Valley Forge

The manor was dark, and silent except for the rain puttering against its ancient windows. 

Dean stood resolutely, his back to the entryway and his hands up in a conciliatory gesture. Seamus stood before him, his face flushed with frustration. His fists were clenched so tightly that his knuckles had gone white. "Dean, move," he said tightly, voice shaking with barely contained rage. "I'm going."

"No, you’re not," Dean said firmly, standing his ground. His heart was pounding, but his voice came out remarkably steady. "Seamus, listen to me. You don’t have a plan. You don’t have backup. He has thousands of followers. And probably even more security measures. You run out there now, you’ll be dead before you even get close."

"So what?" Seamus snapped, throwing his arms out. "We sit here, we do nothing? We wait while he figures out how to make himself immortal again? We have a chance, Dean! Don’t you get that? He’s vulnerable! We need to move!"

"We need to be smart," Dean countered. "We don’t even know where he is right now. What are you going to do? March into the Ministry and ask if he’s in? Hope he’s just strolling around Knockturn Alley? You’ll get yourself killed."

"If that’s what it takes—"

"Don’t," Dean cut in sharply, stepping closer. His own frustration was boiling now, but underneath it was something worse. Fear. "Don’t talk like that."

“You can sit around on your fat fucking arse, Dean, but I’m going out there. Not for you. Not for Harry. For my mam.” 

"Seamus," he said sternly. "You know she wouldn't have wanted that."

Seamus’ whole body locked up, something in his eyes close to hatred as he regarded Dean. His piercing gaze alone was enough to knock the wind from Dean’s chest.

"How would you know what she wanted?" the Irishman asked, voice ice cold. "You didn’t even know her."

"I know she would have wanted you safe," Dean retorted. He hesitated, then stepped forward. He had to stop this before Seamus did something reckless. "Just like I want you safe."

The words hung in the air. Seamus stared at him like he’d never seen him before, as if evaluating him with fresh eyes. 

“Please.” Dean plead, purposefully softening his tone. He felt achingly uncomfortable with the vulnerability, but for the first time since Potterwatch had aired, Seamus was hesitating.

“It’s not about you.” Seamus finally muttered. 

Frustrated at the emotional bid's failure, Dean responded angrily. "And what do you think happens if you die?" he shot out, voice raising. "What do you think happens when you go running off and get yourself caught? You think they’ll just kill you quick? You think they won’t use you to get to the rest of us? They’ll figure out everything you know about the resistance. You want that getting out there? You’d cripple us, Seamus. And then when they get every last piece of relevant information out of you, you’d get it worse than the bloody Longbottoms."

Seamus’ hands twitched at his sides. Whether the tremble was from rage or grief, Dean could not decipher. They continued to glare at each other, standing at an impasse.

And then, finally, something broke.

Seamus' shoulders sagged. He pressed the heel of his palm to his forehead and he shook with the intensity of emotions he couldn't let go.

Behind them, Kingsley let out a long, slow breath. Dean turned, surprised, not having realized that the man had been watching them. The auror stood in the doorway, but Dean had a suspicion he’d only just made himself visible. He had an aptitude for cloaking charms.

"This," he said, sounding frustrated, "is exactly why we do not air strategic information on Potterwatch before discussing it amongst ourselves."

“You would’ve kept this from us?” Dean asked, baffled and vaguely offended.

Kingsley hummed noncommittally and pushed off the wall, "We don't have the numbers for suicide missions. I need people alive. Just because He's vulnerable, doesn't mean things are going to get easier. Desperate animals bite the hardest." He stepped closer, lowering his voice, regarding them sternly. "We’re not losing anyone to reckless heroics. Is that understood?"

Seamus didn’t respond, but Dean gave Kingsley a tired nod. "Yeah," he murmured. "We understand."

The Daily Prophet was waiting on the counter when Hermione entered the kitchen. The headline took up nearly half the front page, bold and triumphant:

POTTER’S LAST TIES SEVERED—MUGGLE FAMILY ELIMINATED!

Her stomach twisted. She snatched up the paper before anyone else could. Despite her best efforts, something in her face must’ve betrayed her, and Ron, concerned, came up behind her. She attempted to pull it away, out of his sight, but judging from the tight line Ron’s mouth had retracted into, he’d read enough.

Molly, who had been setting down a plate of toast, hesitated. "What is it?" she asked softly, her voice carrying the same fragile quality it had since her family had fallen apart.

