[Tavern] Where Do We Go From Here? (Lyall)

Timothy walked into the small tavern in the corner of Hogsmeade. The building was older than most along the shopping street, but it was all the more comfortable for it. Timothy was a frequenter of the tavern, often visiting when he needed his mind clear. It was his most trusted place of solitude for Timothy. The building was never particularly busy, so it became perfect spot to come and think.

Timothy took a seat at one of the tables by the window to the rear of the tavern. He removed the hat that he kept to block some of the harsh suns rays and sat it down on the table. Timothy smiled as the waitress brought him his usual. Today was a day that Timothy always seemed to dread. It was the day where there was no more work to be done at Hogwarts until the students returned. The teachers were cleared to go to their homes and the castle would be kept up by the groundskeeper and some Ministry workers who were tasked with aiding in repairs on the damaged areas of the school.

This should be a day that any teacher would be looking forward to; the day that means they didn't have to work. However, Timothy's work was what kept him happiest. Walking among the halls of Hogwarts, teaching his heart out...that's what kept his mind clear. When it was all over, he was left with only himself and his memories. And his memories weren't the best of company. Alone, Timothy's mind would wander back to the days where he was someone very different than he was now. Back to a time when Timothy was a warrior. A solider. A time where Timothy was wounded physically and mentally. The war. Something that, no matter how hard he tried to run away from it, always caught up to him.

@Rinn

Lyall smiled to Lucy behind the bar as she handed him a glass of single malt whiskey, a reward in his mind. The school term was over and while it brought him a big sigh of relief, he also knew he had a lot of work left to do as well. Hogwarts had never been in this much disrepair since... well since the battle. Had it been almost three years ago now? He almost shuddered at the thought and he was sort of glad that his son Sorley was staying the night over at his sister's house and spending some time with his cousins. He knew it meant he could have another glass of whiskey which is definitely where he was headed.

As he glanced around the room, he was about to start over to an empty table near one of the bookshelves in the back, but then he saw a familiar face and he started over. "Hello Timothy. Long time, no see," Lyall said with a smile, offering his hand out to shake in greeting. He had passed by his fellow professor earlier in the day as they had gone about their last day with students around their classrooms.

"I hear we'll still be seeing a lot of each other," he added after he took a sip of his glass. "You'll be staying to help with the repairs?" he asked to confirm.

Timothy looked up as he heard a familiar voice. He smiled and shook his comrade's hand. "Lyall. Yes it has been a while, hasn't it? I didn't get to leave my classroom much this semester." Timothy stood up and pulled a chair for Lyall to sit down. He nodded at the question. "Yes, indeed I'll be at Hogwarts all summer long. I've let a small wizard family from the coast stay in my house for the summer as long as they upkeep it. I thought that my services here were more welcome than going home. I promised the Headmistress that I'd focus on the rebuild of the the common areas. It's all still such a mess. I don't even know if we'll get it all done before the new semester."

Timothy sighed and sipped at his drink. It was all so complicated. Such a mess. Timothy hadn't seen this level of devastation since the battle. It brought back many memories. "I just hope the students aren't deterred. Hogwarts has had some bad times the last few years, but us professor's won't bend to that. I hope they and their parents see that." Timothy smiled a bit to himself. "I hope my construction skills are what I promised them to be. After all, I'm an Arithmist. Meaning I'm probably not going to do as well as I'd like."

Timothy let himself giggle a bit. "How are you, Lyall? With all of this? I know it was tough for everyone but...with us from the war, I know it hits a little differently."

He nodded to the other professor with a smile as the fellow pulled out the chair for him and Lyall took a seat, stretching his long legs out beneath the table as he inhaled deeply. He shrugged, joking, "it happens to the best of us. I swear, I've probably seen more of the inside of my classroom than I did outside all term."

