Rosalie stumbled through her front door at La Place Des Anges, dropping her bag and leaning heavily against the radiator cover. Above it, a mirror sat on the wall and as she stared into it as she let the glamours around her drop, revealing the sunken cheeks and pale pallor.

"Miss Rose!" Missy called in distress when she popped into the room. Rose gave her a weak smile.

"Je suis bien, Missy. I just need to sleep."

Missy took her hand, popping her straight into her room and helping her fall straight into bed.

"Miss Rose shoulds be taking better cares of herself." The elf scolded.

"I know Missy. Je suis desolèe."

"Mistress Emmeline will be being very angry with yous." The house elf bustled around the room, producing a pain potion from nowhere and helping her drink it before laying her down.

"Je sais."

Rose closed her eyes, only vaguely aware of Missy drawing the curtains and magically darkening the room. As the pain potion kicked in, easing the constant burning in her body she felt herself slipping into sleep, her last aware thought being of Missy and hoping she kept her secret.

The next morning, Rose groaned as she woke up, groping for the pain potion on her bedside cabinet and downing it in one gulp, before simply lying still and waiting for it to kick in. "Missy?" she walked slowly into the kitchen, one arm wrapped around her waist.

"Miss Rose!" Missy squeaked, spinning around with a relieved look on her face.

"I'm fine." Rose anticipated her questioned. "How long has it been?"

"Five weeks."

Missy was eyeing her worriedly, hands waving in the air as if she wanted to fuss over her but not sure where to begin. Rose lowered herself into her seat, resting her head in her folded arms. "Then I can manage." She whispered, half to convince herself. "What time is it?"

Missy handed her a glass of orange juice and placed toast in front of her. "Midday."

"Alright then. Could you bring me invigoration potion from the cupboard s'il ta plait? I need to get through dance, and then I can sleep more." She chewed unenthusiastically and Missy hurried to do as she asked.

"Miss Rose…" she began.

"I know Missy. Don't worry. I'm fine."

She rose and dashed to get ready. Although she collapsed as soon as she'd come home, the next day, once up and out of pain she immediately began conspiring with a bemused Missy to strengthen the wards around the house. They hid the magical signature by blending it in with the environment around it, hoping it would be enough to fool anybody looking. That afternoon, three days after she left, an owl arrived informing her that the procedure on Harry had been a success and there was no longer a horcrux attached to his head. There were also multiple pleas for her to return the academy but those she ignored, instead concentrating on her school work and practices and attempting to cope with the pain the wracked her body each day.

She soon discovered a major issue. She couldn't function without a pain potion, but the more she used them the less they worked. She would stumble home after dark, falling immediately into bed and not rising again until the last possible moment. Glamour charms were now a daily necessity.

Missy was growing more and more worried but Rosalie forbid her from expressing her concerns to anyone, doing so in such a way that the house elf was tied to silence. The girl was beyond thankful that no one had come looking for her- she didn't think that she would be able to hide her condition for an extended length of time, especially not if that person knew her well. But for now, the girl remained alone.

A month later, Rosalie knew that something had to change. Crippled by the pain, the days she found herself unable to get out of bed were now equal to the ones she could. She relied heavily on Missy to pop her backwards to the days she missed, and then to and from school and her other lessons- a mixture of muggle and magical means were keeping her awake and functioning during these, but Missy often had to pop her straight to bed, plying her with nutrient potions in an effort to prevent her weight dropping dangerously low.

Missy, meanwhile, was worried terribly about her young charge. Beneath the glamours, the young girl was pale and drawn, her eyes and cheeks sunken while her collar bones and ribs jutted out, her skin pulled like parchment as she moved with an exhausted slowness. She struggled to make it through a day, a Missy feared the time when the girl wouldn't be able to rise from bed at all. It broke her heart to see the young girl struggle so- she'd cared for her since birth, raising her when her mother had been too busy searching for her missing godson to think of her infant daughter. And in all the years since, when Emmeline had been working, or with Harry or simply involved in something else- it had been Missy who patched up scabbed knees and soothed away nightmares, who had fixed broken bones and wiped away tears.

