Chapter Thirty
A/N: No reviewers.
After all the terror is living under the Death Eaters' rule, wondering if her mother would come home from work each night or if the knock on the door was more sinister, there was nothing more Merida could say of her life in France than that it was dull. 'That is the price of safety, I suppose.' she often thought, although she tried to stop herself. The words only reminded her she had never wanted that safety in the first place.
Vevina did her best to try and make her cousin feel at home, as did her new husband, Anton, who had not turned out to be any sort of monster, but a kindly man who looked at Vevina as if an angel had fallen from the heavens each time she entered a room. But for all their efforts, Merida could not be cheered, not knowing that across the Channel, her friends and family could be hurt, captured. Even dead.
Since she had left Scotland, she had searched the skies for an owl every night, but none ever arrived. No news of the Golden Trio, trekking through the wilderness in search of salvation. No explanations of the horrifying headlines atop even the French newspapers. Not even a simple message of love or good wishes. Nothing.
Merida tried to keep herself from thinking why. It was too dangerous a road to go down, when she had no way of finding out the truth.
"Still no news?" Vevina asked, leaning against the doorframe and folding her arms over her waist. Merida's eyes remained fixed on the window as she shook her head.
"There's not going to be, I don't think." Merida conceded as she studied the darkness. "I just… I can't make myself stop looking, just in case. I know that probably sounds stupid, but…"
"It doesn't sound stupid at all." Vevina stated, moving closer. "I'd do the same if everyone I knew was hundreds of miles away. It's only natural, Meri."
"There's nothing natural about this." Merida bit back, her voice harsher than her cousin deserved. "There's a man with red eyes and the face of a snake going around killing children. It sounds more like something out of Grimm's fairytales."
"Did your mother read those to you when you were a girl?" Vevina asked. She had always been an expert of smoothly changing the subject, enough that Merida allowed herself not to notice the deliberate tactic.
"A few of them." she answered, her lips curling upwards in a wistful smile. She longed for the days when she had been young, when her biggest worry was whether the Sorting Hat would place her in Gryffindor. "She worried they were too frightening for a child, but I enjoyed them. It always felt a little more real to me that the stepsisters would get their comeuppance than go on living happily ever after. I wanted to believe that good would do well, but evil would get their due for what they'd done. I suppose that isn't real after all."
"You don't know that." Vevina pressed, though even she did not seem convinced. "Harry Potter's out there somewhere, fighting back. The Dark Lord hasn't beaten him yet."
"But they're kids, Vevi." Merida argued. It felt strange to speak that way of a hero, one who was still a year older than her. "The Death Eaters have been fighting for years, they know spells Hogwarts students wouldn't even have heard of. Maybe Harry's just been lucky."
Even as she spoke of the Death Eaters, their highly-trained regime and infinite knowledge of dark magic, she could not help but think of Draco. He was only a boy, just like Harry, and yet he would surely be put on the front lines as well. 'When did it come to this?' the girl wondered. 'The biggest war in the history of the Wizarding World, and it's being fought by children.'
"Vevi, I can't just sit here wondering." Merida whispered, her eyes beginning to sting as she turned back to the window. She knew that it was not what her cousin wanted to hear, but she heard no gasp of surprise, and she was thankful for that. "It's not right. My mother is out there, my friends, all fighting an enemy I want to defeat as much as anyone. Don't you think I should have the chance to do my bit?"
"This isn't a game, Merida." Vevina replied, and the younger girl flinched a little. It was only on very rare occasions her cousin would use her given name; it had become a code between them, for that very purpose, to convey that things were no longer a game. "You said it yourself, the Death Eaters are dangerous, and children don't know enough to beat them."
"I never said I could take down a group of Death Eaters in battle." Merida replied, the edges of her lips curling into a sympathetic smile. "I said I could do my bit. I've got advantages with the Death Eaters that others don't have. I can find a way to beat them."
Vevina opened her mouth, as if to ask what advantages she had, but she closed it again almost as quickly. Even having only witnessed the relationship through letters, the elder woman knew exactly what connection the redhead had with the Dark Lord's army.
"There's nothing I can do to stop you, is there?" the brunette sighed, smirking a little.
Merida shook her head. "No. So it'd probably be best to just send me on my way with your blessing?"
Vevina crossed the room, so quickly that Merida shifted back slightly in shock, and locked her cousin in a tight embrace. "You have my blessing wherever you go, as long as you come back."
"I will." Merida assured her, with a confidence she did not truly possess. But she could not bear to see the brunette's face fall once more, thinking that she had lost someone else to fight in Voldemort's war.
The younger girl moved straight to the fireplace, grasping the Floo powder tightly in her hand as if she thought Vevina might snatch it away. She smiled one final smile towards her cousin before she was gone.
Vevina was left alone in the silence, praying a silent prayer that her family would return home to her. Her silence was broken by the tap of a beak on a window; an owl, bearing a letter.
A/N: I didn't think it would be realistic, given how she's behaved so far, for Meri to sit back and let everyone else fight. So she's off to do her bit! Hope you enjoyed and please review!