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It was meant to be easier once Harry arrived.
Molly had convinced herself of it. She would be able to see for herself that he was safe and well. But he’s arrived, and Mad-Eye hasn’t, and it doesn’t matter what hollow hopes she has sold herself. Harry isn’t safe.
And the war is inching closer.
It has been circling them for some time, these winds of war. Whispering in the breeze, it has been gathering momentum until it’s building into a howling gust that rattles the panes and rams the door, shaking the foundations and threatening to upend everything they have built.
She had hoped (foolishly, she knows) that Harry’s arrival would finally bring about some answers regarding this mission of sorts that her youngest son and his friends are apparently about to embark on. Ron and Hermione have so far refused to discuss the matter with her, except to say that they won’t be returning to Hogwarts, and will instead be leaving on some secret mission with Harry. Ron has always been loyal to a fault, and now his loyalty is firmly and fiercely with Harry, and with a dead man who seemed to think it appropriate to send children out in a war to do his bidding.
It isn’t until the afternoon following his arrival that Molly finally gets her chance to pull Harry aside and to ask him directly about what he believed Dumbledore had expected of him. Because it makes no sense that this great wizard would be inclined to entrust a group of children with a task that he wasn’t even willing to discuss with the adult Order members. So she tells him he must have got it all wrong, that surely Dumbledore wouldn’t have left it all up to them. But Harry is characteristically stubborn on the matter. He hadn’t misunderstood, he simply states. It has to be him.
It always has to be him.
That same evening, Molly is standing at the kitchen sink, cleaning the Muggle way because her hands refuse to be still. The three of them are huddled near the corner of the kitchen table, too ensconced in their own plotting to pay any mind to the activity surrounding them. She watches them, sharing sly looks and whispered secrets. And Molly knows. She knows. And it’s almost worse than not having Harry here, because now they can plan and conspire and prepare to make their first move, prepare to leave. She watches them, and she sees her brothers. The self-assured way they spoke about the war, their blind faith in a worthy cause.
She continues to scrub the pan, her hand moving in rhythmic even circles while inside, her heart is pounding, her body screaming. Don’t leave, don’t leave, don’t leave...
So she does the only thing she can think of in her desperation. She meddles. It’s not hard; with guests arriving in just a couple of days, wedding preparations to finalise, a full house, and a revolving door of Order members to feed, there are more than enough tasks to go around. It’s just a simple matter of assigning them jobs that will keep them physically apart.
They rush through their various tasks, instantly gravitating towards each other once they’re done, just like they always do. But Molly stays a step ahead of them, always ready to delegate as soon as a task is completed. No sooner has Hermione finished cleaning the cutlery is she walking purposefully towards the backdoor to the yard, where Ron is supposedly degnoming the garden. Molly looks around and sees the box of wedding favours in the corner of the room. She gives them a gentle shake, mixes them up. “Hermione, dear,” she calls out. “Would you mind helping sort these?”
They’re clearly growing frustrated by her attempts, she knows this, but she refuses to apologise for it. Means to an end, and all that.
“What do you think they’re planning?” Molly asks Arthur one night in bed. She doesn’t need to explain who she is talking about.
“I don’t know,” he replies, with the patience of a man who hasn’t already given this same answer a dozen times before.
She lies there for several moments, listening to the rattle of the shutters as the wind makes its presence known.
“I went and saw Minerva today,” she eventually says.
“Yes? What did she say?”
“She said it’s out of her hands.” Molly gives a soft huff of frustration. “She said once they’re of age there’s nothing to be done. They can choose whether or not to finish their education.” Arthur has the good grace not to point out that they knew this already.
“I just don’t understand it,” she goes on. “Hermione, of all people. I never thought she’d be one to throw away her education. They’re bright kids, they belong in school.”
Arthur rolls on his side to face her. “They are bright kids, and we need to trust that they know what they’re doing.”
“We’re at war, for goodness sake! At least at Hogwarts, they’ll be safe. And you know Minerva will watch out for them.”
“It’s their choice to make.”
“Gideon and Fabian made their choice too,” Molly says, staring up at the ceiling. “But they weren’t the ones who had to live with it.”
Sometimes, in the middle of the night, when her body is begging for sleep but her brain remains defiant, she longs for the times when her biggest worry was whether she could afford brand new school robes for the kids, or if it would be hand-me-downs again. She sometimes envies Hermione’s parents, and their ignorance at what lies in wait for their daughter. In the dark of the night, she thinks there really is something blissful about ignorance. But then she figures ignorance won’t protect them from the downfall, and it’s hard to envy that.
Her days remain busy. The Delacours arrive (and they’re as polite and lovely as one could hope for their son’s in-laws), the wedding marquee is erected, the final preparations are made, and Harry’s birthday approaches, one last milestone before she watches her eldest son defy the brewing conflict to celebrate his wedding.