Hermione swallowed and forced herself to read aloud: "Vernon, Petunia, and Dudley Dursley were killed late last night after a confrontation with the brave enforcers of our Ministry’s new counter-terrorism program. Sources indicate that the Muggle-loving traitor Dedalus Diggle had been harboring them, but his feeble defenses proved no match for the might of Our Lord’s forces. This momentous occasion marks the extinction of the last of Harry Potter’s blood relatives, and brings us still closer to Our Lord’s dream of a purer, better world."

There was more—there was always more, propaganda designed to make the atrocities sound justified—but Hermione couldn’t bring herself to read further.

Ron let out a short, humorless laugh. “Brave enforcers, right.” He shook his head, voice dark. “Harry probably would’ve thanked them for it.”

“Ron…” Hermione chastised, but her heart wasn’t in it.

Molly sat down heavily in the chair beside her. She wasn’t crying, but she looked like she might start at any moment. Her hands quivered as she reached for the Prophet then turned it over, as if by hiding the headline she could somehow erase the reality of it.

Dean had seen paranoia before. It was a natural byproduct of war. Still, there was something surreal in watching Kingsley put Roger Davies through every possible test before allowing him into the house.

The man was thin, paler than Dean remembered him being back at Hogwarts. 

“Go on then,” he’d said tiredly when Kingsley greeted him with a drawn wand.

Cursed object detector: nothing.

Sneakoscope: no response.

What had he and Kingsley last said to each other? “Did you hear about Sirona? Such a shame.”

Only then did Kingsley finally step aside, gesturing Roger in.

Dean, arms crossed, leaned against the wall as he watched them move down the hallway. He wasn’t entirely sure what this meeting was about, but he wanted to find out. He fell into step behind them. 

It wasn’t until they reached the study that Kingsley stopped and turned, leveling Dean with a look. A warning. Then, without a word, he stepped inside, shutting the door right in Dean’s face.

Dean frowned. That was new.

A moment later, a silencing charm shimmered over the wood. 

He hesitated for only a second before sighing and heading back down the hall. He had no chance of finding a way around Kingsley’s spellwork.

Still, when Roger left two hours later, his shoulders tense and his expression grim, Dean couldn't help but glance at Kingsley expectantly.

He said nothing.

George wasn’t getting out of bed.

Lee had known it would be bad. He’d known, even before Fred’s death, that war left scars on people. But this—this absence of George, this quiet where laughter used to be—it was suffocating. It was like both twins had died.

“Come on, mate,” Lee tried, sitting on the edge of the bed and shaking George’s shoulder gently. “I made breakfast.”

No response.

Lee sighed and glanced around the dim room. The shades were drawn, blocking out most of the morning light, and George hadn’t moved from where he lay curled on his side, even though his shoulder tensed, betraying that he was awake. His red hair was a mess, his face unshaven.

Lee placed the tray of food down on the nightstand, nudging it a little closer. Toast, eggs, tea. He was really trying here. He never cooked.

“You need to eat something, George.”

Nothing.

Lee exhaled sharply through his nose, resisting the urge to shake him harder, to force him out of bed and make him eat, talk, do something. 

Instead, he leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “Potterwatch is on tonight, y’know,” he tried. “Could use another voice on it.”

George shifted minutely. At least that was something.

Lee tried again. “They announced the thing about Harry’s relatives this morning. Proper nasty business. Prophet’s bragging about it.” He paused, gauging for a reaction. “Fred would’ve had a thing or two to say about that, huh?”

A sharp inhale. But still no words.

Lee swallowed against the lump in his throat. “I don’t know what to do here, mate,” he admitted. “You tell me what you need, and I’ll do it.”

Silence.

The tea on the nightstand was already cooling.

Eventually, Lee gave up. He placed a hand on George’s shoulder, squeezing it briefly before standing. “I’ll be back later,” he said quietly. “Food’s here if you want it.”

Something had changed with Kingsley, Dean realized.

He’d started retiring to his study more often. Stopped letting him listen in. Dean wasn’t sure when he first noticed it. Maybe it was around the time Roger Davies had stopped by. At first, Dean hadn’t thought much of it. Kingsley was taking a more active role in the leadership of the Order, after all, and the stress could be getting to him. And, Dean knew, it wasn’t smart for foot soldiers like himself to know everything that was going on behind the scenes. He was no Occlumens. He certainly wasn’t resistant to the cruciatus curse or Veritaserum. It made sense that he wasn’t privy to everything. Despite this logic, the shift in transparency bothered him. And then came the packages.

