Disclaimer: They belong to JKR, I'm only playing.
***
--Chapter Sixteen--
When he wakes up the next time there's pounding rain, all other noises suspended in its steady hissing in the deep black of night. Why do I always wake up in the middle of the night? He watches the window for a moment, listening to the different demands the rain makes on different surfaces. Someone's left a plate of sandwiches and a bowl of cold soup on his bedside table and he reaches for them gratefully. Mouth crammed with corned beef, he flexes his back and arms; still stiff, but not painful. In front of the bathroom mirror, he resists the urge to turn around and peer over his shoulder but fails; then steps into the shower in a hurry, swallowing repeatedly. The water pools round his feet, faintly coppery, carrying flecks of dark matter.
When he's dressed and ready, he strips the bed. The sticky smell of potion lingers even after the bedclothes have all been bundled away into the hamper.
Outside, the brightly lit corridor is empty. He pauses, uncertain. The hospital light has inflated the house. Were the corridors always this wide, the stairs so spacious? Surely there never were this many rooms, a door at every third step, round every corner? He steps up to the banister and looks down. A couple of mediwizards bustle in and out of rooms, their faces grey. Through an open doorway, he spots Sally talking to a Healer. He wonders if she'll be around once he's spoken with Ron and Hermione. It might be a good idea to catch Scrimgeour at home, without the armour of office.
Or it might not.
His feet take him to Buckbeak's room. The room's untouched; the dusty heart of the house throbs only with the streetlight. Someone's brought his bike back. The rain's loud here, the window melting, the murmur of activity below subsumed into the greater silence of the downpour. Hedwig's empty cage stands on an old wardrobe.
He's only just sunk down onto the bike, shadows warm around his shoulders, when he hears footsteps at his back. A second later, the door pushes open.
"Harry!"
She rushes around the bike, and his knees and arms pull her in.
"Oh, Harry! Ron, he's up here! How are you feeling? You should be in bed--oh, let me see your back…your skin still looks too pink! Does it hurt? I should've brought more of the ointment from Healer Smith. I wonder if Janice or Martha might have some left…"
Her hands cup his face. She's trying to do everything at once; talk, touch, fuss, worry, stare at him like she hasn't seen him for weeks, months. To make matters simple, he kisses her.
She makes a small sound of protest, but her own body doesn't listen, tumbling into him, immediately pliant.
Then she begins to cry.
"Hermione, what--"
"You just burst into flames, Harry!"
"I know, I…I'm sorry--"
"Oh, don't be silly, it wasn't your fault--"
"Yeah, okay then, don't cry Hermione--"
"You burst into flames and--"
"I promise to never do that again--"
"It's not funny!"
"No, of course not, I only meant--Hermione, shhh, come on, look at me, I'm okay now, see, I'm fine…"
He strokes her hair, kisses her tears and tired eyes, the skin around them still a bruised red from inhaling smoke. She even smells a bit like smoke still. He lifts a corner of his shirt and wipes away the tracery of raindrops on her forearms.
"Are you really okay?" she whispers.
"Yeah, I promise. Still a bit wooden, but that's all. I've even had some food."
His earnestness teases a small, very wet smile. "What about you? How are you?" he says, but she doesn't reply. She touches his cheeks, lips, eyes, pushes his hair back from his forehead, then with a great sniffling sigh drops her face into his shoulder and her arms around his neck.
"Cut it out, cut it out. I'd like to keep my dinner down."
Ron rattles in. There's a small commotion in which he knocks over Hedwig's cage while reaching for a crate to sit on, and Hermione's attacked by a fit of yawning. Patiently, Harry answers questions about his health and asks after the state of affairs outside. Ron catches Hermione's outbreak of yawning. Harry looks at Hermione perched on the bike and trying not to slump against him, and Ron's pale face, and takes pains to point out the obvious; that they should get some rest. Both decline loudly, eyes shifty in that way when they've been talking about him in his absence.
He sighs.
"Don't look at me like that."
Ron looks at Hermione, then back at Harry. "Like what, mate?"
"Like you think I'm about to go do something really stupid."
Ron rubs his nose. "Are you?"
Hermione sighs. "Ron."
Ron shrugs. "All right, I'm shutting up. Go on Harry, put us out of our misery and just spit out whatever it is you're about to do."
"What makes you think I'm about to do something?"
"Oh, come on."
"Ron, just let him talk."
"Well, tell him to talk then."
"I'm going to see Scrimgeour tomorrow."
The room falls silent.
"And?" says Ron.
"And I'm going to ask him if I can still be an Auror."
Silence again.
