Chapter Text
They call him the Grim.
That’s the nickname given to the faceless soldier that’s single-handedly bringing the Order of the Phoenix to its knees.
Some debate if he’s human at all, some speculate that he’s something cross-bred with several dark creatures. Either way, he’s a product, a recent… development, that emerged from Voldemort’s side of the war and practically fights for their cause on his own. He does the Death Eaters’ jobs better than they ever managed, so well that they rarely even have to lift a finger anymore, much less a wand. To them, to Voldemort, the Order has become little more than an annoying insect buzzing around their ears. Hardly a problem to worry about anymore because the Grim is getting rid of them, swatting them away with ease.
It’s fitting, James thinks. The nickname. In the form of a giant black dog, the Grim is a very well-known, very well-recognised omen of death in the wizarding world. And it’s perfect for the soldier because, if one were to see him, that means it’s already too late. It means a swift death is likely seconds away.
The Grim is Voldemort’s attack dog— another reason for the name. He kills like it’s all he was ever trained for, as if his sole purpose is to serve this war. He doesn’t hesitate, he doesn’t question anything, he just fulfils his orders and permanently disables any opposition. More than a human, a dark creature, or even a soldier, the Grim is a weapon. A deadly efficient one.
In the few short weeks they’ve known of his existence, he’s become infamous among the Order for annihilating its members.
James hasn’t glimpsed the soldier for himself, but he’s heard the stories from other Order members— from the traumatised ones that barely survive to tell them. No one can make out more than a shadow of a man dressed in all black. He’s impossibly powerful with insane instincts, completely untouchable, and he doesn’t carry a wand. He doesn’t need to. They say they can’t even see the magic come off of him; the spells just hit their target, invisibly and silently, usually with fatal consequences. The only way to survive the soldier is to hope he saw someone else first and immediately escape.
In what James imagines were the testing stages of the new weapon, it was rumoured he killed Order members as well as the Death Eaters that accompanied him. Now he supposedly shows up alone. Alone and certain to destroy anything with a heartbeat.
Most people are terrified of the Grim, very few are fascinated—some are a mixture of both—but Benjy Fenwick is currently crossing the line into obsessed.
He and James are staking out Mr. Mulpepper’s Apothecary in Knockturn Alley, a sound amplification spell casted on the shop so that they can hear what kinds of potion ingredients known Death Eaters are buying, a scribbled list of their findings laying on the table in front of James, and Benjy is relentlessly chattering on about the soldier.
It’s late—or early, rather—and the cobblestone street around them is empty, the last few straggling shoppers disappearing into the shadows. It’s dark and quiet and James is about to call it quits for the night. He’s sick of sitting at this rickety wooden table outside of a dingy pub, and he’s more than ready to go home and see his girlfriend. The Apothecary hasn’t had any business in an hour, and other than the nonsensical muttering of the shopkeeper inside travelling through the spell, the eerie silence around them is only broken by Benjy.
“He’s young— if he’s from Hogwarts then we probably know him,” he goes on, still picking at the chips they ordered almost two hours ago.
“How do you know?” James humours him. He’s drawing hearts in the margins of their parchment, which Moody probably won’t appreciate when they turn it in. Not that Moody appreciates much of anything these days.
Benjy pauses, almost seeming surprised that James finally responded. “Know what?”
“That he’s young,” James clarifies. He doesn’t look up, focusing on scratching different patterns within his hearts. “No one can see his face, not completely. He wears a mask, doesn’t he?”
“Well, yeah… But he’s tall. And he’s got dark hair and moves so fast. Diggle said that he heard from Bones who heard from… someone else, I can’t remember, but they said when the Grim took out Gid and Fab, he was practically a blur— they didn’t stand a bloody chance. And you know how tough they were. I couldn’t imagine them being taken out by a swarm of Death Eaters, let alone one.”
James hums, not really wanting to discuss the ambush of the Weasley twins that ended in the total mutilation of both of them. How they were almost unrecognisable when James was asked to help identify them; chests shredded into ribbons, limbs ripped off. The bodies left behind are how the Grim sends messages— or, one message, really. A warning to give up the fight. The incident is relatively fresh, having happened just three weeks ago, and Lily says that their older sister Molly still breaks down into uncontrollable tears whenever she goes to visit her.
“And I’ll bet the Grim has something to do with Dearborn’s disappearance, too,” Benjy says bluntly. Caradoc Dearborn never came back with his designated portkey last week after a solo mission in Glasgow. Now every Order assignment is supposed to be done with at least two people— though James suspects that’s less about safety and more about a better chance of at least one survivor to report what happened to the other. That’s basically all their side does anymore: report the deaths and disappearances of their friends and colleagues.
