First Interlude
The Master of Death
Disclaimer: To quote Rorschach's Blot, author of the absolutely fabulous Harry Potter fic Make A Wish… "Read it somewhere else, I doubt you think I own this and I also doubt that it provides any sort of protection against the sort of rabid attack lawyers that are in the employ of the major companies. I only include this section of the fic for the sake of tradition."
Author's Note: I'm particularly pleased with this interlude's epigraph, which I discovered purely on accident while writing it. I think it matches the tone of the chapter much more accurately than a certain other, more widely known line on lost love by Tennyson…
It kind of goes without saying that huge spoilers abound. If you ever wanted to read The Deathly Hallows, or even just enjoy the movies, without having it all given away here… bookmark this fic and come back to it after July 2011?
And finally, I've been keeping to a fairly good update schedule, a roughly a chapter a day. Fair warning, my birthday's this Monday, it's the big 21 and there's a good chance it may be a few days before the next update. I like to have the next two or three chapters written before I post one here, so it all depends on how long it takes me to get the next one done. Hope this one is good enough, and provides enough answers, to tide you over for a little while!
Soundtrack Note: Dumbledore's Farewell from the Half-Blood Prince soundtrack; such an angsty chapter needs an angsty song to go along with it. And for those of you without the soundtracks at home, I cannot recommend Youtube highly enough, pretty much all the albums are up there somewhere. Get yourself a good pair of headphones and enjoy the fic…
Better never to have met you in my dream than to wake and reach for hands that are not there.
-Ōtomo no Yakamochi
She had looked… cold.
It was the only way to describe her, really. Not dead, or lifeless, or at rest, but cold. It was the only word Harry could apply to her without breaking down and throwing himself off the top of the Astronomy Tower.
That was where he sat now, at the very edge, his legs dangling over the battlements. He had come up here blindly, unthinkingly, not sure why he was here the moment he'd arrived. He had considered jumping, but something had stopped him.
His rage had stopped him.
He had killed Voldemort. Killed him, and regretted it immediately. He should have let him live a little longer. He should have kept him alive long enough to cast the Cruciatus Curse upon him until he was within an inch of his life first, then killed him.
He hadn't even said goodbye to her. He'd left her in the castle, knowing that he would be going to his death in the Forbidden Forest. Knowing that that had been Dumbledore's plan all along. The Horcrux within him had to be eliminated, and in order for that to be done he would have to let Voldemort kill him. He couldn't bear to place the burden of that knowledge upon her; to have her know that he was going to his death.
He had taken the coward's way out, disappearing beneath his cloak while she grieved over Fred's body. By the time she'd realized where he had gone, it was too late. The Dark Lord had hit him with the Killing Curse.
And then a miracle happened.
He'd found himself in King's Cross Station, staring into the twinkling blue eyes of the man who'd planned his death.
And he'd forgiven him.
It was impossible to be angry with Dumbledore after seeing him like this; the man had seemed to radiate happiness like light, like fire: Harry had never seen the man so utterly, so palpably content.
After all his resentment towards the man, how odd it had been to sit there, beneath the high, vaulted ceiling, and defend Dumbledore from himself, when he had told him that he could not possibly despise him any more than he already despised himself.
Dumbledore explained to him the story of his sister's death, of his youthful mistakes, of his own death at the hands of Snape, and ultimately of his hopes for Harry's own sacrifice. He recalled the night Voldemort had returned, and the flash of something like triumph he had seen in the Headmaster's eyes when he had told him that the Dark Lord had used his blood in the resurrection ritual.
Finally, he understood. The connection between the two went both ways. While the Dark Lord's unintended Horcrux existed in him, Voldemort could not die; but while his own blood flowed through the Dark Lord's veins, neither could he.
And so Dumbledore presented him with a choice: he could move on, board a train and pass on into the great beyond, or he could return to the world of the living. Return to her.
Rise again.
They'd made Hagrid carry him. It was the hardest thing he had ever done, to not give his friend any reassurances, any signs that he still lived, to endure the half-giants sobs and feel his hot tears rain down upon him.
Their cries were more awful than anything he would ever have believed. McGonagall, Ron, Ginny…
And then he heard her scream, her voice like nothing he had never before heard emitted from another human being. Despair and disbelief, loss and agony and the death of hope. He could not bear to let it continue, needed to cry out to her, to reassure her he still lived, but he forced himself to lie still, silently awaiting the right moment. Soon it would be all over.
