Hermione can't believe, with all the potential magic has, that no one has sat down and thought, "Well, I suppose now that the den's all tidy, I can get around to working on the cure for that disease that kills hundreds of thousands of people a year." Oh. She supposed that was the important part she was missing. Muggles weren't people. At least, they weren't to the wealthy purebloods that sponsored all the medical research, who were much more interested in curing those pesky little genetic defects that come with all the inbreeding. There has, she discovers, never been a case of a pureblood or a half blood being diagnosed with the disease. It seems that magical blood is somewhat of an antidote, an impenetrable biological defence. The only affected people are muggles and muggleborns. And, after all, what's the point in saving trash like them? She just doesn't understand. She's no expert in muggle biology, but she knows that a disease like cancer isn't genetic. She's more familiar with wizard biology, so she knows it isn't magical by nature. All it is is uncontrollable rapidly dividing cells. It sounds fairly mundane, really. Yet, for Hermione Granger, at twenty-eight years old, it is nothing short of a death sentence.
And so, Hermione receives treatment. Muggle treatment. Magical medicine is infinitely easier. There's nothing a foul tasting potion or a well-executed flick of the wand can't cure. Muggle treatment, on the other hand, is invasive and devastatingly personal. There are all these strange people she doesn't know touching her, and so many chemicals, and the sterility of it all nauseates her. Perhaps the worst part is that she can't bring herself to tell anyone about it. She has to, she knows she does, she would be absolutely furious if Ron or Harry were in her position and didn't let her know. But she can't. She just wants to spend what time she has left with them, with her precious people, because that's all the treatment can offer her. Time. She's going to die, this is going to kill her, and it's only a question of when. She tries to manage her time as effectively as possible, dividing it between the Burrow, Grimmauld Place, The Ministry, and home. The constant scheduling is killing her, maybe even more than the cancer is.
As the disease progresses, her glamour spells can no longer conceal the effects it has on her body. She can't focus on work, on fixing other people problems, not when she can't even deal with her own. So she resigns. There's a somewhat large magical creature collaborative strike at the time of her resignation, protesting unfair treatment. She claims her resignation is in support of it. Even though her body feels the effects of her cancer, she's still as politically shrewd as ever, and she's effectively martyred herself. It's a good note to leave the world of politics on. She knows she should use the free time to spend with her loved ones, but she finds herself wandering around parks or seeing matinees for the first time in years. She was practically twenty-eight going on senile.
Ron notices. Of course Ron notices. No one would accuse him of being an observant partner by any means, but he'd have to be dumb, deaf, and blind not to see that something was up. Hermione knows she's not the type to wander aimlessly, to disappear for long amounts of time, to resign as Minister of Magic over what amounts to a bloody tiff. She's not all that surprised when he eventually sits her down with that horrible stern look on his face, that uncharacteristic grimace, and confronted her. She was, however, surprised to hear his deduction. He clasps her hands gently, looks straight at her and whispers, "Hermione, I need you to be honest with me...is there someone else?" She almost laughs, but the disease sucks all mirth and merriment from her. It's been so long, she imagines it'll come out as more as a pitiful, wheezing cough than anything. In some ways, he was right. Perhaps this disease was her illicit lover. It was always with her, always, constantly and perpetually inside her. It was cancer she lied with at night; it was cancer that drew her attention at day. The illness was her morbid mistress, the distraction that kept her from loving Ron as he deserved to be loved. But Ron wouldn't appreciate her subtle internal narration, so she tells him the truth. He needn't worry; she'd been faithful to him. She'd only been faithless to herself.
She decides the best way to break it to him is clinically. The first Hermione he knew was like that, to some extent, ever the logical, coolheaded girl. She doesn't cry; she knows him well enough to anticipate that the sight of her tears will derail the conversation. So she speaks in biological terms, in odds, in time. She gives it to him in months, days, hours. She eventually translates it for him: "Ronald, I'm very, very ill...I haven't much time left." He is angry at first...furious, really. Not at her, never at her, but at the world which kept taking and never giving. He flies into a terrible rage, smashing every fragile object he could grasp. And in the centre of the flying shards and spittle and curses was Hermione, the calm within the storm. She is the picture of passive pity, sitting with her perfect posture, hands delicately folded on her lap, not fazed in the slightest by the destruction. It takes a great deal more than a tantrum to make a woman who had been through what she had flinch.
