'The Unbreakable Vow'
A Harry Potter Fan Fiction Story
Authors Note: Hello Everyone, I just want to mention a few things about my story. First it is set directly after Voldemort is destroyed during the war. Also I hated the fact that Fred had to die, and I read somewhere that J.K. Rowling thought about pairing Fred and Hermione together before she decided to pair her with Ron, and I thought that was a cute pairing... so just for the sake of this story George is the twin that dies, and Fred lives. It's also told through Hermione's point of view. I hope you enjoy my story, and feel free to comment along the way any feedback is always welcome! I do not own Harry Potter or any of it's Characters, The plot and writing in my story is completely fictional, with some hints as to what has actually happened.
Chapter 1: Broken
I couldn't open my eyes, I just saw darkness as I lay here on the cold ground. I knew it was all over, but it didn't feel like the happy ending I thought it would be. I wanted to just open my eyes and wake up from this horrible dream, but this wasn't a dream, and the loss everyone was feeling was worse than that of any nightmare in slumber. I squeezed my eyes tighter shut hearing all the screams around me, and cries. People were dead, our friends, family, and people we cared about, they were all hurt. I survived, and I needed to focus on pulling myself together, and helping everyone else bring back our wizarding world as it once was. I was a fighter, I couldn't just give up now. I have to be strong.
I opened my eyes, seeing I was laying on the cold ground outside of Hogwarts castle. There were dead bodies everywhere. I gasped, feeling heart broken and fighting with my own emotions as I fought back tears. I looked around for Harry, and Ron, but there was no sign of any of them.
I looked down for the first time, noticing the bruises, and the dried blood on my arms, and torn clothes. I couldn't worry about me right now, so I looked around aimlessly, still feeling like it was all just a horrible nightmare. To the left of me was a dead Lavender Brown, and a few of her classmate's among the array of lives lost. I held my breath not wanting to see any more.
"Hermione!" I heard a faint voice in the distance,and I wasn't even sure if it was real or in my head. I felt like I couldn't breathe. The voice got closer, and louder. "Hermione!" I was certain it was real, recognizing it as Ron's voice I snapped back to reality and turned toward him, seeing him limp over to me.
"Ron!" I ran into his arms, and he pulled me in for a tight embrace, as we comforted each other in this time of need. I had so many emotions run though me seeing him right now. I was happy that he was alive, and that we had found each other, but I wanted to cry so hard, but I couldn't I knew I needed to keep everything together. I had to be strong.
Ron pulled me tight to his chest, taking comfort in each other.
"Have you seen Harry?" I asked him, and he pulled away looking around, he finally shook his head.
"No, no one has seen him since Neville killed Voldemort's bloody scary snake with the sword of Griffindor. He just sort of disappeared." Oh no, what could have happened to him? Surely he didn't die again, now that his connection the Voldemort was gone, and finally defeated? I internally panicked following Ron back into the castle.
It was unbelievably sad that this place that was once the safest place in the wizarding world to be was destroyed. I knew it would be built but this was my home for so long I hated seeing it damaged, just thinking about all of the history that has been inside these walls for centuries. One of my favorite activity had always been reading Hogwarts A History alone in the library or curled up by the roaring fire in the Griffindor common room late at night. I sighed they just seemed like distant memories in the past now.
We rounded the corner to the Great Hall, seeing this was where Madame Pomphrey and other healers were brought to the castle to help the wounded and tend to the families of the ill or dead. There sure were a lot of them. I couldn't look away from all of the tragedy in this room. I closed my eyes, and flashed back to all of the wonderful meals prepared in this hall, and how beautiful the enchanted ceiling was, even in the darkest times, but where was the magic of the castle now.
I watched Ron slowly walk over to a group of people in the far corner of the Great hall. I tried to see what he was walking toward, then I saw it, feeling numb myself as I looked into the sea of red hair. I saw the Weasley family, a family who had been like a second family to me for years. I started to panic almost breaking into a run now, as I made it closer, afraid to see what had happened. I saw Ginny, who looked just as hurt as everyone else here, torn and dirty clothes, run over to Ron and throw her arms around him.
"Oh Ron" She sobbed into his chest. "It's horrible" He tried to console her. "Mum said it was an explosion, none of us could do anything" she sniffed back more tears, trying to make sense of the pain she was feeling in the moment, and poor Ron tried to understand what she was talking about. It didn't look like he could understand his hysterical sister. I walked closer to the center of the circle to see who everyone was crowding around, and that is when I saw who it was. I gasped. It was one of the Twins.
