Dwelling on Dreams (A Marauders Fan Fic)

(Optional) Epilogue

Hello everyone! Now this isn't really supposed to be a part of the story, it just waltzed into my head uninvited so I wrote it out. This is optional because I know that I pretty much tied the story off last chapter but if you'd like a little more, here it is.

I'm also writing one about James and Lily which ties in with this (don't worry though, very few of the scenes overlap so it is a completely different story). It's called The Next Great Adventure and it's on my profile (obviously!) or if that's too much like hard work the link is in the external link of this so please check it out; I'd really appreciate it.

And also, if the need to read an original story overwhelms you I have an adventure story called The Bounty Hunter - I would LOVE it if you could check that out since barely anyone's supporting it (and it's really good I swear or at least I think/hope!)

Epilogue

Harry smiled as he watched Teddy running around the garden, his hair changing to match the colour of each flower that he prodded with great interest. "I understand now," he muttered to himself.

"What?" Andromeda asked as she laid the table behind him.

"Nothing."

"Oh, I could have sworn you said something."

Harry paused for a second before unexpectedly repeating what he'd said. "I just said that I understand now. How Sirius must have felt – about me – and how desperately you want them to feel loved; I only just realised how hard it must have been for him in Azkaban."

Andromeda moved over to where Harry was standing and gazed at her young grandson. "He has a fabulous family Harry. You're a wonderful godfather."

"I still miss him."

She looked at him kindly, the eyes that Harry had once thought so similar to Bellatrix's filled with a kindness that her older sister never would have known. "There's no need to Harry," she comforted. "Trust me, I knew Sirius all his life; he's much happier up there than down here."

"But how do you know?" Harry asked.

"Well if Ron and Hermione died, you would be happier with them than alive, wouldn't you?"

"Yes."

"It's exactly the same for Sirius. Being on his own nearly killed him, but up there he has his two best friends, your mother, who I understand he became very good friends with, and Cassie."

"Cassie? Who's she?" Harry questioned curiously.

"Cassie... oh what was her last name? Jones! Cassie Jones. She was Sirius' girlfriend. Well... she was probably the 'love of his life' but that sounds a little cliché. She was his only girlfriend though."

"What happened to her? Do you know anything about her?" Harry asked, eager to find out more about Sirius.

"I'm surprised he didn't tell you though," she murmured, half to herself. "I would have thought that you would have been one of the people he would have talked to. Although maybe the memories were too painful..."

"What happened to her?" Harry repeated.

"She was killed by Bellatrix in the First Wizarding War."

"By Bellatrix?" Harry exclaimed.

Andromeda nodded slowly. "Well, as far as I can remember – from what was said in the Daily Prophet and what Sirius told me at the time – she was actually killed by Voldemort but Bellatrix had been torturing her for hours beforehand."

"Why though?"

"They wanted to know something. I don't know what it was though, before you ask me," she said quickly, looking at Harry as she did so. "All I know is that she wouldn't tell them."

"Do you know anything else about her?" Harry asked, keen to know more about this undiscovered part of his godfather.

"Well let me see... I don't know much; I only met her once and saw her in the corridors of Hogwarts occasionally; I was a sixth year when they started you see. She was in Gryffindor, with Sirius and your parents, and she was best friends with your mother. Cassie and Sirius started going out in their... sixth year. Yes it was their sixth year because Sirius sent me a Howler, saying that 'he was sorry it was a Howler but words couldn't describe how happy he was and he apologised if it shouted at me' or something like that," she said, a nostalgic smile on her face as she remembered her younger cousin. "A couple of years after they left Hogwarts they moved in together and they were still together when she died. I don't know much beyond that, sorry."

"Do you know what she did?"

"Actually I do! I found this out fairly recently – well in comparison to the other things I know – because I was talking to Dora and she told me that Moody had told her she reminded him of Cassie Jones after she got full marks in one of her tests. Being Dora she interrogated him until he told her that Cassie was an Auror and a member of the Order."

Harry very nearly asked Andromeda who Dora was, until he remembered that it was her nickname for Tonks. "So she was an Auror..." he muttered.

"Yes and her parents were too. I remember that very clearly. The one time that I met her Sirius introduced me as 'the only person who would approve of her in this family' but then he said that if her family were more pro-pureblood his parents would have loved her because both her parents were from families which were probably older than the Blacks. They were blood traitors though because they believed in equality for everyone," she said bitterly. "And she told me that her parents had laughed about how her grandparents had been terrified that both of her parents would be killed before they had any children. They said that being Aurors was too dangerous."

"So did she have any siblings?"

"No, as far as I'm aware she was an only child. Her grandparents were right to be terrified though," she said with a wry smile.

"Why?"

"Her parents were killed too, not long before she was. It was in the Daily Prophet, they were attacked by Death Eaters as well. Let me think... it must have been around the time that she was in her seventh year. I'm not sure though."

"Do you know anything else?"

"No nothing else. I'm sorry Harry. I barely knew her."

"I can't believe it," Harry said numbly. "He had this whole life that I didn't know about. I wish I could have met her or known him when he was younger," Harry said wistfully, feeling oddly bereft. Their conversation had reminded him of just how many people he had lost, some without even knowing it. "I suppose I'm glad now, in a way."

"Why?"

"Well now I now that they're together. I still wish that they hadn't all had to die but..."

"Granny! Granny! Look at this!" Teddy cried as he ran inside. "Hello Uncle Harry!" he grinned, his young face lighting up as he saw his godfather.

"Hi there Teddy," Harry said as he scooped Teddy up into his arms, his smile mirroring the boy's. As his godson's laughter rang throughout the house, Harry swore to himself that he would only live in the present and future. "After all Harry," he whispered to himself, "it doesn't do to dwell on dreams."