Chapter Text
Benjy Fenwick died in pieces.
An unknown curse, cast by an unknown Death Eater, on an unknown spy, buried in an unknown location.
The Order arrived days later. They offered their pity and consoled my mother for weeks afterward.
Years later, when I’d grown old enough to listen, they spun stories of him for me, too.
He was a brave man, Elian.
A good man.
He’ll always be remembered.
It’s all bullshit.
Ask anyone who Benjy Fenwick was.
Anyone.
I doubt they’d know.
My father didn’t matter—even if he was a good man who did what was necessary, people don’t remember people.
They remember heroes.
The Fenwicks were never heroes. We had all the courage and loyalty and skill in the world, but heroics are for the selfless, and everybody honest has their own reasons to fight.
Maybe he fought to be remembered.
Maybe he fought so he’d become something his son could be proud of.
Maybe he chose that risky mission so that, for a minute, he could look back on the old days and say he did a noble thing—so he could feel noble.
And, well, good deeds never go unpunished, right?
So, during that mission, he died.
Heroically.
Just as he’d wanted.
Moody had said, “They only ever found bits and pieces of him.”
Well, I’ll say.
He left behind bits and pieces of a life he could’ve had for a chance to be a hero, and he failed anyway.
So, that leaves it up to me.
The glory of a father is the duty of a son.
I’d made up my mind the day I received my Hogwarts letter.
I’d be the hero he always wanted to be.
I’d become what he died for.
I’d become something he’d love.