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[bytedtonks]

He’s so busy looking inside people to find the good that he misses the knife they’re holding in their hand.

Alexandra Bracken, The Darkest Minds (via wordsnquotes)

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[bytedtonks]

[bytedtonks]

[bytedtonks]

❧ minerva i

Where: Hogwarts Grounds

When: October 6th 1979

With: @bytedtonks

Weekends at Hogwarts were a more sedate affair, students played, worked and even had visits from family members. The staff kept order (depending on who was on shift) or left the castle to attend to their own affairs. Minerva, still reluctant to spend too much time in that new office had taken to roaming the grounds near the entrance to the school. That wretched article a few days ago still played on her mind but she was loathe to give the thoughts too much attention lest they bring with them too many unwanted emotions. 

It wasn’t that Minerva refused to grieve, to mourn the loss of her mentor and dear friend; simply that she would not give into grand displays of grief. Minerva didn’t have the luxury of any sort of breakdown with the other staff members all looking on and several nosey ignoramuses at the ministry more than willing to see her replaced with someone ‘more suitable for the position.’ 

Keeping an eye on the students as a cat was a way to distract herself and keep an ear out for any troubles they may have been having. She’d just watched two students, siblings leave the ground with their parents for an afternoon in Hogsmeade and felt a little relief, the younger of the two had been very inattentive in classes the last few days and she suspected the news had more than a little to do with it; some time in a parents embrace would do them good.

She was preparing to head back to the castle when an easily recognisable figure apparented just outside the boundary of the grounds; Mr. Tonks. Wondering who he was stopping by to visit, Minerva waited for him to get a little closer before meowing softly and, with the elegance only a feline could possess, hopped down from the large rock she was perched upon in three easy jumped and transformed back to herself halfway through the final one, landing gracefully with her emerald robes swishing slightly. 

“Mr. Tonks.” she greeted with a small nod, “Back to brush up on your charm work?” she asked dryly, though one who knew her would recognise the joke.

Dora is with her grandmother for the day, and the house is unusually, echoingly empty. It’s unsettling. Usually, there is someone else in the old farmhouse ( his fingers brush the frame of Doc’s empty room and he hopes he isn’t being run too hard, that he’ll be home soon, glance at the clock to check when Dromeda might return ), and while Ted has certainly spent days on his own in perfect contentment before, in the wake of this week’s news the quiet takes an ominous feel, causes ghosts in the corners of his eye with nothing to distract from them.

He needs to get out, he thinks, and reconnect to people. As himself, because he’s been meeting people all week while wearing Halliwell’s face, Love, Elysium either the best or worst timed release of his career depending on your point of view ( ‘People need it.’ his agent had said ‘Now more than ever. Let them have their escape, Tonks.’ ). But it’s different, meeting fans as Halliwell and friends, family as himself. And there’s one member of his adopted family who he worries about the most right now, berates himself for not having made the time the last few days to check in.

The cat perched upon the rock is familiar on sight after so many evenings spent in McGonagall’s office during his years at Hogwarts, and Ted’s already adjusted his path to head in her direction when she changes back. Despite the warmth of his greeting smile, he can’t quite keep the concern and worry from his face as he reaches her. Adjusting his hold on the basket he carries, he shakes his head. ❝ Came to see you actually, Fodryb. ❞ He smiles again, and tilts his head. ❝ I wanted ta make sure you were alright. And Mam sent a care package for.❞

Pride in Grief || Ted & Minerva

[bytedtonks]

[bytedtonks]

❧ andromeda i‌

Her nose wrinkled at Ted’s innate positivity, a breathy sigh leaving her. For a moment, as he brushed her hair back, she avoided his eye-line, unsure of how she even felt. A sense of guilt weighed down on her for not protecting him before, for not doing something more to help fight this damned war, and it was all so conflicting and confusing that she knew she’d somehow found herself trapped between two worlds again. He seemed to remind her of that, making her bite at her lip as she finally looked at him, his accent making her stomach flip in the same way it usually did. It was a reminder amongst all of the chaos that he was still her Ted, her husband, and the man she’d fought so hard to be with, and she wouldn’t let anyone take him away from her. 

‘‘I’m not giving up.’‘ She protested quickly, a retort he’d probably expect from her. The easiest way to get Andromeda to do something was to tell her she couldn’t, and him presuming that she was ready to give up made her want to reassure him otherwise, answering a question that she hadn’t even really known the answer to. It was hard, she didn’t know what direction to go in, but she couldn’t give up. She’d lasted several years keeping secrets from her family, remaining strong even when she’d been pulled in countless other directions and as far as she was concerned, The Dark Lord wasn’t half as scary as her family. ‘‘I just… don’t know how best to move forward. I don’t know how to keep you safe.’‘ She stressed as her hands slid around his neck, fingertips brushing through the hair she found at the nape of his neck, an action that seemingly soothed her as much as it probably did him. 

