Author's Note: Liked the idea of a Marriage Law, so tried to give it my own take.
Oh and none of these people are mine…
What Might Have Been
Chapter Nine
Ginny looked a little taken aback by Harry's intensity, "About what?" she asked.
"About all of it. What has Hermione talked to you about? What are people saying about the Marriage Law? About Ron and Hermione?"
"Where have you been?" Ginny's voice held a hint of teasing.
Harry was not in the mood for it.
"I've been in here since classes were over," he said with a scowl. "People were starting to get on my bloody nerves."
"Well, they're excited," Ginny said apologetically. "Most people think it's kind of romantic. You know, two best friends, secretly in love, forced into an arranged marriage, as he tries to save her from the evil Slytherin…" She stopped, when she saw the shadow of pain dull his green eyes, and winced at her own insensitivity.
"Yes, well…they haven't got it all correct, now do they?" he whispered hoarsely. Ginny gazed at him for a moment, her brown eyes shiny with compassion.
"Why didn't you tell anyone?" She asked simply. "Why didn't you tell Ron?"
"I dunno," Harry replied, with a shrug. "I guess, for a while, we were just seeing what would happen…it was like a big, lovely secret. Just us. We wanted to tell Ron…in fact, we were going to tell him, but that was the morning the scrolls came." Just two days, Harry thought, and it seemed like a lifetime ago. Ginny seemed to read the bleakness in his expression, because she patted him on the back gently. He leaned his head on her shoulder. "When did you talk to Hermione?" he asked, after a moment of silence.
"After dinner. She asked if I'd seen you. She looked…sad…and tired," Ginny said thoughtfully. "Kind of like you, actually."
"I thought I could do this, Ginny," Harry said, although seeming to speak half to himself. "I thought I could watch this happen, because it…Ron… would be best for her. She could keep her life; she wouldn't be in danger…I don't know if I can do this. I don't know if I could give her up." His voice was desperation itself. "Surely something could be done…there's got to be something."
"He is in love with her, you know," Ginny said gently, her eyes never leaving his face. Harry met her gaze, grim-countenanced, and nodded.
"I suspected something like that," he said quietly.
"They could be happy," she said, biting her lip, her voice tentative, almost making it sound like a question.
Harry mulled it over. He could see that. Hermione and Ron, living somewhere near the Burrow, with a couple of brilliant little red-headed kids. Ron would be working for the Ministry, and Hermione would have a job doing potions research, or something like that…and they would have big family dinners on special occasions…and maybe, sometimes old lonely Uncle Harry would stop by…
He gasped, sucking air in loudly, with the pain of it. He looked at Ginny again.
"What about me?" he asked evenly. "It sounds awful to say out loud, but what about me? Haven't I given enough, done enough? My entire life, everyone I've ever loved has been taken from me…now that Voldemort's dead, shouldn't it be enough? When do I get my chance?" His voice cracked in despair, and he was startled to realize that there were tears in his eyes. He tried to blink them back, embarrassed.
Ginny sat in silence for a long moment, eying him as if there were something she wanted to say that he might not want to hear.
"I suppose that you and Hermione could just go off together somewhere…America maybe," she said slowly.
"But?" he prodded, with grim amusement.
"But…I mean, have you thought about what you could do if you stayed?"
"What I could do?" Harry's voice was bitter.
"Harry, you could have a lot of influence here. You're the bloody savior of the wizarding world," she flung her hands wide, theatrically.
"Could I get this law rescinded?" he asked, shreds of hope creeping faintly into his voice.
"I doubt it," Ginny replied, matter-of-factly, "not while the Ministry's in bed with the Purebloods." Harry suddenly remembered Ginny's grim pronouncement on the train to Hogwart's. The Ministry can still be bought with enough galleons. Even from Azkaban. "Dad says most of the Ministry is pretty upset with the law; even Amelia Bones said she doesn't know how it got passed. But the people that complain…you know, out loud…well, they get transferred - or canned." Her expression turned apologetic, "Dad needs his job," she said. Harry waved away her apology with his hand.
"Nobody's blaming him, Ginny. So, what do we do then?"
