When she quieted, he started speaking. "Hermione, I know you're mad. I know you're upset. I know that you think what we did was stupid and reckless and dangerous and a whole host of other adjectives that only your big brain could come up with. But you were dying, Hermione. Literally, actually, dying. Do you think, for one second, that we'd allow it? That we would sit by and do nothing? You wouldn't talk to anyone about what we could do. You wouldn't listen." Deciding that she needed comfort more than he needed to avoid the blood tangling her hair into a gnarled mess, he began stroking her hair, from crown to waist. He cheek against the top of her head, catching the faintest whiff of her, of Hermione, under the tang of smoke and sweat. "We went behind your back. Ignored what you wanted, even though what you wanted was, quite frankly, stupid and wrong. We did what we had to do. And we'd do it again, in half a heartbeat."