Look Out For The Fog
The dark void took on a silvery hue as it transformed into fog. The fog made way for clouds and wind, an invisible storm hiding behind the lazy smile of the sun. Amelia only perceived a growing pressure slapping against her whole body, as if she was falling. The one time she opened her eyes, she was able to see the structure of something green, but no more than that. The air cutting through between her eyeballs and lids made her vision blur rapidly, with such speed that she had to close her eyes hurriedly. She couldn't even breathe – that and the tiny fire raging around her navy blue irises made her feel increasingly uncomfortable indeed.
With a heavy thud she landed on the ground. Surprisingly, she didn't feel any pain, only being aware of her tense body lying on something intent on tickling her skin where it wasn't covered by her nightclothes. Grass, assumedly.
Was she that numb already?
No… No, she wasn't. The bed of grass was cold. A bit wet, maybe. Her nerves were responsive still, so that was good. When Amelia opened her eyes, she noticed a faint rainbow descending into the puffy sky above out of the corner of her eye. Blinking shakily, it suddenly was gone. The blackness seemed to have swallowed it up.
She expected sitting up to be far more difficult, given what she had just been subjected to, but the task was rather easily done. No bones creaked, no muscles screamed. She felt… light.
Like a feather.
Pulling her ruffled blond hair behind her ears, she made herself aware of her surroundings. She was sitting in a vast field of pure green grass, an ending nowhere in sight. In fact, just when she believed she was able to recognize leafs and wood, the image was obscured by dense fog, and there she was, alone again. Alone in a field of grass with nothing but clouds and the occasional strays of sunlight falling down in between the gaps.
Amelia took a deep breath, strangely comforted by how fresh the air streaming into her lungs was.
The problem was, she didn't know where the bloody hell she was. Or how she got here. Who was responsible for it. What, maybe. Accidental apparition simply wasn't a thing with her level of experience and skill.
Deciding to look for answers, she stood up, smoothing the woolen material of her nightgown, which was adorned with flower patterns, in order not to look like a complete nitwit. Not that she already didn't, standing in her nightly attire in the middle of nowhere by clear daylight. Oh, that Skeeter woman would have a blast if she were to find out about Amelia's current dilemma. As it seemed, her mission was to stop that from happening for now.
She hadn't really noticed her feet were bare before getting up on them. She wriggled her toes in response to the touch of the cool, moist strands of grass. Preparing herself to disapparate to the coziness of her bed chambers, where her elm wand would hopefully be waiting for her on top of her nightstand, she closed her eyes and
Nothing.
No rush.
No force violently pulling her from one place to another.
Simply wind, calmly waving around her head.
Now, she decided, was the right time to become alarmed.
There had to lie some magical wards preventing her from apparating about this place, though as of yet, there was no sign of civilization in sight. Well, at least the fog made sense to her now. She was being watched by someone inhabiting motivations that presumably weren't all too noble. Although, why she hadn't been attacked yet or kidnapped directly remained a riddle to her. Perhaps, she was fulfilling the purpose of a human toy right now.
The only thing Amelia was sure of was that this wasn't supposed to be happening.
She was better than this. She was more powerful than this.
You-Know-Who... Right. Apparently not.
"YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE HERE!"
The sudden vocal interruption of her thoughts made her grab her wand. Which wasn't there. Of course.
Merlin's beard, this was getting off the hooker fast.
She turned, only to see a little boy running toward her, sparsely clad with clothes. The top of his head was adorned with tousled locks of brown. As he sprinted across the green grass, dirt sticking to his naked feet and chest puffing wildly, Amelia saw the sun touching his eyes, sparks of dark blue shooting out of the reflection. His irises were wide with desperation and fear.
By the time he had reached her, the woman had sunk down to her knees, not caring whether the nightgown got even grimier in the process. The boy swung his arms around her neck, embracing her in a literally breathtaking hug. She tried to loosen his grip while sucking in all the air she managed to get at the moment, which, admittedly, was not much.
"You're not supposed to be here–," the boy wailed onto her right shoulder, while Amelia's cheeks began to get stained by salty tears themselves, "GO! – PLEASE!"
With an almost violent push, he shoved her away. The woman immediately missed the feeling of having him in her arms again, coughing and rasping as she reached out to him a second time. The boy was thrashing around, hitting air and seemingly not knowing what to do with those limbs of him.
