The Pin in Mightier than the Sword

“Bishop to E7,” Amelia commanded, her voice sounding much more confident than it did in typical conversation, but that was likely because she wasn’t really having a conversation at all. This wasn’t a situation fraught with social norms that had to be upheld or rules of engagement that she would have had difficulty following. No, this was wizard’s chess.

Immediately after the prompt was given, the white piece with the teardrop shaped hat advanced forward toward a rook that was already shuddering in fear of what was to come. When the white bishop had reached the square directly in front of the rook, he raised his pearly saber and let it fall with a crack across the top of the rook, shattering the ebony tower into shards of its former self, covering the board with bits of dust. The pawns which had already been taken – though not as badly injured – advanced onto the board to remove what was left of the rook, leaving the way clear for Amelia’s bishop to take its place on E7.

“Check,” Amelia said briskly as the action on the chessboard ceased, raising her eyes to meet those of her competitor.

But the middle-aged man who sat across from her looked was looking wearily down at the board, his few remaining pieces seeming rather frail as opposed to the army Amelia had managed to maintain. He had been the third challenger today in Peabody Park, where Amelia had taken up her usual spot at the chess board under the weeping willow. Communal chess arenas were somewhat of a muggle invention, but the wizarding world had caught on more recently and had set up places – such as this one, only a short walk off of Diagon Alley – where chess aficionados might come to see how they matched up with other players. So far today, Amelia was the reigning champion.

Chess had always been an area in which Amelia could excel, both in muggle chess and its wizarding variation. The game was the same in both situations, it was just the level of violence which varied. It seemed the game was designed with her in mind: a player was rewarded for logic, rational thought, thinking ahead, looking at all possible outcomes, while letting your emotions sway your decisions often resulted in unnecessary piece casualties.

Although Amelia was usually opposed to social interaction, playing chess with strangers rarely necessitated any kind of actual conversation. She was well known enough here that she could come to play without being expected to partake in conversation, though she did get the occasional newbie who learned quickly not to ask too many questions if he wanted to even be humored by Amelia, who might allow him to play more than 10 moves if he kept quiet enough.

“Kn-knight to A3,” her challenger stuttered, his piece moving as he had instructed to the blank space at the back of the board.

Fatal error, my friend… Amelia’s mind thought, seeing the mistake in his reasoning and smirking at what was to come. In truth, she had had him cornered three moves ago, but he hadn’t seen it then. The moment of victory was always most profound when it was visible to both players, as it would soon be to Steve, sitting on the other side of the table, the bald spot on his head glistening in the mid-afternoon sun.

“Queen to F5,” Amelia stated, her piece not hesitating to follow her orders, putting herself directly in line with her opponent’s king, now undefended.

“Checkmate,” Amelia said, her voice moderated and her words fatal to Steve’s success in the game. As the word left her lips, her Queen took much relish in bringing her sword across the middle of the black king piece, shattering it on the remnants of the finished game.

Her competitor, apparently still stunned by her blindsiding of him, was gaping at the board, likely wondering where he had gone wrong. Amelia didn’t have the heart to tell him he had gone wrong enough in his fifth move to let her know that she was going to win, and thus waited in silence for him to gather his thoughts and his things and stand up from the table. For a moment he looked as though he was going to say something, but then seemed decided better of it and instead just nodded in her direction and walked away, leaving her alone at the table.

Left alone once again in her nearly omnipresent solitude, Amelia raised her arms above her head to stretch them out. She had been sitting for a few hours now, avoiding the hustle and bustle of before school shopping that was going on in Diagon Alley, and also keeping away from the confines of her parents’ home. She had spent enough time with her family in the past few months to warrant her aversion to them, which was why as she lowered her arms and checked her watch, Amelia decided to stay a while longer in the chess compound, waiting patiently for another challenger to arrive.

((Cue Elijah))

Watching the world go by seemed to be the only thing Elijah was good at doing these days. France had been a waste of time. He hadn’t been inspired at all in the damn country. They women were all the same, they did the same things and they were just as boring in bed as they had been the year before. The only difference was that his dealer had put on at least a stone and a half and looked like a pork pie with legs, arms and a cream suit with a pink bow tie that didn’t match anything in that combination. He’d also grown a moustache and both men had commented on the facial hair. Even in his drunken state when Elijah first saw the man, he managed not to insult him. Well, Elijah did insult him but it wasn’t about the stupid worm on his upper lip. It was instead focused on the models and he mentioned something along the lines of ‘just because your wife wants nothing to do with you anymore doesn’t mean you can shoo someone else’s bed warmer away’. It was pretty grim.

But he was watching the world go by in the Ice Cream Shop he’d been kicked out of the week before. The waitresses hated him for just sitting there for hours on end without a change in outward emotion. He was thinking but what about he had yet to decide. A melted mush of what used to be ice cream was in the glass float he’d been given once he’d chosen the scoops he’d wanted. He’d had a mouthful but that was about it. He paid for expensive ones and really he was only paying for the seat. He just had to have an ice cream in front of him to stay there. The waitresses didn’t want to deal with haughty wizards that really just wanted to pick a fight with someone. Elijah was prepared to leave in the event of that happening. He didn’t want to have to listen to the drivel, let alone be the cause of it.

His musings were interrupted when someone sat down across from him and kicked the table leg. Elijah’s dark eyes left the window and met the crystal gaze of Rychal, one of the waitresses. She’d been getting progressively irritated with him over the weeks and was looking for any excuse to get rid of him. He was sure that she pitied him but mostly she probably just wanted him out of the shop. She was ‘apparently’ going for the manager position and in order to get it she’d have to kick him out, the Bulgarian artist that just wouldn’t leave. He was a piece of work and she’d been working her black magic on him for a while now. “Krum you can’t sit here all day.” Rychal said sharply, getting the attention of the artist. “You’re starting to mould.” Elijah glared at her and she sighed. “What about going to summer classes? Festivals? Getting plastered for what looks like the fifth time this week? Okay so maybe it’s the third. You can’t sit here all summer! We do have a closing time, you know. Play chess.”

