Okay, I want to preface this.
This whole missing episode thing was a plot idea that I had that didn't fit in with the story and what I was going for, but it was just so bizarre and I really wanted to post it somewhere. It uses my characters, Gwen and Graves and is the first real episode where I deeply involved Ron, Harry and Hermione all in the same breath. It is mostly just little snippets unconnected, but I don't feel like spending more energy to connect the dots.
Happy reading...
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"Hermione�s dead." Harry said in a dull voice.
"What?" Gwen gasped. She felt the tug in her chest again, she heard the soft whisper for help. She didn�t know what to do. There was so much death to make peace with, she didn�t think adding one more to the tally was even possible.
"Her body was found this morning. She was delivering a message. They said she didn�t even have a chance, she was attacked from behind."
Gwen sat down. "When did they say she died?"
Harry gave her a quizzical look. "Around midnight last night."
Gwen�s stomach lurched. Midnight. The witching hour when she had felt her chest being pulled, when she had heard the soft cry for help.
"Are you ok?" Graves asked. Neither of them had known Hermione really well, neither one had really had a chance to get to know her. They were so intertwined together, it was hard for anyone to get past that bond and into the circle.
~~~~
"God it�s cold in here Gwen."
"Yeah." She said quietly.
"Is it always this cold?"
"Only lately."
"There�s something you�re not telling us isn�t there?" Graves said.
Harry looked at her. "Hermione�s dead, but she�s not really gone is she?"
"No." Gwen replied. "She�s been here all along. She�s been hanging out with me."
"Does she speak to you?" Ron asked in a tiny voice.
"I don�t think she can." Gwen said. "But I think she wants to make sure you�re ok before she moves on. She won�t go otherwise."
Ron looked down, his emotions bubbling near the surface. He put on a brave face. "I�m ok." He said gruffly, fighting the tears that were already streaking down his pale face.
Gwen put her hand on his shoulder and felt the tug at her chest very strongly. She took Ron in a sisterly embrace, trying to take his grief into herself. She could handle it now, she could turn the grief into something useful.
~~~~
"Harry�s taking this so much worse than Ron." Gwen observed.
Graves made a funny sound, as if he was thinking extra hard. "Did you notice the tension between them?"
"Yeah, that was odd."
He rose suddenly from his seat. "What do you want to bet that the baby Hermione was carrying wasn�t Ron�s at all?"
"You�re trying to tell me that Harry and Hermione�" Gwen trailed off, it seemed ridiculous, but all together possible. "That would explain the strange behavior."
"That would explain everything that�s been going on with those two."
"But you really think Harry capable of cheating with his best friend�s wife?"
"Of course not. There has to be more to the story than just that. Maybe Ron is sterile and can�t have children, so Harry stepped in to help. You�ve seen the Mists of Avalon right?"
Gwen started chewing on the inside of her cheek. She was trying to think of an even more logical explanation for the strange circumstances surrounding Hermione�s death. Delivering a message for the Ministry of Magic. Found dead, attacked from behind, the message had been intercepted. Ron was now a widower and his dead wife was nine weeks pregnant with a child of which he was not certain he was the father.
~~~~
"I don�t know how to feel." Gwen said, sitting in her godmother�s office. "She was a nice girl, tons of potential but I never really got to know her. I�m not sure if I should cry or bang my head on the desk."
Minerva patted her hand gently.
~~~~
"She knew she was going to get killed during this mission. That�s why she took it. She couldn�t face me anymore." Ron shouted into Harry�s face.
Harry didn�t respond well. "And whose fault is that?" He spit angrily.
"Boys." Gwen said plainly. They continued yelling at each other, their rage erupting into insults and snide remarks.
"Well if you�d been a better husband to her this wouldn�t have happened."
"We didn�t need you anyway. For once Harry this had nothing to do with you."
"Boys!" She screamed, finally getting their attention. "This is not the way two best friends should behave when someone they both loved has died." The statement had the intended effect, both of them fell into guilty silence. "I don�t know what situation you all got yourselves into, but Hermione wouldn�t have wanted this. You need to help each other through this, not try and slaughter each other." She said furiously. Her grip had tightened on her wand and without noticing she had pointed it between them.
"I don�t ever want to hear this kind of talk from you two again." She realized why they were blanching. All she had to do was whisper a spell and one or both of them would probably end up petrified. She dropped her wand, put her hand to her head and ran from the room.
~~~~
"What�s wrong with you?" The stranger asked.
"I�m having a real bad day." Gwen said, her head clunking softly on the bar.
"Yeah. I�m having a bottomless pit of despair day myself."
"Sounds like you need this more than me." She said, pushing her butterbeer towards her companion.
"Tell me about it."
They laughed. "You know, I don�t think I should be a witch anymore. I almost killed two of my friends tonight. I was so angry. If I hadn�t run outside and gotten some fresh air in my lungs, who�s to say what I could�ve done. With a wand in my hand I�m a danger to everyone. I�m a danger to myself." She said swigging down the second drink the bartender had placed before her.
