Canticum Novum

Chapter 5: The Gift Of Love

Though I may speak with bravest fire,

And have the gift to all inspire,

And have not love, my words are vain,

As sounding brass, and hopeless gain.

Hermione closed the door carefully behind her, quietly so she didn't wake Harry up, then turned and leaned against it for a moment, trying to collect herself.

"Hermione!"

Hermione straightened sharply. Ron Weasley had risen from one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs outside Harry's room and was hurrying towards her.

"How is he?" he asked her in an undertone, glancing at the door.

"He's f--" Hermione shook her head. She couldn't say it, she couldn't lie, as much as she wanted to believe it herself. "He'll live, let's put it that way. But he's in a lot of pain, and whatever happened really took a lot out of him. He woke up about ten, fifteen minutes ago and he was talking to me, but he was obviously exhausted when he finished and asked if he could take a nap. There was something else he started to say, but he was just too tired, I guess. He was asleep before I left the room."

Ron shook his head worriedly. "Would you believe I just found out about all this? How long has he been unconscious?"

Hermione hesitated. "Two weeks. He disappeared four or five days before anyone found him, and he's been here for a little more than a week."

"Oh, God," Ron choked. "What happened?"

"Maybe we should sit down. This could take a while."

The two sat down in the chairs just outside Harry's room. Hermione gripped her hands together tightly and began. "When I hadn't heard from Harry in a few days, I started getting worried. I took the Knight Bus out to Little Whinging...just to make sure the Dursleys weren't holding him hostage in the basement or something. Remus Lupin was just outside the door, lurking around in the bushes. The Order's been trying to watch him even though he hadn't come out--they figured he was just keeping to his room or something. I convinced Remus we should try and get in, just to make sure Harry was okay, so he knocked on the door. His uncle answered. Remus asked if we could please talk to Harry and Mr. Dursley said Harry wasn't there. Remus asked where he was, Mr. Dursley snapped that he was staying with you guys and slammed the door in our faces."

"But--" Ron began.

"But we knew he wasn't staying with you. For one thing, your dad would've said something, and for another he would have written to one of us and let us know," Hermione cut him off. "So we decided to try again. I knocked this time, and it was his aunt who came to the door. I told her that Harry had written and asked me to pick up a few of his things on the way to your house and could I please go up and get them? I think she was on the point of saying yes, but then Mr. Dursley showed up and ordered us off his property, said we were frauds and told his wife not to let us in. Remus lost it--he Stunned Mr. Dursley, not to mention Dudley when he came downstairs. I stopped him from Stunning Mrs. Dursley, though, and asked her if she'd show us Harry's room--we were just so worried about him. She took us upstairs and let us into the room. We thought we might find some clues up there."

"Clues? Like what?" Ron asked.

"A note or something. I don't know."

"Like a note saying he'd run away?" Ron guessed.

Hermione nodded. "Or worse, I--oh, Ron, I was scared to death we'd find a suicide note, that he'd slit his wrists or hung himself from a lamp or something like that."
"But there wasn't, was there?" Ron asked nervously.

Hermione shook her head. "No, but what we found was worse. We..." Tears filled her eyes and her voice trembled. "We went in, and I saw b-blood on the corner of his bed. I w-went over to see if he'd k-killed himself, and... he was just l-lying there, cut and bruised and broken and mangled...I c-couldn't find a p-pulse at first. For a m-minute, I thought we were t-too late...I thought we'd l-lost him. He was alive...but only just."

"How did he get here?" Ron asked, his voice barely above a horrified whisper.

"R-Remus carried him," Hermione answered. "The wh-whole way...he d-didn't even seem to n-notice if he was h-heavy."

"How did he get like that in the first place?"

Hermione shook her head. "We're not sure...but I think it has to do with his uncle. I think his uncle's been beating him."

Ron stared at Hermione, aghast. "You're not serious."

"I was never more serious in my life."

Ron closed his eyes briefly, then opened them. "Wh... what did he say when he woke up? What was he talking about that exhausted him so much?"

Hermione took a deep breath. "This is going to be kind of hard for you to believe..."

"Harry's involved. I'll believe anything."

