Chapter 2: That Which Cannot be Changed
"Ready?" Minerva asked, laying a hand gently on Hermione's arm.
Hermione swept a stray lock - strayer than usual - off her face, adjusted the lay of her sundress, and nodded. "Ready."
The feeling of side-along apparition was notoriously nauseating, but Hermione's stomach was still hardened from a year of time turning - and several more recently in the Ministry for the sake of Unspeakable Croaker's tests - and she took the navel-wrenching with grace.
The landing was not so clean, but she stayed upright at least, and simply had to hope no-one was watching. That Minerva had to knock supported the hope. The speed with which the door was answered did not.
"Mrs McGonagall, Hermione, welcome, welcome, do come in," Mr Lovegood gushed. "Would you care for some tea? I just now hunted the leaves, fresh as anything."
"No thank you, I shan't be staying long," Minerva said in the polite tones of a person who does not particularly enjoy the company they are in, but would not be caught dead admitting it.
"I'd love one, thank you," Hermione said with a smile as she was led across the threshold.
"Are we take it things are well?" Minerva asked, straight to the point.
"Brilliant," Harry answered from somewhere above. "Nearly tore my own face off but-"
"Harry James Potter, you get back in bed this instant!" Luna shouted. "Oh, hello Hermione. Do come up. Harry is resting."
"Alright, alright, I'm going," Harry huffed. He did sound tired.
Luna came down and took over guiding Hermione, leading her up through the Rookery. Hermione was certain the number of steps between each small flight of stairs had changed since last she was there, and they hadn't been consistent to begin with, so she took the help without a single comment about being treated as an invalid. Minerva said something that was possibly a farewell, but Hermione didn't listen; her attention was forward, focused entirely on the boy she was there to see.
The moon had barely left the sky, and so she was there. She felt she should have been there while it was up. I will be there for the next one.
The door to the bedroom made a noise not entirely unlike creaking, and Hermione shook Luna's hand off - not unkindly - to enter.
"Heya," Harry sighed; by the sound of it his excursion to the balcony had taken it out of him.
"Hey. So, uh… How did it…?"
"I'm human. Just about."
The last of Hermione's restraint broke. "Oh thank goodness," she said, rushing forward. "I was so worried, I know what madam Pomfrey said but still I couldn't help thinking the worst and you know it would have been okay but I'm so glad it isn't that."
His hand found hers. "Hermione-"
"Yes? What do you need? I'm here, whatever it is, just-"
"Headache."
"Oh." She dropped her voice to a whisper. "Sorry. Was it that bad?"
"Let's just say it's a good thing you can't see the state of me right now."
"Don't exaggerate, Harry," Luna chided. "She's worried about you."
"Sorry. I'll be fine. Just need to rest."
"And don't you forget it."
"Yes, matron."
A polite knock came at the door. "Room for another well-wisher?" Minerva enquired. "And how is my ward holding up?"
"About as good as I could ask for," Harry grouched. "Could do with some good news…?"
"In regards to Beauxbatons, I am still making enquiries. I do wonder if owls are not the most efficient method of international communication."
"Don't bother wondering, professor," Hermione chipped in, running through all the superior muggle methods in her head. "They aren't."
"I shall take your word for it. And also my leave; abrupt I know, but I have a meeting with the headmaster to attend."
"Good luck," Harry wished her sarcastically.
"I will return in an hour or so to collect you, Hermione." It was not lost on Hermione how the woman did not disagree with Harry's sentiment.
"Thank you."
"Ooh, mind the plums on the way out," Luna warned. "They're over-ripe, which makes them terribly agitated when people leave."
"Thank you for the warning. Adieu, all."
Hermione focused on her Visus Magicae, and thought she could detect the woman's aura receding. Perhaps that was only wishful thinking; she had no right to expect her sense to be that advanced yet.
"I don't feel so great," Harry groaned.
"Have a rest, darling," Luna urged him.
"But Hermione's here."
Hermione ran a thumb along his finger idly. He wasn't the only one who wanted him to stay awake for her visit, but she felt so selfish thinking that.
Luna had other, more outspoken ideas. "And what better time to sleep soundly, than with friends watching over you?"