Then Hermione begins patiently. "Harry--"
He stalls her. "He hasn't been stood down already, has he?"
"I don't know, we haven't heard anything, but--"
"Hear me out, all right? Hear me out and tell me if either of you have a better idea."
He twirls the double-faced talisman still tangled around the handlebars of the bike. The rain drums steadily.
"When I was in Diagon Alley that day, you know, in the middle of that fire, there was one time when I…just couldn't do magic." He looks up at their faces, then gives the talisman another tug.
"Not the way it's been so far, not magic with a wand, but I was trying to pull someone out with a wandless spell and it just didn't work. Has that happened to either of you?"
After a moment, Ron shakes his head. "I can't remember the last time I used wandless magic. Never learnt it properly when they were trying to teach us during the war."
"I haven't tried anything really strong," Hermione shrugs. "Nothing as big as putting out a fire like that."
Harry nods. "I mean, it's irritating when the odd spell fails, but this was different. I've had trouble with all sorts of magic with my wand, sometimes Lumos wouldn't work and that sort of thing, but I've always been able to do wandless magic. So, when I couldn't all of a sudden, it felt really strange. Almost frightening. Like--I don't know--like trying to speak without a tongue or something like that." He looks towards the window.
"And it felt real. I know all this time Sally's been talking about magic failing, and I've come to believe her, but this was the first time I actually felt it."
Hermione reaches into her pocket absently and brings out a piece of paper that looks like an old train ticket. He watches her fingers worry the ticket into bits.
"I don't think we have a lot of time left. I don't think I have a lot of time left, even if I could dig up the last dregs of magic wandlessly, as Sally says. So I…I want to use up whatever time I have left to right some of the stuff that I've put wrong. No, Hermione, it's true. Don't you think Scrimgeour's got a point? London wouldn't have burnt the first time if it wasn't for me, and it wouldn't have burnt the second time if it wasn't for the first time. I am really--" his eyes dance around the room unseeingly, fingers clutching the bike "--sick of having this over my head. I can't undo what happened, the first time I ended up doing…this, but if I don't do something while I can, I don't think I can live with myself."
Drawing a deep breath, looking up, his heart pauses for a fraction. Masked with exhaustion as their faces are, they can't hide fear from him, their fear for him. He clears his throat.
"But I'm not going to just walk in there like some sacrificial lamb. He's going to have to agree to certain…terms."
Hermione curls her hand around the shredded ticket. "Like what?" says Ron.
"For starters, he'll have to face up to facts about magic. I want him to promise me he'll do something about it. If there is no way magic can be saved, then there should be something done about that, about the people. Hermione, don't look like that--I've done a lot of thinking, I've had four days to just lie there. I can't do much about what's happening to magic, if there's anything that can be done. The Ministry can. They have centuries of magical knowledge at hand, they have experts, they have international bodies or networks or whatever you call it to ask for help… pretty much everything that you need, to do something about something this huge.
"Beyond that, if I somehow learn to use wandless magic to…to the best of my ability, to the last drop, then I can lend a hand to put London back together. That way the Ministry will at least have an olive branch to offer the Muggles. That could be a first step. Don't you see? If that problem isn't fixed, we're not going to be able to carry on with what little magic we have, to find out what the hell is happening to magic. Either we'll be slaughtered out of existence or we'll have to go into the worst kind of hiding ever!"
He's sitting so far forward that he's tilting the bike, Hermione with it. He's surprised at his own lucidity; is this how it works when people make up their minds? Settling back, he wishes they would speak now, tell him it's a terrible idea and get it over and done with. And then what would you do? He rubs his eyes and pushes his glasses back. The window continues to melt, the glass caught in an endless spin of change.
After a long silence, Harry gives up.
"Look, I know you both think it's a bad idea--"
Hermione turns around suddenly, rocking the bike a little, her foot hitting the fender.
"Harry, Scrimgeour tried to sell you out! You're going in there with the best of intentions but they're not going to play fair!"
"Don't you think I know that?" He stands up and looks at them in turn.
"Can't you see? This is something that has to be done with the Ministry no matter how twisted the whole lot of them are! There's no Dumbledore anymore to look ahead and see what no one else can see and--and…orchestrate things. Nearly all the older members in the Order are gone. Something really big is happening to us, something bigger than ever. I don't know how to stop it, I don't know if it can be stopped. Look, I didn't pull this out of a hat--I've thought long and hard and this is the only thing I can think of. If you can come up with anything better, go on!"
He strides to the window and glares at it. The room seems detached from the rest of the house, beaten off somewhere else by the deafening rain.
Ron drums fingers on the edge of the crate. "What if Scrimgeour's been stood down already?"