I looked closer, noticing that it was George. Fred sat next to him, holding his hand , hysterically begging his twin to wake up. Not many people could tell them a part, but over the years I had noticed little things about these similar pair of jokers. For instance Fred's hair was a bit darker red, his eyes were like an emerald green, and he seemed to be more internal than his twin George who expressed every thought that he was thinking and was usually the one to first instigate a joke or take it a bit too far.
I pushed my way through everyone, and found myself sitting next to Fred on the ground next to his brother. I took a deep breath and opened my mouth the say some thing, but nothing came out. Fred seemed to look over at me as I came over. I bit my lip, I didn't know what to say, what I could say. It felt strange I always had some sort of answer, or I always knew of some way to fix any problem, but I couldn't fix this. I just reached out and grabbed Georges other hand, that Fred was not clinging too and saw Fred give me a small nod to say that it was ok, it was ok that I was here.
It felt like it had been hours, but it was only minutes later I heard Ginny cry out again.
"Harry... It's Harry!" I looked up quickly seeing the fiery red head run up to the man she was afraid, actually everyone was afraid we'd never see again. He looked awful, his hair was a mess, there was blood and dirt all over his face, his shoes were missing, and he was holding one hand to his head, right where is scar was.
I noticed Ron looking as well, and we quickly made our way to our friend that we thought had died.
"Harry are you alright? What happened to you?" I was so worried, that It may have come out sounding more like a worried mother than that of my best friend. Harry just forced a smile though I knew nothing about what happened would be considered a happy moment, and he shook his head.
"I'm fine Hermione, I think so. I just have this headache." He removed his hand from his scar, and it was bleeding.
"You're bleeding!" I said.
"Bloody hell mate, how did that happen? You didn't die again did you?" I whacked Ron upside his head, but I was annoyed at how thick he was at times.
"Honestly Ronald do you have to be so daft?" He rubbed his head.
"What it's a perfectly logically question. Ya know with everything that has happened." I shook my head at him.
"Harry you need to get that looked at" Ginny spoke up, looking more worried by the second but trying to hold in her fear as best as she could.
"I'll be fine guys... it's just these headaches are worse than before." He tried to hide his real pain, but I knew better, he was just trying to be too strong, he always felt like he had to be, like everything was his fault and on his shoulders.
"Do you think it hurts, because of the connection with Voldemort being gone, and having killed the horcroux part of you?" I could always tell when he was amazed at my intellect and the way I thought and always seemed to know things, when he looked at me at times.
"I'm not sure, but I'm sure we have bigger problems right now." He looked around seeing the mass amount of death around him.
The three of us walked alone to where the bridge used to be, but was now just a pile of rubble. I had about a million things I wanted to say, and just as many questions in my head.
"Why couldn't Voldemort kill you with the Elder wand?" It was supposed to be the most powerful wand ever created, because it was forged by death himself, it should have killed any one. Harry turned back to both Ron and I, and had a bit of a smirk on his face about knowing something I did not.
"Voldemort killed Snape, because he knew at that time the wand never really belonged to him. It belonged to Dumbledore, and Snape killed Dumbledore, but the thing was it was never really Snape's either. It was Draco who Disarmed Dumbledore that day in the tower." That's right I grinned figuring everything else out myself.
"But then you disarmed Draco at the Mannor" I said.
"That's right it's mine" He looked at the wand. And Ron chuckled at bit.
"So what are we going to do with it then?" Harry gave him an odd look, and I scoffed wanting to hit him again.
"WE?" I questioned, half laughing.
"Well yea, were all in this together."
Harry nodded, and with out turning away snapped the Elder wand in half and threw it into the water.
I couldn't have said it better myself.
Later that night, everyone was gathered at The Burrow for a wake for all of our friends. We all felt like they needed a proper burial, and we all needed closure.
Everyone was dressed in black, outside in tents paying their respects to those we lost. Though not all of us felt like being around loved ones right now.
Harry, Ron, and I sat on the hillside, over looking everyone gathered below at the Burrow.
"I'm sorry Ron. I know some part of you must blame me." Harry said looking over at Ron.
"Oi, what are you talking about?" He just responded, looking dumbfounded, and hurt Harry would say something like that.
