Harry Knows #9 - In Which Harry's Tale Ends

or

"Me? I Thought YOU Brought the Marshmallows, Hermione!"

Harry Crane grinned widely, a diabolic expression that looked strangely out of place on his angelic face. Though he sat in the Prime Minister's chair, and rested his feet (bare, of course) on the Prime Minister's desk, he was not the Prime Minister; not by a long shot. He just liked the digs, that's all.

After all, after one has slaughtered the Royal family, the entirety of the Ministries (both magical and mundane), and most of the standing army, a little change of scenery is appropriate.

He'd won; the British Isles were his to play with. Voldemort was dead. Albus Dumbledore was dead. Most of his enemies were dead. Some by his hand, some by his follower's, but a great many by his personal assassin/lover/architect Hermione. And of all those he'd corrupted, swayed, bound to his side and his will, she was the best. His favourite. His toy who could play and dance and command and direct just as well as he.

He didn't love her, of course, at least not in the classical sense. He loved nobody but himself. But he admired her, cherished her, respected her, protected her, and adored her with all that was within him. She opened up new doors for him, and though he himself was brilliant to the point of taking a flying leap over the thin line dividing genius and insanity, sometimes she seemed as far beyond him as he was beyond others. At times, she would startle him with the sheer unbridled prowess of her mind, and at others, she would point out something so blatantly obvious that he would curse himself for not seeing it.

In terms of chess, he was the king, the most important piece, and the leader...but Hermione...

Pawns he had aplenty. Narcissa and Tonks his knights, capable of hooked movements, sidling up and coming at his enemies from where they least expected it. Hagrid and Neville his rooks; powerful, stalwart, but straightforward. Tracey and Daphne his bishops, sliding gracefully across the board to pinion what foes he had remaining and cut off their escape, but Hermione...ah, she was the queen. Powerful, go-anywhere-do-anything.

Knock, knock.

Ah, talk of the Devil and she shall appear.

"Enter, my Queen."

Hermione slid into the room. Gone were the Hogwarts robes of her adolescence, and the mundane clothing of her youth. She'd discovered a fondness for tight-fitting leather clothing, preferring to go her way clad in startlingly brilliant white. He knew that she held more than forty knives hidden on her frame, and was unconcerned.

"Playing the Chess allegory again, Harry?"

"But of course." To the people of his dominion, he was 'God'. To those who opposed him abroad, he was 'Crane', usually prefixed by some combination of 'that bastard' or other epithets. To his closest followers, he was 'Lord Crane'. But to Hermione, he gave the singular privilege of calling him by his Christian name.

"You are my most powerful, most precious piece. I would rather sacrifice all else before I let you fall."

"Naturally not yourself, though."

"Naturally!" Harry grinned widely. She understood him so well! "How goes my Great Work?"

"It goes well. France is suing for peace already. The Delacour girl must have enjoyed her romp with you immensely if she's already managed to convince them this quickly."

"I offered to let you join in, you know."

Hermione half-shrugged. "I was busy with your servant Tonks. And frankly, blondes make me sick."

Harry arched an eyebrow. He'd wondered why she'd never indulged herself with Narcissa or Tracey. "After France's inevitable capitulation, would you like to kill her yourself, then?"

The white-clad young woman didn't so much as blink in surprise. "Is this because of me? Or did you always plan to have her eliminated?"

"Consider it a gift, if you will, but I haven't much use for someone so emotional in my New World. She's a loose end."

"Then I will enjoy ending her myself," Hermione declared. "The Teutonic countries are still holding out, but Austria and the Netherlands are crumbling quickly, as are Italy, Spain, Norway, and Sweden. Switzerland is still maintaining their neutrality."

Harry shrugged and leaned back in his chair. "That's fine. We'll destroy them later."

"An entire country, Harry?" Hermione asked calmly. "That's not going to go over well with the international community."

Harry regarded his lover/assassin briefly, and made a decision to let her in on the True goal of his plan. "Hermione, that's exactly the point."

"What?"