“I don’t know how to play.” He said idly, his finger running along the grain of the wood on the table. Rychal narrowed her eyes and waited for him to elaborate. “When I was four Viktor tried to teach me. I was too scared to really understand. I’ve never played since. Or never really completed the tutorial. He’d only been a child but to this day he wouldn’t go near a Wizard’s chess set. He would if he truly had to but he’d never to it voluntarily. Except from today, perhaps, Elijah didn’t know it yet though.
“There’s a piano there, underneath one of the gazebos. You’ve been learning to play haven’t you?” Elijah shrugged non-commitedly and Rychal sighed. “Don’t play chess then, give a theme to the air. It’ll help you learn, too. Your mother will be impressed that a lowly waitress of an Ice Cream shop has that much power over you. Maybe you’d like that...”

Although revolted, Elijah had to accept she had a point. There was a piano there and although he wasn’t familiar with the type he knew it was there. He was no pianist. He couldn’t play in instrument but he could play the sheet music he had. Elijah got to his feet and picked up his messenger bag. He took a few galleons out of his pocket and chucked them in Rychal’s direction. He picked up his folder of sheet music and tucked it under his arm before lifting his leather jacket off of the back of the chair. Rychal looked immensely pleased with herself but Elijah planned on saying no more where that subject was concerned. He figured that if he at least went down there then he could ask. There was no harm in asking. He was sure they wouldn’t mind and if he threw his last name around a bit then they’d let him in. Elijah had never really pictured himself as a sell out though.

Once out on the street, Eli shrugged his jacket on and looked around. His eyes fell on a little girl outside the Magical Menagerie and he narrowed his eyes. Jumping off of the porch, Elijah moved through the crowd and over to the girl. With a quick tug of the back of her dress, he pulled the girl up into his arms. “Hello Fauvist.” He grinned. “Where’s your grandmother.” The brunette glared at her father and he chuckled. Elijah pushed her up onto his shoulders and held onto her hands as they walked through Diagon Alley. Fauve was meant to be in Bulgaria but clearly that wasn’t the case. Either she’d once again used her magic to wreak havoc or his mother, in her shopping haze, had forgotten the little wild beast. Part of Eli was beyond irritated but he was glad for his daughter’s company. She made everything a little more easy and things fell back into prospective. He wasn’t as selfish when he realised that another life was wandering around wanting to know what her papa was doing.

Knowing that Fauve didn’t like crowds, Elijah picked up pace and quickly made his way towards the park. Fauve was humming under her breath and from what Eli could hear it was one of the lullaby’s he’d sing to her at night if he was the one to tuck her in bed. He’d purposely made that particular one the first he learned on the piano because it was Fauve’s favourite song.

The park was large, huge even and it was definitely big enough for a dog to run around; several dogs in fact. Elijah didn’t mention it to Fauve. She’d wanted a dog for an age but he was a feline at heart. He’d not get along well with a dog. Elijah set Fauve down on the grass and she ran off towards the communal chess area. His father had succeeded in teaching Fauve how to play chess but the problem was that she thought about a hundred different things at once so she never won the game. That’s what made her art so interesting, because the picture would change.

Elijah followed along behind her, taking in the different faces that sat at the tables as he did so. Fauve stopped and lowered herself to the grass with a small thump. Eli smiled and stood beside her. In that split second, his eyes fell on a familiar face. A face that made him remember. His breath caught in his throat and his mind began to hurt, as did his chest. What was she doing there? Elijah didn’t know why or how she was ... He couldn’t really process this. Kneeling down beside Fauve, Elijah took his bag off of his shoulder and took his sketch book out. He laid out the charcoal and pencils for Fauve and kissed her forehead before placing the book in her lap and getting up. He walked over and sat down in the chair opposite her. Eli dropped the folder of sheet music onto the floor beside him and looked at Amelia.

She hadn’t changed. Well, not in his mind she hadn’t. She was still beautiful. He doubted that she’d ever lose her beauty. Age was an interesting thing. “Hello, Mia.” He murmured.

The chess area was not as busy now with competitors as it had been earlier, but it was beginning to fill with the usual foot traffic of the afternoon. The more ambitious of the park patrons were running or biking along the foot paths, clad in athletic clothing and sweating in the late-August heat. A few others had brought food from deli in Diagon Alley and were picnicking beneath the shade of the large oaks on the opposite side of the plaza. Parents were running after their outgoing children, who had strayed just too far outside of the safety bubble and needed to be reigned back in before they hurt themselves.

Despite the noise and hubbub around her, Amelia was utterly in her element. Sitting in the shade of the willow, she was nearly invisible to the passerby, quietly observing their behavior from the safety of her own seclusion. They were all going about, living their lives oblivious to her observation, unaware that their every movement was being mentally recorded by a girl they would not even have noticed.

In truth, there were almost too many people to observe at once. There were a few regulars of the park that Amelia’s eyes skimmed overly quickly, for she already understood much about them from watching them over the years. Others, though, piqued her interest. The family groups were especially of interest to her, though she would not have admitted why.

Her attention was particularly drawn to a family of four who had paused to sit on a bench across the park. The daughter looked to be about eight or nine, just old enough to start asserting her own independence, but not yet old enough that she was adverse to the attention her father showered on her. The boy was younger, four at most, and had not released his mother’s hand since he had come into Amelia’s line of vision. They looked like such a perfect unit, laughing and smiling as though they were on the cover of a brochure of some travel guide for London. It was almost painful to watch, but she couldn’t look away; the scene she was seeing now struck such a dissonant chord with the home she had grown up in, that it seemed to exist in another world altogether.

Amelia had been staring already for an inordinate amount of time, but it wasn’t until she felt that uncomfortable prickling feeling on the back of her neck that she realized something which pulled her from her own thoughts. It was the feeling one gets when they feel eyes on them, and because she spent most of her time alone, Amelia was acutely aware of this sensation.

