Fandom Fusion

Multi Fandom Flood-Relief Benefit

duck_or_rabbit — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 20:40:04 GMT

Self-explanatory.

My offering's here and here ♥.

If anyone who is a friend of fandomfusion would like to signal boost their own offering, train_lindz and I won't object to you posting here. Just spreading the word. Feelings about fandom-sponsored aid varies, we realize.

But since I'm here . . . Lindz, ought we do something productive with this place in 2011? Thoughts?

Anyone? Leave us a note in comments, if you're inclined to re-infuse your fandom spirit :). Or tell us to leave you alone. That goes in comments, too.

Original Writing and Art Event Relevant To Members

duck_or_rabbit — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 21:13:20 GMT

Click to join!

Hey, super groovy people, the writing community pulped_fictions is running a pretty neat-o event for original writing and art. Winterval will be festive from December 1 - March 7. Different writing and art categories in which you can participate in and contribute to will be ongoing during that time. Commitment? That's your call. Tailor the commitment to match the involvement level suitable for you.

The primary commitment is signing up. And that is really the biggest. Next is follow through, then it's something else, and then another thing after that - as I assured you, no biggy, right? I'm kidding. pulped_fictions is a joint that's open year round, and its stress dial is set on low. But not so low it can't ignite the fire in your belly. Winterval's writing and art events are styled for a participant to make independent, individual contributions, but the ethos of the event is teamwork! Sign-up by December 1st to be assigned to a team and together you and your teammates earn points to basically win winter. Doesn't everyone want a winter of their own? Unless you are in the Southern Hemisphere, in which case you settle for summer.

pulped_fictions is a closed community. This means you join-up to join-in. But if anyone is up to trusting me, take my word for it that it's a super groovy place to write and make visual art. See? It's for super groovy people like you.

The pulped_fictions mod may be willing to accept bribes if you ask to be on the Black Team. That's my team. Nothing says Winterval like Black. fandomfusion's co-mod train_lindz is on the Blue Team so if you want to win, avoid that Team.

zia_montrose — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 19:20:27 GMT

Part III
Title: Some Act of Glorious Heroism (conclusion)
Author: zia_montrose
Word Count: 3,369
Rating: PG-13 for some swearing and violence
Genre: Drama
Summary: (Missing Moment as outlined in Prisoner of Azkaban) [James] went after Snape and pulled him back, at great risk to his life... Snape glimpsed me, though, at the end of the tunnel.

Surprise, fellow Fusers! I'm posting the conclusion to the piece I wrote for the awesome Beware the Ides of March challenge--and thank you to those who requested more! It only took me six months, d'oh! Are there, by chance, awards being given out to the slowest fanfic writer? : D

Oh, and please note, that this is Part III. If you're looking for Parts I and II, they're here.

Hope to read more from you all soon...

Welcome to Poll-land

train_lindz — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 19:29:58 GMT

Awards for the Beware the Ides of March challenge are nearly ready, but in the mean time, here are many things for next time to ponder and click about:

View Poll: #1414958

Just like Caesar's rule...

train_lindz — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 15:28:31 GMT

fandomfusion's Beware the Ides of March Challenge has ended. Thank you to all of the participants for their stories and art!

Submissions
chococoffeekiss- Blessed Be The Ties That Bind
magentabear- Notes from Andromeda
duck_or_rabbit - Blackballed
gilpin25- A Grateful Mind
hrymfaxe- For Sacred Ideals
et_tu_lj - A Death Deferred
shimotsuki- Stumbling in the Dark
star54kar - A Mutual Tolerance
javidan- Revelations
francesca_blue - Reflection and Remorse
hereticalvision- Cicatrix and Sic Transit Gloria Mundi
scarletladyy- Alone With Death
zia_montrose - Prod The Knot and Some Act of Glorious Heroism
cuban_sombero - Rebuild All Your Ruins
train_lindz - Like Clockwork

Imaginative awards to come... Feel like nominating someone for something fun? Think javidan should be nominated for something like "Best Dumbledore Drawing on Black Paper"? or zia_montrose for the "Quickest Reviewer"? Let us know!

Still not finished? Feel free to add your story to the community once you have completed it!

duck_or_rabbit and I would like to ask all participants to add 'Character' to their entry headers. This will allow us to generate the masterlist with characters the creators feel are the main players.

Once again, thanks to all the participants, whether it be writer, artist or review, for making our first challenge a success!

AND A BIG THANK YOU TO hrymfaxe FOR HER WONDERFUL BANNER ART! Without it, you would have had to see duck_or_rabbit or I draw, and nobody wants to see that ;)

Blessed Be the Ties That Bind

chococoffeekiss — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 06:52:19 GMT

Title: Blessed Be the Ties that Bind
Author: chococoffeekiss
Genre: General, Humor, Angst
Characters: The Weasley Family
Ratings & warnings: PG for language, mischief, torture and death.
Word count: 4,964
Summary: Family is the only refuge from war.
Author's Note: HAHA! barely finished it in time...
Prompts: #2 Empire and
#55 I won’t give up that ghost
It’s sick the way these tongues are twisted
The good in us is all we know
There’s too much left to taste that’s bitter
‘E-Pro’, Beck

She smirked beneath the scarf that covered her nose and mouth, and pushed a stray, twisted strand of hair behind her ear. The girl took a silent step backwards, admiring her handiwork. It had been a few years since she had written in red on the ancient stone walls of the school—this time she would remember it. This time it was hers, unmistakably.

The paint dripped a bit, staining her hands like watery blood. It would wash easily from her skin, but it etched onto the stone, bubbling and hissing. Her weapon of choice was Muggle spray paint, charmed to be semi-permanent by an ex-professor-werewolf-fugitive with a pregnant wife who happened to be the niece of the woman who had tortured to insanity the parents of the young man standing lookout as Ginny vandalized the school.

Her laugh was quiet and dark—she had always had a fairly twisted sense of humor, and an appreciation for coincidence…or irony, whichever it happened to be.

One would have to be slightly disturbed, growing up with the people she grew up with. It was a form of adaptation, and a coping mechanism.

“I take it you’ve done this kind of thing before,” Neville muttered, grinning grimly as she crept back to stand next to him.

“Sort of.”

“Nice work, Weasley.”

“Thanks, Nev. Couldn’t have done it without you.”

She smiled again as the first rays of sunrise lit the Transfiguration corridor. McGonagall would appreciate the mural.

The paint gleamed wetly on the stone, outlining a scene done in a simplistic, medieval style that might have been born of the magic in the castle itself. A lion, a raven and a badger stood guard on one side of a king and queen with ginger hair and gilt crowns--they had ended up resembling her mother and father more than she had intended.

The royal pair treaded upon on a pale snake with cold, dead eyes--the sword of Gryffindor driven through its body and into the ground. Every few moments the serpent gave a sickening twitch; the throes of a painful death in a pool of blood. A wolf, a dog and a stag looked on in eager anticipation from the other side.

Weasley is Our King! she scrawled across the bottom of the painting, as an afterthought.

Nine hours later Amycus Carrow dragged Ginny, by a fistful of her long, fire-red mane, to the dais on the far end of the Great Hall, where Snape and the rest of the teachers were dining. McGonagall shot her a fleeting look of apology--her hands were tied.

Struggling away from him, Ginny climbed to her feet and spat in his face.

The Gryffindor table broke into rioutous cheers.

Her scream, and then her silence pierced through the murmurs and whispers of the students as the Death Eater shoved her roughly to the floor, casting the Cruciatus as if it were the only word he had ever learned. It almost broke her, but she kept her mouth shut--every ounce of pain would be compensated by the look on the so-called Headmaster’s face when he saw what she had scrawled in German over the door to Defense Against the Dark Arts.

Her brothers would be so proud, she thought, looking up at the clouds streaking across Enchanted Ceiling as she lay on the floor, and she laughed, brushing flames of hair from her eyes.

---

Ropes bound him—he tried to escape, tried running towards the disembodied voices of his friends, but the hold on his arm grew ever tighter until the edges of his vision started to darken and the flashes of light became someone else’s vision—nightmarish scenes spinning out like reels of film until it wrapped him, choked him, and he woke in a cold sweat.

Thoughts can leave deeper scarring than almost anything…

Like he had every night since they had escaped from the Death Eaters on Tottenham Court Road, Ron bolted from the floor, halfway to his feet before he realized he had been dreaming. He dropped back onto his blankets and pushed his hair from his forehead with the back of his wrist, feeling the slick white ropes of scar tissue that had once been pale, freckled skin. It was a talisman, a reminder of why, and oddly enough; it was on the same arm as the Dark Mark would be. The idea made him feel vaguely ill.

Hermione snored quietly, inches away—the noise was oddly comforting. He could see the crisscross mark from a Death Eater’s curse on her shoulders, bared by the slipping strap of her camisole. He wondered how badly it had hurt her, and if the pain he felt at seeing it compared.

Steady breathing on his other side meant Harry had finally made it downstairs. His glasses had slid down his nose and were mashed into his cheek. Ron had hooked a finger around the frames and gently pulled them from his friend’s face. The lightning bolt scar on his Harry’s forehead was another reminder of the war, another little neon sign that kept him from sleeping at night.

To think that he had once envied that scar made his stomach churn with guilt.

Ron was surrounded by whispering reminders of war—and not just in scars and battle wounds. It had been the tremble of his mother’s hands as she made dinner, the steel in his sister’s gaze as she stared out the window. It was in the dark circles beneath his father’s eyes, the hesitation in Bill’s voice and Charlie’s set jaw. The Gryffindor in him would never let him admit that he was frightened. Afraid of dying, yes, but terrified beyond even nightmares that he would lose them. Both of them, all of them, it wouldn’t matter.

He was losing Harry already—the poor sod was set on deciphering the jumbled mess Dumbledore had bequeathed them. Hermione, at least, would pull herself out of a book long enough to let him know what was going on. Solving puzzles was hardly Ron’s strong suit—he preferred to strategize, attack, and then win.

But what was winning, after all? There was not a clear winner in war, like in Quidditch or chess. The First War had been won and he knew the victors personally, though the term hardly seemed to apply. “Survivors” was a more apt title—they had been missing more than body parts, their scars went deeper than skin, and their trophies of war were self-blame and distrust.

Even as loosely as he dared interpret it, their victory was no victory.

The sick feeling in his stomach turned from nausea, to despair, to anger at the inevitable. The end was barreling toward them like a freight train and there was nothing he could do—and even if they won, even if just by the slightest margin, what would the price be? The Weasleys made up the vast majority of the Order of the Phoenix—the odds were greater now that if one was lost, it would be someone with freckles and ginger hair.

He would've taken their place, given the option to die in his family's stead, but Ron wasn't sure he would last that long.

---

The tiny sitting room in the flat above Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes was as full of people as it could be—a handful of Fred and George’s fellow Gryffindors were in attendance, and a few of the Order members they had invited. They’d had a new idea as they had stocked shelves the day before—the Weird Sisters had been blaring on the wireless, and both brothers had been hit with the concept almost simultaneously. It could be done, it needed to be done, and they were likely the only people in Wizarding Britain with the stones to suggest it.

“Hello, gentlemen—“

“And lady—“ George said, winking at Angelina, who sat at the table with a butterbeer, across from Lee Jordan. She winked back.

The twins faced the room with the experience of businessmen and the charm of conmen, making their spiel like they had practiced—a professional yet lighthearted attitude was the key to any sale.

“We have a proposition to make—“

“And Mum would absolutely kill us if she knew—“

“She really would,” their father added, looking up from digging through a box of transistors. Arthur had wholeheartedly supported the idea since the twins had told him the day before—it was a good step in the right direction, though not all of the Order approved of Arthur’s Muggle technology experiments. The support of others would be necessary to make the idea viable.

“But we’ve been planning a takeover of the empty frequencies on WWN, to stage our own news broadcast.”

The room fell silent and both young men imagined the sound of crickets in their head. George looked over at Fred, smirking. They counted silently counted down from ten.

Nine, eight, seven.

Kingsley Shacklebolt raised an eyebrow, the light above reflecting in circles on his scalp.

We should really invent something for that, Fred thought.

Six, five, four, three.

The second eyebrow joined the first and he tilted his chin up so that his earring now caught the light.

George absently rubbed where his own ear had once been.

Two, one.

“That’s mad,” Lupin finally said from the other side of the room, shaking his head. He stared at the floor for a moment, clearly contemplating the idea, then looked up at them. “But just mad enough to work.”

Of all of the Order members, they knew the professor would be the first to take their side.
Harebrained schemes seemed to be his specialty.

“Of course it’ll work,” Lee added, tinkering with a bundle of wires at the table. “We’ve planned it out completely.”

“Completely,” Fred and George said together. The boys decided it was time to push the idea. Fred straightened his collar—their usual signal to lay on the impassioned persuasion.

“But, you see, we need people that want to volunteer—”

“And whatever they want to volunteer—information, time, locations, their voices.”

“With Mad-Eye gone, we’ve got nobody to keep us on the up and up—with constant vigilance and all that.”

“And I don’t know about you, but we’re tired of being fed propaganda, and we’re going to change it.”

George cleared his throat. “It’s dangerous, sure, but we think it’ll be worth it. To improve morale.”

“You can’t win a war if you don’t want to.”

Their friends and comrades nodded enthusiastically, but it was their father who caught the twins’ eyes, sitting in his chair, looking as proud as he had ever been of them. Arthur nodded along with everyone else, but they could tell that smile on his face was more than the eagerness to change the world around them.

“So you all agree—this is a good idea, something you would be willing to support?”

A chorus of ‘ayes’ sounded in the small room.

“Are you…sure you want to get into this?” Kingsley asked, seriously. “If you’re caught, you're dead for sure.“

Both boys laughed heartily, and Fred wiped imaginary tears of mirth from his eyes.

"Mr Shacklebolt, I have some news for you…Weasleys don’t get caught.”

"Hence the name," George added, as an afterthought.

---

He sat in his empty flat with a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other. Mum would’ve killed him if she had seen the state of him, rumpled and sleepless with his glasses askew, half-drunk.

His brothers would’ve probably applauded.

Newspapers littered the floor—he hadn’t tidied up for almost a month. A stack of dirty dishes sat in the sink, porridge crusted to the spoons. Letters from his mother were locked in the desk drawer. She still took it upon herself to send one every few weeks. He never wrote back.
Afraid though he was of the people he worked for, he knew that he would’ve never let anyone else see her notes.

Your brother’s wedding was…interrupted by some of your co-workers. It was beautiful, though, while it lasted.

Your sister was punished for vandalism—her second week back at school and she’s already in trouble, can you believe it? I worry about her, without you there to keep an eye on her for me.

The twins are doing well with their business, though they get inspected weekly, which is a bother.

We miss you very much, Percy.

He almost couldn’t take it anymore. Sometimes the letters were blotched with tears.
They were risking their lives--it wasn’t safe to be behaving in such a way, he thought, not during times like these.

Percy had never believed in gambling and had certainly never taken a risk. It was rather shameful. He could have brought down their empire from the inside out—the Ministry, before it fell into the hands of You-Know-Who. He knew secrets that the Order of the Phoenix could have used, could have told them things that might have saved lives…

Too little, too late.

He hadn’t returned to work since the huge fiasco during Mary Cattermole’s trial. That had been weeks ago, he supposed he had used most of his vacation time, but he couldn’t bring himself to go back.

Being torn between going back to work and going home to his family, and being unable to do either left Percy sitting alone in his flat, getting drunk and waxing philosophical.

He had enough of the family’s inherent pride to keep him too arrogant to apologize to them, but not enough of their spirit of righteous indignation to keep him from joining their band of kamikazes. Fighting against You-Know-Who was suicide, but they seemed more than willing to die for their cause…whereas Percy would never have dared to die for anyone’s cause.

Facing the fact that he was a coward was almost as bad as was going home at Christmas last year and facing his family. They had never truly abandoned him, and they never would, and he was sure they would fling as many spoonfuls of mashed turnips as was needed to make him realize that he was still part of the family.

The Weasleys never threw food at strangers; it was an honor reserved for those they knew best.

