Second-to-last chapter, methinks. There may or may not be an epilogue, depending on what gets accomplished in the next installment, so I just wanted to take this opportunity right now to thank all of you who have hung on for what's going on two years now. For a long time I thought I'd never get this finished--fics that stall this long tend to be a lingering pain for me--so to bring this to conclusion, and to know there are still people out there not only reading but taking the time to be supportive and encouraging, is definitely a good feeling.
snuggles all of y'all
----
Mens mea cupit cantare formas versas in nova corpora.
(Ovid)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Harry had never been given much to faith in his life – too much changed, to place his trust in many things, or many people. But there were certain people he'd learned would never waver, and Ron was one, and even though his friend had looked ready to fall, there'd been defiance still and although his voice had been weak, it was steady and determined as it marched on through years of pain, the twisted threads of an old story, and in a darkened inn room Harry's mind followed the path of Ron's words.
/I had been assigned to supervise Draco Malfoy when he was first exiled, and I guess anyone who knows me would know I hated doing it, because I couldn't stand Malfoy, but since I had to do it anyway, I figured I might as well do it right. And so I kept an eye on him and his communications, and stopped by whenever I had to, and I guess after a while of doing that we just ended up talking, and I ended up thinking about what it was like to be him, out there all by himself... You can't look through a person's stuff and watch his life without coming to feel what he feels, and get a sense of what he thinks./
Harry stretched out on his bed, wincing as sore muscles refused to relax. He very nearly thrummed with energy, a nervousness that refused to dissipate. It was, he thought, like coming down off the high of a Quidditch match – even years and years removed from his last game, he could still recall the hum of excitement in him, how he would lie awake that night and replay the game in his head and his body until adrenaline vanished and sleep came. There was also a certain element of queasiness, and he swallowed that determinedly.
The room was dark, save the light from the moon and stars, and outside all of Diagon Alley was silent. In the common room below him were the muffled thumps and conversation of the Leaky Cauldron's patrons, but with the still air about him, Harry felt insulated from the comings and goings of Tom's evening clientele, but his thoughts still crowded the room with their own presence. He shifted, tried to get comfortable, felt again a nervous jolt in his stomach, a tingle of disbelief.
/Oh, Ron./ The thought was half fondness, half despair.
Harry gave up sleep, turned over on his side and stared into the darkness for a bit, saw Ron standing there like a wraith, talking, spinning out the truth.
/He told me about how he'd run into Harry once, during the war, and he'd had him dead to rights – those were his words, just that – but let him go, because he couldn't say the words, couldn't kill him... And I asked him why he couldn't do it, and Draco said it was because he just couldn't, and he didn't have a good explanation for it beyond that. But I knew right then what he meant, because... oh, damn it... Harry, I'm sorry. I knew what he meant because there have been times when I've done stuff for Harry, and not wanted to say why, not even to myself.
/But he's worth it, and that's what I told Draco. And he looked at me, and said "Yeah, you're right. Weasley."/
Summers had questioned Ron on that, but Ron had refused to answer much past, "Harry's my friend, and he'll always be my friend." And Summers had probably realized he wouldn't get much more – or maybe he didn't need any more, because there'd been a fierce light in Ron's eyes that had spoken more than perhaps any words could – and let Ron continue.
/Well, that gave me a lot to think about, although I didn't really want to think about it much. I mean, Draco and Harry? It was pretty disturbing at first, and I kept it to myself for a while – didn't even tell Hermione about it. But then Harry ran across Severus' diaries, and when we couldn't get them decoded, I realized what I needed to do. It wasn't easy, but I wrote Draco a note and asked him to come and help. Part of me hoped he wouldn't, but I couldn't in good conscience not want to help. Harry's my mate, and he'd been having a hard time of it lately, and he'd said some things – and I guessed that there was maybe some stuff he needed to work out about Draco, and that it had to do with that time they'd met and Draco hadn't killed him.
/I almost called the whole thing off, though, when I thought that maybe the Minister wanted to use the diaries as evidence, maybe to find some more Death Eaters he couldn't get a hold of, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized I needed to do it – I'd do anything to expose what was happening, to maybe make something right when everything had been so horribly wrong for so long./
"And what was that, Mr. Weasley?" Sprenger had asked, her voice smooth as ice, and as cold.
Harry swallowed, thinking of Ron's answer, swallowed to keep back tears and the invocation of his friend's name. He remembered standing there, helpless, waiting for Ron's answer.