She tried to think back to when the feeling had started. Had it been when the family first entered the park? When she had finished the chess game? Before the game had even begun? But try as she might to trace the feeling, she was unable to identify its starting point. It had frozen her to the spot, unsure where to look for the owner of the eyes she could feel on her now until she heard the scrape of a chair against concrete. It was this noise which brought her attention to the person who had been observing the observer, but as soon as her eyes met his, any thoughts she had harbored about the family she had been watching, of her own family, even of where she was were immediately wiped clean.

Elijah Amelia’s mind breathed, as though exhaling on the name. Her physical breath, however, had ceased altogether as her bright eyes met Elijah’s darker ones, her own wide with surprise and confusion. What was he doing here? This was her safe haven, the one place where she could never be thrown off her game. She came here because here, she was in control.

But whatever control Amelia had had minutes earlier had disappeared with the arrival of Elijah Krum.

He was just as incredible as she remembered him, though she had been trying very hard of late not to remember him at all. In the time she had spent confined to her home, he had wandered several times out of the strict compartment she had confined him to so many months ago, but each time she had hastily chauffeured him back, unwilling to let her heart outwit her mind, the seat of reason and analysis.

But finding herself in his presence again, every memory she had of him came rushing back full force. The memory of their first meeting, during which Elijah had overstepped so many of her personal boundaries, and yet still managed to make an impact great enough that it had allowed for second and third meetings. She remembered the Yule Ball, the necklace he had given her and that she had even deemed to wear, at least until it hurt too much to do so. Wearing it had meant seeing it each time she looked in the mirror, a constant reminder of what she had lost when Elijah had disappeared from her life, and so it too had been relegated to a compartment far from her view.

Despite these precautions against him, though, all her defenses seemed to have been broken when her eyes met Elijah’s. His dark hair was falling messily over his right eye, his jawline more defined now than it had been last fall. He seemed to have lost much of what was boyish about him in the last year, the stubble on his chin an indicator of that as well. So struck was she by his appearance that it was several seconds before she remembered to breathe again, and nearly a minute after that before her mind was clear enough to think coherently.

Just leave. Just get up and leave. You don’t need to stay here. You’re only asking for hurt if you do. You don’t owe him anything, and he has nothing to offer you.

But for all her excuses, Amelia was rooted to her chair. When he murmured her nickname, the one only he had ever known or used, Amelia’s heart skipped a beat, try as she might to ignore the presence of such a deceitful organ. Her mouth felt dry and the chess pieces, which had always seemed to Amelia like a personal army which kept the distance between herself and her competition, offered no assistance against this kind of attack.

“Elijah,” Amelia echoed, still in disbelief at his arrival. She wanted – or rather her mind wanted – to be angry with him, but the emotion would not rise to the surface. Perhaps so many years of suppressing emotions had left her unable to tap into them whenever she wanted.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, her voice barely audible above the babble of conversation that surrounded the pair of them. It was not an accusatory tone in which Amelia’s question was posed, but only the words themselves. She tried to keep the hurt out of her voice, but she was not entirely successful. She felt so exposed, sitting here in front of him and incapable of willing her legs to carry her away, that her words seemed stripped of their defenses as well.

A small bird chirped above the pair and Elijah’s eyes drifted up to the branch it was perched on in time to see it take flight and swoop away. He followed the bird with its eyes and he glanced over at Fauve to see her doing the same. The pair watched until the bird disappeared over the top of another large tree. Elijah took his eyes away and turned them back on Amelia. She seemed incredibly shocked to see him. He had been shocked to see her also but he’d gotten over it quickly. The shock was replaced with something else that Elijah couldn’t quite identify. Whatever it was it felt good and he wasn’t about to give up that feeling. He couldn’t prepare himself to do so in time for the actual departure.

He ran a hand through his hair and he picked up a chess piece with the other. The piece looked disgruntled and Elijah hastily put it back down in its place. The chess pieces were insufferable the lot of them, not to mention cruel and violent. That was probably why Elijah was so scared of it when he was a child. Now he was just flat out against the whole thing. He wouldn’t go near a chess board if he could help it but this was an exception. What really disturbed the Bulgarian was the fact that the chess pieces on his side of the board were looking at him fairly intently, as if they could sense his fear of the whole charade they took part in like clockwork. The staring disturbed Elijah more than their job which was to, essentially, beat the living daylights out of each other.

Elijah’s eyes unconsciously drifted to where his daughter was. She was now sprawled out on the lush grass beneath one of the smaller tress with the contents of his bag spread out before her. She’d already got the baseline for her drawing down from what Eli could see and her little hand was working away. She was still clumsy in the way she drew and painted but her talents weren’t yet as refined as her father’s. He still had a lot to work on but Eli had an unmistakable art talent that he made the most out of. Despite the fact that Fauve wasn’t his biological daughter, much to the incredulity of those that saw the pair together, they were incredibly alike and she shared the same talent as he did.

Trusting that she was safe, Elijah looked back at Mia but kept one eye, whether he knew it or not, on Fauve. He swallowed and tapped the corner of the table with his index finger. The silver ring that clung to the finger caught the light and sparkled blindingly. Eli took his hand off of the table and bit the inside of his cheek. He wasn’t sure what exactly he was meant to say to Amelia. He’d hurt her. He knew that. He’d been stupid enough to disappear from her life before reappearing for a short amount of time and leaving again. Then, when he went to look for her, she was nowhere to be found. After that he’d tortured himself and threw himself into what he did best which wasn’t necessarily something that a sixteen-year-old wizard should have been doing.

So he’d messed up, fatally so, and he wanted to make it up to Amelia. Elijah was willing to spend the rest of his life making it up to her if crunch came to crunch. He was going to try for that anyway but if need be then he’d declare if for the whole chess community to hear. But at this rate, unless he started talking soon then there would be no way in hell she’d let him back into her life unless he had a really good reason to. Well, she probably wouldn’t anyway but he had to get talking fairly quickly if he was going to secure a place for himself. Fauve was part of that package deal of course because she wouldn’t take lightly to being left behind. He wouldn’t even let that cross his mind. The little French girl was his life, probably the only one that kept him on the straight and narrow...well, however straight and narrow the straight and narrow was, it was fairly bumpy to say the least.

