A new day dawned, and Hermione woke for the first time, wrapped up tight and cozy in her boyfriend's sleeping arms. They had indeed clung to each other for comfort and warmth a few times last winter, when Ron had abandoned them, but this was far different from that. He was warm and comfortable, but her favorite part of waking up with her arm around him and the left side of her face on his chest was the beautiful sound of his heart softly beating in her ear.
She didn't want to wake him, so she didn't move, aside from a gentle yawn fading into a contented smile.
Harry was back. This was real. She wasn't dreaming.
This new day was going to be a good one. She'd make sure of it. After last night, the incredible catharsis of being able to feel everything instead of simply powering through because the war loomed overhead made her feel like a new person.
Yes, there were still hurdles ahead of them; his curse, her magic, and no small amount of grieving to do with the battle over… With any luck, they'd be getting updates on both of their conditions today. But even in the face of all of that, she had what she'd wanted for years.
Having Harry here with her, sleeping soundly, no less, after all they'd been through was nothing short of a miracle, and she'd be sure to treat it as such. The fact that she no longer had to hide her long-concealed romantic feelings toward him was just the icing on the cake.
They were finally a couple, and beyond the two of them surviving the end of the war, there wasn't anything she'd dared to hope for. She was more than thrilled, but it was tempered by the fact that they needed to have a serious conversation, and soon.
Since at least Christmas, he had silently come to terms with the idea of his death. That alone was troubling, but what was more concerning is that she hadn't noticed. For that to be the case, he must have been putting forth considerable effort to hide it from her, and that's not a good precedent. If they were to be a couple now, they'd need to work on being open with each other. With the benefit of hindsight, she could clearly see the hallmarks of depression in his mood and actions, but they'd all been under immense stress back then. She hadn't seen it for what it actually was.
The letter he sent on Christmas Eve came to the forefront of her mind again, and the memory she'd seen came flooding back to her. To confirm her suspicions about the contents of the letter, she needed to have a conversation with him. She didn't want to assume anything. Reminiscing, she shuddered as Harry's vision blurred with tears and he uttered 'I'm sorry, but that's the best I can do, Hermione,' while the owl disappeared into the night. He sounded so broken and morose it physically hurt her to think on it.
The thought set her eyes to watering once more, and she shifted to wipe them clear.
She froze as he shifted beneath her, but it was too late. She felt his arm tighten around her and felt his lips on the crown of her head. He sighed restfully beneath her and through a wide yawn said, "Mornin' 'ermione. Did you sleep ok?"
She sniffled quietly, not moving her head, and replied in a small voice, Yes, I did… Sorry if I woke you."
"It's okay, I don't mind waking up like this…" he ran the fingers of his right hand through her hair.
She let out a soft sound that was some strange blend of a chuckle and a sob.
"Hermione, what's wrong? Are you okay?" Harry's voice went from sleepy to urgent in a split second. He tried to shift a bit to be somehow closer to her and winced at the effort.
"I'm scared, Harry." She barely whispered it. It wasn't her plan to confront him first thing in the morning, but he caught her in a moment of weakness. It was no mystery to her why she was tearful, she knew exactly why, and if she was going to expect openness from him, she certainly wasn't about to hide anything herself. She was many things, but a hypocrite was not one of them.
As she felt him tense and heard his heart rate steadily accelerate, she cursed her logic, but still couldn't find a flaw in it.
"We're perfectly safe here, Hermione." Harry explained matter-of-factly, sounding alert and confident. "There's an entire flock of Aurors just outside the door, hand picked by Shacklebolt himself. If anyone with any sort of ill-will gets within 50 meters of that door, they'll be sent to Azkaban in a matchbox. You can finally relax. We're okay."
"That's not what I'm concerned with, Harry."
"What is it then? What's got you scared?" His voice was earnest, curious, and calm.
"You."
"Me?" Harry sounded surprised. "Morris knows what he's doing, I'll be-"
"I don't mean your condition... though that does certainly concern me." She pushed herself up off of him so she could look him in the face. "You scare me, Harry. What I saw yesterday, the memory of Christmas Eve."
He looked more than a little scared himself as her words registered for him.
"I… I certainly didn't do anything to scare you, Hermione. I don't really know what you're getting at." To her ears, he didn't sound defensive, just taken off guard. "Do you mean the letter? I'm still happy to tell you everything about that. Planning to, even. I just didn't want to get into that with an audience."
