A Trio Sundered

Author Notes:

Rated for language, violence and mild slash. Rating may increase in later chapters, but is unlikely to.

My best regards to Phantom of Delight for Betaing.

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For a moment after waking, Hermione couldn't understand quite why she felt so sleepy and weak, almost as if her mind and body had become dislocated from each other. The feeling was stronger, even, than those moments when Ron or Harry would storm the library, yanking her roughly from the third great goblin rebellion, the fantasised act of transfiguring the perfect quill from a pumpkin, or - hardest of all - the abstract landscape of Arithmancy.

Of course, even if she had fallen into a deep, studious trance among the high bookcases of Hogwarts, none of that explained the languid lethargy that seemed to have seeped into her every bone, nor the fact that everything about her from the rough, whitewashed walls to the sunlight streaming in through huge lead-pained windows held a greenish tinge. Although now that she looked around, neck exhausted almost to the point of collapse just by the simple challenge of craning forwards, the fact that she was in an infirmary might just provide an answer.

Now if only she could remember what had happened.

For once in her life however, her mind refused to cooperate, focusing instead on the gentle warmth of the summer sunlight on her cheek and the softness of the blankets that her toes burrowed into. And so, exhausted beyond reason and unexpectedly warm and content, Hermione slipped softly back into sleep, never knowing that, later on, she would curse it as the worst day of her life.

The sunlight was dipping low, its dying rays staining the sterilised infirmary crimson when she next stirred, unable to place for a moment what it was that had startled her from sleep.

Next to her Ron lay slumped against the bed, his head pillowed by her thigh and his soft snores filling the room with comfort. The light seemed better now - less blue-tinged - and Hermione had never been so glad to possess the full spectrum of colours as when she gazed over at Ron's madly tousled hair, the bright ginger of it somehow managing to clash with the sunset even as the evening's shadows pooled around them.

Reaching out to Ron then seemed less difficult than turning to glance about had been earlier that day, but she was too focused on the softness between her fingers to think much more than 'thank God he's still alive' before she noticed her hand.

It was her horrified recoil from her own fingers-fingers tangled in short, red hair; fingers little more than skin and bone and nail and for which even the softening tones of sunset could do little to hide the skin's sickly yellow shade - that disturbed Ron. He snapped upright as though she'd hit him instead of accidentally brushing his scalp and for an instant she thought that maybe, just maybe, she'd contracted some terrible wasting disease and that was why she was here, in the infirmary, all alone and weak, and that was why her mind seemed empty and why Ron had jerked back as though stung and why Ron was looking - no, gazing - at her with those wild eyes as though frozen with terror and...

Except that it didn't explain why her arms were suddenly full of a desperate Weasley, who was holding her so tightly that she thought her ribs must surely be creaking under the strain of it all.

For a moment Hermione could only make out the sounds of Ron gasping into her hair and it took her a moment to realise that he was crying, desperately, as though his world had shattered in two. It hurt to be held by him like this just as it hurt to hold him with arms which must surely have been hit with the world's biggest jelly-legs curse, still somehow she held on, the prospect of not holding and being held more painful yet.

By the time Ron finally stopped sobbing and released her to sink back into her pillows, Hermione thought she'd finally figured things out and the realisation had left her cold to her core. Watching Ron surreptitiously rub his eyes dry with a frayed cuff, however, Hermione just couldn't think of a way to broach the subject. Eventually, though, he looked up of his own accord and the age in his familiar blue eyes made her want to cry as hard as he had earlier. She gritted her teeth instead - she'd made it this far without tears and she was damned if she'd start bawling now, before she even knew for certain that anything was wrong.

Ron licked his lips before he spoke and as she watched the tip of his tongue trace over chapped lips she had kissed so many times before, Hermione was horrified to feel a pale shimmer of desire warm her. Now was definitely not the time for lust!