He had felt magnificent awe at the onslaught of the Centaurs, at Grawp's fearless charge into the fray. And he had never been more proud of another Gryffindor in his life when Neville summoned Godric's sword and severed the head of Nagini, destroying the last Horcrux.
He made his move.
Chaos reigned. Death Eaters were everywhere, and from beneath the cloak he cast jinx after jinx wherever he saw them, the defenders of the castle fighting with such terrible urgency that whatever little aid he could give was washed out in the sheer onslaught of their spells. He was buffeted into the Great Hall by the press of bodies, humbled by Kreacher's rallying cry, the castle House Elves being urged onward in his name. Yaxley was slammed to the floor by George and Lee Jordan, Dolohov fell with a scream at Flitwick's hands, Walden Macnair was thrown across the room by Hagrid and slid unconscious to the ground. Ron and Neville brought down Fenrir Greyback, Aberforth Dumbledore Stunned Rookwood, Arthur and Percy Weasley floored Thicknesse, and Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy ran through the crowd, not even attempting to fight, screaming for their son.
He had witnessed Voldemort dueling McGonagall, Slughorn and Kingsley all at once, none of them able to match him.
And just when he was about to make his way into the center of it all, to duel the Dark Lord and finish it all for good, he saw her, cutting past Ginny, Luna and Mrs. Weasley.
Tears streaked down her red face, shaken and contorted by so many different raging emotions that it was a wonder it hadn't cracked: bereavement, anguish, raw, impossible fury…
He had seen no fear there, and to his horror she charged straight for the Dark Lord.
She screamed, and raised her wand, and was struck in the back by a jet of green light by Bellatrix Lestrange.
She fell. She died.
His howl was of such fierce grief that it overpowered the sounds of everything else, and the battle froze, as everyone tried to identify its source.
He cast no spell, focused on nothing in particular except the blinding red haze of vengeance he craved; he merely felt an overpowering desire to see the bitch die, and the Elder Wand was torn out of his Voldemort's grasp and flung into his own.
He had thrust it out at Bellatrix, and willed his heartache out through it. She died. From the sounds she made before she forever quieted, it sounded as if it had been a particularly horrific way to go. He'd had a vague impression that her internal organs had been liquefied, but he was already ripping of the cloak and turning to face the Dark Lord, who stared at him in shock and horror.
There was no witty banter, no final dialogue between foes. He did not gloat, or insult the villain. A quick stab with the Hallow and a flash of green and it was all over. The aftermath was filled with stunned silence and incredulous looks.
"Get out of my way," he had said, and they cleared a path to her body.
He'd wept over her, cradling her in his arms, for a long time, for what had seemed to him like hours. The only woman who he had ever truly loved, who had ever truly loved him…
Cold.
In death the look he had seen on her face, that look of terrible confusion and rage, had vanished; she seemed to be at peace.
He tried his hardest, but was unable to find any comfort in that.
Only the Weasleys dared approached him, and the glare he fixed them with quickly showed them the error of their ways. When he was finally sicker of all their stares than he was desperate to be close to her corpse, he stood, enshrouded himself in the Invisibility Cloak, and left them behind in the Great Hall.
If anyone quotes Tennyson, I swear by my magic I'll Stupefy them…
His rage at it all had kept him from hurling himself from the top of the Astronomy Tower, but without anyone living for him to take that rage out on, it began to cool replaced with a dull, painful ache.
A dull, painful ache, and the beginnings of a plan…
What was it Mr. Lovegood had said? "Master. Conqueror. Vanquisher. Whichever term you prefer."
"Harry?"
He turned and looked over his shoulder. It was Ron. The redhead looked as if he'd been crying. For the first time since he saw her die, he realized that others had lost the ones they'd loved as well. Some more than others. Ron had lost both his brother and the girl he'd loved. She and Harry may have been together, may have loved each other more than words could say, but he knew without a doubt that Ron had been in love with her too.
"How did you find me?" he asked.
"With the Marauder's Map," Ron said softly, holding up said piece of parchment.
The last Marauder died tonight. Harry's eyes snapped away from it as if it afraid looking at the map might blind him.
"Why are you here, Ron?" he asked tiredly.
"Don't you dare," snapped Ron. "Don't you dare do that to me tonight, Harry. I lost one best friend tonight. You're all I have left."
