Scars
Chapter 3: Daisy
By: Eartha
Disclaimer: Harry Potter and associated characters are the property of JK Rowling.
*** Hogwarts, November, 2018 ***
Sitting in a corner of the library, Daisy Dursley was quiet as she contemplated the book in front of her. It was the same book, though not the same copy, that she had read this past summer for her History of Magic class.
Her father had kept her original copy.
The effect this book had had on her father was...startling. She hadn't thought that he had any relationship at all to the magical world before she received her letter. But now, she was questioning that assumption.
After fainting - Fainting?! - her father had been uncharacteristically quiet and reserved the rest of the summer.
She was unquestionably Daddy's Little Girl. She thought she knew just about everything about him. He was such a boisterous person by nature, gruff and good natured. He ran a boxing gym and club that he loved like a child. Everything about him was open - his feelings always apparent on his face - his strong arms always ready for hugs.
But when he saw the book… suddenly he had closed down, his body folding into itself.
Had her father known Harry Potter? THE Harry Potter? The question was unsettling her, had unsettled her since the start of the school year.
She had read through the book again and again, trying to find clues. It made no mention of her father's name and very little mention of Harry Potter's life before Hogwarts.
She reread a small passage again, the only passage in the book that talked about Harry Potter before the magical world.
"Potter's life after that fateful first night with the Dark Lord and before his start at Hogwarts is mostly shrouded in mystery.
Dumbledore, in what was couched by his supporters as an attempt to protect him from malicious actors in the magical world,
left Potter to be raised by his muggle relatives.
Those who had known him in that home have passed, the victims of both time and the war.
Those who came to know him afterwards, in school and during the war,
received a glimpse of what that life was like in the moments of contemplative quiet he would sometimes fall into.
All who heard him speak of it would agree that it was not a kind, inviting or nurturing home.
His family detested magic and the magic within him. He was neglected, abused, and left to raise himself."
In the book, the author reveals all of the hard things Harry Potter went through - the one-on-one fights with Voldemort, the death of friends and family, the battles in the war. Each story was another scar and another indelible wound on Harry's psyche and body.
(This analysis was provided almost solely by a teary Professor Chang. She was prone to moments of red-eyed staring out the window when the curriculum turned to the war and the events leading up to it.)
In the end, Harry Potter dies. He walks right up to Voldemort and dies. After going through all of that pain, surviving through everything else, he dies … and the magical world lives on.
"What a joke." she hissed quietly to herself.
It made her mad every time she thought about it. Why had he done that? Why had he sacrificed himself without even an attempt to fight back? It didn't make sense...
Roughly, she shut the book and slapped it down on the table.
Unnoticed by her, a figure with bright green eyes in a landscape painting watched her as she stared out the window lost in her thoughts.
She could swear she was being followed.
Bright green eyes seemed to show up in the still life paintings of fruit, the professors' portraits, the landscapes, and even the painting of Sir Cadogan. She was certain a figure was following her across those frames.
She had been searching the paintings around her for those very eyes when she heard them.
The Burlap twins. The sister-brother duo were torturing some first year again.
Huffing angrily, she spun around to confront them.
Her heart skipped a beat when she realized her mistake. Not a first year. Scorpius Malfoy was the unfortunate target.
Mentally shaking off her surprise, she confidently strode into the middle of the group, her shoulders straight and her face determined.
Bullying should never be tolerated. Her father taught her that.
The twins were at least twice her size, and there were two of them. But she didn't care. She could defend herself.
Her father had taught her that as well.
Just before Monty Burlap threw the first punch, she thought she saw startled green eyes flashing behind a tree in the framed picture of a forest landscape.
Daisy silently fumed as she stared at her bruised knuckles. She was in Headmaster Longbottom's office. He was about to reprimand her, she was sure. Professor Chang had been livid when she found them brawling in the hallway.
How had she found them so quickly?
Granted, it was probably best that she had shown up. Those two were tough. Daisy had been able to block the first punch and push Scorpius out of the way, but Cassandra Burlap had a mean right hook. Her cheek was still throbbing from the memory of it.
