They found him by the side of a road, after the war. He was broken beyond repair.

The best Mediwizards his infamous fortune could buy toiled over him, day and night. Nothing they tried yielded any response, but the flickering of aged eyes. He spoke no words, and made no protest at the myriad tests and examinations prescribed for him. They did all they could, despite the angry protests of war veterans, for there was never any proof that his hands were red with the blood of the slain; only that he was marked with the painful smudge of sins past. It was Ministry creed to assist all survivors, and the legacy of his lineage proved to be a double-edged sword after all.

In the end they admitted defeat, to match that in his eyes. They stamped 'discharged' on his forms, and argued over arrangements for his limited future. St Mungo's was considered, but then discarded; there was no madness in his silence and stillness, but the heavy stench of guilt in human shell.

It gnawed at me that he was here at all. I wanted to know how he survived the war, why he wasn't amongst the faithful when Voldemort's stronghold fell and he was vanquished. I want to know how he became part of the destruction that I saw all around me, that the whole Wizarding World had to face in the aftermath of the war, even while muted celebration went on.

So the night before his release, I give in to my curiosity to see him. They warn me of his inability to talk, or his unwillingness to do so - something they cannot ascertain - and they tell me it is all a waste of time. But they are wrong.

For I walk into the aseptic cell they put him in, and he opens his mouth when he sees me. But the sound that emerges haunts and chills me through: "Harry. Harry. Harry." He moans my name over and over, sorrowful and purposeful. His gaze trained on me while he repeats my name as a mantra, the same intonation over those two syllables. I feel tears falling to see him like this, and I am amazed for a moment that I am crying for a lost foe. But it is clear he is lost; his grey eyes wide with intense intent, his mouth caressing my name with horrifying mournfulness. It is only when I drop to my knees beside his low bed, overcome, that he stops his chant. But his eyes do not stop watching me.

It amazes the medics, this breakthrough after all the empty months; this passioned response evidence to them that his mind is still alive under the layers of shattered humanity. They suggest politedly but pointedly that my new-found significance to him may be integral to his cure, and then they drop all subtlety and urge me to do my part for the war-recovery relief by taking him home and taking him off their hands. I have every intention of saying no. I did my part before, and this is a greater burden in my eyes than fighting the Dark Lord. But the unearthly chanting of my name on his lips and his troubled eyes holding mine breaks my resolve. No one else wants him.

He says my name once, softly, as I carry him from the taxi through the door to my home.

It is painful to look after him, painful and frustrating. Not a word of thanks, no sign of gratitude, and worse of all, no motive to forget that he was the enemy once, and never repented for his deeds, whatever they were. Just an unchanging tedious daily routine, and strange grey eyes that follow my every move. Even night he wakes in fear, screaming and crying from his nightmares, and soon after the call for me starts. It becomes familiar, waking up to the moaning of my name, all that he will ever say. He never stops until I am by his side to comfort him. Eventually, I find it easier to welcome him into my bed at night and his sleeps much better, as do I. His face begins to fill out the hollow shadows, regain some of his previous colour. Sometimes I feel we are losing our greyness behind, together.

One night I wake to find him watching me with the same singular concentration as he does during the day. When I catch his eyes he says my name, as he always does. "Harry. Harry." Abruptly, he stops and rolls onto his back to stare up at the ceiling with a conflicted look. As I watch him in return I come to realise he has become a part of my life I would be loathe to give up. I think I may love him, this silent shadow - so different from the boy I once knew and hated - but wearing his features. I know I love that he depends on me, needs me with all of himself, even the parts of his mind that are closed to his conscious - is it not in his eyes, in the only words he can say?

I lean over and kiss him gently. He tastes of dust and ashes.

The last thing I feel is his hands on my chest, and then the gaping pain. Once again he is watching me with those grey eyes, and now I see that they are unfathomable, have always been. He whispers sadly to me: "Harry. Harry." and I finally understand why I am so important to him. How wrong I was to think it was love. His eyes never lost the haunted look and now I realise the war never ended for him.

I die with the static of my name, moaned over and over, like the command of madness it was.

END