Chapter 17
She found herself in suspension as if imprisoned in one of his many jars, peering out at the magnified and distorted world. There was a determination in her not to be frantic and was in fact reasonably controlled, but was jumpy and was unable to concentrate on anything for very long. For many hours she found herself pacing a round robin of corridors as well as the entrance halls and even managed to stop off at the library in order to do some research. No sooner was she at the library door, than found herself standing yet again outside Severus' office door. Although she could not enter, she could sense that he was not there: it had a deadness about it, so she continued to roam the school. Part of her tour led her outside the Headmaster's office and she stopped to stare at the great grandfather clock in the corridor outside it, mesmerized by the great pendulum that swung gently to and fro with the booming noise, its' ticking seconds measuring out their fate. As she turned, she met Albus coming down the spiral stairs from his office.
"My dear," he said gently, as he came towards her. She looked at him hopefully, but his expression told her that Severus wasn't with him. Determined not to break down, she stood stiffly, unable to make light conversation.
"I would really like to see Fawkes," she said – "if he is awake of course", and managed a half smile.
"Of course Elrin. Please just go up, the door is open. He was awake two minutes ago, although I can't guarantee that he is now," he replied, raising his eyebrows. She was glad that he gave her no false reassurances about his head of Slytherin. She could not have bourn them.
"Thank you," she said, and went up into the silent room and as she opened the door, the atmosphere fell over her like a quiet balm: as if that all that was within it was connected to great things, to the great tides of history, of human thought and struggle; to events and ideas that were much bigger than her own life, but as if she were part of it all, a small ingredient, but not insignificant.
Fawkes was indeed awake and looked eager to see her.
"I am glad to see you well, Elrin," he said as she approached the scarlet bird.
"Thank you. It's good to see you again."
"I'm not going to give you false reassurances either," he said, as he idly tackled a succulent nut that he had discovered in his bowl. That comment made her jump internally.
Were he and the Headmaster joined at the brain?
She maintained her calmness nevertheless and said nothing.
"Things have moved on a little since I last spoke to you, I believe?"
"Yes, we – we – that is, Severus and I…"
How can I put it?
"We – are – a couple."
"So coy, my dear Elrin."
"Well, it's not a formal relationship."
"You mean you are sleeping together."
A giant bird is talking to me about my sex life.
"I - yes. We do – love each other."
"I'm glad both of you have realized it."
She could contain herself no longer and said, "He's in danger. And I fear I may have made things worse for him."
"There is no way for you to know what would have happened to him without you. There is no way to know the future where our choices led us in another direction. Events may or may not occur despite your decisions. You are part of what is happening." Reassurance appeared to exude from him like the smell of baked bread or a soft summer breeze. She drank it in unconsciously and it eased her heartbeat.
"I can get back to translating the manuscript once he has returned."
"Good, good, that would be excellent," replied the phoenix.
"It's still worrying about the potion going wrong on poor Remus, she said, Severus was so profoundly disappointed, and almost ashamed I think, though he would never admit it."
"Sometimes it is helpful to retrace your steps," he said enigmatically.
"We went so carefully, though I have a feeling that.."
He waited for her to find the words.
"There is something about the text that makes me think – well, it's crazy really."
He said nothing.
"It's not very likely."
At his chest, he found a particularly interesting feather to tweak.
"He would never countenance it.
"Are you not prejudging his reaction? Maybe what you are thinking is not so foolish."
"It seems so unlikely."
"Nevertheless. You have brought your skills to this study, and so you could have more confidence in your own thoughts."
She changed the subject.
"This sound is very powerful isn't it?"
"It certainly is."
"He has begun to sound it himself, with me."
"Has he?" Said Fawkes, impressed. "That is early. Congratulations to him."
Talking about him to the bird held off the dread that sat in her stomach, but images of him flashed so powerfully in her mind that she felt she could vividly see his shift from deadly stillness to sharp movement, his calculating look of assessment, his lethal, knife-like mind and in her arms, his eyes growing from bat black to warm darkness.
She hadn't realized that she hadn't spoken for a while.
"You are doing well, Elrin," he said looking straight at her.
