Chapter Text
The nightmares and Fleur had been scandalously intimate for some time now. It was as if her own body had decided to punish her, over and over, for her damned weakness. Each night, it reminded her of just how foolish she’d been—naïve, selfish, unbearably soft.
The dreams always began the same. She was back in the maze, running. Alastor’s voice behind her, barking her to give up. But no matter how fast she pushed herself, no matter how her lungs burned or her legs screamed, that man — Crouch, cloaked in the skin of an ally — always caught up to her.
Cold slapped her face as she threw herself around blind corners, tore through hedges like an animal. Branches lashed at her skin, drawing blood. Somewhere in that hell, Harry’s voice cut through the dark. A child’s cry: thin, broken, unbearable. He sobbed for Diggory. For help.
And every time, she ran. Harder. Desperate. Teeth bared, lungs screaming like something dying inside her. She ran to escape the bastard hunting her, to outrun the lie wearing a friendly face. She ran to reach Harry before the world collapsed again.
But she was always too late. Too slow.
Too weak.
Too fucking useless.
“HARRY!” she screamed, voice tearing from her throat. “DIGGORY!”
Up ahead, the maze cracked open like it wanted to spit her out. There, in the clearing, the boy knelt, cradling another. Harry, his cheeks soaked in tears. Cedric, slack in his arms. Blood poured from Harry’s leg and he was screaming for help.
I can help!
She surged forward, heart clawing at her ribs—
Crouch sprang from the dark. She didn’t even get a scream out. The spell hit her square in the chest. Her knees buckled. Her body folded. And as her vision bled to black, the last thing she saw, every damned time, was that blue glass eye. Staring, completely aware how worthless she was.
It was nearly three in the morning when she jolted awake. Screaming, crying, clutching her chest like the stun spell had followed her out of the dream. Her heart pounded against her ribs like it was trying to tear itself out.
Outside, the city pulsed with its usual filth and noise. Drunken laughter, a car screeching by. Behind her wall, a couple were fucking like animals, their moans obscene and loud.
She slapped a shaking hand over her mouth to muffle the sobs before pressing her face into her ice-cold palms. Her whole body trembled, sweat sticking to the sheets.
This was getting ridiculous. She couldn’t keep going like this.
Maybe it was time to give in. Do as mother advised. Go beg for a sleeping draught like some broken thing that couldn’t handle her own mind.
Because clearly — she couldn’t.
Slowly she pried herself from her bed and wandered to her fridge to pull out the cheap muggle wine she bought so fervently.
No glass. She drank straight from the bottle, bitter liquid burning her throat, and stared blankly through the window at the streetlights bleeding orange into the dark. Her reflection hovered in the glass, eyes tired and swollen.
Her life was supposed to be starting. She was supposed to be living. She’d finally been allowed to move out, to get her own place in the thick of Muggle London, just a bus ride from Diagon Alley. She had a job. A few people she could stomach calling friends. Her English was finally something more than an embarrassment.
But of course, the world had other plans. Of course, now was the time for it to turn cruel.
The wine tasted just as vile as ever. She forced down a few heavy gulps before shoving it back in the fridge like something shameful. It was four in the morning now. Her shift started at eight.
Fleur dragged herself to the bathroom to wash off the clammy sweat clinging to her skin. And even though she was beautiful, you could see that she was tired. Still she got ready. Using magic to cover eyebags and rosy up her cheeks.
She was always early to work. People loved to point it out, as if it said something nice about her. “You’re such an early bird, Fleur!”
She never corrected them. Never told them the truth.
Fortunately, the goblins didn’t give a damn. As long as the work got done, they didn’t ask questions. Didn’t pretend to care. Didn’t try to pry her open with fake concern.
She preferred it that way. At least someone knew how to mind their business.
As expected, Gringotts was nearly deserted. Just a scattering of goblins hunched over ledgers and the occasional night shift straggler dragging their feet through the silence.