/For a long time I'd believed people were what they were, and could never change. But when we got Severus' diaries, and I was able to read them, I realized that maybe that wasn't the case... and that it was possible for people to be different than what they were. But they need a reason to change, else they won't see why they need to, or will be too afraid... Harry would never go to Draco, and Draco couldn't go to Harry, and they'd both die believing the worst of each other, or at least not knowing the truth. It seemed a good risk, to make a friend happy and to... to prove Severus right./
"So you have taken it upon yourself to reform the entire Death Eater population?" Kramer now, and wonder of wonders he hadn't been sarcastic, but the question had been honest.
/I don't think I'd be so bold as to presume that, sir./
Ron had been looking decidedly weary by this point, his muscles quivering with the effort of remaining upright. But this room had been the center of ritual for hundreds of years, and ritual dictated the accused stand before those who charged him. Fudge had been watching, a sly and triumphant smile teasing the corners of his lips, and oh, how Harry had wanted to pull his wand and hex it right off him.
But Ron had stood, defying Fudge's superiority and his own weakness.
/My parents taught me about life-debts, and I reckon I owed Harry one – Lord knows he got me out of enough scrapes when we were kids, but more than that he's been my best friend for years, and we got each other through dark times. Those are things I reckon you can't really pay back, except by being as good a friend as you can, and I saw that my friend needed me... And Harry had a debt of his own, and I know what it's like, to have something unresolved hanging over you, and needing to do something about it./
"So sacrificing your career seemed the appropriate answer? Risking imprisonment? A trial?"
/If it would help Harry, yessir. In a second. And I did./
Lying in the dark room, Harry sighed and stared at the ceiling. Every time he'd heard Ron insist that the danger to his career was of no consequence, he hadn't quite believed him. There were things you worked hard for and never sacrificed, and Ron had worked for his Auror position, had won it by blood and unshakable determination, and to give it up... Until he heard Ron tell that judge, Dominic it had been, what he'd been telling Harry all along, he hadn't listened. Whenever Ron had said it in the past, he'd felt deeply ashamed, but now he was humbled, turning the memory over in his mind.
/I can't repay you for that,/ he thought, smiled a bit, thinking he was no stranger now to that sort of thing, being unable to find adequate compensation. But maybe some debts were like that... you never paid them back, because you couldn't, because your friend refused the debt, or let it stand in such a way that the only payment required was to live, and to live happily.
Ron had continued at Dominic's prompting: "You'd had a conversation approximately five days before the visit to the Malfoy estates with Neville Longbottom, over fireplace. Mr. Longbottom has been kind enough to forward some of your medical history to us."
/No,/ Harry thought. /Please, I don't want to think about this now. Let me sleep./
But Ron's answer would chase him into dreams if he did not, and to replay the memory of words while seeing Ron's face would be too much.
/I'd gotten in a bit of trouble during the war – taken prisoner for a couple days, and the Death Eaters weren't exactly gentle.../
Harry'd known nothing of that, not until Ron spoke of it, and he'd wondered in a distant way what must have happened in a person's life, to make him say things like "Cruciatus" so easily, and confirm what Neville had told the judges already – that he'd been seriously hurt, his heart nearly giving out from the pain, and had gone back anyway as soon as he could get permission from St. Mungo's, to put himself in danger again.
/And I hadn't been feeling well, exactly, for a couple weeks, and when I talked to Nev – er, I mean Dr. Longbottom – he said there was still damage from the Cruciatus, and it was only getting worse. He said I should think about leaving as soon as I could, resign and all that, but I couldn't, not until I'd made sure Harry and Draco were okay... because I knew that if I'd left, there wouldn't be anyone to make sure they'd had their chance, or to make sure the journals got to where they needed to be. And then, well, everything backfired, and I'm sure you know the rest of the story./
"Oh, Ron." He'd whispered that, when Ron had explained himself, had realized finally, the significance of a thousand little things. The day he'd gone to see about the letter, Ron's pale face, the absent circling of his hand over his chest, /I'm dying here,/ his friend had said, as a joke. Harry saw in painful clarity that hand moving over fabric, pressing down into the flesh, as though to surround the pain, contain it, soothe it into nothingness. And it had not worked. What had the curse done to him when he'd been taken prisoner by his own people? He shivered, thinking about it – the mind shied away from possibilities.
There'd been silence in the room after that, silence save for the pounding of Harry's heart. He'd stood frozen, not knowing what to do, to say. Fudge even seemed shocked, his featureless, flabby mouth open, fish-like, gimlet eyes wide. Minerva had been crying – tears from a rock, it had been. The other judges had simply sat there, soundless.
