The Eighth Year Universe

Love Wins

Headed Towards Regret


The chapter title is from the song:

Never Chase a Boy – Emily James.


! - TRIGGER WARNING - !

This chapter contains some upsetting themes regarding pregnancy and baby loss. I apologise if that hurts or offends anyone.


Potter Manor

Thursday the 9th of September

When Neville woke up, he rolled over and reached out for Lilly. He had done it every morning that he had woken up alone here while she was in the hospital. Although, only half of those mornings had found him waking up in a bed. Most of the time, he'd fallen asleep on the sofa after spending hours working on something for Lupin House.

Harry always gave him a lecture about his back, and Neville rolled his eyes and said it was fine, then spent the rest of the day trying to cover his limp and the throbbing pain that resulted from sleeping in an awkward position.

When his hand found nothing but covers, Neville frowned. He sat up and blinked, then rubbed his eyes and looked at the time – it wasn't even 7 am yet, and Lilly didn't have work to get to, so he wasn't quite sure why she would rise so early.

He got to his feet, threw his clothes on and headed downstairs. The manor was silent because none of the kids would rise for a couple of hours yet. Neville first checked the kitchen, but there was no sign of Lilly beyond the two empty coffee mugs that lay in the sink.

But when he stepped into the drawing-room, the mystery was solved. Lilly was lying on the sofa, her foot sticking out so that she didn't accidentally lie on it, and she was tucked into Harry's side under a blanket.

One of the house-elves, who was stoking the fire to get more warmth into the room, looked over at Neville.

"Have they been there all night?" Neville asked, smiling fondly at his wife and his best friend.

The house-elf bowed her head, "Hard night for Master Potter, so it was mister Neville."

Neville frowned and sat down on the coffee table. He clicked his staff against the ground, and the sound woke them up. Harry jumped awake, eyes opening wide straight away, and Lilly opened her eyes and yawned while she blinked the sleepy dust from her eyes.

"Constant vigilance," Neville joked when Harry shot him an irritated look.

"Don't you start," Harry muttered. He reached for his glasses which were next to Neville on the coffee table, then he shoved them on and yawned.

Neville would usually make a joke, but he could see that something was wrong, and what the house-elf had said only strengthened his suspicion.

"Did you drink last night?"

"No," Harry said. He pushed himself upright and looked over at Lilly, "But I…would have, if it hadn't been for Lilly."

"I sent the very nice bottle he was about to indulge in over to Ivy House," Lilly elaborated, "I thought Michael might appreciate the thank you gift after what he did for me."

Neville smiled slightly and nodded, "I'm sure he will, but what drove you to such stupidity after years of sobriety?"

Lilly and Harry shared a look – the sort of look that meant that they both knew something and were either unsure if they should tell Neville or how to tell him. He'd seen them look at each other like that a lot throughout their years of working closely together in the field.

Still, it always set him on edge.

"What's wrong?"

Harry sighed and ran a hand through his hair, "I had a hunch, so I asked Ben to process an exhumation order on Alfred Nott."

Neville's eyes darkened, "No?"

Harry looked Neville dead in the eye and nodded, "There was no body in his crypt, so on my hunch, I had Ben look into Thaddeus Nott's crypt, and some bones were missing."

Neville was one of the few people Harry had told about everything – Voldemort, Horcruxes, the ritual, all of the darkest things he couldn't talk to Daphne and Lilly, or even Hermione about. Naturally, he looked horrified.

"I had a hunch when I realised that he was in Voldemort's inner circle so he would know all of Voldemorts secrets," Harry said quietly, "He's smart enough to have recreated the ritual that brought Voldemort back, Neville. I just didn't understand why he would lay low for 23 years, but now…I don't think he did."

"What do you mean?" Neville asked.

Lilly sighed and filled in, "Harry thinks Alfred Nott had a plan in place that involved Septimus Cauldwell resurrecting him after the Battle of Hogwarts. Only that didn't happen because Septimus went to Azkaban, so we think he did it when he was released instead."

