The Brightest Sun

Chapter 22

The day dawned bright, the sky blistering with radiant sunlight and clear skies even as those going about the day felt anything but wonderful.

Potter Hall had been unusually somber; Harry and Teddy were expected at the anniversary gala held in honour of those who had lost their lives, and Elia was attending alongside her children.

Ignoring the whispers that broke out when they entered the Great Hall at Hogwarts, Elia tucked an errant curl into place on Teddy’s head as she murmured, “Will you be fine?”

“Peachy,” Harry muttered, a small smile on his face. “Just a few hours to deal with them before we can go home.”

Oddly, for all that Harry had despised public appearances when she first met him, this was one of the few he had no qualms with. The anniversary of Voldemort’s defeat was often used as a day to lavish praise on him, but he had always used it to remind the rest of the world of the incredible sacrifice that had been made in those dark days.

The group he had been referring to was obvious, and Elia could feel the lingering glances sent by those he had once been so close to.

They sat in the front row, Minister Shacklebolt greeting Elia and the children.

“Teddy,” he said. “You’ve gotten so big.”

“Thank you, sir,” Teddy replied, moving forward to take his seat. Aegon and Rhaenys claimed the chairs on either side of him, a slight scowl on their faces as they saw the number of people eagerly watching their brother.

“Behave,” Elia murmured as she took her seat, leaning so that they could hear her. “We don’t need another accident.”

At her pointed look, Aegon turned slightly sheepish. Elia hid her fond smile, turning instead to those seated near them.

There was a family of redheads, with varying shades of colour mixed in as their eyes flittered between where she sat and where Harry stood with his old professor.

Narcissa was keeping to the back of the hall, she knew; much as the woman had done in keeping Harry alive, her prior actions had not truly been forgotten. Nor did she seem keen on entering the spotlight.

A slight hush fell over the room as Minerva McGonagall took to the podium. The old battleaxe swept her stern glare across the hall, eyes softening at the sight of Teddy. They had come to an odd truce, content to ignore any problems so long as did not harm Teddy. Thankfully, the older woman had softened to her sometime in the past two years, and Elia was silently grateful she would not have to deal with a woman as learned in magic as she was.

“…allow me to welcome Herakles Potter-Black.”

“Thank you,” Harry said, waiting for the light applause to die down.

“Seventy years ago, a young wizard received a letter from this very school. He had come to Hogwarts brimming with potential, eager to learn as much of magic as he could. Young Tom was expected to become the future minister, an unspeakable, go to the ICW; the very world was at his fingertips. But he chose instead to bring destruction to the world.

Tom would go on to gather followers, seducing them with promises of glory and power. And in the midst of it all stood a number of people who refused to bow down to what he truly was. He did not want to restore the Wizarding World to glory. He did not intend to share his power with anyone else, for he believed that he deserved it all. Thousands of people died in a seven-year span, in hopes to see an end to the terror he had plunged them into. It would take a couple desperate to protect their child to see his end, but the world hadn’t known that it wasn’t the end.

In 1994, the first casualty of the second war came in the form of Bertha Jorkins, whose only crime had been her concern for a fellow worker. The second…the second would be Cedric Diggory, a young man with a bright future ahead of him. Cedric’s only crime was being in the wrong place at the wrong time.