A/N: Ok, all, here is the final month! An early Thanksgiving present from me to you! I really want to thank everyone for bearing with me while I found my rhythm with this story, which I know is different enough from my usual writing that it probably doesn't suit everyone's tastes. Thank you again for all your support!
December:
On the 3rd, Hermione dreamed of the Final Battle, and woke up with visions of fire and blood and death burned into her eyes, like the phantom aftermath of a camera flash. She pulled a sheet around her shoulders and dashed barefoot down the hall to Draco's room. He was sitting by the window, looking out at the darkness, as if he had been waiting for her all along. She went to him, pressed her face into his neck while his arms banded around her like an anchor, like a touchstone. "Lie to me, Draco," she whispered. "I need you to lie to me tonight." He pulled back long enough to search her face, but he did not insult her by asking if she was sure. He led her over to the bed, laid her down upon in, and in between kisses he said, "Everything will be alright. The Great Battle is far off, and we are ready for it. We will win. We will survive. When it is over, we will be whole and happy, and things will be normal. Everything will be alright."
On the 10th, Draco and Hermione had a screaming row that had started over nothing but which soon came to be about everything. She was shouting and crying, and he was storming around, moving his arms wildly and barking hateful rebukes to her fury. At the pinnacle of their row, Hermione fairly screamed that she hated him and he rounded on her and yelled back, "I hate you, too! This is YOUR fault!" "What is?" she snapped angrily, too consumed by her unfocused fury to notice that his voice had cracked, wavered, changed. He grabbed her by the upper arms and all but shook her. "I was ready!" he shouted into her face. "I was ready to die, and then YOU had to go and change everything, and now I DON'T THINK I CAN DO THIS!" He seemed to deflate, until, instead of a towering, fierce warrior, he stood before her a frightened, thin boy, his head bowed in grief. "I'm not ready to leave you, and I HATE you for it." She felt her own anger dissipate like ash and smoke, and she clutched his arms as he was clutching hers, her grasping fingers skeletal and nearly grotesque. As soon as she did, a dry painful sound, a sob but not a sob, was wrenched from his throat. He sank to his knees and she went with him, and she held him while he trembled and shook and refused to cry, wondering what cruel god would see fit to feed a tyrant's war with the lives of children, and who would so often allow the hardest thing and the right thing to be one and the same.
On the 14th, on the eve of the Final Battle, Hermione didn't sleep at all. Instead, she sat up through the night with Harry and Ron, talking. They talked about holidays at the Burrow and Hogsmeade weekends, about the DA and the Fred and George's pranks. They told stories about Hagrid and Ginny and Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood, and never spoke of how they'd died. They laughed at old pictures, and teased each other about the various embarrassments of adolescence that are remembered with such rueful affection with a few years distance between them. For a while, they were seventeen, and Ron was not blind and scarred and Hermione was not gaunt and pallid and Harry was not afraid that he would die tomorrow and take the world with him. It was a fleeting, fragile night and it was over too quickly, but it was enough. It had to be.
On the 19th, Harry Potter killed Lord Voldemort. Hermione survived. When it came right down to it, that was all she would remember of that monumental day: that she had lived through it. It was the one scenario she had never considered.
On the 21st, after the wounded had been tended and everyone had had time to rest, a celebration party was thrown at Number 12 Grimmauld Place. Hermione went upstairs to ask Draco if he wanted to join them, and found him lying on his bed, chain smoking in the dark. When she asked him to come downstairs, he scoffed at her. "What is there to celebrate?" he asked with a weariness that chilled her. "It's over, Draco. The war's over," she replied tentatively. His hollow voice echoed out of the darkness: "It will never be over. Only the dead have seen the end of war." Instead of going down to join the party, Hermione crawled into bed with him, curling against his side with his strong heartbeat beneath her ear, wishing he wasn't so bitter, or so right.
Quote:
"Only the dead have seen the end of war" - Plato
A/N: DON'T PANIC!! This is not the end! Remember, I've written a one-shot set on Christmas Eve, which will wrap up the Charon's Gift world with a bit more up than this December entry. However, I have a question for you: Should I really just post the one-shot as the final chapter of "The Year of the Rose," as I intended to, or post it as an entirely different story? It is not written in the choppy, scene-by-scene format of "Year of the Rose," but is much more similar to "Charon's Gift" in terms of style and format. What do you think?
A/N 2: It's official! This is the final chapter of "The Year of the Rose." I am posting the one-shot (now officially entitled "Love Song of Dante and Beatrice") as a seperate story. It is complete, and once I find someone to beta for me, it will be posted. Thanks again for all your support! PS: Anyone have an aspirations to become a beta? It would be one time-deal, just for this one-shot, but any volunteers would be appreciated!