Three Hallows, Two Weasleys and One Broken Girl

Chapter 53: Splintering

Firenze guided them out of the forest in silence, the stone settled beside the wand in the mokeskin pouch.
Fred had been quiet, and George was too, but they were very different kinds of silence.
Fred was, by George's reckoning, looking ahead to the last part of their quest, thoughtful and hopeful in equal measure. Far too lost in thought to pay much attention to his twin.

George...
Well George was almost vibrating with rage.

The emotion was so potent he was practically choking on it, and his footprints smoked as his magical control deteriorated.
He waited though.
He waited until Firenze had left them at the gates.
He waited until they'd apparated back to the flat.
He waited until Fred had pulled off his coat and finally turned to George with a grin on his stupid face and a quip forming on his tongue.
Then he punched his twin in the face with all the force he could muster.
He actually managed to knock his brother out cold.

He left Fred on the floor and went to put the kettle on.
He thought perhaps the familiar ritual of making tea, and the pseudo solitude would help calm him down, but it just made him angrier.
It was only a minute before Fred gave a pained moan and sat up slowly. "What the fuck George?"
George took a gulp of scalding tea. It also did not help.
"Do you have any idea how close you came to ruining everything?"
Fred stilled, finally using the knowledge of nearly two decades living out each other's pockets to realise exactly how serious George was.
"I'm sorry George. But the stone-"
"The wand was tempting too you know." George cut off the excuse. "But I resisted it. The wand Fred. I managed to keep a hold of the bigger picture. Blaming the stone is not good enough."
"Well bully for you." Fred's expression turned mulish, "congratulations to you and your immovable heart of bloody stone."
The mug in George's hands shattered into a thousand tiny shards, which lacerated his hands.

He ignored the blood and stood up, snatching his coat, and walking out the flat without looking back.
He disapparated and found himself stood outside Grimmauld Place. Ginny opened the door a minute later, and at the look on his face, her own irritated expression crumpled.
"Come in George. What happened to your hands?"
George stepped inside and opened his mouth to speak, but his voice wouldn't come. Maybe it was how close they'd come to losing. Maybe it was fighting with Fred. Maybe it was just the honest concern of his little sister who'd been forced to grow up so much faster than he'd wanted her to.
He opened his mouth again, and a sob bubbled up his throat before he could stop it.
His eyes burned hot with tears, and he couldn't breathe.

Soft hands that weren't right but were still comforting, wound in his hair and guided him down until his forehead rested on the soft worn fabric of Ginny's jumper. Movement down the hall told him Harry had joined them, but the more he tried to compose himself the harder it was to do.

He let go eventually, letting himself feel all of it, and there was so very much to feel.
The only thing he managed to say, and he'd no idea how long they stood in the hallway of Grimmauld first, was;
"I fought with Fred."
Ginny swore slightly, and carefully led him out of the evening cold. "You'll stay the night here okay? Let me heal those cuts first, Kreacher will find you some of Harry's clean pyjamas to borrow. It'll be alright George. You'll be alright. Come on."

———

Fred stared at the door his twin had left through, astounded but mostly confused.
He'd fucked up, he knew that, and he knew he shouldn't have made light of it before apologising, but punching him out cold, destroying one of Delphi's mugs and storming from the place seemed a little excessive.
George was the master of talking things out when they had disagreements or Fred did something more stupid than usual. He always made sure the air was clear and they could move forward, and that was more important than ever today.

He got sluggishly to his feet and vanished the shattered china with an absent sweep of his wand, making another cup for himself and settling down in his armchair.
Aggi was watching him judgementally and Fred didn't know how long he stared back at the mushroom creature before Luna returned from the Longbottoms', rosy cheeked and clutching a plant that wiggled suspiciously.

"Fred?" She questioned. "Where's George?"
He stared back blankly, and realised for the first time that was a question he couldn't answer. He'd alway been the one George sought comfort from, then Delphi had been there. After them who would he seek? Their father? That was probably the person Fred would go to. Angelina or Lee perhaps? Probably not Lee. Bill was in the country, but Fred suspected Gringotts wasn't enough distance between them for an angry George.
Then again he'd never known George this angry.

"I don't know." He said eventually.
Luna pulled a set of familiar glasses from her pocket and squinted at him.
"You found the resurrection stone."
"We did."
"You used it."
"Almost."
"Such a miserable word. Almost happy, almost free, almost safe...but not in this case."
"Wish George took it was well as you." Fred couldn't help but grouch.
"Why would he?" Luna blinked at him. "We saw the almost, he never did."
"Luna?" Fred rubbed his temples, "I love your riddles...always have...but please not now?"
The girl, woman now really, but not quite - almost - smiled as she set down her new plant and seated herself opposite him. "You saw her die, Fred. I was told too. We grieved, briefly as it was. We stepped into a time where she couldn't follow us, knew it and began to accept it. For us, death's bargain was a chance to regain someone lost."
"But George?" Understanding like a weak ray of sunlight filtered through his mind.
Luna nodded, "he never started grieving, never processed it. For you this is a quest to gain someone lost to you, for him it's a desperate scramble to keep what he never acknowledged was taken from him."
"He just saw that abyss now." Fred voiced.
Luna nodded, "precisely."
Fred swore, "I need to find him! I need to apologise!"
"Yes, yes you do." Luna agreed firmly, "but first-" she grabbed one of Delphi's heavy rune books from the coffee table, and bonked him firmly but lightly on the head. "This isn't a game. If you fail I'll make sure the gernumblies curse you to awkward deep under-skin itches scratching doesn't fix, for the rest of your life."