ccxxii. driving the hearse

The windows of the train rattled as it moved ever onward along the tracks. Inevitable. Inexporable. Like the locomotive of fate bound to the rails, heedless of what lay in the way.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow once wrote, "There is no grief like the grief that does not speak," and Hermione resonated with those words more than she had resonated with anything in her short life.

No one spoke of what happened that day. No one cared at all to wonder how Terry Boot passed away. "An accident," rumor said. "Wasn't that Potter girl there to see it?"

While Cedric Diggory emerged from the maze as the Triwizard Tournament's champion, Hermione's world had been folding in upon itself. Oh, she wasn't so illogical as to say Terry had been her life, or that they'd be soul mates or madly in love. Though she had loved him, it was not Terry's death alone that had disturbed Hermione. It was the fact that he had died, that evil had passed so easily into a perceived place of safety—.

That it had trailed her best friend. That it had touched her, kissed her hands—.

Terry was gone. Gone in an instant. Hermione had been waiting for him—.

And she would always be waiting now.

At the Leaving Feast, Professor Dumbledore did not abide by Minister Gaunt's wish to suppress the Dark Lord's return.

"There are powers that be that would desire for me to tell you falsehoods," the Headmaster had said as he stood before the student body. Behind him, the House banners had been replaced by solemn black tapestries. "They would wish for me to spare you harsh realities and say Terry Boot passed away in a tragic accident. This is not true. What happened to Terry Boot was murder, and it was committed at the behest of Lord Voldemort."

Hermione imagined a line drawn in the sand, and Dumbledore dragging his finger along it. Gaunt would not be happy. She could only guess what repercussions would be forthcoming from the Headmaster's defiance.

All through the Feast, she'd been abnormally aware of the empty seats in the Great Hall. An empty seat for Terry at Ravenclaw. An empty seat at the High Table waiting for a Potions Master who might never return. An empty seat next to Hermione where her best friend was meant to sit. Dumbledore had sent Harriet home straight from the infirmary, excusing her from the last week of classes.

The first time Hermione had heard of the Dark Lord, it had been in a passage of a book, and his name had been "Lord V—." He'd sounded as fantastical as one of the cartoon villains she'd seen on videotapes or the telly. Even as the years passed and Hermione accepted him as a real danger, the Dark Lord had never seemed as genuine, nor as threatening, as he did now.

Lord Voldemort was out there. He meant to kill her best friend—her sister. He was the reason Terry was dead.

"What do you make of Malfoy's behavior?" Elara's voice pulled Hermione from her silent inspection of the train window. They were on the way home, Cygnus tucked into his cage, Crookshanks snoozing on the bench across from them. Rain lashed against the glass. It felt fitting. "Malfoy senior, that is. Why did he help Harriet?"

"I don't know," Hermione confessed, not a statement she often found herself making. "Of all the Malfoys, I understand Lucius the least. He doesn't do anything without a benefit for himself—or his family. I can't think of what he stood to earn by helping Harriet."

"Do you believe he'll blackmail her?"

"If anything, she could blackmail him." Hermione sighed and rubbed at her tired eyes. Sleep had been difficult. Remus encouraged her to talk about what she was feeling—but what could Hermione say? She was gutted. She was scared—she was angry.

There is no grief like the grief that does not speak—.

Hermione cleared her throat. "Has Harriet replied to you?"

"In a manner of speaking. Her letters have been atrocious. Sirius says she only leaves her room when he or Mr. Flamel convince her to come down for supper."

"She should have stayed."

"No," Elara disagreed. "She was too injured to go to class, and she hates the infirmary. It's better she went home to heal, but I'm eager to see her." She pressed her lips in a firm line. "She shouldn't be alone."

Which was why Hermione wished Harriet had been allowed to stay; she would have skipped class to sit with her in the hospital wing if needed. She'd barely been able to concentrate as it was.

"Did you say goodbye to Fleur?" she asked.

Elara's eyes darted to her own, judging her reaction. Honestly, if Hermione was going to fall apart merely from mentioning another person's significant other, she'd need a room in St. Mungo's before too long. She could compartmentalize. She could close the doors on those softer memories, the whisper of Terry's lips against her own, tentative fingers tucking a wild curl behind her ear—.

"There is no pain so great as the memory of joy in present grief," she recited in her own head. Aeschylus. Her father had a thick coffee table book on Greek figures, complete with many of their famous quotes. Hermione had devoured it as a child. She wondered if it was still there.

"We said goodbye before she left with the other Beauxbatons students," Elara said, fidgeting with the gold chain linked to her shirt button. Her Atlas had suffered damage, and though it was still usable, attempting such a thing again would undoubtedly shatter it. Magic made fools of physicists, but that did not make it wholly separate from the laws of nature. Portkeys were not meant to be made at a distance. "I promised to write."

"Will you?"

"I…I don't know," Elara confessed. "Things aren't the same now."

No. Nothing was the same, because Terry was dead, Harriet bore new scars, and Hermione was terrified of what would come next.

