could have done to drive either of them away, they care for you too much.'
'Maybe they ran off with each other,' Harry suggested.
'If you are going to lie to me,' said Fleur, 'you are going to have to think of a better lie than that.'
Harry sighed. 'All right, if you must know,' he said, 'I left without telling them where I was going.'
'You did what?'
Harry took a wary step back. 'You're not going to slap me, are you? I remember when you slapped Draco.'
Fleur took a deep breath. 'No, I am not going to slap you, although I won't say it wouldn't do you some good if I did.' She shook her head.
'Dumbledore must be so disappointed in you, Harry.'
Harry's face changed at that; his green eyes went wide and stunned as if she really had slapped him. 'I didn't have a choice,' he said. 'It was the only way to keep them safe.'
'Safe from what?' Fleur demanded, and held up her hand before he could reply. 'I know what you're going to say, Harry. You're going to say it's the only way to keep them safe from Voldemort. But Harry, if you fail, if you die, who will keep them safe? Who will keep us all safe?'
Harry's mouth opened a little at that. There were bruises on his lower lip where he had bitten it during the fever. He looked very young. 'Well,' he began. 'Dumbledore might…'
'Albus Dumbledore has put his faith in you,' Fleur said. 'But who have you put your faith in, Harry? Is there no one worthy? Are you so arrogant that you must stand alone?'
'It isn't arrogance,' Harry snapped, his voice suddenly hot with anger. 'I -
I couldn't bear it if anything happened to either of them. I wouldn't be any good to anyone if it did.'
'And how selfish is that?' Fleur demanded. 'That is hardly about them; that is about you and what you need and your own fear of weakness. I can tell you now, Harry, if either of them died, you could bear it. You would bear it, for as long as you had to, until you were done, because that is your nature and that is why Dumbledore has put his faith in you. You were not given to us so that you could save your friends and the ones you love, you were given to us that you might save us all. And if you save them in doing so, then we can all be glad for it, and you will have preserved your heart as well as your life. But you cannot expect that you could be willing to sacrifice one without being willing to sacrifice the other.'
'So what are you saying?' Harry's eyes flashed. 'That I should let my friends lie down and die for me, for my own personal, pointless quest?'
'Your quest is neither pointless nor personal,' said Fleur. 'And if they want to lie down and die for you, if they must lie down and die for you, then you have to let them. There is a reason you have the friends you do, Harry. There is a reason you chose them all: Ron, Hermione, Draco as well, and it is not just because you love them, but because you need them. You need them as much as all of us need you.'
Harry looked at her, and the bright angry light faded slowly out of his eyes. 'I'm prepared to die,' he said. 'I've thought a lot about it. But I'm not prepared for them to die.'
'And were you prepared for Cedric's death? Death comes, Harry, whether we are prepared for it or not. You above all people should know that.'
'I dreamed I died,' Harry said. 'Last night. I dreamed I was a ghost in the Manor, and that ten years had passed, and I had done everything I had set out to do, I'd won the battle, and I'd died, but they were still alive.
Everyone was still alive but me. And they'd forgotten all about me. It was like I had never existed at all.' He looked down at the knife in his hand.
'Maybe I'm more selfish than I thought,' he said, and flung it at the wall.
It whipped through the air and struck the target dead center, driving through the corkboard and into the wall behind it. Split by the force of the impact, the corkboard cracked and the two split halves fell to the floor. The knife, driven up to the hilt in the wall, vibrated gently.
'Don't tell me,' Harry said. 'That was Viktor's favorite wall.'
Fleur giggled, and waved her hand at the target board. It sailed back up into the air, the pieces joining smoothly to each other, and re-affixed itself to the wall, just to the left of the knife. 'Your skills are not only warrior's skills, Harry,' she said, her tone gentle for the first time. 'You can use them as well to fix what you have broken.'
Harry gave her a crooked smile. 'Maybe you should be the one saving the world,' he said.
'I would not want to,' she said. 'And I am sorry for you, that you must be the one to do it.'
'It's all right,' Harry said, his green eyes sharp and focused and even a little cold; Fleur fought the urge to shiver. 'At least now I know what I have to do next.'
Before Fleur could reply, the double doors to the weapons room opened, and Viktor came in. His ears were red from cold, but he seemed pleased.
Fleur could tell he seemed pleased, because he was beetling slightly less than usual. 'Come, Harry,' he said. 'It is time for us to go.'
The back Ministry entrance Percy had directed them too was through the gardens, and so that was where they went, slipping around the building through the rose bushes that grew, high and laden with unseasonal blossoms, up to the lower windows of the building. Thorns caught at Hermione's jeans and her wool jumper and she swore under her breath as Draco pulled her forward, his hand clamped around her wrist.
He turned back and looked at her, amused. 'Language, sweetheart.'
'Draco, your jacket — '
He pulled up short as a two-inch thorn ripped its way through the sleeve of his black suede coat. 'Bloody damn,' he said, and went on to mutter something that sounded like 'clucking clam it all to clucking bell.'
Hermione giggled.
The back entrance turned out to be a pair of tall black doors set impressively between two carved marble pillars. The same roses twined up the pillars and across the top of the door. 'Roses in January,'
Hermione whispered, rubbing her cold hands together. 'Rather romantic for the Ministry.'
Draco, brushing fallen pale-red petals out of his hair and off the shoulders of his coat, made a face. 'My heart is going pitter-pat as we speak. Have you got the passwords?'
'Mmm-hmm.' Hermione took the parchment out of her pocket. She was about to hand it to Draco when she paused.
'Yes?' he said, impatiently.
'Just looking at you,' she said, and she was — partially because he looked healthier than he had in days. The cold had flushed his pale cheeks.
Under the long coat he wore a dark green jumper and the color lent a greenish cast to his eyes. 'I don't know why, but I was thinking that despite what he said, Harry would be proud of us for doing this.'
Draco cocked an eyebrow. 'Hermione,' he drawled, drawing out the 'i' in her name. 'I think it has been well established that Harry is an idiot, and therefore your comment, while doubtless intended to encourage, is not exactly filling my heart with complete confidence in this plan of ours. So chop-chop, or I'll think better of all this, vault over the railing and flee into the night.'
'Harry is not an idiot,' Hermione said.
Draco cast his eyes heavenward. 'Oh Lord,' he intoned, leaning back dramatically against the doors. 'Why didst thou smite me with these Gryffindors? What have I done to deserve this fate? I mean, all right, so there was some envying going on, and plenty of lusting and not nearly enough sex, but does that make me a bad person? I ask you — '
'Vera Prima Materia,' Hermione snapped, and the doors flew open. Draco, who had been leaning against them, yelped as his feet went out from under him and he fell backward into the corridor. Shoving the parchment back into her pocket, she sauntered through the doors and stood over Draco, who was just sitting up, wincing slightly. 'I said the password,' she said innocently. 'Did you notice?'
Draco rubbed the back of his neck and eyed her resentfully. 'Slytherin,' he said.