Percy knew he didn’t deserve to be a Gryffindor, and he most certainly didn’t deserve the right to call himself a Weasley. It had taken him too long to realize that the name was a privilege, not a hindrance.

---

Charlie was terrified of needles. He supposed it was the reason he liked tattoos so much.

It seemed stupid for someone who worked with huge, dangerous animals for a living to be scared of something so non-lethal. Tattoos didn’t hurt much, not compared with being burned—it was the idea of being poked with a needle that bothered him. Needles were small and sharp, like daggers.

“Ow nice to see you again, Charlie. I ‘ave been expecting you.” The owner, a woman behind the desk welcomed him in, waving him over to a chair. “Vat are you vanting today?”

He fished a scrap of parchment out of his pocket and handed it to her, then sat down, peeling his shirt off over his head. She flattened the crumpled paper out on the table next to the chair.

“Ooh, nice. Here, you teenk?” She tapped his chest, left of his sternum and just below his collarbone.

“Sounds good to me.”

Bill had gone with him to get his first—a wide band of black tribal flames around his right bicep. There was a cross of St. Florian tattooed between his shoulderblades—his own idea. A curvaceous, dark-haired girl, scantily clad in a feathered firebird costume stretched from below his left arm to his hip—Fred and George had suggested her, and named her Ilsa, after one of their customers.

They had never told him that Ilsa was an old hag with a fondness for explosives; he’d had to figure that one out on his own.

Charlie had received a letter from Ginny by owl a few weeks earlier, which she signed with a gothic-looking black ink monogram. Out of all of the Weasleys, they were the two who would spend hours doodling; her infrequent letters were often adorned with sketches. With this letter, she had included a still photograph of a “painting” she had done in the Transfiguration corridor. He was impressed, but hastily wrote back that she should take care not to push the envelope too far with Snape in charge. By the time she had received his letter, hidden in a box of cookies from home, it was too late; she had already tried to break into the Headmaster’s office for some ungodly reason.

“So, zees are your girlfriend’s initials, no?” The tattoo artist asked, teasingly, as she outlined the art and began filling it in with black ink. The witch reminded him of a Romanian version of Tonks, though less frightening. He doubted that this woman would chase him across the Quidditch pitch while he was half-dressed, trying to transfigure his shorts into yellow and black lacy knickers. To hear Remus tell it, she was even more terrifying while pregnant.

Charlie would take dragons any day of the week.

Nevertheless, there were some similarities—the girl wore her hair in blue and purple dreadlocks and her lower lip was pierced. Her tight-fitting black t-shirt was emblazoned with the logo of a vampire band, and she had a swirl of stars inked up the inside of her wrist, to her elbow. Her eyes were a warm brown, though, like Ginny’s and his mum’s.

The pang of homesickness he felt hurt considerably more than the needle, but he smiled.

“Nah, it’s my little sister’s initials.”

“Your sister?” She inked the final stroke of the ‘W,’ nodding. “May I ask why you do zees?”

It took him several seconds to come up with an explanation that was sufficiently succinct.

“Because…I may never see her again. Or the rest of my family, for that matter.”

A full minute went by before the tattoo artist responded. “Zat is a very good reason.”

“I thought so.”

She wiped the tattoo down with a potion and dried it, then turned his chair to face the mirror. “All done.”

"Nice work."

Three gothic letters laced in and out of each other, in the hollow of his shoulder. It wasn't as large or detailed as his others, but it meant the most to him.

He pulled his shirt back on, and pulled twenty Galleons out of his pocket—the running rate for a simple black and white tat, plus a hefty tip.

“No,” she said closing his hands around the money. “It ees free for you, Charles Veasley.” The girl caught his chin and kissed his cheek.

He flushed pink to his ears and kissed her on the cheek as well--it was a local custom, after all--and turned to leave, but the girl stopped him.

“Ven you see your family next, give them my love, yes?"

He nodded, surreptitously dropping the twenty Galleons in a magazine bin near the door.

"Ven, Charlie," she added, as an afterthought. "Not eef.”

“When,” he repeated, smiling as he left. “Not if.”

---

Shell Cottage was quiet and cozy in the midst of the late autumn storm.

Bill sat in the armchair by the fire, his feet propped up on the ottoman as he flipped lazily through a Muggle newspaper. Fleur sat just a few inches away, curled into the other chair, reading Racine.

The wireless was playing—the first broadcast of Potterwatch, featuring the twins, Lee Jordan, and Kingsley had just ended and now a Celestina Warbeck song warbled through the speaker.

Fleur’s lips twitched as she read—she glanced over at him, and he grinned at her. She rolled her eyes.

Tonks snickered from across the room—she had been quiet for most of the evening, but now she smirked, arms crossed over her only-just-noticeably pregnant belly. She sat on the floor, working a jigsaw puzzle of dragons that Charlie had sent months ago, leaning back against her husband’s legs.

Fleur snorted loudly, then blushed, hiding behind her book when Tonks started lip-synching the lyrics dramatically, putting a hand to her chest and closing her eyes. Her hair turned into a black bouffant and she batted her lashes, looking oddly like the Singing Sorceress. Bill sputtered into his tea and Fleur giggled again.

Remus looked at her over his own book, raising an eyebrow. “What are you all on about?”

“A Cauldron Full of Hot, Strong Love,” Tonks managed, quickly resuming her typical appearance and laughing into her mug of cider. The song picked up, progressing into the banshee and harpsichord solo. Fleur jumped from her seat, dancing across the room, and pulled Tonks to her feet. They linked arms and whirled in circles, shaking their hips and throwing in the occasional disco move, scattering puzzle pieces across the floor.

Remus regarded his wife with mock-mortification. “Dear Merlin, must we?”

Both women rolled their eyes at him synchronously, and started singing the words in earnest—neither of them were very good at all.

“That’s it!” Bill rolled up his newspaper and playfully swatted at the back of Fleur’s legs with it. “I’m changing the station!”

“Aww, come on!”

“Oh, Beel, we're only having fun!”

He tapped the wireless with his wand and it switched to a classic rock song—picked up from the local Muggle radio station.

“Oh, I know this one! I put a spell on you,” Bill crooned into the rolled-up newspaper like it was microphone, gesturing grandly. “Because you’re miiiiiine!”

"You'd better stop the things that you do," Remus joined in from behind his book, singing hoarsely. "I said watch out, I ain't lyin'!"

The girls burst into laughter again and Fleur dropped onto the sofa, shaking her beautiful blonde hair out of her face. Tonks spilled her cider on the rug, frantically trying to clean it up while cackling madly, and made it worse, spreading the spill. Fleur’s cleaning spell missed and the fringe of the rug start to smolder. Remus was laughing with his hands over his face, shoulders shaking.

"Oh, god, I'm sorry, Bill...you can come live with us if Nymphadora burns your house down."

“Oh, bollocks…” Tonks started to cry, tears streaming down her cheeks though she still shrieked with giggles, attempting to stomp out the smoke. "Shut your face, Lupin, I'll have you know that I've never burned anything down that wasn't on purpose!"

In all honesty, Bill hadn't truly felt at home in Shell Cottage until that moment, with his adopted family, laughing like mad and catching the carpet on fire. It was a Weasley moment.

He couldn’t imagine being from such a small clan, like Tonks, who only had her mum for now, since her father had gone into hiding, being Muggleborn. He definitely couldn’t imagine being completely alone in the world like Remus once was, having lost all the people he cared about one by one. Both of them smiled, and were genuinely happy—Bill knew for a fact it was the kind of happiness that only comes from being part of a family like his own, and that even in the middle of a war a family could find something to laugh about. If everyone knew what that felt like, then there probably wouldn’t be war at all.

A sudden knock on the door brought an immediate stop to the levity, and drawing his wand, the eldest Weasley slowly opened the door. Ron was standing on the front step, soaked to the skin, red-eyed and shivering.

Bill was shocked by his sudden appearance, and forgetting security procedures, grabbed him by the shoulders. No potion in the world could have imitated his expression, it was the same look of fear he’d seen only once on the boy’s face, during the last task of Triwizard Cup. Fleur gasped, and both Tonks and Remus drew their wands and were at the door before he could stop them.

"Bill--" he started, looking over his brother's shoulder at the ex-Auror and former Professor. "It's me, I promise--"

“No, everyone—it’s alright, it’s Ron, I know…” Bill pulled him in the house, holding him steady. “What happened?”

“Everything’s f-fine…we’re all okay, I—” his youngest brother looked down, fighting tears and gasping for breath. His Weasley-red hair was dark with rain, drippin down his nose. “I just c-can’t go it anymore.”

“That’s…that’s okay, Ron." He wrapped him in a hug--the boy was skin and bones, and looking for all the world as if he'd just murdered someone. "Fleur, get a blanket, please. It’s okay, man, calm down and tell me what happened.”

"No, I've let them down! Harry and 'Mione..." He shivered uncontrollably as he wiped his face on the sleeve of his soggy maroon jumper. "I couldn't find them after I left...it's so fuckin' cold out there..."

"Hey, it's alright, Ron. Everything's going to be okay."

---

Molly had never told her children that she had been Captain of the Dueling Club at Hogwarts, during her school years. Girls had only just been allowed to join--it was where she had met Arthur, and had quite literally knocked him off his feet with a Body-Bind Curse the first night of practice.

They had been together ever since, building their tiny empire, king and queen of a family who made up, in spirit and kindness and honesty, what they lacked in gold, jewels, and fancy names.

She sat in her favorite chair, knitting furiously without magic. Little Teddy Lupin would need socks for when autumn rolled around again, and so she had a ball of soft, thin, defiantly turquoise yarn on the floor, working it into a tiny stocking with the four sharp needles in her hands. The thread ravelled out quickly, much like her life had, daring to be cut by abhorred shears.

Her husband sat in the chair opposite her, staring into his tea as if waiting for a sign. His newspaper was folded across his knee--he hadn't read it. It was all obituaries.

She added a stripe of pink and gray to the sock, as an afterthought.

Molly Weasley had never told her children many things. She never told Bill that his long hair made him look exceptionally handsome, all propriety aside. Charlie still didn't know that she had forgiven him for that first tattoo at seventeen. She never told Percy that as proud of him as she was, she thought he took life much too seriously for such a young man.

She had certainly never told the twins that they were an accident, albeit the best accident she had ever had, nor had she informed them as to why she hadn't named them after their uncles properly. She had been too afraid that she would lose them, as well.

They had learned that from a stranger, and she regretted it.

Molly dropped her knitting onto the arm of the chair and went to the door into the next room, opening it just far enough to see in. All of her children, save one, were in the room.

Bill and Percy sat facing each other at the table, the chessboard between them long abandoned. The older brother grasped the younger's hand, both talking in low voices. Percy took off his glasses and wiped his eyes.

Ginny sat in Charlie's lap, still wearing the black dress she hated so much, and had worn so often in the past week. She had fallen asleep crying into Charlie's shoulder. He stared out the window, smoothing her hair, the very image of stoicism, though she knew he had gone out drinking with Bill and Percy the night before. Molly wouldn't deny them that right, they were men, after all, and it was how men coped.

Harry, Ron and Hermione were all fast asleep on the sofa--out so soundly it took all but a marching band to wake them, and had been asleep more than awake for days on end. She woke them for mealtimes and funerals.

George sat on the floor near the wireless, his arms around his knees, eyes closed and absently mouthing the lyrics to the Weird Sisters song playing almost inaudibly in the background. The night after the war ended, he had gone to the shop, got every firecracker in the building and handed them out free of charge in the streets of Diagon Alley, and he hadn't gone back since.

It had taken an incredible amount of courage for George to do even that, and she was as proud of him as she ever could have been.

She breathed a sigh of pained, guilty relief and walked out to the front steps, Vanishing the flowers from the door. From the pocket of her apron, she pulled a scarf she had finished only hours before. In her haste she had knitted a yellow F onto bright blue wool, instead of G.

The fringe fluttered on the wind as she made her way down to the orchard, where the children usually played Quidditch. A low white tombstone marked the spot, bearing her son's name. Grass and flowers had already overtaken the bare dirt, with the help of magic. It made it seem more surreal, but somehow more acceptable.

Their family had made it through by a thread, by the invisible bond that held them together--it kept them from giving up.

She picked a rock up from nearby and neatly folded the scarf, placing the stone atop it to weight it down. She pulled a strand of yarn from the fringe and worked it through her plain brown shawl, tying the ends.

---

Notes from Andromeda

magentabear — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 06:37:22 GMT

Title: Notes from Andromeda
Author: magentabear
Rating: PG-13ish?
Warnings: none
Word Count: 4000
Prompts:
22. "Pity your sister- as a final kindness./When he has granted it, I shall repay/my debt, and with full interest, by my death." (Virgil, The Aeneid, Book 4, lines 599-601)
47. "Now it’s your time and you know where you stand/With a gun in your hand, with a gun in your hand/Now I’m no longer an ordinary man" (‘Be Somebody’, Kings of Leon)
Summary: How three letters taught Sirius Black the meaning of betrayal.
Author’s Notes: Well this is cutting it close with the deadline, no? heh. Thanks so much to the mods for the lovely prompts!

-

For all their faults, despite everything they did to hurt those already hurting and despite all the hate they poured into his childhood, Sirius loved his parents until the day they told him he didn't deserve to be a Black. He was too young, just returned from a year at Hogwarts, when his father called him into the study and his mother closed the door with a small click.

"You need to stop talking about Gryffindor," she said softly. Mother always spoke softly when she was trying to control her temper.

"It's not appropriate," his father said.

The room felt like a funeral. Sirius squirmed.

"We're still not certain what you did to end up there—"

"—can't imagine what you must have said to the Hat—"

"—but it's not something we'll allow into our home."

"I didn't say anything, I already told you that," Sirius said. He mimicked Mother's softness.

"You said something to the Hat, boy, don't get smart with me."

"I didn't."

His father laid a hand on his mother's trembling shoulders and narrowed his eyes at his son. "Don't upset your mother. She hasn't had her potion yet."

She leaned into his touch. "I'm fine, dear. Don't fret over me."

It always boggled Sirius how loving they were to one another. Years later he would wonder if it was all an act, nothing more than a firm dedication to their roles, but as a child he was certain they loved each other dearly. It made the disdain they clearly felt for him all the more obvious.

"I'm a Gryffindor, Mother. There's nothing I can do about it, Father. I've done nothing to dishonor the family."

He said the words dully. He'd said them so many times—written them so many times in response to so many furious letters—that he didn't even bother trying to put any force behind the words. It would all get lost somewhere between his mouth and their ears anyway.

Mother stared at him, sizing up the scrawny boy already developing the face of a man. An ugly look came over her. "Blacks don't belong in Gryffindor. You may not share a dormitory with halfbloods—with mudbloods—and expect me to welcome you home again."

"This is where I live," he yelled, furious suddenly, something finally cracking in the coldness he always wrapped around himself during these conversations. "I'm in Gryffindor and you are my parents and my name is Sirius Black."

"No," she said evenly. Mother drew herself up even straighter and met his eye squarely. "No, I don't think it is. You don't deserve our name. You are welcomed to change it when you're of age."

Sirius turned away from her eyes to look at his father. It wasn't real until he nodded. His nod ruled the Blacks. It was the only thing that ruled his mother's anger.

He nodded.

Sirius swallowed hard. He swallowed hard and dug his fingernails into his palms so sharply he broke skin. Mother really must not care, he thought distantly, to let them reach this length.

"You could have been somebody," his father said. "You could have been a Black."

Sirius slammed every door between the study and his room. He dripped blood on the floor and he cursed under his breath and he never, ever let them see him cry. He no longer considered them his parents, not for a moment after that conversation did he ever consider himself their son. But he still played the part. He practiced their manners. He was silent when his mother's headaches flared up. He dressed nicely for company and asked polite questions when she gave him the signal. To every pureblood but himself and his parents he was still Sirius Black, eldest son of Orion and Walburga Black, and decent one at that even if he had ended up in Gryffindor.

