Morning
Fleur has no small skill as a Healer and Madam Pomfrey has been glad of her aid tonight. So many are injured and in need of care. Some are beyond the help of the Healers, and the number of bodies ranged in the two large classrooms near the Great Hall increases as the night goes on.
Now, at last, a new day is dawning, and Fleur is freed from the drudgery and terror of the hospital wing and the three rooms now annexed to it. She washes her hands and face in water so cold that it takes her breath away, and looses her hair from its long plait and combs it out with her fingers. She pulls out her wand to remove the worst of the stains of the long night from her clothing, but her hands are shaking and she finds that she cannot find the words for the simplest of spells now that all urgency has passed. A wave of faintness overcomes her and she leans against the wall until it passes.
She leaves the bathroom and walks through corridors that echo at her tread. There is no one about. The early morning light through windows and broken walls is nearly blinding, used as she is to the dim light in the hospital rooms. She walks down a wide stairway that has been half demolished, avoiding broken steps and fallen masonry by instinct rather than by any conscious thought. She comes to the door of the Great Hall, hearing voices, cheering, laughter, cries and sobs from within.
Bill is there. There is a knot of red-headed people at the far end of the Gryffindor table, and he is among them. They surround George, and Fleur feels her heart constrict and her breath catch in her throat at how alone, how very alone, he looks, even with his family all around him. Bill looks up and sees her and his mouth moves in something that is almost a smile. He touches the arm of the brother nearest to him – Percy – murmurs something to him, and crosses the hall in long strides to meet her in the doorway. Fleur sees that he is limping and that there is blood on his sleeve and on his face.
He puts his arms around her and kisses her where she stands in the doorway, and then takes her hand and leads her out into the grounds. Neither of them speaks. The light out here is dazzling and Fleur squints against it. Bill seems oblivious, leading her rapidly across the lawn to the lake, which is golden with the reflection of the dawn. He sits down under a tree near the lakeside, pulling Fleur down so that she is leaning against him. Neither of them says anything for a long time. The sky in front of them is a glorious mixture of orange and purple and red, and the lake looks as if it is on fire. They watch the sky together in silence, clinging to each other's hands half unconsciously.
Finally, Fleur pulls herself into a more upright position and frees her hands from Bill's.
"You should let me see to your arm, chéri," she says.
Bill shrugs but holds his arm out obediently. Fleur pulls back his sleeve gently and represses a gasp as she sees the jagged cut where one of Greyback's scars has reopened. She cannot heal such a cursed wound with her wand, but she conjures a bandage and binds Bill's arm tightly to stop the bleeding. He watches her impassively, wincing only slightly as she pulls the edges of the long gash together.
"Didn't it 'urt?" she asks him accusingly once she is finished, and he shrugs again.
"Yes," he admits, "but it didn't seem to matter." His voice cracks and breaks on the last word and suddenly he is crying in her arms. She pulls him close and rubs his back and murmurs to him as he cries.
Eventually, he pulls away from her, scrubbing at his eyes with the heels of his hands.
"Sorry," he mutters, and she pulls him close again.
"No need, " she murmurs, and then they are kissing each other, hard and deep and long, forcing their bodies together as if neither can bear to let the other go. They make love there on the grass by the lake, because they are young and alive and hurting and whole and their world is made anew.
Afterwards, they dress silently and sit together by the tree watching the last of the sunrise. Behind them they can hear others moving and talking now as the world awakes to a new day and a new order.
It is a new beginning, but it feels very much like an ending.