A/N: This is my first venture into writing HP fanfiction. I've written bits and pieces for other fandoms but HP was always too sacred for me to touch. Since I've recently fallen into a hardcore Harmony hole, I needed to try my hand at it (hopefully without hitting the pitfalls which seem to distract other authors). Being that I'm trying to avoid "Lord Potter", "Billionaire Potter", "Superhero Potter", "Majorly OOC Hermione", "Evil Weasleys", and "Evil Dumbledore", etc. This story will hopefully be a little different and dare I say, original. Anyway, let me know what you think about my first attempt at touching the sacred heart of fandom (in my opinion)
**H/H**
Ripples rolled smoothly across the Black Lake, intersecting with more of their brethren bouncing off the rocky shoreline. The water gave a light "bloop" as yet another stone broke the surface tension and slipped to the murky depths below. A head of messy black hair turned and twisted around, looking at the ground to find another suitable rock.
Today marked the fifth day of Harry Potter's life without the looming spectre of war. The entirety of the last seven years had been leading up to one climactic moment and now it was all over. There was no more plot arc to his life. From this point on, his only given purpose in life was to "live".
His hand happened upon a smooth worn stone and drew it up for closer inspection to determine its aptitude for skipping. Upon closer inspection, he found that it was the exact shale grey and pitted texture of the exterior walls of the castle. The stone's back side was jagged and burnt. Harry stared at it in disgust, realizing he nearly made a toy of a burnt piece of his childhood home.
The young man's stomach was twisting into tighter and tighter knots before a familiar voice broke him out of his stupor.
"Bloody hell, Harry," He threw the rock away, hoping to avoid a lecture. Light footsteps crunched over the pebbled earth, announcing the arrival of the only person Harry feared right now, Hermione Granger. She wouldn't brook any excuse, she could and would make him talk.
"Do you have any idea how long I – We've been looking for you? The whole castled is worried sick," There was a pause, then she continued, "I've been worried".
He had been ready to fend off the first attack, but the second statement caught him off guard. There was something more genuinely upsetting about her quiet admission than the expression of concern from what amounted to the entire wizarding world. Harry briefly entertained the notion of pretending he had not heard her. After cycling through several versions of that excuse though, he finally accepted the inevitability of conversation.
"I'm fulfilling the last part of the prophecy".
"What?" The brunette witch stopped in her tracks.
Harry intoned a truly awful impression of Hermione's least favorite Seer, "-Neither can live while the other survives...and the one who lives will have no bloody idea what to do for the rest of eternity". He tossed another rock, this time only two skips before the final "bloop".
Hermione gave him a look which told him unquestioningly that she was not amused.
"Harry," she began, her voice still gentle, "You've missed breakfast, and now lunch".
"That's not-"
"This is the fourth day in a row," she interrupted more firmly, "And if you try to tell me again that 'We went for days without food before,' then I might just scream". She had worked herself into a right state. Her cheeks were visibly flushed and her hands were balled into fists. A strand of hair had worked its way out of her already messy ponytail to dangle in front of her coffee coloured eyes. Eyes which were trained tightly on the boy who was looking more and more like a child caught feeding his homework to the dog.
"We did," He spoke, more seriously, "and worse. But we made it through...I made it through".
Harry's shoulders slumped, his indignation giving way in the face of the force of nature that was Hermione Granger.
"Can you keep a secret for me...from Ron too?" He asked, almost scared of the answer.
"Harry...You know you can tell me anything, but keeping secrets from Ron-" She trailed off, mind wandering to the Forest of Dean.
"It's not so much Ron I'm worried about. Ginny and his Mum can practically read his mind and they'd go spare".
He smiled wryly, remembering two Summers ago when the twins had planned a whole elaborate surprise party for Ginny only to be completely foiled by her own ability to game her brother for information. His guts suddenly twisted up...the twins.
The conflicted look never left her face, but Hermione replied after a fashion, "You can trust me".
She had neatly sidestepped his guilt over Fred and back to the forefront the subject at hand.
"I knew I had to die for a while leading up to the Forest," He paused to regather his courage but his inner lion was wilting at the sight of the horrified expression on her face. Harry was struck by a strong urge to keep her beautiful face from ever doing that again, but he pressed on.
"I had time to prepare myself. I made peace with my faults and was about as ready to move on as I could ever imagine being."
Her hands now covered her mouth and she lowered herself to sit beside him, cross-legged, "Oh Harry-"
"Let me finish," he interjected a little more aggressively than was strictly necessary, causing another knot of guilt to form on top of the already tangled mess of other emotional stringwork, "I used the resurrection stone to speak to Sirius, Remus, My parents. They were ready to greet me on the other side. I was ready to go. Then I came back," another sigh, "And this is so much harder".
