All that You Can't Leave Behind, for Literary_Spell
Title: All that You Can't Leave Behind
Author: Lia_Clarissima
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling owns these characters. No profit is being made from this post.
Challenge: for literary_spell
Keywords: chosen, ephemeral, painstaking
Dialogue: “That's not what I expected”
Warnings: Character death, non-explicit sex, angst
Wordcount: 4738
Rating: NC17
Summary: A proposition leads to so much more and Harry learns what he can't leave behind.
All that You Can't Leave Behind
All was quiet in the castle. The halls that reverberated with noise during the day stood in lonely silence. The echoes of pattering footsteps seemed but an illusion. No light shone from within. The candelabras had been extinguished long ago, first in the Great Hall then in the common rooms. No student was still awake to fight off the temptations of sleep. Hogwarts at night was a very foreign place.
A lonely figure darted down the corridors, throwing tentative glanced over his shoulder. The small light from his wand was all that stopped him from falling down a long flight of stairs.
“Steady,” he muttered, catching his breath.
He leaned against the wall, tightening his cloak around his icy body. The cold night air brushed against his face, causing him to shiver. Nevertheless, he continued on, plunging into the darkness.
He chartered his way through the labyrinth of corridors expertly, wending his way through galleries of sleeping portraits and ancient tapestries. He came to a stop in front of a seemingly blank wall and closed his eyes.
Hold on my love, I’m coming for you…
*
It had all started with a note, elegantly written and neatly folded. It spoke of a rendezvous, a secret arrangement. The message had been tantalising, irresistible, something Harry couldn’t pass up, and Draco knew as much.
They were to meet where no one would find them, where no one would dare to follow. They were to meet at a time when the moon was just skirting over the lake, a thin crescent emerging from the horizon. On the witching hour, Harry found himself entering the mythical realm of the Forbidden Forest.
The landscape was still emersed in darkness as shifting shadows flittered about like dancing silhouettes. The sound of owls hooting from their nests mimicked the rhythmic cries of bats on their nightly feast. The scent of dewy grass mingled with the aroma of damp bark, as the nightshades’ leaves unfurled.
He walked on until he reached the clearing of which Draco had spoken. He sensed rather than saw someone hidden amongst the foliage, waiting, listening. He turned at the sudden sound of rustling leaves, drawing his wand swiftly in the process.
“Malfoy?” he asked uncertainly, feeling suddenly foolish for being so trusting, for wandering so carelessly into what could easily have been a trap. He clutched his wand a little tighter.
Upon hearing his name, the figure lifted his hood. Silver-blonde strands fell over his face like a cascade of champagne, the celestial glow bathing his body in an ethereal light. He remained composed as his impenetrable grey eyes drank in the sight of his companion.
“I didn’t think you would come,” he whispered at last.
Harry didn’t know how to respond. “Your note…” he said, the words dying on his lips.
Draco smiled. “I’m glad you’re here.”
Harry swallowed. “Malfoy, I don’t understand. I thought…something might have been wrong.”
The blonde shook his head, stepped closer and, inexplicably, raised a hand to cup Harry’s cheek. “There’s nothing wrong, only I have…a proposition.”
Harry shuddered under Draco’s gentle caress, not wishing for him to let go. His mind whirled with unanswered questions. “A proposition?” he asked weakly.
“I know what you want, Harry," he whispered seductively. "May I call you that, Harry? I can give it to you. I can give you everything you’ve ever wanted, if you do this one thing for me in return…”
Harry’s eyes widened, taking in the sight of Draco’s flushed cheeks and parted lips. He gulped and tried to ignore the stirring between his legs.
“I-I don’t…”
Draco silenced him by pressing a finger gently to his lips. “I know you want me. I can see it in your eyes, feel in whenever you’re near, and sometimes, sometime I can almost hear you in my head. So please, Harry, let me in. In return…”
“In return?” Harry echoed.
Draco lowered his eyes. “My parents…I want, just once chance to speak-”
“No!” Harry pulled away, stumbling backwards. “I can’t, I won’t! I dropped it in the forest and I won’t go back looking for it.”
“Please, Harry, won’t you at least consider it?” Draco asked quietly, and Harry knew this was as close as a Malfoy would ever come to begging. “Sometimes, I miss them so badly it hurts to breathe. You should know what it’s like…”
Harry shook his head, cupping his hands around his ears. It was all so wrong, so twisted, so disgusting. “I won’t do it, Malfoy. I won’t, and you can’t tempt me. It's sick.”