She didn't want him to be kind, as she might crack open, but he went on.
"He needs you to be strong."
"I know."
"You are strong."
"Am I?"
"You know you are."
"I don't know anything of the sort."
"Know as in knowing the deep centre of yourself."
She looked askance.
"Not your aching heart, not your stomach, not your worried mind, but the centre of you that is constant, that no one can touch – that is you – that is your strength."
"You make it sound very simple."
"Well, in essence it is, but in practice, not easy. You are well on the way though."
"If you say so."
"Know that I am here if you wish to talk."
I remember hating him when I ….
"I avoided you when I had the talisman in me."
"I know. It was a hard thing for you to have endured."
"It did not seem hard to endure at the time. It was easy."
"Nevertheless, your body and your mind suffered a change of heart that your soul had to endure."
"And the people around me."
"That is true."
"Which reminds me," she said, beginning to feel the urge to do something, "I need to go and see Hagrid. I have not spoken to him since – since that time. I feel I need to make sure I did not hurt him too much, or if I did, to apologise. He is too kind a person to neglect."
"He is indeed."
"I'd like to go now and see him, even if it is a bit late. If he hasn't gone to the Three Broomsticks of course."
"I believe you may find him there at his hut, right this minute."
"Thank you Fawkes, very much," she said.
"You are welcome, as always dear lady. And for now, I'd like to a little nap."
Her internal tension transformed itself into action, and with shining eyes, was eager to find the half-giant and make up for her cruelty, so giving her farewells to the phoenix, she rushed off as he stuck his head under his wing.
Hagrid was placing some logs on a large fire outside his hut when she arrived, and she stood there for a while watching the flames rip through the darkness and the cool of the evening, the heat on her face. The perfume of beech and ash reminded her of bonfire night, and idly wondered if they celebrated it here.
What do I say now I'm here?
Her feet had carried her there without her brain.
"It's a nice fire," she remarked pathetically.
"Yeah," he agreed gruffly, his tone not unfriendly, but neither was it friendly. He busied himself with poking it with a stick, and she had the impression he was hiding in the actions. She took a deep breath and it came out in a rush into the night air.
"Hagrid – I need to say, I need to apologise for those things I said and did some weeks ago."
He shifted uncomfortably.
"I know an apology sounds so lame," she said, holding her cloak defensively around her, "I'd like to be able to take everything back, but that's not possible."
"Well, er," he said, struggling, "you were under a spell, an enchantment. Wasn't your fault."
I can see the remains of hurt showing.
"No, but the truth remains that I said and did those things and people have been hurt. People like you, who I would not have wanted to hurt for all the world."
Now I've really embarrassed him.
"Er, um," he muttered, coughing into his beard, "it's all over now. You're back ter yourself. Aren't you?" He looked a fraction clearer in his face, his huge eyebrows less compressed.
"Yes, I believe so."
"That's all right then." He leant over to the side of him where he had some supper, and sliced up what he had on a large plate.
"Like a bit o' cheese then?" he enquired, and politely offered her the plate.
Was it cheese made from the usual source or from Griffin milk or even - Snake milk?
"It's a good Cheddar," he explained, seeing her hesitation. She didn't particularly want it, and it was his supper, but since it was a peace offering, she couldn't refuse it. They sat then in companionable silence, eating and listening to the cracking and spitting from the flames, sparks shooting up into the dark like fireworks and the close hooting of owls round them. The moon was huge and very bright and was at its' full splendour as it sat high in the sky above. She felt it's power and shivered.
Eventually, he said, "Severus gone off then?" he asked.
"Yes," she said, moving nearer the fire, her body moving instinctively.
"Saw him around the gates yesterday, I thought he might have – business to attend ter," he said tactfully. Her stomach couldn't help respond to the image of him, secretive and alone, heading for the most sinister power that existed.
"Don'cha worry, Elrin," reassured the half-giant, "He knows how ter take care o' himself. He's a cunnin' one."
"Yes, sure," she said, lying. Then as she bent towards the fire and peered into it, a dark flapping shape came between her eyes and the heat, but after pulling away sharply, realized that it was Sampeer.
