The South
When he’d joined the army he’d been asked for his name. He’d never been told his parent’s names. His mother was “that whore” and his father was someone who paid her. Maybe that made Harry a Dursley, but he’d sooner go back north and die in battle than claim them as kin. He’d heard Aunt Petunia’s family name as a child and held it close like a secret. Evans. Harry could be an Evans.
Who knew what in the south your name mattered. Officers in the south all knew each other by name. The last name, specifically. It didn’t take long for Harry to grow immune to the disparaging looks his name brought on. No one knew an Evans. Where did this green-eyed freak come from?
They made Harry wear a black uniform with silver buttons. Cedric’s clothes on his body. They were stiff and restricting and he had to learn how to move all over again. His peers made fun of him when he changed back into the regular clothes he wore in the north. Hearty trousers and thick shirts and tunics. These southern boys - to Harry, they looked like boys - wore the wildest finery just to sweat on in training.
The southern boys were fighting fit, or so they thought. Harry learned rich men exercised different. They rode horses and played sports. Their sword play had rules and something called etiquette. Many could outrun and outride Harry and they thought it made them better.
What use was caring. Harry stayed quiet. Did what he was told. He was here because he had to be, not because he wanted anything from it.
At night, he wondered if his bed was where Cedric had once slept. Harry closed his eyes and imagined Cedric was there with him now. One arm thrown over Harry’s chest and his nose brushing against Harry’s hair. He had nightmares of watching Cedric die and woke up screaming. Not a way to make friends. Not with these southern boys who hadn’t learned fear yet.
The instructor had a young face even though he was at least a decade older than his charges. His weariness came out in other ways. His light-brown hair which had flecks of gray, his face was always tired and pale. He was rumpled, even if the trainees weren’t ever allowed to be. Harry didn’t immediately see why, but Cedric had spoken highly of Remus Lupin.
In the second week, Lupin randomly paired the trainees up and had them spar with wooden swords. It was a quick elimination competition where the “dead” watched the victors and were instructed to take notes of what they could learn.
No one expected anything of Harry, who’d been middling at the non-combat exercises the week before. Low expectations meant you never disappointed, except that day Harry learned some folks only liked you when you lived up to them. He tore through each match with cold ruthlessness. His peers grew angrier each time he won. Felt like being back with the Dursleys, with Dudley screaming at him because Harry was better at lessons right before they stopped letting anyone teach Harry anything. He wondered if Lupin would send him back north to appease these entitled pieces of shit.
Instead, Lupin picked up a wooden sword. He asked if Harry thought he could land a blow. He let Harry try.
Cold, ruthless effort couldn’t do it. Lupin moved like water, impossible to hit. Impossible to hurt. It was the first time the boys’ laughter got under Harry’s skin. The heat came back to his blood and Harry began to lash out recklessly. He got careless. Which is when Lupin made his move. One swift attack to send Harry rolling on the ground.
“What did you learn?” Lupin asked everyone else. Harry didn’t get off the ground to listen to the boys he beat sound off about fighting positions and specialized techniques they couldn’t do themselves and probably didn’t know well to actually recognize.
One voice cut through the rest in exasperation. “He got angry and it made him sloppy.”
“Well done, Ronald,” Lupin praised. Harry did sit up then to catch sight of the long, gangly mass of red looking smug. Instead of opening the conversation back up, Lupin turned to another boy. The fellow was slumped, his gloomy round face despondent. “What did you learn, Neville?” Nothing, apparently. The plump boy had never even practiced fencing and stumbled through admitting the sword was heavier than he expected. While everyone else snickered, Lupin’s smile was warm. He said everyone had a starting point, and promised Neville there was nowhere to go but up.
Then Lupin told Harry it would be his job to help Neville up. Their trainer split the boys into two teams. Half the boys assigned to the runner up, Marcus Flint. The other half, nearly everyone who lost in their first round, assigned to Harry. Marcus and Harry were named captains. Their teams would face off in three months to see who would win. Questions came about the competition, but Lupin had no answers for them. Just that warm smile and sincere encouragement.
Out of character, Harry actually did speak up afterwards. His request to let someone take his place was denied.