A breath, and Andromeda looked at her husband in alarm and confusion, brow furrowing. ‘’A secret keeper charm?’’ She echoed, having heard of the term, of course, but she wasn’t entirely sure why he was suggesting it, or why he felt the need for one. ‘’Ted, why would we need that? I– tell me what you’re thinking, love, please.’’ 

❝I’m not sure. ❞ He sighs and shakes his head a little, disentangling himself temporarily ( just for long enough to move to the couch and wait for ‘Dromeda to join him ). He cards the fingers of one hand back through his hair as he works through the thoughts. ❝ I’m nae... I’m not thinking anything in particular, Dromeda. I just thought it might make you feel a bit less worried. And it’d nae hurt to have in place that I can see. A failsafe, sort of a thing.❞

He finds her hand and squeezes it, drifting into quiet for a moment as he considers, turning things over. The ceasefire was an odd place, and a good portion of him leaned to this being over, or at lease nearly. Without Dumbledore and Voldemort to polarise the middle, surely the majority would fall back to their own lives when there was no direction otherwise and the Ministry could handle the few fanatics who were left? Surely no one would think it better, more advisable to spin the ceasefire into all out war again.

But someone had thought it once, hadn’t they?

He’s not worried for himself, not personally, not generally. He has means of vanishing if he needs be, of getting lost behind another face. He could step into Halliwell full time for a while, or just someone unknown. But. But that would mean leaving his family, and he doesn’t think he could, not to protect himself. To protect them, though, with his absence? It’s a thought that gnaws at the back of his mind, venom and acid that burns if he lets it so usually he pushes it away. But he has doomed them, hasn’t he? He alone has marked Andromeda as a blood traitor, and Dora he has doomed twice, with muggle blood and a metamorph ability that has far too many uses for the death eaters to be unaware of what she could be if they got her, groomed her. 

❝ I should have married you under a different name. ❞ He admits heavily. A different name, a different face, Ted Tonks left to be nothing that could harm anyone, a forgotten echo. ❝ Halliwell, or... anyone else, who didn’t put you in this situation, ‘Dromeda love. ❞

hold me close || tedromeda

[bytedtonks]

[bytedtonks]

I knew who I was this morning, but I’ve changed a few times since then.

Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass (via goodreadss)

[bytedtonks]

❧ narcissa i

Location: Blishwick Estate Date: May 17th, 1979 @bytedtonks​

          The buzzing sound of the party ( a gathering, really, more than a party. A party was a far more joyous affair, or at least with far more dancing, in Narcissa’s experience ) washed over the blonde witch with ease, an almost relaxed grin playing on the corner of her lips. Mrs Malfoy would not have been able to explain quite what it was about society which made her feel so at ease, in a perfectly rehearsed dance with explicit codes of conduct, but there was something there far more enticing than silence. Perhaps it was the war, which made silence a terrible and tangible dread over what would come, might come, had not yet come. Chatters and laughs and barely hidden gossips felt more like a warm and safe embrace in contrast with it all, a sense of normalcy and learned pretences that Narcissa knew so well. Today’s choice of conversation topic was author E.L. Halliwell — Or rather, his presence at the event which the blonde now suspected had been organised purely so that the hostess could boast of how precious it was to have a celebrity within their rank, and how lovely forcing the poor man to read from the latest addition to his literary curriculum was. His books, the witch gathered, were perhaps the only solace of many of the guests throughout these times ( what better than romance novels to provide that little bit of sought-after escapism ? ). If only it had been that easy for her. 

          From the corner of her eye, she spots the guest-of-honour — Perhaps he had been there for some time now, potentially overwhelmed by the amount of wizards and witches trying to get a few minutes of his time, if they could not get more of his attention than that; perhaps he’d just arrived, fashionably late and aware that too much time spent in society would do terrible things for his aura of mystery and his capacity to stand idle chatter and the “wherever did you find inspiration for this character? they speak to me”. Perhaps, too, he really was the most intriguing guest at the party — Though not for any reason other people might assume. Narcissa had witnessed the hype, picked up the majority of his books to use them as casual conversation when every other topic ran dry and she absolutely could not be rude, and yet ? This was the first time she seemed to cross his path. 