Harry seemed to agree with her, as his grip on Hermione's hand went loose and his worryingly audible breathing slowed. The girls sat in the deepening silence for a minute before Luna whispered; "He had a very tough night. It was terrible to hear him screaming."
There was something off in Luna's voice; a detachment of her tone from the words she was saying. It was reminiscent of her stories about how her possessions went walkabouts, but so much starker; a lingering memory of pain.
"How about you, Luna? Are you okay?"
"No. No I rather think I am not."
"Can I-"
A sob escaped Luna, followed by a sudden barrage of many more. Hermione jumped to her feet and rushed round to comfort her friend, though all she could think to do was wrap her up in an all-consuming hug.
"I will be here for the next moon," she hissed, fighting the surge of anger at herself, both for not being there and thinking only of Harry's suffering. "You will not go through that alone, not again."
Luna lurched as a few more sobs forced their way out of her, but the hug quickly calmed her. I wish I could calm down that easily.
"He will, like that," Luna finally wheezed, forcing the words out between short sharp breaths.
"I am not doing it for him," Hermione said, and it was only a lie by technicality. Of course she would be there for Harry's sake, but she knew Harry could cope with it; it was no basilisk, after all. Luna was not made of the same, stubborn stuff. She wore her emotions on her sleeve, where they were all too easy to damage.
"You're a, very good, friend, Hermione Granger. I'm so glad, the three of us, are together."
"Me too."
"I think, I should like, to be, able to breathe now."
Hermione sheepishly loosened her grip on her friend and sat down on the edge of the bed, careful not to disturb Harry. "So, how is being his nurse for the day?"
Luna "Interesting. He - he showed me his arms."
"He did?" Hermione asked, before it could register that she shouldn't be too surprised. It had been months since she herself felt them, and Harry was opening up trust-wise. Still… "What did he get out of the exchange?"
"Whatever do you mean?"
"Well, he- oh." Harry, you selfless idiotic git. "He showed you without any conditions, didn't he?"
"Yes? Did I do something wrong? Oh dear. I'm awfully new to this 'girlfriend' business."
What?
"Girlfriend?"
"Mmhmm."
What?
"You're his girlfriend?"
"His wrackspurts went away," Luna asserted, as if that explained anything. As if it would serve to soothe the odd, unpleasant sensation rising like bile in the pit of Hermione's stomach.
No. No, there is nothing wrong with this. Nothing at all. It's not as if… well, it's not as if anything. And stop frowning.
Hermione plastered a smile on her face to hide her confusion over where and why the last one had gone.
"That's… wonderful."
"Yes, it should make things much less awkward."
Awkward? What are they doing that would be less-
Not going there. Stop thinking about it. Focus on Luna. Focus. She still needs her friend. Think later.
"Feeling any better?" Hermione asked, cursing herself as she said it at how clumsy the words sounded.
"I think so. I'm sorry. I haven't made such a mess of myself since… since mummy went away."
"Well, Harry isn't going anywhere."
Hermione couldn't say whose benefit her words were for.
"Relative to the rest of us, I suppose you're correct. He's fast asleep; that just leaves us, doesn't it?"
"And an hour until Minerva picks me up."
"An hour to sit and talk."
"Yes."
"What would you like to talk about?"
How you're Harry's girlfriend all of a sudden. If you're planning to take him away from me. That you won't be able to if you try. "You pick."
"Okay then. As I already have wet cheeks, would you mind if I talked about my mother? Daddy finds it so hard."
"Go ahead."
That permission opened the floodgates, and Hermione got a fair idea of how it must feel to be on the receiving end of one of her own impassioned rants. Lectures. Luna went on about so many things; Hermione tried not to dwell on how her attention was only drawn even the slightest bit away from Harry and Luna being together when the talk turned to Mrs Lovegood's research. The woman had been convinced Gamp's Law was flawed, and steadfastly determined to prove it.
So determined she had pushed the limit too far and, in the process of attempting to transfigure a bottle of liquid into gas, paid the ultimate price for her obsession. The explosion had almost brought the Rookery down, and Luna's mother was sat at the epicentre. Luna had been the one to find her. Or at least, what was left of her. And didn't that little tidbit just make Hermione feel terrible about her internal reaction to the day's big news?