Harry sighed. "I'm sorry. I just…"
"Yeah. I know."
The two remained where they were in silence for several minutes. Ron did not pressure him. For once in his life, he was patient. Finally, though, Harry was ready to talk.
He told him everything. About what he had seen in Snape's memories, about how he had gone into the Forest thinking he was about to die, about the way he had left her without saying goodbye because he couldn't bear to have her try to talk him out of it…
He told him about how he had been killed, and what Dumbledore had told him on the other side, and how that because of Voldemort's meddling with forces that he did not truly understand, he had been able to return to life.
Ron knew all the rest. He had been there for the final fight, witnessed her death, seen him kill Bellatrix and the Dark Lord.
"You can't blame yourself," his friend told him, and he laughed, the sound dark and mirthless.
"Oh, but I can… it was my fault," he said, staring up at the stars. "It was all my fault. Lupin, Tonks, Hermione… Fred… If it weren't for me, none of them would've died tonight."
"You're right."
Harry snapped his head around as if he'd been slapped.
"If you had never been born, Hermione would never have been killed tonight," Ron said calmly. "She'd have been killed ages ago, or worse, for being a Muggle-born. You-Kno—fuck it, Voldemort would never have fallen, he'd have conquered the whole wizarding world, probably the Muggle world too, and me and my brothers would probably all be Death Eaters right now if we wanted to have any chance at surviving, seeing how popular we Weasleys are with the bastards."
He leaned in, his voice dangerously cool. "If you'd never been born, Fred would still be alive. He'd be a Death Eater, and instead of owning a joke shop and being brilliant at pranks and spells and making others laugh and being one of the kindest, most incredible men I have ever had to privilege to know… he and George would go around torturing Mudbloods and killing whoever Voldemort thought needed killing. That's the way they would've been raised after my parents were sent to Azkaban or killed for being blood traitors, and they probably wouldn't see a bloody thing wrong with it. Neither would I."
Ron looked at the tears that had pooled in his friend's eyes, and nodded. "Thank you for only getting my brother killed. Thank you for giving him the last seventeen years of his life, to grow into the person he was meant to be. Thank you for not letting him become a monster."
It took Harry a long time to regain his composure. Ron allowed him his dignity and did not try to speak to him while he fought back tears.
"Thank you, Ron," he said at last. "You're a good friend."
"Anytime, mate."
Together, the two looked up at the stars, as they had in so many Astronomy lessons. She had always helped him with his homework in that class… in all of his classes, really…
Harry looked at last remaining best friend. "I can't live without her, Ron."
Ron shook his head. "There are some things even you can't change, Harry…" He trailed off, frozen by the intensity in his friend's eyes.
"Pity the living, and above all, those who live without love…"
"What's that from?" asked Ron.
"It's something Dumbledore told me," Harry said simply. He turned and walked towards the winding stairway, carrying the bunched-up cloak in his hands.
"Where are you going?" called Ron, hurrying after him.
He didn't reply.
In silence the two passed down the stairway and through the muted hallways. The portraits on the walls stared at them, whispering amongst themselves and running ahead through the frames to keep up with them. He ignored them.
Since he had last seen it, the gargoyle guarding the entrance to the headmaster's study had been knocked aside; it stood lopsided, looking a little punch-drunk, and he doubted it would be able to distinguish passwords anymore.
The gargoyle groaned as he stepped over it without saying a word and began ascending the short, clipped steps, Ron hurrying after him.
The room was dark and utterly still. All around the walls, the headmasters and headmistresses of Hogwarts stared down at him solemnly. Gravely they remained there, waiting for him. But he had eyes only for the man who stood in the largest portrait directly behind the headmaster's chair. Tears were sliding down from behind the half-moon spectacles into the long silver beard, and he could feel the regret emanating off of him in physical waves.
"Good evening, Professor Dumbledore," Harry said, his voice wooden.
"Harry—Harry my boy—I am so sorry," whispered the former headmaster. They all knew, then.
"You have nothing to be sorry for," he told the portrait wearily. "It was not your fault, what happened to her."
"But it was… if I hadn't sent you off to die, then she would never have…"
"If you had never sent me off to die, she and every other Muggle-born would have been tortured and killed regardless," said Harry, with a nod at Ron.