He was already stumbling backwards into the undergrowth when Malfoy called out softly, “Think about it, Harry. I can give you everything.”
*
Draco’s words ate away at him, like a steady stream eroding the edifice of a cliff face until it found momentum to become a raging river. The first time Harry lost all semblance of control was in the Quidditch locker room. It had been a particularly gruelling match between Gryffindor and Slytherin. The score had been tied until Harry plunged dizzyingly after the snitch and caught it between his outstretched fingers. He had watched as Draco dismounted and headed into the change rooms without so much as a backward glance at his team.
He had followed stealthily, like a tiger stalking its prey. He found Draco undressing at the far end of the room, and hauled him into the nearest cubicle without preamble. The belt and buckle had come undone easily enough, and Draco fell to his knees on command. As he shuddered and pulsed into Draco’s willing mouth, he swore that it would be the first and last of such perverse acts. He buried his shame, vowing to find the fallen ring and permit Draco his one visit from beyond the grave. That would be the end of it, he was sure. He had been so sure.
Days turned to weeks and time passed at a dizzying pace. Harry preoccupied himself with classes and quidditch. Evenings were filled with homework and friends, sitting around the comfort of the Gryffindor common room. Life after Voldemort was peaceful, and Harry almost believed that he would, for once, experience what it meant to be normal.
He ignored dreams of grey eyes, parted lips and willing tongue. He ignored the sensations that left him hard and wanting and more often than not, wet and messy in the morning. He ignored Draco’s questioning looks as he entered the Great Hall, pushed aside his bouts of conscience and walked on with his head held high.
Except the ephemeral facade of normalness could never last. It didn't take long for him to give into the sickness. Draco had agreed to meet him in an empty classroom a short walk from the dungeons. Deep down inside, Harry knew it to be the beginning of the end.
Every night, Harry would find his way back to a deserted broom closet or empty corridor. Draco, with his patient smile and questioning eyes, would already be there, waiting. Their hands would explore each other with reverence and curiosity, their tongues dancing to an intoxicating rhythm of lust and despair. They shed their robes with haste, removing the offending articles of clothing with brute force. More often than not Harry found himself mending Draco’s torn robes the next day, under the cover of secrecy and with painstaking care.
Every night, Harry savoured the indescribable sensation of being inside Draco, of moving to a carnal rhythm that only his body could control. He loved the feeling of Draco’s legs wrapped tightly around his waist. He grew hard just thinking about the pink flush across Draco’s cheek as he clutched the sheets to stop himself from screaming out. Harry imagined Draco enjoyed everything as much as he did, though for some reason, he never stopped to ask. The rarely talked.
Draco always dressed first. It was a treat just to watch him work with such deliberate precision. Every crease, every fold was perfectly in place, concealing the motley of purplish, brown bites and bruises that adorned his slim body. It was as if the unspeakable acts of the night had never taken place.
They would go through the same routine of questions that composed of the few words they actually exchanged.
Draco, with his hand on the door handle would turn and ask softly, “Have you had any luck finding the ring?”
Harry would shake his head, sigh and promise to keep looking. Draco would accept his answer and leave the room wordlessly. Later, as he dressed in silence, he would touch the inside pocket of his robes and feel the familiar bulge of the Gaunts’ legacy. The thought would bring a twinkle to his eye. It hadn’t been easy to recover the gem from the forest, and he had nearly passed out from relief in seeing the telltale glint obscured by mud. He would smile, almost maniacally, at the thought of Draco, being entirely oblivious to how close he lay to the object of his desire.
One night, the charade ended differently. Harry had being staring at the ceiling, marvelling at the detailed stonework when Draco’s voice interrupted his revelry.
“You’re never going to find it, are you?”
Harry blinked, confused by the unfamiliar dialogue. “What?”
“You’re never going to find the ring, or maybe you already have it, but you’re not ever going to give it to me.”
Draco was in the same position, with one hand on the door handle. Any moment, he would walk out without a backward glance.
Harry raised himself up on one elbow and allowed himself to look at Draco properly for the first time. There was an indescribable sadness in his eyes that made Harry’s throat constrict painfully. He reached for the ring, wanting to end Draco’s suffering, but faltered upon making contact with the rough stone. He froze at the thought of losing Draco, at being cast aside, at being used up and forgotten. No, he wouldn’t allow that to happen.
“You think that just because you’re the Chosen One, you can do whatever you want, that you can string people along,” Draco went on. “We had a deal, Potter.”
