Chapter 30 - See you soon
The day of Dumbledore's funeral is overcast, with rain threatening the outdoor proceedings all morning. Hermione sits between Draco and Ron in an inconspicuous row in the middle of the crowd. They all sit together — Harry is there too with Ginny next to him and Theo and Neville and Pansy and Millicent. The other sixth year Gryffindors and Slytherins sit in the row behind them and everyone gets along better than Hermione could have possibly imagined.
Most of the others don't know exactly what happened, but they all know things are different now — in so many ways.
The funeral service drags on. They can hardly hear the small officiant all the way in the middle rows, though Hermione gets the sense he's giving a rather generic eulogy anyway. Her mind wanders.
Dumbledore, he… well, he remained surprising to the last, at least. She can't get over what she saw the day before in the pensieve with Theo. He was so calculating, impossibly strategic, and so sure of himself. So sure of other people, really. So sure they would do what he needed from them, so long as he pointed them in the right direction.
It's horrible, in a way. The way he manipulated the situation, made people's decisions for them. Took choices away. But then again, he was right, wasn't he? Theo did fulfill the prophecy about him, and he was pushed in the right direction by being in Gryffindor. And it's not like Theo isn't happier for it.
But as for her… the justification is weaker. Though he and Snape did talk through it at length, it never became entirely clear to her as to why. To influence Draco positively. To gain an increased appreciation for strategy and thereby provide more help to Harry. To redirect attention from Theo's resorting.
Those are technically reasons, she supposes. Good ones, even. But she's not sure it's enough. If Dumbledore weren't dead, she'd have half a mind to have a stern word with him.
She sighs, watching white smoke wrap around the body and disappear into the white stone tomb. No use being angry about it now. The year happened as it did.
And she did get some good out of it — Draco of course, though that's still complicated. But Pansy, too. She'll be in her life, for the rest of her life. Hermione's sure of it.
And something more, too, in the end. Maybe she got to see who she really is, what she can handle on her own, who she is without Harry and Ron with her every moment. This year has made her stronger.
But whether or not it was worth it, what's done is done. She'll never have any way of knowing how different things would have been. Perhaps the why doesn't matter.
Eventually, the service ends. The rain holds off, just barely.
"Well," Pansy says, as people start standing up and milling about. "That's that, I guess."
Harry nods, his mouth set in a grim, determined line. Hermione has a feeling she knows what he's thinking — Dumbledore's officially gone and they're on their own.
Her attention is drawn to Neville, nudging Theo in the ribs. Theo clears his throat. "Er — can we all talk? This afternoon? I think we all need some answers."
"Yes," she says, sighing. He's right. "The Room of Requirement is probably the best place. After lunch?"
There's a general chorus of vague agreement and people start going their separate ways.
"So," Draco says, catching Hermione's eye. "Um, do you want to go for a walk?"
He gestures vaguely around the lake. He sucks his lip the tiniest bit into his mouth — he's nervous.
"Sure," she says, smiling slightly, gently. "Can you, though? I mean, you just got released —"
"I'm fine," he interrupts briskly. "I can manage a short walk."
They set off.
Hermione finds herself looking at the ground in front of her more than at Draco and he's doing the same and no one seems to know what to say and Hermione's thinking about just a few weeks ago when she was in his bed and she felt so comfortable and everything seemed alright and now she's forgotten how to even look at him.
"So," he says eventually, clearing his throat. "I wanted to thank you for coming to the manor. I — I deserved to be there, for everything I've done. And I can't stand that you got hurt, if I ever find who hurt you…" He huffs out a steadying breath. "Thank you for coming."
"I'm just glad everyone's okay," she says. "I couldn't have let them do that to you. None of us could — Pansy was brilliant. Theo and Neville too, of course. And those ropes, I mean, no one would deserve that, but especially not you, and anyway it's okay. We're all okay," she finishes lamely, cutting off her babbling.
Draco takes a moment before he responds and Hermione looks out over the lake and the dark, threatening sky. The Hogwarts Express is coming tomorrow morning. It could be one of her last looks over the grounds.