But she was almost helpless now.

Missy gathered together the potions Rosalie would need for that day and popped upstairs into her bedroom, frowning in confusion when she saw that the girl wasn't in bed.

"Miss Rose?"

She placed the potions on the desk and snapped her fingers, lighting the room gently.

"Miss Rose!"

The girl was slumped on the floor, fallen across the rug with her legs twisted awkwardly beneath her as she breathed shallowly. "Miss Rose, Miss Rose!" Missy's hands hovered above her, unsure of what to do. Pale and covered in a sheen of sweat, Rosalie was utterly still other than the sporadic rise and fall caused by her weak breathing.

Missy gently lay her hand on her wrist, and popped them to the one person who could help. It was fortunate that he happened to be visiting the academy that day.

"Master Severus, sir, help!"

The man jumped at the appearance of the small house elf behind him. "What on-?"

Before he could finish, he caught sight of the motionless girl lying on the floor. "Rosalie!"

He dropped to his knees, wand out as he scowled furiously. "Get us to the nursing room!"

He barely noticed the pop of apparition as Missy did as he bade, leaning over Rose with a livid expression. "She was supposed to come to me if there were negative effects! Why didn't she?"

Missy, wisely, decided this was a rhetorical question and instead remained silent, simply moving to fetch whatever the potions master needed when he asked.

Snape worked on the girl, pouring potions down her throat and soundlessly muttering spells, ignoring the small group that had gathered at the entrance, horrified looks on their faces.

"I don't understand." Whispered Harry. "She was fine last time we saw her…"

"And how long ago was that?" Neville snapped. "When was the last time that any of you checked that the fourteen year old girl living alone with a house elf was actually okay? Or spoke to her about anything but Voldemort and Harry?"

Harry gaped at him, while Minerva and Sirius looked stricken. "We… we thought she just wanted to go back home. Emmeline's been ill, I thought Rose was upset about it." Sirius muttered.

"She left because she thought no one cared!" Neville scowled. "And you can't really blame her, can you?"

"Of course she knows we care!" Harry protested.

"So much so you forget that what matters to her is different to what matters to you." Commented Luna, swinging her feet from her seat on the desk nearby.

Minerva frowned. "What are you talking about Miss Lovegood?"

Luna looked up, startled. "Her performance, of course. The first time she was given the lead role. She was very excited, but you all forgot. She was so upset she had Umdulindars flocking to her for weeks."

"Oh no." Minerva's hand flew to her mouth. "The Christmas ballet; I forgot."

Sirius rubbed the bridge of his nose. "So did I."

"Just like you forgot her birthday last year. And her piano recital the year before that. And the time she had to floo my Gran to get her out of hospital because you were all 'too busy' or simply not answering your floos or any messages." Neville pointed out coolly.

"When was that?" Minerva frowned.

"Around the time Umbridge was made high inquisitor. You're all so wrapped in Harry and yourselves, you forgot that she's only fourteen! She lost her mother when she was- what? Eleven? And the only family she's got spends their time on a separate land mass barely remembering to contact her throughout the year! I used to think so highly of all of you, but you abandoned her! And then blamed her for making mistakes! What else was she going to do? She was all alone and you expected her to be able to cope with things most adults struggle with, when she's little more than a child herself!"

"Well said, Mr Longbottom."

They all gaped at Snape.

"Um… thank you Sir?" Neville stammered, astonished at gaining a compliment from the potions master.

"Miss Vance will be fine. She will likely sleep a considerable amount over the forthcoming days- do not wake her. There is a reason she is in that state." He regarded them with a harsh glare. "I suggest you use the time she is unavailable to reconsider your approach to child-rearing, Minerva."

He swept out of the room, leaving behind a group stunned into silence.

