Strange Meeting

Disclaimer: No way am I JK Rowling – I don’t want to be either. Apparently the paparazzi have taken photos of her in bikini on holiday. That’s just cruel….

Strange Meeting

Hermione walked with her arms outstretched, fingertips brushing against the obsidian granite walls which rose up on either side of her. Looking up, she saw the blackness was relieved by an occasional twinkling light. They were not stars, she noted calmly. Stars did not glow red and green.

She did not know where she was. All she knew was that she had escaped the battle. Her last memory was of hurling aside her wand and desperately trying to push Ron’s intestines back inside of him.

No, her mind commanded. Don’t think of that!

So she continued on, slowly moving deeper and deeper into the blackness. Before her rose a titanic archway, covered only in a thin, flapping veil. It reminded her of the doorway they had found in the Department of Mysteries; the one Sirius had fallen through. She hadn’t seen him disappear, of course. She had been unconscious and missed the whole fight. Ron had missed it too, she remembered. Not in the same way, but the brains had incapacitated him…

No, stop! her mind commanded. It is not possible anymore.

Her hands dropped away from the walls, which suddenly expanded out. Dumbly she reached out to touch their comforting coldness again, but to no avail.

Something brushed past her, knocking aside her outstretched arm.

“Move, you filthy Mudblood,” a familiar voice hissed.

She turned her head slowly to see Pansy Parkinson push past her and stalk through the veil. Behind her were other figures, indistinct until they neared her: Seamus Finnegan, Arabella Figg, Vincent Crabbe, Ginny Weasley, Professor Flitwick, and many more she could not name. Aurors and Death Eaters all flowing down together, walking through the arch.

Most ignored her. Some smiled or nodded. Justin Finch-Fletchly reached out a hand to stroke her cheek before pulling away and almost running through the veil.

It was not until she saw Draco Malfoy and his dead smile that she realised she was in Hell.

He stopped. Others continued to flow past him and disappear.

“Granger,” he acknowledged.

“Malfoy,” she returned slowly.

She tried to turn to face him fully, but it felt like she was moving through a vat of honey. She settled for just gazing upon his face. A lone tear ran down his cheek.

“Why are you so sad?” she asked curiously. “It’s quiet down here. Peaceful. I feel … I feel …”

“Nothing,” her childhood nemesis replied. “You feel nothing.”

“Yes,” she breathed out, exploring this concept.

“I feel, though,” he continued. “I feel the waste of my lost life. I mourn that I will never again feel the wind rush past me as I fly; that I will never clasp the woman I love to me; that I will never have a child. I will never laugh with my friends or family, or eat a strawberry again.”

He stopped and glared angrily at the archway before him.

“You ask why I am sad,” he finally continued. “I am sad because I died before I could live.”

Hermione blinked.

“Why don’t I feel that?” she asked dumbly.

“Because, Granger, courage and wisdom are still yours,” he replied ambiguously.

She frowned, not understanding him.

“Ah, Granger. I would my eyes had only the blankness of incomprehension! If I were where you will be, I would pour my spirit without stint.”

“Where will I be?” she asked confused. “I don’t want to leave. Are you a seer?”

His dead eyes gazed at her and suddenly loathing filled his face.

“You do not belong here. This place is for the fallen. You, Mudblood, live. So go, go and live and save their lives too. Your selfish desire to end it all will lead to their deaths.”

“Whose deaths?” Hermione asked, a spark of anger beginning to burn in her chest. “What are you talking about?”

“Go, Granger,” he responded wearily. “They both need you. Oh, and don’t be all Gryffindor and try to choose – you need them both, they both need you and they also need each other.”

He turned and joined the crowd walking to the archway.

“Damn it, Malfoy,” Hermione shouted, before doubling over and clutching at her chest.

As she began to fly back through the corridor of granite, she dimly saw Malfoy’s platinum head turn.

“Try to remember me, Granger, and what I’ve told you,” his voice whispered back to you. “I’ve done you a great service. Live … and name your first boy after me. It will really piss them off.”

Hermione’s eyes opened wide and she coughed into the mouth pressed against her. The hands on her chest released their crushing pressure and just lay there.

“Hermione!”

She focussed on a pair of frantic, green eyes above her.

“Harry,” she rasped out.

“Oh, Hermione,” he sobbed, hauling her up and clutching her to his chest. “I’d thought we’d lost you.”

“If you continue to smother her, Potter, you will.” The snide comment was delivered by a voice as smooth as chocolate.

Hermione gazed over Harry’s shoulder into the black eyes of Severus Snape. In his eyes she saw the stillness of the tunnel, and her eyes reflected her desire to return to the calmness. As she gazed at him, she felt a hand convulse around her breast. Her eyes widened in realisation. Snape’s eyes followed her action, but in shock.

“Your pardon,” he mumbled, trying to extract his hand from where it was wedged between Harry and Hermione’s embracing bodies.

Finally he freed himself and, standing, turned to stride away.

“Wait!” Hermione’s hoarse voice commanded.

Snape stopped, his Death Eater robes swirling around him.

Hermione struggled out of Harry’s arms and, pulling her ripped robe together, used Harry as a lever to stand. Her stance was unsteady, and she almost collapsed before Harry rose up and stood behind her, wrapping his arms about her.

“Don’t leave us,” she implored.

Harry’s body stiffened slightly before he burrowed his face into the sweet curve where her neck met her shoulder.

Snape looked at them with a face devoid of emotion. His hand, however, involuntarily twitched towards them.

“Please,” she whispered.

He did not move; neither leaving them nor giving any indication that he would join them.

Finally, Harry raised his head. Black and emerald eyes collided, and it seemed as though time stopped.

Then Harry nodded and held out one hand.

Severus swooped towards them, enveloping and being enveloped by them. His body started to shake as Hermione wormed one arm around his waist, pulling him in and completing the circle.

And there, on the battlefield, surrounded by the dead, into each other the three poured their spirits, without stint.


Fin


A/n: Bunnies, bunnies it must be BUNNIES. Yes, a rabid plot bunny. You will note it is based on Wilfred Owen’s poem “Strange Meeting”. Basically, I own nothing about this story. I just put the words together. Hope you liked it!!

To GinnyW and JuneW who are amazing, wonderful betas (and so quick - in a good way!!)