Listen to Your Heart
and there are voices
that want to be heard
so much to mention
but you can't find the words
the scent of magic
the beauty that's been
when love was wilder than the wind
Jenny
5/2/11
5:43 a.m.
"What?" I gasped. "That's impossible, the full moon is over!" Lupin shook his head sadly.
"The only reason you changed before a full moon is because you were bitten so many times. A werewolf's magic is always stronger after the full moon, not before. This will change Draco." Lupin's voice echoed to me from what seemed like miles away. This could not be, Draco didn't deserve the suffering that would come with being a werewolf. I put my face in my hands, resting them on Draco's chest and wept.
I wept for him, for Brian, for my Muggle family and friends, and everyone who had died at the battle, and under Voldemort's hand. I hadn't cried for their deaths when they had happened, but now I could not stop crying. My body was vibrating it was trembling so hard; my back heaving with silent sobs. "Remus?" I heard Tonks calling, her voice getting louder, until I heard her run over and stop a few feet away.
"Draco was bitten." Lupin's voice sounded like the day Draco's parents had rescued me form Voldemort, the same chilling voice, full of grief. I heard Tonks gasp almost silently before I was drowning in my tidal wave of grief once more, sound vanishing, and my vision fading until there was nothing but my grief and the searing weight in my chest.
Hermione
5/2/11
5:45 a.m.
The hall had fallen into warm chatter, some of it full of bittersweet nostalgia, but nonetheless, the war was over. Ron's arm was around my shoulder, and I was leaning into him, sitting at a table full of anyone and everyone, no one was sitting according to House anymore. "Oh, no…" Hannah Abbott muttered, looking past us. Ron and I both turned to see out of the remains of the windows in the Great Hall a small knot of people outside. I could distinguish Jenny because of her long blond hair instantly. She was curled in a ball on what looked horribly like a body that had blond hair… I slipped out of Ron's grasp and found my pace increasing until I was running from the Hall, barely noticing people turning to watch me go, Ron pelting after me as I almost flew down the steps, slipping in the dewy grass to turn the corner, getting closer to the scene. About eighty feet apart were two bodies of disgustingly huge and hairy men that had to be the two werewolves Jenny and Lupin had been fighting. In between them I found Tonks, Lupin and Jenny, who was crying over Draco, who wasn't moving. The left side of Jenny's hair, which looked like she had been caught in a wind storm, was covered in blood, and it was dripping off of her arm onto the grass.
"He's not…dead, is he?" I heard myself whispering, and felt my knees almost buckle in relief when Tonks shook her head silently as Lupin cautiously put a hand on Jenny's back. I immediately felt a deep pang of pity for her; she had not had an easy life the past year, with deaths, torture and constant travel. I had heard of Brian's death in the Great Hall as I visited Fred's body with Ron and George. Brian had been right next to him, the long slash on his torso making me wince.
"Jenny," Lupin said in a low voice, the sound feeble from his night as a wolf. Jenny just kept shuddering, occasionally making a quiet gasping noise. "Jenny," Lupin tried again, but it seemed that Jenny was deaf with grief. The one person that had been with her from the beginning, her lover was going to be cursed, just like her. The one thing Jenny had feared the most for Draco had happened right in front of her. I felt my hand instantly fall down to grasp Ron's, feeling inexplicably protective all of a sudden, and lucky to have him. "Jenny, can you hear me?" Lupin's voice was sinking lower as his vocal cords refused to project sound, but fear was building slowly in his voice. Then I noticed that Jenny was crying so hard, she was hyperventilating, but yet, not. Her breaths were fewer and fewer with each second, but they were shuddering gasping breaths, like when I had seen her after Malfoy Manor. "Oh Merlin," Lupin swore when he went to pick her up, and I gasped. Jenny's ear was gone, and the front of her clothes was saturated with blood from six deep holes in her chest, wounds I hadn't even seen because she had been bent over.
"Go get help, now!" Tonks shouted, crouching next to Lupin as Jenny fell over. I turned around and ran faster than before back up to the castle, almost shoving people aside in the Great Hall to get to Madam Pompfrey.
"Madam Pompfrey," I gasped, "We need you now, it's urgent, Jenny and Lupin were fighting werewolves on Voldemort's side, and both are hurt, Draco's been bitten and Jenny's bleeding everywhere, please, hurry-" She swept past me without another word, ending my rant as she picked up her skirt and ran.
"Hermione, what-?" Mrs. Weasley started as I rushed past her after Madam Pompfrey.
"What's happening?" I heard someone else ask, and I heard feet follow me as I ran back to where Jenny was. Madam Pompfrey was kneeling next to her, looking grim.
"-she'll have to go to St. Mungo's," she was saying, but Lupin was shaking his head fiercely.
"They won't take her, she's a Muggle and a werewolf, plus she's still 'wanted' for murders!" Mrs. Weasley gasped next to me at his words and turned around, running back to the castle. "You have to try, do whatever you possibly can, and hurry." Lupin stressed as Madam Pompfrey just sat there for a moment, then seemed to come to life.