And still the war creeps closer, carrying on the breeze of the whistling wind.
It has been inching closer each day, if she’s honest, with every rumour that Arthur brings home from the Ministry, with every update that the Order members hand over when they drop by for dinner. The werewolves are now firmly in his fold, Lupin says. The Department of Magical Law Enforcement has been commuting sentences, Tonks reports. But it’s Kingsley who delivers the most unsettling blow the night before Harry’s birthday.
“They’ve been asking questions about the night Dumbledore died. Asking what Harry was doing there.” Kingsley keeps his voice low as he leans forward in his seat at the kitchen table. The ‘children’ are spread out in the living room with the Delacours, and no one dares risk any of them, least of all Harry, overhearing.
It’s a fairly full kitchen tonight. Remus, Tonks and Kingsley are all there, as well as Bill of course, even though most of them will be returning for the birthday dinner tomorrow night.
“Does this mean they’re investigating him?” Arthur asks.
“No. They’re not interested in an investigation.”
It’s Lupin that chimes in now, the first to grasp the true implication of this. “It means they’re looking to villainize Harry, to implicate him.”
“Implicate him? For what?” Bill asks.
“Whatever they can.”
At Kingsley’s words, Molly looks over to the living room, where Harry is talking with Fred and George. He’s mere hours away from being of age, but when she looks at him, she still sees a boy. A son who had never grown in her womb, but had taken seed in her heart.
“Where will he be safest?” she asks, desperate. “Here? Hogwarts?”
Kingsley is silent for just a moment before he answers, looking her in the eye. “Molly, I don’t think he’s going to be safe anywhere.”
And there it is. The truth she has refused to believe. “So what is he meant to do?”
Kingsley pauses again. “Hide.”
Tonks grabs hold of Molly’s hand under the table and squeezes it tight, but it’s not enough to stop the shaking.
She made a promise, all those summers ago, when Harry had first taken refuge in her home. She had made a whispered promise, mother to mother, that she would protect this boy, keep him safe. She wonders if Lily could forgive a broken promise.
She looks over at Harry once again, and she is terrified.
That night, lying in the sitting room (having given her room up to the Delacours), she manages two hours sleep, but only after her fatigued body wins the fight over her anxious mind.
She follows her usual routine in the morning, waking early to ensure everyone is well fed. There are more mouths to feed this morning, with Fleur’s family staying in the house, but it’s a welcome distraction.
Molly is still cooking and chatting with Bill and Monsieur Delacour when Harry walks in. She’s glad for the opportunity to keep busy while he opens his present, although she doesn’t turn away, searching instead for his reaction. She had asked Remus of course, several months ago, whether anyone had saved James’s watch. But Remus had looked crestfallen (he hadn’t thought of it at the time) and she had wished she’d never asked. So she had begun putting away some money, a galleon here, a few sickles there, hoping to save enough for a new watch. But then she was going through her brothers’ things a couple of months ago (war encourages you to open old wounds like that), and saw it, and it just felt right. Now she’s not so sure though, he’s grown up with second-hand things, after all. But then Harry is opening his present, and she’s already apologising for it, for its battered and worn state. He rises from his chair, but doesn’t speak. He doesn't need to. For in that moment, in that embrace, she knows without any doubt that it was right, and that Harry understands. It was never really about a watch. A warm flush of love fills her, and it’s a welcome reprieve from the flood of fear she’s become more accustomed to.
Charlie arrives, and they’re preparing to celebrate Harry’s birthday. Molly lets herself get lost in the moment, in the celebration, in the perfect summer evening, the air still, and the feeling of having so much of her family around her. But Arthur’s not home from the Ministry yet, and it makes her uneasy whenever he’s late. She’s watching for him to come home, but also keeping a subtle eye out for another absent family member. It’s a habit now that she refuses to shake, especially when the rest of the family are all gathered together like they are tonight. That hope that she’ll see him walking through the gate, up the path, back into their home, back into their lives.
But Percy doesn’t appear. He never does. And the place she had silently left for him remains empty, just as it has for the past two years. Her hopes of welcoming her son back into her home are fading, replaced with a fear that there will forever be an empty place at the table for an absent son.
And then the belief that they could enjoy this one night, independent of the war, is spoiled by a Minister, a will, and three obscure objects that make as little sense as this war. Because of course they can’t have one night of uninterrupted celebration. This is war. And this war has already seduced one son away from her, and marked two others, and it isn’t going to be held back by a young man turning seventeen. War doesn’t distinguish between children and adults, the innocent and the unrighteous. It takes and takes, and knows no end.
She wakes the morning of Bill’s wedding, thoughts of all that needs to be done whirling in her mind, and summons every ounce of hope she can manage. And as she does every morning, she utters a silent prayer to any God that will listen, to grant her one more night with her family - by blood and by heart - safe under her roof.
Plastering a smile on her face, she rises from her makeshift bed and prepares to face a new day.