Windfallen

Windfallen

Chapter Twelve: Wild

What ravages of spirit
conjured this tempestuous rage
created you a monster
broken by the rules of love
and fate has led you through it
you do what you have to do
*
I don't know how to let you go
every moment marked
with apparitions of your soul
I'm ever swiftly moving
trying to escape this desire
the yearning to be near you

***

There was a tense and nervous silence, and then, “No.”

But blood was running, in trickles and pools that soaked into the cracks and fissures of the dark stone, and the only sound was the flickering of flames in the hearth. The halo from the flames was no longer angelic, because it was tinged with red. Still, it cast a hazy light over Draco’s body, almost disguising the blood. Draco had fallen on his side, the wounded part of his head against the floor, and Harry could not see how much damage had been done. Still, Draco did not seem to be breathing or moving or even living any longer.

“No,” Harry said again, but there was no one there to deny it with him and make it true. And then, in a snarl, “I’ll follow you.”

He picked up Hermione’s gun and held it to his temple, his hand shaking, his eyes squeezed shut. He breathed through his nose carefully and his finger trembled on the trigger.

“No.” It wasn’t his voice this time, and Harry’s eyes flew open. Hermione watched solemnly from the entrance. “Harry, no.” Her face was shining with tears.

“I have to follow him,” he said.

“You can’t,” she whispered. “Harry, you can’t follow where he’s gone. You can’t save him this time.”

“This is your fault,” he spat. She flinched. “Why did you bring this gun here? Why did you teach him how to use it? It’s your fault!”

She was sobbing now. “I’m sorry, Harry, I am. But you can't follow him!”

Harry stared at her emptily, and Draco’s body lay between them. “But I’ve got no where else to go, and no reason to go there, if he’s not there.”

“Harry…” She tried to reach over Draco’s body to touch him, but Harry flinched.

He dropped to his knees in the blood and reached through the glowing haze lit by the fire and touched Draco’s hand. It was lying on the ground next to his face, nearly flat on the stone, and stained with blood.

Hermione was at his side suddenly, whispering things meant to be soothing. She pulled him against her chest and rocked him. “You can’t follow him yet, Harry,” she said, her voice thick.

“You have no right,” he hissed, struggling. “No right at all to tell me what I can do now. I want to die. It’s my fault, it’s my fault…”

She cupped his face and stared intently into his eyes. “Listen to me. You can’t. Not yet. We need you. You cannot leave us now. You’re our only hope.”

He shoved her so hard that she fell back, landing hard on the stone floor. “Fuck that,” he screamed. “Fuck being your only hope! I’ve got nothing! Draco had the only spell to help you and now he’s dead.”

Crawling to his side and stroking his hair, she kissed his cheek and said softly, “Please, Harry. Just give us this last thing, and then I’ll let you go. Then you can follow him. Please…”

A strange sound, like an animal in pain, echoed through the chamber, and it took Harry a long moment to realize that it was his.

“Here,” Hermione said, holding her hand out to him. A golden ring with the Malfoy family crest rested in her palm. “He told me to give this to you…”

“You knew?” Harry breathed. “You knew.” He shoved her again, and she fell back, sobbing and curling up into a little ball. She did not deny knowing that Malfoy was going to kill himself, didn’t say a thing. The ring fell from her fingers and rolled a ways, shining dully in the torchlight, resting right by Harry’s foot. He didn’t notice. “I hate you,” he hissed.

Rage, a hotter, more encompassing rage than he had ever known, bloomed inside him, making him tremble and burn as though he was on fire. It was wild and untamed and furious, and Harry could not have stopped himself nor the rage from lashing out at Hermione if he had even had the desire to try.

He did not have the desire to save her, wanted to rip her apart, because she had kept him there, in the bedroom, while Draco had been here alone, and had decided death was his only option. He was breathing heavily, acting on instinct, and he lashed out with magic, blindly. She screamed as she was lifted and sent flying through the air, crashing against the stone wall, and again as she fell to the ground. There was silence then, though he could see she was still breathing, collapsed on the floor, face-down.

It was not enough, those screams and that silence, and he attacked her again and again, screaming until his voice was hoarse and she lay very still. She was breathing, and it was very faint.

Nearly animalistic now, feeling wounded and betrayed, Harry fell to his knees beside Draco. He was barely conscious, the force of his rage so strong that it prevented any sort of rational thought at all.

He moaned softly, crouching over Draco and smoothing back his hair that was sticky with blood. Gathering Draco up in his arms, Harry cuddled him close against his chest, holding him, rocking him, and whispering to him.

"I was yours," he said, flinching and burying his face in Draco's bloody hair. "Now there is nothing."