"You're not… supposed… to be here–"
"Edgar– Edgar, calm down– Oh Merlin, Edgar," Amelia gasped, holding back a sob and letting her hands fall to the ground in emotional defeat. The child version of her baby brother was standing right in front of her, and she didn't know what to make of it. She was not supposed to be here… Probably. Still, he was supposed to be dead alright.
"Why– Why are you here? Am, you shouldn't be, you really, really shouldn't," small Edgar told her, eyes red and glistening sadly. Fortunately, he had calmed down quite a bit, now seeming to shrink further and further in stature. Amelia's lip wobbled, but she was vehemently set on not starting to bawl like a toddler. Her hands, rough and slightly wrinkled, grasped his naïve ones firmly, in an attempt not to only steady her brother but also herself.
"I don't know why I'm here, Eddie. But, do you know where we are? And why you are so..." she pointedly traced his young body with her watery gaze, "–like this?"
Small Edgar hesitated and grimaced, almost as if in pain, before answering.
"I am dead, and we have met again. This is not a dream, Am. You're d-dead, I think."
Her thoughts went mute for a moment – her mind blank.
"Dead," she whispered.
Her blue eyes went abnormally wide. Rigid. Stiff. They fixed her brother's ones, searched them, looking for an explanation, for something to hold onto so as not to slip into the shadows of her psyche.
Several seconds of silence surrounded them. Only the wind dared play its soft tune. To Amelia, it was torture. She remembered all of it now. The first night of July approaching the village, the layers of darkness crawling across the sky. The book she was reading in front of the lit fireplace. A forceful shift in the wards surrounding her home. Red and green lights. The smell of something burning. Blood. Dirt.
Black.
However she had imagined dying, she hadn't been meant to do so at the hands of a madman.
It simply couldn't be.
Instead of giving in to the emotional pressure, Amelia simply cleared her raw throat and blinked multiple times. She didn't cry. How could she not cry now?
She wiped away the damp trails from before with the back of her right hand.
She didn't notice it shook.
Edgar sat down in front of her, legs crossed, grasping for her hands again. He stared at her with a worried frown creasing his small brown eyebrows.
A long moment of silence stretched between them.
"Are Mum and Dad here as well?" the woman asked in a low tone.
"I don't know."
"What? What do you mean you don't know?"
"I don't know. It's all silky. I'm only here for you, for now."
"Could you not talk in riddles, please?"
"That's all I know."
Amelia recoiled slightly. She looked at the boy in front of her and the atmosphere around them from a whole new perspective. Where were their parents if not here? What truly was this place? Why was Edgar being so indirect – evading her questions? The little cub had always been too candid to tell lies, even halfway.
The comfort at the thought of having her brother in her arms again, being able to touch him and talk to him again, vanished in an instant. She didn't want to be stuck in a place without any clarity whatsoever, or with this false apparition of her dead sibling.
Had heaven changed him this much?
Slipping her hands out of his grip, she crisply stood up and cringed inwardly at the disappointment evident on Edgar's face. She pulled the nightgown tighter around her body. It wasn't cold at all.
"So, what are we supposed to do now?" she inquired, looking around.
"I don't know."
This was getting irritating.
"Alright… Do you know something about that fog?"
Edgar suddenly perked up and let his eyes wander, eventually settling on something in the far distance. In the next second, he jumped onto his feet in an amazingly fluid motion.
"Fog! I didn't know there's fog! Merlin's panties, FOG!" he screamed joyously, grinning from ear to ear. He threw himself at her, practically throttling her for a second time.
"Edgar…?" Amelia breathed, partly hopeful she'd finally receive some actual answers this time. She touched his arms lightly, which were slung around her neck, trying to make him cease dangling from her throat with his whole body weight.
"Go back," he said, suddenly solemn. Edgar let her neck go and began pushing her into some random direction; that proved to be rather difficult, since Amelia weighed slightly more than this miniature version of her brother.
"Edgar– Eddie– What are you doing? Stop it!" she ordered. She almost stood as stiff as a stick and only had to lean slightly forward where her effort to resist was concerned. Her blue orbs took on a stern glint.
"The exit is right there, Am! Go! Now!" Edgar replied, as if ignoring her words. She took a deep breath so as not to become agitated herself.
"Which exit?"
"TO LIFE! Ugh, Am! You see those trees there? Where there is no fog? That little hole – a passage, basically. If you go through it, you'll live!" he explained while gesticulating wildly with the whole might of his limbs. With a skeptical frown on her face, Amelia followed her brother's gaze.
She found his words to be true. The trees-and-no-fog part, at least.
