Chapter 9: Choices.
It was dark, and as usual, they were sitting around a small fire. Sometimes Ron would talk about things that had happened in their Hogwarts years, or ask Hermione about her job, or her plans for the future. It was clear that he was choosing safe topics of conversation.
They had already been in the same place for two days. To regain strength after the forest, Ron said. Hermione doubted that this was the reason, although it was true that Ron looked totally exhausted.
This was just one of many things that didn't make sense. During the first days in the woods, her legs had hurt terribly, but little by little her body had got used to the exercise. In the last few days, she had endured the walks with ease... Unlike Ron, who seemed more and more exhausted every day. At first, she blamed it on his long stay in prison, but after so many weeks, it made no sense. He had always been in much better physical shape than she was.
They hadn't walked much that day. They had been exploring the surroundings of the Muggle village, but without getting too close. He didn't want to take any chances. Hermione assumed that he meant that she could call for help or run off among the Muggles.
If she had the chance, would she escape? At first, she would certainly have. Now? She wasn't so sure anymore. She wasn't crazy. She obviously didn't want to be a prisoner any longer... But somehow she didn't like the idea of escaping and... And what? Never knowing the truth? Never finding out what was really going on with Ron?... Or maybe she was just afraid that she would never see him again?
Every day she had to remind herself that Ron was a Death Eater. That the evidence was beyond doubt. But even so, it was all very confusing.
The main problem was that Ron wasn't behaving like a killer. She had ignored, insulted and despised him, argued with him... she even tried to kill him! And what had Ron done? He had put up with everything, and almost killed himself saving her life.
Then, there were the wounds on his arm. As far as she knew they hadn't reappeared, but just once was enough to make her uneasy. She knew hundreds of curses and spells, but none that could do that.
And finally, the breakout. How Ron had managed to escape from Azkaban? And the buns! No one survived with a pair of little buns a day. They weren't normal. And Ron had hundreds of them. It was too convenient... She was sure Ginny had helped him. But why? Did she know something?
Ron's words interrupted her thoughts. "Well, it's time to sleep."
Nothing made sense. She couldn't understand it, and Hermione hated not being able to understand something. "Wait! We need to talk."
"Talk... About what?" Ron asked, startled.
"Ginny helped you escape, didn't she?"
"What?... No! Of course not! Ginny hates me, like everyone else!"
It was so obvious he was lying "So there's someone else. You're waiting to meet someone here."
"I'm not. Strange as it may seem to you, there's no plan. No one is helping me. We're not meeting anyone. I just managed to escape. No plan. No help. Only pure luck."
Hermione decided to let him think she had believed him. She needed more information. "So what are we waiting for? What are your plans?"
Ron ran his hand over his head in a gesture of dismay. "Plans? There's no plan. There's no one to help me. There's nothing at all... Actually, I have no idea what to do. Happy?"
"All this time... And you don't know what to do?"
"Honestly? I don't see a way out. Aurors could locate an apparition in no time. If I release you, in a few hours I'll have the Aurors upon me. And if I don't release you and we keep moving on foot through the open field... How many days will pass before an auror discovers us? Not many... If I had the broom I could have fled easily to another country, but..."
"But you destroyed it when you saved my life."
Ron looked at her firmly. "And I don't regret it."
"Well... There is still a way out." Hermione thought aloud. "It has been many weeks. Now the law forbidding the use of dementors must have been accepted. You could turn yourself in..."
"No way. I won't let Ginny and my family down. I can't be caught... No matter what happens to me."
"What do you mean, no matter? I'll speak up for you. It's always better to go to prison than to end up..." She stopped in her tracks. She had been so slow!
Ginny had helped him to escape, and no doubt so had the twins. If the Aurors captured Ron alive they would examine his memories, and they all would be apprehended.
"No, Hermione. I will do whatever it takes. They can't find me... I have to disappear forever."
"And how are you going to do that?" No matter how hard she thought about it, there was no way out.
"Do you really think I'm a murderer?"
"What does that have to do...?"
Ron looked away. "Every time I sleep I have horrible nightmares. I think they're memories. I do horrible things."
"Memories are not infallible. They could have been implanted in you. A simple Obliviate can do it."
"And my disappearance? And the Dark Mark?"
"I don't know, Ron. But you can't give up." She was surprised by her own words. Why did she need to defend him?
"Give up?... So do you think I'm innocent?" Ron seemed more hopeful than he had been in weeks.
Hermione wanted to say: Of course I think you are innocent!... But how? Yes, there was so much that didn't fit, but all the evidence incriminating him was overwhelming. She couldn't answer in one way or another.
Ron's eyes dulled as quickly as they had lit up.
"No. You don't... I've known you since you were ten years old and you've never been wrong about anything really important. I guess you've always been right: I am a murderer... And Yes. It would be better to turn myself in, but I can't do that to my family."
"What... What do you mean?"
"I don't see any other way out. You have to kill me. It's the only solution. We saw a small lake next to the village. If you transfigure my body into a stone and throw it into the lake they will never find it. You can say that you escaped. No one will doubt you. You'll be free and my family will still believe that I'm alive, hiding somewhere... This is the only possible solution."
"Do you want me... to kill you?" Hermione asked, horrified.
