A/N: everyone thank Linny, for picking this over Saiyuki and X-Ev for this week's first update. And everyone yell at Courtney, because if she reviewed, I would have had this up awhile ago, but I didn't want her to fall behind.
An author-y arigatou goes out to Linny, Remi, and 'Mione, your reviews. you all rock!
Chapter 6: Witch Fever
"Severus!" Madam Pomfrey sighed. "There you are!"
"What's going on?" he asked sternly, walking alongside Madam Pomfrey toward a screened off bed, Rakka following, biting nervously at the skin on the side of her finger.
"I'm not quite sure yet," the school nurse shook her head. "It's nothing I've ever seen before. I figured maye you would know, or at least be able to help me make some kind of sedative for her. She's got to be making it worse for herself, the pain she's in. Maybe, if we can get her to sleep for a little while, we can figure out what's wrong."
Madam Pomfrey threw back the curtain, and Snape's face fell, some strange mixture of worry and confusion. Tomas was gently pushing the hair back from Sienna's eyes, cooing, wiping her brow with a warm cloth, while Zeke stood back, looking relieved that his sister had sucessfully retrieved the teacher.
"Well, Tomas, you're majoring in the Healing Arts, are you not?" Snape asked. "Any conclusions?"
Tomas shook his head. "She's got one heck of a witch fever," he muttered, letting Madam Pomfrey take over with trying to calm the sobbing girl. "Whatever she's got wrong with her, it would have killed a Muggle by now, for sure. Convulsions, bad ones, and witch fever, delerium, apparently some pretty severe pain, considering she's incoherent with sobs, and I don't think the girl's cried once in her life, surely not since she got to Hogwarts. I don't know the exact name for the poision ailing her, but I think I've found a clue."
With that, Tomas stepped over to Sienna's side, turning her head gently, where they saw two small, neat little fang marks, both surrounded by thier own thick rings of deep purple, each about the size of an American Muggle dime.
"Hmm.." Snape looked a bit puzzled as well. "Perhaps if we could do something to dull her pain, we could get her to describe her symptoms a bit better. Rakka, follow me. We've got some potions to make."
"Me, sir?" Rakka squeaked.
"Of the three of you awake, you're the one I feel is most adequate with potions, considering Tomas is busy and Zeke nearly blew up my classroom last week," Snape said firmly. "Now, if you care so much for the well being of your fellow Slytherin, I suggest you follow."
Rakka nodded obediently, following him out the door. As soon as they were out into the hallway, he shook his head.
"Sorry about being so rude," he sighed. "I have to try to look like I have some authority over my students every one in a great while, especially around Madam Pomfrey. She seems to think that I have no control over my classes, and she's been whining to Dumbledore about how far too many students come from my class to her infirmary."
"Well, potions blow up more often than textbooks," Rakka shrugged. "And don't worry, no offense taken. I understand. After all, I was yelling at both of my brothers in front of nearly half our house, the whole girls' dormitory."
Snape smirked. "You'd be a good potions teacher, Rakka. You can control a bunch of panicky first year girls, and mix a potion without blowing anything up. I commend you on that."
"I'm learning from the best," she smiled, chancing a quick glance at him out of the corner of her eye. He was blushing.
"Thank you, Miss Darkflame," he said politely, blankly. "Your opinion is greatly appreciated."
Rakka smiled and shook her head. The same neutral, polite comeback she had used when they first met. How beautifully ironic.
Snape opened the door to his classroom, then brushed past Rakka, digging through his pockets for the key to his private supply cabinet. He opened the huge oak doors, revealing an entire walk-in closet, with shelves lining all three walls, and went about the buisness of gathereing all sorts of bottles off them, muttering the names as he grabbed them.
"Rakka!" he called. "Get two cauldrons warming up, then come in here and help me with all this will you?"
"Yes, Professor Snape, sir," she called back, humming to herself to calm her nerves as she lit two quick fires under the cauldrons at the first table in the dungeon classroom before wandering into the closet, which was an easy ten feet deep and five or six feet wide.
