Wizard Wars: Return of the Auror

The castle seemed so strange and empty as James followed Dumbledore through the corridors. Some passages had windows that cast pale moonlight across the floor, but in others it was pitch black. The candle in Dumbledore's hand cast a sphere of flickering light around them, but all outside that sphere was in darkness. Objects loomed sinisterly out at them as they passed, and their footsteps against the stone echoed around them. Portraits whispered and flitted in and out of their frames, and suits of armour turned their heads with a rusty creak. Drafts whistled around them, making James shiver. He was unnerved and confused. Never before had Hogwarts frightened him. It was like having a dog who was his best buddy suddenly turn and bite him.

It was only now starting to truly dawn on James just how long he had been away. Some things were the same, but other things were so very, very different. He remembered the few times he had visited Hogwarts after his graduation, how students had looked at him in confusion and curiosity, how he had felt like an outsider in the place he had still wanted to think was his home. These were the same corridors that James had walked a thousand times before, corridors he knew better than any student probably ever had or ever would again... But he realised now that they were not his corridors anymore. Totally unfamiliar faces roamed these halls now. Totally unfamiliar minds were being taught the lessons he himself had sat through. Someone else claimed the good seats in front of the common room fire. Someone else slept in his bed. Perhaps some of the current inhabitants were even the children of the people he had been to school with. It seemed so strange that they should be grown up. It seemed so strange that he should be grown up.

It was Hogwarts, but not his Hogwarts anymore, and being here just reminded him how he had lost his place in it. A part of him wanted to cry at how old and alone he felt. He had never really been frightened of death, but the idea of growing old and slowly losing his energy had always frightened him. He had never felt so close to the day when that would happen as he did now.

When they reached Dumbledore's office there was a flurry of movement all around the walls and several small gasps. James might have taken comfort in the fact that Dumbledore's office was also the same as the last time he had seen it, except that the last time he had seen it was the last time he had seen all three of his best friends and his wife together - and the last time he had been in a room with his betrayer.

James' insides were twisting like a cloth being wrung. He sat in the chair in front of Dumbledore's desk and gripped the armrests hard to try and stop himself from shaking. Dumbledore sat opposite him and surveyed him closely. James' heart thumped in his chest. Cold sweat broke out on his forehead as he waited for Dumbledore to speak.

"I must admit I never expected this," the old wizard said softly. "I honestly cannot express how much of a difference your coming home will mean to everyone. They will all be overjoyed to see you."

They? James thought, his breath catching in his throat. Everyone?

"I am sure there are many questions that you wish to ask. And I am sure that the one you most want answered concerns Lily and Harry, am I right?"

James nodded, feeling hot vomit rising in his throat at the distressed look on Dumbledore's face. There was a few seconds of silence and then Dumbledore spoke quietly.

"I wish there was a way to spare you this. But you have to be told and it's always best to get these things over and done with. Part of the answer I must give you is good - " James' almost jumped out of his seat, " - but the other part..." He paused only a few more seconds before he continued. "You know, a month ago another person sat in that same chair where you are now to whom I had to give dreadful news. We stayed here until past sunrise. There was shouting, tears, grief - much like there will be now. When he left this office his life was changed forever - much as yours will be now. Do you know who that person was?"

James shook his head violently. He wanted to punch Dumbledore to force him to get on with it.

"It was Harry."

A moment or two passed in silence before these words started to register a meaning in James' head. A numb realisation crept over him as Dumbledore's words played again and again in his mind. It was Harry. It was Harry. That meant... that meant that Harry was...

A tentative smile started to form on James' face. Then, suddenly, the smile exploded into a grin and he started to laugh. He laughed so loud and he wasn't even sure why. He leaned his head back and ran his hands over his face. Tears of joy were welling up in his eyes. Harry was alive. He didn't know how to handle the happiness anymore than the worry. He couldn't stop laughing...

Until Dumbledore spoke again.

"James, I wish there was nothing else to tell you, and that I could leave you to enjoy this happiness. But the more I let that happiness grow, the more it will hurt you when I tell you the rest. Yes, Harry is alive, and considering everything he has been through, in perfect physical health. But you also wanted to know about Lily."

James choked.

"After you passed out that night, Voldemort went after Harry. Lily tried to stop him. She refused to let Voldemort near Harry, even begged Voldemort to kill her instead."

James was shaking now. A realisation was starting to dawn on him, and he was struggling to wrestle it into submission. He wouldn't believe it... not until Dumbledore said it straight out...

"In the end, he... he killed her to get her out of the way."

And James was broken.

~*~

James seemed to diminish before Dumbledore's eyes. He sank slowly into his chair, all of the colour draining from his face, until he was left pale as death and twice as cold. His eyes, normally bright and alive, were now like two shards of glass. Empty. Lifeless. Soulless. Dumbledore was reminded forcefully of a man who had just received the Dementor's Kiss.