“I’m sorry.” He mumbled. Yes, that was a good start. Kind of. “I’m here because...well, it’s a communal park but I’m here now talking to you because I’ve missed you, Mia.” Elijah didn’t know if she was buying what he was saying but he was being sincere. He’d missed her...words couldn’t describe how much. She could have been quite easily overlooked by anyone but Elijah found her presence to be...well, it was hard to ignore. He wouldn’t have wanted to anyway. “I shouldn’t have disappear the way I did it was unfair to you. I’m here because I want you back, Mia. I want you back in my life again.”

It was difficult for Amelia to keep her eyes on Elijah, especially as his eyes wandered away from her. She wanted to watch his reaction to her question, to try to discern from it what he was thinking or feeling. But while this would have been perfectly possible if she had been looking at another park inhabitant, Amelia seemed oddly unable to read Elijah’s thoughts or motivations in his expression, which changed fleetingly as his attention dropped from an object he had been following with his eyes – judging from the height, it was over her head, so perhaps a kite or other flying object – to something closer to the ground. She was tempted to look to see what had caught his attention and changed his emotion, but she thought better of it, not wanting to be distracted from her task of keeping Elijah at bay. He was a difficult person for Amelia to keep out – the only person for whom this was difficult in Amelia’s case.

Whatever had been distracting Elijah moments earlier had ceased to do so now, for his eyes were back on Amelia’s and his hand was in his hair. It was a characteristic motion of the Slytherin boy, one Amelia had witnessed multiple times. In a motion Amelia had not seen before, Elijah’s other hand reached for one of the pawns that had realigned itself on his side of the board. Although Amelia could not see the expression on the chess piece he was holding, she was able to garner from his quick dismissal of the piece and the way the other pieces shirked from him that they could sense a lack of confidence exuding from him. In wizards chess, the pieces were very telling of your opponent; they can sense fear and inexperience, as well as over-confidence. It was surprising that the ebony pieces on Elijah’s side of the table did not sense the easy confidence that Amelia had always attributed to him, but when she took a moment to reflect on what had come naturally to them, Amelia found that she too could notice the absence of that oh-so-characteristic trait.

In the midst of her analysis of him, Amelia found Elijah’s eyes once again wandering away from the table. His reputation – at least what she had last heard of it before she left school – gave Amelia an idea of what might be on the end of Elijah’s line of sight, but she avoided thinking directly of this because it was painful to think that he might be already growing bored of her, as it seemed he had all those months ago. Amelia felt frustration welling inside her as Elijah failed to look back to the conversation, jealous of the fact that he could simply look away and escape what was passing between them while she felt unfairly jailed in the moment. It took nearly a minute before Amelia’s frustration became such that she was able to look away from Elijah’s distracted expression and follow his eyes to the source of the distraction.

If she was honest with herself, Amelia had expected to see a leggy blond in Elijah’s view, but after a thorough search of the otherwise empty area, Amelia had to concede that the object of Elijah’s attention must have been a small brunette girl, no more than six or seven, whose pale blue dress was sprawled haphazardly around her. In her hands, she held a paintbrush which was dripping black paint onto the canvas in front of her. Initially, Amelia thought it might have been the art which caught Elijah’s eye, but with a glance back to him, the redhead was able to recognize the affection on the boy’s face, affection one didn’t gain simply by related interests with a complete stranger.

Now that she had seen what Elijah had been seeing, Amelia found it difficult to look away. The girl was perfectly cheerful sitting by herself, without any visible parents as far as Amelia could discern. Amelia was unaware even of Elijah returning his attention to her, such was her interest in the mysterious girl beneath the tree. The child was not mysterious in and of herself, it must be noted, but rather mysterious because Amelia could not identify her connection to Elijah.

In seemingly a breach of character, Amelia had always felt more comfortable around children than any other cross-section of the human population. Children were easier to talk to and didn’t react the same way to her as her peers and the adults in her life did. Children had no expectations of a person except that he or she show them affection and attention. They didn’t ask difficult questions, and although they might pursue a topic with, “But why?”, they could be satisfied with a less-than-complete answer. But most of all, Amelia liked children because it was typically they who managed to see the woman behind the mask. They were not yet trained to fall for Amelia’s games of pretend or taught to be stopped by emotional barriers. They still believed in the good in people, and thus saw what good there was in Amelia – the potential she had for intense, undeniable feeling and emotion - even when she was doing her best to hide it.

It was Elijah’s fidgeting that first alerted Amelia that he had returned his attention to her, but she waited a few seconds more before looking back to him. As her gaze came to match his, Amelia could see that Elijah was making no attempt to hide his emotions, proving once again how different the pair of them were. As he began to speak, Amelia could hear the sincerity in his voice, even the pain he hadn’t bothered to hide, but before she could stop herself, her rationale set itself upon the words, breaking them down into component parts to find the dishonesty, the lies, or the sarcasm. Any of these would have made these words easier to hear, because they would have been what she expected.

But try as she might, Amelia could find none of what she was looking for. She should have been pleased, to know that the words Elijah spoke were true and heartfelt, but instead of celebrating this, Amelia recoiled from it. She was far more used to dealing with ignorance, intolerance of her behavior, and unwillingness to try. All of these had a carefully prepared response or a wall of ice to block it from affecting her, but what Elijah had said – or more the way he had said it – left Amelia without words she could bring herself to say aloud, holding back tears she couldn’t show. Although one part of her screamed to echo the words back to him – that she had missed him more than he could understand, that when he had left her life had seemed even less real to her than it had before she had ever met him – the walls she had spent so many years building simply would not allow for it.

Incapable of responding to Elijah’s confession, Amelia instead pulled her eyes away from his, as difficult as that was. With their eye contact broken, Amelia’s eyes wandered back to the girl on the grass whose dark hair was being tugged away from her by the slight breeze which blew through the park.

