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By the time Harry arrives, Death is waiting.
On silent feet, he steps up beside her in the mouth of the alley, accepts the hand she hooks around his elbow, lets her tug him close. The dark coils of her hair tickle his cheek. Beyond their shared plot of shadow, chaos—a swarm of figures in dark robes and bone white masks, and all he can think is Again?—has descended upon Diagon Alley. “I wasn’t sure you’d make it,” Death says to him. If she were anyone else—if he were anyone else—her voice would be lost to the screaming, the thunder of boots on the ground, the magic that splits the air.
Her voice cuts neatly through it. As does his. “Hello to you, too.”
She scoffs, swatting his words away like one would a fly. Still, she smiles at him. “Did you feel it, then?” she asks. Her hand at his elbow squeezes. “Or is this a coincidence?”
Harry touches his chest, wonders that it isn’t glowing for everyone to see. “I felt it,” he tells her, “here, like a pull.”
“A pull?”
He frowns. “Is that wrong?”
“Not wrong.” Her voice is warm. Her dark eyes—rich as loam, as life—are warmer. “Just unexpected. It suggests…obligation.”
Prying. As though she doesn’t already know. “Mm.” He turns away from her and scans the scene of the battle, looking for something familiar. “Perhaps.”
“You sound like Dream.”
He scrunches his nose. Mutters: “Ugh.”
She laughs at him, jostles him. He sways with the force of it like he always does, and she laughs again. “He’s not so bad, you know. Certainly, he’s not as bad as he was before you knew him.”
She’s right, he knows. Still. “I prefer his sister.”
“Aw, how sweet.”
“Mhm, I saw her just the other day.” He eyes her, bites his cheek so he doesn’t laugh at the furrow between her brows. He nudges her with his elbow. “Despair says hello, by the way.”
Her expression clears, gives way to a truly spectacular eye roll. “Cute,” she says, but doesn’t bother to hide the fond curl of her voice. A bolt of sickly green cracks the wall beside them, interrupting anything more she might have said. Down the street, a fire roars to life. Death sighs, leans her head against his shoulder. They watch the flames together. “It’s good that you’re here.”
A shop window shatters, spraying glass into the air. It falls like snow over the cobblestones.
Further away, a spell is redirected into a storefront. It causes an explosion. A man shoves a child out of the way and, in his distraction, falls to twin blades of spellfire to his back.
“Fifty-four years,” Harry says, not daring to blink or look away. The man doesn’t rise. He can barely hear himself speak. “A friend of mine”—to Death’s curious gaze, he clarifies, though he’s not sure he needs to; he never had that many—“Hermione. She told me once that the average witch or wizard could expect to see one hundred and forty.” Then, because he fears she won’t understand: “The longest natural lifespan to end in the last century was two hundred and thirty-two.”
She must hear things like this all the time. When she speaks, it’s with infinite patience. “Harry.”
“I know,” he says, and he means it. Still, his eyes sting. He tells himself it’s from the dust in the air. “I know, I just…” His shoulders slump. “Fifty-four. Less than half.”
“That’s more than a lot of people get, you know.” If she meant to help, she’s fallen short. Death sighs, squeezes his arm tighter. “It wasn’t nothing.”
“No,” Harry agrees.
A woman stumbles to the mouth of the alley, leaking blood through the hand pressed against her neck. She dies choking on it. As she takes her last breaths, she claws at the brick with slick fingers, falls and lands on her belly, staring at nothing. More blood spills into the dirt.
He says, “But it wasn’t enough.”
Death smiles, wry, because this, too, she’s heard before.
Harry leaves her to her work. He steps over the body and out into the fray. Already, the fight has begun to wane. The tide is turning. How many deaths did it take? Twelve so far, but there will always be more. And the worst thing is, he thought this was done with. He though his death would mean something.
Except, that’s not true.
The worst is this: a glimpse red hair, a face he used to know better than his own.
