past, she realized now that it was one of the reasons Lizzie never opened up to him herself. They were alike in many ways, not unlike her likenesses to Tom Riddle. There were many things she admired and respected about her late mentor, but many more things that the haunted part of her soul could not forgive him for tormenting.

One thing was becoming extremely clear to her as time marched on and she meticulously pieced the puzzle together... and that was that she didn't draw a short stick by accident. Everything from the murder of her parents to the horrific abuse endured at the hands of her relatives was part of a web that tied her with every strand back to the man who set it into motion, or perhaps the men that set it into motion. She was convinced Dumbledore wanted it to play out and learn to the fullest extent why a prophecy was made in reference to the birth of a seemingly unrelated little girl. Lizzie couldn't help but feel like an experiment though she knew, and more so in recent years, that his heart was broken over her. She did not trust him to see to her best interests, but she trusted that at every moment in time he had a precise reason to do what he did. If she only trusted one thing, it was that he was determined to see Voldemort fall forever and no decision made was ever in contrast to that ultimate greater good.

Memories played behind her eyes of all the times she'd screamed at him, not because she felt remorse, but because she intensely wondered what he was thinking, what cogs were in motion in those moments, all the things he was not saying.

She flipped the newspaper over and winced with distaste at the sight of Rita Skeeter laughing in an exclusive article.

The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore - Exclusive Interview

Lizzie scanned through with a pained expression reading about the alleged falsities as they related to Dumbledore.

How did he break his nose? There were already eight of the twelve uses on dragons' blood in existence... the truth behind his mother's death, his sister's assault, his brother's grievances... what was his relationship with Gellert Grindewald?

Exclusive discussion below about his relationship with Azalea Potter. Lizzie paused and debated with herself about whether or not she wanted to continue.

G: What was his relationship with the Potter girl, Rita? So much is left for speculation. Was she more than his favorite student?

R: She was by far his favorite, the prodigy. He was drawn to her and her legacy because of her curious and seemingly inherent relationship with the dark arts. But, and I don't want to give away an entire section of my new book...I believe he was scared of her. Most are, everything about the poor thing is troubling... but he manipulated her, he groomed her into a weapon, he raised her to be more than she ever really needed to be if we're being honest. I'm not sure if she was the chosen one or if Dumbledore insisted she be, led her to believe it... The relationship was unhealthy. Azalea rather despised him in many ways. I don't blame her. He ignored every cry for help... just unconscionable what happened to her while the cheek was turned. I think he was creating a monster, myself...one he hoped he would have great influence over. But if I know anything about Azalea, she doesn't have a bone in her body willing to bend for anyone... well, all except those sociopaths who raised her, but that kind of excessive pathologic defiance needed to come from somewhere, didn't it?

I know her very well, probably better than most of her friends. She kept everybody in the dark for a very long time. Many skeletons in her closet, many.

G: You said there was an entire section?

R: Oh yes! That relationship is fascinating. You'll have to buy the book to get the scoop though. Neither will be viewed through the same set of eyes again, I promise you that.

Lizzie crumbled the paper and tossed it across the room in frustration. It was very cold suddenly. This wasn't uncommon, dementors had cast a dreary haze in the evenings as they fed and bred with increasing despair. Lizzie imagined that a few were probably close and wrapped a blanket around her shoulders. She sat down next to Charlie sleeping and he startled violently. Lizzie lifted her hands in apology but the look in his eyes scared her until he softened.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, shuddering in the cold. "Lizzie, I'm sorry," he said again under his breath and rubbed his eyes.

"What are you seeing? Bad dreams?" She asked with dawning recognition. He shook his head and she narrowed her eyes at him trying to read. He wouldn't look at her.

"Nothing," he lied. Lizzie clenched her jaw.

"Charlie, please tell me," she pled in a whisper.

"Nothing. Just you," he said weakly with a forced smile. Her skin turned to ice.

"B-but which one?" She asked a little ominously. She could tell he understood the question and that alone was her answer, but he pretended not to, gave her an extra blanket, a kiss on the side of the face, and laid back down.

Lizzie startled awake to a vivid dream about Riddle at her recent visit to Borgin and Berkes that Charlie was absolutely furious at her for doing without him. Charlie wasn't next to her. She sat up and saw his outline at a bar stool on the kitchen side of the apartment. She heard a glass get set down on the counter and he buried his head in his arms.

Charlie felt eyes on the back of his head and turned, but Lizzie was fast asleep. He crawled into bed next to her and wrapped arms protectively around her body. She responded sluggishly and gripped his forearm but didn't have the energy to move or open her eyes. His heart hammered hard and fast like a hummingbird for several moments still feeling eyes on the back of his head, but he didn't want to turn and look. He pulled Lizzie in tighter and felt her skin ripple with an involuntary sort of shudder.

She pushed on his arm and gave an almost inaudible whimper of protest. Her heart rate picked up and he moved his hand to stroke the hair near her temple instead, his mouth pressed firmly on the crown of her head in comfort until her body relaxed. Muscle memory and instincts were something he knew about all too well and being with Lizzie felt second nature. His greatest strengths had always been a sixth sense in anticipating triggers. He knew Lizzie appreciated not being treated like glass, something tarnished, or something already broken. She was really good at walking the chicken-wire thin tightrope her sanity balanced on, but it didn't take away from the reality that she walked it to being with. Cedric made Lizzie feel more normal, gave her a mental escape, but it took effort on her part to stay in the headspace. Seamus made her feel like she was wanted again, but the overbearing and jealous nature didn't work, she didn't want to belong to anyone. Charlie calmed her nerves and kept something inside her safe. The weight was no longer solely on her shoulders to keep her mind above water. He'd relieved her of most of the burden because he seemed to somehow know what make it sink. He was anticipatory, not reactionary. It must be years of working with the most temperamental of beasts in existence who could not tell him what they needed. Lizzie didn't need to be surrounded by a team of aurors to feel safe when her greatest threat was always what lurked behind her own eyes.

