Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or anything related to the wonderful world, J.K. Rowling has created. I merely like to play with her characters a bit.

Summary: Post HBP. Harry has to deal with yet another loss of someone who has been like family to him. Depressed and feeling lonely will he be able to accomplish the final task?

Begins right after Professor McGonagall has asked Harry to join him in her (and Dumbledore's former) office. (Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, chapter 29: The Phoenix Lament, page 583-584, British edition)

Warning: AU; graphic violence in later chapters; will eventually be ADMM, HPGW; character death.

A/N: Please, please let me know whether this is worth continuing. I have quite many ideas in mind for the story and any feedback from you guys would be greatly appreciated. No flames, though.

DREADING THE MORNING

Chapter One

After glancing once at this portrait, Professor McGonagall made an odd movement as though steeling herself, then rounded the desk to look at Harry, her face taunt and lined.

"Harry. I am not going to ask you any questions right now." She eyed the boy standing opposite of her closely, looking at his trembling figure from head to toe when she finally placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. "Your grief must be overwhelming as is mine but there are things that have to be taken care of." She paused for a mere moment before speaking again. "One of them is you. Dumbledore has left me with instructions as how to proceed in case anything should happen to him." Her voice broke and McGonagall once more rounded the desk and stepped toward a large bookshelf. She drew her wand and tapped one of the books. It flew out of the row of books, hovered to the desk where it landed without making a sound. Professor McGonagall took the letter that now lay on top of it and handed it to Harry. He took it from her and his trembling fingers opened the sealed piece of parchment with difficulty. Tears welled up as soon as he recognized Dumbledore's fine handwriting.

Trust her.

Harry read the simple two words again and again and finally looked up to meet his professor's puffy eyes with his. Then, unable to believe that these simple two words were the only thing, Dumbledore had left him, he read the note again as though he was trying to find some more words, some kind of a message, something Dumbledore had always wanted to tell him but never had a chance to. But there was nothing. "What does this mean?" he finally asked while he folded the parchment up and put it in the pocket of his dirty and torn jeans.

"Do you trust me and at that Albus?"

"Why yes! Of course I do…" Before Harry could finish his sentence McGonagall had walked up to him, again resting a hand on his shoulder.

"I promise I will explain everything to you when there's time. The Minister will be here any moment and I want you gone by then. If you would please follow me now."

Harry followed Professor McGonagall through seemingly endless secret passages that he had never seen on the Marauder's Map for what seemed like a little eternity. The stonewalls were dark and moist and the path only enlightened by a few torches that obviously had been bewitched to burn endlessly. They made many twists and turns and Harry had a feeling that they would probably never get out of there again. But McGonagall seemed to know her way around and came to an abrupt halt when they had eventually reached a quite huge but old wooden door.

"I trust you know how to Apparate by now?" Professor McGonagall asked him while she was busy trying to open the lock with an enormous key.

"Yes, but I've got no license yet."

"Never mind that now." Eventually she had managed to open the lock. "As soon as we've stepped out, just hold onto my arm and I'll guide you."

Harry hesitated for a moment. Her words – they were so much alike the ones he had heard in a conversation earlier that same night. Only it wasn't McGonagall he'd been talking to but Dumbledore. And then there was something else that echoed in his mind, only a few words that had been haunting him for hours now. 'I am not worried, Harry. I am with you…'

"Harry?" McGonagall's voice dragged him back into reality. "Are you all right?"

"Yes," he answered at length. "I think."

"There is no time to lose. Let us be gone. Hold on to my arm." Harry did as he was told and nearly the very same moment the odd sensation of being squeezed through a rubber tube engulfed him again; he found it hard to breathe and nearly as soon as it had begun it was over again.

"Where are we?" Harry asked and looked around. They were standing underneath an enormously tall oak tree right in front of what appeared to be an old and rather weather-worn cottage.

"Not now, Harry." Professor McGonagall rushed towards the wooden front door, dragging Harry along with her. The older witch knocked against the door twice and to Harry it seemed as though she was constantly surveying their surroundings.