Exhaustion pressed upon her shoulders like a stone building slowly leaning into her. Or maybe Hermione was leaning into it. She couldn't tell anymore.

"I did hear from Perenelle," Elara mentioned.

"Oh?"

"Apparently, Mr. Flamel and Professor Dumbledore got into a row. The former wants her pulled from Hogwarts, and Dumbledore had to remind him an apprenticeship supersedes any kind of temporary guardianship he might be able to finagle out of a foreign ministry."

Hermione's eyes dropped to her satchel, pressed between her hip and the train's wall. Professor Slytherin had cornered her in the entrance hall before she left for the Hogwarts Express. He'd shoved two books wrapped in Charmed—or Cursed—parchment paper into her hands.

"Ensure those reach Miss Potter," he'd said, a telling look in his cold red eyes. "She's staying with her godfather, is she not? Your guardian. How very convenient."

Hermione hadn't been able to say anything in reply, merely accepting the heavy volumes, feeling the vaguest prickle of Dark magic seeping through the paper. Harriet would hate them.

Slytherin hadn't been done. He'd leaned closer to avoid the curious ears of passing students, and he'd hissed, "I hope you and Potter and the rest understand she's allowed to stay there purely through my largesse. I could change my mind on a whim, and she'd be required to stay with me." Hermione had gulped as he'd leaned closer still, nothing close to compassion in his scheming expression. "It's a funny little thing. As a master, I am well within my rights to pull the records of my apprentice, and those records clearly state Harriet Dorea Potter is under the care of Petunia and Vernon Dursley. Muggles. Someone is playing Gaunt for a fool."

Hermione had remained frozen, unspeaking, a lump forming in her throat.

"One word to the Ministry and she would be pulled from Black's house—or where ever else Potter stays. You might very well never see her again if that happened."

"One word to the Ministry, Professor," Hermione had rejoined, hating the warble in her voice. "And they would dissolve her apprenticeship."

"I know this," he'd sneered, leaning away. "But does Miss Potter? If she ceases to be of use to me…."

On the train, Hermione shook her head and retreated from the memory.

The door to their compartment clattered open, and Hermione stirred in her seat—her breath leaving in a solid whoosh. Her eyes had caught upon the bronze and blue of a Ravenclaw uniform, and for a fraction of an instant, she thought it was Terry. She'd forgotten for that one second that he'd never open the door to their compartment again, never offer an insightful word, never wear that half-hitched smile he got when Hermione, Elara, or Harriet did something particularly outrageous. He was gone.

Her chest ached, too tight to inhale, too tight to breathe out.

"'Give sorrow words;'" her father read from his copy of Macbeth as little Hermione settled into her bed. "'The grief that does not speak whispers the o'er-fraught heart and bids it break.'"

"Hello, Anthony," Hermione said as Goldstein stepped inside and let the door slam behind him. He looked as tired as she felt, his eyes bloodshot and his robes rumpled as if he'd slept in them. He didn't smile when Hermione addressed him; he stared at her, his features blank, a slim line forming behind his brows.

"I want to know the truth."

"What?"

"I want to know what really happened," he repeated. "I want to know what happened to Terry. What Potter did."

"What are you on about?" Hermione replied, her confusion turning to frustration. She'd tried to speak to Goldstein once this week, but he and the other Ravenclaws had been acting rather insular, especially toward Slytherins. "Harriet did nothing."

"That's not what everyone's saying though, is it?" Anthony demanded. "She was the only one there. And all this bung about You-Know-Who—."

"It's not bung!" Hermione stood, heart pounding. "It's the truth. He's the reason Terry's—."

"You-Know-Who's been dead for years! Dumbledore's gone bloody senile—and how can you stand there defending Potter?" he shouted. "I knew Terry shouldn't have gotten involved with you. All you lot are the same, always closing ranks. All Slytherins—."

"Get out." Hermione pointed at the door. "Get out. I won't stand here and listen to this a moment longer."

"You know something you're not telling us. You're protecting Potter when she probably killed—."

A sudden burst of magic arced from Hermione, and it shoved Anthony backward, his back colliding with the door. Glass cracked, and large splinters appeared in the window at Hermione's side.

Anthony took the hint and left without further argument, though his expression could have withered a growing plant. Silence lay thick in the compartment, no one daring to breathe until Hermione marched to the door Goldstein had left open, slammed it shut, and drew the curtains.

"This won't be the last time we hear about this," Elara murmured. "People have always been quick to blame Slytherins for everything, and Harriet is an easy target."

"Then it won't be the last time I tell someone off," Hermione replied, finding her wand. "I won't allow people to blame this—this tragedy on Harriet when she's suffered more than any of us. Terry died trying to protect her, and we're not going to let them make a mockery of his efforts. This is Voldemort's fault, and no one else's!"

Hermione turned to the window. Then, brandishing her wand, she incanted, "Reparo!"

The splinters in the glass reversed themselves until it was whole once again. Hermione stared at her own reflection superimposed over the moving countryside and the wet streaks of rain.

If only everything could be fixed as easily.