The heart. What is it? The simplest definition is that of an organ, needed to sustain life within a human. It is nothing more than a pulsing muscle, pumping blood throughout a living body. According to some. Others, however, believe that the heart spurns the feeling of love, that it is a peaceful thing that lives in a human in order to make them do the right thing. In truth, neither definitions are correct. Yes, a heart is an organ, and yes, feelings of love seem to “come from the heart,” but it is so much more than that. What is the heart in reality? The heart is a warrior. It fights. It bleeds. It screams. It dies. Like a soldier in a battle, it wrestles both internal and external conflict. Some are lucky. Their hearts rest peacefully, unbothered by a storm raging within them. Others are cursed with a discontented soul, constantly declaring war. It is their eyes that the anger and argument can be seen. It is in their ears that the war drums incessantly beat.

I can remember the faces of that year. They all looked so healthy, going into the castle, so full of life and excitement. Graduation. It was coming, wafted through the air like a scent from the kitchens. You could almost taste it when you ate the food, that promise that the world would soon lay itself down at your feet. It didn’t matter to me whether I had a destiny or not. At the beginning of that year, the only thing that I thought about was the fact that I would soon be free, soon be able to call myself a “wizard.” That, and the fact that he was gone. It wouldn’t be the same, that final stretch of my education. The hands that used to guide me were gone, erased by greed and evil. A top a tower the previous year, I had watched as the man that I most admired and respected was struck down by a hidden enemy. A hidden enemy by his standards, anyway. I had known for years that Snape was evil, and yet I had been able to do nothing. Dumbledore had been too convinced of his metamorphosis to believe me. And so he had passed, shot down by the corrupted Potions master as I looked on, unable to do anything. Yes, Hogwarts would certainly be different, I knew. Things would change, and I was prepared for that.

I was a fool not to foresee how drastic that change would be. Two forces, invisible to the human eye, would fight against me in the coming year. One would cause the death of a friendship, and spurn a betrayal unlike anything I could have ever imagined. The other would cause devastation and casualty greater than any the Wizarding world had ever experience. It would be the force that would tip the scales and send us spiraling into a war. And there I would be, in the center of it all, weak and to blame. Blame. It is something that was not new to me. I felt it burn me. Perhaps that could be the word to define the year.

No. No, that year was not painted by blame. Yes, it was what I felt. Yes, it lay with me. But the year itself was not defined by blame. There was another word needed for the seventh chime of the clock, for the year in which I walked through the castle doors for the seventh time.

Mortality.

It was cool, I remember, that first day that we walked back through those doors. The leaves twisted and contorted in different directions, spinning around us like spiders spinning webs. The wind tossed Hermione’s hair in front of her eyes, and she made an attempt to push it back in order to see. It wouldn’t help. It persisted to draw it in front of her face. Eventually, she would lower her arms and give up.

“It’s too bad you hang out with two boys, Hermione,” I said to her gently, “We don’t carry those elastic things you use to put your hair up.”

“Just leave it alone,” Ron told her as she made one final try to keep it behind her ear, “It looks fine.”

“It’s not how it looks, Ron,” she snapped at him, “It’s the fact that I can’t SEE anything!”

I suppressed a small chuckle at her misfortune. I could see Ron doing the same thing, and we exchanged glances over her head. We walked like that, silently laughing, until we reached the carriage waiting to take us up to the castle. Ron opened the door for Hermione and offered his hand to let her inside. I slid in after them, sitting on the opposite side to allow plenty of room for the two to hold hands. I still wasn’t sure how I felt about them. It was nice to see them happy, to see them enjoying each other’s company in the way that they were. Yet there was something that didn’t feel right about this. I knew that if something happened, if something occurred between the two of them, that I would be the one caught in the middle. I would be the one who acted as the mediator between two feuding beings, the best friend of two people who would never speak to one another again. How would I handle that? I had no idea. These and a million other thoughts were rushing through my head as I closed the door behind me.

“Finally,” Hermione exclaimed as she tamed her knotted hair with her fingers. Ron helped her, gently pulling the strands apart to make it easier to smooth. She was able to get most of it out of her face, and soon, the giant bush that had been resting on her head began to resemble human hair again.

“Sight!” she announced, and I let out a small laugh.

“Better?” I asked.

“Much.”

The carriage jolted as the thestrals started moving. The gentle roll of the wheels against the road made something flutter in the pit of my stomach. I didn’t know if it was a feeling of excitement or dread. With a deep breath, I let it slide by.

“You okay, Harry?” Hermione asked me earnestly. I nodded, my eyes focused on the floor. I was thinking of Dumbledore in those few seconds, and she could tell.

“It’s not going to be the same,” she said slowly.

“No,” I answered, “No, it isn’t.”

“We’ll be all right, though,” Ron attempted, trying to be reassuring, “I mean sure, Dumbledore’s gone. Things aren’t going to be the same. But we kind of expected that of our seventh year, right? It’s the year that everything supposed to change.”

