Chapter Five
A/N: Thank you to kanna-yamamoto and HJP007 for reviewing the last chapter. I really appreciate it.
For just a month, Remus and Dora had had a near perfect life. The couple was finally together, their children were born and healthy and the war seemed to be at a stalemate. Everything seemed to be alright. For now.
It was the very beginning of May when everything began to go wrong. Things had been quiet for so long, far too long, like a bubble of opposition growing larger and larger until it would finally burst. And that time, unfortunately for Wizarding Britain, was to be now.
The pair had been sat together on the settee, Teddy on Remus' lap and Selena in Dora's, when a flash of blue light had floated through the window. Having spent a year teaching Defence Against the Dark Arts, the man did not need a second glance to see that the light was that of a Patronus charm.
The moment it appeared in the sitting room, the ethereal lynx opened its mouth and began to speak.
'Lightning has struck. The time is coming fast.'
For just a second, the pair sat in unmoving silence. Though they had, in truth, been expecting the coded message for a while, due to the pressure building as Voldemort and his Death Eaters prepared to take on Harry Potter, but they had not expected it to be so soon. Not when they had only just acquired what they had been waiting for.
When they finally moved, their gazes met instantly, the locking eyes both sharing one emotion. Fear. However, in Dora's eyes, there was another glint, a hint of determination, one which Remus knew full well the source of, and he would not tolerate it.
"Dora, don't even think about it!" the man exclaimed, a little loudly, causing the children to wake from their slumbers. "You are not going, so don't even try."
"Remus!" Dora responded, her voice laced with the tone of a petulant child. The use of such a tone may have been funny for Remus, had the situation not been as grave as this. "I'm an Auror. I have been fighting battles against Death Eaters for six years, and I am not about to give up and let you get away from me again!"
"What about Teddy and Selena?!" Remus cried, wincing slightly as the twins began to bawl, sensing the distress that their parents were in. "If we both die in this battle, who will be there for them when the smoke has cleared? Who will they have?"
"They'll have my mother, Harry, Molly and Arthur, the whole Order." the woman pointed out, listing them off on her fingers as she rocked Selena into quietness in her other arm.
"And if they fall, as well as us? Who then?" This question silenced the woman, whose hair was slowly darkening from its shade of pink, now becoming closer to crimson.
"Remus, these children are my world, our whole family is. But, no matter how dangerous it is, I am not allowing you to fight in this battle on your own. Either you don't go, or we go together. It's your choice."
Now, it was Remus who had been silenced. He truly could not think of a response to give to the ultimatum his wife had given him. He had to fight, he knew that much, as Harry needed all the help he could get, but he did not want Dora to fight alongside him. If he should die in the battle, he wanted to be certain that the children had one parent remaining to care for them. If she fought with him, the children could be left orphans. There was only one option he could afford to take.
"Alright. I won't go." the man told his wife, kissing her on the cheek as he did so, before they returned their attentions to the children, who were not a great deal happier, seeing that their parents had resolved their conflict.
The lie would not sting until that very night, when it would become a lie.
At around midnight, Dora awoke with a start, crying out into the darkness. She had experienced a terrible nightmare, one where Remus had fallen in the Battle of Hogwarts. 'It was only a dream.' she told herself, trying to slow her breathing a little. 'Remus is here with me, it isn't possible.'
Only when she turned did Dora realise she was wrong. The space on the bed beside her, the space where Remus had lain… was empty.
'No.' she thought, agonising pain filling her heart in an instant. 'No, he promised. He can't have gone!'
Leaping from her bed, Dora sprinted down the stairs, almost falling more than once as she attempted to get to her mother, who was sat on the sofa in the front room, watching the children, as she had done all night.
"Mum? Can you look after them for a bit longer, please? I'm going out." Dora asked, attempting to keep her voice level, so that her mother would not know where she was going. Unfortunately, the woman knew her better than she had anticipated, and could tell within an instant where she would go.
"Are you sure that he's there? Are you sure that it's worth it?" Andromeda asked, rubbing up and down the side of her daughter's arm in an attempt to comfort the woman, who had not noticed that she had been crying.
"Yeah. I know he's there, Mum, and I'm not letting him fight on his own." Seeing how convinced Dora was in what she was going to do, Andromeda knew that she could not be persuaded otherwise, and so did not attempt to do so. Instead, she walked out of the room for a moment, kissing the woman on the forehead as she left, giving her daughter a little time alone with her own children.
"Now, I know you are both so young, but I want you to know this. I love both of you so much, and I won't let anything happen to you. And even if anything happens to me, or to Daddy, which it won't, we will be here for you, always. I love you both." Tears in her eyes, Dora gave each of them a soft kiss on the forehead, before sweeping from the room, unable to stand staying any longer, as it was far too painful.
As the door shut behind the woman, in the silence of the house, two synchronised cries pierced the air, stopping instantaneously.
Later that night, the babies would cry again, and this time, they would not stop.
A/N: I know, depressing, but it had to happen, and the next depressing chapter will have to as well, although it won't be quite as bad as this one. Please review!