Forever Knight [Harmione]

Prologue

A life without you,
Cannot be lived.
Don't deprive me
Of the smile that you give.
If you want to leave,
Take me with you.
I demand to go with,
Don't bother to refuse.
We will be together, 
Against all odds.
It's us who decides,
Not ill-fated gods. 
I mean my words of love,
That i repeat all the time.
Believe in what i say,
And, this love of mine.
Do not leave me,
For I'll become lost. 
You know what you mean to me,
You're all that I've got.
Still if you leave me,
Just to keep me safe.
I'll remind you once again that,
I'm secure in your embrace.
What i said,
Weren't hollow words. 
Still if you leave me,
You've crushed my whole world.

~Still if you leave me, by Sheryl Bennett

~~

It was a night like this one long before when Hermione Granger became the center of his life.  He didn’t know back then that was what happened.  All he knew was that she had appeared at the Dursley doorstep and quite possibly shifted his understanding of love. 

The rain outside the glass window showed no sign of abating and it was cooler than any of them would have liked. 

Grimmauld Place, though dependable against heat or cold, was no place for gaiety and good cheer.  Even its name bespoke of itself: Grim Old Place.  It was perfect for some things and totally inappropriate for others.  One certainly would do better not to have a wedding in it.  It would feel too much like dooming a marriage even before it started.  It was, however, perfect for funerals and solemn Order of the Phoenix governing board meetings. 

So its function right now was perfect.  There were three black coffins in the basement and three vampires to match it.   

Twenty-two year old Harry Potter didn’t know why he wasn’t more bothered.  After all, vampires had that reputation of fancying fresh blood, preferably while it was still pumping alive through their victims’ veins.  But he wasn’t afraid.  Apart from being strong enough and experienced enough to withstand their more direct attacks, Harry had complete faith in the one vampire that reigned in the other two. 

They listened to her like she was some mother to them, or big sister, if ever there was filial affection among the undead.  They made it seem like she was stronger than them in many respects, which was the reason they “feared” her, but knowing Hermione Granger, she gave no reason to be feared unless she was provoked.  Her vampire boys Lucien and Solomon probably weren’t so much afraid of her as they were completely taken by her caring nature, however caring blood-suckers could get. 

How funny that even in death, Hermione won the affection of two hapless boys.  Well, maybe not hapless, and maybe not boys.  Lucien was, as Harry understood it, at least a hundred and fifty years old.  Solomon sounded to be Hermione’s age in vampire years, but he had been turned at twenty-five.  Still, the concept seemed the same.  Solomon didn’t know what to do when he was turned and Lucien had been lost in a sea of bad habits, like snorting vampire drugs and relying on the wrong sort of people.  While it wasn’t exactly like the wide-eyed Harry Potter entering the Wizarding World and the indistinct, ordinary-to-a-fault Ronald Weasley with dirt on his face, there was a kind of twisted parallel to it all.

There was a sound behind him, but he didn’t turn to look.  It was true when he said he was unafraid.  If any one of them bit him, it was probably just as well. 

“Cold night,” she said, walking up beside him. 

His awareness spread over the room and she became a presence.  He wanted badly to touch her, but she had avoided it since she met up with them.  It hurt him that she wouldn’t even let him hold her hand. 

He looked at her and he could see the subtle red tints in her bushy brown hair.  Her pale skin almost glowed in the darkness and when she looked at him with her honey-gold eyes, they almost gleamed like turquoise.  She looked like the perfection of death, and was beautiful for it.