"Hey, take it easy Princess." The stranger said. "One more of those and you won�t feel a thing."
"That�s the state I�m aiming to get at." She said.
~~~~
Ron found her, seated on the end of the dock, her legs dangling inches above the water.
"You know you�re terrifying with a wand." Ron said as he sat next to her.
"I know." She said. "That�s why I ran away. I was so afraid one of you was going to end up dead. I felt like an idiot holding a loaded gun. I�m sorry to have scared you."
"You scared some sense into both of us." He said, wrapping an arm around her. "I think you�d make a good friend and I don�t want something stupid like this to prevent you from letting me get close."
She smiled at him in the dimming light. They looked out on the lake for a time in silence. It was covered in a hazy fog, floating above the surface and looking grey in the pale light from the stars, the moon hidden behind wisps of black cloud. The woods looked almost like looming beasts, trying to stand perfectly still before attacking the grounds.
After a time Ron spoke again. "You know Hermione talked about you all the time. She always said how she wanted to get to know you better. She respected you, even if she thought you were a little crazy."
"Very perceptive." Gwen sighed. "I am crazy." After another long pause. "Was Harry trying to help you and Hermione conceive?"
"That�s a rather dodgy subject I�m not prepared to explore yet." He said sadly. "The thing is, we�re not sure who the father was."
Gwen sat, letting this tidbit sink into her brain. "So, you were all ok with it?"
"Not really." He said. "It�s just that we were having so much trouble, we thought maybe� But it doesn�t matter anymore. The poor little thing died along with her."
He was sobbing again and Gwen started to gently rub his back. She wasn�t sure how to comfort this man in his tragic loss. Mother and child gone, a child he would never know.
"It just seems senseless to kill someone so good and for what, world domination?" He laughed through his tears.
~~~~
"How clairvoyant are you?" Gwen interrogated.
"Not in the least." Graves replied quickly.
"You were right about Harry and Ron."
"You mean the baby thing?"
"Yeah. I think almost exactly like the Mists of Avalon." She laughed.
"That doesn�t seem like a movie you�d watch."
"I read the book, I thought the movie might be ok."
"It just seems odd. There are so many conventional ways to help infertile couples."
"Maybe they�d tried them and they didn�t work." Graves said, popping a grape into his mouth. He had swiped a bowl-full from the kitchens earlier and had been working on it steadily in Gwen�s room, laying across her bed reading Crowley.
"You still read that fraud?" She asked offhandedly.
"The fraud still has some insight."
Gwen snorted contempt. "That doesn�t make him any less a fraud." She paused. "You know it doesn�t make any sense."
"Alistair Crowley?"
"No, the whole baby situation. You think they�d wanted to put themselves in that situation."
"Maybe they did, they were always very close until you came around."
"Ha, ha." She said dryly. "Have you ever thought about kids?"
"As in have I thought about it or have I made a decision?"
"Either way you like to answer."
"I�ve thought and I�ve decided. I�d like to, but I don�t think I�m really dad material."
She smiled at the thought of a little boy being bounced on his lap, and a little girl cradled in his arms, sleeping soundly as her daddy played pony with her brother.
"How about you?" He asked.
"Oh me, I dunno." She really hadn�t thought about it. Like Graves she didn�t really see herself as a parent and so she just left the issue at that.
~~~~
"It�s good to talk about it, get it out in the open." Ron said over lunch the next afternoon. He and Gwen had made a firm resolution to become good friends, in honor of Hermione�s wish to get to know her better.
He had opened up some about the situation with Harry and the baby. It was strange the way he talked about it. The two people he loved most in the world wanted more than anything to help him extend his family and he was almost powerless to do anything about it.
"It�s sort of odd, you know? Coming from a family with as many kids as my mum had, you�d think we�d all be popping out babies." He laughed at the image.
It was nice to see him smile, Gwen thought.
"It is good to get it out." She agreed. She had many things she needed to get out. Her desire for the truth.
~~~~
"It�s just something I�m not prepared to even think about. I was actually excited about the prospect of being a father. Even if it was with my best friend�s wife. Now that�s fucked up."
"That is fucked up but all of you went into this with the best of intentions."
"The path to hell is paved with good intentions." Harry interrupted sharply.
"You�re being unreasonable again Harry." Gwen said levelly.
"So I am." He sighed heavily and laid a warm hand on her knee. "I don�t know where I�d be right now if it weren�t for you."
"Probably getting piss drunk on shit beer and bawling out some awful country karaoke."
They both smiled in the wane light of the moon and Gwen threw herself back into grass with abandon. The night was too beautiful to weigh down with heavy words and thoughts, it was simply a night to be lived.
~~~~
That's it. The end. Missing Episode is over.