It was all an act. It was fake and disloyal. It was a quiet, personal, horribly intense betrayal of the parents who had raised him. And he did it every summer. Every holiday was a practice in betrayal. When Sirius closed his bedroom doors (and he never slammed them anymore for what was the point when the house no longer mattered?) he decorated the walls with red and gold and wrote long letters to his friends detailing his masterful plans of escape. One of them involved a thestral, leading Peter to ask if he'd ever seen someone die, leading to Sirius asking them if House Elves counted, leading to a very horrified Remus spending hours in the library and making Peter promise not to ask the obvious question.

The more he betrayed his parents, the more he became a shell for them, the wilder his escape plans became. It was only a matter of time, he told himself, before he would show them his betrayal. He would run away and that would show them. It was only a matter of time.

Andromeda beat him to it.

Sirius hadn't been especially concerned when Aunt Druella showed up at the House of Black clutching a piece of parchment, a broken wand and a hysterical Bellatrix. But he listened at the door anyway. What else was he to do? It was a holiday and without anyone demanding that he play the role of perfect Black son and with Remus taking far too long with that research, he had some free time. Not like he was planning to do his homework. He pressed himself to the wall and concentrated on breathing silently.

"She's gone," Bella was saying. "She took her clothes and she left."

"Stop saying that, child. We're all aware of the problem here," Aunt Druella said coolly. She was like ice, his aunt.

"My apologies, Mother," Bella cooed. Sirius shook his head, impressed despite himself at Bella's ability to act so submissive. He knew from bitter, bitter experience that she was anything but submissive—unless she was trying to get information. He leaned closer. This was about to get interesting.

He knew he was right when the voices got softer, more secretive. Snatches of conversation floated to him, nothing making sense until he heard the words "ran away" and "marrying some mudblood" in connection with cousin Andromeda. A jolt ran through him and he abandoned his post immediately. He ran (always silently, oh so silently in this house that didn't want him) to his room and wrote a letter to Andromeda. He dashed it out quickly and nearly pushed the bird out the window, annoying it with frantic urges to hurry hurry hurry. He had to send it before the family birds knew not to deliver to Andromeda. When the Blacks cut somebody off, he knew without needing to ask, they did it thoroughly.

He wasn't surprised when the owl returned without a letter. He was surprised it returned without a hex. Andromeda had a quick wand and quicker temper, and no way of knowing he wasn't sending a collection of foul insults.

Weeks later, on his first morning back at Hogwarts, a school owl dropped a heavy parchment in his eggs and flapped his wings in Sirius's face until he surrendered his bacon. He mourned this loss much less when he realized the letter was from Andromeda.

It as a long letter, far longer than any conversations they'd ever had. He read it hungrily, angry, desperately. And when he was done, when he had devoured every word, only one sentence echoed in his thoughts. I don't miss them.

She didn't miss them.

He wouldn't miss them, either.

I don't miss them.

"You okay there, mate?" Peter asked from across the table. "You look a bit splotchy."

James walloped him on the back of the head. "We're being respectfully quiet," he hissed too loudly. "Learn to read a situation."

Remus choked back a nervous laugh.

Sirius shoved the letter into his bookbag and grinned widely at his friends. Remus only looked more nervous.

"I'm not going back home," he told them. "Just thought we should be clear on that."

"It's only the first day of term," Peter said when the silence got too loud. "Why would you go back?"

James looked at Sirius with a fierce sort of understanding, the kind that can only happen when you're too young and too old at the same time and then suddenly you aren't a child anymore. "I don't think that's what he means, Peter," he said with an almost hidden grin. He was still looking at Sirius.

Sirius stabbed his fork into his toast and waved it in a ridiculous little flourish, all the time smiling like a loon at the three of them.

Remus, his expression shifting to match James', plucked the fork from his hands. "Say it properly," he ordered. "Say it so it matters."

"I am never," Sirius said slowly, savoring each word, "I am never going back to the House of Black ever again. I'm never seeing any of them ever again. Never," he added for good measure.

They gave him a standing ovation and three days later James gave him a note from his mother inviting Sirius to stay with them during holidays.

James' parents greeted him with hugs at the Hogwarts station. Sirius leaned into them gratefully, too pleased to see parents smiling at him to care that his friends were watching. Mrs. Potter ruffled his hair and told him it would be a wonderful Christmas and for the first time in years Sirius agreed.

They went to Diagon Alley to find James' dad a Christmas gift (Sirius had convinced them to go all the way to Diagon Alley; it had to be perfect, just </i>perfect</i>, he'd insisted until they agreed) and instead found Narcissa.

"I'm going to speak with her," James' mum announced.

Both boys loudly and frantically insisted this was unnecessary. She ignored them.

"What is wrong with your mother?" Sirius demanded. The demand lost a fair bit of force by his twitchy appearances and rush to duck behind a pillar. "I can't watch," he moaned. "What's happening?"

James just looked uneasy.

"Are they talking? What are they saying? Does she look angry? Narcissa never looks angry. How does your mother know who Narcissa is anyway? What's going on?"

"Will you shut up," he hissed. "Christ, you're annoying. I don't know what's going on, okay? Now get up. You look a right idiot."

Sirius glared up at him from his crouched position. "At least my hair is combed."

James kicked him.

"No fighting, boys," his mum said cheerfully. "Sirius, what are you doing on the floor? It must be filthy."

He bounded up. "What did you say to her? Why? What did she say?"

"Very little," she sighed. "They're quite angry with you, dear."

"Not helping, Mum."

"There's no point in lying, is there? Now, Sirius, I want to tell you something." She straightened her glasses and fixed her very strongest look on him. "You need to know she will always be your cousin. You've left them and they gave you good reason to, but they're your family and you can't change that."

Sirius shook his head.

"Wow, Mum. That's even less helpful."

"You should pity them, Sirius," she continued. "You should pity them for not understanding what you and Andromeda do."

He shook his head again, stronger this time.

"Do you hear yourself, Mum?"

"James, sweetie, be quiet for a moment. This is important. Sirius, your family is narrow-minded and confused and wrong. The kind thing to do is to pity them."

"Inbred dimwits," he muttered. "They aren't my family."

"They made you who you are, Sirius. You'll always owe them that."

"I owe them nothing."

"Maybe a swift kick in the—"

"James."

"Sorry, Mum."

"I don't owe them anything and I don't pity them." He stormed off. James gave him mum a final glare and then followed.

"Andromeda doesn't pity them," Sirius said when James caught up. Doesn't miss them either, he added to himself.

"Of course she doesn't," James agreed loyally. "Don't mind my mother. She doesn't understand."

But Sirius couldn't stop thinking about it. They bought the gift quickly, none of them in the mood to be out any longer, and hurried home. Sirius shut himself in the room they'd given him and wrote a letter to Andromeda.

The entire Potter family heaved a sigh of relief when it was returned. An anxious Sirius was an aggravating Sirius.

James watched him read it.

"She agrees," Sirius said, utterly shocked. He reread it. "She agrees with your mother." He read it again. "She pities them."

"Guess she's kinder than you, then."

Sirius threw a quill at him.

"Ow. That's pointy. Christ, mate, she is kinder."

He crumpled up the letter and threw it away. "I'm finished with this. I can't look at it. C'mon. I'm thinking we need a pre-dinner snack, yes?"

"Fine, just let me get my wand and perform a healing charm you daft idiot. Who throws a quill? Honestly."

"Weakling. I'm eating the good biscuits." And he left.

Sirius found the note at the bottom of his bag when returned to Hogwarts. Say what you want about James, he was a good friend. Sirius reread it once more before hiding it with Andromeda's earlier, and much longer, letter. "But I still don't owe them anything," he muttered. "Pity's as far as I'll go."

Peter walked into the dormitory. "Hello, Pads. Talking to yourself again?"

"Not my fault no one else appreciates the charm."

"Certainly," he agreed easily. "Good holidays? How are the Potters?"

"You know. Same as ever."

"Can I ask you something?" His pudgy face took on a somber expression. Sirius scowled on instinct but Peter preserved. "Did they ask you about you leaving? About why you couldn't go home?"

"Does it matter?"

"Of course. You didn't have to tell your parents. About the leaving, I mean. They already knew you were a lost cause so you could have just faked it a bit longer. You didn't have to go to the Potter's."

"Lost cause?"

Peter blushed. "You know what I mean. You could have gone home again, or just said you wanted to visit James and saved yourself all those Howlers from Bella. You could have lied. You lie all the time, I don't know why you couldn't just lie. It would have been easier."

"No," he said flatly. "I'm done lying."

"So you left them?"

"I believe you were there."

He blushed again. "So… you betrayed them."

"When did I become the bad guy here? Have you met my mother?"

"You're—no. That's not what I'm saying."

"What, exactly, are you saying then?"

"Just… just trying to understand. They're your family. You were angry at Andromeda for leaving you and you acted out. I don't think you meant it, really. No one betrays trust like that."

Sirius stared at him. Peter didn't squirm. There were times when he wondered how Peter had ever ended up in Gryffindor. He was a rat for God's sake. He trembled at shadows and oddly shaped tree branches. But then every once in awhile this sort of thing would occur and this—this flash of hardness—would come over the boy and make Sirius think. It made him think so hard he forgot that he should be furious, should be changing into Padfoot so he could eat this stupid rat of a friend who said he betrayed his family when clearly they betrayed him.

But it wasn't his fault, Peter. He didn't know. He couldn't understand what it felt like, lying so completely like that. Peter's family was ordinary. Peter was ordinary. Ordinary people don't betray anyone and there's certainly no reason for others to betray them. They're far too… well, ordinary.

"Don't try to understand, mate," Sirius advised. "You'll give yourself a headache."

"Sirius—"

"No, we're done," he said harshly, patience gone. "That's it. Andromeda did what she had to do. I did what I had to do. That's it. Now shut up."

Later he would remember this conversation and throw things across the room. He would remember this conversation and remember the way Peter nodded so decisively and he would charge out of the room and hunt him down and then—and then he would go Azkaban.

But first Peter had to betray them.

It took Sirius years to piece together the events that led that night. He and Remus stayed up all night once, just passing a bottle of firewhiskey between them and trying to figure out when Peter switched. Remus was adamant that it wasn't until after Hogwarts but Sirius was equally adamant that it before.

"You don't understand, Moony," he said raggedly. "You didn't see the way he talked about me leaving. Little bugger was fascinated."

"But how could none of us notice? One of us would have noticed the change. You don't just—you can't just start spying and have no one notice."

"He was a forgettable guy, our little rat. And anyway, isn't that the point of spying? The not noticing?"

Remus shook his head slowly in the way only drunk people can. "One of us would have noticed."

A piercing shriek startled them. Sirius drank faster.

"Your mother—I only met her once but she wasn't… I don't remember the yelling. She didn't even send Howlers, not even after you left."

All her life (well, the part he was present for and he takes a firm pleasure in knowing that part was small) Sirius's mother had complained of headaches. His earliest memory was a silencing sell descending on him suddenly while he played with his train set. Mummy, he'd tried to wail, but she just lectured him about the virtues of quiet and the necessity of her poor head having a place to rest.

There wasn't a time Sirius didn't hate her headaches. Even as a child he'd suspected they were fake, something she used to frighten the children into quiet submission. It was a brilliant tactic, if one can be objective about such things, because even if he suspected they were fake how could he be sure? And what son would ever risk hurting his poor mother's head?

Sirius growled, the dog so much closer to him after the years in Azkaban, as he remembered the lectures, remembered the headache potions she made him memorize and the writing lessons she made him do over and over again until he'd learned how to do form his letters in silence. Mother didn't abide with the sound of quill scratching on parchment. Said it wormed into her ears and made her poor head ache.

"I always knew she was faking the headaches," Sirius muttered to Remus. "Knew it. And the cow knows she can't fake it anymore, not when she's DEAD." He yelled that last word, willing it to travel all the way to mother dearest. Remus winced and pointed out that such noises do affect those who can still feel their heads.

"Or maybe it does hurt her," Sirius said, ignoring him completely. "Maybe it hurts her but she's so upset she can't help it. Maybe her canvas head feels like someone's crumpled it up and stepped on it and then torn it up. Do you think?"

"You did hurt her."

"I did." He grinned. "A celebratory drink, old friend?"

"Don't mind if I do."

It wasn't much longer before they finished the bottle.

Remus was looking dodgy the next morning, and not just from the effects of a strong hangover on a sickly werewolf.

"Spit it out already," Sirius ordered. "How else will we pass the time?"

"Oh, fine. You are aware of my, of Tonks and I, well—"

"Sneaking off to go at it like rabbits? Yes, I'm aware."

"Right. That's not what is occurring but I'll not have this conversation again. Her mother would like me to give you this." He left an envelope on the table and walked out.

"Coward," Sirius muttered at the door. The desire to feel James hovering over him was almost overwhelming but he batted it away and opened the letter.

He was pacing when Remus returned.

"Well?"

"I still can't believe you and Tonks are—well, you and Tonks."

"That's hardly relevant and only slightly true."

Sirius laughed, a clipped sort of sound. "And I can't believe you told Andromeda I was here."

"It seemed the right thing to do. What does the letter say?"

"Warns me to watch out for Bella. Apparently she's gone quite round the bend. Even more than last time. Tells me she's sorry about hating me for so long."

"Always a fun apology to hear, isn't it?"

"Yeah, right up there with playing Quidditch. Love it."

Remus watched him pace.

"She won't visit, though, will she?" Sirius asked, only slightly pathetically.

"She won't enter the House of Black, you know that."

Sirius fought the rage that always bubbled when he thought too hard about this house. It was here in this kitchen that Regulus beheaded a House Elf on Mother's orders. It was three rooms away that they disowned him. It was at the front staircase that Father gave him robes with the Crest of Black on them and it was at the top of them, just before their bedroom, that Mother snatched them away a few years later.

"She hasn't spoken to them since she left. Not any of them," Sirius said. "But she still calls Bella her sister. See, look, she says 'my sisters are even worse than before.' My sisters."

Remus took the letter. Sirius watched him read it, knowing exactly which part he was at by the expressions that flitted across his features. The grin was for the part about Tonks and the brief laughter was for references to childhood games. The rest of the time he was angry and conflicted, eyes streaking quickly across the page and eyebrows coming closer together. He finished and looked up at the still pacing Sirius. "She can't really believe that, can she?"

"That they'll be happy when she dies? Of course she does. And they will be. Trust me, they think we owe it to them to just die already. Finish what we started and all that."

Remus sighed heavily. "Tea?"

Sirius finally stopped circling the kitchen to flop into a chair.

He drank the offered tea and looked at the walls that hated him. It was a familiar, almost comforting sort of hate. It felt like home. He drank his tea and thought about his childhood and wondered about Regulus and considered Andromeda and remembered the handful of family dinners when smiles weren't forced.

Remus finished his tea and ducked out. Sirius continued staring at the walls.

Betrayal was a tricky thing. He'd thought it was an event, something with a start and an end. He'd thought he could run away and be a new man, or kill Peter and save Harry. He knew better than that, though. For all his struggles he was still saddled with a name he hated and James was still dead—and that's how it would remain. He would always be the son who ran away, the man who gave information to the spy who killed his friend, the innocent who went to Azkaban. He would always be trapped by his history.

Betrayal wasn't an event. It wasn't the decision to walk out and it wasn't the stunned shock when a friend suddenly became an enemy. It could never be contained in a conversation or a letter or a summer holiday.

Betrayal was a lifestyle.

It was his lifestyle.

Sirius sat in the house he never left and remembered the friends he couldn't save and the friend it turned out he didn't have, and with a grin that didn't reach his eyes he raised his cup of tepid tea to toast the walls that closed in around him.

Blackballed

duck_or_rabbit — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 01:51:03 GMT

Title: Blackballed
Prompt: (6) Nymph and (65) He’s got to make his own mistakes/And learn to mend the mess he makes/He’s old enough to know what’s right/But young enough not to choose it - 'New World Man' by Rush
Characters/Year: Regulus and Sirius Black, 1976
Rating: PG13 for swearing
Word Count: ~ 3000
Summary: Summary: Regulus sees Sirius' step outside of family lines as personal rejection. Will Regulus take that step himself? Or was his brother's choice less visionary and more opportunistic? Having lost contact over the summer holiday, Sirius and Regulus meet-up for the first time since the familial disownment.
A/N: This story has been stored in my memory and in bits on my hard drive for a while, and fandomfusion's genfic and art challenge was a chance for it to have an official lj home. It was meant to be enjoyed, and I hope that happens if you read. It's unbeta'd, so politely point out spotted errors.

