August | Hermione Granger x OFC

Chapter 125

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Robyn was dead. She thought.

She could still hear the sound of small waves crashing against the dock nearby, and it still managed to bring her comfort. But the fact itself made her wonder if Voldemort had maybe missed her somehow, and she was still maybe sitting slumped against the wall. Somehow. Maybe.

But beyond her eyelids was brightness now. And, she realised, she wasn't sitting up at all. Below her wasn't cold, stone floor. No longer did her scar sear or her knuckles throb, and no longer did she bleed.

She felt... good.

She felt the coarse texture beneath her skin where she lay. It was like sand. It was warm.

And then she realised she was naked. But she was also alone, she could just tell, so it was less of a pressing issue as it might have been in life.

Life. Gone. Ended. Over.

Robyn was dead. She thought.

But she could still hear the sound of the small waves crashing against the dock nearby.

She opened her eyes.

Lying on her back, she saw a fantastic blue sky above, not a cloud to be seen. The sun shone, not too brightly but bright enough. A seagull squawked in the distance. The smell of salt filled her nostrils. The waves she could hear were not in fact the small ones crashing against the dock but the ones before her, crashing and retreating, giving and taking, never-ending, in perpetuity.

She sat up slowly, carefully, to see that there was only beach for miles. The sand stretched out behind her and to her right and left for - what seemed like - ever. In front of her, the sea, or the ocean.

She lifted her hands, flexing and stretching out her fingers experimentally. There wasn't an ache or pain. There wasn't even a scar on her palm.

Was this the Summerland? Her very own paradise? And when she was ready, when she was rested and renewed, would her soul reincarnate? Or was it her soul's final destination, ready to end its journey altogether?

Because if anyone's soul deserved to retire, it was hers, she thought.

Sitting cross-legged, she scrunched her fingers into the light, airy sand, and then she picked it up with one hand and let it trickle through her fingertips like a waterfall down to the other, and vice versa, over and over again, listening to the waves. It was peace. It was calm. And she didn't know what else to do.

Robyn was dead. She thought.

Sighing, she put her hands behind her, stretched her legs out, and watched the waves. It could have been hours. It could have been only minutes. Time was not only imperceptible to her, but inconsequential, too. She could've sat there for eternity, playing with the sand, listening to the waves, soaking up the sun's warm rays.

But she didn't.

A noise distracted her. It was as though someone or something was splashing in the water, or flailing in it, whimpering all the while. She squinted her eyes in its direction, seeing a small form not too far from her being carried by the waves, crashing and retreating over and over again. It was not drowning, she thought, but it also could not save itself.

She got to her feet and wished for clothes. A white robe appeared not a moment later, so she walked to it and put it on. It was soft. It was light. It was clean. And she considered for a moment that she might be in the Room of Requirement somehow - whether that be the one in Hogwarts or some sort of afterlife Room of Requirement, she didn't know. She didn't know anything.