Minerva listened idly to the ticking of the clock in the corner, head resting on her hand as she watched Rosalie for any sign of the girl waking up. She'd been unconscious for three days, and had had a constant vigil over her for all that time. This was Minerva's third watch- it gave her time to think, and she realised she didn't like what she'd discovered.

Because Snape and Neville had been right, she'd reluctantly admitted. In the chaos of the past few years, Rose had been forgotten- they'd all assumed that because she could be independent, she didn't need parenting. Merlin knew Emmeline had been trying in the past few months, but playing catch-up for so many years while battling her illness was a struggle and Rose had been suffering the consequences, all without any of them realising.

And the young girl was now paying dearly for that mistake.

Minerva jumped as she felt a pressure around her shoulders, looking up to see Harry placing a blanket around her. "Bonjour, tata."

"Good morning a leannan." She replied softly. "Why are you awake so early? It's not even dawn."

He shrugged. "I couldn't sleep." He sat heavily in the chair by her side, gaze resting on his sister. "We failed her, didn't we?"

"I failed her. It wasn't your responsibility."

"She's my little sister!" he said harshly. "I should have been paying closer attention…"

"We all should have. We were so concerned about Voldemort and Umbridge and the Triwizard tournament we didn't think to look closer to home." She rubbed her head.

"We didn't want to look." Came a rough voice, and Sirius walked into view, deep bags under his eyes and an air of exhaustion around him. "Because if we did, we'd have to question how we could hope to beat Voldemort when we can't keep an eye on more than one child at a time."

Minerva ducked her head, but from the corner there was a sniff. "You're all being far too hard on yourselves." Hermione was sitting at the end of the room, under the watchful eye of the matron due to an accident in defence earlier that day and had woken at their voices. She'd come to the academy with her parents, who had had a very long conversation with Minerva over the summer, during which she had inadvertently revealed many of the secrets Hermione had been hiding from them. Once they knew, they point blank refused to allow her to return to Hogwarts, but Minerva had persuaded them to come to the Academy with Hermione and to portkey to and from their dental practice each day. "Rose isn't a child- she has her own thoughts and is perfectly capable of making her own decisions."

"She's fourteen. Not exactly an adult." Harry frowned.

"Harry, at fourteen you'd faced Voldemort three times, killed a troll and a basilisk and was competing in a tournament aimed at students three years older than you. Age is no excuse for acting idiotically." She said haughtily.

"Yeah Hermione, I had done those things. But you know what? I could have been killed by that troll- it would have been safer to fetch a teacher. The same with the basilisk. I went running after who I thought was a mass murderer targeting me and tried to outfly a dragon! That was idiocy too! And I had Aunt Minerva right there at Hogwarts with me!" he snapped. "So please tell me how she was supposed to do any better when she had a house elf!"

"She had Sirius, didn't she?"

The man in question scoffed. "Oh please- I spent half my time hiding from my demons in a bottle. She was more sensible than me when she was ten, I reckon."

"Sirius!" Minerva looked horrified. "You got drunk while alone with Rosalie?"

The man shifted uncomfortably. "I'm not proud of it. And I haven't done it in a while. But straight out of Azkaban… well, I couldn't stay in dog form forever. And then the memories came back."

"So you got drunk. Leaving Rose to pick up what was left, I suppose."

"What do you want me to say Minerva?! I didn't know she was my daughter, since none of you saw fit to tell me!"

"Her relationship to you is irrelevant!" she snapped. "She was a child- you should not have been drunk around her in the first place!"

"Stop it, both of you!" Harry yelled. "This isn't helping!" They fell silent. "Hermione- Rose is perhaps one of the most sensible, kindest people I know. If you slag her off again, I assure you that you will no like the consequences for your future." he looked at her pointedly. "Aunt Minerva, we have no idea what Sirius went through so do not be so quick to judge him. And Sirius, things will be a lot easier if you stop picking fights and being so defensive."

Harry sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "Does anyone actually know why Rosie is so sick?"

"I believe I can help with that Mr Potter."