Harry finished with a shaky breath. Hermione took one of his trembling hands in her own. She furrowed her brows for a moment then spoke firmly, "When I was young, my father had a saying, 'Life is worth nothing without challenge'. He would tell me that anytime I was worrying about my marks in school or one time when I accidentally knocked down a bookshelf with a magical outburst".
She looked up into his eyes with a familiar look of determination, hands now holding his firmly, their knees almost touching as she had turned to face him, "What you did in the forest wasn't a challenge. You accepted it as inevitable. Rebuilding is the challenge, living is the challenge. You didn't spend your last seven years preparing for a happy adult life".
Hermione was now smiling in a wan sort of way with tears threatening to spill over her long bottom lashes. Harry considered briefly if the expression she wore now was better or worse than the one which had struck him before.
"I know a quote won't fix your problems. But if it can help-" She gasped in surprise.
Harry had closed the small space between them and wrapped his arms around her in a fierce embrace. After a moment's surprise, she returned the gesture and they sat there in the dirt holding one another for what must have been several minutes.
Harry approached the entrance to the Great Hall, nerves building upon nerves. He had not joined any of the large group of survivors who remained at Hogwarts after the battle for any meal or other occasion for the better part of a week. Many had not seen him since the final showdown. Harry's footsteps caught momentarily a few feet shy of the heavy oak doors, breath now coming in shaky gasps. Hermione squeezed his hand and looked sideways at him with an encouraging smile and some of the mountain that was sitting on his shoulders ebbed away.
Even so, his eyes screamed, "Please don't make me do this," as they connected with hers. But as much as she was comforting him, she was also setting an unwavering pace toward the one place he did not want to be right now. The doors creaked as they opened.
Early afternoon sunlight poured through the holes in the ceiling of the Great Hall. Large pieces of grey masonry were strewn about the Great Hall. Some of the larger pieces seemed to be serving as makeshift benches for a few of the huddled groups of witches and wizards, each of whom was engaging in some combination of celebration and mourning. Some of the camps had lit small fires and erected tents. It was strange, Harry thought to himself, seeing the absurdity incarnate that was a wizarding camp in this place, normally so civilized and well, normal.
Bisecting the camp was one of the long house tables, covered in an astonishingly normal assortment of luncheon foods. The kitchens, Harry realized, must have been mostly spared from the destruction being that they are so far down and well hidden.
Harry cursed the loudness of the brass hinges as the doors swung open to admit Hermione and himself. He felt sure that everyone on the entire grounds heard. If anyone noticed though, they kept it to themselves. The fires kept burning, the conversations didn't pause, at least at first.
A few eyes near the door looked up and after a few double-takes, whispers spread down the hall. Watching it was like watching the surface of a placid lake after a stone is tossed into the middle. Before a minute had passed, the entire Hall was standing, watching him. A lone pair of hands started to clap slowly and just like the whispers, spread into a roaring ovation. There were whoops and shouts of glee and appreciation from all directions.
The mountain that had been resting on Harry's shoulders may as well have been a planet now. Not even Hermione's impressively comforting hand in his own could lessen the weight of the situation. The applause died and suddenly a thousand pairs of expectant eyes were on him, waiting, wanting something.
It took Harry an impressively long time to realize they were expecting a speech, a speech from the savior of the world, who's tongue had just turned to stone in his mouth. His ears were ringing. The Hall tumbled wildly around him.
"Oi, let him alone," Harry's salvation came in the form of Ron who stood up and was flailing his arms in an attempt to shoo the assemblage back to whatever they had been doing previously. Ron's actions, though well intentioned, had absolutely no effect. These people expected leadership from Harry and they weren't going to let Ron get in the way of that.
"Back to lunch everyone," Came another voice, Ginny.
Within a few seconds, the entire Weasley clan, even Percy and George were standing around Harry and Hermione in a sort of protective circle. The crowd finally took the hint and started reluctantly to go about their business.
After the crowd had mostly settled back into their own activities, the circle of Weasleys turned inward and there was a moment of awkward staring at one another until Molly attacked.
"Harry dear, we haven't seen you all week," She was on the verge of tears as she gathered him into a hug that only Molly Weasley could make seem friendly rather than combative.
Once he was released there was a barrage of, "You haven't been eating right," and "you poor dear," statements which Harry could barely follow.
"Mrs - er - Mrs. Weasley...I'm fine really. I've just been resting," He hoped that would be somewhat convincing.
"Welcome back to the world of the living mate - Literally I guess," Ron grinned smugly at his own joke and Harry couldn't help but crack a smile as well, embracing his friend.
"You back for good then?" Bill said.
"He had better be," answered Hermione for him. She shot him a sharp look which clearly meant that he would be back for good or she would chase him to the ends of the Earth.