"Yes, and no. I do want to know about that letter, though. That's part of it, but that's not the biggest thing that bothered me about the memory." She reached out and gently put her hand on his cheek. "Yesterday when I saw that memory, it wasn't just like pensive. I didn't just see and hear what you did, I felt what you did too. I felt your longing and your hopelessness, your anxiety and sorrow… What scares me is how well you hid it."
She held his eyes for a moment and watched as he absorbed what she'd told him. Recall faded to realization, then he looked away as he settled into embarrassment and shame.
"I don't know what you want me to tell you, Hermione." Harry leaned back on his bed and turned his head to face away from her. His voice was shaky.
"I just, always thought I was more in tune with you, that I could read you better, and tell when you're hurting but pushing it away."
A hollow silence fell between them. This was definitely not going well. All she wanted was to know why he'd hid so much from her. She needed him to know he could tell her anything. After all she'd done and all she'd given over the years, it killed her to learn how much he'd been pulling away.
In some way, it made her worry she might not know him as well as she thought she did. At no point in her recollection had she ever betrayed his trust or given him reason to doubt that she would support him, no matter what. To call it mixed signals was an understatement. Last night, she'd seen right from his very own mind how he felt about her, but now, he was closing down again.
"Harry," she pleaded softly, "please say something."
"I thought," he hesitated just long enough for the rawness in his voice to strike her, "I was protecting you."
He was still facing away from her.
"You were protecting me by not trusting me with-"
"Don't say that!" He snapped his head to look at her again and the intensity of the pain in his eyes shocked her. "Please, don't ever think that. Not for a second, Hermione. There is not one single soul in this world I trust more than you. I can't even count all the times you've saved my life. Not once have you ever given me poor advice or shared any of my secrets. You've been, far and away, the single most important person in my life practically since I first met you… My not being 'open' had nothing to do with trust."
"Then what, Harry? How was keeping me at a distance, pushing me away, supposed to protect me?"
"I thought it might…" He hesitated, not sure how to say what he was trying to. The desperate, questioning look on her face made it clear his only choice was to try to say it plainly. "I thought it would make it easier then, when I…" he trailed off, breathing shakily.
"When you…" she choked on a word. "Oh.
"Pretty much, yeah." He wiped his face with his bedsheet, trying in futility to tidy himself up. "I figured keeping my suspicions to myself would save you, and Ron and some others, I suppose, a bit of prolonged worry. That it would hopefully make it just slightly less horrible when it was all said and done."
"So you knew all the way back then?" Her eyes narrowed, but she scooted closer to him and found his hand with hers. "When did you sort it out?"
"No, I didn't Hermione. I didn't know for sure, but I'd been suspecting it since well before Dumbledore died... Since Sirius died, actually."
Her scrutinizing look vanished in an instant as his last statement stabbed her through the heart. She'd thought… Well, she didn't know what she'd thought, but it wasn't that he'd been living with that kind of notion in his head, feeling forced by circumstance not to confide in anyone… For two years.
"Harry, I… You didn't have to go through that alone."
"I didn't. I had you and Ron and the others with me."
She gave him a pleading look. "You know what I mean. I just wish you'd have told-"
"I know, Hermione, I do. But I didn't. I figured at the time, the whole 'looming war' thing was putting you all through enough as it was. Adding something I suspected might be inevitable and terrible like that wouldn't have served any real purpose… Other than to spread my misery and bring everyone's spirits even further down than they already were. Never mind the fact that it would have almost certainly slowed down the hunt for the horcruxes. I suspect you might have dropped everything to find another way. You'd all given and given up so much for me, I couldn't bear to feel like I was taking any more from you."
That he was probably right did little to quell the feeling of wrongness in her, stemming from his shocking feat of keeping a mask on around her for nearly two years.
"Okay, Harry." She exhaled deeply. "Thank you for talking to me about all of this, I know it's hard, and I know that you've been through…" she paused as he squinted one eye at her "fine, we've been through a lot over the last few years."
"We have, but we made it here." He squeezed her hand, then tried to pull her down to lie next to him again. She resisted.
"Yes, we have." She smiled softly at the quizzical look on him. He didn't understand why she wouldn't put her head back on his chest. He enjoyed it nearly as much as she did, but she needed to look him in the eyes for a few moments more. "And some things need to change as we move forward."
"I agree." He stated simply.
"Good then. I have something I want to ask of you."
"Name it, and it's yours." His level of sincerity made her falter a bit.
Before continuing, she took a moment to sort out exactly what she wanted to say.
She fought to hold herself together as she remembered her parents. From her perspective, growing up with them, and then as a teenage girl living away from home most of the time, their relationship seemed almost perfect. Over the years, as she got a bit older, they were very open and honest with her about what that sort of partnership requires.