Blackballed

PS - I owe everyone who contributed to fandomfusion's first challenge loads of reviews. I finished my month long work project tonight ::silent scream:: and my free time has returned. I ♥ you all for being part of this!

A Grateful Mind

gilpin25 — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 01:35:40 GMT

Title: A Grateful Mind
Author: gilpin25
Rating: PG
Warnings: Mild profanity
Word Count: 4104
Characters: Remus Lupin, Sirius Black, Minerva McGonagall
Prompts:
#25 "No man, against my fate, sends me to Hades. And as for fate, I'm sure no man escapes it, Neither a good nor bad man, once he's born." Homer, the Iliad.
#46 No more talk about the old days, It's time for something great. 'Atoms for Peace', Thom Yorke.
Summary: Remus Lupin has the chance of a lifetime; more than that, he's being given a life. But does he know what it will cost him? (Set at the start of PoA.)
Author’s Notes: There was a deadline? ;) Many thanks to the mods for organising and inspiring. I've used a famous film/TV series quote about halfway through this, which should be instantly recognisable as definitely not being my words but I have highlighted it at the end. Feedback is always much appreciated. :)

A Grateful Mind

hrymfaxe — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 22:02:01 GMT

Title: For Sacred Ideals
Artist: hrymfaxe
Rating: R
Characters: Fabian and Gideon Prewett, Remus Lupin, Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew, Molly Weasley.
Warnings: character death, violence
Prompts:</b>
5 Mars

35 You will stir up the hornets.
- Plautus Amphitruo (act II, 2, 75)

56 Everybody knows the dice are loaded
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed
Everybody knows the war is over
Everybody knows the good guys lost
‘Everybody Knows’, Leonard Cohen

Medium: Pencils, ink and watercolour.
Summary: It's 1981, and things are starting to fall apart for members of The Order of the Phoenix.
Artist's Notes: Thank you for an amazing challenge, that let me stretch my artistic muscles like never before. My little idea turned into a 12-page graphic novel!! The title comes from a poem by Norbert Capek.

For Sacred Ideals

A Death Deferred

et_tu_lj — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 05:56:51 GMT

Title: A Death Deferred
Author: et_tu_lj
Rating: G
Warnings: none
Word Count: 698
Prompts: #11 slave, and #48 (Blacklisted, Neko Case)
Welcome home faithful one
We forgive you
Characters: Actually, that's kind of spoilery. Highlight to read, if you must know: Lord Voldemort
Author's Note: Beta by militantstemmed

Summary: Death is only the beginning.

Eternity pulls at him, inexorable and unforgiving.

Sic transit gloria mundi

hereticalvision — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 04:57:19 GMT

Title : Sic Transit Gloria Mundi
Author : hereticalvision
Rating : PG-13
Word Count : ~2000
Characters : Lucius, Draco – Malfoy Men.
Summary : For fifteen years all I wanted to be was like you. The father is not the son
Disclaimer : All characters depicted herein are owned by JKR et al. This was written for pleasure, not profit. No infringement intended.
Prompts : #5 Mars and #18 -
Poor husband, what wild thought drives you
to wear these weapons now? Where would you rush?
- Virgil, The Aeneid, Book 2, lines 699-700
Author's note : I didn't mean to write this. It just sort of came out. Unbeta'd so any horrible typos or mistakes are all mine.

Sic Transit Gloria Mundi

A heavy Auror hand on his shoulder as he sits with his wife and his son. "Lucius Malfoy, you need to come with us."

Lucius stands. The battle is over and everywhere people celebrate except here, the three of them, afraid. Lucius still wears the robes of the Death Eater and he knows what is coming. Draco is looking at him as though the only thought he has in his head is Father and the only feeling fear. Lucius looks at him hard, trying to convey all the things he ever wanted Draco to understand about being a Malfoy in that look, then turns to Narcissa. Narcissa wants to kiss him, wants to hold him tightly, he can see it but she would never make a spectacle like that. Her lower lip trembles but her gaze is steady as she nods to her husband.

Lucius presses a kiss to Narcissa's forehead, and touches Draco's shoulder in a gesture not unlike that of the Auror Shacklebolt still standing behind him. The parallel makes him shudder a little but he quells the impulse and says, "It will be all right, Draco."

Narcissa had her own trial, he heard, and Harry Potter spoke for her. She writes to Lucius and her omissions scream inside his head; she writes of her sister's funeral but not how many attended, she writes of Draco's health but not his luck in employment, she writes of changes to the laws about Muggle-borns but not about laws affecting the purebloods. Narcissa is much too sharp to leave out such details unintentionally and Lucius' mind flails wildly as he thinks on all the terrible things that must be happening without him.

His guard, a man by the name of Coote, shows his the Daily Prophet whenever he asks. The man's demeanor is always dispassionate no matter the occasion. Lucius learns all his facts from the newspaper, and has to filter it for bias every time. He wishes his wife would tell him the facts but he dare not ask her. She must know that he sees through her and yet still she attempts to keep him in the dark. She pretends she can protect him and he pretends it's working.

Lucius is holding up very well in captivity. He was here with the Dementors after all, and so a prison with human guards administering the occasional beating and demand for sexual services barely causes him to bat an eyelid. After the first year his family is finally allowed to visit. Draco looks well, somehow, although the first thing he says is, "Father, you look so thin." Lucius shrugs and says, "Age, Draco, will catch us all in time. But not you, my dear," he says to Narcissa. Her face is still beautiful but her hands are growing frail, he can feel it when she places them in his.

"Lucius," she breathes and all the unspoken shattering of their world is in her voice. The confiscation of their funds is clear from the robes on their backs, but they are healthy and they are alive. Draco fidgets, aware that his mother will expect him to dissemble where his father will expect him to be candid. Lucius therefore asks no questions but holds onto Narcissa tight while his son stares into the back corner, face shuttered like a building long abandoned.

Macnair approaches him. "They say there's someone new rising."
Lucius laughs, a cracked, broken sound. "There's no one left to rise."

Potter, it would appear, disagrees. He visits Lucius in the summer of his second year. It just so happens to be the day after a beating; the Auror arrives unannounced and Lucius is healed rather hurriedly before being dropped into the interview room.

"Mr. Potter," Lucius drawls as he had so long ago. "A pleasure."

"Mr. Malfoy," Potter returns, and takes a seat. "I need to tell you something very serious." The expression on his face is making Lucius' blood freeze. "It's about Draco."

Lucius sits motionless as Draco enters the room. His escort is barely outside the door before Lucius has crossed the room in three strides and struck Draco hard across the face.

Draco jerks his head back and stares at his father, fury and shock balanced in perfect equilibrium in his expression. Lucius' mouth twists. "How could you possibly be so revoltingly stupid?" he says.

The fury in Draco is burning hotter. "You think to strike me?"

Once Lucius would have cowed Draco absolutely; no longer. Lucius is proud of the defiance and terrified of where it might end. "Listen to me," Lucius says desperately and Draco makes a choked sound of scorn.

"Listen to you? Oh, I listened to you, Father. I listened to you and I emulated you and I watched as we lost everything. The Manor, the money, our status – it's all gone. Purebloods are a joke, Slytherin house is as reviled as ever and anyone who ever had anything to do with anyone in here has to fill out forms in triplicate before they can leave the country or buy a new wand. And we're caught in its wake because I listened to you. So you tell me, Father," Draco spits the word, "why I should listen now."

Lucius recognizes the righteous anger in Draco's face. It blazes from his own photographs from more than twenty years ago now, when he was full of the pride of the pureblood, secure in his place. When there were still so few Muggle-borns at Hogwarts, when 'Mudblood' was perfectly acceptable parlance, when it seemed like it would be easy to cast them out and preserve wizarding culture as they knew it.

None of those things came to pass. "We are on the edge of the abyss, Draco. We are in our twilight. There is no way to get back to what we once were, there is no way to reclaim the past."

"I'm not trying to-"

Lucius' heart aches. "Yes you are, my son. Yes you are." Draco's mouth turns down at the corners, his familiar sulky expression that Lucius saw so often throughout his teenage years. "I know you are. Potter knows you are."

That is clearly a blow Draco was not expecting. "Potter knows what?" he says, his mouth tight.

Lucius declines to answer, not knowing if Potter has told him the whole. "Listen to me. It's over. I thought you knew that, that night in the Great Hall."

"Potter knows what?" Draco repeats tonelessly.

"Draco, the world has changed. We fought to preserve ourselves and we failed. We lost. It's their world now-"

"Potter knows what?"

"It's their world and the only hope for us-"

"Potter knows –"

"Draco!" Lucius' voice like a cracking whip. Draco finally looks at his father and his eyes are wet. Lucius feels his own expression crumple. "Oh, Draco," he says and if he took the time to consider he'd realize he's never spoken to his son this emotionally before, not ever. Draco bites his lip and looks away. Lucius catches his son's chin and forces him to meet his eyes. "There's no hope of our better world, not any more. All we have left is to carve out a place for ourselves in the world they are making for themselves, carve it out and hold it. And now is the time."

Draco never really did understand politics, Lucius knows, but he recognizes his father's 'political' rhetoric and his eyes narrow. Lucius shakes his head to show that no, he means it, he means it more than he meant the gift of brooms when Draco won a place on the house team, he means it more than when he first showed Draco to his own father and said he was proud. He means it more even than that first stolen kiss with Narcissa when she was still too young for him and he was too eager for her.

"Don't," Lucius pleads now, "don't make my mistakes. Don't fight for something perfect. Compromise and build something real. Now, Draco, now is the time when you can and you're the only one of us who can."

"I can't!" Draco bursts out. "I can't get a job, anywhere. I've taken to brewing potions and selling them through a vendor who doesn't know who I am and only sees me under a glamour. Pansy's family home was attacked and she ran! Vince is dead, Greg's cracking up without him, Blaise and Nott are doing what they can for themselves but none of this, none of this is making any difference and I don't..."

"Work with Potter," Lucius says.

Draco is stunned into silence. "What?"

Lucius allows a small measure of his typical attitude to show through to reassure Draco: "I always told you it was unwise to appear less than fond of Harry Potter. Now you must find a way to do this. He knows about the meetings," Draco makes that choking sound again but Lucius presses on, "he knows about the associations you're making. He knows what you're doing, he has a list of names but he doesn't want a witch hunt."

"Oh, Potter always..."

"Grow up, Draco," Lucius snaps. "He may be many things but untrustworthy is not one of them. He kept my sentence from being longer than minimal, he kept your mother out of here, and Narcissa even tells me he's managed to have some of our estate returned."

"Not enough!" Draco spits. "I should earn back what is rightfully my own?"

"You should learn the right lesson!" Lucius shouts. The fight drains out of him in the silence that follows. Lucius sighs, exhausted, and goes to sit at the horrifyingly ugly table in the centre of the room.

"The lesson is we lose?" Draco manages from behind him.

"The lesson is we learn to compromise. Our time is over, pure and simple." Lucius takes a long, steadying breath. "Pureblood numbers have been dwindling for years, most of the old families are already blood-traitors or worse, and what have we achieved by standing by our principles? The almost total annihilation of our way of life." Lucius half-turns to look at Draco over his shoulder. "You could have died and it would have been our fault. My fault," he concedes, unable to blame Narcissa for any of this. "My fault. And there would have been nothing to fight for. You want to win now? You take a wife, you have a child and you show them we can change. You work honestly, you do everything in the open-"

"Like a damn Gryffindor?" There are tears in the words.

"Like a snake whose only choice left is to survive." Lucius stands and looks squarely at the defeated set of his son's body. "Find a way to adapt. Don't be unable to do so and end up in here with me. Don't be me."

Draco laughs then, harsh and hollow. He raises his eyes to his father's. "For fifteen years all I wanted to be was like you."

Lucius moves back towards Draco, reaches out to squeeze his shoulder as he has so often, but hesitates. Perhaps it is time now for a new gesture. He places his hand over his son's heart. Draco looks up at him, confusion writ large over his face.

"Be you," says Lucius firmly. "You were always so demonstrative, always so obviously feeling. I wanted to teach you to protect yourself, not to become cold." Lucius inhales, long and slow, and come to a decision. "I have always loved you and loved your mother. Take Potter's deal."

Draco slumps a little. "I have to go," he says in a voice softer than a whisper. Lucius nods, and pulls back. Draco gathers his belongings from where his father knocked them to the floor; his hat, his gloves, his cane. He moves towards the door, composed once again. Lucius does not know if Draco has truly heard. He can only hope.

Draco pauses for just a second at the door. "One thing, Father," says Draco.

"Yes, Draco?" Lucius says, unsure whether he should expect a pointed question or a fiercely spoken truth.

Draco smiles a little, just a crack of warmth in the prison visiting room. "There might be a girl, Father."

When Draco said he liked Pansy, the first thing Lucius said was, "Is she a pureblood?" This time he very determinedly says instead, "Is she pretty?"

Draco's expression tells him he has noted the change. "Beautiful, Father," he says as he opens the door. "She's beautiful."

~fin.

Stumbling in the Dark

shimotsuki — Sun, 31 May 2009 18:38:23 GMT

Title: Stumbling in the Dark
Author: shimotsuki
Rating: PG
Warnings: mild profanity
Word count: 1450 words
Characters: Snape, McGonagall
Prompts: #42 (Ovid); #54 (Tom Waits)

Summary: Dumbledore set the wheels in motion, but he left no map. All they can do is hold on tight and hope that someone knows where they are headed. (Part of the DH-at-Hogwarts series Under the Long Shadow.)

Author's note: Made it! (Barely.) I'm happy to be part of such a great event -- loads of thanks to train_lindz and duck_or_rabbit for organizing this. I've only had time to read a couple of stories here so far, but everything looks interesting, and I should have much more reading time in the week to come. (Especially now that I've posted my own!)

Stumbling in the Dark

♠The End of Ides is Nigh ♠

duck_or_rabbit — Sun, 31 May 2009 17:19:07 GMT

Wow, is all we can say to the marvellous entries thus far for the Ides of March challenge! train_lindz and myself are tripping over ourselves with excitement at the number of fics and art submitted and at the top-of-the-line quality therein. It's particularly thrilling for me since I've been MIA Mod the last month and can now dive into reading and reviewing all I've missed. That is, I'll pay the debts I owe when I finish my submission. Eeep! Oh, which brings me to my point. The challenge officially ends on:

June 1 @ 23:59 US Pacific Standard Time

♠ ♠ ♠

Thanks to all the participants - readers, writers, and artists - for making fandomfusion's first challenge a first class one!

PS - June 1 is too soon? Post to the community whenever you're done - it'll still be here, waiting for your HP entries, :D.

A Mutual Tolerance

star54kar — Sun, 31 May 2009 16:02:20 GMT

Title: A Mutual Tolerance
Author: star54kar
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Reference to a canon character death and mention of dead bodies.
Word Count: 1,479
Prompts: Plebeian and "…all these you see are helpless and unburied."- Virgil, The Aeneid, Book 6, line 427
Summary: When the sun rose that morning it marked the beginning of a new era: one that was no longer dominated by the tyrannical oppression of an all powerful madman. Ironically, he had Harry Potter to thank for it.
Author’s Notes: Written for the Beware the Ides of March Harry Potter Genfic Challenge at fandomfusion. Many thanks to the magnificent queenb23more, who is super speedy and worthy of worship for her wonderful beta work! Any and all remaining errors are mine.

A Mutual Tolerance

Revelations

javidan — Thu, 28 May 2009 16:05:40 GMT

Title: Revelations
Artist: javidan
Rating: G
Warnings: None
Prompts:
8 Prophet
32 He who dies for virtue, does not perish.
- Plautus , Captivi (III, 5, 32)

Medium: Derwent drawing pencils in four colors on black pastel paper
Summary: Inspired by what Dumbledore shares and does not share with Harry from the very beginning.
Artist's Notes: This is my first fanart for the Harry Potter fandom. Reference photo for the second sketch courtesy of deviantArtist, skiesofchaos, whose self-portrait made the perfect Dumbledore!