"I tried looking through her research. Most of it survived; she was very good at protective charms. I wanted to understand what it was she- why she-" Luna choked back her words. "None of it quite made sense."
Hermione played with her thumbs. "Would you mind if I took a look?"
"Oh, would you? That would be wonderful. You can take them with you when you go."
"You'd trust me with them?"
"You're my friend, Hermione. I would trust you with much more than some old books."
Hermione rather thought they were more than some old books; they were the last thing Luna had of her mother, no doubt filled with her handwriting, thought processes, and quite possibly a doodle or twenty of her darling girl. They were the final window into a mind now closed forever. Most people showed no understanding of the value of such a book, but Hermione knew Luna would; and she was trusting her with that all the same.
"Thank you."
"My pleasure. Mummy always said books were for sharing. Stories want to be heard. She used to tell the most wonderful stories."
"Care to share one?" Hermione asked, despite her personal disinterest. Talking seemed to be helping Luna get through things.
"Oh yes. There was one I had mummy tell me all the time as a bedtime story. Daddy did too, but I preferred mummy's version. She made it rhyme and everything, although I expect the meaning might have gotten lost along the way. It does that you know; it wanders off when people stop paying enough attention to it. Like a humdinger, only it can't usually find its way back."
"…the story?" Hermione prompted after several seconds of Luna's satisfied silence.
"Hmm? Oh yes, of course..."
Luna's voice dropped then, and slowed, and her intonation changed to something forebodingly foreign; the combination sent a shiver down Hermione's spine.
"Mark upon mark and the equal sum;
Beautiful dawn of a dark'ning sun.
By lightning bright and black as tar;
Love, and worse, shall leave a scar.
A Queen of Power, fallen to dark;
Her beauty fair and her terror stark.
Bathed in the blood of friend and foe;
Mistress Death with wand of woe.
Her might of blood, and ash on the air;
All who love her come weep your despair.
And woe the man would claim her heart;
Hers is Death; they ne'er shall part.
Named a Queen, she shall give unto Death;
All that she is; her very last breath.
Love turned Hate ere the darkness' end;
For her undying power must a law of life bend."
The darkness of the poetry took Hermione by surprise. "Wow. That's less a bedtime story, more something out of Tolkein."
"You know Great Uncle John?"
No way…
"Uncle? Are you saying Tolkein was a wizard?"
"No, a squib, actually. Not truly an uncle either, but a family friend, so daddy says. Grandfather and him were very close."
"Did he tell your grandfather that story?"
"Hmm? No, Grandfather was a seer," Luna explained, which also explained some of her oddity - the Sight was fickle in its passing down hereditary lines, but the strangeness that came with it was rarely so discerning. "He gave prophecies a lot when Uncle John was around, and Uncle John turned them into stories for daddy."
"So this was a prophecy originally?"
"I suppose it may have been. I like it as a story."
"It's rather depressing."
"Lots of things are depressing. Enjoying them all the same is a challenge - like a game. That's half the fun." Luna finally sounded cheery once more.
"So they shared stories?"
"I'm sure they shared a lot of things; that is what friends do. True friends, at least."
"As opposed to fake friends?"
"Yes."
Hermione thought back to her earlier childhood, and the myriad of fake friends she'd had; most of them had turned out to only be speaking to her in the hope she would do their homework for them. "Wouldn't it be nice if it were easier to tell the difference?"
Luna hummed her agreement, and moved about - Hermione thought she must be checking over Harry, though it was so hard to tell with how softly she carried herself. Was she running a caring hand across his scars, counting them as Hermione had? Was she laying a cold flannel on Harry's forehead? Or a gentle kiss? A kiss which would see her thanked, rather than shunned.
"I think," Luna spoke, snapping Hermione out of her funk with the fragility of her voice, "perhaps, to have a true friend is to lodge a little room in the mind of another person. When you speak with such a friend, there is no need for hellos and goodbyes. You are not knocking on the door, or being seen out; you have your own key, free to come and go as you please. And then, even when you aren't there, you leave little pieces of you - shared memories strewn about like discarded glasses and forgotten jackets. You begin to live in their mind. Stay long enough, you may start to change who that person is; as if they let you paint their walls in your favourite colour. And it doesn't matter if they never liked that colour before, because they do now. Because you've shown them how beautiful it can be. Because it reminds them of you."
