Fading

He´s not exactly sure why he´s here; he hasn´t even contacted her in nearly two years. He simply saw the date and location of her funeral and, on a whim, decided to attend. After all, they did get fairly close when he was at Hogwarts a few years back; they kept writing each other through the next year. But their relationship dwindled; toward the end of that year, he sent her a letter and she never replied. He found, over time, that he didn´t miss her all that much. And then, a few years later, he was scanning the paper and found her obituary.

He´s been living here in Britain for nearly a year now, ever since that ill-fated game with the Welsh side. Or, that is to say, what would have been a game with the Welsh side. The attack happened before they could even take to the air, and Viktor was hit in the shoulder with a bad Bone-breaking Curse. When he came to, he was in St. Mungo´s and the Healer told him that he´d landed at a funny angle, and there was nothing they could do -- the break would heal at a lopsided angle that would make it all but impossible to play Quidditch.

Crippled, he saw no reason to return home, where he would be surrounded by sympathetic Bulgarians, all trying to mask their disappointment with kindness. Here, it wasn´t quite so bad -- "See that guy? I think he´s Viktor Krum." "Who?" "You know -- that Seeker from -- Romania, was it? -- who got crippled and couldn´t play any longer." "Oh, right. He was pretty good a few years back, wasn´t he?" "Yeah, pretty good."

Of course, there was the warfare. Constant headlines proclaiming mass killings or bloody battles. His mother wrote him again and again, asking him to please come home and get away from the danger. He never answered. To tell the truth, he didn´t really care. Quidditch had been his life, and now that it was gone, he didn´t really see the point in self-preservation.

But then, over a week ago, he picked up the morning paper and saw the enormous headline plastered across the front page: HARRY POTTER DEFEATS HE-WHO-MUST-NOT-BE-NAMED, taking up half the page but with "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named" in smaller letters to fit in a single line. Most of the second half was taken up by a large color photograph of a very exhausted-looking Harry Potter, with a few lines of the article at the bottom. Of course, the rest of the newspaper was devoted to the details of the historic encounter, and Viktor read it all.

He can remember Harry Potter, from the Triwizard Tournament. He doesn´t like to think about it, though -- memories of the Triwizard Tournament always make his spine crawl. He doesn´t like to remember how the famous British Auror who they ended up saying wasn´t actually the famous British Auror used the Imperius Curse on him, and made him in turn use the Cruciatus Curse on Diggory. He doesn´t like to remember the floating feeling in his head, or the alien savage pleasure that swept through him at the sound of Diggory´s screams. Of course, it was Potter who saved them both, Potter who stunned him. And that´s one of the reasons he doesn´t like to remember Harry Potter.

But when he read that article, he had to let himself remember Potter, and he did. He remembered that Potter had always been polite to him, if a little unsure of himself, and that Potter hadn´t actually had any romantic relationship with her. He remembered confronting Potter about that, and how once it was cleared up, he complimented Potter´s flying, and Potter complimented his. He wondered whether Potter still flew.

It wasn´t until a few days later that the Prophet got a hold of itself enough to publish anything but rapturous accounts of Potter´s heroism, and remembered that life went on. That was when something caught Viktor´s eye as he flicked carelessly through the pages, and he turned a page back to see her name. Her obituary.

As it turned out, she´d been fighting Death Eaters that day, when Potter defeated the Dark Lord, and that they´d killed her. He wondered vaguely why none of the articles about Potter had mentioned her death, which seemed quite heroic to him. He had to remind himself not to be annoyed at Potter, because Potter didn´t decide what got printed in the newspapers, and Potter was probably feeling her loss heavily -- after all, as he had told Viktor himself, she was his friend. He would most likely be in mourning.

And then Viktor saw the date of the funeral, and the location, and that it was open to anyone who wanted to pay his last respects to Hermione Granger. And, simply because it seemed the right thing to do, he jotted it down in his calendar and now here he is, standing awkwardly at the outskirts of the large crowd of mourners and wondering if he should have stayed away.

He turns to see a young man coming toward him, with red hair and an abundance of freckles, wearing long black robes and with his right arm in a sling. He limps slowly over, and as he approaches, Viktor can see that his eyes are red-rimmed but dry.

Weasley, he remembers. Another of Potter´s friends. The one who seemed to dislike me and then asked for my autograph. What was his name -- something with an R -- Robert --no --Richard -- Ron, that´s it. Ron. He wonders why the boy´s coming over here.

Weasley stops in front of Viktor, and doesn´t say anything for a moment, seeming like he himself doesn't know the answer to Viktor's question.

"Hello," says Viktor, after a moment.

"Er -- hello."

They both stand their awkwardly for a moment, and then, for some reason he doesn´t know, Viktor says, "You loved her."

Weasley looks slightly taken aback, then nods, swallowing.

"I did too. I mean, I thought I did. I mean --" He gives a half-shrug, his good shoulder rising while the crippled one sags. "She vos a vonderful girl." Weasley opens his mouth to say something, but Viktor stops him. "You vere together?"

Again, Weasley nods painfully.

"You must haff been very happy then. Both of you."

Weasley seems to have trouble finding his voice. "Th-thanks."

Viktor pauses, then says, "I´m sorry."

The red-haired boy nods once more, then turns and walks away.