"Well then, I'll talk to the Wizengamot," Harry snaps over his shoulder. "Kicking off Scrimgeour isn't going to solve anything. He's an idiot but he shouldered this whole mess all this time, didn't he?"
Hermione's foot hits the fender again. She's going to break the damn thing. "'All this time' has only been a few weeks, Harry. Before that he just stood back and watched while somebody else did his work for him. And he didn't stick with it out of the goodness of his heart, but because he likes being what he is--the Minister."
Pressing his palms flat against the window, Harry feels his skin recoil at the cold, almost as if from heat. He walks slowly to the far corner of the room, trying to pick out and name everything that he bumps into. Chair, chair, mirror. Two crates, broom, broken ancient footrest. He knew it wasn't a very clever idea, didn't he? He wasn't expecting them to agree, was he? Then why does he feel so let down?
The simultaneous rapping at the door and window startles all three out of stillness. Hermione throws the window open and a soggy Hedwig topples into her arms, a soggier newspaper tied to one leg. Harry opens the door to Nick.
"Hi Harry."
Without meaning to, Harry looks at Hermione. She pauses only for a second. Hedwig hoots, the paper drops, and Hermione returns to the bike without a glance towards the door.
Nick shifts on his feet. "I hope you don't mind…the nurse, I mean, the mediwitch said she saw you heading this way."
Harry doesn't think he's ever heard Nick speak so hesitantly.
"Hey Nick," says Harry. "How are you feeling?"
"I'm fine. Thanks for asking." He takes a stab at mirth. "Don't be put off by the bandages, they're just to keep the wind out." A pause, a half-done gesture. "Hi, Hermione."
She doesn't look up. Harry sighs.
"Come in."
Nick starts at the soft snap as the door falls shut behind him.
"Look, I just came here to say…I'm really sorry." His eyes are on Harry, but Harry doesn't think the rushed words are meant for him.
"I never knew Fergus was part of that…group. He and a friend of his wanted to see Diagon Alley. I had no idea they had it all planned. I mean, he seemed rather disbelieving when I told him about Hogwarts, I don't know if you read the paper…anyway, it seems they were ready for weeks. I took them in, and before I knew it, it was too late. I swear! I really--I never meant to harm anyone. You have to believe me!"
Ron fishes the dripping copy of The Quibbler with his crutch. Hermione's hands preen through Hedwig's plumage, the owl cooing at the drying charm. Nick raises a bandaged hand to his mouth.
"I…it's this ring, you see. It makes me talk too much, makes me say things I don't mean to. I wasn't going to tell Fergus anything about the fire but once I started to tell him what I knew about…your world, everything came out. I know you warned me--"
Hermione laughs. Hedwig hoots and flaps her wings.
"Oh, for crying out loud, Nick. You don't need a stupid ring to make you talk."
The tip of Hedwig's wing catches Hermione on the chin. A shower of feathers drift to the floor. When Nick speaks again, his voice has changed.
"Well, maybe if you'd taken the trouble to tell me, I wouldn't have gone asking other people, would I? "
Ron looks up. "Hey--" he begins, but Nick ignores him, making his way towards the bike. Harry steps close to Hermione.
"Does it come with magic, Hermione? This secretiveness? It is after all a mark of your kind, isn't it?"
After a long pause, Hermione shakes her head wearily. "Nick, you still don't understand, do you? This is the very reason we've stayed hidden for centuries! You should never have written to Scrimgeour--"
"No, of course not! I finally dragged it out of you why you could never show me your homework, and I was supposed to just put it out of my mind and go on? What would you have done if it was me? Writing to Scrimgeour was the only way--"
"Yes, and now you've fallen into his trap and messed up everything!"
"I didn't fall into anyone's trap--"
"And why did you let them burn Diagon Alley? If you wanted me and Harry, you knew where to find us!"
"You and Harry? Why's that?"
"Oh, stop it Nick. I've had enough of your games."
Nick laughs suddenly, head thrown back. "Oh, I see." He raises his hand to his mouth again.
Harry takes a step up. "All right, enough Nick--"
But Nick disregards him. I could stop him, Harry thinks, but doesn't do anything.
"Contrary to what you think, Hermione, the world doesn't revolve around you and your Harry. Fergus doesn't care two hoots about that, about the two of you. You mean nothing to them! Can't you see? In their eyes they've been duped by the whole lot of you! As far as they're concerned it's not one person who's responsible for the way their families died--that would be too easy--but it's the scale of this…this whole thing!"
No laughter on his face now, he looks at all three of them in turn. For a second, Harry's thrown by how similar Nick's brown eyes are to Hermione's when in a rage.