The ghost of a smile flitted across Hermione's pale face. "Well...he says he was dead."

"What?"

"Well, not dead exactly," Hermione amended hastily. "Just sort of...well, he was in some sort of pseudo-heaven, but he wasn't dead. But everyone else was."

Ron shook his head slowly. "You're right. That is hard to believe."

A slight half-smile crossed Hermione's face. "Hang on. It gets harder."

"What...exactly...did he say?"

"He said that he woke up on the side of a road," Hermione said slowly. "He said he was stiff and sore, but when he stood up he felt better. He started walking down this road--"

"Why?" Ron interrupted.

"Well, all roads have to lead somewhere, don't they?" Hermione said logically. "Harry didn't know where he was or what was going on...he just knew he had to get away from wherever it was. Anyway, he started walking, but he kept stumbling, and a couple of times he tripped, but he got right back up and kept pushing through. After a while he tripped and had the wind knocked out of him--he couldn't get back up. Someone--a woman, mid-twenties--came along and helped him get to his feet, then asked him if he was sore. When he said he was, she said that meant he wasn't dead."

"Who was it?" Ron asked curiously.

Hermione hesitated, then looked him directly in the eye. "This is where it starts getting really strange, Ron. He says it was Rowena Ravenclaw."

Ron looked bemused. "But...she was over two hundred when she died!"

"Exactly," Hermione nodded worriedly. "Harry said that she told him that when a person dies, they go back to the age they were at the happiest times in their lives. Since the founders were in their mid-twenties when they founded Hogwarts, that's where they went. Er, when they went."

Ron shook his head. "But...that doesn't make sense."

Hermione shrugged. "I really don't know."

Ron took a deep breath and glanced towards the door where his best friend slept, hopefully peacefully and not tormented. "Okay. So Rowena Ravenclaw helped him up and told him he wasn't dead. What happened then?"

"He says...he says she told him he'd have to walk back, but he was in no condition to do that yet, so he should go with her because she had a group of friends with a comfortable house who wouldn't mind her bringing people home. He told his feet to follow her and they did--he wound up at this place he called Red House. Rowena knocked on the door and... and Cedric Diggory opened it."

Hermione glanced quickly up at Ron to see his reaction to this news, but Ron kept his face impassive. "So we've got Rowena Ravenclaw and Cedric Diggory...how old was Cedric? Did he say?"

"Mmm...no, but he did mention that he was wearing the same clothes he'd died in, so I assume it was when he died. After all, he'd just won the Triwizard Tournament."

"Okay, I'll buy that. Were the other Hogwarts founders there?"

Hermione nodded. "Harry says it surprised him, because Godric Gryffindor and Salazar Slytherin were acting like best friends or something."

"They probably were. In all honesty, nothing would surprise me at this point." Ron ran his fingers through his hair. "So let me get this straight. We have a house--Red House--in which we have the four Hogwarts founders and Cedric Diggory...and now Harry. Anyone else?"

Hermione nodded. "He says...oh, Ron, he says his parents and Sirius were there too."

Though I may give all I possess,

And striving so my love profess,

But not be given by love within,

The profit soon turns strangely thin.

Ron's heart beat twice, very fast, and stopped. Oh, my God...Forcing himself to remain calm, he said evenly, "Did he...did he talk to them?"

Hermione nodded, her brown eyes filling with tears again. "He says Cedric took him into the kitchen and got their attention, and there was a lot of hugging and crying that left him kind of sore."

"Right. What did they do after that?"

"Had dinner, according to Harry. He was fine until they got to dessert...halfway through he remembered the people he'd left behind and had trouble with his face. He tried finishing it, but then Godric Gryffindor asked Lily where she got the recipe, she said her sister gave it to her and Harry felt too sick to finish."

Ron swallowed several times. "Then what?"

Hermione closed her eyes. "They started talking and...and Helga Hufflepuff told him that he had the choice to stay with them instead of coming back," she said in a rush.

Ron jerked forward as though he'd received an electrical shock. "What?"

"He says...that she told him...if he wanted to stay, he could have...that his body back here would go into a coma until someone killed it, and his soul or spirit or whatever would stay there--wherever 'there' was." Hermione seemed to be having difficulty breathing. Ron couldn't entirely blame her as he felt the same way. "But...but he chose to come back."