          Quickly taking her leave from the person she was quickly talking to, the witch makes her way to the author with real interest but feigned reassuring smile. In truth, while her reasons to want to talk to the man were far less reductive than other people’s, they perhaps were no better. “Is this the part of the conversation where I have to admit I could not get started on reading your newest work yet?” An arch of an eyebrow and thin though not unfriendly smile.

Ted has to admit that, however good the food and music, a party of ( possible ) death eaters and ( definite ) blood purists is about the last place he’d ever want to be — and yet, here he is attempting not only to not look like he can feel the point of a hex burning between his shoulderblades, but also as though he somehow belongs in this world. Still, he’s written enough in the setting to know the rules, and Andromeda’s drilled him and drilled him in the mannerisms and how to walk and talk and sit until she’d wrung out every bit of muggle farm boy she could find. So. He’s not going to slip and accidentally out himself to a room full of people who want Ted Tonks dead probably more than they want E.L. Halliwell’s next book and the worst that’s going to happen is that he has to send his agent another strongly worded owl tomorrow about how he’d prefer to stick to more public appearances as much as possible.

Right then.

He’s managed to extricate himself from the throng for a moment ( though he has to resort to spinning up the widow story from Halliwell’s bio to get away from one in particular; another of those lines that had seemed fine when they’d written it, ten years and a lifetime ago fresh out of Hogwarts, and now left a foreboding tightness in his chest with the war closing in around them ), finding himself in a relatively quiet area of the party with a moment to regather his thoughts; ruffle out the clench in his heart referencing himself as widowed had conjured even in jest with the thought that he’d be seeing her soon. And, he bites back a smile, she’s always happier to help me out of these formal get-ups than into them.

Approaching, light footsteps make him turn to greet whoever’s coming with a smile — and it’s only the grace of God and a stern self-reminder that she has no idea who she’s really talking to that stops him from flinching when he realises who’s coming towards him. And he’s really going to have to send that Owl to his agent tomorrow, because on the list of people who shouldn’t be on the guest list of something he’s attending, Narcissa Malfoy is topped only by Bellatrix Lestrange. But at the same time, he’s curious — this is his sister-in-law, she should be family yet he hasn’t seen her since he graduated Hogwarts, never talked to her. And this opportunity has all but fallen in his lap, to know this part of ‘Dromeda’s life, to give her the news she so rarely gets.

❝ In that case, I’ll skip the pop quiz, ❞ He says with a good-natured smile and his best I have never seen your sister naked look, before holding out his hand. ❝ Edmund Halliwell. I don’t think I’ve had the pleasure...? ❞

[bytedtonks]

I love the fact that I can make people happy, in any form. Even if it’s just an hour of their lives, if I can make them feel lucky or make them feel good, or bring a smile to a sour face, that to me is worthwhile.

Freddie Mercury  (via thequotejournals)

[bytedtonks]

❧ andromeda i

The sound of Dora’s childish laughter, coming from the playroom they’d lovingly decorated and filled with a multitude of toys - magical and Muggle alike - both soothed her heart and broke it at the same time. It meant so much that her daughter was still afforded the opportunity to be a child for the most part, that she could run around with worry or trouble and Andromeda desperately wished that it would always be the case. That her sweet soul would never be touched or affected by the issues that were swirling around in their world, and she wished that the news had reassured her that that was the case. But instead, the news of Dumbledore’s death had given her anything but hope, it’d weighed on her heart all day and made her even more concerned as someone who was still stuck in the middle of two worlds. 

Because Dumbledore had been confirmed dead, but Voldemort was just missing, and she knew which one was likely to make a return sooner or a later.

And even if he didn’t, even if he truly was shrivelled up somewhere, his death wouldn’t stop all of the prejudice. His views and beliefs would echo through their world, twisting around those who were vulnerable and making their lives difficult and she would always worry about Ted and Dora. They weren’t purebloods, they weren’t considered to be perfect even though as far as she was concerned, they were the most perfect things in the world. They were magic personified and she’d fight for them with her last breath; something that seemed even more likely now.

That sweet kiss against her forehead soothed the ache in her heart just enough in that moment, her arms wound tightly around Ted’s back, not wanting to let go. Dora was too young to appreciate the power of a good cuddle, too active and excitable to be in one place for too long unless she needed a nap, so she clung to her husband instead. ‘’I don’t know this time, Ted.’’ Andromeda murmured back with a heavy sigh, giving him a light squeeze in her hold. ‘’All of this– it’s out of our control. Everything is spinning and crashing around us and there’s nothing we can do about it.’’ It was a double edged sword and she felt damned if she did and damned if she didn’t. Dromeda might have agreed with the Order but actually getting involved seemed too much of a risk.