Snape swept in, moving straight to Rosalie and murmuring a spell to check on her. "Still asleep." He decreed. "But nothing worrying."

"What's wrong with her?"

"Severe magical exhaustion."

Harry scowled. "I'd worked out that much for myself, funnily enough."

"Harry." Minerva reprimanded, frowning. "Severus- please just explain."

"I had an idea to help Emmeline- several months ago now. The plan was to link her magic with someone else's in the hopes of boosting her own and thus enabling her recovery."

"And you linked it with Rosalie?" Sirius frowned.

"There was no other choice mutt. Blood relatives have the closest magical match- there was nobody even close to Emmeline other than the girl." He sneered. "Not to mention the fact that she was the only one around."

"We've all been in France for months." Harry frowned. The potions master shot him a scathing look.

"And when was the last time you visited Emmeline in the hospital before her recovery?"

That caused another moment's silence as Harry ducked his head, realising he hadn't been in months. Snape scoffed and turned back to Rosalie.

"The treatment worked better than we thought it would- Emmeline not only improved but woke up and with other potions was capable of walking around and functioning. We increased the flow of the link when Emmeline was suffering from the extreme fatigue in the hopes of further improvement. It wasn't supposed to affect Miss Vance this badly."

"Is she going to be alright?" came a soft voice from the doorway. They all whipped around the see Emmeline leaning heavily against the frame, pale and drawn.

"Emmeline, you should be in bed." Sirius frowned. She shot him a furious look.

"My daughter is ill- something none of you saw fit to inform me! I should be with her!" She snapped. "Severus, will she be alright?"

"I believe so, but I can't be sure." he admitted. "I expected her to experience some tiredness, maybe find casting spells to be different. This reaction is… unexpected. But she was supposed to contact me if anything more happened- the dunderhead didn't."

"Because it was working." Rosalie murmured, dragging her eyes.

"Rosie!"

"Rose!"

"Rosalie!"

"It was working?" Snape questioned, his eyes boring into her. She suppressed a groaned as she shifted, nodding slighting and gazing at him with tired eyes.

"Maman was improving. She was stronger, less tired. That is why I did not contact you."

"Rosalie, my health is not more important than yours!" Emmeline exclaimed softly, stumbling forward to sit on the edge of her bed.

Snape frowned at the younger blonde. "You could have died, stupid child. If the elf had not thought to bring you to me…"

"No, I wouldn't have." She denied, her voice soft and words slurring. "Missy has a pre-existing order from Maman to protect the lives of Harry and I which supersedes any and all other orders. As long as she did not interfere I knew that my life was not in danger."

"Insolent brat." He cursed. "What if she had made a mistake?"

But Rosalie had slipped into unconsciousness again and Emmeline was sobbing softly, leaving Snape to face the wrath of Minerva.

"How dare you place an experimental spell on an underage child, Severus Snape!? You had no right!"

"If the child was old enough to live alone without adult supervision she was certainly old enough to decide whether to partake in this or not." He retorted. "She had a choice, Minerva, it is not as if I forced her!"

"But there wouldn't have been a choice, not for Rosie! She would do anything to make maman well!" Harry protested.

"That, Mr Potter, is not my problem. I gave her a choice- she made it in full knowledge of the potential consequences. My conscience is clear."

And with that, he swept out of the room.

Harry was half laying in the chair next to Rosalie's bed, supposed to be doing his transfiguration work but finding more and more that his gaze drifted back to his sister. His mother was in the bed next to her, as sound asleep as she was.

Eventually he sighed and placed the work to one side, propping his chin on his hand.

"Do you remember that time we decided to run away?" he murmured. "Maman had been spending so much time at work that we decided to teach her a lesson and go to live in the woods. We thought we were so brave and grown up, sneaking out in the middle of the night and using that book to work out what was safe to eat or not. Never realising that the entire time we were still safe within the wards and that Missy was watching over us."

