Disclaimer: Not mine; more's the pity.
Shadow Walks
My shadow's the only one that walks beside me
--Green Day, "Boulevard of Broken Dreams"
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Chapter Seven:
I wake in the night to find there's no one there but me.
--Good Charlotte, "Ghost of You"
Harry awakened with a startled, inarticulate cry at some point near dawn. The shadows in his room had eased, though the sun was not fully up. He felt grim dread settle somewhere around the region of his heart.
Today would not be a good day.
The sheets were twisted and tangled around his legs, and his pajamas were damp with sweat. He could remember vague pieces of troubled dreams, and the otherworldly laughter of Dolohov and Bellatrix Lestrange rang in his ears. There were disquieting images of Hermione, with Bellatrix's wand to her neck, and Bellatrix's hand snarled painfully in her hair, images that Harry knew his mind had invented as a new way to torture him.
He kicked at the sheets in irritation, and finally succeeded in causing all of the bedding to slide onto the floor in a tangled mass. As it hit the carpeting with a soft whump, he lay spread-eagled on the bed, staring dead-eyed at the ceiling.
He should get up. He'd need to be going soon.
Her eyes. Do they haunt you? Lost, bewildered, confused.
Bellatrix was right.
There are things worse than death.
Worse than death…
Harry sighed. That much of what Dolohov said was true, at least. There were things worse than death, like … like being left behind. The ache of missing Hermione, of not even having the stale comfort of having told Hermione how he felt about her, was like a hollow cavity gaping in his chest, a raw, empty, cavernous vacuum of nothing that would never be filled again.
She leaned in toward him, one hand on his shoulder. Her lips lingered only briefly on his cheek, innocent, chaste, inconsequential… There was a shine in her eyes, a hint of tantalizing mystery that perhaps he would be given the opportunity to solve. He had felt suffusing warmth rush up into his face. He smiled at her; his fingers reached down to tangle briefly with hers; his eyes flicked around the room to search for Ron.
It was nearly time.
He'd had no idea that her softly whispered good-bye would be the last words she would speak to him.
He sat up, pushing himself so abruptly from the bed that he had almost no idea how he'd gotten into a standing position. He abruptly wrenched open the door to the wardrobe, and snatched some clothes out of it without really looking at them.
Ron's snores still whistled softly down the hall, as he crept across to the bathroom. If he was lucky, he'd be gone before either of the other two was awake.
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When he emerged from the shower, there was a light on in the kitchen, and, though it was quiet, there was the unmistakable presence of another person. A look of chagrin crossed Harry's face, as he tucked his wand into his pocket, and his feet reluctantly propelled him toward the room with the teasing aroma of tea. Luna was going to try to pick his brain again, or insist that Ron go with him to Hogwarts, or feed him some more nonsense about the balance of the universe, and he was really in no mood to hear it this….
He stopped with surprise, as he saw Ron, not Luna, sitting at the small table, some untouched toast in front of him, as well as a thick mug of some steaming, viscous substance. Harry instantly recognized it as a Sobriety/Anti-Hangover potion; it was often Ron's breakfast drink of choice.
"Morning, Ron," he mumbled, moving around the counter, and heading for the kettle that was already steaming on the stove.
"Harry," Ron greeted, his eyes flitting nervously to his best mate, and then dropping again to the front page of the newly delivered Daily Prophet. Harry looked at the paper with annoyance. If the Prophet had already come, he was later than he'd thought.
He poured a cup of tea, and absently added milk and sugar without paying much attention to the quantities. The clock on the wall ticked loudly in the tense silence. He didn't bother with any food; he knew he wouldn't be able to eat anything today anyway.
"So, was it you?" Ron asked, and Harry blinked at the odd question.
"Was what me?" he asked, lifting the cup to his lips to take a careful sip of his tea. Ron didn't say anything, didn't even look at him, but instead held up the paper. There was a new headline, obviously added very late, since what had originally been the front page had been shrunk and shoved to the bottom of the page. Harry's eyebrows soared and he struggled to keep a bland look on his face.
