Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

They Took His Heart Instead

By: ChoCedric

All Ron Weasley feels is unstoppable pain as he lies holding Hermione at Shell Cottage, watching her life blood leak away. Bellatrix Lestrange slit her throat before anyone had the time to do anything, and he feels powerless and helpless. Fleur has had lots of medical training, but she has even said there is nothing she can do for her. The cut is too severe that even magic cannot heal her. So all he can do is lie and hold her hand as she grows closer and closer to eternal rest.

She is silent and unconscious, and he wishes he could speak to her for one last time, let her know how he really felt about her all these years. He has done so much wrong, he reflects. Wasting all that time being kissy-kissy with Lavender Brown and furious with Hermione over Viktor bloody Krum, deserting her and Harry on the Horcrux search all because he thought there might be a romantic attachment between the two of them. He feels like such an asshole. Even if there had been something going on between them, shouldn't he have been happy for his friends rather than resentful? He now wishes he could apologize for all the times he'd ever argued with her, all the times he'd ever screamed at her. Even though it happened over three years ago now, he is sorry for the Yule Ball incident.

He thinks of all the things that have ever frustrated him about Hermione, but at the same time, endeared him. He loves the bossy expression on her face as she tries to direct him in how to do a charm right. He loves how she thinks they can always get the answer out of books. He loves how every year, she tried not to let him and Harry do their homework at the last minute.

Hermione's breathing becomes even more ragged, and Ron knows that there is not much time left. Harry, Bill, and Fleur are in the room, but at this point he doesn't care what they hear. He has never been great with words, but he hopes she can hear him now, wherever she is. He hopes to Merlin that she is not in any pain.

"I never told you, 'Mione," he says quietly, "because it never seemed like the right time. But I love you. I've been in love with you for years, I was just too much of a coward to say anything. I'm so sorry for everything, for all the pain I've ever caused you. I'm sorry this had to be how it ends. I'm sorry that bitch Bellatrix did what she did to you. I swear, if I ever see her again, she won't live to see the next day." He strokes her bushy brown hair tenderly, then strokes her hands and her face. "I'm sorry we always argued," he goes on, his voice breaking. "I guess that was just our way of talking to each other, huh? But anything mean I said, I never meant any of it. I wish you could talk to me, 'Mione."

He feels tears prick his eyes, and he tries to wipe them but more come. He can just hear Hermione in his mind, telling him to grow up and not be embarrassed. He's never cried in front of Fleur and Harry before, and the last time he cried in front of Bill was when he was a little boy and scraped his knee. But now, he cannot help it as tears run thick and fast down his cheeks nonstop. Bill comes and sits by him, holding his hand. "I l-love you, Hermione Jean Granger," Ron sobs. "I hope that libraries exist in Heaven, because you'll be happy there if they do."

He hears a choked sob to his right, and he can see Harry on the other side of him. "We'll never forget you, Hermione," Harry says. Ron can't help but feel pure and utter loathing at Harry at the moment. He was the one who said You-Know-Who's name, who got them caught in the first place. If it wasn't for him, Hermione wouldn't be dying in Ron's arms. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean for this to happen," Harry chokes out between sobs.

"Shut up, Harry," Ron says with barely contained fury. Harry looks at him with an expression of such sadness that Ron almost feels sorry for him. And that's the key word. Almost. Because he doesn't.

"Now, now," says Bill. "This is not the time to be arguing."

This sends Ron into more tears, for arguing is what he and Hermione did best. He gently kisses her lips, lamenting in the fact that this will be the only kiss he ever shares with her. "I'll miss you," he says brokenly. "Please forgive me for everything I've ever done. I'm so sorry."

After the war is over, if the good side has won, Ron plans to go to Australia and look for Hermione's parents. He will look up memory charms in any book he can find, and try to find a way to reverse the spell she did on them. Even though it will cause them immense pain to hear what news he brings after the charm is reversed, he feels it is the right thing to do to let them remember their daughter. He and Harry will keep the body safe for now, and cast charms so that it will not decay. He will make sure her body is brought to Australia later, and her parents can choose where to bury her.

"I promise I'll take care of everything," Ron reassures her as her breathing begins to slow. "I'm so proud of you, 'Mione. You can let go now, it's all right. Rest well, my little bookworm, I will always love you."

And as Hermione Jean Granger breathes her last breath and goes limp in Ron's arms, the youngest Weasley boy thinks that when he yelled at the Death Eaters to take him, to keep him instead of Hermione, they interpreted his meaning wrong. Because they didn't take him, they took his heart instead.