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Who: Hermione Granger, Ron Weasley and Harry Potter
Where: The Forbidden Forest
When: 20 July, 2001 - near midnight
Status: Complete

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[waningred]

Choosing to stay out of Hermione's way during most of the brewing so as not to provoke even the smallest disagreement or distraction they couldn't afford, Ron crouched down on one knee and simply kept watch of their surroundings. Resembling more of a feral creature from the forest in cutoffs and bare feet; his long hair, a bright spot of colour that matched the crackling flames, flowed freely over his shoulders and tickled his arms.

Glancing over to the blanket, and the knife, his brow furrowed in brooding contemplation.

"Do you want me to do you?" he asked, referring to the chunk of flesh she would be donating to activate the spell. Ron had already picked his designated harvest spot high up on the back of his thigh - the only real meaty part on his otherwise lanky body - that Hermione would have to cut off for him.

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"I'll need to get yours first..." She said quietly, stepping back from the fire. It popped and crackled as the flames licked around a particularly large piece of wood

[waningred]

Ron could only stare. He could hardly believe what he was hearing. After all the years of bickering over a subject that had torn them apart and set the pitiful remains of the Order on their ears, Hermione Granger decides to get cold feet at the last possible moment. Brilliant.

"Yes you can," Ron snapped as he closed up the space between them and latched his fingers around a slender wrist, jerking the hand holding the knife upward. "And you will because we have no other choice - you said so yourself." The last was spoken with a voice reflecting his anger, frustration, and most of all, sadness.

A choice. What choice did any of them have anymore? Choice got thrown out the window with the bathwater (and the baby) so long ago that it wasn't even worth trying to remember a time when they had any option besides the most extreme ones of all.

Black or white, all or nothing, and no middle ground whatsoever.

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Hermione shook her head, physically denying what he said. How on earth had she turned this far? How on earth had she let herself dabble in such things? She'd become the worst kind of person. She was raising the dead. She was no better than Wormtail or Voldemort...

"I can't do it... what if I've made a mistake? What if he comes back wrong? What if we have to... what if we have to kill him?" Hermione scrabbled desperately to try and find some sort of Gryffindor bravery, but found herself lacking.

She tried to pull her wrist from his hand. This was all wrong and she didn't know where to start and she was going to make it all arse about face and it would be her fault for wrecking everything because she was really just a plain human girl who didn't grow up around magic, trying to make things work.

"I was wrong. I must have been wrong. I can't do this. How could I think I could do this? We can't do this."

[waningred]

"You won't have to worry about killing him," he muttered darkly. And he meant it, too. Because if this ended badly, and the person they hoped to resurrect turned out to be nothing but a twisted wretch devoid of all humanity, there was absolutely no way he'd allow her to lump yet another sin - real or imagined - on her soul. One quick incantation and the problem was solved; and it would never, ever be mentioned again.

He'd see to that much, at least.

"Hermione..." He paused, and loosened his grip, only to pull her so close that scarcely a hair's breadth now divided them.

Breathing in her scent, somewhat masked by the lingering odor from the bubbling cauldron, Ron wished for once that he could be so much more eloquent with his words. "No matter what happens... tonight or any other night... I won't let the world get between us again."