The Other Black Book 6

Chapter 25 - The White Tomb

All lessons were suspended, all examinations postponed. Some students were hurried away from Hogwarts by their parents over the next couple of days — the Patil twins were gone before breakfast on the morning following Dumbledore's death, and Zacharias Smith was escorted from the castle by his haughty-looking father. Seamus Finnigan, on the other hand, refused point-blank to accompany his mother home; they had a shouting match in the entrance hall that was resolved when she agreed that he could remain behind for the funeral. She had difficulty in finding a bed in Hogsmeade, Seamus told Harry and Ron (and Aurora had overheard), for wizards and witches were pouring into the village, preparing to pay their last respects to Dumbledore.

Some excitement was caused among the younger students, who had never seen it before, when a powder-blue carriage the size of a house, pulled by a dozen giant winged palominos, came soaring out of the sky in the late afternoon before the funeral and landed on the edge of the forest. Aurora watched from a window as a gigantic and handsome olive-skinned, black-haired woman descended the carriage steps and threw herself into the waiting Hagrid's arms. Meanwhile a delegation of Ministry officials, including the Minister of Magic himself, was being accommodated within the castle. Harry was diligently avoiding contact with any of them and Aurora was aiding him as much as she could; they were sure that, sooner or later, he would be asked again to account for Dumbledore's last excursion from Hogwarts.

Harry, Ron, Hermione, Aurora, and Ginny were spending all of their time together. The beautiful weather seemed to mock them; Aurora could imagine how it would have been if Dumbledore had not died, and they had had this time together at the very end of the year, Ginny's examinations finished, the pressure of homework lifted... Ginny and Harry would certainly be trying to get some time together.

They visited the hospital wing twice a day: Neville had been discharged, but Bill remained under Madam Pomfrey's care. His scars were as bad as ever — in truth, he now bore a distinct resemblance to Mad-Eye Moody, though thankfully with both eyes and legs — but in personality he seemed just the same as ever. All that appeared to have changed was that he now had a great liking for very rare steaks.

". . . so eet ees lucky 'e is marrying me," said Fleur happily, plumping up Bill's pillows, "because ze British overcook their meat, I 'ave always said this."

There was a slight irony that Aurora had found in the situation with Bill. It wasn't anything amusing at all, but Aurora remembered the first time she met Bill. It had been the summer before her fourth year, when she, Hermione, and Harry accompanied the Weasleys to the Quidditch World Cup. She had relatively just gotten the scars on her neck, and Bill had told her that he liked them and that she shouldn't hide them... And now look at him, scars all over his face, from a werewolf... just like Aurora's scars he had once told her to be proud of. She kept this to herself, however.

"I suppose I'm just going to have to accept that he really is going to marry her," sighed Ginny later that particular evening, as she, Harry, Ron, Aurora, and Hermione sat beside the open window of the Gryffindor common room, looking out over the twilit grounds.

"She's not that bad," said Harry. "Ugly, though," he added hastily, as Ginny raised her eyebrows, and she let out a reluctant giggle.

"Well, I suppose if Mum can stand it, I can."

"Anyone else we know died?" Ron asked Hermione, who was perusing the Evening Prophet.

Hermione winced at the forced toughness in his voice. "No," she said reprovingly, folding up the newspaper. "They're still looking for Snape but no sign . . ."

"Of course there isn't," said Harry, who became angry every time this subject cropped up. "They won't find Snape till they find Voldemort, and seeing as they've never managed to do that in all this time . . ."