“Who is she?” Amelia asked with a nod in the girl’s direction, knowing that this was a completely inappropriate response to Elijah’s full disclosure of his feelings. But, in her own defense, Amelia believed that if she could root herself in something concrete about this current situation, then it might seem less like a dream of her own creation and more like reality. But maybe reality wasn’t such a good thing, for it was in reality that Amelia often came up against the greatest conflicts between what her heart wanted her to do, and what, in her eyes, posed the greatest threats to her personal well-being.

A familiar sound was dancing on the wind and filling the pregnant silence between the two young people sat at the chess table. The little French girl was humming a lullaby, but not any lullaby, one specifically written for her. It was something she had in common with her father. He’d also hum when he was painting and occasionally he’d charm a guitar to play and he’d sing along. The lullabies were created for her so he could get her to sleep. She was a heavy sleeper but it took a long time to get her to sleep because when he first took her as her own because she was plagued with nightmares. After a few sleepless months on his months she got past her nightmares but even now it still took a fair bit to get her to sleep. He spent hours poring over different texts at first in an attempt to find out the best way to get her to sleep. Stories didn’t work, rum in her milk certainly didn’t work but what was effective was music. He sang her to sleep and when the regular songs stopped working, he had to write his own ones, his own lullabies, to get his daughter into the land of slumber.

It had been two years since he’d plucked her out of the possession of the French models. She hadn’t even been four-years-old and she had been incredibly naive to the world around her. That had actually worked in Elijah’s favour because he never had to give answers to things he didn’t necessarily have the answers to. She was now mere months off of turning six and she was beginning to embody him in ways that scared as well as excited the Bulgarian wizard. He was convinced that the Gods had been plotting in his interest. Perhaps they saw him going down a line that he wouldn’t have been able to get himself off of without her help. She reminded him so much of himself when he was her age. He was a bit of a waif when he was her age and didn’t have much to him. He’d described himself as a stick but Fauve found the idea of her father being anything other than the man he was now, today, preposterous. She was already flowering because she was already exceptionally beautiful. She just needed to blossom then it would be up to dear old dad to scare the living daylights out of any future potential boyfriends of hers and deter any that saw themselves as such. It was his job to protect his little girl after all.

Glancing back at Amelia, Elijah saw that she was looking in the same direction as he had been mere moments ago. He looked at her, remaining silent, waiting for her to speak. When she did her words surprised him. He had hoped for something to be said on what he had said. He hadn’t skirted around his feelings. He wore his heart on his sleeve and rarely protected himself from getting hurt. That was why when he did get hurt he was devastated by it. But she wanted to know about Fauve. That was strange. He may have been looking at her but that didn’t necessarily mean that he knew her. Amelia wasn’t stupid, though. She’d probably seen the way he watched her with hawk eyes. His body unconsciously leaned towards Fauve and he hadn’t tucked the chair in all of the way so he could dart out of the seat at a moment’s notice. He worried about her constantly but it was only because he loved her. Elijah truly didn’t know where he would end up if he didn’t have her with him.

“She,” He said after a moment but he didn’t continue because he faltered, not really sure what he was supposed to say. Those who knew him and didn’t know about her but saw her with him assumed they were siblings. Anyone with half a brain could tell that they weren’t though. There was a closer bond there, one of mutual dependence. He usually let people figure it out for themselves. He liked the speculation before they finally clocked that they were father and daughter. It interested him to no end. But this was Amelia. She asked a simple question and no doubt expected an answer but he couldn’t find a way of phrasing it correctly. He should have told her before. He should have told many people a lot of things. He might have worn his heart on his sleeve but when he got hurt he kept those things to himself. That was why Alice was trapped inside his mind and only the poor little Muggle boys remembered her but probably barely remembered her face. That was why he kept the strained relationship with his father out of the public eye, preferring to let everyone believe that e hated his mother. Fauve was another secret. Unlike the others he wasn’t ashamed or terrified. She was his and he wanted to keep her that way. No one else had to know but Mia wanted to.

Swallowing, Elijah turned his eyes back onto his daughter and he watched her absent mindedly click her heels together as she dangled her feet in the air. Her painting style was methodical, practical and intelligent. He created a mess of colours before the picture finally started to take form. It gave the paintings a completely different effect. But that was a trade secret. It was probably why he ran out of paints so often. Elijah tugged on a random piece of hair and swallowed again. “Fauve Leonelle Krum.” He said finally. “My daughter.” He closed his eyes for a few moments and let his thoughts process. He didn’t know why that was so hard to admit. Perhaps he was selfish or perhaps he was worried that he’d have to deal with rejection as a result of her presence in his life.

But the thing was, he could get over that no matter who the woman was. In this case it was Amelia and the loss would cripple him for a while but Fauve, at the end of the day, was irreplaceable unlike a woman in his life. He felt awful for thinking that way but he was a father to her first and foremost before he was someone’s lover. It might have always appeared to be the other way around but there was a reason he treated women like throwaway cameras. It was a safety mechanism more than anything else. He was so used to having one night stands or bedding his models after the paintings were done. He wanted a family, yes. But the fact that there was someone that he could potentially care about...that he wouldn’t need to throw away...it scared him. He didn’t want someone in his daughter’s life that she didn’t like. He didn’t want to bring something like that upon her because he knew she deserved better. But he knew Amelia was different and if he made a horrible misjudgement on her personality then he would walk out of her life as he’d done before to her and to so many other women that had passed through his life, in one door and out the other. That hurt the most, the fact that he could let it happen but this time...he wasn’t sure he wanted to.

The question Amelia had posed hung heavily in the air between herself and Elijah, creating a pregnant silence. She could tell by his facial expressions that he was conflicted about his answer, which was nearly a first for Elijah. Yes, he had shown some hesitation in revealing to her what he was feeling just a few minutes earlier, but still the words had come. For once, Amelia was unsure that her question was going to be answered by the dark-haired boy who sat across form her, his eyes darting back and forth between the girl on the grass and the young woman who sat waiting. He was debating, Amelia could tell, for she knew she wore this same expression whenever he asked her something personal, or really when he asked her much of anything at all.

