Shadow Walker
Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.
-Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"
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Every word you spoke and everything you said, everything you left me rambles in my head.
-The Killers, "Goodnight, Travel Well"
The sheer concussive force of the explosion flung Hermione to the ground, but she did not cry out when the jagged fingers of a broken tree branch clawed at her face. She scrambled back to her feet, dusted her hands off on the seat of her jeans, touched the bloody laceration lightly, and hissed. A high-pitched whine rang in her ears, and she shook her head as if to clear out the noise. She turned back toward the forest, and looked dispassionately toward the ballooning pillar of smoke and the rapidly expanding inferno.
There was a strange glint in her eyes, as the corners of her lips up-tilted. She kissed her bloody fingers toward the blaze, wondering how many of them she'd killed, hoping that it was the entire patrol.
You don't know who they were. There could have been people like Luna, like Parvati… people with families and small childr - Hermione squelched the voice fiercely. They were looking for me. They traced me back to this place. If they could have found me, they would have brought me in to Malfoy - or killed me; the outcomes are the same either way.
These people killed Neville, killed Ginny, killed Ron. They don't deserve my mercy.
Malfoy's henchmen had tracked her as far as the forest, but had found themselves unable to breach her wards. The forest was kept under constant watchful eyes, and while there were other avenues of escape Hermione could have explored, she chose instead the risky maneuver of dropping her wards, and waiting until they were upon her, before she blew up the cabin… with her pursuers inside. It had been as simple as a highly flammable potion used as an accelerant and an Incendio spell. Hermione had glimpsed Draco Malfoy's distinctively white-blond hair at the front of the Auror column, and had felt a ferocious satisfaction welling up inside her.
Good, she'd thought. Good enough, Lucius. I hope you hurt like I've hurt. I hope everyone you've ever cared about dies… Assuming you can care about anybody at all.
She knew it wouldn't be long before another squad arrived to check things out, knew the alarms would sound when the Stealth Owl never arrived with the younger Malfoy's report of Hermione's capture. She took a few precious seconds to Glamour her appearance, as she watched the forest be consumed like so much tinder. The Water Extraction spells she'd performed ahead of time were doing their job; everything was going up that much faster.
Harry, that other voice whimpered, very quietly. Oh, Harry, look what I've done. I miss you so much.
She Apparated to Godric's Hollow, and, deliberately chose a path that took her by the dilapidated remnants of the Potter house, though she would not look at it with anything other than her peripheral vision. Somehow, that house seemed to symbolize the sheer massiveness of everything she'd lost. And even though the day was warm, Hermione could almost smell snow in the air, feel her cheeks chapped with cold, feel her hand snugly in Harry's, as it had been that night where she visited his parents' graves with him. She walked unhesitatingly to the pair of marble stones labeled James Potter and Lily Evans Potter, and knelt before them. A waist-high obsidian obelisk was nearby - not Harry's actual grave, not the ostentatious marble display commissioned by the Ministry, but merely a memorial that she, Ginny, and Ron had had erected - but she could not look at it, not just yet.
"I'm sorry," she said aloud, but her voice was wobbly and broken, cracking between syllables. "I'm sorry that I could not save your son." It had been some time since she had visited, but she always felt compelled to apologize; she could not have explained exactly why. She shuffled on her knees, less than a meter away, and looked at Harry's marker. In Memory of Harry James Potter, 30 June 2001, "A three-fold cord is not quickly broken."
"Harry, I'm sorry." It seemed like apologies were all she had left. She had not saved anyone; she had not changed anything. "They're gone; everyone's gone - and I - I guess I really am a criminal now. I don't want to leave you… but there's nowhere left to go. My mum and dad will..." Her voice faded into a sob, and there was silence, save the wind in the tree tops. She reached out to caress the face of the marker with the tips of her fingers. "I love you."
She closed her eyes for a moment, as the slight breeze wafted forlornly through her hair, imagining that it was Harry touching her hand, her face, Harry's warm breath in her ear, promising someday without speaking a word. The ache in her throat grew to an almost unbearable pressure, and she wondered if anything would ever assuage the painful emptiness.
Finally, she leaned around at a slight angle, her hand resting against the top of the stone for support, to look at the side of the marker. Unobtrusively, beginning at the lower third of the obelisk, were two more names, finely -though hastily - etched by her own vine wood wand. Ron Weasley, Ginny Weasley, 26/4/02. And then, below that, more deeply inscribed, but nearly illegible, obviously driven by raw emotion were the words I'll Never Forget. She had no way of knowing whether the last Weasleys had lived beyond that fateful flight from the Ministry, but they had not been heard from or seen since, and even Luna at her most … persuasive… had been able to unearth nothing.
