Disclaimer: Anything you recognise isn't mine – god bless JK!!!
Chapter 11 – Beyond the Grave
Reminder: I stood up and a grin spread slowly across my face as I turned to Cedric...
"I know where they are"
Moonlight Quandry
The moonlight poured over the stone monuments to lives lived and lost, covering everything with an eerie blue light, but even in the dim light the three figures crouched before a tattered old grave were visible,
I beckoned to Cedric and we made our way over to them, they're voices ringing crisply through the cool night air, at least I guessed it was cool, judging by the breath visible on the air it had to be cold….
"But how did you find it Harry? What made you find your mother's grave after all this time?" questioned Hermione,
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you" he said quietly crouching down and running his fingers over the rough stone
"Why not try us?" persisted Hermione
He turned his head to face her, and I saw the tears tangled in his eyes, the bright green that I loved so much appearing almost black in the moonlight and full of pain.
"Ginny told me" he whispered looking down again,
"You've seen Ginny?" interrupted Ron as Hermione gasped
"But how is that possible Harry? You can't see someone whose dead, you know that better that anyone"
"I did once" he replied
"A long time ago now, but I never told either of you, It was one memory that I kept to myself, that I don't think anyone ever knew, I didn't even tell Dumbledore"
"But you saw Ginny?" Ron broke in impatiently,
Hermione shot him a look behind Harry's back, I even smiled to see it, my brother and Hermione, ever the perfect tactful couple.
"I saw Ginny" Harry replied flatly
"She told me, she said to look at the stone, and then she vanished, like she had never been here"
"But she was here?" insisted Ron looking around as if expecting to see me. "Was she ok Harry, was she real?"
Harry nodded
"It was her voice I heard first, I was sat just here" he coloured slightly, "She, She said she would never let me be alone…"
He broke off and a tear made its way silently down his cheek….
"I looked up and saw her, stood there, looking more beautiful than ever, and all she said to me was the stone, look at the stone, and then her face dropped like something terrible had happened and she vanished, as if she had never been there at all, perhaps it wasn't even here, perhaps it was just the breeze and I imagined it…. "
He stopped
"But if it was your imagination" said Hermione, "Then you wouldn't have known about the stone, it had to be her Harry, I'm certain of it"
Harry stood up and shuffled his foot in the long grass covering his mothers resting place,
"It was her" he said now more confidently, "She wanted to help, and she helped"
I smiled, He had seen me, and he thought I was beautiful, no one had ever said I was beautiful before,
"Do you think she was happy?" said Ron his voice trembling slightly,
Harry shrugged, "I don't know Ron, I just don't know"
Ron nodded his face set in a frown, "If you saw her once?" He asked "do you think you could see her again, do you think it's possible?"
Hermione interrupted,
"Ron, when I was eleven, I found out I was witch, wizards to me were the things for fairy tales, that could be the same for wizards, that spirits who have moved on, they are little but myth and fairytale, yet in one moment one thing can happen to change that theory forever, that can change your whole life and your whole world. One thing I've learnt since Hogwarts is this…Anything is possible."
He nodded satisfied,
Cedric's voice now sounded over my shoulder, "Well he did see you, we just need to know how, and why"
I nodded, and stepping to Harry's side I placed my hand lightly on his shoulder careful not to let it slip through his skin
"Harry?" I said a lump forming in my throat, this was it, he would see me, I could tell him that I loved him, I could tell him that everything was going to be alright, I could tell him I was sorry
"So what you think it means?" he asked,
"The epitaph?" questioned Hermione
Harry nodded,
I removed my hand and turned to Cedric tears forming in my eyes, "it didn't work" I said flatly
He extended his arm to me, "C'mon, you broke through once, It could happen again" he said in comforting tones, "Hermione is right about one thing, anything is possible…. even for us"
I allowed him to escort me away and leave them to they're puzzling.
But inside my heart was breaking, was it possible that one moment with him, one moment where he knew of my presence, one moment where he saw me, was just further torment?
One moment together in heaven, and then back into my life, my death, my permanent hell.
I began to wish we had never shared that brief moment of contact.
Silvermoonluna – more soon, please read and review.