Her parents had both told her and lived as an example for her, demonstrating that trust and open communication truly were the foundation of it all. All the other good things in a relationship would flow from there. She knew nothing about being in a relationship herself, but she'd known for a long time that if and when she ever had one, she would want it to be strikingly similar to that of her parents.
That time was now, and she wanted to do her best to set both herself and Harry up for success, even though it might be awkward and hard to talk about at first. If she couldn't push through it and have this sort of conversation, then perhaps she wasn't ready for a relationship at all.
"I want you to promise me something, Harry. I'd like you to promise me, and I'll offer the same in return, that between the two of us, there will be no major secrets. Not like that one ever again. Okay? Promise me that if you ever start to feel like that again, you will let me know so we can handle it together before it gets too far out of hand, yeah?" She was still hurting just thinking about what she'd missed over the last two years, and wiped her eyes once again.
Harry looked a bit sad at her request, but knew it wasn't unfounded. It wasn't intentional, but the request carried with it an accusation. He didn't like that all this worry and hurt in her resulted from his decisions, but he couldn't really argue it wasn't true.
"Of course you're right, Hermione. No secrets. That's totally fair."
"Harry, that's not quite what I mean… I understand it is important for people in general, and people in relationships," she pulled his hand up and kissed the back of his fingers, "to be allowed their privacy and occasionally have a small secret here and there. It's human nature, and it's to be expected. It's healthy even.
"But if we're to make this work," she squeezed his hand again lovingly, "If we're to make us work in the long term…" she saw his worry take hold immediately at that. He clearly didn't care for the word 'if' being used in that context, and she reassured him. "And I'm very much interested in that. Don't get that twisted... It is important to me that I know I can come to you with anything, large or small, and we will be able to talk about it. And I need you to know you can do the same, because I don't want to feel I need to worry there's something like that lurking in the background ever again."
"I think I understand. And you've got my word. If something's bothering me, I'll talk to you. And of course you can do the same."
She smiled at that and sat up on her knees before leaning over carefully with a hand on each of his shoulders before pressing her lips to his for a long moment. It wasn't long at all before he was smiling too… She could feel his smile on her lips and it made her heart swell in her chest.
She broke the kiss and stared into his emerald eyes. "I love you, you know."
He reached up and held her cheek in his hand. "And I love you."
One more quick kiss and she settled herself back in next to him, with her head resting in the crook of his neck.
—X—X—X—
They laid and relaxed for a few minutes in silence as Harry played a bit with her hair.
Harry broke the silence, sounding deep in thought. "There are a few things I think I need to tell you now."
"Already, huh?" She smiled and felt him chuckle a bit.
"Well…" he hesitated, "I want to tell you about that letter you've been wondering about."
"Okay." She didn't understand why he was so tense about that. He'd already said he wanted to talk about it. "Why does it sound like there's something more?" She added gently.
"Because there sort of is, but…" He sighed, waving the hand that wasn't playing in her hair around in a way that seemed uncertain.
"Harry, you can tell me anything." She encouraged.
"I know that, I do." He still sounded hesitant, and she pitched her head back to see his face.
He looked troubled, but determined.
"Harry?" She kissed the side of his jaw.
"It's just… I know I need to talk about it, and tell you about it, of course. But I don't know if I can yet... I feel like, well- I don't really know how I feel and I think I need to sort that out before I try to have a conversation around it." He sighed. "Am I making any sense?"
She understood him then.
"That's okay, Harry. There's no problem at all if you still need to process things, but you know I'm here when you're ready. We don't need to go into it now, but thank you for telling me there is something.
That's how this is supposed to work. Share what you can whenever you're ready."
"I will." He hugged her snug to his side.
"So then, how about that letter?"
A soft knock on the door interrupted their conversation, and they both chuckled.
"Come in." They called in unison.
Hermione slowly separated from him and moved over toward her bed.
"Hermione?" Erica started. "I don't believe we've met properly. I'm Healer Cartwright, but you can call me Erica. I've been working with Harry since he woke." Milly and Morris were with her as well.
Hermione gave a polite wave and nodded at the woman. "Hi."
Morris chimed in almost immediately. "I suppose we'll get right into it." He began his standard examination of Harry, complete with diagnostics and a dressing change.
Milly was near Hermione, and she fixed the healer with an attentive stare and stilled. She held Harry's hand until the diagnostic spells came around. There was something about Milly today, a certain worry or stiffness to her that was setting Hermione on edge.