James thinks that most of the Order would say that the war slowly crawled up on them. They would say that, in the beginning, they fought because they felt like they were obligated to, because it was the right thing. It was a duty. A necessary call to serve. Then the war rose to their necks like an inevitable high tide, and the reality of life and death warfare didn’t truly hit them until they started to breathe in the water.
And they’re all definitely breathing in the water now. The Grim is pushing their heads beneath the surface, forcing them to feel how real it is if they hadn’t already. With him, Peter predicts the Order will be entirely wiped out by the end of the year.
But the war didn’t sneak up on James. In fact, he can pinpoint the exact day that the idea of death and loss became horribly, excruciatingly real to him. He knows what it feels like to have someone he loves ripped from him unexpectedly and unfairly. He’s familiar with the devastation the same way he’s familiar with cursed open wounds.
Since then, James has held on to everything he has left until his fingers bled because he’s known from the beginning just how easily it all can be taken from him. He still fights the war, he dedicates his youth to it, he sacrifices his life for it, just hoping to make an impact. To prove that taking what isn’t theirs, that destroying lives, has consequences. And despite everything, he’s hoping they can turn it around and have a chance for a future afterwards. A chance to mourn and move on. A chance to live without the constant fear that more of his friends could die at any given second.
But a happy ending is looking less and less likely as the Order struggles and Voldemort’s side thrives. The Death Eaters have more than double their numbers, practically unlimited funds and supplies, public support via terrorising wizard society into submission.
And James is getting tired. He’s losing his motivation in the bleakness of it all. He misses what he’s lost, the pain of it seared into his very being, and he constantly wonders if it’ll ever end.
“There has to be some way to beat him, especially if he’s human,” Benjy ventures, still talking about the Grim, oblivious to the fact that James has stopped contributing. “Everyone has a weakness— something he cares about, that we can use against him. Or some spell to slow him down and give us half a chance at fighting back—”
Benjy’s words are cut off as James is sprayed with something wet and hot, making him shout in surprise and stand up so abruptly that his chair is knocked to the ground, clattering on the stone. He thinks Benjy’s spilled his drink, that he must’ve burst the glass with accidental magic or something because it’s everywhere. James’s shirt under his robes is soaked, he wipes his eyes and spits out a horrible coppery taste, sputtering with it.
“Fuck, mate, what the hell happened—”
With the flickering light of one of the torches sticking out of the pub wall, James can see his hands. His fingertips are red where he had swiped them over his eyes. Red so dark it’s almost black. It’s warm and thick, sticking to his skin, coating his face.
It’s in his eyes, it’s in his mouth.
James gags and stumbles backwards, hitting into his overturned chair. He presses the back of his hand to his mouth to fight the immediate urge to be sick. He looks up, looks for Benjy, but Benjy isn’t there.
His seat is empty, blood is splattered all over the pub windows and across the stone street, resembling a gorey, horrific painting. Their chips are drenched like Benjy poured sauce on them. James can feel the wetness slowly sliding down his face.
“Oh, fuck— oh, Benjy,” James chokes on the realisation. Benjy’s gone, Benjy’s what’s all over him, all over the window and the table and the chips. The blood that had been in his body, pumping through his veins, is layering the cobblestone and dripping down James’s neck. A living, breathing, solid person reduced entirely to liquid.
James scrambles for his wand on the table, which hadn’t been spared, the handle of it slick with blood, and he quickly raises it, switching the amplification spell for a shield charm. Just in time, too, because he feels the vibration of magic bounce off of it.
It’s half a second later, before James even has the chance to think of apparating, that the shield is dissolved and James’s wrist is twisted so that his bone snaps, sending white hot pain shooting up his arm and forcing him to drop his wand.
He falls to his knees, partly because of the pain and partly out of instinct, and he scrambles under the round table, tucking himself beneath it and hopefully out of the line of fire. He looks around desperately for his wand in the dim light, lifting a bloodless section of his robes to press it against his mouth in an attempt to muffle his rapid breaths.
He needs his wand, he needs to apparate. Lily’s at home waiting for him, Remus and Peter are expecting him for dinner tomorrow. None of them can afford to lose any more.
James doesn’t need any further confirmation that it’s the Grim, he knew it when Benjy burst into mist without a single sound or a flash of magic, but he wraps his good hand around one of the legs of the table and leans back and forth in hope of catching a glimpse of the attacker. He at least needs to know which direction to try to run if he can’t find his wand.
He sucks in a breath at the sight of a pair of black boots walking towards him, the steps slow and sure, echoing in the quiet of the alley. He can’t see further than the pair of equally black trousers tucked into them— which look surprisingly muggle-like, almost as if they’re part of a uniform.
James shuffles around, wincing when he bumps his injured hand, pressing his lips together to stifle a whimper, and he decides to do something stupid on the off chance that it’ll buy him time to get his wand and escape. He’s crouching beneath the table, ducking to fit, with one hand pressed flat on the underside of the top, the muscles in his legs straining.