"Have you ever had a friend like that?"
Luna took her hand again, and Hermione took that as the answer she was admittedly fishing for.
"I always thought I was best in sky blue. Harry thought I needed a little more red. I do wonder what colour he painted you?"
It took Hermione some time to think through her response; to sift through the myriad of feelings and memories which made up the part of Harry lodging in her mind. In the end, she resorted to a less logical tactic: She imagined a room in her library, affixed a sign to the door which read 'Harry', and threw open the door to see what colour walls were inside. The result was blinding.
"Gold," she breathed.
"Gold. I do love gold. The prettiest colour in a fire. Do you like it better than your old colours?"
Mind-Hermione stepped into the new room and spun, taking in the beautiful hue and bathing in its light. "There is so much gold in me, I cannot recall what colours came before."
Luna squeezed her hand. "Be careful not to get lost in it," she urged. "Fire is beautiful, but it consumes even as it cleanses. The brightest candle is first to die, and nothing survives a flame too hot."
Hermione digested that statement, and found she did not like the implication. Or how true it rang already.
"What colour did I paint you?"
"I don't think you're done yet. When you are, I believe it's going to be quite something."
Then, because time flies when you're having deep philosophical conversations, Minerva was back, and it was time for Hermione to leave Luna and her boyfriend to each other.
She was happy for him. For them. She was happy for them. She schooled her breathing, unclenched her fists before her nails drew blood, and was happy for her friends. Why would she not be? It was not as if they would forget her; not as if she would be ignored and forgotten, cast aside along with all the things she wanted, to become the lonely bookworm once more. Which meant there was no reason to be anything but happy for him. Them.
No reason at all.
She threw a stack of chemistry notes across the room. They don't make any sense! Worse: They did make sense, but Hermione was not able to wrap her distracted - distracted? Whatever by? - head around that sense, so to every corner of her room but the desk they were banished.
She thought the little outburst would help. It didn't. It made her feel ashamed, and that made her angry, and as such one violent outburst begot another until she came back to herself standing, chest heaving and fists balled, in the middle of a bedroom more resembling a warzone.
Ozone tinged the air.
Her mum was calling her, sounding scared. Scared for her daughter, or of, Hermione could not tell. Since when was that even a question?
Since I tore my room apart? Since I killed man. Since that troll made me into a monster?
"Are you okay?"
"Fine!" she blurted out. "I'm fine."
"It sounded like-"
"I'm fine!" she snapped, her breaking voice betraying the blatant lie.
"Well, there's an owl for you."
"What?"
"From your Ministry. It looks important. No braille; should I open it for you?"
Hermione left her room - closing the door very deliberately - and found the top of the stairs. "What do they want now?" she asked as she made her way down on unsteady legs.
"It says… there was a magical event traced to this address. Asks if everything's okay. Is everything okay?"
Did I use magic by accident? Again? Hermione thought about the state of her room, and the scent therein which typically only followed lightning strikes. "Mmhmm. Yes. All fine."
"Hermione Granger, you are a terrible liar."
"I'll fix it."
"Fix what?"
For lack of a good answer, Hermione said nothing. She slammed her foot into the floor by accident, having miscounted the steps - Or failing to remember to count at all; she couldn't say which.
"Honestly, sweetie, are you okay?"
Because she could hide it no longer: "No."
"Do you want to talk-"
Because she could not let it show: "No."
"Do you need to talk about it?"
Because she was sick of lying: "…"
"Would it help to talk to someone who isn't me? I know there are things you're keeping from us. I won't say you shouldn't because… well, because I don't know what those things are, and I remember what it was like to be a teenager with a normal life. Just don't think that doesn't mean you can't talk to anyone."
"I talk to Harry. And Luna." When they aren't busy being all over each other without me even knowing.
"And what about an outside influence? A new perspective, from someone not so… involved?"
"I do not need therapy."
"You're sure? I know you didn't want to before, but it's never too late to change your mind."
"I do not need it. I do not need any more people judging me."
"Oh honey, they wouldn't judge you. No more than Mr Puddlesmudge does."
