Harry watched Neville leave, and he trod on. It had already been hard enough seeing Neville. Keep going on, he told himself. I must die. His stomach gave a horrible jolt and he could barely breathe. Ginny was striding up the grass, toward where he was walking

"Ginny."

She turned and stared, where Harry stood, still under the Cloak. For a moment he stood still, debating whether to simply continue and let her remain confused. Then he pulled off the Cloak.

She came closer, her lips half-apart, her eyes questioning. Harry remained silent. He didn't know if he should tell her. But he needed to. He needed to say good-bye.

"Harry? Harry, what is it? Why are you under the cloak?"

He still remained silent. And then he said, "It's too long to tell."

Of course that wouldn't have worked. Ginny knew him too well. She knew he didn't to say something, and she wouldn't let up until he spit it out. She stared fiercely into his emerald eyes and hissed, "Tell me!"

And he knew it would be no good to argue. He had to tell her. "You know where I've been all year, out of sight? I've been hunting down Voldemort. The thing is… he didn't die when I was one because over the years, he's been splitting his soul by killing other people and putting the parts of his soul into objects, making them Horcruxes."

Why he was saying this, Harry could not explain. Ginny's expression was one of revulsion and shock. "Go on."

"The Horcruxes were different things. One was the locket of Slytherin. Another was his ring. One was Hufflepuff's cup. And another was Ravenclaw's diadem—that's why I was asking about it, before. And one was his giant snake. And you know his diary, that one in the Chamber of Secrets? It was also a Horcrux, but I destroyed it that year…"

"And you needed to destroy them so that he could die?"

"Exactly. Except… Just now, Voldemort killed Snape."

"What? Snape… is dead? And Voldemort killed him? Why?"

"The Deathly Hallows."

"Come again?"

"The deathly Hallows. From the story 'The Tale of the Three Brothers'. Those things—the wand, the stone, and the cloak, they're all real. Those brothers were real. The things, those are the Deathly Hallows. My cloak's one of them. And the Wand… Voldemort killed Snape to get the wand. And Snape, Ginny, Snape was good. He was on our side all the time."

Harry still couldn't explain to himself why he was saying all this. He knew he was wasting crucial time, that the longer he stood here, the longer Voldemort lived, but he needed to say this.

She looked disbelieving. "But he killed Professor Dumbledore! And you say—"

"Snape changed sides because he loved my mother since they were young, and Voldemort killed her. Snape promised Dumbledore he'd help keep me safe. And Dumbledore, a year before he died, his hand was burnt and he knew he had a year to live. He asked Snape to kill him because Dumbledore didn't want a painful death. Then Snape was helping me all year destroy the Horcruxes secretly…"

Ginny looked torn between shock and disbelief. Harry knew she could hardly believe it. She demanded, "And how do you know all this, if Snape is dead?"

"Just before he died, he gave me his memories. And from them I learnt something awful," he pressed on, his breath coming in gasps now. "In one of the memories, Dumbledore told Snape that when my mother died to save me, and Voldemort couldn't touch me, and he used that curse on me, it backfired on him and made… a piece of his soul… separate from the whole and latch onto…"

A fist seemed to be closing upon his heart and making it impossible to speak. Ginny gathered the worst from his face and whispered, tremulously, "You?"

Harry nodded. He could not speak anymore. Ginny gasped; Harry could see her eyes were watery. She gasped as she grasped his hand, "And he lives while you live, and you have to die?"

Harry nodded, ducking his head. He could not hold back his own tears any more. Ginny grabbed his other hand, as she went on for him, "And the snake… it isn't dead, right? Someone else has to kill it."

He nodded, and he gasped, though his throat was constricted, "Ron and Hermione know, and so does Neville… but if…"

"Oh, Harry! And Voldemort has to kill you! Is that why you're going to the forest? And no one else knows?"

She gave another choked sob and the tears began cascading down her cheeks. Her whole body was shaking. Harry nodded again and his tears began coming. Ginny was looking very different. She'd never cried in front of him.

"Harry, oh Harry.." Without warning she wrapped her arms around him into a tight hug. He wrapped his arms around her, too, and there they stood, a few feet away from the forest, wrapped in an embrace, both of them shaking with their choked sobs. Harry wanted to stay like that for days, or maybe even years, until he crumbled away into dust. Finally, they broke apart. Ginny had stopped shaking, but tears still glistened on her face. "Harry, I'll come with you!"

"Ginny, you can't. Hogwarts needs as many people has they can. And don't tell Ron and Hermione until after I'm gone. And Ginny, kill the snake, please, and also, Bellatrix Lestrange. She doesn't deserve to live, after what she did to Neville's parents and Sirius…"

His voice broke. Ginny took his hand in hers and whispered, "Harry… I love you."

He looked at her, and then he thought he could never stop. Ginny's flaming red hair was tangled, and dirt was smeared over her face, but as he searched her face hungrily, a kind of fierce beauty seemed to shine out of the brown eyes that reflected the moonlight and her locks framing her face seemed to blaze, even in the darkness. Why had he never said he loved her? In all those kisses they'd shared and the sunlit hours by the lake and those Quidditch practices, he'd never said "I love you." Such simple words to say, and now, coming from her mouth, they seemed to wrench his heart from him and make him want to howl with the emotion building inside of him.

Enough. He needed to go on. Stop wasting time. He squeezed her hands and whispered back, "I love you too."

She let go of his hand and he swung the Cloak back on. He now understood why he had said all this. He needed to say good-bye. With his heart beating like a drum, he set off for the forest, but then Ginny called his name and he heard her light footsteps coming toward him.

Ginny found him before he pulled off the Cloak. She stepped underneath it and before he said anything, she drew his face closer and pressed her lips against his. They stood like that, under the Cloak, until Harry drew away.

Wordlessly she stepped out and raised a hand in farewell. Harry raised his hand out from under the Cloak and then turned, going onto the forest. His last kiss with Ginny had given him the strength to do what he needed to do.

When he faced Voldemort in the clearing, behind the fire, she was the last thing he thought of. Her blazing look, and the feel of her lips on his—and with that, Harry died happy.

Though he returned to life later on, he never forgot that "last" meeting outside the forest. Ginny's love for him had helped him do what he needed; he did not need any more affirmation of it than that.