They arrived in the mornings, wrapped in plain brown paper, always unmarked except for Kingsley’s name. The first time Dean saw one, he’d thought nothing of it. But when he saw the second, the third, the fourth—always small, always light, always taken away swiftly before he could get a proper look—he started paying attention.

Kingsley never opened them in front of anyone.

That was the first clue.

He was careful with them, tucking them away with an efficiency that suggested he didn’t want questions.

Dean still asked.

“Nothing you need to worry about,” Kingsley said, his tone indicating finality.

Still, Dean hadn’t stayed alive for a year on the run without developing a healthy dose of paranoia. 

He started keeping an eye out, following the auror's movements with more scrutiny. The latest package was delivered via owl, and Kingsley had taken it to his desk as usual. Dean tried to be discreet, pretending to go in the opposite direction when Kingsley made toward his office. Once he’d turned a corner, Dean had speed walked as quietly as possible to catch up, and had managed to catch him just inside his office, unfolding a short note tucked inside. Dean just managed to see a name scrawled at the bottom of the note before Kingsley noticed him and shut the door, frustration scrawled across his expression.

Damocles Belby.

The name meant nothing to him. But the way Kingsley had stiffened, the way his large hands had moved quickly to obscure the letter—clearly it was something important.

What’s in the packages, Kingsley? Dean wondered. What are you hiding?

Neville had already been operating at a stress level well past his comfort zone when things had taken a turn for the worse. He hadn’t thought his life could become much more difficult. His name and face were featured daily in the Prophet’s Undesirables section - wanted dead or alive, the real news only ever seemed to announce more deaths, and he felt perpetually overwhelmed caring for the needs of the catatonic parents he’d never known.

He had been wrong.

His great-uncle Algie and great-aunt Enid had moved in under the pretense of helping. Gran, who’d never gotten along very well with her in-laws, hadn’t wanted them to. 

And now, every moment in the Longbottom house was suffocating.

“I raised Frank,” Gran snapped one afternoon, slamming a pot of tea onto the kitchen table hard enough to rattle Neville’s cup. “I know how to care for him.”

Enid, who sat opposite her, pursed her lips. She took on a condescending tone as she lectured, “I don’t doubt that, Augusta, but caring for two adult patients is different than raising a child. More than one set of hands is needed.”

“I have more than one set of hands,” Gran said curtly, nodding toward Neville, who immediately shrank into his chair. Why would you bring me into this? he mentally lamented.

Enid scoffed. “Surely you don't mean the boy who can barely even care for himself?" 

Neville clenched his jaw. He hated when people spoke about him as if he wasn’t in the room. He liked it even less when his relatives infantilized him.

“Don’t be dramatic,” Gran huffed.

"He's not Frank, Augusta," Enid reproached.

His grandmother tensed. Her tone was dangerous, "Are you insinuating-"

Uncle Algie, who had been stirring at his tea lazily, finally spoke, sensing his sister-in-law's mounting rage. “No one’s questioning your prowess, Augusta. We’re only pointing out that the situation has changed. You can’t do everything yourself.”

Neville could practically hear Gran’s teeth grinding.

She wanted to tell them to leave. He could see it in her eyes. But they wouldn’t, even if she asked, and she knew it.

Neville let out a slow breath.

“It’s for the best, dear.” Enid said patronizingly.

Neville wasn’t so sure.

Hannah felt useless.

She had tried, at first. She had done her best to be patient, to wait, to trust that the light-side would push through and win. She had followed orders, stayed hidden, kept her head down, even after the death of her mother. 

But the days dragged on, and with each edition of the Quibbler, every broadcast of Potterwatch, the bodies, and names attached to them piling up without relief, Hannah felt more and more nugatory.

She wasn’t a fighter like Neville, Ginny, or Seamus, lacking the bravery that seemed to come so easily to them. She wasn’t brave like Luna or Lee, putting themselves in the line of fire to keep the rest of them informed. She lacked the smarts and logistical knowledge of Hermione and Kingsley, having dropped out in her sixth year. She felt utterly useless.

But she wanted to help.

So, one afternoon, she approached Madam Pomfrey.

The older woman was in the bedroom she’d turned into a sort of office for herself, a stack of potion vials in front of her, carefully inspecting their contents. Nervously, Hannah rapped on the open door.

“Madam Pomfrey?”

The healer looked up, shaking her head as if to clear it. She smiled pleasantly at Hannah. “Yes, dear?”

Hannah swallowed. She bit the bullet. “I—I want to learn. Healing, I mean. We—we need more people who can do it. More people trained.” She was stuttering over her words. She took a breath. “I want to help.”

