Chapter Text
Three weeks earlier
Calliope Nike Potter rang the doorbell of the house she had visited only once before, preparing to break the heart of the owner. A woman who had lost almost her entire family to one side of the war or the other. It didn’t take long for her to open the door, Callie could see it in her eyes, the knowledge of what she was going to say. She could barely get the words out past the lump of grief that sat in her throat since she had seen Remus and Tonks lying dead, side-by-side on the floor of the Great Hall.
“Mrs Tonks, I… Tonks and Remus they’re both. They didn’t make it. I’m so sorry.”
Callie stood there and watched helplessly as Andromeda Tonks shattered. Her husband had been killed by snatchers less than two months before and now her only daughter and her son-in-law were both dead as well. Killed at Hogwarts, in the last battle of the war. Callie’s own heart felt their loss keenly, Remus had been the last of the Marauders, the last link she had to her parents and what should have been. And Tonks, Tonks had been a friend, a kind word, and a source of laughter, even when things had seemed at there most dark.
Callie saw Andromeda Tonks shatter and did the only thing she could, the thing her friends had done for her through every loss. She knelt down beside the older woman and wrapped her arms around her, offering the only comfort she could in the face of their shared loss. Andromeda tensed at the first contact and Callie thought she would protest, refuse to be comforted by the girl she surely blamed for her loss, but she didn’t. Instead to Callie’s surprise, Andromeda returned the hug, put her own arms around Callie and held her tight. And so, the two of them sat there together on the doorstep of the house she had shared with her husband and grieved for everything they had lost, for everything that had been taken from them.
Callie could not say for how long the two of them sat there like that, it could have been anything from a few minutes to a whole hour. It wasn’t until a baby’s cry rang out that they pulled apart. Andromeda stood and brushed herself down.
“That will be Teddy, my grandson. You should come inside Miss Potter and meet him; he is your godson after all.”
Callie stood up as well.
“I…Uh…I’m… Are you sure?” She stammered out eventually.
The look Andromeda gave her was glacial.
“You accepted the responsibility. You will not shirk it now, not for any reason. So come inside and take a seat in the lounge while I will go and get Teddy.”
Calliope quickly nodded and followed Andromeda into the house, closing the door behind her. So, while Andromeda went upstairs to see to Teddy, Callie made her way into the living room and sat down on the sofa. As soon as she sat down the exhaustion, she’d been pushing aside overwhelmed her and, quite without meaning to, she fell asleep. When Andromeda returned with Teddy fifteen minutes later, she found Callie slumped over the arm of the sofa. With a few waves of her wand, Andromeda removed Callie’s shoes, levitated her up so that she was fully lying down on the sofa in a more comfortable position and draped a blanket over her.
“We’ll let your godmother rest Teddy; she’s earned it.”
Callie slept on Andromeda’s sofa for ten hours, as the events of the past few days, the past year really, finally caught up with her. When she finally woke up, it was to find that her friends had all descended-on Andromeda’s house as well. Neville, Luna, and Ginny were all seated together onto the other sofa. Hermione and Ron were sat next to each other on the floor and behind them squeezed onto a single armchair were Daphne and Theo. Finally, there was Blaise, he had somehow managed to take a seat on the same sofa as her and pull her feet into his lap, all without waking her.
Andromeda had pulled a chair in from the kitchen and was sat in that, Teddy in a bassinet at her side, she was watching all of them with an air of bemusement as if she was not quite sure how she had ended up hosting so many battle-weary teenagers in her home. Blaise was the first one to notice that she had woken up, he locked eyes with her and gave her a very unimpressed stare.
“Do me a favour Potter.”
Callie winced and sat up; Blaise only ever called her Potter in that particular tone when he was exceptionally annoyed with her. She looked around at her friends, every single one of them was frowning at her, even Luna, and Luna never frowned.
“Next time you decide to disappear from the aftermath of a battle without a word to anyone about where you are going. Don’t”
“I’m sorry. I guess I wasn’t really thinking.” The frowns didn’t waver. “I’m truly sorry. I should not have left Hogwarts without letting you know where I was going. It’s not an excuse, but I needed to be the one to tell Mrs Tonks about Remus and Tonks. I should have told one of you.”
The frowns held for a few seconds more, but one after the other they all faded.
“You’re an idiot Potter.” Daphne told her with a shrug. “But you’re our idiot. Remember that in future.”
“I think what Daphne means to say.” Hermione said.
“I meant what I said.”
“Is that we love you and we were very worried when none of us could find you.” Hermione continued as if Daphne hadn’t interrupted. “Please try to bear that in mind next time you’re about to do something that might cause us to worry.”
“I know. And I really am deeply sorry.”
Andromeda stood up from her chair.
“Good, I’m glad that’s settled. Now all of you look starved, give me a few minutes and I’ll put some food together for you all.”
