Thanks for all your reviews - you all write such nice things and I really do appreciate every single one.

The title of this next chapter is taken from the poem of the same title by William Blake. Look it up on the net if you're curious, it's a really great poem.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

TIGER! TIGER! BURNING BRIGHT

The room was in darkness apart from two torches glowing gently, high on the wall opposite the bed. They cast long, flickering shadows across the ceiling, leaving the lower half of the room unlit. She noticed the door to the room was wide open - beyond was darkness.

She could hear buzzing. A low-pitched buzzing rather like a bumblebee trapped in a window. It took her a while to realise the buzzing was inside her own head. She groaned and put her hand to her scalp. She could remember being attacked by the fly. After that, a horrible carnival of colours and frightening patches of memory that wouldn't let go, but played over and over and never making sense.

There was a movement across the room and when she looked, a figure had appeared in the doorway. She moved her head to try to get a better look and the movement alerted the person to her wakefulness. He approached the bed.

"Hi," she whispered, surprising herself. She had uttered the word breathlessly, almost like a person would greet a lover the first morning of waking together.

"Miss Carver."

He moved closer to the bed and lit a candle which stood on the bedside table, then picked up a glass and handed it to her.

She pulled herself to a semi-sitting position and took it from him. "Is this a potion?" she croaked.

"It is water."

She took a sip. It tasted cold and clean. It was too clean for her...she shouldn't be drinking this...

She stopped drinking, but did not remove the glass from her lips. Instead she sniffed and began crying, with her nose deep in the glass. He peeled her fingers from the glass and took it away.

"Second stage - depression. I am afraid you will feel bad for the next couple of hours, Miss Carver. I could give you a sleeping draft, but it would merely postpone the inevitable. Natural sleep is a much more effective medicine."

Tears were streaming down her face. Everything that had ever upset her seemed to be returning to her memory and cutting afresh their injuries.

She remembered being three-years old and wondering how she could have been so naughty that her mummy had gone away; when Boy George, her pet rabbit had died; when Gran had died. Everything came up and overwhelmed her until she held her head in her hands and sobbed.

Snape had moved to an adjoining room and when he returned he held a bowl and a cloth. He dipped the cloth in the bowl and wrung it out, holding the cloth towards her.

"Here. It is a balm. It will help cool and calm you. Hold it to your forehead."

She looked at the cloth and took it slowly, but even that gesture made her burst into tears.

"I'm just a complete waste of space, aren't I? I've caused you nothing but aggravation from the moment I arrived. I didn't mean to come here, I promise. Even when I get home I've got to play in that bloody concert and I can't, I know I can't, because my playing sucks. Everything I do sucks. I can't even pick flowers without getting into trouble... OH!"

She had suddenly remembered what she'd done on the banks of the lake the night before and the heat that rushed to her face made her wail even more.

"No wonder John left...I don't blame him...I can't even keep a cat let alone a boyfriend...and I get lost all the time, so why would anyone want to stay with me anyway...and I'll never be as elegant as Katharine Hepburn because I can't even put lipstick on without it looking like jam round my mouth...and my hair has got split ends..."

Snape took hold of the hand that held the cloth and forced it up to her forehead. She leaned her head back on the pillow feeling totally exhausted and desolate.

"I feel so tired," she said, letting her arm and the cloth fall away from her head. "You don't know how debilitating it is, having split ends..."

As she drifted off to sleep, she felt the bed dip as though he'd sat on the edge and then the cool cloth being dabbed gently over her face.

When she woke again, the room was still in semi-darkness, but she felt much better - still crap, but much better. Her muscles were very stiff and they complained as she forced herself to sit up.

She peered at what she was wearing. She seemed to be in some kind of Victorian nightdress, smocked at the front, long sleeves gathered at the wrists and the whole thing was, by the feel of it, voluminous.

Her eyes swept the room.

This was not her room. Although the furniture appeared to be the same, it was arranged differently. Even in the dark she could see the bed-hangings and cover were different.

The door to the room was, once again, wide open. Curious, she pulled back the bed covers and swung her legs over the side of the bed. Sliding down the remaining few inches to the flagstones, she padded, a bit wobbly, across the room, the hem of her nightdress trailing behind her.

She peered out.

She knew immediately where she was, but couldn't quite bring herself to believe it. There in the middle of the room was the refectory table. The light from the glowing fire in the grate reflecting and licking over the dark wood.

"Miss Carver?"

She jumped, giving a little gasp at the same time. A dark figure was rising from the sofa which had been hidden from view by the table.

"Wha...how...huh?" There were far too many questions vying for first place, so that she ended up saying nothing.

She heard a whisper and the torches on the walls gradually got brighter until the room was lit to a comfortable dimness. She moved further into the room and saw a blanket, now scrunched up at the bottom of the sofa. She looked up at him in astonishment.

"Y...you've been sleeping on the...? I've been in your...? I..."