Morris gave Harry a fresh pain potion and its effect was immediate.
"Almost worth the taste, that one." Harry said through a thoroughly disgusted look. But, it was clear it made him much more comfortable.
"Harry, today I'd like to get a proper look at you while the potion is fresh in your system. Is there anyone in here you'd not be comfortable having in the room?"
Harry thought for a moment. "What kind of proper look are we talking about, then?"
"Just down to your pants. Nothing too scandalous, I should think, but it's up to you."
"Oh, that's no problem then. No different from a day at the beach, is it?"
He tried to swing his legs off the bed and scrunched his face when he encountered some considerable difficulty.
"What's wrong, Harry?" Hermione sounded quite concerned right off the bat. She didn't know Erica, but it was clear Milly knew something she didn't.
"Think I've been lying down too long. Legs aren't quite cooperating."
He started shimmying his legs toward the edge of his bed slowly, but Morris stopped him.
"Hold on a moment, Harry. "Wait a moment, Harry," he told him. "And don't get too frightened by this unpleasant looking instrument."
Morris drew a small wheel on a slender handle from a pocket inside his robes. The wheel was about 2 inches in diameter and had tiny sharp looking pins all round the outside edge. It did immediately look a bit intimidating.
Morris took the wheel and demonstrated on his own palm, rolling the wheel back and forth. "See, it's not particularly comfortable, but it doesn't really hurt either. This helps me test your sensation. Go ahead and lie back down, maybe look toward Hermione over there." Morris made to expose harry's lower legs.
Harry did as he instructed, and after a moment, laughed a bit as the pins almost ticked him just above his knee.
Hermione let out a breath of relief to hear Harry laugh. Something was still off, though, but she didn't know what and didn't care for the feeling.
"Alright, so you clearly felt that just fine. How about this?"
There was a pause.
"Okay, how about now?"
Harry twitched again, feeling a slight prickle in his other knee.
"And here comes the last one."
Harry gasped. "I can feel that, but not like I felt the others. It feels… not entirely, but just a bit numb I'd say."
"Okay then, perhaps we'll keep you in bed for now. I do still want a look under your robes and at your back, though."
Harry nodded nervously. He knew something was different today and could see Hermione knew something was wrong, too.
Morris helped his arms out of his robe and Hermione tried to resist her urge to examine his injury for herself. When she gave in, she immediately regretted it. The hole itself hadn't changed noticeably in size, but the discolored area around it had grown significantly and darkened.
"Harry, can you roll toward Hermione a bit?"
He struggled a bit, but eventually used his upper body to accomplish the task.
Hermione still couldn't resist seeing his state. What had been red and purple when she'd seen it yesterday was now fading to purple and black. It was clearly getting worse, though slowly.
"Alright then, Harry. This one is the final version of the potion we'll use to get this sorted out, but it will be a bit of a task. Every eight hours as precisely as you can manage until further notice. We will keep you in good supply."
Morris handed him a vial of the light purple potion, and he downed it in one swallow, much like he'd done for the pain draught. The bruised and necrotic looking coloration faded dramatically toward more standard flesh tones over the next minute or two.
"Good. You can go ahead and lie back, make yourself comfortable again." Morris instructed.
The healer cradled Harry's shoulder and hip to help him roll over onto his back, then adjusted his bed to a comfortably seated position. Without a word, Milly made Hermione's bed mirror Harry's so they could easily reach and see each other.
Morris took on a serious and slightly saddened look, and sat comfortably on a stool next to Harry's bed. Erica was at the foot of his bed, and Milly was still right next to Hermione.
Hermione spoke up before Morris had a chance to, looking at each of the assembled healers in turn. "So this is the part where you give us the bad news, then?" She and Harry instinctively joined hands as she said it.
Morris looked only slightly taken off guard, but not quite surprised.
"Something like that," he continued quickly, "but the situation isn't entirely dire. The good news - and there is good news - is that we have sorted out the precise nature of the wound and have rapidly developed a solution we are quite confident in."
Harry exhaled slowly. "Okay. That's a start. I'm getting a distinct impression we're not simply talking about me taking a potion a few times a day for a few weeks, though."
"You're correct about that. The potion is a secondary measure that will rapidly counteract the curse when taken."
"It's feeding off of his magic, isn't it?" Hermione interjected. Seeing the shocked look on his face, she continued, "I caught a glimpse of the diagnostic when you tried that last potion. I wasn't certain, but I had a hunch."
