I couldn't stand to see her cry. Dumbledore, our last hope, was gone from the world and she stood alone, crying silently into her black veil. She was such a kind person, passionate and full of life. Most people didn't see that, it felt like I was the only one who truly knew her, who looked beyond the mask she wore into the person she truly was, the one she wanted to be. She was always alone, and I couldn't bear to see her in pain.
I felt it too. Dumbledore was fair, sometimes fair to the point of softness, it was true, but he was a good man. Everyone shared the pain of losing someone so great, so powerful, so needed. I looked out at the crowd. The grief was apparent on almost everyone's faces (save Rufus Scrimgeour and his ministry); Cho Chang looked as if she had died herself she was so white with shock. Hagrid's tear fell thickly into his beard giving it the appearance of being over-gelled, Ron Weasley was fighting the tears, I could see it, Hermione Granger let the tears fall, never letting go of Ron's hand.
The quiet song of the merpeople rang out over the assembly as the centaur's showered the area with arrows that would not harm us, the deepest form of honour they could show. It was certain that a great wizard, perhaps the greatest of all eternity, had been lost. The effects of which would bear down, swiftly and with much sorrow. I moved towards her as the merpeople's song finished, and the phoenix song began. She looked up at me as I sat beside her. The tears stopped and she embraced me, speaking only my name. "Argus." Pince had never looked so beautiful.
