To anybody who was to glance at the young woman sleeping in one of the immensely uncomfortable plastic chairs bolted to the floor of the train station it would look as if she was simply having a difficult time getting comfortable in the restricting position. The pinched features of her face and the sudden shifting suggested just that. In her gloved hands she clutched a single train ticket to Chicago, with a departure time for several hours past. Her tattered bag sat on the seat next to her resting against her foot, easy pickings for a thief to simply walk by and pick it up. She hadn't meant to fall asleep, she never did. Sleeping had become dangerous for her these days. When she slept something inside of her would relax, and the powers she worked so hard to keep under control while awake surged to the surface, and became far too easy for her subconscious to access. That, on its own, wouldn't be a problem. But when the dreams she had been having were thrown into the equation, things became much more complicated. Things happened while she was sleeping, things she had no control over. So she had taken to simply staying awake, and when she did sleep it would be for no more than an hour at a time, never giving herself enough time to enter that dangerous world of dreams. Today, however, sitting and waiting in the hot train station, she had closed her eyes simply to rest them for a few minutes. After all, they would be calling her train in just ten minutes and she'd be sure to wake up then. She'd underestimated how exhausted she was, though, and she'd been deeply asleep nearly instantly. And for the first time in weeks, the dreams had taken her.

Deep within her mind a battle raged, the night sky was filled with brilliant flashes of magic as her fury and pain took complete control of her, and the ground turned red with blood. Within the train station the young woman squeezed her eyes shut even more tightly, her hands clenching into fists, and then she was gone. Vanished instantly from sight without a single sound to betray her passage. Thankfully, nobody noticed the unnatural action. They all simply continued on absorbed in their own thoughts. Dvona, however, snapped to consciousness just in time to land on her feet, her bag tumbling to the grass a few feet from her. For a moment she thought she was still dreaming, but when she reopened her eyes and the same sight lay before her, she knew she was doing no such thing. The building that had once been so familiar to her lay in ruin, the beautiful green fields that had surrounded it were still charred and barren. The bodies, and the blood, however, were gone. Likely cleaned up by the Ministry of Magic weeks ago as the sun rose over a night she would give anything to forget. Even as she stood there the memories were reclaiming her. The horror, the screams, the pain. She had run, as fast as she could that night. She had run for hours, she hadn't stopped running until her body gave out, and then she hid, and slept. And remembered. She would never forget.

"Dvona." Instantly she stiffened upon hearing her name spoken just a few feet behind her. On guard and tense, she slowly turned back around to face the man who had broken the silence. "We've been looking for you ever since the massa-" he faltered then, upon seeing the horror in her eyes. "Since that night. We need to talk to you, as I am sure you know." He watched as her shoulders slumped, and she stooped to grab her bag.

"Yes, I know."

"Come, we'll go back to the ministry now." Dvona put up no resistance as he gripped her shoulder and apparated to the American Ministry of Magic… to run at this point would have just gotten her in more trouble. It was bad enough already, being the only one to have survived that night, and disappearing before the Ministry had arrived. Yes, she was in enough trouble as it was.

They walked in silence down hall after hall, and Dvona quickly stopped paying attention to where they were going, and just followed the man in front of her mindlessly. As they walked she was furiously building and strengthening the walls within her mind, blocking out everything from that night that she didn't want to reveal to anyone. If they knew, if anybody knew about the power she possessed, what she had done… no. Best not to think about that. They couldn't find out. That was all there was to it. Dipping into the pool of power that hovered just beneath the surface of her mind she wove it into the walls she was building for added protection. They couldn't know. They couldn't.

"Wait here." the sudden noise surprised her, and when she looked up she realized that she was standing before the Minister of Magic's own office. The man who had lead her that far entered without knocking, and within a few minutes she heard the popping sound as several people apparated into the room. Muffled conversation, and the man returned to bring her in. He steered her to a chair in the center of the room, and she tried not to meet the eyes of any of the people in the room. Nobody was introduced to her, rather, the man who had been in charge of her thus far handed her a small vial of clear liquid, and she poured as much strength into her inner walls as she could, hoping it would be enough, before she poured the veritiserum down her throat.

"Good. Shall we begin?" the many people in the room nodded at the Minister before he came to stand in front of the young woman. "What is your name?"

"Dvona Jocelyn Black." her mind felt horribly blank, and she began to worry that what she had done hadn't been enough, that they would discover her secret.

"How old are you?"

"Eighteen."

"What school did you attend?"

"Erisons School Of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

"How did you survive the attack on the school?"

"I wasn't there."

"Where were you?"

"At the bar in town." around the room eyes narrowed. It was well known that students often snuck out of Erisons and spent their nights in the town just a mile away. But it was, of course, against the rules.

