Disclaimer - I own nothing! Except my writing style… and I think my muse owns me rather than the other way around.
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Oh a thousand words,
have never been spoken,
They'll fly to you,
They'll carry you home,
And back into my arms,
Suspended on silver wings.
-1000 Words, FFX-2
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It was seven years to the day.
Ron woke up, shaking. He had just had the oddest dream… He sat up, pulling his long legs to his chest and wrapping hiss arms around them. Looking down at his wife sleeping peacefully, he slowly clamed down. A voice had awoken him, but no one else was in the room. It must have been part of the dream. There was no way that Harry had-
I'm coming back, my friend. Find me. I don't want to forget… not this time. Harry's voice clearly sounded in Ron's head. He sounded wistful.
I'm going insane, I'm going insane, I finally snapped.
You did not snap. You have to find me, Ron, I don't want to die again, Harry's mental voice was slightly hysterical. I've been dying forever, I've never gotten past seventeen, and this is going to be my last chance, Ron - lamia are not reborn!
Lamia?
Born vampires, Ron. I can't die again, or Draco will be alone. Forever. Please. Find me. I'll be in the States. A vampire by the name of Carys Redfern - there is so much I have to tell you but there's no time. I'm about to be reborn.
Where in the States? Ron asked frantically, there was so much to ask and so little time. But this he had to know.
A small town in the north east… I don't know more than that. Find me? I'll… the phoenix! I'll send him to you. Fawkes…
But Fawkes disappeared when Dumbledore died.
Yes, he did. There was a smile in Harry's voice now. Or, as he should now call him, Carys. Please don't call me Carys. Urgh, I can tell that name is going to be a problem. Call me Carrie. Heh, rhymes with Harry. Well, Fawkes will lead you to the town where I will born. You're married to Hermione, now, right? Well, bring her there and settle down - please please please I need you two in my life even if I won't realize it. Please Ron, I don't want to be alone, I don't want to forget you, or Hermione, or myself… or Draco, the last name went unspoken. He couldn't forget that one. If he did, they were both doomed. I wish I could find him here, before I go, Harry sighed.
Of course, Carrie… Hermione has been wanting to move to a bigger house. She's pregnant. Har-Carrie, I'm a dad, I have a little girl, and now I'm going to have another baby, isn't it great?
Yes. I get to grow up with your children. Harry sounded faint. I'll like that.
He was gone, and Ron let out a ragged sob. His best mate. He had gotten to talk to him again. And he would be able to see him grow up, protect him, make sure this next life wouldn't be as horrible as his last. It was a burden... but one he took willingly and gladly.
"Ron?" Hermione woke up and hugged him around his waist. "Ron, I was dreaming of Harry." She sobbed quietly. It had been years since their friend's death, and they had thought they had gotten over it. They were wrong.
Ron's throat tightened. He hadn't seen her cry so, not since they married, and it hurt. "He spoke to me too, 'Mione, but I was awake. It was real, love. He's coming back to us."
"That… can it really be true?" she asked softly. Then a light sparked in her eyes. She was going to find out. Twenty four years old, she looked much like she did at seventeen… "I'm going to do some research, love, be a doll and make breakfast," she hugged him and ran out of the room in her pajamas.
Ron smiled, and for once in what seemed forever it wasn't forced. At all.
----
A young woman, holding a small blond baby, walked through into the hospital ward. Her home was a base for Circle Daybreak, and they had better not complain about her bringing her only child in.
He was being fussy, and that wasn't anything new, but he wouldn't stop crying and it was making her nervous.
She winced as she heard another woman cry out in pain, and automatically went to see what she could do.
She got there just in time to see the nurse hand the girl her baby. Oh. Oh! Evrand had stopped crying… she looked down to see him looking at the baby with a curious expression.
Lyre Dacoras hugged her little boy and brought him closer, smiling at the new mother. "Congratulations," she murmured softly, before recognizing the woman. A captive, they had let live because she was pregnant and because Circle Daybreak abhorred unnecessary killing.
The woman glared at her. Sentenced to death. Alana Redfern, a lamia, a born vampire, and one of the leaders of the Circle Midnight side of the Nightworld now that her great-great-great-etc- grandfather was dead, as was much of the old leadership of Circle Midnight.
And now her baby would be an orphan because of it. "Take him," the violet eyed woman shoved the tiny bundle at Lyre giving her a deadly look. "His name is Carys Redfern. Make sure he knows it."
Carys. Derived from the Welsh word caru, love. Interesting choice, for a psychopathic vampire bent on breaking the world of man. Kind of strange since it was a girl's name, but… she would grant the vampire's last wish. Since it was so harmless.
"I will," Lyre replied, adjusting her hold on Ev so she could hold the other baby. "Evrand, look. This is Carys. He'll be your new friend," she murmured to her baby, who gurgled happily. A nice change to the wailing whimpering bundle of tears from moments before she walked into the room.
"Get out now," Alana said coldly. Take my baby away. I can't bare to think about… leaving him, she thought, but under tight mental shields. Not with you vermin loving filth. He's going to grow up surrounded by human-coddling Circle Daybreak. I wish I didn't care.
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Hermione looked around their new home brightly. She was heavy with child and knew her second would be in a happy home. She smiled down at the little girl with flaming curly red locks.
The serene expression on Lessa's face as she gazed out the window entranced her. It was so unlike anything she had seen so far on the little girl. Mostly she had looked worn out, before, and it had worried her mother intensely.
Perhaps her parents' distressed youth had somehow managed to convey itself to her.
"Lovely Lessa," Hermione picked her sweetheart up and buried her face in her doll's fiery hair.
