Ginny pulled the wand up, level now with Harry’s chest. Tears of remorse were falling steadily down her cheeks. He put his hands up slowly, shaking his head in fear.
“Ginny,” Harry said, his voice calm and yet shaky, “Don’t do this. You know that if you listen to me, you don’t have to…”
“Ignore everything that they say, Ginny,” Narcissa cackled, “Your ears are now deaf to their voices.”
And though Harry continued to talk, though he and Hermione continued to plead, Ginny could not hear a word that they were saying. Narcissa laughed again, the only sound that filled her ears. She looked into Ginny’s eyes, and nodded.
“Do it, Ginny,” she said, “Kill him.”
Her mouth moved to form the words. The wand was hot and slippery from the sweat on her palms. She felt it slide around in her hand as she raised it higher in front of Harry’s face. He had fallen silent, his mouth now still and unmoving. His eyes, giving the last sign of a plea, gave in as he realized that it was no use. He knew that he would die now. There was no fighting it anymore.
“Which him are you talking about, Narcissa?” came a voice from the corridor. Ginny whipped around, saved for a moment by the two boys standing in the doorway. On the left stood Ron, a broken wand held triumphantly in his hand. Under the crook of his elbow was Malfoy’s head, captured in a headlock that was as painful as it looked. Narcissa’s face contorted in rage. She went to give Ginny another order, but Ron shook his head at her.
“You give one more order to my sister,” he said, stone faced, “and I kill your son on the spot.”
“You haven’t the guts to kill me Weasley,” Malfoy said, and watched Ron’s face fall. It was true, and Ron himself knew it. As the Death Eaters had slept at the camp, Ron had felt repulsed by what he was doing. He had promised himself that he would never again kill another person, be they good or bad. Now, with Malfoy fully conscious, it would be even harder to do such a terrible thing. He tried to recover from his giveaway, tried to keep his face as solid and unafraid as possible. It was of no use. Narcissa had already spotted his weakness. She went to turn around and talk to Ginny again, only to find that two more wands were pointed in her direction. While Ron had distracted her, Hermione and Harry had bent down and retrieved their wands, which had been thrown up against the wall and landed, unharmed, directly behind them.
“Make one more move, Narcissa,” Harry said, “I dare you.”
“Oh,” she said, “well aren’t we the little hero?”
She didn’t look defeated though, and this frightened Harry. Her gaze snapped down onto Ginny again, and this time, a triumphant smirk spread across her face. Harry moved around, his wand still pointed directly at Narcissa, prepared for anything.
“You children can be so naïve,” she said. Within an instant, Ron, Hermione, Harry, and even Malfoy were bound in ropes that seemed to spring out of the air. It clung onto their ankles and hands, making them immobile. Harry struggled to free himself, trying to get to Ginny, but his strength had still not fully returned, and he was soon exhausted. It was a common trick that she had used, one that he had seen once before when Quirrel had summoned ropes out of the air with his mere hands in his first year at Hogwarts. Smiling, Narcissa walked over to Harry. She gave a small, defiant chuckle at his misfortune. Then, she moved her mouth up to his ear. Her voice was small, barely audible to him and not even able to be halfway comprehended by the others.
“Did you honestly think that you could prevail? Beat us, the Death Eaters, when you are merely seventeen? So much for hope…so much for love.”
In that moment, another rope sprung out at him and latched around his waist. This rope, however, wasn’t one of the same make as though around his appendages. It was thick and silver, and had small barbs on it that dug deep into his sides. He cried out in pain, and Ginny got up frantically to assist him, but Narcissa stopped her.
“He is not what you want,” she said, putting her arms out as Ginny wrestled to break free of her grasp. Then, Narcissa led her gently over to the window. Opening it, she looked out over the lake.
“Beautiful night, isn’t it?” she asked, and Ginny didn’t respond. She was frantically looking at Harry, who was seemingly trying to ignore the agony in which he was enduring. Narcissa pulled her face around.
“You are of no further use to me, Ginny Weasley,” she said, and a horrible smile, like that of a demon, spread across her face. Ginny could see that she had gone mad, and she couldn’t stop what happened next.