At least training was an old habit. Easy to get up early. Easy to make everyone else do it too. Familiar lines of soldiers. Familiar drills.
Unfamiliar attitude.
Northern boys might whine about pain or fatigue or how they missed their families, but these southern nobles whined about everything. Harry’s directions were thought open for debate. “I’ve already learned that.” “It feels funny when I do it that way.” “This move didn’t help you against Lupin.”
Harry broke down and challenged anyone who didn’t want to listen to a match and knocked the one guy who took him up on it down on his ass so hard he bruised for a week. Maybe they shut up and finally did the drills, but the big thing Harry’d done was make everyone resent him.
They took it out on Harry in a million ways. Officer training wasn’t like being a northern recruit. After drills, there was strategy, military history, supply management and logistics. Everyone knew things and spoke in what might as well have been a foreign language. What was Beauxbatons? What was Durmstrang? Who were the mountain men and what was a Gurg? How did they write so quickly, and what magic was it that they did with all those numbers?
Marcus Flint noticed Harry’s slow writing and sloppy letters. He jeered and his team followed. The names started again. Nitwit. Moron. Nothing Harry couldn’t take. They wondered again how the freak even got there. They called him halfbreed. Mudblood. Harry fucked up and flinched at the word bastard. That was it. It was put in every sentence. “You catch that, bastard?” “Need some help there, bastard?” “Hey bastard, can you tell me what he said, I didn’t hear.”
Harry grew cold. It wasn’t so bad a name. He didn’t mind so much when everyone wondered what southern lord knocked up his mum who was important enough to get Harry into officer school. Or at least he told himself he didn’t. Told himself it wasn’t as bad as asking who paid his whore mum. No one on his team joined in the teasing, but they didn’t help Harry either. They begrudgingly followed Harry’s trainings, completed the work their instructors gave them, and left Harry alone to struggle. Harry told himself it was fine. Told himself he could stay quiet and do what he was told, right up until Terence Higgs knocked Harry’s books from his hands with a churlish, “be more careful, bastard.” Harry didn’t remember hitting him. His fists moved of their own accord and Harry only realized it when he was knocking Terence back down after he’d tried to get up.
The red-headed beanstock of a boy pulled Harry off Terence before serious damage was done. Harry was dragged away before he realized what had happened. Before Harry recognized the boy dragging him as Ronald. Thoughts came back to Harry. This was Ronald Weasley. Goes by Ron. On his team. Actually decent with a sword, but he’d faced Marcus first round and got knocked out before he could prove it. Got huffy with Harry and said their trainings were too basic. Threw Harry down onto a bench and demanded to know “what the actual fuck.” Harry had no words to answer. “The fact you can’t read won’t matter if you get hung up for assault.”
It was a new concept, the idea that there was some law enforcement out there paying attention. Harry supposed they’d do that for you, if you were in the south and a noble.
Ron dragged Harry away from the books Harry couldn’t read to a practice field. He put a wooden sword in Harry’s hand and demanded Harry teach him something he didn’t already know. They went at it for hours. Until the pain of aching muscles soothed Harry. That night he found a dreamless sleep.
Ron was a guy everyone liked. Or so it seemed at first. Then Harry learned that just because everyone knew your name didn’t mean every name was known the same way. Flint and Higgs meant something different than Weasley. Still, Ron didn’t care that Harry refused to talk to him because he talked enough for the two of them. Every time Harry thought he knew Ron’s whole life story he learned there was another sibling in the bunch and their tales were wilder than the last. There was always a story with a lesson that solved whatever problem was in front of them just then, and Ron would make sure Harry heard it if Harry started to get the slightest bit testy.
Everyone couldn’t be trained the same. Just think of Fred and George, twins who each had to approach a problem their own way before coming together for the perfect solution. Anthony Goldstein and Terry Boot were best friends, but one learned by doing and the other needed it to be explained first before he tried. There were different ways to motivate. A compliment enthused Ginny, but Percy needed to know you actually thought he was useful. Dean Thomas would work twice as hard if Harry was specific in his praise. Neville always worked hard, but only did any good when he believed in himself. Which was the only reason Harry admitted that he needed help. Neville wasn’t very good at their studies, but he knew how to read and basic arithmetic well enough to teach Harry. He was nearly unbearably kind about it. Probably because he knew what it was like when no one treated you gentle. There was no denying that Neville added value, and so he finally believed Harry when Harry told him he could be valuable. That was how Neville started to finally learn.