And then, slowly, emotion started to seep back into James's face and his breathing became harsher. His eyes, glazed with desperation, started to dart about the room as though looking for some kind of visible comfort. He looked at Dumbledore, he looked at the desk, he looked at the floor, he looked around the room but couldn't focus on any of them. He made a sudden movement as though he was going to stand up, but then slumped back down again. He opened his mouth to say something, but then closed it again. And still his eyes moved about the room. He looked like a man who didn't know what to do.

Dumbledore could hardly bare to watch the sight in front of him. He struggled to find something, anything, to say that would comfort James, but he knew it was hopeless. There were no words in any language in the world that would even help to ease the pain right now. And the worst of it was that Dumbledore couldn't even leave James in peace to come to terms with this news yet. There was another blow he needed to deliver, and this one James wasn't even expecting.

Wanting to at least break the silence, Dumbledore said, "I know this has probably been said to every person who has ever lost a loved one during a war, and that it doesn't make the slightest bit of difference this soon, but if Lily could have chosen her own death it would have been the one she had - protecting someone she loves."

James suddenly leapt out of his chair. For a moment, Dumbledore thought the younger man was going to scream at him. Perhaps that had been his intention, but a moment later James was practically running towards the door.

"James, wait, I'm afraid there is one more thing I must tell you before you leave."

James stopped with his hand on the doorknob, but didn't turn around. Dumbledore paused for a moment, wondering how best to phrase this.

"It is better to deliver all the blows in quick succession than let you recover from one before hitting you again." He took a deep breath and then continued. "I am not going to beat about the bush, but just tell you this straight out... Sirius is dead too. He died about a month ago in battle."

James' back was still to him, so Dumbledore couldn't see his face, but his entire body visibly tensed for a moment. Then, suddenly, every muscle in him gave way and he slumped forward against the door and slid down onto the floor. For a moment, Dumbledore thought that he had fainted and rose to help, but then realised James was still holding the door handle above his head.

A few minutes passed in which the only thing that could be heard were long, gasping breathes. Then James took a firmer grip on the door handle, pulled himself up, clumsily opened the door and rushed out. And Dumbledore let him go. He could hear him stumbling down the spiral stairs like as though drunk, and then the statue at the bottom opening and closing. Dumbledore sat back in his chair and put his face in his hands.

~*~

It was a full hour before James came back and when he did Dumbledore could hardly bear to look at him. James' eyes and nose were red and blotchy, his hair was in worse disarray than ever and he looked completely and utterly exhausted. His body was slumped from weakness, and his eyes were shadowed. But what troubled Dumbledore most was that the shadows were not just under the eyes, but also in the eyes. The deadened, soulless look was back, and the old wizard wondered just how permanently James would be scarred by this. In his hundred and fifty years he had seen grief do terrible things to many a person. Some had been driven to the Dark Side, but many more had developed a life long obsession with destroying that which had caused the grief, dominating their lives, making them sick, driving them nearly mad in their quest for revenge. Dumbledore knew that James was not the person to suffer the former fate, but he wasn't so sure about the latter. James was not known for being rational.

The younger man sat back down in his former seat, his face expressionless and hollow. When he spoke, his voice was just as dead as his eyes.

"I want to know everything that happened."

Dumbledore nodded gravely. "Yes, I know. However, before I launch into a very long and rather complicated story, I have tidings of another person that you might be interested to hear about, of whom I can deliver much pleasanter news."

He studied James carefully for his reaction. He was afraid that there would be none at all, that James' grief might cause him to completely lose interest in everyone else, however he thought he saw a flutter of emotion pass across James' face. It might have been hope.

"Who?"

"Remus."

A light flickered in James's eyes and he sat slightly straighter.

"He's all right?" he asked guardedly.

Dumbledore smiled gently. "He is. He's on an assignment for the Order of the Phoenix at the moment, but I have sent a message to him and no doubt he will hurry back at the first available moment."

James seemed to relax a little. Dumbledore allowed him a moment to savour the relief before speaking again.

"Now, as to your previous request... I suppose I had better start at the beginning."

Dumbledore launched into the story of what had happened the night of October 31^st fifteen years previously. He told James again how Lily had refused to let Voldemort kill Harry and had been killed in her attempts to save him; he told him how Lily's sacrifice had given Harry a powerful protection that had caused Voldemort's defeat; he told of Sirius's arrest and the crimes he had been accused of, and how twelve years later he had escaped from Azkaban and the truth had come out. He omitted a lot of the details from this part, as it would have meant straying off onto all kinds of other tangents, but he explained that Sirius had met Harry and had had to go into hiding. Then he told of Voldemort's return the following year, and how the Ministry hadn't believed that it had happened. And finally he related the events that had happened a month ago - how Harry had been tricked into going to the Department of Mysteries (although, again, not going into any detail as to how he was tricked, since that would have involved several revelations about Harry that James was not ready to hear), and how Sirius had gone to the Ministry to try and help and had ended up falling through the veil during a duel with Bellatrix Lestrange.

