Author's Note:

All Latin in this chapter comes from the Catholic Church's Pre-Vatican II Requiem Mass. There are several web pages with side by side translation. Translation is not deemed necessary for the causal reader, however it may provide additional depth to the story for those wishing to look more deeply.

Chapter Three: Requiem

The morning of Cedric's funeral, Harry was woke up by the sound of Dudley tripping over something, followed by a bit of cursing. Harry knew that there was no way he was going to get back to sleep, so he got up, pulled on a pair of boxers and t-shirt. As he trudged down the stairs, he caught sight of the grandfather clock. Five minutes past five, was way too early, but Harry was used to rising early. Well, not quite so early, but he could live with it.

It was too early to start breakfast, and to be honest, Harry had eaten too many of his Aunt Petunia's custard tarts the night before, and wasn't very hungry, yet. So he stepped out front, to discover Dudley stretching. "Morning Harry," Dudley said.

"I didn't expect to see you up this morning, Dudley," Harry said. "You've always been late to bed, late to rise."

"I know, but my boxing coach wouldn't let me do that, and I kind of got into the habit, you know," Dudley replied as he stretched. Harry decided to stretch a bit himself, and copied Dudley. "I think my coach is a little insane actually, but since he started having me run every morning, well, I feel a lot better. Not to say I still complain when he wakes me up and makes me go jogging in the pouring rain."

"Just rain?" Harry replied. "He's not nothing on my Quidditch Captain. Oliver once made us practice in an ice storm. Though, I admit it was helpful during the Hufflepuff game, my third year. My broom nearly was an icicle by the time the game was over."

"Care to join me in my run?" Dudley asked. "I don't really like to run alone, and you can tell me about this Quiddditch game."

"I don't know, Dudley," Harry said. "I don't run a lot."

"You kept out of my range before we went away from school." Dudley replied, still stretching.

"Yes, but that was four years ago," Harry said. "But as long as you don't run for miles, I guess I can try it."

"Good, I'm only going a mile this morning," Dudley said, as he turned towards the street. "Now how is this Quidditch game played, on brooms?"

Harry Potter stood at the door of Number Four in a black three piece suit. He adjusted his tie. Parvati had made it a bit tight when she had arrived with the suit. He'd spent the last hour and a half preparing himself to her standards. As she was one of the fashion gurus of Gryffindor, Harry supposed he should be glad that she'd come to help. Parvati and her twin sister would not be attending the funeral, but Harry had been requested, and he was now waiting for his ride.

As the clock struck nine, a rather distinctive car pulled up to the curb of Number Four. A sleek sliver Austin Martin DB5 with Harry's white haired headmaster at the wheel stopped right at the end of the walk. There was a twinkle in Albus Dumbledore's eyes as he called out, "Harry, need a ride?"

"Yes sir!" Harry called out, stepping off the stoop. "Where did you get the car?"

"Oh, I bought it from your Grandfather, before you were born," Dumbledore replied, carefully modulating his voice so it would carry just far enough so that Mrs. Number Six would hear. "I thought I'd take the new car out for a ride."

"If this is your new car, what was the old one?" Harry asked as he sat down in the passenger's seat.

"The muggle government gave me a Silver Dawn in '49. I do not find it anywhere near as fun to drive as my DB5. I hope you don't mind, but I think we'll put the top down once we get on the M4."

"Ah, Professor, this isn't a convertible."

"And most DB5s don't come equipped with wizarding wireless. Wireless two, if you will, Harry. There is a work by Monty Norman that my friend Alan has promised to sneak into the schedule in a few minutes."

Dumbledore pulled out his wand and tapped the roof. It changed into a convertible's roof, and slid back into the retracted position. As they pulled away from Little Whinging, heading towards the M4, music began to play. The first tune was very forgettable, but the second ...

Harry looked over at the Headmaster. "You decide to take you DB5 out, and arrange for the wireless to play the Bond Theme," Harry said, as he noticed the Headmaster humming along.

"Of course," Dumbledore replied. "There are just some connections that have to be named, and I have found the Bond films to be a most agreeable distraction. Some of them have at times provided me with intriguing thoughts on title alone."

"Like You Only Live Twice and Voldermot," Harry immediately connected.

"Indeed. Though it was The Spy that Loved Me, that first gave me the connection. It was also my sole attempt at introducing muggle movies to Hogwarts. I understand that there is a new one coming out soon ... perhaps I should make another attempt. It would be a good reminder."

"Good Reminder, sir?"