Neville was still frowning as he tried to process that.

"Voldemort taught Alfred Nott how to make a Horcrux," Harry said quietly, "And Alfred would have been one of the few people who knew about the ritual that brought Voldemort back. The only others were Barty Crouch Junior and Peter Pettigrew, who are both dead."

"And you, which is how you figured it out," Neville realised.

Harry nodded, "The only thing I can't work out is who else is working for Lazarus. The first victims were taken between 2005 and 2008 before Septimus got out of Azkaban and therefore before Alfred Nott was resurrected via his Horcrux."

"It had to be someone else who was in on the plan," Lilly put in, "But who couldn't bring Alfred back like Septimus could."

Neville's eyes widened, and Harry recognised the look on his best friends face.

"What?"

Neville looked from Lilly to Harry, "Someone like his wife. Think about it, who would Septimus have told about the plan before he went to Azkaban? Not his daughter who was at school or his son who was fighting with the underground Auror movement, but his wife."

Harry's eyes widened too, "His wife who would have known enough to help him because her brothers were Voldemort's right-hand men."

"Everyone forgets she was a Lestrange before she became a Cauldwell," Neville agreed quietly.

Lilly cursed quietly, "Shit. If Lotus Cauldwell had a stake in this and it got her son killed…."

"It would explain her grief," Harry said with a nod, "Sadie said she screamed and nearly lost control of her magic when she found out about Sorenson."

"Oh fuck," Neville muttered. He ran his hands through his hair, "So all of this…it's all Sadie and Theo's parents?"

"It's starting to look a lot like that, yeah," Harry said quietly.

Before Neville or Lilly could say anything else, Harry pushed himself to his feet and said, "I'm going to speak to Ben. I want to find out if Lotus Cauldwell was out of the country during the time periods when the kids went missing prior to 2008."

Lilly let her head drop back against the cushions, "Ugh, can't we just have one time when the bad guy isn't someone we know or someone who isn't related to us or any of our friends! I mean, is that really too much to ask?"

Harry smiled sadly and kissed her cheek, "No such luck, Lil. Stay off that foot, and look after yourself."

Lilly waved him off nonchalantly, "Keep us in the loop."

Harry nodded and jogged from the room, then Neville took his place by Lilly's side.

"How bad was he last night?"

"He broke down," Lilly answered, turning her head to look at Neville, "And I think he needed to."

"I think you're right," Neville agreed.

They were silent for a moment, then Neville added, "Thank you."

That made Lilly frown.

"For what?"

"Drawing it out of him," Neville admitted, "His grief, that is. When Daphne's not here, you're the only one who can remind him that he's human like the rest of us."

Lilly shrugged and stretched, wincing at the aches that doing so made clear.

"We're a family. We look after each other."

Neville nodded and reached down to take her hand, both of them looking out of the window as the sun began to rise over the ridge.


Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, France

Thursday the 9th of September

It had taken a week, but eventually, Thea cracked. It was a mild morning, and Daphne was out for her daily swim in the pond. To anyone who didn't know her, it might seem vain – an effort to keep her figure. But Lareina liked to think that she knew her daughter better than that, even after all of the time they had spent separated.

Daphne swam as a coping mechanism. It was how she cleared her head and got herself into a healthy place for the day ahead.

On this particular morning, Thea collected the eggs as she always did. But she didn't step into the kitchen with a false smile. Instead, she placed the eggs on a tea towel next to Lareina, leaned against the rickety wooden table, and frowned.

Lareina noticed the shift and glanced back at her granddaughter, "Feeling contemplative this morning?"

Thea sighed and rubbed her eyes, "I had a nightmare last night."

"About Diagon Alley?" Lareina guessed.

"No," Thea replied. Her voice seemed quieter than usual, so Lareina glanced at her again. She had a tormented look in her eyes.

