The song included in this is 'Fiona Apple - All Alone' that's what I imagine Lydia's voice is like.
Chapter One
The Tsar's Inn
February 1923 – New York
She sang in a little Jazz club in the heart of the city, underground, dark and smoky and filled with the same faces every night, interchanging with the fading and rising of the sun. When she'd started there, the place had been all but empty and the owner, Mr Vasiliev, an old concert Pianist from Imperial Russia; a good, tough man who just liked liquor and jazz and wanted nothing more than to run his business without intervention, was at his wits end. He'd employed her as a last result to try and bring people in; she was cheaper than most singers because she was new to the city, young and unheard of. He on the other hand, was a safe employer in a city she didn't know and promised to pay her a basic salary plus, depending on how well the bar did that night, 30% of the takings and so it was fair on both sides.
What both didn't know was that Lydia could sing, really sing, and she quickly brought the club from the brink of closure to being healthily filled with patrons on weekdays and full to bursting on the weekends. When Lydia sang, it was described as someone whose sole purpose was written within whatever song she touched, whose whole being was to create melody and harmony and to be made up of all the notes on a scale strung together in a brilliant symphony. She wasn't the best singer in the world technically or rhythmically, sometimes her voice was rough or slightly off beat and randomly broke in the middle if she reached a little too high, but those imperfections made her voice unlike anything anyone had heard before. It was her sheer love and joy in what she did that made her so adored by the patrons and the fact that you could feel what she sang, the emotion in it raw and bared for anyone to see.
And this was how it worked, her and Vasili (no one knew his first name for some strange intense reason that when you asked him he'd narrow his eyes, mutter something darkly in Russian and suddenly leave so everyone just shortened his last name) and their club and she'd been here now for five years, happily singing her heart out.
This night was no different, or at least it shouldn't have been. It should have been the same alluring concoction of drink and music and dancing which set their world on fire until the morning came and they all fell into bed, sleeping off the buzzing in their minds. But sometimes life is completely out of your control, and in the strangest of ways events lead you back down a path you'd forgotten existed and there is nothing you can do to stop it.
He had his eyes closed, sitting on the curb with his head down, hanging between his shoulders, his arms outstretched resting on his knees as he fought the very real rage that turmoiled, twisting and turning like a hurricane inside him. He was focusing on breathing, on tuning out the screams that had filled the space just moments ago but had now fallen silent, taken away by the North wind as it blew away the lost souls mixing them with ash and tears and flame.
It has been said that you have to have a touch of the dark about you to be an Auror. Aurors are powerful wizards; they have to be to defeat those who wish the world and it's inhabitance harm, but you would be a fool to imagine they are white knights in shining armour who have come to save the day.
Everybody has secrets, Auror's especially. Their entire profession is based around them; they live and breathe them up until they are ultimately drowned by the sheer volume of them that they are asked to keep, and although we like to believe that human beings are simple; either good or bad, black or white, this simply isn't true. We are complicated beings, all of us are the shades of grey in-between good and bad, and although most of us have good intentions sometimes those intentions lead us down dangerous paths that we did not anticipate.
There was no better wizard to fit that description than Percival Graves. Graves was on the whole a good man; mostly straight forward if a little close-minded at times, but a good man of shrewd morals whose ability to constantly do things for 'the greater good' even in times of severe crisis, was known by all who knew him and sometimes plain frightened them. You couldn't really do his job and not be a man of pure iron will when it came to the rights and wrongs of wizarding law which he knew by the back of his hand and without a shadow of a doubt he upheld.
But Percival Graves sometimes forgot that he was just a man, like everyone else he had faults and even an iron will could not protect you forever... especially against something as evil as what he had just witnessed.
Before he didn't notice her kind, they were either an utter nuisance or a genuine worry which cost him many hours of good sleep, which he didn't get enough of anyway and he'd never met one that had held his interest for more than a few minutes; and he had an incredibly acute attention span. But she...she was like the burning sun in a world that had iced over.
Graves was not a man of poetry or love, in fact he thought they were a waste of good time, but he simply couldn't think of any other way to explain how she had made him feel. And it was just that; as if someone had turned the light on in a cold and empty room.
He was not the first, and nor would he be the last to want something he simply could not have. This was especially hard for him seeing as he was very used to getting whatever it was that he desired if he put his mind to it...he was an American Wizard for Christ Sake, he got whatever he wanted. And mainly he found it relatively easy to stay out of her way, to not check up on her too much or have her on his mind and that was for one simple reason; it was better for her that way. The girls strength of character had somehow made it almost impossible for her to completely forget him, even with the obliviation spell and he'd briefly wondered if this had ever happened before or if she was, as she was in his own life, a strange anomaly of great importance. But tonight was not one of the nights where he could find the strength to forget her. Tonight had been one of the nights that made him hate who he was, hate having to see the worst parts of wizards, of humanity.
