It was a hard thing to ask of anyone: a final message.  When his sister Eugenia had passed away a few years before[1], as hard as her death had been, at least she'd had a final few days with her daughter and son and husband.  Lucy Wold had never had the chance to say goodbye to anyone when she'd died her first death, and even though she'd gotten a shadow of a second chance, her second passing had come just as unexpectedly.

But that was what any of them faced.  Death could come in an instant.  Indeed, it could come in any instant: crossing a street or on a quiet patrol turned suddenly harrowing, tumbling down an unexpected trap door in a creepy Knockturn shop.  It was rare that one had enough warning to think about what kind of message to leave as a legacy.

"That's the trick with mortality, innit?" Jonas remarked, raising an eyebrow at Aileen.  "We always think we'll have more time."

At least in this instance, he could help bring a bit of closure.  It was hard to know, but the uncertainty was harder.  He'd learned that much after the war: not knowing which of his friends had survived and which had passed away.  It had been terrifying to take those first few steps to plunge back into the magical world, but it had been worse when all he'd had was his imagination.

He tilted his head to the side for a moment as he considered the best approach.  "I'll find out who's been appointed as the kids' guardian and talk to them first, unless you know," he said, with a glance to Aileen.  "I reckon they'll have the best idea of how to frame things for Lucy's children.  But I'll make sure the family gets word of what happened to her.  If her son witnessed the incident with you and the Dementors at the train station, he must have plenty of questions of his own."

1.	June 12, 2009 - You can shed tears that she is gone

Aileen nodded, lost in thought. Wesley must have questions. He'd asked questions after the dementor had vanished, when she'd been reeling and they'd all been distracted checking on the young students.

Who was it, what was it, he'd said something like that.

A patronus, Sulwen had finally answered, looking at her closely.

Her niece had been right by her side. She remembered that much, and their talk later when Sulwen had asked where the pentral was now. Aileen hadn't been able to offer a guess, hadn't even been able to explain who the pentral was or why the pentral had protected Wesley.

"Wesley's aunt and uncle adopted him and his siblings," she offered what little she knew.

His aunt and uncle were muggles, weren't they? She was fairly certain. Jonas would be the best sort to speak to them, having lived in both the magical and mundane worlds.

She imagined Jonas knocking on the door, sitting down with the family. Confirming that Lucy was dead. Confirming what they already feared, but no, it was so much worse than they feared, it hadn't been an accident, it had been murder, a violent murder, a murder that had trapped Lucy's soul, kept her locked up for years, and then when she was free, when she finally thought she was free, she'd found a person, and hid in that person, a person who was alive whereas she was dead.

Then Lucy had found her family, seen her son, seen him facing danger, one of the dangers she'd once fled, and she'd left that person, left life behind, to draw the danger away, to go... somewhere.

Aileen was still right here, part of this world, sitting across from Jonas, imagining how the Wold family was going to feel. Imagining the questions they'd have, so much more complicated and full of emotion than the simple questions her niece had asked her, so many more questions than the few questions the rest of her family had asked her, as they'd gathered around Abby, who had needed them more. Seemed to need them more.

Concealing the truth for her own sense of privacy seemed ridiculous at this point, after the family had been in the dark for so long. But please, don't tell them it was me, she wanted to say, she almost said. She took a breath, running a hand over her mouth.

"Jonas," she met his eyes. He'd understood so far, had treated her with the same courtesy he'd treated Lucy-Aileen.

"If the family asks, please tell them I'm not ready to talk to them yet. I don't have any words of reassurance, or answers right now."

Someday, she might.

Adopted by an aunt and uncle.  The boy’s story ought to have had a happier ending than this.  He should have discovered that he was the long lost heir to some great family legacy with laser swords, or that he alone had the power to travel between worlds to banish sorceresses and then wish his way home again, or even that his mother had been trapped for decades in a tesseract on a mission to save the universe.  But having your mother murdered and turned into a restless spirit was the saddest sort of family tragedy.  It offered the worst kind of closure, without even a certain end to Lucy’s story.

Still, it was the only sort of closure they would have.  Wesley and his siblings and the aunt and uncle raising them all deserved to know the truth. 

He’d been about to stand, to thank Aileen and offer some sort of quip to lighten the mood, when the former professor met his gaze and made one last request. 

Jonas paused, eyebrows raised, studying her for a moment. A few years ago, back when he was newly returned to the magical world and Aileen Reid had fallen into the role of a foil with her stolen magical dagger, he might have judged her for that.  She hadn’t asked for the responsibility of telling Lucy’s story or offering comfort to her loved ones, but Lucy hadn’t asked for the fate that had been delivered to her, either.  The least that the rest of them could do was try to do right by those more unfortunate.

But he hadn’t been through the trauma sharing his mind with another’s soul.  He wasn’t the one who had been forced to know Lucy and her tragedy so intimately, or to deal with the strain of his thoughts not being his own.  If he’d been in Aileen Reid’s place, with all of her history living up to this moment, perhaps he would have felt the same, too.

“Of course,” he said, flashing her a tight smile as he rose to his feet.  He extended a hand to her across the desk: a handshake, an offering of some shared understanding.  “And if anything else occurs to you, you’ll let me know, yeah?  We’re still doing our best to track down the Hunts.”