Lupin complimented Harry on his leadership. Harry tried again to get out of it, telling Lupin it was all Ron being good with people. Lupin didn’t bother to give him a denial. Just that warm smile and sincere encouragement.
The world lurched again when a new class was added to their training. A thin man with sallow skin and a large, hooked nose waited for them in the front of the class. He leered at the students, displaying yellow, uneven teeth. Behind him was a large canvass of a map with military markings. He called on Neville seemingly at random and demanded he tell the history of the battle displayed. Neville choked and couldn’t do it. Then he called on Terry, who was equally stumped. Marcus and his team were hiding snickers behind their hands. The trainer turned to Harry. He peered past shoulder-length, greasy black hair that framed his cold, black eyes. They met Harry’s equally cold, emerald gaze. “Harry… Evans.” The trainer said. “You were at the battle. Tell us what happened.”
The mood in the room shifted. Even Marcus’s team murmured in surprise and speculated on what the trainer had meant. No one had known Harry was from the north. Harry knew a trap when he saw one, but he also knew to do what he was told. So he explained. The platoon traveled through the mountains. They found the cave fortress. They got in. They killed people.
The trainer, Severus Snape, began critiquing immediately. The map showed they traveled through the valley. Was Harry too daft to remember their route? No. Cedric had asked Harry if there was another route where they were less likely to be seen and Harry asked a soldier from near the mountains who told them a way. Snape demanded to know why they’d take a longer route when intelligence said their target would move out before they got there. Harry explained the Creeveys had a knack for knowing the weather and the upcoming snow would close the mountain pass before anyone could get away. Snape demanded to know how they entered the fortress from the wrong side. Harry shrugged and said sent a scout to follow a barbarian in at the other end of the network and followed in his wake. Snape’s pallor flooded red, outraged by the notion. Why would they take the risk? Harry tried not to wilt under the pressure. At least the reason was simple. The valley was well guarded. Only one in ten of their men died this way.
He didn’t hear Snape’s scathing analysis of that choice, and its blatant disregard for military strategy. He didn’t hear Snape’s lesson on how to always trust your superiors. How their strategy takes into account how many men are needed to complete the mission. How they calculate the value of soldiers’ deaths against the value of the missions outcomes. How changing the plan could undermine the mission, and no one in the room knows better than their commanders what is needed to win the war.
Harry just remembered that one in ten included Cedric leaping in front of Harry and letting the barbarian’s blade slice him dead. Harry’s chest was tight, like when he woke up from a nightmare screaming.
Harry came back to the world just as Snape was finishing. “I’m astonished your platoon managed to kill the Gurg.”
“What’s a Gurg?” Harry didn’t think before he asked. Shocked laughter rang out at his expense.
Snape’s scowl deepened. He loomed over Harry. “The Gurg is the man you killed that gave someone the mistaken idea you deserved to be here in that chair. Harry… Evans.”
Snape sneered out Harry’s mother’s name with such loathing that Harry saw red. Harry gripped his desk so he didn’t lash out in anger. Instead he spoke when he knew to stay silent, throwing Snape’s words back in his face. “Shouldn’t you trust your superiors? No one in the room knows better than them what is needed to win the war.”
Harry knew how to be silent like he knew everything bad that happened was his fault and he’d have to suffer the consequences. In this case, that was Snape demanding Lupin let him lead a training. Lupin may have reservations but he let it happen. Snape used the entire morning to call out Harry’s teammates one at a time to test their skills. Which looked an awful lot like viciously beating them with excessive force. Neville stumbled immediately, and Snape demanded he stand and try again. Over and over, until the red marks of Snape’s strikes could be seen on Neville’s arms and peaking out from his shirt onto his neck. Snape didn’t let up until Lupin stepped in and forced him to. Snape sneered at Lupin, then at the trainees overall. He gaze landed solidly on Harry, who was hot all over and blazing to be challenged to a fight.
