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The Truth About Death	By : Avalon_Sunset Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Hermione/Voldemort Views: 2115 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of the characters or ideas therein. This fiction is purely for entertainment purposes and makes no money.

Chapter List
- 1-The Truth About Death
- 2-Prologue II: Herpo the Foul
- 1
- 2
~oOo~
She felt good. That was really the only way to describe it. It was as if the pathways of her brain had been rapidly unclogged and the thoughts were now flowing through at a completely unprecedented rate. Free from fatigue, free from the feedback of her limbs, free from respiring and digesting, there was so much computing power left for other tasks.
Somehow, despite having no eyes, she was able to perceive her new surroundings. It was unequivocally the waiting room at her parents’ surgery - complete with the rack of old Good Housekeeping and What Car? magazines and a dental floss advert on the wall behind the reception desk. Looking more closely, the text on the magazines was blurred out and she vaguely remembered her Mum telling her about having new chairs delivered last summer. This is in my imagination, then. Of course. She tried the door to the treatment room corridor, then the door to the outside, and was entirely unsurprised to find that neither would budge.
Since nothing appeared to be happening in the ‘present’, Hermione was left to consider recent events. Harry had plainly known something that she had not, and now that her mind was working clearly it was obvious that he had uncovered information in Snape’s memories. Something that made him walk into that clearing with no attempt to defend himself, knowing Voldemort would kill him.
Harry was not suicidal, and neither was he stupid. After eliminating the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. The only explanation was that Harry was convinced of the necessity of his death, and at the hands of Voldemort specifically. Why? The answer provided itself to her, as it had done many times before, but this time the nightmare was real. The parseltongue, the visions… a soul fragment, then. Neither can live while the other survives… And then the full reality hit her.
It was her presence that had caused Voldemort to be killed at the wrong moment. Soul fragments remained. History was going to repeat itself, but this time, Voldemort would know everywhere he went wrong – from the hiding places of the horcruxes to the allegiance of the Elder Wand. And what had happened to Harry after she died, with Bellatrix in a murderous rage not twenty yards away? The likelihood, then, was that the world would not have Harry Potter to help them when Voldemort rose next time.
She might have had no eyes, but it made no difference – on the pseudo-familiar laminate flooring, in a purgatory of some imaginary dimension – Hermione Granger broke down and cried.
~oOo~
A flick of his hand and the heavy iron bolts slid aside, squealing as harshly as their great age would imply. There always seemed to be some kind of renovation going on here, and perhaps the front door ought to be the next project.
Inside the hefty door, a small anteroom served as a place for hanging cloaks. Death shrugged out of his and hung it on the end of a row of almost identical ones. Once upon a time he had tried a little variety – greens, blues, or subtle patterns – but nothing had stuck. It turned out the living had rather a set idea of his professional apparel, and he wasn’t one to deny them a bit of theatre.
Beyond the line of black cloaks, the anteroom opened into the main hall where a fire was already blazing in the giant grate. His place at the long table was set with silverware and the smell of cooking was wafting from the direction of the kitchen. The grandfather clock (a concession to modern technology) read 6.02pm – he always left home at 8 and returned at 6, as if the routine would make the lifestyle somewhat normal. Of course, the time taken to harvest the day’s souls was much longer than those ten hours. It was hard to notice as he flitted across the continents, rarely more than a few seconds in each place, appearing at just the moment he was required.
The notion of time meant very little to Death. Perhaps it was his own immortality, or perhaps it was the nature of his monotonous work, but he found he rarely considered the chronology of the events he witnessed. Consequently, his memory was filled with disconnected snapshots. It was surprisingly easy to forget that not everybody had the ability (let alone the constant need) to travel as freely through time as through space. Surprisingly easy to forget the linear way the living viewed their lives; a journey facing permanently in one direction, in which the chain of cause and effect ran irrevocably from the past to the future and not the other way around.
What had caused the events he had witnessed earlier today? Death remembered the Potter boy – of course – he had been rather expecting to take his soul that Halloween night more than sixteen years ago. More recently, he had become someone he had seen rather a lot of; the incident with the mirror of Erised, in the graveyard at Little Hangleton, in the Department of Mysteries, on top of the Astronomy tower, at Malfoy Manor, on a beach, at Gringott’s, in the Room of Requirement, in the Shrieking Shack… Now he came to think of it, the boy had encountered him more times before the age of eighteen than most people managed in a century.