Morris looked both stunned and impressed. "The few stories I've heard about you in the last couple of days seemed nearly unbelievable, Hermione, but I am starting to see that they were true. That does about sum it up."
"How do we fix it?" She asked, ignoring his compliment. Harry smiled at her.
"The problem is, as you said, the curse uses Harry's magic to power itself, and we can't get enough headway on your healing between doses. We can't just pump you up with a few gallons of the stuff at once either, because in those concentrations within your body, it would be rather harmful."
"Alright. Let us have it then. What am I looking at for recovery, and what will it take to get there?" His knuckles were white, and so were Hermione's.
"I'll preface this by stating that your prognosis is quite good, assuming things go well. The healers I've been consulting with on this matter all agree. You should have an eighty-five to ninety percent chance of making a ninety-five percent or better recovery."
Harry's ears were ringing, and his heart was racing. In the last few days, he had spent little time actively concerned for himself, but now that he was coming down and finally absorbing the facts, he was struggling. During the war, he had become accustomed to not caring much about his own life, believing it was essentially forfeit. He'd been as ready as he could have been for it, and he had accepted his death would be a requirement of victory in the grand scheme of things.
Now that he'd awakened and seen the second morning since he'd died and fought his way back to life though. He had Hermione at his side, who miraculously seemed to still care deeply for him after what she'd been through and what he'd done to and for her… He was beginning to care about his own survival more than he ever had since Sirius died. He wanted a life, and he wanted to live it in peace without the shadows scheming against him, reaching out at every turn. A joyful life with a witch he loved dearly had been an absurd notion until two days ago, but now it seemed nearly in his grasp. He could live a life with many of the friends he'd made over the years still close with him.
"There's no way for me to sugarcoat this, so I will not," he continued, "other than to tell you it's safer than it sounds… We temporarily take his magic away. Turn it off, and the curse won't have any power to feed on. Based on all our tests, removing his natural magic temporarily should make dealing with the curse easier. By removing that, we will make it easier to heal his body, and once his body heals, we will reverse the procedure and restore his magic.
"I follow the logic," Hermione interjected. "but how do we do it? I've never heard of a method of removing a wizard's magic. Not one that leaves them living, anyway."
"How temporarily?" Harry asked flatly.
"Only so long as we take to mend and repair your injury." Morris answered him. "Once it's healed, we will revert the procedure, and over time your core should replenish naturally. Perhaps two or maybe four days to recover from the procedure. It's hard to say how long the healing part will take with any certainty. A few weeks at the very least, half a year at the longest, but most likely somewhere toward the middle.
"We anticipate the initial phase will move quickly. We have some tricks up our sleeve to get you a jump start even with your core effectively disabled. The wound itself should heal within a week I'd imagine, but the lingering curse will take longer to work out of your system, even with its power source, your magic, disabled. Essentially, your body will need to replace the cursed tissue naturally over time. Once it's all done, your core should bounce back to its full strength within another month after we reverse the procedure, give or take a bit."
"And the procedure itself?" Hermione pressed.
"We implant a small alchemical device into his brain."
Hermione was suddenly lightheaded. The three healers immediately noticed her take on an ashen coloration, and Milly was close by her side, offering her support. Erica came around to stand next to Milly. Her presence was… Surprisingly comforting. Almost unnaturally so. The edges of a question about that formed in Hermione's mind, but was interrupted.
Harry, somehow, was holding it together far better than she was. "Hermione, stay with us here. It'll be okay." He tried to reassure and calm her.
"Unfortunately," Morris added, "action is required soon if we're to stop it entirely before some effects become irreversible." Morris had an almost fatherly look of compassion on his face. He seemed to truly care about Harry and was doing a decent job of delivering hard news gently. "It's spread to your midline, causing the reduced sensation in your legs. I expect that will quickly get worse if we don't act promptly."
Hermione felt numb and wished this was some horrible nightmare that she'd wake up from… She wanted to blink and find herself wrapped up with Harry resting soundly in her arms.
"You want him to let you cut into his brain?" Hermione was incredulous. Harry looked almost numb to the idea. He'd be terrified once it hit him properly.
"It's a pedantic distinction, but actually no. We won't actually cut into his brain at all." He produced a small silver coin from his pocket. "This is just a model, not the actual device." He clarified. "I figured you may wish to see it. You remember seeing his scan earlier, and where his core was, right up front here?" He pointed to his forehead and the two of them nodded.
"Basically, we snugly tuck this device into the natural gap between the hemispheres of his brain, right where his core is centered. The device will absorb or block any magical energy there, and function indefinitely until we remove it."