"When we were up in the tower," Draco says apologetically, "we talked, right? I don't remember entirely. I think I know what you said, but I felt like I was dreaming too. I don't know what was real."
The black lake churns, twisting around itself. Hermione's stomach does the same.
"Oh," she manages. "Right, well. Um. I said that I was stupid for ending things and that if we survived I wanted to get back together. And then, um, I told you I loved you." Draco stops walking and she stops too, their eyes finally meeting. "And you said it back. And then we kissed. And after that you promised to be a good boyfriend and be nice to Harry."
"Damn," Draco says with a teasing little smirk. "I was hoping that last part wasn't real."
Then he bends his head and kisses her, opening her to him easily. She drinks it in. The taste of him, the warmth of him, the feel of his shoulders under her finger tips. Solid. Real. Alive.
"I meant every word," he murmurs, his forehead pressed to hers. "I've been such an idiot. So horrendously selfish and cruel. I don't deserve you for a minute. But if you'll have me, I want to do this better. I don't want to do secrets and hiding or anything anymore. I just want to do us. I'm free of him now, Hermione, free of all of it. Merlin, I just — I just want to be with you."
"I want that too," she breathes.
Their lips meet again, and they stand on the path at the edge of the lake as the sky opens up above them and rain pours down, soaking them through to the skin.
Theo and Neville arrive at the Room of Requirement first. Theo thinks of the Room of Hidden Things as they enter, memories of the things that happened there flashing in front of his eyes. The room mirrors his thoughts, and the hidden things appear.
Everyone else arrives soon after — Pansy, Hermione, Draco, Harry, and Ron.
Hermione raises her eyebrows a little at Theo's choice of Room, but conjures a large soft mat and plonks down on it, sitting with her legs crossed. The rest of the group follows her lead, forming a loose circle.
It takes Theo a moment to notice that everyone's looking at him, like he's in charge or something.
"Er," he says. "I don't know. Ask questions or talk or something."
Pansy snorts. "Fine then. I'll start," she says, as if ready with a list of questions. "Potter, what were you doing with Professor Dumbledore the night he died?"
Harry starts, his head snapping up like he's surprised to be called on. "I, er — we were fetching something."
"Not good enough," Pansy says.
"I'm really not supposed to say," he says, looking desperately at Ron and Hermione. "He specifically said I wasn't to tell anyone."
Hermione looks at him carefully for a moment, her lips pursed in thought. "He's dead, Harry," she says softly. "What good has keeping secrets ever done for us?"
"But if he finds out, he could make more. It can't get back to him that we know."
"No one here is going to tell anyone," Hermione says slowly. "It was always just the three of us before, but it's not anymore, is it?"
"She's right," Ron says. "We should tell them."
Harry nods, closing his eyes for a moment like it physically pains him to disobey Dumbledore. "Hermione, you're better at explaining stuff."
So Hermione tells them about horcruxes. At first, Theo wants to be sick. A soul in seven pieces. It's impossible, inhuman. The most evil man to have ever lived, unable to die.
Then she tells them about the six objects: a diary, a ring, a snake, Slytherin's locket, Hufflepuff's cup, something of Ravenclaw's.
Theo flashes a look at Neville who returns it, his eyes wide.
"So Harry and Dumbledore went looking for the locket last week, but they didn't find it. It was replaced with a fake," Hermione explains. "But Harry destroyed the diary in second year, and Dumbledore destroyed the ring last summer. And Neville killed the snake when we were at the manor… Did anything weird happen when it died?"
"Yes," Theo remembers suddenly. "All these black shadows came out of it. But I think I know where two of the others are."
"WHAT?" Hermione squawks.
"Yeah," Theo explains. "The cup is in Bellatrix Lestrange's vault at Gringotts. My father wrote it in a letter — he didn't say 'horcrux', but it seems pretty obvious now. And there's something of Ravenclaw's in this room."
Harry leaps dramatically to his feet. "Where?"
