Title: To Continue
Rating: T
Summary: "So remind me. Why are we going back to school after a year of roving the world and defeating evil?" And how exactly do you pick up the pieces of a shattered life and just keep going? After all, to continue is the hardest task of all. RWHG HPGW.
Disclaimer: Unfortunately, I have neither the creative talent nor the amount of money that I would have if I did own Harry Potter, so I can quite comfortably say that I own nothing. Damnit.
My first serious foray into the world of Harry Potter, so I hope I don't suck too badly… And I hate that summary. Hate it, hate it, hate it. Oh yeah, and post-Deathly Hallows. I love that book.
Anyway. R&R is blessed, and enjoy!
To Continue
Prologue - Adaptation
Hermione Granger watched the world flicker past the train window, her right hand pressed lightly against the cool glass. There was a strange look dancing in her eyes; nostalgia, warring with anticipation. Anticipation and hope – yes, hope was there too.
"I didn't think I'd ever come this way again," she remarked idly, fingers tracing impressionistic patterns in the mist caused by her warm breath. "I thought…" She paused. "I thought that we'd never return to Hogwarts as students after—" Her voice cracked. "After last year," she finished in a whisper.
Warm fingers, interlaced with her own, squeezed gently. "I know what you mean," Ron Weasley agreed, his voice unusually soft. His thumb traced soothing circles on the back of her hand. She smiled—a bittersweet expression—and turned to lean her head against his shoulder, letting her eyelids slide shut. Ron smiled gently and pressed his nose to her wavy hair, just for a moment. Then he pulled back and said, with his usual subtlety, "So remind me. Why are we going back to school after a year of roving the world and defeating evil?"
Twin sighs of exasperation filled the carriage from the two girls in residence. Ginny Weasley, seated opposite her brother, rolled her eyes at him and Hermione straightened up and glared fiercely at him. Ron wilted under their joint disapproval. "What?" he defended weakly, glancing at Harry Potter for some back-up.
Harry just smirked at his friend and sat back, his arm loosely around Ginny's shoulders.
"Fat lot of good you are," Ron commented bitterly.
"We are returning to Hogwarts, Ronald Weasley," Hermione began, ignoring Ron's muttered 'Don't call me that' at the use of his full name "because currently we have no qualifications whatsoever, and even though we've 'roved the world' and 'defeated evil', which was technically all Harry anyway, we're not going to get far without at least a couple of NEWTs."
"But we've got our OWLs," Ron protested. "Isn't that good enough?"
"No."
"Fine," Ron sulked.
Harry smirked even wider, and Ron glared at him. The object of his disapproval shifted slightly and then said, in an attempt to change the subject, "At least we won't have Voldemort to worry about this year."
Ron snorted, his mind dissuaded from its previous track. "Finally. Seven years…" He shook his head.
"It's a long time to live in fear," Ginny commented softly, her voice barely audible over the rattling of the train. The mood in the carriage abruptly changed, and they were quiet – a contemplative quiet, riddled with unspoken emotion. They had lived in fear for so long, and now it felt strange to be free of that fear. It was confusing.
The Hogwarts Express rattled on towards its destination, snowy forests flashing past the windows.
"Unless You-Know-Who had a kid," Ron mused thoughtfully.
Three pairs of eyes swivelled to stare at him in disbelief – Ron was happily oblivious to their incredulity.
"I mean," he blathered on, "it would be weird, although I hate to think about the person who'd want to have a kid with… that."
"Ron," Hermione said quietly, flickers of what bore a surprising resemblance to pain sliding across her face.
But Ron's face suddenly went white as a sheet – apparently, he hadn't heard her. "Umbridge!" he whispered in horror. "Oh God, Umbridge!"
Harry was desperately trying to suppress a laughing fit, more at Ron's face than anything else; Ginny was sat there with her mouth wide open, gaping at her brother, and Hermione looked about ready to strangle the babbling Weasley sat beside her. "Ron," she said tersely.
"…tainting my mind…" Ron groaned.
"Ron!" Hermione barked.
He started.
"Shut up," she retorted sweetly.
Ginny giggled. Harry bit his tongue.
Ron just looked offended. "What?" he asked. "What'd I do?"
She shot him a withering glance. "You're not that thick."
"What's wrong with wondering if—"
"Let's just stop this conversation now, shall we?" Harry interjected, his cheeks bright red with suppressed laughter.
"Yeah, please, let's," Ginny interrupted, her lips twitching up in a smirk.
"Just leave it at the statement 'no more Voldemort', okay?" Harry finished.
Ron shrugged moodily. "Fine," he grumbled.
Hermione mouthed a silent 'Thank you' at Harry.
There was another silence, but a comfortable one this time – just four friends, enjoying the peace that had been denied to them for so long. Ginny snuggled closer to Harry, her eyes closed as she leant her head against his chest. He rested his cheek against the softness of her hair, silently revelling in the closeness that he had missed over the past year, and watched his two best friends. Ron and Hermione weren't quite as demonstrative as their companions – they sat side by side, the fingers of her left hand intertwined with those of his right, both gazing out the window over the snowy countryside.
Harry smiled slightly at the sight. Something else that had taken seven long years to come into fruition – finally, he thought to himself. The spark of attraction between them had been there as long as he'd known them, despite the fact that, up until last year, they'd both seemed to be completely oblivious. He smirked slightly. The jealousy each of them had exhibited at the other's romantic entanglements with Viktor Krum/Lavender Brown had been…entertaining, to say the least.
"It's going to be so different." Hermione's gaze never left the window as she spoke. "No Dumbledore; no Snape." She shook her head slightly, and tears sparkled slightly in her warm eyes. "We lost so many…"
Ron pulled her back against him and into his arms. He pressed his cheek to hers in silent comfort. No words were exchanged – what could be said to assuage this grief? For her, the comfort of his embrace was enough.
Harry looked away.
---------
He couldn't quite shake the image of those fifty-four bodies laid out in the Great Hall as he stood at the entrance to the grand space. The familiar four trestle tables were in place, already half-full with chattering students, from first to seventh years, but all that Harry could see was the dead that still haunted him. It had been a long summer, full of fixing and healing, but those who died to keep him away from Voldemort those last few minutes still followed him wherever he went.
Hermione and Ginny passed him on their way down to the Gryffindor table, talking and giggling (probably exchanging tales of Ron and Harry's misdemeanours), but Ron paused beside his friend. For that moment, it was just the two of them. "You see them too," his red-headed friend said softly.
Harry nodded wordlessly, his tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth.
"Lupin, Tonks, Colin." Ron's voice cracked. "Fred," he whispered. "All of them, just lying there. Broken."
"When will the pain fade?" Harry asked, so softly. The two of them were their own little bubble amidst the festivities; a bubble of pain and memory.
"I don't think it ever will," Ron replied. "But we have to learn to live with it."
Harry shook his head slowly. "If only I had just gone to him when he called for it," he choked out. "If only I'd thought about the consequences… They might still be alive."
"Don't say that." Ron's voice was suddenly harsh. "Don't ever say that." Harry turned to look at his friend, astonishment and confusion in his eyes. Ron met his best friend's gaze squarely, and Harry was shocked at the anger abruptly burning in the other's normally-placid face. "It cheapens their sacrifice," he bit off, every word an arrow. "It cheapens what they died for if you say that." Darkened eyes, blazing with fury and unutterable grief. "So don't."
And he left, their moment of shared sorrow broken.
Harry stared after him, his eyes wide as the rest of the incoming students swirled around him.
---------