The story of the forest clearing started long before the story of Potter, than much was obvious. When had he first encountered the Riddle boy? Death flicked past hundreds of memories, the dark-haired man getting younger as the years retreated. There had been so many murders, muggle and wizard alike. Suddenly the answer came to him, and he felt immediately foolish – was he going senile? The first time he had met the boy was in an orphanage, a damp and dirty room filled with blood and sweat and towels and bed sheets. Not an hour after his birth.
The boy had been set on a path of bitterness and destructive ambition since he had first drawn breath. A child of extraordinary magic from the beginning, quite unlike his immediate predecessors. How very amusing that it should arise from a muggle union. If Tom’s father had not been a muggle, how different would he have been? What if he had grown up with his family and not in the orphanage? What if he had had a contemporary as powerful as him?
It must have been something about seeing the Cloak again that had sent his mind spiralling back along sequences of events in quite such an uncharacteristic way. What if this, then, what if that? He was overcome with a rush of excitement, of power, as he considered the endless possibilities.
It had never seriously occurred to Death to meddle in the affairs of the living. The vast majority of it was of no concern to him, and anyway, he viewed himself primarily as a spectator. However, recent events had just seemed too wrong. The chance to modify the outcome to suit him better was far too tempting, once he had begun to entertain the idea of it. And who could possibly mind? Nobody would even know – well, almost nobody.
He was interrupted from his wild imaginings by a steaming bowl levitating past his chest. It came to land on his silver place setting, where a tiny hand was just placing a basket of bread. Only the tips of the ears were visible above the tabletop, but it was enough for Death to recognise his best kitchen-elf.
“Ah! Nifty. On time as always. That smells delicious.” The grandfather clock made a small chime as the hand reached 6.30, and the elf bowed deeply.
“Nifty is proud to serve the master,” he said. Death settled himself in the heavy chair and arranged the napkin on his lap. “Tonight we is having stew of venison and roots, with bread that Flip is making this morning.”
Nifty was wearing a proud expression, by which Death presumed that the young elf Flip was making good progress with his training.
“Excellent. My compliments to both of you.” It had obviously been the right thing to say, for the old elf was beaming.
“Will master be requiring anything else?”
“No thank you, Nifty. You go and enjoy your dinner.” Nifty bowed again before bouncing away through the archway to the kitchens.
The stew tasted as good as it smelled, so it was not long until he had emptied the bowl. Good food was something that he never tired of, though he did tend to go through phases of preferring one taste or another. That reminds me.
Leaving the empty bowl and basket on the table, Death returned to the anteroom and sifted through his cloak’s inside pocket. Avoiding the pile of small change that had accumulated there, he withdrew his quarry: the crumpled card of Gryffindor, and an unopened box.
Another round archway – opposite the one through which Nifty had left – led to a sitting room of sorts, and it was here that Death was in the habit of retiring for the evening. Three of the walls were hung with tapestries but the forth had been recently cleared to accommodate his new hobby. He was enjoying this one, for not only did he have a rather sweet tooth, but it often brought back memories he had long forgotten. He straightened out today’s card and examined the wall.
“Godric, Godric… Ah yes, here, next to… Glenda. What illustrious company. Still, you were always one for the ladies, eh?” The forty or so cards shuffled themselves about until there was a space between Glenda Chittock and Gondoline Oliphant. Gryffindor’s image smiled rather smugly up at him as he placed the card next to its new neighbours.
Seating himself in the chair by the fire, he opened the second of the boxes he had bought today. It was supposed to be for tomorrow, but it had been a rather trying afternoon, and the stew had given him an appetite. The frog made a valiant hop onto the arm of the chair before he caught it deftly. Chocolate. It had become somewhat of a weakness of his, for the last hundred years at least. Every morsel was savoured before he even glanced into the box for the accompanying card.
Herpo the Foul was a Dark wizard living in ancient Greece. A Parselmouth, Herpo is best known for being the first wizard to hatch a basilisk. He is also credited with the invention of many dark curses and hexes which are now outlawed.