"Don't pretend that you're some trodden-on, persecuted group of people with no alternative but to hide! You people have this enormous power at your beck and call and what have you done with it all this time? Have you ever thought it might be useful for anything other than sweeping the yard? No! It's always been…your property and the only thing you've ever done that made it felt was blowing London up!"
"So you think they were right to set fire on us?" Ron's halfway up on his feet.
"No! I'm saying maybe it's not such a bad idea that your stupid magic is running out!"
"Yeah? Well, thanks for you opinion, now get out!"
"Ron! Stop it! Nick--wait! How did they get the fireworks?"
Nick turns around, the door half open. He looks at Harry, shuffling his feet. "I showed a couple to Fergus weeks back. He has a little sister, and ever since their parents died she's been very…odd. She loved them, the fireworks. So he asked if he could have more."
"And you had no trouble getting them at all, of course." Hermione scoffs. "I'm sure even Scrimgeour couldn't have thought of a more perfect plan had he tried."
Nick takes a step back inside the room. "For the last time Hermione I have no idea why you're going on about Scrimg--"
"He set up one of his cronies to tell you the full story about the Incinerator, he knew that you'd blab to all your Muggle friends--"
"None of Scrimgoeur's cronies told me anything!"
"Right. What a clever boy you are. You found out all by yourself, did you?"
"Hardly." Light shifts at the doorway. "I told him." Fred steps in, scans all their faces and slips his hands in his pockets.
"He thought it was an interesting story." He lifts a thin shoulder. "Anyway, Nick, come along now, Healer Periwinkle's worked himself up to a right state because you weren't in your bed."
For a long moment there's only the sound of the rain. Hedwig flaps up to her cage, still moulting all over the room. Fred returns all their looks without flinching. Finally, Nick turns to Hermione. "Look, I really am sorry, Hermione. I know you thought I was always a little pest, always asking questions about this and that--"
She brushes at her wet clothes absently. Her shoulders are rounded, her face hidden. "Do you understand, now? Yes, it comes with magic. I couldn't tell you I was a witch, I couldn't tell you about magic, do you get that now?"
"Oh, it wasn't just about magic. I'm sure you could have found a way to talk to me if you wanted to."
There's no edge to his voice but a gravelly agitation. Then the words fall from his mouth like he's someone else's mouthpiece, someone a lot younger, someone who couldn't lie or dress the truth. "You had cooler friends. So you didn't care about who you had at home. You went on for hours about them, to you parents. Yeah, I listened, you didn't know. Always Harry this and Ron that and…I mean," he stabs a hand in Fred's direction. "He doesn't mind me. I can't be all that bad, can I? I've known him barely weeks but he treats me like f--"
Fred grabs Nick by an elbow. "For crying out loud, the first chance we get, you're going to get that stupid ring removed! How many times did I tell you to get that done before all this shit happened? It's called a Silver Tongue for a reason, you dingbat!"
*
Their voices trail away and the door shuts with a creak. There's nothing to say all of a sudden. Harry sits down on the bike and his arm winds around her waist. After a moment of struggling against his warmth, she gives up.
"Nick's an arsehole," Ron offers succinctly. "So's Fred."
She is tired. Almost queasy, and cold now too: her clothes are drenched all over. She could use the same drying charm she used on Hedwig, but Harry's got her hands in his and that feels better than anything. She makes a small sound and bites her trembling lip, tilting her forehead against his cheek.
"And you know what else, Hermione?" continues Ron. "It's natural you talked about us all the time. You did spend a lot of time with us and anyway, you had much more of an exciting time with us, didn't you? So I'm not surprised you wanted to talk about your brave, adventurous, funny, good-looking, interesting best friends. What do you say, Harry?"
She laughs to make them happy. Ron grins. Then he looks away, fingers drumming again on the crate.
Was it ever possible to do the right thing? Nick isn't easy to tolerate, everyone knows that. She was never unkind to him, was she? Nick's been in and out of their house for ages, but after she went to Hogwarts, she rarely saw him. When she did, she had a secret to keep. It wasn't hers to give away, was it? It involved a whole world.
And at Hogwarts she met another boy, almost like Nick but not quite. Nick's parents had died in a motor accident when he was little, and until recently he lived with his father's sister. With a sinking feeling, she tries to remember if she'd ever mentioned that to Harry and Ron. It seems suddenly terribly important she should have. How could she not? Such a simple thing really, could come up in the vaguest conversation.
But isn't that the point? Nick never came up in your conversations. He was just…there.
So is this my fault too?
