Disclaimer: I do not in any shape or form own any shape or form of Harry Potter.
Ginny POV. The battle of Hogwarts at the end of DH, parallel to Harry's A Flaw in the Plan. Anywhere that there are breaks is showing where I skipped time (either because I didn't know what Ginny was thinking, or because it wasn't important.)
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Ginny Weasley knelt against the floor of the Great Hall, her head resting against the stomach of her dead brother. In one hand she held Fred's cold, unpulsing wrist, and the other she wrapped numbly around her mother, who seemed to be neither seeing nor feeling. The Hall was filled with people, the dead and the living, and yet it was ghostly quiet—only faint murmurs and sobs were audible. No one broke the heaving silence that encased them all, whether frightened of what might happen next if it were shattered, or simply because there was nothing to say. And so it stretched on ruthlessly, a torturous haven, and with its continuation brought no possible escape or distraction from the fierce pain that pressed down upon each person. It seemed that the same life that had shined behind the eyes of their loved ones was now fueling a grief so powerful that they did not have the strength left to bear it.
Ginny opened her eyes, tears dripping onto the already wetness of Fred's jumper, and she could see Ron and Hermione sitting together on the stone floor at the foot of Fred's bed. The floor was so cold and hard that it was as if Death itself was seeping up through the cracks. Hermione was sobbing openly, her arms wrapped around Ron's quivering body. He clutched the side of her face in his dirt-crusted hand, his fingers weaving through her tangled hair.
"Where is he…where is he?" Hermione's voice was a wisp of sound in the hollow chamber.
Ron held Hermione ever tighter, breathing soothing, half-hearted words to her.
And suddenly, without warning, Ginny felt the immense weight of pain, of futility, of heartbreak, fall against her like a crushing boulder. Every moment that she could remember up to this very instant, there had been hope. It had been the single last bit that refused to be smothered; it had been the hope that Harry kept alive.
But now, the truth was beginning to fall upon her with more and more black certainty.
"Ron…we should, we should…" Hermione's voice drifted off for a moment before returning more strongly. "Ron, we have to be looking for him—we need to go now before he, before he—"
"We won't be able to find him unless he wants us to, Hermione," Ron whispered. Then, more softly, he murmured, "He wouldn't. You know he wouldn't." The reassurance was said vehemently, but at the same moment, Ron began to release Hermione. His face was filling with more and more desperation, and he glanced repeatedly at the doorway of the Great Hall, as if hoping to see Harry standing there. Hermione's tears pooled in his hands.
"He's left us, Ron," Hermione whispered, her voice fading in the air like a wisp of smoke. "I can feel it."
Ginny lifted her head above Fred's still form and for a moment, the room swam before her, muddled by the tears in her eyes. Carefully, she slipped out of her mother's grasp, feeling stiff and sickly.
With great effort, she stumbled slowly towards where her brother and her best friend lay, locking eyes with Hermione.
"I can feel it, too."
And then the cold, high voice sliced into the whimpering silence of the death-ridden Great Hall, and Ginny could feel herself falling away more surely and painfully than ever before.
"Harry Potter is dead. He was killed as he ran away, trying to save himself while you lay down your lives for him. We bring you his body as proof that your hero is gone.
Lies, she thought, lies, but her breath was rasping loudly between her barely open lips and the air around her hollowed out like in a dream… In a dream where you believe that it is true, and you can feel that it is true—you know it is true, but now there was no one to wake her from this nightmare…
"The battle is won. You have lost half of your fighters. My Death Eaters outnumber you, and the Boy Who Lived is finished. There must be no more war. Anyone who continues to resist, man, woman, or child, will be slaughtered, as will every member of their family. Come out of the castle now, kneel before me, and you shall be spared. Your parents and children, your brothers and sisters will live and be forgiven, and you will join me in the new world we shall build together."
Her body was limp and numb as if suspended hollowly in the air; she could see nothing but the shock and disbelief splashed across a sea of faces, hear nothing but the sound of Ron slowly pulling Hermione up from the floor.
Only one thing was certain in that endless instant—love and life was dead, dead with the boy who had stolen her heart, who cradled it still, and it had died with him. The final shimmering shred of hope had vanished.
Hermione grasped Ginny's hand, and Ginny could not feel the pain of the pressure Hermione exulted on her palm; she could not feel anything. Hermione raised her head and stared into Ginny's dead eyes. And then, all too suddenly, the air was flying by her, and Hermione was running, gripping desperately onto Ginny's hand as the tears continued to roll endlessly off Hermione's jaw, leaving a wet trail against the cold stone floor.
