ARRANGED TO BE LOVED ꩜ draco malfoy.

Ron's returning and the Destroyed Horcrux

"It's done." Harry said

"Maybe we can –"Hermione suggested

"It's done." His tone puts an end to it. She nods.

"Here have mine." You offered your wand. Harry nodded at you

"And give me that." He said pointing the locket with Hermione. Hermione starts to speak, then simply hands it over. She starts to leave, pauses.

"He loved you, Harry. I know he loved you." Hermione said as she trails her fingers lightly over his hair, and he closes his eyes.

The fire is merely embers. Harry sits with a frosten crusted blanket draped over his shoulders, staring bitterly into the dark forest. The silence is eerie, shadows play in the trees. He peers through the tent flap and seesh. Hermione slumbering in the light of a small bowl of flames. Then, slowly, light crawls briefly over the tent canvas and he turns, peers into the forest once more. Something seems to glimmer faintly, but so briefly as to seem a trick of the eye. The air is cold, gives texture to the darkness, makes it a living thing.

And then it is there again, the light -- pure and bright and silver and moving through the trees toward him. Harry rises and the blanket slithers off his shoulders.

Gripping y/n's wand, he watches the light drift closer, then shatter throughout the trees, momentarily blinding. And then it appears...

A silver-white doe, moon-bright and dazzling. It gazes at harry and he stands, transfixed. And then the doe turns away.

"No..."

"What is it, Harold?" Y/n asked him. Harry just simply points to the woods. Y/n sees the silver doe.

Frost crunches beneath their feet as they dashes through the trees in pursuit of the silent doe up ahead, breath streaming from his lungs. She leads them deep into the forest until, finally, she stops, as do Y/n and Harry. As they watch, she turns her beautiful head toward them and vanishes. For a moment, a GHOST IMAGE of her, like a retina burn, hangs in the air and then Harry is plunged into darkness.

"Lumos!" Harry whispers

Y/n's wand-tip ignites. Harry paints the clearing with light and something gleams: a small frozen pool. He crosses to it, looks down. He sees his own image reflected dully and then, deeper, within, a silver cross. Y/n's eyes widen as she sees what's underneath the ice. She looks closer.

It is the SWORD OF GRYFFINDOR.

Harry steps back, blinks. It's still there. He glances about, painting the trees with light, looking to insure if they are alone, then casts light upon the pool once more.

"Accio Sword." Harry cast.Nothing. Harry walks about the pool again and again and then stops. He crouches and looks slowly down at his chest. The Horcrux around his neck has begun to TWITCH. Harry places his fingers upon it briefly, then rises. Quickly, with fumbling fingers, he SHEDS his clothes and points Y/n's wand at the pool.

"What are you doing ?" Asked Y/n. Harry doesn't answer.

"Diffindo." The pool's icey crust cracks, echoing in the silence. Chunks of dark ice rock the surface. Harry steps to the pool's edge, peers within and plunges , screaming in the dark silence of the chill water. He kicks down to the glimmering sword, grabs the hilt and kicks for the surface when the locket's chain begins to coil, tightening like a snake about his neck. As the links bite into his throat,

He releases the sword and begins to thrash about, struggling to get his fingers under the chain. Realizing it's no use he reaches for the pool's edge, his fingers scrabbling desperately over the ice, but unable to gain purchase. Slowly, his hands go limp and slip from the ice back into the water, where he drifts slowly down, a slow trail of bubbles escaping his mouth, eyes half-closed as he peers upward, watching as the surface of the water grows slowly calm peaceful when a shadow appears and a pair of hands shatter the glassy surface of the water and Harry is pulled upward and out, landing...face-down on the frigid ground, choking and retching.