Golden Children and the Others

These times were some of Faryn’s favorites. She was with her boys. Dawn was not there to ruin the moment. Lysander wasn’t here either; she loved him well enough, but things were still a tad awkward between them. She dearly hoped that he wouldn’t be able to see her very obvious crush on James, though if she was ever able to make a move on him, Ly would be one of the first to know, and probably more than a little put out. Faryn would cross that bridge when she came to it. 

“Addy’s been going to dueling meetings? She’s been telling mum she’s been practicing Quid with Al and Scorpius.” Faryn said, mentally rolling her eyes as her sister.

“But you have a point- both of your sisters are great duelers and they’ll only be what, second years this year? lily and Roxanne are amazing. Too bad they’re too young for the D.A.” Both Fred and James grinned at this praise. Then James changed the subject. 

“Have either of you heard who’ll be Prefect this year? I haven’t seen the badges out for anyone yet.” He asked. Everyone who knew him knew how much James wanted to be Prefect.

“No, I haven’t seen them yet,” Faryn remarked.

“I wonder what this year’s crop of kids will bring, though.” She mused. Fred and James both looked at her.

“What?” Faryn asked.

“Both of your dads were just First years once too! And they are pretty amazing men.” James and Fred both nodded and sat down on either side of her on James’ bed. Faryn slung an arm over each of their necks.

“I’m glad the Slytherins are no longer the Junior Death Eaters and all. We’re not so stereotypical anymore.” She said softly.

“But Gryffindors are still the bravest,” James declared, and he and Fred both flexed their muscles, making Faryn giggle as the door opened. 

Sixth year Molly and Louis opened James’ door with Adalia, Albus, and Scorpius in tow.

“Extendable Ears,” Louis said, holding up a mess of flesh colored tangled string.

“They were listening at your door, James,” Molly informed them, giving Adalia a pointed glance.

“Al,” James groaned as, at the same time, Faryn stood, appalled, and exclaimed,

“Adalia!” Before any of them, younger or older, could say anything, Fleur came into the hall.

“Hush, children,” She said in her lofty French accent. “Everyone is downstairs. The meeting shall be over soon, I’m sure. Come have some lunch,” Louis’ mother chaperoned them all down the stairs, Faryn giving Adalia a ‘we’ll talk about this later’ look.

The group joined the rest of the kids in the kitchen, with a bustling Molly Weasley the elder fixing food. George was trying to help her, though she kept shrugging her son off. Harry and Ginny stood by the door to the Order meeting room, looking worriedly out to the front hall. Faryn turned just in time to have her arm grabbed by her cousin Ava. The blonde had gripped both Faryn and Adalia, scaring them both temporarily. Faryn gasped and latched onto Fred’s arm as she jumped, before she saw that it was only her cousin. Fred and James chuckled to themselves, oblivious to the tension in the surrounding room.

“Nice grip ya got there Faryn,” Fred muttered, making her giggle nervously, though Ava’s iron grip on her arm worried her. 

“My doing is my own doing!” Ava shouted. Teddy stared at her accusingly, anger, betrayal, and worry in his eyes.

“No it isn’t, Ava. We’re in this together!” Teddy yelled back.

“We can address this later, Teddy Lupin. I have to get my cousins home.” Ava gave him a smoldering glare and turned to Harry.

“Mr. Potter, you may contact me about my assignment at your leisure.” She said curtly.
“Girls, we’re going home.” Faryn didn’t even have a moment to flail and grab for James or Fred before they apparated.

“Wait- Scor-” Adalia managed before they were pulled back into their own living room.
 
[x]

Adalia was appalled.

First, she and the boys get caught spying on Faryn and the others, and now Ava whisks them off without any explanation or moment to say goodbye. “What’s this about?” she asked, once she caught her bearing again. “I didn’t want to leave yet! Mrs. Weasley was making lunch…” Her stomach gave a very audible rumble. 

As Ava opened her mouth to, hopefully, explain, Teddy Apparated into the room.

“Ava, be rational!” he all but yelled, seeming to not notice the other two Katz girls. “You can’t go on this one. I know you want to, but it’s too dangerous!”

Her mouth set into a grim line, quite the opposite of her usual smirk. This was filled with self-loathing and just a bit of selfish pride.

“But I am, Teddy. I’ve already told Harry, and I’m going.”

“But…Ava…it’s too dangerous,” Teddy sounded more broken than either of the Katz girls had ever heard him. Exchanging a glance, they silently agreed to be silent as stone and figure out what was going on. “What about…our future? Us? Our child?”

Addy and Faryn gasped. “Your WHAT?!” they yelled in unison, breaking their new pact already.

Ava spared them a glare. “I’m 8 months pregnant. Get over it.”

“We can’t, Ava, and that’s exactly why you’re being foolish,” Teddy interjected. “You know they wouldn’t think twice of killing you if you’re caught!”

Stealing another glance at her sister, Adalia pitched in with, “Um, excuse me cousin dearest and Teddy. But what the bloody hell is going on?”

With another one of those scary looks, Ava sighed, ticking off the points on her fingers. “I’m pregnant. I’m going on a mission for the Order. I’m going to infiltrate and be a spy. I’m the newest version of Severus Snape. Any questions?” There was a weariness in her eyes that had never been there before.

“WHAT?!” Faryn exclaimed, face paling.

“What she said,” Addy swooned, feeling light headed. “You’re going to knowingly go into the wolves’ den, a little lamb for the slaughter with a side dish?”

“I prefer to think of it as doing my duty to the magical world at large, but if you must put it like that then yes. Like lambs to the slaughter. Except this lamb is a lion in disguise.”

