Chapter Nineteen: Dead Man’s Blood
Ginny was still in shock when they arrived back in their rooms. She clung to Harry numbly, trying to think about anything rather than the haunting images of blood spattering all over herself that wouldn’t leave her mind. She relived the moment over and over again when she had thrown herself into the man who had tried to murder her brother, felt again her vindictive glee as he screamed in agony, and the horror she felt when she realized that he was dead, and she had killed him. Instinct had driven her to use her beak and talons, but she couldn’t get past the feeling that she had killed a man with her hands and mouth, and she would never forget the horror of his blood dripping down her face and off of her hands. When they had first gone back to the motel, she had been violently ill, and it had seemed as though she had brought up everything she had ever eaten in her entire life, until she couldn’t imagine ever eating again.
Harry tried to get her to go to her bed, but she refused to let go of him; he was providing a stable tie to reality and she wasn’t going to give that up. Harry gave up, and sent Ron to inform McGonagall that they were back, before leading her over to a couch and sitting down. He kept his arms wrapped around her tightly, and rocked her back and forth, saying nothing as he held her. Ginny squeezed her eyes shut against the tears that were returning again, but was powerless to stop them. She could feel Harry’s love for her radiating off of him, and desperately tried to gain some measure of comfort from his embrace.
Ginny lost track of time as she sat in Harry’s arms, as tears streamed down her face and her body trembled with the memories. Finally, after a few hours, she pulled back and looked up into Harry’s eyes. They were sightlessly staring off into space, their brilliant green depths filled with sorrow, and tears had left twin tracks down his face. The sight of his sorrow helped her subdue her own.
“Harry,” she began, but her voice cracked and she stopped, trying to stop the tears that threatened again.
Harry conjured a glass of water for her with a wave of his hand, and she gratefully drained it before continuing.
“I’m sorry… I should be able to handle this better…” her voice began shaking and she squeezed her eyes shut, not wanting to think about it anymore, but needing desperately to talk about it.
“There’s nothing to be sorry for Ginny,” Harry said slowly in a soft voice. “That man had intended to kill Ron, and he did kill Fawkes. And…” Harry hesitated before revealing the last detail, “he shot me over the summer, and gave me the injuries that took away my sight.”
“That was the same person?” Ginny asked incredulously, her own pain temporarily forgotten as she tried to take in this incredible coincidence.
“It was. I recognized him while I was a hawk… I’ll never forget his face…” Harry paused before going on in a stronger tone, “The point is, he chose a life that only brought pain and suffering to others; he’s killed several other people, and he would have killed all of us without thinking twice about it. What you did was defend your family, and in the process you’ve made it so others won’t have to suffer in the future. It’s no different from me having to kill Voldemort. I have to kill him to prevent the suffering of others.”
Ginny took several minutes to think about this, trying to take what he was saying into her heart to drive away the pain she felt at being a killer.
“But, I killed him… with my… beak… and the blood…” She couldn’t make herself more coherent than that, but Harry seemed to understand.
“After my party when I killed those men with the lightning bolt, I had nightmares for weeks; I couldn’t see anything in the dreams. I just heard the sounds. I couldn’t listen to a thunderstorm without thinking about what I had done, but I came to realize that the spell I used was the only weapon I could come up with to protect the people I love. You have to understand, you were following instincts that led you to use the weapons that you had. If you hadn’t taken him by surprise like that, he still might have managed to shoot one of us.”
“But I wanted to hurt him… I was happy I hurt him.”
Harry could hear from her voice that she was coming closer to acceptance, and rubbed her back gently.
“In the Ministry two years ago… I tried to use the Cruciatus Curse on Bellatrix Lestrange after Sirius fell through the Veil. It didn’t work because it was only righteous anger, not a desire to cause pain for pain’s sake. You just wanted him to pay for trying to hurt your brother.”
Ginny tightened her grip on Harry and leaned her head up against his chest, and felt her body finally begin to relax. She still had images of the man’s dead body flashing through her mind, and could still feel the blood dripping from her hands… but she could also imagine that those feelings would fade with time.
“Thank you, Harry,” she said quietly, looking up at his face again.
He smiled sadly. “This is what you did for me after I killed the Death Eaters. I just wish I didn’t have to do the same for you… are you still sure you want to be around me?”
Ginny tightened her grip until Harry grunted at the pressure. “You couldn’t get rid of me if you tried, Potter.”
Harry smiled again, with more warmth and less sorrow.
Harry continued to hold her, talking quietly until she finally grew tired and fell asleep, where her dreams were thankfully of Harry and not her experiences that night.
***
When Ron and Hermione emerged from their rooms early in the afternoon of the next day, they found Harry awake and still sitting with Ginny, his arms around her as she slept peacefully.
“How is she?” Ron asked quietly, concerned about his sister.
“I’m fine,” Ginny responded, opening her eyes and stretching, feeling slightly sore after sleeping on the couch. She appeared pale, and somewhat withdrawn, but she was doing much better than the night before.
“Did you get any sleep at all, Harry?” she demanded, as she turned to look at him.
Harry grinned, and his face was momentarily free of the cares and worries that so often made him look older than he was.