She smirked though when she remembered the nice uppercut she was able to throw Monty... He would remember that.
Movement from the corner of her vision caught her attention.
Green eyes.
As she turned towards the movement, she was startled to find that she was staring at the portrait of a young man with messy black hair.
Harry Potter.
Had he been the one following her? He was looking straight at her.
"Are you okay?"
She jumped at his voice. While she knew that the portraits could talk, she hadn't actually ever had a conversation with one of them before…
"Er, yes. Thank you for asking." She squirmed, uncomfortable under his direct gaze.
A thought occurred to her as she remembered those green eyes flashing right before the fight. She narrowed her eyes at him.
"Did you tell Professor Chang about the fight?"
A sheepish smile came over his face, and for a brief second, a memory of her father digging in the refrigerator at midnight came to her mind.
"Two on one hardly seemed fair."
She huffed, but nodded her acceptance.
"Thank you."
His brilliant green eyes lit up at her response, but he said no more after that.
Luckily, she was able to leave the Headmaster's office relatively unscathed, just a stern warning about getting into fights and a few days detention scrubbing the trophies in the trophy room.
She smirked. The uppercut had been worth it.
"Thank you"
A quiet voice from her left broke her thoughts. Again, her heart faltered for the second time that day as she turned to see Scorpius standing beside her.
Cheeks turning a deep shade of pink, she replied. "I don't like bullies."
Giving her a small smile as a response, he fell into step beside her as they walked towards the great hall for lunch.
*** Godric's Hollow, December, 2018 ***
She didn't want to be here.
The car ride had been long and the day was bitterly cold. Taking a trip to a graveyard was the last thing she had wanted to do for her Christmas vacation.
But, her father had asked her, and she could never deny him anything. Without her, he wouldn't even be able to find the grave - Harry Potter's grave.
When they started to enter the small church cemetery, her father stopped as if he was unsure if he could move forward.
It must be the anti-muggle charms. Her father was a straight-forward man. He never hesitated.
She didn't want to look up at that statue. It still made her mad, his whole story. She didn't even want to *think* about it, about him.
When she heard the other man that was already there mention Scorpius' name, she couldn't help the little bubbling of happiness that welled up within her.
Maybe this trip wouldn't be a waste after all...
*** Surrey, January, 2019 ***
Where could he be?
There were only so many places a man her father's size could hide in the small house on Privet Drive.
She was worried about her father. They had visited Harry Potter's grave at his insistence.
Why did he want to go?
She had hoped that he would return back to his normal, boisterous self after that trip. Having paid his respects, she thought it would be enough.
It wasn't enough it seemed.
He was still quiet, still not the same as before. Visiting the grave had seemed to settle something within him, but still...he was quiet. He had been lost in his thoughts the entire car ride back home.
Absently, she looked around at the walls, covered in photos of her siblings and herself, her parents, their parents. There were a lot of memories here. Happy memories. This was her childhood home, her father's childhood home.
The thought made her smile.
As she perused the photos of their family, lost in memories, a large blank space on the wall separating her immediate family's pictures from her father's extended family made her pause.
A chill struck her as she stared at that chasm. It felt like an open wound.
A bang and muffled curse above her broke her thoughts.
Ah, the attic. That's where he was.
She ran up the stairs and pulled open the attic door. It was cold and dusty, filled with the odd bits and ends that a family gathers after so many generations in one place.
Her father sat next to an open box, rubbing his head and glaring at the rafter that had clearly offended him.
Peeking over his shoulder and into the box, she let out a little giggle at the array of photos in front of her. What looked to be at first a round beach ball with a spat of blond hair turned out to be her father as a baby. There was an assortment of photos in the box, all of him or his parents from his childhood.
He didn't seem to pay any mind to these photos though. Instead, he was roughly sifting through them in search of something.
"What are you looking for?"
He looked up then, clearly startled. It was odd of him not to have noticed her. But then again, he had been lost in his thoughts more often nowadays.
Removing his hand from the box and putting the lid back in place, he gave her a small smile.
"A picture of my cousin."