Fleur slipped through the cold corridors with urgency, her footsteps echoing off marble. She reached her desk, tucked away in the far corner like a forgotten thing.
One by one, she opened the drawers, movements stiff, mechanical. The familiar weight of parchment and ink met her fingers. She began sorting ledgers, checking stats, combing through figures and fluctuations. Numbers, names, vault tallies. It would be hours before anyone asked her for tea or sent her off to fetch some bloody biscuits.
That was fine. Math had a way of muting the chaos in her head. Cold, steady logic. No screaming. No dreams. Just columns and numbers.
She must have been working for hours without so much as lifting her head. The next thing she knew, sunlight was bleeding through the narrow windows, and the once-dead silence was beginning to fill with morning voices.
It was eight.
Fleur exhaled, long and flat, and pushed herself up from the chair. Her legs ached from sitting too still too long. She shuffled off to the workroom to make tea. The Muggle way, of course. Boiling water, steeping leaves. She needed the ritual, the busywork. It kept her hands busy, to stop them from fussing with her hair or shaking.
“Hiya,” came a voice behind her.
He’d crept in too damn quietly. She jumped, and the cup slipped from her hands. Boiling water splashed across the floor, and both of them scrambled back, hissing as it narrowly missed their feet.
“Merlin, Bill!” she snapped, keeping her voice a harsh whisper. “Don’t sneak up on people like that!”
She wanted to shout but this was a bank, and goblins didn’t tolerate noise.
Bill held up his hands in surrender, the barest grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I apologise, Delacour. I just wanted a cup of tea.”
Oh how she disliked how he pronounced her last name. It was too British and too rough on his lips. Flaur glared at him before she crouched down to start picking up the broken glass pieces. She didnt have her wand with her, it was still at her desk.
“Like a cat, sneaking up on me,” she muttered and collected the smaller pieces into the bigger pieces. She half expected Bill to flip out his hand and clear it up for her but instead he crouched down infront of her and helped to pick up the smaller pieces still soaked in hot water.
Bill’s grin deepened, a bit of that familiar rogue peeking through. “I’ll bring a bell with me next time. Can't have you breaking all of the tea cups.”
As much as she wanted to scoff, she couldn't.
They had met back in May. Right before the third task. He’d been there to see Harry off, looking tall and out of place among all the stiff Ministry types. Their eyes had met across the room. A flicker. Nothing, really. But it stuck.
Normally, Fleur liked clean men. Polished types. The kind who quoted poetry and flaunted their intellect like medals. Men who knew they were important and still fell for her charm without hesitation. Men she could control with a glance and unravel with a kiss.
Men like that were everywhere. They came easy.
But Bill wasn’t one of them.
He was what the Muggles would call punk (not that she’d admit to liking the word). Long, unruly red hair always tied back with a leather band. A grin too wide and too crooked to be charming in the conventional sense. And that tooth in his ear. Polished and always dangling. She wanted to reach out and touch it, to ask about it, every time she saw it.
He didn’t fit.
Not here.
Not in this pristine, cold place of marble and ledgers.
Not next to her. And yet, there he was.
“Did you read the book I recommended to you?” Bill asked, carefully lifting a sharp shard from the steaming water.
Bill knew she was only part-time here. To earn money, to sharpen her English. But beneath that half truth lay the real reason. Fleur wanted to help Dumbledore bring down the man who killed Diggory. The man who made her feel so useless. So small. She believed she could help, even if it haunted her with nightmares that clawed at her each night. No one else knew that. No one.
Since the moment they saw each other again, he’d offered help. At first, she thought he was like the others, trying to catch her attention, to hold her gaze. So imagine her surprise when instead of compliments, Bill threw a book her way.
Pride and Prejudice.
A Muggle book.
It had taken her ages to finally give in and actually get the damned thing. When she found it in a dusty bookstore, she’d stared at the cover longer than she cared to admit. A romance. Bill Weasley reading romance? The thought was so absurd she was too scared to ask.