‘‘If Dumbledore is gone, the most powerful of all of us, how am I going to keep you two safe?’‘ 

❝ Come on, ❞ he murmurs, unwinding one arm from her waist so he could brush the hair back from her face, smoothing it back in to place ❝ What’s this against us, ‘Dromeda? Against everything we’ve been through? We’ve come through so much together; you’re telling me that this is what makes my ‘Dromeda give up? I’m nae going to accept that.❞

He sighs softly, and rests his chin on top of her head for a long moment, just starting at the wall. It’s not that he doesn’t believe his own words — he does, has little doubt that they’ll find someway through this; there’s always some path forward, once they find the candle to light the way — it’s that... that doesn’t make Dumbledore’s death less tragic, doesn’t mean things haven’t gotten harder and darker. However dark the night, the dawn eventually comes, but that didn’t make stumbling around in it in the meantime any more pleasant.

What makes it hardest is the thought that’s been swirling at the back of his mind; that the best way to keep ‘Dromeda and Dora safe is for him to leave; it is only his muggle heritage that stains them in the eyes of the Death Eaters, after all, his fault that this fear hangs over them. Andromeda Black and her child would never have been in danger if he hadn’t selfishly shackled them to him with the name of Tonks. 

He pulls back enough that he can see her face. ❝ Doc mentioned something the other day. A Secret Keeper Charm. It’s... complicated, I think we’d need someone to do it for us, but... maybe we should look into it.❞

hold me close || tedromeda

[bytedtonks]

❧ drusilla i

LOCATION:flourish and blotts, london DATE:morning, 3 october 1979 AVAILABILITY:for @bytedtonks

There is somethingabout bookshops that always pulls her in, even if she is not in particular needof a new book. Flourish and Blotts is no different, though for once, she isn’tin there on impulse. It surprises her how busy it is, even in these times (a particular expressionthat says everything and nothing at the same time, one of those things she’d immediatelypicked up in her first few weeks here), and she escapes the throng of witchesby drifting between shelves and the towering stacks of books spilling out ofthem, haphazardly stacked on every surface available.

She picksup a copy of Aquatic Wonders of Yorkshire, thumbing through it in order to giveany potential onlookers the idea that she’s still considering buying it, andclasps it between her arm and her torso as she drifts towards the literaturesection. There’s a stand there, books intermingled with the newest edition ofWitch Weekly, the smiling face on the cover mirrored in the flesh behind it. Theline has shortened in the time she has spent browsing, and she smiles as shereaches the front, fingers brushing over the embossed cover of Love, Elysium. “I’mplanning on staying in until I’ve finished it, though if it’s anything at alllike the Engraved Spirits, I’ll probably be done by this evening,” she smilesher best disarming smile, eager to leave something of a normal impression. “Wouldyou mind signing it for me?”

New book releases always involved a large amount of time wearing another face. He should, he knows, be fairly used to it by now but there’s still always an odd feeling after a full body shift; limbs a little too long, a different fit in the hips that throws the stride off for a few minutes before he feels fully settled. Halliwell’s form is familiar, at least, easy to call to mind and step into and the mannerisms and speech patterns are coming back to him by the time he’s changed and stepped through the fire in his living room and out of the one in Flourish and Blotts’ back room.

There are authors, he knows, who avoid these events, complain about feeling like they’re being stared at in a zoo exhibit, but Ted’s never minded them — they’re tiring, sure, but it’s hard to resent that when it’s all born out of love and enthusiasm. ( The only part he regrets is the mask he has to wear for them; 10 years ago it hadn’t seemed a big deal, standing in his agents office as she flipped through the manuscript and told him if she was going to make a male romance novelist work he was going to have to be pureblood, attractive, single and tragic and he was only one of those things, but these days it feels like bowing to the pressures he prefers to ignore. ) 

He pushes the thought away as he moves into the main part of the store and takes his place, giving each person a smile and finding something to talk about as he signs their books. Looking up at the next person, he gives her a warm smile and reaches out automatically to take the book in her hands. ❝ Spirits is one of my favourites, ❞ he says ❝ Elysium’s a little the same and a little different — this one’s set in Ancient Greece. ❞ 

❝ I'm not sure I'll compete with Yorkshire's acquatic wonders, though. I may have my work cut out fot me. ❞ He gives her a wink as he smoothes the book open to the title page and pauses.❝ I should make this out to the lovely...? ❞

[bytedtonks]

tedromeda + aesthetic. for @bytedtonks and @dromedatxnks

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’Love, Rosie’ (2014)