It was her turn to be startled. A cousin? Her father had a cousin?
"Did Aunt Marge have children?" she asked incredulously. She had seen pictures of her Aunt Marge, but never had she seen any other family members - a husband or child. Just dogs, lots and lots of dogs.
He guffawed at that.
"Ah...no. My mother's sister, your Great-Aunt Lily. Her son." He looked uncomfortable then, his eyes downcast.
Aunt Lily? He had an Aunt Lily?
He offered no more details. Though she was burning to ask him more, his demeanor had her closing her mouth, keeping her questions to herself.
Suddenly looking up with a bright, if somewhat forced smile, he asked loud enough for the whole house to hear, "Who wants hot cocoa?!"
A chorus of "me! me! me!" could be heard coming from downstairs. Her father gave her a wink and ushered her out of the attic, quietly closing the door behind her.
*** Hogwarts, May, 2019 ***
She didn't have a choice.
She was going to have to sneak into Professor Longbottom's office.
Ever since she had returned from the winter holidays, she had been searching for those green eyes in every painting she could find.
He wasn't there - in any of them.
Her fists clenched as her annoyance grew. The one time she wanted those green eyes to be there watching her, they were nowhere to be found.
"You've got to be kidding me", she growled, passing by another green-eye-less painting. The school year was nearing its end. She needed to speak with him.
A sudden shift of black robes caught the corner of her vision. Turning, she found herself staring into the startled silver-grey eyes of one Scorpius Malfoy.
"Everything...alright?" he tentatively asked, clearly wary of her fuming figure.
She blushed a deep shade of red when she realized how she must have sounded and looked. Taking a deep breath, she slowly unclenched her fists and smoothed the wrinkles that she knew were crinkling her forehead..
Her temper was not one of her more attractive features.
Sighing, she quietly replied, "I just wanted to talk to him, Harry Potter."
He seemed confused for a minute but then realization dawned on him. "You mean his portrait in Professor Longbottom's office?"
At her slow nod, he frowned for a second but seemed to come to a decision. "I can get you in."
Startled, she looked up at him in wonder. She smiled. She knew she liked him.
It turned out that after the incident last November, Scorpius had overheard Professor Longbottom speak his password to the mermaid painting on the fourth floor, the entrance and guard to his office.
The password had not changed it seemed. "Gillyweed".
The mermaid had shifted her head to the side as if wondering if she should really let these students in, but she had opened the door without confronting them when they spoke the password.
Taking another deep breath, Daisy slowly walked into the office, her eyes immediately landing on Harry Potter's portrait.
He seemed to have been sleeping, but he opened his eyes as soon as she approached him.
Finally seeing those bright green eyes again, she hesitated. She had a question for him, but she wasn't sure she could bring herself to ask it.
Now that she was here, in front of him, she was afraid of the answer.
Clearly patiently waiting for her to speak, she slowly gathered her thoughts to ask him not THE question, but another question she had wanted the answer to.
"Why did you die?"
Scorpius seemed to shift at that question, as if surprised. She guessed he thought it a strange question. Everyone seemed to know the answer - that he died for them, to save them all.
But...why? Why did he have to die…just give up... to save them?
Harry Potter shifted his head in thought, seriously considering the question.
"I can't tell you everything…"
She furrowed her brows in annoyance at that.
"But, I can tell you this: I was given a choice. My choice was between a bad outcome and an unacceptable outcome. I chose the one I could live - and die - with."
She thought about his answer, but she still didn't understand. "But why not fight? Why just walk up to him...and die?"
He stared at her then, his eyes deep and dark.
"There are many ways to fight. Not all of them involve your fists or your wand."
She shook her head. She couldn't accept it. "So what? You just threw yourself at him? Let him kill you? For what, exactly?"
His answer was immediate, hard.
"So he could die."
She jolted at that, a line from the book, the prophecy, coming back to her. 'Neither can live while both survive.'
Softly, he continued, this time with a wistful half smile.
"So the world could live."
He lifted his eyes to hers.
"So you could live."