Remorse

francesca_blue — Wed, 27 May 2009 10:51:29 GMT

Title: Remorse
Author: francesca_blue
Rating: PG
Word count: 620
Prompts: 2: Empire; 43: "Death is not grievous to me, for I shall lay aside my pains by death." - Ovid Metamorphoses (III, 471).
Summary: "They say he showed some remorse, towards the end." Gellert Grindelwald's thoughts between 1945 and 1998.
Author's notes: I'm allowed two, right? I'm afraid the quote I used in my summary is not exact, as I don't have my copy of Deathly Hallows with me; Dumbledore says something to this effect in the King's Cross chapter, though. Again, I hope you enjoy it, and again, comments and concrit will be much appreciated.

Remorse

Albus!

You can’t do this to me, Albus! This is my prison!

I don’t deserve this! They do, but not m- Wait... What are you doing? You can’t let them out, Albus! They’ll ruin everything; they deserve this!

You can’t lock me up here! You can’t! Albus! Don’t leave me! Albus!

Albus!

Albus!

***
I don’t deserve this, Albus. I was trying to do something great! For the Greater Good, remember!

You deserve this. You deserve to be here, you betrayed me, you betrayed everything we worked for. We could have been great, you and I, overlords of the worlds, both magic and muggle, but you lacked the power. Yes... you were weak, Albus, and you couldn’t stand it that I was better than you – that I am better than you – so you did the only thing you could, you took everything away from me, you- you coward!

You are a coward! You didn’t have the guts to go through with it, didn’t have the guts to join me, didn’t have the guts to fight me, and when you finally did, you didn’t even have the guts to kill me, only to lock me up, me, the greatest wizard who ever lived, an intellectual, your better, your friend, your enemy ... You just locked me up! I deserve to die, not to rot away in here!

You are unworthy of the Elder Wand!

***
I don’t understand you, Albus.

You’ve turned down the position for Minister of Magic again. They’re giving you the power that they didn’t give to me, and you’ve turned it down.

Why? What happened to you? You had dreams and ambitions once. Where did you go wrong?

Was it your brother? You always were a family man. Was it something that cretin said to you that changed your mind? Well, that just shows what listening to stupid people will get you, doesn’t it – a mediocre life as a teacher, and a weakened world.

Was it your sister? I’m sorry about her, I didn’t mean to kill her. She just got in the way. She could have been great, if not for those slugs who destroyed her. But I still don’t understand. Why didn’t you want to make sure that no one had to suffer like Ariana did again?

***
I see we were not the only ones to dream such dreams. But the dreams of others are so much more terrible than ours, Albus. This man, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, is a monster. You must stop him, Albus. Why have you done nothing?

***
I lost a tooth last night, Albus.

I am getting old. I am rotting away in here, and yes... Yes, I deserve it. I was no better than that creature that the little boy killed. I destroyed hundreds of lives, thinking only of my own ambitions, never of other people. How very selfish of me.

***
You are gone, Albus.

It’s so hard to believe. You, the best of men, are dead and gone. It is too late for me to ask forgiveness, now.

I hope you went down fighting; you’re the owner of the Elder Wand. But you never did do things the same way as everyone else.

***
He is coming for me.

They say he is searching for a better, more powerful wand... Well we both know why he wants our wand, don’t we, Albus.

I suspect he will kill me. I will do my best not to tell him anything, though I fear that he already knows. Still, I will try. It is the least I can do for you, my old friend.

I am not afraid of death anymore. I used to be so afraid. I raged against death. But anything is better than this.

Reflection

francesca_blue — Wed, 27 May 2009 10:07:34 GMT

Title: Reflection
Author: francesca_blue
Rating: PG-13, to be safe
Warnings: torture, werewolf-related horror, but nothing graphic
Word count: 4224
Prompts: 30: "A guest remembers all of his days that host who makes provisions for him kindly." - Homer, The Odyssey, Book 15, lines 68-75;
59: "Don’t the best of them bleed it out / While the rest of them peter out / Truth or consequence / Say it aloud." ‘Hero’, Foo Fighters.
Summary: Peter looks back at his old life and wonders what he's done.
Author's notes: Sorry, the summary is a bit rubbish. So is the title; if anyone can suggest a better one then please let me know. I hope you enjoy it! Comments and concrit will be much appreciated.

Reflection

Being a rat had quickly revealed itself to be extremely useful. It had been Peter who had been able to sneak into the girls’ dormitories to watch them undress; Peter who had stolen the records of their more serious misdeeds from Filch’s office; Peter who had... acquired the brain-boosting potions for their O.W.L.s. Later, he and Sirius had used their skills as Animagi to aid the Order of the Phoenix, and Peter especially had gained a good reputation for his astounding undercover work. Nobody had expected the timid little rat would betray them; they had trusted him with their most precious secrets. And now they were either dead or rotting in Azkaban for their trust, while here he was, safe and well-fed in Percy Weasley’s pocket.

Living with the Weasleys was wonderful. There was plenty of chaos and noise and excitement for Peter’s comfort, but none of the danger that had constantly threatened his life with the Marauders. Today it was even louder and more excitable than usual. Charlie was starting Hogwarts in September, so the whole family were going to Diagon Alley to get his school supplies. Peter peered out of his refuge with interest; not even life in the Gryffindor dormitory had prepared him for this.

James and Sirius’ pillow fights could be positively dangerous. They were leaping from bed to bed, swinging their favourite weapons and taking out curtains, books, photo frames, alarm clocks... anything that got in the way. Peter watched from the doorway, awed at their grace and ferocity.

“Come on, you two!” Sirius shouted when he saw them standing in the doorway. Peter immediately dashed forwards, seized his own pillow and clambered up onto the bed, waiting for the perfect opportunity to break up their stand-off.

With a yell, he leapt across to the other bed, but he hadn’t timed it as well as he’d thought. Sirius’ flailing pillow smacked him under the chin, knocking him off balance and toppling him off the bed to land heavily on the floor. James ooohed sympathetically, defending himself expertly from another swipe.

“Are you alright?” Remus asked Peter, crouching over him. Peter nodded, accepting the hand up and picking up his pillow again. Roaring, the two leapt at Sirius, just as James’ pillow burst, surrounding them with a snowstorm of feathers.

“Fred, George, no!” Molly Weasley bellowed over the heads of her clamouring children. Peter looked around to see what mischief they were up to this time. One of them had, somehow unnoticed, climbed onto the kitchen counter and begun experimenting with the various ingredients that littered the tabletop. Peter guessed that it wasn’t until the second twin had joined him that Molly had recognised the danger, but by then it was too late; whatever they had created was already smoking around the edges. Peter quickly withdrew his head and held his breath in anticipation.

The world outside exploded. There were crackles and bangs, clatters and crashes, shrieks, whoops, scoldings, smashes. Peter chuckled to himself. The chaotic sounds caused by mischief were music to his ears. Curling up, he allowed the familiar sounds to lull him into a comfortable doze.

***

Peter remembered his first wand. It had originally belonged to his grandfather, who had died in the Grindelwald war. Peter hadn’t liked it very much; it had never been particularly reliable, and he had been almost glad when James broke it during their second year.

“Hurry up, Peter!”

“I’m trying! Alohomora! Alohomora!”

The potions storeroom remained firmly locked. Sirius jostled him under the Invisibility Cloak.

“Oh, move over! Alohomora!”

The door opened easily for him, and they hurried inside. Peter moved out from under the Cloak as soon as possible; he hated small spaces.

“Be quick, we wasted so much time outside.”

“What do we need?”

“Boomslang skin, Acromantula venom, sopophorous beans, unicorn horn-“

“Someone’s coming!”

“Quick! Back under the Cloak!”

James had already disappeared, taking the light from his wand with him. Peter stretched his arms out and felt the air, but all he found were shelves. As he turned away, flailing around, his elbow caught a jar of beetle legs; he jumped at the deafening crash it made.

“There you are!” Suddenly there was light again, as Filch wrenched the door open, leering inside. Peter cried out in shock; so did Filch, as a jet of red light shot from Peter’s wand, apparently acting on its own accord, and knocked the caretaker to the ground.

James wasted no time. He grabbed Peter’s arm and they all ran past Filch and towards the stairs at full speed. Sirius led the way, with the others close behind, through a tapestry, down a secret passageway, towards the common room. James was pushing Peter ahead of him, but he tripped on the edge of the Cloak and they both fell, rolling back down the stairs. There was an incredibly loud craack! and they lay very still at the sound. Then James heaved himself up and rolled away from where he had been lying on top of the two splintered halves of Peter’s grandfather’s wand.

Mr. Ollivander had stared at him accusingly when he was taken to buy a new one. It was as if he thought him unworthy, and Peter was glad that he would never have to be subject to that pale stare again. The Weasley family had split up for the shopping trip: Bill had been trusted to do his own shopping, and had gone to meet his friends; Ron and Ginny had gone with their mother and Charlie; and Arthur had taken Percy and the twins.

The first place the boys went was Quality Quidditch Supplies. Peter had fond memories of this shop; he had visited it every day one summer, when they had all gone to stay with the Potters for a week. James had inherited his enthusiasm for the sport from his father, and Peter could have spent hours listening to them talk about optimum tail length and the speed of the new Nimbus 1500, and when James would be getting one. The Weasleys, unlike the Potters, would probably never be able to afford the broomstick currently on display, but that didn’t dampen their enthusiasm. Even Percy enjoyed Quidditch, though he wasn’t very good at it at all.

“Look!” he said excitedly. “State-of-the-art Breaking and Balancing Charms!”

“You’d need them, wouldn’t you, Perce,” said one of the twins.

Peter sniggered. He, too, remembered the hilarious incident where Percy’s broom had crashed into a tree and rolled over, throwing him off thirty feet above the ground. He had broken his arm in the fall; only Molly’s precautionary Cushioning Charms had prevented more serious damage.

Peter’s laugh suddenly froze in his throat as he remembered his own terrifying fall, as he had been flying over the English Channel on a mission for the Order. If Sirius hadn’t been there...

“I’ve got you!” Peter felt Sirius’ leatherclad arm wrap around his waist and heave him onto the back of his own broom. “Stop yelling, you’re safe now!”

“I hate flying,” Peter moaned, clinging on tightly. “I’m never doing it again.”

“How can you hate this? The wind in your hair ... complete freedom. I was actually thinking of charming my bike, so I can fly more often.”

“You’re mad. That’s illegal, as well as dangerous.”

“So?” Sirius threw back his head and laughed maniacally. “I probably am mad, but that’s alright; you’d be bored of me if I were any different. And dead.”

Sirius’ expression that day had not been dissimilar to the one he had worn just after he had cornered Peter.

Suddenly, he felt sick. How had that happened? How could he have turned one of the bravest men he had ever known into the half-crazed prisoner in Azkaban? How could he have chewed the newspaper article announcing to the world the crimes ‘Sirius’ had committed, and not cared that he had destroyed one of his best friends?

Percy’s hand suddenly wrapped around his body and pulled him out of his pocket.

“Dad, I think something’s wrong with Scabbers. He’s shaking.”

Arthur gently took him from his son’s hands and held him up.

“Alright. Let’s go to the Magical Menagerie.”

***

The witch who now owned the Magical Menagerie was different to the one Peter remembered. She peered at him through her heavy spectacles and gave Percy a bottle of Rat Tonic, dismissing his apparent illness with a rather insulting, “Just old, I expect.” Peter breathed a sigh of relief as they left the shop; that visit had been far less traumatic than his last one.

“I haven’t got Lily a Christmas present yet,” James explained as they walked into the shop. “And I thought I might get her a cat or something. Apparently her sister’s allergic, so she’s never had one before, but I thought she might like it if I got her one.” Meaning: “She might like me more if I got her one.” Though if the rumours were true, Evans more than liked James now.

“Sweet,” Sirius said, looking around, bored.

“Does it have to be a cat?” Peter asked, anxiously. “I don’t like cats.”

“You don’t like cats!” Sirius exclaimed in mock shock. “Wormtail how could you? Look-” He swept up a tiny black and white kitten and thrust it in Peter’s face. “-what about this one? You must like this one, Wormtail!”

The kitchen swiped at Peter’s face with a paw; he took a step back. “Well, cats don’t like me either. They never have. It was a cat that gave me this one.” He pointed to the scar on his right thumb.

“What?” Sirius put the cat down and squinted at Peter’s hand. “There’s nothing there, Wormtail. Stop being such a baby. They’re just cats.”

“May I help you?” A witch had come out of the back room. She wore a purple blouse, and her hair stuck out in all directions.

“I need a cat for my ... friend, for Christmas,” James began.

“A pet is for life, not just for Christmas,” the witch interrupted briskly. “You are sure that your friend will take good care of a cat?”

“What care does a cat need?” Sirius scoffed. “Aren’t they basically self-sufficient?”

The witch turned a baleful glare on him, but Remus, who took Care of Magical Creatures with Evans, quickly stepped in. “Lily is excellent with animals. She’ll love having a cat of her own.”

The witch relaxed a little and turned back to James. Sirius turned back to the black and white kitten and began stroking it. Peter sidled up to him and tentatively held his hand out to the kitten to sniff.

“See,” said Sirius, grinning. “It’s not that bad.”

The kitten raised a paw and batted at Peter’s hand; he flinched, and Sirius laughed. Peter frowned, and moved his hand closer to stroke the cat. It wrapped it’s paws around his knuckles and bit his hand.

“Ow!” Peter exclaimed. He shook his hand vigourously, and the kitten fell off. Stepping back, he nursed his bleeding hand. Sirius was roaring with laughter.

“Don’t worry, Peter, that’s just what cats do. They’re playful.”

“It hurt! Look, I’m bleeding.”

“Oh, stop being such a baby. You’re not bleeding that much.” Sirius picked up the kitten and began stroking it. To Peter’s annoyance it settled down in his hands and began to purr, though it stared at Peter rather unsettlingly.

“We have Kneazles in the back room,” the witch told James. “Much more intelligent than regular cats. Would you like to see them?” Already she was leading him behind the counter.

The moment the witch was out of the room, Sirius’ kitten launched itself at Peter, who yelled. Landing on his head, it sank its claws into his scalp and held on for dear life.

“Aarrgh!” Peter screamed. Sirius and Remus crowded round him, trying to help, but they were just getting in the way. His arms flailed; he tugged and clawed at the animal, but it just clung on tighter. James and the witch rushed back into the room and joined the fray. Immediately, the kitten released its grip on Peter’s head, and he flung it off. It flew across the room and landed on its feet on the counter, where it curled up and started to purr. Peter glared at it, panting, and clutched his head.

“Not that one,” he told James. “Any cat but that one. Please.”

“But I like this one,” James said, picking up the little kitten and cuddling it to his chest. “It’s cute. It reminds me of Lily.”

Peter stared at him. He had never encountered anything less like Lily in his entire life.

Sirius began to laugh uncontrollably at Peter’s horrified expression as James reached into his pocket for his Galleons.

...

He had gone back to Godric’s Hollow, before Sirius had caught up with him, to see what was left. Was the Dark Lord really dead? Why did he have to die now, of all times?

People were crowding around the gate, being held back by Aurors. Moody was there, picking through the rubble for evidence, his face somehow more craggy and grim than Peter remembered. Even though there was no way he was in danger in this form, Peter still shrank back into the shadows.

Slipping through a hole in the wall into the living room, Peter scurried around the edge of the room and made for the stairs, where he would be able to begin his investigation.

Pain suddenly shot through his paw. He looked down and saw that he had trodden on the splintered glass of a picture frame. Looking down at the blood spilling onto the photograph, Peter saw his own face gazing up at him from between Lily and James. It was a photo of the Order of the Phoenix, the one that had been taken just before Peter had... turned. Staring at the familiar picture, Peter felt guilt and bile well up in his stomach. He had sold these people out. He had watched the Dark Lord kill Dorcas Meadowes; he had been one of many to point his wand at Benjy Fenwick until there was literally nothing left – and there he was again, waving up at him. Sirius was grinning, and Peter thought he saw insanity in his laugh. Lily and James were smiling, their arms were around him, but Peter now imagined their eyes were glassy and staring in death...

What had he done?

