stain ☾ remus lupin

EPILOGUE

V I C I
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Just as the the girl's eyes closed for the last time, everything swirled into a cloudy, ebony abyss. The tear covered face of Harry's godfather and mother disappeared, and the golden trio found themselves back in the Headmaster's Office.

In Harry's right hand was a vile that contained a single tear. It had been found looped around a chain and shoved in the trouser pocket of the dead body of Remus Lupin. Harry, who had just seen Snape's memories, supposed the tear could be of importance, and had immediately brought it to the Pensieve.

The tear had been extracted difficultly from the girl's body. It was hard to distinguish between blood, and the tears of others who had wept over her. But it was eventually found nonetheless.

Dumbledore had given the vile to Remus, and told him to view the memories whenever he thought he could. The Ministry had been informed falsely that Fenir Greyback had killed the girl, but that was a lie. It had been Remus, though he did not know this. In the back of his mind he always felt a sense of dread, a sense that maybe it had been him that killed her, but the tear memory was what confirmed this suspicion.

"Bloody hell," Ron finally spoke, and the other two stood in silence.

"Poor Remus," Hermione whispered from beside him.

He felt selfish admitting it to himself, but all Harry could think about were his parents. Lily and James. Their bickering, their pranks, their enthusiasm for certain things. He savored each tiny detail he had seen in Freya's memories. The way his mother's hair fell across her face as she read and the way her eyes grew brighter when she was around the people that she had deeply loved. Had they turned the most hued of greens when she was around him?

He remembered his father through Freya's eyes as well. The rambunctious, confident boy. His determination. The way he threw his head back as he laughed, which he did quite a lot, and the way he dipped his paintbrush three times exactly before he brought the tool up to meet paper's edge.

These tiny, insignificant things made him feel especially grateful for Freya Bradberry.

"Did either of you know Freya existed?" Harry questioned, pushing his glasses further up his nose. As he did so, he remembered his father, whom had acted similarly in the blonde girl's memories.

"No," Ron spoke, "They never mentioned her. Sore subject, I suppose."

"I did," the bushy haired girl commented suddenly. Her eyes shot upwards as if she had just remembered the strangest of events.

"The night in third year with Sirius, in the Shack. Peter Pettigrew mentioned her. The name slipped my mind, but I always wondered . . ."

"What happened?" Harry questioned, not doubting that his friend had remembered something from so long ago.

"It was after Sirius yelled at him," Hermione began slowly. She concentrated fully on the memory, "He said he would rather die than betray his friends. Then Remus went on to say that Peter should've known that if Voldemort hadn't killed him, they would.

Then, I remember, Peter looked up and said something like, 'Was that the logic with Freya?' And the two froze — Remus looked as if he would cry, and Sirius lunged for Peter — but Harry, then you yelled. You told them not to kill Peter, and I was sidetracked at that point."

There were so many unanswered questions. Too many flooded through their minds, but there was no way of knowing. No one in the memories remained alive to answer their desperate inquiries. James, Lily, Sirius, Peter, Marlene, Mary, Regulus, Severus, Remus . . . Freya. All dead.

Their side of the story had ended. For who could write such words with the loss of these main characters?

"I reckon she'd be really proud to see what happened today," Harry said finally.

"Yeah," a nod shook Ron's ginger hair as spoke in agreement. He thought not only of the subjects in the memory, but of his brother, and Tonks, and all the others that had bravely sacrificed themselves, "They all would."

The war was over, good had overcome evil. Though Freya had passed, she now lived in the trio. The dreamer was dead, but the dream lived on.

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AUTHORS NOTE:

this whole book was harry, ron and hermione looking at freya's memories. (don't worry they skipped chapter 25 lmao) I feel like this was a sorta disappointing epilogue for some of you. a lot of you believed that I would bring freya back, or that she would turn into a werewolf. but she's gone. a lot of you wanted to know remus's reaction. he didn't laugh for ages in my mind. probably not until harry was born. of course they all tried to blame fenir greyback, but remus always knew in the back of his mind that it was him that did it. I don't want to write after freya's death, because the whole book was set around her. I'm leaving a lot of little things unanswered because I personally love books that give you the option of playing with the ending in your own mind.

❝kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler's heart, kill your darlings.❞ (s.k)