“You don’t have to do that Mrs Tonks.” Callie rushed to assure her, and was quickly echoed by the rest of the group. “We kind of invaded your home. If you would prefer us to leave, we will.”
Andromeda waved their words away.
“Stay. All of you. I’ll get some food ready; it won’t take me long. And please call me Andy.”
“Are you…”
Andromeda interrupted Callie before she could finish speaking.
“You’re Siri’s goddaughter and you are the godmother to my grandson. I would like you to stay and I would like it if you would call me Andy.”
Andy bent down and carefully lifted little Teddy out of the bassinet. She crossed the room and gently placed the baby in Callie’s arms.
“And I think it’s high time for you to meet your godson. Calliope Nike Potter, meet Edward Remus Lupin. Teddy.”
Callie looked down at the tiny baby and felt her heart swell with love. She vaguely heard her friends offering to help Andy get some food ready and the group filtering out of the lounge, but all of her attention was for her godson. She stared down at him and he stared back up at her, after a moment his hair turned into a deep red that matched her own.
“Hi Teddy. I’m your godmother Callie. Your dad asked me the day you were born, and I said yes, and I will be there for you for the rest of my life. Your mum and dad are both gone now and I’m so sorry that you will never know them. But you should know that they were kind, and brave, and loyal and they both loved you very much. They loved you so much that they were willing to fight and die so that you could have a good, happy, and safe life. I promise you will always know what your parents died for, that they were heroes and that you are loved. I won’t let you grow up like I did, Teddy-bear, I will tell you stories about them whenever you ask.”
“We all will.”
Callie turned her head to look at Blaise, her first and best friend. He was sat at her side looking down at Teddy and she knew his promise wasn’t just for her godson but for her as well.
“Thank you.”
Two weeks earlier
Callie sat in the kitchen of Grimmauld Place, huddled inside of the blanket Kreacher had draped her in, her hands wrapped around the mug of hot chocolate he had shoved at her. She couldn’t stop shaking.
How had this happened.
How was it even possible.
Every muscle in her body ached and she could still remember the excruciating pain that had shot through every time her bones had broken and reformed. The sharp snapping sound her breaking bones had made. The way her bones had shifted and reshaped to form a wolf’s skeleton.
She was a werewolf.
A werewolf who had never once been bitten by a cursed wolf.
It was impossible.
Everything she knew about werewolves said it was impossible. Except last night, the night of the full moon, she had been locked into a painful transformation for hours. A transformation that had ended with her becoming a wolf.
The door to the kitchen swung open with excessive force and slammed into the wall. Callie jumped with shock at the crashing sound, spilling her hot chocolate all over her hands and the table. Thankfully, it had cooled enough that it didn’t burn her, but it did cause Kreacher to tut and mutter under his breath about “silly mistresses making messes for poor Kreacher to clean up.”
In the doorway stood a breathless and clearly anxious Blaise. He looked her up and down and then scowled.
“What in the name of Merlin, Potter? When Kreacher summoned me, I thought you must be dying or something. Not sitting here drinking hot chocolate, while your elf makes you breakfast!”
Without waiting for a response, he turned and yelled down the hallway.
“Ron! Hermione! Neville! I’ve found her. She’s down here. She’s not dead and she’s not bleeding!”
Callie heard a few faint yells echoing from elsewhere in the house and assumed that her friends had split up to search the house for her. Blaise stomped into the kitchen, in a manner hugely different from his usual elegant and graceful gait, and sat down opposite her still scowling. Ron, Hermione, and Neville all traipsed in one after the other, over the course of the next few minutes. None of them spoke and all of them looked to be varying degrees of angry. Neville being the least and Blaise being the most.
Blaise waited until Neville, the last to enter, had sat down before pinning Callie with his furious gaze.
“Well? What’s going on? What was so bloody important that you had to summon us all at that crack of dawn? And why for the love of Merlin was Kreacher so upset about?”
“I’m a werewolf.” Callie’s response was barely above a whisper and yet all of them heard her as clearly as if she had shouted it.
None of them spoke. None of them moved so much as an inch. Even Kreacher’s usual mutterings had ceased. The silence was so all-encompassing that you could have heard a pin drop.
Callie dared to look up at her friends for a moment and saw expressions of shock and disbelief on all of their faces.
“I’m a werewolf.” Callie repeated. “I transformed last night.”
“How?” Ron broke the silence finally. “You’ve never been bitten! We’d have known if you’d been bitten! Wouldn’t we?”
He looked at Hermione and Blaise for an answer. After all the four of them had spent the last nine months together. Hunting down and destroying Voldemort’s Horcruxes. Surely one of them would have noticed if Callie had been attacked and bitten by a werewolf at the last full moon.
“I don’t know. I don’t know how it happened or why. But last night I transformed into a wolf, and it wasn’t by choice.”
