WHO: Valkyrie & Dante Avery. WHAT: Right after the battle, figuring shit out. WHEN: BACKDATED to early Sunday morning. WHERE: Dante's cottage. WARNINGS: Mentions of injuries.
Dante couldn’t remember actually getting back to the cottage.
He remembered summoning one of his family’s house elves, vaguely, like it was a distant memory. He didn’t remember what happened after, but when he slowly blinked awake, he assumed the elf must have attempted to heal him.
He was sprawled out on the sofa they’d ordered before Violet had left. He’d never bothered to cancel the order -- he’d completely forgotten before he’d been told it was ready -- and when he’d set it up, it had fractured what was left of his heart. Now, he was grateful, if only because it provided him somewhere to rest while he recovered.
As his vision cleared, Dante realised he wasn’t alone.
“Val?” She wasn’t supposed to be there. She wasn’t supposed to see him at all. “What --”
"The Dark Lord is dead?" Val asked at once, not wanting to prolong the conversation any further than necessary. She had heard the broadcast, the news absolutely shocking. She knew there was no reason to claim something so false, and yet —
She had showed up to the cottage, trusting her instinct that her brother would be there. "Dante?" she squealed after a moment.
Slowly, he swallowed. His mark wasn’t burning. It reminded him of the last time, all those years ago. An entire lifetime ago, he thought. He was a different man now than he had been then.
Dante nodded, bleary-eyed, and he reached a hand out for her, even though he was stiff and probably shouldn’t be moving too much yet. “I --” He was afraid to say the words outloud, and though he hadn’t seen the end himself, he felt sure that what Valkyrie had said was true. “Is that what they’re saying?”
Val instinctively let her hand grab her brother's and nodded, moving to sit on the sofa. "That's what they — where's dad?" She was nervous about the answer but not having heard anything, her thoughts assumed the worst.
His throat was so dry. His voice croaked, “I --” Dante looked away, too ashamed to look her in the eye. He hadn’t even looked for their father in the end. He hadn’t looked for Clement or Victoria, either. He’d just left, like a coward. He’d looked out for himself first and foremost. He hoped his father would forgive him, wherever he was.
“I don’t know,” he admitted. His next words came out in a rush. “I didn’t see -- I didn’t see him at the end. I don’t know where he was, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”
Val nodded, but didn't respond right away otherwise. Her thoughts kept swirling over the worst, but she could understand Dante's logic, she really did. The thought of her father, laying still and lifeless, sent a shudder through her body, but she turned to Dante. "How are you?" she asked, deciding to focus on the here and now. Her brother was here. At the very least, that mattered.
Was he okay? Dante frowned and pushed himself up to a sitting position. “I’m… not okay,” he said, figuring it was best to be honest at that moment than to try to be brave for his sister. “I got blasted through a window.” Dante knew he shouldn’t be telling her too much, but his brain was so fuzzy that it came out anyway. He’d never wanted his sister to know the details of what they did. Now, in particular, he worried that it would be dangerous for her if she knew the truth. People would be looking for him.
He clutched her hand tighter. “You shouldn’t be here,” he said finally. “They’re going to come to ask you and Mother if you’ve seen me. I don’t want you to have to lie on my account.”
Val pursed her lips, but instead of entertaining Dante's second thought, she wanted to focus on his first. Blasted through a window. She widened her eyes and she reached for her phone, halfway through typing a hext to a Healer. But she stopped herself, not even sure how she was supposed to breach that. "What happened?" she asked, her voice lowered and slightly shaky.
Dante closed his eyes as he tried to recall where everything had gone wrong. “Potter was at Hogwarts,” he started, a frown creasing his forehead, “so we were summoned.” It had felt wrong to begin with, but Dante hadn’t been brave enough to refuse the order. He hadn’t been brave enough to resist.
“We ended up fighting the Order, I presume,” along with students, but Dante left that part out. Val would hear about that one way or another, but it wasn’t something Dante wanted to share. Had it really come down to fighting children? He shuddered. “It all went wrong.”
"Did anyone —" Val started, though she didn't want to finish the thought. She already figured she knew the answer to that question, but somehow, she wanted affirmation from her brother. He was there. He would know for a fact.
So, she cleared her throat and tried again. "Did anyone we know die?" Val intentionally left out any specific names, though she did brace herself to hear the worst of it.
His resolve wavered slightly at the question. He assumed their side had seen a lot of casualties, but he wasn’t sure exactly who. He closed his eyes and tried to recall what he’d see. Who he’d seen.
After a moment, he shrugged helplessly. “I don’t --” His breath hitched. “I didn’t see Clement or Vic in the end. I didn’t see Thor. I assume… I assume they’re dead or worse if they haven’t checked in.” That reminded him that he should probably check to see who else had made it out, but he could do that later.