"Hello little one," she said, trying to fend him off without hurting him.
"Ah, said Hagrid, "that's that bat I found."
Still he persisted to flutter round her face and could hear a barrage of tiny squeaks.
Then it moved off a little, and came back. Something stirred in her mind. It repeated the process and suddenly she was clear.
"Hagrid, it's trying to tell us something." She stood up, and the bat flew further away towards the Forbidden Forest.
"He wants us to follow him."
"Eh? That bat? Nah, it's just friendly like."
"It's not just a bat, it's Severus' familiar, Sampeer."
He looked at her in surprise and did not move.
"Please Hagrid, I know Severus is in trouble and he wants to lead us to him."
"Are yeh sure?" he asked, doubtfully, but as soon as he stood up, the bat zoomed up to him and flew back further towards the dense trees.
"Does look like he wants us ter follow him," he said and began to snap into action. "I'll jus' get me crossbow an' a light and I'll be with yer in a jiffy."
"Hurry, please," she cried, feeling the cold now.
They could not run through the forest: it was too full of enormous twisted roots and grasping bushes, but Hagrid kept up a reasonable pace along the paths, holding the lamp up high in front of them, the brightness not making much headway in the filmy darkness. Fang ambled along behind them, afraid to sniff at anything in case he got left behind. She couldn't see ahead because Hagrid's bulk filled her view but could sense the threat of the forest on either side becoming denser and chillier as they advanced further into the heart of it. All the power of the forest hung in the mist around them, seeping into their nostrils and whispered to them the dark secrets of the tormented. Even the trees no longer appeared as organic sentinels but as converts to murder and mayhem, and swung their branches ever closer to the two figures walking along the path. It was not only physically dangerous to be abroad in there, it pulled at their psyche. From within it's obscurity came siren calls of suicidal urges that fed their secret hungers. If it could not tempt someone to those, it challenged them to mortal combat. Once having given in to any of these seductions, the forest would claim them for it's own and they would never leave again. Eventually the darkness sucked at their souls so that their feet began to flag as if they were wading knee high through enchanted treacle. Hagrid's crossbow was at permanent readiness, his scowl locked into the business of following Sampeer who veered this way and that, and who checked and rechecked that they were following correctly. He also kept flying back in front of Elrin, dancing on his tiny wings so that she had to shoo him off to advance at all. She did not dare think of what she might find, but was almost reassured by the bat's frantic movements, indicating that there was something to find.
Hurry, Oh, hurry.
"We're right behind yer, Sampeer, keep going. Just show us yer master," said Hagrid, grimly scanning the trees. The light that Hagrid shone aloft was getting smaller somehow, was extending less than it had done before as if it shrank in the presence of malevolence. Fang was panicking and it was only the presence of Hagrid that kept him going. As she stroked the dog's huge head, she could feel the tremors going through him. The full fat moon that had followed them, was glimpsed now and again above the trees and surrounded by a corona of light green. The gamekeeper muttered every time he saw it, swinging his crossbow extra wide on his arm. Sampeer was almost apoplectic by now and was being more of a nuisance than a help and it was just then that he swooped over some dark shapes that revealed itself in a wide-open ground. He continued to swoop low and both of them raced towards where he dived down behind a huge tangle of bushes. The shrubs held a mass of dark crimson roses, beautiful, full-bloomed roses, lit by the moon's cold light, incongruous amongst the grimness of the surroundings.
As they got near, Hagrid, from his superior height, could see inside what revealed itself as a ring of bushes, and cursed.
"He's inside," he muttered.
Not able to see, Elrin was frantic and strained to see.
"What's he doing in there?"
"He's lying in the middle – not movin'."
She began to push her way past Hagrid towards the bushes when he swiftly grabbed her by her arm and flung her away.
"Don' yer touch 'em."
"Why not?" She cried, desperate to get to the figure inside. "It might scratch a bit, but.."
"They're deadly. Them thorns'll poison you. Sorta like a drug. Make you see things funny like. Makes your mind go crazy," he said, twirling his finger in the air.
"Do you think he's been poisoned?" She asked.