The first word came jerkily, confident at first, the way she had come to expect Elijah to be, but then his assuredness deserted him, leaving the non-descript pronoun to fall flat. Amelia’s eyes met his, wanting to encourage him to be open, but finding herself hypocritical in the act. If she had been asked such a question, she too would have avoided it, been at a loss for words. So instead, Amelia rather let her eyes linger on Elijah with the only true feeling she was willing to admit at this moment: sincere curiosity.

Even as Elijah looked away, Amelia continued to watch him, and it was only after a few minutes of suspended stillness that Elijah finally found his voice. It was a name which interrupted the silence, a name which ended the same way as the object of Amelia’s attention. But although the shared surname had caused Amelia to raise an eyebrow, it was the next two words which made her eyes open as wide as dinner plates.

Those two small words had taken Amelia completely by surprise, and although Elijah had closed his, Amelia’s eyes were still open and alert, as though it could help her process what she had just learned. With only two words to go on, it was surprising the amount of analysis that Amelia’s mind was able to do in a short period of time, whirring away and breaking down what had been said, trying to make sense of it.

His daughter. That explains the protectiveness, the attention. And the art. They are physically similar, as much so as can be derived with the gaps of age and gender.

To have a daughter at this age though… Amelia thought, doing the math mentally and wondering if it would be possible that the girl was truly his biological daughter. Physically it would have been feasible, but Amelia could not know whether or not it was true and wasn’t one to guess.

It wouldn’t really have mattered anyway, Amelia found, as she reflected on her own reaction to such a blatant revelation of a secret Elijah had obviously kept close to him. Yes, she had over-analyzed in a matter of thirty seconds, but in her haste to analyze, Amelia hadn’t even realized she had forgotten to judge. Of course, she was aware that a boy of her age having a daughter was socially unacceptable, but Amelia didn’t really place her values of things on what was socially acceptable or unacceptable. She was a woman based in reason, fact, and logic; it was the reason she had focused on the details and logistics of what Elijah had said, rather than the social implications of it. She could admit it was unusual, and more than a little surprising, but it she had known even before he had admitted this piece of information that he loved the girl sitting in the grass at the edge of the park. It was written all over his face. What he had said had merely explained that emotion.

Elijah’s eyes were still closed as Amelia finished processing, which allowed her to look over once more to his daughter, still blissfully oblivious to the conversation Amelia and Elijah were having out of her earshot. The painting she was making was starting to take shape, and on the breeze came a few notes of a melody Amelia did not recognize, but identified with. The girl was humming.

Taking a deep breath, Amelia returned her gaze to Elijah, whose eyes were still closed against the world, or perhaps what he feared Amelia might say. The Ravenclaw knew all too well that had the tables been turned, she too would have done everything she could to block out the world, for she gave people much less credit than Elijah did when it came to their ability not to judge. It was with this in mind that Amelia organized her thoughts and inhaled deeply before letting her voice penetrate the silence between them.

“Can I meet her?” Amelia asked gently, willing Elijah’s eyes to open so she might see his reaction to her words.

It was a simple enough question grammatically, but Amelia knew that the question itself was asking more of Elijah than an introduction. She was asking him to let her into a part of his life that, if she had to guess, he likely hadn’t shared with many others. The care and concern he had for Fauve was obvious, and it was a lot to ask of him to let her intrude upon that type of personal closeness. But it was the most relatable thing Amelia could think of to say, and really, the only thing that had come naturally to her. In this instance – and never before – Amelia wanted to step into the unknown arena of someone’s personal life, and her better-judgment was uncharacteristically silent as she expressed her request to do just that.

“You can say no,” Amelia added, though more quietly. She knew what she was asking of Elijah, and thus she knew how big a request it really was. Him turning her down would not have been insulting, but perfectly understandable, especially to someone who played her cards as close to the chest as Amelia did.

With only his heartbeat providing any sort of measurement of time Elijah wondered if that was all he would ever remember of that day. Was that, in years to come, all he would remember - his heartbeat as it thundered against his ribcage, the distant humming coming from his daughter and the far off exclamations from the winning chess players? If that was all his mind would retain then perhaps it was a useless situation to be in. He wanted to remember but time hadn’t passed, the situation hadn’t changed or ended and he was living in the moments right this second so wondering if he was going to remember in years to come was a fruitless exercise. If anything it was just making him more distraught than he already was. He was over-analyzing, worrying over nothing and he clearly wasn’t giving Amelia the credit she deserved. Why did he expect her to have an irrational response? She was far from irrational in any situation so why would this one be any different? It wouldn’t.

But by some stretch of the imagination, if she did act out of fear of social repercussions, if she acted irrationally, then he would be gone in a moment. He wouldn’t have even given her time to suck in a breath. But it was unlikely. His mind was going into overdrive and he was panicking, he could feel himself panicking. If it had been anyone else then Elijah wouldn’t have cared. He would have been blaze and flippant about it because their opinion meant nothing to him. He wasn’t affected by others as much as he was Amelia. Her opinion mattered just like Alice’s would have had she been around to know. But if the blonde had lived then perhaps she would have joined him when he entered a love affair with Paris and its art scene. Perhaps she would have already known and served as a mother figure to Fauve. But none of that even mattered. She was dwelling in the past, though, but not of her own accord. So he should have stopped dwelling on the what if’s and what have you’s; and for the most part he had but, like always, the minority ruled and that minority contained Alice in the purest of forms – memory.

Elijah exhaled shakily and tapped his fingertips against denim material that made up his jeans. When Amelia spoke, Elijah’s eyes popped open. The orbs widened considerably and he opened his mouth, intending to say something but no words came out. Elijah hastily pulled his mouth shut and looked at Amelia, desperate to see if she was sincere in her request. He didn’t know why he was being so judgemental of her. He didn’t know why he expected her to be judgemental of him. He knew her, he trusted her without even having to hesitate. He’d shown in the past that he couldn’t be trustworthy; it hadn’t been the other way around. But he knew he had a reason to be wary. Fauve was a big part of his life, one that he wasn’t going to allow to be tarnished in the way it could be. Yet still, despite his insecurities, he knew that Amelia wouldn’t do that to him.

