Fifty years of terror, six years of hatred and bloodshed, a half century of cousin fighting cousin, of purity and filth laying side by side - no simple declaration of victory, or defeat, could have healed such wounds that dragged both nation and her people to their knees. But, that had been our hope, our dream - all that kept our heads held high even as our children suffered within the age old halls of Hogwarts, as our parents struggled and strove to secure a brighter world and were left bleeding and weeping for their efforts.

Three generations knew fear, knew loss, and knew death...and we dared to believe that we could learn hope when all we had hoped for had been destroyed. A vision for a brighter future dashed, a vision for a peaceful future denied, who amongst us all can blame the other for their apathy now? Who amongst us can truly say they dare to hope, to dream, to strive toward the future that has been granted us by the Fates?

The war is over, the Dark Lord is dead, but the final price we paid, the ounce of flesh taken has left our nation a cripple. Our children died within Hogwarts' walls, the great doors now stand closed, her halls do not echo with the laughter of children free to learn and play - only dust gathers in the secluded corners, only rats scuttle about, catching the crumbs left behind by our dreams.

Our pride sought to rebuild once before, and now those fruits lie as ashes amidst land poisoned by magick most foul. A forest dense and evil covers even the ruins that we might have mourned over, those that seek that place, seek to touch their heritage and see the suffering of their fathers and mothers, they do not return - fate willing.

Diagon Alley emerges once more, though little joy bubbles atop twice shattered cobbles. We rebuild slowly, cautiously, and with empty hearts. Habit guides the brick layers, necessity directs the builders and still empty shells line that street while beyond it, Knockturn licks her rotting wounds and even the pickpockets and peddlers sit against broken stone walls, staring into shadows - fearful of what lurks just beyond the meager flames of street lamps.

Perhaps things would have been different, perhaps hope might have returned had, days after we announced victory, days after we cast off the coils of a snakes fear, our leaders not been slain by an unseen enemy who had grown bitter beyond the reckoning of orphans and widows. A fell blow struck in the final hours, the government destroyed just as chins had begun to lift and see the new dawn rising.

Now, England floats adrift with no hand upon her rudder, no steadying eye to guide nation and battered people to a safe berth. Where we should be building, we weep over weed-infested graves, where we should look up to the sun, we scuttle into holes and sniff at the ground for the scraps left to us. Those that have stepped up to the helm do so because nobody else cares enough to, they cannot be blamed for the apathy that leaves them sitting behind desks that should be filled with public mandate and opinion.

Across the sea, our allies dust off and look to offer us aid, their motives distrusted, our friends spurned by our fears of their corruption. We have lost so much, we cling now to rags and rotting tapestries. Our enemies, our lovers, compatriots and foes...all have become the same as we seal ourselves in this hole and burrow more tightly around the ruins, clutching even more tightly to what is left - perhaps we hope to wring water from the stones, perhaps in some sense we still dream and hope and strive while scrubbing at stubborn bloodstains.

Perhaps.

Legacies left to us, the werewolves we must accept strive to carve a life for themselves and their new kin. Perhaps it is a sign of the time, perhaps it is bitter resentment for their work, perhaps it is fear for some new, rising threat amongst us...but they are dying. Murdered beneath the full moon that promises them freedom and release from doubt, murdered beneath the moon that shows them for what they are.

Law is upheld by a vigilant few, but there is no true court, no Wizengamot presiding over charges, no prison to send the criminals to. Those that strive are few and far between, those that care scream out in frustration at empty halls - but their voices are echoes. Our children are dead, our parents are dead and now there is no longer an enemy to rally against, now we know loss, now we know grief, now we must face the ruins left behind and remember all that we failed to do.

All empires fall to ashes, but then, from ashes Empires may rise. Chins may not be held high but grim determination sets mouths in firm lines. We, they, strive for something though none have courage to admit it. We have memories, we have stories and while sombre minds turn away from flights of fancy, they turn to the one thing that is truly left to us.

We are alive. We have endured and we will live on and for now that is, has to be, enough.