“Are you sure?” Hermione asked. “I mean. Are you sure that it wasn’t a nightmare or a hallucination? Are you sure you weren’t drugged somehow?”
“Mistress turned into a wolf. Kreacher saw it.”
It was as if with that simple statement the dam was broken.
“Merlin!” “Bloody hell!” “Gods!”
Hermione shook her head fiercely.
“There has to be an explanation. Some other reason for this happening, I mean other than you being a werewolf. I mean Ron’s right for one thing. If you had been bitten on the last full moon, we would have known about it.”
“Hermione. Last night was the full moon and I transformed into a wolf. What other explanation is there?”
“I don’t know. But there must be something!” Hermione ran a hand through her bushy brown hair in frustration. “Werewolves have to be bitten. You haven’t been bitten; therefore, you can’t possibly be a werewolf. I need to…”
“Go to the library.” The rest of them chorused along with her.
It was a refrain they had become very familiar with throughout their seven years of friendship. Hermione scowled at them good naturedly.
“I don’t think McGonagall’s going to let you use the Hogwarts Library just yet, Mione.” Ron pointed out. “The whole castle is still basically a ruin.”
“You can look through my family’s library.” Neville offered, “I don’t know if they’ll be anything to find, we don’t have a lot of books on curses, but you’re welcome to look.”
“I’ll have a look through my family library as well. But for information on curses there’s no better place to look than right here. Supposedly the Black family library has the largest and oldest collection of books on dark magic and magical history in Europe.” Blaise suggested.
Hermione looked at Callie, who just shrugged. She had no idea if what Blaise had said was true, she hadn’t really spent much time exploring Grimmauld Place, and had no idea what the library might contain. It probably was though, given that the Black family were renowned for their knowledge of the dark arts. She’d happily allow Hermione to look through the library here.
Given the state of the rest of the house she should probably make sure it was safe first though.
“We probably need to check and make sure it’s safe, but once we have, feel free to look away.”
“Mione will figure this whole thing out Callie.” Ron reassured her. “She’s good like that.”
For the first time since she woke up Callie smiled. Ron was right, Hermione hadn’t let them down yet. Her research tendencies and ability to find the most obscure answers had got all of them out of their own fair share of problems at one time or another. Neville slung an arm over her shoulder and pulled her into a hug.
“And we’ll all be with you until she does. There’s no way we’re letting you go through this alone.”
Ron, Hermione, and Blaise all came round to Callie and Neville’s side of the table and piled on top of them in a mass hug.
One week earlier
Callie held a crying Teddy in her arms even as tears streamed down her own face. Two days ago, they had buried Fred, now it was the turn of Remus and Tonks. Andy was stood next to her being supported by Kingsley; she had nearly collapsed when the coffins had been brought into the graveyard. Probably would have if Kingsley hadn’t been there to hold her upright.
Merlin this was hard.
The past week had been filled with the funerals of those who had died defending Hogwarts. Who had fought at her behest to finally bring an end to the war. Callie hadn’t been able to attend all of them, that would have been impossible. But she had been to some, Fred’s had been the hardest to get through, up till now.
She did her best to soothe Teddy, but it was an impossible task. He wasn’t crying because he was hungry, or tired, or needed to be changed. He was crying because his parents were being buried.
Teddy was an orphan, just like her.
Teddy had lost his parents to the war, just like her.
But Teddy’s childhood wasn’t going to be like hers was.
Teddy had his grandmother and he had her.
As the coffins holding Remus and Tonks were lowered into the ground, she made them a silent promise.
She would always be there for Teddy no matter what. He would never doubt that he was loved, by her, by Andy, by them. She would spend every day of her life protecting the son they had died for.
The wizard presiding over the burial said a few more words and then with a wave of his wand earth covered the two coffins. Another wave of his wand and the headstones Andy had commissioned were put in place to mark their graves.
Andy took a moment to gather her strength and then, spine ramrod straight, she stepped forward, she waved her wand once and blue forget-me-nots blanketed both graves. She waved her wand a second time and two wreaths of hyacinths appeared and gently floated down to rest against each headstone.
As one the crowd of mourners bowed their heads and silence fell across the graveyard, even Teddy’s cries fell silent in that joint moment of solemnity.
One day earlier
The ministry atrium was crowded with people. There were ministry workers of course. Members of the press, journalists and not just from Britain, the international press was here as well. Finally, there was the general public. They thronged around the podium that had been set up, eagerly waiting to hear from their saviour. That’s what she was again, Callie thought with a bitter laugh. Their saviour. The woman-who-conquered. That’s what the press had named her, and the public had eagerly embraced the title.
It had been three weeks since the Battle of Hogwarts. Three weeks since Voldemort had died, killed by his own rebounding curse. Three weeks since the second war had officially ended.
