Disclaimer – I own nothing.

A.N. – So, this story has been in my folder for a while now, and my soul has been itching to write and upload a Sirius/Hermione story. It's summer, and though I'm taking a summer class, I should have a lot of free time still (crossed fingers), so I'm shooting for an update every two weeks for this story. For all those who read TST too and are wondering, I haven't forgotten it. It's in the works, promise. Anywho, hope everyone enjoys!

/To the fissures that keep us divided

Can't hold on the quiet

Can't keep me away

Set me free/

-Nail, Zola Jesus

Chapter 1 – The Fall and Rise

Sirius wasn't the boat in the middle of the ocean, sinking as thunder lit the sky and lightning crashed against the waves of desperate hope, reckless courage, dutiful pride, and too much heart; he was the wave.

He was the wave, and he was magnificent; he was magnificent as he fluidly bounced and danced about the Department of Mysteries, wand lighting up the room in magical colors, his smile dark and disturbed as he battled Bellatrix, heart pounding as Harry yelled, and Hermione was on the floor, eyes closed, body unmoving; he was the wave as the lightning pierced the surface, his body no longer the body he'd always known as it floated back, behind a mirror, behind the veil, and suddenly everything was dark.

Everything was dark and disturbed, the cries of lost souls tearing at him, clawing at him in the darkness. But there were whispers. They were barely there, but he knew that voice.

It was dark. But she was the light. She'd always been the light, since the moment she saved his life when she was thirteen. She would always be the light. Even as the darkness surrounded him from behind the veil.

Every once in a while he could follow this voice to the light, and he could see what he'd lost, if only he could remember.

"This is my fault!"

"No, this isn't, Harry! Sirius's death is Bellatrix's fault—Voldemort's fault, but not yours. You didn't do this."

"You told me it was a trap. You warned me, Hermione, and I didn't listen. I never listen, and now he's gone. He's gone and he's never coming back."

"Harry…"

"He was all the family I had, 'Mione. He was all I had left."

"I know—"

"How could you know? I know how you felt about him—how you disapproved—"

"Don't you think I miss him too? You spent a few weeks with him in the summer at a time—I was there with him all summer! Months, I spent in Grimmauld Place with just him, while the Weasleys were off visiting Charlie in Romania. You think we never talked? You think there weren't days when I needed to talk? He was there. I might not have approved of the drinking, and the sneaking out thoughtlessly, but he was there. So don't y-you d-dare tell me I don't m-miss him just because he wasn't my family."

"'Mione…"

He didn't apologize and she didn't expect him to. They were best friends, and they didn't need to—not when they were wracked with grief. Together, they wept.

He felt this incessant need to comfort them, to tell them not to cry, but he wanted to cry, too. He was the one they were mourning, right? He was the one who was dead? But he didn't want to die. He didn't want to be in this forever darkness that clung to him like everything that was wrong in the world.

"What are we supposed to do now?"

"Ron!"

"What? It's a valid question, Hermione! Yeah, Dumbledore's gone, but we're not. So, what do we do?"

"We search for the Horcrux's—that's what we do. We need to end this. Before anyone else gets hurt."

"And we will, Harry, but it's okay to grieve right now. We buried the greatest wizard to ever live—it's okay to grieve that, to mourn him, even with everything going on. It's wrong not to."

"There's so much to do, to get done before I can face Voldemort."

"And we'll get it done, mate. We'll get it done together, but Hermione's right. It doesn't have to be today. I'm sorry I brought it up."

"It still feels unreal. He's Dumbledore, right? He doesn't get to die—I just—I'm going to miss him. I'm going to miss the feeling that if something went wrong, I knew I—any of us—could run to him. I'm going to miss feeling like nothing could really touch us, that everything would work out in the end. Because how could we lose with him in our corner? H-how? I just—I d-don't know how we got here, a-and it's n-not fair. It's n-not right. He wasn't allowed to die."

Ron put his arms around Hermione's shoulder, tears stinging his eyes, and laid a strong hand on Harry's shoulder, as sadness swept them in her gloomy embrace. They were support and unconditional devotion in their grief.

He couldn't touch them, but he wanted to. She was the light, and she was in pain. They were in pain because her pain felt like his. This young boy's pain felt suffocating. Harry, she'd called him. Harry, Harry, Harry—the name tore at him, but the light was too far, too dim. He couldn't reach it and the darkness swallowed him whole.

"We can't stay here, Harry. We have to be careful while we're hunting horcrux's—we've already been in this spot too long."

"It's trees and grass, Hermione. We've already warded ourselves. Not much difference between this spot and one two miles away."