"There you are," he said, all business, rattling off the names of a few different bottle he would be needing. She grabbed them and followed him back out into the classroom, where he was searching for a book, which he grabbed from the shelves withing a few mere moments of starting his search, thumbing through the pages.
"Alright, I need you to make this," he put the book down on the table, turning it to face Rakka and sliding it over closer to her. "I suggest you arrange your bottle in some sort of order, or you might lose track of what's in it, and what isn't. It's a complicated potion, but I think you can manage. You're one of my best students, you know. I can't think of anyone else better for the job, shy of perhaps Dumbledore.. but his memory is not what it used to be, so I don't even have too much confidence that he could handle it."
Rakka nodded, lining the bottles up, closest to her going first, in order of which they had to be added, while Snape returned to the small library of potion recipes, pulling out another book, which was a bit dustier, before he got to work as well.
Every once in a while, whenever he could spare a moment, Snape would step over toward Rakka to say a few words of encouragement, or remind her to keep an eye on whether or not she was supposed to be letting the potion boil at that particular stage, but she didn't seem to need much help, which was fortunate. By the time the old grandfather clock in the Slytherin common room struck two o'clock in the morning, both potions were finished, and the professor and his assistant were headed up toward the main room, both brandishing large goblets of still steaming potions. Snape handed his over to Madam Pomfrey, telling her when and how much to give to the crying girl, then escorted Rakka over to Sienna's bed, where he calmly instructed his student on how to dose the sleeping potion to the patient.
When all was said and done, Rakka could barely keep her eyes open.
"You did a very good job tonight," Snape gave her a surpsingly honest smile of approval, a rare sight for any of his students, her included. "I'll award you some extra credit points for class, and fifty points to Slytherin for your all night efforts to save your fellow student. Don't bother going to Advanced Healing Potions tomorrow morning, you did more work tonight than they will in class, and you could use some rest."
Rakka smiled wearily at her handsome young instructor, and he gently put one arm around her shoulders, escorting her to the blank stone wall that gaurded the enterance to the Slytherin's dormitories. Rakka turned to thank him, to which he nodded accordingly, and faster than she could say 'firebramble,' he was gone.
An author-y arigatou goes out to Linny, Remi, and 'Mione, your reviews. you all rock!
Chapter 6: Witch Fever
"Severus!" Madam Pomfrey sighed. "There you are!"
"What's going on?" he asked sternly, walking alongside Madam Pomfrey toward a screened off bed, Rakka following, biting nervously at the skin on the side of her finger.
"I'm not quite sure yet," the school nurse shook her head. "It's nothing I've ever seen before. I figured maye you would know, or at least be able to help me make some kind of sedative for her. She's got to be making it worse for herself, the pain she's in. Maybe, if we can get her to sleep for a little while, we can figure out what's wrong."
Madam Pomfrey threw back the curtain, and Snape's face fell, some strange mixture of worry and confusion. Tomas was gently pushing the hair back from Sienna's eyes, cooing, wiping her brow with a warm cloth, while Zeke stood back, looking relieved that his sister had sucessfully retrieved the teacher.
"Well, Tomas, you're majoring in the Healing Arts, are you not?" Snape asked. "Any conclusions?"
Tomas shook his head. "She's got one heck of a witch fever," he muttered, letting Madam Pomfrey take over with trying to calm the sobbing girl. "Whatever she's got wrong with her, it would have killed a Muggle by now, for sure. Convulsions, bad ones, and witch fever, delerium, apparently some pretty severe pain, considering she's incoherent with sobs, and I don't think the girl's cried once in her life, surely not since she got to Hogwarts. I don't know the exact name for the poision ailing her, but I think I've found a clue."
With that, Tomas stepped over to Sienna's side, turning her head gently, where they saw two small, neat little fang marks, both surrounded by thier own thick rings of deep purple, each about the size of an American Muggle dime.
"Hmm.." Snape looked a bit puzzled as well. "Perhaps if we could do something to dull her pain, we could get her to describe her symptoms a bit better. Rakka, follow me. We've got some potions to make."