He tossed her the coin. It was less than 2cm in diameter, and quite thin. A fine, repeating pattern of runes covered its surface. She recognized all of them and what they stood for. Isa ᛁ, a forced period of pause before renewal; Hagalaz ᚺ, temporary difficulties or delay, destruction and renewal; Kenaz ᚲ, controlled energy; and Uruz ᚢ, life force.
"What are the risks involved with the procedure?" He asked, resigning to the idea that this was his only option. Hermione handed him the coin-like device and he examined it.
"Standard surgical risks, for the most part, swelling, infection, and the like-"
"And recovery?" She asked quickly.
"A few days, but… It's important you understand the risks that are standard, that we regularly treat easily with a potion or a spell, are going to be more significant an issue in this case."
Hermione's eyebrows furrowed for a moment before she realized. "Because his magic won't be there to help them work." She sounded hollow as she said the words.
Morris nodded.
"When do we do it?" Harry asked, with his steely determination once more returning to his eyes.
"It will take a few hours to prepare the implant and some other things, and we'll need to collect a sample of blood to key it to. I think it would be wisest to go as soon as possible, probably this afternoon."
"Alright then. Let's get this over with." Harry said seriously. "What do you need to get a blood sample?"
"Nothing much." The healer replied.
He gestured for harry to hold out his hand and produced a tiny vial. He put it top down on the tip of Harry's middle finger and tapped his wand to the bottom of the inverted vial.
Harry felt a brief stinging pinch and in an instant, the vial was full and Harry's finger was healed.
"I'm going to go get the preparations taken care of. I'll see you in a few hours." Morris said with a wan smile as he left the room.
A few moments passed in quiet contemplation before Harry broke the silence.
"I'll be okay." He said it to Hermione, but his tone suggested he was working to convince himself as well.
"Is there anything you two need at all?" Erica asked, and Milly nodded to mirror her sentiments.
"You both knew, right?" Hermione asked.
Milly nodded again. "We did. We wanted to be here to offer any help we could. This is scary business, I know, and we didn't want you two to face it alone and unsupported."
"Thank you for that." Harry said seriously. "But I think we're okay for now."
"We are close by if you need us." Milly said what a look at both of them as she made her way to the door. Erica hesitated a few moments. "Have you two talked about the letter yet?"
"What? No. Why?" Hermione hadn't expected such a non sequitur from Erica at that moment, but before she could answer her, it hit her. "Oh…" she sat back and stared up at the ceiling, tears streaming down her face. "He did something, didn't he?"
In response, Erica looked expectantly at Harry.
"No, we were just getting to that before you came in. I didn't know you'd be aware of all of that."
"Not all of it, Harry. Only the parts relevant to my duties."
He stared blankly at her for another moment before it hit him. "Oh... Right. Suppose that might be important today."
"Can one of you please tell me what the hell it is you're talking about? I'm right here." Hermione was on edge and the subtexts she wasn't privy to were becoming too much for her.
"I'll leave the two of you to it." Erica said, making her exit.
—X—X—X—
No sooner had Erica left than Hermione threw herself over to Harry. She clung to him as though he were a raft in the ocean, and she couldn't swim.
"Hey, hey… It's alright, I'm here." He whispered, as she started to cry again.
"Why can't all of this just be over already? I want it done and behind us."
"I know, I do too. It won't be much longer now, though." His calm was out of place, but it soothed her, regardless.
After a few moments, she calmed down.
"When we're out of here we can go to Grimmauld and settle in for a bit. I know it's been rather dingy and you don't love it there, but it's mine, we'll have it to ourselves, and it's here in London. I've asked Shack to use my account to hire a crew to sort it out. It should be nice by the time I'm out of here. You're obviously welcome to go there whenever. I don't think you'll need to be in here as long as me."
"That sounds lovely, but if you think I'm leaving one minute before you do, you're mad, and I'm telling Morris to sort that out too while he's in there." She said, holding him tightly.
"Do I need to remind you," he said with a grin, "there's a library full of rare- Ow! Did you just flick me?"
"You'll not get rid of me so easily with promises of interesting old books, you prat." She rubbed the spot she'd flicked his arm.
"Wow, you're like, really into me or something, then." She gave him a contented sigh and hummed in the affirmative.
She was smiling again. "Mission accomplished." He thought to himself.
"We should probably finally discuss Christmas Eve, yeah?" Harry asked once she'd relaxed a little.
"Good idea… What did you do, Harry? What was that letter?"
"I took the necessary steps to ensure that you would be taken care of, regardless of what happened or didn't happen to me."