"Harry, I may profess it, indeed I try to follow the maxim that everyone can change and is worthy of a second chance," Dumbledore said. "It an important belief that I try to follow. However, at some point, redemption is no longer possible. And at some point, death is most unfortunately the only option. Before Voldermot's last fall, that point was met, and the Wizengamot gave some of the Auror's a ... if will pardon the stolen term ... a license to kill.

"It is not an easy decision, one of the most difficult ones that the Wizengamot has made in my time. It is not an easy decision, nor should it be, for any Auror, any wizard, to use that license. Unfortunately, I believe that both of those decisions will be yours to make, all too soon. In the Wizengamot, it shall be a decision on who to let live and let die. For you personally, when you face Voldermot for the last time, it will be much more difficult. Taking a life is a profoundly changing experience. It should not be easy. I do not think it will be for you.

"The action may be simple, but I have grown to know you, Harry. You are not one to take responsibly lightly. It shows itself in many ways, I shall not be surprised if the death of Cedric feels like a leaden weight on your heart."

The words hit Harry, suddenly reminding him that the they were on the M4 for one purpose, and only one purpose. They were going to Cedric's funeral. A leaden weight it was. "I shouldn't have told Cedric to take it."

"The cup? In hindsight, that may seem like the right course of action, Harry. We do not live in hindsight. It was an honorable decision, and the right decision, based on what you knew at the time. Even Professor Trelawney did not foresee the course of events at the end of the Triwizard Cup. If a seer with multiple confirmed prophecies to her credit did not see it, how can you?"

"I still feel guilty about it," Harry replied. Even as he said it, though, the guilt seemed to lessen a bit. As he looked out at the passing countryside, the opening horns of the Live and Let Die theme started. Today was a day of grief, though. He knew the feelings would not die today, not even with the thrill of riding in a DB5 with the top down. Though, it would be a shame not to enjoy the ride, just a little bit.

Draco Malfoy somehow managed to get in line with his Pansy to enter the Pavilion that had been placed over the Diggroy graveyard, right behind Harry Potter. Draco had actually departed for the funeral without a word to his parents. He hadn't even left a letter behind to explain it. What he'd discovered late last night had made him decide that he wasn't speaking to his father again.

As was tradition, everyone entered in couples, save the widow. Not that Cho was really a widow, but in all practical manners she was. While they had been waiting, in the slight drizzle, he'd overheard that her parents had disowned her. Draco wasn't surprised to hear that. He was surprised that the general tone of those spreading that news was one of disapproval towards Cho's parents. It had gotten out that Cho was due to have Cedric's baby in the Fall.

Harry Potter appeared to be escorting Luna Lovegood. Ahead of him was Ron Weasley and, Draco flinched as he recalled the reaction she'd had to her using the term that was on the tip of his thoughts, Hermione Granger. Draco thought the Weasel was surprisingly well dressed, before he recalled the picture that had been on the front page of the Prophet. It was obvious that the outfit he was wearing now was the same, now that he looked closer through the gap between Potter and Loony.

Behind him was Neville Longbottom and the Weaselette. Draco would have to talk to Longbottom. Potter would be better, but somehow he didn't think Potter would listen. Draco knew he had only himself to blame for that. In fact there was a good chance that Longbottom wouldn't speak to him either.

Draco shook his head. It wouldn't do to show his frustration with where his life had led him thus far. It was not the place. This was a place where he could show just a bit how he was trying to change. He could not afford to be the stuck up pureblood prince that he had lived his life as so far anymore. He had Pansy and their baby on the way. He had a Death Eater as a father, a father who had spent most of the last decade involved in some very shady affairs, one of which he was sure was going to break wide open in the Prophet with the next week.

"Mr. Malfoy, if you and your partner would follow me, along with Mr. Potter and his partner?" It took a bit for Draco to realize that it was him that was being requested. He looked up at the man. It appeared to be a priest, judging by the roman collar. "Miss Cho would like you both to follow her and the pallbearers in placing a handful of dirt on the lowered coffin, so we need you to sit a bit further forward than you entered. Assuming, of course, that you accept the honor?"

Draco nodded. Since the hour he had spent standing guard over Cedric in the Entrance Hall of Hogwarts, Draco had felt a lot more a part of Hogwarts. He knew that he was receiving the honor only because he had flown against Cedric as Seeker of the Sytherin Quidditch team, there were not many activities where Sytherins got any such honor, or participated in such a way. After standing guard that hour with Potter, Chang, and Krum, he'd begun to question that. Draco wished he had been able to convince his team to extend the honor and take a shift, but they had not. They were too afraid.

Not that Draco wasn't afraid of the Dark Lord. He was. When he'd flown with the other Quidditch Seekers, he'd justified it as camouflage for his allegiance. He wasn't sure it was anymore. Somehow standing there with Cedric's body ... it made it real. Until then, it had all been like some sort of a game. Slyterins hate Gryffindors, purebloods vs muggle-borns, good vs evil ... not any more. Draco was going to be a father. He had to grow up now.

Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine,
et lux perpetua luceat eis.
Te decet hymnus Deus, in Sion,
et tibi reddetur votum in Ierusalem.
Exaudi orationem meam;
ad te omnis caro veniet.
Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine,
et lux perpetua luceat eis.

Only a few words of the funeral penetrate Draco's musing. Somehow, here in these long rows of folding chairs, with the drone of the Funeral Mass as the background, Draco found himself considering what might happen. The Wizarding World would be at war, soon, he was sure. His father was clearly on the Dark Lord's side. He knew what the Dark Lord did during the last war. His father had kept a book of clippings of the Prophet. They were all of the acts that his father had been a part of, Draco believed. His father hadn't told him that, but he knew that only about a third of the acts of the Death Eaters that had been published were in that book.

Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine :
et lux perpetua luceat eis.
In memoria æterna erit iustus,
ab auditione mala non timebit.

He feared his father. He knew what his father had done. He'd seen the pictures in those clippings. He'd seen the burning houses. He'd read of the state of the bodies. He'd heard about the way women, children, even babies were killed. And just because they were in the way of, or even just been there, when the Dark Lord had decreed their destruction. Draco had never been that brave. Potter had been brave. It was the providence of divine fools like the Gryffindors.

Dies iræ! dies illa
Solvet sæclum in favilla:
Teste David cum Sibylla!

Draco had never been brave. Bravery was not something that Slytherins were. Gryffindors were brave. Slytherins were cunning and ambitious. But Draco could not afford to be cunning and ambitious right now. To do so now, as the Dark Lord rose, was death.

Quid sum miser tunc dicturus?
Quem patronum rogaturus,
Cum vix iustus sit securus?

He needed help. He needed somewhere to turn. He was Draco Malfoy, father to be, and it scared him. The world scared him now. Was there no were to turn? Did he only have the path of serving the Dark Lord? Was there only the path of despair?

Confutatis maledictis,
Flammis acribus addictis:
Voca me cum benedictis.

Could he not find a path to avoid the terror that was the returned reign of the Dark Lord? Was it possible that he could escape being a Death Eater himself?

Lacrimosa dies illa,
Qua resurget ex favilla
Judicandus homo reus.
Huic ergo parce, Deus:

Draco turned to Pansy, and pulled her close. She was his rock, his light shining in the darkness. In her was his future. He could not stand without her, and without her, he saw no way out. Inside her was his heir, hopefully the first of many. He did not want his child to grow up alone, with out siblings, without parents. To his right were the Weasleys. He'd often insulted them, but he'd been jealous of them. He could admit it now to himself, at least.

Hostias et preces tibi, Domine,
laudis offerimus;
tu suscipe pro animabus illis,
quarum hodie memoriam facimus.
Fac eas, Domine, de morte transire ad vitam.
Quam olim Abrahæ promisisti et semini eius.

There were not many pureblood families left. The Dark Lord had taken out way too many. Before the Dark Lord's time, all six of the Weasley boys probably could have found pureblood wives. None of them probably would. Draco knew that Percy would probably be marrying that muggleborn Head Girl, Clearwater. Rumors had it that the Weasley Twins were after two of the Gryffindor Chasers, neither of whom were pureblooded enough for a line with their record. Not that it meant much to them. Draco once cared about such things. Now it seemed to be so inconsequential.

Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, dona eis requiem,
Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, dona eis requiem,
Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, dona eis requiem sempiternam.

Draco wished he could rest, let someone else keep him out of the disaster that his father had lead his house into. He could not. The stakes were too high.

Libera me, Domine, de morte æterna, in die illa tremenda:
Quando cœli movendi sunt et terra.
Dum veneris iudicare sæculum per ignem.
Tremens factus sum ego, et timeo, dum discussio venerit, atque ventura ira.

Draco knew judgement was near. It could not be otherwise. Too many things had gone wrong. At the beginning of the year, he'd though that the old ways, the Dark Lord's ways were rising. No longer. In three short days, Harry Potter had turned that around. The Dark Lord feared Harry Potter. Draco could find no other reason explaining his father's behavior since the return of the Dark Lord. The Dark Lord hid, where Potter was about to very publically take charge, if Draco read the signs right.

In paradisum deducant te Angeli:
in tuo adventu suscipiant te Martyres,
et perducant te in civitatem sanctam Ierusalem.
Chorus Angelorum te suscipiat,
et cum Lazaro quondam paupere æternam habeas requiem.