Ben still didn’t like the idea of bringing Nora, but he knew better than to try and argue it again. Melody believed him, apparently, but she looked so shaken that he almost wished she hadn’t. And he knew her well enough to know that if she thought there was any chance she might not be coming back, there was no way she was going to let Nora out of her sight. Which meant if disaster did follow them, he would have to look after both of them, try and save both of them, not just Melody… but he still had to try. If he left her here and she died again, and he’d had the chance to take her away, he’d never be able to move on from this — it would always feel like her death was his fault. And if he took her and Nora away and the worst should happen he would still always feel like it was his fault — but at least then there was a chance that something would change.

“Alright,” he agreed. He had the impulse to reach for her again but knew he shouldn’t give in; grabbing her hand would only delay them in leaving, and he didn’t know exactly when it was supposed to happen. “Don’t bother with a bag, if it’s not already packed. It’s just until tonight.”

---

  

---

MJ made this <3

”Yeah, alright,” she agreed. There was little chance she'd return to the Abbott house if they were already at the cottage, but it wasn't as though the things left behind would be lost forever. The room Melody slept in was all but hers at this point, so she doubted the staff would even bother packing up her scattered personal items. Not if she was still alive anyway. If she died …

Well, if she was dead her personal items wouldn't matter anyway.

Melody left the room then and headed towards the playroom where she knew Nora was likely to be. After a quick instruction to Diana — don't let Henry leave your sight, I'll explain tomorrow. — she met with Ben again in the parlor to begin their trek back to the cottage.

The broom he rode wasn't meant to handle three people, that much was obvious in how it sagged near the snow banks that they hurriedly flew over. However, the road to the cottage was mercifully short and they were soon inside once more. After a busy few minutes of getting the fires going and ensuring Nora was warm enough in the nursery, Melody turned once more to Ben. “I - I don't know what to do now.” She confessed. Were they meant to just wait and see if she was to die today?

---

  

Ben certainly didn't know either, since he'd only come up with this plan twenty mintues ago and had yet to think it through, but he didn't want to admit that. He'd gotten out of his own head enough to notice that Melody seemed to be getting deeper and deeper into hers: she was functioning, lighting fires and getting the essential things unpacked, but she obviously had something heavy on her mind. And he couldn't really blame her, since at the Abbott house he'd told her he thought something bad was going to happen to her and then hadn't offered any explanation about what would happen or why he believed that. She must have been imagining a dozen worst-case scenarios by now. Maybe she was imagining things that might hurt her, or maybe she was imagining that something was wrong with him — flying here from Hogwarts, looking crazed, claiming something bad might happen. He knew it sounded crazy, and he wouldn't have begrudged her for thinking he was crazy. But he didn't know what to do about it, if she did, except wait it out and see whether or not anything had changed.

Well, if it hadn't changed, he knew one thing certainly: he didn't want to let her go without having held her again. "Come here," he suggested, holding his arms out for her.

---

  

---

MJ made this <3

Melody sank into the comforting touch of his embrace. Her heart thundered in her chest as she considered what was to come. Ben believed something was going to happen to her, something so severe he'd stopped at nothing to save her. The only question now was whether he had. Whatever danger lied at Diana's could just as easily find them here, and then what? How would Ben keep Nora safe if he was too focused on Melody's own safety?

"If it comes down to a choice, you choose her." Melody instructed from where her head was buried in his chest. Her tone left little room for argument, but that she thought Ben would ever side with her over their daughter. "Promise me that. She's the best of us both, you save her first regardless of what happens to me."

---

  

---

beautiful set by mj

Ben tensed, just slightly, but holding her close as he was she was sure to have noticed. There wasn't supposed to be a choice, because nothing had happened to Nora... nothing Diana Abbott felt worth including in her letter, anyway. Yes, he was changing things — trying to change things — but it was supposed to make things better, not worse. Nothing was supposed to hurt Nora. When he'd told Melody to consider leaving her behind he had never thought bringing Nora with them could potentially put her into danger, he'd only been thinking of the emotional duress of her being here if something happened to Melody. He hadn't considered what he would do in that eventuality, but as Melody entreated him to choose their daughter over her, a small voice somewhere deep inside him answered: No.

It was the grief talking, he assumed. Obviously he couldn't, not really. Melody would never forgive him, for one thing. She'd never speak to him again if she knew he'd had a chance and hadn't taken it. And he would have done anything for Nora, honestly. He already had chosen Nora over Melody in the past before, hadn't he? He'd gone to November after last New Year's and asked if he ought to divorce her, for Nora's sake —

(but maybe he'd gone to November first because he'd expected her to talk him out of it? And she had, in the end, so he hadn't actually had to go through with it —)

"It's not going to come to that," he said, pulling her tighter against him. "I'm sorry I scared you. You're safe. I promise," (a promise he had no power to keep, in the end —) "You're safe. We're all safe."

---

  

---

MJ made this <3