"But what did you do, Harry?"
"It's no secret I don't have an heir or brother or sister, or anything. I'm the last Potter."
She thought for a moment, before whispering, "You did not." Shock was clear in her reaction.
She picked herself up and shifted to sit with her legs crossed beneath her, facing him.
"I made arrangements to give it all to you, Hermione. Everything. And while it wasn't exactly official, I imagine if Erica knows anything at all about it, it was official enough... I included a note with some thoughts as to how you might divide things up."
"Harry. James. Potter." She was more shocked than anything.
"Come to think of it, how do patients get post in here? Given how I spent my Sunday morning, you might be one of the richest witches in England by now." He grinned at his own joke.
She swatted him playfully. "Wait, richest witch in England? What on earth are you talking about?"
"Well, my family line goes back nearly a thousand years. I've only ever seen one vault, but it was full to the brim and I wouldn't be surprised to learn there is more. It's been nearly twenty years since anyone has been in them really, aside what little I took for school supplies, and to say the goblins are excellent investors is an understatement. I was still underage the last time I went to the bank. I think now that I'm considered an adult, some inheritance things might take effect."
"And you gave everything to me? What about the Weasley's? What about..." She didn't finish her thought as the scope of what he'd done for her came into focus. To call her stunned would have been an understatement.
"Well, at the time, I wasn't feeling particularly keen on the Weasleys, given Ron's disposition just then. I'd been thinking about it for a long time, but it was him leaving that prompted me to actually act on it…"
That bit of information hit her like a train. She'd certainly been distraught when Ron had left, worrying about what it meant for their mission, sure. But that it immediately moved Harry to make solid arrangements for things after his death, was on another level entirely. She felt more than a small surge of anger toward her friend at that.
Harry continued, perhaps not noticing her look of shock. "Even so, there was a bit in the note. I wanted you to use your best judgement to take care of them, and..." He stopped to wipe his eye "And T-Teddy and his parents, and a few others."
"Without even talking to me about it?" She whispered, still shocked.
"Please don't be mad. This was all done before, and we are on the same page now. I'm telling you so that we can clear the air and move forward, yeah?"
"Okay, Harry. That's fair. I'm not mad, really, I'm sorry. I still just feel bad about all of this."
"I know… We already discussed my mindset at the time, and I'm still sorry I kept it from you, but this was also sort of part of all that. If I'd have gone on about estates and wills and trustees and the like, you'd have figured I'd given up. But I just really wanted to make sure you were going to be set for at least a few lifetimes, and that my family's wealth wouldn't go to the state or the goblins or wherever unclaimed things go. I figured if it ever went into effect, I wouldn't be around... I thought I had to be strong..."
"Did you say trustee?"
"There's nobody I trust more, Hermione." He said with a smirk.
"Hilarious, Harry. But I think that means a bit more than a steward of the estate in the wizarding world."
"It does, I'm afraid." He said, giving her a regretful glance. "Remember, at the time, I didn't even think I'd be here to have this conversation with you, so I didn't think this would ever be an issue."
She nodded at him and took his hand in hers.
"But yes, the full on transfer I did doesn't just give you power over my things if I were to die, but over me if I am incapacitated."
"Harry-"
"I know. It's not something you want, I'm sure. Though, even if I didn't mean for this at the time, now that we're here, I don't mind it. There is absolutely nobody I trust more than you. Certainly nobody who knows me better or has better judgement." His piercing green eyes were as honest as they'd been when he first told her he loved her. "But I understand it's a lot, and we're both maybe not in a good place right now. If you'd prefer, I can try to transfer that aspect of things to someone else before… Though, I'm not certain who."
Hermione was still working through some of this new information. Not that she'd ever had a modicum of doubt about his position when it comes to her, but if she did, it would have been thoroughly annihilated by this revelation. She didn't particularly want the immense responsibility of making any decisions about his care, but also she didn't love the idea of anyone else being in that position. It being her meant that she wouldn't need to worry about anyone else causing them problems or doing something she disagreed with.
"I'm… Shocked, obviously, but also sort of flattered." She admitted, forcing herself not to repeat how she wished he'd told her so many things since before Christmas. She was still hurting over his decision to hide all of this away from her. "I'll do whatever it takes to get us through this."
Harry smiled and put a hand on her knee.
"There is one last sort of morbid thing I want to say, though I hope it won't become relevant for a very, very long time." He looked at her seriously.
"Nothing is going to go wrong, Harry." She reassured him, as well as herself.