“It wasn’t supposed to be this drastic,” Hermione said, “I just…I was expecting him to be there for all seven years. Now…well…”

“We’ve got to be adults now,” I finished for her, “He’s not there to protect us anymore. We’ve got to grow up.”

No one said anything else on the subject after that. I think I had pretty much summed everybody’s thoughts up in that one statement. For several moments, we tossed the idea of maturity around in our heads. It was almost like it was a concept too large to grasp for any of us. And yet I knew that I had already grasped it. It had come into my grip as I stood upon the tower, watching the man in whom I held the greatest respect die at the hands of someone he thought he could trust. I had held it that night as I stood over the dead body of my mentor, looking into the once wise, empty eyes of the greatest man I ever knew. Perhaps that grip had slipped momentarily on the week that I had moped over losing Ginny.

Ginny.

I regretted breaking up with her that day on the lake. Yet regardless of how I felt, I knew that I could never take back the things that I had told her. It was for her own protection, for the best. She wouldn’t be killed, not because I loved her. I wouldn’t let that happen. I thought that I was doing the best for both of us by letting her go. And, in some shadowy corner of my mind, I held onto the thought that she would come back to me when it was all over. I didn’t expect that she would move on so quickly. But I guess Neville Longbottom held some sort of hidden quality that she found instantly fascinating. What it was, I still don’t know.

“Have you spoken to Ginny at all?” Hermione asked me.

Speak of the devil.

“Not really, no,” I answered slowly.

“We were all in the same house this summer, Harry,” she pushed, “How could you not have spoken to her?”

“Well…I mean, we said “Hello,” and things like that,” I replied, “ But, if you’re asking if we had full-on conversations, then the answer would have to be…”

“Did you see Ginny around a lot, Hermione?” Ron interrupted.

“No, not really,” she told him.

“It’s because she wasn’t around a lot,” he explained, “I mean, yeah, she was at home, but she more or less hung out in the gardens and things like that. She basically stayed out there to avoid…well…

“To avoid me,” I finished for him.

“Yeah,” Ron said, “Yeah, basically. She just kinda…she went out there and she…”

“Read and wrote letters to Neville,” I finished again.

“Pretty much,” he breathed.

“Oh,” Hermione said, “Oh, I didn’t know that she and Neville were…talking. She never told me anything about it.”

“Did she ever talk romance with you at all?” I asked her. “Did she ever tell you anything, knowing that you were friends with me?”

“I figured that much out, thank you Harry,” Hermione snapped at me, and I backed off a little bit. I had just made a small jab at her intelligence, something you never did with Hermione. She always had things figured out, even before she talked about them.

“Does it bother you?” she asked.

“No,” I lied, trying to act nonchalant, “No, it doesn’t bother me. I was the one who broke up with her, after all. She deserves to be happy.”

“Oh come on, Harry, admit it,” Ron pushed.

“Admit what?”

“That it’s killing you, mate!”

“It is not killing me, Ron.”

“Oh, please, Harry.”

“I’m fine.”

“You mean a fine liar.”

I broke.

“OKAY! OKAY!” I shouted, “It upsets me, all right? I just…I try not to think about it.”

Both of them stared at me intently, as if they expected me to explode on the spot. I took to looking out the window, avoiding their eyes. We were nearing the castle, pulling past Hogsmeade and now rolling gently along the hill that led up to the front gate. Ron made a small popping noise with his lips. I could have killed him.

“What did you think about The Prophet this morning?” Hermione asked, breaking the awkward silence that hovered over the carriage like a cloud.

“Didn’t read it,” Ron said honestly, “You know I’m only half awake in the morning, Hermione.”

“You know, you can be so ignorant sometimes?” Hermione told him.

“Yeah, I know,” he said, and he looked out her softly, “You still love me anyway right?”

She rolled her eyes playfully, and then gave him a small kiss on the lips. I made a point to look away.

“Did you read it, Harry?” she questioned.

“Not really, no,” I replied, and I looked back at her, “I caught the front page. It was something about a sighting of Voldemort out in the countryside. Complete rubbish, Hermione. Why do even keep reading it? It’s just turned into a forum for paranoid writers too scared to write about anything other than the Second War and Dumbledore’s death.”

“Well, there was a certain article that drew my attention,” Hermione informed Ron and me, “It said that Ministry officials believe that the Death Eaters may be plotting a massive attack on some public building. They don’t know where and they don’t know how, but they think that Voldemort may have created a weapon capable of unleashing a terror unknown to any in the Wizarding or muggle world.”

“And you believe this?” I asked her, my eyebrows raised.

“Well, yes,” she said, “We’ve got to be able to put our faith in something, Harry. Otherwise, we’re all done for.”

“Put your faith in something other than that paper, Hermione,” I told her, “Like I said before, it’s written by terrified journalists who don’t know which way to turn in order to find safety.”

“What if they’re right?” she asked.

