Chapter 38 – Redemption
Harry watched as she stumbled and fell after his spell found its mark. He pointed to a guard at his side, motioned for him to advance, and then gestured at two others to follow the first. They heard screams from behind the protective cover, before the intruders jumped up and ran for the door. A number of spells struck the door, shattering the wooden structure.
"After them, you fools! They can't go very far; the bitch was wounded," the Dark Lord commanded.
The three remaining guards scrambled past the debris, pushing aside the remains of the door. Now confident of his safety, Harry stood and followed his men to the corridor.
In the distance he heard someone shout, "Divide et impera," followed by, "RUN FOR YOUR LIFE!"
He made his way out of the courtroom in time to see one guard wounded on the ground. At one end of the corridor a second guard was chasing a large dog through a set of doors, while another was running in the opposite direction, past several prostrate bodies.
"This way! They ran down here!" the far guard shouted, as he ran though another set of doors on the opposite end of the hall.
Harry ignored the first guard and hardly paid mind to the fallen one as he ran towards the far doors. He passed two bodies. The first was of a man, lying motionless, whom he did not recognize; the second of a woman whom he identified immediately. She lay on her side, her back to him; he could see the charred gash in the black cloak she wore.
He slowed down as he came closer and slammed his boot into her back. She flinched at the contact, but did not utter a sound.
"So, they left you to die anyway? How noble of them," the Dark Lord sneered, as he rolled her over. She was still breathing; he could tell her wound was not fatal. He leaned over her body and grinned, raising his fist one more time.
"Orbis Virium," three voices suddenly chanted in unison.
Hermione's eyes snapped open as the area of ground next to her shimmered and slid away. Two figures sat on her other side; all three held hands, a glow engulfing them. Harry began to pull out his wand, but then felt Hermione's hands grab his face.
He felt a sudden surge from her, which held him motionless, and heard her voice through a growing fog.
"It's over, Harry. I love you too much to let this insanity continue," she said. The other two maintained contact with her, adding their power to hers.
"Orbis Virium," the voices repeated.
Harry felt his inner strength drain from his body, and then a sharp, cutting pain tear through his chest. His blood began to boil in his veins as the intense pain of her mere touch cut deep into his soul.
He tried to scream, tried to pull away.
His body stiffened as the burning turned into ice. The last image he had was a blinding flash, then nothing.
"Orbis Virium… Orbis Virium," Harry and the two Hermiones chanted quietly, as they waited under the cloak. Hermione Potter had used a Silencing Charm on the three of them to hide them, while they prepared.
"Orbis Virium," they repeated, until the cloak slid from them as Hermione Granger turned to face the Dark Lord. Harry and his wife continued to hold hands, maintaining the circle as she reached out to him and held his face.
"It's over, Harry. I love you too much to let this insanity continue," she said, as the light engulfed them all.
Harry vaguely remembered this scene occurring once before; though this time he was on the other side of that force. Hermione Granger and his wife looked at him, as if both in a trance, motionless staring into a blinding flash of light.
He looked at it with them. As the flash drew closer, they both seemed oblivious of the emptiness surrounding them, though he seemed to remain cognisant.
"Orbis Virium" He heard again. This time the chant echoed into his very being, the surrounding glow pulling that light even closer. He looked at his wife once again; her body was gone, and only a brilliant glow of pure white light remained. He looked to his other side to see that same glow mirrored on Hermione Granger. He could still see his hands as he floated forward.
'Mione?' he thought.
'I'm here, my love.'
'I am as well.' He heard from his other side. The two glows on either side of him seemed to blind him; the sensation of touch disappeared, replaced with a warm sensation throughout his entire being.
'Are we dead?' he asked. He glanced down to see four figures locked in a twisted embrace. He could distinctly see where he sat with his Hermione, and where the other Hermione was now rolled on her side, with her hands pressed against another man's face.
His face.
He watched as a distant light emerged from the body the other Hermione was holding; its very soul was being drawn from his other self's being. The glow was distinctly different, not pure white, but grey and dull.
'Darling, are you watching this? It's incredible,' his wife gasped.
'My God,' he thought, 'is this really happening?'
'Yes, but I don't remember this. Harry, there. His soul, do you see it?'
'Yes, it's strange. That streak looks strangely familiar.'
A tormented scream ripped through the consciousness they both shared; a man's face swirled in the light before them. In that face a snake, dark as pitch, was twisting around the man's flesh. Its fangs sunk deep into his neck, pumping its venom into his soul. The man screamed in agony as transparent hands tried to pull the coils from his flesh.
'Harry, that's you, but there's something wrong, ' Hermione thought, her distress tearing into his mind.
He imagined his youth; he thought back to that spell she had taught him.
'Abeo Tegere,' he thought, as his mind sent a brilliant ray of light into the tormented soul of his counterpart. The charge of energy struck the serpent's head, ripping the reptile from Harry Potter's black soul. Harry maintained the surge of energy for what seemed like an eternity, until the fangs were finally extracted, leaving a gaping wound. A flash of the darkest light exploded from the serpent, then slowly faded, leaving behind a faint image which too vanished.