"If I didn't know better, Miss Carver, I would assume your gibberish was due to some poison remaining in your system."

He moved past her, crouched to the fireplace and began stoking the fire. The flames illuminated his face giving him, for once, an almost healthy glow. His hair swung forwards as he moved to put a few logs on the fire, but she could still see the flicker of the flames dancing in his eyes.

He hadn't exactly been at the front of the queue when they were dishing out facial features, and no way did his personality make up for the shortcomings in his looks, but there was something about the way he tended the fire, arranged the logs to best catch the flames;the way the bedroom door had been left open, presumably so he could keep an eye on her at a respectable distance; the way... (she swallowed) The way the cloth of his trousers stretched across his thighs as he crouched before the fire, that set something stirring deep inside her.

"Have you never seen a fire being stoked before, Miss Carver?" he said irritably, without looking up.

She shuffled to the table, pulled out a chair and sat. "I feel like shit. I must look it, too."

"Delightfully put." He stood up, brushing his hands together to rid them of dust. "Having seen you with strings of vomit hanging from your nose and mouth, I can inform you you look marginally improved."

"What time is it?"

"Almost four."

"In the morning? Oh, God, I've been out ages. What the hell happened to me?"

"You were stung by a Tiger-fly."

She gave a croaky laugh. "Don't be daft, a wasp can't do that to someone..." She caught sight of his face and stopped. You didn't call Professor Snape 'daft'.

"A Tiger-fly is far from being an ordinary wasp, Miss Carver."

"I'm sorry. My Gran always called wasps 'Tiger-flies'. The sting, does it always have that effect?"

"Invariably. The Tiger-fly feeds off a fungus that grows on crops. It is a pure form of lysergic acid which affects the poison in the fly's sting, making it an hallucinogen."

"Whoa!" Andi stood up, sending the chair scraping over the stone. "What do you mean, 'hallucinogen'? 'Lysergic acid'? Are you...are you talking about LSD? I did acid?" She could feel the blood draining from her face, her hands were trembling.

"If that is the Muggle term for it, then yes; but you didn't 'do' it, you were stung by an insect that carries it. No one is going to come knocking on your door, Miss Carver."

She sat down again, pinching the bridge of her nose with her thumb and forefinger and sighed. "Well that accounts for the talking trees and...oh!" She glanced over at him. She put her hand to her mouth in an attempt to stifle a giggle as the memory of Snape singing 'Sandy' came back to her

He stared back at her, expressionless.

"Did we..." She cleared her throat, trying to control her smiles. "Did we really dance on the lawn?"

"I can assure you, no," he said, coolly. "When I became disrupted by your incessant yelling, I came out of the castle to get you. You began struggling with me."

His words jogged another memory and she glanced at his right ear. "I think I might have thumped you in the ear, I'm sorry. In fact," She looked up at him with sincerity. "I'm sorry for all the trouble I've caused you. I've been a pain in the arse, haven't I?"

"Another delightful Muggle expression Miss Carver but, yes, you have."

There was silence for a little while and she watched the flames dancing in the fire-basket.

She had a vague memory of holding him at some point - of having her arms around him. She felt a sudden warmth - the fire must have flared...

Her eye moved to the brass handle set into the wall at the side of the mantelpiece and suddenly realised how hungry she felt. She glanced at the wooden bowl where she'd seen apples on her first day here. It was empty.

"Could I possibley get something to eat? Some tea and..." (she was positive she saw him wince) "French toast?"

It was brought. As she sat eating, the sleeves of her nightgown brushed across the surface of the table and she realised there was one, quite important question she hadn't asked.

"Professor...um...did...did you...put me into bed?"

There was the merest pause; a skipped beat that would have gone unnoticed had she not seen his eyes glance towards the region of her breasts at the same time.

"If you mean did I undress you - no. Your modesty, on this occasion, has been preserved by magic. I produced your nightclothes with a spell."

They looked at each other. Andi felt the fire flare again.

He got up abruptly. "I think you are sufficiently recovered to sleep in your own room now, Miss Carver."

"Oh God yes, I'm sorry." She had completely forgotten it was four o'clock in the morning and he probably wanted to sleep. She swallowed the last of her tea and got up.

As they moved towards the door, he stooped slightly to grasp the door handle. His head lower, she noticed a bruise just in front of his ear where she'd hit him. She felt something melt inside and, giving in to a sudden urge, leaned up and kissed him on the cheek.

He turned an astonished face towards her.

She was still on her toes, her face close to his and her eyes fell to his lips, slightly parted in surprise. For a brief moment she had another, stronger urge which she arrested before she could put into action.

"Thank you," she said, and blushing, turned to the door.

He opened the door slowly. She left the warmth of his room and went out into the cold corridor. When she reached her own door she looked back. He was still standing there, watching her.

"Goodnight, Miss Carver."

She heard his door click shut just before she closed her own.