Chapter 35 The Very Worst

After a week they had abandoned the boats in order to trek the second half of their journey. Hermione was no stranger to physical exertion but the going was tough. She had learned as much as she could of their companions, Dean appeared to have trusted them implicitly.

At first it seemed to Hermione that they were as good suspects as anyone else, after all, no one she had spoken to had seen him again after he had left with them. But the more she saw, the more she believed in them. They had sailed away with her friend and accompanied him half way up the river before waving goodbye with promises to reunite. They had never seen him again, and until Hermione had cornered them in that dismall town, demanding answers with a determination which had shaken them, they had assumed he was just another traveller, waylaid on his path to enlightenment.

Ponleak could not have been named more appropriately, he had strength and endurance that Hermione could only envy as he picked her up time and time again and urged her forward.

"Close My, we are close to rest now." She'd noticed scars on his back one day as he'd leaped gratefully into the pool at the foot of a waterfall. He'd seen her look and had looked ashamed for a moment until she turned around and took off her shirt, leaving the scars on her back free to see through the gap in her swim suit. From that day on they had been firm friends, two scared and weary friends, but hopeful none the less.

They had settled on My, her old childhood nickname as a suitable alternative to the clumsy sound of Hermione through their thick accents. Kosal had proposed it; he was the youngest of the three and seemed to be oblivious to the dark, oppressive feelings that surrounded the rest of them. His name meant 'magical', a safe guess on the part of his parents, who had long been part of the magical world, and he showed skill with a wand which rivalled Hermione's own. She had asked him once what he thought about muggle-borns, curious about his seeming lack of pure-blood arrogance. His reply had made her feel more at home than anything else could have done.

"The magic chooses the person My, some are good, some are bad, most have good and bad inside of them, it has nothing to do with blood."

Now where had she heard something similar?

Her thoughts were never far from him. The jungle was deep and impenetrable, but there were moments of astounding beauty. The waterfall had taken her breath away, not that she'd had much to lose. They had walked for three days. They walked, rested, and walked some more. The air was humid and stifling and there were bugs everywhere. This was the muggle world. The one she had lived away from for so long. There were no magical creatures here, just the trees above and the earth underfoot, teeming with life that owed nothing to her kind.

She felt kind of liberated to be so spate from magic. It had been almost three weeks now, the longest she had gone without magic since she'd turned 17. They cooked and cleaned, set up camp 

and took it down, all with their hands and with their minds. This was living she felt, in the midst of this dark journey, this was feeling alive.

And she had been aware of every pump of her heart as they climbed the third hill of the day. It never seemed to matter how far you climbed, there was always more. Her shirt was plastered to her back and her breath was coming in shallow gasps. And then there it was. The water glinting off the surface like the reflection of a miracle. One end appeared completely calm while the other was a torrent of foam from the crashing waters of the fall. This was it, this was paradise, this was what Sirius had spoken about and she could only imagine how he had felt to be at a place like this. How confusing this beauty and calm must have seemed after all that had gone before.

"Oh merciful gods."

And Remus was gone, off at a sprint before throwing himself into the air and crashing, splashing, into the water with childish glee. Hermione had to laugh she'd always loved to see this side of him, it made it so much easier to understand his friendship with Sirius. Knowing Remus as an adult had been a revelation; he was kind and generous to a fault, much as he had been when they were young, but now once they were grown he had cut them no slack. He had expected more from them then they sometimes thought they could give, but he had been right and his drive and perseverance, in Hermione's mind, had helped them win the war at a time when all felt lost.

But at times the lighter side of him shone through like a beacon. He was obsessed with Quidditch, much like Ron had been and the two had laughed and argued long into the night once Remus felt Ron was old enough to share a drink with him. Against everyone's expectations the two had become friends and she knew he still felt his loss. She'd seen him battle like a warrior and then sing lullaby's to Teddy in the same night. And she'd seen the fun in him time and time again since the war had ended. He was almost as sexually voracious as Sirius and had spent hours teasing her mercilessly when they were together. He'd once confessed that he often dreamed of her and Tonks together, not a wish she was willing to grant!

It had been fun and satisfying, but they had never created the fire that her and Sirius did. She missed him more than she'd ever thought possible, she missed him with an intensity similar to that which she'd felt for Ron. Something she had never thought she would say about anyone. But there was no guilt anymore, there was only acceptance, acceptance and love, and that was enough for her.

"Bugger." Hermione heard Remus' frustration as he slipped on the damp floor of the jungle and saw his smile of gratitude as Chann, their joint smoking companion, grasped his arm to stop him from falling. Hermione almost laughed at the irony; The Moon helping the werewolf.

The sky had grown darker and the heaviness in the air no longer seemed to be totaly due to the weather conditions. Something was changed, something was up and every pace she took, every branch that whipped back into her face, and every look she shared with Remus all carried the same plea in her mind;



Please don't let it be true. Please don't let it be true. Please don't let it be true.

It had become so much a mantra that Hermione almost surprised herself with the shock she felt when she finally saw the smoke, and caught a glimpse, in the twilight sky, of the very same image she'd had burned into her so long ago.

As her knees hit the ground and she half heard Remus' horrified gasp behind her she realised they hadn't needed to trek for another day. They had all the proof they needed right here.

It took them half an hour to climb to the small, and probably once pretty village. It was now a pile of rubble and ashes and the smell of the jungle was overpowered by the dark, sweet cloying tang of blood and rotting corpses she had hoped she would never have to experience again.

There were bodies everywhere, men, women and children. Whoever had been here had killed indiscriminately. It only took her five minutes to locate the body she had both been searching for and hoping she wouldn't find. Dean was at the door of a small hut, his arms spread wide as if defending something unseen. But as she carefully stepped over him and saw inside the hut she knew what he'd been defending and grief for her friend overwhelmed her. There inside, laid out almost as if on purpose were the small bodies of three children, each charred like Dean, but no less recognisable for what they had been in life.

She met Chann's desolate gaze as she stumbled from the hut and, for a moment, she had been lost for words at how to describe what had happened here.

"It's bad?" He had asked simply.

"Yes. It's bad. It's the very worst." It was all she could say, because in truth her worst nightmares had come true and she didn't know how to explain any of it to the kind man in front of her. They hadn't been aware of the wars that had been waged so far away in England but they weren't strangers to violence. The wizarding community here had suffered as much as any in the brutal years of the Khemer Rhouge regime, and the danger of resurgence was still so real that the government had found it easy to explain away the recent violence as a re-awakening of some dormant guerrilla cells. The reality was just as terrifying.

This was an evil that knew no boundaries, it had no rational except the destruction of everything good and pure in this world and those responsible had no hearts with which to open themselves up to good, no conscience with which to feel remorse.

And it was back, back in their lives. She knew it wasn't Voldemort himself, she'd seen him die; she had felt the finality of it. She seriously doubted anyone had found a way to bring him back to life this time, but it was clear that someone was intent on carrying out his plans, and they had chosen this fragile country as a starting point. Somewhere with a long standing magical community, but somewhere far enough away from home to provide them some initial breathing space to make their plans.



As she saw Remus walk towards her, through a blur of tears, and as she felt his arms move around her, pulling her close, she began to process what had happened, and what it meant, and, when the dust in her mind settled there was only one thought remaining.

"No."