"He...chose..." Ron repeated weakly.

Hermione nodded. A tear spilled down her cheek. "Rowena told him...told him to give them three g-good reasons to c-come back, and he said--" She broke off for a minute, took a couple deep, steadying breaths, then said, "He said that his reasons were Remus, his aunt...and me."

Somehow, this didn't really surprise Ron. "What did they say to that?"

"They...well, Sirius said they were perfectly good reasons. After that...Harry says they just kind of talked for a while until his parents decided he was strong enough to make the walk back, then his dad and Sirius went with him back to the gates and he came home."

Ron hesitated. "Did...did he mention me at all?"

Hermione swallowed. "Well...he said that Godric Gryffindor kind of looked like you..."

"No, I mean...when he talked about his reasons for coming back," Ron interrupted, not sure why he had to know so urgently. "Did he mention me?"

"Well...no...but he does care about you, really he does, and he did want to come back for you," Hermione said hastily. "It's just...they only wanted three reasons and..."

Ron sort of half-smiled at her. "I understand. Family comes first and all that."

Hermione frowned. "I'm not..."

"Literally, no, and neither is Remus," Ron cut her off. "But Remus is like a father to him, especially now that Sirius is gone. He and his aunt have made amends, and from what I hear the get along quite well. As for you...well, you might as well be family. You're closer to it than I am."

Hermione looked bemused. "What makes you say that?"

"Because he loves you, Hermione."

Hermione looked up sharply. Ron's face was deadly serious; he bore no indication that he was joking. "Wh-what?"

"Hermione, surely you've noticed," Ron said gently. "I have. Neville has. Dean has. Seamus hasn't, but he's about as sharp as a Bludger and maybe half as observant. I don't know that Harry even knows it himself, but he really does love you. Has for a while. You're the first person he thinks of in a crisis, you know, and he trusts your judgement. But there's even more to it than that--there's something in the way he looks at you, the sound of his voice when he talks to or even about you, the way he walks when you're walking next to him. Neville told me that when that spell hit you in the Department of Mysteries last month--what was it again?"

"Concerpsicorpus," Hermione said softly.

Ron stared at Hermione in astonishment. "Concerpsi--bloody hell, Hermione, you're lucky to be alive."

"So I've heard. Harry?"

Ron shook his head. "Harry...right...Neville said that when that spell hit you, when you were knocked out, he was afraid for a minute that he'd lost Harry too. He said it was like all the light went out of his eyes and he lost all hope. If Neville hadn't found your pulse, God knows what Harry would have done." He reached out and gripped Hermione's shoulders tightly. "He loves you, Hermione, and he'd do anything for you--he'd even die if it would help you."

"He'd die for you too."

"It wouldn't be the same," Ron insisted. "Let me put it this way. If you and I were in there with him, and someone came in brandishing a gun--I use a gun because I don't think there's a magical defence against one--and told Harry that the person was either going to shoot you or me, which one of us do you think he'd say to shoot?"

"He'd take the bullet himself first."

"True," Ron admitted. "Okay, maybe that's a poor example. Try this one. Let's say the building was on fire, you were in one end and I was in the other, and Harry only had the time to save one of us himself--let's assume he'd send someone else for the other one. Which one of us do you think he'd run after himself?"

Hermione bit her lip. "I--he--"

"You don't have an answer, do you?" Ron asked with a small--and slightly triumphant--smile. "I'll tell you, Hermione--he'd go after you, without a second thought, because he loves you. Yes, he and I are best friends and yes, we would die for each other, but if it came down to a choice between you and me..." His face twisted into somewhere between a smile and a grimace. "Well, it'd probably kill him to make that choice, but he'd choose you every time, without fail, because he loves you and he would be devastated if anything happened to you."

Hermione swallowed. "I...I love him too," she whispered. "But how can I tell him now? He could be d-dying...it might be too late."

"With true love, Hermione? It's never too late."

Come, Spirit, come, our hearts control,

Our spirits long to be made whole.

Let inward love guide every deed;

By this we worship, and are freed.