Instead she focussed on his hands, so large and strong, as they closed over her own, clasping them gently, protectively. His cough shot through the room like a physical thing, slicing at the quiet and, when Ron spoke, this voice, cracked and choked with emotion, was the most beautiful sound that she had ever heard. "I'm glad you're awake, Hermione. I'm so glad you're alright." As he spoke, Ron squeezed her fingers for emphasis, and, rather than making her feel frailer, his strength seemed to seep into her, instilling a confidence that things would be alright.

She smiled tentatively up into his eyes as the sun dipped below the horizon and subdued lighting flickered on throughout the ward. For a moment, in that flickering as the torches took hold, she allowed herself to hope. Maybe it was alright. Maybe there was still a chance. The ward, while a million miles from the comfort of Hogwarts with Madam Pomfrey pottering up and down the aisles, was equally far from the wretched, stinking healers tents she last remembered entering, ironically enough, to visit Ron as he lay, weak and pale as she felt now, after their successful assault on the strongholds of Dundee.

Then her hope faltered. As she'd sat there, helpless and frightened, at her lover's side, Harry had held her hand. His face had been a bleak mirror of her feelings, Hermione recalled.

But Ron was here alone.

She had to ask some questions. Sitting here in ignorance wasn't helping either of them. So she smiled bravely at Ron and asked "what happened?"

"You were hit by a number of curses." Ron wasn't looking at her any more, and for a moment, Hermione thought that he was misunderstanding her question intentionally before she realised how self-centred she was being and that Ron was just answering her question in the only was that his guilt-filtered mind could read it. "We couldn't get there in time. Oh, Hermione." There was desperation in his voice. His eyes, when he looked up from their linked fingers, were full of the wild need to be understood. "You must believe that we tried. We really, really tried. No matter what anyone says, you must know that we both did everything that we could to reach you."

It would only be later, when she couldn't sleep that night, that she would realise that she should have understood then.

Instead she just asked, "And then?", calmly and clinically detached and secretly wondering if Ron was trying to tell her it was fatal, or, worse yet, lingering.

He looked away again. "You've been in a coma for six months."

For a moment Hermione sat still, just trying to take that in and found to her surprise that she couldn't. She didn't even realise that she had taken her hands from Ron until she saw him, pale, staring at her with hurt in his eyes. One part of her wanted, maybe even needed, to reach back for him and hold on tight, needed to tell him that it hadn't been his fault and that she didn't blame him. Part of her-a part that she would make sure to tell Ron of later to make him laugh and say how well he knew her-was horrified to had lost half a year of living and learning from her life and, oh dear Merlin, how had she not registered that it was summer now, not winter? What a terrible lapse in analytical thinking. Partly she was simply relieved, because it explained her weakness and her sallowness and at least it would be alright eventually. Now, here was something that she had never wondered before, but did the wizarding world have physiotherapy?

Mostly though, she just needed to sit back and try not to panic. Half a year? That just wasn't possible! But as Hermione tried to push herself up and back her elbows gave out, determined to contradict her and only Ron's quick reflexes prevented her from falling out of bed and sprawling on the floor.

He propped her up before cautiously sitting back on his stool looking desperately uncertain about what he should be doing next. It certainly wasn't the romantic reunion that Parvati and Lavender used to gossip endlessly about before the war began. Except, was it really endless when they had stopped after Lavender's then-boyfriend Michael was killed by Death Eaters attempting to storm Hogwarts? Hermione still remembered the way flies had buzzed above the blood-soaked lawns before an autumnal downfall had washed it all away.

She looked across to where Ron was playing with the rumpled sheets to distract himself. The frown creasing Ron's freckled forehead should have looked out of place, but seemed like a well-worn expression instead. His thoughts seemed dark as her own, yet again Hermione wondered what had transpired in the last six months.

"Thanks for catching me before." And, in a frantic attempt to make him flash her that carefree smile she remembered: "Perhaps you should have been seeker."

His face darkened further and Hermione's heart clenched. Oh, Harry!