"Ma! You're not supposed to pick me up, daddy said so," Lessa exclaimed and wriggled out of her mother's embrace. "I would have hugged you, silly. No picking up. Remember the baby." The little girl looked up at her mom sternly.
"Oh darling," she smiled, "Don't worry, the baby will come when its ready and not a moment sooner- oh!"
Hermione gasped as a pain rippled across her abdomen. She was semi-aware of falling down, but the pain was too intense to care. She was concerned when she heard her daughter start screaming, but couldn't block out the pain long enough to understand what it was she was yelling.
"Daddy-daddy-DADDY!!" Lessa screamed at the top of her lungs, racing to his office. "Mommy fell!"
Ron dropped his book, stood, and ran out to the living room. At his wife's prone body, he gave a muffled sob, but held everything else in for the sake of his daughter. She was still alive, he told himself. They had to get her to the hospital, now.
"C'mon hun, we have to take Mommy to see the doctor. He'll make her all better," Ron told her with more assurance than he felt.
"What about the baby?" Lessa's face was pale. So scared, so pale. She was only five.
Ron blanched. It was too early, he had no idea if it would live if his wife's body rejected it. Probably not. "We have to hurry, love." He held the tears in.
Lessa and Hermione needed him to be strong. He lifted his wife, and felt tiny hands holding onto his slacks. He murmured a family transportation spell that his beloved had come up with - all on her own, the brilliant witch - and they were in the waiting room for a small wizarding hospital.
It wasn't Mungo's, it was something closer. "It's too early," he whispered desperately to the woman at the desk.
She nodded and a pair of wizards with a stretcher Apparated in an answer to the silent summons. They took Hermione away from him and carried her away. "We shall do everything possible to save the life of your wife and child. Sit, please. It shall take some time."
Ron swallowed hard, picked his little girl, and sat down. Hugging her, not giving into tears, and staring blankly at the toys scattered on the floor. She sniffled quietly. "Less, sweet, she'll be okay." His voice was rough and scared.
"Daddy it'll be okay," tiny arms wrapped around his neck. "Mom is strong, you know."
A few tears slipped from his eyes. "Yes. I know."
----
Ron woke up, his neck stiff from sleeping sitting up. He looked down to see Lessa sleeping curled up in his arms. Then he looked up, to the man in front of him. Lucius Malfoy? He stared at the man blankly.
"My son. Has been reborn," the man said softly. "He said Potter has been as well, before fading."
Ron stared at him, still. Hadn't the man died? In Azkaban?
"I am clearly alive, Weasley," the last Malfoy replied with some annoyance. "Do not test my patience."
"You read my mind!" Ron glared at him, worried.
"No, your shock was written across your face…" the man trailed off, looking more closely at the red-haired young man's face. "You have been crying."
"So I have," Ron agreed.
"Are you not relieved to find your best friend reborn?"
"I am. I am also in a hospital, if you haven't noticed, and for a reason."
Lucius simply looked at him.
"My wife went into early labor. Both she and the child may die," Ron said emotionlessly. He had no idea why he was revealing this to the man. The man who had been in the inner circle of Voldemort.
"My condolences," Lucius said as softly as ever. It seemed that he meant it. That seemed strange, until Lucius realized how much he had in common with the young man. Draco's mother had nearly died giving birth to him, which was why they never tried for another child. His son was dead, and although he had been reborn he still could not stop grieving. And his love… she had died long before, all that was left of her was a shell in Mungo's. A breathing shell. A dementor had taken her.
"She might make it," Ron said thickly. He was not going to cry again, not in front of this man however sympathetic he seemed. Not when his daughter was sleeping so peacefully.
"I'm sorry."
Ron froze at the sound of the doctor's voice. He didn't want to hear this, he didn't, he refused…
"I managed to save the child, but your wife… I don't know how it happened but she simply started having convulsions during the cesarean section and -" the man's face looked drained of blood, as if he had seen the most horrible thing possible. He shuddered, and looked away from the broken young man he had just ruined. "I'm sorry."
"My… baby?" he asked roughly.
"He is small… but completely developed. He will be fine, but we would like to look after him for a few days."
Ron nodded, anything for his son's safety. "I can see him?"
It was a heartbroken plea. The doctor nodded.
Lucius watched them walk away from him, holding his little girl as if she were made of glass. Such joy, taken so away so quickly, so painfully. He sighed and waited, not upset in the least that he had been forgotten. Poor children, so harsh the world was. At least they were not alone…
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I can't believe I wrote that… the next part things begin to get better. Really. That would be a horrible, horrible place for me to leave you, so here I'll continue.
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Lucius started, seeing the very same man that had led Ron away, run back into the waiting room. He had a cheerful smile, and winked at Lucius. "Have you seen Mr. Weasley? Mr...?"
"Malfoy," Lucius murmured softly, wondering what nonsense was going on... "A man, he looked exactly like you, he took him... told him his wife was dead.."
"What?!" the doctor exclaimed. "Mrs. Weasley is doing wonderfully, and she has a beautiful baby boy. Looks just like her, 'cept for the flaming red hair. Must get that from the father-" he frowned.
"Someone impersonated you and deliberately misinformed Mr. Weasley of his wife's wellbeing," the blond wizard stood up and motioned for the doctor to follow him. "Hurry."
"Yes, this way.." the doctor said. They passed a room full of babies. Lucius paused suddenly, seeing a man in it. Identical to the doctor.. he burst into the room and quickly bound the man in spells. As he expected, he saw Weasley on the ground unconcious. Barely breathing. He stalked to the crib they were by. A baby boy, sleeping peacefully. Weasley's son. Malfoy could tell that it was neither his son, nor Potter. Unfortunately, that would've been too easy. But... it seemed that others were also looking for the reborn boys.
Why?