When she finally spoke it wasn’t what the Bulgarian had been expecting. Then again, he wasn’t really sure what he was expecting to hear. Whatever he had been expecting, we can agree that it wasn’t that. Elijah’s eyes snapped open and he gaped at her. When he realised what he was doing, the Slytherin felt his cheeks heat up and he quickly closed his mouth. Amelia had reminded him also that he didn’t have to say yes but he wasn’t sure whether he wanted to. No, Elijah knew he didn’t want to deny Amelia the chance of meeting Fauve and vice versa but... He didn’t even know what the but was. There were no buts in this equation because it was a yes or no answer and the latter was going to be crossed out. A smile crept across Elijah’s face and he winked at Amelia before jumping up out of the chair. He jogged across the green and squatted down next to his daughter.

He ran his hand through her hair, breaking her concentration, and she looked up at him. Elijah lifted Fauve up and sat her on his lap. She reached up with her paintbrush and put a blob of green paint on her father’s cheek. Elijah scowled at her and she looked around as if to look for the ‘mystery’ culprit. The Bulgarian chuckled and he kissed his daughter’s cheek before pointing to the painting she’d nearly finished. “Can’t you tell?” She asked, her eyebrows knitting together in confusion. Eli shook his head and stole the paintbrush from her, setting it down on the grass once he’d done so. “Papa you don’t read enough.” She sighed. “That’s Captain Hook...there’s Peter Pan over there. Tiger Lily is in the tree, do you see?” She glanced back to see if her father was listening, which he was, and she continued. “I don’t like Tiger Lilly that much.” She whispered. “But the Lost Boys are over there with Wendy, she’s telling a story, and John and Michael are listening to the crocodile tick. I’m a fairy like Tinkerbell! Can you see, Papa?”

Elijah nodded. “And do you believe in fairies, my little wild beast?” He asked softly. The French girl nodded and Eli smiled at her. He leaned close to her and whispered, “So do I!” Fauve grinned widely at her father and she jumped off of his lap with every intention of continuing her painting. “Hey,” Eli pouted, poking her gently. She looked up, her dark eyes meeting his, and raised an eyebrow in a similar way he did. “I want you to meet someone, Fauvie. She’s...incredibly important to me. I want her to be a part of our lives as well as us a part of hers so I would like you to meet her first before we deal with my parents. Those two are as disposable as parents. You’re the most important thing in the world to me Fauve. Your opinion means a lot.” The child looked completely bewildered and Elijah didn’t blame her either. He wasn’t entirely sure what she was going to say about his suggestion. She didn’t like anyone who popped into Elijah’s life. She wanted a stable environment for him just as much as he wanted one for her which was why she was as wary as she was. “Fauve..?” Eli spoke quietly, softly, as not to spook her. “You don’t have to if you don’t-”

“No.” She cut him off and her eyebrows came together. “I would like to meet her...” Elijah nodded and Fauve got up. She picked her painting up by the corners and walked beside her father in the direction he was directing her in. Elijah was a lot taller than Fauve, shockingly so. She only came up to about his thigh if that so she had a little bit of growing to do. Actually she had a hell of a lot of growing to do – yet another trait they shared. Elijah stopped a little way away from Amelia, no more than a meter, and knelt down beside Fauve. “Fauve, this is Amelia Lyons. Amelia, this is Fauve Krum.” He introduced, squeezing his daughter’s hand in an attempt to reassure her that everything was alright.

As soon as her words were spoken, Amelia’s wish for Elijah to open his eyes was granted, and when he did pull his hands away from them she was able to see just how wide they became at her words. He seemed genuinely confused by her response to his revelation, which Amelia was tempted to be offended by for about a millisecond before she realized that she likely would have had the same feelings had the roles been reversed. Amelia had a tendency to underestimate the ability of others to be accepting and trustworthy, which was a big part of the reason she kept herself so guarded; it would be hypocritical of her to be angry at Elijah for not having complete faith in her ability not to judge him for what he had revealed.

Elijah’s eyes were boring into her, as if he were trying just as hard to read her expression as she was to read his, and although Amelia wanted to squirm beneath the scrutiny, she held her ground and the eye contact she had with Elijah. After a few long seconds of examination, however, Elijah seemed to come back to himself and his mouth snapped closed, color rising to his cheeks in an uncharacteristic reversal of roles (usually Amelia was the one blushing). He recovered much more quickly from his embarrassment, though, and before Amelia could comment on the flush in his face Elijah had planted a toothy grin across his face and, with a wink, he was out of his chair and across the park before Amelia had any sort of chance to respond to his actions.

As Amelia watched Elijah jog over to the small artist on the grass, she felt her heart rate increase, though she wasn’t able to identify immediately why her palpitations were responding to the situation in that way. The redhead watched as Elijah squatted to reach Fauve’s level, caressing her hair in a protective, loving sort of way before moving her to his lap. The pair of them seemed to be discussing the subject of the girl’s painting, though Amelia could not hear their words from where she sat. She could hear giggling from the girl and see the happiness stretched across Elijah’s features when his daughter smiled. A minute later, Elijah and Fauve seemed to have switched topics from her artwork to Elijah’s companion – namely, Amelia – which was apparent by the way Elijah gestured toward her and the expression of concentration which seemed out of place on the five-year-old’s face.

The discussion seemed to have been brief, however, and shortly after the tone of their interaction had grown more serious, Amelia watched as Elijah and his daughter began to walk toward her. Once again, Amelia’s pulse sped up, her heart seeming to throw itself against her rib cage. More careful this time to determine the source of this change, the realization came to Amelia more suddenly than she might have expected: she was nervous. The way her mouth had dried up, her hands gone even colder than their usual iciness, the switch in heartbeat – she was legitimately anxious about meeting the girl that was now walking toward her, closing the gap faster than Amelia would have liked given her sudden realization of her own emotions. Amelia had realized quite abruptly just what was at stake in meeting this tiny human, what Fauve’s approval might mean to her relationship with Elijah, and in just how many ways she was capable of screwing it up.

