A/N: Hello again! I don't usually update this quickly (as anyone who has read my work already knows), but the story is chugging along pretty nicely (hurray!) and I'm about to start another week of school (ugh), meaning that there will be some work going on but probably no updates for a little while. So, please enjoy this chapter and, if you have the time, please, please leave a little note before you go!
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Recap from Chapter 2:
"Harry?"
He froze in his tracks. Oh, no. It couldn't be. Not now.
"Harry!"
He took a deep breath, trying to make himself look a whole lot calmer than he really felt, and turned towards the source of the voice.
"Hey, Hermione."
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"Harry, what on Earth are you doing out here?" Hermione asked as she hurried to his side. "I've been looking for you for ages, I- What's wrong?" she asked, concern darkening her expression.
"Wrong?" he asked, pretending that he didn't know what she was talking about. "Nothing's wrong."
"You're lying," she said simply, and he felt intensely guilty.
"Hermione…"
"What are you doing out here?" she asked again. "You can't be thinking of giving yourself up," she said worriedly. "You're not, right?"
"Hermione…" he said again, not sure of how to get himself out of this one. He didn't want to have to tell her where he was going, but he had a feeling that she would drag it out of him in the end, even if she had to do it by force.
His one-word response seemed to be enough for her. Her eyes widened, shock replacing the worry on her face. "No!" she exclaimed, causing Harry to jump a little. He watched as shock turned to anger on her face. "Harry Potter, I am not going to let you-" she began fiercely, but he cut her off.
"I have to do it," he said quietly. "I don't have a choice."
"What kind of rubbish is that?" she demanded. "I don't know what kind of sick joke you're trying to play on me, Harry, but it isn't funny!"
"I'm not trying to be funny," he said. "And I'm not joking."
"Then what are you talking about, saying you 'don't have a choice'?" she asked angrily. "You're honestly trying to make me believe that you have to just walk in there and-"
"I'm a Horcrux, Hermione," he said, cutting her off again.
She blinked in surprise, evidently forgetting that she was angry with him. "What?"
"I'm a Horcrux," he repeated. "I have to die." The words came so easily that it scared him. "Voldemort can't be killed while I'm still alive."
He seemed to have rendered her speechless. She looked up at him with those widened eyes again, her lips slightly parted, as though she wanted to say something but didn't know what that something was.
"I'm sorry," he said sadly. "I didn't want things to have to turn out this way. But I have to go," he said, more to himself than to her. "No one will ever be able to get rid of Voldemort if I'm alive. Not while a part of his soul still exists inside of me."
"B-but-" she stammered. "But you can't, I mean- There must be something we can do to- You can't honestly have to-" She fell silent, looking at him with a helpless expression on her face. She was begging him to tell her that he was lying, he thought, asking him to change things somehow, and he couldn't do that for her. Unless he lied again, of course, but he couldn't-and most certainly wouldn't-do that to her now. He wasn't checking out of this life with a lie as his last act.
"This has to happen," he said softly. "I'm sorry," he repeated.
Her mouth opened again, as though she wanted to argue with him, then closed. She looked away for a moment, her eyes darting frantically over the expanse of grass at her feet as though she expected to find some sort of solution hidden amid the soft green blades. Apparently finding none, she finally turned her gaze on him again, and he took in the sight of her tear-filled eyes and her quivering bottom lip for only a moment before she threw her arms around him, burying her face in his shoulder.
"Don't, Harry," she whispered tearfully. "Please don't… We'll- we'll find some other way, okay? Just wait a little while longer, we'll find another way to make it right…"
He sighed softly and wrapped her in a snug embrace. "I wish I could do that," he whispered back. "But it isn't going to work this time, 'Mione," he said sadly, affectionately shortening her name as he slowly swayed from side to side in an attempt to soothe her. "We've already learned every way to destroy a Horcrux, haven't we? No matter how it happens, the end result is always going to be the same: I've got to die."
