The Marauders: Year Six #Wattys2017

Durmstrang

Durmstrang

Far away in the northernmost part of Scotland, as far as you can go on the mainland, in a small village called Faere Dhu, there was a farm house, dark in the night. A man stumbled up the walk to the door and fell upon the step. He sat on the porch and held his head in his hand, dizzy from drink in the village pub, his eyes wet with shame. He'd been sober three years - three years. But there had been a funny rumor he'd overheard - two women in funny cloaks talking in the city of Wick, where he'd gone that afternoon for the supplies they needed for the autumn harvest... They'd been speaking in low voices in the apothecary, where he'd gone to pick up tonic for his wife, and he'd heard a name he had not heard in nearly twenty years.

"...Minerva McGonagall, the deputy headmistress, will be stepping in while the headmaster is away..."

"The Head Girl? The one in Gryffindor? Friends with that Potter bloke, the Quidditch player."

"One and the same. She's from about here, you know... Grew up somewhere not too far away from where we stand this very moment."

"Acting as headmistress! A girl from Caithness county!"

He'd returned home, memories flooding him, gripping the wheel of his automobile quite tightly and he'd found himself stopped and parking outback the old pub in Faere Dhu and going inside for a pint. He'd wiped his face with his handkerchief, ridding his forehead of the sweat that had built up, and ordered a second pint when he gulped his first down too fast, hands shaking as he returned the thick glass to the table top.

"I should've asked where she was teaching," the man lamented to the bartender when he was three deep and feeling a bit pissed, the drink blurring his eyes as he rocked upon the stool. "Should've asked how I could've gotten in touch... I've meant to find her for years, you know... meant to find her..." He paused, looking at the empty glasses that clustered about his elbows on the bar, "Oi, Micah, what've I done?"

The bartender, Micah, sighed and wiped up a bit of the beer that sloshed over the brim of the cup. Micah was years younger than the man on the stool, he had no idea what he was talking about - no details had been given. "Old man Dougal, you need a ride home?" Micah asked several hours later when the bar was closing up for the night and the man was still wallowing about in his drink.

"Nay," the man slurred, his accent always thicker when he drank. "A walk would do me a world of good." And he slid off the stool and stumbled his way to the door, leaving behind the money to cover his bill. He'd fallen his way all the way home, Dougal McGregor had, until he'd landed on his porch and there he lay now, staring up at the stars, being flooded by a hundred thousand memories of years long, long, long since passed.

"Aye a fool I was," he murmured. "Not but a fool."

Regulus Black sat in the window of his bedroom, staring out at the grey sky, hugging his knees. "Master Regulus, Kreacher is done with his chores that Mistress has set him, does Master wish to play at Gobstones with Kreacher?" the elf stood beside him, staring up, his ears back against his head, staring up at him hopefully.

Regulus shook his head, "No, Kreacher, I don't want to play Gobstones, but thank you." Regulus rested his chin on his shoulder.

The elf scrambled up onto the seat and put his little hands on Regulus's knees. "Does Master Regulus wish to talk about what is bothering him with Kreacher? Kreacher is feeling concern for Master; poor Master has been feeling so very sad for all of the summer holiday, Kreacher is telling by Master's way of staring out that Master is feeling sad..."