'Harry?' He heard from his side. 'Was that…?'
'I think it was the last of Tom Riddle's soul. It must have infected me, er, him when you died.'
He felt his hand fall free as one side of the glow surrounding him began to dim and drift to the rapidly fading image before them.
He watched as a chestnut-coloured wave of chocolate and strawberry swirled around the fading light. 'Harry, don't leave me!' Hermione Granger screamed inside her mind.
'You still love me? After all I've done?' They all heard faintly.
'I knew it wasn't you. I knew there was some good left,' she cried.
Harry watched, imagining her holding his counterpart in her arms. Harry held his grip tight, afraid to let his Hermione go as they watched the death of his own counterpart's tortured soul.
'Harry, ' Hermione Granger thought to the fading image, 'I never stopped loving you. Please stay with me…'
'I hated you. I despised you for killing Ron and Ginny. How can you still love me?'
'I hated myself for that too, I wanted you to understand. I accepted what you did because I felt I deserved it.'
Two new figures emerged from the mist; 'You punished her, as we both had. But now, we can see clearly she could not control herself.'
'Ron?' the fading image thought.
'We are both still here, now part of her,' Ginny's thought spoke out.
'We are going to have a child,' Hermione Granger screamed to the fading image of Harry in her arms.
'I know,' the other Harry replied softly.
'Harry, hold on, please,'
'I can't. I deserve to die for what I've done. I could have stopped, but didn't,' the fading voice said.
'I won't live without you.'
'Hermione, there's not enough of him left. Riddle's poison consumed him until this is all that remained. He is almost gone,' Hermione Potter thought.
'You have to stay, I won't let you go.'
'Yes, you must, for the child you will love. Goodbye, my love. Please forgive me.'
The image of Harry Potter, the tyrant, dimmed and faded forever from existence.
In his mind Harry listened to the exchange of the two counterparts in their last moment together and saw them together. He glanced back to the four figures below, still locked in their twisted embrace; not a single hair or muscle had moved.
The brilliant glow that surrounded him weakened further; he could now see a figure floating nearby, and another more familiar one right next to him. The distant figure drifted back to them, and Harry sensed a great deal of sadness about it.
"Hermione?" he called out.
"Darling, I'm right here," she said, placing her hand on his shoulder. She was real to his touch; he felt real. He turned to face her and she smiled.
"I can see you?" he asked.
She nodded, "Yes, although I can't explain why. All I remember from the one time we joined like this was the warm, comfortable sensation that everything would be fine."
Harry looked to the other figure now standing before them. He reached his arms out to it, and Hermione Granger accepted his comfort and wept for her lost love.
"What can we do for her?" he asked, as he stroked her hair.
"Support her when we return. That's all we can do."
"And how do we get back?" A new figure appeared from the mist, as Harry posed his question.
"That will happen soon enough. If you please, I'm certain you have questions, and it is time for answers."
"Myddrin?" Hermione Potter asked.
"Yes, I'm glad you remembered. It makes it easier this way. Please, sit," Myddrin instructed, as the mist transformed into a field of green and a gentle breeze warmed them all. Four chairs, carved from the stumps of trees, sat around a table, carved from a single slab of granite. The man that stood next to one of the chairs held his hands out, inviting them to sit.
He was familiar to them all, yet still seemed to be a stranger. His look was different than the last time Hermione had seen him. He looked much younger; his beard was shorter now, though his hair was sill longer and lightly peppered with grey.
As they approached the clearing, Harry, with his wife by his side, continued to support Hermione Granger. Harry got his first look at the man in the periwinkle cloak, his features similar to the description he read from Hermione's writings of five hundred years ago.
"Myddrin?" Harry repeated.
Myddrin nodded, "Yes. Please, sit. We have plenty of time, but I'm sure you all are quite tired after this ordeal."
"Harry, he's real! I wasn't imagining him!"
"But how can you be here? And also be in the past? And in our reality?" Harry asked.
"That is simple. I exist physically in all realities, just as you do. Over time, I have learned how to share my thoughts with my other selves in the other realities, so that I may help when needed. I simply have to identify which self needs my assistance, or which seems interesting to me at any given time."
"Why did you let this happen?" a weak voice asked from across the table. Myddrin turned his attention to Hermione Granger.
"Please understand, I had tried to prevent this, but I can not interfere directly. I had hoped you could have prevented this in the past, but as this history had shown, I was wrong."
"You weren't wrong; it was the timing. It was the unforeseen human elements, which were difficult to control," Hermione Potter stated.
The ancient wizard nodded. "I resisted trying to change your futures so many times. I am bound by my duty to remain unbiased, but I couldn't let the evil of this world succeed."
Harry looked solemn.