She sniffled and tightened her grip on him to the point where he thought that had Voldemort come and shot his trademark green curse at them, Harry's soul wouldn't have gone anywhere.
"Please…" she whispered desperately.
"I don't have a choice," he whispered back. "I never would have let it come to this if I did." He held her for a moment more, then gently pulled away, cupping her face in his hands. It felt strange, but it was the last time he would ever get the chance to touch her, and he intended to make the most of it. Leaning forward slightly, he kissed her forehead, his hands quickly becoming damp with her tears.
"I'm running out of time," he murmured. "I have to go."
The sound that she made in response could only be described as a soft sort of keening. It hurt him to hear it.
"You did everything you could." He had to find some way to help her, something to say that would ease her pain. "I want you to remember that there was nothing else you could have done to keep this from happening. Can you do that?"
She nodded, more tears spilling from those chocolate-brown eyes.
"Good," he said, pulling her against him one last time. "Could you…" he started, unsure of whether or not he should ask what he wanted to ask. "Could you tell Ron the same thing for me? Please?"
"Of course," she replied, tearfully and sincerely. "Yes, of course."
"Thank you." It was becoming hard for him to keep it together and he decided that he needed to go before he broke down. Pulling away, he gave both of her hands a firm squeeze.
"Goodbye," he whispered, feeling a hot tear slide down his cheek despite his efforts to stop it.
"Goodbye," she whispered back, returning the pressure on his hands for a few more seconds before she let them go. With one last look at her, he turned and continued on his way into the Forbidden Forest. She stood, crying, shaking a little, and watched him until he disappeared into the trees, sure that her heart was breaking. It was so wrong, so terribly wrong for none of this to have been worth anything. Everything they had done, all those years of fighting and worrying and just squeaking by, surviving by some strange twist of Fate, had turned out to be useless. She had tried so hard to protect him, to keep her best friend alive despite the mark that Voldemort had put on his forehead, and now it turned out that the only way for him to be free of the whole mess was for him to allow himself to die.
It was completely illogical.
At that thought, Hermione forced her mind to stop rambling. Taking deep breaths, she wiped her tears away and struggled to think logically despite her shaking hands and hitching breath. If Harry had to… go, then he wouldn't be able to finish Nagini and Voldemort off himself. Someone would need to be there to do the job.
But could she? Could she kill? The thought of killing Nagini bothered her, but it was really only in the way that killing fish for food had bothered her during her time in the tent, and she knew that she would be able to get over it, especially after having watched the snake obediently end Snape's life at her master's command. No matter how evil and twisted Voldemort was, however, he was still a living man. Hermione had never taken a human life before, not even when her own had been endangered.
She wrung her hands, sighed, and scrubbed them over her tear-stained face. She knew that she couldn't stand around doing nothing forever. The most evil wizard to ever walk the earth wasn't going to wait for her to make up her mind. She blew out a breath and started to pace nervously.
I can't. I can't kill someone.
But you'll sacrifice the whole wizarding world?
There must be some other way to stop anything from happening. Azkaban-
Is about as easy to get out of as a paper sack, when you're VOLDEMORT.
She let out a thin scream of frustration. What was she to do? She would never use an Unforgivable. They were horrible curses, absolutely horrible. She couldn't possibly use one.
Not even for Harry?
She stopped pacing, wrapped her arms around herself and closed her eyes, grief hitting her again like a ton of bricks. Why did she have to go and think of him? He complicated things so much, throwing her into that gray area between right and wrong. Her ethics told her that it was wrong to take a life, but her heart reminded her that Harry was her best friend, a friend who had spent his whole life waiting to rid the world of the man who had scarred him. He would never get the chance now.
Her ethics told her that it was wrong to take a life. Her heart told her that doing so was the best way to honour that of the young man who had touched hers.
She opened her eyes and reached for her wand with a steady hand. For Harry, she thought with finality. For him, she could.
Her conscience was quiet as she stepped into the Forest.
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A/N: Dun dun dunnn… Hope you enjoyed it! Another update should come around in a week or so!