While the Years Passed By
Chapter Three: Auror Neville Longbottom
Late September, 2016
Somewhere on the Pontic Steppe
A motion from Terry Boot's hand sent Neville and his two remaining companions veering left, although his words were lost between the roar of the wind and noise of the horses. Not long afterwards he slowed down completely and pulled his wand to flatten and area of grass to reveal gleaming white chunks in the grass. Slowly Neville heaved himself out of the saddle and stretched before lifting his heavy furs to itch at the raw saddle-sores he was developing.
When they had first arrived in the Crimean Peninsula Neville had been both irritated to find out that their journey into the steppe would be on horseback and relief that the local winged horse, the Rüzgar Tayi, was flightless. The small steppe horses, unable to fly with a rider, still used their wings in a strange back and forth motion that allowed them to essentially glide slightly as they ran, taking weight of the horse and making it good for long distance travel, or to beat down long steppe grass and cross the great rivers that fed the sea to the south.
Any relief he'd felt at staying on the ground was lost when he realised that this new motion was chafing uncomfortably along the front of his thighs and cramping his legs. Only the third member of their party, Bill Weasley, seemed unaffected, although this was due to similar experience during a Cursebreaking expedition.
The site Terry had led them too was the largest loss of life that had occurred amongst his classmates since the Battle of Hogwarts. Almost two years earlier some of the last remaining Death Eater's testimonies had become public once the Auror Department, from the initial few remaining at the end of the war a number of others with more passive roles or older Death Eaters who had only fought in the First War were found. One of the pieces of information revealed had concluded that Antonin Dolohov and a cousin Bogdan had been responsible for tracking down Neville's parent for the Lestranges.
Although Bogdan Dolohov was not a marked Death Eater he had been involved in much of their activity and had also fought for Grindelwald decades earlier as one of a number of Wizards in the XV SS Corps, a group of Cossack who had fought for Hitler and, in Dolohov's case, as a liaison between Hitler and Grindelwald's forces. As an active Auror this was none of Neville's concern since he was forbidden from engaging in Blood Feuds, but for most Wizards these were considered as matters of the utmost important.
Last Autumn Anthony Goldstein had contacted Neville to let him know that Bogdan Dolohov and a third family member, Ivan, lived in the wild lands of the Pontic Steppes. Although only Bogdan had been involved in the Longbottom affair, both he and Ivan had fought in Grindelwald's war and were rumoured to be personally responsible for the murder and interment of much of the Goldstein family during the 1940s.
Neville had turned down Anthony's request for aid hoping to dissuade the Ravenclaw from pursuing the Feud, since the fall of the Tsar the Magic Folk amongst the Cossacks had been without any government and the steppes of Russia and the Ukraine had become anarchic and lawless drawing fugitives to join them with the promise of a life free from the law – if generally quite short and violent.
Rather than be dissuaded Anthony had attempted to continue the Feud with the assistance of Terry Boot, Michael Corner and Ernie MacMillan appealing to their long friendships and, in Terry's case, their shared faith and history. Terry had returned eight months later alone and unwilling to discuss the fate of his companions except to pass on his final requests and express the need to reclaim the remains of Ernie and Anthony. Anthony's let request was for any wand that had just cause to take up his blood feud against the Dolohov family.
After consulting with his grandmother Neville had retired from active service and sought out a second person who had cause for a feud but the Dolohov's had always been thorough and m=the few living people he could find were unwilling to face combat after the experiences of the last decades until he found Bill Weasley. A Prewitt on his mother's side, Bill's two maternal Uncles had been murdered by a group that included Antonin and Bogdan.
Sworn to the feud they had started by accompanying Terry back here, were a pile of splintered white bones, some marked and gnawed clean by wolves. These were the last remains of Anthony Goldstein, Michael Corner and Ernie Macmillan and the Lines of Longbottom and Prewitt were there to claim the remains and the feud.
Neville knelt to start recovering the bones before stopping and coughing awkwardly to attract Terry's attention.
"Em . . . how would he want to be, eh . . . disposed of Terry"
The young man hesitated.
"I'm not really sure, normally we try to bury the body quite soon but since this is all we have left." He paused.
"I'm actually non-practicing" he admitted uneasily, "I suppose we try and bring them all back too their families – although Anthony was the last of the British Goldsteins. They are related to the Scamander's somehow and there might be a branch in the American Federation."
Author's Note:
Apologies for the delay, work is a bit hectic during the summer holidays caus we're understaffed. And this is quite a short chapter, although on the plus side I've already planned out two short fics that serve as a prequel and sequel to this chapter, focusing on Anthony's failed mission and Neville, Bill and Terry's hunt for the Dolohovs.
Secondly there are a number of actual points I'd like to mention here, the first and most obvious being that I've made Terry Boot a non-practising Jew (to the best of my knowledge we know of no religious affiliation for him.
Also before anyone has a go at my geography I would point out that I only consider the original HP books canon and will repeatedly be using countries or border's with no 'muggle' or modern equivalent. My reasoning for this focuses on a few things. The longer lifespan of wizard (the times outlined in the guide to this fic explains that, which means that countries such a the US in say 1830 would still largely consist of magical people who may well predate it. Similarly if wizards regularly hit say 120, they would predate the Russian revolution. Also since the plot of my Salazar Slytherin fic focuses on how wizarding government should function I have developed my own system for how the link between mundane and magical government should work, which essentially consist of magical oaths or vows that ensure peace between the magical community and the muggle head of state. This would mean that a non-legitimate succession (from the perspective of the old regime) would create a political break between the magical and muggle governments.
For example (and I'm talking purely definition-wise here, not arguing whether or not there is a moral justification) at the time of the American Revolution any American fighting for the revolution is by definition a traitor (they're fighting against their legal sovereign in open rebellion). Now muggles have the ability to do that when their situation becomes unjustifiable and intolerable (French, US & Russian Revolutions) but wizards would be bound by oath to remain loyal to the Tsar or English and French Monarchs respectively.
Hence it seems relatively unlikely that states that have gone through abrupt changes in government will no longer correspond to the wizarding nations.