Disclaimer: Harry Potter doesn't belong to me and no money is made with this story.

Prompt: write about a character or characters dealing with, coming into contact with, or otherwise engaged with some form of mental illness.

Word count: any multiple of 100, to the nearest 15 words above or below.

Nightly Duty

Time was dragging along.

I got up, walked around the room and sat down again. Maybe I should check on the patients again. No, there was no need to disturb their rest too often. If something was wrong, someone would call me.

Normally, I shouldn't have been here on my own. I wasn't even examined yet. My colleague had suddenly fallen ill himself however, and no substitute was available. The war was demanding plenty of strength from everyone. Thus, I was talking care of the Spell Damage department on my own tonight.

I should have been able to take the necessary measures if an emergency came in but I wasn't completely sure. Usually, there had always been someone to ask.

I was tired. This was the seventh night I'd spent awake in a row. Sleeping through the day just wasn't the same.

I really hoped Bellatrix wasn't too disappointed. There were many nights she had to spend on her own. But who knew what she was up to? She often went away during nighttime herself, none of her explanations was very convincing. Maybe there was someone else. Unlike her mother, she never said so outright, but being married to an aspiring healer probably wasn't what she had dreamed of. Still, I wasn't someone to spend my entire life with my ancestors' money doing nothing useful.

A knock on the door interrupted my thoughts. "Yes."

A pretty young witch in Auror's robes stood in the doorway. Alice Longbottom had changed quite a bit since I had seen her last time in Hogwarts but she was still easy to recognize. Even for me with my bad skills in remembering faces. I did not believe that she was here to talk about school time memories though.

"Good evening Alice. What's the matter?"

"Hello. I need to speak to the healer in charge," she said.

"I am the healer in charge."

Alice raised her eyebrows. "You haven't finished yet, have you? Well, anyway there's no time to waste. One of our colleagues has been tortured."

I was wondering if this was another training accident. Since Crouch had been made Head of Magical Law-Enforcement those had become quite common. To the annoyance of every healer at 's.

"What's happened to him? Muggle instruments, cursed objects or the Cruciatus curse?"

"The Cruciatus curse I believe," Alice said.

"You believe? Well, never mind, take him to the examination room. One door to the left."

Alice nodded and walked away.

I threw a pinch of Floo powder into the fireplace to inform the colleagues in other departments. If there were another emergency, one of them would have to take care of them. Afterwards, I collected the items necessary to help someone made ill by the Cruciatus curse: A potion against the shock, another one to help the patient's magic fight off the curse and a piece of parchment with a quill. Those wouldn't help him directly, but it might allow his colleagues to find the torturer. I put the necessary spells on it right here in the Healer's Room. Wands weren't supposed to be used in front of a Cruciatus curse patient.

In front of the examination room I met Alice and an older Auror with many scars on his face. He introduced himself as Alastor Moody.

"I hope you're not squeamish, lad."

I assured him that I wasn't. Like any trainee healer I had already seen my fair share of blood, vomit and fecal matter.

When I saw the patient, there was nothing like that though.

As if he had read my mind, maybe he had, Moody said: "We already put him into different clothes."

The cloak the ill Auror was wearing seemed to be quite warm but he was still shivering as if lying in the cold. His face was deadly pale but otherwise looked unharmed. His eyes didn't focus on anyone but gazed emptily into the room. It didn't take me much effort to sense the effects of the Cruciatus curse.

"My name's Rodolphus Lestrange. I'm a healer at Hospital. Do you understand me?"

I was aware of the Aurors watching me. Moody obviously thought it was quite foolish to try to talk to the patient. Still, this was the usual procedure and maybe some of the things I said did reach him even if he couldn't react.

I checked the man's pulse and breathing, both were regular. At least something. He wasn't really unconscious either, kept looking around and moving but without any recognizable pattern.

The first thing he needed was the shock potion. It could be taken in over the skin which was very useful given the man's condition. Drop after drop it was absorbed by the skin. After he had received the right dose, I tested his reflexes. They were still working as well. This meant it wasn't the last and worst stage of Cruciatus curse induced illness, stage five.

The next step was the test of the curses. It was necessary to determine their strength and might help the other Aurors.

While I performed the various steps, I kept talking about them. It was for the Aurors' benefit as much as for that of the patient.

"You're attempting this without your wand?"Moody asked before I began with the diagnosing spell.

"Yes, it's better that way."

I had always been quite good at this during training even though I had never been forced to deal with such a bad case. I moved my left hand above the body parts where most nerves ended; there was no need to touch directly. This way I could draw away the magic that had been applied there.

The curses that had hit him had been really powerful. I needed to concentrate really hard to take the magic into me without harming myself. At least, that was true for one of the two curses. The other didn't cause me any such problems. The magic blended in with my own like water being poured into water. It was really strange. The second curse, though not much more powerful, was way more disturbing. There was an almost inhuman quality about it. Some may say the Cruciatus curse is always inhuman but that's not true, no matter how much many people may wish it were.

The feather had written down everything in specific patterns.

"He's been attacked by two people", Alice said.

Moody nodded. "I hope we'll find those bastards.

I gave the second potion to the sick Auror. It would put him to sleep and help his body to fight the rest of the curses off. I didn't say it aloud but I doubted that it would be enough in this case. He was one of those Cruciatus curse patients who couldn't be helped with known methods. My experienced colleagues couldn't have done anything either.

Suddenly, the patient started to scream and twitch as if he were still under the curse. Alice flinched while Moody didn't seem to be surprised.

Stay calm, I told myself. It's not your fault and you know what to do. I had hoped he was more stable but I had to take it as it was. The dark magic had returned to his body. It seemed as if he hadn't managed to fight anything and also as if my magic from before hadn't worked either.

I'd have to repeat the piece of magic done before, this time without quill and parchment.

It worked. Calm returned to the man's body and soon he was back in the state he had been in before. I really hoped that the sleep-inducing effects of the potion would start quickly.

"I'm going to take him to his ward now", I told the Aurors.

The bed was charmed in a way that it would float if touched in a certain place. This way it could be moved around without any wand work.

We quickly reached the Janus Thickey-Ward and I let the bed float inside. Alice was reading the sign on the door. "Permanent spell damage. Does this mean, isn't there anything you can do?"

"It's the standard procedure", I answered. "Level three and four Cruciatus curse patients go here." I didn't tell her that there really wasn't a proper cure. There had been recorded instances of miraculous recoveries, but so far no one had figured out what had made these different from the others.

The patient really seemed to be asleep now and I could leave him for a short while, to do the necessary paperwork with the Aurors.

"You're really talented", Moody told me when we had left the room. "Very few wizards can perform this counter-spell without a wand. And for one as young as you are. It's really extraordinary."

"Thank you."

I was glad to hear this of course, but still, what good did it do? My skills in this area wouldn't save our new patient.

When I returned home at dawn, Bellatrix was in her room and pretended to be asleep. I suppressed a sigh. Why was she even trying this? Didn't she know that it was my job to recognize something like that? By now, it had become almost instinctive.

We've been married for no more than a year and already she's hiding some secrets.