Harry felt as if he had been slapped. Draco had never spoken to him that way, nor called him “Potter” since they’d become intimate. He swallowed, suddenly uneasy.
“Draco, I’m still looking for it. I’m close, any day now…”
Draco grinned wryly. “Any day now…”
The door clicked shut, extinguishing the only candle in the room.
*
It was Filch who found him hanging from the rafters in the Room of Requirements. MacGonagall had cut him down and levitated him to the dungeons, which had become a makeshift morgue since Cedric Diggory’s death. There were no next of kin to notify so the school made preparations for Draco’s funeral. The only Slytherins to visit him had been Goyle, Blaise and Pansy Parkinson. The rest of them couldn’t have cared less. A Malfoy with no fortune and no power was less than a nobody.
Draco’s only other visitor had been Harry who, under the cover of the invisibility cloak, had wept by his side until they carted him away. Harry didn’t go to the funeral. He couldn’t face seeing Draco being lowered into the ground. There was a terribly finality about the whole thing that turned his stomach to ice. Besides, he had no reason for being there. He and Draco had never been friends. In the end, very few were present to say goodbye to Draco Lucius Malfoy, only a handful of staff, some friends and the undertaker. It had been a pitiful affair and one that Harry would like to forget.
Harry had a ceremony of his own which consisted of him burning the last set of robes Draco had left him to mend. He collected the ashes as scattered them in the Forbidden Forest. It seemed somehow befitting, as that was where it all began...
*
A month after the funeral, Hermione found Harry sitting alone in the library. He was terribly thin and pale. He had stopped eating and was slowly wasting away. Until earlier that morning, she and Ron had been perplexed by Harry’s bizarre behaviour and were at a loss on the cause of his depression. Now, as she clutched the leather bound tome, she had a far better idea.
She came to sit beside Harry, who was staring absently at an unopened book. She cleared her throat and said gently, “Harry, can I talk to you for a moment?”
“Sure Hermione, what’s the matter?” he replied softly.
“Harry, I want to talk to you about Draco.”
As she anticipated, Harry flinched upon hearing the name. He turned to look at her as if really seeing her for the first time in months. When he didn’t venture to speak, she went on.
“They went through Draco’s effects yesterday. He didn’t have very much in the end, most of it will be donated.” She paused to considered her next words. “Among the things found was a diary. Professor MacGonagall read it to see if she could better understand Draco's actions, to find a reason. She asked me pass it onto you. Draco might have wanted you to have it. There are things that involve you…”
Her voice trailed off as she battled the tears that threatened to breakout.
“What kind of things?” Harry asked hoarsely.
“Harry, I know what happened between the two of you,” Hermione said, looking at him intently, “and I know that he cared for you very deeply, that it wasn’t all for the chance to speak to his parents. He might have even fallen in love with you.”
“Oh God,” Harry gasped as if choking on air. “Hermione, please, don’t-”
“You need to know, Harry. You need to know that it’s not because of you. He had been thinking of killing himself for months, ever since his parents were murdered by that horrible mob. You were the only person that offered him comfort. You offered him an escape and he was grateful.”
Harry was sobbing inconsolably into his hands. The haunting sound reverberated around the library walls painfully. Not even Madame Pince had the heart to silence him. Hermione cradled him in her arms and allowed him to cry until his tears ran dry. It was almost nightfall when they returned to the Gryffindor Common Room.
Harry, who had been silent until that point, said quietly, “You know, it’s still all my fault.” Hermione bit her lip and waited for him to explain. Harry took a shuddering breath. “If I hadn’t been so goddamn selfish, if I had just given him the ring then he would have spoken to his parents, and maybe gotten some closure. Maybe he’d still be alive…” He laughed bitterly. “I just wanted him so badly that I would have done anything to keep him…”
“Will you do anything to get him back?”
Harry’s head snapped up in surprise. He stared at Hermione, wide-eyed and desperate. “What do you mean Hermione, what do you know? I’d do anything to get him back, anything.”
She paused to consider this, then without hesitation, removed the golden locket from around her neck. She looped it around Harry’s neck as she had done so many years ago.
Harry looked down and gasped in shock. “Hermione! That’s-”
“A Time Turner, yes.”
“But I thought they were all destroyed.”
“All except one,” she said with a small grin.
“It wasn’t what I expected when you said…”
“Well, just don’t tell anyone I gave this to you. Remember, you have one chance and you can’t be seen. Half a turn ought to do it. Good luck, Harry.”
She hugged him tightly and watched as he disappeared into the night.