Eventually, his rage slips away from him, leaving a giant chasm within him that could only be filled with crippling sorrow. And filled it was, and he crumples to the ground from the force of it all. He was clutching at her knees like a bratty child, and she could do nothing but play the ever patient mother, cooing and threading her hands through his brilliant hair. His grief overflows from the confines of his mortal shell, pouring out of his eyes in the form of saltwater, out of his mouth in the form of great gasps of air. She understands completely. All the pain the ordeal has caused her is nothing compared to what her husband is experiencing. They are the sort of people for whom the term "soul mate" was coined. She was getting off easy, being dealt a merciful sentence like death. There was peace in the afterlife, contentment. For the partner she left behind, however, there was only anguish, misery, and suffering. It was a life sentence, an unrivalled cruelty in their world. She could no nothing for her husband, her partner, her other half, other than whisper condolences as his sobs turned into a mantra of just her name. "Mione," he whispered. "Mione, Mione, oh, Mione..."
She knows that she was once brave. Once upon a time she wore her bravery as a shield, an impenetrable fortress. No matter her faults, she was brave and loyal and true. They were her defining characteristics, so says the Sorting Hat. And define her they must. How else could Hermione Granger, hailed by many as the reincarnation of Rowena Ravenclaw, end up in any house other than the obvious one which would stimulate her intellect and curiosity? In her darkest times in her life, she had reminded of herself of this. Yes, she is terribly irritable with her closest friends, but she would lay down her life for them in a second. No, she isn't as beautiful or as strong as she would like to be, but her loyalty shines within her, brighter than any phoenix. She's bossy, stuck-up, and short-tempered, but she's so terribly, heartbreakingly brave, this teenage girl thrust into the role of a warrior in the midst of the darkest battle the world has ever known. In the realm of Once Upon a Times, she is the bravest, most loyal ally any knight or prince could hope for, and a worthy heroine in her own right. The Hermione of the here and now knows all of this. She just can't bring herself to believe any of it.
She's confined to bed rest. The doctors want her in the hospital for observation, but she'll be damned if she spends her last moments surrounded by beeping machines and the smell of latex. She was never a heroine, but she figures she's contributed enough to the story to get some of the perks, namely choosing where she dies. Heroines always end their stories in fields or meadows, under trees and moons, surrounded by flowers and heroes. She's not a true heroine, which is good, because she has no interest in dying in the prettiest place she knows. She knows where she wants to end it all. It's the same place she's dreamt about her whole life, the scenery lingering in the warmest places of her mind. She wants to ride a dragon. The last thing she wants to experience is fierce wind and ancient power and ethereal warmth. She can't. Of course she can't. There's no time to arrange it, for one. It's not like there are any dragons in the immediate vicinity, and she'd never make the trip. Besides, no rational person is going to let a terminally ill, possibly mentally unstable witch ride one of their dragons. So, she supposes she'll have to settle for the next best thing.
They say that magical folk know when they're going to die. It's a terrible dread, they say, an apprehension that settles somewhere in the general vicinity of the liver. Healthy wizards and witches who are about to meet their demise in some tragic accident typically write it off as some kind of freak indigestion. The ones who aren't as lucky, aren't as healthy, well they recognize it for what it is. Some people experience intense fear, anger, and helplessness, and they meet their ends in this fashion. Others view it as quite the blessing, as it gives them time to prepare, to say their last goodbyes. Hermione is one of these people. She knows, as soon as she opens her eyes one morning, that it will be the last time she will do so. It strikes her suddenly, after the period of confusion and haze between consciousness and unconsciousness passes. She knows. She knows, and she accepts it. She's not going to die on this bed, though. She supposes it's time to gather Harry and Ron. It's time for them to board the Hogwarts Express together, for the last time.
It is the middle of summer, so the train would normally be out of commission. However, when the former, and still very popular, Minister of Magic and the saviour of the wizarding world ask for a personal favour, you bloody well do your best to accommodate them. It's the last journey the three of them will ever make together. It has to be just the three of them; Hermione knows this, because after all, don't the greatest things in life come in threes? And they were great. The Golden Trio they called them, Weasley, Granger, and Potter. Once upon a time, there was nothing in the world they couldn't conquer, not when they were together. Even though triangles are the strongest shapes, circles are the most fitting for endings. So, if Hermione's going to break up the trio, she'll have the decency to bring the story all the way around, in a circle of sorts, back to where it started. It was here, on the Hogwarts Express, that they met for the first time. She leads her two boys along the length of the train, until she finds the compartment they had chosen on their first trip to Hogwarts. It was in that crowded little compartment that the trio was formed, and not the spacious destination they were heading to. And that was where it would end.