"Ron's right, Hermione. There really isn't much different. Not until we find another horcrux. We just destroyed another one. We need a break."

"You both say that because clearly common sense isn't very common! There is most definitely a difference. The difference is that if someone keys into our apparition, and follow us here, they'd get the sense that we're here often. If they know that then they have a pretty decent way to track us down—"

"Think they have plenty of ways now."

"Oh, bother!

Hermione scowled, while Harry and Ron laughed, and it was so normal that it almost felt right. The calm before the storm.

Their laughter was like the sweetest balm, and their triumph felt like his triumph—he wanted to smile but there was no smiling in this in between. There was no smiling in this silence that wasn't so silent with the whispers of ghosts and tortured souls.

"Where is it? Where'd you hide it?"

"We didn't take it—I didn't take it!"

"Liar! Crucio!"

"Aaaaaaaahhhhh!"

"Don't lie to me, Mudblood—I know you stole it!"

"Please, stop—stop! I don't have it!"

Her screams, so full of pain, so full of life, drifted and silenced all the world.

Her cries of pain stabbed him, and gripped him. She was the light, forever, even when she bled her agony into the darkness.

"We did it, Harry."

"Yeah, we did, mate. It's done."

"It's done. We survived, together."

They smiled at each other, tears of exhaustion and joy joining the soiled ground of the battle of Hogwarts.

These moments of light, of warmth seeped into him. He almost felt whole, except the souls were clawing at him, and the light was too far. Always too far.

Hermione stood, silent, in Orion Black's study in Grimmauld Place; the room was barely touched—no one had bothered with the room during the war, and now that Voldemort was dead but the war was still raging, no one could be bothered to care still. It was a small favor, one of the few rooms in Grimmauld Place that hadn't been swept clean of Dark Objects.

Her face was clean for the first time in days; she couldn't be bothered to shower the first two days after the battle of Hogwarts, none of them could. It'd been too surreal, too heartbreaking that though they won, they hadn't really won. There were too many dead for the Light side to count it as a victory. There were too many still dying in revels and initiations for anyone to count the Light and Government victorious.

But still, in here, in this room full of the past, she felt as though she could breathe. She felt as though there was hope.

In this room, where the past was the present, she could see how the house had imprinted itself on Sirius, his soul while he'd been alive. It had been in the darkness in his eyes, the kind that spoke of unresolved anger and bitterness.

She let her hands touch the surface of the mahogany desk, the cushion of the black leather chair, the dust covered book of Medieval rituals that were written in Ancient Runes.

She touched everything in sight, let her thoughts fill with the image of Sirius smiling as a child at a father he hadn't learned to hate yet, laughing at a brother he hadn't learned to resent yet, at a mother whose anger was more amusing than hurtful at the time. Hermione let her thoughts conjure an image of a man who'd been only thirty-six when he'd died—so youthful, yet so old.

Her hands collected dust as she touched and touched, picturing the man she'd come to desire to understand, if for no other reason than because he was supposed to have all the answers, and he'd had none.

She wondered if that was the true testament of growing up—learning that you actually knew nothing. But she shook her head. She refocused—his brilliant and mischievous smile filling her mind as she remembered how hearty his laugh had been, though he'd spent twelve years in the presence of dementors.

Hermione remembered the sadness in his eyes as he hugged Harry after Cedric had died, the rage that shook his hands as he went for the bottle at the fact that Voldemort had returned. She remembered his wild smirk and surprised eyes as he went sailing like an angel softly behind the veil-

Hermione pricked her finger accidentally. Her blood dropped into a cup, more and more; the cup, ostentatious and ornate with its golden handle and ruby studied sides, lit up.

She remembered what she read. The Cup retrieved what was lost. At a cost, because magic never gave something without taking something in return.

She could feel her soul rip—tear.

She fell to her knees.

Maybe it hadn't been so accidental after all.

Maybe she simply convinced herself that it'd been accidental, because her self-righteous Gryffindor heart couldn't believe that she'd perform such dark magic on purpose.

Through the darkness, the light reached out to him, and Sirius touched the soul that belonged to her. It encircled him, until the whispers and the claws were driven away, until his own soul screeched and latched on to the light—the pain was almost too much to bear, too much to witness because this wasn't his body, not the body he'd always known.

Except, with a throbbing thump, it was his body again.

He could feel his heartbeat in his ears. He could feel the darkness that had taken root inside of him settle.

He could feel—for the first time since his fall, Sirius felt warm, truly warm, and fell back into time.

He fell back into time, and shakily rose to his feet because he was a Black, and his home was calling to him.

So what do you guys think? Interested? Liked it? Hated it? Let me know and Review! *Reviews are love*