It seemed to Hermione that the searing acid of longing and loneliness surged through her with every pulse of her heart, and sometimes she wondered why it continued to function. It would be so much easier, she reflected, if the damned organ would just stop beating. She thought of just collapsing here, in the shadow of those who had loved Harry the most; she imagined lying insensate as the grass ruffled around her and her eyes sightlessly reflected the sky. She wished for it in the same manner that one might wish to win the lottery, when one has never purchased a ticket.
She couldn't imagine actively doing something to cause her own death. For one thing, it would please Lucius Malfoy to no end. And then there was Harry… his imagined reproach pierced through to the very center of her. Those eyes…telling her that everything they'd endured had been for nothing, that he'd died for nothing, that they'd all died for nothing… No, she had to take up the flag of their cause and continue the fight, for as long as it took, even if she was the only one left, even if the only thing she could do was spit in the faces of those who told her she was one of the untermenschen, and defy them by simply continuing to exist.
Slowly, she got to her feet, feeling as though she'd aged years in the small span of time she'd been kneeling. She kept one hand on Harry's marker for as long as she could, grazing it with her fingertips as she backed away, feeling bereft as the contact was broken. She took a deep breath, as if steeling herself for an unpleasant task, and then Apparated away with a small crack, not even taking the time to lower her outstretched arm.
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Hermione reappeared in a narrow cobblestoned alleyway between two nicely kept houses. Neither had windows facing the alley, and Hermione was confident that she had not been seen, as she pushed open the small white gate and entered the back garden. The back door was locked, so she rapped three times and waited, fingering her wand lightly where it rested up her sleeve.
Just as she was beginning to wonder if anyone was home, there was a rustle, the click of the bolt being turned back, and the rattle of the door handle being turned.
"Mum!" Hermione said joyfully, and threw herself into her mother's arms, almost before the door was fully opened. Mrs. Granger held herself stiffly, startled by the fervent embrace by an apparent stranger, before finally wrapping her own arms around her daughter.
"Hermione? This is a surprise. It's been so long. Why -?"
"I know, Mum. It's been too long. I - there's so much I need to tell you. So many things - " Her mother's comforting hands were stroking her hair.
"You've changed, Hermione …"
"The Wizarding world is not-it's not the way it used to be. I have to be careful, Mum. There are people… looking for me." Hermione did another visual sweep of the garden, before closing and re-locking the door. "Where's Dad?"
"At the office," her mother replied, moving into the kitchen. "Would you like some tea?"
"Yes, thank you. Why did he go in on a Saturday?"
"He had an emergency." Hermione waited for more details, but none were forthcoming. There was a soft clink of china, as two cups were set on the table. Something prickled on the back of Hermione's neck, and she swiveled in the chair to look down the empty, dim hallway. She turned back, feeling even more foolish with her mother's mild gaze on her. "Is something wrong, dear?"
"Everything's wrong, Mum." She struggled to keep her chin from wobbling as she spoke. "You know about - about Harry. I don't even know what happened to Ron and Ginny … and I - the Ministry wants to arrest me, and - "
"Well, you're here now. And your father will be so glad to have you home!" Hermione blinked at her mother's lack of reaction to the news about Ron and Ginny.
"Mum, I just wanted to see you one more time, to tell you I was okay. I can't stay." Her tone was one of stating the patently obvious, even though she'd only just realized that it was true. Her intentions had been nebulous when she Apparated to her childhood home; even so, whatever she had been hoping would happen was clearly a non-issue. The chasm between her and her parents was vast; turning her back on the Wizarding world would be turning her back on Harry. She could not do it. "They probably watch this place from time to time, hoping I'll come here. And after what I did today…" Curiously, her mother showed no interest in details, no maternal trepidation over what was worrying Hermione so.
"You can at least wait until your father gets home. He'd want to see you. I'm sure that it'd be safe that long, at least."
"I - I can't, Mum." Hermione couldn't keep the hesitant note out of her voice. How nice it would be to go to her room and burrow into her coverlet, surrounded by her old books and childhood things, knowing that her parents were there, and nothing could harm her. If only that were true. But there was no longer shelter or solace in this place. Hermione wasn't sure she'd be able to find it anywhere.