Surviving, living, and dying. Three separate things. Surviving was neither life nor death. You had to be alive to die.
She gasped, understanding finally dawning. She curled her fists so tightly they turned white.
Now she was angry for a completely different reason. The weight of that choice he had had to face.
The cruelty of his life…
Her fists tightened again.
Her father.
The truth she didn't want to face...hadn't been able to reconcile with the person she knew, the family she knew.
'His family detested magic and the magic within him. He was neglected, abused, and left to raise himself.'
Tears were in her eyes now. "Why?"
His brows furrowed, unsure of her question.
Taking a deep breath, she clarified. "Why did you even care? Why …" her voice broke.
"After all you went through. After everything people put you through, accused you of. After all my grandparents... MY FATHER...put you through. Why would you want to save someone like me?"
The tears were falling fast and hard.
Scorpius shifted closer to her, squeezing her trembling shoulder to comfort her. Even if he had no idea what she was saying, his support right now meant the world to her.
The portrait was silent for a long time. Perhaps it had been an impossible question…
"Because for all the bad in this world, there will always be some good worth defending it for."
He looked up at her again, through her, to a memory that was instilled into the very brushstrokes of his existence.
"Because of a cup of tea left at a bedroom door."
Scorpius had gently pulled her away from the portrait and out of Professor's Longbottom's office after the silence had stretched to the point that it was clear that the conversation had ended.
The portrait had said no more after his cryptic tea response, and Daisy had not been able to respond or ask further questions, too overcome with emotion.
He had brought her to a quiet corner in the courtyard, away from the prying eyes and ears of students and portraits alike.
"My father" she started, looking him in the eye as she tried to convey everything she had seen in the last year. "He was searching, but he couldn't find one."
It sounded nonsensical, she realized.
Her mouth opened and closed comically until finally she was able to form her thoughts into something resembling coherent speech.
"After reading that book, my father he… he cleared a whole section on our family picture wall - a huge jagged space."
Scorpius was looking away from her, into the distance. She couldn't tell what he was thinking, but she couldn't stop herself from talking either. She had to get these thoughts out.
"I didn't understand at first, what it all meant."
"It didn't make any sense. How could it all be true? My father loves me, has always loved me. My father has always stood up for others, has taught me to stand up for others, to protect others."
"But that book...what it said. If it's all true..."
Tears started falling again, as the realization dawned on her.
"...then all of that was a lie. My father, his family, everything I believed is a lie."
Gently, Scorpius picked up her hand and squeezed it. Still saying nothing, he lent her silent support as the tears continued to fall.
*** Surrey, Summer, 2019 ***
Daisy hadn't been able to look her father in the eye when she returned home. She felt like her wits and her appendages were filled with lead, weighing her down.
Her father hadn't said anything to her, he had only shot her that guilty look.
He was extra quiet now, even more so than after the graveyard. He would spend hours staring at that wall. Still no pictures filled the chasm. He hadn't been able to find any.
That knowledge brought her back into the spiral of disbelief, grief, and disappointment that she had been feeling since her talk with the portrait.
A gentle tapping on the window thankfully broke her away from her thoughts. Turning her head towards the sound, she realized that a bird was the one making the noise… a falcon to be exact. It tapped the window again, staring at her impatiently, clearly waiting to be let in.
She raised her brow in confusion as she opened the window. The bird flew gracefully into the living room and perched itself on the side wing of her father's sitting chair.
Belatedly realizing that a bird was right next to his head, her father jumped back several feet, clearly startled. Unperturbed by his antics, the falcon gently raised his foot and presented a letter attached to his leg.
She approached the bird and gently removed the letter. Staring at the elegant script on the envelope, she confirmed what she had thought when the bird had first swooped in and zeroed in on her father.
Mr. Dudley Dursley
The bird only waited to be sure that she handed the letter to her father, before spreading its wings and gracefully flying out the still open window.
Her father stared at the thick parchment letter in his hands, clearly unnerved. Looking up at Daisy for reassurance, she slowly nodded her head as he broke the thick wax seal - an elegant M - on the back.