It was a low blow, bringing her favourite toy otter into the equation, and that riled her. "Everyone judges me. Perhaps they are right to."
"Why, love? Why would you-"
"Because I killed a man! I killed a professor, and, and-" her legs lost the will to fight along with the rest of her, and she ended up sat, sore-arsed, on the bottom step. "They all think me dark, mum. They think I'm going to be some kind of Dark Lady, I know it. Even my friends, I know they think about it."
Her mum took a seat beside her, nudging her up until she was squished against the wall. "Since when does my little bookworm care what other people think about her?"
"What if they're right?"
"Are they? Did I raise a Dark Queen? Hermione the Terrible, the Great Wrath of the South, bringing ruin to the oppressors, and the ignorant, and people who dog-ear books in public libraries."
"How can you joke about all this?"
"Because I know my daughter better than that. I know you're angry, and you have every right to be. But you are not evil, or dark, or whatever they choose call it. You are not a cruel person. You just need some help with everything life has thrown at you."
"They won't want to help. They'll want to dig around in my head and cut out whatever they don't like the look of."
"And that is why we will not be taking you to a magical therapist. I talked to Emile; you remember Emile? You're booked in Tuesday afternoon, if you want."
"I can't tell her! That would violate the statute!" Not to mention you booked me in for therapy without asking me first!
"You can't tell her the details. You can still talk through how you feel."
"What am I meant to say? How do I hide that?"
"Easily, darling. The phrase is; 'I am not comfortable going into the details.'"
"You really think it would work? That it would cure me?"
"You don't need curing. But it can't hurt, can it?"
"Tuesday?"
"Tuesday."
"Can I see Harry again on Monday?"
"Would you sneak out the window and find your way to him if I said no?"
"You make me sound obsessed."
"Would you?"
She shrugged. "Maybe." Definitely.
"Then I'd best drive you over instead."
"Thank you."
"You have very good friends, don't you?"
"The best."
Monday did not happen in the end; Xenophilius was taking Luna and Harry hunting for some new exotic creature which may or may not exist in the forests of Wales, and though she was invited, without her magic Hermione had to make the call not to walk across many miles of uneven ground and underbrush.
Tuesday therefore found her in a jumpy and irritable mood. Emile was almost aggressively pleasant despite - or perhaps in spite - of her grumpy greeting.
"Can I get you anything, Hermione? A nice cup of herbal tea? I have water out for us already, and a few shortcake biscuits. They're covered in sugar; don't tell your mother."
"Is it normal to see a therapist with a family connection like that?" Hermione snipped, not really looking for an out but hardly minding if she stumbled into one. The idea of talking about her life had soured in the days since she committed to it.
"Not normal, per se, but there is nothing strange about it. It can be helpful to speak to someone who isn't a total stranger. And confidentiality is confidentiality, no matter who I may have gone to uni with. Do you have any other reservations?"
"I'm not sure how much I'll be able to say about… things."
"Not a problem. I have clients involved in all sorts of things - court cases they aren't allowed to talk about and the like. We find ways to work around it."
Hermione pitched the idea she'd had the night before; or a least, tried to. The words didn't want to come out smoothly. "Is it… Is it okay if I… how to explain…"
"Take your time."
"Can I use metaphors? When I can't talk about something directly, could I come up with something that… that makes me feel the same way?"
"If you think it will help, we can certainly try."
"I think it would."
"Alright then. So, is there anywhere you'd like to start, or shall I lead?"
"I don't really know how this is done."
"We'll start with a summary then. Tell me how you are feeling. Right now, in this moment, here with me."
"…Tense."
"What makes you feel that way?"
Hermione searched for the words, and was disturbed that they still did not come. Except for one. "Fear."
"What of?"
"Judgment."
"No judgment here. I only help. Is there anything else you are afraid of?"
"Myself."
"And why is that?"
"What I am capable of. What I have done. What I might do."
"And can you tell me what you have done?"
She shook her head.
"Can you tell me through metaphor?"
If someone had told me magic was real when I was ten, I would not have believed them. I didn't believe Minerva until she transfigured the coffee table. So…
"Are you familiar with the legend of the basilisk?"