A hiss brought Peter back to the present. Looking up, he felt suddenly cold all over: a large, overfed black and white cat was prowling towards him. Peter stared, transfixed, then turned and bolted for the hole in the wall. He made it just in time, dropping into the hedge on the other side of the wall as the cat scratched and batted ineffectually on the other side. Peter’s heart was pounding. He scurried away through the grass, desperate to get far away as fast as possible.

Peter choked on the Rat Tonic. It tasted dreadful, but it did not make the sick lump in his stomach go away. Percy relentlessly tipped another spoonful down his throat. Gasping, Peter resolved to stop feeling guilty for James and Sirius. They had deserved it, after all.

“You really are thick, aren’t you, Wormtail?”

“How could you miss that goal? It was wide open!”

“Don’t be stupid Wormtail, you do it like this.”

“Peter, if you can’t say anything intelligent, don’t say anything at all.”

“You idiot! We’re all in detention because of you!”

“Leave this to the real men, Wormtail.”

“Why would she want to go out with you?”

“You jeopardized the whole mission, Wormtail! You could have got us all killed!”

“You’re useless.”

Yes, they had definitely deserved it.

Happy again, Peter sat up and looked around. Arthur had bought his sons some butterbeer while they waited for the others, and even the twins were sitting still, determined not to abuse the privilege. The Leaky Cauldron had always boasted a peculiarly mixed clientele. With one sweep of his eyes, Peter saw Mundungus Fletcher the thief, Hippocrates Brown the healer, and...

Remus?

“I have bad news,” Sirius announced, throwing himself down on his bed. “Remus is a werewolf.” He tossed the book he was carrying at James.

Peter stared at him, then let out a strangled laugh. It was a joke, of course.

“I know,” James said, holding up the book he was reading, entitled Werewolves and their Habits. Peter choked on his own laughter.

All three boys stared at Remus’ empty bed for a long time.

“It doesn’t matter,” James said eventually. “He’s still our friend. We’re going to help him. There must be something we can do.”

“Yeah!” Sirius said forcefully. “Yes. He’ll always be our friend.”

James grinned. “Definitely. Right, Peter?”

“Right,” Peter said.

But he didn’t get any sleep that night.

...

The werewolf was a raging beast, howling and scratching at its surroundings. It stopped when it caught sight of him, snarled, and then turned away, clawing and tearing at its own flesh. Peter, Padfoot and Prongs watched in silent horror. It was Padfoot who broke the spell; with an angry bark he bounded forwards and launched itself at the werewolf, stopping it from hurting itself anymore. The werewolf turned and growled at Padfoot, who was snarling, then turned back and broke the bedpost in two.

That night had been the most frightening of Peter’s life, but the morning after was even worse. Watching Remus change back from beast to boy had made both Peter and Prongs physically sick. Afterwards, Remus had lain on the floor, naked and trembling, blood streaming from his wounds. He had been conscious, but he had not cried from the pain, though his eyes remained screwed shut for a long time. Peter had never seen anything more at odds with the creature they had witnessed minutes before.

...

“Where’s Remus been going lately?” Peter asked.

“Dunno,” Sirius replied. “Not really our business, is it?”

“Isn’t it?”

“’Course not. He probably has a girlfriend or something. Maybe you should take a leaf out of his book, eh, Wormtail.”

“You don’t think- It’s just...”

“What?”

“Just I’d heard rumours about werewolves. They’re gathering together, someone said they support V-V- You-Know-Who.”

“Just say it, would you? It’s only a name.” Sirius tossed an Every Flavour Bean in the air and caught it in its mouth. “You don’t actually think Remus would join them, do you? He’s one of us.”

“Well ... he might. You remember how bitter he was about that last job. The wizarding world doesn’t really have anything to offer him ... he might turn to them. They are his kind, after all.”

“Don’t say that. You know he’s nothing like them.” But Sirius’ face was troubled. He stuffed a handful of beans in his mouth thoughtfully. “I think we’d better talk to James.”

Peter smiled in satisfaction.

...

Things had gone from bad to worse. They were supposed to be borrowing James’ Invisibility Cloak, but apparently Sirius and Dorcas needed it more, so Peter and Remus had had to make do without. Peter had changed form, but Remus had to sneak from tree to tree; they were painfully aware of just how visible he would be to the Death Eaters who were surely nearby.

Slowly, carefully, they slunk through the frosty silence. Peter’s nerves were beginning to fray – it was just too quiet.

And then suddenly it wasn’t quiet anymore. Four cracks! and the sudden blast of spells, deafening in the silence, announced the half-expected arrival of Antonin Dolohov, Evan Rosier and the Carrows. Remus dived behind a tree, a streak of green light just missing his shoulder. Peering out, he managed to jinx Amycus Carrow before the Death Eaters’ spells blasted a chunk out of the bark beside his head.

Peter had to act fast. Already the Death Eaters were spreading out, and Remus had his back to Dolohov. Scuttling through the undergrowth, he changed form behind their line and pointed his wand at Rosier.

“Stupefy!”

Unfortunately, his spell went wide. Surprised, Rosier and the Carrows turned to face Peter. Seizing the advantage, Remus stunned Alecto Carrow, then turned towards Dolohov just in time. Roaring, Amycus turned back round and rushed at his sister’s attacker.

“Tarantallegra!” Peter shouted, and this time his spell struck Amycus square in the middle of his back.

“Brat!” Amycus howled, his legs jerking uncontrollably.

But Peter ignored him. He was too busy dancing himself, dodging the curses Rosier directed at his feet. Desperately, Peter dove behind a tree and changed back into a rat. If he hadn’t been so scared he would have roared with laughter at the confused expression on Rosier’s face. Instead, he scurried around the tree and changed again beside Alecto’s prone body, reasoning that they would not attack him with any great ferocity for fear of hitting her instead. But he had thought wrong: Amycus, who had regained control of his feet, tackled Peter and they both fell heavily across Alecto, who was beginning to come round.

Things began happening very quickly then. Rosier seized Peter’s shoulder and broke his leg with a curse; he screamed. The next thing Peter knew, he, Rosier, Amycus and Alecto were outside a heavy iron gate, looking up at the monstrous-looking mansion of the Lestranges. Peter was crying from the pain of his leg. They had apparated, leaving Remus and Dolohov behind.

Remus Lupin was sitting at the bar, head bowed over a glass of Firewhiskey. Peter was amazed. Remus wasn’t much of a drinker anyway, and it was still the middle of the day. What was he doing here?

From where he sat Peter had a clear view of the man Remus had become, and he was shocked by what he saw. Usually Remus remained clean-shaven, but now three-day-old stubble covered his jaw. He had always been proud, even though his clothes were shabby and he always looked ill; now he was slumped over his drink, defeated. There were shadows under his eyes, and face was heavily lined. He looked old; how could that be?

Peter knew exactly how that could be. Remus had no one now. His friends were all either dead or locked away. And Peter had done it. James and Sirius deserved it, certainly, but Remus hadn’t.

“How do we get into the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix?” Bellatrix demanded, eyes blazing, her wand held high over Peter’s head.

“It’s under Fidelius Charm,” Peter gasped. “Dumbledore’s secret keeper. Please- No!”

He screamed again as Bellatrix turned her wand on him.

The door flew open and he came in. He raised his hand, and Bellatrix lowered her wand. The terrible, scarlet eyes fell on Peter, and his screams were stifled as if a hand had clamped around his throat.

“I have a few words for the boy.” Bellatrix raised her wand eagerly. “That won’t be necessary Bella. He is weak. He will do as I ask. Won’t you, Peter?” His wand was held loosely in one hand, but it was pointed directly at Peter.

Shivering uncontrollably, Peter stammered, “Y-y-y-y-yes, my lord.”

Bellatrix began to laugh, but the Dark Lord raised his hand to stop her. He stepped forwards and leaned in very close to Peter, so that the scarlet eyes filled his vision. The words hissed against his face.

“You will spy on the Order of the Phoenix for me. I want to know everything.”

“I w-w-will, my lord. E-e-everything.”

Gleaming, those dreadful eyes drew back, and then Peter was alone. His breath came in racking gasps that became sobs that became howls.

“Peter!”

He looked up, trying to stifle his tears.

“Peter!” the low voice came again.

“Yes?”

The lock on the door clicked, and a head peered cautiously into the room.

Remus’ brow was bloody, a testament to his recent duel with Dolohov. His clothes were torn and singed, and he was limping a little, but he seemed alright. He hurried to Peter’s side, and the chains mercifully fell away.

“Remus?” Peter’s voice cracked. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m getting you out. Where are you hurt? We have to hurry, I’m not sure how long my diversion will work. I’m so sorry, Peter! I was so busy with Dolohov I didn’t realise you were outnumbered until you were gone. I should have helped you; you helped me. And then I had to try and find you, but I went to the Malfoys’ first, I didn’t think they’d bring you straight to Voldemort – they don’t know you like they know Sirius and James.”

“Oh, don’t say his name,” Peter said, slumping forwards. “He’s here, Remus! He’s upstairs.”

“I know. It’s alright, Peter, I’m going to get you out.” Remus put Peter’s arm around his shoulders and heaved him up, his wand gripped in his fist.

“I’m sorry, Remus,” Peter muttered, tears in his eyes. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s alright, Peter,” Remus said again. “I’m going to get you out. You’re going to be fine.”

Why hadn’t he thought about Remus? How could he have completely forgotten about his best friend. James and Sirius had been arrogant and uncaring, but Remus had always been kind.

Peter barely noticed Percy spooning more Rat Tonic into his mouth. He was still staring at Remus’ defeated form.

What had he done?

Cicatrix

hereticalvision — Wed, 27 May 2009 02:57:51 GMT

Title : Cicatrix
Author : hereticalvision
Rating : PG-13
Word Count : 2k
Characters : Black sisters and their partners
Summary : The question of who murdered the Black sisters is a matter of perspective.
Disclaimer : All characters depicted herein are owned by JKR et al. This was written for pleasure, not profit. No infringement intended.

Authors Note : Based on the following prompts.

Everybody knows the dice are loaded
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed
Everybody knows the war is over
Everybody knows the good guys lost
‘Everybody Knows’, Leonard Cohen (56)

until an awful hunger and your wrong
in slaughtering my sisters has compelled
your jaws to gnaw as food your very tables.
- Virgil, The Aeneid, Book 3, lines 333-5 (20)

The last thing Bella ever said to Andromeda was, “That Mudblood scum murdered my sister.” Andromeda had looked into Bella’s eyes and tried to think of years and years of love and childhood and dreams but what she saw was Voldemort and madness and death.

Sirius used to say that Andromeda was stronger than her sisters, because she was the one who’d made up her own mind about things. Andromeda doesn’t see it that way.
She didn’t really want that much. She would have settled into the pureblood marriage her parents were preparing for her, but she wanted something else first. Just a taste of the danger, the forbidden. Not like Bella, never like Bella. Bella wanted to carve things up and burn the world down. In the summers when they were confined to their parents’ house, the two of them and Narcissa down the hall, Andromeda would sometimes hear noises coming from Bella’s room. Rodolphus Lestrange sneaking in and out of her bedroom window, Bella casting spells Andromeda didn’t know, and always afterward when Bella summoned her to torment or to reconcile according to her whim the air in the room would taste like blood.
Andromeda’s forbidden desire was warmth. Parents who loved rather than expecting. Partners who worshipped rather than doing their duty. Andromeda had no desire to sharpen the already almost unbearable edge to her life. She craved an emotional comfort that she could sink into like the perfect velvet pillows on her bed.
Ted Tonks had no idea of ambition or pureblood pride or anything beyond telling this pretty girl how she made him feel. It made him irresistible.

When Andromeda was five Bella would rock her to sleep sometimes when she was scared.
When Andromeda was seven Bella told her not to be such a baby, but held her anyway.
When Andromeda was nine she found a cat with a broken leg. She wanted to heal it. She found it dead a day later. Bella looked guilty for a week afterward. Andromeda never asked.
When Andromeda was thirteen Bella had come home one night in the summer with her robe torn and magic crackling all around her body, and kissed Andromeda in a way that made her pull away and feel a little sick.
When Andromeda was fifteen she saw Bella curse a boy in the hallway, not the first time to be sure, but the first time he wouldn’t stop screaming, the first time she didn’t pull away, the first time Andromeda saw her sister draw blood and couldn’t pretend the idea was strange to her.
When Andromeda was seventeen, Bella tried to kill her.

Ted Tonks had his heart in his hand and his feelings bled out of him every time he looked at her. At school every day she saw him and she wondered what it would be like, just for a moment, to have something spontaneous, something that could be gentle.
“Well look at the little Mudblood with a crush,” said Narcissa with malicious humour.
“It’s disgusting,” snapped Bella, who looked simultaneously furious and nauseated.
Andromeda lowered her eyes, and kept them down whenever she was with her sisters, but when she was alone she raised her head and she saw him.

Mother used to say that Andromeda should look after little Narcissa, because she was the smallest and Bella was too wild.
Mother had the measure of Bella right enough, but she’d somehow missed the core of absolute steel that existed within Narcissa. Narcissa had wanted to marry Lucius Malfoy and she had, despite his preferences in that regard and his endless dalliances. She got him to love her and she got him to marry her.
When Cissy had first let slip her crush on Lucius at the age of fourteen, Bella had howled with laughter and spitefully offered to brew her a love potion. Cissy, with a poise that Andromeda would never achieve no matter how old or self-confident she became, said simply: “That will not be necessary.”
And really, who could resist a charming, beautiful woman with an obligingly blind eye and no ambition beyond helping her husband achieve all of his? Her one, utterly unforeseeable failure had been her inability to produce more than one heir, but then none of the Black sisters had proved good breeders. Andromeda could practically hear Father’s sneer as she thought on this.
So Lucius had fallen for Narcissa, and then their parents announced that they were arranging his marriage to Andromeda.

Ted found her crying one day. He held her, the first time he'd touched her, and she imagined the impossibility of telling him about the crushing weight of being a Black and a pureblood, with hundreds of years of tradition to uphold. Instead she let herself enjoy the feel of his arms, let him kiss her, let herself go boneless and let him tell her all the things she'd been longing to hear.
It never felt like a decision at all.

Narcissa said, "Will you marry Lucius, then?"
Andromeda said, "What else can I do?"
Narcissa looked away, trying to mask the flash of pain in her expression.
"You know Father won't change his mind. Can't Lucius…"
"Abraxas Malfoy is harder to handle even than Father," said Narcissa with a sneer.
Andromeda sighed. "Why wasn't it Bella?"
Narcissa's lip curled. "Everyone knows she's been with Rodolphus Lestrange. Father's working on having him marry her; no one else will now."
Andromeda took Narcissa's hand. "Cissy, I don't want this."
Narcissa nodded. "I know."

When Andromeda was four, she was the only one who could make Narcissa stop crying.
When Andromeda was six, she and Bella used to enjoy playing with Narcissa’s brilliant blonde hair.
When Andromeda was eleven, Narcissa wept as her two big sisters left for school.
When Andromeda was thirteen Narcissa was already getting a reputation as the prettiest of the Black sisters, and her weepy demeanour wa a thing of the past.
When Andromeda was sixteen and going to marry Lucius, Narcissa behaved as though she’d never wept in all her life.
When Andromeda was seventeen, Narcissa found out about her and Ted.

Narcissa had said, "I know." It didn't occur to Andromeda until much, much later that Cissy might despise her for failing to value what she herself would give anything to have.

"The Mudblood, Andy?" hissed Narcissa, quiet in the common room after everyone else was asleep.
Andromeda opened her mouth to form a denial automatically.
"I saw you, don't bother."
Andromeda said, "Please, you can't tell anyone."
"What kind of fool do you take me for?" Narcissa spat.
"Cissy…"
Narcissa wouldn't look at her. "You're lucky it was me, not Bella," she said finally before walking away.

In Ted's arms Andromeda could always blot out everything else. She whispered to him once that she was engaged, she was going to have to marry and his arms tightened around her. He swore his love and honourable intentions right there, and Andromeda loved hearing it and didn't trust it for a moment. That habit she would eventually manage to break, but then she trusted only her sisters and the tradition of her family.
Andromeda met Ted on the Astronomy Tower, in the Prefect's bathroom, anywhere they could find to snatch an hour or so for lips and fingertips and tenderness. Andromeda firmly believed she would be able to get enough, and then she would walk back into her pureblood world unchanged.
Then Narcissa brought Lucius to catch her with Ted.