"You make a strong case for friendship, Mr. Weasley," Dominic had said at last, "if not for common sense."
/It seems like friendship is the best sense of all, sir. I don't regret what I did./
"Do you understand that your actions could have you dishonorably discharged? Imprisoned?" Sprenger this time, cold and merciless. "A strong case for friendship, indeed, or perhaps insanity."
/I knew that all along, ma'am, and I was willing to take that risk. I still am./ And Ron had been pale, so horribly pale, and Harry had felt as terrible as Ron looked, caught in the grip of a terrible expectation. Time crawled over his skin, palpable and agonizingly slow in its passage. /But I know what I saw, when I talked with Draco, and when I saw him at Hogwarts with Harry... you can have the testimony for that from Professor McGonagall and the others, I suppose. The only treachery in the whole business wasn't mine, or Malfoy's or Harry's... it was Fudge's, using Severus' diaries like he did, things never intended to incriminate anybody./
"That much is true," Kramer had said, breaking his silence. The journals rested before him, opened to one page. "Severus did not want his journals used to provide evidence against his former comrades – and the investigations proved as much, I think. No... there is evidence of a different sort provided, I think, and it seems to square with Mr. Weasley's assertions as to Mr. Malfoy's character."
"Oh, come now," Fudge had scoffed. "Surely we won't believe the word of a former Death Eater, if we're looking for character references."
"You were willing enough to believe him to incriminate people," Harry had said, surprising himself. Even now, in the dark, he felt the thrill of the attack, the surprise and consternation on Fudge's face, the pride in Minerva's. "I read those journals, sir, read them all, and I agree with Judge Kramer – Severus wanted to believe people could change, because he had."
"'There is a line,'" Kramer had said softly, his voice nearly a chant in the still air of the room, "'a place one stands, at which there is a choice to stay as one is and refuse all change, or to cross over and become something so wholly unfamiliar that the thought of doing so is incomprehensible. To stay on one side is like death, or a slow, rotting misery, but to cross and become the unknown is its own death. What am I, if I am not myself?
"'I have come to that line now, I think. I stand at the very edge of it.'" Kramer had looked up from the book and directly into Fudge's small, furious eyes. "He did cross it, Cornelius. He saved us all, at Cornwall – if he hadn't drawn Voldemort's attention there, we never would have finished arranging Hogwarts' defenses. You don't thank a man for that kind of sacrifice by smearing him."
"You always did like Snape too much," had been Fudge's reply, half a snarl.
"Gentlemen!" Sprenger had interrupted, her voice sharp with demand. "The issue here is not Draco Malfoy, or Severus Snape, it is Ronald Weasley."
"It seems to me that the three cannot be separated at this point," Summers had said. "The guilt of Mr. Weasley may well determine that of Mr. Malfoy – and his innocence as well." His gaze had flickered over Harry. "And Mr. Potter is, of course, tangled up in all of this. A truly fascinating knot."
"One verdict will not untangle it," Kramer had said irritably, "and we will certainly not begin to solve things if we do not press ahead with the matter at hand." She'd turned then, to Ron, who had looked squarely at her and not flinched at all. "Time presses, Mr. Weasley, and there must be a sentence passed."
/The judges all drew their wands, Fudge with a flourish of satisfaction and a smirk of triumph directed at Harry and Ron. Sprenger began to chant the spell, the old Latin rolling from her mouth in rich waves, and the lines of the star engraved in the floor began to glow. A pulse of energy filled the room, sweeping through Harry, tingling, reaching down to the depths of him, and he knew in an instant the nature of the spell – to seek the deepest heart of the accused, to find the truth behind the charges against him – betrayal, treason against the Ministry, things which Ron had never thought to do, could never do.
/The lines of the star pulsed, shifted, changed to a white so bright it hurt Harry to look at them. And Ron, a spectre, red hair glowing like witch-light in the glare, stood in the center of it, and there was no fear in his face, no resignation, nothing, no, not even life./
Harry lay in his bed, fingers twined in the sheets, not wanting to wipe the tears that coursed down his face. He thought of Ron's battered, aching heart, wondered if maybe he knew what the sensation must be – surely this constriction, as though the muscle itself had frozen, or had been gripped by claws, must be what Ron felt, what he tried to soothe away with circles. He wanted suddenly to lift a hand, to push away the hand wound about his heart, but checked the impulse.
/Ron, you always said I was always worth it, but this...? Why did you put yourself through it?/ Ron would always give him the same answer, ever and ever, without end – on his deathbed, the answer would not change – and Harry would never really fully understand it, only know that what his friend had offered him had been something rich, rare, beyond price.