A moment later, Harry walked in through the Common Room door...
~Fin ~
Author: Lia_Clarissima
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling owns these characters. No profit is being made from this post.
Challenge: for literary_spell
Keywords: chosen, ephemeral, painstaking
Dialogue: “That's not what I expected”
Warnings: Character death, non-explicit sex, angst
Wordcount: 4738
Rating: NC17
Summary: A proposition leads to so much more and Harry learns what he can't leave behind.
All that You Can't Leave Behind
All was quiet in the castle. The halls that reverberated with noise during the day stood in lonely silence. The echoes of pattering footsteps seemed but an illusion. No light shone from within. The candelabras had been extinguished long ago, first in the Great Hall then in the common rooms. No student was still awake to fight off the temptations of sleep. Hogwarts at night was a very foreign place.
A lonely figure darted down the corridors, throwing tentative glanced over his shoulder. The small light from his wand was all that stopped him from falling down a long flight of stairs.
“Steady,” he muttered, catching his breath.
He leaned against the wall, tightening his cloak around his icy body. The cold night air brushed against his face, causing him to shiver. Nevertheless, he continued on, plunging into the darkness.
He chartered his way through the labyrinth of corridors expertly, wending his way through galleries of sleeping portraits and ancient tapestries. He came to a stop in front of a seemingly blank wall and closed his eyes.
Hold on my love, I’m coming for you…
*
It had all started with a note, elegantly written and neatly folded. It spoke of a rendezvous, a secret arrangement. The message had been tantalising, irresistible, something Harry couldn’t pass up, and Draco knew as much.
They were to meet where no one would find them, where no one would dare to follow. They were to meet at a time when the moon was just skirting over the lake, a thin crescent emerging from the horizon. On the witching hour, Harry found himself entering the mythical realm of the Forbidden Forest.
The landscape was still emersed in darkness as shifting shadows flittered about like dancing silhouettes. The sound of owls hooting from their nests mimicked the rhythmic cries of bats on their nightly feast. The scent of dewy grass mingled with the aroma of damp bark, as the nightshades’ leaves unfurled.
He walked on until he reached the clearing of which Draco had spoken. He sensed rather than saw someone hidden amongst the foliage, waiting, listening. He turned at the sudden sound of rustling leaves, drawing his wand swiftly in the process.
“Malfoy?” he asked uncertainly, feeling suddenly foolish for being so trusting, for wandering so carelessly into what could easily have been a trap. He clutched his wand a little tighter.
Upon hearing his name, the figure lifted his hood. Silver-blonde strands fell over his face like a cascade of champagne, the celestial glow bathing his body in an ethereal light. He remained composed as his impenetrable grey eyes drank in the sight of his companion.
“I didn’t think you would come,” he whispered at last.
Harry didn’t know how to respond. “Your note…” he said, the words dying on his lips.
Draco smiled. “I’m glad you’re here.”
Harry swallowed. “Malfoy, I don’t understand. I thought…something might have been wrong.”
The blonde shook his head, stepped closer and, inexplicably, raised a hand to cup Harry’s cheek. “There’s nothing wrong, only I have…a proposition.”
Harry shuddered under Draco’s gentle caress, not wishing for him to let go. His mind whirled with unanswered questions. “A proposition?” he asked weakly.
“I know what you want, Harry," he whispered seductively. "May I call you that, Harry? I can give it to you. I can give you everything you’ve ever wanted, if you do this one thing for me in return…”
Harry’s eyes widened, taking in the sight of Draco’s flushed cheeks and parted lips. He gulped and tried to ignore the stirring between his legs.
“I-I don’t…”
Draco silenced him by pressing a finger gently to his lips. “I know you want me. I can see it in your eyes, feel in whenever you’re near, and sometimes, sometime I can almost hear you in my head. So please, Harry, let me in. In return…”
“In return?” Harry echoed.
Draco lowered his eyes. “My parents…I want, just once chance to speak-”
“No!” Harry pulled away, stumbling backwards. “I can’t, I won’t! I dropped it in the forest and I won’t go back looking for it.”
“Please, Harry, won’t you at least consider it?” Draco asked quietly, and Harry knew this was as close as a Malfoy would ever come to begging. “Sometimes, I miss them so badly it hurts to breathe. You should know what it’s like…”
Harry shook his head, cupping his hands around his ears. It was all so wrong, so twisted, so disgusting. “I won’t do it, Malfoy. I won’t, and you can’t tempt me. It's sick.”