Theo points to the corner it got thrown into the day he and Neville were here. "Over there. There's a crown thing with Ravenclaw's symbol on it."
"Don't touch it!" Neville cries as Harry starts to move towards it. "It's cursed!"
Harry stops and Hermione gently summons the crown and levitates it in front of her. She peers at it closely. "It certainly looks old," she says excitedly. "Harry, I think this is it!"
Theo has to fight the urge to reach for the crown. It still calls to him, somehow. He reaches for Neville instead, who squeezes his hand tight, steadying him.
"How do you destroy it?" Pansy asks.
"Well, there could be a few ways…" Hermione says. "Harry used a basilisk fang on the diary and Dumbledore used the sword of Gryffindor for the ring. And I suppose Neville did too, for the snake."
"What are the odds McGonagall would let you borrow the sword if you just asked for it?" Ron asks Harry.
"Damn good, I'd say," Draco pipes in, smirking as he speaks for the first time in a while. Theo almost forgot he was there. "Anything for the Chosen One."
Hermione shoots him a look.
"Hey," Draco says. "What about that wasn't nice?"
"Everything," she says, letting out a little laugh and rolling her eyes.
"Seriously," Harry says, looking at the crown skeptically. "You think I could just ask?"
"Might as well," Hermione says.
"Yeah, go now," encourages Ron.
Harry wanders out the door, closing it gently behind him. There's a moment where no one seems to know what to do, the new knowledge heavy in the air.
"Who else has questions?" Hermione asks after a moment.
Pansy helps herself to another turn, her voice growing rather cheeky. "What's the deal with you and Draco? Everything sorted?"
"Yes," Draco answers, his hand dropping possessively to Hermione's lower back. "We're together, Pansy."
He nods assertively, seeming determined to keep it to that.
"Finally," Pansy says. "Okay, next question. Where are you and Narcissa living this summer and can I come with you?" Slightly wider eyes are the only things that betray her vulnerability.
"Actually," Draco says, "I'm not sure yet, but —"
"With me," Theo interjects, the idea hitting him suddenly. "The three of you will come to my house. It has old, strong wards and too many rooms. And an excellent firewhiskey collection."
Pansy leaps across the circle and flings herself on him, smacking a kiss against his forehead. "You beautiful man," she says, "and your beautiful sad orphan house."
Which he translates roughly as thank you.
"Same here," Draco says, meeting Theo's eyes, piercing emotion welling up within his gaze.
"Well that's settled then," Theo says. "Conglomerate Nebula will be thrilled."
They're discussing plans to apparate from the edge of the Hogwarts grounds for safety, rather than take the train one last time, when Harry returns.
He's got the sword.
He holds it aloft, grinning cheekily. "Who wants to destroy a horcrux?"
Theo jumps to his feet before he realises what he's doing. "Me!"
Potter raises his eyebrows a small fraction but hands Theo the sword.
Hermione releases her levitation of the crown, letting it drift to the ground off to the side of where they're sitting.
Theo glances back at Neville, who gives him an encouraging smile through worried eyes, then he steps forward toward the crown.
The impulse to save it instead of destroy it lasts only as long as he forgets what it truly is: a piece of the Dark Lord's soul. Perhaps there's a part of him that wants to save horribly broken things. Perhaps that's why the crown called out to him. But some things cannot be saved.
He raises the sword above the horcrux and it begins to shake. He presses the tip of the sword to the edge of the metal and a black shadow emerges. The crown begins to speak.
Its voice sounds just like his father.
It tells him he's worthless and forgettable. That he'll never amount to anything. It tells him he's a bad friend, a bad partner, a horrible, disloyal son. It tells him that it's his fault that his mother died and that he'll grow up to be just like his father. It tells him Neville is too good for him and that he doesn't really love him and never will.
Theo stabs the crown, cracking the metal in two.
He won't listen to any more of its lies.
It's wrong about everything and Theo fucking knows it.
There's a moment of deafening silence and then somebody whoops. Ron, he thinks. Then everyone joins in, cheering and laughing.