"I dunno," he said, scratching his head, "but I'd reckon if he had, he'd been crashin' around and he'd be covered in scratches. Just looks like he's stunned or summat."
Sampeer continued to flap around, coming out to the two of them, his desperation evident.
"Ok Professor," Hagrid said loudly, more for her benefit than for his, "we'll get yer out o' there in a jiffy," and he pulled his umbrella out of his voluminous coat. He hesitated for some seconds, until Elrin felt like Sampeer.
"Hagrid," she cried, "this is no time to hesitate, you know it's necessary."
He nodded, and began to point it at the bushes. Just as the spiders arrived.
Hagrid saw her look of horror and turned to see the advancing creatures.
"They won' harm you," he said exasperated, shaking his head.
"They won't harm you, they will harm us. I know."
"Don' be daft."
The spiders bloated bodies and thick legs were beginning to close on them, shifting out of the trees, running along the ground in clusters, running hunched, clicking and snapping.
"Remember what they nearly did to Harry and Ron in their second year? They just escaped with their lives," she argued, glad again for her reading habits, and then glanced at the open ground that looked as if it had become alive.
"Yeah, but yer with me", he replied persistently.
"Sorry, I know what Aragog said, only you are exempt from being eaten."
"How do yer know tha'?" He asked, as if she were clairvoyant.
Dozens and dozens of glittering eyes were fixed on the two figures and they could almost hear the pulsing of ancient heartbeats. They were surrounded.
"I'll tell you later," she muttered.
"Can you get us, or me into the middle of the bushes?"
"Yeah, I can. Wingardium Leviosa" he said to a large log that she had nearly fallen over on their way to the bushes. As it moved over the edge of the ring of bushes, he let it drop, and there was a pathway through.
"Elrin," he shouted as she shot forward, "be very careful – more 'specially the thorns. One false move…"
She hardly heard him, but was careful as she negotiated over the log through the roses. Close to, she could smell them: an over sickly, rotting, malicious smell, and she could sense the wild brooding anger that lived in them and their pull to throw yourself upon the thorns, then aggravating in you the desire to stampede through them, to snarl and to slash your way through thickets to find your most aggressive desires, to wallow in hatred and bitterness, to seek vile company and dredge all sorrows into the darkness beyond.
She fell onto the ground where Severus lay, corpse-like in the very middle. She realized they would be safe only for a short time, as the spiders could drop down on them both from above.
What are you doing here? What have they done to you?
Quickly, she examined the prone figure. His lips were blue, and he had a waxen look about him as if he were lying in a tomb, wrapped in the black shroud of his cloak. As she felt for his pulse that was weak, she noticed the shimmering strangeness on the top part of his face that she had noticed at supper: crystal-like, crumbling encrustations across the bridge of his nose and around his eyes. She felt she should not touch it in case she unknowingly did some damage.
"Hagrid," she shouted, "get us the hell out of here."
"Er," he said, "I'm not sure – how, at the momen'."
She could not wait to get him home.
Home. The first time she had used that word referring to her new abode.
"I don't like the look of this."
"Neither do I," he said.
"No, I mean Severus," she said, "It doesn't look good. I'm not sure how much longer he can last." The snapping and the clicking had reached a chorus now and she could hear Hagrid talking to them as he stood at the entrance of the bushes and she desperately hoped he could do something. She moved her hand over her lover's body to access the damage, but also to reassure herself. The contact gave her courage and her hands stopped shaking.
"My darling," she whispered, though not expecting an answer from him, withdrawn into his unconscious by the look on his face into some inner pain, the lines from nose to mouth deep and sharp, his features bare through his pallor. "We've got to get you out of here mighty damned quick."
"Hagrid," she called.
"Yeah?" Came the reply, the gamekeeper sounding ill at ease amidst what sounded like a louder babble of furtive rustling outside. "I think yer might be right 'bout the spiders."
Well done, Hagrid.
"Can you call the Centaurs or something?"
"Er, no. they won' come. It's not their business."
"They've done it before."
"With Harry? Yeah, he was an exception though."
"And Severus isn't?"
"I don' make their rules Elrin…."and stopped to say something to a very large agitated spider right in front of him.
"Could you summon up the Weasley's old car?"