Hermione embarked upon the tale of her second year, from the moment she extended a hand in Harry Potter's approximate direction, to falling down the tunnel to the Chamber of Secrets. It was all so outlandish to someone not of the magical world, there was no way Emile would believe it to be true; in Hermione's mind, that made it not a violation of the statute. She also supposed she must be a half-decent storyteller, or else Emile was an excellent listener, because her little noises and exclamations made her sound enraptured.
"When we came to the bottom, the professor was… he… he admitted he was not who we thought he was. He was a horrible man, who went around taking peoples' memories and doing horrible things to them. He was going to take our memories too, and leave our friend to die. I couldn't let that happen. I couldn't… he was going to mess with my mind, and hurt Harry, and I… I couldn't let him. I couldn't."
"What happened next, Hermione?"
"I killed him. They said it was self-defence; tried to give me a bloody medal for it. But I killed him. And it was self-defence. To start with. Then. Then I left him there to die. It was not quick. I could have helped. I could have saved him, if I tried. But Ginny… I chose to let him die."
"That must have been a very difficult decision."
"It should have been. Truthfully, it did not really occur to me I should have saved him until much later."
"Stressful situations can impair decision making and judgment. It is rarely healthy to view your past actions through the lens of hindsight, without acknowledging that first."
"It was not the stress."
"Are you-"
"It was not the stress," she asserted, folding her arms aggressively. "I was calm. I was excessively calm. I chose to let him die. I made that decision. How should I feel about that?"
"Should is not a word our emotions pay heed to."
"What a therapist's answer," Hermione scoffed.
"Hermione, I cannot tell you what your morality should be. I can only help you to come to terms with things. Is it bothering you that you did what you did, or that you feel you should be bothered, and you are not?"
"How do you know that?"
"You are not the first to think such thoughts. It is common for people to experience cognitive dissonances following extreme circumstances."
"Cognitive dissonance?"
"You believe killing is bad, and so you think you should feel guilty for doing it. Then it happens, and, for whatever reason, the guilt is not there. Your mind defies its own image of reality, and the pieces can be so hard to put back together. The jigsaw puzzle no longer seems to fit."
"So how do you fix it?"
"Personally? I would decide which reality you prefer; or which seems harder to divorce yourself from; and run with that. Not everything can be fixed. Not everything necessarily needs to be."
"Which am I meant to prefer?"
"For some people, the answer would be whichever is easier; whichever makes them feel better about themselves. Other people choose to redefine themselves as they would want to be; to be better, rather than merely feeling it. Neither approach is more correct than the other. You must choose the one which suits you. These are your emotions; your experiences. They belong to you alone."
Hermione sat and mulled it over. She didn't much like any of the thoughts that allowed for.
"So… what do you think?" Emile asked gently. "How would you like to feel about what happened?"
"I killed a man."
"And…?"
Blasting the rock clean; scouring the final trace of the man's existence from the earth. Denying him his rest; denying him the peace he stole from so many. Hoping he was watching. Hoping that in whatever hellish pit his soul had gone to, he knew: Knew that though she had not meant to kill him, she would not take it back.
"And my guilt is reserved for those who deserve it. He made me do it; he chose his fate. I choose to move on."
His soul can rot alone. He hurt me enough already.
"I'm very proud of you for spending so much time on such a difficult thing. But I have to ask… your friend? Did you get to her?"
"Oh, yes. Yes, we saved her. Harry killed the basilisk, which almost killed him - did kill him, actually, but I brought him back - and Ginny was alright in the end."
It sounded so absurd when she said it aloud; no wonder Emile believed it was all metaphorical.
"You said they tried to give you a medal?"
"Yes, they did."
"Was that for saving Ginny, or killing your professor?"
"Saving Ginny, obviously."
"Yet you mentioned it in the same sentence as the other."
"I… did."
"Do you think you might, on some level, have confused the two?"
She riled at the suggestion. "I didn't deserve it."
"Did you save your friend?"
"Yes."
"Was the medal for saving your friend?"
"Yes."
"Then how did you not deserve it?"
"I…"
"You have to take the victories in life, Hermione. You have to own your successes. The good balances out the bad, but that doesn't happen by mixing it all together. Mix a handful of mud into a cake, and all you get is a cake you don't want to eat. Eat the mud separately, at least you get to enjoy the cake, no?"