The last of the funerals had taken place yesterday. Colins coffin had looked smaller than should be possible as it was lowered into the grave. He’d been too young. They were all too young. The funerals might be over, but the mourning would continue.
The last three weeks had been rough. When she hadn’t been attending funerals, she’d been attending meetings. Here at the ministry and at Hogwarts and if she hadn’t been in meetings, she’d been visiting the bereaved, offering what words she could to those who had lost family at the battle.
So far, she’d been successful at dodging the press, but no longer. Today she would have to face them. Daphne, Theo, and Hermione had taken the time to draft a statement for her to read, one that Kingsley had approved, and he’d promised she wouldn’t have to answer any questions. It didn’t make her any keener to face them than she had been before. Callie hated the press. Had hated them ever since the first of her disastrous meeting with Skeeter in her fourth year. Not that it changed anything, she had to give them a statement, enough people had told her to that she knew it must be true. It didn’t mean she had to be happy about it.
Kingsley finished talking with the small group of ministry officials and crossed the room to her side to where she was stood looking down on that atrium and the crowd of people who filled it. He too surveyed the crowd for a moment before looking at her.
“I know there are probably many things you’d rather be doing than this, so thank you.”
Callie just gave a short nod of her head in response.
“Are you ready?”
“Yes.”
Kingsley placed a hand on her shoulder and gently squeezed it.
“Thank you, Miss Potter. For everything.”
Kingsley led the way out of the room, Callie walked at his side and the group of ministry officials followed along behind. Silence fell over the crowd as their small group entered the atrium, Kingsley and Callie were the only two who stepped up onto the small podium that was being guarded by Auror’s. Each one of them had been personally vetted by Kingsley himself.
Kingsley went first giving his own short statement and a promise to take questions later and then it was Callie’s turn. She stepped up to the lectern that stood in the centre of the podium and placed the parchment with her speech on down. With a deep breath she began.
“Three weeks ago, a battle took place at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Staff and students of Hogwarts, members of the DA and the Order of the Phoenix stood together to defend the school against the terrorist organisation, known as the Death Eaters, who had taken control of our society. The battle, and alongside it the war that had engulfed our society, ended when the terrorist leader Lord Voldemort was killed by his own rebounded curse.
Every single one of us who fought against the Death Eaters, did so in the name of freedom. We fought against the tyranny, violence, and oppression that had taken root in our society and in the end we were victorious. But we must not forget the sacrifices that were made in the name of freedom. The list of those who gave their lives in defence of Hogwarts and in defence of our society is long. I mourn for the loss of every single name on that list and all I have to offer to the families of those who died is my sympathies and my gratitude. Their sacrifice will not be forgotten, and it will not be in vain.
I speak not just of those who died at the Battle of Hogwarts, but for everyone who suffered and died over the course of the war. We cannot, we must not, forget them. Now is the time for mourning but it is also the time for justice, the time for us to rebuild. Our wounds will heal, and our scars will fade but we will not forget.
We have a chance now to do better, to be better and I urge all of you to give your full support to Minister Shacklebolt as he works to heal the rifts that have been left in our society. So that never again will anyone be able to stand aside and allow evil to take root, to take over. Our children deserve better than that. They deserve to grow up in a world where every opportunity is open to them, a world without the suffering that we ourselves have endured. The war may have ended, but there is still work to be done.”
Callie stepped back from the lectern and allowed Kingsley to take a place there once more. She ignored the questions shouted at her by the press and members of the public. Kingsley had promised she wouldn’t have to answer any questions and she was holding him to that. It took a moment for the clamour to die down but once it did Kingsley spoke.
“As Miss Potter just said. Much work remains to be done, we will work tirelessly to see that justice is done for all those who suffered and died under the regime of the terrorist organisation known as the Death Eaters. But for now, I would like you all to join me in a moment of silence as we remember those who gave their lives for our freedom.”
Silence fell across the atrium, a mark of respect for the dead.
Now
The ringing of a phone broke the silence that filled the house.
One.
Two.
On the third ring she began to stir.
Four.
By the fifth ring she was awake.
With the sixth ring she had sat up and was reaching for her phone.
Seven.
Eight.
Nine.
“Hello?”
“Callie? It’s me. It’s Jenna.”
“Jenna? What time is it?”
“Callie.”
There was something about Jenna’s tone that made her heart start to beat faster in her chest.
“Jenna. What is it? What’s happened?”
“They were on Wickery Bridge, it had been raining and I guess they must have lost control… They went over the side of the bridge and into the river.”
“Who!? Who was in the car Jenna!?”
“Miranda, Grayson, and Elena. Miranda and Grayson are dead. Elena’s in the hospital and they don’t know yet if she’s gonna make it.”
The phone slipped out of her hand and hit the floor.
It was too much.
She shattered.