"Sorry, that car has a mind-magic of it's own."
"Can you Disapparate us out of here to the edge of the wood or somewhere close?"
He said nothing for a moment.
"Sorry, I – um – was taken out o' school 'fore I learned it."
Gritting her teeth, she held Severus' clammy hand.
"Unicorns?" She suggested.
"Yeah, I can, but they'd not be much use in this situation."
"For heaven's sake Hagrid," she said, exasperated, "have you got any ideas?"
He was obviously torn between talking to her and the spiders and was frantic to know what to do.
"Could you get a broomstick and take him out of here?"
"Er- there again, I – er – never learnt how. I can ride a motorbike," he said happily over his shoulder, "but it's at the mechanic's in pieces at Hogsmede."
Unkindly, she silently cursed Hagrid for his limited abilities.
Impatiently, and at her wits end, she brushed some of the crystalline substance from off the face of the prone figure.
Isn't the cavalry supposed to come in at this point?
She looked around her, the roses close and vibrating with tension and malice, and the canopies of the trees shadowy above them, probably hiding the eight-legged predators. It was as she crouched there beside him that a terrible unease blew into her soul, like the breath she imagined would come from out of the mouths of spiders as they opened their jaws to devour them.
This isn't fair. How was she supposed to cope with this?
She could feel cold sweat running down the centre of her back. He will die, and she will have done nothing to prevent it and then she will die. All her life had been a waste. What was the point of it all? She couldn't do anything for him, or anyone. They're all crazy, these wizards: thinking they can do something against the Darkness, against Voldemort. He's too powerful, malevolent and the chaos he produces is so much stronger than the light. There is nothing anyone can do against it.
Putting her head in her hands, she rocked quietly on her heels.
Her family made her like this – them and their world. But she had been wrong from the very beginning. Something was wrong with her, ill favoured, warped, not normal, unaligned, disjointed, strange. In her own world she was useless, here in this one she was the same and everything had come to nothing after all. She had no wand to wave, no potion to fling at someone, no thunderbolt to hurl, no magic wings.
She lay down by Severus' body, her head on his chest and pressed herself there. Hagrid began to worry, glancing more frequently over his shoulder at the silence from behind him.
"Have you bin near them thorns?"
She heard him faintly and just as faintly answered.
"No," she struggled to say. It was hard to speak. "Not touched."
He cursed and planted his bulk more determinately at the entrance.
It was as if she was joining her lover's silent world. His heartbeat gradually penetrated her own in a soft rhythm and as she looked up at his face she wanted to cry for the waste of it all.
"Elrin, snap out o' it," cried Hagrid. "It's enchantment. Fight it. En-chant-ment," he spelt out.
What a long word.
She felt something at her shoulder.
The spiders must be here.
They must be ready to take their meal. She and Severus would be torn limb from limb and would become substance within the engorged stomachs of the spiders. Only it was not the spiders, but Sampeer, flapping in her vision.
"Hello little beauty," she said, transfixed by him, mesmerized by his black little eyes
and then as she looked down again at her beloved, something fundamental shifted within her. The sounds of the forest, the clicking of the spiders, the breeze from the bat's wings and her lover's face suddenly flooded back to her like a slap in the face.
She stood upright, shaky and pale, her cloak falling round her, giving the impression of a ghost rising from the dead.
It's up to me then, since there appears to be no one else to the rescue.
With no real thought: almost instinctively, she raised her arms slowly out to the side.
"Hagrid," she warned, "you may need to cover your ears."
"Eh?"
"If you feel pain," she repeated, "plug your ears – hard."
And then she began to sound and coming from the lowest place in her heart came a deep vibration and the roses around her began to quiver.
"What yer doin' then?" He asked, twisting round, but she could not reply. He could feel a strangeness, but could not tell what it was, and he felt no hurt in his body or his mind. The familiar, resting on her shoulder, did not apparently feel it negatively either, but appeared to enjoy the sensation. She could feel the vibration shifting downward a little to her solar plexus and could feel her intent to subdue the spiders. Her vibration became louder and the bushes bent further away and the clicking suddenly stopped. She made it more powerful and Hagrid gasped as he could see the spiders crumbling like shadowy sacks before him, their legs collapsing at all angles.