“Climb up on the ledge,” Narcissa said, and Ginny had to do it. Holding onto the sides for dear life, she felt herself teeter and totter.
“Say goodbye to your friends, Ginny.”
“No…” uttered Harry from the other side of the room, but Ginny still couldn’t hear him.
“Jump, Ginny,” Narcissa said, “Jump now.”
Harry’s screams of pain and horror filled the chamber as Ginny’s feet left the windowsill and she disappeared from sight.
Harry’s stomach rose up into his throat as he watched her fall. He could hear her scream resound through the night air before it ceased abruptly altogether. Filled with rage, and ignoring the excruciating pain in his side, he lunged at Narcissa. The wire dug deeper into his side.
“Harry, stop!” Hermione pleaded. Tears were falling down like rain in a storm from her eyes. She glanced at Ron, whose body was riddled with sobs, limp in the ropes that bound him. His sister was gone…and he hadn’t been able to do anything to save her. She couldn’t bear to look at Harry again. She knew this had broken him…he was nothing more than a shell now.
She was wrong. In the time that it had taken for her to look around, Harry had felt the losses of all of those that he loved boil up inside of him. Images of each one of them…his parents, Cedric, Sirius, Dumbledore, and now Ginny…began to swirl in his mind. He was formulating a plan for revenge, a plan that would save the entire world and avenge their deaths. Remember them, he had said going into battle. He would do that, he told himself. It would start with the Malfoys.
Hermione and Ron felt their bonds suddenly break free, and they fell to the ground in a heap. Malfoy advanced onto them, but Harry was faster than he was. The wand that he had tucked into his back pocket before the ropes had captured him was in his hand so fast, Hermione though that he had conjured it up in midair.
“How did you…” Malfoy began, but Harry, clutching his side, shook his head.
“Enough questions, Malfoy,” he said, and the green light shot out of his wand without even a word of his own. Malfoy’s body flew back across the room, hit the wall, and crashed to the floor. Narcissa, now blind with her own rage, turned her wand on Harry.
“ Avada-”
“ Protego!” shouted Hermione and Ron. Narcissa was knocked to the floor by the impact of the spell, her wand landing beside the body of her son. Harry walked over and pointed his wand in her face. She cowered against the wall, tears falling from her eyes. She was pleading with him, begging him not to take her life.
“Please,” she begged, “Not me too. Please…I don’t want to die.”
“Your entire family is gone,” Harry said, stone faced, “What else do you have to live for?”
“You can ask yourself the same question,” Narcissa told him, “Why do you want to live?”
“It’s not a matter of cowardice, as it is with you,” Harry replied, “I have a duty that must be fulfilled, and I intend to fulfill it. But you…you have nothing!”
“We are his family,” Hermione said, “We love him, and we are the reason that he should live too.”
She wasn’t just saying this to Narcissa, but to Harry as well. She felt that, as Ginny had plummeted to her death, the boy that she knew as her best friend had given up on ever being happy again. She was determined to prove him wrong.
“I don’t deserve to die,” Narcissa said, “I don’t…”
“WHY?” Harry bellowed, tears now burning the side of his cheeks, his side ready to split open, “WHY DON’T YOU?!? YOU KILLED HER! YOU KILLED HER, AND YOU LAUGHED ABOUT IT! I LOVED HER, AND IT WAS YOU WHO TOOK HER AWAY FROM ME! YOU DESERVE TO DIE…YOU KNOW IT!”
Harry went to raise his wand, but someone else beat him to it. Ron, who had been silent and reserved this entire time, had stepped to the side of Narcissa. With a straight face, he uttered the Killing Curse. Narcissa fell with a thud to the floor, dead as a doornail. Hermione looked at Ron in pure surprise, with a sense of unwanted pride. She rushed over to him and wrapped her arms tightly around his waist. He sobbed into her shoulder, and for a few moments, they stood there, holding one another and not saying anything. Just crying together.
