In dark room, on a dark night, a man sits on a desk, writing feverishly. He is young, but not so young. Stacks of clean, white paper surround him and emit a strange glow, as if urging him on, insisting he hurry. His pen skates across the pages, leaving smooth writing that is slanted to the left. Beads of sweat collect on his forehead and he only stops at the sound of footsteps outside his door… and then again, returns to his pages with ever greater intensity. Lines crease the skin around his eyes and mouth; he is worried and upset.
At first glance, he seems to be quite alone in the room. However, there are creatures that share the space with him, creatures invisible to him. They take a great interest in his writing and drift over his shoulder, reading the marks. This is what they see:
I need more time… time I don’t have. But this has to be said, it has to told, written down. Someday I may want to remember it. Someday I may want to bring it all back. Someday… not tomorrow, or the day after, but someday when I am ready to accept the truth. Not all of what I’m writing is even my own recollection. Some is what I’ve heard and been told. But all of it’s true. Right down to the last word.
My room is quiet and dark. Mum and Dad don’t know what’s wrong with me. They can’t understand why I’ve asked them to leave me alone, holed up here. They have no idea what I’ve spent the last couple of months doing. I’m not going to tell them either. Not that I’m allowed. Not that I’ll remember it tomorrow morning. Or even later tonight. The thought is depressing but I’ve made the choice myself. There is nothing else I can do or want to do. I’m not about to give up my life. Not for anything.
I’ll start at the very beginning. Or what seemed like a beginning. It didn’t really start with me… well, it did start with me… but it didn’t. It started, really started, with the people who’d lived through the war, the people who had fought in it and survived.
The creatures exchange glances, move away from the man. They know what this signifies, what must soon come to pass. They remain in the room, but slowly glide here and there, remembering the events of the past months, for the events shape the creatures’ destinies and the destiny of all mankind, as much as they shape the destinies of the men and women to whom they occurred.
“Chinwag and Compunction”
Walking through Diagon Alley after Rufus Scrimgeour’s speech at the Ministry of Magic was a very difficult business indeed. The number of people that had swarmed to the area had to be record breaking. People were Apparating into the middle of the alley, leaking out of shops, talking loudly, yelling, laughing, sobbing. Such a range of emotions in one area was hard to find.
But the case was the same in Hogsmeade, at the Ministry of Magic and even at Number 12 Grimmauld Place.
People everywhere were gossiping to their hearts content, men and women alike, for whoever says that men don’t gossip is ignorant of the ways of men. They talked about the downfall of the Order of the Phoenix which had lost so many valuable members, they spoke of the speech Scrimgeour had made, they reminisced of those who had been lost in the battling and of their resting place behind the Ministry of Magic, and finally, they chattered endlessly about Harry Potter. No matter what Scrimgeour thought, the boy was not going to be easily forgotten. The Minister for Magic had seemingly allowed something to slip his mind during his speech and that was this: During Harry Potter’s ten years of being after the most evil sorcerer to have lived had fled, during which no wizard or witch had ever set eyes on him, and his care was handed over completely to magic-hating muggles, he had not once been forgotten, his existence had not once slipped the minds of the millions of magical folk in the world, for the simple reason that he had banished the one wizard they feared most, (at least for sometime, if not forever) Lord Voldemort. And now that Voldemort was truly gone, once and for all eternity, there was no doubt about it: Harry James Potter would probably never leave the mind of any living witch or wizard for generations to come. So the once thing that Scrimgeour had hoped for did not come to pass: the magical people of England did not forget that Harry Potter was precisely who they had wanted to rule them, once it became as clear as rain that the boy had killed Voldemort, of course. And this was the exact topic of discussion at a large gathering of witches and wizards at the Leaky Cauldron. Needless to say, the pub was full to the brim and also needless to say, the bartender was a very happy man indeed, as his pocket was ready to rip at the seams. The conversation was loud, the folk roused:
‘Right easy to say it is, Scrimgeour was hoping that no one would bring up the topic! The look on his face during that speech was enough to tell ya’!’ said one red-faced man, waving his hand about ferociously and succeeding in soaking himself and those around him in Firewhisky.
‘Of course that was what ‘e was ‘oping! Why, ‘oo’d want to be told to step down from the Minister’s spot, right when things got a smidgen easier to ‘andle! No Voldy-mort means no trouble and that means that ‘e’s got a much easier job now, don’t it!’ replied another man, this one tall and thin, his face resembling a bowtruckle’s.
‘Of course there will be trouble, Abe!’ called a women seated at once of the tables. ‘They’ve still to round up many of the Death Eaters and that will be trouble enough. No the Minister just wanted to ensure that the people didn’t get ahead of themselves and elect a boy in a moment of elation. Rightfully so, of course.’