Snape’s grin was wicked when he announced he’d seen enough. These were the worst trained officers he’d ever encountered. He left Harry fuming, his anger ready to burst.
It wasn’t just Ron who had to drag Harry away. His whole team did it. Even Neville, who probably shouldn’t have been walking on his own but still he put his body between Harry and Snape. They shoved him away from the training field until Harry got the message and stormed off on his own. He roared at the team when they followed but not one teammate turned back round to leave Harry alone.
Harry’d kill him. He’d kill all of them. He’d kill Snape, then Marcus, then Terence. He’d kill the Dursleys and the barbarians and whatever jackass thought it better that 8 out of 10 soldiers die than they spend half a day extra saving lives. Anyone they put in front of him and then he’d kill more. Harry didn’t realize he was saying this out loud until Ron’s arms were around him, squeezing him tightly in a way no one had ever done before.
Harry breathed. He just breathed. And his team stayed with him until he was steady enough to go back without killing anyone at all.
Early the next morning Harry was up with the dawn. He had no energy to fight and no energy to stand still. His team stood with him, expectantly. “Teach me what you nobles did before you came here,” Harry said to the sunrise. It was an odd request, but Harry’s shouts were fresh in their mind and Snape’s bruises were fresh on their skin. They came up with ideas.
Dean Thomas had a strange ball and made everyone run around kicking it. They ran more in an hour than at any point in their training and left full of laughter. The next day, Andrew pulled out a black and white board with funny pieces. The team bullied Harry into sitting across from him and getting absolutely slaughtered. Ron took over after, and both boys explained in depth each decision they made to the rest of the team until everyone was arguing over the best strategy for each choice. The next day Ron took them to the stables and taught Harry how to saddle a horse. Ron led the team through drills he’d learned from yet another brother. Everyone expected Harry to struggle. He should have. He didn’t. He took to it like breathing. His horse was strong and beautiful and when Harry urged her to gallop he felt like he was flying free. Terry pulled out poetry. Neville talked about crops. One after another the team shared their skills and together they found how the skills could be enriching.
The days bled into each other and their wounds healed. Except at night, when Harry woke up screaming.
In the end, Harry cared if they won. It dragged on him like every failed expectation. It chilled the warmth of weeks learning from his team. He went into the competition ice cold. Ruthless movements leading well trained soldiers through an obstacle course of puzzles that couldn’t be completed by anyone alone. Their team moved like water, flowing around hazards and forming up again to strike. They understood each other and their strengths, and the right person always moved forward to solve each puzzle. They came out the other side first. One victory.
Each team was allowed to challenge one member of the other for a test of knowledge. Marcus picked Harry. He’d progressed in his reading but was years behind most of his peers and was soundly defeated.
Each team was allowed to challenge one member of the other for a test of strength. Marcus picked Neville. Harry picked Terence. Before Neville went into combat Harry pulled at his arm. He couldn’t expect Neville to possibly win. No one could. Harry figured there was no point having high expectations. But Neville was at his best when he was helping other people. So Harry asked very nicely for Neville to go kick Terence’s ass for him because Ron wouldn’t let him do it for himself.
And Neville won.
They made Harry stand in front for the graduation ceremony and gave him congratulations as if he’d done anything special and was worth anything at all. Snape sneered and Lupin smiled warmly.
Harry was ice cold. He had fucked up. He had let himself care too deeply. He was afraid these boys had become his friends. Gotten under his skin like puss from a sword wound. Right before everyone was sent out to die.
Harry knew to stay quiet and do what he was told but after the ceremony he found Lupin and begged him to keep the others somewhere safe. Send Harry to the worst of it. Send Harry to die. Let him die before anyone else could.
Lupin didn’t smile then. But he did wrap up Harry tight as held him close like Ron had done. He held him until Harry stopped sobbing tears he hadn’t realized he’d let out. Lupin made soother sounds as he held him.
“It’s going to be alright,” Lupin promised. “I’m going to take you home.”