The Long Fight of Nymphadora Tonks

Chapter 6: The Unthinkable

Remus descended the steps to the inner pit of the Death Chamber with a weary tread. He stood for several minutes, staring at the crumbling archway with its tattered veil through which Sirius had fallen, seeing it happen over and over again in his mind's eye.

He can't come back. He can't come back, because he's ... he's ...

He couldn't quite say it, not even to himself. Perhaps, if he didn't say it, he could pretend it hadn't happened.

It's not fair. Twelve years. Twelve years he spent in Azkaban, and he was innocent. He loved freedom, and spent his life in prison. He loved life, and now ...

Alone again. James, Lily, Peter - lost. Sirius, too, and for the second time. No one left to call his best friend, no one to talk to, no one to turn to. Back to the way things had always been ...

"Tonks!" Kingsley Shacklebolt's booming, though slightly groggy voice broke into his thoughts like thunder.

"Tonks!" the auror repeated. "Mad-Eye, have you seen her?"

"Eh? Oh ... over there somewhere. She was fighting the Lestrange woman."

"Tonks! Tonks!"

Suddenly, Remus found himself looking around him, frantically and wordlessly. Where had she been standing? He had seen her, as Moody had said, fighting Bellatrix. Just there. Remus began leaping up the steep steps as fast as his legs would carry him, even as Kingsley crouched down in between two rows of benches, looking concerned. He skidded to a halt and the auror looked up at him. Kingsley's hand was resting at the side of the young woman's neck. Remus asked a question with his eyes, and the other man answered quickly.

"She's alive. Must have cracked her head against the stone behind her though, judging from the blood."

Remus gave in to his shaky legs and dropped onto the bench. For one horrible moment, he had thought ... no, he wouldn't allow himself to repeat it. He looked down at Tonks, limp and unmoving at his feet, a pool of blood under her pink-haired head, and he leaned forward and took her hand.

"We must get her to St. Mungo's," he heard himself say hoarsely.

"Yes. Will you take her?"

Remus looked up at Kingsley to answer him, but just then both of them were distracted by the return of Albus Dumbledore. He was looking particularly old and weary at that moment, but he waved away all words of concern and said tiredly,

"It's all right. I am not hurt, and neither is Harry."

"And Voldemort?" Kingsley enquired.

"Escaped."

The auror lowered his bald head.

"Where's Harry?" Remus asked.

"I have sent him back to Hogwarts," the headmaster replied.

"Then I must go there at once," said Remus, getting to his feet.

But Dumbledore placed a hand on his shoulder and shook his head. "Not now, Remus. I will take care of Harry myself. To have you present would, I regret to say, only distract him at this time, I think. Your place is here for now."

He glanced significantly down at the figure on the floor in front of them, and Remus nodded slowly. He slipped an arm gently under Tonks's shoulders and the other under her legs and held her carefully. Then he took a deep breath and disapparated with her, straight to St. Mungo's. The healers were quick to take her off his hands, and soon she was bedded down comfortably with her wounds taken care of, and they told him not to worry, that she would wake the next morning and there was no reason for him to wait.

But Remus found he could not leave her. Not after the Death Chamber, not when she was injured and unaware of what had happened, not when he had been so afraid for one awful moment that he had lost her, too. He sat by her bed and allowed himself the comfort of holding her hand while she slept and knew nothing of it. And in the darkness he saw again the dais with the archway of stone and the black veil, and Sirius's body arched back, falling, and he tightened his hold on Tonks's hand.