“Harry,” Hermione said, turning around. He was nowhere to be found. She looked in the doorway and all around the room. Nothing. She tapped Ron, and he looked up. Then, they heard a cry from outside. Looking down below them, they saw a small figure on the grass, holding something in its arms. The two of them rushed down the flight of stairs. The door to the manor was already open, and they slipped through it and onto the stone steps. Jumping down, they hustled over to where Harry sat, Ginny held fast into his arms. He was brushing her hair back, the sounds of his hysterical sobs filling the night. Hermione dropped to her knees, ready to comfort him. He refused to look at her.
It was as if their friend had entered another world altogether. He didn’t notice either of them there, but just seemed to see Ginny and nothing else besides her. He was sobbing and humming at the same time, rocking her back and forth and kissing her lips. He was humming a lullaby, as if she were merely asleep. His phrases weren’t to them, but to her, talking as if she were still alive.
“You remember when you told Romilda Vane about the Hungarian Horntail on my chest?” Harry said, chuckling through his sobs, “And then you said Ron had a Pigmy Puff, but you wouldn't say where? That was hilarious, you know. She probably thought Ron was some kind of weirdo or something.”
“Harry,” Hermione said to him, but he couldn’t hear her, it seemed.
“I’m so sorry,” he said to Ginny, “I’m so sorry for breaking up with you last year. This…this is why. I knew better than this, Gin. I…this is all my fault! It’s always my fault! I shouldn’t…I shouldn’t attach myself to anyone! They always die! THEY DIE BECAUSE OF ME!”
“Harry,” Hermione said again, and she went to touch his hand. He suddenly looked up, searching around for a few moments. Then, his eyes seemed to find her. Looking into them, he broke. His shoulders sagged downward. The arms that were holding Ginny went limp, and she now rested more in his lap. The tears wouldn’t stop coming. Never before had he cried in front of her in such a way. There were times in which she had seen him tear up, but never before like this. This wasn’t the sound of pain and grief…it was the sound of true heartbreak. Ron had bent to kiss Ginny’s forehead, but Harry would not let her go all the way for him to hug her. Hermione moved behind Harry and held him from the back.
“Shh…” she cooed in his ear.
“Why?” he pleaded, “Why her? Why any of them? She was so beautiful! She was…I loved her, Hermione! I-I-I…”
He let out a cry of anguish that Hermione was sure could have been heard for a hundred miles. The wind seemed to whip it away, sending it out to different parts of the countryside. Perhaps others would soon know the great suffering that was taking place.
“Harry,” she said, rubbing his arms in comfort, tears falling fast from her own eyes, “It was her time, okay? She…she knew that you loved her. She understood that.”
“SHUT UP WITH THAT TALK!” he said, “I DON’T CARE WHAT SHE KNEW OF WHAT SHE DIDN’T KNOW! IT WON’T BRING HER BACK! IT WON’T!!”
“She would want you to move on, mate,” Ron said.
“NO!” Harry uttered, “NO, I WON’T! I’M DONE!!! I’M THROUGH! HE CAN KILL ME, I DON’T CARE!”
He broke down again into another bout of sobs. Hermione had to look away. To see him in this kind of pain was unbearable. She refused to watch it anymore. Collecting herself, she began to walk to the front of the manor. Ron, giving his sister a final kiss on the cheek, followed her. Harry merely sat there; crying into Ginny’s shoulders, asking for a miracle that he knew wouldn’t come.
“All of our powers,” he said to her, “All of our abilities, and yet we can’t undo this . I can’t bring you back! God, Ginny, don’t leave me like this! I can’t do this without you! I love you, Ginny! Please…don’t do this!”
He tried to shake her, to see if she would wake up. The shock of it all was making him anxious. It didn’t happen, he kept thinking, she would be up and walking with him in no time! But the longer they sat, the colder she continued to grow. Her eyes would not open, her hands would not move.
“I LOVE YOU!” he shouted, “I…oh, Ginny! Tell them, whoever took you away, to come and get me! You hear that, whoever you are? TAKE ME INSTEAD!”
Still, nothing happened. There was no change in his location, no change in his feeling. There was nothing left to him, except an emptiness somewhere inside of him. He had lost part of himself...and that part was Ginny. He could almost feel her tugging on his shirt, assuring him that everything was okay. Then, suddenly, he felt it again. Looking around, he looked down at her again...and found her staring back at him, a tired expression on her face, but eyes open and alert nonetheless.