Fawkes swept gracefully over the lake, his sad lament continuing to echo on to the Grounds, still speckled with students crowding around the Astronomy tower where their hero had so recently met his end. The doleful note sprang from the very depths of the phoenix as he soared around the castle in a wide circuit, as though determined to leave one last resounding note for Dumbledore's tribute, for his memory.
The scarlet and gold plumage glittered in the moonlight. The calm weather out of place with the catastrophe that had occurred only hours before as Fawkes finished one last flight around the castle and began to soar towards the East. Dumbledore always preferred the East, where the sun had risen for him on this mortal plain, as though hope washed over him freshly every morning as he watched the sunrise before the start of each day.
Slowly and easily, Fawkes flew continuously East, flying away from Hogwarts, away from Dumbledore's now stiff corpse, away from the pain. Though he would be reborn from his ashes, Dumbledore would not. He was alone.