Missing Hogwarts Professor

The attack on Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry following the burial of the late headmaster, Albus Dumbledore, was met with resistance from the ministry's auror department and the Order of the Phoenix. All sudents safely boarded the train with some exceptions claiming to be apart of a student organization formed by Azalea Potter in the 1996-1997 school year, known as Dumbledore's Army, in direct defiance of government and school leadership at the time.

Close affiliates to Azalea Potter, including the infamous girl who lived herself, have fled to undisclosed locations. Many reports indicate she exited the castle on the back of a Norwegian Ridgeback.

We are glad to report that no students were gravely injured in the ordeal. However, one teacher, Professor Charity Burbage, who taught muggle studies for more than fifteen years under the former Headmaster, was nowhere to be found following the attack, and is presumed to have been abducted and missing ever since.

The school is prepared to resume studies under Headmistress, Minerva McGonagall, on September 1.

Hermione set down the news article from the Daily Prophet after reading through several buried articles about missing muggles and Ministry news updates.

She sat completely alone in her house for the first time in her life looking around at pictures lining the bookshelves and walls. Her face no longer appeared in any of them. She stared at her reflection in the mirror above the mantel with a heavy weight of uncertainty in her heart about whether or not she would survive, or if her parents would survive, and if they did, whether or not she would ever be able to reverse the memory charm placed on them so they would believe they did not have a daughter, much less a daughter who was an accomplice of Azalea Potter.

Hermione looked down at a photo she had of her and Lizzie. She smiled at the picture because her friend was beaming, her first friend. Lizzie was her sister in every way less blood relation. Both raised in the muggle world, both hunted in this insidious war, both some of the brightest of their age, and both would lay their life down for the other in a heartbeat. Hermione knew she had the patience and focus Lizzie lacked, that it was unspoken how much Lizzie relied on her brain that wasn't rattled by insidious forms of dark magic to see everything with greater rationality. Hermione also knew that precisely because of this fault, she had access to every secret they needed if they were going to be successful. She tapped the picture to clear its contents and tucked it into a beaded purple bag.

Hermione laid in bed for hours waiting for confirmation that her parents were safe in Australia, glancing over at a calendar on her desk with a rendezvous date for when they would regroup with the Order and her, Lizzie, and Ron would set out on a carefully charted path to find and destroy four of Lord Voldemort's remaining horcruxes. A path which would no doubt fall apart at the seams as they progressed.

Ginny took to sleeping in the extra bed in Ron's room most nights. She knew Ron wasn't returning to Hogwarts, and swore she wouldn't break that news to their mother prior to their departure. She helped him make the family ghoul look like Ron with a deadly illness in the event anyone came looking. She'd even convinced Fred and George not to make crass jokes at their shop about Voldemort because it was only a matter of time before the death eaters caught up to them. At the end of the day, she knew she was returning to Hogwarts without her closest friends and it created the heaviest weight in her stomach she'd ever felt.

Ginny looked at a team picture of her, Ron, and Lizzie just off the quidditch pitch. Lizzie was smiling wide after a big win, snitch in hand, it was the game Gwen Jones from the Harpies went to and offered them both contracts. Her heart ached for the excitement of that again.

Lizzie was a sister to her in all but blood, and she desperately wanted to go with them. Ron, however, the overprotective brother, refused point blank. She rolled over in bed and tucked the picture under her pillow. Lizzie would be fine, she thought, she always made it out in workable pieces.

Ron meanwhile stared up at the posters lining the ceiling of his bedroom, then over at a calendar with the marked for the 25th. His heart hammered. Four horcruxes, and they could be anywhere. They hadn't the faintest idea what one of them even was, and he'd be traveling with his best friend and the most wanted girl in the country. Yet still, the wrath his mother would give when he didn't return to school was scaring him more than any death eater at the moment, and he was certain it was a projection of his own innate fear of not returning to school, and of abandoning the family. Lizzie would be able to end it, he knew that in his bones. The girl that reminded him of his sister from the moment he met her. The girl he knew had to go on from the time he sat atop a knight chess piece on a deadly wizards chess board. The girl he knew fancied his much older brother, but it did not bother him because if anyone deserved a safe and protective person like Charlie, it was Lizzie.

His apprehension was met with a wave of resolve. He forced himself to believe his family would be sitting around the table together when this was over. Hermione in hand, Lizzie being told to sit down and stop serving people like a house elf, the twins not allowing a single somber face in sight. Bill and Fleur happily married. He smirked weakly at the thought.

Remus spun a silver band on his finger absently with his wife in arm as she slept in bed. His only regret in the moment was that Lizzie hadn't been there when he married her. There wasn't much to be at, it was private in the backyard of her mother's home since marrying a werewolf wasn't technically legal under wizarding laws. He didn't want to imagine the scars across his own bare chest might ever end up on his wife who curled up effortlessly and fearlessly next to him as though she wouldn't care in the slightest if they did.

He bit at the knuckle on his thumb impulsively while he stared at a calendar and ran through the plan repeatedly in his mind. He worried about Lizzie, about who she was with and if he would overlook something, inadvertently put her in danger, get himself killed and send a knife through her spirit again. He worried irrationally that he'd hurt her. He worried she'd do all of the above to herself in rash or impulsive decisions. If he owed James, Lily, and Sirius anything, it was keeping their daughter, a perfect mold of all of them, safe. He rubbed his face and tried to sleep.