"I have done you so many wrongs, Harry…"
It disturbed him to see Albus this way; such misery he had never seen on the man, except for the night on which he had died, when he was forced to drink from the potion protecting the false Horcrux…
"And I've forgiven you all of them."
The portrait stared at him. "You have?"
"I have."
A fresh wave of tears overcame the headmaster, and Harry waited for him patiently, choosing his next words carefully, vaguely aware that Ron was still standing behind him.
"The thing that was hidden in the Snitch," he began, "I dropped it in the forest. In a moment I will go retrieve it. I have the wand, and the cloak. When I have all three Hallows again, I will be the Master of Death."
"Harry… even with the stone…" whispered Dumbledore. "You cannot bring her back. Not the way you want."
"Not with the stone, no," Harry agreed. "But with the wand, and the cloak…" He trailed off.
A flash of understanding shone in the portrait's eyes, followed by sorrow. "The past cannot be changed, Harry… Time moves ever forward, and its course cannot be Transfigured with a wave of your wand, even if that wand is the Elder Wand. Believe me, it is a fool's errand—I of all men know that..."
"You of all men should understand what it means to do something foolish for the sake of love," Harry told him softly.
Dumbledore looked at Harry as if he had slipped a dagger in between his ribs. He sighed and looked down, ashamed.
"The Ministry, then," Albus' portrait told him at last. "It will have what you need. You know where to look, you've been there before."
"Thank you, Headmaster." Harry unfurled the cloak, holding it with outstretched arms, smoothing the wrinkles out of the fabric. With a flourish, he swept it around him, so that it hung from his shoulders. Grasping the two corners that dangled over his shoulders, he knotted them around his neck, tying the cloak so that it formed a cape.
"Harry…" called Dumbledore as he prepared to leave.
He looked back at the frame over the headmaster's desk.
"I hope very much that you succeed in what it is you are about to do."
With a nod, he strode out of the room, a new sense of purpose driving him onward. Ron trailed after him, down the spiral staircase the lead down from the headmaster's study. Harry stopped when he reached the bottom, giving his friend one last look, trying to convey all the friendship and devotion he had for the other man through his eyes.
"Where I am going now, Ron, you cannot follow."
"The hell I can't, Harry. I might have abandoned you once, but I'm never making that mistake again. I'm coming with you, for as long as I can."
Harry nodded slowly. "Very well. For as long as you can." Turning again, he continued on down the corridor, heading for the Grand Staircase. Great chunks of marble were missing from it, part of the balustrade gone, and rubble and bloodstains occurred every few steps as they descended.
As they reached the ground floor and made their way to the castle entrance, the others stared after them. McGonagall, Neville, Ginny and Molly Weasley, Hagrid… no one called out to him, no one tried to stop him. He could feel their pity for him.
They needn't waste it on him, he thought.
Soon it would all be undone.
He passed through the castle doors and strode through the courtyard, heading for the Forbidden Forest once he reached the grounds.
Ron struggled to keep up; such was the urgency in Harry's movements that he seemed to glide down the terrain. It was difficult to catch sight of him, as well; with the cloak hanging down over his shoulders, only the back of his head was visible from Ron's point of view. He chased after the bobbing, rapidly moving head as it moved swiftly past Hagrid's hut, but lost sight of him as he reached the edge of the forest.
Harry continued onward, navigating the forest by memory, following its winding paths until he reached neared the clearing in which he had offered himself up to Voldemort.
He cast his eyes around the place, standing in the path ahead of the entrance into the clearing. It was darkest night, and the Dark Lord's fire had been extinguished. His eyes could make out nothing in the pitch black of the shadows. He raised his wand arm, and the Elder Wand pulsed, and the path suddenly glowed with a dull orange light that seemed to come not from any one place but rather all around him.
He squatted down, staring at the muddy earth. A troop of centaurs had charged through here; already the footsteps of Hagrid and the Death Eater parade had been obscured with countless hoof-prints.
"Accio Resurrection Stone," he whispered, and from the earth ahead shot a tiny, round gem, flinging itself into his hand. He wiped the dirt from it, examining it introspectively. He held the stone in one hand, the wand in the other, and the cloak was draped over his shoulders.
He was no longer the Boy-Who-Lived. He was the Master of Death.
From somewhere behind him, he heard Ron calling his name, his voice coming closer, no doubt guided by the light he had summoned.
He closed his eyes, and turned the stone over in his hand three times.
