The night is calm. The dark seems more substantial than usual, creeping to the very barriers between the glow of bulbs lining the street and filling the air, lingering. Everyone knows their job. Everyone is ready to lay down their life for the sake of the greater good. Everyone.
With seven Harry Potters, seven Boy-Who-Liveds, Hagrid smiles to himself for a half-second, thinking of a time not so long ago, when he brought Harry to a place of safety after years of darkness. Darkness that everyone had thought had ended, until—no. No time for thinking of those things tonight. The keepers and the kept are ready to be transported. Ready for anything.
Stepping outside of 4 Privet Drive for the last time, Hagrid puts his hand on Harry's shoulder and hopes he conveys a sense that everything will be okay. Harry's eyes lock on Hagrid's—many feet above—before he looks down at his hand holding Hedwig's cage. Hagrid's eyes follow, looking at her beautiful shape, luminescent even in the thick night, lovely even in the sad anxiousness surrounding the thing which needs to be done. She blinks and meets his eyes, the pain in her deep, golden gaze flashing for a second and it's gone replaced by a more assured look, but Hagrid knows. Hagrid can always read her and he smiles a sad smile at her, hoping they both will be safe and home in a matter of hours.
Harry opens her cage and lets her free, but when she flies out finally, it is with a great deal of reluctance and a quick look at her lover's face, still looking into her eyes, remembering their time together.
An angel in the deep sky, Hedwig soars above the suburban households and finally gets out of sight. It's only when he can no longer see her tangible form that Hagrid tears his eyes away from the sky where if he squints he can see the path made by her form, gliding overhead, keeping things sacred and safe.
Soon enough, he and Harry are safely on the motorcycle. All Harrys and their protectors lift off at the same time, splitting their group only when they start being attacked.
There's so much movement. Spells and death eaters are whizzing by on every side and there's no time to think, there's no time to move, no time to breathe. Suddenly, she's by the side of the motorcycle. Suddenly she's there. And she's looking at him.
Looking at him as her body makes contact with a killing curse. Eyes permanently open as she jerks and falls, as if in slow motion, turning in a ballerina spin in the night sky with no great hurry. She has nowhere to be. She will never have anywhere to be.
Hagrid's heart stops. It feels like it drops straight down with her, and, reflecting later, he supposed it had. But time doesn't stop for his grievance, and Harry's cries are muted by movement, by constant spells coming straight for the pair. And then he's here, he's now. He will never get over this, never move on, and he will spend the rest of the night thinking about her snowy shape—suddenly lifeless, cruelly inanimate—and crying silently into his huge hand—his huge hand with which he held her, felt her feathers, her beak, and he will think of the scent of her on him, the heat of her body as they laid together in bed, as they quickly had those secret touches. But right now he has to keep Harry safe, and he pushes the thoughts of his love to the back of his mind, trying to push them out entirely and forget rather than have the pain, but things never were that simple.
No, now he's drying his eyes, looking sharply ahead, and shifting his eyes, scanning the area and doing his best to keep Harry Potter safe from harm.
Looking to his right for a moment, he sees a flash, hears words shouted.
I'll be with ya again now, Hedwig, he thinks as the spell makes contact.