"That was kind of you," the Charms professor said of Timothy's renting out his home and then nodded gravely at his mention of the repairs. "It's been a tough year. We've made some improvement since September, but there's still a lot of work to do. So I'm glad we'll have an extra wand to help." It was safe to say that Lyall felt a lot of the responsibility on his shoulders of what had happened at Hogwarts. As the Charms professor, he should have been able to figure out how to bring down the dome a lot sooner. He should have been able to build the wards back up after the Battle so that students hadn't been harmed.. or killed when the security wards came down in September. And now with the rebuild, something that had happened more in the recent years than should have, he felt responsible for that too. "We'll have to push hard to get everything done in the few short months before the students return. It's never-ending, isn't it?" he said with a smile as he took another swallow of his whiskey.

He nodded again as Timothy spoke of the parents. "I haven't heard much backlash recently from parents about the school, have you?" he asked. He remembered back to when the dome had been demolished, it was like a flood of concern and caring for everyone trapped within the school, but also a lot of debate and hate and questions of how 'they had let this happen' at Hogwarts from parents and Ministry officials. "You'll probably do better than I will," Lyall said in a self-deprecating joke, defaulting to his usual self-deprecating ways.

The professor turned the glass in his fingers as he brought up one leg to rest on the knee of his other as he considered the question. But he nodded as he said, "I've been alright. It's been a few hard years here. Just seems like the good ol' days are gone... but we keep moving forward." He shrugged as he glanced at his colleague. "September was.." He shuddered. "It was too close to what had happened at the Battle. Even worse in some cases because they were all students. I still think we might not have done enough," he said lowly, thinking of the numerous students who had died because they hadn't been able to reach them in the fires. Something they should have been able to prevent.

Timothy shook his head when Lyall asked if he had heard any backlash. "I've not heard anything. But I know how some people get with things like this. Now that the school year is over and everything is kind of settled down, people will start to think a little more about everything. I don't believe that it will be fall out of any kind, but I do expect that there will be parents that will need convincing in September. I can't speak for everyone of course, but I'd imagine that some parents, maybe even students won't be as enthusiastic about the start of term as they would be normally."

It was the sad truth of things like this. A place normally so fortified and seen as the safest place in the wizard world shuttering with fear is something that causes rifts in confidence all across the UK. Truly, the disasters that befell the school this past year were horrific and there were many questions being thrown every which way. Professors, faculty, Ministry members. Everyone close to the school was being bombarded with questions. Everyone wanted peace. Some answers. The problem was, many didn't have a choice.

Timothy listened to Lyall speak of September. It was all too similar to the Battle. It was all too much of a repeat memory. "We did what we were able to. Believe me, I lay awake at night thinking of just one more child that I could have found. But there isn't any help to anyone in thinking that way, I suppose. We got many students out." Timothy thought back to September. Thought back to the Battle that came before. It was all such a blur of memories bleeding into each other.

"I need your advice on something. As a fellow veteran of the war." Timothy breathed in and took a sip of his drink. "There is a small group of American students, no more than six, that I bumped into in Diagon Alley that are visiting for a week or so. Some sort of school program from their school. I got to talking with their chaperone and as it turns out, they're here to learn about the war. And I let it slip that I was involved. I was asked if I would...recount some of my war stories for them. But...I've not spoken openly about the war since it was all over. I want to assist them but I just don't know...should I do it?"

Lyall nodded as he colleague spoke, agreeing with his words. It seemed like a cycle that would never end. Tragedy seemed to dog the school as of late. It some ways it had been unavoidable, and in others, Lyall still felt more could have been done. He could have done more. Those instances were the ones that kept him up late at night. "I've not heard anything either, but it seems to be the way of things as of late. I hope that parents would not think twice about sending their students back to us, but it has been a few long, tough years at Hogwarts lately and it'd be hard to discount that."

It was easy to say the school had declined since Albus Dumbledore had died, but that wasn't exactly the truth either. There was just so much beyond their control. Yet for parents to not send their children back to Hogwarts? Lyall couldn't fathom a better place in all of England, if not the world, where they would get a better education. Even with everything going on, he couldn't imagine sending his son Sorley anywhere else when it came time for him to attend school in a mere three years. Just that thought alone had him reeling. Time had flown so fast.