And maybe the spell had known that, too, or there was mercy in whatever magic drove it, for when the light subsided Ron stood there, and the look on his face was wondering.
/"Ronald Weasley, you have been found not guilty of the charges made against you by Cornelius Fudge, Minister of Magic. You have been cleared of the charge of consorting with Death Eaters with intent to undermine the Ministry, and to bring harm to the person of the Minister of Magic in particular." That had been Dominic, dark and inscrutable.
"Although you have been cleared," he continued, "there is the matter of your fitness for duty... And it is our determination that you be discharged from service..."/
The memory of the words released the tension in Harry's chest; his heart convulsed, his breath caught and left him in a gasp that sounded forlorn and small in the darkness of his room. The words had been simple, so simple, and yet incomprehensible – in the moment, it had seemed that Dominic had spoken in a foreign language, or had been shouting down a tunnel, the words distorted and meaningless until they reshaped themselves and found their meanings once again, and the meanings were absolution, innocence, and freedom.
Harry'd been beyond tears at that point, had been on the point of defiance – leaping in to defend Ron, to defy the judges to take him away to Azkaban, when he'd realized what Dominic had said. /Ronald Weasley, you have been found not guilty.../ Not guilty, and oh God, Minerva'd been crying, hands clasped over her mouth as though to keep in the sobs, and Ron had stared a moment before falling limply to the floor, hair a bright wash of red against dark stone, and Harry had run to him, taken him in his arms and whispered a mixture of thanks and curses and promises.
/Oh God, Ron, thank you... don't ever do this again... don't say it, Ron, please don't say it./
"You're worth it," Ron had said, smiling slightly, the words little more than a whisper. Their hands had twined over Ron's heart, and Harry had felt the uncertain vibration beneath his fingertips. "I told you... I told you that you could do it. Save the day."
"I didn't, Ron," Harry had protested.
"You did," Ron insisted gently. "If you didn't want me to tell... about you and Draco, I mean... I never would have. Fudge never would have gotten it out of me. And I couldn't have said what I did, if you hadn't gotten those journals."
Ron had stopped, his eyes closed, chest hitching on a breath. Mediwizards had been summoned, Neville leading the way, and Ron had been whisked off to St. Mungo's quick as that. And then there'd been Minerva to hug, Minerva to tell him, "You did do it, Harry," and to say with some of her old authority, "That was good work, Mr. Potter."
There would be more that day – more heartache, and he would need time to sort through those events and work them out, but so much of the day was still raw him, and worrying at it would be to pick at a fresh wound, and there was so much more to be glad about now. Harry shut his eyes, took as deep a breath as he could manage. The air was cool, tinged with the night breeze from the open window, sweet despite the fact that the smoke and scent of London surrounded them. Maybe there was triumph flavoring things, suffusing him with a profound happiness, he didn't know... it'd been so long, so long since he'd felt this way: heady, victorious, truly bone-deep happy. Maybe never, he thought; there'd always been something detracting from the joy, the knowledge of loss and change, the way fortune metamorphosed, going from good to bad, joy to sorrow and loss and regret.
And speaking of which... He opened his eyes, turned to look at the window and the silhouetted figure there. "Hey," he said softly, reluctant to break the stillness, afraid it might shatter with the fragility of a dream, "are you going to sleep tonight or tomorrow?"
Draco was by the window, a dark shadow traced with silver by the starlight, and very still for a moment before he turned to face Harry.
"It is tomorrow," he said, voice threading through the silence. Nevertheless he stood, a rustle of sound and blurry-edged in the darkness, and paced across the room to Harry's bedside to look down, eyes luminous and grey. "But I don't think I can sleep, Harry," he added, and there was softness, uncertainty in the words.
"I can't either," Harry confessed. He grinned crookedly, moved over a bit so there was a larger space on one side, floundered in awkwardness for a moment before he said, "Come on... we can not sleep together tonight."
He felt Draco's grin, although in the darkness he could not see it, and the slender form above him bent, lowered itself to the mattress, and slid under the covers. They negotiated for space with knees and elbows, settled at last into some kind of agreement, as much as could be made in a too-small bed with lingering uncertainty lying between them like a third partner. Harry could smell Draco's subtle scent, this close, and could not put a name to it, could only remember what it had been like to stand close to him, foreheads together, breathing each other's air as they were right now.