"About the boy?" Lareina said.

Thea nodded and looked down at her hands, "He didn't force me."

Lareina, who had just cracked an egg open, froze and turned around. Thea refused to meet her eye, but she continued.

"Everyone thinks I'm lying because I'm ashamed or something. But he didn't force me. He wasn't…you know violent or anything."

Lareina nodded and abandoned the breakfast, "There are other ways to force someone, Thea. Some people can use their mind to do that, rather than their body."

Thea frowned up at her grandmother. Lareina's eyes looked bluer than usual, and they were full of understanding and sympathy that Thea didn't think she deserved.

"When someone uses their mind to force you to do something, it's called manipulation," Lareina continued softly.

Thea swallowed and looked down. She played with a loose thread on her cardigan, "He said…he said everyone called me the Potter whore anyway, so it wasn't like I had a reputation to uphold, but I'd only kissed boys before him."

Lareina sighed and sat down at the table, "Sit down love."

Thea sat down opposite her grandmother but refused to meet her eye.

"Boys and men like that are very good at finding your weak spot and exploiting it," Lareina said. She reached over and took Thea's hand, "That doesn't make it your fault. He is older than you, and he took advantage of you."

Thea's eyes welled up with tears. She nodded and swallowed, keeping her eyes on the table.

"And you are not what he or anyone else says that you are," Lareina continued firmly, "People said things about your mother when she was in school, but she was not what they said she was then, and she is not now. She is proof that you can find true, good love. That you can let a good man in, even after a bad man has hurt you because Merlin knows, Thea, your mother found a couple who treated her wrong before she met your father."

Thea knew enough to understand that, she had heard references to her mother's relationship with Draco and with a man named Blaise throughout the years.

"And you are more like your mother than you know," Lareina confessed softly.

Thea managed a slight nod. She looked tearful, but she was trying her best to keep it in because that was how she felt she ought to live her life – by concealing her true emotions.

Lareina squeezed her hand, "You are not your trauma, Thea. It happened to you. That doesn't mean that it's all you are. You're bigger than it, and you will overcome it even if that feels impossible right now."

Thea shook her head and let her tears spill, "You're all talking like he…like he forced me…and he didn't. I let him."

"That doesn't make it consensual," Lareina said firmly, "In the eyes of the law, I suppose that's how it is. But that's not the case in my eyes or your mothers. Did you ask him to stop at any point?"

Thea bit her lip, "I…um…I said I was scared, and then I panicked about not wanting to. But …he calmed me down and told me it was okay. He said so many things, and they were all just lies."

"Because he manipulated you," Lareina said.

Thea was silent.

"Thea, look at me."

But Thea kept her gaze downwards, on the table.

"Theodora," Lareina said a little more firmly, "Look at me."

This time, Thea looked up. When she looked Lareina in the eye, she saw pain swimming there, but there were no tears. If there was anything she had learned about her grandmother on this trip, it was that she was as strong a woman as her other grandmother was.

"I know how you feel right now," Lareina promised.

Thea frowned, "Do…do you?"

Lareina bowed her head, "Yes, I do. Because when I was around your age, I found myself in a similar situation."

At that, Thea's eyes widened, "You mean…a boy…he…forced you?"

"He manipulated me," Lareina corrected, "I was in Slytherin, like you. And like you, I was the only member of my family who was. My little sister and brother were both Ravenclaws. They thought I was too ambitious for my own good, and I felt like the family outcast."

"But you were the oldest, not the youngest like me," Thea pointed out.

"It doesn't matter," Lareina told her gently, "I felt very similar to the way you did when you met Zachary Smith."

Thea frowned but said nothing further.

Lareina sighed and shook her head, "He was in my year at school so it's not quite the same as what happened between you and Zachary. But this boy, I knew he was no good. He aspired to be a Death Eater like his father because he wanted to be powerful, which should have been the first warning sign, but I was so desperate to be seen that I fell in love with him or convinced myself that I had at the very least."