"What makes you think I had anything to do with that?" he asked. Ron looked at him then, a piercing, knowing look that made Harry distinctly uncomfortable.
"How could it be anybody but you?" he asked rhetorically. "Look at the photo." Harry looked, bending forward to peer at it carefully.
"Sweet Merlin!" He breathed, barely audibly, setting his tea down so quickly that it sloshed over the sides of the cup. He hissed when some of the scalding liquid hit his hand, and blinked down at the headline again. Victory Square Statue Destroyed in Midnight Attack; MLE Has No Suspects.
The accompanying picture was of the remains of the statue, the sparkling fountain sullied and clogged with dust and debris. The pedestal of the names of the honored dead was intact, still in place above the filthy water, but the statue atop it…
The figures of Harry and Ron were gone, magically obliterated, handily relocated to litter the fountain and the once pristine garden.
But the figure of Hermione stood, alone, in the center of the pedestal, clutching her wand, book tucked forgotten under her arm, absolutely unscathed.
"Then it was you," Ron said, unnecessarily.
"I had a bad day," Harry replied, in a lame attempt to justify what had happened.
I can't even hurt an inanimate representation of her. I'm trapped, trapped just like she - he stopped suddenly, wondering what had brought on the idea that she was trapped. She's not trapped anywhere, Potter, he told himself sternly, in his best Malfoy impersonation. She's… and then the thought of Malfoy brought back the former Slytherin's tirade in the halls of the Ministry.
Malfoy has always had more mouth than sense, he thought. Keen on the concept of irritating, infuriating, and hurting Harry Potter, he had always had the tendency to reveal more than he should. He knows something, Harry thought, feeling suddenly more certain than ever. Tonks had arrived and stopped me; she told him to leave, but he had to say one more thing, that whole spiel about her eyes….why?
He chugged the rest of his tea, gasping a little as the heat poured down his throat, and set the cup on the counter with a decisive clunk.
"I've got to go," he said, dismissing the thought of Malfoy-esque conspiracies. There were other things required of him today, perhaps by no one but himself, but wasn't he his harshest master, after all?
"Listen, Harry…" Ron's voice was tentative, hesitant, and on any other day, Harry would have felt sorry for him.
"I can't talk about it today, Ron," Harry said, and the words came out more brusquely than he meant them. "Maybe - maybe tomorrow…" Ron looked crestfallen, but nodded, trying to blink away the obvious emotion in his eyes. "I'm sorry," Harry tried again. "I know you didn't - you didn't mean - " The muscles in his throat grew tense and painful. He lifted both hands heavenward in a gesture of supreme exasperation, and sighed. "I can't talk about it today. Tell Luna I'll see her tomorrow."
In a regal gesture, Harry had thrown his light cloak across both shoulders, and he exited the door with a rapidity that would have suggested that he was attempting to flee demons, if Ron hadn't already known that his best friend wasn't running from demons, but taking them with him.
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The air in Scotland was just balmy enough to be comfortable, but it was cloudy and not overly warm, even in June, Harry thought, as he strode through Hogsmeade. Most of the occupants recognized him on sight, and knew enough about his rare trips here to leave him unmolested. Yet there were still covert glances and murmurs; Harry could feel them prickle up his spine like dancing fingers. He was glad when he left the little town behind, and was striding toward the main gates of Hogwarts.
The wind snapped briskly at his cloak, as he strode up the wide, packed-earth pathway that led to the castle. He did not allow his eyes to linger overmuch on the grounds themselves, features of which were stamped indelibly on his memory as landmarks for an epic struggle. A struggle where he had won everything and lost everything in some kind of poor attempt at cosmic humor.
There, he thought, as he passed through the large school gates, is where a squad of Aurors was stationed, watching and waiting. They were all so sure Voldemort would try something on the last day of school, before everyone left. They were all killed, even the one who managed to get the warning up to the castle. Who knows how many lives they saved?