“Harry,” Death says, standing beside him again. He tears his gaze away, finds her looking back. “Is there anything you’d like to ask of me?”
The question lands heavy in his chest, a blunt and sinking ache.
Because there is. Because she means it, he knows. If he only asks, she’ll leave Ron Weasley be, her gift ungiven, and his friend will keep living. And yet. “It’s his time,” he says, and the truth of it rings like a bell where his heart once sat, bright and clean. “Even if he lives, that won’t change.”
“No,” she agrees evenly, “it won’t.”
What kind of life would that be? A thread tangled, knotted, stretched beyond recognition. The tapestry would correct itself—violently, relentlessly—until everything was again in its proper place. He can’t do that to him. “No,” he says, “there’s nothing.” Except, a thought. A wish. He catches her by the wrist before she goes. “Wait. Could I…” Under the weight of her gaze, he feels small. Fragile. “Could I fetch him, instead?”
She smiles like she was only waiting for him to ask. “Of course.”
She beckons him closer, takes his face between her palms. Her hands are warm, dry, and he bends for her with ease. Her lips on his forehead are a puzzle piece clicking into place, a note slipping back into tune. “What was that?”
“Call it the key to my kingdom,” she says, and her eyes shine like twin suns. “Do you know the way?”
The long road unspools within him, before him, as easy as breathing. “Yes.”
She takes his hands in hers, squeezes, and says, “Walk well, Harry.” And then she goes, picking her way through the crowd toward the others awaiting her gift.
Harry doesn’t stop to watch.
His friend is waiting, too.
He moves through the dregs of the battle untouched, unseen by all but a few. But he isn’t here for them, no matter that their time has come, so he keeps walking. Glass cracks beneath the soles of his boots. Dust from shattered stone clings to black denim, stretches its pale fingers up past his knees as he kicks a stray piece of rubble. When he breathes in, he tastes smoke and chalk and blood-wet heat.
He finds what he’s looking for half-buried under fallen brick, piled high with broken beams of wood. Blood has crusted over his left cheek. Against bloodshot sclera, the blue of his eyes is electric. His hair is stained with grey, from age or dust he doesn’t know. He’s so pale. Washed out.
It’s wrong, seeing him like this.
It hurts.
He sinks to his knees. For a long moment, he can only stare. When finally speaks, his voice is hoarse. All he can say is a name. “Ron.”
It’s enough.
Ron Weasley—Granger-Weasley, now—jolts like he’s been struck by lightning. He peels his eyes all the way open, stares. “Harry?” he asks, voice is thin with disbelief. “Is it really…?”
Harry reaches out to touch because he can’t help himself, smooths the furrow between Ron’s brows. “It’s me.”
Those wide eyes begin to water. Ron lunges for him, crushes him to his chest with his nose buried in his hair. If Harry needed to breathe, he’d be in trouble right about now. But he doesn’t—hasn’t in a while—so he just knots his hands in Ron’s jumper and holds on. He could stay here forever. He’s missed this.
He hasn’t been touched like this in years.
Has he always been so cold?
When Ron pulls back, Harry’s grip tightens before he abruptly releases him, shuffling back. Ron doesn’t let him get far. Hands planted on his shoulders, Ron looks at him, desperately drinking in the sight of him. His eyes crinkle when he laughs. “Always knew you’d be a specky little git forever,” he says, and then his laughter gives way. Voice thick, wondering, he says, “You look so young.”
Harry grins wide, hopes the sight of it warms him. He presses his thumb to the crow’s feet that wrinkle the skin around his eyes. “You don’t.”
Ron doesn’t blink, doesn’t look away. “It’s been thirty years.”
“Thirty-six,” Harry says, because he’s been counting.
Ron shakes his head, swipes his grimy sleeve across his eyes. “Everyone thought you were dead.”
“I know.” He didn’t go to the funeral, but Death tracked him down afterward, said it was lovely. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t—” Ron looks down, shaking his head. “Don’t apologize, just. Tell me. What happened to you? Where did you go?”