He was already stumbling backwards into the undergrowth when Malfoy called out softly, “Think about it, Harry. I can give you everything.”
*
Draco’s words ate away at him, like a steady stream eroding the edifice of a cliff face until it found momentum to become a raging river. The first time Harry lost all semblance of control was in the Quidditch locker room. It had been a particularly gruelling match between Gryffindor and Slytherin. The score had been tied until Harry plunged dizzyingly after the snitch and caught it between his outstretched fingers. He had watched as Draco dismounted and headed into the change rooms without so much as a backward glance at his team.
He had followed stealthily, like a tiger stalking its prey. He found Draco undressing at the far end of the room, and hauled him into the nearest cubicle without preamble. The belt and buckle had come undone easily enough, and Draco fell to his knees on command. As he shuddered and pulsed into Draco’s willing mouth, he swore that it would be the first and last of such perverse acts. He buried his shame, vowing to find the fallen ring and permit Draco his one visit from beyond the grave. That would be the end of it, he was sure. He had been so sure.
Days turned to weeks and time passed at a dizzying pace. Harry preoccupied himself with classes and quidditch. Evenings were filled with homework and friends, sitting around the comfort of the Gryffindor common room. Life after Voldemort was peaceful, and Harry almost believed that he would, for once, experience what it meant to be normal.
He ignored dreams of grey eyes, parted lips and willing tongue. He ignored the sensations that left him hard and wanting and more often than not, wet and messy in the morning. He ignored Draco’s questioning looks as he entered the Great Hall, pushed aside his bouts of conscience and walked on with his head held high.
Except the ephemeral facade of normalness could never last. It didn't take long for him to give into the sickness. Draco had agreed to meet him in an empty classroom a short walk from the dungeons. Deep down inside, Harry knew it to be the beginning of the end.
Every night, Harry would find his way back to a deserted broom closet or empty corridor. Draco, with his patient smile and questioning eyes, would already be there, waiting. Their hands would explore each other with reverence and curiosity, their tongues dancing to an intoxicating rhythm of lust and despair. They shed their robes with haste, removing the offending articles of clothing with brute force. More often than not Harry found himself mending Draco’s torn robes the next day, under the cover of secrecy and with painstaking care.
Every night, Harry savoured the indescribable sensation of being inside Draco, of moving to a carnal rhythm that only his body could control. He loved the feeling of Draco’s legs wrapped tightly around his waist. He grew hard just thinking about the pink flush across Draco’s cheek as he clutched the sheets to stop himself from screaming out. Harry imagined Draco enjoyed everything as much as he did, though for some reason, he never stopped to ask. The rarely talked.
Draco always dressed first. It was a treat just to watch him work with such deliberate precision. Every crease, every fold was perfectly in place, concealing the motley of purplish, brown bites and bruises that adorned his slim body. It was as if the unspeakable acts of the night had never taken place.
They would go through the same routine of questions that composed of the few words they actually exchanged.
Draco, with his hand on the door handle would turn and ask softly, “Have you had any luck finding the ring?”
Harry would shake his head, sigh and promise to keep looking. Draco would accept his answer and leave the room wordlessly. Later, as he dressed in silence, he would touch the inside pocket of his robes and feel the familiar bulge of the Gaunts’ legacy. The thought would bring a twinkle to his eye. It hadn’t been easy to recover the gem from the forest, and he had nearly passed out from relief in seeing the telltale glint obscured by mud. He would smile, almost maniacally, at the thought of Draco, being entirely oblivious to how close he lay to the object of his desire.
One night, the charade ended differently. Harry had being staring at the ceiling, marvelling at the detailed stonework when Draco’s voice interrupted his revelry.
“You’re never going to find it, are you?”
Harry blinked, confused by the unfamiliar dialogue. “What?”
“You’re never going to find the ring, or maybe you already have it, but you’re not ever going to give it to me.”
Draco was in the same position, with one hand on the door handle. Any moment, he would walk out without a backward glance.
Harry raised himself up on one elbow and allowed himself to look at Draco properly for the first time. There was an indescribable sadness in his eyes that made Harry’s throat constrict painfully. He reached for the ring, wanting to end Draco’s suffering, but faltered upon making contact with the rough stone. He froze at the thought of losing Draco, at being cast aside, at being used up and forgotten. No, he wouldn’t allow that to happen.
“You think that just because you’re the Chosen One, you can do whatever you want, that you can string people along,” Draco went on. “We had a deal, Potter.”
Harry felt as if he had been slapped. Draco had never spoken to him that way, nor called him “Potter” since they’d become intimate. He swallowed, suddenly uneasy.