Ginny realized vaguely that Ron was among them, now crying in earnest, unwilling or unable to let go of Hermione. The three of them together streaked through the Great Hall that was now erupting in screams, slipping and weaving around people that were clutching onto each other and the cots that held the bodies… the endless row of bodies. Ginny blinked as the Tonks and Lupin flashed by, resting lifelessly side by side, and watched as the last of the bubble-gum pink color faded from Tonk's hair. Ginny saw the terrified faces of her family, her mother, her father, Charlie and Bill, and Percy following behind closely, towing George.
They grew nearer and nearer to the Entrance Hall, where just outside Ginny would have to face the sight of Harry's body, limp and horribly, sickeningly lifeless…
Would they pick him up, throw him around? Kick him? Ginny didn't know what would be worse, hearing Harry's scream of agony as Voldemort shouted crucio,or watching his body as it moved like an artificial cringed, but there was no escaping the images inside her own mind. Breathe, just breathe…She told herself shakily. You need to get a hold of yourself, there's no escaping this— you have to do this.
The air still slipping by her, Ginny watched as Professor McGonagall emerged from the crowd and burst through the doors just ahead of them.
"NO!"
Ginny gripped Hermione's arm for support, her legs still moving blindly beneath her, as they burst into the blackness of the night air.
Ron was the first to shout. "No!"
Hermione pulled free of Ginny's grasp and sank to the grass, gasping.
"No!" she cried.
And finally Ginny let her eyes settle upon him. He lay motionless and pale in Hagrid's arms, looking very much like a small, defenseless child. His raven hair was as disheveled as ever, with bits of grass and leaves stuck in. His eyes were closed, and for the first time, Ginny felt an unnerving sweep of relief; she didn't think she could bear seeing his wide, bright eyes open and unseeingly staring, Death dancing behind them like a poison. Even then, he was beautiful to her—beautiful and impossible—the way he had always been. "Harry!" she screamed, willing him to respond, to move from Hagrid's arms and come to her, impossible as always—"HARRY!"
And finally, she fell to the ground beside Hermione and Ron, quivering as the sobs shook her body.
The others were there now. Molly Weasley was placing her hand over her heart and making a wretched, half-mad sound at the sight of Harry's body draped in Hagrid's quivering arms. She stooped down to pull her daughter up from the ground, and Ginny could hear the sounds of the rest of her family, Neville and Luna, and the other survivors as they ran from the lighted entrance of the castle, brave and indignant. Ginny listened to them scream and cry out in rage and grief, feeling her mother's hot tears falling into her hair. Wake up, she shrieked to herself. WAKE UP.
"SILENCE!" Voldemort bellowed, and Ginny did not stir in Molly's embrace. A white light flashed behind her closed eyelids as the spell hit them, and a forced hush cut through the crowd, leaving a thick, throbbing silence behind.
Where was her heart? The air whistled hollowly down her throat…were her lungs gone as well? The loss of Harry and Fred were like steel claws that had ripped pieces of her body away. She had felt fear before…pain…but never to this magnitude. She felt so mangled; she couldn't understand what was holding the rest of her together anymore.
A future that had once been illuminated was now barren and black and utterly pointless. She had always had safely tucked away wishes for a future with Harry. And now, too suddenly, it was erased, like color bleeding under water.
"It is over! Set him down, Hagrid, at my feet, where he belongs!"
Ginny twisted around to watch as Hagrid tenderly lowered Harry onto the grass before Voldemort. She had never laid eyes on Voldemort in this form before. She looked up, and was not surprised by what she saw—had he ever been truly human? He was the picture of malignance, of terror, and she understood why he made himself like this. Lord Voldemort had always wanted to be feared—his image, his voice, his abilities, even his name. Voldemort's ruthlessness and brutality took on a different meaning for her now that Harry was gone. Ginny felt a searing, mordant hatred towards him.
They had won. He had won.
"You see?" Voldemort taunted. Ginny stared at Harry's still form, looking very tense to pass as dead—but she didn't allow herself to hope, to want—she wouldn't. "Harry Potter is dead! Do you understand now, deluded ones? He was nothing, ever, but a boy who relied on others to sacrifice themselves for him."