There was something, Harry thought, to be said for simple presence. He thought back on the days and weeks of absence, the dreadful pain of missing his friends – of missing Draco, who in a short time had become inextricably entwined with his life, so necessary to it, and the consequent fullness of having him restored was enough to banish the fears of the day for the time being, to let him slide hands over Draco's shoulders and draw him close, and at last, to sleep.
-to be concluded-
snuggles all of y'all
----
Mens mea cupit cantare formas versas in nova corpora.
(Ovid)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Harry had never been given much to faith in his life – too much changed, to place his trust in many things, or many people. But there were certain people he'd learned would never waver, and Ron was one, and even though his friend had looked ready to fall, there'd been defiance still and although his voice had been weak, it was steady and determined as it marched on through years of pain, the twisted threads of an old story, and in a darkened inn room Harry's mind followed the path of Ron's words.
/I had been assigned to supervise Draco Malfoy when he was first exiled, and I guess anyone who knows me would know I hated doing it, because I couldn't stand Malfoy, but since I had to do it anyway, I figured I might as well do it right. And so I kept an eye on him and his communications, and stopped by whenever I had to, and I guess after a while of doing that we just ended up talking, and I ended up thinking about what it was like to be him, out there all by himself... You can't look through a person's stuff and watch his life without coming to feel what he feels, and get a sense of what he thinks./
Harry stretched out on his bed, wincing as sore muscles refused to relax. He very nearly thrummed with energy, a nervousness that refused to dissipate. It was, he thought, like coming down off the high of a Quidditch match – even years and years removed from his last game, he could still recall the hum of excitement in him, how he would lie awake that night and replay the game in his head and his body until adrenaline vanished and sleep came. There was also a certain element of queasiness, and he swallowed that determinedly.
The room was dark, save the light from the moon and stars, and outside all of Diagon Alley was silent. In the common room below him were the muffled thumps and conversation of the Leaky Cauldron's patrons, but with the still air about him, Harry felt insulated from the comings and goings of Tom's evening clientele, but his thoughts still crowded the room with their own presence. He shifted, tried to get comfortable, felt again a nervous jolt in his stomach, a tingle of disbelief.
/Oh, Ron./ The thought was half fondness, half despair.
Harry gave up sleep, turned over on his side and stared into the darkness for a bit, saw Ron standing there like a wraith, talking, spinning out the truth.
/He told me about how he'd run into Harry once, during the war, and he'd had him dead to rights – those were his words, just that – but let him go, because he couldn't say the words, couldn't kill him... And I asked him why he couldn't do it, and Draco said it was because he just couldn't, and he didn't have a good explanation for it beyond that. But I knew right then what he meant, because... oh, damn it... Harry, I'm sorry. I knew what he meant because there have been times when I've done stuff for Harry, and not wanted to say why, not even to myself.
/But he's worth it, and that's what I told Draco. And he looked at me, and said "Yeah, you're right. Weasley."/
Summers had questioned Ron on that, but Ron had refused to answer much past, "Harry's my friend, and he'll always be my friend." And Summers had probably realized he wouldn't get much more – or maybe he didn't need any more, because there'd been a fierce light in Ron's eyes that had spoken more than perhaps any words could – and let Ron continue.
/Well, that gave me a lot to think about, although I didn't really want to think about it much. I mean, Draco and Harry? It was pretty disturbing at first, and I kept it to myself for a while – didn't even tell Hermione about it. But then Harry ran across Severus' diaries, and when we couldn't get them decoded, I realized what I needed to do. It wasn't easy, but I wrote Draco a note and asked him to come and help. Part of me hoped he wouldn't, but I couldn't in good conscience not want to help. Harry's my mate, and he'd been having a hard time of it lately, and he'd said some things – and I guessed that there was maybe some stuff he needed to work out about Draco, and that it had to do with that time they'd met and Draco hadn't killed him.
/I almost called the whole thing off, though, when I thought that maybe the Minister wanted to use the diaries as evidence, maybe to find some more Death Eaters he couldn't get a hold of, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized I needed to do it – I'd do anything to expose what was happening, to maybe make something right when everything had been so horribly wrong for so long./
"And what was that, Mr. Weasley?" Sprenger had asked, her voice smooth as ice, and as cold.
Harry swallowed, thinking of Ron's answer, swallowed to keep back tears and the invocation of his friend's name. He remembered standing there, helpless, waiting for Ron's answer.
/For a long time I'd believed people were what they were, and could never change. But when we got Severus' diaries, and I was able to read them, I realized that maybe that wasn't the case... and that it was possible for people to be different than what they were. But they need a reason to change, else they won't see why they need to, or will be too afraid... Harry would never go to Draco, and Draco couldn't go to Harry, and they'd both die believing the worst of each other, or at least not knowing the truth. It seemed a good risk, to make a friend happy and to... to prove Severus right./
"So you have taken it upon yourself to reform the entire Death Eater population?" Kramer now, and wonder of wonders he hadn't been sarcastic, but the question had been honest.
