A/N: I have been absent from writing for a long time and the desire for it is slowly coming back. This is something that has been sitting on the edge of my consciousness for a while and I finally decided to write it. It is a statement to how much I am struggling to write that I've kept it under a 1000 words. Please have tissues ready… I cried the whole time I was writing it.
If you are reading this for a second time, you will notice that most of the lyrics have been removed from the song; this is because I was informed in a comment that I am not allowed to have full song lyrics in a fic. Sadly, this really does detract from the emotion I was trying to set for this and makes me uncomfortable with the story. I heard this song sang at the funeral of one of my own teachers and that is why I chose it. I'm sorry that I had to remove it but please look up the lyrics and mentally insert them at the prompted places as they were intended to be there.
The light was fading as the Wizarding Priest finished his speech around the grave site that was sparsely littered with mourners. Harry was there – duty alone had him sitting at Hermione's side; his presence, an apology from himself and the generation of Potter's before him.
Minerva McGonagall looked bereft as she stood behind her two young Gryffindors, simultaneously gripping the chair for balance and wiping her eyes. Kingsley Shacklebolt sat on Hermione's other side, a stoic expression on his face but a hand covering Minerva's where it was perched on the back of the seat.
Three other Professors were present; Septima Vector (having been a classmate of the deceased); Horace Slughorn (his old Head of House); and Sybil Trelawney (known to have had a severely unrequited love for the late Potions Master).
Standing on the other side of the grave from this small contingent of Hogwarts and Order of the Phoenix cast were the Malfoys. All three of them looked on mournfully, not sparing a glance to others that grieved. Hermione had a suspicion they were only allowed to be present because Kingsley was but she had no reason to examine the thought further.
It seemed quiet all of a sudden as her register of those present came to an end and she felt a slight nudge in her ribs from Harry.
"It's time…" he whispered and squeezed her hand.
She nodded and stood carefully, walking toward the grave with tears in her eyes. She looked toward her friends and mentors who all nodded or gave half smiles of encouragement. She caught the Malfoys in her periphery, wariness clear on their faces but she held her courage together, cleared her throat and began.
"There are many people whose lives were affected by Severus Snape and I count myself lucky to be amongst that number. I won't stand here before all of you and pretend he was an easy man to like but he was possibly the easiest man to respect I have ever met.
She swiped at an escapee tear, determined to carry on without completely cracking.
"He walked the finest of lines for more years than several of us here have been alive. He sacrificed his life for all of us and he did it because of love. Therefore, I wish to honour him with a song that I feel captures the feeling for this magnificent and courageous man in the hearts and minds of everyone here. I hope I will know such blind devotion in my life."
Hermione nodded to Harry slightly and he pulled out a walkman and speakers from his formal robes, checked the volume and pressed play.
A single note played on a piano sounded out eight times and on the eighth note, Hermione began to sing…
"Some say love..." her soft voice began, working her way through the first verse, looking down as the wooden box was magically lowered.
There wasn't a dry eye amongst the listeners, as she continued; even the Malfoys looked a little misty.
"It's the heart afraid of breaking..." she continued, desperately trying to cry.
As Hermione reached the third verse, she noticed Harry stood beside her, taking her hand and squeezing. She didn't concentrate on it, she couldn't… she'd crack.
"Lies the seed that with the sun's love, in the spring becomes the rose." She finished, hanging on to the note as long as she could. If she could just keep singing, she wouldn't have to truly say goodbye to a man who was part of the snapshot in her mind of what Hogwarts was.
Harry let the music finish naturally as Hermione held the last note like a lifeline. As he clicked the tape recorder off and shuffled to put his arm around his grieving best friend, she flicked her wand, silently conjuring a blackthorn arch over the headstone and flourished it with black roses, bursting from bud to bloom.
As the small congregation's teary eyes widened a little in surprise, Hermione fell to her knees aside the open grave and sobbed.
The others slowly moved away after conjuring their own flowers and placing them in Hermione's archway; the muggle tradition striking a painful chord in each of their hearts.
After ten minutes only Harry and Hermione remained.
"I think he would've liked that." Harry whispered consolingly, his arm still around her shoulders.
"No he wouldn't." She said with a sniff and slight, almost non-existent smile.
Neither of them could tell how long they sat there, mourning the man who had protected them for seven years with a perpetual scowl but it was dark and cold when they finally got up and walked toward the gate of the Spinner's End Cemetery. So dark in fact, that neither of the saw a familiar billow of black robes that moved from a distant tree toward the conjured archway and touched it delicately with eyes as misty as theirs.
A/N: Thank you for reading. Please review.