"Eddie… How do you know this really is the truth you're telling me?" He made an insulted face at this, so she decided to quickly continue, "I can't suddenly become undead, can I?"
"A zombie-you… Anyway, it already happened once! Professor McGonagall was here recently, I know that from her husband, that Urquart character. She found her way out of the fog, so it has to work with you as well!" Her appreciation of his enthusiasm was dampened by the memory of Minerva's attack a few months ago.
Amelia remembered being worried about the other witch to no end (though she didn't let it show, stoic reputation and all), as well as harbouring murderous thoughts for a certain toad-faced Senior Undersecretary. Oh, how she had desired to hex Dolores into oblivion. As for Minerva – they had been friends, and a little more, at Hogwarts, even though Amelia had been three years above the McGonagall girl back then. She had never told anybody about their stolen kisses, mainly since no one had asked and same-sex relationships had been strongly disapproved of, even non-sexual ones (as had been their case). Honestly, she had wanted to spare them both the trouble the truth usually brought with it, though it had disagreed with her always-forthright agenda. Amelia assumed Minerva hadn't told anybody as well. The latter was a Gryffindor after all, honorable in her words if anything.
Needless to say, they had revelled in their ability to keep their mutual love – love it had been, not a fling nor attraction acted upon – from the public.
After school, they had stayed in contact, but not nearly as much as the blonde would have liked – both of them being very ambitious and career-orientated, their jobs had taken too much of their time, still did, though they cherished their rare eye-to-eye talks. Platonically, this time.
Amelia thought of it as a valuable, if unconventional, experience. Unbeknownst to her, a little smile lifted the corners of her mouth in her current position in almost-heaven.
To think, though, that Minerva had been knocking on death's door this spring sent shivers down the woman's spine – she knew the Professor had been in critical condition because of Dolores and her rats, but to be reminded of the potential loss of one of the most formidable friends she had ever had was like being kicked in the face.
"I suppose it can," Amelia mumbled, directing her thoughts to the here and now.
"It will," Edgar added confidently. It was then when the witch knew she had made her decision.
"Will you wait for me a second time?" she asked, clenching her jaw while looking down at her brother. Her dead baby brother.
There's time for crying later.
She had to march on.
"I will always wait for you, Am," Edgar replied, smiling.
Hand in hand, they walked toward the green trees.
She awoke in cold sweat.
Amelia's eyes were fixated on a white ceiling. Suspiciously familiar, it was… She gasped for breath. The sterile smell pushed her further into the realm of sensibility. Her vision began to shake. Something lime green bustled around her and what she presumed to be a bed.
The image of reality was a blur.
Lightning hit her head. It began to rain. Memories, not water. His smile. His fingers, as they let hers go. Him – fading. A rainbow, as she fell onto the Earth like a banished angel. Now here she was, gripping the rough sheets, missing the feeling of wet grass on bare skin.
"More calming draught!"
"Alsie, go get some new sheets–"
Despite the many hushed voices coming from every corner and every crack, a sense of tranquility washed over her, making her close her eyes again. The white on her knuckles retreated as her grip on the sheets loosened. Her breathing calmed. The sweat covering every perceivable inch of her skin was wiped off with a cloth by invisible hands.
"…stabilizing…"
She gave herself over to the gardens of darkness.
Amelia tried to grab the cup of water standing on the small table next to her hospital bed, but it was to no avail. Only a few hours had passed since she had woken up; she was exhausted. Trying to utilize wandless magic didn't solve the problem either. Her magical reserves were exhausted. She let her right hand – the one without a bandage – fall onto the sheets. Defeated.
Frankly, she found her whole situation to be beyond frustrating.
Alright, she had been attacked by You-Know-Who. Alright, she had almost died. (Certainly would have, had she not mustered up remnants of her strength to apparate to St Mungo's from where she had lain outside in the dirt. Reminiscing, she imagined she had made quite a sight crouching on the hospital floor, considering all that blood and mud.)
But, really, she just wanted to get back to work.
Pius Thicknesse had been appointed her temporary replacement. He certainly was a kind man, very calm, but these characteristics didn't automatically make a person able to shoulder the hard work being the Head of the DMLE brought with it. Letting her doubts aside, the Ministry had gotten itself into big turmoil as well, as she had been told by Jesica, her younger sister. (As to the matter of personal visits, they only allowed close family into her room as of now, well-being of the patient and basic safety measures being the main reasons. Amelia was currently awaiting the arrival of Ministry officials though – she knew regular procedure.) Rufus Scrimgeour had just been appointed Minister of Magic and many were apprehensive concerning his political skills, what with him having more experience of the military sort. Amelia just hoped he would prove to be a better politician than his predecessor. Merlin, almost anybody would be a better politician than bloody Cornelius Fudge.