Harry's arms tighten around her, as if he could feel what she's thinking. No one speaks for a long time. Nor does anyone seem keen to leave despite the combined exhaustion heavy in the room. Ron's voice reaches her from faraway.
"Hermione," he begins cautiously. "I was just thinking that maybe Harry's got a point. About the Ministry, I mean."
The drenched newspaper on the floor has a picture of Hogwarts, before and after, on the front page. It's the Special Edition of The Quibbler Luna and her Dad were working on, the day she went to see Sally. How long ago that seems. How much more real. She looks at Ron, trying to focus her thoughts. His fingers pause on the wooden crate, then begins again with a different tune.
"If it's not Scrimgeour, it'll be some other nut job. What's the use of that? Might as well keep him, at least we know what his tune is, we can work with it. What's more, this way, Harry can have Scrimgeour eating off his palm."
"That's blackmail, Ron."
"No, it's not."
"Yes, it is. You can dress it up whichever way you want but if Harry tells Scrimgeour he'll get him off the hook if Scrimgeour does as Harry says, that's--"
"A good bargain. Hermione, listen--"
Harry interrupts. "Look, we should do this later. And I never said I want Scrimgeour eating off my palm." He gets to his feet, tugging her hand, flashing Ron a look. Ron shrugs, unabashed. Then he yawns loudly and scratches his head.
"Well, I reckon we should call the Order back together."
In the flickering streetlight tossed everywhere by the rain, she looks at Ron.
"Yeah," she says slowly. "I think we should…"
"Then Harry doesn't have to do this alone," Ron presses on. "Besides, I don't trust Scrimgeour so I reckon we should have a back-up plan if things go pear-shaped. The Auror department is pretty much useless anyway. With all this stuff going on, I'm sure the Order can do a better job."
She sits up. "Yeah. Whoever's up to it in the Order could be trained to do wandless magic. That way London could be sorted out faster. We might be using up magic faster, but if it's going to stop anyway might as well use it for a good cause."
"Well, I suppose we'll have to get the Ministry to approve that sort of decision," adds Ron.
"If they don't?"
"We'll go ahead anyway. When has the Order ever listened to the Ministry? Hermione, there's a time and a place to be honourable but--"
Harry interrupts. "You can't teach everyone wandless magic. They'll be in danger. There's a thing called extraction, remember? And anyway, who's still left in the Order?"
She raises her eyes at him. Every time she looks at him, she still sees how he fell, flung by the fire. So she has to blink, clear her eyes and see him as he is now, light on his feet, and straight.
"Out of those…alive, your Mum's not what she used to be, Tonks isn't herself, Fred hates the sight of us, Ginny's leaving, and you, you two--"
Ron raises an eyebrow. Time quickens. "What about us, Harry? Do you think just because I'm lame I'm incapable?"
"No! That's not what I meant--I just didn't know how you felt, and you--" He turns to her. "I thought you didn't want to have anything to do with magic anymore."
He says it too fast, like it didn't bear telling. She looks away. How final the rain seems, as if intent on making an undeniable point, as if it wanted it all done and over for all time. Her heart beats fast. She clasps her hands on her lap.
"Well, needs must when the devil rides."
She knows she's blushing now. "I went and spoke to Healer Bellamy today. He still had one internship spot open, so I…signed myself up for it." She shrugs, trying hard to be casual. "It'll be very busy, I still want to do Muggle school, you know, but I'm sure there'll be time to…to do work for the Order."
She stamps her foot on a feather on the floor that flutters and flutters in a breeze she can't see. Harry remains standing. Ron thumps his crutch on the floor.
"Brilliant, Hermione! I knew you'd come around! I bet Bellamy's on cloud nine right now. It'll be a wonder if the poor old codger doesn't conk out of happiness!"
"Ron!" She grins. She steals a glance at Harry and finds she can't bear the expression on his face. Slowly, he walks up to the bike and sits down next to her. A little far, as if he wouldn't dare come close, he might break it all apart again. He looks so young, like they were starting all over again, back in the train to Hogwarts. She bites the inside of her lip to keep it from trembling. Scooting up close, she slips her hand in his. Shoulder to shoulder, palm against palm. A strangely shy kiss lands offside her cheek. In the dim distance, Ron clatters to his feet, remonstrating loudly, incomprehensibly.
"Oh no, don't start getting all lovey-dovey, wait till I'm out of here! Honestly, we need some ground rules here, all right? Number one, how about, no snogging when our best friend in the world, Ron Weasley, is around. It's like watching my parents doing it!"
Hedwig hoots sleepily, shuffling her feathers. The rain continues to shimmer at the window. Ron voice fades, the door closes. Then there's only the two of them, she and her Harry.
--end chapter sixteen--