Pomfrey stared at her for a long time, her discerning eyes scanning Hannah’s face as if searching for something. Hannah stood her ground, keeping her shoulders squared even though her hands fidgeted at her sides.

Then, to her surprise, Pomfrey’s expression softened—just a fraction.

“You understand that healing isn’t simply a matter of waving a wand and immediately fixing things, yes?” the matron asked. “It requires patience. Precision. A level head.”

“I know,” Hannah said quickly. “I—I’m not saying I’ll be good at it right away, but I want to try. I want to do something.”

A pause. Then Pomfrey nodded.

“Very well,” she said, and Hannah couldn’t help exhaling in relief. “I’ll teach you. But only if you are serious about it. You will listen. And you will learn. Properly. Healing involves other people’s lives, Miss Abbott. It is not something to take lightly.”

“I know,” Hannah said, nodding firmly, “I—I’ve thought about this for awhile. I’m serious. Really.”

The mediwitch studied her for another moment, scanning her face for any hint of hesitance. “Then we start tomorrow.”

The house was too full now.

Neville had never been particularly social—he had spent most of his childhood alone with Gran, quiet, trying not to disappoint. But now there were too many people in too little space, too many voices talking over each other, too much stress, too many unsettled, unhealthy family dynamics clashing.

They weren’t always explosive, but they were always there—thinly veiled comments, cutting glances. Aunt Enid was particularly adept at backhanded compliments.

Neville kept out of it as much as he could. He took over most of the actual caretaking for Mum and Dad because at least that was clear. Feed them, bathe them, tuck them in at night. There was something grounding about it.

Mum and Dad didn’t notice the fighting.

They existed in their own world, one where time didn’t move, where their minds had long since drifted away. Neville had long since accepted that. But that didn’t make it any easier to see his mother staring blankly at a window, or his father sitting in the corner, hands twitching as if reaching for something invisible.

Algie and Enid tried. He would give them that.

They spoke to Frank and Alice as if they could understand, as if any moment now, they might just snap back to who they were. They kept Mum’s hair neatly brushed, and brought Dad blankets when he shivered. They told stories of the past, of things Neville had never known, things that made him feel like a stranger in his own family.

“Frank loved Quidditch,” Algie reminisced one evening, when Neville was helping settle Dad into bed. “Oh, he was brilliant. Played Chaser at school, you know.”

Neville blinked. “He did?”

“Of course,” Algie said, adjusting the pillow behind Frank’s head. “Fast as hell. Team captain and everything.”

Neville stared at his father, at the slack, vacant expression on his face. He tried to picture him soaring through the air, chasing after the Quaffle with all the intensity Neville had seen in Ginny Weasley’s eyes back at Hogwarts.

He couldn’t.

Dean had imagined this moment a hundred times over.

Lying awake under the night sky, peering up at the stars, the snores of Ted Tonks and Dirk Cresswell lulling him to sleep. Staring at the basement door in Malfoy manor, certain he’d never see the other side of it again. Looking into the licking flames of Kingsleys hearth, thinking about Seamus’ mum - the way they’d painted the walls with her blood. He ran through plans in his head like an old Quidditch playbook. He had pictured knocking on his mum’s door, stepping into his childhood home, breathing in the familiar scent of home-cooked meals and laundry detergent.

An emotion he couldn’t identify settled deep in his chest as he stood outside the door of his mother's household, his knuckles hovering over the wood. It had been nearly a year since he had last seen his family—since he had fled after being expelled for being a Muggleborn. A year since his world had changed completely. He’d wanted to come back for some time now, but Kingsley had only just given him the all-clear on account of his injuries and the recent revenge killings.

Kingsley had helped him check in on them, discreetly. A quiet word from one of his contacts, a confirmation that they were still alive, still safe. But "safe" didn't mean what it used to. And that wasn’t good enough anymore.

He needed to see them.

Dean knocked twice, sharp raps against the door. He heard footsteps, then a latch sliding back, and the door swung open.

His mother stood there, staring at him.

For a moment, neither of them moved. Then, before he could say anything, she pulled him into a fierce embrace, arms wrapped so tightly around him it nearly knocked the breath from his barely healed ribs.

“Oh, my boy,” she murmured into his shoulder. “My darling boy.”

Dean squeezed his eyes shut, inhaling the scent of home—his mum’s perfume, faint traces of soap and tea. For the first time since he’d hit puberty, he let himself sink into his mother's embrace.

When she pulled back, she held his face between her hands, scanning his features as if checking to make sure he was real. “You look—” She exhaled shakily. “You look so tired, love.”