Hermione reflected on that analogy, and all else that had been said, for a good few minutes until Emile interrupted her thoughts.
"I'm afraid that's about all we have time for, unless there is anything you didn't get the chance to say?"
"No, I, uh, think that's it," Hermione stammered as she was drawn back to the present.
Emile nodded sagely. "Lots to think about. Before you go, I wanted to take you through some calming exercises; mostly breathing, but I think aromatherapy could be highly beneficial to you as well. If you can associate a scent with calmness and safety, then carry that scent with you, you will have a way to centre yourself in difficult moments. Would you like to give that a try?"
"Why not?"
"Excellent. But first, a spot of controlled breathing. Here, follow my lead… Breathe in…. And out. Imagine your stresses leaving your body with every outward breath. So again, in… Nice and deep, that's it. And out."
They did that for a minute or two, and Hermione found it did help; the anxieties bubbling up from recounting her tale were calming. It didn't solve any of her problems, or magically make her a better person, but it helped. She left the session calmer than she went in, which was about all she had dared to hope for. Whether or not things would be better going forward, she hadn't done nearly enough breathing to think about.
Dumbledore looked into the bottom of his cup again, but the dregs were just as chaotic and meaningless as the last time he saw them. "The cards speak of tragedy, but there is no detail. How are we to guide if we cannot see the way?"
Across the desk, Trelawney put her own cup down. "Trust in the fates, Albus. And do not delve too deep; terrible things befall those who do."
"My own fate has not been a concern of mine for some time. If I am to be punished for my failures, or my life is the price of victory, then so be it."
"You wish to protect the boy?" she asked approvingly.
"I always have." Thoughts of what he had learned about Harry's childhood arose, but for all the discomfort they caused they did not change the truth. "I did all I did with good reason, you must understand."
"It is not I who needs to understand. And if Destiny has chosen her champion, who are we to intervene?"
"He is not ready. He is still so young. How can we expect him to face such cruelty on his own?"
He awaited an answer - any answer, he was fast becoming that desperate - but Trelawney was not listening to him; her eyes were unfocused, staring into the middle distance. Albus knew that look; he had seen it from her once before. His divination professor had three eyes open, and of them only one was seeing.
"Sybil?"
"One must yet die by the other's hand… for few are those who might stand his equal counted. In the last rays of the sinking sun… in the night of endless torment… one shall succumb to darkness, e'en as the other is bathed in light. Done! It must be done! Done by power which he knows, and knows not even so… and in the knowing of such power must evil be done for good!"
At the prophecy's apparent climax, Dumbledore scrabbled for a quill, desperate to commit the words to parchment; memories of prophecies were known to be fallible in a pensieve. But Trelawney was not quite finished. Her voice fell, and her words were all the more portent for it.
"Mark upon mark under darkening sun. So few are those who might stand his equal counted… for the child is no longer one."
Then Sybil was back in the room with him as though nothing had happened. "It saddens me that I could not find your answers, my friend," she lamented.
Albus struggled to contain his nerves as he continued to write. "That's quite alright, Sybil dear. Quite alright. But might I ask you: Leave an old man to his thoughts?"
"Yes. Yes, I should" - she looked at the empty sherry bottle beside her - "retire to my quarters for the night."
Sybil took her leave, but Albus hardly noticed her go. One must yet die… one shall succumb to darkness… power he knows and knows not… evil done for good.
…the child is no longer one.
He could not yet wrap his head around the wording, but the last worried him greatly. One thing, however, was abundantly clear: He could not afford to lose what access remained to Harry, at least until he understood. Harry had to be kept close by anyway, or how could Albus guide him to victory?
…the child is no longer one.
"I am sorry, Harry. I truly am. But it must be done. Our deeds are greater than ourselves."
He put his record of the new prophecy aside, and turned his quill to a new task; composing a detestable letter to the detestable Minister of Magic.
A/N
Turns out between covid, taking on a full time job, and a chapter which refuses to come together in the edit, I suck at getting uploads out on time. I'd say sorry, but I might start to sound like a broken record. All I can say is I'll continue to focus on quality over quantity or regularity, and it takes as long as it takes to get to the end. To those who stick with me, thank you and I hope you can still enjoy the drip-feed.