"I don't want to die, but I can't escape, and I can't be captured. There's no other way out. I would do it myself, but I can't."
Hermione recited as if reading the paragraph from the book of Magical Theory. "The survival instinct is too strong. No magic can be used against the life of the person performing the spell."
"Yes." Ron looked at Hermione for a few seconds with an exhausted expression. "It's no so bad... I am constantly tortured by horrible nightmares - so many that I hardly sleep at all. I can't stand it anymore... I have seen too many people die, I killed many of them myself... I guess now it's my turn."
"Ron. I don't think I can do something like that." Hermione said, sickened.
"Of course you can. It's the right thing to do."
Ron looked at Hermione with a weird, contemplative way.
"Losing the broom was a disaster, but I don't regret that it was you. I wouldn't have chosen anyone else to spend these last few weeks with."
Ron hesitated for a moment, before asking. "There's just one last thing I'd like to know before, you know... Did you ever liked me?"
That took Hermione so completely by surprise that she couldn't help but blush to the roots of her hair. "That... That's a private matter..."
"I knew it!... Well, obviously, I didn't, but..." Ron shook his head with a sad smile. "Merlín, I've been so stupid!... Well, it doesn't matter anymore. It was only one last question that irked me."
Ron knelt down beside Hermione, took her hand and wrapped it around the handle of his wand, resting the tip against his throat.
"Use a cutting spell. It will be very quick."
Yes. It would be quick. Hermione could visualize it perfectly: A whispered word and a clean cut opening flesh, cartilage and tendons. Ron collapsing on his back as blood gushed out of his neck, and finally glassy, empty eyes looking up at the sky. Perhaps a last shudder before death. Did she really have to do that? The thought made her nauseous.
Ron was willing to sacrifice his life for the welfare of his family. But that's what had made him betray Harry, wasn't it? If she believed everything she heard at the trial, the only way out was to kill him.
She pressed the wand against Ron's throat. He made no move to defend himself. He was at her feet, on his knees, with his eyes closed and shaking slightly, perhaps cold or perhaps frightened.
She had to do something, but what?
Betray him and give him up to the Aurors? That would condemn Ginny and the twins, and totally destroy the Weasley family. Or what little would be left of it.
Try to erase his memory of the escape? She'd never tried a spell like that before. With the right books and a few weeks of practice, she could do it. But without any preparation, she'd leave him as a vegetal for the rest of his life.
There were only two options left: Kill him or... accept that nothing made sense... And... What?
She had expected someone like Malfoy: cold and ruthless, but he was the same old Ron. The same one who had risked his life without a moment's hesitation to save her right after she tried to kill him; The same one with whom she had shared half her life, her best and her worst moments; The Ron she had always known.
They knew him better than the palm of their hands, Fred and George had said. They knew him... And they knew he was innocent. They just knew. No reasons needed.
She felt as if something was breaking inside her. She knew him a lot better than any of them, but she hadn't known... She had refused to believe in him. After looking down on him so many times. Had she done it again?
She could think of a thousand reasons for and against, but in the end, it all came down to one decision: what to trust? Her head or her heart?
Hermione clenched her fists. She had chosen: She was going to believe in him. As Ginny and the twins had done. As Ron would have believed in her without a moment's hesitation.
Hermione pushed the wand away from his throat.
Hermione felt like laughing and crying. She was happy and angry with herself for doubting him, and with Ron for believing that she could murder him. Hot tears were rolling down burning her cheeks, and she smiled as she recalled their conversation after Cho's first kiss with Harry... She wished she could have the emotional depth of a teaspoon too!
"What's wrong? Why are you putting the wand away?" Ron almost looked disappointed.
"Do you want to die so badly?" The rage growth inside Hermione. "Stupid boy!... It doesn't matter anymore!... Maybe to you, but did you really think I'd be able to murder the person I've been in love with since I was fourteen?"
"What..." He couldn't go on because Hermione had roughly taken his head in her hands and was kissing him as if her life depended on it. Ron, took by surprise, fell backwards with Hermione on top of him.
Hermione parted her lips from his barely enough to speak. "I was so wrong... And Fred and George were so right."
Ron was completely shocked. "I understand nothing... As usual."
"They told me that they didn't need to go to the trial, that they didn't care what evidence they showed. They knew you since the day you were born, and they knew perfectly well what you were capable of, and what you were not... They said the whole trial was ridiculous, a bad joke."
"Did they really say that? Ron asked, amazed.
"I guess they love you more than they seem." Hermione looked down. "Much more than I do,"
"Hermione, not..."
"Yes, Ron... I've failed you. I haven't trusted you when you needed me most."
"You're here. That's all that matters. I've made hundreds of mistakes and you've always forgiven me: When I thought Crookshanks had eaten my rat, or when I stopped talking to Harry in our fourth year..."
"It's not the same thing!"
"Yes, it is! I thought Harry had betrayed me, just like you thought I had betrayed you."
"No Ron! It's..." But Ron silenced her with a kiss.
"It's not that I'm uncomfortable lying in the mud with you on top of me, but I think we'd better warm up a bit at the fire before we catch our deaths."
This chapter has been hard to write. Too many changes, and I don't know if all has been as smooth and believable as I wanted.
Well... Things will be a bit better for Ron from now on... But only a bit... Still hard times ahead!