But before she could set herself into full-on panic mode with her over-analysis, Elijah and Fauve were upon her, still standing far enough away that Fauve could back out of the confrontation if she wanted to, but close enough that Amelia could see her up close for the first time. She looked shockingly like Elijah, with her dark hair and eyes, though the critically inquisitive expression on her face actually reminded Amelia a bit of herself. The girl was curious, but not so much so that she was willing to speak first, so it seemed both Amelia and Fauve could be thankful that Elijah took care of the introductions for them, kneeling again so as to be at a closer height to that of the young girl.

Reminding herself to breathe seemed odd, but it was a necessity before Amelia had enough oxygen to think clearly and to formulate words. She was not exceptionally conversational to begin with, though she had always found children easier to converse with than adults. It was the added pressure of this being Elijah’s daughter that was making it difficult for Amelia to find the appropriate first words, but as she searched for them, her eyes drifted toward the painting the girl held daintily in front of her, and suddenly Amelia found herself relaxing and leaning forward on her chair to peer more closely at the artwork.

The painting was not as exceptional as her father’s, but it was certainly notable for one of her age. The scene was immediately familiar to Amelia, who had read Peter Pan many times as a child, and even occasionally returned to it now when she was feeling nostalgic for a piece of her past. Among the forested backdrop Amelia could see the blue dress of Wendy, the ruddy faces of lost boys, and the clear, ageless outline of the forever-boy, Peter Pan himself.

“That is a lovely painting,” Amelia said softly, finally finding words as she looked back to the young girl’s face, careful not to look too long or too intensely, lest she scare the child. It was a precarious balance, even now that she had found a topic that put her slightly at ease, to control her nerves long enough to avoid scaring Fauve. Children were particularly perceptive when it came to feelings, and if Amelia wasn’t careful, her anxiety over meeting Elijah’s daughter would only make Fauve anxious and skittish as well.

“Have you ever been to Neverland?” Amelia asked in a half-whisper, as though sharing a secret with the brunette child in front of her. Of course, this question was an abandonment of her usual roots in reason and logic, but then again, those were not strictly necessary or even appropriate when dealing with children. In her childhood, Amelia had missed out on the opportunity to believe in fairytales, magic, and things that could never really be, and a part of her was reveling in the fact that Fauve was still of the age where she could believe in those things, or at least Amelia hoped she did. If not, her opening conversation line would fall entirely flat.

She’s five, Amelia. She still believes. She has to… Amelia’s subconscious reassured her, though whether or not that was true remained to be seen as Amelia waited for the wide-eyed girl’s response.

Whether Elijah realised it or not, everything that could drastically change his life weighed on his daughter’s opinion. He probably did know but only subconsciously. He knew the difference between right and wrong and he knew what it felt like to have decisions made for him. He didn’t want to do the same to Fauve. Every day he strove to be a better father to her and although sometimes he didn’t always succeed in the ways he wanted to, every day he got a little bit better. He’d never be a good person because he had issues he had to deal with without her help but he would always be a better father to her than his father was to him. Perhaps that was all he really wanted, to give her what he didn’t have.

But what she didn’t have was a mother, like the Lost Boys in that respect. He’d tried, oh he’d tried, and he’d never let anyone tell him otherwise. But at the end of the day, perhaps that wasn’t what she’d wanted. Women were fickle and there was always something they wanted before a family. It was usually money or fame and Elijah didn’t understand it. He brought that in a bag that he couldn’t get off of his back so he didn’t know why they couldn’t appreciate the idea of having a family of their own. That’s all Elijah had ever wanted. He’d wanted it because he’d never had it. Fauve was the beginning of that. The wide-eyed five-year-old that so desperately wanted to learn – she was the start.

Amelia was so very different though. He couldn’t read her. He didn’t see any fickle, vain wants or needs residing within her. She was a learned individual who based things on logic and reason. The only time he was logically was when it suited or when he ran out of Firewhisky. Elijah admired her. She gotten him where others in the past had wanted him to be and she probably didn’t even know about it. He hadn’t hit rock bottom yet. With Fauve he was working his way up slowly with a spoon but with Mia in his life he had a nice big fat drill to do the work for him. He was being pulled up to the surface he was avoiding rock bottom but only just. He still spend nights away and the mornings asleep because of her.

Elijah didn’t appreciate the direction his thoughts were going in what so ever. To think about Alice would mean that his heart was mutinying against his mind. He still loved her. He probably always would but she was a no go zone. The only person he’d ever told was his grandfather. Even Fauve didn’t understand why every year he shut himself away four days before Christmas. He couldn’t break the odd ritual he had with himself. He couldn’t afford to. To spare thoughts for Alice meant that he could remember her without distraction. He missed her so much that sometimes, on those days, it hurt to breath. Mira was a ghost of Alice. If he hadn’t lied then their betrothal would have probably still been in effect. To live with her for the rest of his days would have been a living hell.

Fauve wiggled uncomfortably beside him and the brunette edged away from her father and further towards Amelia. Fauve, like her father, enjoyed attention from people but she wasn’t as arrogant as her father and didn’t show outwardly that she enjoyed it. She just liked people. She loved talking to different people and liked finding out random assorted titbits about their lives. Amelia was almost holding a hand out for Fauve to take although it wasn’t as obvious. By striking up conversation with the girl, on a level she could understand, Amelia was already working her way into Fauve’s good books. It was that that made Elijah thank whatever higher power was controlling them because his daughter could be difficult sometimes. This, he hoped, wasn’t one of those times and everything would go the way he wanted it to.

“No,” She said somewhat mournfully. “But Papa leaves the windows open...only sometimes though. I don’t think he wants me to go.” Fauve glanced back at Elijah, a soft smile on her face and Eli chuckled. “I don’t think I would like to be away from home though.” Fauve mused. “Not for long, anyway. Have you ever been?” She asked eagerly. Elijah looked at Amelia, wondering what she would say in response to his daughter’s question.