Originally, Amelia herself had also been in on the run for the position of the Minister (been the top candidate, really), though she had not particularly desired it. The attack on her person seemed to have scared off the masses, made them root for Scrimgeour instead. Just as well. A temporarily restricted individual like herself couldn't very well be the leader of a country at the beginning of something that wasn't unlikely to morph into a Second War anyway, could she?
A rather young witch with brown hair came bustling into Amelia's room – high-security, as she had realized soon after waking up – with a tray of food, which would be her lunch. A steaming bowl. Soup? The other witch put it next to the filled cup the blonde hadn't reached earlier, glancing at it with green eyes that reminded Amelia of a snake's skin in its prime. Her nameplate read Alsie Harper.
"Wanted to wait for the food, didn't you?" Harper assumed with a smile, nodding to the cup. The young woman's voice was surprisingly deep for someone who looked like 25.
"No…" Amelia wanted to say more, but the pain gripping her throat abruptly prevented her from doing so. She couldn't even swallow to ease the awkwardness surrounding her own thoughts. The presence of that neck rail around her throat didn't contribute anything positive to the atmosphere either.
"I was just jesting. I know you can merely move a muscle. It would also be better if you didn't attempt to speak at all – causes less pain," the other witch mentioned in a tone one would use to talk about banalities like the weather. With a flick of her taupe-coloured wand, Harper conjured a spoon, which she took with her left hand, and used the other to put the wand in one of her green pockets and take the bowl.
A horrifying realization dawned on Amelia: She would be fed.
The blonde wasn't used to having others do things for her. Well, not things she was supposed to be able to do herself anyway. She lived alone, hadn't any house elves, and, quite frankly, was a workaholic beyond redemption. She liked working. Loved it, really. It gave her a sense of importance, of usefulness, one she couldn't live without. Some people – the sort who absorbed gossip like it was the air they needed to live – tried to tell her over and over how she was just overshadowing her real problems, for example how much she wanted a husband and children, as if those were things a woman couldn't live without. She still was a witch of dignity, thank you very much. It's true, sometimes she longed for someone to come home to. Didn't everybody?* But being a traditional mother had never been her goal – the well-being of magical Great Britain was, and had always been, her ultimate priority.
She hoped she had succeeded in her job, to a certain extent at least.
"Open your mouth," Harper probed while holding up the dripping spoon. The soup looked like brown water.
Amelia's cheeks were already buzzing and burning by the time the spoon was being inserted into her mouth. Really, this is beyond embarrassing. To her surprise, the brew glided down her throat smoothly, with no effort whatsoever.
"It's enchanted to do so," Harper said casually while filling the spoon with more soup.
Ah, yes, that's why it tastes so ghastly, Amelia thought.
One week and two days. She was stuck in this hospital bed for one week and two days already. She was a patient person, yes. She was also able to feed herself again, yes. She still hated the hospital food, yes.
She also wanted to get back to work.
Amelia opened her eyes and looked at the clock. 3:54pm. No ticking was heard – she had switched on the radio earlier. Some jazz tune she recognized from one of the Ministry balls was playing. She let a smile cross her lips, content with her choice of channel. Lightly, she drummed with her fingers on the white sheets. The ones belonging to her right hand anyway. She still felt like her left one contained tiny bricks instead of flesh whenever she tried to move it.
The creaking noise of the door being opened reached her ears through the sounds of jazz. Harper, in her usual lime green clothes and usual harmonic demeanour, stepped in. She was smiling, as usual. Though it appeared a bit strained at the moment… The woman surveyed the room, as if searching it for faults.
"Is everything alright in here?"
"Yes. Why shouldn't it be?" Amelia asked, her voice clear and steady. One of the things that had improved over the days, gratefully. The neck rail was gone, her neck bones not being in danger anymore. The bruising had partly retreated as well, only yellow marks left to serve as a temporary reminder of the attack.
The measures of security surrounding her room were continuously enforced.
"For heaven's sake, ah've been kept waiting for twenty minutes already and, frankly, ah donae see what all the fuss is about!" The Scottish lilt hang heavy in the room. Amelia forgot to breathe for a moment and suppressed a smile both at once, resulting in her making a squeaking sound. She instantly moved her right hand to her mouth. She dearly hoped nobody had heard that, despite the ongoing music in the background.