"Everything is my fault, everyone was fighting my battle with Voldemort, and if I had stopped them, maybe our loved ones would still be with us. I could have stopped..." I put my hand on Harry's shoulder to comfort him, knowing he was about to lose it. "If it wasn't for me, George would still be alive." Ron just shook his head.
"I don't blame you Harry, not for anything. This war, it wasn't just yours, it was bigger than you and you know that." Harry scoffed, not believing anything but his own self.
"Yea, but Ron, you don't know what it was like to be The Chosen one all of these years, to be the one thing to destroy the dark lord, to only find out oh wait I'm a horcroux that Voldemort never meant to make, and I had to die too." It came out a little more cruel that Harry had intended. He was right thought, no one but him could say he suffered the most loss, almost everyone he had ever loved or cared about has died, and Harry blamed himself. I felt for both of my friends.
Harry stood up in a huff. "I'm going to go find Hagrid, I'll see you guys later" Not a moment later , he stormed off into the crowd.
"Ron, I'm worried about him, He's not handling things well, and everyone that he would turn to ,besides us is gone" Ron nodded, holding my hand. It was a kind gesture, and exactly what I needed right now. I stared down at our hands, and it reminded me of our kiss in the Chamber of secrets earlier. It wasn't expected, but you could say it was a long time coming. It was the first time Ron referred to me as his girlfriend, and the first time he really showed any kind of real emotion toward me, but still I couldn't shake this nagging feeling in my gut. It all felt wrong to be moving forward with Ron now. His brother had just died along with a lot of our friends, and I felt guilty. I missed my parents most of all right now. I had obliviated their memories of me, and ever having a witch for a daughter. I wanted to protect them, so I hid them in the world, I didn't even know where to begin looking to find them. Even thought I knew they were not dead a part of me felt like I had lost them in all of this mess as well.
"Hermione, I'm glad I finally admitted my feelings towards you, I don't know what I would do If I had lost you in the war too!" I felt my insides melt hearing him say these sweet things to me. I leaned in closer to him, resting my head on his chest ,as he wrapped his arms around me. This should have been the perfect moment.
"I know how you feel Ron."
"Promise me you'll never leave me, and we'll be together forever?" I looked to him and smiled. Looking into his eyes I could see how serious he was, and I have always wanted this happy ending with Ron.
"I promise Ron."
"NO, I mean really promise me. Hermione I want to make the ultimate vow with you." What was he talking about? I felt my gut grow to worry again, feeling like he was up to something.
"What?"
"Make an unbreakable vow to be together forever." I felt my eyes go wide with fear, and I dropped his hand.
"Ronald Bilius Weasley, you don't know what you are asking!" He shook his head.
"Yes I do Hermione, It's romantic! Don't you want to be with me?"
"You know I do, but we don't need to do that, and you know it! There is a reason they call it an unbreakable vow!"
"Hermione," He grabbed both of my hands in his, and looked deep into my eyes. "I have never been more sure about anything in my life. I do not want to live with out you, so much that I'd rather die, if I didn't have you. Hermione Jean Granger, You have always been the one for me."
Hearing him say that to me was the most romantic gesture he has ever made to me, aside from his glowing ball of light touching his heart story.
I took a deep breath.
"Lets do this" I almost couldn't get the words out as I pullout my wand and binded our promise together ,with an unbreakable vow.
I couldn't help but feel different when the spell was complete, but I shrugged it off thinking it was probably nothing.
"I'll be right back" I said to him, as I made my way down to through the crowd and into the Weasley's home.
I needed air, space to think, to think about everything. This is what I had always wanted right? I put my hand to my head to stop this dizzy feeling, that's when I heard a crash, startling me from my thoughts. I quickly rushed into the kitchen to where I heard the noise, seeing Fred Weasley kneeling on the floor surrounded by broken glass.
"Oh my God Fred!" I rushed over and bent down next to him.
"Hermione? What are you doing here?" Upon closer inspection I noticed it was fresh bottle of Fire whiskey, being able to smell lit on his breath.
"I needed some air." I simply replied, as I tried to pick up some of the lose pieces of glass. He grinned, hearing my answer.
"You needed air, so you came inside the house?" I realized how stupid that sounded, so I laughed along with him.
"I just mean, everything is getting to be a bit much, I wanted to be away from all of the people..." He looked up at me making me feel nervous. "Fred, what happened?"