When he opened his eyes, she stood before him, regarding him with a sad smile upon her face. Neither ghost nor living flesh, she looked exactly as she he had last seen her, pale and cold and dead—he could think it now, now that he knew it would all be undone soon enough—in the Great Hall. The only difference was her eyes, open and sparkling and very much alive.
"You know what I am about to do," he said softly. It was not a question.
"Yes," she answered.
"You aren't going to try to talk me out of it?"
She rolled her eyes and told him, "Since when have I ever been able to talk you out of anything? I hardly expect to be able to do so now."
She looked so normal and alive, just then, and he could feel his wounded heart being torn open all over again.
"I love you," he whispered.
"And I you," she told him. "Always, and forever. No matter what happens."
"I'll fix it. I swear. And none of this will ever have happened."
She gave him that slow, sad smile again. "You can't fix it, Harry. I died."
"I have to try," he whispered at her.
"Of course you do. You wouldn't be you if you didn't. But you won't succeed, my love. And even if you do succeed… I don't want you to. I want the love that we had, together, as brief as it was, than to have never had it at all."
He brushed her words aside. "That will never happen. I won't allow it."
Someone came noisily running down the path, and the two turned to see Ron break through the shadows and into the opening of the clearing. He froze in place, staring in awe at her, his mouth dropping open in wonder.
"H—Hermione?" Ron asked weakly.
Harry lowered the hand containing the stone, and Hermione faded away, her gleaming brown eyes that last of her to disappear. The orange light dimmed and went out as well, leaving them in darkness.
"Wh—what did you do that for?" demanded Ron, glaring angrily at the silhouette of his friend as their eyes adjusted once more to the dark. "Bring her back! I didn't get to say goodbye!"
"There is no need," he told the redhead. "Soon she will be alive and well again. Goodbye, Ron. You have followed me as far as you can. From here I must go on alone."
And just like that, he gripped the Elder Wand at his side tightly in his fist and vanished with a loud crack, never mind that you're not supposed to able to Apparate or Disapparate on Hogwarts grounds, leaving Ron alone in the forest, dreadfully certain he would never, ever see either of his two best friends again.
He reappeared within the Department of Mysteries, in the Time Room. Next to him sat a large crystal bell jar, glowing from within, a hummingbird fluttering about near the top. As he watched, it sank towards the bottom, growing smaller and fuzzier, until it was swallowed whole by a tiny, jewel-bright egg, which resealed itself perfectly and then hatched to unleash the rapidly aging hummingbird all over again.
This was the place, alright.
At the edge of the room lay a workbench, upon which sat several jars of sand and boxes of broken glass. They had all been destroyed two years ago, he knew, in the battle over the prophecy. Evidently fixing them hadn't been a major priority under Thicknesse's administration, or else they were simply beyond repair.
For anyone but him, that is.
With a wave of the Elder Wand, the shards of glass came together and the lid shot off of one of the jars, a stream of sand flying into the heart of the contraption. The edges of the device glowed a molten red-orange for a moment, and then it settled down on to the surface of the workbench, a tiny, immaculate Time-Turner.
He picked it up, cradling it gently in his hands. This would do perfectly.
Dumbledore and Hermione had both told him that he would fail. He would prove them wrong.
He could go back, digging up and destroying the bones of Voldemort's father, preventing him from killing Cedric Diggory and rising again. Or even further, to when he had been just an infant, to prevent Peter Pettigrew from betraying his parents. Or all the way back, and snap the neck of Tom Riddle as an infant in his cradle… He could save them all, his mother and his father and Cedric and Sirius and Hedwig and Moody and Dobby and Remus and Tonks and Fred…
But no. He knew, though the idea of leaving them all to rot in the ground ate away at him, that it was not his place to save them all. It was not his role to decide, to clutch the dead back from their realm as long as he had happened to have liked them in life…
He was only here because of her. Hers was the one death that he would never be able to accept, to learn to live with.
She had died because of her love for him. He would need to make sure that the same mistakes were not repeated. There were so many moments he could choose, the most important moments of his life, the ones he had shared with her…
But there was really only one, though, when it all came down to it. One moment to keep their feelings for one another from blooming, to delay her love for him until the war was over and it would be safe for them to be together…
Placing the Time-Turner around his neck, he began to twist it between his fingers.
He had made his decision. His quest had begun.
The Master of Death was on the move.