“Oh, yes, and how do you intend on whipping out the lion with all those enemies around you, Ava dearest?” Addy asked, suddenly sitting upright, voice dripping with sarcasm. “By calling Parlay and getting taken to their new Voldie? Because that’s a brilliant plan, congratulations on thinking of the single stupidest thing ever.”

Faryn gasped, looking at her younger sister in surprise. “Adalia, stop it right now!”

Addy turned on her sister, eyes gleaming with unshed tears. “Oh, shut up Faryn!” she yelled, sobbing, as she ran up the stairs. 

It was too much. She couldn’t deal with the fact she might lose her family to another war, that those same people that haunted bedtime stories might be back to wreck the world again. That Ava was willingly putting herself on the line and her unborn baby as well. That her family could lose everything, like they had when her Mum and Daddy were her age.
 She pulled out her secret books, the ones that no one knew she had. The one Ms. Hermione had written about the second Wizarding war. Another, a comic based on what Harry had told the world of his adventures. Her own journal.

Cracking open Hermione’s book, A Tale of Two Wars, tears kept escaping down her face. The book was full of horror stories from the two separate reins of Voldemort, complete with pictures and vivid descriptions. “What if it ends up happening again…?” Addy whispered. “We don’t have a Dumbledore to step in and save everyone, and Harry’s tired. He’s done this for years…”

[x]

If there was one thing that Ava hated, it was being told what to do. She loved Teddy, she did, but she wasn’t going to let anyone at all push her around. 


“Teddy, please leave.” The blonde said, crossing her arms. This was not the couple’s first fight. But there was a very real possibility that it might be one of their last. 

“We can talk later, but not now. Not when we’re both mad. Go home. I’m going to stay here.” She informed him.


Teddy had never looked so broken in the entire time they’d known each other. Her heart hurt. She wished her cousins had not been here to witness it. Before Teddy could reply, Adalia had her outburst, only making things more difficult, and causing Ava’s frustration to increase. 



“I don’t need this from you, Adalia!” Ava shouted right back, glaring as her cousin run up the stairs. Faryn looked crushed and about ready to cry, be frozen in place, staring after Addy, then at Teddy and Ava.

Teddy looked at her with pleading eyes. 



“Ava … don’t do this to us. To our baby.” He whispered. Ava couldn’t trust her mouth to answer him. It might betray her, and pull her into Teddy’s embrace, to find his lips. She needed to do this. To prove her worth. To prove that just because she was going to be a mother, she was still of use to the Order. She was still strong. 



Teddy hung his head at her silence. 

“Maybe your cousins can talk some sense into you.” He whispered in that sorrowful tone of his. He was giving up, and part of Ava bubbled up with disappointment and doubt- he was supposed to fight for her, even if it meant actually fighting her. Faryn, in the background, choked out a sob, but was still unable to move. With a last mournful look, Teddy disapparated, and Ava was left alone in her aunt and uncle’s kitchen. 

She reached a hand toward where Teddy had been standing moments before. Oh, how she wanted to kiss him, to tell him it would be alright. But that was a truth she couldn’t assure. 

Without the familiar feeling that Teddy was near, she felt a bit lost. Like all her tough-girl act was just smoke and mirrors, not thing substantial. Just there, another spell like so many she had used in her life.

Turning, she looked at Faryn, unshed tears still frozen on her face.

“How could you?” the younger girl whispered, eyes boring into Ava’s own. “First Teddy, which I can understand, but Adalia? She’s only 14, Ava. She’s still a child. You’re her greatest idol, the person she wants to be.”



Trying to take the harshness out of her words, Ava put a gentle hand on her cousin’s shoulder. “And you’re still a child, much as you don’t think so, Faryn dearest. Which means you can’t understand why I’m doing this, and I get that.”



“I think I could, if you would only explain. But at least go talk to her. Please.”



“I will. If she’ll let me in.”

Ava climbed the staircase to Adalia’s room. Silently, she checked to see if the door had been magically locked. It had not, but trying the doorknob proved that the girl had at least used the nonmagical way to insure that no one got in. “Addy? Sweetest? Let an old bat in?”



“Why should I?” came the sullen reply. “You’re just going to leave all of us behind. Leave Teddy. Godric, probably even leave the baby behind.”

Ava sighed. This was going to be more difficult than she thought.

“Adalia Marie Katz. Don’t do this, please.”


“Do what? Tell the truth? Be an ‘obstinate brat’? Call you out on being a terrible friend, even worse role model and worse yet mother to be? No thanks, I’ll keep right on doing this then.”


No more Mrs. Nice Girl, Ava thought, fuming. With the senses she had learned from years in the Order, she heard Faryn creeping up the stairs. “Just because this door is locked does not mean I can’t open it.”



“Try it.”



“Watch me.” With that, Ava slid her wand out of her boot, pointing it once again at the door. “Alohamora!” 

The door burst inward, revealing Adalia laying in the middle of her floor. Surprise widened her eyes momentarily before they narrowed into slits.

“I don’t recall inviting you in.”



“I don’t recall asking. Now, listen to me, you bloody girl. I am doing this so you and your friends can have a cushy little life safe at Hogwarts. I’m doing this so everything Albus Dumbledore did, everything Harry did, everything Teddy’s parents did, is not put to waste. That they died for something worth fighting for. Do you hear me?”



“So, the years of peace mean nothing to their legacies? Instead, you would endanger the very thing they fought to protect – this next generation of wizards and witches? Endanger Andromeda and Ted Tonks’ great-grandchild? Remus and Nymphadora Lupin’s grandchild? Really?”



Before she was quite sure what she had done, Ava realized her palm was stinging. Adalia was shaking on the ground, one hand pressed to her cheek.

“You have no idea what you’re talking about. And that is why nothing you can say will stop me.”