“Well, it’s a pretty good possibility they are,” I said, “I mean, we know that the war is on. We know that Voldemort wants to kill as many people as he can. It’s logical to believe that there’s gonna be an attack. The only real question is where.”

“That’s my point!” Hermione said, “Where do you think he’s going to go?”

“I don’t know,” I replied, now getting irritated, “If I knew that, I would be a Seer, not an aspiring Auror.”

“I’m thinking Hogwarts,” she stated bluntly. Ron looked at her sideways, and I could see a small amount of fear in his face. I shook my head.

“It’s too secure.”

“No,” Hermione said, “No it’s not, Harry. Think about it. Dumbledore’s gone.”

“We’re still protected by charms and spells on every single side and at every single angle on the castle,” I argued.

“Easily broken if you’re as powerful as Voldemort is,” she retorted.

“Why would they want to attack Hogwarts anyway?” I asked her, “I mean, there aren’t any real powerful wizards here. Sure, McGonagall, but that’s nothing. Why attack a bunch of teenagers instead of the entire Order of the Phoenix or Ministry of Magic?’

“Because the death of their children would be the biggest blow either organization could receive,” Hermione said, sending a chill wafting through the carriage. It crept up my spine and spiraled it’s way up my body. “If Voldemort can do away with an Auror’s pride and joy, then he has just killed their soul and their will to live. That would be the way to win this war, by weakening the force that drives the offense. Attacking Hogwarts would give him that power. That, and the fact that…”

“I’m here,” I said.

“Yes.”

The carriage came to a stop before we could finish the conversation. As the door opened to let us out, Hermione made a point of looking at me.

“I’m still not all that worried,” I told her.

“I don’t want you to be worried,” she said, “I’m just telling you what I read.”

Ron hopped out, and extended his hand to help Hermione out of the carriage.

“You sure know how to dampen a mood,” Ron told her, and she smiled up at him.

“Thanks,” she replied. Before they kissed, I turned my back and walked over to where the thestrals were standing.

“Nice ride today,” I said to the creature as it stood there. It cocked its head and looked at me, as if surprised that I could see it.

“Yeah,” I said to it, “I can see you. And I wish I couldn’t.”

“HARRY!” Hermione called to me. I gave the thestral a final “Thank you” and ran to join my friends.

“What were you doing?” Ron asked me.

“I was…thanking the thestrals for the ride today,” I explained, “Yeah, I know…it’s cheesy.”

“Not cheesy,” Ron reassured me, “A little crazy, but not cheesy.”

“Thanks,” I said, and I gave him a small punch in the arm. We headed up the castle steps and through the open doors.

Instantly, I felt the wave of change hit me like water hit the shore. It was nearly enough to bring me to my knees as I entered the halls of the castle. They were empty somehow, part of their warmth erased and replaced with a chill. As the Great Hall erupted before my eyes, I noticed the black drapes that hung over the tables. They mimicked those used after the death of Cedric Diggory, but with one small difference. They were traces of purple on them, stitches of violet stars outlining the edges of the material.

“For leadership, do you think?” Hermione asked. I felt myself nod. We took our seats in silence.

“Good evening,” Professor McGonagall’s voice bellowed over the tables and heads. The room grew silent.

“To our new faces, welcome,” she said, “To the old, welcome back. Before we begin, let us observe a moment of silence for the passing of our great Headmaster, Albus Dumbledore. Please, bow you heads.”

I bowed my head for a few moments and allowed my eyes to wander. McGonagall still sat in her normal seat, Dumbledore’s left untouched. It was as if he was still there, and just running late for the feast. That, I decided, was the way it should be. I also noticed there was no Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher present. Snape had yet to be replaced. I grimaced at the thought of the murderer’s name, and pushed the image of his face from my mind. I drew my gaze to the Slytherin table. No blonde, greasy-haired boy could be seen sitting there either. Malfoy had slipped away with Snape the night that Dumbledore had died. I felt the anger well up inside me, and forced it back down.

“Thank you,” McGonagall said, and there was a wave of lifting heads from the hall, “And now, let the Sorting Ceremony begin.”

The first years advanced, their timid bodies shaking in anticipation. I watched a tear fall from one small girl’s eyes.

“I’m glad that the school didn’t close and that we came back,” Hermione told me, and I nodded. Hogwarts couldn’t have closed, I decided. It was the one place where we felt safe. I hadn’t wanted to come back this year, argued with everyone that it was time I fulfilled my destiny. It was Hermione who had convinced me that a final year would only make me stronger in my ability to defeat Voldemort. So, I had agreed to come back for one final lesson before setting out to defeat my enemy.

I looked around the hall in an attempt to lighten the darkness threatening to settle over my heart. I caught sight of Ginny, seated beside Neville a little further down the table. Our eyes met for a short period of time, and I saw her wave at me. I returned the gesture. I can remember the one thought running through my mind at that time.

I will always be alone.