"Are you killin' 'em?" He cried, afraid.
Still sounding, she shook her head at him. He looked worried, but held his ground and watched as they finally closed their glittering eyes. She gradually slowed and hoped that she did not have to continue, because that might very well kill them, and she did not want to do that, even if they were going to kill but above all she did not want to hurt Hagrid,. When she halted, they did not revive, but she knew they would live.
"Please don't worry," she said, slightly spaced out by the sound, "they are just put out of action. None of them has been harmed."
Just as they surveyed what looked like a battlefield, the spiders having fallen from where they were in various places and positions, something bright emerged from beyond the trees into the clearing. It made her breathe in with delight at the glowing creature that stepped out with all the beauty of the world in its movements and its body. Pure white, it had a light that extended feet away from its coat and a rhythm of walking that spoke of music and colours that mortals never saw. The unicorn had a straight stubby horn on it's forehead and as it came over to them, she could smell the wonderful heady smell of horse, but with an extra sweetness that made her think of the fragrance of flowers. It nuzzled her and she stroked its' fine soft muzzle, immediately feeling that they would be safe.
"Would you carry Severus?" She asked, and although she couldn't know whether it was assent or coincidence, it nodded fiercely, shaking its' long white mane.
She turned to the half giant. "Do you think it would?"
"Well, it might. Trouble is – how?"
She thought for a minute. "Would it take two of us?"
"It might. I could carry him myself, but I need to have the crossbow at the ready."
"Do you think," she said, rubbing the unicorn's neck with her hand, which it obviously enjoyed, "that you could get us both up? If I go in front, I could hold his arms to keep him upright."
"All right," he said, peering anxiously at the still suspended spiders. "We'd better get moving."
He helped her up onto the unicorn's back and as the creature did not seem to mind, he risked levitating Severus up behind her as a dead weight and she grasped his limp arms to stop him from titling sideways. His black cloak fell down starkly against the glowing whiteness of the unicorn and his head lolled against her shoulder, his hair flopping on her neck.
My darling, stay with me.
Quickly, Hagrid made some bindings round their legs and waist to fuse them together.
Surprisingly to him, the unicorn stepped out as he finished and made it's way down the path that they had come from originally, so he followed behind with the crossbow. Fang appeared from nowhere.
"Where 'ave you bin?" asked Hagrid. "Hidin' in the bushes. Can't blame the poor fellow I suppose."
At several points she became concerned that the spiders might follow and chase, especially as and there was nowhere to hide, but whenever that happened, she felt a gentle surge of feeling from the unicorn, almost like she had from Fawkes, a quiet assurance of well being. As she clung to her precious cargo, she could feel his breath on her neck and wondered if she had stopped his circulation from holding his arms tightly.
Stay with me.
She repeated this like a mantra as they moved through the forest. Gradually, the fear and deadly lure within the forest diminished as they went. The journey back, like all journeys, seemed shorter than when going out, and they soon arrived at the edge of the forest.
It had been her responsibility for not letting him fall as he was still totally unconscious, and so it was almost if he had given his trust to those around him to keep him safe and her heart opened even wider to him and when Hagrid released them from the bindings he had made, the wizard slumped more strongly against her, vulnerable and acquiescent, and she held him for a brief moment, unknown to him in his own interior shadows.
It was like another enchantment, so close had she been to this unicorn that she was left with a kind of dreaming. Songs drifted and circled in her head as if the forest were the safest place in the world. After she had dismounted, and Hagrid had slid him off the unicorn and lain him on the ground, the unicorn had nodded its' head again, and as she thanked it, the half-giant said that she could if she wanted, take a few hairs out of it's mane, because he knew by his experience with them that it was being offered as a present. She was reluctant for the creature to leave, so enmeshed was she to its charms, despite the need that remained in the back of her mind to get Severus into the hospital wing.
"That's nice, though I can't imagine what I would do with them. Hagrid took a knife out of his great moleskin coat and gently extracted a few hairs and gave them to her, and as the long glowing coils of mane lay in her hands, she gazed at them.
