WHO: Maddie Savage, mentions of Marcas, Ailsa, Wallace and Diane Savage; Davina and Lucas Macmillan; Jasper Williamson; and Clement Max WHAT: Madeline Savage, an evolution. WHEN: Various points from 1991 to now. WHERE: Various places in Scotland and England. WARNINGS: Sadness. References to dead people.
“Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaddie.”
The sun was setting over the woods that surrounded the Savage property, the plaintive cry of the six year old being left behind rising above the trees. It was quickly followed by a gleeful giggle and jubilant cry as a tiny blonde broke through the edge of the trees, arriving in her back garden.
“I win!” Maddie boasted, doing a little victory dance as her brother soon followed through, his hands scratched from breaking a fall and protecting himself from tree branches.
“Madeline,” their mother said sternly. “Winning isn’t everything.” Six year old Maddie just shrugged and bolted into the house, leaving her injured brother in her mother’s care. Her dad would be impressed.
“I’m going to try out for the Quidditch team,” Marcas announced at the dinner table, the night before they were due to return to Hogwarts. Before anyone else could say anything, Maddie chimed in.
“Why? You’re pretty rubbish at it.”
“No, you’re rubbish at it. I’ve been practicing. The coach says I’ve got good reflexes, that I’d make an excellent keeper.”
Maddie narrowed her eyes at her brother as the rest of the conversation flowed on.
Next round of tryouts found her on the Gryffindor team as a chaser, while her brother became the new Ravenclaw keeper. Gryffindor lost their game against Ravenclaw and she sulked for a week.
“What’d you get?” Maddie demanded of Jasper, snatching the test parchment out of his hand and smirking when she saw the result.
“I told you you should have studied more,” she proclaimed. “I got an O. You can borrow my notes next time, honestly I don’t know how you make sense of yours.”
Jasper just laughed, and later snuck his test paper back from where Maddie had discarded it. And made sure to rub it in her face on the next test he did better on.
“Madeline Savage!”
Maddie glowered at the strident note in her grandmothers voice — not the grandmother she missed with everything she had, the grandmother that was kind as well as strict and turned a blind eye when she snuck into the scotch. No, this was Mrs Davina Macmillan, who did not tolerate her teenage granddaughter helping herself to the firewhiskey or climbing up onto the roof so she could look at the stars.
Maddie hiccuped, though it was hard to tell if it was because of the smokey alcohol she’d downed or the sob she was trying to suppress.
“Come down from there this instant, Madeline.”
When she finally did come down, Maddie could hear her grandparents arguing.
“Honestly Dougal, if she keeps this up she’ll have to stay at Hogwarts in her breaks. My heart can’t keep up with all of this. She was on the roof!”
“She’s just grieving, my dear. She’ll settle down.” A pause. “And it’s comforting having her here. Don’t you think she looks like our Ailsa? Especially her eyes. She’s got her mother’s eyes.”
“Ailsa at least knew how to behave.”
Madeline didn’t go up to the roof again.
“Why should you be an Auror?”
It was the final interview. Maddie stared each of the panel in the eye (even Moody’s strange, spinning eye) before she started her response.
“Because I’m the best.
My academic record shows that - my grades have always been high, and I excelled in all six of my NEWTs. I’m intelligent, organised and hard working.
Physically, I’m in perfect shape. I can keep up with the demands of both the training program and the job. I’ve been active since I was a child, and was on my house’s quidditch team.
Personally, you’re unlikely to find better. I understand more than most the dangers that Dark Wizards pose to the world, and I’m not about to succumb to the temptation of the Dark Arts. I will do everything I can to fulfil the duties of the Auror office and protect the people of the United Kingdom.”
“Yes dear?” Her grandmother prompted with her usual inscrutable smile. Or was it just a little bit warmer than usual? Maddie glanced at Clem one more time before focusing on her grandparents.
“Clem and I are engaged!” She burst out, flashing the hand with the engagement ring with a brilliant smile. It was returned by a slightly more restrained one from Davina Macmillan, who gestured for her granddaughter to come closer.
Maddie burst up off the couch, surprised to have her grandmother offer her a brief hug, and kiss on the cheek. It was the first gesture of its kind that Maddie could remember from Davina since her mother’s funeral.
“Congratulations, my dear,” she murmured and Maddie blinked back tears, finally feeling like she was part of a family again.
When the word first came through that Voldemort was back, Maddie hadn’t wanted to believe it. And it had been Ministry policy not to believe it, so it didn’t matter what Moody said, or the uneasiness in the Auror Office. Fudge claimed Harry was lying, Scrimgeour did what he thought looked best, and Maddie just wanted to do her job. And plan her wedding.
Which had to be perfect. She wasn’t settling. She and Clem were going to have the best wedding, she didn’t care how long it took.
Then Voldemort’s return was confirmed. And then Moody was killed, and Dumbledore and Scrimgeour and the world under Maddie’s feet suddenly wasn’t as firm as it had been.
The Auror Office dissolved. Gawain died. And then...
Joining the Order hadn’t meant what she’d thought it would. There was no structure, no strategy, just people doing whatever they thought was a good idea in the moment.
Staring out at the stone and brick of the small town she’d stopped in for the night, Maddie had decided she knew what she had to do. She looked down at the list of names she’d scrawled into her notebook, at the three names she’d circled a few moments before.
She’d just have to take care of the Death Eaters herself.