"Until your father gets home, Hermione. Then, you may go, if you must." Her mother's voice had a hint of iron in it, and it surprised Hermione once more. It had been quite a long time since she had been spoken to like that. "Drink your tea."
Hermione raised the cup to her lips, her feelings of unease a tightening knot in her stomach. The house seemed oppressively shadowy; its stillness foreboding rather than soothing. All the drapes were drawn, yet she could not shake the feeling of being watched.
She stopped, with her lips touching the rim of the cup, wondering at the unfamiliar smell of the tea.
"Is this a new blend, Mum?"
"Why - why yes, it is." Her mother stumbled over the reply, and Hermione replaced the cup in the saucer with a decisive noise.
"Mum, has anyone - " And then she heard it: the scuff of shoe sole against carpet, so softly that she might have missed it altogether. Without hesitation, she flung herself sideways out of her chair, hitting the ground and rolling, wand at the ready. A spell had barely missed her head, and taken out a cabinet or two, judging from the noise of splintering wood.
"Expelliarmus!"
"Protego!"
"Dad?" Hermione said stupidly, staring at her father, armed with a wand of all things. She had to dodge another hex before she could say anything else, diving for what cover she could near the refrigerator. The realizations were almost immediate and very nearly crippling. "You're not my father!"
"They did say you were the brightest witch in your year." It was not her father's voice. She fired blind, and heard him swear, as the Stinging Hex narrowly missed him.
"What have you done with him?" Her voice was almost unintelligible with rage and terror.
"I assure you, he is quite beyond your concern." There was a sob from behind her, from her mother. Hermione looked at her, startled, having thought if one was a Polyjuiced impostor, then both must be. Imperius, she realized, taking in her mother's motionless stance in the middle of a magical firefight. The moment of inattention cost her. "Expelliarmus!" Her wand landed neatly inside the vase of flowers in the center of the kitchen table. "Avello!"
The scream ripped from Hermione's throat, and she crumpled as the curse hit her. It felt like her skin was on the cusp of being forcibly separated from the sinew; it rippled and twisted, as if living things were writhing just beneath it. She realized she had fallen, when she felt her head smash against the Spanish tile; her sensory awareness was swamped beneath overwhelming pain.
"Stop!" Her mother's tear-clogged scream met her ears, as if from a great distance. There were sounds of wooden chairs scraping the floor and toppling over, the noises of shattering glass. Her assailant was evidently trying to reassert the Imperius curse over her mother. Quietly, she rolled over, blinking furiously to remove the points of light from behind her eyes, and saw her wand lying in a puddle of water, leaves, and broken glass. Breathing heavily with effort, she retrieved it and pushed herself to her feet.
"Leave my mother alone! Your master's quarrel is with me. She's nothing to you!" The man-who-was-not-her-father was fending off her mother with one hand, brandishing his wand with the other. Mrs. Granger was fighting him wildly; Hermione could not get a clear shot.
"Imperio!" He finally hit her, and her mother's features settled back into a placid mask. He flicked his wand in Hermione's direction. "Kill her."
Mrs. Granger moved toward back into the kitchen, removing a long knife from the block on the countertop with a metallic shhiing. Their attacker was flicking his wand back and forth, causing the older woman to walk in an odd pattern that kept her in - and him out of - Hermione's line of fire.
"M - mum?" Hermione could see tears streaming down her mother's cheeks, even though her eyes were impersonally cold. Hermione raised her wand, and it trembled so violently in her hand that she wasn't sure she could aim it with any kind of accuracy. "Impedimenta!"
Her mother was repelled violently in the opposite direction, as if shoved by rough, invisible hands. For a split second, her Polyjuiced father was distracted by the movement, and all Hermione needed was a quick Reductor at the ceiling.
There was a rumbling crash that quickly crescendoed to a roar, as the white plaster, followed by the attic flooring and stored items came raining down with an avalanche of force. White dust and insulation billowed forth, engulfing the room in a cloud and swallowing up their foe. For a long moment, there was utter silence. Hermione balanced on the balls of her feet, ready to move quickly should the fight commence again. She opened her mouth to speak, and was rewarded by choking powder, which coated her tongue and the inside of her mouth.
"Mu - Mum?" she said, in a dusty rasp. There was a moan in reply, followed by the rattle of sliding debris. "Mum, don't try to move. I'm coming." She slipped and slid across sawdust, random articles of clothing, and irregular slabs of drywall. Once she had moved closer, she could see the body of their assailant; his neck was bent at an unnatural angle and his gaze was directed over her head at nothing. She could muster up no emotion other than grim satisfaction.