"I agree, but if it does… I need you to know that I do not want to linger. I do not wish to spend the next hundred or more years in a bed, unable to think or care for myself." He hated himself for the look on her face as he said it. "Do you understand what I am saying?"
She did. He was asking her to let him go in the event that something went terribly wrong today. The thought coursed through her like basilisk venom. Though, she had to admit, if it were her in his position, she'd have very similar wishes.
"It won't come to that, but I do understand. You just make sure you come back to me."
"I died, and it didn't stop me from coming back to you, Hermione. You brought me back. This will be nothing at all." He smiled at his feeble attempt at levity.
When she gave him a curious look and didn't smile, he grinned a bit and asked, "Too soon?" She nodded, and he gestured for her to come down to him again.
Starting to, she hesitated as she noticed again something she had seen but hadn't acknowledged a few times.
She hovered over him, looking not quite at his eyes, but at his glasses.
"Harry, your lens is cracked."
"It is."
"Why haven't you bothered to learn that bloody spell yet?" She chastised him jokingly.
"Well, you see… There's this girl." He smiled at her as he said it. She did too, but it faltered into a sad look of pain in an instant.
"I should…" the words caught in her throat, "You should have someone tend to that."
"Erica already offered. I asked her not to, Hermione." He reached up and wiped a tear from her eye.
"But we both know I can't anymore…" Her eyes were glistening, and she tried to look away, but he still had his hand on her cheek, and didn't let her.
"You will, though. I know it." He smiled encouragingly, "And until then, my glasses will stay as they are. Maybe then I'll let you teach me that spell."
She sighed and settled into her favorite spot with her head on his shoulder, and the room fell silent again. "…But probably not." He added, grinning, and she snorted out a small laugh.
"What did you mean just then, 'I brought you back'?" Hermione asked after he tucked her comfortably back onto his shoulder.
He breathed out deeply. "That's… I'm sorry, I shouldn't have gone there. It's related to that thing I'm not quite sure how to talk about."
"Oh… Okay." She sounded a bit let down by that explanation.
"I hope to tell you all about it sometime soon, yeah?"
"I'm looking forward to it." Her mind was racing, but she didn't want to push him for more information. "Good…" he signed contemplatively. "Just know that I love you more than I can really put into words, Hermione."
"I love you too."
—X—X—X—
Meanwhile, in an affluent muggle neighborhood in Kensington, there was a knock on a door.
A middle-aged man opened his front door, holding a cup of tea.
"Good morning, how can I-" his sleepy eyes settled on the men on his doorstep. There were four of them. "I see. Come in, Morris."
"No time, I'm afraid." Morris said darkly. He was flanked by three aurors in muggle gear, trying their best to look inconspicuous. They weren't doing well at it.
"What's up with the goons? It's a high-profile patient you need my assistance with, then?" The man asked.
"If you call your desk, I have reason to believe that your calendar has been cleared for the day, John."
"So it's like that, is it?" A weary smile peeked above his cup of earl grey.
"It is."
"What's to say I'm not inclined to hit the links if I'm suddenly free all day?" John asked with a mischievous smile. It wasn't a choice for him, he was nearly compelled to give the man a hard time. It was something of a joke between the two of them.
"Spare your clubs the embarrassment and come with me to do something you're actually good at today." Morris grinned. "It is an interesting case for certain; the patient is a young celebrity… And a recent war hero."
"You're joking."
"Do you want to help me save Harry Potter's life, or not?" Morris gave a victorious smirk.
John's warm mug fell from his hands in his shock, and it shattered across the floor. "Shit!"
He immediately squatted down, gingerly picking up sharp shards of ceramic covered in hot tea.
"Let me try mine, John. I don't need you damaging your hands this morning." Morris unsheathed his wand and flicked it idly. The mug rapidly reassembled itself, and the floor was instantly dry. "You may need to brew another cup, though."
John stood up, about a head taller than Morris, and failed even given that to look imposing. "Show off."
"Only sometimes." Morris replied with a smile. "Can you be ready in ten?"
—X—X—X—
You gotta swim, swim for your life Swim for the music that saves you When you're not so sure you'll survive You gotta swim and swim when it hurts The whole world is watching You haven't come this far to fall off the earth
You gotta swim, swim in the dark There's no shame in drifting Feel the tide shifting and wait for the spark Yeah, you gotta swim, don't let yourself sink Just find the horizon I promise you, it's not as far as you think The currents will drag us away from our love Just keep your head above
Artist: Jack's Mannequin Track: Swim Album: The Glass Passenger