‘Ah, but Melinda,’ said Abe, wisely, ‘the Death Eaters won’t be much trouble now, will they? They’ll be scared and ‘iding away, ‘oping that they aren’t killed on sight, ‘eh? They’ll be easy to bandy up, all the Minister’s got to do is send in ‘is Auror’s and the job’s done.’
Melinda obviously didn’t agree and probably would have said so if another woman hadn’t interrupted.
‘You know what I heard?’ she said excitedly, standing up on a chair to be heard, for she was a very small woman. ‘I heard that Scrimgeour ordered the killing of Harry Potter, right after old Voldy snuffed it! Didn’t want no competition! Verrrrry clever, that Scrimgeour, we’ve got to hand that to him!’
‘Fool of a woman!’ cried a third man, with a long flowing mustache. ‘Scrimgeour, order the killing of a boy!? Despicable! The man wouldn’t even think of it! I daresay you got that bit of information from the Quibbler! Piece of junk, that paper is! Nothing in it is true or my name is Harry Potter, and of course, it’s not!’
This seemed to anger the woman who had made the remark about the “assassination” and she immediately grew very red in the face. No doubt there would have been a fight if a tall, handsome young man hadn’t stepped in.
He stood up, slapped a Galleon onto the bar counter to pay for his drink and then said, in a loud, clear voice, ‘Oh, get over it!’
They did.
And he left. He wasn’t seen in the wizarding world again for more than two years.
The chattering group in the Leaky Cauldron began another discussion “ this time about the recently decorated war hero, Sebastian, who, after Harry Potter, was one of the main reasons the “good guys” had even won the war. According to the Minister for Magic at least, who made sure to leave the “Harry Potter” bit out whenever he spoke of the “great war hero, who risked his own life to bring the tragic war to an end”. Rumors had gone around about Sebastian though; no one really knew why Scrimgeour had decorated him so lavishly… in fact, he was one of the first war heroes ever to be named by the wizarding government… for some reason, people couldn’t get rid of that feeling: that something fishy was behind Sebastian's title. Was he even a “hero” at all? Harry Potter though dead, hadn’t been mentioned once in any of Scrimgeour’s speeches or bestowed any badges or titles or awards. He had only been given a memorial grave behind the Ministry of Magic. And he had killed Voldemort.
Not a single one of the pub’s occupants seemed to realize that the man who had just walked out was the man they were now eagerly gossiping about.
Of course, all the commoners weren’t as easily calmed as those in the Leaky Cauldron. Though, over the next few weeks, they did get over the fact that Harry Potter had died and that they would have to settle for Scrimgeour continuing his work as the Minster, it didn’t mean they forgot their hero. That would never happen, no matter how much Scrimgeour or any other person wished and prayed and hoped. The fact that Harry Potter’s body had never been recovered fueled their memories and discussions. The Boy Who Lived was more talked about than ever before. Details and rumors about him were tossed around in everyday conversation. In the end Scrimgeour grew tired of trying to draw away his people’s mind from The Chosen One and back onto himself. His Junior Minster, Percy Weasley, assured him that there was no danger in discussions. After all, it wasn’t like the boy was alive or could be revived. The last war had ended with a massive explosion which had taken the lives of everyone in the vicinity of the blast “ Potter had been the cause of the explosion “ he had been at the heart of it, this everyone knew. His chances of survival were less than the chances of those around him. And since all around him had perished it was obviously clear to everyone “ Minister and commoners alike “ that Harry Potter had perished too.
Aya Miyazaki had also been honored as a war hero, though not as generously as Sebastian. And like Sebastian, no reason was given to the magical community as to why she had been honored. All that had been said was that she, like the other “heroes”, had sacrificed endlessly to win the war and had been “brave beyond all reasoning”. Her friends and family were quite positive, however, that during the war Aya had continued her work as an Unspeakable, doing nothing out of the ordinary to aid the war effort. And so they, like so many others, had been befuddled that the Minister for Magic should label her a war hero. Very few people knew what Aya had been decorated for, and none of them was about to give any explanations. She was a hero. End of story. Soon after Scrimgeour’s speech at the Ministry of Magic, however, she said her goodbyes to friends and family, left for work in the Department of Mysteries at the Ministry “ and wasn’t see again for more than two years.
And so the wizarding community was provided with more gossip material: Why should the two most respected and revered war heroes stop attending ceremonies, speeches and the likes, most of which were in their honor? Why should interviewers from the Daily Prophet, who had been hounding them ruthlessly since the end of the war, be suddenly unable to find them? Why should they, of all people, want to disappear? And where could they possibly go? Was this a voluntary departure, or had they been murdered?
Luckily for Aya Miyazaki and Sebastian, as familiar as their names (or in Sebastian's case, his first, and only, name) had recently become to the wizarding world, not many people could recognize them and so, it wasn’t all that difficult to disappear.
It was exactly what the Minister for Magic had been hoping for however: Something to draw his people’s minds off that goddamned boy.