Thea watched her grandmother carefully. Lareina took a breath, "I didn't want to sleep with him. I wanted to save that for marriage because I knew my father would be furious if he found out that I had done that out of wedlock. The Crouch's were a very traditional family, after all."

Thea nodded, "But he made you?"

"He told me he would marry me, so it was fine," Lareina said. She shook her head and laughed humourlessly, "And of course, at seventeen, I believed him. I thought maybe it would be okay. Maybe I could marry someone who I loved. He was from an old wizarding family, and my father would approve the match."

Lareina got to her feet and put the kettle on the stove, "So I gave in, and I regretted it. In fact, I came to regret it for the rest of my life."

She paused, pondering whether she ought to tell Thea the whole story when nobody – not even Daphne – knew about that.

"What happened to him?"

"He died," Lareina answered, "In 1981…he was young, only in his early 20's."

She turned to face her granddaughter, "He did become a Death Eater, and Alastor Moody killed him. Your brother's namesake."

"Why didn't he marry you?" Thea asked curiously.

Lareina looked out of the window, her eyes on Daphne, who was just getting out of the pond and drying herself off.

"Because a month before my eighteenth birthday, I had a baby," Lareina answered.

Thea's eyes widened.

"And I am so grateful that your parents realised what was going on before that happened to you," Lareina admitted, her voice broke, and she turned back to the stove.

"But….my Mum…?"

Lareina sighed but kept her back to Thea, "Your mother is not my first child, Thea. She thinks she is, but the truth of the matter is that I have given birth to four daughters and only had the privilege of watching two of them grow up."

"What?"

Lareina closed her eyes and took a breath. Then she turned to face Daphne, who was standing in the doorway, her hair was still damp from her swim, and she had a towel thrown over her shoulder.

"Grandma got hurt by a boy too," Thea said quietly, "When she was at school."

Daphne's eyes widened, "Mum…what…?"

"Evan Rosier," Lareina replied calmly, "Who you know I briefly 'dated' at school."

Daphne nodded. She was staring at her mother in shock.

"He was cruel and manipulative," Lareina said. She looked down, "And after him, I felt quite worthless. I grew to believe that my worth was in how I looked and presented myself, not in who I was and that started quite an unhealthy trend in my romantic partners."

Suddenly all the idiots her mother had slept with made sense. Suddenly, the reason she felt that Cygnus could never love her made sense.

Daphne looked her mum in the eye, "You had a baby with Rosier?"

Lareina nodded and turned around, "I kept it hidden for as long as I could, My mother found out, of course, and she swore not to tell my father. But when the baby was born, he barged into the room in a blind rage."

Daphne swallowed and stood stock-still.

Lareina had tears in her eyes for the first time, "My mother was a very kind-hearted woman, but she could not convince my father to calm down that time. He wasn't cruel, but he was traditional and bloody-minded."

Daphne nodded. She remembered how kind her Grandmother Aphrodite had been, she had always had a very close relationship with her, but her Grandfather Hyperion had been cold and distant for all of Daphne's life.

"She said he swore the girl would be allowed to live but that I would never be able to track her down," Lareina finished, "If it hadn't been for my mother and her bargaining, I suppose he would have disposed of her in the way that pureblood families disposed of squibs back then."

"Didn't you ever look for her?" Daphne asked.

Lareina shook her head, "No, I couldn't. After she was born, my father placed a 'forget-me-not' charm on me."

Daphne's eyes widened, "He made you forget her existence?"

Lareina nodded and looked down, "For as long as she lived, I would never remember I had known her. When she died, I remembered the curse being placed on me, and I knew who she was and how her story ended."

Daphne sat down and spoke softly, "She died?"

Lareina nodded, so Daphne hugged her mother silently. Lareina wrapped her arms around her daughter and sighed, blinking a tear out of her eye.