Opening the folded parchment, she saw a letter with the same beautiful script as well as a smaller envelope with a messily scrawled "Dudley".
Her father read the first letter silently, his hand turned enough to let her read as well.
Mr. Dursley,
Enclosed you will find a letter addressed to you from Harry Potter. I will admit that this letter has been in my possession for some time.
I didn't want to give it to you. He wrote it right before the end.
Knowing the bleeding Gryffindor heart that he was, I was sure it was an absolvance. He always forgave those who hurt him.
I know this firsthand.
He thought his pain, his life was an acceptable loss.
He could have lived. There should have been a third option.
But he was taught from the beginning that his life was somehow worth less than others.
Your father, your family taught him that.
I was taught that my life was worth more than others.
My father, my family taught me that.
Now, you bear the scars, like I bear the scars. They are our punishment, our inheritance. As they should be.
I won't let him take them away. I won't let him absolve me. They are my burdens to bear.
~ Draco Malfoy
When she arrived at the bottom of the letter, she was confused. Draco Malfoy. Wasn't that Scorpius' father?
Her father too was staring at that signature, face drawn, fingers tightly gripping the letter.
"Draco Malfoy...the author." he whispered to himself.
Suddenly, the connections clicked in her head. Scorpius' father was the author of the book… Her face grew pale as a thought occurred to her… 'Had Scorpius known all along about her connection to Harry Potter?'
A mirthless laugh shocked her out of her thoughts.
Her father was holding the second letter in his hands, Harry's letter. She couldn't see what it said.
"Dad?" she softly queried, trying to figure out his reaction.
He was staring at the wall again, at the ugly wound tearing her family apart, tearing him apart.
He began to talk, and the story he told was not one she wanted to hear.
It was a story of an unwanted child hidden in a closet. A story of his father's rage, of his mother's apathy, and of his own sadistic pleasure.
She couldn't look at him now. She couldn't look at that wall either. The smiling faces of her grandparents and her father, staring out from their perfect family portrait, were suddenly transformed into cruel smirks. A child with messy black hair and bright green eyes was crying in her mind's eye. Their demonic grins only widened.
The spewing of his cruel history had finally stopped. She was grateful. She didn't want to hear anymore.
She just couldn't understand. Staring at her hands, the lessons that her father had taught her came back to her unbidden.
What she thought had been a gentle giant had held her hands, bruised from a fight with a neighborhood kid who had called her names. He told her that fighting should only ever be used as a last resort. That because she was strong, she had a responsibility to protect others, even if they were mean to her. That to be a strong person she had to know how to use her strength proportionately and judiciously.
She looked up at him then. Trying to see both men - the cruel and the kind. Trying to reconcile what she now knew.
She couldn't. His eyes were red and glassy. He wasn't the same as he had been. He couldn't be. Something had changed him.
Something had to have changed him.
"How…" her question tapered off. What could she say?
He looked up at her then, finally seeing her. The pain she saw in his eyes nearly broke her. The guilt...it was eating him up alive.
He finished her question for her. "How did I change?"
He looked at her, his brows furrowed. "I think...it goes back to that summer. The summer when we were attacked by those things in the tunnel."
She didn't understand what he was talking about, but she knew it must have had to do with his cousin. Something magical.
"Whatever it was, it forced me to face myself. I don't think I understood it fully at the time, but afterwards, I couldn't look at myself in the mirror for a long time."
"I didn't like what I saw."
"That last summer... I tried to apologize, I think. I still didn't fully understand. But I knew that Harry was hurting, and it was no longer something I liked. I didn't realize it would be the last time I would ever see him."
Now that he had turned more towards her, she was able to read the second parchment.
Thank you for the tea.
That was it. The mirthless laugh suddenly made sense. No wonder he had lost it a little. It sounded so glib.
Everything else had made it feel like it should be something more. But there it was, one short sentence, to say goodbye.
And she realized, it meant more than maybe her father understood. Because of a cup of tea left at a bedroom door, the portrait had said.
She turned to him to try to explain some of the message, to maybe put his mind at some ease.
