The World and Her Stars

Chapter Forty-Seven

ROSE POV

I looked in the mirror at myself for the first time in months, and I hardly recognized the person that looked back at me.

My clothes barely hung to my fragile frame. My cheekbones looked razor sharp, and my hair was tangled into a nest.

I had been silently doing cleaning spells for months, as the thought of getting up and shower sounded like the worst thing ever.

Something about Leo's words woke something up inside of me.

Is this really how I wanted to die?

Did I want Draco and my mother's deaths to be for nothing? Did I want them to die just so I could die in the comfort of a bed in a bunker in the middle of nowhere?

I wasn't going to let their deaths be for nothing.

I was going to finish what was started.

I was going to help the best I could, and I was going to be the one that watched the life leave Antonin Dolohov's eyes.

The subject of Dolohov's death has been something I've thought a lot about in my three months of emptiness.

He deserved a slow death.

Slow...painful...and excruciating.

But then again, he didn't deserve a minute of my time.

Maybe I would snap his neck like Theo did to Sirius Black.

Snap. Thud.

Maybe I could slit his throat and get a front row seat as the light dimmed in his eyes.

All I knew was that I wanted to be the last person he saw as he took his final breaths on Earth.

I wrapped a blanket around myself, and trusted my sense of hearing to guide me out of my room for the first time since being here.

A few doors down, I stopped at the door of the person who I believed would be able to help me with my hair situation. Someone with notoriously wily hair themselves.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

Although it was late, I knew she wouldn't be asleep.

No one in the bunker sleeps much.

"Yes—oh. Rose..." Hermione gasped as she saw me standing outside the door.

"My hair...it's a bit of a mess. I was...I was hoping you might be able to help me." I whispered timidly, realizing those were probably the first words I had spoken in weeks.

Hermione's nodded immediately and opened the door wider to let me in.

"You can sit on the bed. I just need to grab a few things." She smiled kindly before dipping into the bathroom.

On her nightstand was a lovely picture of her and her parents at what looked to be a beach.

Her and her mother look so much alike.

A pang of pain in my stomach and chest tore my eyes away from the picture, and back to my hands in my lap.

Delicately, I twirled my rings around my fingers.

The fit a little looser now, but I refused to take them off.

"Do you think you could possibly fit my rings as well? They've gone rather loose and I don't want to lose them." I asked quietly as Hermione came back with a comb, a small vial of something pink, and some sort of paste.