Right, this is just a one shot which originally, and may still, was going to be the prologue for a, dare I say it, Harry Potter/Lord of the Rings FF. Tell me what you think because i've never really done one shots...
Red as Roses
Blood. The lands were dead. Red as the most romantic of roses. I had given Ginny a rose like that, once. They stained my hands, crushed petals. Under my nails, in my hair, the fold of my skin. The ice buried into my flesh. So cold it was a wonder I did not really feel it. Rubies seemed to swell from the ground, trickling lethargically over the marble. Towards me. One of its fingers tumbled into a laceration in the stone and there they gathered till all at once it over flowed. Thick and mysterious as only blood could be. A hand, bare and grimy, covered in darkened blood, dirt and bruises. So small. From the body it was adjoined to the stream spread from, ever moving. I couldn't bear to see the face. I was numb, yes, and I didn't want that to change. Sweet and fair she still seemed. My best friend. Brown hair, unruly right to the end, haloed her face. Her eyes, brown orbs, were dull and that spark of intelligence and logic I loved gone. Gone. Gone...
I was alone.
The world was heavy and dark. Twisted around me. Faces blanking stared into nothing. Figures heaped over one another crudely. The day was dawning beyond the walls. A ray of light bouncing from the horizon. The glow pushed through the shattered windows, the burnt and burning walls, the darkness of black magic. I didn't see it. Nevertheless, I wasn't blind. I saw the blood. I saw the mutilations. I saw the twelve year old who believed he could help win a war.
Had we won? I couldn't remember any more.
I was too empty for tears as I stroked my fingers across the soft, now cold, skin. Now hard. I pulled away, empty. Warmth had deserted us all. Was I not just like these people? Broken, cold, lifeless. Who was here to testify otherwise? The room, castle, was noiseless. So quiet it pressed on my eyes and ears.
I saw red. Over there. It was a flash, brilliant and pure. Not the red of blood, or anger, or hate. Somehow I was on my feet. I didn't ever feel the pain, just the raw stiffness of my body. Rigid. Spinning walls surrounded me and I tumbled towards the red. Or did the red come to me? I didn't care.
Perhaps now I would cry. Perhaps it would be in this moment that I broke. The red spread around her. Faced down I could almost believe I didn't know her. I didn't, couldn't. She wasn't meant to be here. No. I pulled the weight of her body around to face me, cradled the woman in my arms. No. She wasn't meant to be here. And yet she was. Her pale skin, softer than velvet. Her pink lips, warm next to mine. Her hair as fiery and beautiful as everything about her. She was here. Her eyes held the determined edge I knew was all her. All of her, what a lie that was, she wasn't here anymore... and yet it wasn't a lie. She was here.
And I was alone.
After everything.
Sure, Tom Riddle was dead. The death eaters were gone. But what was this place when my Ginny, my Ginny Weasley, my friends, everything I held dear, everyone I loved, who I'd tried to save, was gone too. What would I do now? What do I do! With the body of the one girl I ever loved in my arms and all of my siblings, my family, around me, dead, gone. Gone. Gone...
I'd given her a rose once. We'd walked beside the lake, blissful and at ease, hand in hand. We sat by the water and she'd laughed as I stared in amazement at the vivacious woman who by some miracle loved me. She stood and moved away from me. Her bare feet trailed in the water and she teased me with her eyes, daring me to come closer. I didn't think about it, my shoes were already off as I padded into the cool water. To her side. Always to her side. Even as I ran through forests or sat brooding in a familiar tent I'd been going to her. Every step I took was to bring the day when we could be together closer.
And here we were. Together.
Somehow I found it wasn't as I had expected it to be.
I tasted salt on my sand-paper lips and a stench of burning rose to my nose. I heard nothing but the weak thrum of my own rebellious heart. Why was I still alive? Why could I still feel the cold that gnawed at my bones? Or the sharp pains of cuts on my skin? Or the dull ache of bruises in my flesh? Why was I still here? Looking down on the world that was dead to me. Brown eyes. The life I'd worked for, massacred.
I was alone.