"A war happened Hermione." It's amazing that he still had a grin on his face, but I suspect had something to do with the alcohol he had been drinking.
"No, why were you drinking in here, alone?" He said nothing, just staring at the floor. I just watched as pools of dark red blood began dripping from his hand to his mother's freshly waxed floor. "Fred you're bleeding" He looked down at his hands.
"Huh, how about that, I am bleeding." I continued to look at his hands. I wanted to help, I wanted to do something, and I was growing concerned for him.
"May I?" I gestured to see his hand, and he just nodded, watching me slowly turn over his hand to reveal bits of tiny broken glass and blood all over his hand. He kept staring at me, noticing that I wasn't moving or backing away, and this was curious to him. I pulled out my wand to heal him, but he pulled his hand away quickly.
"No Hermione, I don't deserve magic."
"Why do you say that?"
"George died today and I couldn't save him, it should have been me, or I should have found away to help him." He was hurting and angry. Everyone needed to stop blaming themselves.
"Fred, what happened to George is not your fault. There was nothing anyone could do." I started to whimper feeling the brunt of everything hitting me today. "If there was anything I could have done to help I would have."I wiped a tear from my eye. "Please Fred, you have to let me help you heal you hand, or it will get infected." He could see the worried look in my eyes, and it's like a part of him understood.
"I feel so empty. I can't explain it. Ron and Harry wouldn't understand. I lost my parents in this war." He looked into my eyes as I went on. "I obliviated their memories of me. They know nothing about me and the wizarding world or having a witch as a daughter. I know it fails in comparison to the loss of your twin, but I have no one left, not really. I don't come from a big family, and I'm a muggle born witch so I don't have any one out there who understands me. I feel like a part of me is missing and the worst part of it all is I don't even know where they are to return their memories, because I hid them to keep them safe." I started to ball my eyes out. I had not expected to tell anyone what I was feeling, let alone Fred. I almost jumped when I felt his other hand, the one that was not covered in glass and blood, squeeze my hand. I looked up into his green eyes, and I didn't see pity, or fear, I saw someone who was trying to understand.
"If it will make you feel better, I'll let you clean up my hand." I nodded, taking his hand back into mine.
"I'll be gentle" I whispered, just loud enough for him to hear me. I pulled out the broken pieces of glass from his hand. I saw him wince every now and then, but for the most part his eyes stayed starting directly at me. I had to admit making me a bit nervous. I wasn't used to any one staring at me. "I'm not hurting you am I?" I asked nervously.
"To be honest Hermione, I feel pretty numb to anything right now, so even if you were, it wouldn't phase me."He joked, but then got a bit more serious. "No you are not hurting me, I don't think you could." I smiled hearing that.
"Well, good." I took a deep breath, continuing to remove the last pieces of glass. I accio'd myself a rag, and started gently dabbing his hand to clean it up.
"He was my best friend." I looked up, hearing him speak again. "George." I nodded figuring that is who he meant. When I saw the explosion go off, and I saw Fred fly through the air with that curse. I felt my heart stop. I think I knew it before everyone else. I knew my twin was dead, and now a part of me feel it. Hermione. I get it. I do get how you feel." I felt another tear slide down fro my cheek, burning my eyes. Before I knew it, Fred was wiping the tears from my cheek, and I felt a shiver go through my body at his tight touch.
I was greatful that he had opened up to me like that, even though I feel like a fool for unleashing on him. We were never close, so I was worried that would be weird. I finished wrapping his hand, not knowing what else to say, but wanting to say so much. I could never tell anyone about the unbreakable vow I had just made with Ron, but I wanted to tell Fred. Maybe it was the fact that both of us were opening up to one another, or maybe it was because I regretted it. I needed to get out of here.
I watched as he stood up.
"Thank you for fixing my hand" He held out his hand to help me up off the floor, and I took it. I quickly cleaned up his mess with my wand.
"Wouldn't want your mother to find her freshly clean house a mess." I tried to force a smile. I turned to leave, but then turned back to wrap my arms around him for a hug. "Please don't try drinking yourself to death again." I said into his neck, but it surprised him that I knew because he had never actually said what his intentions were, even though I was spot on.
I then quickly turned to leave, but before I could leave he asked me one more question.
"Why did you need to get away so bad?"
"Ron and I made a vow to each other tonight." He just stared at me.
"Congratulations"
I smiled up at Fred and turned to leave, making my way back to Ron.