Chapter 37: The Passing

Harry shivered involuntarily, pulling his invisibility cloak around himself.

"You do, of course, understand that you must not interfere," said Dumbledore softly. "You have agreed to this, Harry."

"I understand," said Harry softly. "Doesn't mean I like it. Isn't there another way, sir?"

"Oh I imagine there are a great many ways, Harry. Nevertheless, I feel within my being that this is the best way… the right way. To you, I suppose this seems insane, perhaps. However, I have come to understand and trust my gut instinct in cases such as this, and it is usually not wrong."

Unable to stop himself, Harry spoke out again.

"Did your gut instinct tell you to leave me with my aunt and uncle?"

"No," said Dumbledore, and Harry could hear the pain in the headmaster's voice. "I didn't follow my instinct then. I followed my logic. Where else would you be safer than under blood wards? Who else could accept you like your family? It was that, and my many feelings with you that have led me to trust my instincts. My heart tells me this is what I must do Harry."

Harry looked up at the headmaster, and saw tears in the gentle eyes behind the half-moon spectacles. Ever since their talk in Dumbledore's office, Harry had been consumed with guilt over the headmaster's suicidal intentions. He'd argued several times with the old wizard ever since his fifth year and while he'd always done what he felt was right, he was now filled with regret. Dumbledore had always been kind to him, his failure in Harry's life not withstanding.

While he didn't like a lot of what the headmaster had done, he did understand it. Harry had wondered more than once if he wouldn't have done the exact same things the headmaster had done, were he in that position. Dumbledore had watched and helped the creation of Voldemort. Why wouldn't he take drastic measures to prevent a second instance of that creation?

For all his failures and for all his shortcomings, Harry couldn't hate the old man. Try as he might, he couldn't shake the feeling that Dumbledore had been a guide that had loved him. Maybe he hadn't been a parent, not like Sirius had been, but he had loved Harry sincerely. So, Harry said the only thing that was in his mind.

"I don't want you to die, sir."

At this, Dumbledore smiled softly.

"Harry, I know this is hard for you. It is yet another burden I have unfairly placed upon you, although it is far from the worst. You have had little time understand this. Yet I have had many years to come to terms with my own mortality. I have always understood I may die fighting against Voldemort. My only hope was that I might be able to do some good before I went, and now, I hope that I will be able to do so. Dying to help keep you safe is by far the best choice I have made regarding your life, Harry."

"Thank you, headmaster. Honestly though, I'd rather die to help keep everyone else safe if it would work."

"I know you would, Harry. That is one of the many things that makes you a far better man than I could've hoped you would grow up to be. I admit, all my choices with you would've been much easier if you were a different person. I half-hoped some arrogance would remain in you and you might end up being a pain. Yet you have made my people love you through merely being who you are."

"I don't know about that sir."

"You underestimate the effect you have on people Harry. Miss Greengrass loves you enough to challenge almost everything she has seen in her house and much what the wizarding world believes. She loves you enough to face down abuse and the darkest wizard of the age. Miss Granger has faced additional persecution at the hands of students both in and out of her house because she's allied herself with you, and more than a few people assumed she was a romantic interest of yours."

"Well, Hermione and Daphne are… different, I think."

"Not so. Sirius loved you more deeply than I've seen him love anyone, even James and Lily. He loved you beyond being the son of his best friend. He loved you for who you were and what he saw in you. Remus and Tonks I believe see much of the same in you. I personally have spent more night than I might count speaking to Hagrid and Professor McGonagall about their concerns for you. I have received hundreds of owls from the Weasley, Greengrass, Longbottom and even the Bones families offering a place for you during the summer or looking for assurance that you were in good health."

"I… I don't know what to say to that sir."

"Mr. Ronald Weasley has spent two years doing all he could to prove himself to you, along with Mr. Longbottom and Miss Davis. You have united students from all four houses so they could learn to fight and resist Voldemort and his death eaters. Harry I say without hyperbole that I have never seen and never expected to see a student rise to such occasions as this with so much success. The house rivalry is legendary and particularly between Gryffindor and Slytherin, and yet you and Miss Greengrass have all but abolished it. Slytherin has no longer become the outcast house of liars and manipulators that they were once seen as… students like Mr. Malfoy not withstanding."

"I've… I just did what I thought was right, sir."

"And that is all I hope you ever do, Harry. Now, if you would kindly disarm me; I believe I hear two sets of feet approaching us. I believe you are required to stay within fifteen feet."

Harry did as he asked, stuffing both wands under the cloak and hiding behind a pillar of the astronomy tower. He wouldn't watch, but he couldn't stop himself from hearing. Malfoy and Snape burst from the door, wands drawn.

They spoke in hushed, and angry tones, while the headmaster responded in his usual calm voice. He offered no resistance or argument against Malfoy. Harry stuffed his fingers in his ears and yet he couldn't stop himself from hearing as Snape softly called out the spell.

