DISCLAIMER: The verses quoted at the end of this fic are the words of John Donne, from the poem 'Death be not proud.' And, of course, I do not own Hermione Granger or anyone else who may happen to mentioned in this fic.
Non-DH compliant.
One would have thought that it would have been pouring rain.
It wasn't.
One would have thought that the whole school would have turned out for the 'occasion.'
It didn't.
One wouldn't have thought that the three youngest people at the 'occasion' would be the three arch-nemeses of the two people lying on the stone biers.
They were.
Hermione sighed, not a disgruntled sigh, not a contented sigh, or even a relieved sigh, just a sigh. It was what it was and nothing else. …Or was it?
Those past few days had been hell, not like hell, but hell itself as if the devil had, by some cruel and twisted turn of fate, risen from the fiery pits of his domain and wrecked havoc and mayhem within the walls of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Hermione had already seen more than most eighteen year olds by that time, but the past few days had been worse. Much worse.
She had seen mangled bodies, limbs bent out at grotesque angles and blood oozing, congealing, and crusting on so many wounds. It was truly horrifying to see these atrocities after the fact, but inexpressibly more so to see them committed, especially when there were more effective and painless ways of winning a war, more efficient and less painful ways of killing when it came right down to it. It had been especially horrifying since she personally knew the people committing those inexcusable acts and the people to whom the horrors were done.
Far beyond any magical damage or weapon inflicted injury that was inflicted, there laid baser demons. For, Hermione was most haunted by other crimes she had witnessed; the bodies of young girls, and boys, ravaged and violated by the most worthless and vile refuse of wizarding society. And it wasn't just those whom were readily viewed as le fond d'etang, the scum of the earth. Lucius Malfoy, newly broken out of Azkaban, brought his own form of heartlessness to an entirely new plane, committing rape as easily as it came to the likes of Fenrir Greyback. Verily, Lucius had always been cruel, but he had always before seemed to carry himself above the rest, disdainful of more primitively bestial acts than the Unforgivables. Hermione shuddered, thoughts progressing to the memories of seeing Percy Weasley pounding into the body of a third year Hufflepuff. So it wasn't just upbringing, like so many case-studies said, because she knew what kind of upbringing Percy had had, and it certainly hadn't taught him to accept or embrace the depraved act of rape.
She shivered. Harry put an arm around her, gently rubbing her shoulder. He understood. Ron understood.
She sighed again. This time, it was more than just a sigh. It was a sigh of disappointment and waning hope. She couldn't call it despair, because she knew that life had to continue, even if it could never again return to what it had been.
One would have thought that one of the older adults attending the funeral would have been crying, even if she, Ron, and Harry were not: McGonagall, Flitwick, Moody, Lupin, or, er- Mrs. Lupin.
They weren't.
One would have thought that Hermione would be crying, even if no one else were. She had always been sensitive to pain.
She wasn't.
Yet.
She and Draco hadn't had a wild, passionate, one-year fling. They hadn't poured out their hearts to each other with promises of what would be after the war was finished. They hadn't had a one-night stand on the eve of battle. (Coincidentally, she and Snape hadn't either.)
What Hermione and Draco did have was even more heart wrenching for her now. They hadn't really had anything, not a touch, a kiss, not a single whispered sweet nothing uttered between them. There had been looks, but even few of those. Hermione cherished each memory of such an occurrence, when Draco had regarded her without hatred or animosity and instead with... something else: affection, maybe, she dared not think it love, but dead men tell no tales. So what Hermione was left with was regret. Not regret at how she had felt for him, what she still felt for him, but regret at not having acted on her feelings. She wished she had been braver, had done something about it, anything!
She sighed again. She seemed to be doing quite a bit of that. And, because it wasn't raining (it was a beautiful day actually), because the world didn't feel her pain and wouldn't weep for her, Hermione began to cry. It wasn't a sobbing crying but the kind one can't avoid and can't stem the tide of once it has begun. Big, fat tears coursed down her face, slowly and sporadically at first and then increasing in every way. And with the tears came a dripping nose. Hermione pulled a large handkerchief from her pocket and blew her nose noisily.
One would have thought that the handkerchief would have been black.
It wasn't.
(It was pink and white checked, actually.)
One would have thought that someone else would have started crying next.
They didn't.
One would have thought that Hermione would have jumped back like everyone else when the bodies were engulfed in flame and replaced by gleaming white tombs.
She didn't.
One would have thought she would have cried harder, like people sometimes do when dirt hits the top of a coffin.
She didn't.
She smiled. Not a full, toothy smile. A quivery smile, but a smile nonetheless.
Harry didn't understand why. Ron didn't understand why. But Hermione understood why. Professor McGonagall understood why. She had gone through the same thing when Dumbledore had died the previous year. And Hermione understood now why McGonagall had reacted as she had to the Headmaster's death, with a sad smile on her face, but her head held high, not guilty to be alive …
One short sleep past will wake eternally
And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.
FIN