Faerie Folly and Wizard Wands

Chapter Twenty-Six

Author's Note: This final chapter concluding Faerie Folly and Wizard Wands takes place ten months after the fall of Voldemort and the conclusion of the war of good and evil.

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Blue skies hung gayly and pure over the land of England. It was one of those rare days where a cloud was forbidden to approach the clear blue bell of the dome above the green and lemon of the earth. The moors were covered in purple heather and blue cornflowers. Wild orange poppies made a few appearances, and the grasses waved long and tall.

The air was clean and crisp, with a taste of the sea, and a ring of seagulls. The wind circled and played and whispered of summer.

Hogwarts was full of itching children ready to leave the confining walls and their troublesome exams. Anticipation drifted through the country, as all prepared to enjoy the full comforts and delights of a pleasant weathered weekend.

Saquoya sat sedately in her garden, playing absent-mindedly with a few early crocuses. Their regal purple blooms looked like stained plums in her pale hands, and beneath her cream wizarding robes the grass was the Kelly green and emerald of spring.

Life had changed since the end of the war. For Saquoya, it had changed not only her life, but her being.

There was a spark of fire in her eyes that never left. It matched her father's blue shimmer and never rested. But it was a tired flame.

Since the end of that battle, Saquoya had been drained of her energy. All of her potent power had diminished with the passing of Mother Earth through her veins. That fateful moment had taxed the faerie blood until it caused the pixie woman to be nothing more than a witch with a few slight peculiarities.

When feeling refreshed, she could make the flowers bloom without water. She could still smell the wind better than an animal, and hear more acutely than any other human. Her unnatural healing powers remained intact, and her ability to sense other creatures near her was yet part of her body.

But Saquoya could no longer fly. She could no longer force the flowers to grow and die within seconds, and she could not wield magic without a wand. No force flew from her hands and fingers, and her blood never danced with the same fury.

Mother Nature had given a gift, in a way. She had made Saquoya more human.

She had given Saquoya strength. Without the powers she once had, her weakness had fled her heart.

The temptation to become one with more power, the greediness of the darkness was never part of her thoughts any more, although some of the dusk had tainted her in ways that could not be reversed. She loved the night now, and loved the blanket of solace it gave. She reveled in the swarthy sky of the evenings, and loved to feel the remembrance of what once had been hers to have.

Saquoya would never be the same sweet girl that had existed in America, nor the naive woman turned pixie witch. Now, she was merely a witch with a wand made of rosewood and a sliver of earth in its core. She held pixie blood which detested uncertainty, change, and imbalance, but she was calmer now. The battle had taken away much of her alien spirit.

She was at home within herself, her father, and her friends.

Sirius came once a week to see her. She would talk with him, but of trivial things. Now he brought Harry, though infrequently, and the boy was attached to her for reasons she knew he did not understand. Harry Potter was different in that he had thwarted Voldemort. He was a celebrity in his world, and the burden of his name always preceded him. Now, she too would live with that difference, and that bond held them together, though he was still too young to fully comprehend it.

But Sirius had too peaceful of a heart for Saquoya's liking. Even her father was too much of a good man. Both of them had nothing which yanked at their memories, haunting or taunting them with dreams of what might have been. They could not fully grasp who she was, or what she had become, no matter how much they loved her.

It was with Severus that Saquoya became alive. His presence and talk gave her life, a deeper life than what she had expected from him when she had discovered that she loved him. They did not need to reminisce of the past, for it could bring them both to topics they wished to forget. She could forget with him. His past swallowed hers, and hers overwhelmed his, and in this the circle still continued.

So, on this lovely day of spring, she waited for the dark man to come to the lonely white house, just as he always did, and he would never disappoint her.

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"Saquoya."

He came from the other side of the house. She smiled, for she had already sensed him. Looking up, she smiled in greeting, though he did nothing but nod his head. Severus wore color now, if it was his fancy. It was one of the few differences he had made in his life after the end of the war. Now he wore dark green, reminding her of the colour of the shadows in her mother's woods. Sometimes it was a deep blue, and other times a red so dark it was like the thickened ruby of old blood.

"Severus."

They did not need to speak, some days, and today the weather was too lovely to discuss much. Absently, his hand went to touch the red gold of her head, and to barely caress the locks. Saquoya basked in the touch and the glow of the sun. She closed her eyes. Enjoying the simplicity of life was now her only goal. She would do as her father asked, and taught Muggle remedies at Hogwarts twice a week. But that was all that was needed of her there, and her time was spent working in the earth, and discovering new healing concoctions from her English herb garden.

Severus would help her some days, or would silently bring a magical substance to add to a potion. He was not all that interested in her line of work.

But he knew that she loved him. She did not need to tell him, and doubted that she would ever need to.

Their lives were intertwined in more than one way, and both were content now, to leave it so. She had lost her hot temper and passion in the war, and she would not fling herself to him, which was exactly what Severus wanted in a woman.

They never spoke of marriage. It was a taboo topic, and neither wanted to break their oddly content relationship. Their union was too perfect to disrupt with silly legal messes, and to change their pattern would destroy the natural boundaries each needed to exist.

She often recalled the night he had made love to her for the first time. When she had given herself freely to his body, he had cried out, once, and in that moment, she had felt his heart next to hers, and how they beat to the same rhythm.

Severus loved her, in perhaps the only way he knew how. It was not the romance loves of the books, nor even the practical love of a husband. Severus accepted her being, and her mind, and his acceptance was all he could give her now. There was a peace with him that created the end of her search.

It was enough, for it gave her life.

THE END