/I don't think I'd be so bold as to presume that, sir./
Ron had been looking decidedly weary by this point, his muscles quivering with the effort of remaining upright. But this room had been the center of ritual for hundreds of years, and ritual dictated the accused stand before those who charged him. Fudge had been watching, a sly and triumphant smile teasing the corners of his lips, and oh, how Harry had wanted to pull his wand and hex it right off him.
But Ron had stood, defying Fudge's superiority and his own weakness.
/My parents taught me about life-debts, and I reckon I owed Harry one – Lord knows he got me out of enough scrapes when we were kids, but more than that he's been my best friend for years, and we got each other through dark times. Those are things I reckon you can't really pay back, except by being as good a friend as you can, and I saw that my friend needed me... And Harry had a debt of his own, and I know what it's like, to have something unresolved hanging over you, and needing to do something about it./
"So sacrificing your career seemed the appropriate answer? Risking imprisonment? A trial?"
/If it would help Harry, yessir. In a second. And I did./
Lying in the dark room, Harry sighed and stared at the ceiling. Every time he'd heard Ron insist that the danger to his career was of no consequence, he hadn't quite believed him. There were things you worked hard for and never sacrificed, and Ron had worked for his Auror position, had won it by blood and unshakable determination, and to give it up... Until he heard Ron tell that judge, Dominic it had been, what he'd been telling Harry all along, he hadn't listened. Whenever Ron had said it in the past, he'd felt deeply ashamed, but now he was humbled, turning the memory over in his mind.
/I can't repay you for that,/ he thought, smiled a bit, thinking he was no stranger now to that sort of thing, being unable to find adequate compensation. But maybe some debts were like that... you never paid them back, because you couldn't, because your friend refused the debt, or let it stand in such a way that the only payment required was to live, and to live happily.
Ron had continued at Dominic's prompting: "You'd had a conversation approximately five days before the visit to the Malfoy estates with Neville Longbottom, over fireplace. Mr. Longbottom has been kind enough to forward some of your medical history to us."
/No,/ Harry thought. /Please, I don't want to think about this now. Let me sleep./
But Ron's answer would chase him into dreams if he did not, and to replay the memory of words while seeing Ron's face would be too much.
/I'd gotten in a bit of trouble during the war – taken prisoner for a couple days, and the Death Eaters weren't exactly gentle.../
Harry'd known nothing of that, not until Ron spoke of it, and he'd wondered in a distant way what must have happened in a person's life, to make him say things like "Cruciatus" so easily, and confirm what Neville had told the judges already – that he'd been seriously hurt, his heart nearly giving out from the pain, and had gone back anyway as soon as he could get permission from St. Mungo's, to put himself in danger again.
/And I hadn't been feeling well, exactly, for a couple weeks, and when I talked to Nev – er, I mean Dr. Longbottom – he said there was still damage from the Cruciatus, and it was only getting worse. He said I should think about leaving as soon as I could, resign and all that, but I couldn't, not until I'd made sure Harry and Draco were okay... because I knew that if I'd left, there wouldn't be anyone to make sure they'd had their chance, or to make sure the journals got to where they needed to be. And then, well, everything backfired, and I'm sure you know the rest of the story./
"Oh, Ron." He'd whispered that, when Ron had explained himself, had realized finally, the significance of a thousand little things. The day he'd gone to see about the letter, Ron's pale face, the absent circling of his hand over his chest, /I'm dying here,/ his friend had said, as a joke. Harry saw in painful clarity that hand moving over fabric, pressing down into the flesh, as though to surround the pain, contain it, soothe it into nothingness. And it had not worked. What had the curse done to him when he'd been taken prisoner by his own people? He shivered, thinking about it – the mind shied away from possibilities.
There'd been silence in the room after that, silence save for the pounding of Harry's heart. He'd stood frozen, not knowing what to do, to say. Fudge even seemed shocked, his featureless, flabby mouth open, fish-like, gimlet eyes wide. Minerva had been crying – tears from a rock, it had been. The other judges had simply sat there, soundless.
"You make a strong case for friendship, Mr. Weasley," Dominic had said at last, "if not for common sense."
/It seems like friendship is the best sense of all, sir. I don't regret what I did./
"Do you understand that your actions could have you dishonorably discharged? Imprisoned?" Sprenger this time, cold and merciless. "A strong case for friendship, indeed, or perhaps insanity."