"They're' beautiful," she said and kissed the cheek of the unicorn, and she watched fascinated as it stepped gracefully back into the dark domain from where it came.
It was strange and fascinating to see the half-giant tenderly lay the irascible professor down on one of the beds in the ward and they both watched Poppy take over. On the other side of the bed, Elrin didn't know what to do, she only knew she had to keep Severus within touching distance, and would not be parted. She knew that she had to let the nurse do her work, but Poppy, as usual , saw another intruder and obstructer to her work and shooed them both out of her immediate way. Hagrid clapped an enormous hand on Elrin's shoulder and gave her a half smile.
"Thank you Hagrid," she said.
"He's in good hands now, yer know that," he said, "why don' yer get some rest?"
"There is no way I am going out of here," she said with a slight wooziness in her voice, which both Poppy and the gamekeeper detected.
The unicorn's gifts were still in her eyes and her movements, despite her fear for Severus, and a part of her knew that if she were not hypnotized like this, she would be frantic, desperately fearful for him, so she understood that it was a mercy. The proximity to the unicorn had suffused both her and the wizard with some kind of healing energy, because she still pulsed with it and she had detected in him a lessening of the waxy look and blue lips as they came to their destination, but it had left her in a light-headed state.
Poppy, though her main concern was the potions master, gently pulled her to one side and noted Elrin's dilated pupils, and sat her down on the bed next to him.
"If you wish, you may stay here. You can see him if there are any dramatic changes. Just take your outer clothes off and lie down."
"I don't want to lie down, Poppy."
"Listen," she said, low and serious, "I don't have time for this, Severus needs my attention now and if you don't do as I say, I will take you right out of here, so do as you are told."
Elrin blinked, and seeing from some deeper part of herself that it made sense, submitted to the nurse's demands and started to take her cloak and boots off, as Hagrid took his leave, unnoticed by Elrin.
"Good girl," said Poppy, who, released from the inconvenience of the healthy, bounded towards her critically ill patient. From her vantage point, Elrin watched the nurse dash backwards and forwards with medicines and poultices, waving her wand over him constantly, muttering and pouring potions down his throat. She pulled the curtains round while she stripped him, and although Elrin hated him not to be in sight, she knew that he was there and in good hands. Soon, the curtains were pulled back, and she strained to see how he was, which appeared to be little different. In fact he looked ashen against the pillows with his stark black hair. He had been tucked up in the healing womb of the nursing profession, dependant on ministrations that were tightly bound by both sheets and rules. She wished she could touch him, but found that she could not move from where she was, and was also fearful of reprisals by Madam Pomfrey, and eventually just lay watching him, his profile jutting out sharply from his face. Gradually, as the night wore on, Poppy slowed down what she was doing, and as she noticed the appeal in Elrin's eyes, took pity on her and came and spoke to her.
"I do believe he may be over the worst."
"What is it that is wrong with him? Has he been tortured?"
Poppy hesitated, then seeing the strength in Elrin, agreed that he had been tortured.
She hardly dared breathe and ask the question.
"How?"
"Extensive Crucio."
"Anything else?"
As if that wasn't enough.
She was aware that someone could go crazy with that alone.
"No, I don't think so, but he is very weak. In fact I haven't seen him so…".
She waited for the completion of the sentence that never came.
"Oh, I just remembered something I need to do."
"What were you going to say?" She called as the nurse rushed off into her office.
"Sorry? Can't remember. Just keep your distance for the time being though. I know it's hard. I'll be back soon."
Mm.
And so the night wore on.
She remembered drifting off to sleep and unfathomable though it was, snatches of daylight and Poppy moving round the ward seeped into her consciousness now and again. When she awoke fully it was night again, and wondered if the intervening occurrences were illusions and that it must still be the night they came back from the forest, but there were cut flowers by her bedside, and cards too – although there were none by the next bed, its inhabitant silent as the grave, lit by a single levitated candle over the bedside locker. Getting out of bed and wrapping herself in the thin counterpane, she crept towards him, bare feet on the cool floorboards, her stomach chilled by his motionless figure. Her unicorn enchantment had left her clear headed but her aching heart now split open for him who lay so close. If she could have wrapped herself round him, she would have done, but she feared damaging him in some way, so she held back. Looking at the one forlorn candle, she remembered how this man had set about healing her with muttered counter-curses in her ear, arranging a glorious array of candles to drive away the darkness and then with his own body had made a canopy over her with signs and symbols in incense. He had even grown ferocious at Fawkes on her behalf and she only had to whisper and he was there at her side.
