Endgame

Chapter 73

Sometimes I feel like giving up but I just can't,

it isn't my blood

- Shawn Mendes

***
The burrow, many years ago

"Come on mum. Bill got to go to Hogwarts today, surely we can have a bedtime story?" A young Fred asked.

"Okay, Freddy. Only one both you and your brother enjoy though, alright?" Molly smiled. "George, which one would you like as well?"

"The Tale of the Three Brothers please, mum," George beamed.

"Of course," she nodded, using her wand to grab the book from the shelf. "Now you two boys get comfortable okay? You'll get sleepy very easily whenever I'm half way through the story."

"Never!" Fred shouted valiantly, before laughing and falling into his bed.

"Hush now, everyone else is asleep. Now let us begin."

"There were once three brothers who were traveling along a lonely, winding road at twilight. In time, the brothers reached a river too deep to wade through and too dangerous to swim across," Molly looked up at the page to see Fred and George's eager faces before looking down once more.

"However, these brothers were learned in the magical arts, and so they simply waved their wands and made a bridge appear across the treacherous water. They were halfway across it when they found their path blocked by a hooded figure."

"And Death spoke to them. He was angry that he had been cheated out of three new victims, for travelers usually drowned in the river. But Death was cunning. He pretended to congratulate the three brothers upon their magic and said that each had earned a prize for having been clever enough to evade him."

"Mum, was death mad at these men?" George asked attentively.

"Well it's heard to say, sweetheart. Death isn't a person, it's part of life. The way this story has positioned death is for a sense of moral doing."

"Moral doing?" Fred repeated.

"To teach you a life lesson, honey," Molly nodded. "So the oldest brother, who was a combative man, asked for a wand more powerful than any in existence: a wand that must always win duels for its owner, a wand worthy of a wizard who had conquered Death!"

"That's so cool!" Fred shouted. "I wish I could conquer death."

"Yes, but conquering death isn't a good thing Freddy. We need it in life to restore the natural order. Humans shouldn't live forever."

"Continue please, mum," George asked.

"So Death crossed to an elder tree on the banks of the river, fashioned a wand from a branch that hung there, and gave it to the oldest brother" Molly read on, "Then the second brother, who was an arrogant man, decided that he wanted to humiliate Death still further, and asked for the power to recall others from Death. So Death picked up a stone from the riverbank and gave it to the second brother, and told him that the stone would have the power to bring back the dead."

"And the third brother?"

"Death asked the third and youngest brother what he would like. The youngest brother was the humblest and also the wisest of the brothers, and he did not trust Death. So he asked for something that would enable him to go forth from that place without being followed by Death. And death, most unwillingly, handed over his own Cloak of Invisibility."

"Then Death stood aside and allowed the three brothers to continue on their way, and they did so, talking with wonder of the adventure they had had, and admiring Death's gifts. In due course the brothers separated, each for his own destination."