“Everywhere,” Harry says, knowing Ron won’t be satisfied, hating that he doesn’t have a better answer. “And nowhere. I visited you, sometimes.”
But not often. Not enough.
He thought he’d have more time.
Ron’s brow furrows. The hand on his shoulder holds him tighter, fingers grasping. Enough to bruise. “We never saw you.”
An accusation and question both. It would hurt less to claw out his heart and splatter it against the cobblestones. “No,” he says, admits. Because he could never stay. Because he wanted to. Because he would have, if they’d only asked. “It seemed…easier.”
For who, Ron doesn’t ask, but Harry sees the question in his eyes. “Well, you’re here now,” Ron says instead, like it’s all he needs to know. Nearby, a boy on the cusp of adulthood takes his last breath. Death’s shadow arcs over them as she passes by. Ron flinches, looks around, like he’s only just realized where they are. “Harry,” he says he turns back to him, brow furrowed, “why are you here?”
“I’m filling in for a friend.”
Ron stares. “I don’t understand.”
Harry sighs, ducks his head. Death walks by them again; this time, he feels her fingers in his hair. “I never got to tell you,” he says, taking the easy way out, sidestepping the unasked question. “Do you remember the story of the three brothers?”
“Yes, I—wait. No.”
Harry grins. "Yes."
“You’re the Master of Death?” Ron leans in. Laughs, incredulous. It’s close enough to the truth that Harry doesn’t bother correcting him. “Hermione was so sure it was just a story. I knew it was real.”
“Did you really?”
“Well, eventually.” Ron looks away, clears his throat. “You disappeared, you know? I thought… There had to be a reason. There had to be something.”
Oh.
Harry holds himself carefully still. He doesn’t blink, he doesn’t breathe. He fixes his gaze on the ground and says, “You were both right.” He can feel Ron’s eyes on him again, can feel the familiar, welcome weight. “In the beginning, the hallows were nothing; they had no power beyond their function. They just…didn’t stay that way.”
“What happened?”
Harry risks a glance, smiles unbidden at the sight of his friend’s open, hungry expression, at the way his hands wring together. He looks so much like Hermione, but then, that’s what sharing a life does to you, isn’t it? Ignoring the sting in his eyes, he chooses the answer least likely to inspire questions. About himself. About Death. He says, “Destiny.”
For a moment, he thinks Ron might press. Then he snorts, shakes his head. “So, what you’re saying is: in the end, I was more right.”
Relief is a flood; it chases out the dark, the sour weight. He laughs so hard he surprises himself. “Is that what I said?” he asks.
“Ha! It’s what you meant,” Ron crows. He rises onto his knees, looks around with his arm half raised, ready to call out. “Just wait until I tell her. She’ll be spitting mad when she finds out.”
Ah.
His heart is a stone, and it sinks. He takes Ron’s arm, pulls it back down. When he speaks, his voice is soft, careful. “Ron.”
Ron looks back at him, echoes of laughter still on his face. Realization comes slowly. Betrayal follows on its heels, and so does hurt. “No,” he says, shaking his head. “No, no. That’s not—This isn’t.” He looks around again, desperate for a different answer, gaze darting frantically. Then he stills all at once. He sees it: his body, lying where it fell. Half-buried. Grey and cooling fast. “This isn’t real. I need to—”
“Ron,” Harry says again. He takes his hand, cradles it like a bird between his own, feels scarred knuckles and callouses he never got to see form. He pets his thumb over Ron’s wrist, where blood used to flow. “It’s time.”
For a long moment, they sit there together in silence.
“It wasn’t supposed to be like this,” Ron says eventually. He takes a breath he doesn’t need. His head bows. “I wasn’t supposed to go first.”
Harry doesn’t know what to say, so he says nothing.
He holds Ron’s hand tighter.
The next time his friend speaks, his voice shakes. “I told her I wouldn’t leave her alone.”