"War. War is the goal!" A strange fire lit in Harry's eyes as he catapulted himself out of the chair and over the desk, stalking around Hermione, who was looking stricken. "The English crumbled. The Wizards crumbled. It was so very, very...boring. Subtlety has its place, but that place is the past now. I want nothing more than The Last War, the one that will immortalise me, make me remembered long after I've gone! Do you know the beauty of it?" He faced the window, arms outstretched. "The earth trembling, the seas boiling, the sky itself burning red! That I had been born fifty years past! These little skirmishes with the Continent have done nothing but to whet my appetite!" He looked over his shoulder at Hermione, his eyes wide with delight.

"I've missed my beautiful war so very, very much. The symphony of screams, the chorus of tanks, the melody of bombs and the thundering drums of artillery! The majesty of men torn apart, the smell of ozone..." Harry closed his eyes and took a deep, shuddering breath. "Pushing, pulling, tearing away this pathetic, useless veneer of 'peace' and encompassing the world in the cleansing fires of endless destruction."

"A legacy that will forever change the world!" He roared, and the windows rattled with his joyful exuberance. He gracefully slid over to Hermione, who was wide-eyed with shock. Leaning close he purred into her ear:

"Now, isn't that something to look forward to?"

He was so close that he had no time to react when her forearm wrapped around his neck, pulled him off balance, and let him hear her sorrowful "No" before his body flashed green and he fell to the ground.

Dead.

Hermione looked down at the body of her lover for a moment, slowly lowered herself to her knees and cradled his head in her lap. Her eyes were wet, something that she'd thought had been lost to her forever as she kissed his cooling lips.

"I'm so sorry, Harry," she said sadly. "You lost your way. Should I have seen it? Could I have stopped it? I don't know. But wait for me, darling," she said, lifting the tiny wand she'd concealed in her hand to her throat, "I'm coming to you. Avada Kedavra."

The world never fully recovered from the slaughter Harry wreaked upon the British Isles, and as less than eighteen thousand native English-, Irish-, and Scots-men remained on the surface of the planet, within twenty years, the UK was absorbed into France. Harry's entire Cabinet and close associates were executed, save for Tonks, who disappeared, and Hagrid, whose mind had been so broken and controlled by Harry's will that he'd simply lay down, gone to sleep, and never woken up the instant Harry died.

The magical world was outed, and serious efforts were made to regulate and police them. Ironically, the Pureblood sympathisers were all dead to a man within eighteen months due to resistance, and all that remained were the 'mudbloods' and 'blood traitors', who rebuilt, and, under the careful eyes of the mundane governments, began to bring the world into a new, golden age.

Hermione gasped and sat up abruptly. The stench of brimstone and fire filled her nostrils, and horrid shrieks abused her ears. She felt...'disconnected', insubstantial, but still real, if that made any sense. She looked around her, to behold a wasteland of fire, ash, and lava. "This is-"

"-Hell, my Queen." Hermione stiffened at the sound of Harry's voice, and slowly turned around. His face seemed sharper, his eyes brighter, his grin more unpleasant than she'd ever seen before. "I have to admit," he said calmly, "you surprised me. You killed me. Oh, irony. The one person I came closest to trusting."

"Harry, I-"

"Shut up." Hermione did, and whimpered. "Betrayal, betrayal, betrayal. By my dearest Queen. Not very nice at all. But!" he said suddenly, "You have done me a great favour, my dear."

"W-what favour?"

"Why, you've given me exactly what I wanted!" Harry crowed, and now Hermione could see that he was different. His body contained angles and planes that didn't make rational sense. "You've given me an endless playground, a whole new reality to conquer! War unending, unceasing, unbending! And now I have all of eternity to make my desires felt." He leered at Hermione. "Not quite how I was planning on achieving immortality, my dear. But then, you always knew what was best for me, didn't you?" He took four quick strides forward and stood above her. He slowly held out both of his hands to her.

"Well, my Queen? Are you coming?"

There was silence and stillness for what seemed an eternity, and then two small hands placed themselves in his.

"Yes."

Fin