Grindelwald's followers were growing in number. The groups had been springing up all over the city, little pockets of wizards who were, to him anyway, completely vulgar, believing that wizards should enslave the human race. They met in dark and dingy places, talking about their abhorrent ideas and in some instances cruelly abusing no-maj's in ways which had made him on more than one occasion feel physically sick.
Tonight had been no exception to that rule. She had been what? Twenty four? Twenty five? Blonde and beautiful and Lydia...it wasn't that the young woman had looked particularly like her, it was just been the idea that it very easily could have been...this could have been Lydia. And that wasn't just him being paranoid...they knew who he was. There was a reason most Aurors lived such secretive lives inside and outside their work.
The leader of this particular small group was called Charles Vance, a young man unlike anyone Graves had met before...he'd only glimpsed him for a few seconds over the past year, that smug, terrifyingly ruthless smile on his face, a face that was far too young to think the kinds of violent and volatile thoughts that it did. And this kid, for that's what he was really, had developed a particular and unfortunate obsession with the older man chasing him. a game of cat and mouse had begun. Graves was a man who of course Gellert Grindlewald would reward and praise his followers for taking down, a '
A game of cat and mouse had begun. Especially since Percival Graves was a man who of course Gellert Grindlewald would reward and praise his followers for taking down, a 'betrayer of the pure race' being burnt under the new regime they were making for themselves. His death held significance.
They'd raided the place, wanting to stop and arrest Vance and the others before they committed a terrorist act, but they had underestimated just how insane Vance was. He'd taken the whole building out. Seven floors of people, wizards and no-maj's alike, his own followers...gone. Even some of the Auror's he worked with hadn't emerged alive...Graves himself had apparated just in time, managing to grab Tina, the newest and youngest on the team before the ceiling had completely caved in.
She was sitting next to him on the pavement, her mouth hanging slightly open as she looked at the dusty rubble in front of them, unable to make herself move. None of them had anticipated it...no one had thought Vane that ruthless...sure he'd try to run but kill the people who trusted him? What kind of man did that?
He felt as if he were stuck between a rock and a hard place, and as backup arrived and he briefed the others, sent Tina home and managed to send a message to the President who he was sure would be wanting a debrief in the morning.
He'd found himself wandering around the cold streets, finding himself in the place he always did when he felt as if he were eroding...the one place he was never supposed to go. He sighed gently in the cold, eyeing the place passively and inwardly cursing himself for being such a coward before he stepped to the door and pushed it open.
Her voice filled the air outside and he automatically closed his eyes, feeling it calm him down. It was and always would be, the most beautiful thing he'd ever heard in his life. He walked in out of the cold, his eyes training the stage until he found what it was he was looking for and he stood in the shadows of the overhanging entrance for a moment, watching.
She finished her song with a long, beautiful note which received her a loud round of applause and a few whistles from the crowd. She smiled, that glorious radiant one she owned as she looked into the crowd she couldn't see. He moved towards the bar, leaning an arm upon the counter top, his eyes not leaving her.
"Now, that was one of my favourites! ...but let's slow it down a little shall we? Give the lovers something to dance too as the night draws to a close..." He heard a lone piano burble into life, and he listened to it's keys as he sat down at the bar, his back to her as she began to sing a slow, calming song called 'All Alone.'
"Just like a melody...that lingers on...you seem to haunt me night, and day."
As he listened, he could feel his soul stitching itself back together, the torn, frayed pieces rejoining and making him once again a man and not a monster made up of rage and disappointed hopes.
"I never realised...till you had gone, how much I cared about you...I can't live without you..."
The words rang heart wrenchingly true, and they stabbed into his chest like needles and he had to stop himself from clutching the glass in his hand so tightly that it smashed.
"All alone...I'm so all alone...there is no one...else...but you. All alone, by the telephone...waiting for...a ring...a ting-a-ling, I'm all alone every evening...all alone feeling blue-oo-oo..."
He turned, risking a look and seeing that she was sitting on the stage, her legs hanging off the side, a dreamy but almost sad look on her features as she watched the several couples that slowly danced in front of the stage.
"...Wondering where you are, and how you are...and if you are all alone too..."
Her voice rose for the emotional part in the quiet song, her precious voice showing the real melancholy in the song in a way no one else did.