He couldn't help the tingle that started in his nose like a sneeze, but worked its way up into his stinging eyes instead, as he looked over the pristine grounds. They - like the very foundations of the old castle itself - seemed unchanged, but the perspective from which he viewed them was forever altered. He would never look at the turrets of Gryffindor Tower, the jaunty, flying pennants of the quidditch pitch, the pumpkin patch behind Hagrid's hut without thinking of her, and so there was no way he could regard Hogwarts, which he loved with a stirring that he felt in his blood, with anything less than utter torment.
There, he thought, looking by the tree that overhung the lake, that's where Justin Finch-Fletchley fell. Took four Death Eaters with him. And that is where Dennis Creevey was killed, after saving Ron from a curse in the back by Rodolphus Lestrange.
There, he thought, is where the Patil twins died. They were fighting side by side, and Parvati picked up her sister's wand when she fell. They said she fought double-wanded for twenty minutes before Bellatrix Lestrange finally killed her. Gryffindor indeed.
Dumbledore's tomb glinted whitely beyond that, but Harry wasn't ready to go there just yet. He had a specific ritual that he followed, and at precisely the same place that he always did, he left the path to cut across the stony slope to Hagrid's hut. Smoke chuffed cheerily out of the chimney. There, he thought, looking at the rickety doors that marked Hagrid's root cellar, Hannah Abbott hid seven wounded student fighters, guarding the door until she was hit with a stray Avada Kedavra. She saved the lives of every one of those students.
He climbed the worn stone stoop and knocked at Hagrid's heavy front door.
"'Arry!" Hagrid said with delight, though his eyes were subdued. Most of the fighters were on this day. It was the wizarding public, the ones who had not been personally touched by the Battle, who celebrated gleefully.
"Hallo, Hagrid," Harry said, trying to smile and not quite succeeding.
"Not goin' so well, this year, is it?" the half-giant asked. "'Eard `bout Ron. Bloody shame, that is."
"Yeah…" Harry said noncommittally. He did not want to talk about Ron. His gaze roamed over the interior of the cabin, which looked as rustically cluttered as it always had. Hagrid's beard was nearly completely gray, with the color starting to bleed into his hair, and he now all but dragged his left foot behind him when he walked, using a walking stick as big around as a troll's club. Generally, his cheerful nature seemed unchanged, and Harry envied him that, though he was all too aware what Dumbledore and Hogwarts meant to Hagrid.
Hagrid slopped some stew into a huge trencher, which Harry largely ignored except for poking a disinterested fork into it a couple of times. It actually smelled good, but Harry had had bad experiences eating on this particular day, and he did not try any. But Hagrid always served him some anyway.
He sat quietly while Hagrid ramblingly reminisced over the first years that they'd known each other, smiling or commenting in the appropriate places. They spent a good deal of time mocking the Dursleys, and Harry always teased him about Madame Maxime, with whom Hagrid remained fast friends. The stories got fewer and harder to find after Harry's fifth year. Buckbeak and Grawp were almost never mentioned, because Hermione was so entwined in their stories, and Harry's sixth and seventh years were too full of mostly dark happenings for friendly conversation.
After he'd exhausted these topics, then the Keeper of Keys and Grounds would turn to the War. He usually spoke mournfully of Dumbledore ("a great man an' a great wizard, none greater."), of Charlie Weasley ("no man ever loved a dragon more'n `e did."), of Filius Flitwick ("yeh wouldn't've thought such a little man could ha' fought off so many Death Eaters lon' enough for the Express ter get safely away wi' the young'uns."), and of the handful of classmates in Harry's year that had been killed in the fighting. Harry's face would get more drawn and gray the longer Hagrid talked, and when he could take no more, he would spring to his feet as if propelled by outside forces, and politely, but decisively take his leave.