"Professor–"
"I'm not your Professor anymore, Miss Harper, and I would greatly appreciate it if you'd not attempt to push that door in my face so an intelligent conversation is possible."
"This is a high-security room, and I'm sorry to inform you, but you're not allowed in until all precautions–"
Amelia sighed when she heard the door slamming shut. Sometimes, being a high-ranking person in the Ministry had its disadvantages. The voices were hardly perceivable now, thanks to Harper's determination not to let Minerva into the room. Well, the blonde was able to appreciate the way Harper was set on following the rules, but to try to argue with Minerva McGonagall simply wasn't something you'd do if you had a brain.
With a bit of stretching and only slightly painful bending, she managed to switch off the radio to her left. The jazz vanished into air – silence remained. The voices were gone. Only the ticking of the clock registered in the back of her mind while she strained her ears to hear something from the other side of the door; without success. Absent-mindedly, she began to count the seconds.
1…
2…
3…
14…
58…
135…
257…
...
With a mere click of the door, Minerva, clad in black elegance as ever, rushed into the room at a moderate pace, a wooden cane firmly in her left hand, unused. Harper trailed behind, looking exhausted and mindful of the tip of that walking stick, as it was lightly swaying in her direction every time the Professor took a step. Amelia found herself marginally amused at the sight. 273 seconds.
"That'd be all, Harper," the witch cautioned dismissively, forcing herself not to smirk as the Healer looked at her with a somewhat flabbergasted expression. She didn't move an inch, however.
"Well, you heard the woman," Minerva added, looking more imperious than ever; her hands lay on top of her cane, one over the other, her head was slightly tipped, making her black hat appear even more crooked, and the look in her emerald eyes was able to instill fear even in persons of the likes of Alastor Moody. Harper puffed out her chest, probably in an attempt to restore whatever was left of her pride, and walked out of the room. Amelia gave her credits for not slamming the door this time.
The face of the raven-haired witch standing opposite of where the patient lay immediately softened. She leaned her cane on the windowsill and came to sit on the wooden chair next to the bed, not without wavering slightly.
"Aren't you supposed to be using that stick?" Amelia asked. She knew Minerva – that bloody woman was prone to neglecting her health out of foolish pride.
"I'm here to check up on you, not the other way round," the other witch retaliated, her face momentarily adopting a stern expression. The lines creasing Minerva's face relaxed as she laid her hands on the white sheets, next to Amelia's body. Their fingers were almost touching, but not quite – as if not daring to touch the other. Afraid to sully skin so soon after having fled death. (Together.)
"So, how are you?"
"Healing," Amelia responded. Cherishing simplicity.
"And how are they treating you here?"
"Considering I'm behaving more civilly than you would under the circumstances, rather well. The security precautions are exhausting though – I'm not the Minister."
"Ye would've been, had ye nae been attacked," Minerva countered, wringing her hands angrily. That Scottish accent of hers was more pronounced now. "Albus doesnae trust Scrimgeour, though tae me, he appears pretty decent."
"More decent than Fudge, in any case," Amelia added, nodding slightly, although to her, it seemed like Minerva had stopped listening – the emeralds wandering on a spot left of Amelia's head. The Professor appeared to be drifting in thoughts. Her friend let her.
"Can I be honest with you?" Ah, the bagpipes and lassies had retreated. Minerva had collected herself.
"Of course."
"...I feel like my situation has come down to limiting– I feel like I can only trust myself, in this time of war. That's not happened before, you know, thinking of the first time." And this is sad. The unspoken words surrounded the two women like a tight net.
"What of Dumbledore?"
"He isn't himself anymore. Hasn't been for some time now, come to think of it. That's really all I can say."
Amelia nodded. I understand.
"I know we don't see each other often, but, well, I'll try to be trustworthy anyway." You can trust me.
Minerva smiled, with a kind of tenderness that was rarely seen on her features. Her fingers lightly trailed the small bones resting beneath the skin of Amelia's left hand, which moved slightly in affectionate response. Shining emeralds met a calm ocean, mixing, creating a bond of dark cyan.
"You already are." I know.
*While I know of and wholly acknowledge the aro ace spectrum, Amelia herself is unaware of it. Think of it, the Wizarding World, Great Britain, it's not even 2000 yet. The general mindset then wasn't as advanced as ours is now.
Also: I simply love writing Scottish accents.