The sky is a brilliant shade of clear, clear blue, the best sort of accent for the miles of English countryside that roll by outside. They're all cramped together on one booth in the compartment. Hermione sits in the middle with her head on Ronald's shoulder, clasping Harry's pale palm in her hand. She stares out the window and talks. She just talks. She tells them all sorts of silly little things she never got around to telling them. She tells them why they're here, on this train. The train is huge, and fast and graceful. It's sleek and metallic, covered in red and black plates. It's powered by fire, powered by flames, and smoke billows out of it. In short, it's an industrial dragon. She tells them about dragons. She tells them about the little girl who reads their stories and sympathizes with them. She tells them about the wide eyed teenager sitting in the stands during the Triwizard Tournament, taking in the sheer beauty of the creatures. She tells them about the blushing bride who honestly enjoys riding a bright pink dragon more than she does her own wedding. She tells them about the Minister of Magic whose tweaks to the education system are for the sole purpose of giving fantasy dragons their long deserved happy endings. The boys watch her during all this, and wonder how much they don't know about the girl between them...how much they'll never know. But then, Ron cracks a joke and Hermione scolds him in that tone of hers and Harry laughs and holds them closer.
And for a few moments, they're eleven years old again, on their first train ride to Hogwarts. Suddenly it's all chocolate frogs and foul tasting beans and gentle teasing again. Ron's a freckled imp with a trunk full of hand-me-downs and a slanted view of the world. Harry's a reserved boy with broken glasses hiding mirthful green eyes, realizing, for the first time in his life, what it feels like to be among friends. Hermione is great masses of chocolate hair and a haughty tone, thinking she knows all there is in the world to know, even though she knows so very, very little. Their future stretches in front of them, much like the rolling green hills leading to the place they will learn to call home. There will be dementors and trolls and Death Eaters to come, but that's all right, because there will also be hippogriffs and golden snitches and phoenixes. Hermione wonders if perhaps this, and not the calculated magic she knows with all its potion ingredients and charm inflections, is really the sort of magic muggles always talk about? The moment leaves as quickly as it came, and so does Hermione.
Her boys hold her as she goes, closing her eyes for the last time surrounded by everything that is the Golden Trio. Neither of them knows whether to cry or scream, but Hermione would. Hermione always knew whatever needed to be known, always, and they would never have made it as far as they did without her. Any sane girl would have turned them, those two blustering beasts, away. A normal girl would take one look at the two of them, who radiated danger and power and fire so brightly, and run to safety. But not Hermione, never Hermione. She takes it upon herself to tame them. She sees an insecure, jealous redhead who wants nothing more than his time in the spotlight and turns him into a brave, loyal knight, who's happy to walk outside of the limelight, as long as it's with her. She takes an abused, confused boy who's had the weight of the world thrust upon him, and makes him into the courageous, gentle man he is today, the hero who's saved the world more times than anyone can count. In other words, she saved them.
The Hogwarts they arrive at is different than the one they know. They've never seen it in the summer, all breezy warmth and open space. They carry her between them, as they walk the path they've known for as long as they've been a trio. They bury her beneath the Whomping Willow. It's an ancient tree, and it knows that their needs at the moment are greater than its own, so it lets them go about their task without interruption. The digging itself they do without magic. Harry and Ron want to feel the place she'll spend eternity in themselves, even if it means raw hands and dirty nails and exhaustion. When they've finished, and they've placed her in as gently as they can, the magic comes out. When all is said and done, they charm it so that if an individual tries to get to the grave, he'll meet fierce resistance from the Whomping Willow. The same is true for a couple. But if a trio sets out to see Hermione's final resting place, it'll be an easy task. And if, in the future, a trio of young Hogwarts students sets out to solve this mystery, following in the footsteps of a certain Golden trio, they'll find a simple gravestone for an extraordinary woman that reads only this: Hermione Jean Granger She who would save dragons.
A/N: I may include an epilogue for this.