A black wave of grief took him there, and he began to cry, huge, gasping, broken sobs as he held Draco to him, blood in a river all around.

There were screams building up in his throat, furious, hateful screams. He did not permit himself to scream, because that one ounce of fragile control was the only thing keeping him from tearing the world apart with the force of his rage. He had only ever wanted one thing before, and now that one thing lay shattered in his arms.

Instead, he whimpered, "Why?"

He knew why. He should have seen it coming. Because it was easier to hate than it was to love, easier to learn the Dark Patronus than it was the light. And Draco had been teaching him to hate. Had destroyed himself so that Harry might live.

But he had gotten it all wrong. Harry did not want to live if Draco was not with him. There was nothing worth living for, nothing worth dying for, nothing mattered, except that there was blood on the floor and it was Draco's and Draco had spilt it to save the world. Reluctant heroes were always the first to die.

But not for nothing.

Harry set him down carefully in his own blood, and kissed his forehead, before standing up. He was breathing heavily, still furious, still aching, still hateful towards the world that had brought them to this.

Hermione moaned softly and Harry followed the sound, rolling her onto her back. Her face was broken and bloody.

"What am I to do?" His voice was cold and dark, and her eyes widened at the sound. He could feel the dark magic in his veins.

"The ring is a Portkey to the gathering place of the Dementors," she said, voice faint. "It is a trap for those who dare to spill Malfoy blood. When the ring is wet with Malfoy blood, the next person to touch it is transported to the center of the Dementors... An execution."

He did not really care. His fingertips were sparking with dark energy, and he stared at the ring Draco had left for him, which now lay in Draco's blood. "I will do it," he said tonelessly.

He picked up the ring and it burned, searing the Malfoy family crest into the palm of his hand. Closing his eyes, he tilted his head back and screamed with the agony of it as it wrenched him out of the caverns and into the gathering place of Dementors that Draco had told him about only the night before.

There were thousands.

The rage faltered under a wave of terror. He could not do this, did not know how, was not strong enough, Draco had died for nothing... And then, as the cold fear inspired by the Dementor magic stole over him, a voice in his mind shrieked, I am not ready to die, not even for Draco, I am not ready to die.

But then, he certainly wasn't ready to live without Draco.

He shrunk back; there was a stone wall behind him, no where to run, and the creatures were turning and moving closer. There was no sound, no breeze, and far above, he could see the early morning sky.

He cast the Patronus Charm, though what good it would do against a thousand Dementors, he did not know. They flinched back a little and then kept coming closer, the force of their combined terror overcoming one paltry Patronus. And so he cast more and more, until a ring of silver stags danced around him, and he could only distantly hear the sounds of his mother screaming in his mind, and the rapid secession of gunshots, first the one that killed Ginny, and then the one that killed Draco, over and over again.

He was broken and weak, he'd known it all along. The force of terror was bringing him to his knees, and he cowered on the stone floor, the clear morning sky above, and he cried.

The Dementors could not penetrate the ring of stags, and he was safe for the moment, save for the visions and sounds in his head. When one stag faded, he'd create another, growing weaker and weaker as the sun moved across the sky.

He was panicking, and stupid for thinking he was strong enough for this.

A fitting way for Harry-Potter-Boy-Who-Lived-By-Accident to die. Crying and trembling on his knees in a stone pit under a perfect sky while a thousand Dementors watched on and laughed.

Oh god, oh god, I'm not ready...

The sun set, and Harry was still there, still terrified, still frozen, still protected by useless charms created from memories of his school days with Hermione and Ron, from Draco's kisses and smiles, from Pansy's words of belonging to Draco Malfoy. Weak, weak, weak. He was doomed and not ready to die.

It was dark soon, where had the day gone? Hours of reliving all of the most terrible things he had done-- he wondered if this was what Azkaban was like, and wondered further if this was hell. Had he killed himself after all, after Draco had died? Killed himself and gone to hell, but that meant Draco would be here somewhere too, in this hell. Though if Draco shared his hell, it wouldn't be hell at all, but heaven, and the very idea that Draco had abandoned him to his own private hell made Harry so furious.

Used him, used him not as his lover or his...his friend even, but as a Hero. Someone to break into dust and rebuild into someone capable of saving the fucking world.

But he'd failed. This was Draco's fault. Draco hadn't made him strong enough. Hadn't taught him well enough. Hadn't broken him because Harry could still feel what it was like to lie in Draco's arms, to be inside him, to have Draco inside him, to kiss him, taste him, laugh with him, and all of that... all of that was enough to keep Harry from breaking. Somehow. But it didn't make sense! Nothing was making sense. Nothing except that this was hell and Draco was not here.