"You're right, I know you're right," the Charms professor conceded with a tilt of his head as he tipped his glass back and drank. The liquor burned a hot path down his throat that was both fiery and chilling at once. Talk of death and destruction could do that to you, he guessed. "I still feel like we should have seen it coming. Could have stopped it..." he trailed off and lifted a shoulder gently. His powerlessness was showing through, the memories that kept him up at night. Lyall felt like everything that had happened over the past few years was weighing heavily on his shoulders, but was extra heavy today.

He glanced up from his glass, his blue eyes seeming more gray in the falling light, as Winchester asked for his advice. Lyall inclined his head in acquiescence. The thought of the war on top of the tragedy from September made his heart constrict, but swallowed thickly as if to suppress the sudden rush of emotion that was brimming just beneath the surface. Comyna. His wife. Images of her filtered through his mind even as he tried to concentrate on the other professor's words. American students, visiting, learning experience. Should I do it? Lyall nodded slowly. "It might be a good opportunity for them to learn what had happened, get an inside look at what went on and maybe help so that the past doesn't repeat itself," he told him, speaking from the professor side of his mind. The personal side, however, didn't entirely agree. "Where were you during the battle? I'm not sure if we ever.. crossed paths," he asked, the question feeling like wool in his mouth.

Lyall couldn't believe even after all this time, it was still hard to speak of it.

The professors all were in a state that no one should have to be in. Timothy feared that come September, the staff would have to band together to convince parents and students that Hogwarts was worth it. And if that were to happen, it would be much more difficult than people would think. Lyall moved on to answering Timothy's question. He heard the answer that came from Lyall, but Timothy saw his eyes give a different answer.

Lyall asked about Timothy's spot in the war. "Well, I started here with everyone else. After Mr. Potter and Dumbledore's claims of the Dark Lord returning at the conclusion of the Tri-Wizard Tournament, I decided that the evidence was too strong to be a false claim. So, I waited for a bit and watched things slowly happen. I was fortunate enough to have a connection who could tell me a bit, and a very limited bit, about what the plan from the Order was, but I knew I couldn't get involved with something like that. When the war officially broke out, I went to an outpost and volunteered services. I was placed in charge of a small unit of men from the area where I grew up."

Timothy took a drink and thought about those years. The lands that he saw, the people he met. "We rooted ourselves down in Scotland and fought with small pockets of Death Eaters, but we weren't gaining any sort of strong hold. We got the word from London that we needed to make our way to mainland England. When we got there, it was just after Dumbledore's death, mere minutes. It was decided that we were no longer going to be just a small pocket of soldiers and we joined a larger unit. I was still in a leading position, but the main decisions were made by a confidant."

"We engaged much larger pockets of Death Eaters and took critical casualties. I was hurt and placed on leave for a week. In that time I discovered that the man that I had been in love with for years was in league with the Death Eaters. He went on and I came back into my unit. We fought all over England, mainly in the countryside. For months, we slowly advanced forward. Agonizingly slow. We broke bones, sustained wounds that should have honestly killed us. However, we just went on. I found myself face to face with my love in a battle and I killed him. It was then that I felt the loss of whatever humanity was left in the war. It was about a day later that we got the call to come and defend Hogwarts."

Hogwarts. The deadliest battle ever raged in the history of magic. "We got to the school as the shields were being put in place. It was decided among the unit that we had to split up. We did no good staying together. So we split. I fought in the court yard, the Great Hall, in the dormitories, in the dungeons. Everywhere. I don't know how many I killed and don't know how many times I was close to being killed. As I'm sure you remember, the battle seemed to drag on forever."

It did. It seemed as if it was never going to end. Adults and students were dropping like flies together. Soldiers from 11 to 111. "When it was over...well it never really ended did it? Even if the battle was won, the war was never truly done. And we haven't made it out from it's shadow yet." Timothy thought about the war and if he had ever seen Lyall. "Did we cross paths? I met so many, I don't remember. Did we share battlegrounds?"