Further towards the back of the room, she saw her mother, struggling to free herself from a pile of debris. Hermione was horrified to see that one of the ceiling beams had given way, and was crushing her mother's midsection. "Mum, please… try not to move."
"Your… your father - they - they killed him." Her breaths were coming in inadequate pants; her hands were scrabbling at the heavy wood with utter futility.
"I know, Mum. Wingardium Leviosa." The beam lifted, moved aside. The pain-wracked look on her mother's face eased slightly, but her breathing wouldn't regulate. Hermione moved her hands over her mother, frantically at first, and then more mechanically, as the reality of the situation set in.
"He - he would never - he would never hurt me - or you, sweetheart."
"I - I know he wouldn't." The tears were scalding her eyes, her cheeks, dripping down her chin and onto her fingers. How much could one person cry? How much could one person bear? Harry - Merlin help me, I'm not as strong as you.
"They did - they did something to my - to my mind. I - I tried to stop them - I wanted to warn you, but I - but I - "
"It's okay, Mum. I know you tried. It's okay."
"Are - are you in trouble, Hermione? Are they - are they going to come - come after you?"
"I can handle myself, Mum. Don't you worry about me."
"You're my little girl. Of - of course, I worry. `Smy job." Her breathing became erratic, with heaving, convulsive inhalations. Hermione noticed that the pupils of her mother's eyes were different sizes. When she leaned over to check her mother's head, her palms came down in something sticky and dark.
"I love you, Mum," she managed to make herself say clearly. "I'm sorry I - I wasn't there more."
"You- you were doing something important. Your father and I - always knew you would do big things. We - we always knew…" She suddenly stiffened, her facial features tensing. Her hand clamped around Hermione's wrist. "You need to go."
"Mum, I can't leave you here. I - "
"Please - please, Hermione. You must save yourself. There's nothing - nothing you can do - for me. He says you need to go - now! ."
Hermione stumbled to her feet, half-blinded and covered in dust. She tripped over a couple of smashed crates and nearly fell, a sobbed curse escaping her lips.
"Wh - who says, Mum? Who? What are you talking about?"
"Why, Harry, dear. Such a nice young man." Her mother's eyes were glassy and pain-dazed, with nothing of lucidity left in them, her voice slurred, yet her feeble hand-gesture made Hermione whirl, hoping against hope for some sight of him, even as she knew it was ridiculous. Her mother was dying, hallucinating; there was no rational reason she should -
Multiple cracks of Apparation, distant, yet all too close snapped her from her reverie. When she glanced back, she knew her mother was dead. She reeled from the realization, but felt no pain. The first hammer blow had fallen with Harry's death, had been fatal; these successive strikes were unnecessary, overkill as she staggered around, careening from one tragedy to the next, stunned and senseless, while Fate waited for her to give up and stop moving.
Sorry, not today. She maneuvered quickly around the rest of the mess, and slipped smoothly out of the kitchen door, breaking into a run once she cleared the steps. She vaulted the low stone wall separating their garden from the neighbor's, with one blood-smeared hand. She had just done so, when there was a surge of magic that rippled behind her, crackling at the ends of her hair. She had just barely made it outside the range of the Anti-Apparation wards. Before any Aurors could make it round the house, she Apparated away.
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She had not consciously decided where to go, but found herself back at Godric's Hollow, near the wall enclosing the cemetery. The Potter house, she knew, was just out of side around a bend in the footpath. The little hamlet was quiet, even sleepy, and she had the sudden stabbing sensation of being the only person left on the planet. If I just ceased to exist - right now - who is left that would even care? And her mother had seen Harry… yearning sliced through her, as if death were a reunion among old friends, to which she had not been invited.
Hermione Granger, you are losing your mind. Resolutely, she pushed thoughts of Harry, of her parents, of the Weasleys aside. She could not afford to let herself feel anything; if she did, she knew that she would crumble to the ground like a discarded cloak. She needed a new place to hole up, a new way to remain in contact with Luna, a new method to disperse her insights, to remind people of the Boy Who Lived and Lucius' true allegiances.