Supposedly, Bill thought reading in English would help her improve. That idea irked her more than she wanted to admit.
She never told Bill she hadn’t read a single page yet.
“No time,” she lied, taking the broken shards from Bill to toss away. When she looked back, he was using folded paper to soak up the puddle of hot water on the floor.
Bill nodded, a teasing glint in his eyes. “You always say that. I’m starting to wonder what you do all day.”
Cry mostly, panic, write to my mother and sister.
She kept the answer to herself, hurrying to grab another teacup to start the process again. Bill moved beside her, effortlessly mirroring her movements.
“What have you planned for today then?” he asked.
The teabags steeped in their cups; Fleur had drizzled honey into hers, stirring it absentmindedly.
“Going out with friends,” Fleur lied smoothly. The truth was, she had nothing planned, but somehow she didn’t want to seem like a sore loser in front of Bill.
“Where to?”
“Bar.”
Bill raised an eyebrow. “Which bar?”
She hesitated, realizing she wasn’t getting away with her lie this time, then smirked. “The one where no one asks awkward questions.”
He chuckled, the sound warm and easy.
“Maybe you’ll join me,” she teased, her voice dropping just enough to pull him in.
Bill’s grin deepened, eyes glinting with mischief. “I might just take you up on that.”
They’d been doing this for months now, these flirty and teasy exchanges. Around others, Bill was all professional, almost too serious. But with her… that smirk, that laid-back demeanor. He knew exactly how to get under her skin. It drove Fleur wild, and she’d lie awake later, biting her lip under her covers, regretting every bold thing she’d said.
And worse, when her fingers wandered beneath the blankets, she’d get drunk on those moments, craving the heat of him like a secret she couldn’t admit.
Her breaths came uneven in the dark, the silence broken only by the rustle of sheets. She hated how much she wanted it. Wanted him.
When it came time to clock out, Bill was already waiting by the door. His briefcase looked ridiculously small beside his long, lanky frame.
Fleur liked tall men.
“Ready?” he asked, voice casual but eyes sharp.
She hesitated, heart stuttering. She had thought their back-and-forth was just teasing but nothing serious.
“Yeah,” she said, forcing a smile. “Let’s go.”
Together, they wandered through Muggle London. Every now and then, Bill would toss out some random fact about a building or a street corner, and Fleur couldn’t help but find it silly. Why did Bill know these things? They were wizards, after all.
It quickly became embarrassing, though, because Fleur hadn’t actually planned on going to a bar that evening. Bill could sense it immediately and kept on asking, “This one?” at every place they passed.
After the tenth time, the repeated question finally cracked something inside her. Laughter bubbled up. Fueled by her amusement, Bill smiled and kept up the game. “Does this bar even exist?” he teased.
Fleur shook her head, smiling more freely than she had in days. Maybe tonight wouldn’t be so bad after all.
The bar they finally settled on was small, tucked between a laundrette and an old bookstore, and oddly close to Fleur’s flat. She didn’t mention that. It felt too intimate to say I live just around the corner when her palms were already a little too warm from how close he walked beside her.
Bill went to the counter and returned with two pints, the foam nearly spilling over the rims. “They didn’t have anything French or fancy, like you.”
Fleur raised a brow as she took hers. “Too bad.”
Bill settled into the booth, swirling the amber beer in his glass before looking up with a curious smile. “So, how are you liking London?”
Fleur took a sip, watching the foam cling to the rim before answering. “It rains too much. The food is bland. People avoid eye contact on the street. And the tea obsession is disturbing.”
Bill laughed, low and warm. “So you’re loving it, then.”
She smirked, swirling her beer. “It grows on you. Slowly. Like moss.”
He grinned. “That’s the most poetic insult I think I’ve ever heard.”
She shrugged, the corners of her mouth tugging upward. “It’s not home.”
