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Holy Sonnet No. VII
At the round earth's imagin'd corners, blow
Your trumpets, angels, and arise, arise
From death, you numberless infinities
Of souls, and to your scatter'd bodies go;
All whom the flood did, and fire shall o'erthrow,
All whom war, dearth, age, agues, tyrannies,
Despair, law, chance hath slain, and you whose eyes
Shall behold God and never taste death's woe.
But let them sleep, Lord, and me mourn a space,
For if above all these my sins abound,
'Tis late to ask abundance of thy grace
When we are there; here on this lowly ground
Teach me how to repent; for that's as good
As if thou'hadst seal'd my pardon with thy blood.
John Donne (1572-1631)
On This Lowly Ground
"Harry Potter is dead."
At first, there was only the shock of hearing that high, cold voice, and the words mightn't have been English, for all Ron understood them.
His eyes shot up and down the corridor, but there was no one in sight—only Hermione and the two wounded Hufflepuffs she and he were crouched beside.
Ron felt himself relax before meeting Hermione's frantic eyes.
Her horrified expression hit him like a punch to the gut, and the words finally registered in his mind as something more than just a series of syllables.
His breath was suddenly gone, and the air around him froze.
He stared at Hermione, and the possibility of it seemed to rise up and take shape in the space between them.
The possibility that Harry was—
The time between his heartbeats stretched out impossibly, and when the next one finally came, it seemed to be with the effort of his entire chest, and his body gave a small spasm.
The movement earned a cry of pain from the boy whose broken arm Ron had been gingerly holding, about to ask Hermione to help him heal it.
He let go, much less gently than he should have, and stood, walking towards Hermione as the voice still booming through the castle caught up with him.
"—trying to save himself while you lay down your lives for him."
"He's lying," Hermione whispered quickly. "He's bluffing. It's just a tactic to—"
"We bring you his body as proof that your hero is gone."
"Where's Harry?" Ron said quickly.
Hermione's eyes grew even more terrified. She shook her head and raised her shoulders.
"He didn't leave the castle, did he?" Ron hissed. "He just went upstairs, right? He had Snape's memories, he needed the Pensieve, yeah? He just went upstairs?"
Hermione nodded furiously. "He must have. I—I didn't see him, but … he must have. Where else would he have—"
"Come out of the castle now, kneel before me, and you shall be spared. Your parents and children, your brothers and sisters will live and be forgiven, and you will join me in the new world we shall build together."
Hermione's eyes were wide and bright, and she shook as she spoke. "Ron," she shuddered, "he wouldn't have—without coming to us—he wouldn't have—he wouldn't have—"
Ron stared at her.
He felt a terrible silence seep into his body—and he knew that Harry might have.
Something hot and desperate flared in his chest.
How could he have thought of anything—anything—but finding Harry?
The three of them had come back to the Great Hall from the Shrieking Shack, just to check in before figuring out what to do next.
But then his family had been there, and the sight of them—of Percy and his mother and George and—there was nothing else.
Not until he'd seen Oliver Wood carefully setting down the limp body of Colin Creevey, and he'd looked up, knowing Harry would be drowning in guilt.
He'd managed to suppress his panic, and they'd just about left the Hall when an anguished cry had gone up from somewhere behind him, and a woman had rushed at Neville, who'd just come through the doors carrying yet another broken body.
Ron's thoughts had flown to the others who might still be out there, somewhere in the castle, lying injured—lying dying.
"We can't do anything 'til he's done looking at the memories," he'd whispered. "We'll just be sitting there." Hermione had nodded, her face pale but understanding. "He's safe. He's got his Cloak and the Map. He'll find us when he's done. He'll know where we are."
And so he'd given in to his pathetic need to feel useful, had spent the hour exactly as You-Know-Who had instructed, blindly flitting about the castle, helping anyone he could find, trying not to think about the look on his mother's face or how many more they might lose, once the battle recommenced, if Harry didn't come back soon.
That Harry might not come back at all had never occurred to him.
And now he stood, frozen, staring at Hermione and gagging on that very possibility.
How could he have thought of anything—anything—but finding Harry?
"C'mon," he said, as he turned and strode quickly down the corridor. "We've got to find him." The path to the headmaster's office would take them through the Entrance Hall, and he tried not to think about what might be waiting for them there.
They walked in silence, Hermione hurrying to keep up with his long paces. They passed open and broken windows, and the sounds from outside were impossible to ignore. Triumphant, gleeful sounds of Death Eaters emerging from the Forest.
Ron glanced out at them as they walked, but refused to stop and look more carefully.
"Ron," Hermione whispered, "what if? What if he's—"
"No," Ron said firmly. "It's a trick. We've just got to find him."
"Ron," she said again. He couldn't look at her, but he could hear her clenched jaw and quivering lip, and he knew tears were pooling and probably already spilling from her eyes. "If he's—we've got to remember, Ron, OK? We can't let this—"
"This nothing, Hermione. Come on." He quickened his pace, and she scurried to keep alongside him.
He hurried through the corridors and pushed back the memory of a whispered conversation, the only time he'd ever allowed himself to contemplate the possibility.
"Ron," Hermione whispered, "are you awake?"
Ron groaned into his pillow. "Am now."
"Shh!" she hissed quickly. "I don't want Harry to hear."
Ron sighed and rolled onto his back with a wary glace at the front of the tent. "What's up?" he whispered.
She drew breath as though to speak twice, but didn't say anything.
