Let Me Be Your Voice

Part 5

**Smut Warning**

*note* Apparently Wattpad won't allow any but my followers to read some of the R rated bits, but as they are intregal to my plot I'll post a tamer version of them here so as not to trip the mature wire. If you'd like to read the uncensored version, look me up on Ao3 (Archive of Our Own) under Queenie_Mab. You'll have to search through my works to find it, but the complete story is there.

~*~

The atmosphere at Hogwarts that afternoon was filled with a mixture of emotions. Harry was pleased to see that all walks of life were contributing to the rebuilding effort. House-elves worked their magic side-by-side with wizards. Firenze was the only centaur helping, but he used his strong back and legs to haul heavy loads he pulled in a cart. Grawp and Hagrid collaborated in moving rubble away from the castle, and when he stopped to have lunch under the beech tree, taking a break with George, he saw that even the mer-people were pitching in by bringing blasted pieces of wreckage up from where they littered the lake, placing it on the shore for easy disposal.

“How are you holding up, George?” Harry asked, unwrapping a roast beef sandwich Kreacher had packed for him before he’d left.

George sat with his back against the tree, not eating, but watching the tentacles of the giant squid make ripples in the surface of the water.

“I’ve been better,” George said quietly, as if he had trouble admitting it was hard to be present in the place he’d lost his twin. “But Fred wouldn’t have wanted me to dwell on being gloomy, you know? I feel like I owe it to him to go out there and live twice as hard and have twice as much fun as a normal person. Like, I’ll live for him. I know that’s what I’d have wanted if it had been me.” He fell silent.

Harry nodded, chewing thoughtfully. “He’ll always be alive in you. The ones we love never truly leave us, they just change form a bit until we go and join them.” He thought of Sirius then, feeling his loss all over again.

George cracked a sly smile at Harry. “So, now that you’ve reached enlightenment, oh wise one…” he started, but Harry shut him up with a friendly kick to his foot.

“Mr. Potter?” Professor McGonagall’s voice called from behind them, making them both turn to see her draw closer. She walked with a staff now and a slight limp, though she held herself as rigid and proud as ever.

“Hello, Mr. Weasley,” she said, when she saw George. “Thank you both for contributing to the rebuilding process.” She turned back to Harry. “I hoped I could have a word with you in my office, Potter. Sometime before we retire for the night at any rate.”

“Yeah, sure,” Harry agreed at once. “No problem. I’ll come up and talk to you as soon as I finish my lunch.”

She gave him a sharp nod, but smiled warmly, looking out at the shore where the mer-people were busily piling rubble. “Albus would have loved to have lived to see this,” she said. “To see everybody putting aside their differences and taking up together for a common purpose.” She stopped talking, and dabbed at her eyes beneath her square spectacles with a small lace handkerchief.

Harry and George watched her retreating figure head back to the castle, over the sloping grounds.

~x~

After he’d finished his sandwich, Harry and George walked back up to the castle together; George stopped to join those working on restoring the Great Hall, and Harry headed up the stairs to Professor McGonagall’s office.

He passed Slughorn and Flitwick on his way up as they worked together to replace a section of wall that had been demolished. Harry smiled to see that Slughorn was huffing and puffing, sweat dripping from his balding head, and his robes hanging loosely from his shoulders.