She let her gaze drag itself up the path to where it disappeared around an outflung arm of forest, beyond which was situated Harry's childhood home. They had stayed there for awhile, the three of them, during a phase of the Horcrux hunt: cold, wet, frightened, and miserable. The house was decrepit and leaky, which they tried to offset with a distracted Sealing Spell every now and then. Dumbledore was dead, the Ministry was less than accommodating, and Death Eaters had orders to lethally curse her and Ron on sight, and then escort Harry to his final destination. They had stumbled across a random patrol one evening, and it had turned into a brief skirmish. Clambering through the back door of Harry's erstwhile home, they had frantically erased all evidence of their presence, and hidden in the cellar. Hermione had Banished their research to a Muggle storage unit she had rented in her father's name for just this sort of eventuality, and they had crouched in the most shadowy corner, beneath the Invisibility Cloak, watching the half-flight of rickety stairs (the bottommost steps having crumbled into rotted splinters long before they arrived), and scarcely daring to breathe.
Hermione remembered how she had felt, with the dampness of the wall seeping through one side of her jumper, Ron all but sitting on her feet, and what seemed like blazing warmth, where Harry was pressed up against her on the other side. In the dark, she had groped for his hand, as Ron had reached for hers, and they had clung together, hoping that the imminent danger would pass them by. In the end, the Death Eaters had evidently been satisfied by the abandonment of the house, because they gave the utter darkness and broken stairs of the cellar only the most cursory of inspections. Thereafter, the Trio had blanketed the small town with layers of Detection Wards, and had slept beneath the Cloak each night, until moving on to their next Horcrux lead, two months later.
She cast a Disillusionment spell on herself before coming into view of the house, and hitched a jagged breath as she lifted her eyes and looked, really looked, at the old building. She waited for the expected pain to throb through her, and then did a careful perimeter sweep before entering through an already broken window. She wanted to leave the rotten door intact, so as to draw no undue attention to her presence. It was empty, derelict, forsaken, as it had been when she stayed there with her boys; dust coated the floors, and cobwebs festooned the ceilings and corners. The house was empty, as it had been three years ago - nobody had known who cleared out the house following the occupants' deaths, and where the furnishings had gone.
Hermione was careful to erase her footprints, and to touch nothing, using her wand to stealthily open the cellar door. She would feel more at ease down there, where she could control access, where there were no windows at her back or unused rooms where assailants could lurk. She leapt lightly to the mucky cellar floor, and risked a little wandlight to look around. It was just as bare as the rest of the house; they had been painstaking in their efforts to leave no trace behind. Even so, Hermione almost thought she could see the three of them, as they had been: herself, hunched over a leatherbound book in the corner, charmed quill taking notes on a roll of parchment affixed to the wall; Ron, with Extendable Ear in place, monitoring his brothers' Wireless program, and other news reports; and Harry, poring over their Horcrux notes, looking pale and weary, flashing a strained smile at some humorous comment from Ron. She could almost hear Ron's laugh, and she shivered, the loneliness pressing down on her as though she were entombed.
Entombed… The oppressive darkness came roaring back with the force of a tsunami. Mum, Dad, Harry, Ron, Ginny, MumDadHarryRonGinny … She had not gotten to say good-bye to any of them. She felt smothered, sluggish, spent, rent asunder; the weight of her isolation was crushing.
She eyed the door to the house, positioned high on the wall from where she stood, with trepidation. It was still too open, too assailable, not far enough in the bowels of the earth for someone Forgotten as she. She had made a circuit of the room, and was standing near a far wall, rolling her wand between two fingers, only half-listening to the click, click, click it made against the damp brick.
The noise made her think of Diagon Alley, and that made her look at the dreary wall in a new and different light. A new room, an invisible undetectable flat off the cellar… I would be hidden, I would be close to Harry, somewhere that once meant something to Harry…
She traced the outline of the bricks into the vague shape of a doorway; the mortared lines glowed briefly as her wand touched them, and she was filled with an odd sort of melancholy joy, as she struggled to salvage the tattered remnants of what she had left.
Everything that's gone… everything I've got left… it's all the same. Despite her earlier reluctance to even look at the house, it seemed appropriate somehow, to retreat here, in this place of Death, to mourn what was gone, what she would forever miss. And maybe, somehow, to fight those who had destroyed her life, to make those who had taken everything sorely regret the taking…
Harry, I'm here…
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Thanks to all of you who are still reading H/Hr. Maybe the `ship has sunk, but she was glorious while she was seaworthy! As long as there is still good H/Hr fanfiction out there, I'll keep reading it! You may leave a review on your way out, if you like.
--lorien
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