The four of them stood looking at each other a long moment. Narcissa's face was curled in triumph. Lucius' expression revealed shock and anger, and if there was a measure of relief there Andromeda knew it wouldn't save her.
"Well," said Lucius. "My fiancée and a Mudblood. How interesting."
There was no denying what they had been doing. Both their robes were askew, both their faces flushed.
Andromeda began, "Lucius-"
Narcissa cut her off, "You can't sleep with a Mudblood and then bear Malfoy heirs, Andy, what are you thinking?"
Ted tried to speak, but was cut off by "Petrificus Totalis!" from Lucius' wand.
Lucius smirked at her. "I will be writing to your parents to inform them that I am breaking our engagement, and of the reason why. I suggest you plan accordingly. Good-bye, Andromeda. Come, my dear," he said, offering Narcissa his arm. She took it and they left without another glance.

Sirius thought that Narcissa had never challenged anything a day in her life, that she done her duty with Lucius and ignored his dalliances and indifference in the hope that he would come to love her in the end.
Sirius thought Narcissa weak and Andromeda strong, but then Sirius couldn't even see that Remus loved him. Sirius could see nothing at all in the people he supposedly knew and that's why Sirius, strong, bold Sirius died.

Andromeda wasn’t the type to accept sacrifice lightly. She’d tried for months to work out a way to keep Ted in her life without losing her sisters, without losing her position as a Black. She was Slytherin after all – and it was her ambition to have everything she wanted, all at once.
But there was no way to fight everything at once and when Narcissa betrayed her and Bella threatened her and Ted told her he'd do anything to be with her she settled for that half-life and found to her relief that being with Ted really was worth it after all.
She consoled herself with the idea that betrayal had made her happy.
Andromeda wasn’t the type to accept the need to sacrifice and she hated that she had managed to surround herself by people who did.
Ted left her and died to save her. Remus went to his death so Nymphadora wouldn’t have to. Nymphadora charged after him because she had her own damn battles to fight. Not one Slytherin in the pack, not one who could think of how to keep it all. And she herself was a Slytherin barely worthy of the name; she couldn’t even work out how to keep her family together, not at seventeen and not at forty-five. And so they all left her and little Teddy alone.
Narcissa was a Slytherin who had kept both of the people she loved alive and with her. Anyone who ever thought Narcissa weak had clearly failed to pay attention.

Three sisters. So many murders.
To Bella, Ted Tonks murdered her sister.
To Narcissa, Molly Weasley murdered her sister.
To Andromeda, Narcissa murdered both her sisters and Bella the rest of her family.

Andromeda doesn't know why she went to Bella's funeral. Her sister had counted her as dead for years. Andromeda wondered, when Bella killed little Dora, if she did it because she could see Ted in her, or because she saw her own rebellious sister and the promise of that rebellion come to fruition. Had it been pure hatred or perhaps some latent jealousy? Bella would never have understood Andromeda's need for something comfortable, never did understand that she had found it. Oh, Bella. Is there more hope of redemption now that she's dead?
"Molly Weasley came," said a sudden, familiar voice Andromeda should have known to expect. She turned; Narcissa wasn't looking at her. "It was her killed Bella you know."
Andromeda's voice was thick when she said, "Bella killed my daughter."
Narcissa nodded, and met her eyes. "I know."
Andromeda chuckled without mirth. "Everyone who fought is a murderer."
Narcissa nodded again. "But why she felt the need to come…"
"Because some people feel bad about these things," Andromeda snapped.
Narcissa fell silent. Andromeda felt the weight of withheld absolution between them, and wondered if she too should expect a visit from Molly. She wouldn't know what to say to her then any more than she knew what to say to Narcissa now.
Andromeda looked behind her to where Draco and Lucius stood, blond and elegant and exactly as she had pictured them. Lucius and Narcissa are still the most handsome couple in any given room. Andromeda has not aged quite so well; she had become plump but worry has thinned her, turned her hair grey, drawn new lines on her face all in the space of a year. "You didn't fight?"
Narcissa caught her gaze again and said, "I fought, in the end. I didn't want to but I did."
Andromeda nearly choked on the way she had never, ever wanted to fight and had in the end had a cast-iron three-month-old reason not to and hated that she'd counted on it.
"Did you forgive me?" said Narcissa, and there's a catch in her voice like the answer might mean something.
"No," Andromeda told her without emotion. "But I was happy. So it didn’t matter. For a while anyway."
Narcissa looked away blindly.

It’s always the weak who survive, thinks Andromeda, unbearably tired, with a child to look after and no one to look after her. Among the good, anyway – because the good among the strong always fight. Good people sacrifice themselves, good people lose. And that’s why the war happens again and again and again.

Alone With Death

scarletladyy — Wed, 20 May 2009 21:36:43 GMT

Title: Alone With Death
Author: scarletladyy
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Tragedy, Angst, Character Death, Non Consent, Torture
Word Count: 4855
Prompts: 11 Slave
70 They’re going to send you back to mother
In a cardboard box
You’d better run
‘Run Like Hell’, Pink Floyd
Summary: Hermione is kidnapped and while the Malfoy family seem only to want information out of her, someone else wants much, much more.
Author’s Notes: I really hope you like this :) Comments are always appreciated! Major characters include Hermione Granger, Lucius Malfoy, Draco Malfoy and Bellatrix Lestrange.

It was a warm, summer's day and Hermione was enjoying it walking in her local park. Her parents had decided to go away for the summer, but Hermione didn't want to go and Harry and Ron were busy with Quidditch, so she spent her time quietly outside.

She had walked so many times across this park and never once had a reason to fear it, despite the fact it was empty most days.

Hermione sat on the grass and got out her now old and battered copy of Hogwarts: A History, and didn't hear someone creep up behind her as she was so immersed in it. One minute she was reading and the next minute she was in a dark, cold, stone room.

“What the hell?” she said out loud, seeing if there was anyone about.

The door opened. Hermione recognised Lucius Malfoy. “Ahh, you're awake.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I mean you've been unconscious for hours.”

“No I haven't, I was reading in the park and -”

“- and you were kidnapped, knocked unconscious and several hours later, woke up, here. Is that clear enough for you, Granger?”

Hermione knelt up from her previous condition. “This can't be happening. You can't seriously have kidnapped me.”

Lucius' eyebrows raised. “And Draco said you were the clever one.”

Hermione shot him a look of deep fury and Lucius walked out of the room. “Wait, where are you going?” she shouted after him. “You can't just leave me here!” Hermione thought about that statement carefully; this was a Death Eater she was dealing with, he could do anything he wanted, as he just proved by kidnapping her in broad daylight. How could she be so stupid as to think she wouldn't be a target?

Lucius didn't come back for the rest of the day and Hermione was hungry and desperate for the toilet by the evening time. She was moaning out loud, what did it really matter, they couldn't hear her anyway, or at least that's what she assumed. And if they could, they probably wouldn't care.

Just then, as Hermione was starting to wallow in her own self pity, the door opened, and she recognised Lucius' son and her fellow classmate, Draco Malfoy. He came carrying a plate full of bread and a glass of water. It wasn't much, but Hermione jumped at the chance and took it off him, so much so he actually flinched at her sudden jump forward.

“I see you're hungry then.”

Hermione gave him an obvious look. “I need the toilet.”

“Thanks for that piece of information, Granger.”

“Well?”

He looked at her, confused. “Well, what?”

“Where am I supposed to go?”

“I don't care, pick a corner.”

“I'm not an animal!”

Draco smirked. “You're locked up like one.”

Hermione screamed and Draco left the room, shooting her a smug look as he locked the door behind him with his wand.

She gobbled down the rest of the bread and drank the water, but this only fuelled her toilet need even more, and after an hour of debating with herself, she went to the corner furthest from the door to do her business.

Hermione finished utterly humiliated and degraded; feeling like an animal more so than before. They had taken her human rights away and they didn't even care. She couldn't debate on the issue for long, it was hardly a revelation and she was getting tired.

Taking the corner furthest from the one she had recently let herself go in, she curled up in a ball on the hard stone floor, trying her best to get to sleep. Due to the gravity of the situation, it didn't take her long and her dreams took her to a happier place, happier times with Harry and Ron.

“Get up,” Hermione was woken by the sound of a gruff man's voice, and the light shining through into the room from the outside corridor. To her, it was still dark and her times were now all muddled up.

After she wiped the sleep from her eyes, she looked up to the owner of the voice, and it was of course, Lucius Malfoy.

“Get up,” he repeated, and she obeyed, if only to have the chance to leave this room. “Come with me,” he dragged her out into a stone corridor which had a window at the end of it. As far as Hermione could tell, it was early morning time.

Hermione was taken up a set of stone steps into a large room. It had black wallpaper and a red carpet, and there were two people stood in the corner; Bellatrix Lestrange and Draco Malfoy. At the former, Hermione's eyes grew wide – she did not feel at all safe with an insane woman around.

Lucius pushed her into the dead centre of the room, locking the door with his wand behind her, and Bellatrix and Draco moved closer, smug looks on their faces.

“You are obviously here for a reason,” the senior Malfoy drawled, walking in front of her to join his family.

“But we can make bonus ones,” Bellatrix laughed, eyeing Hermione's body, leaving her to tremble at the sheer thought. Near the wall there was a table and several chairs behind it, and a couple of armchairs in the corner. “Come on, Lucius, we can have some fun first, surely,” Bella touched his arm gently, and Hermione had to wonder what his wife would say.

“Fine, fine,” he waved her off casually and left the room, leaving her in the not so capable hands of Bellatrix and Draco.

“Come here, deary,” Bella said, walking backwards but luring Hermione with her fingers. Draco had settled himself comfortable in an armchair to watch the situation unravel.

Hermione stepped forward, not wanting to unveil this woman's wrath like she did in the escapade of Malfoy Manor, and Bella touched her hair, as one would with a child. Hermione chanced a glance at Draco, who was leaning with a finger on his head and a smug look upon his face.

“Bella!” a blonde woman ran in the room with an angry look upon her face, and seeing Bella practically molest Hermione seemed to anger her further. “I need a word. Now.”

Bella looked from Narcissa to Hermione, and a second later was leaving the room with her sister, sighing and muttering under her breath about how inconvenient it was. “I will have my way with you, mudblood.” She said just as she slammed the door shut.

Hermione turned to Draco.

“So that leaves me and you, pet,” he smirked at her.

“Pet? I'm not a dog, Malfoy!” she yelled.

“You might want to shush unless you want my Aunt back in here,” he sneered at her. “And I don't think she'd be as generous as I will be with you.”

“You, generous?” Hermione scoffed, still not believing she was even here.

“If you're not willing to co-operate then i'll just have to take you back to your cell -”

“NO!” Hermione protested before she realised she had even said anything.

“No?”

She paused. “It's horrible...”

He nodded his head knowingly. “Sorry the living quarters aren't quite up to your standards, Mubdlood.”

“Draco!” Lucius stormed through the door. “Where's Bella?”

“Mother wanted her,” he replied, matter of factly.

“Great. Well we have a problem with Mulciber,” he sighed. “Take her back will you,” Lucius left before Draco replied and he saw Hermione's face drop.

“You've only been in there a day,” he commented as he took her arm and led her back downstairs.

“You try living in a cold, stone cell with no bed, toilet or food,” she spat.

They reached the bottom of the staircase. “Well, there was going to be food, but...” He shoved her roughly into the cell and she fell flat on her face, tasting blood in her mouth from a cut lip.

As Hermione got herself up, she noticed Draco had left and she was stuck back on her own again, bored and with nothing to do, and desperately needing the toilet again.

Resigning herself to the same degradation of yesterday evening, she squatted in the corner again to do her business, and promptly sat in the opposite corner soon after. She leant her head against the wall and tried to think of her happier, childhood memories, and she wondered whether or not Ron or Harry would even know she was gone.

The next few days passed with little contact; once a day a servant girl brought her a piece of stale bread and water, and on this diet alone, Hermione was getting weaker by the day, but she suspected this was what they had planned all along.

She was thankful that she hadn't seen the Malfoys or Bellatrix again, the alone time was good, if a little dull. But she had to think it was better than having information tortured out of her.

Her cell wasn't exactly clean anymore; the frequent use of urination and her other business there made it a disgusting and vile place to be, and Hermione was sure she would end up getting ill from it.

Suddenly, she heard footsteps outside and sat up, awaiting their arrival – it was a Death Eater she recognised as Rowle, and remembered how Harry had told her he saw Voldemort ordering Draco to torture him.

Rowle was not weak now. He was not pleading. He was smirking and held her food tray in his hands as he made his way into her cell. Looking directly at her, he spat in her food, and spilt her water over it and set it down on the floor in front of her before turning to leave, a cruel laugh emanating from him.

Hermione was mortified and shocked; she was starving but she couldn't eat soggy bread...could she? Yes, she could. She was desperate and picked it up, taking a bite and feeling nauseas.

“Put that down,” in her shock at the state of her food, she had failed to hear anyone enter, and her eyes found those of Draco Malfoy. Slowly she put the dripping wet bread back on the tray. “Aguamenti,” he said coolly, filling up her empty glass, and proceeded to bring her bread back to the state it was in before Rowle had played with it.

Hermione stared at the food, glee in her eyes. “Why?” she whispered.

He shrugged. “Everyone needs to eat.”

“Thank you,” she said gratefully, and gobbled the bread down in gulp.

“Malfoy!” Draco's name was being called from upstairs.

“What?” he shouted back, not tearing his gaze from Hermione who was now drinking her water.

“They want her. Bring her up, will you,” the voice called.

“What?” Hermione snapped up and wasn't happy to feel Draco's hands pressing into her arm.

“I'm sorry,” he whispered into her ear and her eyes grew wide in fear.

“No!” she protested, pulling against him, but she was weak from not being fed much and Draco was very strong.

He dragged her up the stairs and into the same room she was in the other day. The several chairs behind the long table were now occupied by Death Eaters, and the two armchairs had Draco's father and aunt in them, looking ever so proud of themselves.

“Bend her over the table,” Bellatrix called, and the Death Eaters wolf whistled as Draco did so, holding her in place with his hand, firmly on her lower back. “Come round to the front of her, Draco,” Bellatrix cast a spell to keep Hermione firmly in place without his help. “She is yours.”

Draco turned around. “Mine?”

“Do with as you wish,” Bellatrix waved her hands in the air nonchalantly.

“Thank you,” Draco said convincingly enough that his Aunt smiled at him, and he bent down to look in her eyes. “This will hurt, Mudblood,” he sneered at her and the Death Eaters sniggered behind him.

Draco unzipped his trousers and pulled out his rock hard cock, shoving it brutally in her mouth, making Hermione pull on her invisible bonds to no avail, which only made everyone enjoy her show more.

Feeling she had no other option, Hermione bit down hard on Draco's cock and he screamed out loud, pulling away and slapping her round the face roughly. “You evil little scum!” he slapped her again and Bellatrix stepped up, furious.

“You cunt!” Bellatrix cast a mighty boiling hex upon Hermione, causing her to writhe and the pain did not cease until she was crying floods of tears and the Death Eaters were crying with laughter. “Draco, take her, now!”

Draco, after recovering from the bite he gave her, moved around to the back of her and lifted up her dress, shoving his cock into her cunt, which wasn't as tight as he had expected. “Slut.” He shoved a finger in her ass and conjured some lube onto the table, taking his finger out and smothering around her ass hole and onto his fingers. “You will feel this.”

Hermione wailed as she felt his fingers probe her insides, stretching as he fitted another in and pushed hard into her cunt at the same time. She groaned and felt Bellatrix groping her breasts viciously, pulling and pinching on her nipples.

The ordeal seemed to go forever for Hermione but in reality it was only a few minutes long. Draco was cruel and the Death Eaters applauded him when he came all over her back and in her hair, and he violently grabbed her and took her back to her cell.

Today she was glad to be going back. Anything to get away from the wandering eyes of mass murderers who hated her guts and her every presence.