/I knew that all along, ma'am, and I was willing to take that risk. I still am./ And Ron had been pale, so horribly pale, and Harry had felt as terrible as Ron looked, caught in the grip of a terrible expectation. Time crawled over his skin, palpable and agonizingly slow in its passage. /But I know what I saw, when I talked with Draco, and when I saw him at Hogwarts with Harry... you can have the testimony for that from Professor McGonagall and the others, I suppose. The only treachery in the whole business wasn't mine, or Malfoy's or Harry's... it was Fudge's, using Severus' diaries like he did, things never intended to incriminate anybody./
"That much is true," Kramer had said, breaking his silence. The journals rested before him, opened to one page. "Severus did not want his journals used to provide evidence against his former comrades – and the investigations proved as much, I think. No... there is evidence of a different sort provided, I think, and it seems to square with Mr. Weasley's assertions as to Mr. Malfoy's character."
"Oh, come now," Fudge had scoffed. "Surely we won't believe the word of a former Death Eater, if we're looking for character references."
"You were willing enough to believe him to incriminate people," Harry had said, surprising himself. Even now, in the dark, he felt the thrill of the attack, the surprise and consternation on Fudge's face, the pride in Minerva's. "I read those journals, sir, read them all, and I agree with Judge Kramer – Severus wanted to believe people could change, because he had."
"'There is a line,'" Kramer had said softly, his voice nearly a chant in the still air of the room, "'a place one stands, at which there is a choice to stay as one is and refuse all change, or to cross over and become something so wholly unfamiliar that the thought of doing so is incomprehensible. To stay on one side is like death, or a slow, rotting misery, but to cross and become the unknown is its own death. What am I, if I am not myself?
"'I have come to that line now, I think. I stand at the very edge of it.'" Kramer had looked up from the book and directly into Fudge's small, furious eyes. "He did cross it, Cornelius. He saved us all, at Cornwall – if he hadn't drawn Voldemort's attention there, we never would have finished arranging Hogwarts' defenses. You don't thank a man for that kind of sacrifice by smearing him."
"You always did like Snape too much," had been Fudge's reply, half a snarl.
"Gentlemen!" Sprenger had interrupted, her voice sharp with demand. "The issue here is not Draco Malfoy, or Severus Snape, it is Ronald Weasley."
"It seems to me that the three cannot be separated at this point," Summers had said. "The guilt of Mr. Weasley may well determine that of Mr. Malfoy – and his innocence as well." His gaze had flickered over Harry. "And Mr. Potter is, of course, tangled up in all of this. A truly fascinating knot."
"One verdict will not untangle it," Kramer had said irritably, "and we will certainly not begin to solve things if we do not press ahead with the matter at hand." She'd turned then, to Ron, who had looked squarely at her and not flinched at all. "Time presses, Mr. Weasley, and there must be a sentence passed."
/The judges all drew their wands, Fudge with a flourish of satisfaction and a smirk of triumph directed at Harry and Ron. Sprenger began to chant the spell, the old Latin rolling from her mouth in rich waves, and the lines of the star engraved in the floor began to glow. A pulse of energy filled the room, sweeping through Harry, tingling, reaching down to the depths of him, and he knew in an instant the nature of the spell – to seek the deepest heart of the accused, to find the truth behind the charges against him – betrayal, treason against the Ministry, things which Ron had never thought to do, could never do.
/The lines of the star pulsed, shifted, changed to a white so bright it hurt Harry to look at them. And Ron, a spectre, red hair glowing like witch-light in the glare, stood in the center of it, and there was no fear in his face, no resignation, nothing, no, not even life./
Harry lay in his bed, fingers twined in the sheets, not wanting to wipe the tears that coursed down his face. He thought of Ron's battered, aching heart, wondered if maybe he knew what the sensation must be – surely this constriction, as though the muscle itself had frozen, or had been gripped by claws, must be what Ron felt, what he tried to soothe away with circles. He wanted suddenly to lift a hand, to push away the hand wound about his heart, but checked the impulse.
/Ron, you always said I was always worth it, but this...? Why did you put yourself through it?/ Ron would always give him the same answer, ever and ever, without end – on his deathbed, the answer would not change – and Harry would never really fully understand it, only know that what his friend had offered him had been something rich, rare, beyond price.
And maybe the spell had known that, too, or there was mercy in whatever magic drove it, for when the light subsided Ron stood there, and the look on his face was wondering.