"I hate you," he shrieked, getting to his feet, though his legs trembled and he wanted to fall. He screamed to the stars, who did not care that he was in agony, that he was dying, while gunshots echoed in his head. He screamed to the Dementors, who waited so patiently for him to go mad, to grow tired, so they could have him. He screamed to Draco, in case this was hell and Draco was standing somewhere, watching. He screamed and screamed until his voice gave out, and then, because he could not scream, and tears were running down his pale cheeks, and he hated everything, he lashed out blindly with his wand.

The hate ran through him like a black wave, trickling through every cell and bursting from his fingertips, channeled through his wand like a cold breath, and spilled out in a shimmering black shadow. It twisted into serpent, a basilisk, writhing on the stone floor and then rising up, preparing to strike.

It did strike, destroying one Dementor, which melted to ash when the basilisk dove through it. Then the Dark Patronus was gone, the Dementor was gone, and nine hundred and ninety nine stood in its place.

Harry started to laugh, drained, exhausted, longing to die, and Draco's spell was proving worthless. Draco had destroyed him to give him the power to kill one fucking Dementor.

The world was doomed, and so was Harry Potter.

He kept up the defensive ring of stags around him, and they cast a silver halo over him and the Dementors that waited for his strength to give out, and he began picking off one Dementor at a time, though it was pointless. He soon tired, his legs trembling, his face sticky with tears.

Hatred was not enough, love was not enough.

He moaned softly when his strength gave out, and it was all he could do not to fall to the ground. He could hear his own breath echoing harshly, and he did not have the strength to lift his wand for another spell. Night was passing quickly, and soon it would be dawn. Harry did not know if his Patronus would last the night.

And it was Draco's fault. Draco was supposed to be here, holding his hand, telling him it was alright that he wasn't strong enough, brave enough. Draco had promised not to hurt him, had promised to be with him in hell, and now here hell was, and Harry was alone.

He started to cry. There was no hope, nothing. It was all darkness and a fading silver halo, hundred of Dementors waiting patiently for their chance at all of his lightness, their chance to devour his soul.

If they knew that he'd lost his heart and soul to Draco already, he wondered if they'd still be there, waiting for the silver stags to fade.

And Draco had taken them with him when he died. Draco had taken everything good about Harry with him, was the only good thing Harry had left to lose and now Draco was gone. There was nothing inside of him for the Dementors to feed on, and Harry let out a soft breath, and with it, the last bit of his fury.

After all, just the night before, he had given Draco permission to break him this way. "What if, to save the one person you cared about, you had to destroy them. Could you do it?"

"I would destroy anything that threatened you, even if it was you, as long as you went on living."

"Am I a terrible person because I don't think I can do the same?"

"You can. No one thinks they can give up the things that matters most to them until the time for it comes..."

Maybe there had been no hope for them in life and Draco had known that. And maybe, after all of this was over, Draco would be waiting for him on the other side.

There was only one thing to be done.

"I forgive you," he whispered, eyes wide and voice bleak, because it was the only way. He forgave Voldemort for a thousand murders, killing for his better world, and he forgave Sirius for being so clumsy as to fall behind the veil, and he forgave Ron for losing his magic and Hermione for being so busy, and Ginny for losing her mind. He forgave Charlie for making him feel like he was to blame, and Pansy, for starting the Unforgivable. And most of all, he forgave Draco, who had loved him and left him and broken him.

That forgiveness poured out of him and twisted with the hatred, because for all that he forgave, he could not love. He had forgotten how. But the hatred and the forgiveness tangled together, silver starlight and darkest shadow, howling as it tore from him all of his strength and courage and power, shrieking through his veins. He did not scream, though he longed to. The screams lodged in his throat and echoed in his mind, with all of those nightmares that plagued him. His mother's screams and Sirius' stumble and Draco's blood, all over his hands... and then the Dark Patronus twisted upwards, into the air, and, with a hiss, it dove back again, to the army of Dementors. The forgiveness froze them in terror, and the hatred ripped them apart.

The two Patronus twisted together into one, projecting their power, combining forgiveness and hate with enough power to crack through the terror of the Dementor magic, and destroy every Dementor that had gathered there, and then Harry's magic, his courage, and his despair, expanded throughout the world and destroyed every Dementor that existed.

And then the fallout began.

Wild magic snapped back towards him, magical remains of the curse that had held every mind captive, magic that had locked nightmares in the minds of humans all over the earth. It could not be destroyed, so it reflected back, wild and expending itself in light and heat. The sky seemed to burn, even as the sun began to rise in the east, and the stars, fading already, seemed to crackle as the Dementors burned and turned to ash.