They're one step closer to winning.
Theo returns to his seat, setting the sword on the floor in front of him.
Everyone looks to him again, as if it's his turn to speak. He raises his hands, palms up. "What?"
There's another round of laughter, and then Pansy says, "I have more questions," and everyone laughs again, nearly hysterical with it, and for a moment it's like it's normal, like they're friends.
"Draco," she says when they've recovered, "tell everyone about your task. There are still things I don't know. Start at the beginning."
Draco casts a mildly panicked look at Hermione, who just wraps her hand a little tighter around his.
He looks to the ground as he starts to speak. He tells them about his Dark Mark and the threats on his parents. He tells them he was tasked with killing Dumbledore.
Theo gasps. He didn't know that was what the cabinet was for.
"Yeah," Draco mutters, his eyes flashing up to meet Theo's for a second.
He tells them about Snape's vow to Narcissa and Hermione's theory that Dumbledore was dying anyway.
Theo watches Harry's face break as he recalibrates what he knew about his mentor and what he witnessed the other night on the Astronomy tower. Theo recalibrates too. That's what Snape and Dumbledore were talking about in the memory. Everything fits, everything makes sense, everything's awful.
Draco explains about breaking the cabinet and how he got taken to the manor because of it.
Draco looks up, tense and ready for judgement, for condemnation. It doesn't come.
"Huh," Harry says. "I mean, I guess I was technically right, but when you put it like that…"
"Yeah, mate," Ron says. "That sucks."
Hermione smiles at her friends so widely it looks almost like she's going to cry.
They all stay in the Room for a while after that. Pansy asks a few more questions, including about the memories he and Hermione saw.
They talk about Harry's plans to track down the final two horcruxes and Ron and Hermione's plans to go with him. None of the rest of them are quite sure what they'll do. It feels, to Theo at least, that this is the end of something. He can't imagine coming back for another year at Hogwarts, going to classes, taking his NEWTs. Not after everything that's happened.
But who knows. Next year is months away. And right now, the only thing that feels real is the seven of them, and this room, and this moment.
Hermione arrives early in the Great Hall the following morning, levitating her trunk behind her. She's waiting for Pansy and Draco to say her goodbyes before they set off for Theo's and she heads off with Ron and Harry on the train.
She spots Theo at the Gryffindor table and makes her way over, sliding onto the bench next to him. It's funny, they're in just about the same place she was sitting the very first night of the year, before the feast.
"Morning, Theo," she says softly.
"Hi Hermione," he smiles. "Weird year, huh?"
"They're all weird," she laughs, pouring herself a bit of tea.
In a way, it's odd to be leaving. But at the same time, she feels ready to move on.
She talked to Draco for hours last night and as much as she'll miss him, and as much as he is vehemently opposed to her doing anything even vaguely dangerous, he accepts that going with Harry is something she has to do.
It's not over. She can visit him at Theo's and they can write. She's not sure how long it will take, but it's only two horcruxes and they already know where one of them is. It might not be that long.
But regardless, she's confident in Draco. She's confident in what he means to her, and that he shares those feelings. He's worth waiting for.
"Do you wonder where we'd be without it?" Theo asks. "The resorting?"
She shrugs. "Impossible to know, isn't it? But you wouldn't have destroyed a horcrux yesterday, I'd imagine."
"Yeah," Theo agrees. "I think we're all better off, in the end."
Hermione takes another sip of her tea and notices Draco and Pansy coming up from the Slytherin dorms and into the Great Hall.
"I'll see you soon, Theo," she says, rising from her seat and wrapping him up in a tight hug.
"See you soon," he says. "You'll do great out there."
A/N: We made it! Thank you for reading and commenting. I hope you have enjoyed the story.
Thank you to sun-celine for betaing ❤️
And - though this story may be over, I have many more stories to write. As I mentioned in a previous note, I will not be posting anything else here, but please do find me on AO3 (same username) or on tumblr (diana-skye) to read more of my writing and to keep in touch!