“I was having too much fun to go to bed. You talk in your sleep,” he said, a mischievous light entering into his eyes.
Ginny blushed as she remembered parts of her dreams. “I do not!” she exclaimed, only partially sure.
“Do too,” Harry retorted, his grin growing larger.
“What did I say?”
“Do you want me to tell you in front of Ron and Hermione?”
“Okay, that’s enough of that,” Hermione interrupted, though she giggled briefly at the exchange. It was incredible to her how easily Harry was making Ginny forget about her problems. “What are we going to do next, since the orphanage didn’t get us anywhere?”
Ron was eager to put his previous idea forward again. “What about finding where he learned all of his dark magic after he disappeared?”
Harry sat thinking for a moment.
“Where do you go to learn to be a Dark Wizard?” he asked.
“To another Dark Wizard,” Ginny answered, as a sudden thought occurred to her.
“Who else...? You mean Grindelwald?” Hermione queried incredulously. “He was killed around the same time Voldemort got out of school.”
“But he might have gone to Germany to see if he could find anything of Grindelwald’s,” Ron put in enthusiastically.
“And if he couldn’t find something belonging to Ravenclaw or Gryffindor, he might have chosen something belonging to the previously most-feared Dark Wizard,” Harry added thoughtfully.
“How are we going to search Germany?” Hermione wanted to know, “None of us speak German, and we won’t have proper papers if we need to stay somewhere or if something happens.”
“If we do go,” Harry said, “then we should research everything we can about Grindelwald before we go, and have a plan as to exactly where we want to look. We’ll have to wait until Fawkes has grown up again, but he can just bring us back here when we are done searching every day, so hopefully we can keep from having any contact at all with the Germans. We’ll probably be able to find everything we would need at Grimmauld Place; the Blacks seemed to like Dark Wizards a lot, so we can do our research over the Christmas break.”
“Brilliant,” Ron muttered sarcastically. “Our one break from our NEWT year homework, and we get to spend it doing research.”
***
The rest of the time before break was relatively peaceful, and most of Harry’s time was spent teaching, training, and caring for Fawkes. The little phoenix grew remarkably fast, and was flying around their rooms within a week. He had all the knowledge and memories of the old Fawkes, but he still seemed somewhat immature; behaving like an adolescent, Harry would think in amusement. Training without Fawkes had been difficult, because Moody expected him to perform just as well without him, but within a few days after being able to fly, Fawkes was providing Harry with vision again. Harry had a bit of trouble restraining the phoenix, in his current reckless stage, from joining the fight himself, but soon Harry was able to take on large groups of Order members all working together. His confidence was also growing, and he began to feel like he really would have a chance against Voldemort when the time came.
Finally, Harry had his last day of classes; he had been teaching all of his classes evasion techniques, and finally came through with his promise of a future snow battle. The charm that hurled snowballs was simple, and all of his students, including the first years, had been able to learn it quickly, so Harry spent the last day pairing up his students in mock duels where they would hurl snowball “curses” at each other while trying to evade anything coming their way. The students had a wonderful time, and Harry was proud of the way they were learning to move and think. As Ginny picked him up from his last class of the day and walked him back to their rooms, he couldn’t help but excitedly telling her about the whole day.
“You really enjoy teaching, don’t you?” she asked fondly.
“Yeah…” Harry said, suddenly thoughtful. “I do.”
“Rethinking your decision to become an Auror?” she pressed.
“I don’t know. I think I’m putting a lot of my plans for the future on hold, until I have more of a future to plan for.”
“Well, keep your options open. You never know; you could suddenly decide to enter Muggle Relations with my Dad,” she laughed.
“All of my experiences with Muggles haven’t been that great lately,” Harry said, smirking, “so I really don’t think that that is very likely.”
They laughed together as they reached their rooms and began to pack for their Christmas trip to headquarters.
***
They waited until the train carried the rest of the students away, before Fawkes tried his first long distance transport since his death. When they appeared in the kitchen at Grimmauld Place, Fawkes flew around exuberantly, singing proudly about his accomplishment. Harry let the phoenix feel his gratitude and pride, and Fawkes alighted on his shoulder and continued to sing.
Mrs. Weasley was waiting for them, and rushed around giving each of them huge hugs. She lingered with Ginny, studying her still pale features and nervous expression, and seemed to understand some what her daughter was feeling. She held her tightly, and both had shining eyes as they broke apart and Mrs. Weasley moved on to Harry.
“How are you, dear?” she asked as she embraced him warmly.
“Fine, thank you, Mrs. Weasley,” Harry answered, returning the hug.
“I’ll let you all get settled, and then we’ll have dinner. The twins and Arthur will be here, and Bill and Fleur might stop by as well.”
Dinner was a cheerful affair, with lots of good food prepared by Mrs. Weasley, and good natured joking and laughter from the twins. Mr. Weasley wanted to know how their schoolwork was going, and everyone seemed interested to know how Harry was doing with his teaching and training.
Harry was telling them all about his snowball dueling classes, while the twins complained about never having such a good time in Defense lessons, when the house suddenly shook with a resounding ‘boom,’ as the floor shook and Harry felt himself thrown from his chair.