By the time he had finished, James's mind was so full of thoughts and questions and regrets and sorrows that he just couldn't sort through them all. His brain was almost aching from all the information that was being fed into it, and he wondered if he might forget half of it by tomorrow as a defence mechanism. He was, by now, more exhausted than he had ever been in his life. It suddenly occurred to him that he hadn't slept more than a couple of hours in the last one and a half days.

"I don't think I can handle anymore tonight," he said quietly.

Dumbledore nodded understandingly. "It has been a long day for you. I suggest that you try and get some rest. A potion for dreamless sleep and some peace and quiet is what you need. Things will seem better in the morning, they always do. You can stay in the castle tonight and then tomorrow..."

But James wasn't listening anymore. His mind was on overload and seemed to be on the verge of shutting down completely. He allowed himself to be lead from the office and followed Dumbledore blindly through the dark and empty corridors. He wanted to get away from here. The castle seemed haunted by the ghosts of a thousand memories. He could almost hear far off voices echoing in the endless passageways, shadows of things the castle had seen released from the walls to taunt him. He could hear children laughing and shouting and chatting happily, voices many of which were now silent forever. And then, as they passed a tapestry by a window at the end of a corridor on the third floor, a vivid déjá vu came over him - the corridor was suddenly filled with light, birds were twittering outside the open window, and a fifteen year old Sirius was standing in front of the tapestry, his schoolbag slung over his shoulder, arms crossed, top button undone as it always was. He turned his head, saw James walking towards him and a broad grin spread across his face. Then Sirius's voice was calling to him from somewhere far away.

"Get a move on, Prongs, you pillock, they're already down there!"

James's heart skipped a beat, and he almost opened his mouth to reply. But then the vision was gone, the corridor was dark once again, and there was no one standing by the tapestry. James felt a blow to the stomach - Sirius was not here, and he would never see him again.

"Here we are."

It took a few moments for James to even recognise what part of the castle he was in.

"This is Professor Tilly's office."

"Professor Tilly left around the same time as you, remember?" said Dumbledore gently. "These rooms are currently unoccupied. We're still going through Defence Against the Dark Arts teachers like a hot knife through butter. I'm sure Harry will have a lot to say on the recent teachers."

Dumbledore unlocked the door with a muttered spell and pushed it open.

"Make yourself at home. I'll have a house elf bring you everything you need, as well as the sleeping potion. We'll meet again in the morning after breakfast, all right?"

James nodded. Dumbledore handed him the candle, put a comforting hand on James's shoulder for a brief moment, then turned and swept away up the corridor, his long robes trailing along the ground behind him. James was left alone.

He stepped inside the office and shut the door. The last time he'd been in here he'd been in trouble for putting timers on dungbombs and putting them in all the toilets in the castle. They had all exploded at once and water had gone everywhere. More than one student had been using a toilet at the time. Professor Tilly had caught him and Sirius and brought them here to wait for McGonagall. Instinct told James he should be smiling at the memory but the muscles around his mouth just weren't working.

The office was now barren except for a sofa, an empty bookcase, the teacher's desk, a students' desk and two chairs stacked by the door.

James put the candle down on the teacher's desk. He wished Reiley were there. He'd never lived alone in his entire life, except for the first few weeks after he'd left the hospital, and now he found himself on his own and starting his life over for the third time in two decades.

As he stood there in the semi-darkness images and sounds and memories flooded his brain and suddenly his strength gave out. He collapsed on the sofa and let the cushions soak up the tears that leaked out of his eyes. He barely noticed the house elf who came to bring him the sleeping potion and some food and amenities. He stayed there without moving for what seemed like hours. Silence pressed in on him from all sides like he was underwater and he just stared at the flickering shadows the candlelight cast upon the walls. It seemed as if there were no other person in the world. There might as well have been a nuclear holocaust and he the only survivor. A thousand thoughts and worries and regrets spun around in his head. In the time that he lay there he missed just about every person he had ever known - he missed Remus, he missed Reiley, he missed his mother and father, he missed the Peter he had known at school, he missed Professor Tilly, he missed Harry, but most of all he missed Sirius and Lily. What wouldn't he give right now to see a friendly face, any familiar face?

He was just considering whether or not he should go back down to Hagrid's when a knock at the door brought him back to his surroundings with a jolt. He had very nearly actually convinced himself that he was the only person in existence and having someone suddenly show up was almost a shock. He looked at the clock and found that he'd only been lying there for about half an hour. Vaguely wondering who it could be but not really caring, James slithered off the sofa and rushed to the door and opened it.

He stopped dead in the doorway, for the person whose face he was looking into was one of the best people who could have shown up at that moment.

"Remus..." he breathed.