"Hermione?"
"Sorry," she finally said. "It's just—there's something you and I need to talk about."
"Uh huh?" He tried to ignore his suddenly pounding heart and sweaty palms.
"It's about Harry."
Ron frowned into the darkness, but recovered. "Uh huh?"
"Well, Ron, it's just—what we're doing here is very dangerous, and of course I have every faith that we'll do it, that we'll win—that Harry will succeed."
"Uh huh," Ron said, as a different sort of tension began to build in his chest.
"But, Ron, we three are the only ones who know what needs to be done. The only ones who know how to make You-Know-Who vulnerable. And I think that you and I need to—to acknowledge that there's a possibility that it—that at some point we might be the only two."
"WHAT?" Ron hissed.
"Shh," Hermione rushed. "I don't think that's going to happen. I'm sure—I'm sure that it won't. It won't. But, Ron, there is simply too much at stake for us not to think about it. How we would—what we would do if—if it came down to the two of us."
Bile was rising in Ron's throat now, as it had that night, and he swallowed it down again.
She'd been right, of course.
Somewhere buried in his blind faith—his complete, soul-deep faith—that Harry would succeed, and save them all, he knew, intellectually, that there was a chance, a possibility—that it was not impossible for Harry to fail.
He'd tried to promise that night. Tried to promise that he wouldn't give up, that he wouldn't accept that Harry's—that if the prophecy was fulfilled the wrong way, that he wouldn't accept that You-Know-Who had won.
It was just a prophecy. It wouldn't mean the end of the world, even if it just might mean the end of Ron's.
They hurried down the battered marble staircase into the Entrance Hall, and Ron caught a glimpse through the windows.
The Death Eaters had formed a long line facing the doors, and their vile leader stood before them, wearing his giant snake around his shoulders, the snake that had killed Snape just an hour ago.
The snake, Ron remembered. Right.
"The snake, Hermione. Someone's got to kill the snake before Harry can—"
"NO!"
Ron froze as the sound of Professor McGonagall's anguished scream tore a gaping hole in his chest. The people streaming into the Entrance Hall from the rest of castle seemed to freeze as well.
Without thought, without feeling, Ron pressed through them, needing to get to the doors.
Light from the castle streamed out into the night, and there was Hagrid, with great rivulets of tears flowing down into his beard, dripping from the ends of it.
He was sobbing.
He was sobbing, and he was holding—
"No!"
If his own scream made any noise, he didn't hear it.
He couldn't breathe and his head was spinning and he was numb and he thought he might be sick as he stood there and felt a great wave of something incomprehensible crash over him.
It wasn't—
It couldn't—
But why—
How—
Ron's breaths were coming in short, sobbing gasps, making him dizzy.
Harry.
It was over.
The mere thought of it was unbearable, the mere possibility that Harry was—
There was only numb, disbelieving silence.
Someone was grabbing at Ron's arm, clinging to him. Hermione or Ginny or—he couldn't turn to see who it was, he couldn't take his eyes from the limp figure in Hagrid's arms.
The silence bore into him, crushing his chest and head, hollowing out the space within.
"Harry," he whispered, and the sound of his voice broke the silence.
Everyone was screaming. A great wall of sound was issuing from the crowd as they cried out at the Death Eaters.
Their sound flooded every empty corner of Ron's body, surged through him, electrifying his nerves, nearly knocking him to his knees.
It was overwhelming, the way they screamed.
Ron felt the buzz of the silencing charm fall over the crowd, and then all he could hear was his own heartbeat.
He felt it throbbing against his ribs, felt his entire body contract with it, and went cold with the realisation that Harry's heart was still.
Harry was dead.
Harry was dead.
"Set him down, Hagrid," someone said, "at my feet, where he belongs!"
Nausea shot through him as Ron watched Hagrid set Harry on the ground, and the snake-like man began to stride back and forth next to his body.
Ron stared at Harry, and felt everything he knew shatter and fall away.
Everything was gone.
Everything but the white-hot hatred that flared to life inside him.
Hatred that bubbled and simmered and boiled in his gut.
Hatred for this man, this wizard, this thing that strode before him now, sneering triumphantly over Harry's body.
Voldemort.
Ron's eyes flitted over Harry, over Voldemort, and settled on the great snake.
Right.
Determination seared and branded the inside of his chest.
He may have failed Harry completely, but Ron would be damned if he'd have to face Harry in the afterlife and explain why he'd given up, why he'd let these people die.
Voldemort's silencing charm hung heavily over the members of the crowd, clinging to their screams and suffocating their voices, but Ron could feel their sound building inside of him.
Their determined, angry sound—proof that they were alive and fighting—proof that Harry had not yet lost.
"He was nothing, ever," spat Voldemort, "but a boy who relied on others to sacrifice themselves for him!"
"He beat you!"
Ron's words came like a roar, exploding from him before he knew they were there, and his voice, alone, pierced the magical silence, tearing through it, breaking the charm, and releasing the mighty sound of the crowd.
The explosion of sound didn't startle him, but the flicker of shock that passed over Voldemort's face did.
Shock that appeared and disappeared so quickly, it might not have been there at all.
But when Voldemort's second, stronger silencing charm carried a distinct tremor of frustration, Ron knew.
He stared at Voldemort, with his thin, white lips moving in some new taunt, and felt the pressure of the crowd's resolve rise.
His eyes fell back to the black-haired boy on the ground, and Ron knew that Voldemort hadn't won yet.