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Oliver watched as Sybil paced the length of the safe house. The fact she was half out of her mind wasn’t helping. Muttering as she paced, Oliver found that even that couldn’t disturb the silence that had descended upon them. Being charged with guarding the one known seer in their world was daunting. Made more so by the fact the Dark Lord had started a manhunt for the woman who currently paced the living room floor.
“You should rest while you can.” Oliver’s voice fell on deaf ears as Sybill paced an even deeper hole into the floor. As if his words had sped up whatever tune she was marching to in her brain. Yet when she slept silence descended upon the cabin.
An absolute silence that seemed to soothe Oliver’s soul and rattle it simultaneously. They had been trapped here for so long that he had become accustomed to the ebb and flow of silence and noise. As if by clockwork at exactly eight am Sybill would wake. She would pace and rant and rave about being taken away from Hogwarts. Hogwarts had been her home for nearly twenty years and to have to leave as abruptly as they had…well it had shaken the Divination professor to the core.
Oliver could understand why she had gone slightly mad. They had left in the middle of the night, barely giving the older witch time to pack anything. That had broken her more than anything. The fact she had to leave her books, crystals, and divination decks behind. Something that had been a constant to her had suddenly been taken from her with no warning.
The tower that she had spent twenty years turning into her own haven was now in the hands of Death Eaters.
“Rest? Rest? No. The stars are bright tonight.” She spent a lot of time looking at the stars. So far they hadn’t been able to make sense of the charts she compulsively pumped out. Star charts, astrology charts, and even a few Arithmancy charts. All stored in case they meant something. Yet so far, no one had been able to make sense of them.
They had tried pairing Sybil’s charts up with Septa’s to see if that helped any, yet they were just as confused as they were before.
It would have been so much easier if someone who actually liked divination had been given the job of looking over Sybil. They at least stood a chance at deciphering the compulsive page upon page of work she pumped out as if her life depended on it. Oliver hadn’t taken Divination, but he knew one thing.
When the eccentric Divination teacher fell silent when she wasn’t sleeping, something was coming. Something big. The last time she had fallen silent, there had been an attack on Godric’s Hollow. The time before that? Diagon Alley. It had taken a while to equate her silences with the attacks that were happening. Oliver hadn’t figured out if she was actually seeing things or if there was just a big enough energy shift that it was enough to cut through the fog that seemed to encase Sybil’s brain.
He wasn’t an expert at Divination by any means. Hadn’t even taken the class. Which left him scrambling to decipher some of her charts and card drawings. Oliver had learned more about divination in the last year than he ever had at Hogwarts.
There was nothing else to do in the hours that sounds seemed to echo in the silence. Slowly, they built up a library. Half taken from the bookstores in Diagon Alley, when Oliver felt brave enough to risk a trip, mainly through the safe house networks that Hermione and her team were building.
The fact they were tucked away in a forest, miles and miles from anyone, and hidden deep behind a fidelius charm made shopping a chore.
Yet Oliver found that when he went out into the world, the noise seemed to push him back home that much faster. He longed for their safe house and the silence he could produce in a way that wasn’t natural. He had learned long ago to leave Sybill to her eccentrics and had soundproofed a room that allowed him to see the front door.
Silence had become as much a part of his life as the constant chatter had. When she sat spinning wool on the spinning wheel, Oliver watched in fascination as she weaved a spell all her own. Sybil may be eccentric, but he had long learned there was a method to her madness. The wheel spun, faster and faster as she entered a trance. By the time she came down from her trance, something usually clicked within her brain, and she knew what needed to be done next.
Whether it was moving someone from a safe house, attempting to take back a certain area, or something as simple as what Hermione’s next set of orders was going to be, Sybill had a way of knowing it before it happened.
Oliver had grown so accustomed to the ebb and flow of silence and noise that he wasn’t looking forward to whatever his next assignment was. He found he could spend hours working in the garden, cultivating and harvesting depending on the season. The fact there was a decent river within their enchantments for fishing hadn’t been an accident.
All things considered, they had gotten really lucky they had been given this safe house. It enabled them to live as close to everyday life as possible. It helped stock the other safe houses. Sure, it came with hours upon hours of extra work because it was a working farm. Yet Oliver found that he didn’t mind the hours spent tending the garden or the animals.
It kept his mind occupied and his hands busy. It helped keep the bubble of silence around him that he had grown accustomed to. It let him keep an eye on Sybill without having to do weekly and bimonthly trips out to get supplies. Yes, he did have to stock the other safe houses, but he found he could do that in two nights.
Always nighttime, never during the day.
Oliver found it best to leave when the Seer was asleep and return before she woke. He had once walked in on the tail end of a prophecy that had taken her months to finally repeat.
Sybill was never left alone again during waking hours.
There was too much at stake. Too many people scouring the countryside for her. The fact the Dark Lord wanted her that much told them all they needed to know.
Sybill Trelawney was to be protected at all costs. Even if her prophecies only came once every few years, it wasn’t worth the risk of her falling into the Dark Lord’s hand.
They had been lucky so far. That they were able to hide in plain sight. Tucked away in the countryside where houses were kilometers apart. It let them expand their enchantments around the entire property without anything catching a glimpse of them.
As the days stretched on the silence seemed to encase him from all sides, Oliver made the best of it.
There would come a day Sybill Trelawney wouldn’t be there, and he knew he’d miss the inane chatter.
Yet for now, for now he found he craved the silence.