"When you returned to school, what did you find." At the question her head exploded in pain, though she didn't allow herself to show any outward signs of it. The truth serum was trying to destroy the wall she had put up, trying to get to the truth, but for the time being the wall was holding.

"The dark mark. When I reached the top of the hill the only thing I saw was the dark mark in the sky. That is all I remember." with the potion unable to find the truth within her mind, she found it shockingly easy to supply a different answer.

"What do you mean that is all you remember?" The Minister sounded shocked, as if such a thing wasn't possible.

"I saw the dark mark, and the next thing I knew it was sunset and I was laying on the bank of a stream in the forest. The were cuts all over my hands and face, as if I had run haphazardly through the trees. Also, I was incredibly exhausted and my ankle hurt horribly."

"What did you do then?"

"I slept." that, at least, was the truth, and the horrid pain began to abate. "The next morning I started walking, until I found a road. Then I hitchhiked. That's more or less what I've been doing ever since. Trying to get as far away as I could." His eyes narrowed then, and silently she cursed herself for being backed into the corner as she just had. Before he even opened his mouth she knew what his next question was going to be.

"If you were trying to get as far away as you could, why then did you return to the school grounds tonight?" There it was again. The pain. This time it was much stronger, however. Having already weakened her defenses it seemed to be attacking them twice as intensely, determined to break them.

"I had a dream," The pain abated then, for Dvona was only telling a half lie. "that one of my close friends was alive, waiting at the school. When I woke up I- I just had to check." the people in the room were exchanging worried and sympathetic glances at that point, and the Minister murmured the counter spell for the potion and she blinked rapidly with relief.

"We thought you might return there at some point. There have been aurors posted on the grounds ever since that night, keeping watch for you. We had to bring you in for questioning, you see. Have you had any news since that night?" His face was etched with concern, and slowly she shook her head.

"Everyone who was at the school was killed. And by the time we got there…" his voice faltered, and she could see the ghosts of what he had seen in his eyes.

"All of the death eaters were dead. They had been violently killed, tortured even. Everywhere we turned there was blood." she could hear people shifting around the room, but she kept her eyes on the man who was talking, the one who had found her. "We still have no idea what happened. There was a residue of powerful magic everywhere, and the building was destroyed. There are some who think that the school itself had some sort of ancient power built into it, a defense mechanism, that rebounded on the death eaters. But, that explanation is a stretch."

"A stretch it might be but it is still the best option we have." a woman with a shrill voice cut in, glaring at the man who had been speaking.

"It doesn't matter." yet another woman cut in. "The child has been on the run for a month, she must be exhausted. Listening to you lot argue about what happened yet again is pointless. Clearly she can offer no more insight that any of us can. The trauma has kept her from remembering anything of that night, a blessing for her. Nobody deserves to see something like that, especially not a child. Let her rest." Dvona silently rankled at being called a child, but forced herself to stay still. If the woman could so easily accept that the trauma had wiped her mind of the night, then perhaps the others had been convinced as well. And if thinking of her as a child helped them to see her as nothing but a victim, then all the better.

"You're right of course." the minister nodded toward the woman who had just spoken, and he stood and turned toward the man who had brought her there. "Blake, would you take Dvona to the hotel down the street? A good night's sleep and a couple of meals are in order for her." the man, who she now knew to be named Blake, nodded and the minister turned back to her. "Tomorrow afternoon, after you have had a chance to rest, come back here and we'll talk about where you can go. There have been a lot of developments since that night, that clearly you haven't heard about. One in particular that will have quite a large impact on your life. But for now, get some rest. You're safe." she knew he meant it as a way to calm her down, but in her mind she laughed. She had never been in danger. In fact, if anything, she was in danger now. In danger of loosing the freedom she had only just recently found. Yes, she was of age, but she knew that wouldn't stop him from trying to interfere with her life. Some things never changed.

Pushing herself to her feet she caught the strap of her bag and slung it over she shoulder, silently following Blake out into the hall.

"It wasn't too bad, was it?" looking up at him she saw him smirking a bit, and she smiled back.

"No, it wasn't that bad. I guess I was running for nothing." it was a far cry from the truth, but he nodded in agreement, and held out his hand for her to take before apparating once again.

The hotel was modest, only ten rooms, all small but comfortably furnished. He led her to the first one on the right, and handed her a key he produced from his pocket. At her puzzled look he explained that it was a hotel just for ministry officials and their guests, not the public. He handed her the key then and told her he would stop by the next afternoon to take her back to the minister, and to sleep well. She almost laughed at that. Sleep… she hadn't had a full night of sleep since that night. She sometimes wondered if she ever would again.

A/N: Just something I've been thinking of for quite a while now. Should I continue or just forget about it? Review and let me know.