Here there was no one to watch over him, to use their magic powers to care and heal. Poppy had done what she could, but all was silent and dark and the only fragrance that could be detected was floor polish. The fact that she had some flowers by her side and none by his, hurt her and she gently touched his arm over the covers and stroked it and immediately energy shot through from him to her like a minor thunderbolt. As she tentatively moved closer, she saw that his skin looked stretched and thin across his proud features. Leaning forward, a floorboard creaked under her foot and he jerked his head towards her, as two pits of darkness like that of the interior of the forest shot open and fixed themselves on her. Sharp to move and sharp to strike, she was forcibly reminded of a snake and she saw danger in that look, a defensive reptilian glare. She could faintly see the vestiges of what had been on his face and knew that what was happening was dangerous, could feel the pricking of her skin as if she were facing the most deadly serpent on the planet. It was as if she had been hit with something at full force, and as her brain synapses refused to jump and her blood no longer circulated. It was as if an earthquake had split her open and she was plummeting through a cold, wide chasm, into the maws of death.
What under all the stars of heaven had they done to him?
She did not move either forward or back, but remained motionless, as did he. Some inner sense, some inner prompting, forced her mouth open, and she said in a clear voice that she did not recognize or know where it came from, "You are not going to deny me." Her heartbeat had begun to thrum in her ears and slowly, very, very slowly, keeping her eyes onto his, reached a hand out over his body above his chest and slowly, very gently as he, moving nothing and exhibiting no emotion, watched as she gradually brought the flat of her hand down to almost touch him over his heart. There it steadied as she felt his energy, and then down to touch and immediately he breathed out as if he had been released, and she knew that the danger was over. His head flopped over to the side and his features became mobile and the man she knew.
"My darling," she whispered, wanting to hold him and was so many inches away from doing so, but still held herself on the edge since there was still something not quite right.
He suddenly tore at the upper part of his face, rubbing and scratching.
"Oh, please don't," she urged, wanting to cry out, but kept her voice low in case the nurse heard her and sent her away from him.
"I have to remove it," he croaked angrily.
"What is it?" She asked. "What is that strangeness on your face?"
"The mask, the mask," he said roughly, twisting round in his efforts to get it off.
"It's a mask?"
"Is there anything left?" he asked, but since he was not lifting his head up and partly shielding his face, she could not see. He was avoiding her gaze, but at the same time, wanted her assurance.
"I can see nothing," she said sharply, "especially if you will not let me see," and she seized the candle and with one hand, thrust it towards him. Slowly, reluctantly, he offered his face for inspection, his eyes glowering, searching hers for the truth.
"If you see anything, do not touch it," he warned abruptly.
"It's all gone. I can see no trace of it now, even if I move the light about. Not one tiny spec. It would reflect if there were."
He took a deep breath.
"It's a Death Eater Mask, I presume," she stated, in an unemotional voice, holding herself steady.
"The mask is not something separate you put on," he explained, a little less angrily. "It's not a costume, it's a transformation of part of one's face. It is the nature you take on," or and he paused grimly, "is revealed. It's a badge of slavery – to cruelty, to supremacy, to insanity."
Despite her reassurances, he still felt around with his splayed fingers, afraid of it's revelation to her, so she leant over him with the candlelight catching her quiet face and hair, and softly kissed the warm damp flesh around his eyes, his brow and over the bridge of his high nose and then as she stood, he looked up at her in a kind of painful awe. For the first time she had known him, weak though he was, he pulled her to himself, wrapped his stiff arms around her waist, pressed his face to her smooth belly and groaned aloud. As she leant over and covered him, she stroked his hair, rocking slightly and whispered to him until he gradually slipped down, releasing his grip, to fall asleep.