"Curatio Vox." Madam Pompfrey said, her voice trembling, and a orange light fell from her wand tip onto Jenny's torso, the light disappearing into the stab wounds, and traveling up to her ear, healing scratches bruises and bite marks. As she was doing this, I heard more people hurriedly crossing the lawn.
"What's going on?" Harry asked next to me. I turned and saw a crowd of people flowing from the castle across the lawn to the growing knot of people behind me.
"We all heard the werewolves fighting outside when you were dueling with Voldemort, but we just assumed that Jenny and Lupin won the fights. They did," I added quickly, seeing the look on his face, "but, both of them are hurt, and Draco was bitten. Lupin says he'll turn." Harry looked at me in shock. I squeezed Ron's hand as I continued. Lupin can go to St. Mungo's, but they won't take Jenny because…of who she is." I finished angrily, turning back around to see Madam Pompfrey levitating Draco with her wand.
"-you can't possibly carry her, Lupin, are you out of your mind?" She snapped at Lupin, who was stooping to pick up Jenny. He couldn't hide his grimace from the movement from Madam Pompfrey or his wife. Madam Pompfrey turned and scanned the crowd, then raised her voice. "Arthur, will you come here a moment?" She called, and Mr. Weasley hurried past us and over to Tonks, Madam Pompfrey and Lupin. "I need you to carry Miss Quinty to the hospital wing, it's imperative that we get there soon. Lupin and Mr. Malfoy need treatment as soon as possible as well." She said briskly, and Mr. Weasley carefully knelt and picked Jenny up. He let out his breath sharply when he saw the missing ear and his eyes traveled down to the blood stained shirt, the bruises, scrapes and scratches; the huge bite marks, and the spots on her skin where the skin had been ripped away. They were all slowly healing of their own accord, thanks to Madam Pompfrey. "Out of the way please!" Madam Pompfrey called, and the crowd parted, muttering. I instantly started to follow them.
"It's that psycho girl-"
"She's the one who murdered all the Death Eaters-"
"Wasn't she one of the wolves-?"
Pushing through the crowds and their comments, I followed them, Ron and Harry after a moment of talking, hurrying behind me too. Madam Pompfrey levitated Draco onto a bed. He was already paler than usual, the one bite on his neck standing out on his pristine skin. Other than the bite, there were no visible blemishes or scars to be seen. Mr. Weasley gingerly set Jenny on a bed, and after checking Draco one more time, Madam Pompfrey pulled the curtains around her bed. I started to pace nervously as Lupin winced when he sat down on a bed. He had a two large bite marks on his head, and a few scratches here and there, but he was exhausted, I could see it in his face. "He had three werewolves for the fight tonight. I was fighting one earlier in the night, but it caught my shoulder. Jenny killed the first wolf and then got me back to the castle. That's why I was limping." He answered Tonks question before she answered it, and she took his hand, looking lost.
"I'm just glad you are alright. I just don't know how I'm going to tell the Malfoy's that their son was bitten." Everyone in the hospital wing glanced at Draco for a moment. She suddenly bit her lip, then mumbled, "And if Teddy changed, if he inherited the gene." Lupin's face turned to stone. Madam Pompfrey came out from behind the curtain and approached us slowly. She started healing Lupin without a word, but then spoke in a rush.
"I don't know if what I've done is enough. It's sustained her for now, and I'll give her some potions, but there were a lot of internal injuries."
"Like what?" Tonks asked after a moment, sounding sick.
"One of her lungs was punctured. Her heart," she swallowed, "on the other hand, had quite a lot of damage. The magic in her blood was probably the only thing that saved her before I got there. She's lost a lot of blood."
"And an ear." Mr. Weasley added quietly after a moment, and Tonks shuddered.
"She's lucky she didn't loose a limb. The first wolf and the one that," Lupin glowered, "hurt her this badly were both a lot heavier and stronger than her."
"I thought you said she only fought two?" Ron asked, startling me. I had almost forgotten that he and Harry were here.
"She started out fighting my opponent, but we switched somehow in the fight," Lupin explained, his voice heavy, and turned his gaze onto the curtained bed. Then he held up his left hand, and it was then that I noticed that half of his pinky was gone. Tonks swore and reached across the bed to cradle the hand. "I lost it earlier in the night." He said, then grimaced as Madam Pompfrey handed him a potion as she passed from her office back to Jenny's bed.
"But it's over," I said softly. "She can finally be safe." Lupin scowled.
"I wouldn't be so sure. Society still is prejudiced against werewolves, and even though she was killing the enemy, she doesn't seem any less crazy to them. I wouldn't be surprised if they still tried to modify her memory, saying that we have all broken Wizarding Secrecy Laws in keeping her alive." He said coldly.
"But that's ridiculous!" Mr. Weasley said furiously.
"But that's the way it is." Lupin said bitterly.