Heartwarming

The night was still dark; the skies were blackened with broken spells seeming to linger in the air. Dark smoke clouded everything, causing one to believe morning was hours away when it was in reality, softly poised and waiting for the opportune moment to break through the stillness and arrive.

But no such solace came and none was expected. The battle at last, had met its end, and both men lay in pools of their own blood. Only one man breathed, yet even so, it was only just. Air seemed to escape him with every breath he took, and only his struggling breaths broke the impenetrable silence; having broken it in fragments, tears slid down his cheeks and into his snowy-white hair and beard. He wept not for the fact that death was waiting nearby, but for what he would leave behind…Who he would leave behind.

Blood poured freely from him, as if he had cut the valve that regulated it. He grew cold. His vision began to subside at the edges and as birds began twittering in the distance, the sounds were muffled, indistinct, confusing to him. They were transformed into the whispers of voices he recognized, but he lacked a voice to reply.

"Never good enough for school--"

"Genius of a saint, but lacking the heart of one--"

"What a wart."

"She's died because of you."

"Albus? Albus!"

He wanted to answer that he was there, almost to convince himself that this was life now. He felt far away, nondescript, like a bug on a leaf under some sort of magnification and all of his flaws were outlined in a bright fuchsia color, so they could be seen from a distance. He coughed and sputtered, trying to regain his breath and deny the colors that were untrue and conceal the ones that were not. Like a fish out of water, he flapped his arms this way and that, but the color would not leave him. It only grew brighter. Groaning at the unfairness of it all, he began to count his heartbeats as if recognizing his impending doom internally and wondering if he had ever reached the milestone of heartbeats that all human beings appeared to meet. Perhaps time was measured in this mechanized, confusing way. No one's was the same, yet this internal timepiece was the difference between life and death. It was so exquisitely intriguing to think of life in this manner that he almost failed to notice the woman kneeling beside him.

He chorused the numbers to himself as if he would forget to breathe if he did not count, and the agony was slowly subsiding, clearing his mind somewhat and thus he counted on until the rosy scent wafted heavily in the air as she bent over him.

"Minerva," his mind reverently whispered, like she was the goddess herself. He must have shut his eyes because he could not see her now, but he blinked and sight was still lost to him in a flash of crimson luminescence. He smiled slightly at his misfortune before he closed his eyes and felt his head lifting higher and higher until her lips touched his forehead. There, it burned and his sight suddenly returned in full force, but he feigned the rest he so desperately desired.

"I--I've come to heal you… Just lie still--" she whispered in his ear, the tears leaking in her voice as it trembled so delicately.

"My love, you already have," he thought in confusion, wondering why Minerva didn't simply Apparate the both of them to St. Mungo's. He knew her certification did not qualify her treating the wounded as severely as he, but his mind was too sleepy to contemplate it further.

His chest from where the blood poured with every traitorous beat of his heart suddenly burned with warmth, but hot overwhelming warmth-- nothing like what her sweet, gentle touch brought him. His head spun as his vision began to fully clear and as the sun rose, he could distinctly see her through the slits of his eyelids; her face bathed in awakening sunlight, and her beauty enshrouded in tenderness as she inspected the rest of him. Her emerald eyes were alive, sparkling with burning determination and something soft and silent he could not yet name. Whatever it was woke his heart and he trembled as he became ensnared in a daydream of her loving him as he was, fuchsia flaws encompassing all. Even after her duties were through, she did not leave him, but remained kneeling over him, her breath mingling with his own as she stroked his beard and hair, detangling it and removing the staining blood with whispered chants.

When that was through, there was nothing but the both of them and the sun shining in her hair and he admired it from his place on the ground as she peered away from him at the rising eastern sun. Her profile forever etched in his memory, her eyes turned back to him, and her eyes focused on his ears hidden behind mountains of silver hair.

"They sent me… I volunteered among many others, yet I had something the rest of them did not. I could hide should I have the need, and that, ironically, is due to you." The smile in her voice lifted his spirits even more than the sun that slowly warmed every piece of his skin cold and barren because of the lack of blood a few minutes before.

"There was a time when I didn't believe in myself," she began softly, and he almost heard a song on the wind before she continued. "There was a time when I thought my future was as black as soot and I saw nothing ahead. No lumos would suffice and there was just choking darkness, almost like a dementor sucking the life from me constantly. That was when I pictured my life without you. But somehow, you dove beneath the waves and brought me to the surface and I sputtered for breath, and you let me cry my heart out. No one ever let me do that. A woman's main duty is to retain all emotion from all those who may matter to her, and you mattered then, as you always have, but that night was the final bridge between impossibility and possibility. You taught me how to live, and I could never repay you but with what I've had lingering beneath every action all along. Albus, I love you." She turned away and cried aloud and his finally warmed heart spurred him to action.

The sun climbed higher, it seemed, and Albus touched her cheek as she wept, opening his eyes fully and smiling at her. The shock in her face awoke a whole new realm of excitement in him and he gingerly sat up against a rock and held her to him, whispering of her great worth to him as he stroked her hair. "Minerva," he said softly as she trembled in his embrace with sheer joy and relief, "I love you too."

And all the rest of the world was lost to them for precious twenty minutes before their love healed all.

A/N: I was looking for classical music when I heard a song that brought the angsty image to mind of Albus appearing as though he were dying in Minerva's arms. But then my internet died on me. This piece didn't turn out how I wanted it to, but I still think it works... I only had my earphones plugged in half-way so when people sang, it was very far away and echo-y and then the music behind the words was the loudest. Very strange way to get inspiration I think, but it worked. :D I will dearly cherish the reviews you give me close to my heart, and should I disappear again, just think-- your words will be the driving action behind my next work. Do carry on then. :D