"You could - we could…well, we could try to … you know, obey this law on our own terms. Like Ron and Hermione. She would have had to marry Malfoy otherwise. You know how the Slytherin Purebloods are likely to treat any Muggle-born or half-blood wives."
"Like breeding slaves," Harry said darkly.
"We could stop that….I mean, we could at least try. You have Grimmauld Place. We could help them escape, or help them make other marriages. There are other good Purebloods…like Neville, or - "
"What about you?" Harry asked suddenly.
"Me?" Ginny looked confused.
"You're a Pureblood witch. What happens to you?"
"Oh," Ginny shrugged. "I have to marry a half-blood or Muggle-born, I suppose, after I'm of age. I have more options than Hermione does."
"Why?"
"Because there are more half-bloods and Muggle-borns than there are Purebloods," Ginny said. "Although, Hermione's so high-profile, what with helping you kill Voldemort and all, that she could have had any wizard she wanted, if Malfoy hadn't..."
"Bought them off," Harry finished gloomily.
"What about you?" Ginny asked, nudging him in the ribs. "You're the Boy Who Lived. You're going to be able to have any witch you want." Harry had not thought of that before, and the prospect filled him with dread.
"No I'm not," he corrected her. "I'm not going to get the only witch I want." Sympathy flooded Ginny's face again, and she sat with him in silence for quite some time. "We ought to get the D.A. involved in this," he said suddenly.
Ginny looked at him, startled, until she realized that he was talking about her idea. She let out a cry of delight, and threw her arms around him. He allowed the embrace, patting her on the back, and felt himself smile for the first time in several hours.
"I should go talk to Dumbledore," he said. "Do you want to come?"
Hermione dashed to the front window of the Burrow, and watched Harry walk, his back hunched slightly under the weight of his knapsack. The wind was blowing briskly, and his hair was flying straight back like a black banner over his head. She splayed her hand out against the window, her breath fogging the glass, as she watched him go.
And somehow this was harder than any time he'd left her before.
He reached the gate of the rickety fence that surrounded the Burrow, and she watched, with a sad half-smile, as he wrestled with the stubborn catch, finally resorting to kicking it open. He stepped outside the gate, and shut it gently behind him.
At that point, Hermione knew, he could Apparate away, and she leaned close to the glass, not wanting to blink for fear of missing his departure.
He stiffened suddenly, as if he had heard something, and turned back toward the house, brushing his hair impatiently out of his eyes.
She saw him see her, standing there in the window, one hand upraised. Her very posture was one of supplication…please don't go…
He raised one hand, not quite waving it, but obviously gesturing farewell. He shouted something at her, but the wind tossed the words away, and Hermione couldn't make it out. She pelted toward the front door, and flung it open.
"What?" she called, desperately, frantically, foolishly. "Harry!?"
He had Disapparated.
Hermione was sitting on the sofa of the Head common room, staring sightlessly into to the flickering flames. She was curled up under a blanket, and there was a cup of stone-cold tea sitting on the table beside her. She wasn't sure how long she'd been sitting there.
Her eyes drifted up to the flower pot on the mantle. I could just Floo away, right now. Get to my parent's house, catch a plane…go to Australia or America…
Even as she concocted these hasty travel plans in her head, she knew she wouldn't go through with them. She couldn't leave…couldn't leave Ron…couldn't leave him. She thought of Ron's face, as he handed her the family ring this morning, twisting the unfamiliar object around her finger as she did so. He had been so hopeful and nervous…almost the same way he had acted when he asked her out earlier that year.
Then she thought of Harry's face. The unbelievable agony on his face had almost been enough to bring her to her knees. She had watched him, her heart crumbling into pieces, as he brought a mask carefully over his real emotions, watched as the pain in his eyes became shuttered.
"Congratulations," he had said, smiling. Oh, Harry…
She twirled her engagement ring round and round, pushing it with her thumb. Her eyes were glazed over, filled with tears that did not fall. Flames glowed orange and gold and yellow-white before eyes that reflected them, but did not really see.
"Harry…" she murmured brokenly to the empty quiet common room. And it was a sigh and a wail and a plea…and a thousand other things that she would have to turn away from forever. She wondered if perhaps it would have been better to have continued to love him, unrequited, unobserved, without ever knowing that he loved her back. She would have been able to love Ron, marry Ron, and her love of Harry might have faded as a delicious, but unattainable dream.