"Just for a moment you were mine...! And then, you seemed to vanish like a dream...I long to hold you in my arms again, my life is very lonely...for I want you only...I'm all alone every evening...all alone feeling blue-oo-oo..." she seemed to stare off into the distance for a moment, as if she were seeing something that made her greatly sad and he saw the tears that laced her eyes and she swallowed, suddenly looking down as her voice grew quiet for a moment,
"...Wondering where you are...and how you are...and if you are...all...alone...too..."
No-Maj music, packed full of far too many emotions and words...they didn't have real magic, they had to settle for writing about the only kind of magic that occurred in their lives. He didn't dislike it, it just made his life more difficult. She sniffed and smiled wiping away a tear from her cheek almost as if she were surprised.
"Oh look at that! Just got some dust in my eye folks honest! Look what music can do!" She laughed, her smile breaking over her face and the crowd laughed cheerfully, clapping as she stood and walked back up the small steps to the stage.
She sang a few more and he stayed, quiet and watching in the dark, it was the time of night for the slower songs and people were becoming tired and ready to leave. He stayed as long as he dared before escaping into the night and waiting around in the alley way opposite. He waited like he always did till she emerged with the members of the band who waved her a good night and they went in their separate directions, and like he did every night he could, he followed behind her, his hands in his pockets as he walked the New York streets. He watched her sway this way and that, a few misplaced dance steps here and there, quietly humming the songs in her head and thinking she was completely on her own, but not particularly caring if anyone saw her anyway.
It occurred to him that she didn't even need magic, she had enough in her own head to exist without it. The walk home was uneventful, like it usually was and he only had to intervene once, whistling down the road to distract a couple of men who took interest in her and were about to start following, but upon hearing his whistle and seeing his figure in the cold night air they scarpered.
He watched from the edge of the room, leaning against the wall and glancing at his pocket watch. The hand with her engraved silhouette pointed to the word 'Safely home' and he almost smiled, if that were something he was capable of...which consequently, it was not. His eyes flicked up to her level and he saw her lights flicker on. He was about to leave the street corner when movement caught his eye and he glanced down to the watch again.
A smaller hand, one shorter than the engraved one had moved, instead of 'Whimsical' which it what it had been pointing to before, it was carefully moving to point to 'Melancholy'. He exhaled audibly, placing the highly illegal pocket watch back in its place and muttering "Damn it Lydia." Under his breath before moving to his own apartment block and swiftly climbing the stairs to his door which he unlocked and stepped inside.
Inside was the interior of a grand mansion complete with a marble floor a double sweeping staircase. He picked up the post, shrugging out of his long coat and walking in the direction of the study where he placed the envelopes down on the table top and walked towards another door, through a library and then finally to a large, high-ceilinged room which situated only a large, black grand piano. He unbuttoned his waistcoat, tugging it off and letting it fall to the floor as he crossed the room and sat down. He turned in the seat as his fingers brushed the keys to see her standing by the window, her arms wrapped around that damn cat. The damned cat though seemed to sense her sadness and stayed happily in her arms, tentatively licking her arm from time to time.
He knew her...the damn song had made her sad but it wasn't that it had made her sad that was causing her misery, it was not knowing the reason why she was sad that was causing her mood. He sighed gently, turning back to the piano and laying his hands on the keys in a flourish of notes as he began.
"City of stars, are you shining just for me?" He glanced at her, seeing her frown and blink, her whole body still as he continued "City of stars, there's so much that I can't see. Who knows? ...I felt it from the first embrace I shared with you-"
"That now our dreams, they've finally come true" She came in on que as he stopped singing, and he knew she didn't understand but he smiled "City of stars, just one thing everybody wants...There in the bars, and through the smokescreen of the crowded restaurants...It's love, Yes, all we're looking for is love from someone else." She stood and he watched as she twirled around, the perturbed cat in her arms as she danced with him and continued singing,
"A look in somebody's eyes! To light up the skies! To open the world and send it reeling. A voice that says, I'll be here, and you'll be alright...I don't care if I know, just where I will go, 'cause all that I need is this crazy feeling, A rat-tat-tat on my heart..."
"Think I want it to stay..." He watched her still, his fingers moving over the keys, something changing in her face, a content feeling passing over her as she let go of her cat and went to the window, looking out over the city "City of stars, Are you shining just for me? City of stars, You never shined so brightly..." And as he finished playing, he pulled out his watch and glanced at the second hand which had moved to 'happy'.
I know, super soppy and romantic right? Well my usual style's pretty dark so it won't be for long.