Before she could speak though, she was caught by the image of a tear gently rolling down his face.
Her father never cried.
He gestured to the wall, seemingly unaware of his tears. "I'll never be able to fill that hole...to heal that wound."
"I will never be able to say how truly sorry I am."
As it reached the tip of his nose, the drop fell onto the smaller parchment.
She watched as that watermark spread, slowly consuming the words.
It took her a second to realize that it was continuing far past where the small amount of water should have affected the parchment.
She gasped, touching his hand, bringing his attention to the paper.
The words were swirling, changing, scribbling across the page in that same untidy scrawl.
Dear Dudley,
If you are reading this now, then my assumption about the tea must have been correct. We must have finally come to understand each other, at least a little.
I'm sorry I didn't get the chance to talk to you Dudley - to truly talk to you. It is one of my many regrets.
For everything else that I despised about Privet drive, being there taught me to be strong. Your fists taught me how to move past the pain, how to continue when everything seemed bleak.
And that strength, that knowledge has been priceless in this war. In truth, I believe it will mean the difference between success and failure.
Our scars mean that we have lived. They tell our story. The good, the bad, the ugly. They make up our history and shape our future.
If there is one thing that I can ask of you Dudley, please don't forget the past, don't let others forget. Acknowledge it, embrace it, learn from it.
I know you can. And I believe you will make the world better because of it.
Sincerely Yours,
Harry James Potter
A cascade of tears were falling now, a river across her father's face.
Her heart was breaking.
For her father. For his regret.
For Harry. For his regret.
For the truth that had turned her life upside down and inside out. For the wound that had torn a hole through the happy memories of her family.
Turning her head away from her father's face, unable to handle the onslaught of emotion, she stared at the envelope with the hasty script spelling her father's first name.
This was one of his last messages. At the end of the war, Harry, her father's cousin, had thought about her father, had cared enough to leave a note to soothe his soul.
He always forgave those who hurt him.
The thoughts made her roiling emotions pitch and turn, making her queasy. She grasped the table to steady herself, her hand landing on the larger envelope, the one from Scorpius' father.
She paused.
There was something else there. The envelope was too thick without the two letters inside of it.
Unsteadily, she straightened herself and picked up the envelope. She wasn't sure what she would find.
Slipping her fingers inside, she felt two small, glossy pieces of paper. Dragging them out of the envelope, she gasped as she stared down at her discovery.
Two photos.
The top photo showed a picture of a raven haired man with messy hair and glasses. Next to him was a smiling red-headed woman. Her eyes were a brilliant green, the same green she had seen following her across the frames at Hogwarts.
Her eyes widened as she realized who it must be. Her Great-Aunt Lily.
Shaking, she shuffled the pictures to reveal the second photograph. This one felt achingly familiar.
Harry Potter was sitting on the grass in front of Hogwarts. She knew exactly where that was, had sat there herself many times as she attempted to focus on her homework away from the hustle and bustle of the common room.
He was with two other people - a bushy haired girl and red-headed boy. Hermione Granger. Ron Weasley. They seemed so happy, so young.
They were her age, she realized.
And within a few years, they all would be dead.
But in that moment, they were smiling and living their life.
Taking a deep breath, she steadied herself again, bracing herself to reveal this cursed treasure to her father. It was a reminder of what was and what had been lost.
A hand reached out from the corner of her eye before she could turn to him. He had already seen it.
He grasped the photos gently, holding them both up, one in each hand.
She realized then that the one with Harry Potter and his friends had a small inscription on the back of it.
Squinting her eyes, she saw another elegant script. It was similar to Mr. Malfoy's, but it was different. Still neat, but a tighter scrawl. She thought it looked familiar but she could not place it.
Fill the hole. Heal the wound. Let the scar fade.
That was it. There was no signature. It felt almost like an incantation. Magic words to illicit comfort.
Staring up again at her father, she saw his red eyes shining, but dry. A small smile was on his lips as he held up the photos, filling in the hole on the wall in his field of vision.
She released the breath she didn't know she had been holding. There was comfort there.
Her father had found his peace.