He tilted his head. “Do you miss it?”
There it was. The real question, cloaked in a casual tone.
Fleur didn’t answer right away. Her fingers tapped lightly against the side of her glass. “I miss speaking without thinking. I miss my mother. I miss the sea.”
Bill nodded, quietly. He didn’t try to fill the silence with platitudes, and she liked that about him.
“You lived by the sea?” he asked, lifting his pint for another sip. The foam clung to his upper lip and Fleur had to fight the absurd urge to lean forward and wipe it away with her thumb. Instead, she looked away — let herself close her eyes for a breath too long.
The sea was still there, somewhere deep behind her eyelids. The salted breeze, the taste of saumure on her lips. Long summer days spent combing the shore for shells, laughing as Gabrielle shrieked at a fish and then begged for a braid in her hair. Her mother humming in the kitchen. The soft clatter of plates. That warmth that wrapped around you like a spell. Home.
But more than anything, she missed waking up without dread. Without the sweat. Without the weight of having survived.
“Mhm,” she murmured finally, eyes opening again to meet his. Bill was watching her.
“Sounds nice,” he said softly.
“It was,” she replied. “Before it all turned to shit.”
The words slipped out sharper than she intended. Bluntness had always been her curse and her mother made sure she never forgot it. It had gotten her into more trouble than she cared to admit, earning the cold shoulders of girls who preferred softer tongues. But Fleur believed in the power of truth, no matter how harsh. Still, her mother’s voice echoed in the back of her mind, urging her to be more demure, more careful.
Still, the old instinct flared. She braced herself, waiting for Bill to recoil. Something stiff and proper to put her back in her place.
“Let me guess,” he said, “you had a ridiculous seashell collection.”
Fleur let out a surprised laugh. “A whole drawer. Categorised by shape and colour.”
“Merlin,” Bill grinned, “you’re one of those.”
Fleur smiled faintly and drank her beer. Conversation with Bill felt effortless. No posturing, no attempts to charm or impress her with cheap lines. He asked questions and actually listened. It was disarming. Fleur had expected a lot of things from Weasley. This quiet, thoughtful attention wasn’t one of them.
“What about you?” she asked, swirling the last of the beer in her glass. “Weren’t you in Egypt?”
“Yeah,” Bill replied, tipping his glass back and setting it down with a soft clink. “Cairo mostly. But I moved around — Tunis, Thebes, a week in Libya chasing a cursed chalice that turned out to be a glorified butter dish.”
Fleur laughed. “So exotic.”
He shrugged with that crooked grin. “If you count sand in your pants and boils from ancient hexes exotic.”
She tilted her head. “Why’d you come back?”
She already knew. But she wanted to hear him say it.
Bill’s smile faltered, slipping into something grimmer. “War. My family. Things are changing. Getting darker. I want to be where it matters.”
The words struck something in her. That same ache she carried in her chest each morning when she woke gasping, heart pounding. The same knot that kept her from going home, back to the sea, the salt, the safety.
“You think it’s really beginning again?” she asked quietly.
Bill met her gaze, the teasing long gone from his eyes. “I know it is.”
Fleur didn’t speak. She just stared into her glass for a moment, then whispered, “I want to help. I just don’t know how.”
There was a pause. Then, gently, Bill reached out and brushed his fingers across the back of her hand. It wasn’t grand or dramatic. Just a soft, steady touch.
“You will,” he said. “I can see it.”
And Fleur… didn’t pull away.
Later, Bill walked her to her apartment like a proper gentleman, even though the sun was still clinging to the sky. She muttered a thank you as she unlocked the door, and he gave her a wave before turning back down the street.
Inside, Fleur tossed her coat onto the sofa and flopped down beside it. Her eyes drifted to the book on her coffee table. Pride and Prejudice.
With a sigh and the ghost of a smile, she picked it up and cracked it open.
Maybe tonight, she'd actually read the first page.