This hurt, at least, he can ease. “She won’t be alone, Ron,” Harry says and scoots closer, until their knees knock together. “Your family—”
Ron’s head shoots up, eyes wide, panic clear across his face. “My family—the children!” He clutches Harry’s hands with bruising strength, nails biting into his skin. Desperation scrapes his words raw. “Rose, Hugo, the kids.”
“They’re fine,” Harry promises, and slowly Ron’s grip eases. “They’re alive.”
The fight is well and truly finished now. No one else will be dying here today.
“Master of Death,” Ron says to himself, wondering. A huff of laughter, strained but real. “You’d know?”
“I would.”
“And you’d tell me?”
Harry nods, holds his gaze. “I swear.”
Ron’s expression crumples, and the rest of him falls too. Harry bears his weight gladly, pays no mind to the tears that wet his shoulder. “She’ll be alright,” Ron says, like he’s trying to convince himself.
“She will,” Harry says and knows it’s true. He squeezes the back of Ron’s neck, rests his cheek in his friend’s hair and breathes in. He still uses the same shampoo. Harry doesn’t know what to do with that knowledge, so he does nothing. He just holds him. For all that Ron has grown—tall and strong with age—he feels small in Harry’s arms. He’s no burden at all. “And she won’t be alone. Your family will be there. It will live on; it’ll keep growing, and so will Hermione.”
Ron sighs, sniffles.
Harry holds him tighter, pushes on. “And when her time comes, when she dies, I’ll be there.”
“Do you know how long—”
“Ron,” Harry says, gently chiding. He grips the back of his head by his hair, tugs until Ron is forced to meet his gaze. “I can’t tell you that.”
Ron swallows, nods. He still has questions, but—“What now?”
Harry smiles. He nudges Ron back, pushes himself to his feet and brushes the dust from his knees. When he offers his hand, Ron takes it. “Now, we go for a walk.”
Ron takes a step back, looks at the whole of him. “A walk, huh?” He shakes his head. His smile is faint, but it’s there. His eyes shine. He doesn’t ask where they’re walking to, and it’s for the best; Harry wouldn’t tell him if he did. “Well, I reckon I’ve followed you worse places.”
He has, and he follows Harry again.
This time, the path is easy. They’re in no rush. There’s no one to save, no battle to fight. The road is long, but it’s well-worn, and the company is good.
“Will you do something for me?” Ron asks as their journey comes to an end.
Anything.
He bows his head that isn’t really his head—in this place that isn’t really a place—and he listens carefully for his friend’s words lest the twilight swallow them up. When he hears them, his laughter spills new light into the dark, and this is how they part.
It takes forty-three years for Hermione to join him.
He finds her in room packed full, friends and family crowded around the bed she once shared with her husband. Her curls, long grey with age, are a crown splayed across her pillow. The life she’s lived is written into her skin, and it’s a privilege to see it. He was right, years ago, when he told Ron she wouldn’t be alone.
Her eyes are closed. Her breaths are steady, their rhythm unmarked by pain. Death is always kind, but this death will be peaceful.
He moves easily toward the bed, unseen and yet unhindered as the others make room without knowing why. He sits on the edge of her bed, takes her hand. “Harry,” she says, and when she opens her eyes, understanding shines like tears. “You came.”
His chest aches, stuffed full of some feeling too big to name. “It’s good to see you, Hermione.”
He brushes his thumb beneath her eye, catches a tear before it falls. She leans into his palm. “Is it time?”
“Yes.” He folds her hands between his own, rubs warmth back into cold fingers. “But, before we go”—a smile breaks across his face—“Ron wanted you to know he was right about the three brothers. He told me to say he told you so.”
Her eyes alight, a flush rises in her cheeks.
Her last breath is spent on a laugh.
“Take me to him,” she says as she rises from her bed, because she knows she need not ask. All around them, a flurry of movement as the others realize what’s happened. She pays it no mind. She has more important things to think of. “He can say it to my face, if he’s brave enough.”
And so he does.
He takes her by the arm, and together they walk out the door.