When the Grim is close enough, four or five strides away, James propels himself upwards and uses all his strength to launch the table directly at the soldier. The cheap wood crashes into his chest and knocks him off balance, sending him stumbling sideways.
It’s enough to distract him from his current mission of murdering James.
James whirls around, searching frantically for his wand, his swelling wrist cradled to his stomach. Fear has made a home in his throat, curling around his windpipe.
He’s going to die, he doesn’t want to die. He’s going to die, he doesn’t want to die. Those two thoughts trip over one another inside his head, creating the deafening buzz of pure panic.
Just as he spots his wand, an invisible force shoves him from the back, wrenching him from his feet and pinning him against the section of brick between the windows of the pub. It holds him there, pressing like it might push him through it, and James manages to turn around to face the Grim, grunting with the effort. The magic crushes his chest so that he can barely expand his lungs, his toes graze the ground as he tries to flail and free himself.
The Grim approaches, dressed completely in black like people said, and when James raises his eyes to meet the soldier’s, he’s barrelled over with an agonising pang of nostalgia that he can’t identify. They’re silver, the colour brought out by the black smudged around them like poorly done makeup, on his eyelids and beneath his lashes, smeared to where a mask sits on the bridge of his nose. The mask covers the bottom half of his face, wrapping all the way around his jaw and disappearing behind long black hair on either side, making his eyes the only notable feature. Framed by the shadows, his skin is so white it’s almost translucent.
James hasn’t heard all of these details about the Grim’s appearance, which means anyone that gets to look this close doesn’t live to share them. But something’s off. In the back of James’s mind, he’s begging everything to slow down so that he can figure out what it is. Because it’s important, it means something.
But he doesn’t have the time, the Grim isn’t slowing down as he walks closer, eyebrows low over his eyes like he’s pissed about having a table chucked at him. And James is sure it doesn’t help when he pulls his legs free of the binding magic and bends them at the knee to plant his feet hard into the Grim’s stomach, making him double over.
The spell breaks and James drops to the ground, landing unsteadily on his feet. Physical attacks seem to throw the soldier off, who’s probably so used to having magic casted at him, so used to relying on his own, and so James leaps forward, throwing his arms around the man and fighting him the muggle way. He can’t let him have a second to think about magic, not until he’s able to grab his wand.
The Grim struggles in his grip, gloved hands pulling at his arms, and James twists so that they both stumble and fall, crashing to the stone street. James rolls over, digging his knee into the Grim’s stomach so that he releases a punched-out breath, and his fist swiftly connects with the side of the soldier’s face, right beside his eye. It’s with his nondominant hand, his left, but it’s still hard enough to hurt. If the recipient is human, that is.
The Grim makes a low growling noise, sitting up for a responding attack, but James headbutts him, his forehead smashing into his covered nose. The soldier shouts in pain—so he’s at least a little human—and James inhales sharply, pain of his own throbbing inside his brain. But the Grim seems shocked, as disarmed as he might ever get, his hand raised to his mask.
James doesn’t waste any time, pushing his knee off of the soldier to stand and spinning to run for his wand. He’s almost there, he almost makes it, when he trips over his fucking chair, nearly blind in his desperation. He lands hard, so much pain exploding from his wrist that he almost blacks out, but he gets back to his feet, not willing to lay down and die, and he lunges for his wand, curling his fingers around it.
He doesn’t know why he hesitates before apparating, he doesn’t know why he glances over his shoulder instead of escaping. But… the Grim should’ve gotten him just then, when he tripped. That extra heartbeat should’ve cost James the rest of them.
He sees the soldier standing, his hand still raised to his mouth and nose, patting them and checking his glove, looking like he’s never seen his own blood before. His mask is off, abandoned on the ground by his boots, letting James see the profile of a face he’ll never forget. The one he sees every time he shuts his eyes. It’s been years, a decade, but he recognises the slope of his nose, the line of his jaw, the shadows beneath his cheekbones— no longer that of a teenager, but painfully, achingly familiar. It’s the half of himself that he’s been missing.
James can’t breathe, he can’t hear anything past the thrumming of his heart in his ears. He can barely force a word through his closing throat, where every emotion possible has suddenly lodged themselves. “Padfoot?” he says, little more than a whisper.
The soldier turns. Metallic grey eyes that James would know anywhere look at him without a hint of recognition, their gaze narrowed maliciously as he growls, “Who the hell is Padfoot?”
He charges at James, and the fear of the Grim, of the deadly weapon customised to kill him, instantly overtakes the paralysing shock of seeing his best friend— more of a bodily reaction than an actual thought process. He grips his wand tightly and spins on the spot, leaving Sirius behind.