Lavender was used to waking up in Seamus' arms now. He needed her there and she had come to accept that. Neville tended to sleep in the Room of Requirement to keep an eye on the younger students, so that usually just left Seamus alone in his dorm. Fortunately Parvati never seemed to notice her absence, or if she did then she never said anything. She knew that if they did ever talk about it then Parvati was sure to use this as another example of how she knew that Lavender was in fact falling for Seamus, so Lavender just never brought it up.

Seamus was the one who was there for her when Ron had shattered her heart into a million pieces - Parvati had been there too, of course, but she was much less sympathetic and often pointed out that she had been warned. Their friendship was a mutual one, that was for sure. She looked out for him and he did the same for her without fail.

Slowly, she glanced up at his face. He was still sound asleep, his arms wrapped around her tightly. It made her feel slightly queasy to think about it, to think that there was a possibility that there were some feelings there. Seamus was never meant to be her crush. She was never meant to think of him that way. But here she was, watching him sleep and having him hold her close.

She let out a soft sigh as she wondered why she couldn't find a boy like Seamus. She wasn't desperate to find someone but she knew that when Dean came back, moments like this would end and she would find herself back out in the cold - so to speak. Her friendship with Seamus was very different to her friendship with Parvati as well.

While she loved Parvati with all her heart, it wasn't the same sort of love that she felt for Seamus, though they were both her best friends. She was scared that when Dean came back, everything would be completely different, but she knew that she did want him to come back because she wanted and needed for Seamus to be happy. His happiness was far more important than her own.

Lavender closed her eyes again and tried to put all of her thoughts back out of her head. The more that she thought about Seamus, the more her brain was trying to convince her that Parvati might be right, that there was a small chance that she might just have feelings different than friendship about her relationship with Seamus. She swallowed thickly as she watched the steady rise and fall of his chest. She couldn't let herself fall for him. That would just be setting herself up for heartbreak and there was more than enough of that going around.

She decided to try and get some more sleep. She knew she probably wouldn't manage to sleep now, but she couldn't just lie here and allow herself to dwell on these thoughts when there were more pressing things to worry about in life.

Seamus blinked his eyes open, his hand rubbing Lavender's back sleepily before he realised that they'd fallen asleep together in his bed. It was the new normal. He couldn't sleep alone anymore, not since losing contact with Dean anyway, but that didn't stop the guilt that he woke up with everyday that it was Lavender in his arms.

How he felt about Dean had not and would never change, but that didn't mean that he wasn't starting to feel something for his best friend. It wasn't a something that had ever been there before, he knew that for a fact. Lavender had kissed him once before after all. She'd promised then that it had meant nothing to her either. She was doing it as a favour to him after all, and she had still been hung up on Ron - something he never quite understood in the first place but that was neither here nor there.

"Lav…" He said softly as he tried to wake her as gently as possible. It wasn't that he particularly wanted to get up, but he was all too aware that their presence would be missed by Neville in not too long.

"Five more minutes." The brunette mumbled as she hid her face against his chest.

Seamus couldn't help but smile. Even in these dire times, she somehow managed to make things feel somewhat easy.

"Okay. Five more minutes." He conceded as he pressed a kiss to the top of her head, his fingers playing with the end of her hair.

The guilt was easier to ignore when she was awake, when she was just being his best friend and not… Well he didn't know what. There wasn't really a word to describe what she was to him. He supposed up until the end of sixth year, it had always been him and Dean against the world. It hadn't been easy for him to allow someone else to fill the void that his boyfriend had left behind. It hadn't been easy to let himself rely on someone who wasn't Dean. He often found himself wonder if Dean had a Lavender wherever he was. He more often than not found himself hoping that he had a Lavender.

She'd been his friend for the last seven years, his best friend for the last three, so he knew that Dean didn't have a relationship exactly like this, but he at least hoped that he had someone he could seek out comfort and support in.

Dean stumbled, rolling over his own ankle and ducked behind a tree as a curse flew his way. The tree crumbled to ashes in an instance. He swore under his breath as he scrambled to his feet, his eyes darting around as he tried to find Ted. He knew their pact had said that if they'd ever gotten separated in a situation like this then he was just meant to apparate away, meant to save himself, but he couldn't just leave the man that he'd practically called 'Dad' over the better part of a year.

Finally he spotted him. Ted was sprinting across a clearing. A snatcher hot on his heels.

Then the words rang through the night air, followed by a blinding green light. "Avada Kedavra."

Dean watched in horror as Ted crashed to the ground, but he didn't wait around. He quickly stunned the snatcher, ran over to Ted and apparated them both to another forest.

Dean then dropped to his knees and promptly threw up. Ted was dead. He rolled the man over and stared into his eyes. He knelt there for a very long time before he slowly reached out to close Ted's eyelids.

Dean watched as Ted's body glowed a silvery white and a chameleon patronus rose up from his chest. He cast his eyes down as the patronus kissed Ted's forehead before disappearing. He knew that it would now go find Ted's wife and tell her the last thing that he wanted to say. He dreaded the day that he'd be sending Seamus one.

Dean sat there for a few minutes longer, willing himself not to cry. It wouldn't help either of them. "I'm sorry." He told Ted's body quietly as he stood up. If he thought he had the time to bury the man, he would have, but as it was, he knew he needed to move on. Magic could be traced and he couldn't risk being found. He couldn't risk his biggest fear becoming reality.

He gently removed the backpack from Ted's back, shouldering it before he started walking. Part of him wanted to stop in at his house, to see his mum, and have her kiss his cheeks, but the reason he'd left in the first place was to keep her safe.