"What happened to her?"

Lareina sighed and looked down at the marked table, "She was raised by my Uncle Silvanus, who went by Silas by that point. He was a squib who had been cast out, and he and his Muggle wife couldn't have children. From what I learned after her death, they took good care of her and she was a witch, of course, so she went to Hogwarts and was sorted into Slytherin. From everything I heard about her, she was intelligent, but she..."

Daphne squeezed her mother's hand, and Lareina swallowed, "She got herself into trouble and she got pregnant in her final year at school. She was so terrified to tell my uncle, who she thought was her father, that she gave birth alone at Hogwarts. The baby did not make it, and… she killed herself, only a few days later."

"Merlin, Mum," Daphne breathed, "I'm so sorry."

Lareina wiped her eyes hastily and looked out of the window, "After that curse was placed on me, I remembered that I'd had a baby and that the baby was safe. But until she died, I didn't even remember her name or her date of birth, or the moment I first held her…."

"When was she born?" Daphne whispered without drawing back from the hug.

"On the 3rd of January, 1978," Lareina replied. Her eyes were distant, "And losing her was the most awful thing that had ever happened to me until your father and I lost your younger sister as a newborn in 1981, Daphne."

Thea's eyes widened, "I didn't…I didn't know that."

"It was common back then," Lareina said, her eyes on the stove, "Losing children young, or before they could be born…especially in the ancient families."

Thea nodded and got to her feet, "I'm sorry, Grandma."

She hugged Lareina, who squeezed her tightly, then forced a smile.

"I'm afraid I've burned those eggs, love. Would you mind heading out and getting some more?"

Thea could tell that it was a dismissal, that her grandmother had spoken enough about this and needed a break, so she nodded and headed back outside.

Daphne looked down at the table and admitted, "It wasn't just common back then, Mum."

Lareina looked over at her daughter, her eyes widening, "No, Daphne. You didn't…you didn't lose a baby?"

Daphne frowned slightly, "We lost two, actually. It was…it was why we were on the verge of giving up and… why we adopted Alastor."

Lareina placed a hand on her daughter's shoulder, "When?"

Daphne sighed and brushed a strand of hair behind her ear, "After our wedding, early in 2000, I fell pregnant, but I lost the baby before my first appointment at the hospital. Then…in 2001…."

She shook her head, "I was five months pregnant, and it was…it was on Neville's birthday. The healer said it was a genetic anomaly; something was wrong with her heart. It happened a lot in inbred lines, apparently. I didn't think we were inbred, but I suppose us being second cousins was enough to cause that sort of damage."

Lareina sighed and knelt to look Daphne in the eye. She wasn't surprised to see tears in her daughter's eyes.

"We never told anyone, apart from Narcissa, Neville and Lilly," Daphne admitted, "I suppose I knew something was wrong because we didn't announce the pregnancy, and there were a lot of problems from the start. I was really sick, and I never was with Andie or Thea…."

Lareina gripped her hand and asked, "Did you give her a name?"

Daphne nodded and cleared her throat, "We called her Lily."

Lareina gave her daughter a tearful nod then pulled her into a hug, "I called your sister Lydia," she confessed.

It was something Daphne never talked about, and clearly, her mother had needed to get that secret off her chest.

For the first time in a long time, Daphne felt like maybe they understood each other. And maybe Thea understood her more than she knew too. The purpose of this trip had been to heal, not to bond, but somehow all three of them had managed to do both.


The Auror Office

Thursday the 9th of September

When Harry stepped into the Head Aurors office, Ben looked frazzled.

He looked up when he saw Harry, and he forced a smile. But it wasn't genuine, and Harry knew why. Ben was stressed. They both were.

"Any developments?"

Ben shook his head, "Apart from that I'm a man down, no."

Harry frowned and opened his mouth to ask Ben what he meant. But before he could, Ben looked up and clarified.