/"Ronald Weasley, you have been found not guilty of the charges made against you by Cornelius Fudge, Minister of Magic. You have been cleared of the charge of consorting with Death Eaters with intent to undermine the Ministry, and to bring harm to the person of the Minister of Magic in particular." That had been Dominic, dark and inscrutable.
"Although you have been cleared," he continued, "there is the matter of your fitness for duty... And it is our determination that you be discharged from service..."/
The memory of the words released the tension in Harry's chest; his heart convulsed, his breath caught and left him in a gasp that sounded forlorn and small in the darkness of his room. The words had been simple, so simple, and yet incomprehensible – in the moment, it had seemed that Dominic had spoken in a foreign language, or had been shouting down a tunnel, the words distorted and meaningless until they reshaped themselves and found their meanings once again, and the meanings were absolution, innocence, and freedom.
Harry'd been beyond tears at that point, had been on the point of defiance – leaping in to defend Ron, to defy the judges to take him away to Azkaban, when he'd realized what Dominic had said. /Ronald Weasley, you have been found not guilty.../ Not guilty, and oh God, Minerva'd been crying, hands clasped over her mouth as though to keep in the sobs, and Ron had stared a moment before falling limply to the floor, hair a bright wash of red against dark stone, and Harry had run to him, taken him in his arms and whispered a mixture of thanks and curses and promises.
/Oh God, Ron, thank you... don't ever do this again... don't say it, Ron, please don't say it./
"You're worth it," Ron had said, smiling slightly, the words little more than a whisper. Their hands had twined over Ron's heart, and Harry had felt the uncertain vibration beneath his fingertips. "I told you... I told you that you could do it. Save the day."
"I didn't, Ron," Harry had protested.
"You did," Ron insisted gently. "If you didn't want me to tell... about you and Draco, I mean... I never would have. Fudge never would have gotten it out of me. And I couldn't have said what I did, if you hadn't gotten those journals."
Ron had stopped, his eyes closed, chest hitching on a breath. Mediwizards had been summoned, Neville leading the way, and Ron had been whisked off to St. Mungo's quick as that. And then there'd been Minerva to hug, Minerva to tell him, "You did do it, Harry," and to say with some of her old authority, "That was good work, Mr. Potter."
There would be more that day – more heartache, and he would need time to sort through those events and work them out, but so much of the day was still raw him, and worrying at it would be to pick at a fresh wound, and there was so much more to be glad about now. Harry shut his eyes, took as deep a breath as he could manage. The air was cool, tinged with the night breeze from the open window, sweet despite the fact that the smoke and scent of London surrounded them. Maybe there was triumph flavoring things, suffusing him with a profound happiness, he didn't know... it'd been so long, so long since he'd felt this way: heady, victorious, truly bone-deep happy. Maybe never, he thought; there'd always been something detracting from the joy, the knowledge of loss and change, the way fortune metamorphosed, going from good to bad, joy to sorrow and loss and regret.
And speaking of which... He opened his eyes, turned to look at the window and the silhouetted figure there. "Hey," he said softly, reluctant to break the stillness, afraid it might shatter with the fragility of a dream, "are you going to sleep tonight or tomorrow?"
Draco was by the window, a dark shadow traced with silver by the starlight, and very still for a moment before he turned to face Harry.
"It is tomorrow," he said, voice threading through the silence. Nevertheless he stood, a rustle of sound and blurry-edged in the darkness, and paced across the room to Harry's bedside to look down, eyes luminous and grey. "But I don't think I can sleep, Harry," he added, and there was softness, uncertainty in the words.
"I can't either," Harry confessed. He grinned crookedly, moved over a bit so there was a larger space on one side, floundered in awkwardness for a moment before he said, "Come on... we can not sleep together tonight."
He felt Draco's grin, although in the darkness he could not see it, and the slender form above him bent, lowered itself to the mattress, and slid under the covers. They negotiated for space with knees and elbows, settled at last into some kind of agreement, as much as could be made in a too-small bed with lingering uncertainty lying between them like a third partner. Harry could smell Draco's subtle scent, this close, and could not put a name to it, could only remember what it had been like to stand close to him, foreheads together, breathing each other's air as they were right now.
There was something, Harry thought, to be said for simple presence. He thought back on the days and weeks of absence, the dreadful pain of missing his friends – of missing Draco, who in a short time had become inextricably entwined with his life, so necessary to it, and the consequent fullness of having him restored was enough to banish the fears of the day for the time being, to let him slide hands over Draco's shoulders and draw him close, and at last, to sleep.
-to be concluded-