"Avada Kadavra."

He had his eyes screwed up tight, and yet he could clearly see the flash of green light from behind his eyelids, and he could see Dumbledore falling backwards off the tower in his mind's eye. Despite everything that had happened, all the deceit and all the yelling and the arguing, Harry wept softly, rocking back and forth as he felt a soft presence of magic envelope him, almost like a hug.

He waited for almost a full minute after he heard Malfoy and Snape leave the tower before climbing down the stairs himself. It was complete confusion. People seemed to realize that there was something wrong, but nobody knew what it was. Several of the prefects and teachers were trying to corral students towards the great hall, and Harry joined the throng of Gryffindor students before pulling off the invisibility cloak and stuffing it in his bag.

"Harry!" Hermione breathed sharply. "We were so worried! Is… Did it…"

"He's gone," Harry said softly, not wanting to say anything more just yet.

Ron made a weird grimace while Harry could see tears forming in Hermione's eyes.

"Snape and Malfoy left," said Ron grimly. "Ran out the front door while everyone was trying to figure out what happened."

They entered the hall and Harry found Daphne with Tracey, Neville and Astoria, all of whom stood huddled together, whispering. They were far from the only group to be doing so. Most of the student body seemed to be huddled in groups and wondering what had happened. Harry, Ron and Hermione joined them.

Tracey looked questioningly at them and Harry nodded softly.

"It's done," said Ron.

Daphne, without a word reached into Harry's bag and her searching hand found the cloak. Without a word, she pulled it out and draped it over the two of them and pulled him to a corner of the room, and held him while he cried.

"I'm sorry, Harry," she said. "I know you didn't want this."

"I don't want a lot of things," Harry said, his voice shaking slightly. "But they all happen anyway. He knew what it would be though. He even smiled… like it was a happy moment."

"Maybe it was?" Daphne suggested. "Maybe he just sort of… accepted it? Didn't he once tell you that death might be like going to bed at the end of a very long day?"

Harry gritted his teeth, thinking of his parents, and Sirius. Still, his pain wasn't due to her and the fact was the Dumbledore had looked more content in the moment of his own death than anyone else Harry had seen die.

"So what's our plan?" he asked her. "What happens now?"

"Well," she said, and Harry could tell she was struggling to collect her thoughts. "For now, we rest. We get… we find peace with this, and then we'll go back to your aunt and uncle's for a couple weeks… Then, I suppose we have a… um…"

"Our wedding," Harry finished for her, kissing her on the forehead.

It seemed slightly calloused to talk about marriage at that moment, but talking about the future… about something happy… it helped. It reminded him that good things could still happen, even when things seemed dark.

"Right," she said, seeming relieved that he wasn't put off or upset. "Right. Then I suppose we try and finish things with Voldemort. Just yourself, the snake and him… right?"

"Exactly… Daphne… If this… if our plan for me doesn't work out, what will happen with Voldemort."

"Harry," she said solemnly. "If you… If we can't save you, I will raise every supporter I can, and shatter his snake and his body into a thousand pieces myself. I promise."

He reached out and grasped her hand, running his thumb softly over the back of her hand, feeling every vein and knuckle that he passed.

"I don't think you'll have to," he said softly. "I don't think it will come down to that. There's… I don't really know how to explain it. If it didn't come down to him and me, it wouldn't feel right, you know? It would just seem wrong if it wasn't he and I in the end. We've always been opposite pillars of one another, even if we sort of started from the same place."

Daphne shook softly next to him and Harry saw tears falling freely and pooling on her robes and the stone floor beneath them.

"I… I don't know what to do," she said, still shaking. "I've always—always known what I should do, but now… nothing's right! I don't know what the best way forward is. I don't even know if there is a best way forward!"

Harry took her hand and held it against his chest, right over his beating heart.

"I can't tell you what's going to happen," he said softly. "I can't tell you if I will defeat Voldemort or is everything's going to work out in the end. All I can do is to do my best in the moment, and keep hope."

"I want to be there," she said, kissing him quickly. "When it happens… one way or another, I want to be with you."

"I don't suppose it matters if I beg you not to go?"

"Of course it matters," she said. "It'll break my heart, Harry. I'm your wife… or will be in a few months' time. But I'm asking you not to cut me out. I'm asking you, begging you, to let me stand beside you. It's the height of everything and I can't stand just being on the sidelines just hoping that you come back."

"Daphne, I will be terrified if you're there… I'll be terrified regardless, but I can't stand putting you in danger."

She looked him in the eye and he saw her determined steely gaze.

"I am to be your wife, which means we face things… together. Life is hard, Harry Potter, even without dark lords. I don't want to marry you to be protected. I want to marry you to live our lives together, short or long as they may end up being."

Harry look at her, and unable to speak, he nodded.