A/N: only own what's not recognisable from the books

The lyrics at the beginning are from '10 000 Miles' by Mary Chapin Carpenter

Thanx to all who reviewed throughout he entire story you ppl rock!

Sorry about the shortness, the crapness, the lack of Draco/Ginny and the basic all round rubbishness of it but I had a major block at the time of writing and it wouldn't come out right anyway here it is the last chapter

Chapter Eleven – Farewell

Fare thee well
My own true love
Farewell for a while
I'm going away
But I'll be back
Though I go 10,000 miles

10,000 miles
My own true love
10,000 miles or more
The rocks may melt
And the seas may burn
If I should not return

Oh don't you see
That lonesome dove
Sitting on an ivy tree
She's weeping for
Her own true love
As I shall weep for mine

"Dante?"

Appleby's voice reverberated back from the damp stone walls to her own ears as her sharp eyes searched every corner of the dungeon corridor for her husband. Eventually she saw a shadow flickering in the back of a dungeon at the very bottom of the school where no light penetrated the room save the tiny slice of moonlight filtering in from the arrow shaped window in the far wall.

"You know why we're here don't you?"

She sighed and tugged her veil out of her hair, dropping carelessly into a corner where the tiara tinkled across the stone floor before resting in a heap behind her.

"I know, I did think we could avoid it."

Dante shook his head and raised his eyes to see his wife framed by the barred door, the torch-light from the corridor silhouetting her so her hair glowed and turned her skin to fire, she was beautiful. Silently he drew his sword from the sheath by his side and balanced it in his hand with the other, carefully twisting it in his hand and offering the hilt to her. She took it.

"This isn't our choice; this was decided a long time ago."

She knew better than to think he was justifying their situation but she listened anyway, enjoying the sound of his voice in her ears and watching his every movement with carefully emptied eyes. Her palm was sweating against the metal of the sword hilt in her hand and she tightened her grip, kicking off her high heels and balancing on the toes of her bare feet as she waited for the fight to begin.

She had accepted the fact that this would happen no matter what they did to stop it and was caught between a desperate desire to let him kill her and get it over with and her sense of stupid responsibility to the world. Testing the waters she took a step forward and clashed her sword lightly against Dante's watching as he blocked it perfectly, his face expressionless but his eyes a fury of emotions.

She barely had time to register the fact they were fighting when his sword sliced against her shoulder, tearing away her sleeve and releasing blood in a scarlet trickle down her arm and dress, she bit down on her lip hard refusing to shout out. She glared up at him as he flinched at the deep gash in her shoulder and darted back towards him her sword colliding with his own shoulder with a final sounding crack that gave her the distinct impression she had broken or dislocated something at the very least

Fighting back a torrent of guilt she stepped back and squared her burning shoulder, blinking hard as her vision blurred for a second. She was busy shaking her head to clear it of the fog descending on her when he caught her unawares and she slipped against his blow and fell to the ground, hard. A flashing moment of guilt made Dante back away from her as she pulled herself up with her good arm and rubbed the back of her head where she had landed, pulling back a hand covered in blood.

He watched her as she watched him and he shuddered, he didn't want to do this, he didn't want to make her do this. Appleby's eyes flickered up, burning pure black with tears she refused to shed they watched as Dante watched her back. Rising from her kneeling position on the floor her eyes still didn't leave her husband's as she silently drew the discarded sword from the floor and took a step towards Dante, her white dress splattered with blood both hers and his as she flexed her long white fingers against the black hilt encrusted with emeralds.

"Can you do it? Can you go to the extreme to save the world that gave you nothing but fear and pain?"

His voice sprang back from the grimy walls of the dungeon as she stood watching him; one of her sleeves had been ripped from her dress and was tied around the top of her arm steadily turning red and leaking blood onto her lily-white flesh. As she took another step forward her dress parted to make room for her bare leg as the slashed material fell away from her thigh to reveal bruises from her encounter with the floor earlier.

He said the words so easily he didn't know her heart was breaking inside her chest, she could literally feel it tearing itself open with every second that took them closer to the end. Tightening her bloodied fingers on the sword in her grip she coiled every muscle into the pounce she was preparing and narrowed her eyes, furiously hating the world for what it was making her do.

He watched her and suddenly he wasn't afraid, in fact he closed his eyes on the dull dank dungeon they were standing in, he wasn't there he was back in the Hospital Wing on that first night. He could feel her skin against his as she breathed his name over and over, her fingertips smoothing over his lips in wonder as he gazed down on her feeling her melting in his arms as they moved.

He opened his eyes to look at Appleby, his eyes telling him what his mouth couldn't and she faltered. Their eyes locked and he knew this was killing her as much as it was breaking him but he also knew she wouldn't change her mind; this was the only choice. Sighing he took a minute step towards her his eyes never leaving hers as his heart told her his choice and she knew, in that instant she knew, if she didn't do it he'd do it anyway.

She lunged...

She fell to her knees again next to him and hauled him towards her, with a great deal of difficulty he smiled up at her and raised a bloodied hand to trace a long finger over her cheek, down her nose and over her trembling lips. Closing her eyes against her tears she leaned down and brushed his lips with hers, feeling his gasping breaths against her lips. Her tears drifted onto his cheeks and he licked his lips tasting their salt against his tongue as she tugged him into a sitting position, his dark head resting on her bare shoulder.

She rocked him gently until she could hear his breathing getting shallower and his grip was loosening and tightening on her waist as spasms of pain increased their regularity. Finally Appleby knew what was coming and she leaned down so she could hear the words he was fighting desperately to say to her;

"You're mine, always."

Nodding she could barely get the words out of her mouth as she agreed and lowered her head to kiss him one last time;

"Always."

Letting out a howl of desolation when he fell back into her arms she leant her head against his shoulder and sobbed for all she was worth, smears of blood smudging her tears and left over make-up as she heard the door click open behind her. A hand was dropped onto her shoulder but she ignored it until it was accompanied by a familiar voice;

"He's not entirely gone, Appleby. As we speak there is a part of him growing in this very room not as far away as you'd think."

Appleby jerked her head up and stared and Dumbledore in disbelief, was he serious?

"I'm... pregnant?"

He nodded, his eyes twinkling with tears as much as amusement at her shell-shocked face breaking into an amazed grin.

"So the test we did inform us."

Appleby looked back down at Dante still cradled in her arms and leant down to give him one last kiss, her hands smoothing over every inch of his face as though committing him to her memory which was stupid; his face was already engraved into her heart.

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AmericanGirl1114 – ((hits on head)) do you remember? I have a younger brother and he never does anything for me or gives me anything. My mom overreacts so much if you're in 2 minutes late its all 'you had me worried sick, you should have rang me, you're grounded!' ahem yeah anyway thanks muchly for all the reviews and hope this was acceptable as an ending

Nickel – you could have used the name Dante if you'd liked lol I don't mind I'm glad you like it! I hope you didn't damage yourself too much waiting for it and I hope it was worth the pain. Thanx for all reviews

little-munchkin-poo – I bet I didn't make you cry in this one cos its not very good, I made ppl cry in my songfic though! Naturally it was a D/G fic ahem yeah I'll shut up now :D thanx for reviewing and putting up with my ramblings!

Alicandra Black – thanx for all the compliments! And also for putting up with my stories hehe I'm going to work on my other fic Dark Temptations again very very soon woo! Anyway yeah I'll stop self-promoting now :D oh yeah go me I have a number 1 fan!! And it's someone with excellent taste in names as well, can't get much better than that :D

Sphinxtress – thanx for the review hope it was ok!