"Coming!" responded a female voice from inside. Harry could hear footsteps hurrying down a staircase and quite soon a young woman opened the door, quickly stepping aside at the same time to let her late night visitors in. McGonagall, who was still holding on to his arm, dragged him quickly inside and Harry could hear the door being thrown shut behind them. McGonagall turned toward Harry and forced him to look at her.

"Listen, Harry. You have to stay here for a while. I promise I'll come back later and explain everything. For now I have to go back. Maggie is going to take care of you."

Harry didn't quite know what to say and so he chose to say nothing. Instead he just nodded and McGonagall turned back to the woman she had just referred to as Maggie.

"Take a look at his wounds. Madame Pomfrey didn't have time as there were too many wounded."

"I shall do that, Minerva. Now be gone. I'll take care of him, don't worry." The younger woman said. "Be careful."

"I will be. Good bye." Professor McGonagall glanced once more at Harry and then disapparated without another word.

With a flick of her wand Maggie turned the lights in the house on and then led Harry into the living room. Mentioning for him to sit down on the old but comfortable looking sofa, she went out of the room only to return a few moments later with a tea tray. She placed it on the coffee table and sat down next to Harry.

"I'm Margaret," she eventually introduced herself. "But everyone calls me Maggie," she added with a slight smile and handed one of the tea cups on the tray to Harry who accepted it with still trembling hands. He sipped from his cup and eventually took a look at the woman sitting right next to him who was also sipping her tea. She appeared to be no older than thirty, thirty-five at most and to his surprise everything about her appeared to be black. She wore her black hair in a long ponytail that nearly went down to her hips. Her green eyes were hidden behind a pair of round eyeglasses much like the ones Harry wore himself and was dressed in black robes. In a way her appearance reminded him of Snape if there hadn't been that aura of gentleness and warmth that seemed to be surrounding her. There was only one thing that Harry thought was rather disturbing about her looks. Her eyes were all red and swollen as though she had been crying for the better part of the night. "Look, I know this is quite an awkward situation for both of us. You don't know me, I don't know you and yet we're sitting here together. So I suggest we behave like every other human being under the given circumstances. I'm going to take a look at your wounds and then show you to your bedroom. I really hope M…" she hesitated and then corrected herself. "I really hope Minerva will be here in the morning and I'm quite sure that she'll explain everything then. Are you okay with that?"

"Yes," Harry answered and was somewhat taken aback by her being so straight forward. Maggie sat down her teacup and started inspecting a deep gash on his forehead. "I need to get some bandages for that," she murmured after a while and got up. "Drink up, Harry. I'll be right back." Maggie went out of the room and Harry did as he'd been told. Other than in Gryffindor Tower, the silence in Maggie's living room was deafening. Sipping his tea, Harry closed his eyes to shut the world out, but what he saw, made him open his eyes again quickly. It happened again. Everything was back as though he were once again in the middle of the disaster. Dumbledore on the ground, drinking the potion that with every sip brought him closer to his end – the tower – Malfoy – the Death Eaters – Snape – the two unspeakable words, that had not only killed Dumbledore but something else within his very self…

The loud shattering of porcelain breaking on the wooden floor as it fell down pulled Harry back into reality. Tears were streaming down his face freely; his entire body was trembling with the effort of keeping himself under what little control he had left.

"It's okay, Harry," he heard Maggie's voice from far as she held him in a tight embrace, rocking back and forth as though he were a little child. They sat like this for while but Harry couldn't get a grip on himself.

"They're dead. All of them gone," he whispered and kept staring blankly at the opposite side of the room.

"I know," Maggie whispered and after a while she let go of him, still steadying him with one hand against his back when she handed him a glass filled with a yellowish liquid. "Drink this, Harry. It will make the demons go away. At least for a little while."

Harry drank the potion she gave him and it didn't take long until the world around him dissolved into the deepest shades of black.