"Good seein' yeh again, `Arry," Hagrid said sincerely, leaning against his doorframe. "We should do it again sometime."
"Sure," Harry promised emptily, knowing that once a year was all he could manage without coming completely unglued.
Once back on the grounds, Harry would make solitary visits to Dumbledore's tomb and the pitch, absently still marking places - almost against his will - where notable events - mostly losses - had occurred. There were a few markers here and there, but Harry didn't need them. The locations of the bodies were seared permanently into his mind, the stories told him by other fighters in horrified whispers recorded forever in his ears. There is where Seamus Finnegan died, jumping in front a curse meant for Dean Thomas, who was dragging an injured Ginny Weasley to safety. Dean and Ginny had gotten married last Christmas; he had refused to have a best man.
And here, he thought, leaning his cheek against the cool stone of Dumbledore's tomb, here is where I became a murderer. There was no sign of the furious battle that had taken place here, the scorched grass had grown back, the wand gouges in the marble monument had been repaired. And when he fell, when the last breath of life had rattled out of his lungs, I was glad….I was glad. I thought maybe it was finally over, maybe I could finally live.
What do you mean she's gone?
Harry hurried his stops, feeling out of sorts at the lateness of his start, as it had gotten his entire routine out of kilter. He also felt vaguely uneasy, almost with a sensation of impending doom looming over him, as if there was another shoe he'd been waiting on for five years, and it was about to drop.
The feeling only worsened as he extricated himself from the kitchens and Dobby's effusive appreciation of his visit. He tried to shake it off, but it intensified as his legs took him across Hogwarts' grounds to the spot where she'd fallen, already shadowed by the overhanging trees.
I asked her if there was anything going on between the two of you.
We were angry… I left her there.
When I finally got my bearings, she was gone.
There was no marker for her here. He had asked them not to erect one, unable to stand the thought of seeing her name etched into a shiny marble face, making the horror real, proclaiming to the world the permanence of her absence… as if he wasn't reminded of it every day by his own doing.
He stopped abruptly, as he saw a regal figure standing there, backlit by the afternoon sun. Anger flashed in his eyes at the thought of someone intruding on their time together, the only time he had with her all year long, but he forced himself to step forward.
"Good afternoon, Professor," he addressed Headmistress McGonagall politely.
"Hello, Harry," she said informally, and something old, tired, and sad glinted in her eyes, as it always seemed to when she looked at him. "I wouldn't have disturbed you in your … remembrances, but we've just had an urgent Floo call from Mr. Weasley. I thought you'd want to know."
Alarm slammed into Harry like a Bludger to the chest. Ron wouldn't have Flooed unless it was urgent. He knew, as nobody else could know, what simultaneous necessity and agony this day was to Harry.
"What's wrong?" he asked hoarsely.
"There's been some sort of attack - an attempted burglary - at the Ministry. Miss Lovegood's been injured. You can use the Floo in my office, if you'd like."
"Yes, thank you, Professor. I'll - I'll do that, but I'll just be a moment." His old Transfiguration teacher nodded sympathetically.
"Certainly," she said, and retreated away from him. He watched her in a dazed way, as she returned to the castle, and slowly dropped to his knees on the springy green grass.
"I'm sorry, love," he whispered, tears clogging his voice. "I'm sorry I can't stay longer. But Luna needs me, and I've got to go." He knelt there for only a moment, longing for some kind of communion, but finding none, and in that heartbeat when he stood to his feet, he felt as if, by leaving prematurely, that he'd abandoned her there himself. The perceived betrayal was so acute that he gasped in pain, and when he turned to proceed up to the castle, even though he'd only been kneeling a short time, his gait was that of someone who had lived seven or eight decades, rather than hardly more than two.
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AN: Wanted to get through the actual anniversary, but now things are going to start moving a little faster, with Harry starting to put pieces together…. Because of course, you know that the burglary at the Ministry is related!!
You may leave a review on your way out, if you like!
lorien
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