Abruptly, Ginny became aware of Ron's presence beside her. She felt the tremors rock his body as his rage overtook the charm.
Ron shouted, "He beat you!" And the noise broke out in the moment following, the anger bubbling around them like acid, until another, even stronger cracking sound silenced them once again.
"He was killed while trying to sneak out of the castle grounds," Voldemort went on, and Ginny's stomach churned with disgust at the pleasure in his voice, and she knew beyond a doubt that it was a lie, "killed while trying to save himself—"
Without warning, Neville burst through the crowd, seemingly charging at Voldemort. He hit the ground instantaneously, Voldemort Disarming him with ease. A single high, cold laugh rang through the air, seeming to echo and surround Ginny from all sides as she stared in horror.
"And who is this? Who has volunteered to demonstrate what happens to those who continue to fight when the battle is lost?" He spoke softer now, clearly amused by Neville's daring disobedience. His voice was like a hiss, venomous.
Ginny heard a euphoric sound break loose; she turned to see a woman with long, haphazard black hair and savage eyes. Ginny knew she had seen her before; not only did an image of towering shelves form in Ginny's mind, but she recognized her laugh, a twisted sound of equal distortion and jubilance. Bellatrix Lestrange smiled chillingly, staring at Neville like a prize she had won in a contest.
"It is Neville Longbottom, my Lord!" She exclaimed. "The boy who had been giving the Carrows so much trouble! The son of the Aurors, remember?"
Ginny was immediately submerged in a memory. She was standing in St. Mungo's with her brother, Harry, and Hermione, a harsh and poisoned understanding beginning to course through her. That's why he's never spoken of them, she remembered realizing.
The sound of Voldemort's voice, quickly becoming far too familiar, wrenched her back into her own nightmare.
"Ah, yes, I remember," said Voldemort, and he spoke as if recalling a pleasant outing with a friend.
Neville stood again, and she remembered suddenly of when Ron had told her about Neville falling off his broom in their first flying lesson. How different he was now. And yet she knew that all the while as he stumbled through his Hogwarts years, this blazing courage had been within him.
Neville looked impossibly far away and impeccably wandless as he stood facing the greatest enemy of them all.
"But you are a pureblood, aren't you, my brave boy?"
He isn't yours, Ginny thought fiercely. He's ours.
You can't have him like you took Harry. I won't let you.
"So what if I am?" Neville proclaimed.
"You show spirit and bravery, and you come of noble stock. You will make a very valuable Death Eater. We need your kind, Neville Longbottom."
Ginny glanced back toward Bellatrix, who looked as if this conversation wasn't going at all as she would have liked.
"I'll join you when hell freezes over," Neville spat. "Dumbledore's Army!"
Ginny broke free of her mother's grasp and shouted. Her voice burst into the night like a surging river as Voldemort's charm broke once more. Encouraging cheer rose up around her.
"Very well," said Voldemort.
Ice flooded through Ginny's body, replacing the momentary relief. She suddenly, and frighteningly, had recognized that tone; they way the words greeted you innocently, with knives in their hands. And she was standing in an echoing stone chamber, a smell of dead rats and stench, and blood coating her fingers like icing.
"If that is your choice, Longbottom, we revert to the original plan. On your head," he said softly, "be it."
Voldemort's wand sliced through the air. Ginny quickly noticed the way everyone was staring fixatedly towards the castle, and she turned to watch as a dark unidentifiable object soared towards them. It settled in Voldemort's outstretched hand. He held it by the tip, swaying slightly, holding it out for them to see as if it was something disgusting he didn't want to touch.
Ginny knew exactly what would come out of Voldemort's mouth next, and she stared at the Sorting Hat as if it was a lost dream, looking equally decrepit and wise.
"There will be no more Sorting at Hogwarts School," said Voldemort. "There will be no more Houses. The emblem, shield and colors of my noble ancestor, Salazar Slytherin, will suffice for everyone." He directed his attention to Neville once again, who was standing quite still and showing no signs of planning on retreating any time soon. "Won't they, Neville Longbottom?"
Neville, Ginny screamed in her mind. Neville, get away from there!