"Owen disappeared half an hour ago. Sarah's in labour."

"Ah," Harry realised. He nodded and sat down opposite Ben's desk, "Well, mother nature isn't renown for her sense of timing, is she?"

Ben did manage a small smile at that, "No, but if you're here, you either have more information, bad news or another hunch. So, which is it?"

"A hunch," Harry admitted, "But…I think it's time I told you about everything that happened in the graveyard the night that Voldemort came back."

Ben bowed his head and leant back in his chair, "Okay."

Harry sighed and surveyed Ben, "I know what's in that file, so you know that Voldemort had a Horcrux, and Peter Pettigrew resurrected him. The file references a dark ritual, but it doesn't go into detail, does it?"

Ben shook his head.

"The ritual required three key ingredients – bone of the father, unknowingly given, you will renew your son. Flesh of the servant, willingly given, you will revive your master. Blood of the enemy, forcibly taken, you will resurrect your foe."

Ben frowned slightly, "And Alfred Nott recreated that?"

Harry nodded, "Septimus Cauldwell is the servant, and the missing bones confirm that Thaddeus Nott's bones were taken. The only piece of the puzzle we haven't solved is how Alfred acquired the third ingredient."

"Blood of the enemy, forcibly taken," Ben mused, "Who is Alfred Nott's greatest enemy?"

"His son," Harry replied simply.

Ben's frown deepened, "But if he had forcibly taken blood from Theo, then Theo would know that he's still alive."

Harry shook his head, "No, because it doesn't state that the blood had to be forcibly taken from Theo by Alfred. Nor does it state that the blood has to be fresh."

Ben's eyes widened as he began to realise what Harry had the previous night.

Harry continued, "Lucia Cross forcibly took a lot of things from Theo in 2005 when she held him captive – his magic and his blood. Now, she had no idea she was working for Alfred Nott, a man she hated because, in her eyes, he took her mother – Almina Crouch – from her. But that's Alfred Nott's greatest skill; he is a master manipulator."

Ben nodded, "So who was the accomplice? Because Septimus Cauldwell was still in prison in 2005."

"Yes, but Lotus Cauldwell wasn't," Harry said simply, "She knew about Septimus and Alfred's plan all along. Originally, Septimus would bring Alfred back after the Battle of Hogwarts, but he was sent to Azkaban, delaying Alfred's return by ten years. Now Lotus Cauldwell never liked Theo, Sadie's been upfront enough about that. They never thought Theo was good enough for her."

"Are you saying Lucia was working for Lotus?" Ben asked in disbelief.

"Lucia killed herself before we could strip her of her magic and imprison her," Harry reminded Ben, "Which, at the time, we thought was out of vanity. But what if it wasn't? What if she had been instructed to do that so we could never probe her mind and find out about Lotus's involvement?"

"Why would Lotus Cauldwell have wanted to wipe out the pureblood families, though?" Ben asked pointedly, "What does that have to do with what's going on now?"

"At first glance, nothing," Harry admitted, "But the more you look into it, the more it makes sense. Lucia was wiping out pureblood families as a means to an end. What she wanted was to reform the wizarding world, and how is that any different to what the Statute Saboteurs are doing now?"

Ben looked at Harry in disbelief, "So the Lucia Cross attacks were the first attempt, but we foiled them."

Harry nodded, "And now, Septimus is out of prison, and Alfred is back, so things are running more smoothly this time."

"Fuck," Ben muttered.

Harry nodded again, "Yeah, exactly. Get your best guys on this. We need to know if Lotus Cauldwell was out of the country when the pre-2008 kidnappings happened. If she was…then we have our suspect, and I don't think it's a coincidence that the first child was taken mere months after Lucia killed herself."

Ben nodded too. He rose to his feet and said, "I'll get Organised Crime on it straight away."

Harry bowed his head, "Keep me in the loop."

- TBC -