Dragonweed

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DRAGONWEED

"The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven"

John Milton, "Paradise Lost"

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CHAPTER 5 -- Mud and Butterflies

--- Harry ---

I wake up to a bright day and a white ceiling. The equally white dividers and something about the atmosphere and the way the light falls in through high windows tells me I'm in the hospital wing at Hogwarts. My eyes go around the room while I try to understand how I came to be here. I lie still for a long time, trying to reconcile the brightness of the room with the dull emptiness inside me.

Shreds of memories drift past, ragged flashes of mud and fear and pain.

I touch my scar. It does not hurt. Perhaps I am imagining it, but I can hardly feel the familiar lightning-bolt ridge under my fingers. It seems to have sunk into the skin.

The door opens and Madam Pomfrey enters. She starts when she meets my eyes, and comes up to me with a look of deep concern.

"Oh, you are awake," she says. "How do you feel?"

How do I feel? I hardly know who I am. Confusion and bewilderment are very weak, very inadequate words. I don't know if I will ever find words to describe the abyss inside me. She seems to understand this, without me saying anything.

"Here," she says and places a beaker of something vividly red on my bedside table. "Drink this."

I drink it obediently, and the taste of it calls up a faint memory. It is hazy and without detail, but I know it's a pleasant memory. I can't hold on to it. It flutters at the edge of my mind and dances away like a butterfly.

A few minutes later I am asleep again.

* * *

When I wake up this time the light is softer, the reddish golden light of a winter afternoon. I feel a hand on my shoulder and turn to see Dumbledore's eyes look into mine, warmth spreading through my numb body. He looks very tired but also tremendously relieved and -- and yes, he looks happy.

"Harry," he says warmly. "Just rest. Just rest."

"Voldemort," I say.

"Voldemort is gone, Harry," he says softly. "I will tell you all the details when you are feeling better."

"Gone?" The word leaves a vacuum in my head. For a moment, everything stands still. I will not even try to comprehend. I start on another, more immediate thread. "And -- and Sirius?"

"He's here in the hospital wing."

Cold fear spears me.

"Is he -- will he be all right?"

"Yes, eventually. It will take some time, but -- yes."

Scraps of vivid memories flash past. I'm halfway out of bed in alarm.

"Ron -- Hermione! Bill, Charlie... They were all out there with us, weren't they?"

"Yes, Harry, they were." Dumbledore's hand on my shoulder gently pushes me back onto the pillows. He is silent for a while. I can see that he is sorry for me, so sorry, and doesn't know how to tell me what he has to tell me. "Ron is well; he's at The Burrow." He pauses again. "But I'm afraid that, as always, the good news is accompanied by bad. Are you strong enough to hear the worst of it?"

I am so tired. I just want to sleep.

"Yes," I say.

* * *

I must have cried for hours after Dumbledore left. It's too much to grasp, too overwhelming. Hagrid, Bill, Charlie, Lupin... So many more whose names I have never known. So many gone. Hermione is here in the hospital wing, being treated for a dark burn that covers most of her left side and very nearly cost her her life. But I have no strength to go and see her.

With the aid of Madam Pomfrey's blessed potions I sleep for several days. I lose track of time. I just lie here and watch day change to night, night to day. Madam Pomfrey brings me nourishing food, little treats, kind words. Dumbledore visits me regularly. I know he senses the overwhelming guilt I feel, but we don't talk about it. I have only asked him to send an owl to the Weasleys to tell them how very, very sorry I am. Sometimes the feeling of guilt is so strong that I get physically sick, grabbing the bowl from my bedside table and retching up Madam Pomfrey's excellent dinner into it.

I lie and watch the light wander around the room, white and cold on the wall opposite me in the morning, bright and sharp across my bed at noon, slanting and softly golden in the afternoon when it almost touches my face.

Days go by.

* * *

Today I got out of bed. I went to see Sirius. He is much better now, but neither of us had the strength to talk about what has happened. I don't know exactly what it is he is being treated for and I did not ask. We sat like strangers, making conversation about harmless things. The subjects were so limited that I soon got up to leave. He got up, too, and gave me one single look. I knew that he could see my pain, and I saw his, raw and screaming. He did not say anything at all, just took a step forward and embraced me. I put my head on his shoulder and we stood there wordlessly. All I heard was his steady heartbeat and my own ragged breathing. I thought I was crying but there were no tears. Then I pulled out of his embrace and left him without another word.

I lie on my bed staring up at the ceiling. I should go and see Hermione but one strained bedside conversation is enough for one day. Madam Pomfrey tells me Hermione is holding her own. I will go and see her tomorrow.

Dumbledore comes in and sits down in the chair beside my bed. He looks very purposeful today.

"Now, Harry," he says, "I think you are strong enough for this."

I close my eyes. I don't want to hear it. Every time Dumbledore comes here he feeds me a piece of unwanted information, like bitter bread I have to choke down against my will.

"There is someone who wants to see you, Harry."

No.

I've spent so much time trying to hold off this moment. My whole being is screaming out in protest. I want to hide under the bedclothes like a child, beat at the pillow with my fists. The white fire in me that I have managed to quench for days is there again, as searing and painful as ever.

"He has been here every day, but Madam Pomfrey didn't think you were strong enough to see him."

Madam Pomfrey is quite right. I doubt if I will ever be strong enough to see him again.

"Well, Harry, will you see him?"

I shake my head on the pillows, unable to even say no. I want to say, tell him I will never see him. He ought to understand why.

"As you wish." Dumbledore gets up from the chair, hesitates. "I just want you to know that you owe Mr Malfoy a great deal. He did save your life, after all."

And then he leaves the room, noiselessly, leaving me to deal with the waves of hot pain rolling in over my fragile shores.

* * *

I realise now that I have spent most of my time here in my sickbed trying to numb my mind, stop my thoughts, bar all the gates to my consciousness. And I feel ashamed to admit that the main reason for this is not my feelings of guilt or even the sorrow for all the people who have died, deep and genuine as that is. The main reason, the driving force, is Draco Malfoy. Of course. As always. He has been the centre of my pitiful emotional life for so long -- why should there be an end to that because of trifling little things like his joining the Death Eaters and attempting to kill me on the battlefield? I have been concentrating so hard not to think about him that he has been in my mind constantly.

Dumbledore's words are ringing in my ears. You owe Mr. Malfoy a great deal. He saved your life, after all.

I can't make it fit. I don't want to make it fit. I can't accept that I should have been so wrong. And God knows I don't need to feel any more guilt. Or gratitude.

* * *

I wake up to a grey dusk. I lie still and let the greyness soothe me. I have dreamed again of the green flashing light, violet stars sparkling from wands, the shouting and the screaming and the pain, the tall column of a man in front of me, all black and silver and terrifying beauty. Tears are gushing out from under my eyelids. My pillow is wet and I must have cried in my sleep.

A soft rustle next to me makes me jump and sit up straight in one movement. The shock is so great that black spots dance before my eyes.

Draco Malfoy simply says:

"Harry."