He smiled slightly, watching the gentle rise and fall of Rose's body as she breathed. "All those days we would spend in the forest, leaving as soon as we'd finished breakfast and not returning until the sun was setting. We'd eat dinner and fall straight into bed and then do it all over again the next day.

"Did I ever tell you that you taught me how to play? My aunt and uncle before didn't believe in having an imagination. I wasn't allowed toys, really, or allowed to play so I didn't know how. And I treasured those days we spent."

He huffed a small laugh, looking down at his hands for a moment.

"Fighting pirates and taming dragons."

His head snapped up, shock on his face when he saw tired blue eyes staring back at him. He grinned happily at her, relieved she'd woken. "Exploring new worlds and hunting for treasure."

"Burying it too." She smiled weakly. "Did we ever manage to find that treasure chest we buried?"

He chuckled. "I'd forgotten about that. I don't think we did, no."

They fell into silence again, and Harry noticed her eyelids beginning to droop. "Harry?" she murmured, just before she fell into sleep. "I wouldn't have changed it for the world… not for anything."

"Me neither." He whispered, reaching out to entwine his fingers with hers. She was already asleep again. "Me neither."

Rosalie felt irritation wash through her as angry voices speaking in hushed tones broke through the haze of sleep. Couldn't they be quiet?

She tried to turn her head towards the noise, but the attempt sent pain lancing through her and she moaned softly, tensing automatically which only caused more pain. The only person in the room to notice was Neville, who broke away from where he was watching the arguing group with a disappointed expression to sit beside her, drawing the curtain to block them off from the rest of the room.

"Hi." He greeted softly. "How are you feeling?"

"Like I got run over by a hippogriff." She gasped. Neville leant over to grab the bottle of pain potion sitting beside her bed, carefully helping her to swallow some.

"Better?"

She nodded. "Thank you. What are they arguing about?" the voices had got louder on the other side of the curtain. Neville shrugged.

"You, Harry, your mother, Voldemort, Snape, the academy, Hogwarts, Dumbledore. Want me to carry on?"

"Non, I think I get the picture." She sighed. They listened for a moment.

"She was a child! Why was she on her own in the first place? Let alone for long enough for nobody to realise how ill she was?"

That was Mrs Weasley, who had apparently arrived alongside her four youngest children, judging by the other voices that rose.

"With all due respect Molly, this has absolutely nothing to do with you. And apart from that, until we opened the academy for the protection of people which includes you and your family, Sirius was living with her!"

Aunt Minerva, Rose recognised sleepily.

"Oh and that's so much better!"

"Hey! Sirius may not be perfect but he's doing the best that he can! I'd like to see what you look like after twelve years in Azkaban!"

Harry.

"That's redundant! That man shouldn't be left in charge of a dog, let alone a child!"

"Molly enough!" Minerva barked.

"I am the first person to admit that I have not been the best father or Godfather. But I care about those kids as much as you care about yours!" Sirius got louder and louder as he spoke. "I might not have watched her grow up, or been there for the important bits but she is my daughter and my heir, and Harry is my Godson! And i'm damned if I'll stand here and let you talk as if you know best for them! You don't!"

"What do you know about children?!"

"I know that smothering them will do more harm than good! Tell me Molly, did you never wonder why all five of your eldest children moved away from you as soon as they could?"

"WHY YOU-"

Rosalie let out a small cry, clamping her hands to her ears and curling into a ball in an effort to block out the noise. Neville slid his hand over hers, waving his wand to cast a silencing charm around the bed.

The girl had tears streaming silently down her cheeks. "J'ai voulu seulement ma maman." She whispered. "I missed her so much that it hurt. I just wanted to make sure she stayed well. Was that truly so wrong?"

Neville could only slide beside her on the bed and hold her tightly as she sobbed silently into his shoulder, her body trembling while outside the bubble he'd created the adults continued to shout at each other.

Je suis bien- I'm okay

Je suis desolèe- I'm sorry

Je sais- I know

J'ai voulu seulement ma maman- I only wanted my mum