Ron toyed with the bedding some more before dropping his corner, throwing it down to glare at her with a look that could be seen as belligerent, but which she recognised as defiant. "The war is over."

Whatever Hermione had been expecting, no matter what she'd tried to brace herself for, it wasn't this. It couldn't have been this, or she wouldn't have been so surprised. And Ron had to be winding her up in an unexpected fit of cruelty because that just didn't make sense.

The war was over. They had won. The wards were almost empty. But... Where was Harry? And why was Ron so miserable? Why was everything so stark and silent?

Had Voldemort won instead? Was Harry - tears sprung to her eyes even thinking it, but she had to think about it, she had to be calm and clear and collected and make sense out of this madness - was Harry dead? Had everybody died? Was that why the ward was silent and empty? Yet, if so, how was she here? Or Ron? He would never have left Harry's side.

Nothing made sense. There seemed to be no logic to this riddle.

"Ron?" His face when he tried to smile at her almost twisted into a grimace. "Ron, who won?"

"We did." A strange, one shouldered shrug: a gesture old enough to look practised that Hermione had never seen before. "Sort of."

It wasn't exactly the answer she'd been waiting for. Surely there should have been a smile there? Surely, unless...

"So Voldemort's dead?" She tried to ask the question in a roundabout way, but at Ron's jerky nod was afraid she'd have to be more direct. He was gazing at his fingers now and she'd almost think he was as startled by those long, strong digits as she had been by the changes found in her own hands except that his eyes were blank and whatever it was that he did see, it wasn't nails bitten to the quick.

"Harry did it. Killed him." It sounded like Ron was in a trance, talking blindly of thoughts that sparked out of sight behind his eyes. But something of the tension in his shoulders told Hermione that he wasn't lost in thought; that he was still talking to her; giving her information he knew she would need, and that, if he didn't have to for her sake, he'd never let his mind wonder there again. "The second war ended nearly four months ago. You should have seen the parties." For a moment there was almost a flash of delight, childish and pure, to his voice. "We came to see you everyday, me and Harry. We came to see you..."

He trailed off, but that was alright. Hermione had found the will to talk again with the lightening of a leaden weight from her soul. "So Harry made it? He wasn't killed?"

"Yeah, he made it." For the second time Ron almost looked like himself, a small smile tracing the curve of his lips, the soft light throwing familiar shadows across his face. "Did you ever really doubt it?"

And in spite of all her logic, all of her reviewing the odds, Hermione had to admit that deep down, she'd never really thought Harry would fall. It wasn't faith, blind or otherwise, but a deep and desperate denial that she'd ever lose someone so close. She'd never allowed herself to believe that Harry would die - she'd been frozen to find him not at her bedside, fighting not to acknowledge the possible reason for it. "Then where is he? When can I see him?"

Harry would have been busy of course! That was why he hadn't been here! He'd won a war, everyone would have things for him to do. She spared a moment to worry about how he would be holding up. Harry always had been more of an action person than a manager.

"Hermione." Ron spoke as if he were about to deliver a great shock. He took her hand gently and, even as she felt her stomach fall away in fear, she was warmed by the knowledge that now, finally, after half a year, they would be together again. That together the three of them would weather the problems and emerge triumphant. "Hermione, I've got some bad news." He looked sick. "We're gearing up to a third war."

Later she'd realise why she'd spent the entire conversation two steps behind the truth. She'd known why she hadn't read Ron correctly and why what should - third war looming or not - have been one of the happiest days of her life, had instead been stained all along with fear and uncertainty.

But Hermione was logical and some things were not ruled by logic. Harry certainly never was.

She'd figure all that out later. After Ron had departed, limping from a wound she hadn't been there to nurse. After the overly-friendly healer had checked her over and declared her amazing and talked on and on and on about ways of getting her up and about. After the torches burned out and plunged the infirmary into a darkness to match her depression.

Even then Ron's words would ring through her mind: "Harry is the opposition."

No, she wouldn't be seeing Harry again. As sure as if he were dead.