Chapter 11
Chapter 11
Dorcas wakes up to light pouring through the curtains and Marlene curled in her arms. The gentle rise and fall of Marlene’s chest draws her back into the lull of sleep until their breaths are coming in tangent and Dorcas is nearly embraced in the arms of Morpheus.
The illusion of peace is shattered moments later when Marlene’s brow furrows and sweat beads her forehead. Her breathing shifts and suddenly, they are no longer breathing together. Marlene’s wand arm twitches before she’s flinching away from Dorcas, deep in the throes of a nightmare.
“Marlene, wake up. It’s not real, you’re at home in your flat. You’re safe; you’re okay.” Dorcas continued murmuring into the darkness, not daring to attempt shaking her awake when Marlene was known to lash out in her sleep.
After a painful few seconds, Marlene’s eyes shoot open, her chest heaving.
“Hey, you’re okay. You’re in our flat. Everyone survived the mission, Remus will be okay. Just breathe. Is it okay if I touch you?” When Marlene gives a shaky nod, Dorcas scoots across the bed, closing the gap between them. She wraps her arms around Marlene, feeling the slight trembling and holds her tighter.
They sit in silence for several minutes while Marlene stops shaking and then slowly pulls away from Dorcas.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Dorcas whispers.
Marlene doesn’t speak, just shakes her head in refusal.
“Okay, that’s fine. Let’s go get some food, I know neither of us ate very much yesterday.” Dorcas doesn’t push Marlene to talk, knowing her own distaste for speaking about her nightmares.
Before Dorcas can move to get up, Marlene speaks. “Can we visit my brother?”
“Yeah,” Dorcas agrees immediately. “Yeah, we can go see Oliver.”
– - – - –
When they arrive at the estate belonging to the McKinnon’s and not too far from the Potter family’s manor, a grinning brown-haired boy opens the door.
“Marlene!” Oliver glances behind his sister. “Dorcas!”
The kid dashes forward, enveloping his sister in a hug. Marlene hugs him back tightly and Dorcas can see how much she needed this.
When Oliver lets go of his sister, it’s only to peak his head around her shoulder and stretch out a hand to Dorcas.
“Come on, group hug!”
Dorcas doesn’t even try to fight it, and secretly, doesn’t want to. She lets herself get pulled closer to Marlene and her brother, wrapping her arms around both of them and squeezing them tightly.
When they all finally pull away, Oliver leads them into the house and takes them to the sitting room, gesturing them in like usher at a party would, giggling to himself.
Oliver throws himself onto the sofa, one hand dangling off the side.
“How long are you staying for? Can you stay for dinner? Do you want to play a game with me? Mum and Dad are at work right now. Did you need to see them? I think Mum made brisket for dinner! You should stay for dinner!” The words leave Oliver’s mouth in rapid procession, leaving no time for Dorcas or Marlene to answer.
Marlene chuckles and Dorcas is elated to see true happiness in her eyes.
“We can’t stay for dinner sadly but we can stay for the next few hours. How about that? And yes, we would love to play a game with you. We came here to see you!” Marlene leans over to bop her brother on the nose.
“Yay!” Oliver cheers. “Can we play hide and seek? I found some awesome new hiding places.
“We can play anything you want,” Marlene says.
They run around the estate for half an hour, finding Oliver in increasingly bizarre locations before halting the game for snack time after the kid spent ten minutes in a laundry shoot Marlene had forgotten about.
“So how are our parents doing?” Marlene questions Oliver once they settle around the kitchen island.
“They’re okay. Mum said she wouldn’t get me a pet dog because I’m going to Hogwarts next year but Dad said that if I am doing good in all my classes then he’ll get me a cat at Christmas! Mum wasn’t too happy about that but Dad made a pinky promise so he has to get me a cat,” Oliver rambles.
Marlene is watching Oliver with a fond smile on her face and Dorcas is reminded of how tight the bond is between the siblings. Despite the nine year age gap between them, they’re extremely close and Dorcas knows Marlene constantly misses him.
“Well, if Dad doesn’t get you that cat, just let me know and I’ll take it up with him myself.” Marlene grins.
“Thanks Marly! Do you and Dorcas have any pets?” The kid questions.
“Sadly not,” Dorcas jumps in. “We just don’t have time to care for an animal.”
“Well, that’s not completely true. We have Mercury.” Marlene smirks at Dorcas. She knows Dorcas was against getting that bloody owl in the first place but who was she to deny her girlfriend anything.
“Who’s Mercury?” Oliver asks.
“Our owl,” Dorcas says with a sigh. “We found him injured in the woods and Marlene insisted that we take him home with us.” Dorcas neglected to mention that the only reason they were in the woods was to prevent a Death Eater raid on a nearby muggle camp and that Mercury was now used between all her friends to send mostly Order related messages.
“And isn’t he just the sweetest owl you’ve ever seen?” Marlene smiles.
“Yes, well, I guess it worked out in the end.”
“Can I meet him sometime? You can write me a letter and send it with him!” At Oliver’s request, Dorcas sees Marlene’s smile fade a bit and knows they are thinking the same thing. The Death Eaters are most definitely tracking as many of the Order’s owls as possible and they can’t take the chance that one of Voldemort’s followers will follow Mercury to the McKinnon’s estate.
“Sorry buddy, but he’s still recovering from his injury. It’ll be a while before he’s ready to fly,” Dorcas lies. She hates it but she’d rather betray the kid’s trust than admit that there are people in the world who would gladly murder him and his entire family if they could just find the house he lived in.