But, no…Her face crumpled in anguish, and she pressed a blanket-wrapped fist to her mouth, not wanting to give rise to the sobs that clogged and tightened in her chest. She had known the reality of Harry's love…still knew it, in fact. She had seen the light in his smile, the glow flaring from his emerald eyes; she had felt his arms around her and his lips on hers; she had heard the low, impassioned words for her ears only. She wound the blanket more tightly around herself. That was hers, at least, hers alone, and she would not relinquish it. No one could make her do that.
The portrait hole opened, with a slight squeak, and Hermione straightened slightly, blinking back the dampness in her eyes and composing her features. Harry, Ginny, and Ron were the only students besides herself with the password.
"Ron," she said, managing a smile that she hoped looked natural.
The lanky redhead smiled when he saw her, and moved across the room to sit beside her on the sofa. His eyes searched hers briefly, and then flitted to her left hand.
"Do - d'you like it?" he asked, almost shyly, and Hermione wondered if they'd ever have a natural conversation again.
She extended her fingers to look at the ring. "Yes, I do, Ron. It's lovely."
"I expect Charlie and Fred and George will be getting married before too long, but," and here his grin was impish, "I asked first." She smiled again, but quickly grew serious.
"I - I wanted to say thank you," she said softly.
Ron looked at her in a bemused way. "For what?" he asked, his voice light. Her brown eyes were solemn and dark, with pools of light in them, reflecting the glowing fire.
"You know what. If you hadn't….if I…Malfoy…" she stammered incoherently.
"Don't thank me, Hermione," he said, with a half-grin, "it kind of ruins it." He looked down, self-consciously. "Besides, I - I - I wanted to." They glanced at each other for a moment, before Hermione's gaze returned to the firelight.
"Been quite a day, hasn't it?" Ron said congenially, after a moment.
"Yes," Hermione admitted, "it has been that."
"You'd think nobody had ever gotten married before."
"They're going to be affected by this law too," Hermione predicted darkly. "You'd think they'd be more worried about their own futures."
"They think it's romantic," Ron countered, with a shrug.
"They haven't had to -" Hermione realized what she was saying, and blundered to a ungainly halt. Ron looked at her sharply, but said nothing, reaching over instead to take her hand in his. He tilted her chin toward him with one finger, forcing her to look at him.
"I'm sorry, Hermione." He saw her swallow hard, and she looked at him almost fearfully.
"Whatever for?" she asked, her voice rising a little. Her heart was pounding double-time.
"That this is happening this way." He lowered his hand from her chin, but his eyes did not leave hers. "That you're not getting the proposal of your dreams, the wedding of your dreams, and the m - the man of your dreams," he muttered the last part, hastily and in a low voice, finally dropping his gaze.
Hermione started. He looked at her again, and her dark eyes were questioning. How long have you known?
"It's pretty obvious, isn't it?" Ron spoke in an odd mixture of anger and sadness.
"But you would do this," she flung out her left hand, gesturing toward her engagement ring, "anyway? Why?"
"Do you really have to ask that?" Ron said, incredulously, his voice soft. Hermione darted a glance at him, and flushed a deep red.
"It's not very fair to you," she mumbled twirling a lock of hair around her finger.
"It saves you. It saves H - him. You should have seen him; he's been a wreck from worrying over you. He knows I - I'll - "
"Yes," Hermione said in nearly a whisper. "He knows." She cleared her throat, and continued. "What do you get out of it?" she asked, almost rhetorically, afraid to hear his answer.
"I get to know that I helped my two best friends out of a jam," he said, shrugging, trying to lighten up the moment, but his blue eyes remained dark and serious. "And - and - I - "
Hermione knew then what he was going to say, and put two fingers over his lips. "Don't say it," she pleaded, her face anguished. "Please…not…not right now."
Ron looked crestfallen, but his eyes were looking over her face with concern.
"Whatever you want, Hermione, but just know that I do." She nodded, and tears began to fall in earnest.
"I know," she said.
And then he held her while she cried over the injustice of it all.
TBC
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