“Draco, I’m still looking for it. I’m close, any day now…”
Draco grinned wryly. “Any day now…”
The door clicked shut, extinguishing the only candle in the room.
*
It was Filch who found him hanging from the rafters in the Room of Requirements. MacGonagall had cut him down and levitated him to the dungeons, which had become a makeshift morgue since Cedric Diggory’s death. There were no next of kin to notify so the school made preparations for Draco’s funeral. The only Slytherins to visit him had been Goyle, Blaise and Pansy Parkinson. The rest of them couldn’t have cared less. A Malfoy with no fortune and no power was less than a nobody.
Draco’s only other visitor had been Harry who, under the cover of the invisibility cloak, had wept by his side until they carted him away. Harry didn’t go to the funeral. He couldn’t face seeing Draco being lowered into the ground. There was a terribly finality about the whole thing that turned his stomach to ice. Besides, he had no reason for being there. He and Draco had never been friends. In the end, very few were present to say goodbye to Draco Lucius Malfoy, only a handful of staff, some friends and the undertaker. It had been a pitiful affair and one that Harry would like to forget.
Harry had a ceremony of his own which consisted of him burning the last set of robes Draco had left him to mend. He collected the ashes as scattered them in the Forbidden Forest. It seemed somehow befitting, as that was where it all began...
*
A month after the funeral, Hermione found Harry sitting alone in the library. He was terribly thin and pale. He had stopped eating and was slowly wasting away. Until earlier that morning, she and Ron had been perplexed by Harry’s bizarre behaviour and were at a loss on the cause of his depression. Now, as she clutched the leather bound tome, she had a far better idea.
She came to sit beside Harry, who was staring absently at an unopened book. She cleared her throat and said gently, “Harry, can I talk to you for a moment?”
“Sure Hermione, what’s the matter?” he replied softly.
“Harry, I want to talk to you about Draco.”
As she anticipated, Harry flinched upon hearing the name. He turned to look at her as if really seeing her for the first time in months. When he didn’t venture to speak, she went on.
“They went through Draco’s effects yesterday. He didn’t have very much in the end, most of it will be donated.” She paused to considered her next words. “Among the things found was a diary. Professor MacGonagall read it to see if she could better understand Draco's actions, to find a reason. She asked me pass it onto you. Draco might have wanted you to have it. There are things that involve you…”
Her voice trailed off as she battled the tears that threatened to breakout.
“What kind of things?” Harry asked hoarsely.
“Harry, I know what happened between the two of you,” Hermione said, looking at him intently, “and I know that he cared for you very deeply, that it wasn’t all for the chance to speak to his parents. He might have even fallen in love with you.”
“Oh God,” Harry gasped as if choking on air. “Hermione, please, don’t-”
“You need to know, Harry. You need to know that it’s not because of you. He had been thinking of killing himself for months, ever since his parents were murdered by that horrible mob. You were the only person that offered him comfort. You offered him an escape and he was grateful.”
Harry was sobbing inconsolably into his hands. The haunting sound reverberated around the library walls painfully. Not even Madame Pince had the heart to silence him. Hermione cradled him in her arms and allowed him to cry until his tears ran dry. It was almost nightfall when they returned to the Gryffindor Common Room.
Harry, who had been silent until that point, said quietly, “You know, it’s still all my fault.” Hermione bit her lip and waited for him to explain. Harry took a shuddering breath. “If I hadn’t been so goddamn selfish, if I had just given him the ring then he would have spoken to his parents, and maybe gotten some closure. Maybe he’d still be alive…” He laughed bitterly. “I just wanted him so badly that I would have done anything to keep him…”
“Will you do anything to get him back?”
Harry’s head snapped up in surprise. He stared at Hermione, wide-eyed and desperate. “What do you mean Hermione, what do you know? I’d do anything to get him back, anything.”
She paused to consider this, then without hesitation, removed the golden locket from around her neck. She looped it around Harry’s neck as she had done so many years ago.
Harry looked down and gasped in shock. “Hermione! That’s-”
“A Time Turner, yes.”
“But I thought they were all destroyed.”
“All except one,” she said with a small grin.
“It wasn’t what I expected when you said…”
“Well, just don’t tell anyone I gave this to you. Remember, you have one chance and you can’t be seen. Half a turn ought to do it. Good luck, Harry.”
She hugged him tightly and watched as he disappeared into the night.
A moment later, Harry walked in through the Common Room door...
~Fin ~