Not all of the feral rush of energy was expended in light and sound, however, because Harry's magic had been torn from him and other magic rushed in to restore the equilibrium.

As soon as the magic entered him, however, it became twisted and dark, because Harry was now twisted and dark. There was no room within him for lightness, and so he took in the darkest parts of the wild magic. The nightmares, the terror, the desire to die that had been torn from the minds of the curse victims all tore through Harry. He tilted his head back and shrieked with the agony of it, even as he craved more and more.

And then it was over.

When the Dementor dust slowly settled all around in a thick layer of soot, Harry fell, so slowly, to the sun-baked earth. With a soft breath, he gave in to the weakness, and willed himself to die.

The dust and the burning soot settled, a hazy cloud drifting slowly to earth and covering him like a blanket. Harry did not move, scarcely breathed. He just lay there, on his stomach, one hand pillowed under a hollow, bruised cheek, the other closed into a fist on the steaming ground. One knee was pulled up a little, the other leg stretched out, and his jumper had risen up a bit, showing a vulnerable patch of his back, and the slight shadow of his spine. His hair ruffled a little in the breeze, and his glasses lay broken nearby. His scar blazed a brilliant red, and he waited and wanted to die.

It should not have taken long. He was beaten and bruised and so incredibly weak. He could have just slipped away, drifted away into nothing. He was so tired.

But he was not allowed to die.

Draco was there suddenly, stepping into the bright light of the sun that nearly blinded him. His silhouette caused the light to refract and beam around him, giving him a halo and what seemed like fragmented angel wings.

“I’m dead, then,” Harry decided, with no small amount of relief. He was so tired, and now he could let go. Now Hermione would let him go. He closed his eyes.

“Shit…” Now that wasn’t right. Angels never cursed. He opened his eyes, and the light had shifted, Draco was kneeling beside him, and he didn’t look angelic at all. His face was coated in a fine sheen of soot. “Wake up,” he commanded.

“I am awake,” Harry said dully, except that his lips didn’t move, and no sound came from his throat. His body was very stiff and sore, and he couldn’t tell if he was breathing. He didn’t want to breathe. He had betrayed himself and everything he’d ever believed in, for this fucking cause. For the right to die and follow Draco, who had betrayed him and left him. And now he wanted to die. That was why he’d done this, so he could rest. Sleep. Die. There was nothing here for him any longer. Not love, nor hatred, nor blame.

He closed his eyes.

“Open your eyes,” Draco hissed. It wasn’t real, though, because Draco was dead. Had died because of Harry. Blamed Harry for his own death. So Harry didn’t listen. “Breathe. Fuck, Harry, breathe. Why isn’t he breathing? Shit…” Draco-who-wasn’t-real was touching Harry’s face, and his fingers were cold. Maybe it was just because Harry’s skin was burning with fever.

“He doesn’t want to breathe…” Another voice, this one cool and calm, though Harry did not allow himself to be fooled into thinking the speaker did not mean him harm. His entire being, his heart and his soul, felt chafed and raw. He did not open his eyes. “Oh, Harry, please…” He was vaguely aware that Hermione was there, touching his face, pushing sweat-soaked hair off his forehead, but he didn’t care.

Until she leaned close to his ear and he could feel her tears falling on his face. She whispered, “It wasn’t real.”

He was aching and empty and cold, and it hurt, but he opened his eyes and stared dully up at her. His throat burned a tiny bit as he sucked in a shaky breath.

She watched him, brown eyes sharp with tears, and she stroked his face, swallowing hard. “I’m so sorry, Harry,” she whimpered. “It wasn’t real.”

Sorry it wasn’t real? It made no sense... Harry was sorry it was real, and his eyelids fluttered again as though they were going to close.

Suddenly, Harry wasn’t lying on the ground any longer. He was lifted roughly into someone’s arms, and then Draco was hissing, “Harry. Harry, fucking stop this, right now, I will not let you die.”

“That’s funny,” Harry tried to say, but his throat was closed and frozen. “Because I thought the same about you.”

But then Draco was kissing him, a hard, punishing kiss, and Harry lifted his fists weakly and pushed against him. Hermione was shrieking something in a fury, and tugging his shoulders, twisting him out of Draco’s hold. And then Harry was falling back to the ground, his mind cracking and cracking more and more, the closer to the ground he fell... This was it. This was dying. And Draco, wait for me... Harry's mind shattered before he hit the ground, and then there was nothing.

***

a glowing ember
burning hot
burning slow
deep within I'm shaken by the violence
of existing for only you...