“Soon,” Marlene blurts out. “Soon, he’ll be able to fly and we’ll send you all the letters you want, okay?” Dorcas hears the pain in her voice and her heart aches for her girlfriend.
“We’re doing everything we possibly can to fix him, I promise,” Dorcas adds, and from the meaningful look Marlene shoots at her, she knows her girlfriend got the underlying message. We’re doing everything we possibly can to end the war.
“Okay.” Oliver sounds disappointed but he perks back up a moment later. “Let’s go to my room! I can show you the new quidditch poster Mum got me.”
“Lead the way,” Marlene laughs, her smile back in place.
The rest of the day passes in a blur, following Oliver through the house as he shows them every small change that’s been made since Marlene moved out, and playing games with the boy.
By the time evening hits, Dorcas can see Marlene is exhausted and is struggling to keep up a happy facade for her brother.
After they finish the third game of exploding snap, Dorcas grabs Marlene’s hand.
“I’m so sorry buddy but I think we have to head out now,” Dorcas says and she feels Marlene squeeze her hand in thanks.
“But why?” Oliver complains in true child fashion.
“Because we have stuff to do back at the flat,” Marlene says apologetically. “Sorry Oli.”
“Okay, but you have to pinky promise you’ll come back to visit soon.”
Dorcas sees Marlene suck in a breath but holds out her pinky anyway to her brother.
“I promise,” Marlene says before pulling Oliver into an embrace.
“Let’s go,” Dorcas says softly, tugging Marlene out the door.
They watch Oliver wave from the doorway before Dorcas is spinning on her heel, apparating herself and Marlene back to their flat.
– - – - –
Back in their flat, Marlene sinks onto the couch and lets out a sigh.
“I hate lying to him,” she says after a beat.
“I know,’ Dorcas replies.
“But I have to. To protect him.” Marlene sounds like she’s trying to convince herself of this fact.
“I know.”
“He’s too young to know how bad the war is. The things you have to do in war.” Dorcas looks up quickly at Marlene’s words.
“This is about Lestrange,” Dorcas says slowly.
Marlene’s hands are trembling though she’s doing well at hiding it. She gives a short nod.
“Marlene, that wasn’t your fault.”
“I know.” The sharpness in Marlene’s voice shocks Dorcas. “I know, logically, that his death isn’t my fault. He was the one who cast the spell, he would’ve killed me, I was just protecting myself, I know that.” Marlene’s voice cracks and she’s speaking quieter now. “But there is now one less human being in this world because of my actions. And nothing can change that.”
Dorcas sits down on the couch and puts an arm around Marlene, pulling her girlfriend into her side. Marlene buries her face in Dorcas’s shoulder and finally, the tears start to fall.
“It’s okay, darling; it’s gonna be okay,” Dorcas whispers, her heart breaking at the pain she knows Marlene must be in. Dorcas knows too well what the aftermath to killing someone can feel like, intentional or not, justified or not. Like Marlene had said, despite the reasons behind it, nothing could change the fact that a person was dead, gone from the world forever. It’s a weight on your soul Dorcas fears will never fully leave her and she hates that Marlene will now be forced to feel it too.
Dorcas is only glad Lestrange died from his own curse and not any spell of Marlene’s. It’s one less weight for Marlene to bear; the weight of knowing what you are capable of doing. To cast a spell that takes another person's life, killing curse or otherwise, is something that is much harder to come back from.
Dorcas trusts that Marlene will be okay. She’ll have nightmares for a while like the rest of them but she’s tough. The next time she’s sent on a mission her hand won’t shake as she levels her wand at a Death Eater. Her voice won’t tremble as she hurls spell after spell at the people trying to take away everything and everybody that she loves.
And her eyes will be dry as she continues to fight to the bitter end, until the world is a place she and all her friends can feel safe in. Where she can send an owl to her brother without fear.
But until that mission comes, Marlene stays tucked into Dorcas and clutching her hand, escaping from the world for just a few more minutes as she wraps her head around the things this war has forced her to do.
After a while, Marlene’s tears dry and she lifts her head slightly.
“How can you stand to touch me after what I did? How could I hug Oliver with my tainted hands, knowing what he would think of me if he knew what had happened last night?”
“For the same reasons you are able to embrace me and kiss me after I come back from any mission I’m sent on. Because I know who you are has nothing to do with what happened last night and Lestrange’s death changes nothing about who you are as a person. Yes, you will feel bloody awful about it for some time. And yes, it will be difficult. But you will come to realize that you did what you had to do and that doesn’t define you in the slightest. You are still the incredible, beautiful, kind, loving person I fell for in third year. And if Oliver was old enough to comprehend everything that happened and has been happening, all he would be is proud of you and so so happy you’re still here to feel these emotions that make you want to puke.” Dorcas finishes her impromptu speech with a sad laugh and is relieved to hear Marlene snort in response.
“Yeah,” Marlene sighs eventually. “Yeah I guess he would, wouldn’t he.”
“You can sleep now, darling. I’ll wake you up for dinner but right now you deserve a nap,” Dorcas says, getting off the couch to pull a blanket over her girlfriend.
Marlene nods sleepily and says, “thanks Cas, love you.”
Marlene’s already half asleep but that doesn’t stop Dorcas’s reply. “Love you too darling. Always and forever.”