"Me, sir?" Rakka squeaked.
"Of the three of you awake, you're the one I feel is most adequate with potions, considering Tomas is busy and Zeke nearly blew up my classroom last week," Snape said firmly. "Now, if you care so much for the well being of your fellow Slytherin, I suggest you follow."
Rakka nodded obediently, following him out the door. As soon as they were out into the hallway, he shook his head.
"Sorry about being so rude," he sighed. "I have to try to look like I have some authority over my students every one in a great while, especially around Madam Pomfrey. She seems to think that I have no control over my classes, and she's been whining to Dumbledore about how far too many students come from my class to her infirmary."
"Well, potions blow up more often than textbooks," Rakka shrugged. "And don't worry, no offense taken. I understand. After all, I was yelling at both of my brothers in front of nearly half our house, the whole girls' dormitory."
Snape smirked. "You'd be a good potions teacher, Rakka. You can control a bunch of panicky first year girls, and mix a potion without blowing anything up. I commend you on that."
"I'm learning from the best," she smiled, chancing a quick glance at him out of the corner of her eye. He was blushing.
"Thank you, Miss Darkflame," he said politely, blankly. "Your opinion is greatly appreciated."
Rakka smiled and shook her head. The same neutral, polite comeback she had used when they first met. How beautifully ironic.
Snape opened the door to his classroom, then brushed past Rakka, digging through his pockets for the key to his private supply cabinet. He opened the huge oak doors, revealing an entire walk-in closet, with shelves lining all three walls, and went about the buisness of gathereing all sorts of bottles off them, muttering the names as he grabbed them.
"Rakka!" he called. "Get two cauldrons warming up, then come in here and help me with all this will you?"
"Yes, Professor Snape, sir," she called back, humming to herself to calm her nerves as she lit two quick fires under the cauldrons at the first table in the dungeon classroom before wandering into the closet, which was an easy ten feet deep and five or six feet wide.
"There you are," he said, all business, rattling off the names of a few different bottle he would be needing. She grabbed them and followed him back out into the classroom, where he was searching for a book, which he grabbed from the shelves withing a few mere moments of starting his search, thumbing through the pages.
"Alright, I need you to make this," he put the book down on the table, turning it to face Rakka and sliding it over closer to her. "I suggest you arrange your bottle in some sort of order, or you might lose track of what's in it, and what isn't. It's a complicated potion, but I think you can manage. You're one of my best students, you know. I can't think of anyone else better for the job, shy of perhaps Dumbledore.. but his memory is not what it used to be, so I don't even have too much confidence that he could handle it."
Rakka nodded, lining the bottles up, closest to her going first, in order of which they had to be added, while Snape returned to the small library of potion recipes, pulling out another book, which was a bit dustier, before he got to work as well.
Every once in a while, whenever he could spare a moment, Snape would step over toward Rakka to say a few words of encouragement, or remind her to keep an eye on whether or not she was supposed to be letting the potion boil at that particular stage, but she didn't seem to need much help, which was fortunate. By the time the old grandfather clock in the Slytherin common room struck two o'clock in the morning, both potions were finished, and the professor and his assistant were headed up toward the main room, both brandishing large goblets of still steaming potions. Snape handed his over to Madam Pomfrey, telling her when and how much to give to the crying girl, then escorted Rakka over to Sienna's bed, where he calmly instructed his student on how to dose the sleeping potion to the patient.
When all was said and done, Rakka could barely keep her eyes open.
"You did a very good job tonight," Snape gave her a surpsingly honest smile of approval, a rare sight for any of his students, her included. "I'll award you some extra credit points for class, and fifty points to Slytherin for your all night efforts to save your fellow student. Don't bother going to Advanced Healing Potions tomorrow morning, you did more work tonight than they will in class, and you could use some rest."
Rakka smiled wearily at her handsome young instructor, and he gently put one arm around her shoulders, escorting her to the blank stone wall that gaurded the enterance to the Slytherin's dormitories. Rakka turned to thank him, to which he nodded accordingly, and faster than she could say 'firebramble,' he was gone.