Dean forced a small smile. “Been a rough year.”

She made a wounded noise, then yanked him inside.

His stepdad, Gary, was standing near the couch, arms crossed. His expression was unreadable, but when Dean met his eyes, he gave a firm nod.

“Good to see you, son.”

Dean swallowed. Gary wasn’t a man of many words, but there was something solid in the way he said it. Dean had never called him Dad—never felt quite right doing so, not when he had never known his real father. But Gary had been there for as long as he could remember, steady and present in a way that mattered.

“Yeah,” Dean said, voice rough. “You too.”

His mother ushered him toward the couch, fussing over him in that way only mothers could. “Have you been eating enough? You’re thinner than I remember-”

Dean shook his head, feeling oddly like a child again under her scrutiny. It was comforting. “Mum, I’m fine. Really.”

She pursed her lips like she didn’t believe him but sat beside him anyway, gripping his hand tightly.

It was only then that she looked at him properly, really looked at him, and the warmth in her eyes dimmed slightly. “You wouldn’t have come if it wasn’t serious.”

Dean hesitated.

He hadn’t rehearsed this part.

How did you tell your family they had to run? That the life they had built, the home they had made, wasn’t safe anymore?

He took a slow breath. “Mum, we need to talk.”

Her grip tightened around his hand. “What is it?”

Dean glanced at Gary, who was watching them carefully.

“There have been attacks,” Dean said. “On families. On people like us. I know you’ve seen some of it on the news, but what they’re not saying—what they won’t say—is that it’s getting worse. And it’s not going to stop.” He swallowed, forcing himself to meet his mum’s eyes. “You need to get out of London. Out of England.”

Her expression barely changed, but her fingers curled tighter around his.

“Leave?” she asked, unsure.

Dean nodded. “Kingsley—he knows people. He’s got someone who can help. Someone who’s been getting people out.”

“Kingsley…” she echoed.

Dean remembered that he hadn’t mentioned the auror to her. “He’s been keeping me safe. Seamus and I—we’ve been staying with him. He used to work for the ministry before… everything. He has a lot of connections.”

She exhaled shakily. Dean worried, for a moment, that he’d given too much information at once. But then she looked at Gary and asked, “What do you think?”

Gary was quiet for a long time. Then, finally, he said, “I think we listen to him.”

His mum turned back to him, her throat bobbing. “And what about you?”

Dean had known the question was coming.

He squared his shoulders and tried to summon a bit of Gryffindor bravery. “I have to stay.”

Tears welled in her eyes. “Dean—”

“I have to,” he said, firmer this time. “I need to fight, Mum. Our numbers are horrid, and somebody needs to stand up against this. This isn’t just— I can’t run from this. People have died. People important to me. And I can’t—” His voice cracked, just a little. “I can’t leave who's left to face it alone.”

When his mum spoke again, her voice was barely above a whisper.

“You’re too much like your dad.”

His heartbeat stumbled over itself.

His dad.

She never talked about him.

Dean swallowed past the lump in his throat, forcing himself to speak. “Mum.”

But she only shook her head, blinking back tears. “He was brave too, you know. Stubborn as anything. He had that same look in his eye when he left that morning—” She cut herself off, inhaling sharply.

Dean felt like a rug had been pulled out from under him.

Suddenly, the man he'd never known, spent years wondering about, never getting answers, was here, like a ghost pressing between them.

Dean’s throat was dry. “Mum, what—”

But she was already wiping her eyes, straightening her shoulders. “We should start packing.”

Just like that, the moment passed.

Dean wanted to push. He wanted to ask—but he didn’t.

Instead, he nodded, and after another long hug, he gave them the contact information Kingsley had provided.

His mother held onto him for a long time before finally letting him go. Gary shook his hand, gripping it tightly.

Kingsley was waiting for him when he got back. After giving Dean the standard security checks, he didn’t say anything, merely nodding at him and beginning to turn toward his study.

Dean was emotionally exhausted. But still, he grabbed at Kingsley’s sleeve before the wizard could disappear into his desk again.

Kingsley turned back around to face him, one eyebrow raised.

“Where will they go?” Dean asked, with more emotion than he’d expected. Something about returning home had lodged something loose in him.

Kingsley was quiet for a long time before he finally said, “The more people that know, the less safe they’ll be.”

Dean thought about the spider from fourth year. The one "Moody" had Crucio’d in front of them. About the Veritaserum he’d overheard Harry complain about.

He didn’t ask again.