The swirling cacophany of pain and despair slowly faded into a warm, white mist.
She awoke slowly and blinked, trying to take in her surroundings. At first it seemed that she was surrounded on all sides by a brilliant, featureless whiteness, but that gradually faded into a small, quiet glade, surrounded by elm trees. A small brook flowed quietly past her, with reeds and wildflowers swaying gently in a breeze she couldn't quite feel. Everything was eerily familiar, and yet brighter and paler than she expected it.
It was some time before she realized that she was naked, which struck her as not at all proper. Almost immediately, she noticed a small flower-print dress folded neatly on the grass in front of her. As she put it on, a slow realization was creeping up the back of her mind.
She had spent a summer walking the banks of this very stream, when she was small. This dress was the very dress she had ruined climbing its banks, re-sized to fit her - her favorite dress, a gift from an Aunt who she had never known very well. A little south, and she would come to a place where she could cross the stream, into the wilder woods that she had always longed to explore.
A pair of eyes were staring at her from the river.
She stepped forward, and was somehow not astonished to see a small, silvery otter, sitting up and looking patiently at her. It chittered sharply, and she very distinctly understood that she was to follow it downstream, into the wild woods.
She frowned and thought for a moment. What was she missing? She looked down and noticed her own feet, toes dipped into the lapping water. Below the thighs, her legs were the same silvery-white as the otter's pelt... there was something she couldn't remember about her legs.
There had been a roar, and a horrible crunching noise, and more pain than she had ever known was possible. And... something had happened, and she was so scared... and then Harry had showed up to save her. The otter looked up at her, expectantly.
She smiled sadly at it, and sat down on a large rock at the edge of the stream. The woods beyond stretched out before her, quiet and bright and welcoming.
She reached down and picked up the large book that had quietly materialized beside her rock.
"I'm sorry, I won't go with you. I'm going to wait here for Harry." She opened the book across her lap, and quite contentedly began to read.