Val's heart dropped at the thought of that, though she knew something like this was bound to happen. Too many things in the past few months had pointed at this exact direction. No one had checked in, but at least she had Dante with her. She gulped and tried to swallow away the lump in her throat, though to no avail. Her eyes pooled with tears and she looked away from Dante, trying not to use this moment to get emotional.
"What are you going to do?" she asked, her voice laced with resignation and resolve.
That was an enormous question, and Dante still hadn’t been able to wrap his head around what had happened, let alone around what he was going to do.
“I’m not going back to prison,” he stated, though he knew he might not get a choice in the matter. “I can’t, I can’t be there again.” His voice wavered. Not very long ago, he thought he had everything: a secure future, a fiancée, a son on the way. His family had been safe, and his siblings had been reaching for their own dreams. Now that was all gone. His family was in ruins, Violet had left, and he didn’t know how he or Valkyrie could recover from this. If only one of them could have that chance, though, it should be Val. “I can buy you time.”
That lump in her throat seemed to grow bigger, and Val tried to swallow it away again, but to no avail. She pursed her lips instead, frowning as her gaze fell to the floor. She thought about that statement, and about all the conversations she had had with their father and with Thor. She had options.
She finally forced herself to look up at her brother and squeezed his hand. "Thor said he wanted me to go with him, but —" She didn't even know if he was alive. "And dad and I had made plans about situations like this. And it involved the Imperius." It felt like a knife through her heart at that particular moment, but Valkyrie knew she had to be strong at this moment. If not for her, then for her brother.
"What should I do?" she asked, hoping her brother would tell her exactly what to do. The thought of making this choice on her own made her feel slightly ill.
If Thor was alive, that was a good option, but Dante didn’t know. He trusted Thor would be able to protect Val, and he knew that his friend made Val happy. That was all Dante wanted: to know that his sister would be safe and that she would have a chance to find happiness again.
He closed his eyes, trying to ignore the throbbing in his back. Their mother would likely return to her family in Denmark, once she was able to. He’d kept her out of it as much as he could, but he didn’t know if his father had. He hoped so. Their mother deserved her freedom, too.
As much as it pained him, he knew what his sister had to do. “You need to go. Take our mother and don’t look back. The Imperius won’t work. They’ll never believe it after I claimed it before. You did nothing wrong, in any case. You never hurt anyone. They’ll find out soon they can’t prove that.” He cleared his throat, coughing a little. “But they will use you to find me.” He had no doubt about that.
Val nodded in response, the reality of the situation sinking in slowly, but surely. The new Aurors would be ruthless, she knew, and they would have no mercy for the Avery family. She would have to ensure that she and the matron of the family would be safe right now.
Sighing loudly, Val offered her brother a small smile. "I'll make arrangements with mum." They needed to leave as soon as they could. Before they were being looked for.
Finally, Dante smiled. The smile was weak, but it was there, and the relief he felt at seeing his sister was strong. The grief he felt, bubbling just under the surface, at seeing his sister again was strong, too. They might never see each other again, he thought. It was entirely possible -- highly likely, really -- that he wouldn’t make it out of England. Even if he did, it might never be safe for them to see each other again. The thought made tears spring to his eyes.
“Val, I’m… I love you. You and Keats, you were everything to me. I’m sorry none of this turned out how we wanted.”
Seeing her brother's eyes watered was her breaking point. She let the tears flow without protesting and threw her arms around him, holding Dante as close as she possibly could. Those words, the thought and emotion behind those few words, sent her further into a spiral, and suddenly she couldn't control herself any longer.
They were supposed to protect their culture, and yet, they'd lost so much more than the could ever imagine.
"I love you too, Dante," she choked out, in-between her sobs. "I'm so glad you're here, and not —" dead. "I'm sorry for every hurtful thing I've said."
The wounds on his back hurt when he moved, but Dante reached out to wrap his arms around his sister anyway. He didn’t care how shaky he was or how worried he was that his injuries were infected; the only thing that really mattered was his sister, and saying goodbye. It broke what was left of his heart.
“You don’t need to apologise for that,” he insisted, “it doesn’t matter anymore.” He brushed a hand through her hair gently. “You’re here. That’s what matters.”
Val finally pulled back from his grasp, just enough so that she could attempt to wipe away her tears. She sobbed, wordlessly, and blinked, shutting her eyes for a few seconds, before looking at him again. "What can I do for you in the meantime? Before — well, before anything else happens. Name anything. I'll do it."
He wanted to ask her to tell him how his back looked, to clean the wounds left when he flew through the window, but Dante held his requests back. The less she knew, the better.
He wished he could make all of it better for her. He wished he could fix it. He wished he could give her the life she deserved. “Just promise me you’ll find a way to be happy, Val. That’s all I want.”
"I promise." Val could feel the emptiness of her words, but she would try, if nothing else.