Voldemort centered his wand on Neville, and before Ginny had time to fear what would happen next, Neville was immobilized. Voldemort stepped forward almost daintily and shoved the hat onto Neville's head. Ginny suddenly thought madly of how it fell below his eyes as a 7th year just as she knew it must have when he first arrived at Hogwarts…
The stirring of watchers surrounding her became more distinct and for a gleaming moment Ginny thought someone was going to do something, someone was going to save him—and then she felt a wave of disgust at herself sweep through her. When had she ever waited for others to do what had to be done? It was her, Neville, and Luna that started up the DA again, because nobody else was going to. And now, now was not the time to be reserved or wary of pain.
Just as she was about to raise her wand and step forward, every single person on the opposite side of the line seemed to get the same idea: each Death Eater simultaneously pointed his or her wand at the mass of survivors—at the losers—and all movement ceased.
She moved forward anyway, courage and fear raging their own battle within her, and she had stepped closer to Neville than anyone else had dared when someone suddenly grasped her arm.
"What are you doing?"
"I need to, he's going to kill him—" she struggled, trying to pull away.
She looked up into his eyes and the vigor quickly drained out of her, allowing him to tug her gently back to safety.
"You wouldn't leave me like Fred did, right Gin?" George whispered.
"Neville here is now going to demonstrate what happens to anyone foolish enough to oppose me," said Voldemort. Ginny only barely saw the twitch of his wand as she turned her eyes away from George's unrecognizable face, before her vision was consumed by the red flames that had suddenly exploded; the Hat was on fire, and the Hat was on Neville, and Neville was unable to move…
Noise erupted, screams piercing her ears from either side of her. Before, Voldemort had been addressing them pleasantly, informing them of the world they would soon be subjected to, as they watched, seething and terrified. And suddenly everything had blasted open, and chaos streaked through what had before been so carefully controlled.
He had thought it was over, but Ginny realized that Voldemort had not yet won—there was still hope. Ginny felt as if before she was groping for a streak of light in a pitch-black cavern, but now it had arrived—and hadn't done so quietly.
Shouts and cries boomed from the edge of the grounds. Ginny watched—awed, and solitarily motionless, as what must have been hundreds of people ran towards the fight.
"HAGGER!" The ground shook beneath her feet; she wobbled, grasping onto George.
The giants charged at each other, and simultaneously arrows began shooting across the sky like wooden birds, pelting towards the coven of Death Eaters. George was trying to pull her away, out of the midst of the fight.
She wrenched out of his grasp, drawing her wand like a sword.
You can't hide me away. She pointed her wand.
"Stupefy!" The Death Eater fell to the ground, his face concealed.
"Ginny, NO!" George reached for her again, the tears falling thickly from his eyes.
Neville! She panicked. I'd nearly forgotten!
Her mother was suddenly there, holding on to her as well, trying to drag her away from the shouts and bangs and flashing green light…
For a second, she gazed out at the insanity, the desperation and rage and abhorrence. She had never seen anything so unbridled. It was scarier and more uncontrollable than she ever would have believed could have come out of an incantation, the twitch of a wrist. The sound of curses, sobs, and shrieks of fear molded into a sort of twisted soundtrack of a nightmare.
She knew that it was reflected in her own eyes as well. The wildness.
"LET ME GO!" She shrieked, and Molly's fingers loosed in shock enough for Ginny to wrench herself towards Neville. Before she could reach him, the curse broke and he moved; the fiery hat tumbled towards the ground and as it went he reached within it, pulling a great silver sword with a handle of colored rubies.
"HARRY!" Hagrid shouted. "HARRY—WHERE'S HARRY?"
Ginny spun her head around, sudden and unnerving panic coursing through her. Where had Harry's body gone? He was dead—whether or not the bluntness of that truth startled her, it was nonetheless true—and people who were dead did not simply rise and walk pain was still swallowing her from all sides; it was difficult to think clearly. This entire time, Ginny had tried to avoid thinking of what Voldemort might do with Harry's body; afraid of what her own mild imagination would dream up, dreading more morbid images to endure. She had wondered if, in the heat of a chaotic moment, she and Ron might be able to take Harry's…she couldn't think corpse…take Harry's body somewhere safe, until it was possible to Disapparate out of the grounds. Clearly, the Death Eaters had beaten her to it. She had wondered at the time—the Burrow or beside his parents? The answer was clear the moment she had thought it.
