Chapter 1 Six feet under

It was a cold, gloomy day. The sky, clouded by heavy rain clouds, resembled a dirty grey blanket. Cold winds were blowing, shaking the nearby trees relentlessly, ripping off yellowish leaves.

They spun to the ground where they would soon decompose to an unidentifiable mush. It was as if the day itself wanted to emphasise the pain they all felt as the plain coffin was lowered into the gaping hole in front of them. It had started to rain again and droplets began to collect on the coffin's polished surface. Like translucent pearls they clung to the wood, trembling as they disappeared in the depth.

Arthur Weasley gulped, noticing that the lump in his throat had grown. Tears burned in his eyes, and he felt incredibly helpless as he watched his son getting on his knees, sobbing dreadfully. What could he do? How could he take the pain from him? It had been hard enough for Ron to lose Fred. But loosing her shortly after?

Destiny was a cruel goddess that, often enough, punished the wrong people. Arthur wiped his tear stained face with an already wet tissue and crouched down beside him, carefully putting his arm around his son's torso, whose shoulders trembled under the burden of pain.

"Come, my boy, get up!", he said softly.

But Ron didn't seem to listen. Arthur looked to his wife who had already sat down next to their son. Much like his own, Molly's face wore an expression of utter helplessness. She didn't speak, no soothing words, nothing she would usually have said. Just like him she didn't know what to tell their son to make his loss more bearable. And so they kept on touching him consolingly, which Ron didn't even notice in his grief. Arthur raised his head, glancing to the right side where her parents stood with ashen faces. Expressions of utter sorrow. He knew what they were currently going through, he felt connected. He too, had lost a child. He too knew the black abyss threatening to kill all happiness whatsoever.

Next to him, somebody moved. Harry. He had closed his eyes. On his face tears mingled with rain drops. Arthur gulped shakily for air. When would it finally end? All the pain, all that grief? Hadn't they suffered enough already?

It still seemed surreal. He almost expected her to appear right in front of him. Her forehead creased, philosophising about the likelihood of failing all her exams and what she should do in that case. As if she ever had failed an exam! A slight smile tugged at the corner of his mouth, as he remembered her panicking whenever she had had the feeling of having failed a class.

I went into too much detail concerning Odgen's theoretical approach and didn't pay as much attention to Smethwick's. McGonagall will have to deduce points! I'm sure!

But she would never feel like this again. She was gone, once and for all and it was hard, so very hard for him to accept this fact. After Sirius, after Lupin, after Fred, he couldn't just accept her death. It couldn't be true that she would leave Ron and him behind. They had always been together, had weathered the worst time in their lives, had won a god damn war. How could it be over now? Now, that they should have led happy lives? Harry clenched his fists and asked himself once more if he had done enough to save her life. She'd gotten him out of each mess he'd gotten himself into, and god knew, they hadn't been small ones. And he? He'd been too weak to do the same for her.

Deep down, he knew he wasn't guilty. That he couldn't have done a damn thing, no matter how hard he tried. But that did nothing to silence his conscience. And so, the question remained in his head, gnawing, leaving behind bite marks of guilt.

It began ordinarily. With a headache. On a Saturday morning at the Burrow. During breakfast, Hermione's face had turned white as a sheet. She then complained about a piercing headache which forced her to return to bed. One day later her condition had worsened. They took her to St. Mungo's. It seemed to be nothing too alarming. At least the healers didn't seem to worry. Still, they kept her for the night, just to feel certain. And with that the tragedy took its course.

Nearing midnight her veins protruded so distinctly that it almost seemed as if a grotesque net of blueish lines had covered her skin. She was running an alarmingly high temperature, couldn't speak any more and was breathing shallowly. Harry didn't miss the troubled looks the healers gave each other as they banned him and the Weasleys from entering the hospital room.

Determined to find out what was wrong with his best friend, he took the earliest opportunity and stopped a female healer that had been about to leave the hospital room in a hurry.

"We don't know what's wrong with her yet!", she admitted after hesitating for a few seconds.

"I'm very sorry, but I can't tell you more!"

They tried to save her for the rest of the night. Without success. The next day they called her parents. All hope was gone. An hour later her body dissolved into thin air right before his eyes. Slowly her legs disappeared, followed by her torso. Until she was gone, the dent in her mattress being the only sign that a body had lain there. That she had existed.

It was one thing to say goodbye to someone dead. You could touch him, could find comfort in this last gesture. But it was something else entirely to witness how someone disappeared without a trace. Irretrievably gone, as if this beloved person had never lived. He'd refused to accept it then and there, and he wasn't about to accept it now. He didn't want to accept that she was gone, that she was dead. Lost to him forever. How could he when the coffin at his feet contained nothing more than her picture?

From her position she could see more and more funeral guests heading for the wrought-iron gates behind which the small muggle cemetery lay. For someone attentive it wasn't hard to spot the members of the magical society amongst the guests. Every so often a black cloak flashed through the masses of muggle coats and at the very front of the procession a tall man was walking whose pointy hat was visibly from a long way.

She shook her head, glanced at her rear-vision mirror and looked at her grandson. His grief touched her heart.

She knew he had known the girl. In his fourth year at Hogwarts they had met each other at the library and though their friendship had never been as strong as her friendship with Harry Potter or Ron Weasley, her death had hit him hard.

"Do you want me to come with you?", she asked.

She could see him shake his head. Then he unbuckled, opened the door of the magically modified Vauxhall Victor and slipped out. She gazed after him, until he had reached the other funeral guests.

"So, it's over for real?"

The old lady turned her head, scrutinizing her husband's face, who had remained silent until now.

She was astonished to see worry in his eyes.

"Did you doubt it?"

He nodded, combing his hands through his white, but still plenteous hair.

"They wouldn't have made her obituary public otherwise!", she reassured him.

"So, we don't need to worry?", he asked again, still not entirely convinced.

"No, love. Everything's all right!"

He exhaled audibly, took her hand and stroked it.