Death chuckled to himself. Obviously they couldn’t mention the whole horcrux debacle on confectionary sold to children. As if that was the way to achieve immortality! It was beyond ludicrous! Honestly, if you want to stay on Earth that much, just be a ghost. It’s a lot better than a disembodied soul fragment. It had all been rather embarrassing for Herpo when he finally repented and so passed on – the entire council of Elders had been on the floor from laughing at him. Most of his achievements had rather slipped under the radar after that.
Once Herpo was in his rightful place (the other side of Glenda, in fact) he poured himself a measure of firewhisky from a decanter on the sideboard and returned to his chair. The souls of Potter and of the girl were still waiting for him, so he would have to go back out tonight, but first he needed to finalise the plan. His brow furrowed as he commiserated the amount of effort he now had to use in order to understand the living and their motivations.
The soul of Riddle was tattered beyond recognition, making Herpo look positively sensible by comparison. The fragments Death had collected were being held in wait for the rest, and it now looked like being a long time. He could have been so much more.
From even the most cursory glance at the Potter boy it was clear that prophecy alone had singled him out. His soul – the part that was uniquely his – was startling only for its ordinariness. Without the fragment, Potter would lack any magical empathy with Riddle. In fact, the boy had never displayed any significant ambition for magical ability at all. At this point, the only useful thing to do would be to send the boy on, where he would be reunited with his family. This outcome will be ensured via another route.
Yes, another route indeed – that was where the third soul came in. What a stroke of luck that such a soul had been delivered to him right in that moment. Death considered what he would say to the girl, and what arrangements he would need to make. He needed to act fast, before the Elders could try to stop him.
Sweeping back through the hall and into the anteroom, he grabbed his cloak from the hook and shoved open the door. The evening breeze was rustling a gentle wave through the barley field opposite, and he let the calming movement empty his mind enough to focus on his destination.
~oOo~
She had no way of measuring how long she had been in the room, but it seemed an age to her racing mind. The calm that had come over her immediately following her arrival had been gradually replaced with restlessness until she wanted to scream and beat the walls from desperation.
With no warning, a hooded figure appeared in the doorway and she inadvertently let out a squeak of surprise. This, in itself, surprised her as she did not currently have a mouth; being disembodied would evidently take some getting used to.
The figure had made no further move, but she could sense its amusement.
“Who are you?” she asked. The tone had been intended to display a casual disinterest, but instead came out rather abruptly.
“Honestly,” began the voice – which was male – “Do they not teach any manners these days?”
The question was clearly rhetorical, and Hermione thought better of opening her mouth in response. The man was now looking around the room, though his expression was hidden in the shadow of the deep hood.
“Interesting...” he mused, apparently only to himself. “At least one muggle parent, I presume, given the décor.”
Hermione was too confused to form a cutting remark about the insignificance of one’s heritage, so she merely nodded.
“I am Death, of course.”
There was not much to say to that, since upon reflection it had been rather obvious all along, so she just nodded again. Death exhaled a sigh of weary exasperation.
“It is customary for me to offer magical souls the chance to return, or to go on.” His tone betrayed no hint of his opinion on the matter. She considered the words for a minute.
“Are you asking if I want to become a ghost?”
There was a soft chuckle from somewhere beneath the hood.
“Ordinarily, yes.”
There was a pause in which she assumed he would elaborate, but he did not.
“Then what do you mean?” As an afterthought, she added, “Sir.” Another pause was growing uncomfortably long before he spoke again.
“Seventeen years it’s been, since I first glimpsed the soul of Tom Riddle.”
This remark did not appear to have any relevance on its own, so she had no option but to wait for him to continue.
“Five years ago, I collected a fragment. I waited patiently for the rest to follow, and I have recently been… rewarded. But now the soul is wandering again, and my patience wears thin.”
Hermione had not really considered that her horcrux hunting failure would have upset Death, of all people. Several responses crossed her mind but none seemed appropriate.
“It matters not,” he went on, as if he could hear her internal monologue, “it can be fixed.”
“H-how’s that?” It was hard not to sound hopeful. Death was dangling the proverbial carrot, and they both knew it.
“If Tom Riddle had never made a horcrux, it would never have fallen to your friend to destroy it.”
The logic was infallible, but the relevance of the statement once again evaded her.
“I am sending you back.”
At once her mind was racing, struggling to form the appropriate questions.
“We will meet again, Hermione Granger.”
Panic gripped her; once again the world was dissolving.
~oOo~
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The Truth About Death