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Harry didn’t know where the idea to stab the book with the fang came from, but it worked. Tom Riddle was gone, and Ginny was starting to stir, color slowly returning to her face. Harry, though, was beginning to feel dizzy. His forearm burned like fire. He slumped to the ground as Ginny sat up.
“Wha—HARRY!” she screamed. She scrambled to him, dropping to her knees beside him. Her breath hitched as she saw the wound. “Oh Harry, it was me! I did it all.” She tore at her robe in panic, pressing the ball of fabric to the gash on his arm. “I’m so sorry! Please… please be okay!”
“Ginny…” Harry rasped. The chamber spun around him, shadows creeping in at the edges of his vision. His limbs were numb, but small, involuntary twitches jerked through his body as basilisk venom flooded his veins. “Ginny, it’s okay. Ron… Ron’s back there, behind the rocks. You have to help him…”
His chest rose and fell in short, uneven bursts. His voice was barely audible.
“I’ll be fine. You have to help Ron…”
“You don’t look fine!” Ginny sobbed. Her face, pale and drenched in tears, hovered over his.
“You have to go!” Harry coughed, blood dribbling from the corner of his mouth. “If you want to help me… go get Ron… and some help…” Another cough shook his small frame, and Ginny whimpered.
She didn’t want to leave him. But she had to. She turned and ran, forcing her trembling legs to carry her toward the pile of rubble. It was the only thing she could do. Harry’s blurred vision followed her until he couldn’t hold on anymore. The final thread tying him to life snapped. His head dropped limply to the side, resting in a spreading pool of blood and ink.
Ginny ran faster than she ever had in her life. Her lungs burned. Her legs ached. She slipped more than once on the slick chamber floor, but it didn’t matter. She couldn’t stop. Harry was dying—because of her. Her heart pounded in her ears, drowning out the voice in her head screaming that it was too late.
She reached the mound of rocks and heard shouts and scraping from the other side.
“Move, you stupid rocks! I gotta go help Harry!” Ron’s desperate grunts echoed through the chamber.
“Ron!” Ginny cried, throwing herself at the rocks and digging with her torn-up hands, scraping skin and nails against stone.
“Ginny! Thank Merlin you’re alive!” Ron gasped with relief. “Is Harry there? Is he okay?”
“He needs help, Ron!” she cried, voice cracking. “I think the basilisk bit him!”
“Damn!” Ron’s voice trembled, heavy with fear. He dug faster, and Ginny had to leap back as rocks tumbled down. A massive boulder crashed where she’d just been. She coughed from the dust as Ron coughed too. Then he appeared—red hair, dust-covered, wild-eyed—at the top of the rubble.
“Ginny!” He skidded down toward her, and without a word, she turned and led him back to Harry.
“Bloody hell…” Ron choked out when he saw Harry’s lifeless body on the marble floor. He dropped to his knees.
“No!” Ron shouted, hands shaking as he checked Harry’s pulse. Nothing. “No! HARRY, STOP JOKING AROUND! YOU’RE THE BLOODY BOY-WHO-LIVED! You can’t—no—you can’t leave me!” His voice cracked, tears pouring down his face as he pressed his ear to Harry’s chest.
Ginny ripped more of her robe and gently wiped the blood from Harry’s mouth with trembling hands.
“Ron… he can’t be gone. Right?” she whispered. Her voice was small and broken.
Ron didn’t answer. He couldn’t. His best friend—his brother in all but name—was gone. Harry had survived the Killing Curse. He couldn’t die now. He couldn’t.
But he was so still. So cold.
Ginny rested her head on Harry’s chest, her sobs soft and heartbreaking. Ron pulled her into a hug, and the two Weasleys cried together.
Then came footsteps—fast, echoing off the stone.
Ron’s head snapped up, and he saw Dumbledore rushing into the chamber, tears glistening in his blue eyes. But Ron didn’t care. He glared at the old man with pure, raw fury.
Dumbledore hurried forward, gently lifting Harry’s body into his arms. He cradled the boy like something fragile. Precious. Too late.
Ron's fists clenched. Now Dumbledore showed up? Now he came, when Harry was already gone? Where was he before? Where was he when it mattered?
To Ron, it was clear—Dumbledore didn’t see Harry as a person. Just a weapon. And Ron would make sure he never forgot what he’d let happen.
They followed the headmaster in silence. Ron’s face was red with grief and rage. Ginny’s lips trembled as she walked beside him, her eyes empty. She kept hoping—begging—that Harry would wake up. That this was just another miracle waiting to happen.
But it wasn’t.
Harry Potter, the boy she loved, would never laugh again. Would never smile at her or scowl at Ron’s jokes. She never even got to tell him how much she cared.
And now, it was too late.
The funeral for The Boy Who Lived took place a week later.
The castle was quiet. Too quiet. Tears were shed. Hagrid sobbed into a handkerchief the size of a tablecloth. Dumbledore sat in a corner, hazy-eyed and silent, clutching the diary—now destroyed, a gaping hole through its center.
Ron couldn’t forgive him.
Not for this.
The headmaster had failed Harry. Ron was sure he could’ve saved him—if he’d only come sooner. If he’d only cared enough.
But that day wasn’t about Dumbledore. It was about Harry.
The boy who gave everything to save Ginny.
The friend Ron could never repay.
The brother he lost too soon.
Ron’s world would never be the same. And as the sun set over Hogwarts, Harry Potter was buried there on the castle grounds—forever part of the place he called home.