"Then you are responsible for her power? And her miraculous resurrection from death ten years ago was also your doing? And you said you can't interfere."
Myddrin looked at the two women, but addressed Hermione Potter first. "You never did actually die, in the strictest of terms. Yes, your heart stopped and you ceased to breathe. And you would have died that day and nothing would have brought you back, if Harry had not pulled the dagger from your chest."
"I barely touched it. It was still in her chest when I took her to the hospital."
"Quite right. It was, however, enough to allow her heart to beat on its own. And she did draw on you and your life's essence to survive. She took only enough to heal the damage to her heart." Myddrin turned to Hermione Granger and added, "Ron, however, had removed it from you."
"So, I do have the ability to draw a soul from someone else?"
"Yes, but unfortunately once that soul has been removed, you cannot reinstate it."
"Then, how did I survive that day?" Harry asked.
"That is one of the great mysteries of life and of love. It should be enough that you did survive, much the same as when Sirius Black nearly lost his soul to the Dementors that night you proved his innocence. I would say it was your pure love for her that kept your soul from leaving. As for Hermione, since her powers are the cause of this bubble between life and death; she was able to survive on her own."
Hermione Potter reached a hand to Harry and another to her stomach.
"Our child…is it…" she began, appearing distressed.
Myddrin chuckled softly, "Your child is safe within you, and will be unharmed by this experience. However, your child," he added, turning to Hermione Granger, "needs more than you will be able to provide on your own. I expect you will survive this pain, and find a way to be happy."
Hermione Granger shook her head, "No, I lost the one person whom I loved."
"Yes, you have lost your first love. But there is a gentler love, one that will warm your heart softly and won't burn away in a wave of passion; a love softened by laughter and friendship, the one that will last. Remember that you must learn tolerance, for one day you may find your greatest foe to be your strongest ally," he punctuated his last comment with a wink to Harry.
She shook her head, "There's no one left who cares about me." Myddrin smiled warmly and held her hand.
"There is someone, I promise, little Hermione. And he's calling you now. He's desperately looking for you. Can you feel it?" She closed her eyes and smiled for the first time in this strange place.
"Yes, I can feel a warm embrace wrapping around my heart. Is that him?"
"Yes, he is waiting and searching."
Hermione Granger looked up and said, "I feel something pulling."
"Don't resist. Follow it, follow his strength. Otherwise you might not find the way back."
"But..." she tried to protest, as her form faded, leaving only the pure, white glow of her soul, which hovered and then disappeared into the green of the forest. Myddrin finally turned his attention to Harry and Hermione.
"Your task here is over, but there are more challenges before you, and one that may prove to be the most trying of all. It will be some time before that task comes to light, but I must warn you both, your daughter's life may well hang in the balance."
"Daughter?"
"Yes, you will have a daughter. When you leave here and return to your physical forms, you must return to your own world and let life find its own course."
"To our own world? Won't the trip through the portal harm our child?" Hermione asked.
"No, neither of you had been properly prepared to prevent passing through safely."
"Prepared? How?" Harry asked.
"How is not important for you to know; should that knowledge escape, the damage would be irreparable."
"Then we are safe to return, and Sirius as well?" Hermione asked.
"Yes," he said nodding, as they also began to fade. "But you must keep the events of these months as a deep secret. Tell no one of the details, or the delicate balance may be lost forever. " His voice faded as his last words were spoken, the green grass dissolved, as did the stone table and tree-stump chairs.
"You know the way back. Follow it…" They now heard in their shared thoughts.
Harry and Hermione returned to their physical forms, to find Hermione Granger cradling her Harry's body in her arms, weeping over him.
She looked up at Harry and Hermione with tears streaking her face. "It really happened?" she asked.
"Yes, now you know why and how he wasn't able to control his actions. He had been battling Voldemort's soul for ten long years," Harry said, as he knelt by her side.
"He's at peace now. You helped him find that. Remember, deep in his soul he still loved you," Hermione Potter added. She picked up Harry's old cloak and draped it over herself and Harry. The wizarding world of this reality would accept the illusion that Hermione Granger had acted alone.
The fall of the Dark Lord was not witnessed by anyone, since the corridor had been empty. But once those ordered to witness Hermione Granger's execution heard her quietly sobbing, they realized the reign of terror was over.
The crowd that began to gather started with those who sought to rescue Hermione; Sirius and Professor McGonagall were the first to return, followed by Caterina and Charlie, and then members of the Elite Guard.
Hermione and Harry drifted close to Sirius; Hermione tapped his shoulder.
"Follow us," she whispered in his ear. The three vanished silently from the crowd.
The door to the Death Chamber lay near the end of the corridor, and no one in the throng of wizards noticed it open and no one saw a single wizard slip through it.
No one noticedthe thin veil flap in the breeze and the slowly stop to hang dead still.
Fin
To be continued in "The Lost Warning"
Author's notes:
To my faithful readers, the next and (hopefully) final segment to this saga will begin after a brief hiatus.