We Were Soldiers

We Were Soldiers

By Argenteus Draco

Part Four

    The grass is always greener on the other side. Until, of course, the green grass on the other side is covered in the bodies of the dead and dying. That’s how my husband described everything after the final battle of the War. I wasn’t personally there to see it, but I know from the dead look he had gotten in his emerald eyes that it was worse than I had ever imagined.

    We had been married only five days when he told me that; he a man of twenty-two, and I a girl of twenty. It’s amazing the difference those two years made, I was just graduating Hogwarts the year he was called to war, still at an age that excused me from the drafting lists. He had been such a lively boy before the war, only older than me by two years. When he came home, and asked me to marry him a week after, I was shocked by how much older he seemed. But I can understand; he watched many of his friends die.

    It’s different with me. While many of the people I grew up with - Cho, Terry, Padma, Mandy Brocklehurst, and many others - died, I didn’t have to watch it. I only know what other people told me, and I could choose to block out the voice of that person if I wanted. I know it must have been harder to block out dying screams, Harry told me that much.

    There are so many things different about the people who survived; some good and some bad. Hermione almost seems to care more for everything now, and she lets everyone know that. Harry, on the other hand, seems almost dead inside on some days, and I know he’s thinking about the final battle. Many people chose to commit suicide upon hearing of the death of loved ones, but the pain seemed only to help others, to make the stronger in some way.

    I think I may have been one of those people. With every war comes good and bad, and I happened to get lucky. I won out on the chance for good. For that I am grateful, but I know it had to come with a price. While Harry survived, countless others died; while my love returned home, hundreds of other girls lost husbands, brothers or sons.

    Even if we refuse to admit it though, we all gained something from this war. Whether it be the knowledge that the cause you fought for was right, or a higher respect for the people who gave their lives, we all have something we didn’t have before. Each of us may also have gained something unique to us. I, for instance, have gotten back in touch with a part of myself I thought I left behind with my muggle family, my creativity. In the seven years since the war began I have used a love for writing I forgot I had to encourage the fighters, educate those on the homefront, and honor the dead. I wrote several poems for specific people, and one of them was written at the base of a memorial statue at the sight of the final battle.

    I remember - out of all the times I’ve visited that statue - the day I was there with Harry for the first time. He wept upon reading the poem, and he wasn’t the only one. A stranger to whom I had never personally spoken came and told me what a beautiful job I had done on that piece, his face plainly showing that he had cried here as well. How he knew me I will never understand, but I will always remember his face, and his exact words.

    “We may not know it, but every one of us fought. Even those on the homefront, you helped in ways you cannot imagine.” And he was right. No one in the wizarding community was left unmarked by this war; we all fought; each one of us.

    We were soldiers.