Draco chucked her in and mouthed the word 'sorry' at her before disappearing back to his family and friends, and Hermione lay down on the floor, crying.

A maid entered her cell the next morning, escorted by the one and only Rowle, who was sneering at her. The woman carried a mop and bucket and cleared up the mess Hermione had made, which humiliated and degraded her beyond belief.

“Malfoy demands you shower,” he laughed. “He was almost sick after yesterday.”

“Whatever,” she sighed, curling back up in the corner.

“Filthy mudblood,” he spat, dragging the maid out of her cell before she had properly finished.

It took a couple of hours before someone entered to give her a shower, and Hermione recognised her as the maid that mopped up her cell earlier. “Miss,” she said quietly. “I'm here to take you for your shower.”

“What, no escort?” scoffed Hermione, getting up slowly.

“No.”

“Oh,” Hermione smiled weakly at the girl. “I'm sorry.”

“Don't worry about it Miss,” the maid bowed at her and took Hermione upstairs, through the room she had been in twice before, and across the hall into a luxurious, white tiled bathroom.

“I'm Hermione,”she held out her hand to the maid, but she did not take it, only responding with her own name.

“Georgia. The shower is on the left and i'll be back in fifteen minutes.”

Hermione heard the door locking her in and was grateful of the chance to shower, the chance to be clean and feel human again and embraced every minute of it. Only too soon though, it was over – she heard Georgia knocking on the door and calling 'Miss' - louder each time, and Hermione surrendered and finished her shower; if only to keep herself and Georgia out of trouble.

As the shower turned off, Georgia opened the door and helped Hermione dry herself, though Hermione had a strong urge to ask her to leave her to it. “Please,” she smiled weakly. “I can do it myself.”

“But Master Malfoy told me to -”

“Master Malfoy doesn't have to know,” Hermione grabbed the towel from Georgia's clutches and dried the rest of her body while Georgia folded the clothes Hermione was instructed to wear.

“You can't be serious...?” said Hermione as she checked out the black stockings and ragged brown dress on the chair.

“Yes, Miss,” Georgia whispered, and Hermione reluctantly got into the clothes. It wasn't long before she was being taken back to her cell, which was now fully clean and Hermione felt a lot better about herself, feeling more strong minded and more strong willed, and later that day it showed when Lucius came to drag her out of her cell.

“Come,” he motioned to her.

“No,” Hermione said sharply, staying leaning against the wall.

Lucius sighed. “Well, if this is they way you behave after we give you privileges like a clean cell and shower, do you think we're likely to do it again?”

Hermione hadn't thought about that, and looked at him meekly, with that smug look upon his face. She was slowly learning the best way to survive here would be to obey and earn as many privileges as possible.

“Come,” he repeated, a sterner tone apparent in his voice, and this time Hermione obeyed. He took her to the same room as usual and on the table this time was a light blue box, all on it's own in the dead centre of the room. Lucius walked over to it and picked it up, motioning for Hermione to come closer. “This is for you,” he undid the box, and there was a pale blue collar with silver jewels on it – it looked expensive.

“A collar?” she asked, offended.

Lucius moved forward to put it on her, but she struggled and he ended up using the Imperius curse on her. “It's got a device in there that will tell me if you try to escape and give you an electric shock, so don't try anything. Alongside that, it is charmed to bond you more to our family, so you show more willingness, loyalty and the ability to obey.”

Hermione felt the collar around her neck and still couldn't believe it.

“It will allow you the freedom to roam around the manor, and you will also be alerted when you are wanted. You may use the library at your discretion when you are not wanted for anything.”

Hermione was shocked, that she was really allowed such freedom and was only too curious to ask more. “Why?”

“Just because.” Lucius left the room, leaving Hermione with such sudden freedom that she didn't know what to do.

“Father?” Draco walked into the room and was shocked to see Hermione alone, but after noticing the collar he didn't think twice. “Ahh, Granger.”

“Malfoy,” she was ashamed of the collar and what it represented, and after her harsh welcome to the Malfoy heir, the collar forced her mind into a different set of thinking. “Is there anything I can do for you?”

“Have you seen my father?”

“He just left.”

“Right,” he straightened his jacket, preparing to leave again.

“Sir...” Hermione started, the collar having an immediate effect.“What should I do?”

“Whatever you want.”

“Where is the library?”

Draco pointed out the doorway. “Third door on the right.”

“Thank you,” she smiled weakly at him and made her way down the corridor, passing nobody else but a house elf on her way there. The library itself was huge, bookcases that touched the ceilings and all the way round the room, only stopping at a large window at the very end. There was a large table in the middle, and several armchairs around it.

Hermione spent a couple of hours just wandering around the library and looking at all the books on offer, putting the ones she liked on the table, only this pile kept growing and the books fell over, causing a loud crash due to the enormous amount of them.

“What is going on in here?” Narcissa came running into the room to see Hermione on all fours, frantically clearing up the books.

“I'm sorry, Mistress, it was an accident...”

Narcissa sighed. “Leave it, Georgia will clear it up. It's getting late and I want you to warm our bed for us.”

“Yes, Mistress,” Hermione put the books in her hands on the table and turned to leave the room.

“Third floor, second door on the left.”

Hermione nodded and left the room quickly and walked as quickly as she could to the Malfoy's bedroom. It was minimalistic white, but with a dark ceiling and dark, black carpet. The bed too was black and white, a very luxurious duvet and upon lying in the bed, she felt in heaven.

“What are you doing child?” the shrill voice of Narcissa called and Hermione woke with a start. 'Shit, i've fallen asleep!'

“I'm sorry, i'm sorry...” Hermione got out of bed, making sure to pat down the covers behind her.

“You were supposed to keep our bed warm! Not sleep in it!” the woman was clearly angry and Hermione didn't know how to fix the situation, so she stayed there, staring flatly at the woman with an apologetic look on her face. “Oh get out.”

Hermione obeyed and found herself wandering the corridors, not knowing where to go or what to do – it was getting late and she didn't have anywhere to sleep.

“Granger?” Hermione whipped around, Draco was coming up the corridor she was on. “What are you doing? You look lost.”

“I don't know where to sleep...”

Draco sighed. “Alright. Top floor, first door on your left.”

“Thank you,” Hermione found the stairs up to the top floor and left Draco behind her, seeing a different world up here. Instead of luxury white carpets, her room was simple, dark brown wood, and she only had a bed and a dressing table, with an accompanying wardrobe in the corner. The window was a skylight and there was a dull, faded blind across it.

Still, Hermione knew it was better than being in that cell - anything was. She took a tour down the corridor her room was on, which was similarly decorated and found a grubby bathroom next door, but the other rooms she tried were locked.

That night, apart from the earlier nap in the Malfoy's bed, was one of the smoothest she had ever had. It felt so comfortable, despite the mattress being lumpy and hard, and the blanket being itchy – compared to the dark, stone walled and floored cell, it was like a haven, and it didn't take Hermione long before she drifted off to sleep.

Hermione had been at the Malfoy's for over two weeks now, and she was getting used to life there; it was fairly easy going – the tasks they gave her weren't hard or that fulfilling, and a lot of her time was spent in the library.

Lucius was increasingly away, and Hermione had walked in on arguments between the married couple by accident a couple of times.

Bellatrix had only been around once since, and was eager to have her way with Hermione properly, but Lucius was adamant that she was busy at that time, and Hermione couldn't have been more grateful if she tried.

Death Eaters did come and go, and she got eyed up by Rowle a lot when he was around, but he wasn't much trouble other than that, and Draco seemed to be around every time he got her on her own and tried to threaten her.

Hermione was in the library again, finding more books that she wanted to read, when Bellatrix opened the door dramatically.

“Mudblood!” Hermione turned around in surprise, banging into the bookcase and letting a few escape from the shelves. “I knew i'd get to have my way with you.”

“No, please...”

“What makes you think they care about you?” Bellatrix was circling her now, taking strands of her hair and twirling it around her fingers. “What makes you think they're going to want you around in a week, a month or a year? You're a filthy mudblood. Here to be used, abused and tossed away at the end of the day.”

Hermione didn't know what to say; she didn't want to anger Bellatrix further.

“You're just their slave,” spat Bellatrix. “And i'm going to save them the trouble of looking after you.”

“No,” Hermione whispered, which just made Bellatrix grin even more.

Within a split second, Bellatrix had grabbed Hermione's hair and thrown her to the floor, causing her lip to bleed and Bellatrix to take the time to get out her wand and cast her infamous Crucio curse.

The sheer pain running through Hermione was unexplainable; she was lying there shaking and writhing through the force of the curse; her vision was blurry and she couldn't see anything but black spots as she shook violently.

“I hate you,” spat Bellatrix as she kicked Hermione in the stomach viciously, causing Hermione to gasp for her breath, but she was not given the choice as another, hard kick was delivered again.

Hermione felt her hair being torn and pulled out as she was dragged across the floor by it and her screaming echoed around the room.

“They'll come for me,” whispered Hermione, wiping the blood from her chin and proceeding to try and hold her hair to lessen the tension from the force of Bellatrix.

Bellatrix cruelly laughed and brought Hermione into a standing position, throwing her against the bookcases and causing the books to fall onto the floor noisily.

Hermione edged backwards as she saw Bellatrix cast a silencing spell around the room; she wasn't sure if she would get out of this situation alive.

“You can't kill me,” Hermione backed into the wall at the end of the room. “They need me for information.”

Bellatrix cackled. “I can get that for them,” and Hermione was being bound with her arms around her back and her legs together; it took all her strength to keep standing and not fall to the floor.

Out of Bellatrix's pocket came a small jar that was filled with a colourless liquid; Hermione knew what that was. “Veritaserum?”

Her captor nodded and Hermione shook her head violently, she would not have the information pulled out of her; that would lead to her sudden death. She attempted to make a run for it, forgetting about her bonds, and landed flat on her face. Feeling utterly humiliated but fearing for her life, Hermione crawled along the floor as much as she could; Bellatrix's eyes were on her pathetic escape attempt and it didn't take long for her to grab Hermione and tie her to the nearest chair.

Hermione was strong, but she was not as strong as Bellatrix was and her mouth was forced open, no matter how hard she tried to fight it, the colourless liquid found its way into her mouth and Hermione wasn't able to stop herself swallowing it as Bellatrix was holding her head as far back as it would go; her neck was in sheer agony and soon enough the Veritaserum took hold.

Bellatrix took the chair across Hermione and sat herself down comfortably to start the interrogation. “Right. Where's Potter?”

“Playing Quidditch.”

“Where?”

“I don't know.”

Bellatrix cackled. “Is he staying at that thing the Weasleys call a house?”

Hermione nodded. “Yes.”

“And he'll be there all summer?”

“Yes.”

Hermione's interrogation went on for about an hour before the effects started to wear off and Bellatrix decided she had all the information that was needed.

“So where shall I start?” An evil grin spread across Bellatrix's face and her eyes glinted with power.

Hermione tried to knock herself off the chair but it wasn't working; she even tried non verbal spells but none of the ones she knew would help her out of this situation.

As Bellatrix lifted something out of her pocket, Hermione looked around for any ideas she had to get out of her predicament, but nothing came to her and the more she panicked the more she found her mind utterly blank through fear.

Bellatrix came closer to Hermione, holding up what she had brought out her pocket – it was a knife, the same knife she had threatened to use on Hermione so many years earlier.

It was a quiet morning in the Weasley household; Harry and Ron had more Quidditch planned for today and were eating their breakfast when Ron's owl, Errol, flew into the kitchen holding a heavy package that was nearly weighing the bird down.

“What's that?” asked Ron, mouthful of toast, and Harry shrugged, undoing the string and opening the package himself.

Harry's shrill scream filled the whole of the Weasley household and brought all Weasleys to the kitchen to find out what was going on.

“Mate?” asked Ron in concern for his friend, and Harry did nothing but stare at the now open box and pass Ron the note that was inside of it.

'Don't worry, you'll get to see your friend again – bit by bit. In case you don't recognise it, this was her arm.'

“HERMIONE!” Ron screamed and fell to the ground, collapsing in a fit of tears and hugging the only body part he had – her arm that had once caressed and loved him.

zia_montrose — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 06:48:37 GMT

Writing about two-way mirrors somehow made this into a two-way point of view. Please read the two parts in the order posted below so they make the most sense.

Part I

Title: Prod the Knot
Author: zia_montrose
Word Count: 897
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Drama
Characters: Sirius Black, Severus Snape, James Potter
Summary: (Missing Moment as outlined in Prisoner of Azkaban) “Snape had seen me crossing the grounds with Madam Pomfrey one evening as she led me toward the Whomping Willow to Transform. Sirius thought it would be—er—amusing to tell Snape all he had to do was prod the knot on the tree trunk with a long stick and he’d be able to get in after me.”

Part II

Title: Some Act of Glorious Heroism (incomplete)

Author: zia_montrose
Word Count: 2,020
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Drama
Characters: James Potter, Sirius Black, Severus Snape
Summary: (Missing Moment as outlined in Prisoner of Azkaban) “But your father, who’d heard what Sirius had done…”

Author's Note: It’s my turn to be mean to Sirius, I guess. We’ll blame it on those angsty-but-excellent prompts... Though I might be a little daft for choosing such a BIG missing moment to write about. Hopefully, I haven’t totally botched it. A big thanks to the mods for all the work they put into this challenge to make it fun—and of course, a thanks in advance to any readers.

Prompts:

Triumvirate (a group or association of three)

Cover the mirror
Hide in your dreams
Forget what they told you
Forget what it means

—‘Bury My Lovely’, October Project

Rebuild All Your Ruins

cuban_sombrero — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 10:38:14 GMT

Title: Rebuild All Your Ruins
Author: cuban_sombrero
Rating: PG
Warnings: -
Word Count: 2295
Prompts: So now you'd better stop
And rebuild all your ruins
For peace and love can win the day
Despite all your losing
'Immigrant's Song', Led Zeppelin

". . . all these you see are helpless and unburied."

- Virgil, The Aeneid, Book 6, line 427

Summary: Weasley’s Wizarding Wheezes was naught but a shadow of what it had once been, and if it hadn’t been for Lisa and the others that died, Michael thought that laughter might have been the war’s worst casualty of all.
Author’s Notes: Merlin, it's been forever since I wrote Harry Potter fanfic - and I can say that, while I definitely have missed it, I've still been productive in the meantime. Just you know, not around here. D:

The second prompt is much less evident in my story, to the point where it's mostly non-existant. I only used to inspire the idea of writing post DH fic - something I haven't done in an awfully long time, and certainly not with these characters. To give credit where credit is due, the idea of writing Michael came from some of suzanne78 's stories about him, even if she doesn't know it. I highly recommend everything she writes.

Comments are always appreciated!

here @ spiffing_stuff

♠ Currently accepting fics and art, but... ♠

duck_or_rabbit — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 22:43:10 GMT

CHALLENGE DEADLINE EXTENDED TO JUNE 1

Take a Poll-eroid!

train_lindz — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 16:41:27 GMT

The mods are wanting to be helpful to our members and want your input on the most recent challenge thus far and how we can make it better. Plus, we are nosy and want to know what you are all up to. Let us know - thoughts, questions, concerns...

View Poll: Ides of March Midway Evaluation!

Like Clockwork

train_lindz — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 16:20:53 GMT

Title: Like Clockwork
Author: train_lindz
Word Count: 1260
Rating: PG
Genre: Angst
Summary: He tried to avoid sleep, focusing on the screams around him to try and keep him awake, although he knew that it was inevitable. There were only ever two nightmares that he had each and every night that his body lost the battle with sleep and it over took him.
Author's Note: First submission to kick it off! I like posting first so that I can sit back and read the rest that roll in. Who's next? Remember to review, because reviewers are eligible for awards in this challenge.
Prompts:
Prophet

"If you go off to die, then take us, too, to face all things with you; but if your past still lets you put your hope in arms, which no you have put on, then first protect this house."
- Virgil, The Aeneid, Book 2, lines 914-7

Pull up your head off the floor
Come up screaming
Cry out for everything you might have wanted
‘In A Big Country’, Big Country

Like Clockwork