She knew that he was linked to his parents in an irrevocable way, perhaps strengthened rather than diminished because he had never known them, and that what her home and her family had been to him couldn't compete with his lost dream, the dream he had always deserved. And suddenly, unexplainably, she felt this overwhelming and surging anger at him—at Harry. How could you DO this to me?! She shrieked internally at he turned himself over? She knew he hadn't been escaping in the cowardly way that Voldemort was trying to thrust upon them—it was amazing that he was ignorant enough to believe that the people who really knew Harry would accept this invention. Ginny knew that the Death Eaters—or Voldemort himself—would want to take credit, no matter what had truly happened. Of course they would. After all, who would be alive to argue?
The searing pain flooded through her again. How could he give himself up? How could he be so stupid—so selfish! This wasn't just about him anymore—did he not realize that her life was bound to his in an unbreakable way? Did he not care? We were fighting for him, always for him—I was fighting for him! What about the future? What about what he told her—he promised! Did his promises mean nothing now?
—
"…I am the true master of the Elder Wand."
Ginny could feel her breath rasping against the dryness of her throat, and she suddenly and inexplicably knew that this was the moment—the moment that each and every person, that Harry and Voldemort themselves, had known would arrive.
And she could not protect herself from the truth any longer—it was now or never, it one or the other—or both, and she could not bear to think of watching him die, or losing him again. She had said goodbye to Harry too many times, in too many ways, some more horrible than others, and she was quite sure she wouldn't be able to do it again. There was only so much he could ask her of…only so much she could ask of herself.
And in that immeasurable instant, the sun blasted open the sky, cracking the sleek darkness like the breaking of a crystal, and the red-gold beam of sunlight shot over the sill across from where Harry and Voldemort stood before each other, no longer predator and prey, but a danger on each side; and she held her breath.
"Avada Kedavra!"
"Expelliarmus!"
The explosion of the connecting spells ripped through the room and pounded against her head, and then, too quickly—far too quickly, it was over, and she heard the sure, unquestionable thud of a lifeless body hitting the ground.
And when she lifted her eyes she saw him and only him, and he was standing quite calming, staring unblinking down at Voldemort's corpse, looking as if he was not entirely sure how it had happened—and yet it had happened, so how did it matter?
The silence lasted for hardly a split second as the tangible shock, a feeling like fluid rushing down the length of her body, swept to each person in the room, and then the sound exploded.
And Ginny was rushing towards where the crowd was closing in, and up ahead she could see Ron and Hermione, their figures blurred through her tears, and then she was there, and she could touch him, and it had seemed like a lifetime, like forever, and here she was. She managed to throw her arms around his neck and breathe him in for the faintest moment before she was overtaken by the surge of euphoric survivors that seemed to be as powerful and nearly unstoppable as a great ocean swell.
The sun continued to drift almost lazily up the sky as it always had and always would, oblivious to the events that had taken place only a few moments ago. That's the way time was—powerful above all else, and yet completely uncaring. And Ginny was panting and crying and she felt like she could scream and shout and the entire world would hear her—never had she felt so powerful, like finally her world was clean, clean of Voldemort and the despair he had thrust upon all; a world that promised not fear and further loss, but hope and life. And she breathed in the air like it contained the most amazing scent she had ever experienced, although it truly was soaked with the smell of battle and blood—celebration only just barely reaching out to claim dominance…
Luna and Hermione were suddenly there, pulling her, half-laughing and half-crying, but Ginny did not move from where she stood, watching Harry. Finally Hermione relinquished her hold on Ginny's blood-smeared wrist in defeat and instead fixated her eyes on Ron who had indeed come lumbering over, looking quite a bit dazed but yet still notably mussed up. With something of a cry that could have been any number of things, Hermione ran at Ron and began kissing him with fervor. Ginny could hear Luna's tinkling laugh from somewhere nearby, as well as great booming outbursts from Lee and Percy as they caught sight of their younger brother clutching onto Hermione with something close to desperation.
"All right there, all right there—isn't the point sort of that we're not going to die—" And Percy began cackling even harder at Lee's statement.
Finally Hermione and Ron broke apart, light in their eyes and splashed across their faces. Neither looked the least bit embarrassed, seeming rather unconcerned that they had just confirmed everyone's suspicious about them before the entire Great Hall. They each worse exhilarated grins as they pushed back into the crowd once again in search of Harry.
Ginny felt as if every hour of every day she had ever spent at Hogwarts could be encompassed into the all-consuming moment. She watched the light play in Harry's hair, his eyes weary and yet still glimmering impossibly, and she never in her life had she felt so at home. Hope shimmered around them all like a golden beacon, wrapping them all together safely in its eternal promise.